The Battle Part 1 and the end

Light is just begining to break enough to see the enemys camp in the valley below. You look around you at the ragged but fierce band of your kinsmen and motion for them to come along as you slip silently through the trees toward the camp. In the predawn you can just barely make out the other clans moving to take up there places on both sides of you. You stop just short of the tree line and watch the dark shapes moving up from the edge of the camp to rejoin you. One group breaks off and comes stright toward you, lead by a tall lankey figure.

Your oldest son grins as he brings the group of younger warriors back from the edge of the camp, they are covered in blood but none is theirs.

"The Guards are Dead" he softly says, "the camp is wide open"

He takes his place beside you and his younger brother who is nerviously grasping his spear and waiting for his first taste of combat. As he wipes the blood from his sword he tells him how easily the enemy fell and jokes about him soon losing his cherry. You hush them and wait for the signal from the Tribal Chiefs.

While you wait, you unhook your Axe from your belt, it is a simple weapon with Runes carved into the haft and it has served you well for years. As you heft it with both hands and feel the securty of its weight you feel the blood start humming in your veins and your breathing becomes heavier.

You look upon your clansmen as they ready themselves for battle, loosing swords, axes, spears and shields and softly muttering among themselves.

To your left are your two brothers one whispering encouragment to his oldest son who also was fighting for his first time the other just stand with a dark far away look on his face, thinking maybe of his boy who died at the battle for the bridge a few weeks ago, hacked down screaming the clans battle cry as he held the bridge while the rest escaped.

To your right is your cousins group, you grin as you can just barely make out the remains of his ear that you bit off in a fight to win your wife so many years ago. He is talking to his sons and brothers and waiting for your word.

Behind you mills the rest of your kin, cousins, nephews, uncles and in-laws, as you watch them start to focus on the camp below the hum in your ears grows to a low roar.

"Stay close to me and watch each others backs" you tell your sons while you can still speak and you start to sway with the roar in your ears and you feel the urge growing inside you.

You can feel it spreading among you like a living thing, here and there low moans and growls escaping from snarling lips of slowly swaying glassy eyed men. It seizes them one at a time as they throw down shields and rip off there shirts, stomping and pawing at the ground.


As your vision narrows till you only see the camp below the signal is given.

You lift your ax and howl as the bloodlust takes control and the rage is on you and as you charge down the hill to the camp, your screaming clansman around you, you can think no more.

As you reach the edge of the camp you see the enemy stumble from there blankets fumbling for weapons and screaming for the others to wake up.

You come upon the first one and the look of fear in his eyes pushes you over the edge of sanity and you swing your ax at his head............



This is part one if anyone is interested I will finish it

[Edited on 1-4-2004 by Amuk]

i for one am interested...i was there man...swinging my axe...i like the whole perspective thing you did..

Yes - definitely worth finishing !

Yes, please finish.

Amuk

That was awesome man. Didn't knew you had such writing skillz. Please, finish it, I'm hooked !

Nice Amuk, reminds me of "Worms of the Earth." Please continue.

Yeah you do need to finish it. I'm a foreigner to this style of writing and it's spiked my interest. Thanks for the heads up U2U!

Thanks Guys writing this was like going to school in your underwear......lol, I have never written anything before, but I have noticed that most writers writing about combat have never been there and it shows. I was trying to convey the mixed bag of emotions, before during and after, and maybe exorsize a few personal demons at the same time


Its not that long and I will try to finnish it over the next few days or so.

Cool! Really reminded me of playing a RPG. I had all these memories of those old 'Choose Your Own Adventure' books from back in the 80s. You know, the kind where you would get to the end of a section and have a decision to make: "If you wish to kill the troll go to page 68 or if you wish to pull the lever on the wall go to page 75".

By all means continue in the current perspective as it's quite unique, but also consider a couple alternatives for future work or possible revisions...

A future story might use the technique of first person (saying "I") telling the story in the form of a prayer or letter... also, the traditional third person where you fully develop and describe the character, giving the reader the sense of his perspective, but not inserting the reader.

But again, your take is unique and I'm curious to see how it goes. Hopefully the reader won't die at the end.

Amuk .. That was great. I am very impressed. I was swinging my ax too. I fear the bloodletting that is about to occur in the camp below. You must finish this would be a good book. Your off to a great start. I myself am interested in writing an action book where my character spoils a terrorist plot. A couple of tips if your serious. These were passed to me.

How do you start a fiction book?
With something that gets the old curiosity rolling (you did pretty good).. But maybe paragraph #1 should be in the first person like Rant said.

Here is an exaggerated Example: The first time I killed another tribal leader I had just turned eighteen and was in the full bloom of manhood. I was afraid the axe would just bounce off his broad shoulders.

You make any kind of a start like that, and then explainwhy you killed the sucker the first time, allude to the subsequent times, and what happened to you as a result of causing his demise this pertikler time. By the time you get through explaining everything, you're into the book so far no reader will let you quit.


Plotting made easy
How do you plot a novel? You read your favorite book and the writer put the twists and turns in just the right places. The pace was perfect. The excitement built to the end and them WHAM- What a finish! How the heck to they do that?

Step 1- Write your book in two sentences or less. That's right- two sentences. Remember when you looked at the movie listings in the paper and they had these two sentence descriptions that told you what the movie was about. That's what you have to write first. Why? Because the golden rule of writing is to know what you're writing when you write it. Sure, you can get around this and throw out pages and ideas as you go, a lot of writers have. I think that's wasteful. I've heard several stories of great writers submitting their manuscripts in large trunks- thousands of pages. "The story's in there somewhere- they tell the editor." Look- no editor in today's publishing world is going to bother with that. You have to have the book done and edited to perfection BEFORE you send it in. That's why you need to write your story's plot in two to three sentences. Anything that you write or plot later must relate to those sentences or they need to be cut- period.

Here's an example: Moby Dick- Ahab, a whaleboat captain bent on revenge against the white whale that mauled him, spurs a tired crew across the ocean in a grand hunt. Ignoring the dangers of the sea he becomes consumed with revenge and will do anything to get it.

There it is. Hundreds of pages boiled down to two sentences. Melville should have done this exercise himself. He grew as a writer as he wrote more and more- culminating in this great literary classic, but even Moby Dick is flawed in a fundamental way. Melville includes an entire chapter that reads like an encyclopedia of whale biology. There is no story whatsoever in this chapter- just diagrams and descriptions of whales. It is often called the least read chapter in all great literature. Perhaps if Hawthorn had kept the heart of his story in mind he would have left that chapter out- or at least put it in an appendix.

Boil down your story into 2 sentences and stay within those sentences.

Do this first. You will have to do it eventually when you submit to publishers and agents- so you might as well do it now and benefit from the sharp focus it provides.

Step 2- Get out your index cards. Get a bunch of 'em, whatever size you like. Now sit and think about your story. Are there scenes and events that pop to mind? Jot them down. No detail here- just enough to remind you what the card is about. Write the cards in any order. The LAST thing you want to do is to force yourself to think of these scenes in a linear way (see my column on the writer's mind for more detail.) Just jot down every scene you can think of. Some scenes will give you ideas for others. Just keep going. When you're tired put them down and review them later. Add more (don't take any out, even if you've decided you probably won't use them.) Keep adding cards and scenes until you just can't think of any more ideas. By now you're probably excited because you're getting a great view of the story and you can't wait to start writing. Well- wait anyway. There's more to do.

Step 3- Organize your cards. Now's the time to put them in order. Keep two things in mind- first, unless you're doing weird things with the timeline- everything should be linear. Event A should be followed by event B and so on. Don't do B,T,Z,P,A, or some darned thing unless you really, really know what you're doing. If this is your first book- I wouldn't even think about it. A-B-C, 1,2,3- Keep it nice and simple.

Second, think about what events you want your readers to see. Chances are you won't be showing every single action taken by every single character throughout the timeline. Decide what scenes are most exciting or important for the main storyline. Don't worry- you can easily find ways to share these events with readers without launching into the full scene. A main character could get a phone call or a note. They could hear about an event from another character- or maybe even guess that the event has occurred based on their observations. Make a little mark or symbol of the cards that you're sure you'd like your readers to see. Don't worry- nothing's set it stone yet. Just make a note and move on.

Step 3- Now that you have all of your events it's time to get picky. Lay your cards out on a large flat surface, or put them up on a bulletin board. When I first started I bought two sheets of corkboard and put them on the wall in my office. I pinned all the cards on the board the way I liked them. When you're done you should be able to see your whole novel and enjoy following the plot. Keep rearranging if you want to- go nuts. Don't stop until you like what you see. This is a concept called storyboarding, and it's used by creative in a variety of mediums. Watch one of those how-they-made-the-movie documentaries. They ALWAYS storyboard. It's a great tool.

Step 4- Details. Now take your cards down one at a time. You're going to make some notes on the back before you put it back up. You can make a new card if you need to. Here's what you're going to put on the back:

* Location: Where is the scene happening? Watch for problems with logic here. A character in New York can't be in London 5 minutes later. Think of ways to have the setting enhance your plot. Be creative. I once put a car chase scene in the hallway of the Smithsonian. Just made things more interesting.

* Time: What is the day and time this is happening? Also- watch for logical flaws.

* Characters: List all characters who will appear in this scene.

* Main POV: Every scene should be written through the eyes of just one character- your point of view character. Who is the POV character in this scene?

* Main POV's goal: What is the POV character trying to accomplish here?

* Problems that stop the main POV character from reaching their goal (Try to list 3-4 at minimum.): What's in the way? What's stopping the character from getting what they want? By the way- if there's nothing in this scene that's in the way this better be the last chapter of the book or you're in trouble. All drama is based on conflict. Make sure there's plenty of it in every scene.

* Scene ending hook: In most of the book things should be getting worse, or if things are looking better- make sure your reader knows that relief will be short lived. End the scene with some hint of more conflict to come. Don't let the reader have an excuse to put the book down because they might not pick it up again.

Step 4: Put the project down and come back to it a few days later with a fresh view. Read- revise- and wait again. Do this until you're happy with the product.

Step 5: Start writing from the cards one scene at a time. I like to take what I've put on the cards and put them into a single document in Word. That way I can keep adding notes and rearranging without a lot of trouble.

When it's time for me to write I pick any scene- not necessarily in order, review the information and write the scene based on the information on the card. You always start writing knowing what your goal is and what needs to be included. No writer's block to deal with here.


Creating Believable Caaracters:
Creating believable characters is an essential element of fiction. The story rests on your characters shoulders, if they don't hold up then your story collapses. So how do you make believable characters?

First recognize that different genres of fiction have different needs. A tightly plotted action or suspense thriller may not need characters fleshed out in detail as much as a literary novel. Also be aware that the more outlandish your plot is, the more important character believability becomes. Read any Steven King book and you'll see this. The reason he can take us on these journeys through strange and unusual events is his power to create realistic characters. When we believe the character, we believe what's happening to them.

Originally posted by Jonna
"If you wish to kill the troll go to page 68 or if you wish to pull the lever on the wall go to page 75".

I was never any good with those things.


If you wish to kill the troll go to page 68

OK ... turns to page 68

The troll kicks your arse around the room before ripping your head off and using it as a bowling ball.

Try again.

Typical

I want to think everyone for their support, this was very scary for me. I am training my son for the next two days for his upcoming fights and will have to wait till thursday to finish the story.


It is already wrote in my head but I want to take time to polish it before I present it to yall, and thursday is my first day off.

I hope you enjoy the rest of it.

[Edited on 30-3-2004 by Amuk]

Great story Amuk. I enjoyed it. Can't wait for the next part.

Although I'm not much on battle or war type stories, it reads well, and the perspective is different, since you're in the story.

Blood gushes as your axe bites into the mans neck at an angle to the collar bone and you pull back at the last instant to keep it from catching in the shoulder, you spin as the man crumples taking the next one just under the ribs, as you jerk the ax out the man fails among the coils of his intestines and you move on.

Your oldest moves like a dancer among the enemy his short sword flickering like a snakes tounge droping any that come within its reach, your youngest is engaging two men at once with his spear so you take one, a grizzled veteran, out with a blow to the spine, as he falls flopping like a fish like they sometimes do, your sons spear finds the throut of the other and he makes his first kill.

A cousin falls to the spear of a young enemy warrior and you smash your axe into his face it catches in the skull and you almost lose it as he falls. You look down at your cousin writhing on the ground pinned by the spear, foamy blood is pouring from his mouth and you know there is nothing you can do so you move on.

You move past a nephew hacking wildly at a long dead body on the ground to engage the man charging at him, you side step the spear thrust spinning around and behind him to bury your ax into his back just below the shoulder blades, he falls twitching to the ground and you move on.

As you hack down the last one, a crying boy not more than 14, the age of your youngest, you hear shouts coming from futher down the valley. Your sons run up to you and point to where the enemy has regrouped into a shield wall bristling with spears. A pile of bodies, mostly Bear Clan, your wifes people, lay around them a testament to a failed charge.

As you run up to the men of the Bear Clan you yell for your kinsmen to regroup, a cousin raises the Banner of the Wolf Clan to rally your people. As your people gather around you salvage a shield from one of the many bodies strewed along the blood soaked ground. You look and see both sons beside you but other faces are missing as you are joined by the Eagle and Raven Clans.

Someone starts chanting the war cry of the Clans and it is picked up by everyone, you stomp your feet and slam your axes and swords against your shields, in time to the chant, building up to a fevered pitch of bloodlust your tribesmen pass the point of no return and charge as one toward the enemy.

You quickly cross the space between the two groups the man beside you runs head long into a spear head and as you slam shield first into the man in front of you he sprawls backwards and you hack downward with your axe feeling it bite into flesh you step foward and are among them. At first you are alone among the tightly packed enemy and you slaughter them their spears almost useless at this close of range, but as you are soaked with their blood first a son then, a cousin, then more join you and you have shattered the wall and it collapses under a screaming blood crazed horde of Clansmen.

You jerk your dulled axe blade out of the chest of of a crumpling man and look up to see a tall man shouting orders under the Dragon banner, your blood rushes as you relize this is their leader and you howl your challange and rush him and his men.

He meets you head long no sign of fear only a rage to match your own, his shield deflects your axe and you feel something shatter in your arm as his heavy war hammer slams into your shield. You swing your axe at his head but he dances away landing another agonizing blow on your shield. As you trade blows with the younger, faster, stronger man you know you are in trouble.

Your left arm is useless and your axe is getting too heavy to lift as you stumble backwards over a body trying to avoid his hammer blows. As you lay on the ground you look upward at his upraised hammer and know that you cant block it and your death is coming.

He lurches forward, a look of suprise on his face, your youngest sons roars from behind him as he lifts him from the ground on the end of his spear you think his head will make a fine trophy for his first battle.

As you set up gasping for breath you relize that you are bleeding from a dozen small wounds and have a broken arm.

Your son falls to his knees throwing up and shuddering.

As your other son and kinsmen butcher the last of the enemy you set down your axe and put your good arm around your 14 year-old boys shoulder and say "It gets easier"

The horrible truth is

It does


I hope yall liked it

omg...that was so gruesome and so totally captivating and great!!!! I absolutely love it. (this coming from someone who opposes violence)

seriously...violence in the form of fiction is totally acceptable to me and i can see this situation playing out centuries ago and perhaps even now in tribal areas..well told story

Well done Amuk.. Liked it alot. Question: was the Bear Clan (your wifes people). The group your were fighting or on your side?

They were on our side, they had charged the shield wall too early in their bloodlust, before they had the men to break it, sometimes it happens in the heat of the moment

I just didnt know because thier bodies were piled up at the feet of the regrouping enemy and I thought they may be regrouping by thier own dead..