Hallucinations

Discussion in 'Creative Writing, Graphics, Movies, etc.' started by Insolent, Nov 15, 2011.

  1. Insolent
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    I write with an old guild of friends (they used to be active game wise back in the diablo days, but the group mostly only writes now), Most of the stories are told with two (sometimes 3 or more) writers with each writer writing as a specific character.

    So some background... The world is medieval/fantasy style. This is part of a larger story but basically this part is where my "girl" got herself captured and drugged up so that mage could siphon off her magic ability (she has telekinetic abilities). This bit is just her hallucinating while high on the drugs.

    ~~*~~ ~~*~~ ~~*~~ ~~*~~ ~~*~~

    She sat chilled to the bone and shivered uncontrollably as she looked across the vast space of white and blue. Floating on a chunk of ice in the middle of an ice flow, there was no way to warm herself. She could see shapes just be low the water and the sharp angled dorsal fins of sharks. As the chunk of ice tipped and shook she wondered if it was from the sharks below or the her chunk of ice being bumped into by others. Looking out toward the horizon she saw nothing but the chunks of ice and open water. No land, no ship, nobody else, and nothing else but the cold and the sharks below her. Despair sat heavy like a rock in her belly. In some dark corner of her mind she knew time was passing but it was growing harder to keep track as the hours crept along and turned into days. It was this same dark corner that the last of her sanity sat waiting out the now vivid hallucinations. Something grabbed her ankle causing her to yelp and look down as she fought to shake the thing away from her. Taking a closer look at her little attacker, she saw that it was a bright orange scorpion. It lazily reached for her again with a pincer and snagged her pant leg. She could only watch as it climbed up her leg and then with its tail, stung her hip. She cried out and slapped the scorpion away from her. Then she heard loud squawking from a parrot near her shoulder.

    As she turned to look over her shoulder she was faced with the steamy heat of a jungle. As cold as she had been, she was now weak from the imposing steamy heat of the jungle. She could hear the rumble of ocean waves as she ran through the forest. But even as she ran, she didn't find any water. As flat as the jungle was, she thought she should be able to see something. But there were no hills, no fallen trees to get up above the brush to get a good look around. Every time she thought about climbing a tree to take a look above the canopy all of the trees were too tall, too thick, too difficult to climb, too hard for her knife to cut into for leverage. And so she ran in what she thought was a straight line, but got nowhere. Winded and confused, she sat down and was immediately attacked by vines. They wrapped themselves around her wrists and ankles, pinning her to a log. She screamed in terror as she struggled and her hip throbbed in pain. She looked down and could only see blood streaming in long red ribbons down her arms and legs. Siana cried out for someone to help her, anyone.

    A bright orange hued parrot settled itself on a branch near her before fluffing its feathers and then shaking itself vigorously. Parrots higher up in the blue green canopy called but the parrot in front of her just stared at her. It turned its head to the side, looking and watching her, sliding sideways on its perch and leaning towards her and looking at her some more. “Let's see how easy you'll behave for me,†it finally said to her in a disturbingly human voice. A hand brushed across her cheek and then clamped down across her mouth. She struggled against this unknown assailant, tossing her head from side to side, trying to bite but getting nothing. Finally the hand disappeared and she breathed in a big chestful of air before finding herself suddenly drowning. The hands held her head as another pair forced her to swallow something oily and horrid tasting. Siana gagged and struggled for momentarily before giving in and choking down the substance.

    Siana moaned as her tormentors let go of her and her head fell forward. She could feel the rope pull taunt across her chest that kept her from falling and knocking the chair over. She knew it would only be a matter of minutes before she was passed out again and consumed by hallucinations. Her head wobbled side to side as she tried to get a better look of the room she was in. But as blurry as her vision was she didn't see much. She didn't even see a door and figured that it must be behind her. She heard the ocean again, the rumble of waves calling to her as her mind tempted her to fade back into the previous hallucination. Siana shook her head and shifted her body so that the wound of the dart at her hip hurt again. Using the pain to focus her mind she tried to concentrate on unraveling the knots in the rope that held her.

    Of course trying to unravel knots was useless, eventually the hallucinations took over again and Siana's mind slipped back into the unreal and time lost meaning.
     
  2. Secksy
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    (Let me start this post by saying that I mean you know ill-will; I am simply very critical when it comes to writing.)

    One thing that was immediately apparent to me was that your paragraphs run on. A new paragraph needs to start once a new idea begins. Your first paragraph could easily become three. This will also give the illusion that your piece is longer than it actually is (which is always nice).

    You're also starting a lot of sentences with pronouns. She, it, they; try to avoid over using these, because it interrupts the flow and can confuse readers. Excessive use of these will make the reader sometimes think "...what were we talking about?" Not to say you shouldn't use pronouns at all, just moderate them a bit more.

    My last suggestion is that you try reading out loud. You will want to automatically stop speaking when you run across something that needs a comma or period.

    I liked it, but it just doesn't flow well.
     
    Last edited: Nov 15, 2011
  3. Insolent
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    Its fine. Good critiquing, thank you. It was harder to write then I had imagined it would orginally. lol.
     
  4. Immanent
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    Is nice!, huggies Dana =)