How easy is it to differentiate AI work from real work? With this series we want to try and tackle that question when it comes to telling stories. This series will feature scenarios created by different people with the same prompt. The catch is one of them will be AI generated using the same prompt and the same rules.
The rules
- All stories must be based on the same prompt
- Try to keep the word count between 500 -1000 words
- All stories must be written by different authors
Anthology series 1
For this first anthology, the prompt chosen was an interesting scenario featuring ‘A farmer tripping on drugs has a conversation with his cow.’ This is what we asked chat GPT to generate the story:
‘Write a scenario between 500-1000 words using the following prompt: A farmer tripping on drugs has a conversation with his cow. For this scenario you may use dialogue if you wish.’
Without any further setbacks, here are the stories. Can you guess which one is AI and which one isn’t?
The Viking of the North
Alistair had been looking for this trip for what seemed like ages. Sprawled in the middle of a pile of long lush grass, he gazed at the blazing sun in front of him.
“Not the brightest bulb in the box huh?”
“The filament burnt down, must’ve been on for too long.” replied a long voice.
Alistair looked to the side to find a distinguished gentleman, wearing a black suit and a Viking helmet looking down at him.
“You are?”
“I’m Thorfinn,” he replied, stretching out the words.
“Funny way to talk, Thorfinn, what brings you out here?”
“The usual.”
Alistair looks at him with a bewildered expression.
“Why would a viking in a suit have any business with my farm?
Thorfinn motioned toward the grass.
“I’m having some fine grass.”
Alistair cracks in laughter.
“Fucking hell mate, me too.”
“It’s tastier than usual.”
Alistair sits up. “You eat it?”
Thorfinn considered the thought for a moment and nodded.
“Lush and tasty.”
Alistair looked at Thorfinn and then down at his pipe.
“You’re fucking with me.”
“Dead serious.”
Alistair laughs and falls back to the ground.
“You can fucking eat it!”
Alistair then turned on his back and lay facing Thorfinn.
“What sort of Viking are you?”
Thorfin shrugs and eats a bite of grass.
“The usual.”
“Do you attack and raid villages for treasure?
“More or less.”
Alistair’s eyes widened.
“Are you going to raid my farm?”
“I only pillage lands for the grass.”
Alistair erupted into laughter. Meanwhile Thorfin sniffed the pasture around him.
“You’re the coolest fucking Viking mate.”
“Thanks,” Thorfinn replied.
Alistair’s eyes showed a glimmer of light.
“Hey, show me a Viking war cry.”
“Mmmmmmmoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!” Thorfinn screamed in response.
Alistair felt his skin tingle, and shuddered.
“Whoa! What was that cry?”
“Its my clan’s own war cry.”
“What clan do you belong to? You seem to be a powerful Viking gentleman,” Alistair asks.
“I hail from the Great Boli clan, raiders of grass and masterful milk bearers,” Thorfinn stated proudly as he thrust more grass into his mouth.
Alistair laughed uncontrollably as he reached for his back pocket and grabbed a sealed pouch. Amidst the laughter he shakily opened it and reached out for its contents, grabbed some of it and shoved it into Thorfinn’s mouth. He glared at Alistairs before proceeding to chew the content of the pouch, unbothered.
“What does milk bearer even mean? Do you have the most magnificent breastfeeders in the North or what?”
Thorfinn looked at him as he chewed his grass in a delicate manner, waiting to finish before answering.
“We produce the richest milk. We have consumers everywhere in the land.”
Alistair looked at his hands, having found them oddly perfect. Long delicate fingers.
“Pardon, can you say that one more time?”
“We have consumers everywhere in the land.”
Alistair spat and jerked his head to look at Thorfinn, then violently grabbed him by his helmet’s horns.
“Your clan sells its women’s fucking breastmilk to others?”
Thorfinn nostrils flare and he lets out a fierce war cry before headbutting Alistair who fell back headfirst into the grass, motionless.
After seeing his foe knocked down Thorfinn once again screamed victoriously and settled down next to the body of his victim, and feasted on the grass around him.
Alistair woke up to the yanking pain of a bull chewing on his hair.
“Cut it out Gunpowder, I’m not food.” Alistair said as he yanked Gunpowder’s mouth out of his slobbery mess of hair.
Gunpowder grunted and stood up, its meal interrupted, shook its head, batting away flies and walked away to pursue food in another grass patch. With pain rippling through his skull, Alistair clinged one hand to his forehead while he looked up at the sky and saw the sun in the horizon, dimming. Alistair lay there, stared as the sun slowly melted into the horizon. He then slowly shifted his gaze unto the bull munching on the pasture and then to his own pipe, and then back to Gunpowder.
“Breastfeeding strangers? Hell of a bloody trip!” He chuckles.
You get me so high
Cain laughs hysterically, clutching his stomach to the point that he is kneeling down. There is too much water in the grass, he thinks he has to drain it tomorrow. Yet all the water in the soil is good, because it makes such a comfortable mattress to lay down. He feels like the princess in the princess and the pea, when she is laying on twenty mattresses, she still finds it uncomfortable, he finds his wobbly grass extremely comfortable.
Laying on the grass with his arms behind his head, he feels like he is on a high speed carousel and that he will be flung off it any time soon. He closes his eyes yet he still sees stars. Bright, falling stars leaving trails of glitter behind that wink and flirt with him. He blinks and the sun is glaring at him. He takes off his button shirt, he finds his hands too shaky so he tears the shirt off, buttons popping off and falling onto the grass, lost forever.
He can now feel every blade of grass behind his back, tickling, caressing, whispering. He giggles. Suddenly, a shadow crowds over the sun and he gasps. Maybe he is lucky enough to see an eclipse.
Moo.
He blinks again and suddenly, the shadow morphs into monstrous heads and he wonders if Cerberus is that affectionate, licking his face. He laughs and he has never felt this happy and carefree. He does not have to think about how his farm is going to be taken by the government to fucking build a hotel for tourism. He does not care that he has to leave his family farm and move to the other side of the country to do an office job. He doesn’t care that he has to leave everything behind. All that matters right now is that the dragon is huffing and puffing and licking him, bumping its head against his. He reaches out to stroke its head, but instead slaps his own face.
He tries again, slowly, and focusing his eyes. He finally realises that it is Betsy, his baby cow. Not such a baby anymore, but he remembers having her since he was a child. Now Betsy is old, so old that he cannot bring her with him to his new home. He cannot bring any of the animals. They were all sold. Betsy is the only one left. She will be euthanized tomorrow. He cannot bear to sell her and have her be eaten by anyone. He has to remember the appointment is at 8am. His hand finally reaches her head and he strokes her. His first friend.
His hands are no longer reaching above him to pet her, instead, she has knelt down, like a disciple praying to his god. He lays his head on hers. He is smiling and laughing and yet tears are falling down his face. His vision swims and spins and dances. He can see the moon and stars and suns, multiple suns. Yet all he can hear is soft groans from Betsy. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, hoping to inhale enough of the earthy, dirt smell and he can keep it for the rest of his life, locked up in his heart.
The tears are frozen on his face and it hurts but he does not want to remove his arms from Betsy. Betsy solves it by licking his face and he giggles. He can hear the wind screaming between the trees surrounding the clearing. He can feel the grass digging into his back, dragging him down and down into the earth. He wants to be on the ground. His fingers claw at the dirt and he can feel the dirt gathering underneath his fingernails like blood soaked claws. He thinks one of his fingernails is broken. He sticks his entire face into the hole he has dug for days. He can feel Betsy biting his pants and pulling him out but he wants to dig a bigger hole. One big enough for both him and Betsy to hide until the fucking government officials are gone. Maybe he can just lay here and become a relic and haunt anyone that will live in this hotel or whatever the fuck it would be.
He only comes out of the hole when an earthworm is wiggling in his face.
Moo.
He buries his face in her soft pelt, the tiny fur caressing his face, wiping his tears and dirt.
Moo.
He laughs again because he is so cold now, so cold, even though the sun is still high in the sky. Or is it the moon? It is still so bright he has to squint and blink the black spots out of his eyes. He rubs them, but he screams, because his eyes are now burning like hot oil was spilt on them. He cries and cries until the burn is gone and his eyes just feel swollen. He holds Betsy’s face in his hands and kisses between her eyes.
Moo.
Someone is speaking but he cannot hear anything, all he can hear is Betsy’s whining, her first moo as a baby. Her resting her head on his lap. Him trying to ride her and breaking his ankle. He is suddenly tired. So tired that he flops on the floor. His bones are dragging him down, down, down. His muscles turn into lead and his head weighs a thousand tons. He closes his eyes.
Post Drug Clarity
The sun had just dipped behind the hills, casting a golden haze over the barnyard. A quiet evening, the sort where the only sounds were the distant clink of metal and the soft rustling of the wind through the hay. But for John Carter, it wasn’t quiet at all. Not anymore.
He sat on the porch of his farmhouse, his legs dangling off the edge of the wooden steps, staring out at the wide expanse of land he called home. His mind, however, was somewhere far, far away.
The day had started innocently enough. He’d been working in the field, planting corn, as he did every year. But as the hours dragged on and the summer heat bore down, he had remembered the strange, little package he’d found in his barn a few days before. He hadn’t thought much of it at the time—just some odd mix of herbs and powders—but today, curiosity had gotten the best of him.
“What’s the worst that could happen?” he’d asked himself as he sprinkled a little bit of the mixture into his coffee. It had tasted bitter, almost metallic, but after a few sips, something strange began to happen. His body felt light, his thoughts blurry, and before long, the whole world started to shift. The sky seemed to swirl above him like a great painter’s palette, and the trees… the trees started whispering.
And then, there was his cow, Bessie.
“John,” Bessie said, stepping out of the barn. The sound of her hooves on the dirt path was a rhythmic thud against his eardrums. John blinked, his vision wobbling like the horizon after a long drink.
He rubbed his eyes. “Bessie… did you just—did you just talk?”
Bessie blinked, then nodded solemnly, her brown eyes wide and serious. “Yes, John. I have much to say. It’s about time you listened.”
John stared at her, completely unfazed. “You’re a cow,” he muttered. “You can’t… you can’t talk.”
Bessie lowered her head and sniffed the grass near her hooves. “Well, of course I can. I’ve always been able to. But you, John—you’re always too busy with your corn and your plows and your tired old farmer thoughts. I had to wait for you to slow down. And now, look at you. You’re a mess.”
John scratched his head. “A mess? No. I’m just… I’m just, uh, a little different right now.”
“Uh-huh,” Bessie said, raising an eyebrow. “That’s the drugs, I assume. You’ve been mixing things up again, haven’t you?”
John chuckled. “Well, I didn’t mean to. It’s just… I was curious. You know, sometimes life gets so boring around here, I thought I’d… I don’t know, spice it up a little. And now you’re talking to me. That’s pretty spicy, right?”
Bessie gave him a flat look. “Spicy? More like disturbing. But, fine, I’ll play along. Since you’re clearly in a… heightened state of mind, let me ask you this: Do you even know what you’re doing with your life, John?”
John tilted his head, the question hanging in the air. “I’m a farmer. What else is there to know?”
Bessie snorted. “Oh, please. You think your whole life is just plowing fields and milking cows? What about the bigger picture? The universe? Your soul?”
John frowned. “My soul? I dunno. I’ve got work to do. Who’s got time for all that soul-searching nonsense?”
Bessie took a few steps closer, her hooves sinking softly into the earth. “You’re missing the point, John. Do you even think about the animals, the crops, the land you tend to so obsessively? We live here too, you know. You think you own it all, but we—well, we share it.”
John squinted, his vision rippling again. “What do you mean? You’re just a cow. You don’t own anything.”
Bessie let out a low sigh. “And you think you do? You don’t even realize that I’ve seen the world change. I’ve seen the seasons shift and the weather turn cold. I’ve watched your family grow old and leave, one by one, while you stay here, day after day, stuck in the same routine. Your farm isn’t just your farm, John. It’s part of the earth, part of a cycle. And we… we’re part of that too.”
John nodded slowly, though it felt like he was listening to someone else’s thoughts. “So, what? You want me to quit farming? You want me to become… a philosopher or something?”
Bessie shook her head. “No. I’m not asking you to give up your life. But maybe, just maybe, you could open your eyes to what’s around you. The way the light hits the hay at dusk. The way the wind smells after a storm. The way the earth feels beneath your boots. All of that matters. More than your endless planting and harvesting. More than your endless cycle of work.”
John’s eyelids drooped, his mind swimming. “You’re right. I’ve been too busy… too busy thinking about what comes next, and what comes next, and… what comes next.” He laughed softly, realizing how strange it all sounded. “I guess I never really stopped to look at the now.”
Bessie stepped closer, her breath warm against his skin. “Exactly. You’re tripping, John. But in a way, that’s exactly what you need. You’re seeing things a little more clearly, even if it’s through the fog of whatever you put in that coffee. Sometimes, it takes a trip to get back to where you need to be.”
John nodded again, his head heavy but strangely content. “Thanks, Bessie. I think… I think I get it now.”
Bessie gave a satisfied snort and walked away, her hooves clicking softly as she returned to the barn. “No problem. Just don’t make a habit of it.”
As John sat on the porch, the stars above him twinkled in patterns he’d never noticed before. His mind still floated, but now, it felt like it was floating with the world, not against it. He smiled, a peaceful smile, like he’d just woken up from a long, restless sleep.
Maybe Bessie was right. Maybe it wasn’t about what came next. Maybe it was just about sitting there with the cows, the earth, and the endless sky above.
And that, for once, was enough.
So who wrote which?
This time around, The Viking of the North was written by Gabriel Pazmino, you get me so high was written by Jenny Wong, and finally, Post Drug Clarity was produced by Chat GPT AI. Could you tell the difference?
If you want to read more anthologies, click here for Series 3, here for Series 2.
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