An excerpt from my story, Le Vampire Rouge - Writers Forum

L'Oiseau Noir · 12-17-2007, 04:09 PM

I wanted to know if this sounded all right, and if it's a good, interesting start for you as readers to read?

I was never very good with action scenes, but I think it came out pretty good. Hopefully it's not just a delusion of mine. Anyway, critiques and all forms of feedback are welcome.

Lucial no longer cared what was to happen to him--he wanted revenge. He sprinted across the blood-soaked verdure of the Champs de Mars, stumbling over the bloody remnants of his comrades’ bodies. Hatred burned within his chest like a wildfire, and adrenaline sped through his veins like electricity. The soles of his boots pounded at the damp, smoldering earth, and his grip around the ash stake tightened until his knuckles turned white.

“I’ll make you pay for what you did to them, devil!” he cried as hot, stinging tears welled in his eyes and poured down his hollow cheeks.

An unearthly shriek answered Lucial, and a winged shadow, larger than any man, descended from the stormy heavens. It circled the utmost peak of the Eiffel tower and spiraled toward the ground; and as it neared the earth the creature stretched out its great, bat-like wings, throwing out its taloned feet toward Lucial as if it were the eagle, and he was the fish.

Lucial quickly dove out of the way just as the creature swept over him, contracting his body into a ball and rolling across the muddy ground. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the creature turning around and bee-lining toward him, gliding along a gust of wind to hasten its speed. He had to time this right. Lucial stood up and, with his free hand, reached into his mud-spattered coat, drawing a silver grappling gun with ornate ivory emblazonry along the sides. The steady beat of the monster’s massive wings grew louder, and he could see its luminous crimson eyes penetrate the swirls of mist like two balls of fire.

“I got you,” said Lucial beneath his breath, a tearful but triumphant smirk unfurling across his pale countenance. As the creature’s immense shadow overspread him, he aimed at its right leg and fired his grappling hook, snagging a hold on the monster’s ankle. The cable strained and jerked, sweeping Lucial right off of his feet and sailing into the air. Beneath him, the reflecting pools diminished until they looked like kiddy pools, and the sea of shimmering city lights grew fainter, blotted out by thick tendrils of fog.

The creature bucked, screeched, and flailed it's ankle, which the hook had cleanly skewered. Its altitude began to drop; the creature flapped its wings harder, trying its best to maintain a steady flight, though Lucial’s weight, coupled with the sheer pain of its wound, continued to drag it further toward Earth. The creature, at last, resorted to biting, but its prey was too far from its jaws to reach; it only managed to tear a strip of cloth from Lucial’s coat.

Lucial gritted his teeth and scaled the grappling cable, digging his fingers into the creature’s sinewy skin to gain a hold. He swung his right leg around its haunch so he could climb up onto its back, and stake it in the head. However, something Lucial hadn’t expected happened: The beast’s momentum suddenly increased, and it dove toward the Eiffel tower like a kamikaze bomber; and a particularly thick crossbeam was heading his way, too.

“Shit!” Lucial exclaimed, his lime-green eyes as wide as tennis balls. He quickly wrapped his arms and legs around the demon’s haunch, holding on with every bit of his strength as the beast swept toward the tower’s steel lattice.

Folding its wings to increase its velocity, the beast sliced through the night sky like an arrow. It threw out the leg that Lucial was fixed on, attempting to fling its prey against the crossbeam to his death like a soccer ball; but Lucial did not budge. Forced to abandon its plan, the beast, before it crashed, threw out its wings and sped skyward, ripping through the storm clouds and into the moonlit, starry calm of the stratosphere. It arced about and grazed the tops of the clouds with its belly, lunging back into the cold, inclement darkness toward the damp, scorched, and blood-soaked earth of the Champs de Mars.

Realizing the creature was attempting to smear the ground with him, Lucial scurried up its haunch and atop its back, gathering a fistful of its slate-gray fur. He yanked the creature’s head toward him, raising his ash stake high above his head and crying out, “Die, nightbeast! You‘ll not see the silvery light of another full moon!”

Before Lucial could deliver the final blow, however, the creature swung back its right arm and nailed his gut, hurling Lucial from its back to the ground residing several hundred feet below.

Plummeting through the fog, breathless, Lucial saw the ghostly images of his life drift before his eyes. He reached out his arm as if he expected God to catch his hand and save him; but no angel, nor God, came to his aid.

L'Oiseau Noir · 12-18-2007, 09:01 AM

Aw, how disheartening... no crits. Oh well, I can wait.

*Bump* (That is allowed, right?

)

L'Oiseau Noir · 12-18-2007, 06:35 PM

No one still? Aww, don't tell me I irritated the people here already.

L.C.Mills · 12-18-2007, 09:13 PM

I liked it. It's obviously hard to get really in to it without knowing what's going on, but it seemed to be written well. I'll leave the heavy critique/advice to those more experienced than me. Good luck.

L'Oiseau Noir · 12-18-2007, 10:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by L.C.Mills

I liked it. It's obviously hard to get really in to it without knowing what's going on, but it seemed to be written well. I'll leave the heavy critique/advice to those more experienced than me. Good luck.

Yay, someone replied!

It just starts out in the middle of the action, but as it progresses it explains why Lucial's fighting this beast. The action was basically used to give a bit of insight on his "job", as well as hook the reader in the story. I'm glad you liked it overall. I'll be making a thread later in the future dedicated to the entire first chapter of this story once I've written it, so if you're interested still, stay tuned.

VNW · 12-18-2007, 10:46 PM

Patience, patience. Don't be so quick to give up on us - this is a great start and I expect you'll be hearing from more of us. I really enjoyed this. It piqued my interest from the start and you did a great job with the action. It's very well written--I could easily picture the characters/scenes/action and appreciate the great variety in your phrasing and sentence structure.

I think that this opening is "good to go" for now - move on & write more. There are a few words and phrases you might "shore up" on a later edit but I think that may best be done after you've let this section "rest" for a bit. I'm referring to tiny things like: the use of "bloody remnants" (remnants seems too dainty here, need something more like chunks?), describing the beast as "larger than any man" (twice as large as any many would say more), etc. Again, though, these are very minor points (and very subjective).

By the way, your response to my recent post prompted me to check out yours (so your good deed paid off).

L'Oiseau Noir · 12-19-2007, 07:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by VNW

Patience, patience. Don't be so quick to give up on us - this is a great start and I expect you'll be hearing from more of us. I really enjoyed this. It piqued my interest from the start and you did a great job with the action. It's very well written--I could easily picture the characters/scenes/action and appreciate the great variety in your phrasing and sentence structure.

I think that this opening is "good to go" for now - move on & write more. There are a few words and phrases you might "shore up" on a later edit but I think that may best be done after you've let this section "rest" for a bit. I'm referring to tiny things like: the use of "bloody remnants" (remnants seems too dainty here, need something more like chunks?), describing the beast as "larger than any man" (twice as large as any many would say more), etc. Again, though, these are very minor points (and very subjective).

By the way, your response to my recent post prompted me to check out yours (so your good deed paid off).

Thanks so much for taking the time to read; I'm glad you enjoyed it so far.

L'Oiseau Noir · 12-21-2007, 08:12 PM

*Bump*

Added some new stuff to the first post in the thread; Crits are all welcome.