Report, edit, etc...Posted by CaptainWill on 2006-02-15 at 17:55:01
You may recognise the first chapter - I posted it ages ago in a kind of competition on SEN. If you like it/hate it, please give feedback.
[center]I - Discovery - I[/center]
Above the planet Nihal IV, a pinprick of white light shone briefly in the upper atmosphere, becoming a faint streak as an object fell towards the surface near the small, isolated outpost of Trai Ridge. The forested hillside beneath the outpost glowed for a second as the object hit the ground at high velocity, and an audible thump echoed across the valley.
Captain Dethus squinted through his military issue Teleglasses at the landing site - the enveloping darkness of the 37 hour Nihalian night had quickly returned after that momentary flash of light from down in the valley - and a wall of dark conifers prevented any observation of whatever had landed down there. Dethus quickly switched the Teleglasses to infra-red mode, scanning the dense forest for the tell-tale red blip in the darkness. Aha! There it was - a rounded object had appeared on the screen projected by the equipment. Dethus frowned - the object was too rounded to be natural, and the on-board assistant software was bleeping at him frantically to take notice of something. "What is it?" he snapped irritably. The long nights of sentry duty on this godforsaken backwater planet were a constant strain on his patience, and the last thing he wanted to hear was the digitised voice of the assistant telling him that there was problem with his Teleglasses. The damned things always seemed to break. At the sound of Dethus's voice, the assistant flashed up a message on the screen, and at the same time informed him:
"Warning, heavy gamma and ultraviolet radiation is being emitted from the coordinates 164'452."
Dethus was alarmed. A radioactive, ultraviolet emitting, perfectly round object sitting in the forest less than a mile from his position was not good news. He interrogated the assistant:
"Get me a GeoSat reading on the coordinates."
"Sorry, Captain, GeoSat appears to be offline."
Dethus' eyes widened. GeoSat was never offline, ever!
The assistant continued:
"All satellites on the GeoSat network are failing to respond - heavy radar interference has been detected."
This was extremely strange, and the captain was feeling more and more uneasy as he thought about the situation. An unknown object had landed in the forest, and Nihal IV's interplanetary communications had been cut off. He removed the communicator from his belt and called the outpost commander.
***
Down in the forest, a large, dark form emerged from the red-hot drop pod lying in a small clearing that its sudden arrival had created for itself. It took less than five seconds for it to come awake from its state of hibernation and enter its only other state - that of battle readiness. As it stared up the valley towards Trai Ridge, the lights of the outpost filtered through the trees and reflected dully off the new arrival's eyes. 'Let the prey come to you.' The thought echoed in the mind of the scout, and it obeyed it without question. It silently scaled the trunk of a tall fir, and waited.
***
Trai Ridge Outpost was still quiet. The civilian settlement in the North-Eastern corner of the enclosure was sleeping peacefully, as was much of the military complex. The perimeter lights still shone, and so did the lights of the commander's office on the second floor of the officers' lodgings.
"Just send a scouting team down, Dethus." said Commander Richardson, not at all happy to have been ousted from his bed, "We can fully investigate this in the morning, which is, I might add..." he made a point of looking at his watch "...in just 5 hours time."
"But, Sir, the assistant gave some very disturbing readings."
"You know as well as I do that our equipment here is obsolete and prone to errors, Captain" said Richardson, his tone final "Send a scouting team to investigate this anomaly, or ignore it. Good Night, Captain Dethus."
***
Five minutes later, Troopers Bennett and Smith were zipping through the forest on their scoutbikes. Their Xenon headlights cut through the darkness as they rapidly approached the landing site. Smith tapped his helmet, activating the short-range communicator with Bennett's earpiece. He wished that they didn't have to wear the cumbersome HAZ suits, but a worried-looking Captain Dethus had told them that they were investigating a source of radiation.
"Hey, do you know exactly what it is we're supposed to be looking for?" he asked.
"No, they don't tell us anything - you should know that by now, Derek."
Smith paused for a second.
"So...you didn't buy that crap Dethus spouted about a meteorite?"
"Of course not, why would he send us out at night to investigate something as mundane as a meteorite? There's obviously something he's not telling us."
"Yes, that's exactly what I was thinking."
"Proceed with caution then?"
"Yeah, stay alert."
***
The scout watched from its vantage point as the clumsy bikes approached the rapidly cooling drop-pod. It would wait for the men to dismount before attacking - it did not want one of them getting away to raise the alarm. The bikes stopped. The scout's claws extended to their full length and a boil of adrenaline-based combat hormones surged through its body as the first man jumped off his bike to investigate the landing site. A thought flashed through the scout's mind: 'Humans can be curious to the point of stupidity.' Watching the two men in the clearing, the scout had to agree.
Derek Smith was approaching the drop-pod slowly when Bennett's voice spoke through to him through his earpiece.
"Stop. I think we should call Trai Ridge before we go any further. I have a really bad feeling about this - there just seems to be some kind of...evil aura about this thing, and it's obviously not a meteorite, so we can just tell them that it's something weird, and get out of here."
Smith tapped his helmet three times to connect to the outpost communications centre.
"I'm just getting static, Jack."
Bennett tapped his own helmet.
"I've got a connection, but it's shaky." "Control, come in Control."
A tinny sounding voice answered. "This is Trai Ridge - we can hardly hear you, Trooper Bennett, there is too much static on the line. Please report your current situation."
"We've located the anomaly and it's no meteorite, I can tell you..."
Meanwhile, Smith was reaching out to touch the drop-pod's glossy black surface. He was suddenly thrown to the floor as his hand encountered some kind of powerful force-field. Dazed, he realised that most of the energy had been absorbed by the HAZ suit. 'I'm glad we brought them after all,' he mused.
Bennett saw his friend fall to the floor, and with an exclamation of 'Jesus...,' leapt from his bike and began jogging towards the prone Smith. He never made it there. Without warning, something dropped from the trees on the other side of the pod, and hurled itself at him. It was like looking into the face of Death as it silently closed the distance, eyes locked on and glowing, mouth open in a slavering mess of razor-sharp teeth, and 4ft blades extended. Smith forced himself to his feet and looked on in horror as the creature whipped its claws left and right in a frenzy of aggression, slicing Bennett into three pieces as if he were made of warm butter. Smith was already dashing for the nearest bike, his suit encumbering him as he scrambled into the seat and rammed his foot onto the accelerator. Nothing happened. Panicking, he grabbed his sidearm - an automatic pistol, aiming it at the monstrous creature as it left Bennett's mangled corpse and rushed at him, once again with that deadly silence. It seemed to anticipate him, weaving to the left. Still, several bullets smacked into the scaly body of the scout, but it still came on, raising the 4ft claws above Smith's chest and bringing them downwards, slicing through his torso and then continuing into the frame of the bike, pinning him like an insect. The angry creature did not afford Smith the mercy that it had given to Bennett, leaving the trooper to die in the seat of the destroyed scoutbike.
At Trai Ridge Outpost, the operators at control listened in shock to the screaming and tearing sounds coming across the comms channel over the static. Suddenly, there was silence.
"I think," said an ashen faced operator, her expression grim, "That someone should call the captain."
[center]II - Landing - II[/center]
On the balcony of Trai Ridge’s observation tower, Dethus was looking anxiously about the valley. Clouds were rapidly building somewhere in the north, their grey, swirling forms blotting out the light of the stars. He had heard gunshots from somewhere out there in the dark forest, and he turned immediately as he heard footsteps clattering up the stairs to his lonely vantage point. It was a messenger from communications.
‘You have something to report?’ said Dethus.
‘Yes, Sir’ replied the messenger, eager to pass on the disturbing news.
‘We lost contact with the scouting party – it appears from the audio records that they were killed by...by something out there.’ He produced a speaker unit and played the last moments of Bennett and Smith. Dethus’ face hardened as he listened to the mens’ harrowing screams and he made up his mind. He would not see Richardson about this matter. The man was probably asleep and he wouldn’t authorise any ‘extreme action’ anyway, he was like that. Besides, surely Imperial Colonial Command, the ICC, would understand that he was using his initiative in a situation where his commander had proven incompetent?
‘Messenger – take this down,’ he barked.
‘Yes, Sir’
‘The alarm is to be sounded – the civilians are to gather at the spaceport and await possible evacuation via dropship. I want snipers posted at each corner of the outpost wall, defence teams at every entrance, and I want an assault team assembled outside the barracks. I shall lead them personally.’
‘Ok, Sir – I have that.’
Dethus was really getting into this now. His years of training would finally pay off. He stood a little straighter and his voice took on a confident ring as he gave the messenger more orders.
‘Also, I want the reconnaissance craft to make several sweeps over the area where –‘
‘Sir!’
Dethus stopped abruptly, angry at being interrupted.
‘What?’ he roared.
‘The sky – look!’
The captain turned on his heel and stared at the sky where clouds had been gathering only minutes earlier. A dull yellow glow was now illuminating the heavens in the north and, as he watched, streaks of light shot in great arcs from the bank of cloud that had massed and was now illuminated from within by that curious yellow light. As the clouds rolled closer, the severity of the situation dawned upon him. This was an invasion – the clouds were hiding some sort of landing craft, and those streaks of light – they looked just like the ‘meteorite’ that had landed and let out the horror that had killed his men in the forest! Dethus ran for the stairs.
***
‘What’s going on out there?’ shouted David Smith from the bathroom of the small dwelling that he called home.
‘I don’t know, dear. I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about – probably another drill,’ said Hannah. The two had been married almost a year, and had only just moved out to Nihal IV to exploit the planet’s supposedly vast mineral resources.
David emerged from the bathroom, rubbing his face with a towel, and looked out of one of the grubby kitchen windows.
‘Doesn’t look much like a drill to me – there’s snipers and everything.’
Hannah didn’t look up from her target practice. She and David went out into the forests prospecting every day, and as she was trained in firearms, protecting herself and David from wild animals was her job on the ‘team,’ as David liked to call it. He watched her now as she steadied the heavy hunting rifle and took aim at the holographic target projected by the so-called ‘Virtual Indoor Range.’ The gun made a crack like a whip, sending a glowing kinetic charge spinning through the air at high velocity and straight into the centre of the target.
‘Good shot!’ said David. He’d always had a particular respect for this weapon, despite his ordinary loathing of instruments of war, he thought. The gun was one of the last made by the famous Jameson-Cooper Company before it folded back in ’86, and this model was regarded as their best and somewhat of a rarity. Kinetic charge technology had been largely overlooked by weapons manufacturers in favour of the crude but effective slug-firing guns that humanity had been using back in when it was still confined to Earth.
Just then, there was a thumping at the front door of the little house. David opened it and saw his neighbour, Mr. Miraz, looking very agitated.
‘What’s going on, Ben?’ said David worriedly, as he looked over his neighbour’s shoulder at the soldiers assembled in neat groups all around the outpost. ‘What’s happened?’
‘I’m not sure, David. I’ve been told to get everyone to the spaceport. It looks like a meteor shower or something, but I don’t know.’
David looked up at the sky and saw the streaks of light shooting downwards. He heard the muted thumps as they crashed into the dark trees surrounding the compound.
‘Shouldn’t we be staying inside if those things are landing around here?’
‘I’m just following orders – take what you need and go to the spaceport – look – I’ve got to go and get everyone else out. I’ll see you there.’
Miraz left and hurried on to the next house. Hannah appeared at David’s shoulder.
‘Did I hear that correctly?’ she said.
‘Yeah, looks like something’s really got the garrison on edge if they want to evacuate us though. That must be why they’re sending us to the spaceport. Come on, throw some stuff in a bag and let’s go.’
As he spoke, gunfire began to break out on the other side of the outpost; the snipers were firing furiously at something on the other side of the wall.
‘The first thing that I’m taking,’ said Hannah, ‘is my gun.’
[center]I - Discovery - I[/center]
Above the planet Nihal IV, a pinprick of white light shone briefly in the upper atmosphere, becoming a faint streak as an object fell towards the surface near the small, isolated outpost of Trai Ridge. The forested hillside beneath the outpost glowed for a second as the object hit the ground at high velocity, and an audible thump echoed across the valley.
Captain Dethus squinted through his military issue Teleglasses at the landing site - the enveloping darkness of the 37 hour Nihalian night had quickly returned after that momentary flash of light from down in the valley - and a wall of dark conifers prevented any observation of whatever had landed down there. Dethus quickly switched the Teleglasses to infra-red mode, scanning the dense forest for the tell-tale red blip in the darkness. Aha! There it was - a rounded object had appeared on the screen projected by the equipment. Dethus frowned - the object was too rounded to be natural, and the on-board assistant software was bleeping at him frantically to take notice of something. "What is it?" he snapped irritably. The long nights of sentry duty on this godforsaken backwater planet were a constant strain on his patience, and the last thing he wanted to hear was the digitised voice of the assistant telling him that there was problem with his Teleglasses. The damned things always seemed to break. At the sound of Dethus's voice, the assistant flashed up a message on the screen, and at the same time informed him:
"Warning, heavy gamma and ultraviolet radiation is being emitted from the coordinates 164'452."
Dethus was alarmed. A radioactive, ultraviolet emitting, perfectly round object sitting in the forest less than a mile from his position was not good news. He interrogated the assistant:
"Get me a GeoSat reading on the coordinates."
"Sorry, Captain, GeoSat appears to be offline."
Dethus' eyes widened. GeoSat was never offline, ever!
The assistant continued:
"All satellites on the GeoSat network are failing to respond - heavy radar interference has been detected."
This was extremely strange, and the captain was feeling more and more uneasy as he thought about the situation. An unknown object had landed in the forest, and Nihal IV's interplanetary communications had been cut off. He removed the communicator from his belt and called the outpost commander.
***
Down in the forest, a large, dark form emerged from the red-hot drop pod lying in a small clearing that its sudden arrival had created for itself. It took less than five seconds for it to come awake from its state of hibernation and enter its only other state - that of battle readiness. As it stared up the valley towards Trai Ridge, the lights of the outpost filtered through the trees and reflected dully off the new arrival's eyes. 'Let the prey come to you.' The thought echoed in the mind of the scout, and it obeyed it without question. It silently scaled the trunk of a tall fir, and waited.
***
Trai Ridge Outpost was still quiet. The civilian settlement in the North-Eastern corner of the enclosure was sleeping peacefully, as was much of the military complex. The perimeter lights still shone, and so did the lights of the commander's office on the second floor of the officers' lodgings.
"Just send a scouting team down, Dethus." said Commander Richardson, not at all happy to have been ousted from his bed, "We can fully investigate this in the morning, which is, I might add..." he made a point of looking at his watch "...in just 5 hours time."
"But, Sir, the assistant gave some very disturbing readings."
"You know as well as I do that our equipment here is obsolete and prone to errors, Captain" said Richardson, his tone final "Send a scouting team to investigate this anomaly, or ignore it. Good Night, Captain Dethus."
***
Five minutes later, Troopers Bennett and Smith were zipping through the forest on their scoutbikes. Their Xenon headlights cut through the darkness as they rapidly approached the landing site. Smith tapped his helmet, activating the short-range communicator with Bennett's earpiece. He wished that they didn't have to wear the cumbersome HAZ suits, but a worried-looking Captain Dethus had told them that they were investigating a source of radiation.
"Hey, do you know exactly what it is we're supposed to be looking for?" he asked.
"No, they don't tell us anything - you should know that by now, Derek."
Smith paused for a second.
"So...you didn't buy that crap Dethus spouted about a meteorite?"
"Of course not, why would he send us out at night to investigate something as mundane as a meteorite? There's obviously something he's not telling us."
"Yes, that's exactly what I was thinking."
"Proceed with caution then?"
"Yeah, stay alert."
***
The scout watched from its vantage point as the clumsy bikes approached the rapidly cooling drop-pod. It would wait for the men to dismount before attacking - it did not want one of them getting away to raise the alarm. The bikes stopped. The scout's claws extended to their full length and a boil of adrenaline-based combat hormones surged through its body as the first man jumped off his bike to investigate the landing site. A thought flashed through the scout's mind: 'Humans can be curious to the point of stupidity.' Watching the two men in the clearing, the scout had to agree.
Derek Smith was approaching the drop-pod slowly when Bennett's voice spoke through to him through his earpiece.
"Stop. I think we should call Trai Ridge before we go any further. I have a really bad feeling about this - there just seems to be some kind of...evil aura about this thing, and it's obviously not a meteorite, so we can just tell them that it's something weird, and get out of here."
Smith tapped his helmet three times to connect to the outpost communications centre.
"I'm just getting static, Jack."
Bennett tapped his own helmet.
"I've got a connection, but it's shaky." "Control, come in Control."
A tinny sounding voice answered. "This is Trai Ridge - we can hardly hear you, Trooper Bennett, there is too much static on the line. Please report your current situation."
"We've located the anomaly and it's no meteorite, I can tell you..."
Meanwhile, Smith was reaching out to touch the drop-pod's glossy black surface. He was suddenly thrown to the floor as his hand encountered some kind of powerful force-field. Dazed, he realised that most of the energy had been absorbed by the HAZ suit. 'I'm glad we brought them after all,' he mused.
Bennett saw his friend fall to the floor, and with an exclamation of 'Jesus...,' leapt from his bike and began jogging towards the prone Smith. He never made it there. Without warning, something dropped from the trees on the other side of the pod, and hurled itself at him. It was like looking into the face of Death as it silently closed the distance, eyes locked on and glowing, mouth open in a slavering mess of razor-sharp teeth, and 4ft blades extended. Smith forced himself to his feet and looked on in horror as the creature whipped its claws left and right in a frenzy of aggression, slicing Bennett into three pieces as if he were made of warm butter. Smith was already dashing for the nearest bike, his suit encumbering him as he scrambled into the seat and rammed his foot onto the accelerator. Nothing happened. Panicking, he grabbed his sidearm - an automatic pistol, aiming it at the monstrous creature as it left Bennett's mangled corpse and rushed at him, once again with that deadly silence. It seemed to anticipate him, weaving to the left. Still, several bullets smacked into the scaly body of the scout, but it still came on, raising the 4ft claws above Smith's chest and bringing them downwards, slicing through his torso and then continuing into the frame of the bike, pinning him like an insect. The angry creature did not afford Smith the mercy that it had given to Bennett, leaving the trooper to die in the seat of the destroyed scoutbike.
At Trai Ridge Outpost, the operators at control listened in shock to the screaming and tearing sounds coming across the comms channel over the static. Suddenly, there was silence.
"I think," said an ashen faced operator, her expression grim, "That someone should call the captain."
[center]II - Landing - II[/center]
On the balcony of Trai Ridge’s observation tower, Dethus was looking anxiously about the valley. Clouds were rapidly building somewhere in the north, their grey, swirling forms blotting out the light of the stars. He had heard gunshots from somewhere out there in the dark forest, and he turned immediately as he heard footsteps clattering up the stairs to his lonely vantage point. It was a messenger from communications.
‘You have something to report?’ said Dethus.
‘Yes, Sir’ replied the messenger, eager to pass on the disturbing news.
‘We lost contact with the scouting party – it appears from the audio records that they were killed by...by something out there.’ He produced a speaker unit and played the last moments of Bennett and Smith. Dethus’ face hardened as he listened to the mens’ harrowing screams and he made up his mind. He would not see Richardson about this matter. The man was probably asleep and he wouldn’t authorise any ‘extreme action’ anyway, he was like that. Besides, surely Imperial Colonial Command, the ICC, would understand that he was using his initiative in a situation where his commander had proven incompetent?
‘Messenger – take this down,’ he barked.
‘Yes, Sir’
‘The alarm is to be sounded – the civilians are to gather at the spaceport and await possible evacuation via dropship. I want snipers posted at each corner of the outpost wall, defence teams at every entrance, and I want an assault team assembled outside the barracks. I shall lead them personally.’
‘Ok, Sir – I have that.’
Dethus was really getting into this now. His years of training would finally pay off. He stood a little straighter and his voice took on a confident ring as he gave the messenger more orders.
‘Also, I want the reconnaissance craft to make several sweeps over the area where –‘
‘Sir!’
Dethus stopped abruptly, angry at being interrupted.
‘What?’ he roared.
‘The sky – look!’
The captain turned on his heel and stared at the sky where clouds had been gathering only minutes earlier. A dull yellow glow was now illuminating the heavens in the north and, as he watched, streaks of light shot in great arcs from the bank of cloud that had massed and was now illuminated from within by that curious yellow light. As the clouds rolled closer, the severity of the situation dawned upon him. This was an invasion – the clouds were hiding some sort of landing craft, and those streaks of light – they looked just like the ‘meteorite’ that had landed and let out the horror that had killed his men in the forest! Dethus ran for the stairs.
***
‘What’s going on out there?’ shouted David Smith from the bathroom of the small dwelling that he called home.
‘I don’t know, dear. I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about – probably another drill,’ said Hannah. The two had been married almost a year, and had only just moved out to Nihal IV to exploit the planet’s supposedly vast mineral resources.
David emerged from the bathroom, rubbing his face with a towel, and looked out of one of the grubby kitchen windows.
‘Doesn’t look much like a drill to me – there’s snipers and everything.’
Hannah didn’t look up from her target practice. She and David went out into the forests prospecting every day, and as she was trained in firearms, protecting herself and David from wild animals was her job on the ‘team,’ as David liked to call it. He watched her now as she steadied the heavy hunting rifle and took aim at the holographic target projected by the so-called ‘Virtual Indoor Range.’ The gun made a crack like a whip, sending a glowing kinetic charge spinning through the air at high velocity and straight into the centre of the target.
‘Good shot!’ said David. He’d always had a particular respect for this weapon, despite his ordinary loathing of instruments of war, he thought. The gun was one of the last made by the famous Jameson-Cooper Company before it folded back in ’86, and this model was regarded as their best and somewhat of a rarity. Kinetic charge technology had been largely overlooked by weapons manufacturers in favour of the crude but effective slug-firing guns that humanity had been using back in when it was still confined to Earth.
Just then, there was a thumping at the front door of the little house. David opened it and saw his neighbour, Mr. Miraz, looking very agitated.
‘What’s going on, Ben?’ said David worriedly, as he looked over his neighbour’s shoulder at the soldiers assembled in neat groups all around the outpost. ‘What’s happened?’
‘I’m not sure, David. I’ve been told to get everyone to the spaceport. It looks like a meteor shower or something, but I don’t know.’
David looked up at the sky and saw the streaks of light shooting downwards. He heard the muted thumps as they crashed into the dark trees surrounding the compound.
‘Shouldn’t we be staying inside if those things are landing around here?’
‘I’m just following orders – take what you need and go to the spaceport – look – I’ve got to go and get everyone else out. I’ll see you there.’
Miraz left and hurried on to the next house. Hannah appeared at David’s shoulder.
‘Did I hear that correctly?’ she said.
‘Yeah, looks like something’s really got the garrison on edge if they want to evacuate us though. That must be why they’re sending us to the spaceport. Come on, throw some stuff in a bag and let’s go.’
As he spoke, gunfire began to break out on the other side of the outpost; the snipers were firing furiously at something on the other side of the wall.
‘The first thing that I’m taking,’ said Hannah, ‘is my gun.’
Report, edit, etc...Posted by CaptainWill on 2006-02-23 at 11:04:04
Well, any feedback at all would be appreciated. I see other people's stories get it...
Report, edit, etc...Posted by Doodan on 2006-02-23 at 12:36:02
I've been meaning to get around to reading this. It's a shame this forum doesn't get more traffic.
Anyways, I DID read it and here's what I've got to say:
What I liked:
-Very descriptive. I like that a lot. You're descriptive about settings, equipment, etc., which is great because a lot of amateur authors unintentionally assume the reader will get the right picture and so they neglect to describe things. I liked how the captain had to switch to infrared to see the object, nice touch of detail.
-Good pacing. You allow suspense to build instead of just trying too hard to terrify the reader with gruesome details.
-Every chapter or smaller unit ended with a cliffhanger. You need lots of loose ends to keep readers interested, as you know. If you study how comic books are written, they will tell you that EVERY PAGE must end in such a way that the reader will want to turn to the next page to see what happens. You got it right.
Suggestions:
-I'm not sure who I'm supposed to be rooting for. While the story obviously has the human race as the protagonists, I'm not sure who exactly is the main character. I'm thinking it's the David Smith character that was introduced towards the end, but he doesn't feel like a main character at this point because the reader has spent so little time with him and his importance is unclear. While it's not necessary to introduce the main character at the very beginning, the best way to make him feel important is to build up some suspense before introducing him (Maybe a character could say "We need David Smith! He will know what to do." or "There's only one man for the job, David Smith.") and, of course, spend more time with him than any other character.
-This sorta ties in with what I just said, but it's more of a stylistic complaint. It just didn't feel right for me to know what the monster was thinking. The reader/audience will naturally develop some sympathy for the character(s) they spend the most time with, and letting them inside the monster's head so early into the story was a mistake, in my opinion. Also, as soon as I knew there was a creature out there and it was in battle mode, I could already guess that any disposable characters that were sent over there would die. IMO, it would have been better if the monster was not introduced at all until it pounced on the guys that went over there. I'll use Jaws as an example. The original Jaws worked so well because the audience spent almost zero time with the creature that was a mortal threat to all of the other characters. While it's presence was felt heavily, the actual character of the shark was almost never seen. People fear the unknown, so witholding information about the characters you want to scare them with is usually a good idea.
Of course, if you've already written more of the story, then it could have taken some different directions than I had not anticipated. But overall, it was a nice read and it's got some cool potential. Keep at it!
EDIT:
Changed "I had anticipated" to "I had NOT anticipated", which is what I meant to say the first time.
Anyways, I DID read it and here's what I've got to say:
What I liked:
-Very descriptive. I like that a lot. You're descriptive about settings, equipment, etc., which is great because a lot of amateur authors unintentionally assume the reader will get the right picture and so they neglect to describe things. I liked how the captain had to switch to infrared to see the object, nice touch of detail.
-Good pacing. You allow suspense to build instead of just trying too hard to terrify the reader with gruesome details.
-Every chapter or smaller unit ended with a cliffhanger. You need lots of loose ends to keep readers interested, as you know. If you study how comic books are written, they will tell you that EVERY PAGE must end in such a way that the reader will want to turn to the next page to see what happens. You got it right.
Suggestions:
-I'm not sure who I'm supposed to be rooting for. While the story obviously has the human race as the protagonists, I'm not sure who exactly is the main character. I'm thinking it's the David Smith character that was introduced towards the end, but he doesn't feel like a main character at this point because the reader has spent so little time with him and his importance is unclear. While it's not necessary to introduce the main character at the very beginning, the best way to make him feel important is to build up some suspense before introducing him (Maybe a character could say "We need David Smith! He will know what to do." or "There's only one man for the job, David Smith.") and, of course, spend more time with him than any other character.
-This sorta ties in with what I just said, but it's more of a stylistic complaint. It just didn't feel right for me to know what the monster was thinking. The reader/audience will naturally develop some sympathy for the character(s) they spend the most time with, and letting them inside the monster's head so early into the story was a mistake, in my opinion. Also, as soon as I knew there was a creature out there and it was in battle mode, I could already guess that any disposable characters that were sent over there would die. IMO, it would have been better if the monster was not introduced at all until it pounced on the guys that went over there. I'll use Jaws as an example. The original Jaws worked so well because the audience spent almost zero time with the creature that was a mortal threat to all of the other characters. While it's presence was felt heavily, the actual character of the shark was almost never seen. People fear the unknown, so witholding information about the characters you want to scare them with is usually a good idea.
Of course, if you've already written more of the story, then it could have taken some different directions than I had not anticipated. But overall, it was a nice read and it's got some cool potential. Keep at it!
EDIT:
Changed "I had anticipated" to "I had NOT anticipated", which is what I meant to say the first time.
Report, edit, etc...Posted by CaptainWill on 2006-02-23 at 16:54:09
Good comments.
David Smith would be the main character, but I never got very far with developing him. He's the kind of guy who hates guns and violence - his wife is in charge of the weapons, as you've seen. He's a pacifist with an unusual gift for fighting and warfare which he's unconsciously aware of, but suppresses ruthlessly. He would probably develop his ability and come to accept it through necessity (he's going to be thrown into some pretty dire situations) if I was to continue the story.
The monsters thoughts were probably a bit unnecessary - I guess I thought they were a good idea at the time.
Cheers for the compliment about description. Sometimes I think I overdo it a bit and end up writing like wangens (who uses far too much description - making his books a bit of a chore to read), but it seems that you liked it.
Thanks for your feedback!
David Smith would be the main character, but I never got very far with developing him. He's the kind of guy who hates guns and violence - his wife is in charge of the weapons, as you've seen. He's a pacifist with an unusual gift for fighting and warfare which he's unconsciously aware of, but suppresses ruthlessly. He would probably develop his ability and come to accept it through necessity (he's going to be thrown into some pretty dire situations) if I was to continue the story.
The monsters thoughts were probably a bit unnecessary - I guess I thought they were a good idea at the time.
Cheers for the compliment about description. Sometimes I think I overdo it a bit and end up writing like wangens (who uses far too much description - making his books a bit of a chore to read), but it seems that you liked it.
Thanks for your feedback!
Report, edit, etc...Posted by fm47 on 2006-03-11 at 03:22:13
It is a shame that this section of SEN has so little people invovled... I myself am guilty of that matter.
A lot of us are creating on starcraft because they have a story to tell... yet no one uses this section...
Anyway, I haven't read your chapter yet, but I will given that I have the time sometime. Wait for me
A lot of us are creating on starcraft because they have a story to tell... yet no one uses this section...
Anyway, I haven't read your chapter yet, but I will given that I have the time sometime. Wait for me
Report, edit, etc...Posted by Deathawk on 2006-03-11 at 10:18:12
I think this didn't get much responses because of the length. People don't want to sit on their computer and read 4 pages of text, even if it's quality.
Report, edit, etc...Posted by Mp)Blu on 2006-03-15 at 17:49:14
Nice. It's what i have to say.
I do like the dteails you gave about the surroundings. Hope to see more of your work.
I do like the dteails you gave about the surroundings. Hope to see more of your work.
Report, edit, etc...Posted by Felagund on 2006-04-14 at 10:39:44
Ugh, whenever you just wake up is not the time to be doing this.
Ok, let me start with some things I disagree with in the plot:
Why would each... alien monster assault creature get its own landing... meterorite ship? You might argue that these things don't know much about technology, but they have force fields, which would require an inane amount of power. You might want to consider revising it so that the Scout gets its own little ship, while the actual invasion occurs with several or many assault troops on the same ship. Also, the comm system was full of static, but I felt that Dethus had a crystal clear audio recording of their deaths. Oh, I suppose it would be clear enough. Not major qualms, by any account.
Other than that, there are some word choices that I would have changed. Also, the writing style is very blunt. While that is not bad in and of itself, try to change it up quite often. It will be much more flowing if you stay away from those three and four word sentences (not flowing like in Shakespearean literature but moving from one sentence to the next without an awkward break).
However, I think that the monster's thoughts are sort of useful for the story. It is almost a collective intelligence or communication with something else, as if it is foreshadowing the invasion. You might want to limit the amount of thinking you express though. It's fairly good, but I'd still edit some parts of it if I were you. Ok, I seriously think it's time to roll back into bed.
Ok, let me start with some things I disagree with in the plot:
Why would each... alien monster assault creature get its own landing... meterorite ship? You might argue that these things don't know much about technology, but they have force fields, which would require an inane amount of power. You might want to consider revising it so that the Scout gets its own little ship, while the actual invasion occurs with several or many assault troops on the same ship. Also, the comm system was full of static, but I felt that Dethus had a crystal clear audio recording of their deaths. Oh, I suppose it would be clear enough. Not major qualms, by any account.
Other than that, there are some word choices that I would have changed. Also, the writing style is very blunt. While that is not bad in and of itself, try to change it up quite often. It will be much more flowing if you stay away from those three and four word sentences (not flowing like in Shakespearean literature but moving from one sentence to the next without an awkward break).
However, I think that the monster's thoughts are sort of useful for the story. It is almost a collective intelligence or communication with something else, as if it is foreshadowing the invasion. You might want to limit the amount of thinking you express though. It's fairly good, but I'd still edit some parts of it if I were you. Ok, I seriously think it's time to roll back into bed.
Report, edit, etc...Posted by CaptainWill on 2006-04-14 at 13:34:34
QUOTE(Felagund @ Apr 14 2006, 02:39 PM)
Ugh, whenever you just wake up is not the time to be doing this.
Ok, let me start with some things I disagree with in the plot:
Why would each... alien monster assault creature get its own landing... meterorite ship? You might argue that these things don't know much about technology, but they have force fields, which would require an inane amount of power. You might want to consider revising it so that the Scout gets its own little ship, while the actual invasion occurs with several or many assault troops on the same ship. Also, the comm system was full of static, but I felt that Dethus had a crystal clear audio recording of their deaths. Oh, I suppose it would be clear enough. Not major qualms, by any account.
Other than that, there are some word choices that I would have changed. Also, the writing style is very blunt. While that is not bad in and of itself, try to change it up quite often. It will be much more flowing if you stay away from those three and four word sentences (not flowing like in Shakespearean literature but moving from one sentence to the next without an awkward break).
However, I think that the monster's thoughts are sort of useful for the story. It is almost a collective intelligence or communication with something else, as if it is foreshadowing the invasion. You might want to limit the amount of thinking you express though. It's fairly good, but I'd still edit some parts of it if I were you. Ok, I seriously think it's time to roll back into bed.
[right][snapback]465208[/snapback][/right]
Ok, let me start with some things I disagree with in the plot:
Why would each... alien monster assault creature get its own landing... meterorite ship? You might argue that these things don't know much about technology, but they have force fields, which would require an inane amount of power. You might want to consider revising it so that the Scout gets its own little ship, while the actual invasion occurs with several or many assault troops on the same ship. Also, the comm system was full of static, but I felt that Dethus had a crystal clear audio recording of their deaths. Oh, I suppose it would be clear enough. Not major qualms, by any account.
Other than that, there are some word choices that I would have changed. Also, the writing style is very blunt. While that is not bad in and of itself, try to change it up quite often. It will be much more flowing if you stay away from those three and four word sentences (not flowing like in Shakespearean literature but moving from one sentence to the next without an awkward break).
However, I think that the monster's thoughts are sort of useful for the story. It is almost a collective intelligence or communication with something else, as if it is foreshadowing the invasion. You might want to limit the amount of thinking you express though. It's fairly good, but I'd still edit some parts of it if I were you. Ok, I seriously think it's time to roll back into bed.
[right][snapback]465208[/snapback][/right]
Ok, nice to get some more feedback.
The meteorite ships are essentially drop-pods of various sizes. This alien 'race' is essentially organic in technology as well as form (think Zerg), and on board the invasion ship (obscured by the cloud) the invasion force is enclosed in individual pods, which I know doesn't sound very cost-effective, but they are ejected from the invasion ship through tubes, rather like torpedoes, and go on to land in the general combat zone.
As for the style, I agree with you. It is very blunt and awkward, and I blame that on having read 4 Dan Brown books in a couple of weeks before writing the story. His style is also quite stilted. If you compare the story in this topic with this one I wrote last year, you might be able to see a difference in style.
The plot of Synthetic Genetics is actually rather ridiculous, but I'll reveal the full thing if you want. It involves the usual conspiracies...