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Connections



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Mon Jan 02, 2012 11:52 am
Niebla says...



Spoiler! :
Now for the story behind the story. In YWS chat, AhmadBlues, murtuza and I decided to embark on a "triple dare" in which each of us would write a short story on a topic one of the others chose. Blues' topic was "Blue Jeans", Murty's had to be set in a coffee shop, and mine had to be based on a nuclear power plant.

This story may be a little bizarre, but it's what my mind came up with. It's also not entirely about a nuclear power plant, but I think I could just about get away with saying it's based on one.

Anyway -- enjoy!




CONNECTIONS


The Wylfa nuclear power plant was a great, grey looming building which both awed and intimidated anybody who saw it. With exteriors the colour of dust collected over thousands of years, it was a sight that most of passers-by averted their eyes from.

For many of the years it had been operating it had been nothing more than just that – a nuclear power plant some protested about, some praised and most liked to not think about. Yet in the recent months, since Boris Shackler had become the owner of the Wylfa plant, rumours of whispers and hauntings had been circling the place - the talking always kept to a low level, but always persistently there. Some even believed there were ghosts in this power plant, waiting for their time to come.

In a way, they were right. Only none of the staff had ever even suspected for a moment that their boss was a murderer who stored the bodies deep within safes near the reactor, from which their restless souls could not escape.

They were also right about the whispers – deep within the safes, these restless souls would stir and whisper, vague pieces of a puzzle waiting for the centrepiece to arrive and connect everything together.

Then, it seemed, their mission would be accomplished.

***


At 21:30 on the 5th March 2010, a little girl with ragged blond locks was sitting in the dark, holding a kitchen knife to her teddy bear.

She had been connected to her father since birth. For years she had channelled his strongest, and often most brutal thoughts and feelings. Yet this time seemed worse than ever, almost impossible to cope with. She had to direct her rage at something – anything.

Darkness had already crept upon their silent street, working its way through windows into unlit rooms. The curtains were drawn in Sophie’s room, but it was not completely dark. Her eyes had long ago adjusted to the shadowy light, her pupils dilating as they tried to hold on to the chink of light shining through a gap in her curtains. She wore a long black skirt and a plain white top, and her hands were smeared with blood. Her eyes were wide, her pupils equally so. Her pale locks cascaded over her thin shoulders, midnight black in the dark.

The world was a misty haze before her eyes. There was no sound – no almost deafening thoughts in her mind as there sometimes were. There was only a drive – a force, a purpose so straightforward and certain that she almost found a certain sense of peace in it. She felt her way to her knees, and then reached out for the knife, which glimmered silver at her. She pulled the teddy bear onto her lap, and calmed herself with the sound of the faux-fur ripping. The guilt, fear and rage washed over her in uncontrollable waves and she tried to fight through them, but at one point, one of them inevitably brought her down with it.

But when she awoke, she was calm. The darkness was almost complete now, so she crawled over to her nightlight and let the sights wash over her in what felt like not much more than a horrified, dull series of waves. For one moment the pain throbbed dully – the next, it was gone completely. But it always came back.

“Sophie?”

Her heart leaped. Her eyes flickered dismally over the mess in front of her: her blood-stained hands, the gash on her left thigh which still oozed a minimal amount of blood, the torn apart teddy bear and the kitchen knife, shining at her almost tauntingly. She grabbed the teddy bear and the knife and reached her bed in a few hurried leaps. Then she buried herself and the evidence underneath the bed covers; when her mother finally came in, gently pushing the door open, she appeared to be fast asleep, with her light locks spread over the pillow and her face seemingly untroubled.

Her mother kissed her, and she held her breath. Her eyes almost flickered open involuntarily. She wanted to tell her mother about everything, about the truth of what really went on at the power plant. But she knew that her mother would think she was insane. She might even stop loving her.

Her mother pushed the door to, and Sophie ran her small fingers over the edge of the knife. When she was sure her mother was gone, she slipped out of bed as silently as a shadow, and began to work on hiding the evidence. She did it like a professional, with no hesitations, fear or regret. She did it the way one daily brushes their teeth or cleans their room or gets dressed – not because she found any pleasure in it, but because it was one of those things she just had to do. She had done it many times before, and she thought with a sense of something that was not far from disgust that she was actually becoming good at it.

Goodnight, sweetheart, her mother said in her daydreams. Don’t let the bedbugs bite. Be careful not to hurt yourself too badly with that knife. Remember to clear away the teddy bear. I don’t like seeing dismembered soft toys.

When she climbed back into bed, she stared sleeplessly up at the ceiling. She didn’t cry. There was only one thought in her mind.

Like father, like daughter.

***


It was late at night, but in this faraway corridor of the Wylfa nuclear power plant, it was easy to lose track of day and night. It was lit by white, clean lights, much like a hospital corridor; however, while there was always some activity in hospital corridors, this corridor was deserted both day and night. There were no windows.

Boris Shackler, owner of the plant, was looking into the desperate eyes of Sasha, his secretary, as he held her down with two strong, muscled arms. She was breathing in shaky intervals, between pleading for him to let her get up and go and asking him what he wanted from her.

“Are you going to rape me?” she asked at one point, her voice braced yet terrified.

He snorted. “No. I’m not interested in that – not at all.”

“Then why won’t you let me go?”

“Because I’ve got to get rid of you.”

“Why?”

“You’re doing something wrong. If you continue to live, you might ruin this power plant. You’re not meant to be in the world, Sasha,” he said, his voice cold and certain.

“You’re crazy! I’m not doing anything wrong! How could you even think –“
She never had the chance to finish that sentence. Both of Boris’ smooth, strong hands moved from their place just below her chest to her neck, and began to twist and grip it, until Boris could feel the bone crumbling in on itself, cracking underneath his enormous strength. At first Sasha jerked and struggled like a fish out of water, but as he felt the beating of her heart cease, the pulse in her arteries beneath the skin of her neck fade, so did her struggling. He saw the life fade from her eyes, and for a moment, he felt lost. He looked around, wondering why he had done this, whether he truly was crazy. He only wondered for a moment, though, before the drive returned – and he shouldered Sasha, with her dead, glazed eyes, and carried her off towards the safe.

Even that, however, had given him enough time for the fear to set in.

He laid her down in the safe, and then took care to close and lock it. He knew that nobody would find her there, not for as long as he owned the plant – his was the only key.

They would not find the others, either.

Satisfied, he strolled to his office where he worked until dawn, and then slept for three hours at most.

***


Ellen Shackler had always known her husband was unstable, but similarly, she had never quite known what to do about it. To her mind it was not a serious kind of instability, anyway – more of just something she sensed when she was around him, something strange and just off. She was used to his strangeness, to the long nights he spent away from home, but at the same time, she was terrified. She knew there was something he was hiding. She only prayed that her daughter would be okay, that they would all make it through whatever was happening.

That night, he didn’t return home, and she knew that Sophie wasn’t asleep. She wasn’t, either. She lay there, staring at the ceiling, thinking, in some lethargic state she could not explain. The next night she spent in a similar way, unable to get away from the world even just for the few spare hours of the night – but this time, Boris had returned home. He slept beside her like a baby. It was just past midnight, though, when she heard him turn restlessly.

“Boris, darling?” she asked, but he just moaned.

“Sophie, I’m sorry,” he muttered. “I’m sorry about Sasha, but … I needed to.”

Ellen froze. She felt tears fill her eyes, and suddenly, she felt that she knew. Her mind, at least, had come to a conclusion which was almost definite to her at the time. An affair – her husband was having an affair. She should have known it all along. Unable to lie next to this great, lumbering beast any longer, she slipped out of bed and held the edge of her nightgown in her left hand as she slipped into Sophie’s room and slept on the floor there instead.

***


They were in the living room, watching the news. Daddy was at work again, so it was just her, Sophie, and Mum, sitting on the sofa silently like ghosts. Sophie wasn’t paying much attention to the news. Instead she had a notebook spread open on her lap, and she was writing. Just one simple line.

Daddy is a murderer.

She paused for a moment, thinking, her pen poised perfectly in mid-air as she considered how to use it. Then she added another line.

I am a murderer because I was there and I saw Daddy doing it and I could stop him and God please help me because I am going to murder like Daddy and I don’t deserve to be ali

“What’s that you’re writing, honey?” her mother asked, leaning over. There were immense bags under her eyes, and her voice was cracked and worn. Even Sophie could tell she hadn’t slept for days. I wish I could tell you, she thought. But she snapped the notebook closed very gently and pulled it to her chest. “It’s private,” she said.

Her mother frowned. “I’m sorry, sweetheart, but now isn’t the time for private things,” she said, reaching out for the notebook.

But her hands froze unexpectedly on their way to it, and she pulled them back towards herself only to have them fall limply and desolately by her side. Her eyes were fixed on the screen.

“Sasha Renter, a former employee at the local nuclear power plant, has been reported missing for two days now. Locals are urged to keep an eye out for her and report and local disturbances of suspicious activity. The last place she was seen was at the power plant – all members of staff known to be there at that time are pending questioning.”

Ellen’s face paled and her breath caught in her throat. She couldn’t exhale to the extent that she felt she might have to throw up to get out that horrible, putrid air. Sophie just watched it desolately. She knew this. It was like a dream. Sometimes – most of the time – it was a nightmare. All of this. This entire life was a bad dream and she could only hope that someday she would wake up from it. It had happened twice before. Only this time her mother seemed to know something.

Before she had the chance to stop her, her mother swooped upon her and grabbed the notebook from her hands. “No!” she cried as her mother opened it on her lap and began to read.

It was then that Ellen really did lean over and throw up.

***

Ellen’s mind went through a number of different scenarios. In the first, she phoned the police and told them everything. They laughed at her and told her she was crazy. They locked her little daughter up and proclaimed them both mentally ill. In the second one, she showed her husband the sheet of paper and he laughed it off, but disappeared the next day. Perhaps killing them both first.
She knew that she could not do either of those things.

On that third night, after returning home, Boris asked her abruptly if she’d been watching the news. She pretended that she hadn’t. He nodded and went to bed early. She lay awake, and not long after midnight, she took his keys. It was all she could do to stop them from jingling and waking him up as she took them from his bedside. Then she went to Sophie’s room, and gently shook her awake. Her heart was pounding, and she felt like a hunted animal.

Then she took all of their money, her coat, Sophie’s coat and the car keys. Although it had been years since she had driven, she placed the sleepy Sophie in the back seat, having breathed a sigh of immense relief once they had found themselves outside the house. She closed the front door, but she didn’t lock it. She felt that monsters didn’t need protection.

By the time she started the car, checking that the keys were all safely beside her, Sophie was wide awake and staring at her mother. They had not spoken since Ellen had seen her daughter’s words. She had sent her to her room and she had stayed there, obediently, for the entire day.

“Do you know, Mum?” Sophie asked in a small voice.

Ellen’s hand shook slightly on the steering wheel. Then she let out an almost hysterical laugh. “Do I know? I don’t know anything for sure, Sophie. I can only suspect. And I suspect that you do know something.”

There was an entirely silent pause, during which Ellen felt her daughter’s heart breaking, even moments before the tears started to well up. “I’m sorry, Mummy,” she whispered. “But I think I’m going to have to kill myself. Because it’s not just Daddy who does these things. It’s me, too.”

“What do you mean?” it was taking all of her strength and calmness to keep her voice steady, to keep driving onwards towards the nuclear power plant where all of this seemed to start.

“I mean that I watch him. I watched him kill Sasha – and I heard his thoughts. I felt his feelings, his frustration. I tore apart my teddy bear because I had to direct it at something.”

“Are you trying to tell me that you were there with him, Sophie?”

“No. I was in my room. I just saw him. I connected with him – as soon as the rage began. I saw it all, until he locked her up and then I was back to myself. I managed to calm down – that’s – that’s when you checked up on me.”

A pause, during which both of them sought for words to fill it, because it was the nearest thing to unbearable that either of them had ever felt. Then; “Do you believe me?” whispered Sophie.

“I don’t know what to believe anymore.”

Yet they carried on driving towards the power plant in silence. It was in view now, just feet away. It loomed before them, a series of connected grey, murky buildings, fences adorned with hazard signs. It was an ugly, monstrous thing, and for a moment Ellen wondered how the human mind could ever have managed to bear inventing such a monstrous thing to fulfil their needs.

She climbed out of the car and helped Sophie out. She saw that her daughter’s face was still and shocked and subdued. She started towards the entrance to the power plant, but then realised that she had left the keys behind. When she left the car for the second time and locked it, her hands were shaking badly and she was finding it difficult to breathe.

“Mummy …” said Sophie helplessly.

“I’m scared, honey, okay? Mummy’s scared this time. So it’s up to you to look after me.”

“Yes …” Sophie whispered. “But I’m scared too.”

***


Ellen unlocked the main gate with shaking hands and pulled it shut behind her. Then, with one last glance up at the entire bizarre arrangement of dirty grey buildings and towers, they started towards the office sector.

In the dead of the night, not a soul seemed to be around. An owl hooted somewhere in the distance, and some terrible chill seemed to have enveloped them within its clutches, but there were no faces to be seen, and no footsteps to be heard.

Ellen stopped partway into the main hallway, and Sophie stopped and turned to look at her a few minutes later, bemused. “What’s wrong, Mummy?” she asked.
“I think I’ve forgotten where his office is,” Ellen said. “Oh God, what are we going to do, Soph?”

“I know where his office is,” Sophie said quietly.

Ellen shook her head wonderingly. “Yes,” she said. “Of course you do.” She took a deep breath. “This is your chance to prove yourself, Sophie. Because what you’ve said is almost impossibly hard to believe – but I know you would never lie to me like that.”

Sophie nodded, and brushed a blond lock away from her face. “It’s this way,” she said quietly, and they began towards the office. For a moment, Ellen could not believe her eyes when they finally arrived there, without any wrong twists or turns, but her mind soon came around to the idea. Perhaps it was true after all, then, that Sophie was somehow linked physically to her father. Perhaps it was true that when he worked himself up to a murderous state, she would feel his anger, think his thoughts, and see every one of his actions.

They stopped at the door to the office. “Do you think he can see what you’re doing, too?” she asked Sophie quietly, and her daughter looked up at her with sad blue eyes.

“I don’t think so,” she murmured. “But I tried anyway. I tried to tell him to stop.”

As they pushed the door gently open, glancing around warily as if afraid that Boris was going to pounce at them any minute now and that they would come to the same fate as Sasha had, Ellen couldn’t help but think of how much like a conscience Sophie was to Boris – all-seeing, all-knowing, and even in the darkest and most frightening of moments trying to steer him towards the right path.
She took one glance around the office – with its generally modern furniture and the contrast all of this created with the two small stone gargoyles he kept on either side of his desk – and she collapsed in the chair behind the desk, trying to breathe deeply and stay calm. Sophie perched on the chair opposite her, looking at her mother with wide, anxious eyes.

“I’m sorry, Mummy,” she said eventually. “I would never lie to you in such a way. I know it’s hard for you to believe – because – because you love Daddy. But it’s the truth. And I wish he wouldn’t. I wish I wouldn’t. I – I –“ and she began to sob. Ellen stood up shakily and walked over to where her daughter was sitting, trying to hold back the tears which inevitably poured down her cheeks. She gently enfolded her in her arms. She wished that her husband hadn’t turned out to be a monster, and wished that none of this had ever happened; most of all, she wished that Sophie had never had to play the part of her father’s conscience.

Eventually, when Sophie’s sobs quietened and her shaking ceased, Ellen released her from her hold and knelt down to look at her daughter. “I’m sorry you had to be brought in to this, honey – I really am,” she said. “But now that we’re here, there are some things which just have to be done. You can stay here, if it makes you feel safer – or you can come with me. I’ll try to keep you safe, but there’s a chance that the things we’ll find tonight will be scary – even horrible.” She faltered as she said it. The options she was giving Sophie were equally dismal – stay here alone, or come with me to find horrors neither of us may be able to bear.

She wished again that there was a way out. That Sophie had never been a part of this – that neither of them had ever been involved. She came close to wishing that she had never met Boris, or even that he had never existed, but then she found herself looking straight into Sophie’s tear-streaked face and realising that she could never wish such a thing.

“I want to come with you, Mummy,” she said, and her tone was more decided than Ellen’s had been for this entire nightmare of an evening.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

Terrified for both herself and her daughter, terrified at the prospect of all the horrible things she knew they would find, Ellen slipped her hand into Sophie’s and they left the office. Once standing outside in the bleak white corridor, lit by scouring white lights, she turned to Sophie and asked, very gently, if she knew where Sasha was.

Sophie didn’t sound a word, but her head moved up and down in an imitation of a nod. She held her mother’s hand more tightly, and she began to lead the way. But as they neared their destination, Ellen felt Sophie’s hand shaking.

It was only once they reached the corridor of the safes, where Sasha the secretary had breathed her final few breaths that Sophie broke down. She came to an abrupt halt a few steps into the corridor, and when Ellen gave her hand a gentle squeeze and a tug forwards, she pulled her hand out of her grasp and shook her head soundlessly. In a silent pantomime, she went over to lean against the wall, where she cupped her face in her hands and began, very gently, to cry.

“I don’t want to see this, Mummy,” she said. “I don’t want to see what Daddy did. I don’t think I can bear it – I don’t think I can bear to see what I did.”

“Sophie – whatever your father really has done, you had no part in it. It’s not fair for you to blame yourself. Even if you really could somehow see what he was doing – what could you have done? You’re six, Sophie. For a girl of your age – or any age, for that matter – you’ve been incredibly brave. And I’m –"

“No,” Sophie cut in, and Ellen realised that her tears had stopped. Her voice was now hard and cold, much more sombre than any six year old’s voice ever should have been. “What he does, what I do – what we do – don’t you see that they’re all the same? We’re connected. Those murders are as much mine as his. Because I was there. I watched them, I felt them. If I had been there, I would have been the one killing Sasha.” Her voice now dropped to a defeated whisper. “And now I don’t want to see. But I know that I have to – I – I just can’t stand it.”

Ellen went to her and held her tight again, but to her dismay, her daughter was limp and cold in her arms. Eventually she wriggled away from her, and half-closing her eyes, her face crumpling as she recounted those beautifully terrible memories, she felt all the safe doors, one by one. The one she came to a stop before was just as unremarkable as all the others – a grey, plain door, locked and bolted.

“This is the safe,” she said, and then she took a few steps backwards and she sat on the floor, small and defeated, cradling her head in a futile attempt to shelter her mind from what she might see when the door was opened.

It took Ellen ten minutes to find the right key, and time after time she envisaged herself leaving the keys, swooping Sophie up and running away. They would get away from this place, and away from Boris. They would move, and she would start a new life for herself, and for Sophie.

But eventually the right key clicked in the lock, and she felt the door suddenly ready and unresisting underneath her hands. It seems that she stood there for an eternity while her mind battled with her instincts on whether to enter or not. But instinct won over – now that she was so close to discovering the truth, it was impossible to turn back. She pushed open the door slowly, as if in a dream, unable to scream or to turn back or to run. For a moment the smell and sight of what was before her were completely overwhelming; the next moment they were just a far off memory in the distance as her mind enveloped itself in its own kind of momentary shock.

Perhaps it was the smell which struck them first – the smell of rotting, decomposing flesh, the sickly sweet stench of things gone bad over time. Then it was the sight – the sight of the three bodies, one newly dead and with only bruises around its neck and a trickle of blood escaping its mouth – the body of Sasha, the secretary. One of the other bodies was that of a grown man, the third of a child -- and what had been done to them was terrible, too terrible for either of them to bear. One corpse – the man’s - was missing both of its arms – the other, the child’s, wore a white dress stained scarlet from several stab wounds in her chest.

The third thing which struck them was the sound – the sound of the safe door slamming shut behind them. Ellen stood wordlessly on the spot, mouthing silently at the carcasses, barely able to breathe. Momentarily, she expected the corpses to begin to move – but they didn’t. Without glancing down even once at Sophie, she began to back away towards the safe door, trying to prise it open with one groping hand. It was locked.

She turned around, breathless with fear.

Boris had never believed in ghosts – but Ellen had wondered more than once. If ghosts didn’t exist, how could you explain all the phenomena that occurred around them? Despite her suspicions, she’d never been sure. Now was the first time in her life she could be sure – really sure – that ghosts truly did exist.
They stood around Sophie, hands linked, all connected together. When she threw a fleeting, terrified glance backwards, she saw that the corpses were truly there – yet the spirits stood around Sophie, more solid than she had expected but flickering every so often.

She saw that Sophie had taken on a vacant, empty look and realised almost immediately that she, too, was connected to these restless spirits – though her connection was an invisible one. A connection existing only in the mind.
She turned away from them, the ghosts standing so sadly, so still, around her daughter, who was so empty. She turned away and began to bang and howl at the door like a terrified dog.

“It won’t open,” Sophie said suddenly, “Not for you.” Yet her voice was not her own, but that of another young girl, and when Ellen glanced down, she snatched her hand away and hopelessly shook her head in terror before beginning to scratch away hopelessly at the door.

The ghosts had gone, yet the girl she was looking down at was not Sophie, but a paler image of the little girl’s corpse. She saw it turn away, bend down, and pick something indistinct up from the floor. Then it turned to face Ellen.

“Your husband is coming,” she said in a soft whisper. “I’m sorry about what we have to do – but it is the only way to stop this. The only way to finish this power plant for once and all.”

She paused for a moment, and then a small smile came over her pale face and she nodded. "He's inside now,” she said.

Her image flickered for a moment, and then Sophie’s image returned and Ellen, taking a great, gasping breath of putrid air, tried to grab hold of her. Instead, the door swung open at Sophie’s touch and Sophie went running down the corridor, her golden blond hair streaming out behind her.

Unable to think of anything, her daughter being the only thought left in the world for her to hold on to, Ellen began to run after her. They ran through corridor after corridor, Sophie running faster than Ellen would have believed possible for a little girl’s legs to carry her. Ellen could barely keep up, but still she carried on, until Sophie came to a grinding, terrifying halt in the white clearing overlooking some machinery. She turned to face Ellen with sombre eyes.

“You should have listened to me, Mummy. I’m so sorry,” she said.

“What – What do you--?” Ellen was struggling to find the right words.

It was then that she saw Sophie taking the small package out of her small bag.

“What is that?” Ellen asked in a faint voice. “Please, honey, don’t do anything –"
“I am as connected to them in death as I am connected to Daddy in life. He was one of the ones who brought me to life, and now he was the one who brought them to their deaths. And I can see. I can feel – I can feel just what it is to feel this way. I can’t stand it. But they’ve told me. They’ve given me this, and they’ve told me what to do.”

“Please, Sophie,” Ellen begged.

“This power plant is evil. My father is evil, and as long as I am connected to him, that evil will live on. The dead – they want to be released. They made me feel it – I know I have to do this. You just happened to be here at the wrong time, and – I’m sorry.”

“Sophie –"

“I love you, Mummy,” Sophie said. She looked down at the bomb she held in her hands, and then looked, for one last time, into her mother’s eyes. She smiled sadly.

Then she pushed the detonator.
  





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202 Reviews



Gender: Male
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Reviews: 202
Mon Jan 02, 2012 12:52 pm
Blues says...



Hallo Nuclear Mist!
Mmm... Let's get started! I hope you had a good new year.

My first impression of this is... wow. It's an interesting story and I love your take on it. It's really interesting!

So. I did notice a few things that could be improved. There was one typo, which was here:

You wrote:I am a murderer because I was there and I saw Daddy doing it and I could have stopped him and God please help me because I am going to murder like Daddy and I don’t deserve to be ali


I also thought that the 'alive' bit was misspelt, but I later realised it wasn't. I think it might be better to add -- or something to show that she was stopped half way.

You said it was a bit unfocused - I actually agree. It took a while to understand who's POV it was, even though it was in first person. I was like "where are we now?" at some points through the story. Also, now that we're on characters... Sophie feels a bit too mature for her dialogue. Perhaps if she was 8 or 9, it'd be better, but that's more on the minor stuff.
But... But, I think that the pacing is good. It didn't feel like it was rushing fast, just unfocused :)

Now, my final thing - a nuclear bomb would be heavily guarded and I doubt they're kept in nuclear reactors, because if the reactor blew up, so would the bombs and the world would just end, basically. Unless, it's a normal bomb. If it is, where did she get it? But in this case, a normal bomb would be better.

Overall, I think this could do with some tweaking and improvement, but well done. It's a difficult subject - not the easiest - and I think you did really well. I love the plot! It was really cool.

Well done! Keep Writing,

AB.
  





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Mon Jan 02, 2012 6:58 pm
CSheperd says...



My honest opinion of your story was that it was well written ad the descriptions were pretty vivid. You truly painted it out for anyone who reads it. On the other side of it, I feel like too much of the story was told forthright leaving little to the imagination. The sinister acts of a corrupt power plant owner that causes his evil to eminate from it and his daughter is cool and all, but if you open with that...it pretty much turns anything going on between the beginning and the end just filler.
Also, I felt no connection really too any of the characters. It felt more like I was reading about them in a newspaper. They were fairly flat.
This would be a great piece to sharpen your foreshadowing on.
  





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Wed Jan 11, 2012 10:28 am
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murtuza says...



Misty! ^.^

I'm so sorry for the late reviewing. When I read this story, I was quite happy and satisfied that you brought such flair into it. Obviously, I've missed out on the dare and I'm glad I read both yours and Ahmadbro's works before I post mine (which is coming up pretty soon at the time of writing this, btw xD) too. It's great to see how you've both melded the topics and made something awesome. Fantastic job!

First Impressions

This piece is overwhelmingly unique. Unique in that its entire story and context, setting, atmosphere, plot etc., all coincide and make up a fantastical and believable horror-themed tale. I'm astounded by the level of language and the use of words in the piece. Sophie's distraught nature and confused state makes me as a reader empathize as well as be afraid of her unpredictable nature. I'm grasped by the plot and captivated by the characters' images.

Whenever the mentioning of the plant emerges, I can instantly get the picture of a factory warehouse type of building in a dilapidated condition with the rusty interiors and unreliable power connections (which could be ironic since it's a Power plant ;D). You haven't mentioned much of the power plant by itself. And the image automatically has to come to my head. But it's accurate to the story nevertheless. A little more on that later though.
Character conceptualization and character attachment is something I strongly look forward to in any piece of writing. And this piece is flawless in that department. A few chinks in the armour here and there, but seemingly flawless nevertheless :)

Nit-picks

Nit-picks are a few. And mind you, with a piece as well-polished as this, it was more than hard to find any rough spots. So here goes -

I mentioned the issue of the power plant before. And what I felt which lacked was a bit more detailed introduction to the power-plant and its functioning. You never seemed to mention other workers (apart from Sasha) who operated at the plant. And it's a nuclear plant. It looked like Boris Shackler was the only person who was actually doing all the work there which is actually not quite possible because I imagine a nuclear power plant to be quite busy with regulators who constantly check for the power limits and other such technical engineers who need to fix stuff and so on. You've somehow managed to skip all of that and just directly gone ahead with the main idea - A haunted, seemingly abandoned power plant. There was more to Wylfa, I'm sure. And that history has somehow been obscured among the rich plot which is odd since The plant is where the main scenes happen and is the fulcrum for the graduation of the story.
I honestly felt that you used Wylfa as a formality just so that you could get it over with. I'm sure it's not true, but the impression does incline towards it. You could have spoken about incidents where because of the plant, certain sections of the city were faced with blackouts which were somehow supposedly caused either by Boris and/or the spirits. That could have been added to create drama and excitement towards the plant's purpose. Many other such descriptions and imagery could have solved the seemingly unknown profile of Wylfa. Please do not worry over this one bit, though.
Remember, I did say that your story just needed to revolve around a power plant and that you could make it as stylized as you wanted to. I'm greatly happy with the piece and you've certainly not disappointed anyone. All these comments are just me being very very nit pick-y :)

Moving on, the main cause for the entire story and the purpose behind much grief and anxiousness among the main characters was Boris Shackler. And while he did have a presence in the first half, he gradually faded away from the rest of the story. Like the power plant, he too could have used some further detailed background insight. We just come to know that he's a maniac who can't control himself when it comes to blood-lust. And that's it. No reason or past to delve into the character's twisted mind. Thus, my connection with Boris slowly fades too, which is a shame since he's the main guy that everyone is so obsessed over. And when all the action comes rushing in towards the end, we find Boris in bed snoozing away while his wife and child are madly engrossed with other cool events in the plant. Boris, by now, seemed to be well out of the picture and Sophie seemingly took over the mantle as the seemingly sweet-yet-confused-and-maybe-possessed little daughter.

Eventually, when Sophie’s sobs quietened and her shaking ceased,

This line seemed a bit off. The word 'quietened' didn't really sound so good. I'm being far too technical and picky maybe, but it's something that bothered me. A lot of better words like 'softened' or 'muted' or 'faded' or 'subsided' etc., would have sounded better. Just in my opinion though.

...but then she found herself looking straight into Sophie’s tear-streaked face and realising that she could never wish such a thing.

'Realizing' I think isn't the correct usage in this case. 'Realized' sounds more apt.

I didn't get to fully understand the reason of why Sophie was connected to Borris and of how the spirits managed to find Sophie and have her see the hallucinations in her head. The only reason I can come up with is 'just because'. But that still doesn't take away the fact that it was a convincingly good write.

The Good Stuff

The conflict between the wife and her family. It's so well portrayed. She acts like a proper mother and also the suspecting yet careful wife who tries to solve all the puzzles and also finds herself in dire stress. She's a character I feel sorry for the most because she's the innocent in the entire mess. Even Sophie knew what was going on but Ellen was unsure yet determined to make things right.

The whole idea of Connections is so intriguing and very well thought-up. The daughter-father connection and the connection with the souls is quite eerie and at the same time very brilliantly portrayed. The crisp descriptions and emotions emitted by the characters are so human and have that flawed personality that make it all so real. Kudos for making it so compelling and riveting.

The scenes that make up for the drama, the thrill and the eventual realization towards the end are golden. I genuinely felt scared for the characters and it all just popped up in my head like a movie. I was enjoying the movie a lot.

Final Words


This was a joy to read. Not faultless, but shone quite well. You've got great talent for shedding light on a scene. And I'm so inspired by writers who have a knack for these types of things. With all my limited knowledge on story writing and writing as a whole, I might not make the aforementioned statement sound convincing. But believe me, they are very true! And I'm going to pretend that I didn't hear any of that "It's not gonna be a good story! It'll suck!" stuff that you said earlier about it. Never under-sell yourself. Write the way you want and the way you feel. You will never go wrong. And clearly, you've done a great job of it.
Oh, And don't be surprised when you find me stalking your works again for more inspiration. You're someone to look out for. Oh, and because you guys did such a great job of writing, I'll award you both with 1000 points once the points system returns for going through it all.

Keep the ink flowing, Misty. You've got bags of writing skill. I enjoyed reading this. Thanks for sharing. *goes off to finish his currently unfinished story Xd*

Murtuza
:)
It's not about the weight of what's spoken.
It's about being heard.
  








It is most unlikely. But - here comes the big "but" - not impossible.
— Roald Dahl