Young Writers Society

The key was deep breathing. Wait for that moment between heartbeats, where everything is perfectly still, all while riding the edge, the technique describing keeping the trigger on his .50 caliber bolt action sniper rifle at the point right before the pin drops, unleashing a twisting malestrom of steel, hollow-pointed fury.
His target was inbound.
One week he has been behind enemy lines undetected and his list of primary and secondary targets was dwindleing. His camo-steel armor blending so perfectly into the terrain, the bugs crawling on him couldn't tell the difference.
The target was now in position.
Easily he released the trigger and pulled back the bolt, releasing the hollow point round, and swiftly replaceing it with an armor peircing one. His psy-ops program in his cyber-mind kicked in, and an unearthly calm settled over him.
Making ever so slight, yet vital adjustments with a praticed ease, he started timing his breaths. He replaced his finger on the trigger and slowly pulled back. At this moment something stuck as odd in his mind.
He was like a god, and like a god, he was about to smite an evil war instigater. He was content.
The target moved into his chair inside the building, the perfect spot form the shooters angle.
One last breath, and his finger eased the rest of the way bad. The shooter and anyone else within a 20 meter radius heard a rifle report a fire, but past that a muffled sound like somebody punching a pillow.
The round traveled through the window, and struck its victom into the pupil of his right eye. The head exploded, leaving a mess of gore all around the room. His mission was accomplished, it was time to pack up and go home.

Welcome to YWS. I see this is your first story posted.

Okay, to start off, military writing, whether it be in the past, present, or future, is always fun to write and read. But is very difficult to write, as much of it has been done over and over again. Incentive in important here.

I liked the beginning. I think you started it off well-- you bring us into the inner-mind of the sniper. A bit of teaching involved as well.

50 caliber bolt action sniper rifle

Phrases like this always come across as rather cheesy when you just try to stick them into the middle of a sentence like that. Instead, I would just address the rifle directly. Perhaps just simply tell us the type of rifle he is using and something about its accuracy or size instead of sticking it in the middle there. Most people who nothing about guns will appreciate the extra effort.

He was like a god

I love this line, but...

he was about to smite an evil war instigater

...eh, not so much. Drop the good vs. evil wrap. Instead just say that he was punishing; perhaps an unbeliever? a sinner? a forsaker?. I think you'll find it much more powerful.

The head exploded, leaving a mess of gore all around the room.

Er... unnecessary gore here. Sometimes having less blood is better. We are desensitized to blood and gore mostly these days, but not to shock and suddenness. I would try to incorporate those aspects into your story. Perhaps show what the man is doing casually before the bullet hits him the head. This will give you more shock value than any amount of exploding heads.

Good luck with this piece in the future!

Hello! Nice to meet you. Hope you like YWS.

Wait for that moment between heartbeats, where everything is perfectly still, all while riding the edge, the technique describing keeping the trigger on his .50 caliber bolt action sniper rifle at the point right before the pin drops, unleashing a twisting malestrom of steel, hollow-pointed fury.

This is one hardcore run-on sentence. It would be so much better if you divided it up into a few, shorter sentences. Also, how much of this is really necessary? In a Western, the cowboy wouldn't whip out his gun and talk about how pulling the trigger mechanism ignites the gunpowder which propels the bullet forward and stuff, he would just shoot the bad guy. The same should happen in sci-fis.

One week he has been behind enemy lines undetected and his list of primary and secondary targets was dwindleing.

Since you're writing in the past tense, you would 'One week he had been hiding instead of One week he has been hiding. If you decided to change your tense to present tense, I think it would work in this story well, because of the action. It doesn't really matter though. Whatever tense you choose, be consistent.

The description is a little excessive. I get the point that this guy is really well practiced without all the flowery extras. All of your descriptions are well done, but there are just so many!

One last breath, and his finger eased the rest of the way bad.

You probably mean 'back' here, not 'bad'.

It seems you lead up to the shot, but that part, despite the gore, was a little boring to me. Also, for the bullet to hit the pupil of the man's eye, wouldn't he have to be looking at the sniper? Also, I don't really care about what happens to the man's head after the shot hits. Writing gore is fun, but it's not that interesting to read. I'd much rather hear about the gun man. What's his next mission? Is he satisfied?

Good luck and keep writing.

Welcome fellow writer! I love your avie by the way. And i like the title of your piece but thats cause of a Final Fantasy reference in my mind.

Wait for that moment between heartbeats, where everything is perfectly still, all while riding the edge, the technique describing keeping the trigger on his .50 caliber bolt action sniper rifle at the point right before the pin drops, unleashing a twisting malestrom of steel, hollow-pointed fury.

I really like the description in green. The red confused me. I agree with Jenna about the run on sentence and the words are confusing. I don't really understand what this technique is.

One week he has been behind enemy lines undetected and his list of primary and secondary targets was dwindleing. His camo-steel armor blending so perfectly into the terrain, the bugs crawling on him couldn't tell the difference.

This part is just sort of in there for me. It doesn't connect to the paragraph before or after and it makes it hard to stay focused.

One last breath, and his finger eased the rest of the way bad.

It might just be stupidity on my part but i don't understand what this is saying.

I don't care much for gore but if that's what you see in your mind you should write it down. Remember that this is your story. I'm sure you noticed that this site doesn't follw you're original format so just put spaces between each paragraph and it will come out clearer.

Good job and i look forward to some more of your stuff.

Brought to you by the CCF

‘Wait for that moment between heartbeats, where everything is perfectly still, all while riding the edge, the technique describing keeping the trigger on his .50 caliber bolt action sniper rifle at the point right before the pin drops, unleashing a twisting malestrom of steel, hollow-pointed fury.’

- Overlong sentence. Personally, I’d end it after ‘perfectly still’, and make the next part a new sentence.
- ‘where everything is perfectly still’ - just before this you were describing a moment. ‘when everything is perfectly still’ may work better.
- ‘the technique describing keeping the trigger’ - doesn’t make sense.
- I don’t really like the description of the sniper rifle. Just calling it a ‘sniper rifle’ right now would probably work better. You could give it a more in-depth description later.


‘His camo-steel armor blending so perfectly into the terrain,’

- This would work better in the active voice (http://www.youngwriterssociety.com/viewtopic.php?t=11631). Replace ‘blending’ with ‘blended’ (‘His camo-stell armor blended sp perfectly into the terrain,’).


‘Easily he released the trigger and pulled back the bolt, releasing the hollow point round, and swiftly replaceing it with an armor peircing one.’

- Again, this would work better in the active voice. With ‘-ed’ verbs instead of ‘-ing’ ones.
- ‘Easily he released the trigger and pulled back the bolt, released the hollow point round, and swiftly replaced it with an armor peircing one.’


As a fan of sniper rifles in stories, I have to say I liked this. Although it was kind of short.


Anyways, keep on writing .

Hi! I thought you're story was good, despite the fact i'm not really into that sort of stuff.

Wait for that moment between heartbeats, where everything is perfectly still, all while riding the edge, the technique describing keeping the trigger on his .50 caliber bolt action sniper rifle at the point right before the pin drops, unleashing a twisting malestrom of steel, hollow-pointed fury.

You obviously know what you're talking about, sometimes a bit too much. This whole sentence left me somewhat bewildered. It needed to be broken up, and maybe have a little less rifle jargon. I don't know if it's just me, but i found the sentence a bit difficult to grasp, the reason being that it was too long.

Another bit i found a little strange was the following:

He was like a god, and like a god, he was about to smite an evil war instigater

This all seems slightly over-dramatic. The 'like a god' bit was good, but 'about to smite an evil war instigater'? A little over the top, and too much good versus evil. A sinner, or something along those lines may have been more appropriate.

The final bit i found, frankly, a little disturbing.

The round traveled through the window, and struck its victom into the pupil of his right eye. The head exploded, leaving a mess of gore all around the room

This gore is unnecessary. It leaves the reader feeling more sick than anything, not a good end. Maybe describing the killer as human, and then showing the cold blooded murder would have been a better end..?

All in all, i think this has good potential. Maybe a little less technical jargon, and a bit more character depth would improve it...?

*Moved to Science Fiction.*