Warning: This work has been rated 18+ for language and violence.
Chapter 6:
Jane fell to her knees, with Dragon’s motionless body before her. His face showed no pain, but something more like comfort. Fox looked towards Alice, who aimed the silver gun at her. Fox had no intention of letting her get away with this. She ran up to her at huge speed and knocked her off her feet, before smashing her fist into her stomach. Alice crashed into the floor below her, creating a large hole where she landed. But Fox didn’t stop there. She grabbed Alice by the throat and threw her into the cell on her right. Alice broke through the bars and nearly broke through the wall on the other side of the cell. Fox ran over to her and kicked Alice in the face with all her strength. Then, Fox grabbed Alice by her neck and put all the strength she had left into strangling her. Alice struggled to fight Fox’s hand off of her neck, but she was too weak. Soon, Alice stopped squirming around. Fox let go of her neck, allowing the body to fall motionless onto the floor. She could see very clear claws marks on her neck where Fox held her hands, but those marks were quickly covered up by a large river of blood from Alice’s mouth.
You foolish girl, Fox thought. Just who did you think you were?
Fox ran over to Jane and Dragon’s corpse. Jane’s tears pattered onto Dragon’s chest like rain.
“Jane,” Fox spoke, her voice seemed a little shaky, as if she was about to start crying. “As you repeated several times, we have to leave. I’ll take Dragon’s corpse and you’ll have to fend off any soldiers.”
Jane looked up at Fox, though her vision was blurry. She nodded and got up, before drawing her pistol. Fox bent down and picked up Dragon’s body.
“Jesus Christ, he’s heavier than I expected.” Fox muttered as she struggled to keep the corpse level with her chest. Jane stared at Fox for a while, until she received a nod.
They ran down the corridor of cells, Fox was slowed down immensely by the corpse, which made Jane’s job of keeping up with her easier. The prison seemed to be void of any presence of soldiers, which made the two women grow suspicious. They stopped by a junction, Fox was in front of Jane, but Jane pulled her back gently. She looked at Jane, who simply gave a friendly smile and moved in front.
Jane looked out from behind the wall to look out for any soldiers. She noticed one just ahead. Jane stepped back over to Fox and whispered into her ear:
“How’d you get here?”
“We got here by boat. There’s a port outside.” Fox said softly. Jane nodded, before moving back to her place by the edge of the junction. She peered out, making an extremely deplorable mistake. Her eyes met with the eyes of the soldier she saw before, her heartbeat sped up instantaneously. She dashed towards him and put the gun’s barrel against his head.
“Make one false move and you’re done.” She whispered aggressively. The soldier placed his weapon on the ground in response and raised his arms to signalise that he surrenders. Jane pulled the trigger and allowed the soldier’s blood to splatter over her face. Fox stared at her in pure horror from behind the wall.
“Why the fuck would you do that?!” She whispered abruptly.
“Because I can.” Jane answered. “It’s not like you wouldn’t kill him.”
“Yeah, but at least he would try to kill me! You disarmed him and then killed him! That’s dishonourable!”
“Oh, I didn’t know you and Dragon followed some kind of code of conduct.”
“Actually, we don’t. We simply use common sense.” Fox walked past Jane and began stepping down the stairs. Jane followed her obediently.
They got to the bottom of the staircase and ran out into the open air, where they found the boathouse. Fox felt the beautiful, fresh air dashing into her nostrils with the strong wind. Jane looked around the area carefully. The morning sun made things a bit easier for her. Jane noticed a medium-sized boat tied to one of the stumps lining the edge of the wooden floor of the pier. Jane looked at Fox, her expression demanding an explanation.
“That’s the boat we came here on.” Fox said.
“And where’d you get it from.
After a moment of silence, Fox finally answered.
“We… Stole it.”
“And you were moaning at me killing an unarmed soldier.”
“What you did was just as bad as what Dragon did on the Shard! Except you killed one unarmed soldier, and he killed about a hundred armed soldiers!”
“Moving on, where should we go from here?”
There was a long silence.
“I want to see if Jack and Caruso are alive.” Fox finally stated.
“Do you really think your two friends are dead?” Jane asked.
“Personally, I don’t know. I’d like to think they’re not, but that means we’re leaving them behind here.”
“I have an idea. Put Dragon’s body into the boat, I’ll wait here for you in case the soldiers come to destroy the boat.” Fox looked Jane up and down. Jane sighed in response. “I promise I’ll be able to withstand it. If I don’t, you’ll have to find another way to get away.”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea? We’re not even sure whether Jack and Caruso are alive.”
“We will be once you find them. Go on, I’ll wait here.”
***
Jack woke up in a lab room, strapped to a mattress. Around him, he could see a large pentagram on the floor, Jack could tell by the scent that it was drawn with human blood. Next to him, strapped to another mattress inside the same pentagram, was Caruso. Jack’s breathing sped up steadily as he struggled to get out of this trap. A sudden voice made him stop squirming, but he held his breath.
“Don't worry,” the voice said calmly. “It'll be over soon.”
Author's Note: I hope you enjoyed this chapter! I'm really struggling to keep things interesting from this chapter to the next one (which I am currently writing), but I do have a great event coming on after the next chapter, so that's worth looking forward too... right? Anyways, I would love some feedback on how I could stop this middle bit from being so boring. Once more, I hope you enjoyed this chapter!
Points:
Time spent:
Canary word: Present
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Original Text:
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125,029 Literary Works • 672,781 Reviews
Reviews might be coming a teensy bit slower not that I have started watching the tennis hehe
Nit-picks:
Why wouldn't Alice shoot? If she was just going to fast, say so.
The Fox/Alice fight seems a bit too easy. It's fine for it to go that easy, if it has to for plot reasons, but something like Fox being so distraught about Dragon would explain why she was fighting with such fury and strength that she easily overwhelmed Alice.
I don't think she'd have found that so easy to say.
To be fair, I can now see why they would be friends, having just gone through this massive trauma together.
You don't really need "extremely" before "deplorable". It's pretty extreme on its own.
I'd also expect her to mention that it made a really loud noise when they were trying to escape. In fact, surely the guards would have been alerted when they heard Alice's gunshots.
Wait, when did they lose track of them?
Repetition of "boat" jolts a bit.
Overall:
Character: I like the relationship building up between Fox and Jane. I think it seems a lot more natural now that they are snapping at each other but also being overall understanding. I also think it should have taken this much time to get there, and not have them described as friends earlier on. I also think each of them should start saying something about Dragon (as in sobbing) but stop themselves because they have a task at hand, so that I can see the emotions they are feeling.
Setting: I think it's unlikely the alarm wouldn't have been raised by now. If there's a reason, I need it at least guessed at by one of the characters. It seems far too easy for them to have escaped and I'd have expected loads and loads of guards swarming the corridors by now.
Plot: This is getting really fast paced and exciting. I don't think you have to worry about it being boring at all. That is, if you make it more dangerous. Right now I feel like they're just walking out. If you make it more difficult with more guards, it will be more exciting.
Hope this helps,
Biscuits
I have returned for another review. I'm guessing this is pretty predictable by now and I'm running out of ideas for meaningless introductions.
I don't like this sentence. Dragon's death is a big deal. It seems like Fox is belittling it, somehow. Maybe she thinks that he's heavy, but I'd think that Fox would be a bit more reverent.I. When Fox kills Alice (I'm pretty sure she's dead) it's pretty obvious from her actions that Fox is distraught and furious. However, you don't explicitly state this. Fox just lost her best friend. What is she feeling?
II.
III. You keep referring to Dragon's body as his corpse, sometimes, just the corpse, and that also seems a bit irreverent. Also, it's getting repetitive.
IV.
What happened to Dragon's body? Is Fox still carrying it? And Fox teleported in- does it only work at a certain range? If so, that needs to be explained. How did Jane get here? Also, there's a pretty huge difference between stealing a boat and killing an unarmed soldier.
Of the chapters that you've written so far, this is definitely the best. I actually love Jane's reaction to Dragon's death, although I would have liked to see more emotion from Fox. I felt that the cliffhanger at the end was really well done. I'm excited to see what's next!
Keep writing!
Feltrix
Hey there Dragon! I thought I'd address your AN first and then move on to the story. One idea I had as I was reading was the possibility of some big dramatic breakdown in the middle. Dragon's death obviously hit everyone hard, but Fox didn't respond as strongly as she could've. If you're looking for something to make this interesting, you could have Fox drop to her knees in the middle of a deserted hallway and start weeping over Dragon's body. It would make everything a bit more dramatic if you thought it was necessaryl.
This doesn't make a whole lot of sense, at least in my opinion. Common sense doesn't really apply to murders, so a better response would probably be "Actually, we don't. We just apply basic human morals."As a bit of an unrelated encouragement, don't be afraid to have some chapters where the plot doesn't move as quickly. Obviously, keep it interesting- but you've never had an issue with that. So long as you don't end up with a three-chapter monologue about the woes of a character's death, a chapter where everyone just comes to terms with Dragon's death is okay here and there. It won't hurt anything to throw in a bit of spice during those sections if you prefer that style of writing, though.
On to the actual story:
That would also set Jane up for her response about you-don't-have-morals that she brings up later regarding the boat.
I would think that there should be a bit more hesitance to surrender the argument, just judging by the personalities of both of them. Even just "She sighed in resignment, but accepted defeat." would help in this situation.
Other than those sections and what I mentioned in the AN response, that's all I really have for you today. Hopefully this was helpful, and I'll be back later for some more reviews!
Best wishes,
MJ
Thank you for your feedback! I admit, I could've done better with Fox's reaction to Dragon's death, but, in my opinion, she doesn't seem like the person to cry openly. I'm glad you're enjoying it!
Hello again!
Okay, the first thing I wanted to say is that I think "Corpse" and "Body" are too harsh when referring to Dragon especially when used in dialogue. I think it would be better to just say "Dragon" because it kind of shows that they haven't quite come to terms that he is dead which is more realistic.
Also, if you are worried about this chapter not being as interesting as the others I think that use of wording in this chapter could really help. So what I mean is that Jane and Fox are mourning so using more sombre words and description will help to show the reading what they are going through. Describing colours as dull versions of the colour, what it's like to move (heavy, slow), dialogue (some of the dialogue sounds like the previous chapters but I think there should be a difference). I wouldn't over do it though because they are also in survival mode.
Again, I like the ending because it's mysterious, you don't tell us the name of the person and what they mean by "It'll be over soon" but we can guess and it doesn't sound good. Though I have to say I still don't know where this going right now, this section feels a bit like a side plot and seeing as we are 6 chapters in we should have more of a clear understanding. One of the thoughts I had was that it might be to do with the people from Dragon's memory. If so maybe try to highlight that a bit more or really go into detail about what happened. If not then do feel free to ignore me and any other suggestions I make here.
Overall, it was a good chapter that needs some work, can't wait for the next chapter. Happy writing ^_^
Thank you for your feedback! I plan on having more of Dragon's memories to come into the light and I kind of intentionally used the words 'corpse' and 'body', because I want to rub it in the reader's face that Dragon is dead (I'm so evil, aren't I?). I'll keep the things you mentioned in mind when writing the next chapter. Once more, thank you for your review!
Hi, DragonNoir. Time for another review!
Starting by addressing the author's note, I'd say that this part of the story is anything but boring. It might not be as full on and action-packed at other chapters (though it's still pretty dramatic!) but I think it's a good idea to have some calmer moments between the huge conflicts. Constant drama tires the reader out.
So, in short, don't worry about this chapter being boring.
Glad to see some interaction between Fox and Jane, and especially intrigued to see Jane unravelling to the point that she kills an unarmed man. I'm looking forward to seeing the consequences of this rescue, as I can only assume that it will have big repercussions in regards to Jane's job as an agent. Will they take action against her? Will she go fully rogue? I'm excited to find out.
I'm quite disappointed that Alice has been killed off so quickly, as I feel like she was barely in the story at all. I think I mentioned in an earlier review that I would've liked an extra chapter to explore Alice and Dragon's time in confinement, and her death only strengthens that wish from me, because there's never going to be another opportunity to get to know her character.
Anyway, general points aside I'll go into the nitpicky part of the review. Here we go.
I'm not so fond of the bit in bold. It's telling writing, something we can infer from Fox's actions, and it slows the scene down. If you deleted it and just went straight into 'she ran up to her' then I think it might be better.
Again, this is unnecessary. 'Ran' already conveys speed. If you want to convey more speed, maybe try for a different verb, something like 'lunged' or 'dashed' or 'raced'.
As opposed to the floor above her?
I feel like if Alice was hurled hard enough to break through bars and almost break through a wall, she'd be dead before she even hit the ground. Unless she has super resilience, but I don't know enough about Alice's capabilities to determine whether this is unrealistic or not.
DragonNoir. I'm sure you know what I'm about to say by now. No full stops in dialogue followed by a reporting clause! You get it right here:
But you have to apply that rule to all your dialogue. Go through it systematically in your editing, making sure there are no capitalised "she"s or "he"s or "they"s and that there are no full stops before reporting clauses. You have to be vigilant before it becomes automatic.
These are comma splices. A comma splice is when two independent clauses are connected by a comma when they should be connected by a full stop, semi-colon, or connective. You can read about fixing comma splices here, but in the case of these examples, just swap out the commas for full stops.
Deplorable? While it might be a blunder, I'm not sure it's a mistake worthy of moral condemnation. 'Deplorable' tends to describe something shameful, so I don't think it's that well suited to describe someone accidentally making eye contact with a guard.
Tense slippage. You're writing in past tense, so it should be 'surrendered'.
I know Jane is unravelling in this chapter, but even so it seems a bit odd that she wouldn't notice the distinction between stealing a boat to rescue someone and literally murdering an unarmed man. Even if she felt justified in killing him, I can't really see why she'd act like stealing a boat was just as deplorable.
There's something implacably odd about this bit of dialogue. It just seems a strange thing to say, especially given that, by wanting to search for them, Fox is making it clear that she doesn't think they're dead. If Jane said something like 'do you really think they survived?' it would make more sense to me, because she'd be questioning the sense of searching for them. But asking if she thinks they're dead is just a bit odd in this context.
I like how this references back to the earlier chapter. It's an effective end.
All in all, a good chapter. Most of my points were just nitpicky this time, which is a good thing. Nitpicks are easily fixed. However, I do urge you to pay close attention to your dialogue in future chapters, because I've pointed out those issues in multiple reviews and fixing them will add more polish to your writing.
Always looking forward to the next chapter! You know, I don't think I've followed any other YWS work as avidly as this one.
Keep writing!
~Pan
Thanks for your feedback! I'm sorry for messing up with the full stops before a reporting clause, don't kill me please lol. I'll try to improve my vocabulary too. I'm glad you like the story so much! Don't worry, I have plenty of drama and character development coming up
It's fine, don't worry about it haha! Eagerly anticipating the drama and character development.