Afterlife chapter 4

Hey Col3!

Damn. This chapter certainly takes things up a notch. Overall I like this chapter, I think it's been written quite well; the twist at the end is also definitely a bit interesting.

There's one small, consistent issue revolving around your dialogues; there's often no punctuation there before and after the quotes.

Team captains are chosen by grades, the two with the best grades get to be captains. That means Rachel and Micheal are captains. They get up and walk to the front. I'll be honest, I'm not exactly a 'sports' person, so I've never practiced, but I am a mean goalie.

I really like this bit! It gives us readers some insight on the kind of person Cody is, as well as subtly letting us know that Rachel is good at sports.

You don't need to know, just know that I really am sorry that I have to do this." He kisses my forehead, and puts the barrel of the gun on my chest.

Okay, while this is touching, I do feel obliged to point out that logically Luke shouldn't have done this; the whole point of a gun is that it can kill at range. Coming right up close to pull the trigger ruins the point.

Anyway! This definitely put a spin on things and I finally understand the relevance of the title! Definitely looking forward to reading the next few chapters, heh. I hope you keep writing!

~Lee

Hi Col3,

Mailice here with a short review!

I actually really liked the composition of this chapter. It had a better overview and good structure than the previous one.But I also see that there is something that slows down the reading flow a bit.

I looked out the window. Today, I'll get the information. I sigh, class will be over soon, then gym will start. 

I'll use the beginning of the chapter as an example to show you what I mean. You go from three sentences to "ring, ring" here. You even describe it in the third sentence quoted here. It would be better to develop all this a little further so that you manage to create a construct that is tangible for the reader.

At the moment your story seems very two-dimensional, like a wall. It's hard to keep it upright because it has no support anywhere. You can do it, but it doesn't always help, and then it falls down. Before that happens here in the story, I would advise you to build three more walls to make the construct more stable.

I'll go deeper into your example here. Your last sentence describes that the school lesson will soon be over. I would expand on that and describe what subject it was? What was the protagonist doing? Were there any problems? What does the class look like? Is there a particular detail that is not necessarily important to the story but that you would like to share here? This is where you could very well include what is called "fanservice" and give more detail to the world you have created so that it all comes alive in the end.

I hope I have given some useful tips here.

Have fun writing!

Mailice

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: Okayy...so I'm back for chapter four..and well twist galore and I have a few theories here now...things have just gotten even more interesting here and I'm all for it.

Anyway let's get right to it,

I looked out the window. Today, I'll get the information. I sigh, class will be over soon, then gym will start.

Ring~ Ring~

Called it. Soon the entire class was up and moving to get to their next class.

"Hey, Cody, let's go to gym together." Rachel came up to me with a smile

I smiled back "Alright."

We walk silently to the gym. As we entered, I saw that everyone was already there. We took our seats on the bleachers and waited for attendance.

"Alright, looks like everyone's here." The coach said, re-looking over the attendance. " We'll be playing soccer today, but because of the construction going on next door, we will be playing inside. Captains choose your teams."

Hmm, alright, I love how there's just a single line on the main thing we're all invested just to keep us guessing about what that information might end up being and then we're just moving right along into just regular school activities here with there being nothing to suggest that this person has literally just committed a murder probably less than a day ago.

Team captains are chosen by grades, the two with the best grades get to be captains. That means Rachel and Micheal are captains. They get up and walk to the front. I'll be honest, I'm not exactly a 'sports' person, so I've never practiced, but I am a mean goalie.

"Hey, Cody, you're with me!" Rachel called

I smiled "Kay!"

I jogged over to her side.

"Looks like some team wants to lose. Again." Michael smirked

Rachel rolled her eyes.

"Ignore him. You're good at goalie, so that's where you'll be." She said looking back at the other students.

OKayyy...well that seems pretty much exactly like this sort of thing tend to go down in class...and I'm loving these moments of friendship that we're getting to see. It does a good job showcasing the normal aspects of Cody's life so that we know who he normally is.

He blows hard on the whistle, and almost immediately, Michael runs up and gets the ball, heading straight towards me. Suddenly thankful for the endless practices with Luke and Liu, I felt confident that I could block this one. He kicks the ball so high to where I'd have to jump to catch it. Doing just that, I missed the ball by a few inches. The other team starts cheering.

"They still have to get 9 more points. Bastards." Rachel mumbled

"Sorry." I look down, I had a feeling I'd be the reason for our lost today.

" Don't say that, everyone makes mistakes. Anyways it's only a game." She said, firmly

"Yeah, I guess."

As the game started to get going, the intercom came on.

Well...that's an interesting moment to include there. Is this just a sort of reflection on his general ability to goalkeep or is this a bit of a sign of him being distracted with the whole murder situation and the information that he's waiting for. It seems like perhaps the second situation is what's going on and in that case its actually a good thing to include here and show his he is affected by what he does.

We were all silent for a moment.

"What are you doing!? Go, do what we've practiced!" The coach yelled, running for the gym doors

"Rachel this way!" I grabbed her arm leading her to the locker rooms.

We stayed there for what seemed like hours before we heard shooting. I hear Rachel silently sobbing.

"Cody, why are we in the male locker room?" She whispers

"This way it's harder to find us, they'll think everyone is in one place." I whisper back

Oh dear...well that looks like some sort of attack on the school...I've no idea how those tend to work, so I can't comment too much on that. The emotions on display from our characters are good I think, if maybe a little lacking. I feel like you could focus a bit more on the kind of thoughts you might have in such a situation and show a bit fear. Its present right now, just this is first person too, so you can include quite a bit more and that's what really brings across the tension in situations like this.

Just then someone started to bang on the door. We crept back as the door swung open, revealing a man in all black, carrying a sort of gun with him.

"Rachel, run." I whisper

"What about you?" She looks at me fearfully

"Don't worry about me, just get out of here."

"Are you done yet?" The man walked closer

Rachel closed her eyes as she ran away. The man didn't even turn around to shoot her. He kept his gun trained on me.

Okayy that's certainly an odd moment. I get the sneaking suspicion that whoever is coming here is somehow targeting Cody specifically. Someone randomly attacking a school wouldn't just sneak up on a person and completely ignore someone running away. Did our dark web friend want to tie up a loose end? I have so many theories.

"Who are you?" I glare at him

Slowly he takes off his mask. My jaw drops.

"L-Luke." I stutter

How can Luke-?

"I'm sorry, kiddo. I really am, but you're investigating Liu too much." He said, almost like he was sad.

I swallowed "Was it you? Did you kill my brother?"

He nods "Yes."

Oh wow, well that's quite the twist. Definitely did not see that one coming at all. I though Luke was one of the good ones...oh well, this is quite a turn. Now I'm having doubts about who this Mr. Know It All might be. I almost feel like with that whole situation the day before at the murder and now this revelation, Luke might actually be Mr. Know It All.

"He was your friend!" I yell, I was crying now. I was betrayed.

"I know, but he was in the way." He moves closer to me.

I looked around, I had nowhere to go, I was trapped.

"In the way of what?" I growled

"You don't need to know, just know that I really am sorry that I have to do this." He kisses my forehead, and puts the barrel of the gun on my chest.

"W-wait, you're really going to kill me, like you did Liu?" I didn't want to die yet.

He looks at me sadly, "may you rest in peace."

Then I felt a searing pain throughout my body, then I felt nothing at all.

Well....gonna I'm no expert on getting shot at so can't quite judge that ending...but well, this is an interesting moment. Luke does genuinely seem to somewhat regret this. It seems like one of those scenarios where he really does care for Cody and Liu but whatever is going on here is a little too important for him to value human life over it so he does these murders. Its an odd level of complexity here..and well...now our main character is dead..hmm..I have a feeling this is where the meaning of the title of this will come into play.

Aaaaand that's it for this one.

Overall: Overall, I love this twist here. It looks like things are only going to continue to get even more interesting from here onwards and I'm all for it. This chapter needs a bit of padding out in the emotions department like I already mentioned above but otherwise this is pretty good here.

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

Stay Safe
Harry