The world stopped spinning, and Verona could feel solid ground underneath her again. Her eyes were still screwed shut, and she was half-dazed with pain from the shock, but the cold, hard stone she lay on told her that Lani had succeeded. They were here. Wherever ‘here’ was. She cracked one eye open, but the landscape was shrouded in darkness. She couldn’t see anything.
Verona didn’t have the strength to sit up, so she lay where she had fallen. Spikes of pain stabbed down her spine, her whole body shuddering with each one. The sound of wind whistling against the rocks was drifting in and out like a badly tuned radio. All Verona wanted to do was lay there and sleep, but wasn’t there something she had to do? The thought eluded her, and she sank deeper into the sea between consciousness and dreams.
Dimly, she heard the whoosh of hydraulics nearby. Footsteps and voices followed, and suddenly there were people all around her, talking in loud, urgent voices and flashing bright lights around. Why couldn’t they just leave her alone? She was so tired…
A pair of strong hands lifted her gently and carried her inside, where it was much warmer. She felt herself being laid on a bed. The soft pillows and sheets felt like heaven. Something pierced her arm, and she cried out weakly, but a moment later the spikes of pain ceased, and Verona drifted into sleep.
--
Waking up was a slow, luxurious process. When Verona finally broke through into full consciousness, she remembered her friend’s plight.
“Lani!” she cried, and tried to sit up, only to find that she had been strapped tightly to the bed. She looked around the room anxiously. It was a white, sterile room with no windows. A few dozen beds lined the walls, and to her right Verona could see a large door overlooking the room. It seemed to be some sort of hospital. Most of the beds were unoccupied, but some of them had curtains drawn around them. Verona assumed it was for privacy purposes. There were no curtains around her bed.
Another, smaller door on the side opened and a middle-aged, stout woman came hurrying through, carrying a techpad and looking harried.
“Ah, good, you’re awake,” the woman said. “Just in time for the evening initiation. I’m the head doctor here, by the way. You can call me Yenene.” She tapped something on the techpad.
“Where’s Lani? Is she all right? The police shot her – at least, I think it was them, I couldn’t see – we were in the Room.” The words tumbled out of Verona in a rush.
“Agent Lani is fine,” the woman said soothingly. “You arrived late last night by base time. She was moved to the main ward early this morning, after her condition was stabilized. After that, it was a simple matter of closing up the wound.”
Verona closed her eyes and sent a quick prayer of thanks to Nirvana. “What happened to me?” she asked. “What did they hit me with?”
“It was a stun gun – I’m sure you’ve heard of them. Normally, they’ll knock you out almost instantly. They’re usually safe, if a bit painful, but because you were in the Room it didn’t work, and it started to trigger a seizure.” Yenene shook her head in disapproval. “They really should know better. I’m sure they meant only to capture you, but thanks to incompetence they nearly managed to make a better job of killing you than they did of Lani. Laser wounds are easy to fix, but if we hadn’t had that antidote for the seizures, you wouldn’t be laying there now.”
Verona was stunned. Had she really been that close to death?
After a moment, she spoke again. “Why did they shoot Lani?” she asked. “Neither of us had done anything – we didn’t even know they were there.”
The woman shrugged, not looking directly at Verona. “Who knows? One of the officers probably panicked at seeing a fully-geared agent escaping with their prisoner.”
Verona wasn’t quite sure she believed Yenene. “Why am I tied down?” she asked suspiciously.
“Oh – you were thrashing around because of the seizures. We had to strap you down in order to administer the antidote.” The older woman had returned to her techpad and was focusing intently on her work.
“Then why am I still strapped down?” Verona challenged.
Yenene looked up from her work and sighed. “To be quite frank, you’re a security risk. You haven’t gone through any of the processing that new recruits normally go through. We haven’t even searched you properly yet. There were extenuating circumstances, yes, but now that you’re recovered you aren’t allowed to leave this room without an escort, which should be on their way here right now.”
She checked a timepiece on the wall. “I’ve got to get back to work.” Bustling back into her office, she left Verona with nothing to do but lie there and hope her escort came quickly. Couldn’t Doctor Yenene have at least let walk around the room a bit? She tried to unbuckle herself, but although the buckles didn’t have locks, they were all out of her reach.
Barely two minutes later, the doors whooshed open, and a tall, middle-aged man with a shrewd look walked in. He glanced around the room as if he was looking for somebody.
“Doctor Yenene’s in her office,” Verona said.
He jumped a little – apparently he had not noticed her. “Are you the newbie?” He looked Verona up and down with a critical eye. “I thought you were injured?”
Verona started to explain, but the man brushed her off. “It doesn’t really matter, as long as you’re fine now. Anyway, I’m here to take you to do the recruit procedures. I’ll be interviewing you to make sure you are who you say you are.” He opened the office door and poked his head in.
Well, that was rude, Verona thought. I hope I don’t have to deal with him much.
After a moment of conversation, he withdrew from the doorway and returned to Verona. Without further ado, he started unbuckling her restraints. He had just finished the ones on her wrists when Verona stopped him.
“I can do the rest myself, thanks,” she said coldly.
When she was done, she swung her legs over the side of the bed, steeled herself, and stood up. The room swam, and Verona clutched the bed for support, but the spell passed.
“Sure you can handle it?” the man asked.
“I’m fine.” Verona said.
“Then come with me.”
Verona didn’t want to go anywhere with this rude man, and she didn’t really want to be questioned and put through processing. What would they ask her? What if she didn’t make the cut? But she followed him anyway.
[b]A/N:[/b] This chapter was originally going to be longer and actually have important stuff happen, but it just didn't work out. I'll probably end up cutting a lot of it.
End of chapter
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140,665 Literary Works • 673,584 Reviews
Hello! I missed this chapter while I was abroad! :O
General thoughts.
This chapter serves as a nice transition from the action of when they got out to what I'm assuming will be more action in the next part. I didn't have strong feelings of either like or dislike about it, it's just there. I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing because you may not want a big jump between their escape and what happens when they get to the destination. I might have more thoughts about this after I read the next Verona scene. You might be able to play around with telling a recap of this scene in the next scene instead of showing us this scene.
I've mentioned this in previous chapters, but I would still like more feeling. What's going through Verona's mind in this room? Is she scared? Annoyed? Angry? Apprehensive? Regretting her decision? Worried? Show us that.
The other thing I wasn't quite sure about was this guy at the end. I don't understand why she writes him off as rude so quickly. I get that he brushes her off and doesn't seem to care much (or at all) about her well-being, but that seems a little minor compared to her reaction. I'd like a little more of her emotions or thought processes about this. Is she so emotionally spent from her ordeal that she just can't handle this guy? Does he remind her of someone that did something similar? Does she expect to be treated differently? (If so, how?)
Specific thoughts.
Now this might be my own problem because it's been a little while since I read the Verona scene that took place before this one, but I don't remember Verona being shot with anything. I remember that Lani was, but not Verona. This confused me later in this chapter too when she was being treated, but oh well
This sentence started to get long for me. All of the commas got a little confusing.
I love these short, snappy sentences. I would almost set them apart even more by making this its own paragraph and then starting a new paragraph with "She cracked..."
I liked this whole paragraph and the description of where she is, but there is too much repetition of "room" for my taste.
Remind me who "they" are.
Same here.
I liked this. The woman isn't looking at her which is sort of fishy and then Verona confirms that maybe there's more than meets the eye here.
You left out a word here - "...let her walk around...
Slashed because I think it's an unnecessary detail.
It seems a little obvious that that's what he's doing.
What's his reaction to this?
I think you could weave these thoughts in throughout and give us more of them and more of her feelings.
I feel like they have to take her, right? She's come this far!
Hola, happy review day.
Since I'm assuming said escort is a person, who would be the correct word.So, I haven't read the previous chapters, which understandibly left me a little confused at the beginning. I thought this was a fantasy novel because it sounded like she was waking up in some new location. That doesn't seam to be the case, but I would like to know how they got there. Did Lani drag her there? But I think Lani was shot so how could she do that? Maybe these questions were answered in the previous chapter but if not I'd look iunto clarifying that.
I think my other problem is that I thought she was there by herself, but since the hospital/agency thing picked up Lani as well I'm guessing Lani was there with her on the beach. It might be a good idea to reference that. At least have her mention that there was another body by the ocean, maybe even mention the blood. It'll up the stakes on that scene if we think Lani is dying, which is always a good thing. In a writing sense.
I have another question. It sounds like Verona didn't know where Lani was taking here, simply that she was being taken somewhere. And when she wakes up she doesn't seam to know where she is, or why she's strapped down. Yet when the doctor walks in, she automatically assumes this is where she's supposed to be and that these are the people Lani was trying to take her too. Just seams to me like she takes this all in a little too easily considering she doesn't have any reason to trust these people. Maybe she could grill the doctor a little more to get more information about where she is? The doctor doesn't have to give it to her, and that struggle would add another element on conflict. Just an idea.
I have one little grammar nitpick:
Anyway, it looks like some exciting things have already happened in your story, prison breaks and gun shots, and your main character is about to join some secret world of spies and agents and stuff. Looks like it'll be a party.
Thanks for sharing!
-Art
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If you had read the previous part, nearly all your questions would be answered. I might have Verona grill the doctor more, though. Thanks for the review!
Hi there, Meandbooks! RagingLive here to offer a review from Team Tardis!
First of all, you have wonderful details here and some good imagery. I do want to warn you though, that I haven't read your other chapters, so this will be a review based purely on what I know from this chapter.
You've already mentioned 'spikes of pain' and this feel repetitious and monotonous. I understand if you were trying to offer the same analogy to make it consistent, but judging from your previous similes and comparisons I don't think that repeating this phrase does your novel justice.
Yenene has just mentioned that the police used a stun gun on Verona in the previous paragraph, so this is a bit coincidental. Or maybe it's just me. Still, I would suggest that you say something like:
"Verona was dumbfounded." or "Verona opened her mouth, but nothing came out."
I, too, would like to see a bit more emotion coming from Verona. Also, like Dustbunny14 said, you might want to make passing reference to the fact that she either does or does not know where she is. You did have wonderful imagery, like I said, and hopefully if I get more time, I'd love to read more of this novel!
Keep writing and keep on smiling!!
~RagingLive
Hmm, yeah, it's complicated because she knows she's in the rebel base, but she doesn't know where that base is. I probably should mention that.
Thanks for the review!
One more chapter part and I'm all caught up! I don't have much to say about this one because it's small and perfect, but I'll give it a go!
I adore the first section of this chapter, the part before the "-" thingy. It was so well-written! I could feel Verona's pain and dullness so clearly. You did a great job describing the scene with hardly any sight involved at all: your readers could hear the wind and the hydraulics and feel Verona's anguish.
Your readers are smart. They can assume that just as well.
A little nitpick.
The guy didn't really seem rude to me. I would have emphasized his rudeness more; maybe tell us what his facial features are like and what expressions he's making, so that the reader and Verona can share in our dislike of him. I don't like that Verona described him as "this rude man" because that's pretty much telling the reader, "I'm the MC and I think this character is rude. So you should think that too!" What does this guy look like, at least? Does he have black eyes? Icy blue eyes? Green eyes the color of envy? Make me dislike this guy! And of course, to begin with, he could have said things that were actually a little more rude. Read back at what he said. He honestly seems fine to me.
For example, look at his word choice: "Are you the newbie?" That's a pretty friendly word. Now, if he had said, "You the new kid?" or something like that, things would be different.
I like your consistency with the time period. Instead of having the urge to say, "She checked the clock on the wall" (which is something I'd totally do), you changed it to "timepiece." Nice.
So far, my impression about the Absolutionists is that they're efficient and organized. They have their own little underground hospital (or at least I suppose it's underground - theoretically or literally) and special recruiting procedures. The two characters - three, counting Lani - that we've met clearly aren't the warm and fuzzy type, but they don't seem all too bad. I'm looking forward to the next chapter so I can get a better impression on these guys. Hopefully Verona will be happier soon, because right now she just seems annoyed.
Keep up the great writing, Youandnovels!
Hey hey hey! Dustbunny here for a review! Now before I get any farther let me just say that this is the first time for me seeing one of your chapters, but i wanted to do my best to review because once you get so far in a story it's sometimes hard to get people to read but that being said if anything I have to say conflicts with the overall story and plot, then just ignore me.
Anyway as far as this little bit by itself goes, one thing I wanted to point out was description. When Verona wakes up, the impression that I get just from this chapter is that something pretty traumatic happened. She got tazed and her friend got shot, but I just don't get much emotional description from Verona. I do however understand if you were going for numbness, like, she doesn't feel anything. Which is fine, maybe just point out she doesn't feel anything.
Also as far as description goes, I don't know where she's at, then again maybe she doesn't know where she's at either, so maybe a little setting description would be nice.
The dialogue seemed pretty realistic so you get a plus for that, but again, the only emotion I get from Verona is when she starts getting worried about Lani, but even then seemed a little numb.
I will say, and this is just me when you wrote "And Without further ado..." That just threw me off XD it feels a little out of place with the rest of the chapter. Like she just woke up, her friend was injured, she just got tazed and had seizures... See what i'm saying? The narration should always keep the atmosphere which just threw me off.
And without further ado... (Lol) Great chapter! Like i said, haven't read all of it, but this little bit did intrigue me, also I wasn't going to really comment on the ending because i didn't know if their would be another part or what, but it felt anti-climactic so maybe check that out when you finish. Otherwise good job!