4. Darkness & Pain
I fought against the darkness and the pain that accompanied it. My eyelids fluttered as the impending night cast shadows over the remaining light in the clearing, but they wouldn’t open no matter how hard I tried. I gave up trying to regain complete consciousness and tried to make sense of all that had happened. My mind struggled against the murky fog that covered it. As it seemed to lift, a blast of burning air pierced my skin, fiery spears. It felt as if my blood was boiling and slowly seeping out of all my pores. I tried to roll over so I could stifle the feeling. My brain refused to work with my body or at all for that matter.
Suddenly, the agony shot straight to my heart. My muscles clinched with the force of the oncoming scream, but nothing came from my mouth. My lungs, frozen like ice from pain, had suddenly stopped working. I could feel the deathly stillness of them. But I didn’t start breathing again. That horrible paralysis kept me still even though I desperately wanted to bang the life back into my body.
Since my lungs had stopped pumping, my heart was beating faster than I thought was possible. I realized that my gnarled brain couldn’t even figure out how to breathe; there was no way I could figure out what was happening to me.
I tried to scream out in pain-pain for me, for Dad, for the world-but my lungs were still frozen. Warm and slightly burning tears dripped down the sides of my face. When would this misery end? Couldn’t I just die and be with Dad? God was playing mind games with me, making me suffer for all the bad things I had done. What if I’m supposed to live through this? I attempted to scream again; that would be a worse fate then death in my eyes.
Two voices penetrated the silence of my clearing. It was my clearing now, the home of my father’s death, the place of my “experience.” Yes, no one could ever hold more claim over it than me. When-or if-I ever woke up, I would defend it with my life.
But I needed help now; either friend or enemy would have to do. Come this way. Please, anybody? I pleaded, hoping that they, if anyone, could help me.
“Uh, we should go this a way,” said a delicate voice.
“No. I smell blood. We do not want to disturb anyone. Stay with me. If you want to be safe, that is,” a gruff, almost patronizing voice told her.
“You’s ain’t gonna tell me what tuh do just ‘cause uh I’m yur charge. I’m goin’ ova there, an if ya value yur safety ya best not get in meh way.” She stomped past the tree line; I felt the vibrations from her steps become louder as she neared me. “Oh. She but a mite of a thang, Nicholas. What should we do?” Even though her voice was heavy with tears, there was no denying that her accent wasn’t from Luna. Her tongue was thick with a slurring and obnoxious accent. She had to be from Sela.
“Didn’t I tell you not to come in this clearing?” Smugness colored his voice.
“Yeah,” she whispered.
“She will be fine in the morning.” His breath choked off in a sort of strangled gasp. “We need to leave. Now.”
“Uh cain’t we stay ‘til she gets up?”
“This girl is one of the Guardians,” he snapped. “If Jordin finds out that we interacted with her, we will fall to the lowest rank. She specifically told us to stay away from the both of them. The girl will rise soon, and we shouldn’t be here when she does. Let’s go.”
I felt their presence leave as quickly as it came. From their conversation, it seemed like they were in on this too. Was I the only one still in the dark? It sure did feel like it.
I decided that I should stop struggling against whatever was happening to me. I was resigned to my fate, whatever it may be. The fog that I’d been persistently pushing away crept back over my mind, feeding on what was left of my sanity and memory. I quickly took all my precious memories and stored them in a corner of my mind that seemed to be immune to whatever that stuff was. I left everything else to the hazy monstrosity.
It seemed like my body was feeding off the pain. Every time a wave of anguish submerged me, I felt it soak into my bones and diminish completely. I didn’t want that feeling to go away. It was the only thing I could focus on to stay sane; I was becoming dependant.
Instead of the intense burning I was used to, a rivulet of torturing ecstasy billowed through my body, making my back arch in pain and pleasure. A yearning to be awake filled me. It was almost like something was pulling me away from my spot on the forest floor. My back thudded against the ground and pushed air back into me. My lungs struggled with breathing like I had never taken a breath before. Chest trembling from overexertion, I finally rose.
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Canary word: Present
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125,029 Literary Works • 672,781 Reviews
Hey, Danie, Pink here.
Alright, so I liked the description in this piece more than the other chapters. You flow was exceptional and I understood what points you were trying to bring. Also, your choice of characters are quite interesting. I liked these two, I don't recall their names but you give them life and make them so realistic and quirky, if I may add, to the point where even if they're evil and stubborn, I still fall in love them. Although, I have to say that woman's accent was bit bothering to read. I know it's thick and all but hopefully you don't make it too hard to read or give her less lines, haha.
There was a part where Asha said:
This sentence bothered me a little. Couldn't I just die and be with my dad? I didn't like it, it was very unemotional and again it doesn't seem to fit with the fact that her father just died and it's kind of cold. Although, I'd like to compliment you on the next sentence because it really fits the situation. She thinks she's being played with, like a toy and I don't blame her for thinking that way.
All in all, I enjoyed this chapter. It was very interesting and I'm looking forward to the next!
Till then,
~Pink
Hiya, Diane, coco here!
So this chapter was pretty thought, I hoped it would have been longer.
As far as Asha's emotions, they have definitely improved, although she still doesn't seem to care that her father has just been murdered - again, really unrealistic.
The accent thing is tough, very few writer's can incorporate it into their stories well. Just remember not to overdo it and remember to maintain it throughout the dialogue of the character. Look at the Harry Potter books for example, and how J.K.Rowling went about writing Hagrid's accent. It wasn't too over the top but it still gave off that element of accent.
Keep up the good work, and I'll see you in chapter five
*coco
I’m back~!
Okay, I have to say that the narration in this chapter is a big step up from the narration last chapter—this gives me a much better idea of what’s going on in Asha’s head. Really, this was a very introspective chapter for her—it shows a lot of sides of her personality, and I think it’s also a really good chapter of character development for her. We see her progress from someone weak and vulnerable, shivering on the ground, and then we see her give up entirely, and then we see her clutching on to the most valuable of her memories, struggling to stay herself. It really shows another, steelier side to Asha which we got a glimpse of in her parting line to Layla last chapter, one I’m really eager to see more of.
Hmm, those voices seem to have something interesting beind them, too—I can’t wait to find out what their deal is. They look to be a bit of a link between the story involving Layla, Brae and JoJo and the story involving Adrian and Asha’s mom, which interests me because I’m excited to see how all the puzzle pieces fit together. It’s also really great to see their interactions—both of them are interesting and have pretty distinct personalities. I like how their dialogue works—it feels pretty natural, which you don’t usually get with “mysterious voices”; but the best part is that it conveys information without resorting to “As you know, Bob…”-style infodumps.
The only thing I’m going to nitpick about here is the girl’s accent. It’s interesting, and I really love the way it makes her unique while also showing a bit of that inter-island prejudice in Asha, but it kinda bugs me that it’s only rendered phonetic for one sentence. Granted, if you wrote it the way you did in that sentence for every line of her dialogue, it could get kind of annoying, but I think that a more toned-down version of her accent (Maybe just keeping things like “ain’t” and “you’se” and the dropped gs in “ing”) would be okay throughout all of her dialogue. It would help keep that quirk of her character from disappearing beyond that one sentence. That’s kind of a stylistic choice, though, so you can take it with a grain of salt. XD
This review is a tad on the short side, sorry. I really enjoyed this chapter, and I’m starting to get really intrigued by the story now. It has a lot more energy and mystery than a typical urban fantasy, and I’m eager to find out more. Until next time!
I like the introduction for these next two characters. Even though Asha is only aware of their voices, the way they speak and the things they say do well to bring them to life. The accent of the first and the dominant attitude of the second are nice quirks to start. After the comments I've made about the introductions of other characters previously, I'd say whatever method you used to come up with these two, it was quite successful.
On the other hand the description reminded me of the first chapter. It was good, and very well written, but it just seemed to be too much in one chunk. Because of that, compared to the development in the other chapters this one seems a little dry.
If you think about it, what happened in the last chapter? Asha and Josiah were about to go camping, two strangers turned up who were actually old friends gone bad, Josiah died and Asha was badly wounded. What happened in this chapter? Asha is in pain, and two strangers walked by... The change of pace is too sudden.
Just to make note: I do like this story, a lot! But it has a lot more potential that you haven't quite dipped into yet, so I apologise if I'm being over critical.
On to Part 5.
Hey Pink <--(Can I call you that?) I'm Apple and I'm going to be your reviewer today.
A couple of Grammar mistakes. I don't know if you intended it or what, but I thought I might as well pick up on them.
It should really be; "We need to leave. Now!" This makes it look a little more natural instead of repetitve with the full stops.
This is a simple mistake and yet I often fall for it myself...actually I always fall for it. Instead of an ordinary colon it should be a semi-colon. EG. But I needed help now; either friend...
This would fit just as well without the excesive use of question marks. EG. Please-Anybody? Or, Please...Anybody? Or even; Please, anybody?
Now, I did read the other parts, though I didn't comment. I find this one a lot more interesting then the others and more grammatically correct. This is a really easy read and you really drew me in. The title doesn't give it any favours though. I think you should really work on it, so that it draws people towards this.
I like your characters and sentence structuring. You didn't bog the readers down with useless information instead spilled it out through the story; Great job!
~Apple's Reviews.
Wow this is really good
wowza!
I read all of your other chapters but i think this one is the best for description wise. The way you describe some things here, especially in the first and last paragraph is just
I didn't really find any mistakes either and i am so totally interested to see who Nicholas and the other girl is so please, post more soon!
Im sorry, this wasn't a very helpful post but i didn't see much wrong and i really liked it
x
Hi Danie. This was as lovely as the other parts were! I don't think there was anything here for me to nit-pick. You never give anyone a chance of it. There's one thing though, try to give some space from your over description in the next chapter so that the reader doesn't get bored. Othere ways, you're set on the track!
I didn't like the sentence here, personally.I loved it. The way you compared two things.
Good job!