BlameThePixel!

LOL. Sarge, now your really gonna need to send me that since I didnt save it onto my computer.

.:EDIT:. You other people didnt hear that.

oh shit lol, I forgot to post it..

And there was me waiting for comments

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The journey through the desert hills was proving to be a vain impossibility for Tom. To add to the heat, dehydration and huge sandy dunes Clementine was becoming increasingly afraid about something. When asked what it actually was, she replied “It’s bad! We shouldn’t be here! It’s not safe! They will get us!� and then broke down into quick sharp sobs. Resting was not an option. They had to find another cube as quick as possible otherwise they would lose any liquid they had in their body to the heat and shrivel up on a dune somewhere. However hard Tom tried not to think about the danger it kept coming back to him. Perhaps this was what Clementine felt. But something about her words gave the impression that what she was scared of was more physical.

The pair struggled through the desert without speaking to each other in the fear of wasting valuable energy. Tom looked down at his bare arms. They were red and sandy. Freckles were beginning to show clearer than before, although Tom had never understood the nature of the strange brown lumps. His shirt had dried into a crusty, solid garment due to the sand. His legs were pained with sudden rise in healthy exercise, fed more on fear than anything else. His mind was almost blank, however, only focussed on the task of staying alive to worry or speculate.
Clementine stopped suddenly and whirled around in a confused fashion. Her dry mouth opened and closed as if she couldn’t convert her feelings into words. And then it hit Tom too. The familiar degrading of everything about them, nothing was here. Very carefully, he sharpened his mind and miraculously managed to find nothing. It wasn’t coming down the nearest dune and Clementine wasn’t in the way of anything. And this nothing was particularly nothing whatsoever.
“Watch out!� Tom shouted before leaping at Clementine and pushing her to one side. They fell in a confused heap as nothing shot by and something appeared again.
Tom got up feeling baffled once again. Clementine got up gave him a baffled slap.
“What the hell d’you think your doing?� she said quickly.
“I…I don’t know. Saving you from nothing…I suppose� was Tom’s answer. His mind was somewhere else though. What did just happen there he thought. Whatever that was, it certainly wasn’t anything that happened at home…or didn’t happen at home…
Tom shook his head, and carried on after the stricken Clementine. They had got half way up the umpteenth dune when Clementine suddenly collapsed. Tom scrambled across the steep dune to her still side. Turning her over, he saw that she was still breathing. He had to get her moving again.

“We can’t stop� he groaned, “or we’ll just die out here, with no water and that bastard of a sun up there.� Tom shivered at the thought of it.

Clementine replied with a groan.

“Clemmy?� he tried.

Her eyes suddenly flicked open, catapulting tiny granules of sad from her scorched eyelashes. Her eyes were sharp and focused with annoyance. “Don’t ever call me Clemmy.� She growled, and with an effort that seemed to appear from nowhere she got up and trudged up the hill at an alarming pace.

“Clemmy…err…Clementine! Wait!� Tom croaked, and struggled after her. Her pace was fast and determination flashed in her eyes like nothing that Tom had seen before. Frowning, Tom began to feel that this was no ordinary girl. This girl has issues.

The top of the dune overlooked many others. It was a wonderful view of sand dunes, hills made of sand and sandy valleys. Tom breathed a sigh of relief as he finished the climb and stood next to Clementine. Her face was set in a rigid frown, her eyes focussed on a sand dune close to the one they were on. Tom followed her gaze.

“This was where I appeared.� She said suddenly. “Right next to that cube�

Tom looked closer. She was right; there was a cube on top of the sand dune…and a movement. Clementine’s face suddenly flowed with a familiar fear; her eyes were as wide as she could get them in the light. “Oh no� she whispered, and took a step away from the direction of the cube.

And that was what annoyed Tom. This same fear had delayed their journey countless times until he could only just bare it. This time he couldn’t put up with it. His marbles went and smashed into tiny pieces of anger. His mind was flung into a state of total annoyance that this girl could push him to the edge with some kind of stupid fear that she did not want to get over.

Turning around to face her scared eyes, he croaked two words that made her gasp with surprise, then thundered down the dune in search of what this crazed girl was terrified of.

As he reached the bottom he started up the next dune with determination. Out of the corner of his eye he could see a figure standing atop the dune he had come down, watching him, but not following. The scared bastard he thought, and quickened his tiring pace.

The dune began to level out, and a faint screech of something inhuman could be heard over the haze of the heat. As he carried on further a buzzing began to fill his ears. Tom frowned and began to feel a bit afraid himself. Perhaps Clementine had reason to be that scared. His pace wavered at that, but it was too late. He had reached the top of the dune. The massive cube loomed above him a few yards away and the buzzing was loud and audible. A second screech came from all directions freezing Tom to the spot.

And then a human scream.

Total fear flowed through Tom’s body. His blood curdled into a thick ice. He didn’t know where to run or even if he should run to or from. With a mad flurry of thought, he blindly ran to the cube and raced around the corner of it. The scene clearly explained Clementine’s actions, and made Tom feel guilty for a split second before a second dose of fear was given to him.

A girl about his age sat rigid against the cube, as if trying to move through the metal wall away from the most terrifying monsters Tom had seen. These were a cross between the Daemon of Death in the film The Ghastly Massacre and the king of bugs in The Swarm. The things were buzzing around in the air, darting at the girl with open claws, teeth and something very sharp and pointy. As Tom stared, the creatures turned to look at him with bulbous insect-like eyes and massive mandibles. A split second later something hit him from behind knocking him to the sand. The buzzing came closer and Tom found himself shouting and scrambling to his feet. His fear blinded him as he pelted towards nowhere in particular. Something grabbed him around the waste and his feet were no longer intact with any sand. He felt hot air rush past him as he was carried further up into the air with a constant buzzing all around him.

Then suddenly a loud explosion rippled through the air and the beast reacted violently from a dull thud on its body, threatening to drop Tom. It went limp and began to stop climbing before plummeting madly to the ground. Tom hit the sand and almost bounced over onto his stomach. His ears picked up a second gunshot, and a third. Things screamed around him and he heard the fearful sobs of the girl somewhere close to him. He tried to get up but something large and gruesome pinned him to the hot sand. All he could do was black out and wait.

Confusing wording, change to 'Tom tried his hardest...', or just 'Tom tried...'.



Change 'healthy exercise' to 'activity'. Change 'however, only focussed' to 'too focussed'. Also, I think focussed is spelled wrong, but I don't want to look it up.



Take out the he thought (it's evident he's not talking), and end with a question mark.



Take out 'hills mad of sand', it's sort of redundant.



It doesn't HAVE to be changed, but it's bad form to end a sentence with a preposition.



The that is redundant.



Put commas around suddenly, interjections have to be surrounded by them.

Also, now might be the time to go back through the entire story, and start changing passive sentences to active sentences. If you need help, it might be a good idea to consult your grammar book.

Another great chapter .

HAH, last night I checked through it and changed most of those myself! *dances happily*

But yeah I will check through the whole thing and fluentialize(?...made up word)it.

No can do, the healthy excerise stays since it dosnt actually matter and Id rather it was more creative.


its now changed to "sand dunes, hills made of sand and golden rolling hills." Im not sure you get the joke, but everyone else seemed to think it was fine, although I cant find a way to make it better.
But yes, its supposed to be redundant. The subtle repetition is SUPPOSED to show that all he can see is bloody great piles of sand.
and its made not mad

I changed the whole sentence around and it sounds a bit better now.

Ipraiseyou for your helpfulness.

when ive finished polishing it all up. The process is slow because i'm on the dge of GCSE's and the likes of growing up. Not to mention my long lapses of uninspiration.

He hasn't guaranteed anything so stop complaining!

I will garantee a new chapter at some point in time. But Ive actually ended up adding whole new paragraphs into the bits ive already done. I have done a new chapter, but I'm not gonna post it until Ive polished off the rest of it.

.:EDIT:. In fact, its time to do a quick lil poll.
How many readers think that the story goes very fast and should be a short story? And how many people think its going at a normal pace of a moderatly long book?

woo ok. Ive written much more. For anyone who can be bothered anymore...
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Tom’s ears were the first things to gain consciousness. The sound of crackling flames reached him along with the sound of feet scuffing against sand and some light talk with low, male voices. Then his skin began to feel the familiar stifling heat, but also a small wave of coolness swept over his face and stomach. Opening his eyes, he could make out blurred figures walking about or sitting down around what looked to be some sort of fire. Groaning, Tom began to work his body into full consciousness. A voice suddenly shouted, “Sir, he’s awake�, followed by a raised murmur of other voices. There was a scuffle of feet that grew louder and suddenly Tom found large, leather boots obstructing his view. Looking up, he saw the face of a rugged man in his thirties. A smile touched the man’s lips as he saw Tom looking at him.

“You were lucky to survive the pests,� he told Tom, as a way of introduction. “My name is Kyraan, captain of the pest control squad. We were patrolling the mountain area and were fortunate enough to find you or you would have been stripped from the bone.�

Tom stared gormless at the large man’s hardened face. The sober, brown eyes gave no inclination that he was joking, and Tom finally had accept that this god forsaken nightmare hadn’t finished. A tear escaped his eye and ran down his cheek. He croaked, “I wanna wake up�.

Kyraan looked at Tom with a vaguely puzzled expression. “Son, you are awake,� he explained, with a tone that suggested there had to be a catch to this.

“I can’t be,� Tom argued, “I must have fallen asleep in the toilets. I’ve heard of people who did that. They fell into a comber after a kidney failure or something. I must have done that. I can’t have got here any other way. And it’s so strange here. Its not real.�

An expression of complete bewilderment crossed Kyraan’s face. And then it relaxed, the wrinkles in his skin folding over and resting in exagerated sympathy that clearly showed that he thought Tom had gone mental.

A second shadow fell over Tom. Looking behind, he saw Clementine looking healthier and less stressed.

“I don’t think this is a dream. This is real.� She explained

“How would you know?� asked Tom, a deep well of worry filling his stomach.

“It’s…I just do okay? I know these things sometimes. Besides it hurts when I pinch myself.�
She slipped the rag up her arm to reveal sunburnt skin pocked with deep, red marks shaped exactly like her nails. A deep, puzzled silence filled the air around Tom as he stared intently at Clementine’s arm. Kyraan made a huge effort to cough as unawkward as possible before he spoke. “How did you three get here anyway?� he asked.

“Three?� repeated Tom. Then he remembered the girl being attacked, cornered against the cube, screaming for her life. And it all came back to him: the inhuman screech, the buzzing that filled all the senses, the blood thirsty creatures.

“The other girl is in a state of shock. We gave her a slumbaa pillow.�

Tom didn’t bother asking.

“We will leave here in the morning via the Desert Highway. I suggest you both get some good rest before then.�

As Kyraan walked away, Clementine timidly sat down beside Tom.

“I don’t think this is our world either.�

“I’m prepared to believe that� retorted Tom.

An awkward silence followed this remark that both Tom and Clementine were unaware of. They were lost in their own thoughts of home sickness, puzzlement and, most of all, fear.