I my experience writing more academic articles, all we academics do is read a bunch of other people's work and paraphrase it into our own original words and cite sources. There's really no originality unless you were the first person to discover something. As for fiction, it's not often I see original scenarios but the characters and stories can be different. That's why I can watch ever post-apocalyptic world TV show and movie and still be entertained. I've been gone a long time and it's nice to see you are still writing stories. Just dropping it to say hi and visit old friends posts.
RE: How original do stories need to be?