[Please read the instruction post before commenting]

Professor Augustus Pennywright took a long, slow sip of his coffee and sighed in contentment, turning his head this way and that to a stunning array of cracking sounds and the pleasant relief of pressure. He had one rule for himself whenever he woke up on Restday: he’d enjoy a drink and have a nice read of the broadsheets before he would allow himself to think about work at all. There was a burning smell out the window—but it was someone else’s problem, and he could already hear the incantations that someone was shouting to contain it. He wasn’t going to get involved, not right after he’d woken up.

Augustus liked his pleasures, and he liked that secret time in the morning where his thoughts and feelings were just his own. He made his coffee bitter and strong to wring more experiences from it than just flavor; his dressing robe was quilted for warmth and brocaded for appearance. The broadsheets were just-for-pleasure reading as well; for a short time, he could put aside dense, jargonistic academic journals and see what was going on in the world, what scandals were being talked about, what crimes had occurred, what marriages had been sworn, what rituals had been poorly conducted out in the public and were causing trouble for the civilians, what was being done about it. 

But soon enough the coffee was done, the broadsheets were read, and it was already going on midday and long past time he should be changed into daywear. He might have gotten his chores done yesterday—on the appropriately named Choresday—but when one worked at a university, one rarely had a full Restday to actually rest in. Regrettably. 

His suit for the day was a nice dark green with gold brocade thread on it that matched his wedding band. He fastened his vest, though he left his jacket to the side; he wasn’t sure yet if he were going out or not, but it was easier to get into the mindset of work if he weren’t lazing around in his shirtsleeves. He brushed his hair—a graying black and a little too long, though he found he liked the effect of having to push it back and of feeling it brush his collar—and took a moment to admire himself. He was no longer as young as he used to be, and the effects of good living had filled his form out since his lanky youth, but he liked it; his thickness gave more dimension to his textured clothing, and he enjoyed the way his body looked lived-in.

But that was enough self-indulgence, alas. With a good-natured sigh at his own reluctance, Augustus pulled his notebook out and double-checked his schedule for the week that started tomorrow:

Firstday: Conjuration 101, 9-12, morn
Twosday: Office Hours, 1-3, aft
Thirdsday: Planar Studies 102, 2-5, aft
Fourthsday: Office hours, 10-12, morn
Fivesday: Planar Studies 202, 2-5, aft

(It would then be followed by another Choresday and Restday, of course, but those were not on the schedule).

Any time that wasn’t blocked out was technically free time, but in actuality, free time for a professor was a split between genuine leisure time and time spent on grading, independent research, class-planning, and paper-writing. Usually, leisure lost the competition. Right now, Augustus had three classes on his schedule with associated preparation and grading, personal research to conduct and research that he’d promised his husband he’d do, and a monograph that the department head Honey Terwillegar wouldn’t stop chasing him about (though he knew that was less on her and more the fault of the Dean, Reginald von Beekeeper, who was trying to justify a budget increase to the board).

Frowning at his schedule, he tried to decide which of his options was best for his free time today. 

[It begins with a light, introductory segment.
Comment below. Should Augustus:
> Go into the office and prep for class tomorrow
> Go into the office and see what his research assistant has dug up
> Research on his own (personal, or for the husband)
> Stay home and work on his monograph
> Call his husband (about what? Describe in comments.)
> He should do something else (describe in comments)]

[next]

It’s time! It’s time! My yearly Halloween Interactive Fiction begins tomorrow! Spooky, queer, and a whole lot of fun.

How it works:

• On October 1, I’ll put up the first section of a story.
• By no later than 4 pm PST the next day, you will leave a comment to the post with a suggestion to help the protagonist. Generally, this will be an action or something for them to consider.  (i.e. a post goes up on Oct 1 —> You have until 4 pm PST on Oct 2 to comment).  You can always +1 other people’s ideas if you like it!
• The next section of the story will get posted between approximately 5-9 pm PST on the next day.
• We repeat this every day through October! Please only leave suggestions on the most recent post — if we’ve already moved on, I won’t be able to fold the suggestion in.
• The story will climax on Halloween, and then I’ll put up a wrap-up post to chat about the story!

Aim suggestions at the protagonist — you can’t tell the villain to surrender, but you can tell the protagonist, “Beg the villain to surrender.” If suggestions contradict each other I’ll pick either the one most people have suggested or the one the character is most likely to do.

This game only works if people participate, so please don’t be shy! That said, don’t feel that you have to comment or follow along every day: it’s OK to hop in and out as you like. If you don’t want to have to remember to come back every day, you can put your email in to “Get Email Updates” in the page footer, and you’ll receive an email every time the blog is updated with a new post. (You can always unsubscribe if it ends up not working for you!)

For a visual idea of how this works, take a look through the Halloween IF archives.

This year’s story:

It’s set in a brand new, high fantasy world (so think of elves, dragons etc as existing in this setting). We will be following a professor of Conjuration at a high fantasy university. He’s a normal guy, really — classes to teach, research to do, a husband to miss. (I mention a husband, but it’s an open relationship, so if you want to pursue someone else as well, that is totally fine). Expect:

• Interdepartmental rivalry
• I don’t want to have to work on my monograph so the university can increase its budget, I have my own research to do
• Eldritch horrors beyond all comprehension and demonic incursions unfortunately well within comprehension
• WHY do people keep coming to talk to me during office hours; don’t they know this is technically my free time?

So … normal university stuff! Just… a bit spooky. We’ll see how much that amps up 🙂

In addition, there’s one little mechanic I’m adding: because the professor and his husband aren’t currently living together, you also have the “Call Your Husband” option. Doing this can be just to chat, or for a goal (“Call your husband to ask about x”). The magic telephone ritual takes time, though, so expect at least a few hours to pass when you do this.

KICKOFF COMMENTS

To get us kicked off, comment here with some character names I could use. This is a fantasy world, so as well as real names like Ivan or Akiko, you are welcome to make up fantastic names. If you really hope for an academic named GROCKGNAR THE DESTROYER that’s cool, we can do that.

The Fine Print
I reserve all rights to this work. If I eventually get this published in any form that requires me to take this version down, I will send copies of this online version, with comments left intact, to everyone who contributed suggestions, if I am reasonably able to get in contact with them.

[Go to Day 1]

[Author’s Notes / Story Q&A]

Thank you, everyone, for joining me in Final Call! Whether you hopped in or just read (or are reading this in the future), I’m so grateful for your time and presence with me. It was a lot of fun to write, and I hope you enjoyed reading it!.

The final length of this story was almost 40,000 words (around 90 pages in gdocs)! Which is a lot, but I also achieved my goal of not trying to hit NaNo wordcounts during this hell year, lol. If and when you want to reread it, you’ll be able to find this story linked from my Interactive Fiction page. Feel free to check out some older interactive stories there too!

If you enjoyed the story and are looking for ways to support me and my work, you can learn about and pick up my books over here. Read some already? Leaving a good rating or review on Goodreads or Amazon can make all the difference. I’ve also got a tip jar over at Ko-Fi if you’d like to buy me a drink! And please, feel free to follow me on social media to see what I’m up to: Personal Twitter and Book Twitter.

Now that that’s done—let’s do a story Q&A! Feel free to ask me anything you want about the story, whether it’s about what my writing process was, how I got the idea for certain events or characters, things people may have suspected but not had confirmed, other ‘routes’, etc. Wonder what would have happened if you’d done X instead of Y? Ask it here! (Lurkers are totally allowed to ask too, you don’t need to have participated to ask!).

I think, also, the story managed to hit the full list of tropes you turned in way back at the beginning, whether in the play within the story or within the story itself. We had a betrayal, a monster who-isn’t-that-monstrous, unrequited love AND secret longing, a costume that’s more than a costume, a duel, a sudden earthquake, a key that refuses to be used, two characters mistaken for each other because of their startling resemblance, crossdressing for flimsy plot purposes and, of course, an emotionally-fraught kiss.

Thank you once again… and happy Halloween!

[Ask Me Some Questions, I’ll Tell You No Lies]