Young Writers Society

Minnow, Shadow, James, and Jade are best friends who have the ability to control an element. They are being hunted down by a group of scientists who want to kill them. During an escape, Shadow was caught in an explosion, which mutated him. The others thought he was dead, since he was separated from the team. Only Minnow knew he was alive, but she didn’t tell the others because of her fear of Shadows capabilities. This story starts when Minnow, James, Jade, and a group of underground kids go to meet Shadow.

“Do we really have to do this?” Chris glanced at me, and everyone’s eyes followed.
“I don’t have a choice,” I replied, “but you can leave if you want.”
“I’m not,” Jade said smiling, but Chris frowned.
“Look, if you want to go, go,” James snapped. All of the kids ran out, and I shook my head. I turned to the door and took a breath. After knocking gently, I opened the door.
“Hey, It’s me,” I said as Jade and James gasped.
“Hey,” Shadows voice rang out in my mind. He had brushed up on his mind-messaging skills while I was gone.
“You told us he was dead,” Jade said, about to flip out. Before I could answer, sirens pierced the air. Without thinking, I had grabbed my lighter, and powered up.
“Um, just in case you forgot, we’re running from scientists WHO ARE TRYING TO KILL US!” James shouted, but I stood my ground.
“I’m not letting them split us up again.”
“Fine,” James huffed, his stone hands flexing behind him. Just then a flood of people entered the room. I nodded, and we started to fight.
As we disarmed them, which was super easy, Shadow messaged me “They aren’t scientists.”
“Good,” I said out loud, pounding one in the face. Shadow whipped up a windstorm, which I was able to use to jump on the walls. Following through, I slammed into a lot of the people, and flipped one over. By the time their was only one left, I had a bloody nose and a cut lip. I looked for my team, but they weren’t there.
“Looking for someone?” The person smiled, and something hit my shoulder. Suddenly, I was fighting sleep. Reaching up, I pulled a tranquilizer dart from my shoulder.
“Shit,” I muttered as I blacked out.
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My first thought when I woke up was to punch the nearest thing. My fist flew out, nearly missing the man that was staring at me.
“Glad you’re up,” He smiled.
“Where am I?” I asked, my fists clenched.
“All in due time Minnow,” He smiled again, but it slowly faded as I growled. He backed out of the room claiming to be getting food. I slowly relaxed and decided to ripple locate Shadow. Breathing deeply, I let my aura drop. I felt it ripple, and then start pulsing quickly. At least he was close. I focused my aura into his mind so we could mind-message each other.

Hey Shadow, you there?
Yeah. You alright?
I’m alive if that’s what you mean.
Ha ha. Why did you tell them I was dead?
What?
Why did you tell James and Jade I had died? You can tell me, right?

I realized what he was saying. I had been the one to keep the team apart for so long. Did I have the right to do that, even as the leader of the team? I was about to answer when Mr. Smiles came in with a feast of food. Despite how famished I was, I snubbed it off.
“I want to see my friends,” I said.
“Not until you eat,” he said, his happy-go-lucky attitude fading.
“I won’t eat until I see my friends,” I said, standing up.
“Be sensible,” He said, standing up with me. I was through with him, and showed it by throwing him against the wall.
“God dammit!” He exclaimed, as two others looked in. He got up and left abruptly, with fear in his eyes.
“Please. I can be worse,” I said. Then I noticed the other two hadn’t left. I turned to the wall and lent an ear to their conversation.
“Is that the one?” A girl whispered to the other.
“Think so,” A male replied, “Do we really have to do this?”
“I don’t have a choice,” the girl said as my head snapped up. She had walked into the room, her blond hair was in a loose ponytail.
“Who are you?” I asked, as she looked me in the eyes.
“Fern, short for Inferno. And you?”
“Minnow. Where are we?” I asked.
“Secret,” She said shrugging but I just accepted it with a smile.
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Later that day, I was finally allowed to see Jade, Shadow, and James. After the flurry of questions and talking, We all looked at Mr. Smile (who Fern told me his name was Crest), and Jade stepped forward.
“Wanna start talking?” He asked, and Crest met his gaze. Before he could speak, two things happened. The explosion was bad enough, but the scientists made it horrable.
“Fuck Dad, don’t I get free time?” I asked, stepping in front of the crowd.
“You can’t even power up, What make you think you’ll win?” The lead scientist, AKA my dad, said.
“Guess again pops,” Fern said, as she, Crest, and two others showed their powers. They where elementals. Fern held up a fireball and winked. I nodded, right before all hell broke loose. I moved, using the walls to my advantage, until I was next to Fern.
“Some day,” She said, launching a fire-ball into the crowd.
“I’m used to it,” I said, as she gave me some fire.
“Fern, get to the ship,” Crest shouted.
“Got it. Trent duck!” She shouted, and everyone did. She grabbed me, and pulled me to a hall. Jade, James, and Shadow followed.
“Shit, How’d they find us?” Jade asked, and I shook my head.
“Dosen’t matter,” I said as Fern opened a door to a rather large airship. A few minuts later, Crest, Trent, and a girl walked in.
“Wendy, get the door,” Crest said and we were off.
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Fern’s hand brought me back into the present by slamming into my stomach. Ducking, I grabbed Trent, threw him into Fern, and wrenched Jades arm behind his back.
“Say it,” I said and he laughed.
“Never!” He shouted as Wendy and James charged me. I dropped Jade, Vice-gripped Wendy’s hand, pushed her over and flipped James.
“Would you guy’s cut it out?” Crest said with Shadow behind him, and we all sighed. I looked at the walls of the building we were living in. We had set up camp here a while back, and planned to stay for a while. Crest had even found a way to channel my agressions.
“Fight circles tonight. This time, try not to fuck anyone up,” Crest looked at me and I smiled back. Who knows, maybe I’ll win against my dad next time. Right now, I was happy to be alive.
“Round two?” Fern asked, and I smiled.

Later that day, I was finally allowed to see Jade, Shadow, and James. After the flurry of questions and talking, We all looked at Mr. Smile (who Fern told me his name was Crest), and Jade stepped forward.
“Wanna start talking?”who said that? He asked, and Crest met his gaze. Before he could speak, two things happened. The explosion was bad enough, but the scientists made it horrable.wrong spelling should be, horrible
“Fuck Dad, don’t I get free time?” I asked, stepping in front of the crowd.
“You can’t even power up, What make you think you’ll win?” The lead scientist, AKA my dad, said.so her dad is trying to kill her? You could explain that more
“Guess again pops,” Fern said, as she, Crest, and two others showed their powers. They where elementals. Fern held up a fireball and winked. I nodded, right before all hell broke loose. I moved, using the walls to my advantage,How? until I was next to Fern.
“Some day,”Someday what? She said, launching a fire-ball into the crowd.
“I’m used to it,”Used to what ? her dad trying to kill her? I said, as she gave me some fire.
“Fern, get to the ship,” Crest shouted.
“Got it. Trent duck!”Who is trent? She shouted, and everyone didWhy did everyone do it? . She grabbed me, and pulled me to a hall. Jade, James, and Shadow followed.
“Shit, How’d they find us?” Jade asked, and I shook my head.
“Dosen’t matter,” I said as Fern opened a door to a rather large airship. A few minuts Minuteslater, Crest, Trent, and a girl walked in.
“Wendy, get the door,” Crest said and we were off.
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Fern’s hand brought me back into the present by slamming into my stomach.Is she attacking? Ducking, I grabbed Trent, threw him into Fern, and wrenched Jades arm behind his back.They sound like there fighting
“Say it,” I said and he laughed.Say what?
“Never!” He shouted as Wendy and James charged me. I dropped Jade, Vice-gripped Wendy’s hand, pushed her over and flipped James.
“Would you guy’s cut it out?” Crest said with Shadow behind him, and we all sighed. I looked at the walls of the building we were living in. We had set up camp here a while back, and planned to stay for a while. Crest had even found a way to channel my agressions.this is spelled wrong
“Fight circles tonight.What is a fight circle?This time, try not to fuck anyone up,” Crest looked at me and I smiled back. Who knows, maybe I’ll win against my dad next time. Right now, I was happy to be alive.
“Round two?” Fern asked, and I smiled.

I did like this though the end confused me .
Sorry if I sounded mean this is my first real review.

~mari

Hey hi!

Is this the first piece to the story? Or is it some excerpt from the middle? I'm assuming it's the beginning, seeing as how we're sort of told that. But I have a problem with how we're told that.

Minnow, Shadow, James, and Jade are best friends who have the ability to control an element. They are being hunted down by a group of scientists who want to kill them. During an escape, Shadow was caught in an explosion, which mutated him. The others thought he was dead, since he was separated from the team. Only Minnow knew he was alive, but she didn’t tell the others because of her fear of Shadows capabilities. This story starts when Minnow, James, Jade, and a group of underground kids go to meet Shadow.

This pretty much tells us the history of these characters in one massive info-dump. We know a lot about them now, but we don't really care. We haven't seen any of this happen. We don't know the characters at all. There's no emotional impact to knowing that Minnow kept his being alive a secret.

There are also a lot of things that we don't know. Why are the scientists trying to kill them other than study them? How did they escape? What were they escaping from specifically? How did they meet? Why are they friends? Why would Minnow be afraid of Shadow in the first place?

I liked the dialogue here. It was pretty snappy and kept the pace moving. I would have liked the story to slow down a little though. It zips along so quickly that I was left reeling. We don't have any time to get to know the characters, or even really tell them apart from one another. I'm not really sure of the gender of most of the characters.

Take your time. Show us what happened in the beginning. Take the time to explore the backstory and the friendship between these characters. Let us see them escape. Let us see how they are saddened at the loss of Shadow and then shocked when it turns out he's still alive. Take us through the story and the actions, instead of just telling us about them. We want to get to know the characters so we care about their story.

This looks like it could be really cool, but it just zips along so quickly that I can't decide how I feel about anything. Feel free to PM with any questions. This has a lot of potential, it just needs a bit of work.

~GryphonFledgling

So, there were a few things that didn't quite sit right with me with this story. I read Gryph's review though as well, and I have to say, she makes a lot of very valid points. I would be mindful of her review.

One of the main things I wanted to go ahead and point out for myself was the fact that throughout the story, I found that many things were unclear in the readers eyes. For example, the characters. I wasn't sure which was the narrator until quite a way into reading. It should have been more of an immediate bit of information.

It also should have been a little more easy to catch on to who was saying what as well. I found myself rereading areas in order to correctly digest it all. When reading action and diologue, it has to really be fluid so that the reader can easily interperet every single thing that is happening. I think that you could use some improvement along the lines of story flow.

The key is, you don't want to seem too explanative. Your way of introducing the story for example, seemed like very choppy stuff. There wasn't very much creativity when you wrote that. To me it seemed more as though you were putting it out there just to get the reader to understand where your mind is at in the story. What you want to do is put the reader's mind into the story rather than explaining so flatly in order to catch up to where you would like things to be.

The story seemed like it started off in such an active area. And not that I'm against diving into the action, it's just I feel that in your intro, there was a lot more substance and depth missing. I got the feeling that maybe it should have started off somewhere where the reader could begin to develop an understading of what happened recently to get the characters where they are presently. There are many ways you could do that and still make it interesting. My personal favorite is the usage of memories to build on past events. It gives the reader the knowlege without the bland taste of a flat intro.

There's something about your writing though that really does carry a lot of potential. You can be very smooth about your words. I would've definitely loved to have been able to see your smooth way with words level up to your ability of creating smooth story structure.

You also seem to be very entertaining with charcter names. Mr. Smile was a weird name I thought. On top of that though, you made it a side note that his first name was Crest. As in the toothpaste I assumed. Doing something as bold as that though - mixing humorous details with a more serious type plot - can either show unintended lack of creativity, or just plain irrelevant quirkiness. Character names are a personal choice though and don't necessarily affect the story in many ways. I just wanted to put it out there that Mr. Smile sounded more like a name belonging to a parody of sone kind.

Anyway, before I get to engrossed with small details, I would just like to say that overall this does seem to have a lot of potential. Although, I'm not so sure it fits into the short story category as well as it might fit under the novel category. You could break this up into chapters if you planned on having the length of it span into more than a few parts if it were a novel. But yeah, I would just mainly focus on the things I pointed out. It should be of some help in making this story live up to it's potential. ^-^

Howdy mvb! I'm Dreamwalker, here to review this piece! Hope you down mind!

Alright so, how my reviews go these days is pretty simple. In this aspect, I'm going to note about little things that should be taken into consideration whilst you continue your writing, ne? Most of the grammatical nit-picks were taken care of anyways, that I know of! So, on with the show.

Minnow, Shadow, James, and Jade are best friends who have the ability to control an element.

Okay so, I know this is not really apart of the storyline but firstly, I think it would be best if you wrote something like A/N beside it to show us thats is some sort of an authors note Secondly, how many short stories or novels in themselves have to explain what its about beforehand? The whole point of writing is to unravel something interesting for us. When you just give us an idea, its not really writing, now is it.

Next, I would like to touch up on character names. I don't quite know what time period this takes place, or for what reason, but what I do know is that the names are wonky. Why, you might ask, am I pointing this out? Well, this big thing here is that you have to very normal names. I've known people to have names like Jade and James so initially my mind thought that every character should have a perpetually normal name. And then you have to very different names. Names we don't see often.

What I'm going to have to say is that you should try to keep a pattern. If you are going for weird names, keep with weird names. If you want normal, don't throw in random names that don't necessarily fit, ne? It helps with consistency.

“I’m not,” Jade said smiling, but Chris frowned.

Alright so here we have a bit of a problem in how you are wording your dialogue descriptions. The line 'Jade said smiling, but Chris frowned' sounds odd in any case. Word it so that it doesn't sound wonky. For example;

ex. "I'm not," Jade said. Though she had smiled at this, Chris did not appear to be pleased.

That way, you have something that sounds a little more well planned instead of childish and rushed.

“Hey,” Shadows voice rang out in my mind.

Shadows should be Shadow's.

“You told us he was dead,” Jade said, about to flip out.

Another example of wonky dialogue description would be this. Why do we need to know that Jade is about to flip out? We don't. Its an inner thing. If she's going to flip out, she will. Instead, maybe make her say it in a peevish tone such as;

ex. "You told us he was dead," Jade muttered peevishly.

It gives a better effect in the long run.

WHO ARE TRYING TO KILL US!”

Don't use all-caps. Its really not necessary in any form of literature. The greats didn't write in all-caps. I don't see why contemporary writers should see fit to do so when there is such a thing is the exclamation point and italics.

Just then a flood of people entered the room. I nodded, and we started to fight.

You are a rusher. I don't want to be blatant, but sometimes its better to get the point across by just stating things as is, and in this case, you're rushing into certain things without really explaining yourself. Rushing into emotion. Rushing into plot. Patience is a virtue and to a writer, its absolutely key. Calm yourself, take your time, and write passionately.

As we disarmed them, which was super easy, Shadow messaged me “They aren’t scientists.”

A reoccuring punctuation error would have to be the spliced commas in this piece.

The comma after 'easy' is spliced. It should either be a period or a semicolon. Lets not use commas where they're not supposed to be.

“Good,” I said out loud, pounding one in the face. Shadow whipped up a windstorm, which I was able to use to jump on the walls. Following through, I slammed into a lot of the people, and flipped one over. By the time their was only one left, I had a bloody nose and a cut lip.

Did Shadow not just say they weren't scientists? Why does she feel the need to be brutal with them than?

And this is a mess of... well, not goodness. Your descriptions of fighting were pretty owish to say the least and they did nothing to help me really understand much of anything. You just jumped from one aspect to the other without really tell us much of anything. Thats the whole point of writing, I'm afraid. Getting us from one point to the next with beautiful articulation. Not just skipping completely.

“Looking for someone?” The person smiled, and something hit my shoulder. Suddenly, I was fighting sleep. Reaching up, I pulled a tranquilizer dart from my shoulder.
“Shit,” I muttered as I blacked out.

... connections are not being made.

And I'm going to have to stop there. I'm sure any points I'd be making later on would be just me repeating myself and I fear that wouldn't be worth anyones while, so lets get down to business.

You have plot here. Lots and lots of plot. Everything else is unfortunately very weak. Work on your writing. Work on prose and character and vocabulary. Work on all the things that make a writer a writer, because right now you appear to want to show us something but just don't, and that makes me really sad. I can see it in this piece that you love what you do and you want to get better, so keep trying and I'm sure you'll achieve it. Just understand that everyone needs to start somewhere and, in this case, improvement is necessary.

~Walker

"“I’m not,” Jade said smiling" Not what? I'm going to assume you mean she's not leaving, but it sounds kind of odd to just leave it hanging there. At this point, three sentences in, I don't really know what kind of person Jade is, but if she's a really laid-back person, maybe you could even make that come across. "I'm not goin' anywhere." "You couldn't make me leave if you tried." Whatever her personality is like.

Where are they at? Because when you said they were going to meet Shadow, I pictured 'traveling, walking on a road.' And then it turns out they're right outside his door. Even with the little blurb at the top, I think I'd like a little more context.

What did Jade and James think that they were going to do? What about this meeting is scary enough that all the kids ran away?

"“Fine,” James huffed, his stone hands flexing behind him. Just then a flood of people entered the room. I nodded, and we started to fight. As we disarmed them, which was super easy, Shadow messaged me “They aren’t scientists.”"
More details about how they're fighting and disarming people, please. Also, Shadow, delayed reaction much?

" I slammed into a lot of the people, and flipped one over. By the time their was only one left, I had a bloody nose and a cut lip. I looked for my team, but they weren’t there. " Could I get a little more emotion in this fight scene, please? You should really be getting us caught up. Leave us breathless. Word choice makes a big difference, and I'm not sure about yours in that first sentence, especially. "I collided into a group of four and grabbed at another one's ankle, flipping him off of his feet." Something like that is a lot more grabbing, I think. Also, maybe to add to the action, she could glimpse her teammates being pulled away during the fights, rather than just have it be like, "Oh. Where'd they go?"

"“Looking for someone?” The person smiled, and something hit my shoulder." What person? Where is he, what's he wearing, is it a he or a she?

"nearly missing the man that was staring at me." So, to clarify, she almost missed him, but she did in fact hit him? I think you were probably trying to say that she narrowly missed him, or she nearly managed to hit him.

"I slowly relaxed " She's captured. She's never going to really relax completely, is she?

"Ha ha. Why did you tell them I was dead?" Please take out the 'Ha ha'. It sounds like text speak, not to mention, he's about to ask why she told people he was dead. This could be a tense moment, so I don't think he's going to be laughing at a little comment like that. Maybe he could sort of shrug it off... Or maybe he could laugh (actually laugh. This is mind to mind talk, so maybe it's like a little mental bubble or happy feeling or something), then give a long pause before asking his question.

"who Fern told me his name was Crest" Take out the who.

"but the scientists made it horrable." Horrible.

“You can’t even power up, What make you think you’ll win?” When did she figure out that she couldn't power up? What's changed between now and the undisclosed location where they were meeting Shadow? (Later: Oh, I see, she needs a flame to start from).

This feels a little rushed in places. Don't be afraid to drag it out a little more. Give us more description, more detail, more emotion. Really get into the character's heads, and carry us along for the ride. I'd like you to elaborate on the settings a little more, and I feel like you could use some more transition time between their escape and the very last section.

I'm also not sure about your title. These 'fight circles' don't really come into play until the very last little part, so it's not exactly a history of them... :/

A really good start, though. Lots of potential. Just needs a little work here and there, but that's true of any rough draft.

Keep writing. And welcome to the site!