Prologue

by firevithral

Published May 7, 2011

Jimmy ran.

There wasn't a whole lot of options as to where he could run. He could either dash out the door in an amazing act of stupidity and die a heroic and brave death, or he could turn on his heel and flee out the exit.

He chose the exit.

He heard a gunshot near him. He kept running. A bullet whipped past his face. Something fell on his back from above, stopping him temporarily. Whatever it was, it snagged in his long, heavy black cloak. He ripped it off, now not caring if they saw him. He needed to get away from the building.

He heard a shout of surprise from the shooter of the bullet. Jimmy didn't care. He madly raced ahead. He could make it. He had to. He-

BOOM!

Right behind a strange, snow-white mutant being whose only hope against detection was discarded on the ground under a rock, a building exploded.

Comments & reviews · 5
User avatar
kaitlyn
Review
kaitlyn wrote a review Review · Sep 21, 2021

Good Morning/Afternoon/Evening/Night(whichever one it is in your part of the world),

Hi! I'm here to leave a quick review!!

Anyway let's get right to it,

Jimmy ran.

There wasn't a whole lot of options as to where he could run. He could either dash out the door in an amazing act of stupidity and die a heroic and brave death, or he could turn on his heel and flee out the exit.

He chose the exit.


Well, I'm already loving this start cause not only do we have a fun undertone of humor going on there, with almost a bit of a jab at how situation like this tend to go down in most books or movies, it also seems like our protagonist here is someone that can think logically and smartly and knows when they can't do anything about a situation and hence must run away in order to live to fight another day. It certainly gives you some hope as a reader...and overall, this start here works wonders to get our attention here, not just with things being in the midst of an action scene, but also with this little decision made by Jimmy here.

He heard a gunshot near him. He kept running. A bullet whipped past his face. Something fell on his back from above, stopping him temporarily. Whatever it was, it snagged in his long, heavy black cloak. He ripped it off, now not caring if they saw him. He needed to get away from the building.

He heard a shout of surprise from the shooter of the bullet. Jimmy didn't care. He madly raced ahead. He could make it. He had to. He-

BOOM!

Right behind a strange, snow-white mutant being whose only hope against detection was discarded on the ground under a rock, a building exploded.


Oooh, this turned into a proper action scene towards the end there, and despite the best efforts made by Jimmy here, it looks their still certainly getting fired at with plenty of bullets there as they try to run off. This makes for a pretty fun little action sequence there. You've done a pretty decent job of capturing the action there.

The ending was also super mysterious. We have some sort of explosion and a description of some kind of strange mutant creature...which well...kind of comes out of nowhere, but I'm also not complaining cause it adds on some mystery to the already awesome action here and I'm loving it. Overall, this makes for a pretty satisfying start to a story here. :D

Aaaaand that's it for this one.

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

Stay Safe
Harry

User avatar
silentpages
Review
silentpages wrote a review Review · May 9, 2011

"He could either dash out the door in an amazing act of stupidity and die a heroic and brave death, or he could turn on his heel and flee out the exit.
He chose the exit."
Where does the stupidity-door lead to? Why would he die automatically by going that way? And isn't the exit also a door? Couldn't it also be described as 'the way he'd come in'?

"Something fell on his back from above, stopping him temporarily." No! Dude, don't stop! You're being shot at! Falter, or nearly trip. Break your stride. Something. But keep running.
;)

"Whatever it was, it snagged in his long, heavy black cloak. He ripped it off, now not caring if they saw him." Oh, so is the snagged thing physically stopping him from running? Like a giant fish hook, and they're reeling him in? :/ To be honest, I'm not entirely sure what this snaggy thing is supposed to be. I also don't know why he would care if they saw him, though I'm assuming it has something to do with keeping his identity a secret...
This just goes to show that long back cloaks - while very stylish and epic-looking - are not very practical in actioney situations, no matter how cool the swirling fabric looks.

"Right behind a strange, snow-white mutant being whose only hope against detection was discarded on the ground under a rock, a building exploded" Ooooh! So he's a mutant, and that's why he doesn't want to be detected! Anyway, this line is a little wordy, and it took me a second to realize that the mutant was him (unrelated to the story, but I can't get the image of an abominable snowman out of my head. XD). Maybe make this a bit more clear?

Question: How did a rock fall from the sky and 'snag' on the cloak? And why did the building behind him blow up? Who blew it up? The people chasing him (in which case they just blew up their own building), or the people who sent him (if he was sent by somebody), or some other third party with access to explosives?

After he goes outside, I'd like a little more information on what kind of area they're in. Is it a populated area, with lots of startled civilians around? Or is it a desolate swatch of land in the desert, where nobody will notice the explosion right away?

This is a bit short, but it's just a prologue, so that might not be bad. Maybe you should just elaborate on a couple more things, like the setting stuff I mentioned above (I'm still not really sure what kind of building this was, or what exactly the other door would have led him to. Why did he come to this building in the first place?) It caught my attention pretty well (explosions and mutants are always good. ;) ) and like other people said, I think my biggest problem is that it ended too quickly. :)

Keep writing! ^^

User avatar
snoopysoap
Review
snoopysoap wrote a review Review · May 8, 2011

hey this is really good although it is a bit short, but some people enjoy short prologues!
i really want to find out more! this is actually really interesting i want to know more but there is none! O.o keep writting, expand on it. keep me posted!

pm me if need a review

Soap :thud:

User avatar
Snoink
Review
Snoink wrote a review Review · May 8, 2011

Yay! Your story had explosions in it. Every story should have an explosion in it! :D

Anyway, you have this really exciting beginning! But, it still seems very unfinished and it's unclear where this prologue is leading us to. Not that this is a bad thing... quite honestly, I like action-packed stories! No, your main problem is that it's too short, which is a very good problem to have! Delve in it a bit more and don't afraid to expand. What does he do after the building explodes? Does it hurt him? Does he die?

What about the people shooting at him? Maybe they'll stop once the building explodes, if they don't want other people to notice... since you kind of have to notice an exploded building! Maybe they get an idea from the exploding building, so they decide to explode other things around him... always a neat idea! So, there could be even more explosions! And I don't know about you, but explosions pretty much make a story for me!

So, definitely see what you can do with this and definitely expand on it! It'll be awesome. :)

User avatar
Lollipopper
Review
Lollipopper wrote a review Review · May 7, 2011

Hey firevirthral, I am really liking your avvie! Is it a phoenix? I love phoenixes.

Okay, I actually really liked this. It gave just enough information to leave the reader satisfied with your writing but unsatisfied with how much you gave--they'll want more.
Honestly, I can't really pick out anything other than that your sentences are either really choppy and short, or really long and leave you out of breath. It's good to have variation, but you need some middle-length sentences to balance the entire feel of the writing out. It's not needed but it could help the writing a tad bit.

Thanks for sharing! Sorry if this wasn't much help...looks like you don't need much anyway!:) If you ever need a review, just ask.

--Lollipopper



You can't blame the writer for what the characters say.
— Truman Capote