Thread: The Nuva(Prologue)

Another story I've been working on, any help would be appreciated.

Part One: The Mission
Chapter One: The Briefing

Arthur Sonneville sat in front of the lit up projection screen with a dozen or so other recruits surrounding him; it was the day they were to be briefed on their mission. As members of the NEI, or Nuva Elimination Initiative, it was their job to destroy the Nuva threat to humanity; today they would find out how to end the relentless attacks the Nuvas were launching against them. As he sat their his mind wandered to how he had arrived at this point, and of why he had joined the NEI, Arthur watched as the head strategist of the NEI stepped slowly towards the projection screen. The strategist looked into the projection booth and a map appeared on the screen; the map depicted what appeared to be a ship, with a big red “X” on one of the deepest rooms in the ship.
“Recruits,” he spat, the word almost a snarl, “this is your destination;” he tapped the screen before continuing, “This ship is in the heart of the black zone.” Nervous murmurs broke through the previously silent room; the black zone was the most dangerous place on the planet, all the nuvas seemed to originate somewhere in that area. No one had ever returned from the black zone and survived, all they knew of the area was taken from satellite imagery. Unfortunately the satellites all seemed to fail shortly after catching sight of the ship whose specs were shown on the screen, they had obtained the specs after one satellite had caught sight of an identification number on the ship. The strategist continued, “at the heart of the black zone is this ship, we obtained the plans to the ship and have discovered through thermal and other scans that a massive amount of energy is being emitted here.” He tapped the room marked with the “X” with his index finger, “we believe that whatever is emitting this energy is what is causing the Nuva to appear.” Arthur nodded to himself, it made sense; earlier in this war against the Nuva some scientists had claimed that they had discovered the origin of the Nuva, they said that some sort of accident had occurred in the bowels of the very ship now projected on the screen in front of him. The scientists were mocked, the army said that the Nuva were just a biological weapon launched by another country, the scientists had ventured into the black zone to research further, they had never returned. Arthur had always suspected that the Nuva were the result of some sort of genetic engineering project gone wrong, but he had never voiced his opinion; even to him it sounded like a bad science fiction movie.

“We have reports of the types of Nuva roaming the area,” the strategist continued; too many this was the most worrisome part, some Nuvas were monstrous, some posed little threat. Arthur had researched each type, some frightened him when he even heard their names mentioned. A few were upwards of eight feet tall, some were tiny and insubstantial, but at least when you saw a big one you knew you were going to die, the small ones hid and jumped out from blind corners. In a way they were far more deadly than the large ones. Some were so rare only one or two sightings had been reported, but the rare ones usually were the most deadly Nuvas, they usually had frightening powers, ones rarely ever seen used, as most didn’t survive the encounter with these Nuvas stories were scarce. The strategist took a slow wheezing breath, he was a smoker no doubt, thought Arthur, the strategist then continued slowly, “The types you will encounter are:”…

I like the story, it gives a good starting point for what's going on, who you're dealing with, and the protagonist the story will follow. The set-up also leaves a lot of room for a wide number of plot twists, I'm already wondering about several things myself. It looks like that start of a solid story, I'd like to get to know the characters too, props Nick.

I'm sorry to reply so late, but as you posted the continuation to this recently, I wanted to read the beginning beforehand and I thought I would comment while I'm at it.

So, regarding the content, I was intrigued enough to want to read more (and that's what I'm gonna do ). You're being vague enough about the Nuvas that we want to know more. So that's a good thing. I can't really say anything else regarding the story, although, regarding the setting, the mention of "movies" made me think: around what time does the action take place? I mean, if you have decided. If not, it's not that big a deal for me

I'll comment mainly on the writing.

The first thing I noticed is you make a big use of semicolons and, while I have nothing against them, at times I wondered they were really necessary. I understand you may have wanted to create an effect; semicolons are great for that But I felt here that overusing them sort of decreased their effect. In a nutshell, using them less often would make for more impact when you do use them. But maybe it's just me and I'm just nittpicking and other people won't mind as I do

I'll just quote passages that bug me in particular.

“Recruits,” he spat, the word almost a snarl, “this is your destination;” he tapped the screen before continuing, “This ship is in the heart of the black zone.”

Punctuation. It would look better like this: "this is your destination." He tapped the screen before continuing: "This ship...
I personally find you could do without the "before continuing" bit and make it flow better:

“Recruits,” he spat, the word almost a snarl, “this is your destination.” he tapped the screen. “This ship is in the heart of the black zone.”

Unfortunately the satellites all seemed to fail shortly after catching sight of the ship whose specs were shown on the screen, they had obtained the specs after one satellite had caught sight of an identification number on the ship.

The connection between the two parts of the sentence doesn't come off very clearly to me. How about:

Unfortunately the satellites all seemed to fail shortly after catching sight of the ship whose specs were shown on the screen, although one (satellite) had lasted long enough to find/read an identification number (on the ship).

The strategist continued, “at the heart of the black zone is this ship,

Punctuation:

The strategist continued: “at the heart of the black zone is this ship,

but at least when you saw a big one you knew you were going to die, the small ones hid and jumped out from blind corners.

That struck me as not very optimistic, almost to the point that the guy wouldn't put up a fight and let himself get killed if he were to run into one of those. Maybe something less extreme, like "you knew you were in trouble"?

Some were so rare only one or two sightings had been reported, but the rare ones usually were the most deadly Nuvas, they usually had frightening powers, ones rarely ever seen used, as most didn’t survive the encounter with these Nuvas stories were scarce.

I don't see a contradiction between the rarity of the kind and its deadliness. Also, the rest of the phrase seems a little redundant. A proposition:

Some Nuvas were so rare only one or two sightings had been reported. (Incidentally,) it seemed the rare ones also turned out to be the most deadly ones. The few people who had encountered such specimens and hab been lucky enough to survive mentioned frightening powers.

hope that helps. Cheers

He isn't an optimistic character, as is later revealed. He does have a reason for his pessimism though, he also isn't suicidal, just quite honest. He would defend himself and his fellow soldiers, but he doesn't have too much left to live for.

I reread your text and found what bugged me about that "at least when you saw a big one you knew you were going to die": it makes it appear as if Arthur had a lot of combat experience, whereas he and his comrades are addressed at first as "recruits" by the head strategist.

They have been "recruited" for this mission, but you're right, I'll tighten that to soldiers