S.O.S. Space Exploration Chapter 1

[Richard-Allen]

C-1

I peered at the screen where there was a blip. There numerous smaller blips. They looked tiny in comparison to the large one. I worried... No! I was concerned about seeing it there. My mouth grew dry as I saw it there. The screen showing what before us. There should not be one there. We are afraid of what we saw. Space should have been void of life other than alien life forms. There was one ship. I felt it could be a human type ship, but I could not be sure from the blip alone. But I felt it was dangerous for us. I was the intelligence officer my name is Bucka. I heard what Jewels had heard over the com just past the static. It was a mayday signal. That was something earth used many centuries ago. There should be no earth ships here.

“Winds can you see what that ship looks like!” Mual asked.

“Yes, I can,” Winds implored.

“ Bring it up full on the screen,” Mual said, turning to the screen.

Winds expanded the screen to show the spaceship. It looked like a box, several kilometers long. The ship was armed to the eye teeth in weapons they would effective against any adversary in space. That we had come across. There were marks identifying it as a US spacecraft.

It could have been a huge meteor shower, that caused the damage, but we doubted it. A huge dent in the middle of the ship, with gouges and tears in this dent. There are pieces and portions of the spaceship littering space where it happened. The scorch marks marring the surface didn’t come from a meteor shower. But an attack by someone or thing. It had been attacked by someone with certainty. We could see into the ship to see the ship’s interior hallways and rooms through the damage done to the ship. We suspected.

It resembled an Earth space ship from the US space agency. That made no sense, There was no way an Earth could be from there. The US agency hadn’t designed a way to travel as fast as warp in the time that this ship had come to be. When the Alliance came to accept us, Earthlings, as space travelers. She turned to the targeting screen. She froze as she saw it there. She looked at it again trying to see if she hadn’t imagined it. She discovered no she had not missed seeing it.

Mual in the middle of the bridge he advanced towards Winds. His cadence is not broken. His hands are behind his back. He frowned, with a furrow on his brow. His eyes glued to the ship he transfixed by seeing it, “How could it be there?”

“I don`t know! There has to be an explanation for this?” I suggested as I looked at the ship. It defied common sense, there could not be a ship from there. Could there? I could not believe my eyes. An earth ship before the Alliance, there is no way it could be there. It could not fly at warp. Pieces would fly off of the ship as it gained this speed it encountered. Yet the whole space ship there.

I was afraid that I saw the ship. I was fearful of how the ship could be here. There was no way it could be there. I knew what the ships at that time frame were able to do. They could not be there, how could they be there. It was not possible. The ship was not able to fly at warp.

The ship had the appearance of a human type ship before the Alliance; this was what I felt it was. That was impossible. How could it possibly be there? It defied common sense. Rubbed the back of my neck to relieve the tension I was feeling upon seeing it there. I felt fear bubble up inside of me.

“Bucka, that’s where the signal came from!” , Jewels said as she looked about. Her eyes wide with horror upon hearing this radio signal over the static. Jewels seated at her chair listening in over the static of space, when she heard a mayday signal over the com. The bridge is spacious having rounded edges for all of the equipment on her. There is a huge board where communication and satellite information came in on. There is an area for a drink to be set on and food as well.

“Who sent the signal?” Mual asked who was standing in the middle of the bridge with his hands clasped behind his back he turned and strode towards her in a confident gait. He wore a coat and dress shirt that silk, slacks that black from his belt hung a sword, and a revolver in a holster. He is a tall man with a bit of muscle on his body. His left cheek had a scar from a dagger that caught him there, it was jagged.

“Is that really what we are seeing?” Winds asked, her eyes huge in disbelief.

“We have received a Mayday,” Jewels said, peering at Winds with Mual hovering beside her. She tried to calm her nerves as she opened and closed her hands. Mual's eyes were stone-cold and unmoving. He looked at the screen where the image. He looked concerned. His jacket and dress shirt without a wrinkle or spot on them. He gnawed his lower lip as he saw it there. He did a double-take of it.

Jewels heard over her commlink, “This is Dark castle. We are under attack. We need assistance. Mayday! We are under attack!”

Jewels responded, “We are. Responding to your Mayday. What is your location? How about if the crew are still alive?”

She heard nothing over the commlink, but static aside from the Mayday. That she heard as clear as day. Fear’s maw bit down her soul, she was frightened by what she saw there. The ship could not be there. It could not. Yet it was? Why was it there, there had to be a reason for this to have happened here.

“Is there anyone there?” Mual asked, his eyebrows arched. He had a military bearing, head held high. Back straight he had his hands behind him. Furrows appeared on his forehead. He squinted. Mual asked as he looked at Winds, there were tears in his eyes, “Location of the signal?”

“Bearings 347 latitude 567, it came from there,” Jewels said. There is a little dot of light on the screen. The screen is 3 meters square.

“An earth signal?” Jewels asked, “I can't believe what I heard. How Could an Earth Ship Be?”

“There should be no earth ship! Especially an Earth ship before the Alliance! That can not be!” Mual exclaimed his skin paled, beads of sweat began to appear on his forehead. He trembled.

“Then why did we receive a Mayday! Not an SOS, but a Mayday,” Winds said beads of sweat ran down her face and her eyes wide in terror as she realized this.

“Earth used Mayday before the Alliance came into being! Didn’t they? Especially the US at that time?” Jewels asked looking at me as I sat there in my chair.

“It does not make sense,” Mual declared. “There has to be a record of it being! He knew that they hadn’t sent any ships from what he recalled. He could not remember when the spaceship named Black Castle ever entered space.”
.
There was a wheel that the helmsman handled to its right. There are four seats there on the bridge. One for the communication tech, the ship’s weapon specialist, the security officer, and lastly the first officer.

“The ship is signaling SOS. The signal is as it should be if it is from the earth prior to the alliance.” Jewelsreplied, the blood drained from her face. Her eyes widened, her fingers trembled as she looked at Mual. She knew that there should be no ship from the earth. Especially prior to the alliance. That the reason that we explore this region of space?

“Bucka, what do you make of it!” Mual screamed.

“What are you talking about? There were no ships sent out before the Alliance,” I declared, and grinned. I want to find human life out rather than alien life forms. The aliens do not like humans.

“That’s where the target is located,” Winds said. Her face pale, eyes widened.

Winds lifted her eyes, smiled, prepared to engage the weapon systems. Her hands hovered above the buttons to control the weapon boards and looked triumphantly at Captain Mual awaiting his words to fire.

The warning lights flashing, there came bells chiming, the emergency initialized.

 

[Joshua Jones]

Thanks for sharing your work! I can tell you spent quite a bit of time hammering out the universe in which this occurred, and it does seem like an interesting start of the story. I do have some things I feel I should bring to your attention though…

First, I’m fine with a disjointed approach to writing, but there are some grammatical issues here that take me out of the experience. You’re going to want to have a good editor go through your work to point out and correct these. Alternatively, these could be intentional as part of the character, but for me, it doesn’t quite work if so.

Second, there is a massive amount of unnecessary repetition in this scene. Declarations that the ship’s presence doesn’t make sense was probably the worst about this:

• Bucka (12):
  • There should be no earth ships here.
  • That made no sense, There was no way an Earth could be from there.
  • It defied common sense, there could not be a ship from there
  • An earth ship before the Alliance, there is no way it could be there
  • I was afraid that I saw the ship.
  • I was fearful of how the ship could be here.
  • There was no way it could be there
  • They could not be there, how could they be there.
  • It was not possible.
  • That was impossible.
  • How could it possibly be there?
  • It defied common sense.
• Mual (5):
  • How could it be there?
  • There should be no earth ship! Especially an Earth ship before the Alliance!
  • That can not be!
  • It does not make sense
  • There has to be a record of it being
• Winds (1):
  • Is that really what we are seeing?
• Jewels (5):
  • The ship could not be there.
  • It could not. Yet it was?
  • Why was it there, there had to be a reason for this to have happened here.
  • I can't believe what I heard. How Could an Earth Ship Be?
  • She knew that there should be no ship from the earth

We get it. They don’t understand why it’s there. But you spent 216 words outright telling the audience the ships presence doesn’t make sense, or about 15% of the chapter. There are also repetitious statements about the crew members being afraid, descriptions of Mual’s appearance (4 that I counted), the mayday/SOS distinction, and others. None of these things are necessarily bad on their own, but when there are so many uses of it, I feel it’s swatting a fly with a radioactive sledgehammer.

Third, I was a little thrown by where you placed the descriptions of Mual and company’s ship, as well as some of the descriptions given. For example, consider:

“Jewels seated at her chair listening in over the static of space, when she heard a mayday signal over the com. The bridge is spacious having rounded edges for all of the equipment on her. There is a huge board where communication and satellite information came in on. There is an area for a drink to be set on and food as well.”

This interjection of a description takes the reader out of the action, and honestly doesn’t do much to advance the story, because there is no reference to those features again. For example, at least at this point, you don’t have Jewels suddenly jarred and striking her head on the rounded surfaces, which presumably would not cut her in such an event (hence the point of the rounded features). You don’t have her eating here, so the reference to the food and drink area is irrelevant. In my opinion, details like these should be left out until there is a specific reason to mention them, such as the characters interacting with them in some way. This is especially important with first person narration like you have here, because presumably this isn’t Bucka’s first time seeing Jewels’ workstation, so the likelihood that he would take note of these details at this moment is pretty low. Details like “The screen is 3 meters square” is another example. How would the dimensions of the viewing screen be relevant at some point in this story unless one of the characters ripped it from its mount to use is as a makeshift shield or something?

All that said, I kinda like the idea of where this is going, and while I do think this is several drafts away from being complete, I think it has some potential. So keep working at it and you’ll get there. Also, if you haven’t already, check out some of the writing challenges on this forum! These have helped me immensely as a writer, and I commend them to anyone who is even remotely interested in having a published work.

Thanks again for sharing!

 

[Richard-Allen]

Thank you. You have done a greatr deal of work here. I appreciate it. So, how may times should I reiterate about a problem. One other writer pointed it out to me. I did not realize that I had done this with the ship as well. So, I should try and cut it down. Unless I have another reaction to the detail of their response. The information you have supplied will be looked at. Thank you so, much for this information that you have gleaned here for me. Thank you.

 

[Joshua Jones]

Thank you. You have done a greatr deal of work here. I appreciate it. So, how may times should I reiterate about a problem. One other writer pointed it out to me. I did not realize that I had done this with the ship as well. So, I should try and cut it down. Unless I have another reaction to the detail of their response. The information you have supplied will be looked at. Thank you so, much for this information that you have gleaned here for me. Thank you.

Anytime! I hope this proves helpful.

Perhaps some of the more accomplished writers on here should chime in, but for me, the rule of repetition is as few times as possible. In broad terms, I prefer to let my readers remember this sort of thing and imply it in dialogue and actions than have the narrator pop up and remind them again. But, again, I don't pretend to know if this is the best approach; I was just making a point as a reader.

 

[Richard-Allen]

As you should. I have to try ane engage the reader, I have to remember that If I said something once. It should be enough. A fellow writer suggested if I still want to use this tangent. I should have an other reaction to the item listed. If he is afraid. Why is he afraid. Give examples of this or an example of this. This way you present to the reader a reason.
The description is able to allow the reader to know these things. Should I repost the work again, I realize I need help in this. Thank you for the support.

 

[The Judge]

Should I repost the work again,

Not for a while. Quite apart from anything else, this version has only been up for a few hours, so there may well be some more critiques to come. Then you need to work through this scene and take account of all the feedback you've received here and in the earlier critique. Take it slowly -- writing is a marathon, not a sprint. After you've revised this scene again, I'd suggest you leave it for a while, and work on other chapters for a few weeks, then come back to this one and have another look at it. You'll undoubtedly see things that you will want to change since in even that short time you will have gained more experience. Make those changes and then perhaps think of putting a third version up.

Meanwhile, I don't know how much reading you do, but I'd advise you to spend time a lot of time reading and then analysing what you read. In the critiques you kindly gave others, your feedback largely consisted of giving a summary of the extract, which rather suggests that you haven't yet acquired understanding of the other aspects of writing -- not just grammar, but things such as point of view, world-building, character arcs, how to build tension and excitement in a scene etc. You need to learn all of these things, and more, to become a proficient writer, and reading other works and seeing how other authors deal with these matters, can be invaluable.

Although personally I'm not fond of How-To-Write books, they can be helpful, especially for new writers, so it might be an idea for you to get hold of a couple and work through them. In the meantime, we do have a Toolbox thread which covers some issues such as info-dumping and action scenes which might be of interest. The Toolbox -- The Important Bits

 

[Richard-Allen]

Thank you. I was referring allowing the other writers who critique the item to complete this for me. I thank you for all the support you have offered to me.
I have found that the company is very good to deal with, I should take a look at the other work that is offered to the writers to learn the rules and the things that we have to offer to learn. I appreciate the help you are offering to us fellow writers.

 

[Abernovo]

Okay, very quickly, as I really am supposed to be doing other stuff (story of my life -- juggle, balance, etc.)

I'll start off by saying I like the scenario. You take us straight into the action. I like the set-up, and you give the impression you've got a story going here. But (you knew this was coming ), you're using your page space to tell a lot of what could be shown. You have a great stand-out sentence in the first paragraph, "My mouth grew dry as I saw it there". That's where you can start it from.

Purely as an example: My mouth grew dry as I saw the blip* where there should have been none.

You have no need to tell us the character is afraid. Emotion is conveyed by the mouth going dry. That really worked for me, and I wanted to know why your character's mouth dried up. Emotions are visceral. In the same way, don't tell us of a martial bearing. Show us, and we'll get it, because we'll be on the bridge with your character. Don't tell us that it couldn't be a US ship; let a character question how it could be, and perhaps have another point out there'll be time to work that out after, and to get on with the job at hand of responding to a ship in need of assistance. Then you can drip the background detail in later rather than it breaking up what needs to be a tense scene.

I want to find human life out rather than alien life forms. The aliens do not like humans.

Related to that is where, I think, your character's thoughts interject into the story. The concept is fine, but improving the closeness of the storytelling may stop the tense slip, where it drifts out of first person into an omniscient third.

You have a bit of repetition going on, which you can deal with, so not a huge deal on an early draft, but maybe something to watch. Things like the fact it's a Mayday call. Once established, you probably don't need to refer to it as a Mayday again. If you do find you need to, you could switch out to distress call, maybe.

Finally, I think you've got the beginnings of a story here, but you need to develop rhythms, something which is discussed in the toolbox Her Honour mentioned. At the minute, your sentence structure is a bit staccato. If you vary sentence lengths, you can create a flow. And, different tempos can actually show the characters individual speech patterns, and thoughts, as well as differentiating the story flow from the conversation, action from routine duties, and so on.

Most of all, well done for posting something for critique, and good luck with your work in progress. Remember, it's a marathon, not a sprint, and we've all of us been there, and will be there again, just trying to sand down the rough edges. Right, back to work for me.

*Honestly, not sure about the word 'blip', but that's such a minor point.

 

[Joshua Jones]

The other thing I'll add to the excellent suggestions of @The Judge is I would strongly encourage you to enter the writing challenges on this site. The quality of work by the other writers is absolutely incredible, the tight word limits will push you to be concise and ruthless as an editor (I literally cut two thirds of my first draft from my 100 Word Anonymous Challenge entry, and each challenge has an "Improving" section where you can post your story for review and suggestions (or, for my stories, to be flayed and scattered to the winds!). And, because we're talking about stories that are 75, 100, or 300 words, it doesn't necessarily take forever to write them.

 

[Richard-Allen]

hi,
A blip is what appears on a radar scope when it identifies an object being there. This is what the techs call them. I don't know what they will call signature of a ship being on a targeting board of a space ship In the future. That is why they have been called a blip as they have been able determine them. So, I have no idea as to what they will call them. I don't know what devises can travel faster then warp speed. I don't think we have anything that can travel after than that present. So, I will stick with blip.
Thank you for asking about that matter. The ship has a way to stop the signal of the targeting array to show that the ship is there. So, they know that they are there. There maybe a way to cloak the ship like the stealth crafts do to not be seen by them. I realize that there maybe a way that the spaceship has done this.
I think, warp will make the targeting array not work. That is what I have been developing for the reader to understand.

 

[Richard-Allen]

Can you helpRichard print the above article.