A New Awakening -Prologue-

by Autumn17

Published April 30, 2011

Arianna opened her eyes and harsh bright lights blinded her. She squinted as she tried pull herself into sitting position. Numbness gripped her body, pins and needles itching beneath her skin from her neck to her toes.

Ari closed her eyes and tried to remember her life before the room. Nothing came to mind. Not a name, or a favorite color, or even a glimmer of a memory to help cast away the veil over the mystery of how she'd arrived in the room.

Ari slowly slid open her eyes again, cautious of the bright lights, and looked around at the room. It was very standard; gray walls, gray floor, gray ceiling, painfully bright industrial lights banishing all shadow, a lone metal door solemnly barricading the way out. She seemed to be lying on a gurney, with several multicoloured wires trailing from her body to a large, imposing metal box covered with dials and flashing bulbs. A small, dark green screen displayed her heart rate and breaths per minute and everything on tiny neon green graphs. A little ways from her cot was a round oak table with a laptop on it, a dark green screen covered with minusicle neon lettering, just like the machine. Hoping it held some information about her past, Ari leaned forward, squinting to read the diminutive script.

Experiment Number: 16

Name: Arianna Jasper Montgomery

Age: 16

Birth Parents: Jackson and Casey Montgomery (missing)

Siblings: Serena Hale and Alec John Montgomery (missing)

Progress: Successful memory erase! Experiment appears to retain all previous skills and knowledge, as well as basic survival skills, and has no memory of it's previous life. But something is different about this experiment that we can't figure out. Hopefully we'll find out soon, before the experiment does. Things can get out of hand with the special ones if they find out their gifts on their own. Surgery was a success. Waiting for experiment to wake up.

Comments & reviews · 7
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kaitlyn
Review
kaitlyn wrote a review Review · Sep 26, 2021

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

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

Anyway let's get right to it,

Arianna opened her eyes and harsh bright lights blinded her. She squinted as she tried pull herself into sitting position. Numbness gripped her body, pins and needles itching beneath her skin from her neck to her toes.

Ari closed her eyes and tried to remember her life before the room. Nothing came to mind. Not a name, or a favorite color, or even a glimmer of a memory to help cast away the veil over the mystery of how she'd arrived in the room.


Ooooh, this is really fun opening there...not too often that you run into memory wipe storylines, but I always do find those quite fun and it looks like that is exactly what has happened to this person here. Its interesting to see how she appears to recognize the existence of memories and what a room is...although she can't really remember her past, this suggest her brain isn't totally wiped, but some select parts have been taken out somehow. Definitely leaves you with a few questions to consider here.

Ari slowly slid open her eyes again, cautious of the bright lights, and looked around at the room. It was very standard; gray walls, gray floor, gray ceiling, painfully bright industrial lights banishing all shadow, a lone metal door solemnly barricading the way out. She seemed to be lying on a gurney, with several multicoloured wires trailing from her body to a large, imposing metal box covered with dials and flashing bulbs. A small, dark green screen displayed her heart rate and breaths per minute and everything on tiny neon green graphs. A little ways from her cot was a round oak table with a laptop on it, a dark green screen covered with minusicle neon lettering, just like the machine. Hoping it held some information about her past, Ari leaned forward, squinting to read the diminutive script.


Alright, yeah that theory is being completely reinforced there, she shows no problems or confusion at all when it comes to recognizing things around here. There's a really nicely done description there to show what her surroundings are like...and I that's definitely nice to have at the start of a story.

Progress: Successful memory erase! Experiment appears to retain all previous skills and knowledge, as well as basic survival skills, and has no memory of it's previous life. But something is different about this experiment that we can't figure out. Hopefully we'll find out soon, before the experiment does. Things can get out of hand with the special ones if they find out their gifts on their own. Surgery was a success. Waiting for experiment to wake up.


Well I'm gonna make a wild guess and say that this person wasn't meant to be reading that...maybe, this piece certainly leaves you wondering here...and the rest of that message only adds to the whole mystery of things here...and I'm loving it. This one kind of officially confirms all the initial suspicions we have while also adding plenty more which I think makes for a very nicely done ending here. Overall, this all comes together to be a pretty effective prologue right here. This certainly seems like a story that I'd read at any rate. :D

Aaaaand that's it for this one.

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

Stay Safe
Harry

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roxywriter1573
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roxywriter1573 commented Comment · Jun 23, 2011

Woah!!! Mystery! Me likes! More more more! lol

Keep on Writing
-Roxy

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tigershark17
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tigershark17 commented Comment · Jun 23, 2011

Excellent prologue! One of the best I have read on here. You gave info, but just enough to keep us on our toes waiting for more. Loved it! Let me know when chapter one is up!

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Redfang18
Review
Redfang18 wrote a review Review · May 25, 2011

Such mystery, such suspense. I smell a classic romance coming up soon. This is beautiful so far. Keep writing for the sake of writing, let your imagination guide you throughout your writing, and just be yourself. This will be a great novel, I can feel it.

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StoryWeaver13
Review
StoryWeaver13 wrote a review Review · May 1, 2011

Okay, so this was good. It felt a little rushed, but it was still a solid start. I'm pretty sure another reviewer already pointed out the fact that the information most likely wouldn't be on the computer in direct view with the knowledge their "experiment" here could potentially wake up. Also, this information would probably be a little more statistical and inhuman - I just don't quite get the professional feel from that in comparison with the surroundings and such.

As for your character, I feel like we could've gotten more emotion. Even if that emotion wasn't fear or anger, even if it was purely disoriented, I wanted to feel more of it.

Solid start? Yes, for sure. Needs work? Yeah, probably. But it was definitely interesting.

Keep writing,
StoryWeaver

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Masquerade
Review
Masquerade wrote a review Review · May 1, 2011

Hello, I am Masque, and I shall be reviewing your prologue. -ehem-

This was an interesting prologue. It gave me enough information to be curious without giving too much away. I'll go through some nitpicks first.

She squinted as she tried pull <This should be either "tried to pull" or "tried pulling". herself into sitting position.


Ari slowly slid open her eyes again, cautious of the bright lights, and looked around at the room. It was very standard; <I don't think this should be a semi colon. gray walls, gray floor, gray ceiling, painfully bright industrial lights banishing all shadow, a lone metal door solemnly barricading the way out.


A little ways from her cot was a round oak table with a laptop on it,<This should not be a comma. I believe it should be a colon, but I'm not sure. a dark green screen covered with minusicle neon lettering, just like the machine.


Now that that's out of the way, I'd like to point out a few more things.

You use the progressive tense (-ing) a lot. This is a bit of a pet peeve of mine. The tense is useful and can be very effective in certain places, but when it's not necessary it makes your writing seem... almost timid. I would go through the piece and try replacing some of the ing verbs with past tense (-ed). It makes your writing have more conviction.

There's a another thing, though it's more of a content issue. I found it strange that the scientists (I'm assuming that's what they are) just left the laptop out where she could easily see what was on it. I feel like they would make more of an effort to hide it from her.

Overall, an interesting prologue. Good work!
~Masquerade

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Amfliflier
Review
Amfliflier wrote a review Review · May 1, 2011

Wow. This was really good and mysterious. What happens next? :)

I liked the mystery of this piece, and the description in the beginning. Although, one thing that I found unrealistic: Yeah, it helps progress the story and helps explain what happened, but would the doctors honestly leave that information out for her to look at when she wakes up? That's my only complaint.

Other than that, awesome job! Let me know when the next part comes out! :)



I do not use my siblings as the cleaning equipment.
— Atticus