12+ Violence

The Assassin

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The Assassin

Approaching its victim suspiciously on a dark street, a walking shadow appeared out of nowhere. Walking pass his victim, he told him to run away and pulled put a gun out of his pocket. 

Walking on a rainy night at a narrow, dark street, the victim didn’t notice the shadow. He thought he was alone, so he walked confidently to his house. Little didhe know that a shadow followed him for the past thirty minutes. 

Peter, a sixteen-year-old boy, did not notice the shadow approaching him until he was told to run away. Peacefully walking, he wore his headphones while listening to pop music. Being a fan of Shawn Mendes wasn’t easy, he had posters of him in his room. He lived happily until fear and anxiousness collapsed his mind. 

Telling Peter to run, the shadow calmly pulled out a gun. Horrified, Peter whitened his face and did what he was told to. Anxiously, he began to run trying to escape. He ran at full speed, totally unaware that the shadow had its gun aiming at his back. While shooting Peter, the shadow tried to increase the damage. The sound of the gun silenced the rain’s noise. As the shadow approached the corpse, it hit the ground and lied calmly on the ground. The magazine was emptied on the warm corpse. It looked as if he was a dummy in a shooting range. The bullets were inserted into his body while blood ran away from his body as trying to escape from the bullets. 

Being satisfied with his work, the shadow simply looked at the boy’s poor corpse and smiled while hiding the gun on the same pocket that he had pulled it out before. Awkwardly, he looked away and walked firmly to somewhere. Could It be his house? Could it be the victims house?

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kaitlyn
Review
kaitlyn wrote a review · Sun Dec 25, 2022 5:57 pm

Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening/Night(whichever one it is in your part of the world),

Hi! I'm here to leave a quick review!!

First Impression: This was a pretty solid piece I think. It has its kinks here and there but ultimately I think it does manage to do what it sets out to do, so that's pretty solid, although I don't know if I could call the character here an assassin per see given how sloppy and how vengeful this seemed.

Anyway let's get right to it,

Approaching its victim suspiciously on a dark street, a walking shadow appeared out of nowhere. Walking pass his victim, he told him to run away and pulled put a gun out of his pocket.

Walking on a rainy night at a narrow, dark street, the victim didn’t notice the shadow. He thought he was alone, so he walked confidently to his house. Little did he know that a shadow followed him for the past thirty minutes.


This is a slightly disjointed start here. While we've got a pretty decent bit of tension being built up there at the same time the way there's a random shout to run mention by who we can only assume is the assassin and then we cut to a person wandering randomly despite the shout just is a little jarring and it breaks the whole flow of the piece and makes it a lot more disjointed than it should be.

Peter, a sixteen-year-old boy, did not notice the shadow approaching him until he was told to run away. Peacefully walking, he wore his headphones while listening to pop music. Being a fan of Shawn Mendes wasn’t easy, he had posters of him in his room. He lived happily
until fear and anxiousness collapsed his mind.

Telling Peter to run, the shadow calmly pulled out a gun. Horrified, Peter whitened his face and did what he was told to. Anxiously, he began to run trying to escape. He ran at full speed, totally unaware that the shadow had its gun aiming at his back. While shooting Peter, the shadow tried to increase the damage. The sound of the gun silenced the rain’s noise. As the shadow approached the corpse, it hit the ground and lied calmly on the ground. The
magazine was emptied on the warm corpse. It looked as if he was a dummy in a shooting range. The bullets were inserted into his body while blood ran away from his body as trying to escape from the bullets.


Well that was quite the graphic climax right there. I think you manage to go ahead and really dive at the very heart of the piece with that one. Its a pretty powerful moment, one that definitely is made even more so by that stark and unforgiving description that shows this assassin clearly having some sort of vendetta against this poor person if the rather violent manner of the killing is anything to go by. Its still a little clunky on the flow because you hop back and forth between the POV's really quickly and seem to hop back and forth in time too.

Being satisfied with his work, the shadow simply looked at the boy’s poor corpse and smiled while hiding the gun on the same pocket that he had pulled it out before. Awkwardly, he looked away and walked firmly to somewhere. Could It be his house? Could it be the victims house?


This ending is perhaps the best part of this piece. It manages to be fairly intriguing and mysterious and it flows the best out of all the paragraphs. The ambiguity to end on and the promise of potentially worse to come for this poor victim is a powerful note as well there.

Aaaaand that's it for this one.

Overall: Overall though, this is still a pretty powerful piece and I think despite the few flaws it has at its core it works well enough that this could really reach quite a good place with just a bit of editing.

As always remember to take what you think was helpful and forget the rest.

Stay Safe
Harry

Hi Adrian,

Mailice here with a short review! :D

This was a strange, interesting story. It had a certain tension built up, especially because you got off to a very dynamic start by changing the sentence structure. I also like the POV of the story. It's great to see the story from a different point of view. Still, it seems a bit short and I wonder if there's more to come, or if it was just a short story.

The story itself still has some things that make it a little tiring to read. The reading flow is partly affected by the words and you manage to repeat yourself more and more from the second paragraph on. Especially the beginning parts of the sentences read the same and there you could have managed to put in the same dynamic as at the beginning.

I also wonder what the plot is. As a reader, you're hardly going to know anything; you're really only going to know the execution, but no back story, and I think you could certainly write an introduction there, like the assassin reading a name and then approaching the boy. At the moment it seems more like a snippet of a story than an overall construct.

In places I like your choice of words and how you describe things. It gives the story a very cool and dangerous undertone. Other points that stood out to me:

Walking past his victim


Here it should be "past" instead of "pass".

Being a fan of Shawn Mendes wasn't easy, he had posters of him in his room.


I don't know why you included the second half of the sentence. It is a contradiction to the first half. I would explain it a bit more, why it isn't easy to be a fan.

He lived happily until fear and anxiousness collapsed his mind.


I like this sentence. It has this fairytale vibe "They lived happily until the very end" but here it as a pretty dark and sinister tone.

The sound of the gun silenced the rain's noise.


I like this sentence too. It's an interesting approach to change the sound sources to prioritize one more than the other.

Overall it was a neat little story, where I think you could expand it a bit more, to give more information.

Have fun writing!

Mailice

User avatar
LittleLee
Review

Hey there, Adrian! I hope you're having a good day!

I'll get right into it.

Approaching its victim suspiciously on a dark street, a walking shadow appeared
out of nowhere.

Good one-line hook, although the "suspiciously" is unnecessary.

Walking pass his victim, he told him to run away and
pulled put a gun out of his pocket.

I think you mean walking past his victim.

Peter, a sixteen-year-old boy, did not notice the shadow approaching him
until he was told to run away.

You already established that he didn't notice the shadow, and I'm a stickler for not having repetitions.

Being a fan of Shawn Mendes
wasn’t easy,

..why not? Why on earth not?

Horrified, Peter
whitened his face and did what he was told to.

Don't say he whitened his face, say he went pale/white. It isn't a voluntary action.

He ran at full speed, totally unaware that the
shadow had its gun aiming at his back.

How could he not know, when the shadow pulled it out right in front of him before telling him to run?

While shooting Peter, the
shadow tried to increase the damage.

By doing what? Explain.

it hit the ground and lied calmly on the ground.

*lay* calmly. Not lied.
And "calmly" is a very weird word to use here. Perhaps you could replace it with "still."

The bullets were inserted into his body

Contrary to what you were trying to do, this doesn't create a cool visual. It just sounds silly. "inserted" is too gentle a word to be used in describing how the bullets bury themselves in a corpse.

boy’s poor corpse

The words need to be rearranged to read "the poor boy's corpse."

Awkwardly, he looked
away and walked firmly to somewhere.

Quite a clumsy sentence.
"He looked away, then walked off to an unknown destination" sounds a little more solid. And it doesn't have any grammar problems.
Why is he awkward, anyway?

Could It be his house? Could it
be the victims house?

I don't see the need for these questions if you just say he went to an unknown destination. The questions only made the ending feel very awkward.


Frankly, I'm not terribly impressed with the story, mainly because of the grammar, which needs a lot of work. I suggest you use Grammarly for some time to improve your writing skills. Or just read more, and observe how sentences are phrased.
The structure/format was pretty interesting; they look like stanzas, which lends an almost poetic quality to this piece.
The plot is also okay, although it's not going to be able to single-handedly carry your story. And I don't know enough about the characters, action, and setting to actually feel anything. My emotions were completely flat. I wasn't thrilled or scared. I didn't see what this story is trying to do.
But it's a good effort, and I'm sure with practice you can do much better. Happy writing!

~ Lee

PS: If anything I said offended you, I'm sorry. I'm genuinely trying to help. I'm not trying to be mean or anything. I'd love to see you improve. :)

User avatar
Dossereana
Review

Hi it's Dossereana here to review your short story. So let's get right into it shell we.

Approaching its victim suspiciously on a dark street, a walking shadow appeared
out of nowhere. Walking pass his victim, he told him to run away and
pulled put a gun out of his pocket.


Wow this was a great line to start it all of, I was instantly hocked. Gosh who is this man with a gun? and who is he aiming for?

Walking on a rainy night at a narrow, dark street, the victim didn’t notice
the shadow. He thought he was alone, so he walked confidently to his
house. Little didhe know that a shadow followed him for the past
thirty minutes.


Wow this poor victim why's this person going after him like this.
Okay this is really good so far, you got me really hocked to the hole thing, but your probably wondering why didhe is in bold, well that should be spelt: did he, easy to forget to ad a space, don't worry it's not a big thing.

Peter, a sixteen-year-old boy, did not notice the shadow approaching him
until he was told to run away. Peacefully walking, he wore his
headphones while listening to pop music. Being a fan of Shawn Mendes
wasn’t easy, he had posters of him in his room. He lived happily
until fear and anxiousness collapsed his mind.


Gosh Peter is only sixteen, I can't believe this, and this person want's to shoot him ouch what did he do wrong. Hu Pop music the classic's for when ya want a good jig. Also I must say Shawn's pretty good at his singing.

Being satisfied with his work, the shadow simply looked at the
boy’s poor corpse and smiled while hiding the gun on the same
pocket that he had pulled it out before. Awkwardly, he looked
away and walked firmly to somewhere. Could It be his house? Could it
be the victims house?


Nice end, now I'm really wondering about these two last questions, who's house is it? I must say I love gory story's I no I'm weird that way, but this was so cool to read.

Okay so that's all I can say about this, thank you so much for giving me a great read I really in joyed it a lot. I hope to read more from you in the future. :)

I hope you have a great day/night witch ever side of the world your on.

@Dossereana Flying Over The Green Room And Spreading Shards Of Encouragement

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greg27 Comment

Good story, i like the details

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dumptruck12 Comment

Amazing!!!! Love it.

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hxrryp10 Comment

love your story



A cynic is a man who knows the price of everything, and the value of nothing.
— Oscar Wilde