Chapter 1
David Echoe
17 year old Rick O'Brian, looked at the small black chest sitting on the ground in front of him. He wiped a mixture of sweat and dirty cave water off his forehead and took a quick look at his surroundings, he had found a small opening into a large cliff face and decided to follow it, the small tunnel eventually led him into a larger 7 by 8 foot circular room, the roof of the cave angled inwards giving the whole thing an egg shape. Rick tentatively touched the gold lined box in front of him, it was only about the size of his mom's jewelry box but when he tried to pull it towards him it felt like moving a cinder block. He looked at the box expecting there to be a lock of some sort that guarded whatever was inside, but there was none, with trembling fingers he put a hand on each side of the lid and started to open it when-
BOOM!!! With a flash of black light, the black box started shaking, the lid bouncing up and down, Rick dropped his flashlight in surprise and in the light he saw black shapes shoot out of the box, the darkness in the room slowly started to eat away the light. Rick was too shocked to scream or do anything, he turned and crawled out of the cave as quickly as possible.
Suddenly a loud shriek sounded behind him making his ears ring.
“AAAAAA!!” Rick yelled, he was scared, he crawls in a cave finds a box and now the box is shooting out black light! He saw the light at the end of the tunnel and crawled as fast as he could inside the small space; he was almost out of the tunnel when he felt a cold tentacle wrap around his leg and drag him back in. Rick screamed again quickly grabbing the outside edge of the tunnel, he was so close to freedom.
“Hello.” Rick stopped being scared for just long enough to wonder who was telling him “hello” As he was being pulled into a cave by some creature. He looked up and saw a young guy about his age, David tipped his dark red baseball hat that had a lightning bolt on the front.
“My names David. Would you like some help?” David asked just looking at him.
“Yes! I Want Help!” Rick yelled panicking he let go of the ledge and tried to grab the guy who was just sitting there watching him struggle against whatever was trying to drag him back into the cave.
Letting go was a bad move, but David caught him by the forearm just as Rick was about to be pulled in. It was just like in a movie Rick thought, it was like he almost fell off the cliff but somebody caught him at exactly the right moment.
“Whoa!” David yelped, Rick was jerked further into the cave , Dragging David with him.
“Some help you offer!!” Rick yelled accusingly. David did the best he could to shrug, but it was kind of hard to do while being dragged through a small cave.
“I didn't know it was this strong.” He replied casually, if Rick hadn't wasn't so scared at the time he would have almost thought that David was perfectly comfortable with the situation.
“Uh Oh!” David yelled “Not Cool! Not Cool!”
“Whats wrong!” Rick asked all of a sudden afraid that something bad was going on, was David about to get eaten by some monster? At that point anything seemed possible.
“These are my new pants!” David groaned “I like,bought them yesterday!”
Rick frowned, this was probably the weirdest day ever, he was worried about getting eaten alive and David was worried about his new pants.
Then whatever had been dragging them stopped, the cold grip on his leg disappeared and there was a loud hissing noise filling the “Egg” cave that Rick had found the box in. The creature had just pulled them back to the starting point. David let go of Rick's arm and hopped up he casually walked over and picked up the heavy black box.
“Be careful.” Rick warned still laying on the ground “It's heavy.” David shook the box and then tossed it at Rick.
“Watch it!” Rick screamed rolling out of the way “That thing ways a ton!”
“Dude, it's empty.” David said rubbing his eyes “Why would I throw a thousand pound box at you?” He paused for a minute as if wondering why he would throw a heavy box at somebody “Wait, bad question, I have several reasons, none of which matter by the way.”
Rick wanted to beat his head against the hard stone wall, this guy was a nut job, but he still needed to get out of the cave.
“Wait,” Rick said questions forming “It's not heavy?” He knelt down and picked up the small box, this time it actually felt like a black box and not a concrete block.
“It's empty.”David said examining the smooth curving walls “Whatever was in there is out now.”
“So we can leave now?” Rick asked eager to get back home as fast as possible. David nodded his head but kept his focus on the walls. Rick picked up his flashlight and shined it at the wall, the circle of light that normally came out of the flashlight now looked like cookie that had a big bite out of it. He tried to clean off whatever dirt was keeping his flashlight from shining properly, but there was none, he checked the bulb but everything.
“Oh, that's cool!” David said looking at the light “It seems to me that whatever you just let out of that little black box, is hungry.” Rick had to grip his flashlight or he would have dropped it.
“You're telling me, that THING, ate the light?” Rick asked, all of this was like a wall of water smashing into him.
“Yeah, I guess.” David replied sounding bored. He started to crawl through the cave carrying the box with him, not wanting to be left behind Rick quickly followed.
“Ow” David muttered covering his eyes with his hand, it was about lunch time and the sun was at it's brightest and they had just been in a dark cave. Rick finally got out and started hugging the trees and kissing the grass.
“I'm alive!” He cried, near tears. David just sat down and looked at him curiously.
“What is going on?!” Rick asked feeling really stressed out “What did you figure out? Was there anything on the walls you were looking at?” David laughed.
“No, I was just doing that to look like I actually knew something, which I don't, I know you opened a box and now we got a Shadow on the loose.”
“Shadow?” Rick asked. David threw his hands up in the air.
“I am surround by imbeciles!” He yelled out to no one in particular, “It was a black thingy that looked pretty flat to me, so I guessed I'd call it a Shadow.” David pulled his hat down over his forehead wiping away the sweat then started walking into the woods.
“Where are you going?!” Rick asked suddenly paranoid about every bush, every log, afraid that they might try and drag him into the ground.
"I don't know about you,” David said not stopping “But it's lunchtime and I'm hungry.” Rick decided to follow quietly, he was still pretty psyched out.
David walked through the tropical forest stomping down a trail as he went, for all he knew they might have to go back in the cave and it would help to know which way to go. He took a quick glance back to see if -
“What's your name?” David asked “you never did tell me.”
“Rick.” Was all he got in reply, David nodded in acknowledgment and just continued walking.
“You handled yourself pretty well back there.” David said trying to start up a conversation, which hopefully, would calm Rick down a bit.
“Pretty well?!” Rick asked in a crazed voice “ You say that as if you've done this before.” David cleared his throat.
“Well, I guess you could say it's a hobby of mine.” He said.
“Near death experiences, is a hobby??” Rick asked “Why not golf? Or rugby or something normal?” David shrugged and didn't answer.
"One more question" Rick said trying to keep up with David who moved easily through the dense forest "Why were you in the woods, at, like, exactly the right time?" David laughed.
"I'm an adventurer" He said "most of the time, trouble finds certain people but me, I go looking for it."
The rest of their walk was fairly quiet with only a few words exchanged between them. When they finally made it out of the woods and into a civilized village on the coast David went to the nearest coffee place and Rick went straight towards his house. He didn't bother looking at himself, he knew he was covered in dirt and grime, but Rick didn't care he was alive and that's what mattered. He just walked off, there was no good bye or anything, it was the end it was all over... Right?
Points:
Time spent:
Canary word: Present
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Original Text:
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125,029 Literary Works • 672,774 Reviews
Hey there! Stella here as your reviewer today! Okay so overall I like what you've got going on here!
The first thing I noticed was, naturally, your first line. And honestly it didn't draw me. Because you don't need to give us all that information about Rick at once, and the first line is a good illustration of the rest of the story in terms of "show, don't tell". This is the oldest trick in the reviewer handbook, but it comes in super handy as a writer too!
Basically instead of telling us that your MC is a 17 year old called Rick O'Brien, just show us a boy called Rick. Later on when he has to introduce himself maybe he could mention his last name. When he sees David, maybe he can think about David's age relative to his own- and that's when you tell us he was seventeen. It's the same thing for a lot of this story. Don't just tell us about the room and its dimensions- show it to us through Rick's eyes. How large does he think it is? How does he estimate its size?
You also need to have another readthrough of this- there were a few tense slip ups. Decide if you want to tell the story in past or present tense and stick to it. Also have a look at how to properly punctuate dialogue- Demeter has a great article in our own Knowledge Base. These are both really important things that make your work change from looking unfinished to looking really polished and professional. And that's important whenever you go off to look for agents and publishers etc.
Hope I helped, drop me a note if you need anything!
-Stella x
Hey David!
Browsing through the humor section of works, I stumbled upon your little gem here.
In short, I thought this was excellent!
Took a while to put together what was actually going on, but once I did, I appriciated the relaxed and nonchalant approach to it.
Both your characters are very enjoyable, two sharp contrasts and they have some funny back and forth dialog. Good introduction to them.
You write scenery and backgrounds very well and dialog is fantastic (had a good chuckle at the pants).
Grammar wise, there is nothing much of note I can speak of. There are some commas missing here and there, but otherwise I'd give a top passing grade.
I see that David Echoe is a character you have used before, and a while ago, so I'll probably check that out. Would be interesting to see how your style has changed since you joined YWS
Cheers
Birkhoff
I liked the story, it was really good. But there is something, i think maybe to much happens to soon. How does this other kid no so much about the shadow? And one more question, why didnt Rick ask David why he was in the woods. I love the story so far tho, maybe your leaving all of those questions unanswerd so the reader will be intregued and read on.
Thank you for our view on it. The character David Echoe is actually supposed to be like that, and more will be explained about him further on in the story.