Young Writers Society

Any ideas on improvements?

PROLOGUE

June 2002- Somewhere in the Western Amazon

Bubbles cascaded to the surface of the pool as Nicolai struggled against the strong hand pushing him under.
“What do you know?” a burly figure, masked in the shadows and concealed underneath a black hood asked, for what seemed for the millionth time. . The man grabbed his hair and pulled him up, Nicolai coughing and gasping for air. He swallowed water as he was dunked again. His serpentine voice reminded Nicolai briefly of Ka from ‘The Jungle Book’, one of his favourite childhood books, before he was sharply forwarded to reality by the second searing pain of the poker.
“N-nothing! Argh!” Nicolai spluttered, as he was brought to the surface again, this time much more briefly than before. His lungs felt like they were going to explode, his chest heaving with lack of oxygen.
“My-my Jeep b-broke down”, Nicolai gasped, struggling against the searing pain sending daggers into his skull. “I came here for help!”!”, he whispered frantically as his head was held underwater again. He was dragged, shuddering and asphyxiating, back to his cell.
“You lie.” The man whispered, his words spat out with venom. “And, for that, you shall perish, alone and in agony.” He stormed out of the room, kicking a wall on his way out and cursing.
Nicolai was left alone, in silence, gasping. He tried to struggle against the tight bonds restricting his arms and legs. It was useless. The combination of food deprivation and the suffocating bonds that tore into him made him only cough and splutter. The slightest movement now made him wince in pain, hours of torture making it difficult to breathe through punctured and bleeding lungs. He ached and stung all over, and being trapped alone for days on end had made him isolated and traumatised. His claustrophobic, dank and dirty cell was his adopted home, with no windows, no hope. . This water torture was the latest in Cobra’s armoury. Pokers, thumbscrews, manacles...it was just one giant circle of pain, with no signs of letting up.
But he hadn’t given in.

Hours later, a sharp, clattering sound awoke Nicolai from his from his thoughts of potential escape. Or was it sleep? Now, he couldn’t tell the difference. His black dungeon would be his dying place, his hard steel bunk his deathbed. He was sure of that. His secrets would be lost, as would all hope of stopping this nightmare, snuffed out deep in the Amazon Rainforest. Cobra would see to that. Ominous footsteps echoed down the abandoned corridor- this was it. The door opened, creaking loudly. Light streamed in, momentarily blinding Nicolai. Cobra reappeared, something draped around his muscly body and black hood. Nicolai recoiled in fear.
Cobra was stooped, bowed down by the weight of a writhing mass: an eight foot anaconda! He caressed the monster’s scaly head, as large as a football, and let it go. It gently slithered onto the cold stone floor, its narrow eyes gleaming with the prospect at potential prey. Adrenaline fuelling his terror, Nicolai managed to free one of his emaciated, manacled arms. The huge serpent was only metres away from him now. He could hear the excited hissing, smell its rancid breath, see the glint in its slit-like eyes.
Paralysed by fear, Nicolai lay, rooted to the spot, as the gargantuan snake slid over his stomach, almost making him pass out with the pain. The serpent began to wrap itself around him, enveloping him in its vice-like grip. Nicolai managed to gasp a cry of agony as it crushed his ribs and squeezed his lungs to breaking point. Blinded by pain, he mustered the last of his diminishing strength and attempted to club the writhing mass, but the snake was far too powerful. His vision began to lose focus as the monster squashed his life force away.
Nicolai registered footsteps, from what seemed like miles away. He could hear leather on stone, amongst his strangled gasps for air. Cobra swam in and out of his blurred vision, giving the illusion of some sick, twisted dream. Laughing at his torture, Cobra lifted his hood and Nicolai froze, aghast. He relinquished his struggle as his face drained of colour, allowing the snake to strengthen its grip and making him feel faint. He collapsed in a mass of wriggling serpentine flesh, but that didn’t matter any more. Nothing did any more. He welcomed the darkness, embraced the red cloudiness, greeted death. He was glad to be gone. Better than living, especially after what he had just witnessed. With the last of his strength, he put his hands over his eyes and allowed his body to drift into unconsciousness.

Interesting. Kind of depressing for my tastes, but interesting none-the-less. Although I'm not much of an editor, I noticed one tiny mistake. Metres. I think you meant "meters". Still, it's only a little problem in what was a good piece. Very good, really, if not my thing.

Oh my god. That was frightening. The writing was fairly good but the talent almost seemed wasted on something so hopelessly dark.

Although there is, technically, nothing wrong with this piece, I still have some suggestions that I hope might help with improvement.

It is hard to tell by the ending if you plan on Nicolai dying or not but either way I would suggest something less...gruesome. Torture is actually much more compelling if subtle. So, if you began this with a half-drowned boy - I would get rid of the savagery of hot-pokers - and perhaps display his slightly feverish thoughts amidst this terror. Have the snake come in and imply that it is going to kill him, maybe have the 'face' be revealed and then cut to the more revealing section of the story.

Honestly, even subtle torture, can only be so good. Not only is it not entertaining but it's also disturbing in an unredeemable way. Most people just don't want to read it.

Anyway, good luck with this and feel free to PM me if you have an questions.

This was a bit over-bearing, you seem to just jump into the torture, and there's lots of it, so it's hard to read such a story. Maybe if you had something before the torture to make the reader more attached to Nicolai and therefore want to keep reading to find out what will happen to him, that way it would be much less over-bearing and more interesting. Maybe try to talk about Nicolai before the torture and have us get to know him better.

That was a really cool, gruesome, stomach-turning piece.
I liked it, but what you could do with Nicolai, is have him have some flashbacks before he gets killed. It would be cool if you could explain in a little bit more detail how he got to, where he was and why, (maybe in the next chapter or so) other than the problem with his jeep. Show even in this prologue why the bad guys are so suspicious of him, don't make it real apparent, but hint it . . . maybe they found something on him, a medallion, a knife . . . something that aroused their suspicion and made them act so cruelly, if you decide to keep all the torture in there.
If you could pull that off, that'd be excellent.

I like your gruesome depiction of torture, surprisingly when I read books on horror, some of the most terrifying scenes aren't so terrifying, but you depicted them really well, so congrats on that. Your imagery is good.
I hope you write more of this story, it has a promising beginning.
Sorry if what I say sounds ridiculous, but I'm a new writer . . .