A green fog was setting in all through the hallway of the space destroyer. One of the gas ducts had begun to seep the thick vapor. It made an ominous situation rife for more misery. It didn’t take long for the visibility to be cut out and the background to become as clouded as a Scottish valley.
Ensign Lylander reached back with outstretched arms, arching his back and accentuating the tension that ran through his body. Quietly and confidently he remarked, “Well, we’re screwed.”
Across from the ensign was Barkley, a diminutive man who wore an expression of eyes wide open and face unflinching. It registered an almost tacit agreement with the statement. Barkley nodded and said, “big time.”
Posted by wbriggs (Member # 2267) on :
That'll need to be 13 lines, if in Courier 12 point with 1-inch margins.
Genre? Length? What kind of help do you want?
First line: I never figured out who said it, or why. I'd say drop it.
What's with all the Scottish stuff? If there's good reason, keep it, but if not . . . it's unlikely that your average spaceship in the future will be all Scot.
What is the green fog? Tell us, so we'll know how scared to be. If it's chlorine gas -- which won't look that thick, I think -- Lylander and Barkley are pretty blase. I wouldn't be arching my back and speaking "quietly and confidently" (how *can* you say "we're screwed" in this manner?); I'd be scrambling for a gas mask. Or else choking and dying.
If it's not, why are they screwed? Is it some sort of fuel, harmless to humans?
The reaction is the main problem I have here; the rest is nit-picking. If the characters in the story don't care much what's happening, why should I?
Minor mechanics errors (punctuation, capitalization).
Posted by Nietge (Member # 3474) on :
I'm definitely wondering what the ominous situation was before the gas leak. And as far as Barkley goes, I couldn't help but think of the engineer Barkley from ST:TNG; you know, the bumbling one? A minor point, admittedly...and yes, shouldn't they be scrambling for gas masks? Doesn't the space destroyer have at least an alarm system, or a computer announcing, 'Warning, gas leak, section Alpha-8'? What about exhaust systems? Plus the captain, or someone, would be ordering people around like mad: 'Scramble the biohazard teams ASAP, clear out that section, bring us to yellow alert!" If not, I'll need an explanation why...is he just demoralized? Incompetent? If so, there'd be at least one of his aides with a cool head brusquely asking him why he's not taking charge of the situation. Or they'd take charge themselves. It's a destroyer, so I'm guessing the crew would be sizeable, so you'd have plenty of officers....or is the whole crew in a state of sleepy, fatalistic resignation? "Oh well, we're gonna die, guess I wont be able to catch the Lakers game on ESPN after all." As it stands, it simply isn't believable enough for me.
Posted by J (Member # 2197) on :
A little heavy on the cheese (e.g., "space destroyer" brings to mind 60s comic books), and I couldn't tell if it was intentional or not. Cheese is not bad or good in and of itself, but it's something to be aware of, and something you want to do on purpose if you do it.
Nothing at all wrong with your idea as far as I can tell, but I think Strunk & White could help you a lot with the execution.
A few things that jumped out at me:
1) Your first sentence is in the passive voice for no good reason 2) "It made an ominous situation rife for more misery"--ominous and misery aren't synonyms, so the "more" misery doesn't make sense standing alone. Further, the sentence implies that an ominous situation exists from before the green fog began spreading, but fails to clue the reader in as to what that situation is. 3) Last sentence of the first paragraph contains further egregious use of the passive voice. The verb tense also seems inappropriate (one of the grammar gurus around here can correct me if I'm wrong) in light of the present time frame set by the first sentence. 4) The last two paragraphs suffer from an overpopulation of descriptors, particularly adverbs. Such words are not your friends.
Posted by MightyCow (Member # 3384) on :
What tripped me up was all the words.
quote: Ensign Lylander reached back with outstretched arms, arching his back and accentuating the tension that ran through his body. Quietly and confidently he remarked, “Well, we’re screwed.”
Across from the ensign was Barkley, a diminutive man who wore an expression of eyes wide open and face unflinching. It registered an almost tacit agreement with the statement. Barkley nodded and said, “big time.”
How about: Ensign Lylander stretched and turned to Barkley, "I'd say we're screwed."
The diminutive Barkley nodded, "Oh yeah, big time."
I'm assuming there's some tongue in cheek going on here, since the crew seem so complacent. If it's comedy, or intentionally cheesy, I probably need to see a little more to let me know. If it's serious, I expect more realistic actions from the crew.
Posted by taking_back_sci-fi (Member # 3486) on :
Thanks for the feedback.
Let clear a few things up. The first sentence..."Oh, Captain, My Captain" was supposed to be the title, not the first sentence.
Genre: Sci-Fi, short story Length: 6,000 words
I actually had the fog arriving after this introduction but see that I made that decision in far too great haste. What I gave to you was pretty much the 1st draft.
My main purpose with presenting this was twofold: A) to see if I could grab your attention and make you want to keep reading and B) to see if anyone would be interested in reading the whole thing and critiquing it. Since it's a first draft, I'd expect people to let it rip. Please. Friends and family won't even come close to delivering anything near the brutal honesty as the anonymous Internet. All that I ask is don't go off and shred it just to get your rocks. The human Id thrives on anonymity and can be quite savage if unchecked.
Just be objective, which all of you were. I think space destroyer is pretty damn cheesy, too. It was all I could think about for that quick edit before I submitted. I could have said something like... the KOLGORTH was the shit and roses of the space Armanda. It represented a mammoth leap forward in killing prowess. This ship and others in its class formed the backbone of fleet…and so on.
Oh, I do have some humor mixed in with some horror. I wanted to try and put a smile on your face before I make you throw up. So if any of you are game, I'm more than happy to lend my eyes and my opinion to your stories. Just let me know. Thank you. Post again.
Posted by Nietge (Member # 3474) on :
As far as ship names are concerned...one thing I do, is go on websites for space-based vidgames, or space-based roleplay with ships, and go through all the different names for spaceships they use. You'll see a lot of interesting names, I'm sure. Other names for space destroyer might be battlecruiser, titan, platformship, lighthugger (if it can come close to the speed light; then again, this is an Alistair Reynolds' term), starcarrier, or be creative...think of any and all synonyms you can think of involving 'big', or 'powerful', and tack them onto -ship, and see what you can come up with. You might surprise yourself. I actually had to do this recently for a term given to a type of smallship I use in my stuff.
For your space destroyer, I'm thinking of maybe... supernovaship? Er...megaship? Macroship? Supership (from supertanker, name given to those huge ships that carry oil)...Deathcruiser? Deathstroyer (chuckle)... Magnacruiser? Planetbuster? (specializes in space-to-ground destruction, wiping out entire cities from orbit) Quasarship? I'm sure you could think of something...
Posted by First Assistant (Member # 3458) on :
One does need to be careful not to impinge on copyright when getting ship names from video games.
Posted by Nietge (Member # 3474) on :
Ouch! I didn't think of that. I sure as hell hope no one has a copyright lock on 'corvette'. Or 'dreadnaught'. Hmm, maybe a slight respelling...
Posted by tchernabyelo (Member # 2651) on :
Corvette and dreadnaught date back many, many years as ship names, so I don't think you need to worry on that score.
Although perhaps you should worry if your research into such things is based solely on video games.
Posted by Elan (Member # 2442) on :
The expression: "Oh Captain, my Captain," makes me snort my coffee. It's out of "Deat Poets Society," where all the students stand on top of their desks to salute their teacher (Robin Williams) as he leaves following being fired. I was an Advertising Director about 15 years ago, and had an assistant working under me who would stand on her chair and say, "Oh Captain, My Captain." In fact, I still get calls from her and the occasional note where she says that.
So seeing the phrase used in another context always brings that scene back up for me. It makes it hard for me to treat the following story seriously; this is, however, probably my own personal bias. I don't know if other people think "Dead Poets Society" when they read that phrase or not.
Posted by wbriggs (Member # 2267) on :
I do, and I despised the movie.
Posted by kings_falcon (Member # 3261) on :
I had the same Dead Poet's Society flashback.
Posted by Survivor (Member # 213) on :
Oddly, I had a flashback to the Walt Whitman poem. I do recall thinking it was pretty tasteless for a literature teacher to compare himself to the martyred Abe Lincoln (since, in the end, he only gets fired), but I don't automatically flashback to the movie when I hear the phrase. I generally find Whitman's poems over-emotive and lacking in genuinely lyric qualities, and that one isn't an exception. But it isn't a terrible literary sin to reference it, as long as someone dies.
Posted by taking_back_sci-fi (Member # 3486) on :
I was thinking of changing the name of the story anyway.
"Turn out the lights"
If anyone would like to take a look at the rough draft, all 6000 words of it, I'd return the favor by looking at some of your stuff.
Here's the updated 13 lines:
A rotten Captain could turn even the mighty Nexus-class Manglers into an expensive tomb. The crew of the Nado had one of the worst.
Inside the hull, sandwiched between the two half’s of the ship, on J-Floor, two Ensigns met up.
Ensign Lylander looked around with paranoid intensity. The Captain kept a close eye on his ship and a closer eye on his crew. Anything from nano-cameras to hidden listening devices were the norm.
Lylander quietly remarked, “well, we’re screwed.”
Across from the ensign was Barkley, a diminutive man who wore an expression of eyes wide open and face unflinching. Barkley nodded and said, “big time.”
[This message has been edited by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (edited June 21, 2006).]
Posted by tchernabyelo (Member # 2651) on :
I think this is better. Good opening paragraph, here. But the second line doesn't work for me. "Met up" is just such a weak term - did they intend to meet, bump into one another while out for a stroll, or what? And it's "halves", not "half's", and I don't understand "inside the hull" - anyone on the ship should be "inside the hull" - do you mean they're in a crawlspace between two hull layers, or something else?
Posted by ken_hawk (Member # 2647) on :
I agree with tchernabyelo about the changes he suggested. This second version was much better I thought. One thing I did notice was that you said "Anything from nano-cameras to hidden listening devices were the norm." If this is so then why would they be discussing the captain being "off his nut" if he can see and hear them while they speak? This story does seem interesting and I think once you make a few corrections to the beginning that it will have some potential.
Posted by Sara Genge (Member # 3468) on :
I'll read as long as you're not in a hurry
Posted by taking_back_sci-fi (Member # 3486) on :
Sara, I'd love to email it to you. I'm still new to this site and don't know how to access email addresses. Any help you could give would be great. Thanks.
Posted by First Assistant (Member # 3458) on :
On the top line of every post there are a couple of icons. One of them is an envelope. Click that and you'll get their email address.