Young Writers Society

This is my first foray into the short story. Please critique honestly, I need to know if I am to continue with this tale!

The Last of Homo Sapiens

He woke up to the same sounds he woke up to everyday. Some loud and emotional voice kept screaming into his ear, "Mommy, mommy, look, a human!!" Concerned mother, trying to whisper, but also shrill and uncomfortable, stated, "Shush dear, the human is sleeping! You might wake him up!" He turned over and opened his eyes. His cage was made of glasslike material, far stronger than steel, yet clear and thin. It surrounded him like a bubble, or a dome, with small house inside. The only door leading out of his prison was locked with keyless lock, only the voice of one of his caretakers could open it. He was surrounded by life, staring them right in the face, and they knew it and stared at him with curiosity and fear. "Please step aside, feeders are coming through!" The same voice penetrated his ear with the force of an atom bomb, every day, the same, the same. He sighed and lifted his frame out of bed. The sun shone with its glorious power, its heat reaching him through greenhouse roof. It was around 10 in the morning.

The evolution of humanity happened unexpectedly. Over time, humans have lost their past shape, became rounder, bigger, with shrill, and disturbing voices. The first signs were noticed in 2080, when Chinese baby was born with altered vocal cords, that made the baby cry louder than any other ever. The baby survived, and mated with one Hu Tzao, producing Lu Tho, who also had the voice anomaly. As the generations progressed, the changes grew more noticeable. The limbs became misshapen, strange anomalies like antennae, erupted at random, and by the 23rd century, the new humans, caused by the unrestrained reproductive rates that were the hallmark of the Tzao family, outnumbered the Homo Sapiens. The new humans were named Homo Casus, seemingly to reflect the terrible genetic idiocy wreaked by nature upon them. Their brains however, were the most intriguing part of the new human. The brain evolved a new abilities, something that Homo Sapiens could only dream of, such as telepathy. The antennae gave new humans the ability to sense disturbances hundreds of miles away. The best known case of such sense was when H. Casus Jonhy Sheppard predicted the destructive hurricane Geoff, which nearly washed away all of Miami. Hours before the strike, he escaped to Iowa, where he sat out the storm, while thousands of Homo Sapiens were virtually wiped out by the horror of Geoff. Ever since that time, efforts were make to curb the evolution. The new humans were placed under martial law, any of them could be shot on sight, the season was opened on the evolved, but the new humans managed to survive, and even thrive under pressure, and by 25th century, just 400 years after the first reported case of the evolution, the species Sapiens were facing the brink of extinction. The new humanity, quickly took over the infrastructure, and began to make it better than before. New materials were researched, new ideas were thrown into the melting pot that was science, and as Homo Sapiens dwindled, the Homo Casus took over. By 26th century, there were no humans left, except for one.

He was 20 years old, blonde, and thin. His eyes were always frightened, looking for danger. He scanned his cage, looked at the handlers opening the door, and dropping the food near it. Then the door closed with metallic clang, and the last of the Homo Sapiens was left alone. He came up to the food, and quietly ate it. He did not feel like struggling anymore, and throw himself against the wall trying to escape. He had lost his hope of escape, a couple of days ago, and now he just felt resigned. His cage contained exact replica of human home, a two story cottage, with wide bedroom, and bathrooms, and living room. His captors were not cruel, they did not wish to hurt or humiliate him, all they wanted was to keep him alive for as long as possible, as he drew heavy crowds of H. Accidentalis, who all wished to see the last human.

NICE! I liked it! It's incredibly intriguing and I can only say that what attracted me the most to this piece was my curiosity to see what will happen next to the human species. It's not dramatic, but the middle paragraph was quite fascinating. Scientific, historic, and a little charming if I could say.

Some problems:

Watch your commas. You cannot simply put commas at random in a sentence. With too many commas, your sentences do not flow. One cannot, say this. You see? It distracts the Homo Sapiens (haha) reading it.

Also, the first paragraph was kind of drawn out and, though it was a good opening, it was a little cliched. Especially the description of the voice--show, not tell! You can't say "emotional voice". It maked the reader feel a little stupid.

The piece on its own is fantastic. Please continue the story!

Overall, I liked it. Other than what gadi pointed out, your stoy is a bit information dumpy. the format in which this is written makes it hard not to be, but you could still change some bits to show us what happens, instead of telling us. I also think that instead of referring to the last of the homo sapiens always as he, you could find something else to referr to him by.

I also found some minor grammatical errors:
[Over time, humans have lost their past shape, became rounder, bigger, ]
you are switching tenses here. get rid of the have and the sentence is fine.
[Concerned mother,]
this should be: A concerned mother.......
[prison was locked with keyless lock]
you are repeating yourself here. try something like:
'his prison was secured with a keyless lock'
or something like that.
[the species Sapiens ]
we already know that Sapiens is a species, so you can get rid of that word.
[evolved a new abilities]
get rid of the a.
[and throw himself against ]
it should be throwing.

Other than those little typos, and the other things you have a really good idea, whiach you should develop on. PM me if you post the next in this series. (you have to)

VERY interesting! Reminds me slightly of "The Planet of the Apes". I didn't see many errors, but you need to space this out better. You've divided this up into three paragraphs, which isn't enough. With the dialogue in the first chunk, you need to leave a line between each bit.

And write 20 as twenty.

Very good idea, are you planning to continue?

I'm going to read the second part after this, though maybe not tonight.

Firstly, I like the plot and the idea of a new evolution along with the idea of the last homo sapien. Very cool.

I won't concentrate here on grammar, but you do need to get this proofread. There are a number of grammatical mistakes that strongly detract from the story.

Now as for the story, there were a few things that caught me. You start of with the evolution part as saying that a Chinese baby was born with abnormally high vocal cords. How would that be noted anywhere? Why would that be the start of a new breed of human? Start off with the antennae! That would be interesting.

How did the citizens of Miami not know a hurricane was coming? We don't need telepathy to know that a hurricane is developing; indeed, we can predict them with pretty good accuracy. With today's technology, you have at least 48 hrs warning. With tomorrow's technology, they may have a years warning! So instead of using that example, say how the telepathy enabled the new breed to work more closely together, and thus become more productive. As a group becomes more productive, they gain an evolutionary advantage.

How did Homo Sapiens die out so quickly? Five hundred years is all it took? Instead, say how there was a terrible disease to which the new breed was entirely immune. Or something like that.

And in that last line, where did H. Accidentalis come from? Up until then you talk of H. Cassus, so that pops up out of nowhere.

What you're strongest strength here is the story. It's fascinating and I look forward to reading the next part.

I really liked the way you named the historical figures, it made it seem more real. Instead of just someone did something. Interesting to see human evolution.