To Whomever,
I didn’t hesitate even for an instant once I had Corrine by the throat. Something in me just snapped and I could suddenly feel every ounce of pent up frustration swelling out of me. It seemed she was the ideal target for all of rage. She was my doppelganger, my mirror image adorned in white wings and labeled as the better of our two halves because of it.
I’ve spent time wondering: Which is good and which is evil? Is there even a difference? Are we simply predisposed to become one or the other, or is there something else that effects or position in the universe?
I need to know.
Respectfully Yours,
Nala
P.S. She wasn’t all that great of an angel anyway.
Nala folded the note up carefully and pressed it into Corrine’s lifeless hand.
They would come for her. She had broken the Angel’s Creed, the only laws she was obligated to obey and for that, the only punishment was disposal. They would pull her thread from the tapestry of life and feed it to the fire so that it would never be woven into existence again.
The scene around the body was set in crimson, blood pooling into the cracks in the sidewalk. The knife had run a single sleek line, passing through Corrine’s dainty neck.
Nala wondered if she had perhaps killed a part of herself.
There was evil in her, of that, she had no doubt. But there was hope and faith shining even brighter. The Angel of Death had murdered the Angel of Deliverance. Could a soul such as hers ever be forgiven?
Who knows?
She looked down once more at her doppelganger before lifting off the ground and disappearing. They could try to catch her, but she was going to put up a fight. Until then, she was hoping for the best.
Lily's Notes: This is the last of a three part short story for BigBadBear's "What is Evil and Good?" Contest. The whole point of this short story is to explore my definition of good and evil through the actions of my rather conflicted Nala. You can find the first two parts up above.
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Time spent:
Canary word: Present
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125,029 Literary Works • 672,775 Reviews
WOW!! I wouldn't have thought it would end like this. OMG. Shocker. But is really good.
How about you write on, like I don't know, a few parts more? I mean its really good, and i absolutely enjoyed it. I even told my friends about it, and that I really liked it.
But one thing. You skipped the fighting. Sorry, but that's not good. It confused me a little. (OK Im easily confused^^), but you really should have brought that in.
Hope you continue.
Okay... mainly, you need to add character to your character. By what I have read, she seems one-sided and not at all human [or angel... whatever]
It seems to me that she is fighting between good and evil, and in the end, she gives up hope and evil prevails. I don't exactly get that feeling from the text though. She seems to find that evil is much easier than good, so she goes ahead and kills her best friend, and runs away. You should go more into this, and let us hear what is going oninsede her head. This would improve the story, and make it longer, so it isn't a two minute read.
You skip over the fight scene. This is a big no-no. We hear that her friend is giving her a hard time about being sensitive, and then we suddenly hear that she is standing over top the angel with blood at her feet and a knife in her arms. I want to see this imporved,a dn by that I mean go and write about the fight scene. This emans letting us inside her head - let us hear the internall battle that makes her kill her douple ganger! That's what we want to hear... that's what would make this story about good and evil! Have her thinking about what it really means to be good... would killing her firend be better than having this evil soul out there in the world. What drives your character to make the decision to kill? That's what this story should be about... not:
The scene in part one. I think you should cut that out. really... the story would be better without it. I'm serious... you could have her standing at the top of the building, with the wind blowing through her hair, the light of the city winking in and out, and her thinking about the jump. Then, in italics:
“When you lose hope, evil is first in line to fill your heart. And once it has a grasp on you, it will never let go,”
The words from all those years ago come flooding back to me, and they drown out all thoughts in my mind. I can't believe what a small, innocent child I was then, back when I had a chance to make the right choice...
yeah... I shouldn;t be writing your story for you... but if you make it look like she's trying to commit suicide, then you will have a better first sentence, and you will catch alot more attention from the readers.
Well, that's it for me... but if you look back through the article, that's what you need to work on... right there, indicated in bold.
-Good luck!
Upon finishing part three: ZOMGSHWOW.
Yep, that was necessary.
Seriously, this was exactly what I wasn't expecting but in a wonderful way. I love the way you started it off with a bang (though maybe the note could be in italics?) and (sorta in contrast to the other two parts) I think this was worded beautifully. So, I absolutely love this ending. Love it. Love it. (Especially the tapestry of life part.) (Although since it's in past tense I think who knows should be who knew.)
So here are my suggestions for the overall. And I've split them up to make it clearer but they all kind of tie into each other, so I may regurgitate a bit, so forgive me for that.
I.
I think I mentioned this before? Finally, in the note, Nala says that she was struggling with good and evil...really? Because from the other parts I wouldn't have known that. So I want more of her thoughts and reactions more quickly. Because I had no idea that the death of the girl bothered her; she could have had the same thoughts as Corrine, and just kept them quiet.
She doesn't seem to have a personality, really, because we don't know enough about her. :-/
Which brings me to my next point:
II.
The note should be expanded imo. Nala says she's been struggling with good and evil, in the very abstract sense (we, universe) but not in the personal one. Obviously it's something that's been gnawing at her, and obviously it's affected her in a very, very personal way, because she murdered her friend-type person (?) because she was so frustrated about it. But then all we get from her is "I, like, sort of think that, like, maybe there isn't a difference between good and evil?"
(I imagined her twirling her hair as she said this.)
Seriously though, it's such an interesting subject, good and evil, and there's so much to say about it, and you have this perfect vessel of a character in which you can explore the topic at virtually any length, and to only get what I get (which is the above imo) is exceedingly frustrating and I think this has so much potential and you should take advantage of that.
Point three.
III.
You remember that paragraph at the beginning of part two that I ranted about in the other review? Yeah. Well, what if you cut out the whole Angels of Deliverance/Death Bringers part and, instead of telling us what her duty is, showing us through her - or Corinne - what it is. I think that would be a lot more intriguing for the reader, especially if we saw Nala witnessing the death and doing nothing and wondering why. Instead of throwing that at us and then going, "Okay, that's out of the way, now here's the actual story."
IV.
The ending is weird, where she says she's going to fight, because it seems like she just doesn't care at all. So it's weird that she's going to "fight" it. I dunno how to explain it. It's just like, "wait...huh?"
V.
This ties in more to point two; pretty much at every single point through the story I thought there was so much that could and should have been expanded upon and then you just didn't and it was frustrating (as I mentioned before). It's all been kind of squished together and that doesn't really work. It's good. It's really good. It's so original and there are so many little things that could be said and details and the upshot of pretty much this entire thing is:
This deserves more than a short story.
More than deserves. It needs it. It doesn't work otherwise. I think you should seriously consider making this into a longer project - I mean, enter THIS for the contest, but seriously consider turning this into a novella or something. At least think about it.
[/soapbox]
-Mars