opinions please - Printable Version
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opinions please by 00123 on 06-24-2006 at 04:27 PM
This is the story ive written, i think its quite good but i wouldnt mind having you opinions!
Deceptive Thoughts
Becca walked across the room and picked up the ringing phone.
"Hi" she said
It was her scumbag of an ex-boyfriend - Marcus Killcrass.
He thought she still liked him but she wasn't going to forget what he had tried to do to her.
"No , I’m not gonna go to the cinema with you or any of your freaky mates, and if you thought you could get me to come you're even stupider than i thought, now get lost"
She slammed the phone back on the table and walked into the kitchen to make a sandwich.
Exactly why he had told her she was going to regret going, Becca didn’t know, but she supposed it was to make her jealous, but she wasn't unduly worried.
Becca was only 14 ,she had long black hair and lightly tanned skin, she was 5ft 4,popular, and did well at school. She knew that getting into a stupid relationship at her age was stupid in the first place, but she had done it anyway and at the time she was 13 - even worse , she constantly reminded herself.
It was that evening when Marcus phoned again and told her what was going to change the rest of her life for the worse .
She realised that if she had decided to go with them that morning it would have been her......
She knew she should call the police but for those last chilling words he had said.
Marcus wasn’t exactly all that between the ears and so had been pretty stupid boasting about what he had done to that poor little 9 year old, he was 15 and suffered from ADD, compulsive lying and mild Schizophrenia, so the mental and physical requirements of what he had done were all well within his capabilities .
In some ways Becca wished she had gone that morning if it had spared that 9 year old.
But raping and beating up a 9 year old can go two ways:
- You find it fun and want to do it again
- You get cuaght by the police
So far it had gone the first way for Marcus and his friends and he was determined not to be caught .
Becca walked into the front room and switched the TV on . There wasn’t anything good on , but it took her mind off what was happening.
Next morning Becca had forgotten about her troubles until she turned on the TV.
“Good morning, I’m Amanda Walker, our headlines today :
A young girl has been violently raped and beaten up in Waltham Abbey , police have found no leads so far and have issued a warning to stay in public places and not to go out alone….”
Becca turned the TV off,
“SCUMBAG, YOU DIRTY LYING NASTY PIECE OF SH*T” she screamed at the TV.
An hour later Becca walked into the Somerfield across the road to get herself something to eat, her mum was at work so she had to sort out her own food and stuff for the duration of the summer holidays - the worst few weeks of her life as it would turn out to be.
As she opened her front door she saw Marcus and his bunch of no-life’s coming around the next corner, she was half tempted to pick up the recycling box by her feet and throw it at his square head, but she knew what would happen if he saw her. She walked inside and shut the door as quietly as she could.
Becca went up to her room and peeked out of the window to see what he was doing, she had to look twice to take it all in, Marcus was crouched down beside the green box that held all of the streets telephone wires inside it, he was holding a pair of wire cutters....
Becca rushed down stairs and picked up the phone...
the line was dead.
Becca now realised that things were far more sinister than she first thought - she knew that Marcus on his own would not be intelligent enough to think about cutting her phone wires , she also now realised that he wouldn’t have been smart enough to threaten her about calling the police.
She also knew that her broadband wire was attached to her phone wire meaning that it would be easy to sever both connections, meaning she was disconnected from the outside world apart from her mobile - she dare'nt go outside because she knew that he was watching her house.
She picked up her mobile intending to phone her mum
peeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep peeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep peeeeeeeeeeeeeep
"the signal on this device has been shorted out"
peeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep peeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep peeeeeeeeeeeeeeep
"the signal on th........"
"SH*T" she shouted
She looked out of the window again and gawped .
One of Marcus's mates was sitting on a wall around the corner with a laptop with an aerial, she guessed that this was what was stopping her mobile .
This told her that whoever was providing the brains must have money as well .
Things were looking very bad...
Another problem was that her mum was away on business in Newcastle and wouldn’t be back for 3 days and her dad was at one of his golf sleepover weeks in Kent .
Becca knew that someone would follow her if she went out of the house - so she was trapped.
"...The 9 year old girl who was raped and was brutally beaten up yesterday was found dead at lunchtime today... police were called to Barclays bank in Waltham Abbey yesterday when a customer found her underneath his car in the bank car park..."
This time Becca threw the TV control at the TV and burst out crying .
Only now was the reality of the situation she was in really getting through to her - the fact that a lot more lives depended on her outsmarting Marcus's surrogate brain.
All Becca could really do was eat sleep and go to the Somerfield across the road for food - and even then she was being watched.
The only advantage Becca had was that she was confident that they had forgotten about "low- tech" and had put all their concentration into stopping her using things like the internet and phone.
Next morning
Becca knew the address of the police station and had written a letter explaining in depth what was going on: saying that she was under threat and that any obvious attempt by the police to arrest Marcus and his friend would probably lead to her own death.
The next part of her plan wasn't so simple...
Becca opened her front door and turned left out of her drive - towards the cemetery, she immediately noticed that some one was following about 20 metres behind.
A bus came around the corner while she was about 5 metres from the bus stop, she showed no signs of wanting to get on it and carried on walking until the last second. The bus was 5 metres away when she stuck her hand out to stop it, she had timed it perfectly... she was at the bus stop when the bus opened its doors and but she was far enough away from her follower so that if he ran he would still have no chance of catching it . The bus didn’t even stop - it slowed to about 5 mph and she hopped on while it was moving.
It wasn’t luck that had got her this far , it was her brain - she had watched the bus drive along the next street from her bedroom window, and timed it so that she would be at the bus stop when it went past, she had also got on the bus going in the opposite direction to the police station so that her trail didn't think she was going to the police station - but there again she wasn't, so what did it matter.
Becca got of the bus at Sainsbury's, she knew there was a post box there and if she came back with shopping bags from there crammed full of food, it would douse the suspicion of what she had been up to even further.
As Becca put the key into the lock and turned it she was very pleased with herself, she had pulled off what she wanted to do without difficulty and she had bought triple chocolate chip ice cream while she was doing it...her favourite!
What she saw when she turned on the TV definitely put her off the ice cream...
"Photos of Amy Leah James, the 9 year old girl brutally murdered yesterday have been released to BBC news, we advice you not to watch the following footage if you are squeamish..."
A picture of a mangled and cut up body appeared on the screen and then it cut to a school photo of a cute brown haired little girl with blue eyes and light freckles.
Becca was about to turn the TV off again when the anchorman interrupted .
"News just in here, another little girl, Alice Southgate, has just been found, we don't know full details yet, but we will keep you updated..."
Becca was now more scared than she'd ever been in her whole life, but there was nothing else she could do other than lock all the doors and windows and wait until Thursday when the police would leave a reply with the owner of the off-licence down the road................
Thursday
The previous day Becca had spent ages planning on how to pick up the reply from the police without suspicion, she had now decided on how to do it...
As she pushed open the door of the off-licence the bell above her head clanged and the shopkeeper looked up and gave her a friendly smile. She returned the smile before setting about picking sweets and putting them inside her plastic bag.
As she did so she saw the shopkeeper get a small envelope from under his counter and put it beside the till.
So her arranged signal had worked, she breathed a sigh of relieve and walked up to the counter, put her bag on it and gave him the money, she moved to the left slightly so that the 15 year old hoody who was 'tying up his shoe laces' couldn’t see what she was doing . The shopkeeper slid the envelope into her bag and took the money as normal.
The whole point in Becca's plan was to act like she hadn’t the faintest clue she was being followed and as if she didn’t care about what Marcus had done...so far she had pulled it off very well and that was how she intended to carry on.
She threw herself down on her bed and opened the reply..............
Dear Rebecca Williams
...We regard that your position is very dangerous and so we are not going to initiate a press release. We have stationed an undercover officer outside your house and we will arrange for an officer to tail you discreetly wherever you go,
we will not immediately arrest the suspects, because we would like to catch them all together.
We are going to leave a mobile phone in your back garden so that you can communicate with us, the signal is encrypted so that it wont be intercepted.
As this is a special case, we are going to use special branch MI5 to help with our enquiries .
We recognise that you are very intelligent and realise the severity of this case, we are going to need a lot of assistance from you in the actual arrest.
If you discover anything else, please phone us.
yours faithfully
DCI Rob Goldman
Becca stared at the letter in amazement, although she was confident about her plan, deep down she didn’t really think it would work. She walked into the back garden and got the phone, a black nokia 3360,and went back inside.
Becca walked into the front room and flicked the TV on, as she did so she saw a silver van pull in to the kerb , about 20 meters down the road.
Altogether she felt slightly more relaxed and safe…
Well, she thought she did, until her jeans started vibrating and emitting a cheesy version of ‘when the saints go marching in‘, so the police did have a sense of humour.
She pressed the receive button
“Hi, my name is John Robertson, in case you hadn’t guessed I’m in the silver transit van 20 metres away, I just thought I’d say hi”
“Well, thank you , ermm, I’ll call you if I need any help,… actually, do you reckon you could get my internet working again? I’ve got a hunch about something, and I need to check it”
“OK, I’ll see what I can do then, but no promises, bye”
“erm, bye “
And she ended the call,
“Bloody weirdo” she said to herself.
“Mum, mum?. Look, when you get this message you need to come home straight away, its really important, and I need you, I cant say on the phone, but please come home…”
That was strange, Becca’s mum always answered her mobile, even when she was in meetings……
Becca tried to phone her mum twice more that evening but her mums phone just kept ringing and ringing and ringing. Becca was crying now, she had already phoned the incompetent police surveillance officer in the van round the corner, he had simply said he’d “look into it “ that made her feel so much more comfortable, not.
She cried herself to sleep and didn’t wake up until 11 the next morning, only to find 4 missed calls on her protection phone, all from the dimwit in the van 20 metres away - asking her where her mum was meant to be.
She sent him a text in reply and settled down to have breakfast, and watch some crappy midmorning TV.
Ding dong.
Becca stumbled down the stairs and checked through the fish eye who it was at the door, she nearly collapsed in fear right there and then, she felt the adrenaline shoot up through her body and she ran towards the back door with the phone in her hand.
She dialled 999 as she ran through the garden, and it was only then that she realized that if Marcus was at the front door then he would almost certainly have someone covering the back gate into the alleyway that ran parallel to the road . She took the only option she had left - she threw herself at her garden fence pushing the ball of her back foot hard into the ground and simultaneously springing forward with her front foot, the result was that she flipped into the air above the fence and hit the ground running in her next door neighbours garden , she did the same until she was 4 houses away from her own, where she ran at full pelt at the conservatory door hoping that the old wooden frame would give way. What did happen was a lot more painful but it still got her through. She was now running down the hallway of a complete strangers house bringing half the glass from their back door with her, she was a little more humane getting out the front- she simply opened the door- as she sprinted down the street she heard her 999 call eventually go through to the operator .
“I need the police”
“ok, where are you “
“shut up and put me through, my number is BT9456”
She heard the operator mutter something about rudeness before she heard her gasp as she brought up the case on the computer and realized how serious it was.
“I’m putting you through now..”
Another 20 long seconds went by as the call was patched through to DCI Goldman.
“Rob Goldman”
“ Hey, its Becca, he just knocked at my door”
“Who?”
“Marcus” she yelled into the phone.
“Ok’ where are you ?”
“erm , I’m running towards B&Q at Burythorne roundabout”
“umm, ok, wait inside the foyer, I’ll be there in 5”
“but he’s following me!” Becca screamed.
“I’m sending two squid cars to drive past, we’re not gonna arrest , we’re just gonna scare him”
“why no..”
“Because I said so” he cut across, and with that, he put the phone down.
Sure enough within about a minute Becca heard the sirens of two police cars cutting through the air, she checked behind her just in time to see Marcus disappear into an alleyway.
The 2 patrol cars zoomed past pretending to go somewhere else.
200 hundred metres away a plain clothed police surveillance officer slumped forward with a knife in his back in the back of a silver van….
Becca could here the siren wailing just in front of her, she was feeling numb as she sat in the back of DCI Goldman’s car because 15 minutes ago, someone had phoned 999 to report a dead person in a back alley just 200 metres away from where she was.
They were now cruising through the midday traffic from the police station to the scene. Becca knew who it was , although she didn’t have the heart to tell Rob.
The 2 marked cars in front were slowing down obviously looking for something. The front car swung down an alley way a bit like the one at the back of Becca’s house.
The second car sped away following the road round to the left and the stopped and reversed down another alley.
Rob sped up and turned onto the dual-carriageway that went past the B&Q that they had met at just 20 minutes earlier.
The car sped up again, and Becca found herself back on her own turf within about 5 minutes.
“Where’s John?” Rob asked, more to himself than anyone else, but Becca realised she had to say.
“Umm, look, I think you ought to know, he’s, he’s…”
“He’s what?” Rob interrupted.
“I’m sorry, he’s dead!” Becca whispered.
“Look, I know you’re upset, but there’s no need to think like that..”
“No, he is, he’s the person who got killed, you’re about to go and see” she was crying now and Rob clearly thought she had lost it. He let her out of the car and watched her go into her house. As he turned the steering wheel to pull out again, his radio crackled and someone said
“It’s John Robertson, he’s dead”.
A small tear ran down DCI Goldman’s cheek, right before his front window smashed and a brick knocked him back into his seat……..
The interior of the Citroen C5 was a bloody mess, there was a swarm of police cars parked along Becca’s road and an ambulance was pulling away from the kerb, carrying the unconscious body of Robert Goldman.
As Becca had got out of Robs car, she had noticed someone crouching by a double wheely bin 15 yards away. She couldn’t warn Rob because, next to the person was another teenager, holding a gun aimed at her. So she had simply walked on as if nothing was wrong.
As she had closed her door, she heard a window smash outside, she immediately took out her mobile and dialled 999.
Now she was watching the police gathered around DCI Goldmans car from her front room window with a look of horror on her face.
The following morning there was another news-story about a murder, suspected to have been committed by the same person who had raped and killed the two little girls, this time however, it was someone she knew, she couldn’t believe it, she blinked hard and swallowed, hoping it was a dream, but she knew it wasn’t . Becca stood, paralysed staring at the TV screen.
“14 year old James Murray was found in the early hours of this morning floating in a river with numerous stab wounds to his chest…”
Becca felt the tears running down her cheeks…….
One of her best friends in her whole life, was dead .
Becca and James had met at nursery, and had grown up together going to all the same schools. Becca’s eyes went cloudy as she was drawn back to that night 12 months ago, when he had more or less saved her life, she remembered the roar of the traffic below her, and the laughing coming from behind her, she remembered she was freezing cold, standing, at the edge of the footbridge over the motorway, knowing what she was going to be forced to do, and the consequences if she didn’t, she remembered her feet were tied together and the rope was being held by a tall boy called Marcus Killcrass . He was tugging the rope threatening to tip her over the edge,
“NO, please Marcus, please don’t make me, please NO PLEASE ” she cried.
“OK, then” he said, and tugged the rope extra hard, she grabbed the rope, and suddenly she was falling towards the 6 lanes of 70mph traffic below, and then she jerked to a stop, suspended 3 metres above the oncoming traffic, she looked up to see James looking down at her and holding the rope, then she started to go up with James pulling the rope, and then …
Darkness, pure blackness, nothing but darkness.
Becca squirmed on her front room floor, the TV was still on, but now Eastenders was on, and suddenly Becca’s eyes flickered open and she began to register the sound of someone hammering at the door, she realized she had fainted, she got up slowly, feeling dazed and dazzled by the sunlight pouring in.
She made her way towards the front door and started to open it…………………………..
“MUM! You’re OK, I was really worried…” Becca said, looking into her mothers eyes, then she noticed the slight dazed blankness and the way her mum was standing.
“mum? Are you ok?.... MUM? What’s wrong…” then her mum collapsed, just as she heard her back door closing.
Becca picked up the phone and dialled 999 .
Riing riing , riing riing …
“Hello, 999 emergency response, how can I help?”
“Case BT9456, Rebecca Wlliams…”
She heard the tapping of a keyboard and then..
“I’m sorry, but that case doesn’t exist.”
“WHAT??” Becca shouted
“It existed 2 days ago!!”
“Ermm, I’m sorry, but that case has never existed, are you sure you’ve got the right case number?” The operator asked
“YES, I am bloody sure, I’ve used it enough times!”
“Would you like to report the case manually?”
Becca flipped shut her phone and dragged her mums body inside, only to see the side panel of her computer ripped out and the hard drive and modem gone.
Becca pulled out the phone again and dialled 999.
“999 emergency response, how ca…”
Becca cut across and said dryly “I need the police at 45 Twarot avenue, I’d like to report a robbery and attack” and she flipped the phone down.
Once again, she felt her knees give way, and suddenly, she was back on the bridge over the M25 with James……………………………….............................................................
When Becca next regained consciousness she was in an ambulance speeding through north London. The paramedic realised she had woken up, and wrapped an arm around her.
“It’s all gonna be OK, sweety, don’t worry” she said comfortingly.
“What happened? Where are we?” Becca asked groggily.
“Your mum was drugged, she’s gone into a coma, but we’re doing all we can, we’ve been to the hospital already, but we’re going to a special unit near Watford so they can look after your mum, Ok”
“What’s gonna happen to me?”
“Some people are going to look after you until we can get in touch with your dad, don’t worry now, get some rest”.
The thought struck Becca like a golf ball slamming into her head - if Marcus had been able to track down her mum, What was to say he hadn’t caught her dad?
Becca couldn’t face telling the paramedic, so instead, she looked out of the window at the dreary evening rush hour traffic, watching the reflection of the flashing blue lights of the ambulance.
Suddenly there were more flashing lights all around the ambulance, forcing their way through the traffic and creating a path for them to drive through, she watched the police cars flood the road, creating a barrier between the outside world and the ambulance, Becca continued staring blankly at the blue flashing lights, and early evening colours of London, as she sped past, she was thinking, she didn’t know what about, it was something at the back of her mind, something small enough for her not to say anything , but big enough for her to ponder over, still staring out of the ambulance with her cheek rested on the cold glass of the window, Becca thought she saw someone she knew speed past in a blue Nissan micra, it was her mind playing tricks on her, she knew Marcus couldn’t drive, she was simply paranoid. The paramedic who obviously thought she was asleep had gone back to the front, Becca noticed four police cars peel away from the group and speed off down a slipway towards Uxbridge, she had obviously been classified as high risk, but why the police thought they needed to escort her all the way to a hospital that was 35 miles away from her home, she really didn’t know.
She felt the ambulance slow down and seconds later she saw a road-sign for a hospital.
As they pulled into a sheltered delivery bay, Becca read the hospital sign.
Welcome to the NHS Watford royal specialist coma and paralysis unit.
Vehicles are left at owners risk , please do not leave valuables inside your vehicle
She smiled, looking around at the area the hospital was situated, she was surprised anyone would want to come anywhere near it with a wheelbarrow, let alone a car. But sill someone had taken the risk, a light blue Nissan micra was sitting in the corner, Becca read the number plate as a matter of habit.
M232 RYT
The driving paramedic was now at the back of the ambulance wheeling the stretcher out of the back, and the one who had tried to comfort Becca was opening the door of the hospital.
Becca felt a sudden gust of cold wind as the front drivers door opened, she whipped her head around and froze, she hoped she was asleep, she wished with all her energy that she was asleep, but she knew that this wasn’t a dream.
“Hey baby cakes!”
Becca cringed.
“What’s wrong sweetie, you know who I am”
“Yeah, a pathetic, low-life moron, with no friends and an extremely tiny dick”
“Now, that’s not very nice” Marcus replied as he gunned the ambulances engine …………..
RE: opinions please by Tasha on 06-24-2006 at 05:19 PM
Hmm... I read all of this. And well, apart from the general thing of grammar and spelling and that, I have quite a deep thought on your story.
It's okay. It's quite gripping, but to be honest, it's not carried out very well. I think the initial idea is really good, but the way you've written it is just unbelievable, and in a way, gross, to me. You can write in such a way its very tasteful and respectful, gentle yet brutal, but the way you're writing, it's kind of disgusting (that's too strong of a word actually). It's just how you put "raping and beating", like it's a really matter-of-fact thing... It just doesn't seem right to handle such a horrid subject in such a matter-of-fact way.
This story is pretty unbelievable too. I don't mean that it's weird for a 15 year old to do murdering or whatever, but it's really unbelievable that they'd actually do so much in such a short space of time. And I mean, that bit where she goes out the back garden, she couldn't get over the fence and flip like that. Also, the way the police and ambulance people are acting is really just not right, I highly doubt they'd act like that in real life. I really doubt any 14 year old girl in that situation would be as cocky as this Becca appears to be either.
I do seriously dislike how you've handled such a delicate subject in this story. Like I said, the idea is good, it's just the way you've carried it out seems really horrible.
Hey, this is just my opinion, I read and write a lot, so I have a big view and opinion on stories. I reckon this could be an awesome story if it was handled a lot more delicately.
RE: opinions please by Nathan on 06-24-2006 at 05:51 PM
[b]Some tips:/b]
- Check Spelling Mistakes
- Spread the action over time
- Use puncuation to its best of advatages
- dont use.............................. you should use...
- dont tell the day becuase it is like a diary
- get a better ending
- Write it like it would be published (stucture)
- use more composition
I wish I could write like that
Don't take this offensively im just giving factors to make it better!
The bit at the end "...small dick" thats just a bit wierd, get rid of it
apart from all of that it has the pottential to be a really good story.
Put it this way if it comes out in shops I will buy it
RE: opinions please by LittleK on 06-24-2006 at 06:18 PM
Agrees with Tasha, its a bit wierd to be honest, i dont like the way its set out its like something somone with a fetish for killing would write, not an experianced writer. Yeah the ideas good though, but i don't like the way its set out and put across. Sorry!
RE: opinions please by stoshrocket on 06-24-2006 at 06:37 PM
one tip: it is extremely hard to get a professional feel to you're writing... Tasha's thoughts are basically mine as well as they derived from a conversation we had about this story... the best peice of advice i can give you is think about the story more... it feels very, amateurish to me, put this story away, pick it up in a month and read it with a clean mind then see what you think of it. The majority of the time you'll want to change loads... That's what i always do and it improves the style of writing as well...
RE: opinions please by Tasha on 06-24-2006 at 06:49 PM
"...The 9 year old girl who was raped and was brutally beaten up yesterday was found dead at lunchtime today... police were called to Barclays bank in Waltham Abbey yesterday when a customer found her underneath his car in the bank car park..."
She was found dead TODAY, and the customer found her YESTERDAY...
RE: opinions please by Voldemort on 06-24-2006 at 06:50 PM
I agree fully with Tasha...
Try using different word, not repeating things like:
quote:
Originally posted by 00123
she hoped she was asleep, she wished with all her energy that she was asleep, but she knew that this wasn’t a dream.
quote:Becca's name repeats quite a bit too...
Originally posted by Tasha
She knew that getting into a stupid relationship at her age was stupid in the first place,
I think its a bit weird story for a 13 year old
, amateurish, but fairly good short story...In a few years, buy some of Iris Johansen books... they involve murder and that sort of things you wrote about... but seriously, wait a few years
, they involve some 15+ topics...RE: opinions please by azn angel on 06-25-2006 at 06:52 AM
i stopped reading after the raping of the nine yr old..
tbh, the mental illnesses make it pretty unrealistic.. that and her age.