It's funny how quickly a situation can turn from bad to worse. I threw the flashlight behind me, not caring how loud it clattered. Desperately, I pointed the watch in front of me. I was disappointed to find that the watch's dim light only let me see a few feet in front of me, which was horrible compared to the flashlight.
"Just get me out of this place," I whispered to the watch, and crawled onward. Trying to get my mind off of the endless black tunnel, I tried to to think 'happy thoughts'.
"No, I can't sleep in there with you and mom; I have my own room," I had once tried to explain to Johnny. His blue and grey train pajamas had made him look so young and innocent that night.
"But," Johnny's eyes had widened. "Aren't you afraid of the dark?"
"Of course not. What's there to be afraid of?"
"Well, there might be monsters in the closet. Or they could be hiding under your bed!"
"Oh come on Johnny, aren't you a little old to believe that?" He was nearly six now.
"Mommy says that I won't ever be too old for anything."
Now, in the tunnel, I could tell I was lying - and that mom had been right. I was afraid of the dark, and I'm pretty sure I would never be too old for that.
Clang. My knees against the metal started to make noises. Pausing, I knocked on the walls. Clang, clang, clang. It was as if it were another sign - like my voice not echoing, the clanging meant I was getting closer.
I practically ran on my knees forward, until finally, there was nothing but air beneath me. Screaming, I fell to the ground. Rubbing my arm, I stood up. At least I hadn't hit my head on the stupid wall... I shone the green light around the room.
There was a table in the center, a chair or two, and a few shelves lined with supplies along the walls. Other than that, the room was empty. I rested my hand on the table, but immidiatley drew it back.
"Yeesh," I wiped the dust and grime on my pants. "Someone should dust around here." I set the backpack down on the ground, and rubbed my eyes. When something rubbed up against my shoulder, I jumped back. There were probably a lot more things than spiders crawling around in here...
Instead of a creepy crawly insect, it was a long string, like one to an old lightbulb in celllars. As soon as I pulled it, the room was filled with a soft yellow light. Silently thanking Martin, I took off my outer jacket. I wiped off the tables, then the shelves, and finally the chair. Getting a closer look, I could see there were at least thirty more cans of beef and beans, as well as some rope, extra clothes, matches, and a few flashlights. Whoever had created this place must of been planning on staying for a while...
"Okay," I spoke aloud again to keep the little sanity I had left. "First, I'll unpack everything, clean this place up a little bit, then hopefullly find a way out..." Of course going back through the tunnel was an absolute no, and there weren't any other obvious doorways. I purposely saved finding a way out for last so I wouldn't have to worry about it.
I laid the contents of the bag on the now slightly cleaner table. Before I started to clean, I sat down to rest. I picked the knife up out of it's silver casing, and grabbed a can of beef and beans. I jabbed at the can repeatedly till it opened. Even cold, they tasted amazing.
"I could eat you for days," I mumbled through a mouthful of the stuff. After I finished, I drank some of the water left from the bottle. Letting out a sigh, I glanced at the watch. 1:35. But who knows what day it was. I don't even know if I remember what day I entered the tunnel. Friday night maybe? Saturday morning? Who knew?
"Whatever day it is," I muttered, "I have to get out of here." Hopping up from the chair, I felt along the walls. They were a smooth metal, not unlike the walls in the tunnel. There were no crevices, no secret books on the bookshelf, or buttons on the wall. It was just as it was - a room. A room filled to the brim with beef and beans, that is.
"Well, what a help the safe room has been up till now," I spat out the words, hoping the room would somehow hear me and open up a door out. I finally came to the conclusion that the room wasn't a magical one, and I'd have to find someway to pass the time until Martin got here. He had said he was going to meet me in the tunnel, right?
Organizing the cans of beef and beans took about five minutes. There were twenty six in all, so probably enough for ten to thirteen days, at the most. I soon discovered there was more to just the other supplies than I orginally thought. Buried under the piles of ropes were a couple of notebooks and pens. Behind the extra clothes were a few bottles of room-temperature water, and next to the flashlights and matches was another watch.
"Now both of my wrists will be able to watch where they're going," I yelled to myself as I snapped it on my other wrist. It was really a horrible pun, yet I still managed to waste another five minutes laughing at my own joke.
After that, I grabbed a pair of shorts and the smallest t-shirt there was. After putting it all on, I discovered the shirt was still way too big; maybe one or two sizes. I pulled the hairbands out of my hair, and tied one around the tail end of the shirt, tightening it.
"Inventive," I muttered as I pulled my hair back up with the remaining rubber band. Now that I at least had some fresh clothes on, I could think a little clearer. "Alright, I need to get the backpack ready in case I need to leave in a hurry." I slid my old folded clothes as well as another pair into the bottom of the bag. Next came two of the water bottles, one can of beef and beans, and then the rope. Nothing else could fit in the main pocket, so I stuffed the flashlight, matches, and dagger back into the side pockets. Zipping it up, I smiled to myself.
"You're actually getting somewhere, Magdeline West." Looking around the room, I felt a lot better. All I had to do was add my bed, and a few posters, and then this place would be my room! Except you're missing your mother, and brother. The little voice inside my head always knew how to bring a good mood down.
End of chapter
Continue to next chapter Blotted Out - Chapter 3.2Points:
Time spent:
IP address:
Canary word: Present
Possible AI signals:
Original Text:
Are you sure you want to delete this comment? This cannot be undone.
Mark this comment as a review? Points will be awarded to the poster.
Your comment was posted, but it wasn’t long enough to count as a review. Reviews need about four complete sentences (at least 250 characters). Try writing another review that explains your thoughts in more detail — the author will appreciate it, and you’ll earn points for it.
139,448 Literary Works • 672,565 Reviews
Okay, so. For once, I'm going to start with the positives! I like all the detail you're putting in. As someone who struggles with that a lot, I always admire when others don't have that problem. Also, there's just enough humor in this to lessen the darkness.
Finally, Maggie's shoes are blue and silver, and now you're saying that Johnny's pajamas are, too? I don't know if you intended this or not, but I get the feeling those colors are going to be important......
But there were still some syntactic errors.
1. The "clang"s should be italicized.
2. I don't have time to go and find the exact quotes, but I think you misspell "immediately" again at one point, and at another point, there's a tense switch.
I have to say that your use of descriptions is very good, quite vivid in their execution. I can really get the feeling of being in the tunnel and the room as you describe everything using only the light from a small watch. Having had to do that before myself I know how hard it can be to try and see something using such a dim light.
My only real trouble with this was that I don't get that sense of fear that your main character says that they feel. They mention it more as a passing thought than actually being afraid of something. How is the character feeling? You have put a great amount of detail into what the character sees and what they touch but very little on how they feel on the outside. When you are doing a first person perspective we only have that one character's perceptions and feelings to go off of. It can be slightly difficult to remember that we need to know this character's emotions and their physical reactions to those emotions. For instance if we know that the main character is afraid then they might be able to hear their own heartbeat in their ears. I know that this is sort of over used in the case of fear, but it really does push the point of fear.
Other then that I want to say that I thought you did an amazing job here. I look forward to reading more.
Happy Writing!
See you later tunnel! Won't miss you.
I also don't have any suggestions nor critiques, other than to say that I agree with @Skins when they said that the switch between the flashback and the present should be more prominent--at first I was a little confused at the initial switch, again though, it is rather late. 
)
Well, I didn't find any grammatical or spelling mistakes, but that doesn't mean there aren't any. It's late, so my brain isn't all that attentive at the moment, sorry about that.
For some reason I feel like I should mention that I'm enjoying Maggie a lot more now, not that I disliked her before, of course. I was very amused at the times she was talking to herself.
I laughed at that pun.Totally didn't laugh at the pun, though.Yes, yes I am 8.(Nice work, Snazzy. <3
You posted this at the perfect time for me because before now I was watching Japanese K-Pop make-up tutorials on youtube while snacking on an entire packet of breath mints for no reason whatsoever (aka, I was insanely bored and had nothing to do).
After reading this extract, I'm 99% sure I'm going to be even more useless than usual. Oops.
Maggie finally found the end of the tunnel, yay! I can't help but wonder where on earth she must be now, in terms of location. I she still in her town/village/city? Has she crawled so far that she's no longer there? Is going back through the tunnel the only way out? So many questions! But it's good, I like me some meaty questions. I remember you saying Martin may be a little shady, too, so I'm curious to find out more about that. You had small bits of humour in this part, which I was very fond of. Your humour in all of the chapters so far has been really well done actually, and I don't think I've mentioned that yet, so yeah... a job well done! It's not in-your-face, obvious stuff, but subtle jokes here and there. I like it! As always, a really nice piece of writing overall.
One quick suggestion before I move on: this would feel a bit cleaner if you separated the present and the flashback scene more clearly. I can tell where it begins and ends (I'm not quite that dumb), but if you insert a symbol of some kind at the beginning and end of it, I just think it would feel a bit smoother. Nothing dramatic, just a hashtag or something (#). That's what I always use, and I remember reading that's what publishers like at some point in my mess of a life.
So! I don't know if this is just me being fussy/weird, but I kind of want Maggie to be more paranoid about everything. Throughout all the tunnel scenes, she never really looks back and considers what is happening (so to speak). If I was her, I'd have several moments where I'd wonder if I was turning crazy as I trudged through the narrow, black tunnel that goes on for literally hours. I'd start questioning things, too. For example, even without you mentioning Martin's potential shadiness, if I were Maggie I'd start pondering over the possibility of him not being completely straight with her. I'd wonder why he seemed to want to protect me so badly, why he had this in the first place, how he knows about those silver tattoo guys e.t.c. In a way, I suppose I'm saying I want Maggie to be more worried. She's worried about her family, which is awesome, but I want her to be more worried about her current situation. Does that make sense?
Something else that has bothered me a little is that these tunnel scenes do feel like they've gone on for quite a while... I realise this is only the beginning of the 3rd chapter, and maybe this is purely because you've posted the chapters in fragments, but it has felt like the tunnel has dragged (for lack of a better word) a little. It's not necessarily because you've focused so much time on it, but that all of the different extracts of this scene you've posted have been quite similar i.e. it taking ages, Maggie feeling fed up, worrying about mum and brother e.t.c. I remember suggesting you delve deeper into Maggie's life during this scene, and I think doing something like that would fix this issue. This isn't a proper critique, really, more like something to bear in mind when editing in the future!
The only other thing I'm questioning is the ease of entering this tunnel/room. Unless I'm just a confused mess, Maggie fell into the room through the tunnel, right? It seems oddly easy. What I mean by this is that it's not very secure at all, and as the purpose of this room is to keep people safe, it seems a bit odd. I mean, if someone comes across this tunnel there's no way for Maggie (or whoever would be inside) to stop them from entering the room. I don't want a retina scanner or anything, but for it to literally be a case of just walking (well, falling) straight in seems kind of strange. I realise entering the tunnel itself is a bit of a challenge, but these dudes with silver tattoos seem like they'd be able to find a way. It's just something to consider, anywho
Me being a whiny little swine aside, I'm still very much into this story. I know I say this in every review, but I really do look forward to finding out how Maggie's path will cross with the runaway experiment's. This story remains very unpredictable, which I love, and I look forward to finding out what exactly is going on, who these silver tattoo guys are, what the deal is with Martin e.t.c. There are a lot of questions that are truly keeping me hooked on this, so yay for that! As always, just let me know if you've got any questions or comments regarding anything here.
Keep writing,
xoxo Skins