Between Angels and Devils

[Darth Marsden]

As mentioned/threatened in my other thread (http://www.armageddongames.net/forums/showthread.php?t=96842) ( ;) ), this is the first chapter of the novel I'm currently writing. It's still only a first draft, but given that the night I was writing it the house was having power blips and my PC kept resetting itself, I ended up re-writing several sections. Take that as you will.

Thoughts and comments would be appreciated, but not essential.

Now... are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin...

Daniel Jordan - Between Angels and Devils

Chapter I - Hidden in Plain Sight

It was a cold, dark and generally unpleasant Thursday evening. It was raining slightly and the wind was chilling to the bone. Why the meeting had to take place down by the seafront he’s never know. It was a depressing place in the best of times, but in these conditions it because a whole new nightmare.
Daniel Jordan reached into his pocket and fished out a stick of gum. He carefully unwrapped it and placed the stick into his mouth. He’d been out here for an hour, and he was thoroughly fed up. If he didn’t show up...
As if to answer his question, a man stepped out of a nearby street and walked towards the pier. As he crossed the road, Daniel could just make out his suit under the heavy coat. This was his man. He stood up, making sure that he wasn’t seen, and followed him towards what had once been a place of happy memories for him.
The man walked down to the side of the pier and made his way towards the beach. It would be impossible to follow him down there, so he’d just have to take the high road. Daniel walked up to the entrance of the pier and carefully climbed over the locked gate. If anybody saw him, they made no indication of the fact.
Blessing the inspiration that had made him wear his trainers rather than his boots, Daniel quietly made his way along the pier, looking over the side to make sure he was keeping up with the man he’d been waiting for. Suddenly he disappeared. Daniel looked over and checked up and down, but he’d vanished. Then he heard voices beneath him and he realized that that man had simply walked underneath the pier. Handy meeting place, he thought to himself as he pressed himself down to the well-worn wood to hear what was going on beneath him.
‘Christ, it’s cold.’
‘What do you expect? It’s January.’
‘...yeah. I guess so.’
Daniel could tell that the man was scared. He should be. He was selling company secrets, a crime which, if Daniel could prove, would see the man locked away for a good while. Reaching into his coat pocket and pulling out a small Dictaphone, he placed it on the wood beside him and, timing it so that the sound of the waves covered up the slight click, started recording.
‘Did you bring them?’
‘...yeah. Yeah, they’re here.’
There was the sound of something being drawn from the man’s coat and passed over to the other, faceless figure who was awaiting them. Then a slight rustling, as if the second man was flicking through them, making sure they were what he wanted.
‘Good. Here.’
More sounds. Daniel had been doing this long enough to imagine the envelope full of money being passed over, the greedy hands snatching it and opening it, eager to feel the cash for themselves. A name, dammit. That was all he needed now.
‘There... there’s not enough here’ There was a slight panic set into the voice.
‘Yes. You inconvenienced us. Cancelled a meeting we had taken great pains to arrange. There is still plenty there.’
‘But... we arranged for five thousand.’ The voice was more defiant now. He was being wronged, and he wasn’t standing for it. ‘There’s less then four here.’
‘Exactly four thousand.’ The other voice was calm, assured. He’d done this before, god knows how many times. ‘It was very inconvenient.’
‘Dammit all, that’s not fair! They switched my schedule at the last minute; there was nothing I could do!’ The panic had snuck back in.
‘That is not our fault. We arranged a time and a place at our expense. Your changes cost us, and we have deducted you the appropriate amount. You are hardly in a position to argue.’
Something happened that Daniel couldn’t follow. He’d have to see what was going on. Carefully he moved to one of the thin slits between planks and looked down. Even in the darkness, he recognized the glint of a pistol. Which one of them was holding it, though?
‘Simon, don’t be like this.’
Simon. The name. That was all he needed. He could run away, get out, earn his reward. But something stopped him. It was Simon who was holding the gun. The same Simon, he had been assured by the company representative who had approached him the previous day, who was harmless. Who was probably only doing this to pay for his mother’s health care. Daniel looked further up - the other man had his arms out in front of him, gesturing to Simon that this was pointless.
‘I want the other thousand.’
‘The man smiled. Daniel knew, just from that expression, that he didn’t have it on him. He also knew that someone was going to get shot, and that someone was probably going to be Simon. He held his breath.
‘I don’t have it.’
‘Then get it.’
‘Take what you have and leave. This is pointless.’
Simon fired a shot into the ground. It echoed around noisily. What the hell was he doing? This wasn’t going to get him anywhere.
‘I need it.’
‘That is a shame. But you will not get it this way. If you were prepared to perform another small task for us, however-’
Another shot, but this time into the air, or rather, the pier. The bullet passed through the wood and flew right past Daniel’s ear, and he involuntarily rolled away from it. As soon as he had done so, he cursed himself. They would have heard him, knew that someone was spying on them. Daniel grabbed the Dictaphone and ran like hell for the town proper, all attempts at stealth forgotten.
He leapt over the side of the pier and landed on the shells that made up the beach. Barely pausing for breath, he continued onwards, ignoring the shots that echoed around. Was it Simon or the other man who was firing the gun? Daniel guessed it would be the other man. Simon didn’t seem like the type to try and kill a man. Then again, he didn’t seem the type to carry a gun, and he’d done that. Another pullet passed him and shook him out of his thoughts. No time for that. Get to safety. Pass the evidence on to the men who wanted it.
After what seemed like an hour, Daniel made it to the pavement. Dashing across the road, he vanished into the shadows of the buildings on the other side. Whoever was chasing him would have a hard time finding him, it they bothered to try at all.
They didn’t. People had been woken by the shots, and as the man approached the road, a shrill woman’s voice yelled at him to stop making so much noise. The man stopped and paused to catch his breath. He wasn’t going to find whoever it was. Probably just some kid out for a wander who’d wondered what was going on. He shook his head and put the gun into the waistband of his trousers. It was nothing to worry about.
Three days later, Simon Demeal was arrested on the charge of corporate espionage. The story wasn’t particularly newsworthy and barely registered in the public’s eye, but as Daniel Jordan placed the case file into the cabinet along with all the other successful cases he’d taken on during the last year and a half, he couldn’t help but allow himself a brief smile. It may not have been a particularly flashy case, but it made a change from the rut he’d gotten himself into. And the bonus he’d gotten once the verdict of ‘guilty’ had been given was a pleasant surprise. As he closed the drawer of the filing cabinet, he made a mental note to call back and thank the company for their generosity. But it could wait until tomorrow. Rescue Me was on in half an hour.

[Dechipher]

Just from reading that, I would suggest perhaps starting off with the first two lines of dialogue, and then going on to set the setting, so it's more like "Things are happening in real time" as opposed to "this happens and then this happens and so on.
Just my thought.

[Darth Marsden]

I can see what you're saying, but I'm not sure why you're saying it. Does it feel slightly wrong as it, or is that just how you would write it?

Taking your suggestion into account, I came up with this (again, it's only a brief draft, but see what you think):

‘Christ, it’s cold.’
‘What do you expect? It’s January.’
‘...yeah. I guess so.’
It was a cold, dark and generally unpleasant Thursday evening. It was raining slightly and the wind was chilling to the bone. Why the meeting had to take place down by the seafront he’s never know. It was a depressing place in the best of times, but in these conditions it because a whole new nightmare.
Daniel Jordan, lying face down on top of a pier, was watching the two men have their conversation. He quietly chewed the gum in his mouth as he mentally pictured the pair. One he knew, having followed him all the way here, but the other man was a mystery to him. All he knew was what he could piece together from the voice, and that was absolutely nothing.
Slowly he moved himself over to one of the cracks in the wooden planks that made up the pier, making sure not to knock over the Dictaphone he'd set up to record the conversation. The darkness hid the pair well - it was a good meeting place. His efforts to put a face to the voice thwarted, Daniel instead put his ear to the crack and listened to what he could.
‘Did you bring them?’
‘...yeah. Yeah, they’re here.’
...and so on. That seem better? Worse? No different? Thoughts please, people.

[Pineconn]

I personally like it how it is. I generally dislike books that begin into dialogue, and prefer those that describe the setting or mood first.

That is a great intro. Like I said, the scene is first described, then it gets suspenseful. That's a great attention-grabber. So I give a :thumbsup: for it! So where does the book go after that? :)

[Glenn the Great]

I'm liking your story. It's very atmospheric, and I felt like I was there. It's nice how you were able to lay out the setting without wandering into any purple prose. Nice hardboiled crime story.

I think that it is better in its original form. Some things happen before people start speaking, and it is best to cover that first.

What I found sort of awkward, and maybe only because I'm not used to seeing the technique, is how you use a 3rd person narrator who personifies himself (i.e. thinks the thoughts of) with multiple characters. In this case, moving from mainly Daniel, over to Simon for a brief moment during the chase sequence. Usually in an attempt to create a 3rd person/1st person hybrid, the narrator will limit his mental empathy to the protagonist.

Your style of narration, combined with the past tense verbage, makes your story look like it was designed for an audio format, rather than visual in a book. This is another throwback to hardboiled fiction as you might have heard broadcast over radio in the old days. If anything, it gives your story a more classical feel.

[Dechipher]

I personally think it's better to start off with dialogue, because the whole starting with "It was..." seems a bit cliched and has been done many times before (and even if it hasn't it certainly feels like it has.) However, this would require a lot of changing around the events that happen (something that I missed on my first skim through.) My point is less about starting off with dialogue and more about changing up the first sentence. Also, the paragraph:

It was a cold, dark and generally unpleasant Thursday evening. It was raining slightly and the wind was chilling to the bone. Why the meeting had to take place down by the seafront he’s never know. It was a depressing place in the best of times, but in these conditions it because a whole new nightmare.
starts with "It was" a bit too much. Perhaps the following?


It was a cold, dark and generally unpleasant Thursday evening. The wind was chilling to the bone and it was lightly raining. Why the meeting had to take place down by the seafront he’s never know. Certainly it was a depressing place in the best of times, but in these conditions it became? a whole new nightmare.

Now, this is coming from a composer's standpoint moreso than a reader or a writer. As a composer, I find that I rarely encounter a problem with material, it's moreso about the flow, and that's what I try to scrutinize when reading that. Who am I to say "your material is good/bad?" I have no position to say that, obviously, and certainly not with any authority. However, I might be able to point a few inconsistencies in flow, and even if I'm dead off on any suggestion, it may bring other problems into light.
Every writer could work on something, so certainly, I'm not talking in terms of "good" or "bad." Such subjective terms are totally apart from what I'm focusing on, and I would hope that any suggestions I make would not reflect an opinion either way. It's not about what I like or don't like it's all about it how it feels in my head, for no doubt your style and tastes are vastly different from mine (this much can be seen from how we view the very opening. Who's to say that one is better or worse, inherently?) It's all about how the writing flows. That's what distinguishes fantastic authors/composers from great authors/composers from good authors/composers. Good writers can come up with good material and get it to flow decently without too many snags. Great writers often times will not have the best material, but can pace it so well that it feels like the material is good even if it is subpar. And Fantastic writers are those who can produce A material and pace in superbly. This is, obviously, where everyone desires to be, but it is far more challenging than one would suspect. Anyway, everything I've said applies to composing and, to some degree I feel, writing. I hope that I haven't sounded too pompous. I'm merely an infant in my studies of composition, and this is just what I've gathered so far.
Hope I've helped a little.

[Darth Marsden]

Thanks guys, good points all round. Lemme try that first section again:

It was a cold, dark and generally unpleasant Thursday evening. A light fall of rain and a chilling wind combined to prevent anyone from coming out. Why the meeting had to take place down by the seafront he’s never know. The area was depressing in the best of times, but in these conditions it because a whole new nightmare.
While I understand what you're saying Dechiper, I feel it works best if I don't start with dialog. It adds a sense of speed that isn't in the scene - Daniel (the lead character) has been waiting for this man for an hour, so he's had time to think about his surroundings.

And don't worry - you don't sound pompous. You sound like someone who knows what he's talking about. I appreciate that.

Pineconn: Allow me to quickly mock up the blurb on the back of the book...

Daniel Jordan is about to take on the greatest case of his career. Someone's gone missing, and when they turn up, it's with someone else who bares a remarkable similarity to the devil...

But that's not the only puzzling thing going on in the universe. People are asking questions. Where did the last two weeks go? Why are there devils being sighted? Who on Earth is Paul M Stepson? And why are people dying in the most horrific manner?

To get to the bottom of it all, Daniel's going to need every bit of strength he can summon. But even that might not be enough. This time, he might need to die for the cause...

[The_Amaster]

I like it. Seriously, I've read published authors who couldn't write that good(Mind you, they were on the back of cheap sci-fi/fantasy paperbacks). Still, you're dialouge is definetly the high-point of the excerpt.


He leapt over the side of the pier and landed on the shells that made up the beach.
Landed on the shells that made up the beach sounds a bit like you're forcing it, or somthing. I can't put my finger on it, but it sounds a bit awkward.

[Darth Marsden]

How about...

He leapt over the metal barrier at the side of the pier, landing on the shells that made up the upper half of the beach.
Feel any better?

[Prrkitty]

Y'all need to pay attention to tenses of contractions ;) <hug>

Shouldn't... "Why the meeting had to take place down by the seafront he’s never know." ...

Be: "Why the meeting had to take place down by the seafront he’ll never know."

:)

[Pineconn]

I noticed [well, quite a few] typos, but I assumed since:


It's still only a first draft, but given that the night I was writing it the house was having power blips and my PC kept resetting itself, I ended up re-writing several sections.

...that they will have been worked out before publication. ;)

[Dechipher]

Y'all need to pay attention to tenses of contractions ;) <hug>

Shouldn't... "Why the meeting had to take place down by the seafront he’s never know." ...

Be: "Why the meeting had to take place down by the seafront he’ll never know."

:)
Wouldn't it be
"Why the meeting had to take place down by the seafront he's never known."
?

[Lilith]

sucks, redo it

[Darth Marsden]

Thanks for that wonderful piece of help, Lilith. :rolleyes:

Nice to see so many people interested in my work! Seriously. Appreciate all the comments you've made so far, especially regarding that one sentence which I wasn't altogether sure about in the first place. Taking all your thoughts into account, I've redone the section slightly, and this is what I've got now:


It was a cold, dark and generally unpleasant Thursday evening. A light fall of rain and a chilling wind combined to prevent anyone from coming out. Why was the meeting taking place down by the seafront? It was a depressing area in the best of times, but in these conditions it because a whole new nightmare.
Daniel Jordan reached into his pocket and fished out a stick of gum. He carefully unwrapped it and placed the stick into his mouth. He’d been out here for an hour, and he was thoroughly fed up. If he didn’t show up...
As if to answer his question, a man stepped out of a nearby street and walked towards the pier. As he crossed the road, Daniel could just make out his suit under the heavy coat. This was his man. He stood up, making sure that he wasn’t seen, and followed him towards what had once been a place of happy memories for him.
The man walked down to the side of the pier and made his way towards the beach. It would be impossible to follow him down there, so he’d just have to take the high road. Daniel walked up to the entrance of the pier and carefully climbed over the locked gate. If anybody saw him, they made no indication of the fact.
Blessing the inspiration that had made him wear his trainers rather than his boots, Daniel quietly made his way along the pier, looking over the side to make sure he was keeping up with the man he’d been waiting for. Suddenly he disappeared. Daniel looked over and checked up and down, but he’d vanished. Then he heard voices beneath him and he realized that that man had simply walked underneath the pier. Handy meeting place, he thought to himself as he pressed himself down to the well-worn wood to hear what was going on beneath him.
‘Christ, it’s cold.’
‘What do you expect? It’s January.’
‘...yeah. I guess so.’
Daniel could tell that the man was scared. He should be. He was selling company secrets, a crime which, if Daniel could prove, would see the man locked away for a good while. Reaching into his coat pocket and pulling out a small Dictaphone, he placed it on the wood beside him and, timing it so that the sound of the waves covered up the slight click, started recording.
‘Did you bring them?’
‘...yeah. Yeah, they’re here.’
There was the sound of something being drawn from the man’s coat and passed over to the other, faceless figure who was awaiting them. Then a slight rustling, as if the second man was flicking through them, making sure they were what he wanted.
‘Good. Here.’
More sounds. Daniel had been doing this long enough to imagine the envelope full of money being passed over, the greedy hands snatching it and opening it, eager to feel the cash for themselves. A name, dammit. That was all he needed now.
‘There... there’s not enough here’ There was a slight panic set into the voice.
‘Yes. You inconvenienced us. Canceled a meeting we had taken great pains to arrange. There is still plenty there.’
‘But... we arranged for five thousand.’ The voice was more defiant now. He was being wronged, and he wasn’t standing for it. ‘There’s less then four here.’
‘Exactly four thousand.’ The other voice was calm, assured. He’d done this before, god knows how many times. ‘It was very inconvenient.’
‘Dammit all, that’s not fair! They switched my schedule at the last minute; there was nothing I could do!’ The panic had crept back in.
‘That is not our fault. We arranged a time and a place at our expense. Your changes cost us, and we have deducted you the appropriate amount. You are hardly in a position to argue.’
Something happened that Daniel couldn’t follow. He’d have to see what was going on. Carefully he moved to one of the thin slits between planks and looked down. Even in the darkness, he recognized the glint of a pistol. Which one of them was holding it, though?
‘Simon, don’t be like this.’
Simon. The name. That was all he needed. He could run away, get out, earn his reward. But something stopped him. It was Simon who was holding the gun. The same Simon, he had been assured by the company representative who had approached him the previous day, who was harmless. Who was probably only doing this to pay for his mother’s health care. Daniel looked further up - the other man had his arms out in front of him, gesturing to Simon that this was pointless.
‘I want the other thousand.’
‘The man smiled. Daniel knew, just from that expression, that he didn’t have it on him. He also knew that someone was going to get shot, and that someone was probably going to be Simon. He held his breath.
‘I don’t have it.’
‘Then get it.’
‘Take what you have and leave. This is pointless.’
Simon fired a shot into the ground. It echoed around noisily. What the hell was he doing? This wasn’t going to get him anywhere.
‘I need it.’
‘That is a shame. But you will not get it this way. If you were prepared to perform another small task for us, however-’
Another shot, but this time into the air, or rather, the pier. The bullet passed through the wood and flew right past Daniel’s ear, and he involuntarily rolled away from it. As soon as he had done so, he cursed himself. They would have heard him, knew that someone was spying on them. Daniel grabbed the Dictaphone and ran like hell for the town proper, all attempts at stealth forgotten.
He leapt over the metal barrier at the side of the pier, landing on the shells that made up the upper half of the beach. Barely pausing for breath, he continued onwards, ignoring the shots that echoed around. Was it Simon or the other man who was firing the gun? Daniel guessed it would be the other man. Simon didn’t seem like the type to try and kill a man. Then again, he didn’t seem the type to carry a gun, and he’d done that. Another pullet passed him and shook him out of his thoughts. No time for that. Get to safety. Pass the evidence on to the men who wanted it.
After what seemed like an hour, Daniel made it to the pavement. Dashing across the road, he vanished into the shadows of the buildings on the other side. Whoever was chasing him would have a hard time finding him, it they bothered to try at all.
They didn’t. People had been woken by the shots, and as the man approached the road, a shrill woman’s voice yelled at him to stop making so much noise. The man stopped and paused to catch his breath. He wasn’t going to find whoever it was. Probably just some kid out for a wander who’d wondered what was going on. He shook his head and put the gun into the waistband of his trousers. It was nothing to worry about.
Three days later, Simon Demeal was arrested on the charge of corporate espionage. The story wasn’t particularly newsworthy and barely registered in the public’s eye, but as Daniel Jordan placed the case file into the cabinet along with all the other successful cases he’d taken on during the last year and a half, he couldn’t help but allow himself a brief smile. It may not have been a particularly flashy case, but it made a change from the rut he’d gotten himself into. And the bonus he’d gotten once the verdict of ‘guilty’ had been given was a pleasant surprise. As he closed the drawer of the filing cabinet, he made a mental note to call back and thank the company for their generosity. But it could wait until tomorrow. Rescue Me was on in half an hour.
Pineconn: Bear in mind I'm from the UK and we spell some words differently over here. Even so, I only found two typos, both of which are now fixed.

New thoughts?

[Pineconn]

--It was a depressing area in the best of times, but in these conditions it because a whole new nightmare.

--‘I want the other thousand.’
‘The man smiled. Daniel knew, just from that expression, that he didn’t have it on him.

(There shouldn't be a ‘ in front of the narration.)

--He also knew that someone was going to get shot, and that someone was probably going to be Simon.

(This isn't a typo, but I thought Simon was holding the gun. How would Simon get shot? Or are both men holding guns? Even so, it wasn't apparent.)

--Whoever was chasing him would have a hard time finding him, it they bothered to try at all.

...And that's all. No big deal. :)

[Prrkitty]

he's = he is

he'll = he will

"... but in these conditions it because a whole new nightmare."

could/should read "... but in these conditions it became a whole new nightmare."

[Darth Marsden]

Ack! Stupid me. I'll get it right one of these days. Ok, let's try that again:

It was a cold, dark and generally unpleasant Thursday evening. A light fall of rain and a chilling wind combined to prevent anyone from coming out. Why was the meeting taking place down by the seafront? It was a depressing area in the best of times, but in these conditions it became a whole new nightmare.
Daniel Jordan reached into his pocket and fished out a stick of gum. He carefully unwrapped it and placed the stick into his mouth. He’d been out here for an hour, and he was thoroughly fed up. If he didn’t show up...
As if to answer his question, a man stepped out of a nearby street and walked towards the pier. As he crossed the road, Daniel could just make out his suit under the heavy coat. This was his man. He stood up, making sure that he wasn’t seen, and followed him towards what had once been a place of happy memories for him.
The man walked down to the side of the pier and made his way towards the beach. It would be impossible to follow him down there, so he’d just have to take the high road. Daniel walked up to the entrance of the pier and carefully climbed over the locked gate. If anybody saw him, they made no indication of the fact.
Blessing the inspiration that had made him wear his trainers rather than his boots, Daniel quietly made his way along the pier, looking over the side to make sure he was keeping up with the man he’d been waiting for. Suddenly he disappeared. Daniel looked over and checked up and down, but he’d vanished. Then he heard voices beneath him and he realized that that man had simply walked underneath the pier. Handy meeting place, he thought to himself as he pressed himself down to the well-worn wood to hear what was going on beneath him.
‘Christ, it’s cold.’
‘What do you expect? It’s January.’
‘...yeah. I guess so.’
Daniel could tell that the man was scared. He should be. He was selling company secrets, a crime which, if Daniel could prove, would see the man locked away for a good while. Reaching into his coat pocket and pulling out a small Dictaphone, he placed it on the wood beside him and, timing it so that the sound of the waves covered up the slight click, started recording.
‘Did you bring them?’
‘...yeah. Yeah, they’re here.’
There was the sound of something being drawn from the man’s coat and passed over to the other, faceless figure who was awaiting them. Then a slight rustling, as if the second man was flicking through them, making sure they were what he wanted.
‘Good. Here.’
More sounds. Daniel had been doing this long enough to imagine the envelope full of money being passed over, the greedy hands snatching it and opening it, eager to feel the cash for themselves. A name, dammit. That was all he needed now.
‘There... there’s not enough here’ There was a slight panic set into the voice.
‘Yes. You inconvenienced us. Canceled a meeting we had taken great pains to arrange. There is still plenty there.’
‘But... we arranged for five thousand.’ The voice was more defiant now. He was being wronged, and he wasn’t standing for it. ‘There’s less then four here.’
‘Exactly four thousand.’ The other voice was calm, assured. He’d done this before, god knows how many times. ‘It was very inconvenient.’
‘Dammit all, that’s not fair! They switched my schedule at the last minute; there was nothing I could do!’ The panic had crept back in.
‘That is not our fault. We arranged a time and a place at our expense. Your changes cost us, and we have deducted you the appropriate amount. You are hardly in a position to argue.’
Something happened that Daniel couldn’t follow. He’d have to see what was going on. Carefully he moved to one of the thin slits between planks and looked down. Even in the darkness, he recognized the glint of a pistol. Which one of them was holding it, though?
‘Simon, don’t be like this.’
Simon. The name. That was all he needed. He could run away, get out, earn his reward. But something stopped him. It was Simon who was holding the gun. The same Simon, he had been assured by the company representative who had approached him the previous day, who was harmless. Who was probably only doing this to pay for his mother’s health care. Daniel looked further up - the other man had his arms out in front of him, gesturing to Simon that this was pointless.
‘I want the other thousand.’
The man smiled. Daniel knew, just from that expression, that he didn’t have it on him. He also knew that someone was going to get hurt, and that man would probably be Simon. The other man had the look of confidence on his face that almost guaranteed he would survive. He held his breath as he continued to watch.
‘I don’t have it.’
‘Then get it.’
‘Take what you have and leave. This is pointless.’
Simon fired a shot into the ground. It echoed around noisily. What the hell was he doing? This wasn’t going to get him anywhere.
‘I need it.’
‘That is a shame. But you will not get it this way. If you were prepared to perform another small task for us, however-’
Another shot, but this time into the air, or rather, the pier. The bullet passed through the wood and flew right past Daniel’s ear, and he involuntarily rolled away from it. As soon as he had done so, he cursed himself. They would have heard him, knew that someone was spying on them. Daniel grabbed the Dictaphone and ran like hell for the town proper, all attempts at stealth forgotten.
He leapt over the metal barrier at the side of the pier, landing on the shells that made up the upper half of the beach. Barely pausing for breath, he continued onwards, ignoring the shots that echoed around. Was it Simon or the other man who was firing the gun? Daniel guessed it would be the other man. Simon didn’t seem like the type to try and kill a man. Then again, he didn’t seem the type to carry a gun, and he’d done that. Another pullet passed him and shook him out of his thoughts. No time for that. Get to safety. Pass the evidence on to the men who wanted it.
After what seemed like an hour, Daniel made it to the pavement. Dashing across the road, he vanished into the shadows of the buildings on the other side. Whoever was chasing him would have a hard time finding him, if they bothered to try at all.
They didn’t. People had been woken by the shots, and as the man approached the road, a shrill woman’s voice yelled at him to stop making so much noise. The man stopped and paused to catch his breath. He wasn’t going to find whoever it was. Probably just some kid out for a wander who’d wondered what was going on. He shook his head and put the gun into the waistband of his trousers. It was nothing to worry about.
Three days later, Simon Demeal was arrested on the charge of corporate espionage. The story wasn’t particularly newsworthy and barely registered in the public’s eye, but as Daniel Jordan placed the case file into the cabinet along with all the other successful cases he’d taken on during the last year and a half, he couldn’t help but allow himself a brief smile. It may not have been a particularly flashy case, but it made a change from the rut he’d gotten himself into. And the bonus he’d gotten once the verdict of ‘guilty’ had been given was a pleasant surprise. As he closed the drawer of the filing cabinet, he made a mental note to call back and thank the company for their generosity. But it could wait until tomorrow. Rescue Me was on in half an hour.
There. Fault THAT.

[Prrkitty]

:) couldn't find one Darthy... fault that is. So there!! *sticking my tongue out atcha*

By the way... very nice start to the story. I would honestly like to keep reading it as you add to it. Please and thank you :)

[Pineconn]

--It was a cold, dark and generally unpleasant...

(Nowadays, there is a comma before the "and" when you use a list of 3 or more. However, it is still acceptable to exclude it. So I wouldn't change it if you would have to break a habit.)

--Reaching into his coat pocket and pulling out a small Dictaphone, he placed it on the wood beside him and, timing it so that the sound of the waves covered up the slight click, started recording.

(You kind of change tenses here. It's slightly nonparallel. I suggest that you change "covered" to "would cover". But it's not technically incorrect.)

--Another pullet passed him and shook him out of his thoughts.

(Another what, now?)

So only one more definitive error. Maybe I should stop this. My English teacher always told us that we would never make friends correcting people's grammar. :D

But I really do like your intro. I also like your style; it's sort of stream-of-consciousness.

[Darth Marsden]

Cries

It was a cold, dark and generally unpleasant Thursday evening. A light fall of rain and a chilling wind combined to prevent anyone from coming out. Why was the meeting taking place down by the seafront? It was a depressing area in the best of times, but in these conditions it became a whole new nightmare.
Daniel Jordan reached into his pocket and fished out a stick of gum. He carefully unwrapped it and placed the stick into his mouth. He’d been out here for an hour, and he was thoroughly fed up. If he didn’t show up...
As if to answer his question, a man stepped out of a nearby street and walked towards the pier. As he crossed the road, Daniel could just make out his suit under the heavy coat. This was his man. He stood up, making sure that he wasn’t seen, and followed him towards what had once been a place of happy memories for him.
The man walked down to the side of the pier and made his way towards the beach. It would be impossible to follow him down there, so he’d just have to take the high road. Daniel walked up to the entrance of the pier and carefully climbed over the locked gate. If anybody saw him, they made no indication of the fact.
Blessing the inspiration that had made him wear his trainers rather than his boots, Daniel quietly made his way along the pier, looking over the side to make sure he was keeping up with the man he’d been waiting for. Suddenly he disappeared. Daniel looked over and checked up and down, but he’d vanished. Then he heard voices beneath him and he realized that that man had simply walked underneath the pier. Handy meeting place, he thought to himself as he pressed himself down to the well-worn wood to hear what was going on beneath him.
‘Christ, it’s cold.’
‘What do you expect? It’s January.’
‘...yeah. I guess so.’
Daniel could tell that the man was scared. He should be. He was selling company secrets, a crime which, if Daniel could prove, would see the man locked away for a good while. Reaching into his coat pocket and pulling out a small Dictaphone, he placed it on the wood beside him and, timing it so that the sound of the waves would cover up the slight click, pressed the record button.
‘Did you bring them?’
‘...yeah. Yeah, they’re here.’
There was the sound of something being drawn from the man’s coat and passed over to the other, faceless figure who was awaiting them. Then a slight rustling, as if the second man was flicking through them, making sure they were what he wanted.
‘Good. Here.’
More sounds. Daniel had been doing this long enough to imagine the envelope full of money being passed over, the greedy hands snatching it and opening it, eager to feel the cash for themselves. A name, dammit. That was all he needed now.
‘There... there’s not enough here’ There was a slight panic set into the voice.
‘Yes. You inconvenienced us. Canceled a meeting we had taken great pains to arrange. There is still plenty there.’
‘But... we arranged for five thousand.’ The voice was more defiant now. He was being wronged, and he wasn’t standing for it. ‘There’s less then four here.’
‘Exactly four thousand.’ The other voice was calm, assured. He’d done this before, god knows how many times. ‘It was very inconvenient.’
‘Dammit all, that’s not fair! They switched my schedule at the last minute; there was nothing I could do!’ The panic had crept back in.
‘That is not our fault. We arranged a time and a place at our expense. Your changes cost us, and we have deducted you the appropriate amount. You are hardly in a position to argue.’
Something happened that Daniel couldn’t follow. He’d have to see what was going on. Carefully he moved to one of the thin slits between planks and looked down. Even in the darkness, he recognized the glint of a pistol. Which one of them was holding it, though?
‘Simon, don’t be like this.’
Simon. The name. That was all he needed. He could run away, get out, earn his reward. But something stopped him. It was Simon who was holding the gun. The same Simon, he had been assured by the company representative who had approached him the previous day, who was harmless. Who was probably only doing this to pay for his mother’s health care. Daniel looked further up - the other man had his arms out in front of him, gesturing to Simon that this was pointless.
‘I want the other thousand.’
The man smiled. Daniel knew, just from that expression, that he didn’t have it on him. He also knew that someone was going to get hurt, and that man would probably be Simon. The other man had the look of confidence on his face that almost guaranteed he would survive. He held his breath as he continued to watch.
‘I don’t have it.’
‘Then get it.’
‘Take what you have and leave. This is pointless.’
Simon fired a shot into the ground. It echoed around noisily. What the hell was he doing? This wasn’t going to get him anywhere.
‘I need it.’
‘That is a shame. But you will not get it this way. If you were prepared to perform another small task for us, however-’
Another shot, but this time into the air, or rather, the pier. The bullet passed through the wood and flew right past Daniel’s ear, and he involuntarily rolled away from it. As soon as he had done so, he cursed himself. They would have heard him, knew that someone was spying on them. Daniel grabbed the Dictaphone and ran like hell for the town proper, all attempts at stealth forgotten.
He leapt over the metal barrier at the side of the pier, landing on the shells that made up the upper half of the beach. Barely pausing for breath, he continued onwards, ignoring the shots that echoed around. Was it Simon or the other man who was firing the gun? Daniel guessed it would be the other man. Simon didn’t seem like the type to try and kill a man. Then again, he didn’t seem the type to carry a gun, and he’d done that. Another bullet passed him and shook him out of his thoughts. No time for that. Get to safety. Pass the evidence on to the men who wanted it.
After what seemed like an hour, Daniel made it to the pavement. Dashing across the road, he vanished into the shadows of the buildings on the other side. Whoever was chasing him would have a hard time finding him, if they bothered to try at all.
They didn’t. People had been woken by the shots, and as the man approached the road, a shrill woman’s voice yelled at him to stop making so much noise. The man stopped and paused to catch his breath. He wasn’t going to find whoever it was. Probably just some kid out for a wander who’d wondered what was going on. He shook his head and put the gun he'd snatched from Simon into the waistband of his trousers. It was nothing to worry about.
Three days later, Simon Demeal was arrested on the charge of corporate espionage. The story wasn’t particularly newsworthy and barely registered in the public’s eye, but as Daniel Jordan placed the case file into the cabinet along with all the other successful cases he’d taken on during the last year and a half, he couldn’t help but allow himself a brief smile. It may not have been a particularly flashy case, but it made a change from the rut he’d gotten himself into. And the bonus he’d gotten once the verdict of ‘guilty’ had been given was a pleasant surprise. As he closed the drawer of the filing cabinet, he made a mental note to call back and thank the company for their generosity. But it could wait until tomorrow. Rescue Me was on in half an hour.
Actually, I have asked you to point out my mistakes, so you're not losing a friend at all. It's better to have them pointed out now rather than later, so thanks for spotting them all.

I like to think of you guys as my test group, and you've all done a great job. Thanks a million, all of you. Now if we're all done with this chapter, I think it's time for the next one...

[Prrkitty]

Ya know... I read "pullet" as "bullet". It's funny how our brain will read what it's supposed to be as opposed to what it truly is. :)

[Pineconn]

Okay, looking good. After another round of proofreading, the chapter appears to be errorless.

Pullet, bullet... Spell check won't help 100% of the time. ;) I never even knew that "pullet" was a word.

[Darth Marsden]

Yay!

Next chapter... when it's done. ;)

[Dragon Omega]

I usually don't read this type of story, but I thing that you're doing a pretty good job with it regardless. :mischief:

[Prrkitty]

If I remember right ... pullet = chicken and/or another name for chicken.

[Pineconn]

pul&#183;let (pŏl’it), n. a hen less than one year old.

Well there ya go. :) I can't wait until that pullet grows up so that I can eat it.

[Darth Marsden]

Ok, Chapter Two is taking longer then I thought to finish - it's pretty dialog heavy - so to tide you over until I can complete it, here's a small section from a later scene.


Daniel moved over to the window, and sure enough, blurs of red were clearly visible in the distance. He was staring at them, trying to figure out if they really were what people were saying they were when one of the dots started moving towards him. As it drew closer, Daniel realized it was actually targeting him, and leapt to the right just before it crashed through the window.
Landing slightly awkwardly, Daniel turned round to see just what had crashed into his apartment. The creature was spinning round in the air, aiming for him again. Blinking, Daniel quickly examined the red monster. It looked almost like a human, except for the horns and the giant wings that stretched from its back. For a second, its eyes locked with Daniels, then the demon let out a guttural roar and charged for him again.
On reflex, Daniel kicked out with his foot. Thankfully, he hadn't taken his shoes off when he'd come home, and the heavy boot somehow managed to collide with the demon's jaw. It let out another, more painful roar, clutching its jaw as it flew backwards into the light hanging from the ceiling.
Taking advantage of the few seconds he'd gained, Daniel got up and ran over to the cabinet a few feet away. Reaching on top of it, he grabbed the shotgun he kept up there and aimed it at the demon. Almost as soon as he did, the creature charged at him again, and Daniel pulled the trigger.
The demon flew back into the opposite wall as shotgun pellets slammed into his chest. Sliding down onto the floor, it groaned in agony as Daniel stepped over it and pointed the shotgun at its nether regions.
'Now... are you going to talk' he said, gesturing with the shotgun, 'or am we going to say goodbye to the mini demon?'
The demon looked up on him, the fire in his eyes dying a little. 'Fine' it spat out. 'Whaddya wanna know?'

[Darth Marsden]

Sorry for the double-post. I was hoping someone would respond to my awesome preview of Chapter 7 (I'm estimating that that's where it'll go), but no such luck, sadly. :(

Anyway. I would really appreciate people's comments about Chapter 2, which I have now finished and is posted below. Everyone (Lilith excepted) was incredibly helpful with the previous chapter, and I'd be much obliged if they now turned their critical eye(s) to this latest installment. There's a few things I'm not too sure about with this one, but I'll leave it up to my 'Beta Testers' to point out what could be improved. ;)

A coupe of you have been waiting for this, so here we go. Enjoy!

Daniel Jordan - Between Angels and Devils

Chapter 2 - Back in Action

The next fortnight was unusually quiet for Daniel. In all, he’d only taken on two cases, both of which had been his normal fare of ‘my partner is cheating on me and I want you to obtain proof so I can divorce them without giving them any money’. In all honesty, Daniel had been glad of the quiet life. The previous few months had been much busier, and several times he’d only survived intact by the skin of his teeth. Private Investigating was a dangerous business, and he was glad of any breaks that he could get.
He’d spent the downtime doing some essential housekeeping. He’d tidied up the small 4-roomed apartment which he’d lived in since leaving home some 3 years ago, and had re-organized his case files, currently sitting in an ugly filing cabinet in what he called the study. His bedroom had needed some serious cleaning, and he’d vacuumed the front room. The kitchen, he’d decided, didn’t need anything done at all. For the past 6 months he’d lived on take-out food and microwavable dinners, though his hectic lifestyle had helped to stop the weight from building up.
Once he’d finished tidying (which, given that he’d been interrupted twice, had taken several days), he took it easy. Catching up on his favorite TV shows, playing with his new Wii console, reading the few books he’d picked up that he hadn’t gotten round to yet... it had been a fairly relaxing time.
Perhaps it was a good thing that it had suddenly been ended. The knock at the door had only interrupted the Bond book Daniel had been reading, and the woman who had barged in as soon as the door had opened slightly hadn’t even given him the chance to say anything before making herself at home and sitting in his recently vacated chair. He sighed and ran his hand through his hair as he closed the door and addressed her.
‘Can I help you?’
The woman turned to him, the look on her face exclaiming the obviousness of the question. There was obviously little point in treating her as unintelligent.
‘Yes. I need you to find someone.’
The hand went through the hair again, this time pausing to rub the back of his neck. ‘Who?’ he asked, his mind slowly creaking back to life after the time off.
‘My brother’ came the response, along with another look of superiority. ‘Shouldn’t you be writing this down?’
‘I’ll remember it. When did you last see him?’
She shook the hair out of her face as she spoke. ‘Years ago. Our parents divorced, and he went with our father.’
Daniel sighed. It was going to be an irritating case. ‘What was his name?’
‘Michael. Michael Hargraves.’
Wandering over to the nearby table, Daniel grabbed his notepad and withdrew the pen jammed into the rings at the top. Skimming to the first clean page, he asked the woman to spell the surname, and he wrote it down as she did so. Asking for her name, she put her well manicured hand into her coat and pulled out a calling card, which she gave to him. Reading it, the name Sophie Richards leapt out in horrendous gold leaf on top of a somewhat hypnotizing pattern of leopard-print. The cards must have cost a small fortune to have printed. He took another quick look at her.
Shoulder-length brown hair half hung over her face, almost concealing her heavily made-up face. Her dull blue eyes looked bored, and the clothes she wore, all expensive, top-of-the-line labels, conveyed that this was a woman who was used to getting what she wanted. Having handed her card to Daniel, she was now looking at her nails, waiting for him to respond. He did so.
‘What was your father’s name?’
She stiffened slightly. ‘John, James... something like that.’
‘Why do you and your brother have different surnames?’
‘I took my mothers, he took his fathers.’
So, he was looking for a Michael Hargraves, or, failing that, a John or James Hargraves. That was something, at least. He probed further.
‘Anything else you can tell me? Where he was last seen, any other family members, that sort of thing?’
She looked up at him. ‘No, nothing. That’s what’s made this so frustrating.’
Yeah, I’ll bet, thought Daniel as he put the pad of paper onto the table. Of all the people to shake him out of his holiday, he had to have a spoilt rich kid who didn’t understand that she couldn’t always get everything she wanted at the click of her fingers. He was tempted to not even bother - just call her sometime next week, saying that he’d found nothing.
Almost as soon as the thought crossed his mind, he inwardly cursed himself. Why would he do that? People like this pay the bills. He looked over at Sophie, who was once again checking her nails. He may not like it, but few people ever really liked their jobs. He was luck to enjoy it most of the time. He walked over to the door and opened it.
‘Ok. Well I’ll look into this and get back to you if anything turns up. If you think of anything else...’
He picked up one of his own business cards from the small table beside the door and handed it to her as she approached him. Unlike the lurid slight of hers, his cards were plain white with black text on. His sister, having achieved her childhood dream of being a graphic designer, had designed them for him when he’d announced to the family that he was becoming a Private Investigator. Thinking about this, Daniel realized it’d been some time since he’d last spoken to his sister. He decided to give her a call once he’d had a preliminary check into Mr. Hargraves.
Sophie looked at the card and then glanced back up at Daniel, the disapproval written all over her face. ‘Yes. Well, I hope to hear from you. Soon, if possible.’
In the back of his mind, Daniel saw her fingers snapping. He shoved the image away. ‘Well, I can’t promise anything, but I’ve nothing else on at the moment, so this’ll have my full attention.’
‘Glad to hear it. ‘
She walked out the door and Daniel closed it behind her. She had been relatively polite to him, and yet he couldn’t wait to have been rid of the woman. He hadn’t even talked about his going rates with her. As if she cared, he told himself. She probably had more money then sense anyway.
Walking into the kitchen, he reflected on the afternoon before checking his watch. Nothing was on TV tonight, so he’d have a quick look on the internet for his Mr. Hargraves, and if nothing came up he’d give his sister a call. It’d be good to talk to her, he reflected. She had a bubbly side to her that was infectious, and he’d become too routine lately. A good pick-me-up lecture would probably do him some good. He grabbed a can of Coke from the fridge and then headed back into the study.
An hour and a half later, Daniel gave up. His usual web-haunts had failed him, and he’d already e-mailed his two other contacts that might be able to help him. Plenty of Michael Hargraves lived in UK, but none of them could possibly be the ones he was after. One was a DJ in Liverpool, another was a Barrister up in London and a third, he was surprised to find, worked in the same company as his sister.
He reached for the phone to give her the promised call when he saw his watch. Nearly 6:00. He decided to hold off from calling her until he’d caught the Six o’clock news. Walking into the front room, he grabbed the remote from the sofa and promptly collapsed into it the way his parents had never let him when he was younger. Thinking of this, a slight smile spread across his face as he aimed the remote at the TV and turned it on to BBC1.
10 minutes later, Daniel got up and went back to the phone. Much to his irritation, the biggest story that evening had been that of a new best-selling novel. Watching the story, Daniel realized that he recognized the author of ‘For God’s Sake!’. Paul M. Stepson had used to run a burger bar just outside where he’d gone to school. Flipping buns to flipping off Catholics by claiming God didn’t exist... Daniel shook the sheer lunacy of it out of his head as he picked up the handset and dialed his sister’s number.
‘...hello?’
‘Hey Natalie.’
‘Daniel! Ah, it’s been ages! How are you?’
A smile spread across Daniel’s face. He could picture her as she was talking. It may have been a while since they’d last seen each other, but he could clearly remember her. ‘Ah, I’m alright. Just looking at the cards you did for me and got all nostalgic.’
‘See? I told you they’d come in handy!’
He pictured her smiling. ‘That you did. So how are you?’
A faint thump came from the background. His mental image of her had suddenly sat down in a chair. ‘I’m good, actually. Got some big project that I‘m not allowed to talk about.’
‘When are you ever?’
‘I know, I know... one of these days I’ll get something I can share with you, honest!’
Daniel laughed. He loved his sister, but not that much. ‘No rush, please.’
Now it was her turn to laugh. ‘Why, if I didn’t know better, I’d think you were discouraging me!’
‘Then I guess it’s a good thing you do know me, isn’t it?’
Another laugh. ‘Yeah... Hey, listen. I don’t suppose you’d mind doing me a favor?’
Without hesitation, Daniel replied ‘I don mind, thank you very much.’ His last favor for her had ended up with him plunging into the swimming pool belonging to one of her friends, along with a cold that seemed to last for a month.
‘I promise, it’s nothing as bad as last time.’
‘That’s exactly what you said LAST time!’
She laughed again. ‘Oh, come on! Please? Pretty please?’
Daniel couldn’t help but give in. He’d do anything for her, and she knew it. ‘...tell me what it is, and I’ll think about it.’
‘Yay!’ she squealed, knowing she’d won. ‘Thanks bro. I’ll make it up to you, promise.’
‘What is it?’
‘Ok. So, recently I’ve been getting all nostalgic lately, right? And I decided to get back in touch with one of my old friends, ‘cause we used to be BFF’s or whatever. With me so far?’
Daniel nodded as he confirmed that he was.
‘Ok, so I gave her a buzz over MSN, and she came back saying it’d been ages since we’d last seen each other, blah blah blah. So we agreed to meet and just, y’know, hang out.’
Picturing the scene, Daniel smiled. He’d had a best friend back in school, but, of course, they’d grown apart. Ian was in insurance these days, he believed.
‘So we were gonna meet yesterday at that place we always meet up. Remember the one?’
‘What, the AGN? Yeah, good times’
Another laugh. ‘Yeah, that’s the one. Anyway, she never showed up, and I can’t get her back on MSN or anything. Just wondered if you’d mind tracking her down for me, since that’s what you’re so good at these days.’
Daniel moved over to the computer and moved the mouse. The screen-saver turned itself off and revealed the results of his last search. ‘Ok, I’ll give it a go. What’s the name?’
‘Dana Lucile.’
Sitting down, Daniel passed the phone over to his left hand as the right went for the mouse. He clicked the cursor into the search bar and the hand moved over the keyboard. ‘Ok, D-A-N-A...’ he spoke as he typed.
‘L-U-C-I-L-E.’ he sister told him as he continued. Hitting enter, he waited for the results of the search. One struck him in particular - a blog. He clicked the link and the screen turned almost completely black, except for the text, which was a hard-to-read shade of purple, and a picture of, presumably, Dana.
‘Black hair, brown eyes, looks kinda like a Goth?’ he asked.
‘I dunno, I never saw her, remember?’ came the reply.
‘She never sent you a photo or anything?’ He highlighted the text to make it legible and started reading it as he spoke.
‘Oh yeah, she did. Hang on.’ Another dull thud as, Daniel imagined, his sister put the phone onto the table. He continued reading the blog and found the text somewhat disturbing. After a minute or two, he heard the phone being picked back up.
‘Yeah, that’s her.’
‘Well, I’ve found her blog, and it’s... well, it’s an interesting read, I’ll say that much.’
A note of worry set into the voice. ‘What’s it say?’
‘Uh, hang on, lemme read some to you.’ He scanned the page, trying to find something that would convey Dana’s thoughts. He found a section and read it out.
‘Ok, here we go. ‘Last night I found the ritual. Soon I will summon him, and he and I will be together forever. I’ve waited so long for this; I can’t believe I finally found it! Can’t wait to try it out.’ Sounds pretty weird, huh?’
His sister paused for a minute. ‘Is there an address?’
Daniel scanned through the text. ‘There’s an e-mail address if that what you meant, but nothing else. Sorry.’
‘What’s the e-mail?’
Daniel gave it to her. Once he’d done so, he continued to scan the text.
‘Ok, I’ve got it. I’ll give her a buzz. Thanks Dan, I owe you big for this.’
‘Hmm? Oh yeah, sure.’
Concern filtered though the phone. ‘You Ok?’
‘Yeah, just reading more of this. There’s some pretty serious stuff here, Nat.’
‘What’s the URL?’
Daniel was about to give it to her when, as he scrolled down further, he saw several very inappropriate images. ‘...actually, I don’t want you reading this.’
‘Why? Does she slag me off of something?’
‘No, there’s just... Ok, there’s images of demons doing really nasty things to women, and to be honest, I like your state of mind right where it is.’
Natalie laughed. ‘It can’t be that bad!’
‘Yeah, it can. There’s one with like three demons, one woman and so much blood I’m not gonna sleep for a week.’ Much as he wished he was, Daniel wasn’t exaggerating. The images were seriously disturbing.
‘Really? Oh, now I gotta see them.’
‘NO.’ Daniel almost yelled the phrase into the phone. There was a pause as Natalie thought of what to say. After almost a minute, she started talking about something completely different, all bad blood between them suddenly brushed aside. Daniel smiled again. She had a habit of doing that, but it was an endearing one.
The two talked for almost half an hour before Natalie closed off the conversation. Wishing her a good night, Daniel hung up and placed the phone back into its station. As he did so, his gaze turned back to the image displayed on his screen. It really was horrific.
He moved to close the window, before pausing. What if there was an address somewhere here? He closed his mind to the disturbing imagery and scrolled further down. All of a sudden, there it was. Right at the bottom of the page, in the second entry. A road. Pentaview Lane. That was enough. He reached for the phone again and got in touch with another old friend.

If someone could please post and stop this thread from going under, I'd appreciate it...

[Pineconn]

Sorry for not posting for so many days. Revisions in underlined text:

--Reading it, the name Sophie Richards leapt out in horrendous gold leaf on top of a somewhat hypnotizing pattern of leopard-print.

Not a typo, just wondered what that means, exactly. :tongue:

--‘I took my mother's, he took his father's.’

Apostrophes.

--He was lucky to enjoy it most of the time.

Mm, I love the cereal Luck Charms. :D

--‘Glad to hear it.’

You had the wrong end apostrophe. No biggie.

--She probably had more money than sense anyway.

Such a common mistake, the mixing up of then and than.

--His usual web-haunts had failed him

Should that be haunts or hunts? Looking in the dictionary, haunt can be defined as to recur persistently to the consciousness of; to visit frequently. So which ever you implied you should put.

--‘I don’t mind, thank you very much.’

Yeah, you left that out. :)

--His last favor for her had ended up with his plunging into the swimming pool...

Another common mistake. Plunging is not actually a verb in this sentence, but instead a gerund (or possibly a participle, but that doesn't matter). So therefore you should use the possessive case of the pronoun, his. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, you should look it up - knowing about it will make you seem even smarter. ;)

--‘What, the AGN? Yeah, good times.’

Niiice. Oh yeah, and you need that period at the end.

--‘L-U-C-I-L-E.’ his sister told him as he continued.

His, not he.

~

That should be it, but I'll proofread it again when you revise it. I like this chapter better than the last, it finally shows the main character's... character. So he has a Wii, huh? :p

[Prrkitty]

He was right with his usage of the word web-haunts. :)

[Darth Marsden]

Yeah, he has a Wii. Lucky bastard. So other than the typos, you think it reads Ok? I still have concerns about one or two sections.

I'm not that great with descriptions of people - if you read carefully, it's two chapters in and I still haven't described the main character properly. In the re-edited version below I've dropped in some mentions of his hair, which he bleaches blonde (that's something I do too :D ), but I haven't found anywhere to describe anything else about him. Turquoise eyes, medium build, dresses in t-shirt and jeans, that sort of thing. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Also, that bit about the book, 'Oh My God!', is a bit of an infodump, but I need it in some form as it's important to the plot. I've looked at trying to make it seem less forced, but it's a challenge. Again, thoughts and ideas on this would be great.

Anyway. Here we go again, this time with all your errors hopefully fixed.


Chapter 2 - Back in Action

The next fortnight was unusually quiet for Daniel. In all, he’d only taken on two cases, both of which had been his normal fare of ‘my partner is cheating on me and I want you to obtain proof so I can divorce them without giving them any money’. In all honesty, Daniel had been glad of the quiet life. The previous few months had been much busier, and several times he’d only survived intact by the skin of his teeth. Private Investigating was a dangerous business, and he was glad of any breaks that he could get.
He’d spent the downtime doing some essential housekeeping. He’d tidied up the small 4-roomed apartment which he’d lived in since leaving home some 3 years ago, and had re-organized his case files, currently sitting in an ugly filing cabinet in what he called the study. His bedroom had needed some serious cleaning, and he’d vacuumed the front room. The kitchen, he’d decided, didn’t need anything done at all. For the past 6 months he’d lived on take-out food and microwavable dinners, though his hectic lifestyle had helped to stop the weight from building up.
Once he’d finished tidying (which, given that he’d been interrupted twice, had taken several days), he took it easy. Catching up on his favorite TV shows, playing with his new Wii console, reading the few books he’d picked up that he hadn’t gotten round to yet... it had been a fairly relaxing time.
Perhaps it was a good thing that it had suddenly been ended. The knock at the door had only interrupted the Bond book Daniel had been reading, and the woman who had barged in as soon as the door had opened slightly hadn’t even given him the chance to say anything before making herself at home and sitting in his recently vacated chair. He sighed and ran his hand through his short blonde hair as he closed the door and addressed her.
‘Can I help you?’
The woman turned to him, the look on her face exclaiming the obviousness of the question. There was obviously little point in treating her as unintelligent.
‘Yes. I need you to find someone.’
The hand went through the bleached hair again, this time pausing to rub the back of his neck. ‘Who?’ he asked, his mind slowly creaking back to life after the time off.
‘My brother’ came the response, along with another look of superiority. ‘Shouldn’t you be writing this down?’
‘I’ll remember it. When did you last see him?’
She shook the hair out of her face as she spoke. ‘Years ago. Our parents divorced, and he went with our father.’
Daniel sighed. It was going to be an irritating case. ‘What was his name?’
‘Michael. Michael Hargraves.’
Wandering over to the nearby table, Daniel grabbed his notepad and withdrew the pen jammed into the rings at the top. Skimming to the first clean page, he asked the woman to spell the surname, and he wrote it down as she did so. Asking for her name, she put her well manicured hand into her coat and pulled out a calling card, which she gave to him. Reading it, the name Sophie Richards leapt out in horrendous gold text on top of a somewhat hypnotizing pattern of leopard-print. The cards must have cost a small fortune to have printed. He took another quick look at her.
Shoulder-length brown hair half hung over her face, almost concealing her heavily made-up face. Her dull blue eyes looked bored, and the clothes she wore, all expensive, top-of-the-line labels, conveyed that this was a woman who was used to getting what she wanted. Having handed her card to Daniel, she was now looking at her nails, waiting for him to respond. He did so.
‘What was your father’s name?’
She stiffened slightly, as if the memories were painful. ‘John, James... something like that.’
‘Why do you and your brother have different surnames?’
‘I took my mother's, he took his father's.’
So, he was looking for a Michael Hargraves, or, failing that, a John or James Hargraves. That was something, at least. He probed further.
‘Anything else you can tell me? Where he was last seen, any other family members, that sort of thing?’
She looked up at him. ‘No, nothing. That’s what’s made this so frustrating.’
Yeah, I’ll bet, thought Daniel as he put the pad of paper onto the table. Of all the people to shake him out of his holiday, he had to have a spoilt rich kid who didn’t understand that she couldn’t always get everything she wanted at the click of her fingers. He was tempted to not even bother - just call her sometime next week, saying that he’d found nothing.
Almost as soon as the thought crossed his mind, he inwardly cursed himself. Why would he do that? People like this pay the bills. He looked over at Sophie, who was once again checking her nails. He may not like it, but few people ever really liked their jobs. He was lucky to enjoy it most of the time. He walked over to the door and opened it.
‘Ok. Well I’ll look into this and get back to you if anything turns up. If you think of anything else...’
He picked up one of his own business cards from the small table beside the door and handed it to her as she approached him. Unlike the lurid slight of hers, his cards were plain white with black text on. His sister, having achieved her childhood dream of being a graphic designer, had designed them for him when he’d announced to the family that he was becoming a Private Investigator. Thinking about this, Daniel realized it’d been some time since he’d last spoken to his sister. He decided to give her a call once he’d had a preliminary check into Mr. Hargraves.
Sophie looked at the card and then glanced back up at Daniel, the disapproval written all over her face. ‘Yes. Well, I hope to hear from you. Soon, if possible.’
In the back of his mind, Daniel saw her fingers snapping. He shoved the image away. ‘Well, I can’t promise anything, but I’ve nothing else on at the moment, so this’ll have my full attention.’
‘Glad to hear it.’
She walked out the door and Daniel closed it behind her. She had been relatively polite to him, and yet he couldn’t wait to have been rid of the woman. He hadn’t even talked about his going rates with her. As if she cared, he told himself. She probably had more money than sense anyway.
Walking into the kitchen, he reflected on the afternoon before checking his watch. Nothing was on TV tonight, so he’d have a quick look on the internet for his Mr. Hargraves, and if nothing came up he’d give his sister a call. It’d be good to talk to her, he reflected. She had a bubbly side to her that was infectious, and he’d become too routine lately. A good pick-me-up lecture would probably do him some good. He grabbed a can of Coke from the fridge and then headed back into the study.
An hour and a half later, Daniel gave up. His usual web-haunts had failed him, and he’d already e-mailed his two other contacts that might be able to help him. Plenty of Michael Hargraves lived in UK, but none of them could possibly be the ones he was after. One was a DJ in Liverpool, another was a Barrister up in London and a third, he was surprised to find, worked in the same company as his sister.
He reached for the phone to give her the promised call when he saw his watch. Nearly 6:00. He decided to hold off from calling her until he’d caught the Six o’clock news. Walking into the front room, he grabbed the remote from the sofa and promptly collapsed into it the way his parents had never let him when he was younger. Thinking of this, a slight smile spread across his face as he aimed the remote at the TV and turned it on to BBC1.
10 minutes later, Daniel got up and went back to the phone. Much to his irritation, the biggest story that evening had been that of a new best-selling novel. Watching the story, Daniel realized that he recognized the author of ‘For God’s Sake!’. Paul M. Stepson had used to run a burger bar just outside where he’d gone to school. Flipping buns to flipping off Catholics by claiming God didn’t exist... Daniel shook the sheer lunacy of it out of his head as he picked up the handset and dialed his sister’s number.
‘...hello?’
‘Hey Natalie.’
‘Daniel! Ah, it’s been ages! How are you?’
A smile spread across Daniel’s face. He could picture her as she was talking. It may have been a while since they’d last seen each other, but he could clearly remember her. ‘Ah, I’m alright. Just looking at the cards you did for me and got all nostalgic.’
‘See? I told you they’d come in handy!’
He pictured her smiling. ‘That you did. So how are you?’
A faint thump came from the background. His mental image of her had suddenly sat down in a chair. ‘I’m good, actually. Got some big project that I‘m not allowed to talk about.’
‘When are you ever?’
‘I know, I know... one of these days I’ll get something I can share with you, honest!’
Daniel laughed. He loved his sister, but not that much. ‘No rush, please.’
Now it was her turn to laugh. ‘Why, if I didn’t know better, I’d think you were discouraging me!’
‘Then I guess it’s a good thing you do know me, isn’t it?’
Another laugh. ‘Yeah... Hey, listen. I don’t suppose you’d mind doing me a favor?’
Without hesitation, Daniel replied ‘I do mind, thank you very much.’ His last favor for her had ended up with his plunging into the swimming pool belonging to one of her friends, along with a cold that seemed to last for a month.
‘I promise, it’s nothing as bad as last time.’
‘That’s exactly what you said LAST time!’
She laughed again. ‘Oh, come on! Please? Pretty please?’
Daniel couldn’t help but give in. He’d do anything for her, and she knew it. ‘...tell me what it is, and I’ll think about it.’
‘Yay!’ she squealed, knowing she’d won. ‘Thanks bro. I’ll make it up to you, promise.’
‘What is it?’
‘Ok. So, recently I’ve been getting all nostalgic lately, right? And I decided to get back in touch with one of my old friends, ‘cause we used to be BFF’s or whatever. With me so far?’
Daniel nodded as he confirmed that he was.
‘Ok, so I gave her a buzz over MSN, and she came back saying it’d been ages since we’d last seen each other, blah blah blah. So we agreed to meet and just, y’know, hang out.’
Picturing the scene, Daniel smiled. He’d had a best friend back in school, but, of course, they’d grown apart. Ian was in insurance these days, he believed.
‘So we were gonna meet yesterday at that place we always meet up. Remember the one?’
‘What, the AGN? Yeah, good times.’
Another laugh. ‘Yeah, that’s the one. Anyway, she never showed up, and I can’t get her back on MSN or anything. Just wondered if you’d mind tracking her down for me, since that’s what you’re so good at these days.’
Daniel moved over to the computer and moved the mouse. The screen-saver turned itself off and revealed the results of his last search. ‘Ok, I’ll give it a go. What’s the name?’
‘Dana Lucile.’
Sitting down, Daniel passed the phone over to his left hand as the right went for the mouse. He clicked the cursor into the search bar and the hand moved over the keyboard. ‘Ok, D-A-N-A...’ he spoke as he typed.
‘L-U-C-I-L-E.’ his sister told him as he continued. Hitting enter, he waited for the results of the search. One struck him in particular - a blog. He clicked the link and the screen turned almost completely black, except for the text, which was a hard-to-read shade of purple, and a picture of, presumably, Dana.
‘Black hair, brown eyes, looks kinda like a Goth?’ he asked.
‘I dunno, I never saw her, remember?’ came the reply.
‘She never sent you a photo or anything?’ He highlighted the text to make it legible and started reading it as he spoke.
‘Oh yeah, she did. Hang on.’ Another dull thud as, Daniel imagined, his sister put the phone onto the table. He continued reading the blog and found the text somewhat disturbing. After a minute or two, he heard the phone being picked back up.
‘Yeah, that’s her.’
‘Well, I’ve found her blog, and it’s... well, it’s an interesting read, I’ll say that much.’
A note of worry set into the voice. ‘What’s it say?’
‘Uh, hang on, lemme read some to you.’ He scanned the page, trying to find something that would convey Dana’s thoughts. He found a section and read it out.
‘Ok, here we go. ‘Last night I found the ritual. Soon I will summon him, and he and I will be together forever. I’ve waited so long for this; I can’t believe I finally found it! Can’t wait to try it out.’ Sounds pretty weird, huh?’
His sister paused for a minute. ‘Is there an address?’
Daniel scanned through the text. ‘There’s an e-mail address if that what you meant, but nothing else. Sorry.’
‘What’s the e-mail?’
Daniel gave it to her. Once he’d done so, he continued to scan the text.
‘Ok, I’ve got it. I’ll give her a buzz. Thanks Dan, I owe you big for this.’
‘Hmm? Oh yeah, sure.’
Concern filtered though the phone. ‘You Ok?’
‘Yeah, just reading more of this. There’s some pretty serious stuff here, Nat.’
‘What’s the URL?’
Daniel was about to give it to her when, as he scrolled down further, he saw several very inappropriate images. ‘...actually, I don’t want you reading this.’
‘Why? Does she slag me off of something?’
‘No, there’s just... Ok, there’s images of demons doing really nasty things to women, and to be honest, I like your state of mind right where it is.’
Natalie laughed. ‘It can’t be that bad!’
‘Yeah, it can. There’s one with like three demons, one woman and so much blood I’m not gonna sleep for a week.’ Much as he wished he was, Daniel wasn’t exaggerating. The images were seriously disturbing.
‘Really? Oh, now I gotta see them.’
‘NO.’ Daniel almost yelled the phrase into the phone. There was a pause as Natalie thought of what to say. After almost a minute, she started talking about something completely different, all bad blood between them suddenly brushed aside. Daniel smiled again. She had a habit of doing that, but it was an endearing one.
The two talked for almost half an hour before Natalie closed off the conversation. Wishing her a good night, Daniel hung up and placed the phone back into its station. As he did so, his gaze turned back to the image displayed on his screen. It really was horrific.
He moved to close the window, before pausing. What if there was an address somewhere here? He closed his mind to the disturbing imagery and scrolled further down. All of a sudden, there it was. Right at the bottom of the page, in the second entry. A road. Pentaview Lane. That was enough. He reached for the phone again and got in touch with another old friend.

There ya go. Please do rip this apart - it's the only way I'll learn.

Also: I've caught up with the latest South Park episodes, and I could SO turn Series 11, Episode 7 into another AGN story. Ooo, the ideas are bubbling...

[Pineconn]

Sorry for missing all of these:

--He’d tidied up the small 4-roomed apartment which he’d lived in since leaving home some 3 years ago, and had re-organized reorganized his case files, currently sitting in an ugly filing cabinet in what he called the study.

I don't know how y'all over there do it, but we in the states would spell it "reorganized".

--10 Ten minutes later, Daniel got up and went back to the phone.

Never start sentence with numbers! (I'm not yelling, BTW.)

--Nothing was on TV tonight, so he’d have a quick look on the internet Internet for his Mr. Hargraves, and if nothing came up he’d give his sister a call.

That would be in teh c4p5.

--Plenty of Michael Hargraves lived in UK, but none of them could possibly be the ones one he was after.

He was after only one person. :)

--He decided to hold off from calling her until he’d caught the Six six (?) o’clock news.

Um, either capitalize the whole thing if it's the name of the program, or leave it lowercase if you are being general. I don't know the way you intended it, but the status quo is wrong fo' sho', yo. :cool:

--‘No, there’s just... Ok, there’s there are images of demons doing really nasty things to women, and to be honest, I like your state of mind right where it is.’

Singular/plural.

--Concern filtered though the phone. ‘You Ok?’

Maybe. Technically, it is either "OK" or "okay", and I've never seen "Ok". But it is okay. (Pun intended.) Do it however you want. I don't want you to throw away all your styles and such.

--‘There’s an e-mail address if that that's what you meant, but nothing else. Sorry.’

'Nuff said about that one.

~

I see that you haven't gone into detail, I just meant that we could finally see some attributes of Daniel. In the first chapter, he was like a stone soldier. Maybe in the beginning of a chapter (3rd, 4th, whatever) you could just dump his features. Like the classic approach - ‘he looked in the mirror and studied himself. His hair / eyes / face...’

Anyone else?

[Darth Marsden]

Don't be sorry. You're like my biggest fan!

Not sure about just 'dumping his features', as you put it. I never feel comfortable writing those. I did it with Sophie Richards above, and I still don;t feel right about it. Maybe I could just drop little bits in here and there. I've already mentioned his hair, maybe I could just mention his eyes in the next chapter, and then have another character comment on his clothes sense and stuff. That way we gradually build up our mental picture of him without having been explicitly told everything all at once.

Thanks for pointing out those typos. I can't be bothered to repeat the whole chapter again, but I'll certainly take them into account.

[Pineconn]

Shoot.

--‘my partner is cheating on me and I want you to obtain proof so I can divorce them him or her without giving them any money’.

Them (plural) ≠ partner (singular). To make this correct, you should use him or her in place of them.

--‘I took my mother's, he took his father's.’

Well... You've been using the cool little ‘ ’ apostrophes, and I used the ' one. You copied the ' instead of the ’ when I corrected the sentence. If you plan on using the ‘ ’ apostrophes when you publish it, you should change 'em... I'm just really nitpicking on this one.

--Why? Does she slag me off of or something?’

Or at least I think.

~

And now I think that's it. :p I think that this chapter is good enough to go under wraps! Anyone else?

[Darth Marsden]

Chapter 2 - Back in Action

The next fortnight was unusually quiet for Daniel. In all, he’d only taken on two cases, both of which had been his normal fare of ‘my partner is cheating on me and I want you to obtain proof so I can divorce him/her without giving them any money’. In all honesty, Daniel had been glad of the quiet life. The previous few months had been much busier, and several times he’d only survived intact by the skin of his teeth. Private Investigating was a dangerous business, and he was glad of any breaks that he could get.
He’d spent the downtime doing some essential housekeeping. He’d tidied up the small 4-roomed apartment which he’d lived in since leaving home some 3 years ago, and had reorganized his case files, currently sitting in an ugly filing cabinet in what he called the study. His bedroom had needed some serious cleaning, and he’d vacuumed the front room. The kitchen, he’d decided, didn’t need anything done at all. For the past 6 months he’d lived on take-out food and microwavable dinners, though his hectic lifestyle had helped to stop the weight from building up.
Once he’d finished tidying (which, given that he’d been interrupted twice, had taken several days), he took it easy. Catching up on his favorite TV shows, playing with his new Wii console, reading the few books he’d picked up that he hadn’t gotten round to yet... it had been a fairly relaxing time.
Perhaps it was a good thing that it had suddenly been ended. The knock at the door had only interrupted the Bond book Daniel had been reading, and the woman who had barged in as soon as the door had opened slightly hadn’t even given him the chance to say anything before making herself at home and sitting in his recently vacated chair. He sighed and ran his hand through his short bleached-blonde hair as he closed the door and addressed her.
‘Can I help you?’
The woman turned to him, the look on her face exclaiming the obviousness of the question. There was obviously little point in treating her as unintelligent.
‘Yes. I need you to find someone.’
The hand went through the bleached hair again, this time pausing to rub the back of his neck. ‘Who?’ he asked, his mind slowly creaking back to life after the time off.
‘My brother’ came the response, along with another look of superiority. ‘Shouldn’t you be writing this down?’
‘I’ll remember it. When did you last see him?’
She shook the hair out of her face as she spoke. ‘Years ago. Our parents divorced, and he went with our father.’
Daniel sighed. It was going to be an irritating case. ‘What was his name?’
‘Michael. Michael Hargraves.’
Wandering over to the nearby table, Daniel grabbed his notepad and withdrew the pen jammed into the rings at the top. Skimming to the first clean page, he asked the woman to spell the surname, and he wrote it down as she did so. Asking for her name, she put her well manicured hand into her coat and pulled out a calling card, which she gave to him. Reading it, the name Sophie Richards leapt out in horrendous gold text on top of a somewhat hypnotizing pattern of leopard-print. The cards must have cost a small fortune to have printed. He took another quick look at her.
Shoulder-length brown hair half hung over her face, almost concealing her heavily made-up face. Her dull blue eyes looked bored, and the clothes she wore, all expensive, top-of-the-line labels, conveyed that this was a woman who was used to getting what she wanted. Having handed her card to Daniel, she was now looking at her nails, waiting for him to respond. He did so.
‘What was your father’s name?’
She stiffened slightly, as if the memories were painful. ‘John, James... something like that.’
‘Why do you and your brother have different surnames?’
‘I took my mother's, he took his father's.’
So, he was looking for a Michael Hargraves, or, failing that, a John or James Hargraves. That was something, at least. He probed further.
‘Anything else you can tell me? Where he was last seen, any other family members, that sort of thing?’
She looked up at him. ‘No, nothing. That’s what’s made this so frustrating.’
Yeah, I’ll bet, thought Daniel as he put the pad of paper onto the table. Of all the people to shake him out of his holiday, he had to have a spoilt rich kid who didn’t understand that she couldn’t always get everything she wanted at the click of her fingers. He was tempted to not even bother - just call her sometime next week, saying that he’d found nothing.
Almost as soon as the thought crossed his mind, he inwardly cursed himself. Why would he do that? People like this pay the bills. He looked over at Sophie, who was once again checking her nails. He may not like it, but few people ever really liked their jobs. He was lucky to enjoy it most of the time. He walked over to the door and opened it.
‘Ok. Well I’ll look into this and get back to you if anything turns up. If you think of anything else...’
He picked up one of his own business cards from the small table beside the door and handed it to her as she approached him. Unlike the lurid slight of hers, his cards were plain white with black text on. His sister, having achieved her childhood dream of being a graphic designer, had designed them for him when he’d announced to the family that he was becoming a Private Investigator. Thinking about this, Daniel realized it’d been some time since he’d last spoken to his sister. He decided to give her a call once he’d had a preliminary check into Mr. Hargraves.
Sophie looked at the card and then glanced back up at Daniel, the disapproval written all over her face. ‘Yes. Well, I hope to hear from you. Soon, if possible.’
In the back of his mind, Daniel saw her fingers snapping. He shoved the image away. ‘Well, I can’t promise anything, but I’ve nothing else on at the moment, so this’ll have my full attention.’
‘Glad to hear it.’
She walked out the door and Daniel closed it behind her. She had been relatively polite to him, and yet he couldn’t wait to have been rid of the woman. He hadn’t even talked about his going rates with her. As if she cared, he told himself. She probably had more money than sense anyway.
Walking into the kitchen, he reflected on the afternoon before checking his watch. Nothing was on TV tonight, so he’d have a quick look on the Internet for his Mr. Hargraves, and if nothing came up he’d give his sister a call. It’d be good to talk to her, he reflected. She had a bubbly side to her that was infectious, and he’d become too routine lately. A good pick-me-up lecture would probably do him some good. He grabbed a can of Coke from the fridge and then headed back into the study.
An hour and a half later, Daniel gave up. His usual web-haunts had failed him, and he’d already e-mailed his two other contacts that might be able to help him. Plenty of Michael Hargraves lived in UK, but none of them could possibly be the one he was after. One was a DJ in Liverpool, another was a Barrister up in London and a third, he was surprised to find, worked in the same company as his sister.
He reached for the phone to give her the promised call when he saw his watch. Nearly 6:00. He decided to hold off from calling her until he’d caught the news. Walking into the front room, he grabbed the remote from the sofa and promptly collapsed into it the way his parents had never let him when he was younger. Thinking of this, a slight smile spread across his face as he aimed the remote at the TV and turned it on to BBC1.
Ten minutes later, Daniel got up and went back to the phone. Much to his irritation, the biggest story that evening had been that of a new best-selling novel. Watching the story, Daniel realized that he recognized the author of ‘For God’s Sake!’. Paul M. Stepson had used to run a burger bar just outside where he’d gone to school. Flipping buns to flipping off Catholics by claiming God didn’t exist... Daniel shook the sheer lunacy of it out of his head as he picked up the handset and dialed his sister’s number.
‘...hello?’
‘Hey Natalie.’
‘Daniel! Ah, it’s been ages! How are you?’
A smile spread across Daniel’s face. He could picture her as she was talking. It may have been a while since they’d last seen each other, but he could clearly remember her. ‘Ah, I’m alright. Just looking at the cards you did for me and got all nostalgic.’
‘See? I told you they’d come in handy!’
He pictured her smiling. ‘That you did. So how are you?’
A faint thump came from the background. His mental image of her had suddenly sat down in a chair. ‘I’m good, actually. Got some big project that I‘m not allowed to talk about.’
‘When are you ever?’
‘I know, I know... one of these days I’ll get something I can share with you, honest!’
Daniel laughed. He loved his sister, but not that much. ‘No rush, please.’
Now it was her turn to laugh. ‘Why, if I didn’t know better, I’d think you were discouraging me!’
‘Then I guess it’s a good thing you do know me, isn’t it?’
Another laugh. ‘Yeah... Hey, listen. I don’t suppose you’d mind doing me a favor?’
Without hesitation, Daniel replied ‘I do mind, thank you very much.’ His last favor for her had ended up with his plunging into the swimming pool belonging to one of her friends, along with a cold that seemed to last for a month.
‘I promise, it’s nothing as bad as last time.’
‘That’s exactly what you said LAST time!’
She laughed again. ‘Oh, come on! Please? Pretty please?’
Daniel couldn’t help but give in. He’d do anything for her, and she knew it. ‘...tell me what it is, and I’ll think about it.’
‘Yay!’ she squealed, knowing she’d won. ‘Thanks bro. I’ll make it up to you, promise.’
‘What is it?’
‘Ok. So, recently I’ve been getting all nostalgic lately, right? And I decided to get back in touch with one of my old friends, ‘cause we used to be BFF’s or whatever. With me so far?’
Daniel nodded as he confirmed that he was.
‘Ok, so I gave her a buzz over MSN, and she came back saying it’d been ages since we’d last seen each other, blah blah blah. So we agreed to meet and just, y’know, hang out.’
Picturing the scene, Daniel smiled. He’d had a best friend back in school, but, of course, they’d grown apart. Ian was in insurance these days, he believed.
‘So we were gonna meet yesterday at that place we always meet up. Remember the one?’
‘What, the AGN? Yeah, good times.’
Another laugh. ‘Yeah, that’s the one. Anyway, she never showed up, and I can’t get her back on MSN or anything. Just wondered if you’d mind tracking her down for me, since that’s what you’re so good at these days.’
Daniel moved over to the computer and moved the mouse. The screen-saver turned itself off and revealed the results of his last search. ‘Ok, I’ll give it a go. What’s the name?’
‘Dana Lucile.’
Sitting down, Daniel passed the phone over to his left hand as the right went for the mouse. He clicked the cursor into the search bar and the hand moved over the keyboard. ‘Ok, D-A-N-A...’ he spoke as he typed.
‘L-U-C-I-L-E.’ his sister told him as he continued. Hitting enter, he waited for the results of the search. One struck him in particular - a blog. He clicked the link and the screen turned almost completely black, except for the text, which was a hard-to-read shade of purple, and a picture of, presumably, Dana.
‘Black hair, brown eyes, looks kinda like a Goth?’ he asked.
‘I dunno, I never saw her, remember?’ came the reply.
‘She never sent you a photo or anything?’ He highlighted the text to make it legible and started reading it as he spoke.
‘Oh yeah, she did. Hang on.’ Another dull thud as, Daniel imagined, his sister put the phone onto the table. He continued reading the blog and found the text somewhat disturbing. After a minute or two, he heard the phone being picked back up.
‘Yeah, that’s her.’
‘Well, I’ve found her blog, and it’s... well, it’s an interesting read, I’ll say that much.’
A note of worry set into the voice. ‘What’s it say?’
‘Uh, hang on, lemme read some to you.’ He scanned the page, trying to find something that would convey Dana’s thoughts. He found a section and read it out.
‘Ok, here we go. ‘Last night I found the ritual. Soon I will summon him, and he and I will be together forever. I’ve waited so long for this; I can’t believe I finally found it! Can’t wait to try it out.’ Sounds pretty weird, huh?’
His sister paused for a minute. ‘Is there an address?’
Daniel scanned through the text. ‘There’s an e-mail address if that's what you meant, but nothing else. Sorry.’
‘What’s the e-mail?’
Daniel gave it to her. Once he’d done so, he continued to scan the text.
‘Ok, I’ve got it. I’ll give her a buzz. Thanks Dan, I owe you big for this.’
‘Hmm? Oh yeah, sure.’
Concern filtered though the phone. ‘You Ok?’
‘Yeah, just reading more of this. There’s some pretty serious stuff here, Nat.’
‘What’s the URL?’
Daniel was about to give it to her when, as he scrolled down further, he saw several very inappropriate images. ‘...actually, I don’t want you reading this.’
‘Why? Does she slag me off or something?’
‘No, there’s just... Ok, she's put up images of demons doing really nasty things to women, and to be honest, I like your state of mind right where it is.’
Natalie laughed. ‘It can’t be that bad!’
‘Yeah, it can. There’s one with like three demons, one woman and so much blood I’m not gonna sleep for a week.’ Much as he wished he was, Daniel wasn’t exaggerating. The images were seriously disturbing.
‘Really? Oh, now I gotta see them.’
‘NO.’ Daniel almost yelled the phrase into the phone. There was a pause as Natalie thought of what to say. After almost a minute, she started talking about something completely different, all bad blood between them suddenly brushed aside. Daniel smiled again. She had a habit of doing that, but it was an endearing one.
The two talked for almost half an hour before Natalie closed off the conversation. Wishing her a good night, Daniel hung up and placed the phone back into its station. As he did so, his gaze turned back to the image displayed on his screen. It really was horrific.
He moved to close the window, before pausing. What if there was an address somewhere here? He closed his mind to the disturbing imagery and scrolled further down. All of a sudden, there it was. Right at the bottom of the page, in the second entry. A road. Pentaview Lane. That was enough. He reached for the phone again and got in touch with another old friend.

There we go. That better?

[Pineconn]

I can't fault that. :(

So that means I like it. Unless you want to change some of the story or whatnot, I would have to say that chapter 2 is complete... for now.

[Darth Marsden]

Christ, I'd better get started on chapter 3 then... ;)

[Darth Marsden]

And only 9 months late... Awesome.

Daniel Jordan - Between Angels and Devils

Chapter III - Discovery

It was nearly eight by the time Daniel arrived at the address he’d gotten, and darkness had fallen across the city. Daniel seemed to work a lot at night - it was always easier to take discriminating photographs or record a candid conversation if nobody could see you. Shaking the thoughts from his head, Daniel stepped out of the Ford Fiesta he’d had for years and headed for the apartment block.
Scanning the list of tenants next to a set of buzzers, Dana’s name almost seemed to jump out at him. She’d written it in what seemed to be a black marker pen, which contrasted with the other, more low-key names on the buzzing apparatus. Apartment 15, it seemed, was hers, so he pressed the button and hoped for a reply.
After ten minutes, Daniel abandoned the idea that she was home. Glancing down at the windowed door, he saw that there were several letters for her that had been placed on a small table inside. At a guess, Daniel estimated that they were around 3, maybe 4 days old.
Looking back at the list of tenants, Daniel decided to buzz the apartment next to Dana’s – number 14, belonging to a Mr Robeck. Barely thirty seconds had passed before he got a response, a man’s voice asking who it was.
‘My name’s Daniel Jordan, Mr Robeck. I’m trying to reach Miss Lucile, and I was just wondering if you’d seen her recently?’
There was a short pause, then the loud buzzing sound of the door’s lock being released. Swinging the door open, Daniel quickly made his way inside the building and headed up to apartment 14. He’d just made it there when the door opened and an elderly gentleman with grey hair and a well-lived face appeared. He smiled warmly.
‘So you’re trying to find Dana, are you?’
Daniel nodded. ‘It’s for my sister. They were supposed to meet today, but Dana never showed up, and we haven’t been able to get in touch with her since.’
The smile remained fixed in place. ‘What was your name again?’
Almost on reflex, Daniel reached inside his coat pocket and pulled out one of his business cards, which he handed to the gentleman. After some close examination, the man tried to return it to Daniel, but he gestured for the man to keep it.
‘Private Investigator? Didn’t realize you guys existed outside of the movies.’
Daniel smiled. ‘Well, we do.’
‘And what did you want with Dana?’
‘Just to make sure she’s alright.’
The old man took another look at the card and then stared at Daniel for a few moments before nodding his head slightly.
‘Well, honestly… I haven’t seen her for a couple of days. It must have been… yes, Wednesday. Three days ago. I remember because I was picking up the mail downstairs, and she came rushing in with something. I said hello but she just ignored me – ran straight in, she did.’
Daniel rubbed his chin thoughtfully. ‘Any idea what she was holding?’
The old man shook his head. ‘None. She was clutching it for dear life though, I remember that much. Like it was the most important thing in the world. And then there were those strange noises that night…’
‘Noises?’
Nodding, the old man pointed to the Dana’s apartment. ‘Mmm. Weird, thumping sounds. Almost…’ He looked around, afraid that anyone else would hear him. ‘…well, inhuman.’
Daniel put his hand on the old man’s shoulder. ‘Don’t worry. It’s probably just the TV or something. I’m just gonna leave a note for her, alright?’
The man nodded as Daniel reached into his coat and pulled out his notepad. Removing the pen tucked into the rings at the top of the pad, Daniel flipped to a clean page and started writing a brief note. Once done, he ripped the page out, folded it in half and tucked it under the door to Dana’s apartment. He turned and smiled at Mr. Robeck.
‘If you hear anything from her, could you get her to call me?’
The old man nodded, and so he headed back to the stairs and made his way down. Once he reached the front door however, he stopped. Opening it, he let it close again while listening out at the top of the stairs. After a moment, he head Mr. Robeck close his own door, at which point Daniel made his way back up the stairs. He kept going up until he reached the top, then opened the fire door leading on to the roof.
Outside, he carefully closed the door behind him and made his way over to one side. He’d worked out that Dana’s apartment was on this side of the block of flats, and he looked over the edge to make sure that there were windows. There were, and so Daniel very carefully climbed over the side of the building and, hanging from the edge, maneuvered his feet over to the window beneath him.
It took him ten minutes and three very close calls before he finally made it down to Dana's window. He looked inside but could make out little, so slowly he reached inside his coat and pulled out a small flashlight from his pocket. Turning it on and shining it through the window, Daniel could just about make out the handle on the other side of the glass.
Turning the light off, Daniel put it back into his coat pocket and took his penknife out from the rear pocket of his jeans. Balancing himself, he managed to draw the knife out of its holder and, slowly but forcefully, he drew a small circle in the glass near the handle with it. Once finished, he carefully tucked the knife back into its base and returned it to pocket before gently tapping the circle with his finger. It fell onto the carpet, bouncing slightly as it landed.
Making sure not to cut himself, Daniel carefully placed his hand through the hole and opened the window. Extracting the hand, he climbed through into the apartment, closing the window behind him as he did so.
He took his torch out again and shined the beam of light across the room. A few things magically appeared from the darkness, engraving themselves into the mental picture Daniel was building in his head. A small two-seater against the wall, a TV in the corner, a table of some sort in the middle... it struck him as a very simple, almost neglected room.
Shining the torch higher, Daniel found what he was looking for. He made his way over to the light switch and flicked it on. The room was instantly filled with light and colour, and as he pocketed the torch again, Daniel focused his attention on the doors which led out of the front room. One led to what appeared to be an equally sparse kitchen, while another opened out into a hallway.
As Daniel walked down the hall, he noticed one of the door had odd markings on it. He looked around for another light switch, but failing to find one, resorted to his torch once more. As the beam of light shone onto the door, Daniel moved back slightly in surprise. Pentagrams had been painstakingly painted onto the woodwork in such a way that it gave Daniel goosebumps just looking at it.
Settling himself, Daniel reached out his free hand and took hold of the door handle. A shiver went down his spine, and he realised that he was trembling slightly. He took a deep breath, calmly opened the door and stepped inside, instinctively moving his hand to the light switch by the door frame as he did so.
As soon as he'd switched the light on, Daniel dropped the torch, turned back round, walked straight back to the kitchen and threw up into the sink.
Despite everything he'd braced himself for, he couldn't possibly have prepared himself for what was in that room. It hadn't been the bodies that had affected Daniel so much as the smell. The sick, gut-wrenching odour of death was in that room.
Taking a few minutes to clean up after himself, Daniel took the damp dishcloth he'd used to wet his face with and headed back to Dana's bedroom. He stopped just before he got the the doorway. Taking a deep breath, he pressed the dishcloth over his face and stepped inside.
The room was an absolute mess. Almost every piece of furniture was covered in dried blood, and in the centre of the floor, lying in another painted pentagram, were two bodies. One was clearly Dana despite being covered in blood, but the other was something very different. If Daniel hadn't known better, he would have sworn that it was some sort of demon.
Unable to take the stench any longer, Daniel crossed over to the nearest window, threw back the drawn curtains and forced open the window. He dropped the dishcloth and, leaning out into the night, breathed in the fresh air. Then he reached into his coat pocket yet again and pulled out his mobile. He had a few calls to make.

This has been a really difficult chapter to write, for some reason. I'd had writer's block for months, then when I started the writing contest (note to self: start another one of these soon), I finally started getting back into the swing of things. I only finished this late last week. So... yeah. 9 months. Oof!

Once again, I'd very much appreciate people's thoughts on this chapter. As near as I can tell, there aren't any typos (remember - I'm British, and we spell things a little differently to you guys), but any comments on structure, descriptions and other techniques would be hugely appreciated.

Thanks in advance, and I promise I'll get working on the second half of that South Park story now! :p

[Pineconn]

Looking back at the list of tenants, Daniel decided to buzz the apartment next to Dana’s – number 14, belonging to a Mr. Robeck.


‘My name’s Daniel Jordan, Mr. Robeck.


After a moment, he heard Mr. Robeck close his own door, at which point Daniel made his way back up the stairs.


There were, *and* so Daniel very carefully climbed over the side of the building and, hanging from the edge, maneuvered his feet over to the window beneath him.

^^Is the word "and" necessary? It sort of disrupts the flow of the sentence. I would personally delete it.


colour

Bleh. :D


Despite everything he'd braced himself for, he couldn't possibly have prepared himself for what was in that room. It hadn't been the bodies that had affected Daniel so much as the smell. The sick, gut-wrenching odour of death was in that room.

Hm. These sentences finally reveal the climax of the chapter, but they are so horribly choppy that the effect was ruined. The first sentence is fine, but I think the other two need to be either combined or rewritten to be more mysterious/disgusting/etc.

But overall, that was a great chapter. I can't seem to find any other problems that just scream out to me, and that's a good thing for you. ;)

[Darth Marsden]

I'm not reprinting the whole thing for a few changes, but regarding that last one, it was a re-arranging of two paragraphs into one, which is probably why it looks so choppy. Let me try it again, with the already written sentances surrounding the line in question being in teeny-tiny writing:


As soon as he'd switched the light on, Daniel dropped the torch, turned back round, walked straight back to the kitchen and threw up into the sink. Despite everything he'd braced himself for, he couldn't possibly have prepared himself for the sick, gut-wrenching odour of death that filled the room.
Taking a few minutes to clean up after himself, Daniel took the damp dishcloth he'd used to wet his face with and headed back to Dana's bedroom. He stopped just before he got the the doorway. Taking a deep breath, he pressed the dishcloth over his face and stepped inside.
Better?

[Pineconn]

Excellent, much better. I'm liking where this book is going so far! Keep up the good work!

[Darth Marsden]

Hey, only 4 months. Getting better!

Daniel Jordan - Between Angels and Devils

Chapter IV - Graveyard Shift

It took twenty minutes for the police to arrive and another half an hour until, all the windows having been opened, they finally declared the apartment 'contaminant free'. As they followed their usual procedures Daniel kept to the living room, letting the professionals do their job. As he leant against a wall, one of them broke off and approached him, a smile on his face in greeting. Daniel returned it and folded his arms.
'Should've known you'd be involved. You always give me the weirdest stuff.'
Daniel laughed. 'Well you can't spend every day behind that desk of yours, Dave.'
'Hey! I like my desk! It's warm and safe and nobody ever gets horribly mutilated on it!'
Rolling his eyes, Daniel nodded towards the bedroom where he'd found the two bodies. 'Speaking of which, any progress?'
David shook his head. 'Not really. We're still trying to figure out what the hell happened in there. You'll have to talk to Neil when he's finished.'
'Any idea how long that might be?'
'No idea. You know what he's like.'
Daniel nodded. He knew exactly what Neil was like - thorough. He mused over the procedures he'd be doing right about now as David walked over to the sofa and slumped down on it. Daniel looked up. Something seemed to be on his mind.
'How'd you get in? Neighbour said he heard you leave.'
Daniel gestured towards the window he'd come in through. David followed his finger and saw the missing circle of glass. He opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came out. Instead he clenched his hands into fists, shook them at Daniel and suddenly opened them out in a gesture of frustration. His anger vented, he swung around and lay lengthways down the sofa, his legs dangling over the arm. Daniel smiled at the gesture and pushed off from the wall, heading into the kitchen.
'Water?' he called out.
'I'm good.'
Rooting through the cupboards, Daniel finally found a clean glass. He filled it with water and took a sip before returning to the living room, where another police officer had joined David. Rather than interrupt them, he leant back against the wall and listened in on the conversation the two were having.
'...and near as we can tell, there's no reason either of them should be dead. No physical injuries, no signs of internal damage, nothing. It's like... like they just stopped living.'
'That doesn't explain why they were lying on the floor like that. Nor the blood. Neil can't tell me anything?'
'Uh...' The other cop paused to think for a second. 'He thinks they were doing it before they died, but that's about it.'
'Well, at least they died happy.' David stood up from the sofa. 'That's everything?'
'Yeah. Neil said he'd be out in a minute or two - he's just finishing up.'
David patted the cop's shoulder in thanks. 'Ok, we'll hang on for him then. Thanks, Rick.'
Nodding, Rick headed back into the bedroom. Daniel pushed forward from the wall and approached the sofa, which David had already slumped back down on.
'Why do you always give me these type of cases? You know I can't do a thing with them.'
Daniel sat down next to him. 'Consider it payback for all the times you borrowed my rubber without asking.'
'Yeesh. That's holding a grudge.'
'You wore it down to a stub!'
'I bought you another one!'
'Yeah, and you did the same to that one as well!'
David stammered for a second, then held up his hands in mock defeat. 'Ok. You got me.'
'And here I thought Amy had you.'
David looked away into space. '...it didn't work out.'
A few moments of silence passed before Daniel broke it. 'I'm sorry, man.'
'Yeah, well, you know... women and cops, and all that.'
A cough interrupted them. The pair looked up to see a man in a very bloodied smock standing next to them with his hands up beside his head.
'Sorry to interrupt, but I heard you two were after me?'
Daniel smiled. 'No rush' he said, taking another sip from his cup.
'No, I'm pretty much done here. Not much more I can do until I get them back to the morgue.'
David stood up. 'So what's the verdict?'
Neil looked at him uneasily. 'Well, it's the oddest thing. I can't seem to find a thing wrong with them.'
'Except that they're dead.'
'Well, yeah. But beyond that...' He shrugged.
Standing up, Daniel brushed off his jeans with his free hand. 'So there's nothing else you can tell us?'
'Not til I get those two back to the lab. Sorry.'
'Ah, it's not your fault.' He took another swig of water. 'I don't suppose you could let me know when you do find something?'
Neil nodded. 'Sure. You're not gonna stick around then?'
'Nah. Not much more I can do here. And I'm not getting paid, so...'
David laughed. 'Oh yeah, you've fobbed 'em onto us, so now you're in the clear.'
'Oh, thanks.' Daniel finished his water and headed back inside the kitchen, washing out the glass and leaving it on the draining board. As he returned to the front room, he noticed Neil had left - presumably back to the bodies. He nodded over to David.
'Hey, could you let the guy next door know what's going on?'
'Sure. I'll see you later?'
'Yeah. Maybe without a murder next time.'
'Fingers crossed.'
Daniel smiled and waved David away before heading out of the apartment and making for the stairs.
As he left the building and reached for his car keys, something caused him to stop mid-stride. He couldn't explain it, but for some reason he could feel something above him. Looking up though, he couldn't see anything other then a few birds.
A chill went down Daniel's spine. For some reason he had a horrible feeling that this was going to be the start of a very dangerous chain of events.

[The_Amaster]

Not sure if I've said this before, but your writing sounds really...professional.
Opinions on the story aside (I think it's great, but thats not relevant), you have "flow", that instinct for exactly how many syllables long each word or sentence should be to achieve the right pace over the text. I await more with interest.

[Pineconn]

His anger vented, he swung around and lay lengthways down the sofa, his legs dangling over the arm.

I'd probably prefer "around" over "round" (unless "around" is Americanized).


Rather than interrupting, he leant back against the wall and listened in on the conversation the two were having.

Ouch... two mistakes in one sentence.


'...and near as we can tell, there's no reason either of them should be dead.

Not "wither." :p


Daniel sat down next to him.

Nest to him?


'Ah, it's not your fault.' He took another swig of water.

Probably the most common grammatical error in the English language.


A chill went down Daniel's spine.

I think that's about it. I agree with Amaster - you have a very conversational tone. If you ever finished and get published, I'll be the first one to buy it.

[Darth Marsden]

Ooo, lots of praise. Thanks.

Grammar fixed. Rather then change 'Rather then interrupt' to 'Rather than interrupting', I changed it to 'Rather than interrupt the pair', as I feel it flows better. Have a look at it in the context of the paragraph and see if you agree or not.

I really appreciate your thoughts and spell checking, it's a big help. You will definitely get an acknowledgement when this gets pubished in 2015!

[Pineconn]

Okay, that sounds a lot better. The infinitive alone was throwing me off.

So... yeah... it looks good to me. Chapter 5 in just 3 months this time, maybe? ;)

[Darth Marsden]

3 months? Ha! How about another 9? Stupid real life getting in the way. Still, I've a couple more chapters, if you're interested anymore...

Daniel Jordan - Between Angels and Devils

Chapter V

Despite the relatively late time he’d gone to bed, Daniel woke up early the next morning. He skipped washing, having had a quick shower the night before, and threw his on usual jeans and short-sleeved shirt.
Leaving the top button undone, he stepped into the front room and checked his answering machine. He hadn’t expected any messages, so wasn’t at all surprised when there weren’t any. Instead he made his way over to his PC and switched it on. It lit into life as he collapsed into the computer chair, revealing the desktop picture of Daniel and his friends. The picture had been taken years ago, back when he’d first started as a PI. The magnifying glasses and trench coats they jokingly wore served to remind him of the close bond they’d maintained since meeting in college.
He briefly reflected on the good times he’d had with the gang as he opened his emails. Several responses were waiting for him, and he leaned forward as he quickly scanned them, but sadly there were no leads on his missing person. Slumping back into the chair, he looked out the window. The sun was up and beaming down over the street. It looked like it was going to be a beautiful day.
Leaning back, he rubbed his chin with his hand, musing over what to do next. There was little more he could do here, and it was such a nice day…
His mind made up, he turned off the PC and headed back into the bedroom to grab his sunglasses and wallet before moving to the front room and taking his notepad from the side table. He shoved the pad into the left rear pocket of his jeans, the wallet in his front right pocket and hung the glasses down the front of his shirt, then made for the front door.
He took the stairs to the ground floor two at a time, as always. After 3 and a half years, the three floors barely even registered to him anymore. As he emerged from the front door the sunlight almost blinded hum. He grabbed the sunglasses from his shirt and put them on. The world took on a much more manageable blue tint. He turned to his left and headed down the street, undoing another shirt button as he did. The weather was much warmer then he’d guessed.
It took Daniel about 25 minutes to reach the library, the walk having taken almost twice as long due to the summer traffic. Leaning against a wall, he paused and watched the world go by as he finished his ice cream before pushing off and heading up the steeps to the building.
As he reached for the door, he heard a loud ‘whoosh’ above him. He looked up and caught a glimpse of a red flash before it vanished above the building. Now he was sure that last night hadn’t just been his imagination – something was definitely going on. He resolved to look into it once he was done here. He took his shades off and hung them down his shirt again as he opened the door and stepped inside.
The smell of paper came over Daniel as he made his way past the front desk and an unsightly display of ‘For God’s Sake!’ and headed towards the record room at the back of the building. The library was never particularly busy, and today was no exception. A few regulars were sitting in the comfortable chairs dotted around the room, and as he passed them by they smiled at him in greeting. Smiling back, Daniel reflected that while life went on as normal outside, it was always peaceful here. Maybe that was why he liked it so much.
He reached the back of the library and knocked on the wooden door that was there. A few moments passed before an elderly man opened it slightly and peered out. Seeing Daniel, he fully opened the door and smiled cheerily.
‘Daniel! It’s been a while. Come on in.’
Returning the smile, Daniel followed him into the storage room. It was darker then the rest of the library and it took him a few seconds to adjust to the dim light.
‘I take it you’re here to read the headlines?’ The old man asked.
‘If you don’t mind, Hugh.’
The old man smiled and shook his head. ‘Of course not. Come on through. Don’t mind the mess.’
He led Daniel through a veritable maze made of towering piles of books and boxes. Daniel wondered what Hugh would do if any of them fell over, noting that several of them seemed dangerously close to doing so. He carefully made his way around a stack of old video cassettes and approached the microfiche that Hugh was turning on for him.
‘Will you be long? He asked as stepped away from it to give Daniel access.
‘Shouldn’t be. I’ve only a month or two to skim through.’
The old man took another step back and let Daniel sit down at the machine.
‘Well, let me know if you need anything.’
Daniel smiled as he sat down. ‘I will. Thanks.’ As Hugh made his way back to whatever it was he’d previously been doing, Daniel entered the dates Ms Richards had given him and leant into the machine.
The front pages didn’t look to dissimilar to recent ones, he reflected as he quickly scanned them for mention of the divorce. It was a long shot that he’d find the breakdown of a marriage on the cover of an 80’s newspaper, but the local tabloids had surprised him before.
It was nearly two hours later, when the only papers left were the Lancashire Evening Post and the Northampton Chronicle, when Daniel conceded and turned the machine off. He made his way back through towers, gave his best to Hugh and headed back into the main area of the library.
As he passed one of the tables, he noticed that one of the men sitting there had that morning’s paper folded in half in front of him. Curious, Daniel made an inquiring gesture to the man, pointing to the paper. When the man picked up the paper and handed it to him, Daniel smiled and nodded in thanks, then headed over to the children’s section and sat down in one of the bean-bag chairs there.
The headline was typical of a tabloid newspaper. ‘RED DEVIL’, with the word RED, predictably enough, in bright red. The accompanying image, however, was of more interest. Though it wasn’t all that clear, he recognised the red blur as what he’d seen outside the library. He opened the paper and read the story behind the picture.
As it turned out, he hadn’t been the only one to see what the papers were calling ‘devil creatures’. They’d been seen across the skies over the last few days, and experts were at a loss trying to explain what they were.
Daniel closed the paper and stood up. If these things were what he thought they were, then he’d seen them before, and if they were making their way into modern day life, something was very wrong indeed. He dropped the paper back onto the table he’d gotten it from and left the library.
As he made his way outside, he reached for his phone before realising that he didn’t have it on him. He silently cursed himself as he started making his way back to his flat, before noticing a bus approaching in the opposite direction. Remembering where the bus went, he stopped and ran back to the bus stop outside the library, where several other people were waiting. He could afford to make a quick stop before heading home.

I've given up on chapter titles. They will not be missed. But yeah, thoughts? It's a bit of a slow chapter I know, but it will pick up soon.

[Pineconn]

*reminder to read this later, it's far too late for me*

[Darth Marsden]

Yay! Someone's going to read it!

Honestly, do feel free to tear this chapter apart. It doesn't feel quite right to me, and anything you can do to help with it would be very much appreciated.