/lit/ - Literature

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708756]

Dear /lit/, I come to you seeking opinions and criticism of a short story I wrote. I'd like to say it's of the "strange fiction" genre. It's only a bit over 3,000 words, and I'd appreciate it if you took the time to read over it. Taking a trip just for this thread.

------

"I saw him when I was taking a nap with my grandmother, she never woke up from that nap. I didn't either. I see shadows always, always. I'm terrified of them. They know when I speak of them. They follow me. They find me. Other people I know see them around me. Is--" he stopped for a moment, looking to the right of him. It was the wall of his prison cell. After staring for a moment, he continued. "It's so horrible. I don't know how to tell you what they begin to do to my mind. I almost cry when I think about them. My grandmother told me it's something that happens to every other generation in my family. She doesn't know what they want b-but--"
"Quiet! We don't want to hear of your grandmother, or your shadows. You're a weak one, losing yourself so quickly. Barely been dead a month, and you're already crazy." Histern cut Dreg off, weary of his rambling. The crazed spirit constantly sat in his corner, rocking back and forth with his knees to his chest, talking of his grandmother. And really, Cess thought it was getting annoying.

He hadn't been dead long. Maybe a couple of weeks. Histern and Dreg were his cell mates, and both had been there when he arrived. Trying to live again. That's what they were in for. The dead did not belong in the mortal plane, and so the Manifest was created: for those who wanted to experience life when dead. Cess thought he'd be fond of it. He was wrong. And so, like his cell mates, he tried to escape, to find actual life again, only to be sent back to the imitation made for those free of mortal bonds.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708758]

>>2708756
"The Manifest is a trick." Histern had commented when Cess first arrived, sympathizing with the newcomer. "I can't understand why someone would stay in such a place. But this is even worse. Sometimes I think the Spectrum would be better. But we'd still be dead no matter where we went, really. We're still prisoners of death. Why could the Maker not make us somewhere more pleasant to go to?"
"There is the Soul's Abode." commented Cess, at the time. He was answered by a laugh from Histern, and a whimper from Dreg.
"Yes, men favored by the gods get into the Abode. How lucky they must be. I doubt such a place even exists in parallel to this prison." Cess never replied to that.

Time passed in the cell. Sometimes it went quickly, and others it went slowly. Occasionally, Dreg would talk about his grandmother, or how he saw a fourth person in the cell with them. Histern would only speak when spoken too, most of the time commenting on Dreg's laments. Cess kept to himself, aside from asking the occasional question.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708766]

>>2708762
Its head was an angular chunk of wood. One grotesque eye dominated the upper portion of it, and below was a crooked, wavy mouth. The other eye was smaller, and it starred a separate direction than its twin. The creature was hideous.
For an instant, Cess thought it to be looking at him. He froze in place, and only stared at the lanky, horrid creature. He couldn't look away. Faintly, he could hear screaming. A loud, mad screaming. Was it him? No, he couldn't even scream. After what seemed like an hour, the creature slowly turned its gaze away from him with a droning creak, and shuffled away.
Feeling as though he had woken from a deep sleep, Cess gathered his wits. He could still hear the screaming, louder than before. Looking behind him, he could see Dreg huddled up even closer to his wall, eyes wide and empty. Eventually, he stopped, and instead started whispering.
"The shadows, the shadows-- they found me! He was right there! He always finds me! He knew I was talking about him, he always knows."
Then he was silent. His eyes still remained full and wide, but he didn't rock himself anymore.
Cess couldn't find the strength to stand, so instead he crawled over to his cellmate.
"Dreg?"
The spirit offered no reply. He was motionless, and no sound came from him.
"He'll be like that for a while," said Histern. "Really, he should know better than to look at them by now. Probably why he's so insane. He's like a boy playing with fire. There's no reason to wonder why he's burned, Cess. Been playing with too much fire, he has."

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708762]

>>2708758
"Are we to be here for eternity, dear Histern?" The large spirit to which the question was aimed looked at him, and without saying a word, pointed to the cell across the hallway. Cess glanced in the direction he pointed, and the door was open. The prisoners who were in it earlier weren't visible. Upon seeing this, Cess immediately began rattling his the bars of his cell door, attempting to open it.
"No, stop that," Histern started. "We aren't getting out of our own accord. I personally think the gods do it for fun, to see if we can escape. They can open the doors, if they so please. Who knows, maybe we'll get lucky."
"So there's hope." Cess was almost happy for a moment, before Histern nodded towards the cell. Looking back, Cess observed a tall, skinny creature, who looked to be made of wood. Though, he moved more fluidly than wood could, and may've been made of water had it not been for the obvious wooden colors and patterns across its body. He had no hands at the end of his arms, only stubs. Yet somehow, he carried two prisoners with him as he strode towards the cell. One in each arm. It moved quickly, and with a certain grace, despite its legs leading to stubs as well. With each step, the loud echo of wood hitting marble could be heard.

Knock-knock-knock-knock, it moved into the cell, throwing the prisoners down. Knock-knock-knock-knock, it turned around and clicked its legs against the floor out of the room, the door slamming shut behind it. This was when Cess first saw its face.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708768]

>>2708766
Cess could only offer a sympathetic look to Dreg before asking what he had seen.
"Keepers of this prison of souls, obviously."
"Yes, but what are they?"
"What, do you think me all-knowing? How should I know?" Cess didn't reply. After a moment, Histern laughed. "Let's call them Shadows. Something you might know, is that you shouldn't look at their face. It's best not to look at them altogether, really."
Thoughtfully, Histern looked at Dreg,who now seemed to be coming to his mind, and continued. "Funny thing is, they're corruptions of the bastards who first tried escaping, shadows are. Back when the Maker still cared for this world, back before the gods arrived. He set the laws of this deathly-life we live. The rules of the Manifest, the Spectrum, the Abode-- he set them all. And now we get to live it. Isn't that nice?" A dry, mocking laugh came from his mouth, sounding almost as though it was accidental.

Cess felt a twang of sympathy for the spirit. Always cynical, never happy. "Histern, you know a lot about this place. How is this so? Maybe you've escaped before, just to be thrown back here. Is that it?"

Histern looked at him for a moment; again with a thoughtful gleam in his eye. Cess thought that maybe he looked amused. "I'm just a prisoner of this world, like you."
Cess didn't ask another question. He may've a moment later, had Histern's gaze not fallen behind him, to the door of the cell, which was now open.
"Oh, look at that." said Histern, not excitedly. Dreg seemed to have noticed as well, for he stood up with a disturbingly large smile, and ran to the door. He grasped the sides of the bars and poked his head out, looking back and forth before turning to his cellmates.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708774]

>>2708768
"Freedom! The shadows can't get us out there! We're free, free, free! Oh, I can see my grandmother again." His voice's shrillness annoyed Cess, who felt guilty to be delighted when the crazed ghost left out of his cell, immediately turning to the right and running off down the corridor.
Cess stuck his head out the door to watch his former cellmate run down the black marble floor of the hallways. After a few moments, he could no longer see him.
Turning around, he spoke to Histern. "Should we go? We may get out, you may be free."
Histern looked up at him with an apathetic expression and said, "No, no. I don't think I'll ever be free. I think I've lost my nerve for all of this. You go. The way out is to the right, where Dreg ran to. Follow the corridor, and stay out of the torch light as much as you can. They'll see you in it. In the dark, you're as much a shadow as they are."
"Histern, come with me. We'll be free! I'll go to the Spectrum, if I can find it, and I don't know what you'll do, but you're sure to do it if you're free!" Cess could hardly contain his excitement.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708775]

>>2708774
His friend's expression changed to one of mild anger, though he spoke in the same tone as before. "I think I've lost my nerve for it all. I don't want to see what you'll have to see. You go."
Cess didn't think. He turned around, stepped out the cell door, and began running down the hallway. Other cages and cells were to his right, and a great gap in the floor was to his left, with a broken, rusted fence between them. Across the gap was another corridor of cells.
Eventually, at the end of the line of cells, Cess came to an open doorway. Through it was a small room with a spiral staircase both ascending and descending, and a torch lit the entrance. Suddenly, he heard the tapping of a Shadow walking coming from below him.

Remembering what Histern advised, Cess quickly maneuvered onto the ascending stairs, out of the light. He dared not move any further on the marble, lest he make a noise and be discovered by the shadow. "Can they even hear?"
He waited, back pressed against the wall, trying to peak around the pillar in the center of the stairway to see when the shadow passed. And as he waited, the steps of the shadow echoed in his ears. Knock. Knock. Knock. Knock. It's steps were slow and deliberate, climbing the stairs below him, and they were growing louder.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708777]

>>2708775
He stared at the doorway from which he entered the stairwell. Hearing the steps get closer, he saw the shadow come into view. It was facing away from him, looking out the doorway. The shadow was a terrible creature. Wooden knots decorated random creases of its thin, branch-like arms and legs. Its head was of no describable shape other than that of a blob. A wooden, disfigured keeper of the dead was only feet from him.
He was aware of a noise. At first, he thought it was his heartbeat. "But gods! I have no heart!" Then he noticed that in the back of the shadow, there was a hollow spot where a live heart was beating. There was no wood covering it-- just a bare heart, attached by bizarre twig-like veins.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708781]

>>2708777
Thump-thump. Thump-thump. It almost sounded like someone banging on a drum in a rhythmic pattern. Cess was entranced by its pulsing, and stared at it for an uncertain amount of time. It was alive. The thoughts and ideas flying through his mind were insane, yet they made amazing sense to him. "I can take the heart. I can take the life, and I can live again." He slowly extended his hand, as if he could reach the heart from where he was. He couldn't. To his dismay, right as Cess began to move, the shadow moved too. It shuffled out the doorway, taking its heart out of view from the spirit.
He felt lost. "What was I doing just a moment ago? I shouldn't be sitting here like a helpless child." Confused as to why he had stared for so long, he continued up the stairs. Climbing further, he heard a scream echo up from behind him. It may've been in some language he had never heard, or it may've been meaningless. A moment after it quieted, he heard knocks coming up the stairs, from the same way he came. They were quick knocks, each hitting the marble with a loud sound, growing closer with every tap of the wood against the black marble stairs.
Cess quickened his pace up the steps, constantly rounding. He knew he couldn't out-run the shadow. He fell to his knees and waited, though he'd never be able to say why. The tapping and knocking grew closer until the source was right in his sight in the dimly lit staircase.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708786]

>>2708781
Cess focused his gaze on the creature's feet, not daring to look at its face. He could hear the shadow's heart thumping, and decided it was best to keep from looking at it as well. But as soon as the monster came into view, it left. It hadn't even seemed to notice the spirit cowering on his knees.
Standing, Cess recalled what Histern had said: "In the dark, you're just as much a shadow as they are." The feeling of relief running through him seemed to speed his climbing of the stairs. Soon, the stairs came to an end, and he came to another doorway, leading out into a dimly lit, wide, open room supported by the occasional pillar, and everything in the room was the same black marble as the staircase-- except for the bodies.

They were brown, skinny things, wheezing every few moments as a green gas escaped their mouths. Their eyes were all open, and had no color to them, not even in the pupils-- except an empty white.
Cess stepped over any he came to, trying to keep in the dark. He could hear the steps of shadows echoing through the room, and it scared him when the corpses wheezed even the tiniest bit. What are they?

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708788]

>>2708786
As if to answer his question, one of the corpses began rattling. Cess fled to a darker area of the room and watched the transition from wheezing corpse to wooden shadow take place. First, most began to grow on its arms, legs, and torso. It spread over him, turning darker in color- like that of rot. The rot slowly changed to the round patterns that are commonly seen in the hearts of trees. The corpse's limbs became longer and thinner. The flesh round its chest shrunk, and the the cavity of its heart was left open, exposing its still-beating heart.
It's head was the last to change, and looking at it; Cess realized it was Dreg's corpse. It swole and turned a sickly purple as the ears and nose rotted and fell off. Its mouth was left in a distinct 'O' shape as the lips changed to the same dark brown color as the rest of it. The terrible corruption of its face had left one eye towards the top of its head, while the other somehow found itself to the side of the mouth.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708792]

>>2708788
"The face. I'm looking at the face." Cess was paralyzed with fear as the shadow's neck creaked like a tree blown about in the wind. His former cellmate was now what the crazed spirit had feared the most, and he was staring directly at Cess. The 'O' in his mouth did not move an inch, yet a terrible scream came from it, and it sounded exactly like what Cess heard earlier on the stairs.
Immediately, a thousand knocks were heard all through the chamber as the wooden ghouls surrounded Cess, who was now curled on the ground in the same fashion as the corpses around him.
The terrified spirit gazed at the crowd around him. No two faces were the same. Where Dreg's mouth was an 'O', other mouths could've been anywhere from a box shape to a blob. The heads themselves were all misshapen in their swollen state;they were all a big wooden knot. Their hearts all beat at the same time, in the same rhythm. Cess's ears followed the rhythm, and he started feeling a heartbeat inside of him, pounding with the others.
"I have no heart, this isn't happening."

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708797]

>>2708792
Despite that, he still felt it beating. He felt his skin prickle; everything on his body felt as though it were freezing. His body itched, yet he could not scratch it. His arms were frozen, and as he looked; he could see brown skin growing on them. He was turning into a corpse. He felt the bones in his hands ache; his arms felt bruised; his muscles ached as he struggled against the freeze in vain. It had been so long since he felt the warmth of blood flowing through him, so long since he felt a pulse, so long since he had felt solid. And how he had longed for it so, only for it to feel as though he were charring in the pits of a fire!
The skin burned as if it had been roasting in the sun for hours. "The skin! The skin!" He tried screaming the words, but his mouth did not allow it. It was frozen in the transformation with the rest of him. He felt the wooden skin creep up his face, over his mouth, into his eyes. . .

[Anonymous No.2708798]

Word of advice:

pastebin.com

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708799]

>>2708797
Cess was standing up. The peripheral of his vision were clouded, as though in a dream. Before him, he saw the feet of a giant man. Cess fell to his knees, now solid and brown, pressing his face to the ground in front of this great figure in front of him.
"You are a god! Please, save me from this prison, my skin burns as though I'm alive, yet I'm trapped in this confinement of souls!"
"It is as you say. I am a god. A Watcher of this prison. But you are this way because you wanted to live again. You are of the earth when alive, and of the spirits when dead. You meant to corrupt yourself and the balance of the cycle, and so you must be punished. Now you'll live, and you'll be of the earth again-- a tree of my own making. This is what the Higher Gods have termed as just, and so it shall be." The voice was deep, commanding, powerful.
"Do you mean to make me into earth or fire? It feels as though you gave me the pain of a burning wood, gods have mercy!"
"I'm ashamed of this, Cess. I can only swear to free you from this existence eventually."
Hearing his name, the shadow looked up at the god. His skin was a plain grey, and he was indeed a giant. Green lines in ancient patterns covered his body, and a deeper green was in his eyes; more alive than anything Cess had seen alive or dead. His face lacked any hair, and his head was bald. His facial features were bold and strong, and they looked like that of an aging yet powerful man. His face was that of Histern's.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708802]

>>2708799
Seeing the realization in Cess, his old cellmate spoke again this time, in the same sad tone as he had when Cess last saw him.

"This prison is a terrible device. I did not create it. But I lock myself inside of it. It is so I am not forgetful of the plight suffered by the denizens of this horrific place. I have suffered just as you have, many, many times. I unlock the prison doors, and I let them attempt to escape. Sometimes they do. More often, they don't. As long as you suffer, I suffer too."

Cess stared at him, and then froze the same way he had when the he looked at the shadows before his transformation.
"I will free you one day."
As soon as the god said this, Cess felt his flesh boil, his eyes eroding, and his heart increasing its pace. But then, he was back to the black marble chamber, on the ground. He was a corpse, wheezing breaths and waiting for life to begin.

END

>>2708798
Yea, I'll put it in one now. Thanks bro,

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708813]

http://pastebin.com/ZLkb6hMJ

There's the pastebin. Would've done that from the start, but posting it all in here gave me several free bumps, and hopefully got a few people's attention.

Really, I'm just looking for opinions on the dialogue, prose, and anything anyone feels like commenting on. This is a final draft.

Thanks for reading, if you have. I'll be bumping this every once in a while for the next hour or so.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708863]

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708899]

>>2708863
bumping, yet again. Holy shit /lit/, be a dick to my work.

[Anonymous No.2708904]

I think you're a plagiarist. There was a guy who posted a story a few months ago with a similar concept and he did it much better.

"black marble" WTF man...

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708910]

>>2708904
What would I have to gain from plagiarizing this? I wrote it in October of last year. I don't remember posting it here before, but I might have.

And as for black marble, I think that's the least of the "wtf" moments in there. Actual criticism, please. I'll note the black marble thing though, just in case that actually bothers someone.

[Anonymous No.2708922]

>>2708910

Marble is never black. Not even in some fantasy world. Why don't you research a black rock and put it in your shitty, plagiarized story that has obvious dialogue, predictable similes, and all-around corniness.

[Anonymous No.2708927]

I read through the first and second posts. It's not good.

- Too many characters
- Not enough description of setting
- Dialogue is patently uninteresting
- Nothing is at all evocative
- No establishment of narration or scene
- Style of dialogue doesn't match the style of the narrative

I could go on, but you get the idea. Also note that I'm listening to Summer Breeze by Seals & Croft at the moment, so that might have put me in a mood that would make me give more praise than what's deserved.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708929]

>>2708922
>Implying black marble is the lesser worry of realism when there're spirits, a random god, and tree-things recycled from dead bodies

Also, give me an example of each of the problems you mentioned.
>obvious dialogue
>predictable similes
>corniness

>>2708927
Thank you much for the input. What do you mean by saying "the style of dialogue doesn't match the style of narrative." Totally unfamiliar with a concept of differing dialogue's for a third person narrative.

[Anonymous No.2708956]

>>2708929
>"Quiet! We don't want to hear of your grandmother, or your shadows. You're a weak one, losing yourself so quickly. Barely been dead a month, and you're already crazy."

>"Yes, men favored by the gods get into the Abode. How lucky they must be. I doubt such a place even exists in parallel to this prison."

It strikes me that the characters are basically taking on the narrator's style of narration. They don't really have their own "voices".

As a side note, hardly anyone would say something like
>You're a weak one, losing yourself so quickly.
or
>Yes, men favored by the gods get into the Abode.

Things like this make for a stilted read. See (beware, TVtropes incoming)
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AsYouKnow

[Anonymous No.2708961]

>>2708956
and to add onto that for clarification, the stiltedness of the dialogue (that is, the unnatural way in which they speak) is bad. Stiltedness of narration can sometimes work to your advantage in the contruction of prose outside dialogue, but character dialogue must sound natural to be believable.

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2708967]

>>2708956
>>2708961
Understood. Thank you for bringing all that up. Will work on it, and hopefully get better with it. I'll be back in a week or two to share a different story, which I've written more recently, and hopefully the opinions will be a bit more on the positive side.

Again, thanks for the input.

[Anonymous No.2708997]

Welp, I actually enjoyed it, OP. The descriptions of whatever those things were, were well done.

>>2708927
I disagree with this guy. The dialogue didn't disinterest me, it made me want to read more to figure out what the fuck was happening. It seems like he has a bad case of opinions to me.
Besides, Neil Gaiman introduces eight characters in the first few pages of American Gods, and you only introduced three. Your setting was well-established too, imo.

[Anonymous No.2709050]

sorry but i agree about the stilted dialogue. also, we're told what's happening, instead of being shown. some info dumping may be necessary but op could have integrated the info into the story much more smoothly.

i know op was trying to create some mood with the first paragraph but ultimately, dregs and his grandma don't matter. short stories need to be as efficient as possible. the first paragraph should go to cess.

[Anonymous No.2709128]

>>2708997
Are you trolling?

[None !qz81tVJ4ZE No.2709298]

>>2708997
Thanks.

>>2709050
I was trying to bring the story in without an awkward manner.