IT GETS WORSE

So I know already that I tend to have an issue with plots. It's dogged everything I've ever written, bar the category romance and the less said about those the better... I've just come up with a story (at about 6am this morning) out of the wreckage of one of these conjoined triplet plot monsters, which is less plot than 'jumble of ideas', and I know it's a story because it feels ridiculously simple, I can explain it to someone else and they look like it's making sense, maybe even interesting. I think I had a bit of this idea yesterday evening.

It must have festered in my brain overnight. Kids' dad is rying to train them for the Apocalypse like it's a dead cert and nothing else matters - which is causing all kinds of mayhem with school. He says he knows because he's from the post-apocalyptic future but unfortunately his time machine broke - and during the entire length of the book, none of them can get it working. Dad is very weird, feeding the kids algae and mungbean sprouts and teaching them to shoot down the last, rabid survivors - which will likely include their classmates.

The boy isn't very good at it, and prefers metalwork, striking up a friendship with his metalwork teacher. Dad says metalwork is pointless as there won't be any electricity or metal after the Apocalypse. The kids don't believe him. But they're having disturbing dreams that may actually be memories. What seemed like a joke starts to feel worryingly real. The kids start to realise, what about the others? Dad permits has struck up a friendship with a fellow eco-warrior, Sally, who's also extremely concerned about the future fate of the planet. The only thing is, the kids come to realise, Sally's the one who causes it.

She's going to save the planet by wiping humans off it. The Apocalypse is real and it is due in a day. Sally's already set it in motion, and they can not get the time machine working...

Propp's Character Types MC/sidekick: Kids Mentor: Dad Villain: Sally Blockers: Toad (school bully); Deputy Head; History Teacher Helpers: Metalwork Teacher; Sally (at times); Prize: don't have one! (Sally? for Dad's romance), maybe the kids' lost mother.

It came to me in a dream. What can I say?