Artecila - Prologue

I decided to contribute and post the first piece of Artecila. (From which my user name comes from.) While the prologue is rather long, I do hope it starts the story off on that dark, cruel and delightfully twisted way that is entertaining.

Happy Reading

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Prologue

Swirling in his leather chair the Mr. Chang picked his nose idly as the computer booted up. The rush of the fan signaled the machine's start, then a loud cracking and tapping sound as the old hard drive spun to life. Like a machine without its oil, the battered and banged up computer suffered numerous kicks, smacks and other forms of abuse that was only rivaled by the number of curse words directed at it.

The Windows 98 logo displayed and locked up for a second, Chang kicked the front of the computer, leaving yet another scuff mark and dent against its once pristine gray front panel, “Work damn you! WORK.”

The fat balding man wiped his brow and liver spots with a plaid handkerchief and pressed the page button for his secretary, he barked into it, “Miss Kitsuni! Get your ass up here and fix this god damned piece of shit NOW!”

Swift footsteps came towards the ambassador's office, he grinned and fixed his worn out monkey suit, that had once been his father's before him. An original Zoot suit from 1930's Harlem had worked its way through a number of less then honorable men to serve as the Japanese ambassador's suit for dealing in American politics. As the young supple form of Miss Kitsuni opened the door to the ambassador's room the foul mouthed lecher set his wicked gaze upon her.

Once a beautiful model featured on some of the more high-class male entertainment magazines, she had landed a position as a secretary with an undetermined, but exceptionally high paying job. Forced to wear skirts except on 'Casual Friday' a whole week of abuse lay in front of her. Milky white thighs were generously exposed for Chang's personal satisfaction. He grinned as the usual routine started bright and early on this Monday morning.

“This damn piece of shit locked up again. Fix it.” ordered Chang, his eyes following the hem of her skirt as she rounded the cherry table and next to him. Satisfied with only looking after the last scandal, Chang had begun to stoop lower and lower to get cheap entertainment from a seemingly endlessly rotating set of secretaries that lasted no more then a month since he had taken the position.

Miss Kitsuni was definitely hot and flaunted her good looks and bust whenever possible, but even her ability to withstand the constant gawking made her more then uncomfortable. She kept her legs always tight together, hands out in front of her and never let him get a good eyeful. Brushing back her hair with her right hand, she tapped the keyboard and brought up the task manager and shut down the offending program: BonzieBuddy'. As the program shut down, Chang's hand slipped and knocked a couple of pens off the table onto the floor on the opposite side of the desk.

“Oh Miss Kitsuni! Can you please pick up my pens for me?” he asked sweetly with that raspy lecherous voice of his.

If looks could kill, Chang would have been dead a thousand times over by now. She bent down and started to pick up the pens one by one on the floor, only to feel that bastard's cane lifting up the back of her skirt to gaze unhindered at her black satin panties. His voice was as cruel as his gaze, “Your skirt is two inches too high, tsk tsk. Forgetting regulations around here again? Oh and Miss Kitsuni, black means you WANT me to see them.”

She spun around, five pens clenched in her fists as she tried to cover herself, “Would you stop doing that already?!”

Placing the pens back onto the desk she started to leave when a strange, digitized woman's voice called out from the speakers of the computer.

“Mr. Chang, God is watching you.”

“God? What the fuck?!” gasped Chang, he arched back in his leather chair and yelled at the computer monitor, his foot stomping on the tower underneath his desk, “What is going on. Who the fuck are you! I'm an ambassador! Are you threatening me!?”

“Sir, what is that?” asked Miss Kitsuni moving back against the wall, her gaze fixated out the office of the building as a small white winged object was approaching from the distance. Its low cut tail-wings and bulb shape was too small to be a plane and it was too slow to be a missile. Skimming across the parking lot towards the building aligning itself on a crash course for the office.

“What is what?” yelled Chang, staring at his secretary's dumbfounded look. As he wheeled and spun the chair around to face out the window he saw the drone coming closer towards the window and ran out of his chair, his pudgy frail body shook with each desperate footfall to get to safety, “FUCK!”

“Cassius, Brutus and Iscariot scream from Satan's mouth. TAKE OUR PLACE.”

Chang let out a scream that was drowned out as the Predator drone burst through the bulletproof glass and exploded with its payload just inside the office of the ambassador. The fireball erupted and burst out, throwing Miss Kitsuni, fatally wounded, through the wall. She was impaled through the chest, specifically her right lung, upon a steel rod torn from the concrete by the explosion. Her high cut skirt and white blazer, scorched by the heat, slowly started to soak with blood as the still conscious woman cried out in agony. Her arms desperately struggling to push herself off the broken wall, a two inch steel rod through her body surged out with blood. Streaming from her wound, her blood fell upon the blue carpet of the office and stained it a dark brown.

By some inhuman feat of will, the woman pulled herself off the steel rod and stood up as the sound of screams echoed throughout the office. The blown apart and burned corpse of Chang lay upon the floor in several segments. His decapitated head looked at his secretary from the floor, eyes wide open with a look of baroque terror. Miss Kitsuni standing mere meters from him, terribly wounded, but somehow alive.

“Iscariot.” she gurgled and staggered backwards into the hallway. Her ragged breathing and shaking form pressed up against the white washed wall, and slumped down to the floor in a pool of her own blood.

Hi. I think you did a pretty good job of hooking the reader, and this was, in general, well-written.

Couple things, though.

Swift footsteps came towards the door of the ambassador's office, he grinned and fixed his worn out monkey suit, that had once been his father's before him.

I don't think this sounds right. I would've put: Swift footsteps came towards the ambassador's door, and he grinned. He hurriedly fixed his worn-out monkey suit, which had once been his father's before him.

Milky white thighs down to her ankles were generously exposed for Chang's personal satisfaction

The problem I have with this is that thighs stop sometime above the knee--they don't go all the way down to the ankles, the way it seems like here.

Keep writing. Wasn't bad.

First impressions? I immediately feel bad for that poor secretary! To have to put up with Mr. Chang every day? I think I'd shoot myself first...or him...whoever was closer. Second impression? Chang needs to die and go to hell. It made me feel quite happy that he did in the end of your prolouge.

I love how you first show Chang picking his nose. That just seems to fit so much.

Oh and as for the Windows 98 part? I can definately say I've felt that way a few times...*glares at the old computer next to me and smiles at my new one*

Only a few problems here...

Miss Kitsuni was definitely hot and flaunted her good looks and bust whenever possible, but even her ability to withstand the constant gawking made her more then uncomfortable.

"then" should be "than"

“Mr. Chang. God is watching you.”

This could be left alone but would be better if you wrote it as "Mr. Chang, God is watching you."

“Cassius, Brutus and Iscariot scream from Satan's mouth. TAKE OUR PLACE.”

I am a little confused by this. I know the reference to Dante's Inferno here, but who exactly is saying that? Is it the computer telling him that Cassius, Brutus and Iscariot are screaming that or are they themselves saying it? If the later is the case then you've placed your quotations marks incorrectly.

The fireball erupted and burst out, throwing Miss Kitsuni, fatally wounded through the wall. She was impaled through chest, specifically her right lung, upon a steel rod torn from the concrete by the explosion.

Two errors here. There should be another comma after "wounded" and a "the" before "chest".

The blown apart and burned body of corpse of Chang lay upon the floor in several segments.

Just a quick note, a corpse is a dead body. So you need to fix that sentence to either "burned body" or "corpse" or even "burned corpse" instead of "burned body of corpse of".


Other than those mistakes it looks quite fine. I loved this piece. Please PM me and tell me when the next part is up! I'd love to read it.

Interesting. I'm no grammer nitpicker, so I'll focus on something else.

I must say you hooked me from the first line. Your use of language is excellent and you do not stray off into the obscure.

Thank you everyone, I edited it some to correct for the mistakes and will continue to do so. Thanks for the help. ^-^

Hi there! You've got an interesting beginning, but let's see what I can do with it:

1. Adjectives

the young supple form

Milky white thighs

a plaid handkerchief

Apart from these being clichés (which I’ll address in a second) they don’t really add much to the story. Give your readers a bit of credit! They probably know what thighs look like, and can probably imagine how “supple” a young form would be! Don’t feel that you have to explain and describe every little thing to the reader because it’s patronising, and turns your writing into a swamp that the reader has to cross. If they’re bogged down in adjectives then they might not enjoy the ride so much. Limit their use. They'll be more effective that way.


2. Clichés

If looks could kill, Chang would have been dead a thousand times over by now.

This isn't original, to be honest. I'm sure there's a better way you could describe how she feels instead of going for the "overused cliché" option. Write about how she feels and avoid the clichés to keep your writing fresh and yours.

I'm an ambassador! Are you threatening me!?

Oh. It's the same old "fat balding" man who has got too used to power. Readers see this over and over again. Surely you can do better than that! If you want to make an impression then don't use this sort of stereotype. Unless it's really integral to the plot, I'd consider changing Mr. Chang's character around a bit. Give him some quirks that aren't the usual lazy lecherous ones. Perhaps he chews gum all the time and has disgusting habits with that? Perhaps he keeps a pet at work with him? These aren't particularly good ideas, but maybe you will be able to add some more original depth to his character with these prompts!


3. Detached Narrative

The fireball erupted and burst out, throwing Miss Kitsuni, fatally wounded, through the wall. She was impaled through the chest, specifically her right lung, upon a steel rod torn from the concrete by the explosion. Her high cut skirt and white blazer, scorched by the heat, slowly started to soak with blood as the still conscious woman cried out in agony.

I can't feel anything for Miss Kitsuni. Notice that in this paragraph you explain what happens, but you don't let the reader understand anything deeper. I am very clear as to what happens but, because you haven't made me feel anything, I don't care! You need to give your third-person narrative a less detached feel otherwise the reader won't care about what happens to your characters. If you write what they feel, or what they think, or how they react then you'll generate empathy from the reader. Keep trying!

Overall

And now, to confuse you, I’ll give you my opinion!

It wasn’t bad at all!

Now, it may seem that I’ve actually torn apart your story, but I only do this to the ones worth saving. You’ve got an incredibly interesting beginning to hook the reader in and this is necessary in all writing. I like the way you built up to it with the lechery (even if it was a bit cliché!) and then introduced the tension and the action at the end. It seems this story might be about religion too, what with the computerised message, and that intrigues me too. Perhaps the use of language is a little over-the-top in places. There’s only so many times you can read the “F” word and be shocked by it… Anyway, I’d certainly like to read on, and when you’ve done the re-write of this chapter I’ll come back here again too! The suspense is great, the beginning is good, but there’s always somewhere to improve.

Good luck with the redraft!

Charlie

P.S. If there’s anything you’d like to chat to me about then feel free to PM me! If you want to argue any of the points, feel free to do that too.

Thanks for the review! Just wanted to go into some author notes here, in case if I was too sparse on dropping hits for everyone to pick them up, and see if I should make any changes based on my subtlety or blatant overuse of some thins.

Mr. Chang is stereotypical, that was supposed to be part of the point. He was a corrupt vile and blasphemous ambassador who was marked for death because of it. If you want to get rid of a politician you usually try to vote or use a scandal to get him out. The scandal was an obvious past attempt (you had to read between the lines) to show that he has clung to power when other men would have stood down. Examples would have been like Nixon, Clinton and countless senators and political servants. Despite him breaking the law, he stayed in power and was thus marked for death.

Now Miss Kitsune, I don't know if I was subtle enough for most people, but she is in fact a porn star and is viewed as one of the most beautiful women in the world because of it. I do not need to go into too must about her measurements or wonderful good looks, because everyone should already know what a supermodel, porn star and high class call girl look like. I dropped numerous little hints for her on that part, she's there for Chang's own entertainment then working, and each secretary does not last for long because of it.

As for your cliche part... he was picking his nose and was horribly abusive to the old government issued Windows 98. He was also surfing for porn and was entertained by a spyware/adware program called BonzieBuddy. Part of the reason he got hacked into and tormented enough to not escape his own assassination.

As for other stereotypes, anyone in politics has to generally lie, cheat and suffer to move up in that position, the things most politicians hate is for those dirty secrets to be let out. Jefferson had 6 illegitimate children with his slaves, that was a HUGE problem for his campaign, and was actually proven to be true some years ago. Came up in my political class, on Monday. There are far more true stereotypes in this world that some are an outright given, especially ones on behavior. Race and class have them to, but as you go down more specifically to a single role, few types of people exist. Does a good honest Joe go home and read a paper? Who knows? Does a person in a powerful position want to keep their job and livelihood? You bet. Granted Chang was stretching it for a scandalous terrible figure, but in a few chapters you realize more about him in death then what this brief scene shows you. Oh and the little whore secretary survives, that is something of a problem as the investigation (taking place by the US government) will start probing around even after the cover-up is done.

It's a dark cold world and this is just the tip of the iceberg. Oh and I'd like to say thank you to Aly Tobias, you found the Dante's Inferno reference, something I am actually amazed that you know of. Yes it was the computer, not their actual voices crying out. Each one of the three are chewed in Satan's three mouths for all eternity according to Dante. The references to Dante's Inferno and other forms make up much of what the interpretation of Hell really is in the story, but the world in which they are all connected to is in fact something much greater. It's going to be a little trippy, but scary ride.

hey yeah i really like this piece ! i feel bad for the secretary lol thank goodness she's no Mary Sue lmao we get enough of those in the Twi BS. Not much to say that everybody else hasn't, so very, very good job Keep writing.