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Desolate

zapdos926

I'm secretly a typhlosion, shh
998
Posts
14
Years
desolate_by_drag0nl0ver-d374lwv.png


Desolate

Prologue

The Trireme Athens
Captain Antoine's log

It has been a mere 13 days since the beast came aboard the Athens. It is still roaming the ship and I can occasionally hear it. There it just was! It scares me to no end. No enemy has been worse than this creature. Nearly three quarters of the 600 some spearmen are dead, as well as most of the rowers. Those left dare not go below the second deck, for there are many places for the beast to hide aboard such a large vessel. The only thing I know about it is that the creature wont go above the second deck. Occasionally, a young soldier gets cocky and tries to go below. They never return. Our archers are always aiming at the stairs that go below, what's left of them anyways. The first night, it was not scared of us. It roamed the entire ship, seeking out anything it could. We fought back and it got scared, leaving for the below decks. Occasionally though, a man will go missing, killed and most likely eaten by the beast.
We are currently stationary, as with a mere 200 rowers left, there is not enough man power to get the Athens moving again. Many days I have hoped for a breeze to at least make us move slightly, but there has been nothing.
Our rations are slightly improved, what with the loss of so many, but we have to go deeper into the prow of the ship in order to find some of this food, and the creature tends to hang about in that area, due to the fact that or fires are at the stern. Our citrus though, is gone. Many men have fallen sick and died. We throw them into the ocean, that way the beast gets weaker. Soon, we will have to resort to eating our dead.
There is no escape, there is no hope. I will not be writing here for much longer.
 

zapdos926

I'm secretly a typhlosion, shh
998
Posts
14
Years
Ch. 1


The cruiser sailed smoothly through the calm waters. The sun was just going down as the U.S.S. Pristine began its maiden voyage to Korea, where it would take part in the large naval fights that went on. The loud whirring of one of the two AH-73 Apache's blades stirred the silence as it touched down on the empty helipad and the air support crew chained down the anti-submarine/battleship helicopter.
A young woman stepped out of the helicopter, and was greeted by another young woman. "Hey, Marina! Whatcha see out there today?" The second woman asked.
"A whale, some water, a few of the seagulls that hang around the ship… that's about it Olive."
"I told you not to call me that!"
"Fine, I'll call you Ollie instead, is that better?" Marina laughed and took of her helmet.
"No, its not, my name is Olivia, and that's all. Nothing else."
"Comrades, please! Stop bickering." A young man who went by the name of Riska came out the door that led to the bridge. An older man came out from behind him.
"Tell me again, why you Russians constantly call people comrade?" he asked Riska.
"How many times must I explain this Scott? All who we call 'comrade' are our friends or allies. That is what a comrade is, am I wrong?" Scott stared at the younger man.
"Okay, I think I get it now."
"Marines." Olivia and Marina said simultaneously.
"Comrade, when zombies or aliens attack us, you'll be glad we're here!" Riska exclaimed.
"You're becoming more American everyday, Riska!" Olivia exclaimed. "I mean really, you're talking about aliens and zombies." She looked around. "Have any of you seen Shawn or David?"
"BOO!" two men jumped out from behind the helicopter, making everyone else, including the now finished chain-squad, jump. The lead "chainer" yelled at them to get a life.
"Shut up, chain boy!" the man named Shawn called out. He gave a fist-bump to David and they both walked over to the others.
"The chainer is right comrade." Riska said. "You should stop pulling jokes like that." A siren suddenly blared. It gave two loud whoops and then one long honk, signaling another ship.
"Is this just a drill, or is this for real?" Shawn asked nobody in particular.
"This is real alright!" a passing gunner told them. "A ship has been spotted about a mile west; we're going to meet it." He said and hopped into the seat of one of the starboard turrets.
"Well then," Marina said and put her helmet back on. "I'd better go check it out." She climbed back into the seat and watched as the other helicopter rose above the bridge from the front landing pad. The chainers, annoyed at needing to take up the chains so soon after putting them down, let the bird loose.
"You know, I feel bad for the chainers." Scott said.
"Why is that?" Olivia asked. Riska butted in:
"Because it is the law of mechanical engineering comrade, that after your hands are covered in grease, your nose will start to itch and you'll have to pee." Riska and the others waved Marina off and took their positions.
Riska, Shawn, David and Olivia and a few other marines that were aboard would be the boarding party, and the AH-73's would be the aerial support.
"Okay men, lock and load!" Scott said as he retrieved his rifle from the rack at the entrance to the armaments room. The other marines got ready and followed Scott to the small boat that would be used to get to the ship.
"Sergeant Mitchell, what exactly are we dealing with?" one of the lieutenants asked.
"Not quite sure, but Riska here will give you the information when we have it."
 

zapdos926

I'm secretly a typhlosion, shh
998
Posts
14
Years
Ch. 2


"Holy-!" Riska exclaimed as the "Pristine" approached the other ship.
"Watch your language Lt. Kamos." Scott Mitchell looked at the large wooden vessel that seemed to be just drifting. "Damn! It's so old its got freaking oars!" he muttered. As the sound of whirring helicopter blades became louder as the cruiser got ever closer. The two AH-73s hovered above, an invisible x-ray beam shooting down from both of them, providing necessary information to the commanders in the bridge, who relayed it to Commander Mitchell.
"Okay boys, and girl," he started, acknowledging Olivia, "this hear is a tireme, tiream," he zoomed in on the information panel, "a trireme. This boat is about 2490 years old! Damn! I have no clue how it stayed intact so long, but its here. It should be around 120 feet lo-!" he was cut off as an update appeared on his screen. "Damn! This thing is 500 feet long! The tallest mast alone is 182 feet high; add that to whatever is below the mast, that's about 272 feet! Damn! Lt. Riska will take over from here." The young Russian man stepped up and aimed a portable projector at the side of the bridge. It showed full schematics of the trireme.
"This is a 100 oar ship, 50 on each side, four floors including the deck. It is only 100 feet shorter than this boat comrades, it is very large. There is a single, seen, large spike jutting out the back and there are no signs of life being picked up, not even rats. Anything and everything is to be expected to fall apart the second that you touch it comrades since it is more than 2000 years old, so be careful. You five will explore the second floor, you five the third, and you the first. My squad and I will explore the fourth floor, and incase anything goes wrong, you are all equipped with inflatable life jackets."
As the cruiser pulled up alongside the trireme, the whole crew noticed just how big it was compared to the cruiser; it was much taller and almost just as long. The captain pulled the cruiser next to the trireme, being just far away enough that it wouldn't hit, but close enough to extend the gangplanks. "Why aren't we taking the motor boats?" David asked Shawn as they chainers extended the wide steel walkways.
"Because there aren't any ladders on the sides of this bucket 'o splinters." Shawn replied. The squad began to cautiously walk across to the wooden boat. David accidentally bumped into Olivia she nearly fell, but Riska caught her.
"Watch your footing!" she said without turning around. David played innocent.
"Me? But I'm the most nimble person in this squad!" seeing as they were the last two on the ramp he started bouncing around.
"Stop it!" Olivia yelled at him. "You're going to fall!" David stopped and got off the ramp, followed by Olivia. The boarding party explored the main deck for a moment. There were bones scattered everywhere. A full skeleton wearing medieval plate armor leaned against the port wall. Shawn went over to touch it, but Scott stopped him.
"Don't touch that for two reasons," he grabbed the younger mans shoulder, "it's probably diseased, and it's a skeleton. That would be disgusting."
"There is something wrong with that skeleton though, with all these skeletons." Riska mentioned, coming up behind them.
"And that would be?" Shawn inquired.
"Their all from different time periods. This one is obviously from around the time of the renaissance. It is wearing knights' armor and it has a long sword and kite shield. That skeleton over there however," Riska pointed to one that was leaning lying on the ground near the stern. "That one is wearing the helmet of a Spartan, and the shield is also that of the great Greek soldier, he was probably one of the spearmen aboard this vessel. There is something strange going on here comrades." Just as he finished, a loud groan came from within the ship.
"That didn't sound natural…" Olivia said tentatively. Her com piece suddenly was suddenly filled with the sound of helicopter blades and Marina's voice.
"Something is moving down there and its not you guys!" Marina yelled worriedly.
"I thought you guys didn't pick up anything on the x-ray or radar!" another marine shouted into his own com. The rumble from the depths of the trireme got louder and the whole boat shook, causing the skeletons to crumble to dust. Olivia watched the guns on the cruiser aim at the trireme, preparing to shoot whatever came from the bottom of the boat. The boarding crew cocked their rifles and aimed at the floor boards. The groaning stopped and a few of the marines relaxed.
A loud crunch was then heard and three pale white tentacle type things shot out of various points of the boat. The cannons on the cruiser opened fire on them as two of the tentacles wrapped around the Pristine and lifted it out of the water. The marines on board fired at the tentacle that had come out of the deck, a few were trying to free a man that was clasped by the tentacle, but it just disappeared under the planks of wood. They then fired on the two tentacles that were attempting to snap the pristine in half. The tentacles and the Pristine disappeared in a fiery explosion as the most advanced cruiser in the U.S. NAVY snapped in two. The fire washed over the trireme, but the only thing that seemed to catch fire was the sail. The two AH-73's which had been launching missiles and firing their gatling guns at it now tried to rise as the tentacles reached up for them. Each tentacle grasped one helicopter, stopping the blades completely. Marina watched the other helicopter explode from both the stress on the engine, and the tentacle squeezing on it. Marina watched her own missile proof window start to crack. She looked up and saw that the blades had stopped just at the right spot that she could eject. She looked at the emergency button, and then hit it.
 

psyanic

pop a wheelie on a zeitgeist
1,284
Posts
12
Years
  • Age 27
  • USA
  • Seen Apr 10, 2023
A military and mystery work? We'll see how this goes.

I now can see that you actually tried to format your story now that I have it in a quote box, with the indentions and all, but the forum takes that all away. Instead, adopt the forum formatting and double space between paragraphs. It's easier to read that way and it's just basic formatting since indentions don't really show up.

"Watch your language Lt. Kamos." Scott Mitchell looked at the large wooden vessel that seemed to be just drifting. "Damn! It's so old its got freaking oars!" he muttered. As the sound of whirring helicopter blades became louder as the cruiser got ever closer.
Mitchell is a hypocrite. Stupid old hypocrite. Anyway, the bolded part is a sentence fragment. Just combine the sentence with the previous sentence, adding a comma after "muttered". Or, just take out "As". It would be like this:
The sound of whirring helicopter blades became louder as the cruiser got ever closer.
It sounds more clean and crisp now.

The two AH-73s hovered above, an invisible x-ray beam shooting down from both of them, providing necessary information to the commanders in the bridge, who relayed it to Commander Mitchell.
Seeing as I have no idea what an AH-73 is, I'm lost other than that they are some kind of helicopter or something. I'm still lost on the x-ray beam as well. It just kind of needs a small little explanation for clarity, because knowing what an AH-73 is is not exactly common knowledge. The next bit is that there is just an excessive use of commas, it's just listing stuff. It's not exactly violating anything grammatical, it just doesn't flow.

"Okay boys, and girl," he started, acknowledging Olivia, "this hear is a tireme, tiream," he zoomed in on the information panel,
For the bolded part, I have no idea what you're trying to get at here. My best guess is that he has no idea what a "trireme" is, so he can't read it correctly. It's vague when there's not much description, mainly referring to the character's actions and his body language which would tell readers he's confused.

"a trireme. This boat is about 2490 years old! Damn! I have no clue how it stayed intact so long, but its here. It should be around 120 feet lo-!" he was cut off as an update appeared on his screen.
The correct form is "it's", since that is the conjunction of "it is". Its would represent possession, which would be irrelevant here.

"Damn! This thing is 500 feet long! The tallest mast alone is 182 feet high; add that to whatever is below the mast, that's about 272 feet! Damn! Lt. Riska will take over from here." The young Russian man stepped up and aimed a portable projector at the side of the bridge. It showed full schematics of the trireme.
Damn! Damn! Damn! See how annoying that is? Leave a bit out. I mean, it's just a ship. It's like the guy has never seen a boat in his entire life.

"This is a 100 oar ship, 50 on each side, four floors including the deck. It is only 100 feet shorter than this boat comrades, it is very large. There is a single, seen, large spike jutting out the back and there are no signs of life being picked up, not even rats.
The first bold shows that "it is very large" is in a comma splice, as the sentence the comma combines them with has two independent clauses. Replace the comma with a semi-colon. For the next part, I'm confused with the "seen" in the sentence. It looks like the word is just dropped in there. You could just omit it.

David asked Shawn as they chainers extended the wide steel walkways.
Probably a typo, but it should just be "the".

"Watch your footing!" she said without turning around. David played innocent.
He played innocent, but I have no idea how he did so. I can assume that he just looked away and whistled. I can assume he turned away and looked at the lapping of the waves as they hit the old boat. I can only assume. Be sure to describe it more.

"Don't touch that for two reasons," he grabbed the younger mans shoulder, "it's probably diseased, and it's a skeleton. That would be disgusting."
Forgot the apostrophe there, so it should be "man's".

"Their all from different time periods. This one is obviously from around the time of the renaissance. It is wearing knights' armor and it has a long sword and kite shield. That skeleton over there however," Riska pointed...
You want to use the form of "they're" because that is the conjunction of "they are".

"That didn't sound natural…" Olivia said tentatively. Her com piece suddenly was suddenly filled with the sound of helicopter blades and Marina's voice.
Suddenly was suddenly. What? Omit a suddenly.

"I thought you guys didn't pick up anything on the x-ray or radar!" another marine shouted into his own com.
I'm iffy on these. It's just repetitive. You could just leave it as "his com". I mean, he wouldn't shout into someone else's, would he?

A loud crunch was then heard and three pale white tentacle type things shot out of various points of the boat.
The bolded part, "type things" tells me that you can't adequately describe your monster. That tells me a lot. I know you can describe it. You created it. Don't use that bolded text. It kind of discourages readers.

She looked up and saw that the blades had stopped just at the right spot that she could eject. She looked at the emergency button, and then hit it.
Yeah, for that very reason, helicopters don't have an eject function. The blades would slice you up. The most sensible would be for the pilot to go into a hard landing, but seeing that she's being grabbed by a monster and is in the middle of the ocean, it doesn't look like a good option. I guess if she unstrapped herself and just jumped out of the side, at least it made sense.

So before the above quote, you had a rather long part about how the marines were firing on the monster. Not much description other than, "the marines shot at it. The tentacles waved like they were in a rave and smashed the mast. The marines shot more. The helicopters fired misseles, somehow missing the marines on board and keeping the wooden boat intact. Modern technology was at its greatest now. Marina screamed in her com as the tentacle smashed against her window. The marines shot some more."

Okay you didn't really say that, I added in some of my flavor, which was more for my entertainment than yours. I can have fun too right? But it's really boring to read that. Add in description. I can't stress it enough. You have solid action, but there's almost no images. All I can do is assume what everything looks like. Use your five senses and put that onto the computer screen.

That's all I can say, or feel like saying, for now. So be sure to keep in a few facts in mind and remember to proof-read. You have a few grammar mistakes and typos, which are actually one-time occurrences since I saw that you had the correct usages somewhere else in the chapter.

Good luck and keep writing!
 

zapdos926

I'm secretly a typhlosion, shh
998
Posts
14
Years
Thanks very much for the constructive criticism :) I greatly appreciate it.

You have pointed out a lot of typos that I made as well as extra words that I accidentally skipped over while re-writing sentences, which I will certainly go back and edit. Now, to answer your questions/reply to your comments:

An AH-73 is a helicopter that I made up. I think it's pretty clear that it is at least a helicopter.

I can see your point on my descriptions. Body language is a pretty big part of it, and I do see how adding more things of that nature would add to it.

Some things are for the reader to imagine how they happened. When "David played innocent," there aren't exactly a wide variety of things that come to mind; maybe an innocent smile or something of that sort.

The whole "damn" thing, just part of his personality. Plus, it's a really old boat, and of massive proportions.

Another typo....

As the writer it seemed a lot better, but again, thank you for pointing out all these mistakes. Yes, I realize that there was a lot of firing at stuff, but I've had some pretty serious writers block since before I started this story, and I still have writers block. I do appreciate the criticism.
 
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