Wanted to try something for a writing challenge. Take something from your week and use it to write a short piece of fiction. No worries about creating new characters. For instance, I could write about the great monitor heist or the all day treasure hunt for food hidden under chairs.

And as always, anything else people want to discuss is fair game here.

Hey everyone - been a while. Curious to hear your thoughts on this. I'd describe it as literary fiction with a bit of light humor sprinkled in, but it touches on some big subjects.

My story - Smoke

Crit 1 [3601]

Crit 2 [720]

[2024] [3605] [3601]

I wrote these 2 chapters of a longer fantasy (maybe dark fantasy?) book I have in mind. I have never written anything before outside of school, so looking for any and all feedback I can get. Feel free to be blunt/harsh. I don't know if it's weird to share two chapters, but both my chapters are very... different, and feel like I need to show the whole picture to really get feedback of how things will work together.

NOTE: There are swear words in there in case anyone is offended by that and wants to skip.

Google doc: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vQXaeU-4md3Z_UaVFUVfPpYIDnrHPY11bWb9JHLnmMAH9cA2bmDyBry4Am3S95R-Q/pub

Critique #1 668

Critique #2 2278

Docs link: Witch's Labyrinth

Hello,

This is a prologue to a contemporary fiction story. It's the first big writing project I've done, so I really appreciate any feedback on areas I can improve and if it's compelling as a story start!

The gods were dead, so the girl knew no one was listening when she cursed them. The rabbit she’d caught fell into the fire, scattering embers across the dirt floor. Smoke billowed out as she used a dagger to retrieve her dinner from the flames. It smelled like the fires that swept across her village days ago.

She butchered the rabbit’s carcass with ease, only pausing to stare at the blood on her unfamiliar hands. They weren’t the hands she was born with.

Her body was modeled off a cousin and her face from a neighbor. She’d become no one in a body that wasn’t born. It was better this way. The men who burned her village to the ground couldn’t recognize a girl who never existed. The ability to shapeshift was a gift she’d stolen, and the only way to atone for the theft was to use it well.

With a final rip, she finished pulling the meat apart, then wiped her hands on the edge of a belted tunic. Her cat rubbed against her. It was a sweet, wild thing with a notched ear and crooked eyes.

“Here you go, dear,” she whispered as she tossed parts of the rabbit near the fire. The hearth was always the cat’s favorite spot.

The abandoned cottage was empty, so she set her bronze armor against the wall to lean on and shivered as a cold wind blew through the open window. She ate while her leather helmet watched her. It was plated with small pieces taken from boar tusks. Some pieces she’d earned in hunts, while others were gifts from her family. The helmet’s empty eyes judged her for living while everyone else died.

Her cat purred again, begging for more food, but the girl could only offer affection. The cat was halfway in her lap, when it bolted towards the cottage door. She cracked the door open and scanned the dark surroundings. A crescent moon illuminated steep hills broken only by the shadows of a few rocks and lonely trees.

“There’s nothing there,” she said, crouching to rub the cat’s head.

Then, one of the shadows moved. The girl slowly rose, holding her dagger up. It was a creature, defined not by what it was, but by its absence: a black nothingness in the shape of a large hound. A second shadow appeared, closer, but it was too late to put on her armor. She never should have taken it off.

The creatures crept closer in unnatural silence. Her breath came faster now, shaking like a bird in a cage. Looking at them was like staring into a well ending in sheer blackness. She could watch them forever and never find a foothold for her eyes to grasp onto. There was a wrongness as they stalked forward, as if they were drawn outlines of creatures without dimension, warping as they moved.

She slammed the door shut. If she could reach the sword near her armor, maybe they would be alright. But the hound hit the outside of the door, the wood biting against her back as she held it shut. There was no way to latch the door.

The other shadow wormed through the open window. Her cat hissed, then shrieked and threw itself against the intruder, tearing against an unseeable face. The hound jerked its head violently and shook the cat off.

“No!” The girl screamed, one hand still holding the shuddering door shut, the other hand reaching forward with the knife, but she was too far away.

The shadow turned to her and pounced. She drove her knee into its head, stabbing her knife under its neck. There should have been more resistance to her blow, but the blade slipped in as if it was moving through water rather than flesh. A real animal should have made a sound, but this thing took the knife in silence, then shattered apart into darkness.

The door shook again, this time she couldn’t keep it shut. The impact knocked the girl down. She raised her arms, one shielding her face, the other thrusting her blade up. Someone screamed, it must have been her. The monster bit down, tearing into her arm, then her throat. The sounds stopped. The last thing she felt was her cat nudging her head.

Then, for the second time, the girl died.

[2672] [3181] [2332]

Hello everyone! Did a full revision on my chapter one and adjusted the POV. All critiques and suggestions are welcome. Thank you!

~~~~~

Chapter One - Avon

***

The sun was a monster.

It tore into my eyes with teeth of molten gold the moment the Grand Lift crested to its final stop. I flinched—blinked until the edges of Red’s Square smoldered against the glare.

I loved it anyway. I still do.

In the Foundry, there’s no sky—only iron. A canopy of latticed catwalks suspended in an ocean of shadows. Everything beneath is hollowed out by the cold cerulean glow of arcanite lamps. There’s no sunrise. No sunset. Only bells on the hour and the ticking of hands on clocks held captive in stone towers. That day, I’d been down there so long I’d forgotten how the sun could bite.

Sunlight dripped through the Lift’s grated steel walls in long, low stripes, across me and the hundreds of other scavs crammed onto its platform in their fraying blacks and browns.

My hand was locked in my father’s. “Stay near me, Avon.” He looked down at me, his thumb pressed hard against my knuckles. “Promise me you’ll be where I can see you.”

The tiny, familiar crease deepened between his brows.

“I promise,” I said softly.

But I’m my father’s daughter, and my promise was empty.

I had made a different one to Sable. She and Serrah would be by the fountain, and I’d slip away the first chance I got. It was Serrah’s last Solstice. One more day, and the Choosing could never touch her.

The metallic tang of magic stung my nose as the Lift’s gears stilled.

I smoothed the front of my dress. It wasn’t every day I dressed Highmarket fine. The others around me were trying their damnedest to look like gents, but I didn’t have to try. My dress had been cut down from one of my mother’s finest Marketside gowns—every stitch straight, every seam intact.

It made me a liar too.

Except for my boots.

They were the only honest part of my outfit—black Foundry boots, patched at the heel, seams more thread than leather. My mother’s boots would have lied. Elegant, the way I remember her. They’d sat vacant by the door since last summer, and Seamstress help me, I’d wished so badly they’d fit that I thought wishing alone might shrink them. Or grow me. But that morning, they’d still swallowed my feet whole.

So I wore my own and hoped no one looked down. Little to worry about. No one Marketside ever does.

Overhead, the loudspeaker chimed and a woman’s brass alto crackled through the static. “Anthem City Transit. This stop: Highmarket—Red’s Square. Traveling bel—” Steam hissed from the Lift’s joints, smothering her voice. The barricade exhaled a steel groan and dropped.

The crowd swept us through the transit center’s marble arcade in a blur of ribbons and mountain-flower garlands. Enforcers in cornflower-blue coats, rifles slung over their shoulders, herded us out into the Square.

Then—Highmarket.

Bone-white buildings ringed the plaza, their verdigris domes gilded by the dying sun. Silk lanterns glowed above a river of people, and the air was thick with cinnamon and hot sugar wafting from market stalls. Near the fountain, dancers in red silk spun to brass and drum while more enforcers drove hawkers back from the stage.

My father’s eyes swept the Square, searching for whatever might take me.

Across the Square, a hand shot up above the crowd. Sable, bouncing on her toes by the fountain, waving like we hadn’t seen each other in years. Serrah stood beside her, a head taller, laughing at something I couldn’t see.

I didn’t wave back. A nod. A smile.

My father’s grip was iron. Sooner or later, he’d have to let go.

I stepped down the first stair, but he pulled me back.

“Stay by my side, Avon.” There was grit in his voice now, and his gaze tracked a group of men passing close, their union tattoos unlike his own. “Girls go missing on Solstice.”

Back then, being taken was something that happened to other people. A neighbor’s daughter. Someone’s cousin. A girl from another district, a name without a face. It flickered at the edges of my world but never crossed in.

Chosen or taken, whatever they called it, I thought it would never happen to me. I thought grief had made him cautious. That his fear had no teeth.

So I let his warning slip past me and wished he weren’t there.

I was a foolish girl.

A woman from my father’s union stepped out of the crowd, crossed pickaxes inked at the base of her throat. She pressed a sealed letter into his palm and leaned close to whisper.

He let go of my hand to break the seal.

One step sideways. Two.

Then I was gone.

When you’re twelve, Solstice is a landscape of elbows and coattails and hems of people’s skirts. I was small enough to vanish into it. Behind me, my father called my name. Then the brass songs swallowed it whole.

Of course my father would be furious. I knew that, and for a moment, my heart ached. He didn’t deserve the worry. But he’d understand. He always did.

I trailed a cleric in church whites until the fountain was ten yards off. Sable stood on its rim. I called her name, and in a heartbeat she was on me. Her arms flung around my neck so hard we nearly toppled into the water.

“You did it!” she shouted, squeezing the breath out of me. “Your father’s going to skin you, Avon.”

I laughed, shoving down the same thought. “If I’m to be skinned, I demand candied nuts.”

Serrah hopped down from the rim and wrapped us both up. “Wonderful. Now we’re union fugitives.” She poked me in the ribs, and I giggled.

She was beautiful, though there was a sadness about her that night, something she locked behind her smile. She and Sable wore Foundry colors, like the other scavs, but had pulled their blonde hair back in loose curls, and their eyes, bright and glacier-blue, stole the lantern light.

If Sable looked like that at eighteen, who would ever see me? Hair the color of mud. Freckles like I’d rolled in the dirt.

A stupid thought.

Hard not to think it, though, with someone so radiant beside me.

“C’mon, you two,” Serrah said. “Let’s go find Avon’s last meal.”

She spent a few crowns saved from her name day on a paper cone of candied nuts, and we passed it between us, cinnamon and sugar sticking to our fingers.

Serrah ate the nuts with the same worried crease my father had. I’d never seen it on her before. Maybe, until that night, she’d believed what I did: that it always happened to someone else—a threat without teeth.

None of us dared to speak of it. For five years, the threads hadn’t picked her, and after tonight, they never would. That was what we’d gone to celebrate: to watch the airships fly low over the Square and imagine it was us aboard them. Imagine it wasn’t Highmarket that owned the skies. It was us.

It was a small defiance of the truth. Because everyone, both Marketside and Foundryside, knew the game was rigged. Only Foundry girls were ever Chosen, and the gents loved pretending it was fair. They called it the Choosing. Below, we called it what it was: being taken.

Next year, both Sable and I would be thirteen. Old enough to age in. Then all we’d have was hope, again.

Around the stage, the crowd was thickening. The dancers were gone, and enforcers were carving out a space near the front.

“We won’t see a thing from down here,” Serrah said. She tipped her head back and looked up.

Above the Square, gentry houses huddled shoulder to shoulder, their rooftops crowded with marble terraces and potted lemon trees. Up there, the airships would pass close enough to touch.

“We’ll never get up there,” Sable said.

I was looking at a narrow alley between two of the houses, and the painters’ scaffolding climbing its far wall.

“Not by the front door,” I said.

Serrah followed my gaze and grinned.

We skirted the edge of the Square and slipped into the alley. Someone had painted its walls with the golden tulip fields outside Anthem. My father used to take me there when my mother was still alive. The painting didn’t do them justice. You can’t just see those fields. You have to feel them. Out there, you know how the world should be—the sun on every inch of you, a place without borders.

At the end of the alley, the scaffolding waited, a mismatch of crossed iron bars and wooden planks climbing all the way to a terrace draped in night jasmine.

“Avon—we can’t,” Sable whispered.

“No one’s going to see us,” I said. “And if they do, look at my dress. You two just act like hired help.” I lifted my chin and put on the obnoxious Highmarket croon I’d heard from ladies in the plaza. “Though I’d never keep such filth in my home.”

Serrah laughed and grabbed the lowest bar. Sable gave me a dour look. I kissed her cheek and followed Serrah up. My palms closed around iron and wood, and my boots found purchase on the planks. For once, the honest part of me was useful.

“Serrah! Avon! Damn it all!” Sable hissed.

She followed, slower and sulking. If I was to be skinned for abandoning a promise, she could risk a bit of trespassing. Planks rattled under our weight, iron bars carried us upward, and the marble alley shrank below.

“See? Easy,” Serrah said.

She was right. This was nothing compared to hanging off catwalks in the Foundry or scaling rusted hulls in the Scrapyards. When your world is built between canyon walls, you learn to climb early, and you learn not to look down. The Foundry spirals up from the Great Below, Highmarket sits on its shoulders, and everything that survives in Anthem climbs. The sky, at least, has a top. Fall into the Great Below, and you fall forever. It’s a terrible thought, but it helps you keep your grip.

I kept mine, and every pull upward felt like a promise that one day I’d climb out for good.

Tiny white buds caught around my fingers as I pulled myself past the trellis of jasmine. Serrah’s hand closed around my wrist, and up I went, rolling over the stone balustrade onto the terrace. Sable followed, still pouting, and I hauled her over after me.

Serrah peered into a nearby window that looked onto the terrace, and when she was satisfied, beckoned us forward.

“Looks like it’s just us,” she said, falling into an outdoor settee, staring up at the sky. The stars were out now, pinpricks against a blanket of calamine and ink.

Sable didn’t sit. She hovered by the balustrade, arms folded, eyeing the dark window, waiting for it to look back. “If they return, we’re caught. They’ll call the enforcers, and then Avon’s father finds out, and then Mam finds out, and then—”

“—and then we’ll have seen the airships. And then, and then—” Serrah said, not opening her eyes.

“That’s not an answer, Serrah!”

“I don’t want to think about ‘and thens’ and what comes after.” Serrah opened her eyes and her lips went flat. “Because I don’t know what does.”

Sable huffed, but she perched on the very edge of the settee, as if sitting down completely would make her an accomplice.

She reached into her pocket and pulled out three bracelets of braided red thread. A small pewter charm of the Seamstress was tied into each.

“I was going to wait until after the Choosing, but if we’re going to get caught—might as well,” she said, cheeks pink. “Mam says a seam tied on Solstice holds all year.” She took Serrah’s wrist first, then mine, knotting each bracelet with a tailor’s fingers. Then she held out her own wrist to me, and I tied hers.

“So we don’t fray,” she said quietly.

Serrah sat up and looked at the three red threads, then at her sister. Her face softened. “Keep your seam, Sable.”

“And you, yours,” Sable answered.

Serrah pulled her sister into a hug. Sable stiffened, still determined to sulk, but when Serrah pecked kisses across her cheek, she broke into a giggle and finally settled back against her on the settee. 

My family isn’t religious. I don’t believe fate is decided by gods, old or new. I am, after all, my father’s daughter. I wanted to make a joke. For once, I knew not to spoil the moment, and I had the sense to keep my mouth shut.

Somewhere beyond the domes, a low hum rolled through the air, deep enough to feel in my teeth. The crowd below roared, and the three of us rushed to the edge of the terrace, laughing.

Dozens of spotlights swept up from the rooftops, raking the sky. Fireworks burst overhead in gold and blue, silver and red. Brass rang out from the streets, and the city’s anthem swelled through the plaza.

The airships came over the domes and parted the smoke.

The first was enormous, nearly as long as the Square was wide, its hull of polished silver and bronze blooming with the colors of the fireworks. Engines tethered by chains floated above it, belching blue arcanite fumes into the sky.

Three smaller ships glided behind it in a slow, glittering procession, so low the flares from their engines painted Highmarket in the Foundry’s own cold blue. Gentry crowded the railings, tossing ribbons into the wind and raising wine glasses to the crowds below.

The last ship was different.

Iron, unadorned, its sides hung with blue Anthem City banners bearing the Watchful Eye and Sun. No music. No gentry at the rails. A row of girls in blue and gold high-collared kaftans lined the deck. They were still, hands folded, and their faces were calm. If they watched the crowd, I couldn’t tell; their eyes were milky white, without any color at all. Like unfinished porcelain dolls.

At the bow stood Callista, the Lady Arcanist, dressed in the same blue and gold, waving to the crowd with a wide, bright smile. Her eyes were like theirs, pale and strange, but where theirs were milk, hers burned Anthem blue.

The engines dropped to a low thrum, their glow dimming softer than the lanterns below, and the ships hung unmoving in the air. The fireworks stopped, and the song played its final notes.

Callista lifted a hand, and the crowd went silent. She stepped forward to a podium with no microphone.

“Citizens of Anthem. Brothers and sisters of the Seam.”

Her voice didn’t crackle through loudspeakers like the transit announcer’s had. It was simply there, in our ears, warm and close, as if she were standing on the terrace beside us. Sable flinched and glanced over her shoulder.

Callista smiled down at the Square with the tenderness of a mother putting her children to sleep. “The sun has set on another year of innovation, and tonight, we consider its worth.

“A century ago, no one would have believed a mining town at the edge of a canyon could become the greatest city the world has ever seen. Now, our ships carry industry to every port from Castellia to the Spine. The Eastern Reaches. Aerown. Ur. Our lamps light cities that have never heard our name. Our engines lift the world, and we, the people of Anthem, are at the helm.”

The Square erupted. On the procession ships, gentry raised their glasses, and below us, a thousand hands lifted with them. Serrah whooped. Even Sable was smiling.

Callista waited for the cheers to fade. When she spoke again, her voice was softer.

“But, dear brothers and sisters, the price of progress is not paid in crowns alone. It is paid in sweat. It is paid in tears. And it is paid in blood.”

The Square went still.

“Let us take a moment, in the Seamstress’s name, to remember those we’ve lost.”

Across the plaza, heads bowed. Near the fountain, men from my father’s union pressed their caps to their chests. One was shaking. I thought of my mother’s cough, quiet in her sleeve, and of her boots by our door. I looked at my feet until the silence ended.

“Tonight,” Callista said, “a few of our daughters will give the greatest gift of all.” She held her hands out, presenting the porcelain girls with milky eyes, and they stepped forward to the airship’s edge. No emotion. Not a single twitch.

I felt Serrah’s hand tuck into mine. She was holding Sable’s too. Serrah drew in a heavy breath.

“The Chosen,” Callista went on, “are Anthem’s finest investment, our future, and our promise to the generations to come. They will lead this city forward and strengthen our hold on the world we have learned to captivate.” Her smile never wavered. “As the Seamstress taught us, every thread strengthens the whole. Keep your seam, friends.”

“And you, yours,” the Square answered, a thousand voices—one.

Callista turned her palms toward the sky and brought her hands together.

Blue lightning crackled along the arcanite engines as she drew power from them. Ice spread across the airship’s hull, branching out from her in veins of white, and the air grew so cold I could see my breath. Along the Square, the arcanite lampposts flared in a single flash of blue, drawing gasps from the crowd. The engines roared higher, spitting threads of light that whirled and spooled above Callista’s hands until they gathered into a teardrop of blue.

She lowered it to her chest, where it hovered, glowing. Then she dipped her fingertips into it—once, twice, three times—drawing out a fistful of threads each time and casting them over the crowd.

There were to be thirty that year.

Cold blue strands floated above the people, droplets of light falling from them like snow, as they searched for the Chosen. They found them, one by one.

One near the stage, and the spotlight followed; a girl in Foundry clothes, a year or two older than me—tears welling in her eyes as she blinked against the glare. The thread snapped taut, wound twice around her wrist, and held.

Another somewhere below. I couldn’t see her, but I heard her mother cry.

And another who ran. Her thread followed, glowing between the bodies of the crowd, until the enforcers caught her and dragged her up the stage steps, her heels scraping wood. 

All of them Foundry girls.

One final thread, and it floated up and up, searching the rooftops.

Serrah’s eyes went wide, and her hand flew to the bracelet at her wrist. All three of us knew then.

“Run!” Serrah hissed, and we were over the balustrade, dropping down the scaffolding as fast as our feet allowed. Droplets of light rained down around us, and the alley glowed blue as the thread stalked us down.

We hit the alley floor hard. Sable’s ankle buckled, and Serrah hauled her up by the arm without breaking stride.

“Where do we go?” I gasped.

“Anywhere,” Serrah said. “Just away.”

We ran. Past the painted tulips, gold washed hollow by blue light, toward the mouth of the alley and the roaring Square beyond. If we could reach the crowd, we might be free. I’d freed myself once that evening. I could do it again.

Behind us, the light grew brighter, and I looked back.

The thread wound down the alley, slow and serpentine, droplets of light flaking off its length and dissolving against the summer air.

“Serrah—”

Then it shot forward in a blur of blue that wound around her wrist, right over the bracelet’s braided red.

Her arm snapped back. Her feet kept going, and she slammed onto the stones flat on her back, the air driven from her lungs.

“No,” Sable sobbed. “No, no, no—”

I grabbed the thread. It was so cold it burned, and my fingers passed straight through it. I grabbed again anyway. And again. I was fighting a ghost.

Three enforcers rounded the corner.

Sable stepped in front of her sister. “You can’t have her! This is her last one. It’s her last one!”

“I’m sorry, little miss. She’s Chosen,” the nearest enforcer said, and tried to push past her, but Sable pushed back with all the fury of a desperate child. Another enforcer wrapped his arms around Sable, pinning her hands to her sides, and she started shrieking.

I dropped beside Serrah. She was still fighting for air, but she caught my sleeve and pulled me close.

“Look after her,” she whispered.

“Don’t you dare,” I said. “Don’t you dare.”

The enforcers took Serrah by the arms. Sable sank her teeth into the wrist of the enforcer holding her. He swore and let go, and then she was there, grabbing Serrah’s hand, holding on and pulling her back towards the alley. I wrapped my arms around Serrah’s waist and shoved her from the front, all three of us together—trying to outweigh the city.

We couldn’t.

I was torn away from Serrah. Then, the sisters’ hands slid apart. For one moment, their fingers stretched toward each other across the stone, close enough to touch.

Then fingertips too far.

Sable screamed, and I held her as the enforcers marched Serrah out into the light. At the mouth of the alley, Serrah turned back once. She didn’t wave. She just held up her wrist, the red thread there beneath the blue, so her sister could see.

Then Anthem swallowed her too.

Rewrote this chapter based on critiques from this sub. Need feedback on if there’s still issues.

Chapter 1:

My home was small, made smaller by the yells that filled it, but it had a bed. Walls, too. I don’t regret leaving. Never. I just miss having a ceiling.

These past few hours I’ve watched the same scene from the clock tower I sit against. Workmen rush past in a blur of blues and browns and kick up dust from the cobblestone square. In the distance, houses stack so high it looks like they’ll topple over. Even further than them, the sea, lit by the sun so it seems more white than blue. 

Each hour rumbles through me. The stone against my back is so warm it’s almost painful, but I am too tired to sit up straight. My head falls back to peer up at the spire, only for the sun to scorch my face.

Worse than hot, it is humid. It’s as though I am swimming in air. Sweat pools behind my elbows, my knees, in every crevice. My dress feels glued on. Each breath lacks that cool breeze at the back of my throat, so my brain— that animal part of my brain is convinced we are suffocating. When my chest does not tighten, my body is nauseous, irritated almost, that we are not dead on the floor.

Crying brings some relief, at least. I look around to check nobody’s noticed–I look awful when I cry– and find I continue to be invisible. Still, I wipe my cheeks with a finger. The gnawing in my belly has me lick the salty droplets. I cry harder when they immediately dissipate on my dry tongue. I hope the saved pennies of every passerby are worth my misery. What wondrous things they must buy in their fascinating lives.

A scurry and a chitter. My eyes dart to the alley beside me. I can’t stop my mind from conjuring monsters from the shadows, but when a soot-stained face pokes out, the fear settles into disgust. A gangly pack of street urchins weaves between the marching legs, trying to snatch the littered containers before they’re kicked out of reach, then fight amongst themselves for the prize. The winner shakes crumbs into their open mouth.
Rotten. I wrap my arms tighter around myself when a pair of beady eyes meet mine. How much longer can I survive without kindness before transforming into those things?

Desperate for respite, I close my eyes. Instead of peace, I find every sound grows louder. Even more appear I hadn’t noticed before: the cawing of birds, the distant honk of ships. 

I focus on the starry darkness. Here, I find the dream that had me cross an ocean. Since I was a child, every night I’ve fallen asleep to the image. It remains just as bright in the light of day. 

I see myself as I am meant to be. A princess. I will be led into my fairytale by my Prince, and we shall be happy forever after. 

The clock strikes 12, and my eyes snap open. I imagine a countdown to my death– already, I am the oldest I have ever been. Do I need to travel across another ocean to find him? I’d spent every penny on a ticket to the furthest town I could reach, but what if I was still too close to home for anything to have changed? 
Or could it be the world isn’t as big as I thought? But surely there must be somebody here for me? I’m only looking for a single person.

All I know is my time is passing too quick but what is there to do but wait until–

Sleek leather shoes shine against the background of worn boots. They pause abruptly, pivot, and grow larger in my narrow field of vision until they are my entire view. A sudden cool shade, and I can breathe again.

My gaze travels up: pinstripe trousers, the silver chain of a pocket watch, a tailored suit jacket on a crisp white shirt. 

His face. 

Oh, wow.

I would have thought him a living bronze statue were it not for those eyes. A drop of honey in a pool of milk. I feel like drowning.

I want to touch him, but blush at the thought. My hands are too dirty. I sit up straighter, tuck my hair behind my ears, fidget with my hem, then clasp my hands together once I realise how silly I must look. He is watching me. He smiles. I smile because he smiled, and now we’re both smiling.

“I’ve never seen you before.” His voice has me imagining myself sitting in his lap as he strokes my hair. “I would have remembered you if I had.”

“I only just arrived this morning.” My voice comes out in a croak. I bite my tongue and resign myself to life as a mute.

He crouches down. This close, I can see streaks of gold in his dark hair. My brain scrambles, enough that I break my seconds-long vow of silence with a stammered, “What’s your name?”

With the softest touch I’ve ever felt, he holds me by the neck, turning my face this way and that. My skin prickles beneath his cool hand.

“Ambrose,” he breathes, “My name is Ambrose.”

Lady Ambrose. Perhaps Duchess instead. Countess, I could be.

Princess.

My body stops hurting.

“I have a friend who would be very interested to meet you.” A soft squeeze on my neck and I am chest-deep in quicksand. It is so warm here.

“You are very beautiful,” my Ambrose says, “and we collect beautiful things.”

His hand leaves my neck, and he holds it out. Palm up. “Would you like to meet them?”

I place my hand in his, and together we rise.

Critique: https://www.reddit.com/r/DestructiveReaders/s/V7TD6T4ctE

Also if anyone’s interested, I’m looking for beta readers for the rest of the manuscript [24K words]. Just leaving feedback for Chapter 1 above would be super helpful!

Crits: 4723 2925

I initially wrote this one for the Halloween contest here on RDR, but was frustrated by the word count limit. This is an extended cut, so to say. Any feedback is welcome.

For those who read the original submission for the contest, I am curious to see if the added sections of this one deserve the added word count, or are they meandering/bloat?

[The next big thing] (Edit: I closed the link. Got enough great critiques; thanks to all who commented.)

P.S, in an attempt to avoid spam, I'm using the 'publish to web' feature. Let me know if there's any issues with that.

Hi everyone, this was originally going to be a response to an r/writingprompts post but kind of turned into a larger project than would easily work for a comment reply.

Docs link: The Meadow

My critiques:

• [1122] The Seven Sisters Orchard

• [862] Heaven and Hell

• [2309] Go cry to your money

Thank you for any feedback!

Hi! I’m a young writer working on a historical coming-of-age novel set in 1898. This is a section of Chapter Two.

For context, Will and Teddy are two thirteen-year-old boys from an orphanage. Teddy accidentally gets off at the wrong train station, and Will jumps off the moving train after him.

I’m mainly looking for feedback on the dialogue, pacing, and narration. Does the dialogue sound natural for their age and the time period? Does the pacing feel too slow or rushed? Is anything repetitive or unnecessary?

Please don’t be afraid to be critical! I appreciate honest, constructive feedback.

critique: https://www.reddit.com/r/DestructiveReaders/s/ZbT2HVvGzx

Manuscript: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1H_M9VzOhp-1ckaL6KAPD51v_xgEP4xTawf7ztCq6xTc/edit?usp=drivesdk

Hi everyone! This is my first post here. I have critiqued:

[2925] Lim Seok Jin

Here's my story:

A Masterclass in Escape Artistry (Previously Life/Dream)

In your critique, you can critique any aspect, but please include two things:

1. What do you actually understand this work to be? On an intellectual level, what is your understanding?

2. Has three subpoints; all are based on feeling:

A) As you read through the work, how do you feel? What stirs in your heart, if anything? Please speak about what happened during your reading (the evolution of mood across the work).

B) Directly afterwards (once the mood has accumulated fully, what is your experience of that accumulation? What do you see?)

C) Post-reading, once everything has calmed down, what is your impression of this? Did it leave anything on you, feeling-wise?

Thanks! And again, if you want to note anything else - line craft, polish, etc., feel free!

[3181] How To Make A Hundred Thousand Dollars

[2925] LIM SEOK JIN

This isn't a story, just a piece of writing on a subject I really enjoy. I am not religious by any means but I do come from a very religious country. Any feedback is welcome.

---------------

Have you ever known so much shame it becomes you? One day you wake up from a deep slumber in the middle of your life and all of a sudden you cannot recognize yourself anymore. A dread grips your whole body and sleep flees you like a fugitive. All you see are two vertical folds of skin between your eyes that resemble scars from your perpetually furrowed eyebrows. When did my softness leave me? You can not recall. 

You get irritated by the slightest infractions and your patience wears thin but you don’t know why. You act before you think sometimes, realizing the words you have just spoken only after having spoken them but you don’t know why. You want to speak up but how can you? The lump of thought lodged in your throat chokes you but you don’t know why. And when you try to swallow, everything gets pushed down into your chest, day after day, piling. You silently rage but you don’t know why. You incessantly talk to yourself but you don’t know why. You try to summon something good about yourself, but all that arises is a flood of unworthiness, but you don’t know why! You have inherited an ancient malady, the roots of which are so deep and primitive, to trace them would be to trace mankind’s anguished history. 

This history, like all histories, is a story, told to me by the elders. The first story I ever heard and if you hate religion like I do, I am here to tell you that it doesn’t matter. The story goes that before the nothingness of nothingness, God wished Himself and His love to be known. So over six days He manifested that love in the form of creation; the witness to all His Glory. On the sixth day, God placed before all His children; the heavens, the earth and everything in between, His Sacred Trust or *Al-Amanah* and invoked them the responsibility of its divine injunctions. That is, the Trust to fulfill all religious obligation decreed by God and acceptance of all His commands and prohibitions stipulated by the bestowal of reward or punishment thereafter in varying degrees. To fulfill such a Trust, God offered the condition of free will and conscience, the gift that would distinguish its recipient from all of God’s other creations, the ultimate ability to self actualize as the manifestation of God Himself; the divinity of thought. The same thought that is blithely unaware of its own divinity. 

Out of fear of His wrath upon failure to fulfill these commands, all His children refused. They remained content in being exactly what God had made them; the heavens, the earth and everything in between, and in their obsequious service to Him without any further responsibility or enhancements. 

God revealed: “Indeed, we offered the Trust to the heavens and the earth and the mountains, and they declined to bear it and feared it;…” 

However, man accepted it. To this God commanded “Be” and exhaled a Divine breath in wet clay transforming it into a vessel that held a drop of His consciousness. Written in this beginning is the story of mankind’s simultaneous end.

That is how man came to be upon a recondite earth - without any manuscript or deliberate notions to fulfill his pre-eternal promise. The gift of his curiosity helped him survive. Soon he understood safety was in numbers and quickly, a sense of reliance and community was born, a sense of belonging, possibly purpose. Mankind learnt what made it happy, sad, angry and it started to show an iota of what it is to be human. But somewhere along its trudge, along the evolution of his awareness, he realized free will was not the only condition God had bestowed upon him to fulfill *Al-Amaanah*. There was another; man's time in this domain was to be limited. Atrophy was to be a natural part of him. He was not impervious to disease, no rock like impenetrable skin, or the fluidity of water, or the lightness of air, just brittle bones covered in flesh and skin, easily scathed but doubly hard to repair. Death was to be his second condition.

From then on, man’s gift of thought, meant to reflect on the human condition and its relationship to the Divine, turned its eye outwards instead of inwards. It shifted from surviving, to resisting its own impermanence. Man became consumed with the fear of his own end and birthed the source of his unending worry; greed. He raced through the intervals between hunter gatherer to farmer to industry, to hydrogen powered bombs (or thermonuclear bombs, about a 1000 times more powerful than an atomic bomb or nuclear bomb) and finally to the age of the computer and modern technology to stretch his life. It was a need to survive and persist so voracious, under the pseudonym of progress, it decimated the only living source designed to sustain not just mankind but itself as well. He plundered and looted, murdered and massacred himself in his attempts to control his own fate and then compensated for it with exhaustive and unforgiving productivity, efficiency, convenience and worst of all, unrelenting urgency. 

The suffocation of his mind caused by this supererogatory urgent need deprived man of the ability to take pause and think about how life was in fact meant to be lived. And when there was pause, it was contingent on the very limited period set of course by those who demanded constant productivity from others. Anyone in opposition to these values faced shame on a societal level. Man told himself his means were justified if the end result was convenience and progress for all even though his history is littered with proof of the contrary. Under the conditioning of his own shame he started to behave how everyone else expected him to behave, a human acting as a human, a people pleaser. He split himself in two. One face he showed the world and the other he kept hidden deep inside his heart, protected. Overtime the two become indistinguishable. Soon, the face he had chosen to hide became lost and the face he had chosen to show became both faces.  

His egocentric fear to control and subdue everything around him to optimize his chances of survival lead to nothing but the profligacy of his hallowed gift and the absolute privation of empathy towards himself.

“…but man \[undertook to\] bear it. Indeed, he was unjust and ignorant.”

The facility God so lovingly sought to bestow on man, became his greatest burden. But not all those who have possessed the gift of thought have been enslaved by it. Some have tasted its divinity. One only need but a lick of it to imagine a universe where man’s gift of curiosity leads towards introspection, deeper self reflection and a fearless embrace of the eventuality of his nature. One where actions are led with empathy and not reaction. Where human life would be worth more. One where man would recognize nature to be a part of himself and learn its divine ways merely through patience. He would know that when God designed a bee, he had no choice but to design a flower too. He would recognize that every blade of grass that extended, did so magnificently, without its neighbor in mind. 

And when he would speak to nature through his silence, it would show him the secrets of its persistent beauty. It would show him how it surrendered God’s offer of *Al-Amanah* in order to gain the ability to manifest itself so beautifully, without a hint of comparison to itself. Of course, that is the trade nature made. It gave up conscience to be able to achieve this infinite exquisiteness. 

It would say to man, “I only exist in my singularity. I can not judge, I can not be good or evil and I can not perceive, I just am. It is what I have always been.” Nature removed all the things in its path that would have hindered its most beautiful self from coming forth including God’s merciful gift. Then man would know without a shadow of a doubt that even time moved quite differently in nature than it did in his own mind. Nature was not concerned with things like the future or the past. It was ever present. He would come to know the secret of longevity and timelessness. Man would realize that this recognition was only possible because he came from the same beauty and that he would merely be recognizing himself. There is no story greater than nature. It is one that needs no words, only an open heart to see.

But man’s outward facing eye has shown him only fear. Fear of failure, fear of rejection of abandonment, fear of himself, fear of death. It has taught him to take other lives to extend his own. It has moved him far away from his eternal truth and placed within him a barrier of shame so large, it is all that is visible to him. And when it would speak to him through the noise of his thoughts it would show him only that which he lacks. It would show him in others that which he can not yet see in himself. It would wound and cripple him to the point where he would not be able to recognize joy or peace or love anymore, he would be enslaved by his own thoughts. He would miss the point of love and mistake it for attachment. Love is absolute, he will not know this. It is not something to be given or taken like an exchange. It is something to embody. He would be scarred by his own mind. It would tell him that he must *be* something in order to be accepted by himself, anything at all and that shame awaits him if he fails to be so. And here, where he will eventually surrender to his shame, he will mistakingly believe that his purpose is to label himself, to have an identity worthy of recognition.  

Man is wired with the instinct to survive with an evolutionary history that associates survival with belonging to a group for its protection, nurturance and passing on it’s genes. As such he has to abide by the group’s “rules” or “standards” or “values”. Often when humanity values one thing, it condemns the opposite. Therefore shame can very easily become a method of control. It is a self conscious emotion linked to real or *perceived* moral failures resulting in lack of self worth, and perception is something that can easily be manipulated.

This is an ancient force that has survived since man’s existence and it affects every single human no matter where they may be from. An intangible morass created by mankind’s heinous treatment of one another in the name of control, left untangled, turned in to a walking talking manifestation of shame in the shape of a human being. Multiplied by several billion, an entire race that lives as if plagued with open scars on its skin, the slightest touch causing searing pain, lesions and burns inflicted by its own outwardly values.

In the face of this unbearable guilt and shame, man has leapt towards justification not just with blind progress but also with trite platitudes that pretend to be ointments for his open wounds, “be kind to one another” without realizing it is absolutely more important to be kind to himself first. The latter negating the former. 

We don’t live in *this* world. We live in the world that’s inside our head, in the fog of its own perceptions. We talk to it, scream at it, hate it, love it, reason with it and before we know it, it passes us by as quickly as a stranger does on a sidewalk. A flame that goes out before it even has a chance to know its own light. Somewhere underneath the pollution of our mind is a life of no reward or punishment, no comparison or loneliness, no fear of its own end. It is a life of wholehearted acceptance, of love, the truth of God’s gift.

Now that you have recognized me, I will show you what I am. If you believe in purpose, you will get stuck in purpose. And if you achieve your purpose, you will get stuck in your achievements. If you want to know the purpose of life, look upon nature with patience and one day you might recognize yourself in it and know that the only purpose of our existence is to simply be a witness. 

Hi, this is the first story I’m posting here.

Here are some of my critiques:

3181_how_to_make_a_hundred_thousand_dollars

2309_go_cry_to_your_money

1515_watching_the_comet_strike_them

2990_ethiopia

1832_leave_only_ash

1379_chapter_2_horror_urban_fantasy_paranormal

2900_gothic_horror_dark_paranormal_romance

2377_number_42

1095_bus_gods

2058_come_home_family_drama

2278_the_beacon_hotel_total_rewrite

2558_untitled_novel_chapter_1

Link to the file LIM_SEOK_JIN.pdf

The file is in PDF format, hosted on my own server, and proudly free-notarized by NotarizeMy.com (Code: NM-KH5Z9EZ3YDPKY285)

Any comments and/or criticism are welcome.

Thank you.

The Seven Sisters Orchard

My critique: [2309] Go Cry to Your Money

Critiques:

[2309] Go cry to your money

[1822] Alone and Sinning

[1192] The Winnowing

Hey folks! New-ish writer here! I'm writing something I can hopefully submit to a contest, and so far it's a little rough. I'd love to get some feedback on it, where it's weakest, and what I can do to make it better. Also, I should mention that english is my second language, so this might be a clunky read. Anyways here's the story!

How to make a hundred thousand dollars

I do part time work on Duit. It’s pretty much Craigslist, but more regulated. There’s good cash in it if you look hard enough. Easy money for easy work. Cleaning gutters, babysitting, things like that. Though every once and a while you’ll find jobs that stick with you for the rest of your life.

One listing I always tell my friends about was the old man who was looking for someone to pet his cat for an hour. I filled in for an easy two hundred bucks. When I got to his place, he took me to his bedroom where, in the middle of his bed, was a hogtied persian. He told me to sit on the side of the bed, stroke the cat, and call him sir throughout the session. And so I stroked his persian for a bit, all the while the man sat on a chair in the corner of the room, beer in hand, telling me when to stroke and how hard, when to go easy on the cat and when to slap its behind. His account never posted a job listing again after that.

Another odd job I recall was a hundred bucks to swim in a bog with a bunch of old men. Oddly enough, it didn’t seem sexual. Though with the kind of money I made that day, I wouldn’t have minded.

I say all this to preface the kinds of jobs I usually find and fill in for, and why I’ll never work on that damned app again.

I was scrolling through job listings, refreshing the tab over and over again, until a fresh listing with no applications yet.

One thousand dollars for anyone who wants to sleep in my house

It was an old lady looking for someone to sleep in her guestroom for an evening. Jobs like these are usually immediate red flags, but her account had a long enough history, and she had glowing reviews from a lot of accounts. And so, I signed up. The moment I sent in the application, I got a notification saying I was accepted. I talked with the lady over the phone.

“Hello dear! I’m glad you applied for my listing!”

Why yes ma’am, I’d be more than happy to sleep in your house for an evening, especially for one thousand dollars! I said, making sure I mentioned the amount in case it was a typo

“Why yes, dear! It’s an odd job, I’m aware, but please understand that in my old age, good company is worth its weight in gold.”

I took up the job right then and there. She told me the address, and a few days later, I was off to make the easiest thousand of my life. 

I arrived in the evening and found myself standing at a giant gilded gate that guarded a cobblestone path shouldered by wide palms leading to a giant mansion. A thousand seemed like chump change now. Before I could do anything, I heard a buzz and the gates parted with a creak, as though it hadn’t opened in centuries. I got out of the taxi and walked on foot through a cobblestone path leading up to the estate. There, I was greeted by an old lady in a shawl who, in her youth, must’ve been a heartbreaker. The moment she saw me, she put her hands to her mouth and took a step back.

“I’m sorry, it’s just…” she said, unsure where to put her hands, “I knew it from your profile picture on the app but, you look so much like my son.” She let out a sad moan as she wrapped her bony arms around me, feeling them quiver as her hands squeezed my back. “Oh, god.” she said, not letting go for a long time. “I’m sorry. Can I just hold you like this? Just a little longer?”

And how could I say no? She was old and frail, and there was a softness in her voice that made me want to protect her. And so she held me in her arms, sobbing into my chest as she did, calling me Jason all the while.

After a long time, she slowly unfurled her arms and started, as though suddenly remembering, “Oh dear, where are my manners?” she chuckled. “I’m Beth. Please, come in.”

The inside of the place was every bit as lavish as the outside. Tall, intricate pillars held the place together as a glass roof let in soft moonlight. Pristine checker pattern floors were strewn with extravagant tables and plants with flowers I’d never seen before. Just the living room alone costs more money than I’ll ever make in my lifetime.

She brought me to the dining area, the kitchen abuzz with chefs in uniform, the dining table flanked by a dozen butlers standing as still as stones. Sitting at the table was an odd selection of folks. Three of them. Two women and an old man. Beth sat me down and with the ring of a bell, chefs came out in droves, and the table was set with lobster and crab cake, java rice and pork, and old wine from before I was born. We ate what I can only describe as the most delicious dinner of my life. We ate in silence, unsure of what to talk about.

“Now then,” Beth began once the last fork was put down, “I’m sure you’re all wondering why I’ve gathered you all here. As you’ve figured out by now, all of you have been hired off Duit. And yes, all of you will receive your thousand dollars come morning time.”

The offer still sounded so unreal. I looked around the table and I could see the others thought the same thing. Especially the old man. He looked to be in his seventies and was quite well dressed in his oxford shirt and vest. He seemed to have aged quite gracefully with his full head of silver hair and the wrinkles around his mouth that told of a man with a large love for life. But his eyes, his eyes were all too happy to hear about the cash. There was a glint of wanting in them that made me wonder if he was about to stand up and shout yes! Give it to me!

The two other women didn’t seem as shaken by the promise, but shaken nonetheless. One wore a tight red dress and had brunette hair. She was beautiful. Maybe even more beautiful than Beth in her youth. And the other, who seemed the youngest of us with dark brown eyes, messy hair, and wearing nothing more than a band shirt and baggy sweatpants, was slackjaw at the mention of the money.

“But I must confess something to you all. I left out quite a bit from the job listing.” At that, the energy in the room plummeted. Here we go, I thought, another odd eccentric.

“You see,” she began, “I am the only one left of my family. My husband and son, and his dear wife…” she clutched the edge of the table, steeling herself  “have left this world after a terrible car crash,” her voice trembling at the mention.

“I’m terribly sorry to hear that.” Said the old man, who was sitting next to Beth. He moved his hand over hers and held it softly. Beth immediately pulled her hand back. She held her hand in the air for a moment, before slowly letting it fall back down to the table and unto the old man’s hand.

“Thank you, Daniel.” She said softly, squeezing his hand with all the force of a petal. “Now where was I? Ah, yes. I did not mention that for each day you stay in my home, I will pay an additional fifty thousand dollars. At the end of the week, if you choose to stay, I will pay you all an additional hundred thousand dollars.”

It got quiet real quick. The air suddenly got heavy with the weight of a hundred thousand dollars. Then the lady in the band shirt spoke.

“What’s the catch?” She asked.

“Well dear, I’m rather embarrassed to ask you all of this,” Beth looked back to the long hall that led to the living room and towards a family portrait, “I want you all to be my family. Just for the week.”

“That’s it?” asked the woman in the red dress, her brow furrowed in disbelief, leaning forward against the table. Sheepishly, the small, old woman looked down and, like a little schoolgirl, became flush with embarrassment. 

“Yes. It’s just…” she said in a small, feeble voice, “The house has been so, so quiet without them.” I took a long look at the portrait in the hallway and realized that there was a man in the picture that looked just like me. Not just that, but each face in the portrait had a lookalike present at the table. “If it’s not too much to ask, I’d love to spend just a little more time with my family, even if it’s just play-pretend.”

Daniel, the old man, slowly raised his glass of wine and said, “I think I speak for everyone in this room when I say we’d be more than happy to keep you company.” With that, we each raised our glasses in toast, and watched as the small old woman’s eyes leaked out quiet tears.

That would be the first night I spent at the estate. Beth went to bed early and the butlers showed us around the place before finally leaving us in the smoking room and offering us cigars from the Philippines. Notes of whiskey and chocolate said the butler, to be lit strictly with Spanish Cedar Matches.

“This place is quite something.” said the young girl in the band shirt, nursing a glass of sparkling water. “So, what are you guys here for?”

“For the money.” chuckled Daniel, the old man, smoke rising from his cigar like a fingerprint unravelling.

“No, but like, what are you really here for?” 

“Does there need to be a reason to want to get paid?” asked the girl in the red dress, smoke lazily billowing out her mouth

There was an awkward pause before I offered, “well, I’m here to pay off my sister’s tuition.”

“Oh how sweet.” said Red Dress flatly. 

“See? Now that’s a reason!” Band Shirt raised her glass to me, half smiling. “I’m here to pay for my mother’s funeral.” 

“I’m sorry to hear that.” said Daniel. 

“Don’t be. Bitch left her entire will to some cult.” Band Shirt held her hand out to Daniel, who passed his cigar. She took a long puff.

“Well, I’m here to leave something to my grandkids. Only a matter of time before what’s mine is theirs.” Daniel craned his neck up, looking softly at the moon through the glass roof. “Brain cancer. Inoperable.” 

“Shit.” Red Dress said, passing her cigar to the old man. 

“Shit indeed.”

“My name’s Melissa by the way.” Said Red Dress. “You can call me Mel.”

“The pleasure’s all mine, Mel.” said Daniel, shaking her hand.

“I’m Reyna.” Said Band Shirt. “Call me Rey.”

“Mike.” I said.

It was midnight by the time they showed us to our rooms. I reeked of fine tobacco, and found myself a giant, lavish bed, strewn with pillows that were probably stuffed with the feathers of extinct birds. Beth had told us not to pack anything, and I could see why. On the bed laid a set of silk pyjamas, cool and smooth on the skin. I could get used to this.

I laid in bed, falling in and out of sleep. I could hear a thousand bird calls coming from out the balcony, seeming to echo from the dark countryside night. I checked my watch. 3AM. I could still taste the tobacco in my mouth, now with that bitter taste of still spit. My mind was buzzing with thoughts of a hundred thousand dollars. Would I get them in a tightly packed briefcase? A duffle bag filled with bills like ruffled feathers? I lied to everyone in the smoke room. I wasn’t paying for my sister’s tuition. I haven’t talked to my sister in years. No, I ran away from home a week before I took out a giant loan I had no intention of paying. I was a stupid kid with stupid dreams of making it big on my own. I wanted to be a rockstar. Dropped a small fortune on a guitar and sound equipment, spent my nights playing for nobody in seedy bars, and sucking off old men to earn myself a warm bed at night. Didn’t pan out. I lasted all of three months before the loan sharks found me, and eventually, my family. They’d send me photos of my parents’ house at night, of my sister going to class, of Daryll, our family dog, lying dead on the pavement, his head a stone toss away from his body. This was my last shot at freedom. My last shot of keeping my folks safe. 

My mind was going to a dark place. And so I got up to wander. That’s what I would’ve done, but as I got up to the door, I smelled something awful in the air. It was coming from the door that led to the hall. I could hear footsteps, slow and careful, and the sound of soft bristles brushing up against the doorframe. Someone was right outside my room. Getting closer, I could hear straining and –yes, gagging, I heard a stifled gag from outside my door. It was a man’s voice. 

“Make sure to brush it between the ridges.” whispered a man from right outside the door. “Small and thin as you can.”

But there was another voice, coming from upstairs, crawling in from the balcony.

“Oh, Richard!” moaned a voice from above my room. It sounded like Beth. “Richard! Richard!”

I went back to bed slowly. I sat on the bed until daylight, not getting any sleep. Once I could hear the others moving in their rooms (my room was flanked by Rey’s and Mel’s) I got out to inspect the door. That was when I saw a thin red line running across the top of the intricately carved door frame. It smelled like shit and blood.

And so I made my way downstairs to the dining area. The house seemed strange in the daylight, as though it were a different place altogether. They brought out eggs and rice, ham and bacon, and sweet, refreshing orange juice. We ate in silence.

“Now then,” clapped Beth, “I hope you all had a wonderful night, because we’ve got some fun plans today! isn’t that right, honey?” she said, looking at Daniel, who had tired eyes and slumped shoulders. He hadn’t touched a single thing on his plate.

“Right, dear.” he said, ragged and frayed. 

Rey nudged his shoulder, offering him a cup of coffee. He didn’t even look up from the table. “You good, dude?”

“Yeah, it’s just…” his eyes turned to Beth as he put on a wide, tired smile. 

“Oh my, looks like someone had fun last night.” she winked.

Daniel tensed up, nodding slowly and keeping his eyes locked on his plate.

Jesus Christ. Jesus fucking Christ. You could hear a pin drop with how quiet it was. One of the chefs just had his arms on the kitchen island, looking at the marble countertop, unmoving. Mel was aghast, looking at nowhere in particular, unsure of what to do. 

“Well then, I’ll meet you all at the function room at ten. The butlers should have some fine clothes for you once you get back to your rooms.” She walked over to Daniel who was sitting on the left of the table, and put her old hands on his shoulders. Daniel shuddered, his face cringing as he clung to the table cloth for dear life.  “Some very, very fine clothes.”

Once she left, and we made sure of it, we all turned our heads to the old, quivering, man. 

“What the fuck happened last night?” asked Rey. 

“... I don’t –I don’t wanna talk about it.”

I could see the portrait in the hall more clearly in the light. There, I could see an old man that looked like Daniel holding hands with Beth. In the foreground stood a man who looked just like me, and holding his arms stood the Dopplegangers of Rey and Mel.

“Daniel,” said Mel, “Did she do something to you?”

“Goddamnit!” he yelled, getting up and slamming his hands on the table. “We’re talking about a hundred thousand dollars here! Any one of you would’ve done it! Not one of you would’ve refused!”

Not one of us said a thing.

“Right? I’m… I’m not…” he was shaking, gasping for air. “Fuck,” he moaned in despair, “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” he cried, hands wrapping around himself in shame, as he slowly sank back into his seat, now trembling with tears. “Oh god.”

We sat there, speechless. Daniel asked for a drink from one of the butlers, and he drank half a handle of whiskey on his own, washing it down with a pitcher of water.

Daniel went back to his room, as I and the girls went to huddle in the smoking room.

“This is seriously fucked.” said Rey. “Can’t we, like, report this?” She was on the edge of her seat, antsy.

“And if Beth decides to call off the gig?” Mel spat.

“Does that matter right now?” I barked. 

“It does, actually. I’m not about to lose out on a hundred thousand dollars because an old man can’t keep his poker face.”

“How could you say that shit, Mel? How fucking dare you.” said Rey. “Fuck this. I’m leaving.”

“Oh don’t be so fucking selfish!” hissed Mel. “If you leave, none of us get shit!” 

Rey stood up, and slapped Mel across the face. “What the fuck is wrong with you?!”

Mel only took a puff of her cigar and let the smoke crawl out of her red face. Rey got up and left, slamming the door on her way out. I chased after her, unsure of where I stood. Just suck it up, I wanted to say. Please, god, just suck it up. But then again, Daniel…

“Wait!” I yelled after Rey. 

“Oh what, you’re on her side too?” she asked. We were by our rooms, early morning light shining down from the roof.

“Look, I think,” Mel shoved me, hard.

“Think what? That this shit is fine? That I should keep my mouth shut and play along?”

“I think that this should be Daniel’s–” just then, the door on the far end of the room burst open, and out came Daniel, red with alcohol.

He stumbled out towards us, and bellowed, “We’re staying! No one leaves, or so help me God I’ll kill you! Kill you myself!” And so it was. We returned to our rooms and waited.

Critique: 2,309 — Go cry to your money

Content warning: sexual references and pornography.

I don't understand why I acted so impulsively last night. I was alone, so there's no one else to blame. Full responsibility is mine. Still, I can't quite figure out why I did it. Maybe if I trace back what actually happened, it'll make sense.

I remember it starting around 10 PM. Or maybe the friction started in the morning.

Around 8 to 8:30 AM, there were messages in my apartment community whatsapp group that the water supply was impacted and this was unforeseen. I assumed it’ll come back in an hour. It didn’t. I couldn’t hold my poop longer. So I used one toilet in the morning, and another toilet later in the afternoon (running water wasn’t back until 8:30 PM!). Both toilets upstairs had unflushed waste. I hadn't expected the community water pump to fail out of nowhere and I realised how unprepared we were. So from the moment I woke up, I was walking around with a low-grade irritation. I took a ‘best brother’ coffee mug my sister had gifted me for a rakhi into the bathroom, carefully measuring out drinking water from my water bottle to clean my bum. Like the classic river-crossing puzzle with the tiger, the goat, and the haystack, I was calculating when to use reserve water from the flush, when to use water from the geyser, if any left in the holding tank, where every drop of water was in the upstairs rooms, trying to flush and wash up without wasting any before heading out. Well I had a hunch that there could be some water downstairs. But I just didn’t want to carry a bucket of water upstairs. It felt embarrassing for some reason.

It feels like a "privacy problem." There was a water issue upstairs, and there was water available downstairs. Yet I didn't want to deal with an older relative and our househelp downstairs to get it. If my wife is there, it's completely fine. With just the two of them, I just don't want to interact. If you ask me why, I can’t come up with good reasons. That's why I label it a privacy problem.

Anyway, by 8:30 AM, I managed to flush, clean up, splash barely enough water on my face, and started my work from home. Whenever I could, I went out and walked in the community. I managed to finish my 10,000 steps by evening.
Coming back.
Because of the morning's irritation, I didn't feel like eating breakfast at all. By afternoon, when hunger finally kicked in, I took some red rice upstairs and ate late by myself. Almost around 3:30 PM. No complaints about the food. Just the same recurring issue: privacy.

The older relative is always at home. Whether I want to walk through the living room or cook in the kitchen, I constantly feel like someone is in my way. To be honest, if anyone other than my wife is in the kitchen, I feel boxed out. I cannot share a kitchen and cook in peace. Even at my own home, I can only be free around a handful of people. My wife, my brother. Not even my mum. I know these are privileged, personal problems. Maybe adulthood spoiled me.

While all this was building up during the day, I noticed a dull pain in the bottom-right corner of my right eye whenever I blinked or pressed it. I was too lazy and drained to even check it in the mirror, so I kept postponing it. It was a hectic day work-wise with a pressing deadline. Misfortunes never come singly!

When I finally checked my eye in the mirror at night, nothing was visible, though the ache was still there. As I’m writing, it’s still there. I brushed it off as screen and reading strain and figured a good night's sleep would fix it. That's usually our default answer for everything, isn't it? Now let's look at why I'm sitting here feeling this level of self-loathing. My original plan for the night was to drink a protein shake and go to sleep early. With my wife away, though, my brain keeps rationalising that I could masturbate more than once. Specifically, hunting for female muscle wrestling clips on adult sites. I can't even fully explain why I fixate on that niche. Maybe when we feel restricted in daily life, we watch extreme things to vicariously feel a sense of physical control and power. Isn't that what big action movies or superhero films like Avengers do for most people? None of us can be the Hulk or a Super Soldier in real life. Yet if someone offered you that raw physical dominance for a week, wouldn't you take it? What draws me in isn't scripted entertainment like WWE, or brutal combat like MMA. It's those unscripted, grainy 240p or 360p clips where two muscular women actually test their strength against each other with personality, real exertion, and total physical control. They either don’t do it anymore or they’re freakin’ expensive. Because high-quality, unscripted videos like that are scarce and locked behind expensive $25 pay-per-clip sites that feel wasteful and "sinful" to buy, I go on a treasure hunt on free tube sites. Since the target videos are a niche, only 1 in 20 is a good result. When you discover that one, you start mushroom picking and storing these in your short term memory, and go on this wild mushroom chase. You hunt longer, watch repeatedly, and binge. Before you are happy with one video, you are curious about what happens in the other one. So you switch. At this point, I don't know if it's just extreme lust or something deeper wired into the brain.

Next came the gluttony. Around 10 PM, hunger hit hard. I could have walked downstairs and eaten the food already at home. Instead, I craved something new. Anything outside the house. Desires took over. The moment I opened the food delivery app, though, financial caution kicked in. I started a loop: open a restaurant, pick an item, apply every coupon code, check the final price, memorize it, back out, and repeat. Even at one minute per restaurant, comparing every decent option took nearly an hour. The perils of choices in a city 🙁

By the end of that hour, the value of money had completely eroded in my head. It's just money, I told myself. I can always earn it back. “My time must be worth more than the marginal cost differences” I thought. Out of all those options, wanting both novelty and guaranteed meat quantity, I ordered a massive two-person festive biryani pack. With 4 or 5 kinds of meat in it. By the time I ordered, showered, and got the food, it was 10:45 PM. I knew my body wouldn't even enjoy heavy food that late. Eating downstairs wasn't an option. The older relative was asleep. The privacy problem.

So I carried the whole feast upstairs unopened. There was a mix of awkwardness and greed about hiding what I was eating. I put on a movie and started eating. How much can you actually enjoy food like that? I wasn't really tasting it. I was just mechanically finishing what I started, with guilt running in the background. It was enough food for two full appetites. Four types of meat, rice, sides, and two packs of buttermilk. I ate all of it except for a mound of rice that I just couldn’t shove in. Packing up half of it for tomorrow didn't appeal to me at all. Putting leftovers in the downstairs fridge meant the older relative would see it and judge me. Once I finished, I paused the movie just to figure out how to dispose of the containers without anyone downstairs noticing. I briefly considered tossing the bag out from the balcony before my civic sense stopped me. Leaving it outside the house meant overflowing the already full bin. So I snuck downstairs and buried it in the kitchen dustbin. I suspected the older relative might discover my sin in the trash. But I took that risk. Even she must feel awkward to ask a grown man about something in the trash can.

Between 1 to 1:30 PM, I paced around my room for a few minutes to ease my heavy stomach. A tiny compensation for a huge mistake. By the time I went to bed, it was 2 AM, with no idea when I'd wake up. I masturbated once more right after the movie and turned on another movie. My better senses prevailed and I put the phone away.

My wife called at 6 AM in the morning and I couldn’t go back to sleep. I meditated for half an hour. Then I decided to reflect on what exactly happened last night.

Now that the reflection was done, I went on gemini and asked a bunch of questions like “why did the body do this? What could I have done better? Blah blah..”

This is what I understood.

1. I spent 14 hours draining my self-control on small, unnecessary frictions. Rationing water with a coffee mug, skipping breakfast, hiding in my room, and ignoring a painful eye. By 10 PM, my brain's braking system was completely empty. My depleted brain demanded a reward.

2. Because I felt boxed out of my own living room and kitchen all day, staying up until 2 AM doing "forbidden" things in total secrecy was my brain's way of reclaiming autonomy and space (Still can’t wrap my head around it).

3. Both the 240p video hunt and the 60-minute delivery app scroll were the exact same behavior. The dopamine wasn't in the food or the videos (Not enjoying biryani was the proof). The dopamine was in the hunt. Spending an hour comparing discounts didn't save me money. It just wore down my willpower until I bought a massive feast at 10:45 PM.

4. I didn't finish a two-person meal out of pure greed. I ate the whole thing so I wouldn't have to leave leftovers in a shared fridge downstairs. I used my stomach to destroy the evidence.

Gemini’s recommendations for my solo nights:

1. Eat proactively before 8 PM: Don't let hunger build up until late at night when willpower is zero.

2. Keep an upstairs stash: Keep simple backup food and a 5-liter water can upstairs so a basic physical need never depends on crossing a social zone when I want to be left alone.

3. The 10-minute delivery rule: If I want outside food when I'm solo, decide before 8 PM and cap browsing at 10 minutes using 2–3 default solo meals.

4. Stop trying to be invisible in my own house: Walking downstairs with a bucket or putting leftovers in my own fridge requires zero explanation. Let people observe or judge if they want—tolerating 30 seconds of awkwardness beats force-feeding myself at midnight to hide trash.

First chapter in an urban fantasy heist story. Any feedback welcome. Comments should be enabled in the google doc.

Critique here: Critique 1
First chapter here: Google doc link

Thanks in advance

Crit: - [4264] https://www.reddit.com/r/DestructiveReaders/comments/1xf1m2y/comment/19s0wzoylqso2/?context=3

Story: - https://docs.google.com/document/d/1RySObtoGNouLNVlg1mLBRf4ZauAnsvS7x-NM_712l_o/edit?usp=sharing

Note: - If anyone is interested in the context of the story, please feel free to visit the previous part.

TLDR for context: - Basically, it takes place in a war zone between loyalists and the rebels. The chimera was once a rebel soldier but now seek a better life in the woods.

(2672) Branches - Part 1

Critiques

• (438) Cipher

• (490) Geromé 13:1 – Tales of the Battlefield

• (953) Stop putting your friends on pedestals

• (1180) The Off Stranger

Hello! This story was developed for my worldbuilding project, World of Relics (rename pending). The full story is split in three parts. After this submission, I'll post another part once I make more critiques to cover its word count.

For some quick context, WOR is a high fantasy xenofiction about living fantasy object characters (think giant swords and axes).

This portion of this story covers the story's beginning with Caelestis checking on Eligius and a flashback of what happened.

For critiques, I'm interested in the following.

• How is the overall execution of the story so far? Would you be interested in reading more? Why or Why not?

• Do you have an understanding of the worldbuilding? Exposition, character descriptions, environment? Do I explain too much of anything?

• Does the sentence and dialogue structure makes sense? What is redundant or needs cutting?

• How well did I do characterization? Character, voice, motives, and intentions?

• Other issues such as grammar, consistency, and other things?

Problem areas I need help on:

• I got confused on how to handle Third Person Omniscient vs Third Person Limited. The earlier drafts started out as 3rd person omniscient but later revisions became 3rd person limited. I'm not sure if I change it well, but any pointers on how to do this better is welcomed.

• I have no idea how big Endoxi Sofia is in my setting. It's based on the Hagia Sophia, which is an already really big building. I tried to imagine it fitting for the scale of my Refitted characters, such as Guardian Meria (approx. 34ft ) mentioned in this story part for example.

• Why objects? Why not!

Thank you!

Edit: I decided to work on a major revision on this part (and the remaining story) base on the issues pointed out by one user in the thread below. I think tackling these issues first (readability, 3rd-person limited, inconsistencies) should be my priority going forward, including research on how to do revisions properly. Thank you to those who critiqued my work and left line edits in the doc!

Critiques: [1820] [1558] [862] [490]

Sir Patrick Stewarts' death reignited a long-running Star Trek love, that had been slumbering for quite awhile. So came this story.

Any thoughts are appreciated. It is meant to be a full "episode" and not part of a larger plotline- what is introduced here ends here, though I may take the premise of the piece and apply it to other situations.

Edit: I’ve removed the Google Doc link because of the spambots sending me emails. If you’re super interested in reading this, shoot me a DM. Otherwise, I’ve got some good feedback already thanks to folks who got here before this!

2026 HALLOWEEN CONTEST RESULTS

The ballots have been counted, the jury has reached their verdict, and nobody was harmed in the process.

This was loads of fun. Thanks to all who participated for the wonderful writing they submitted, and the team of judges who made the process of ranking it all so gloriously glabrous. The writing was off the hook this year. No two judges voted for the same story twice--wait, this isn't actually true, but the one story that did receive two votes for first place didn't end up placing at all(!!math??). This is how close the top 5 stories were.

Lots of very pretty prose and plenty ambiguous endings. A few stories in particular I'd like to come back and flip through just for prose inspiration--koff Shy Lock, koff Winnowing koff Voluptas Vinculorum Vinculum...koffkoffkoff

As for voting, there was very little deliberation among the judges; we were all left alone to decide how much, for example, to weigh the use of the HEART theme into our rankings.

The votes sort of pooled around five or six glowing submissions...

But the rest were all fantastic. Among them, the usual assortment of human miseries; a retired bounty hunter interrogats a suspected nonperson, a tourist ignores her shrill mother and allows herself to be swept up into the deranged festivities of a strange coastal town, a sinner's curiosity dooms more than his relationship with sleep itself, aaand yet another day begins to loop in Punxsutawney...

What else, what else. Some prehistoric dental work? A man isolated on a space-elevator is impervious to existential dread...until he isn't.

There wasn't a bad story in the lot. And should any writer want for more extensive feedback, they can invite it in this thread. (Don't negatively critique them otherwise, since these stories weren't submitted for feedback.)

^{AAAND NOW...THE MOMENT YOU'VE ALL BEEN YADDA YADDA...} **^{DRUMROLL PLS}**^...

THE WINNING STORY IS:

MAGGOTS FOR BRAINS, by u/SweetEverest

2nd and 3rd place winners are:

IS IT? by u/kataklysmos / u/lisez-le-lui and POWDER CREEK by u/maryjanemclain

As well we should honorable mention a story that managed to rake two judge votes for first place:

I WILL TRY TO GO QUIETLY by u/umlaut

Congrats and thanks again. Judges can be tagged for their true feelings at: u/ak5204 , u/Andvarinaut, u/bytor_snowdog, u/cpjacobson97 , and of course u/A_C_Shock.

^{Also, what about a winter holiday writing contest? Yes? No? Too busy?
Also, how important should the theme be, really?}

Hey guys, I am looking for some feedback for some short stories that I wrote. Please be honest. What is good, what is bad? What can be improved?

I am a new author. But I have been writing short-stories since I was 16 years old. I am trying to put together a compendium of short stories that I have written since.

English is my 3rd language.

Here is my critique: https://www.reddit.com/r/DestructiveReaders/comments/1xdshyw/comment/19rxyuaufg9k0/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

And without further ado, here is my story, hope you enjoy and please let me know what you think

______________________________________________________________________________

Heaven and Hell - By Aksi Koles

How on earth did I manage to die in such a stupid way? Seriously. Not everyone gets to die under a chunk of balcony that’s just fallen off a building. And at thirty-five, no less.

I looked down at myself. I was still wearing the same clothes I died in. Shirt and jeans. No ceremony. No funeral suit. No ghostly white robe like in the films.

As expected, I walked down a corridor towards the light, smiling to myself at what a cliché it all was.

Behind the light there was a spacious white room. In the middle stood something that looked suspiciously like a reception desk.

“Step closer. Don’t be afraid. Stand here.”

A young woman with an utterly indifferent expression pointed at a large black cross marked on the floor.

“Where exactly am I?” I asked, looking around.

“The Allocation Room. We’re about to measure the height of your vibrations and decide where you go next,” she recited, clearly repeating a memorised line.

I froze when I noticed the two doors behind her.

Above them were signs:

Heaven Hell

Was this actually real?

Right… I mean, I’d been a fairly decent person… hadn’t I?

Every stupid thing I’d ever done immediately started popping up in my head, one after another, until I stood there completely paralysed with horror.

“Yes, yes, it’s all real. Now step onto the cross. You’re not the only one waiting,” the girl said sternly — as if replying to my thoughts.

Either everyone thinks the same thing here… or she really can read minds.

Carefully, I stepped onto the cross.

A strange device rose from the floor and extended upward along my body. Some kind of metallic plate. Hard to tell exactly what it was.

“Alright. Exhale. Relax. Don’t think about anything,” the girl instructed.

Don’t think about anything. Don’t think about anything…

God, that’s hard.

Most importantly, don’t think about your sins. Think about floating on clouds in Heaven instead.

Suddenly the plate began to vibrate.

And my spirit vibrated back.

It felt as if we were speaking to each other on some completely different level. Oddly enough, it was… pleasant.

The plate grew brighter, filling with light. It was beautiful to watch.

At some point I felt warmth — which was strange, considering I was already dead.

I forgot all my worries. I just wanted it to continue.

I closed my eyes and let myself dissolve into the feeling.

Clap.

And suddenly everything went dark.

As if someone had switched off the Sun.

“Not bad. Fairly high vibrations,” the girl muttered to herself with a small nod.

“So… I’m going to Heaven?”

“No. You’re slightly below the threshold. Please proceed through the left door. They’ll give you further instructions there.”

She didn’t even look up from the papers on her desk as she pointed towards the door labelled Hell.

“How is that possible? I… I don’t want to go to Hell!”

“No one does. But your vibrations are still too heavy for Heaven.”

“I don’t understand any of this…”

“You’ll be shown everything further down the corridor. Please don’t hold up the queue,” she said sharply, finally looking me straight in the eye.

I obediently shuffled towards the door.

Brilliant.

So I’m going to burn in Hell.

And here I thought dying was the worst thing that could happen to me today.

What a fantastic day. Absolutely wonderful.

Behind the door there was another white room — even larger than the previous one.

Some kind of optical illusion perhaps, but it seemed endless.

Along the walls ran a continuous bench, and people of all races and ages sat there reading some sort of magazine.

In the centre stood yet another reception desk, and behind it another door labelled Exit.

“I don’t understand anything. What is all this?”

“Step forward. Take a catalogue,” another stern young woman behind the desk said, handing me the same magazine everyone else had.

“What’s this for?”

“Open it. It reads your vibration level and shows your options.”

“Options?”

“Yes. Once you decide, press the option you want and proceed through there,” she said, pointing towards the Exit.

I opened the catalogue.

The first few pages were filled with photographs of strange people.

A few pages later I saw my own photo and my name.

Under the photo it said: More details.

Everything about me was there.

When I touched the text, memories flooded my mind — my entire life, from birth all the way to being crushed by that bloody balcony.

“What on earth is this?”

“Your past lives, including the most recent one. You can review where you’ve already been and what you’ve done. It helps people choose their next life.”

She pointed at the next page.

“Turn the page. Here’s the catalogue for your vibration level.”

I turned one page. Then another. Then another.

The more I flipped through it, the more pages appeared.

They were filled with photos and short descriptions of people.

Under each one were two buttons:

More details Choose

“Wait… a new life? You mean I’m going back to Earth?”

“Exactly.”

“But… I was sent to Hell…”

“Exactly. Now go sit down and choose.”

Hey all!

This is a short dark fantasy story centered on a man attempting restlessly to make it 'home'. I would love to get your critiques of any kind, especially as it pertains to prose, plot, pacing, overall intrigue, and if the story feels too melodramatic. Thank you so much :)

Critique[1880]: https://www.reddit.com/r/DestructiveReaders/comments/1xgpih7/1880_the_off_stranger/

...

Above the snowy mountain peaks, above the blackened sky, sit the stars in their countless many. All these curious specks yield to the greater light, for the moon shines full, freezing the earth in blue. They wait and watch the people below, the players in their favorite stories. This night, are the celestial beings much different than you and I?

Come! See through the naked trees, all standing motionless in the cutting wind, disheveled and stiff with death. There in this winter forest, covered in rags and animal pelts, walks a man. His head hangs low, his movements lethargic, yet he continues through the night. He pays no heed to the stars above, apathetic to the moon and its splendor. Rather, he stares at the ground, trudging heavily with each step. 

Look, can you spot it? Cradled to his chest, waits, warped brown from the heat of a fire. The contents thereof are ash and dust. Behold his hands: past the dirt and the frost rests a layer of crusted blood. A thin, sheathed dagger hangs at his side, bound by worn, boiled-leather ties. Across the metal of its hilt are engraved three lines in a slant, stacked one on top of the other, the three-lined sigil marking a blade that was forged by those down south—a land plagued by war, a fire that moves from village to village.

Surely his journey has seen many moons, for the rags he wears were not crafted to meet snow from the mountains of the north. And still he moves onward, lips cracked and ornaments of frost dangling from his beard. And so this pattern carries on till he summits the peak, halting to swallow for breath. Below this great mountain is a canvas of waterfalls, stilled in the act of an icy pouring from the ridges, with a pine forest reaching far and wide. And afar three days' journey lies a city built of stone. Despite the artistry of a city cut and chiseled with ornate detail, the man’s eyes remain drawn to a field that overlooks a valley. Lit by the curious light of the moon.

He takes a glance back to the trail he conquered, his eyes wide and posture curled like that of a feral animal. He turns his head, never to look back. The man continues down the mountain, sliding his feet to stable himself. With each step, he treads slower and slower.

The man falls forward, his head slamming to the ground. After a moment of confusion, he uses his shoulders as leverage to get to his knees and then feet. Fresh blood trickles from the gash in his forehead, past his nose and to his cheek. His hands never flinch from the jar. 

He makes it down the mountain, parting his way from the trees to the field before the valley. The blood on his face is frozen and appears purple in the moonlight. All is silent except the snow crunching below him. Each step leads him closer to a solitary tree just before the valley ridge. He stops there, taking deep, raspy breaths, and falls to his knees. Gently, he removes the lid from the jar and upends it, letting the ash scatter before him on the roots of the tree. 

Behold, look upon him, for tears are swelling and falling from his eyes. He sinks to the side and lies upon the ground. He brings his limbs close and curls upon the frozen earth. He is weeping. Yes, he is weeping with the jar still cradled in his hand.

But wait and watch on that mountaintop, as the daylight falls from the earth. Can you see it? Something moving behind the trees? A creature on all fours, its body long like a man outstretched, its movements soft and precise. It stops behind a grey tree between it and the descending man. Its four elongated fingers wrap around the tree with its claws digging into the bark. It peeks its head out from the other side of the tree. Its skin mirrors the environment, a dull gray to blend with the withered landscape, with the exception of one black eye that twitches over a mouthless face as it watches the man.

All the stars look on, sharing concerned glances between one and another. The moon pays heed only to the man. All perfectly quiet. But then, can you hear it? The whisper of an ancient thing. 

“I know this man. Indeed, I know the man beneath my leaves.” The stout tree speaks through the shuffling of its pines.

“You know this man?” The stars, they cry. “Please tell us of his--”

A rattling scream! A high, shriek! Listen as it echoes along the field. It flows from the height of the mountain. And there the creature reveals itself above the curtain of trees to take the stage of ice and snow. With each squeal, it physically shutters as it nimbly moves to descend the mountain toward the man. Orifices along its back and chest open and constrict to let out a ballad of pain.

The man. He does not hide. He does not run. Slowly he places his free hand to the ground and pushes himself to his knees. His eyes are swollen; dark hollows rest beneath them. Yet, his blistered red cheeks rise, and a smile parts his stringy beard. 

“I know,” says the man.

“He knows? What is it he could know? How absurd the sound.” The stars, they plead from their homes above, “What does he know? Oh gracious pine, what does he know?”

But the tree says nothing and waits in silence.

The creature, all the while, is increasing the pace of its steps. Now nearly a quarter of the way down the mountain, its bulbous eye, absent of color, fixates on the man. And amidst the chaos of its movements through the trees, it shrieks once more.

“I brought you home,” says the man.

“Home? Who?” The stars argue, “Surely he speaks not of the vile creature that poisons the mind?” 

“Little friends, you know the creature consumes like any animal that walks these lands. Indeed, do not term it vile, for it hunts to survive like the man himself, the only poison it uses is man’s own memory,” says the tree.

“But the poor man!” The stars interject. “What memories could possibly root him there?”

“I may only offer strict suspicion. That man stood below the shade of my leaves. With him, I saw a woman whose countenance shined like wildflowers. The only thing more rarely separated from each other's gazes were each other's hands, clenched tight. They laughed oft—unable to discern what spurred the action. Near my roots, they lay before the valley ridge, his arm around her shoulder, her head cradled under his chin. ‘When my time is done, or when the war is won, I will build you a home. Here, on this spot,’ the man declared.”

Meanwhile, the creature wails in response—less like a beast, its bearing something closer to man. As it nears the base of the mountain, it shifts from crawling on all fours to shuffling clumsily on two, its arms elevated and curved like a threatened spider. 

“No. Forgive me, but I will stay.”

All above who watch—the moon, the stars—scream, “Do not stay!” Each horrified observer chants, “It lies, it lies, IT LIES!’” 

The creature draws closer, nearly steps away from the man and gaining more confidence in its approach. It arches its back, and from the cavity of its chest juts a fang the size of a dagger. And before the creature seizes the man with its elevated limbs, the man speaks his last words: “I just wanted to see you two one more time.”
 

...

The man’s body is left atop the scattered ash, his face as pale as the snow falling all around him. The tears that fell to his cheeks and down his neck remain as frozen eulogies. For, to the man, his final moments were not of fear. Beyond the streaks of dried blood, beyond the frozen, weather-worn skin lies a soft smile, the eyes finally closed and rested. He lies peacefully with the jar just out of reach on a bed of ash.

The stars above, and the moon also, look to the tree. Each aghast. Each begging for answers to this scene.

“Yes. As earth grows flesh, so too must flesh feed the earth,” says the tree. “Tragic. Tragic indeed.”

“Tell us, great tree. What happened here?” say the stars.

“The man’s blood runs through me now. Though he is not alone. The ash mixes with his blood to feed my roots, a woman, the one I spoke of before, and a child join me also. I know them now.” 

“A child too?”

“Yes, a young boy, I’m afraid. A boy of spirit. A boy of ash.”

“What befell them?”

“The man had grown mighty since last I saw him, and an even mightier instrument in war. Yet the weight of tremendous death burdened his soul to total disillusionment.”

The stars above sigh, having observed the charred remains mankinds hostilities leave upon the earth.

“And so, the man fled. He escaped to rejoin the woman and their child. In desperation, he led them to journey here and build a home. A shelter away from the fire.

“But they never arrived? You said yourself you’d only seen the man once before,” the stars lamented.

“Yes. Yes indeed. The man was captured by those he called brothers. They burned everything—everything to the man—and made him watch as penance.”

“And left him unscathed?” the stars puzzled.

“When opportunity presented itself, the man allowed grief to ignite rage. And burning, he consumed his brethren with fire and bloodshed.”

The stars seemed to sink a bit then, stumbling to turn the final page of this story.

“That fury, however, can only guide a man so long. And so grew a despair so great, it became undeniable to the creature of the night.”

“Can you tell what the man spoke of in his final moments?” asked the stars.

“I suppose that is the last to know—of a man, a woman, and of a child.”

“Father, you know this isn’t us,” said the boy. 

“I know,” said the man.

“Why are you doing this?” said the woman.

“I brought you home.”

“I know, love. But please don’t do this,” said the woman.

“No. Forgive me, but I will stay.”

“Tread through the dark to see the sun, Father, remember?” said the boy.

“I just wanted to see you two one more time.”