Young Writers Society

Chapter1 Nowhere to run
Date Winter, 2022 AD
Location River Dnieper, Ukraine

POV: Captain J.W Price

Year 2022 AD, the war for mankinds struggle for survival has reached its peak, and now Eastern Europe lay in the hands of 5th North East Ukrainian platoon. Half of them were dead, only a third of the people left had any fighting experience let alone quarter of that actually had any weapons.
No tanks, no aircrafts, and just to add onto that, there were no reinforcements coming, and none of them had eaten in seven days.

Layno.’ Spat Captain Price, he had assumed command after the colonel had been KIA (Killed In Action.) His stomach ached and he was down with yellow fever. All the medics were dead and he assumed that he would be as well very soon. Price coughed and clutched his stomach. Then he sat up and stumbled outside into the camp where a half dead man wearily saluted and drifted back to sleep. The Captain was sure that the man would never wake up. He had hoped that someone would launch a rescue mission and had even considered deserting. But he knew it was all forlorn hopes because they wouldn’t get two miles out of camp into the snowy wilderness without being tracked by the creatures. This was the only fort left in the east and the nearest one was in Venice. Along the middle of Europe stand more than half a dozen major forts and towers. That will soon be the front line after this fort had been destroyed.

A shudder suddenly erupted over the fort and Price dragged himself over to the wall. There he could see billions of them; marching in formation, chanting in their alien language. The Captain knew that they were heading for the elimination of Europe, the last standing continent against them. About fivehundred of the Creatures stopped and started heading for the fort. The others just kept on marching. He had hoped that the river would have held them off for long, but he was wrong.

Price pulled out his KL Twenty shotgun. Better go down fighting, he thought. Then he remembered. When he was posted here he remembered the colonel saying something about the flare. He knew none of his troops could get out and the aliens were going in unmonitored by the radars, virtually unseen by all. They would take off the towns one by one; millions of people across Europe would die. The flare that was it. It was right at the top, if he might be able to get up, he might be able to warn the others.
He was running now, and could already hear the crunching of the gates under the impact. He signalled to a couple of his men to follow him. They sprinted up and up the stairs, that’s when the gates broke. He could now hear the opening fire of guns and the Ticking and sharp sound of the enemy spike gun, powered by an advanced source of clockwork this was way above Human technology. Price looked back and saw an armoured red creature, they looked like dragons but they were more intelligent and stronger. Drangons were a myth; these were as real as the sky.

One of the men nodded to Tyne, who nodded back. Then the man turned around and plunged a sword into the Beasts heart. And then threw his grenade at the next one, blowing it up into fragments, but was ripped apart by another one, screaming he just had a chance to grab his grenade out and kill the last creature he would ever see.

The grenade was a P1 fire grenade, designed to destroy. Making the dragon set alight and run into another dragon that screamed in fury as Price got away. Price and the other man skidded round a corner then stopped at a group of motorbikes. These were old-fashioned D-class Hondas and must be one of the only vehicles left.

‘I’ll drive, you shoot.’ ordered Price, as he hopped on at the front. The other man jumped on the back and loaded his assault rifle. The Captain revved the engine and sped off up the ramp, he looked round. He wished he hadn’t. There was another creature, it looked like one of the beasts but had a clubbed tail with spikes standing out of it. Its right legs were robotically controlled and half of its head was machine.
But that was nothing compared to what was on the dragons back. Price had seen a lot of things in his long life, but this was the worst. The thing was the size of a man, but had black armour. Not the ordinary black, it looked like the nothingness, a dark vortex. The person had a helmet moulded into his head and underneath the helmet there was blackness. Not evil, not hatred, but worse. Nothing. It was the blackest black, no feelings just endless time and space. Price managed to tear his eyes away from the man and steer up to the top. A small concrete building the size of a shed laid in front him. The motorbike screeched a to halt and both men jumped out and sprinted to the shed. Price kicked the door open and the other man rammed it shut.

‘Barricade the door’ shouted Price ‘I’ll set the flare.’ The man took a spray bottle from his back and sprayed round the edges of the door. The spray suddenly hardened and solidified into sticky white goo. The man now with a fully loaded shotgun in one hand and a grenade in the other faced the door with a grim expression on his face. Meanwhile the major typed in a number on the keypad and read the message on the screen.

Activate emergency flare y/n?

He pressed y and the number 5 showed on the screen, closely followed by the number 4. Suddenly the door burst open and a 6 ft creature stepped through, it had green scaly skin and had massive bulky armour with white stripes, Price immediately recognised it as a Hurm, the main bulk of the enemy’s army. It roared as it stepped through but was blown to pieces by the shotgun, so was the next but the third one stabbed the man with a vicious curved sword.

3

The Hurm turned to face Price who plunged his spear into its neck. Another dozen came rushing through and he threw his javelin ripping through a stomach of the creature.

2

Price flipped two automatic pistols out of his side pockets and fired while both in each hand. These were state of the art Glock 13s. A beauty, firing a full round of 25 white titanium bullets in only half a second. These ripped through the line of Hurms, as they were only centimetres away from him. He heard the ticking of the Hurm Spike Clockwork gun and dived to the floor at the spikes sped over his head. He shot the Hurm in the middle of the chest.

1

The Captain froze as the thing walked through the broken door. Blackness was the only thing Price could think about. It seemed to be draining light from the room. It smashed its sword to where Price was standing but he nimbly dodged it and raised his assault rife and fired. The thing seemed to absorb the bullets and lunged again. In a flash of a second, the Captain unsheathed his sword and blocked the attack. Two swords were in irons with each over but the blackness seemed to cover his sword and was creeping up his arms. Price’s heart was drenched in fear but he did not let go of the sword.

FLARE ACTIVATED

The blackness covered Price’s left leg and most of his body, slowly working its way up his neck.
‘Why die for ones who you will never meet?’ It started in a deep rasping voice. ‘Don’t you see? The universe is doomed. No force on earth can stop the alliance. And you die saving civilians, when there is no hope. We destroyed the Galactics and the Cranobites. I know of no one who can stop us.’
‘That is where you are wrong’ replied the Captain. ‘We may be lacking in numbers, but we have hope. The earth has never been taken, and never will be. You cold hearted son a bitch.' With that Price gasped and fell into death.



For Pt. 2: topic51547.html

This is my first review, so forgive me if I'm either too critical or not critical enough.

I liked the story, it's hard not to like an alien invasion/extermination themed story, and I also liked much of the content of the story-the clockwork guns, for example, while they aren't 100% original, they are very original in this context. And it's a nice choice of location (I don't mean to offend anyone, but it really gets on my nerves the way, 90% of the time, the USA just happens to be in the centre of everything).

There are some problems I think need dealing with, however:

1) Tenses. You keep switching between them unnecessarily. This was probably accidental-I sometimes accidentally go from third person to first person at random moments, only to notice them after several paragraphs! I'm going to assume you intend on writing this in the past tense (have you ever read a story written in the future tense?!!). If that is the case, "Along the middle of Europe stand more than half a dozen major forts and towers. That will soon be the front line after this fort had been destroyed" should be "Along the middle of Europe stood more than half a dozen major forts and towers. That would soon be the front line after this fort had been destroyed." I think there are more examples of this throughout the story, I'll let you root them out and put them right.

2) This isn't always the case, but generally it is best to write numbers as words-i.e, "two" not "2". That isn't to say you should call the KL20 shotguns KL Twenty shotguns, but you should probably say "two miles", not "2 miles".

3) Finally, I think "Price looked back and saw an armoured red creature, they looked like dragons but they were more intelligent and couldn’t breath fire" could do with a bit more, or something...I don't know, this sentence just doesn't sound right to me. I don't really know what you should do with this, but try experimenting with different word orders to see if it sounds better.

Right, that's all from me for now. I hope I have been useful and constructive rather than simply sounding like a whiney something rather (not feeling very imaginative at the moment).

Thanks I get annoyed as well because America seems to have all the fun with aliens... The book mainly will be set in Europe but some bits will be in the arctic, Sahara desert etc. Any way thanks for taking the time in reviewing it

To anyone who is reading this, weather you like it or not; I'm going round a friends house so i might have to post the second chapter in a couple of days........

Hi. It took me a long time to review this. My dogs decided now was the perfect time to go crazy (i have three) and my mom kicked me off the the computer for a half our, and my favorite television show is on, and it is extremely long. A suggestion -i've gotten the same suggestions a bunch of times- to break up the chapter into parts so that its less overwelming and you'd probably get more reviews that way. But here are just a few things that i noticed.

This is a run on sentence. You could try something like No tanks, no aircrafts, and just to add onto that, there were no reinforcements coming, and none of them had eaten in seven days You could even try a colon instead.

No tanks, no aircraft and just to add onto that there were no reinforcements coming and not one of them had eaten in seven days.

You might want to try All the medics were dead and he assumed that he would be as well very soon or something along those lines. It felt like it was missing something.

All the medics were dead and he assumed that he would be very soon.

Then he sat up and stumbled outside into the camp. A half dead man wearily saluted and drifted back to sleep.

You could try combining these two sentences. instead of a period put 'where'

No one in the platoon was not sick or injured.

Awkward sentence.

they wouldn’t get 2 miles out of camp without being tracked

write out two.

There he could see billions of them. Marching in formation, chanting in their alien language.

combine these sentences...

About 500 of them stopped and started heading for the fort.

What exactly are they?

Better go down fighting he thought.

Better go down fighting, he thought. Missing comma.

Then the man turned around and plunged a sword into the dragon’s heart.

You just contradicted yourself because you just said it wasnt a dragon.

Ordered Price as he hopped on at the front.

Comma after Price

The thing was the size of a man but had black armour, not the ordinary black. It looked like nothingness, a dark vortex.

Switch these sentences around. The thing was the size of a man, but had black armour. Not the ordinary black, it looked like the nothingness, a dark vortex.


It's a big thing, you have to write out the numbers in a story.
I like your writing style. But i'm not into the topic.
Good Luck.

Thanks I've just corrected it Really nice long reveiw thanks for taking the time... I'm away for the weekend so i'll post ch 2 then and try and break it up a bit.

Ok, this is a very interesting story. I like the basics of the storyline but there are a few problems that I noticed as well.

First, you need to work on adding more detail to the landscape. I can picture the fort fairly well, but I don't know if the terrain outside is flat, rough, swamplike, or grassy. For the fort, I suggest you describe more about its inside area, such as if there are rooms that are out in the open, or if there are battlements along the walls. It would also be nice to know what the gates and walls are made of.

Second is timeperiod. You do well with describing some of the modern weapons, but it's unclear if the story is placed in the future or if it's happening back in 1990. To bring the time period to life, you need to work on adding things or descriptions that narrow the readers focuss.

Lastly, you have a few capitilization errors. "‘I’ll drive, you shoot.’ Ordered Price" was the one that really stood out.

Over all it is a well written piece and I enjoyed reading it.

Cool thanks, glad you enjoyed it. Now I'm Extra determined to get round to posting ch2. Thanks Again

hey man. just here for your review.

well, it has potential, but it is lacking in needed details and has many details that we dont need to know. dont get rid of the ones you dont need, just add the ones you do (ex. names, i dont know all these army terms, what is a "Hurm", ect.)

this seems like its a bit too much like now to be 500 or so years in the future.

future sci-fi really isnt my thing, so half this stuff may just be how the style is.

kl i pmed u