What if...?

My Day Job is stressful.  I listen to some truly horrible calls.  But, the nature of the job dictates that I deal with facts.  Remember that 1960’s show “Dragnet”?  Friday was always telling people, “Just the facts.”
Sometimes I get callers who want to play the “What If” game with me.  They ask “what if this happens?” over and over again. I always have to tell them that I don’t deal in hypothetical situations, just in facts.  That there is no way to determine a human reaction to any situation.
That being said, I spent the better part of this past week playing the “What If” game with my story. What If this happened in my story? What would the consequences be? Who would suffer? What it Plot Point A happened here and Plot Point B there? How would my characters react?
This is the fun part about writing fiction. I am in control of the situations and outcomes. I can tell my characters how to behave (or misbehave!). I get to decide the consequences to the actions they choose. Kind of. They still like to pretend they’re in charge.  It’s fun to see how crazy things can get when we play the “What If” game.
How about you?  Do you play the What If game with your stories?  Have you ever been surprised by what happens when you do?