This is my little piece of fan fiction I did for the new MMO, Star Wars The Old Republic.
Star Wars: The Old Republic
--Dantooine, Enclave Ruins--
Every aged field within sight was silent, still. Three-hundred years had passed, yet they remained ever deaf, ever dead to the force, and, until this night, ever dead to curious adventurers who once arrived in their droves, to greet the relics of the Jedi Enclave, with delusions of great fortune.
The sky was dark with contempt, its thunderous clouds were as eyes, scanning down toward the greyed landscape below, upon which were some number of intruders to the Enclave lands. A belch of lightning caused the air to perk up along with a snoozing Rodian who sat lazily against the side of a raised piece of ground not far from the poisoned stream some meters ahead.
“what teh hell!” barked the Rodian, somewhat alarmed.
“lightning Twitch, just lightning… again” the human woman fiddled with her collection of homemade blades, paying little attention to Twitch.
“damned nature, I hate it!”
“and doubtless, it hates you as well” said the voice of the nearby Wookie, aiming his large carbine toward a rock face while gently stroking the trigger in an indisputably sadistic manner.
“I mean you Rodians are the most unnatural lookin’ things in the galaxy, and before you ask that’s including Bith”
“including Bith?! Bah! You wooks aint exactly the cutest Gizka’s in the galaxy either”
“if you think Gizka’s are cute then you Rodians definitely have some issues” the human woman chuckled as she sheathed her blades while the Wookie simply continued the caressing of his carbine.
“put a frag grenade in your mouth and chew Zordan!”
“you wont convince me to do anything with a grenade after that incident on Tatooine…. Those Herders never worked out where their Bantha’s went did they?”
“well technically they didn’t go anywhere” said the woman.
“yeah I think when it swallowed that plasma grenade its skeleton contained most of the blast”
The entire group chuckled, save the Zabrak stood at the edge of camp, avoiding the light of the campfire while nursing a glass of some brown liquid.
“Tayra do you have the life support packs ready?” the woman raised her head, somewhat fearful of the Zabrak.
“… yes why?”
“something doesn’t feel right… we shouldn’t be doing this”
“what’ya on about?! This was YOUR idea! It was YOU who got the deal to plunder these dusty ruins and YOU who convinced us all to come along… and since when the hell do you get cold feet?”
“since it started raining?” Twitch suggested.
“zip it twitch!”
“yikes! Y’ok!”
“you know what I mean Tayra, they say the Jedi left so many traps in that place that this could be where the Mandalorian wars ended! I don’t fancy testing the rumour to be perfectly honest!”
“so when did they set the traps? Before or after it was bombed into submission?” the group laughed but the Zabrak was not amused.
“don’t you feel it? There’s something bad in there… real bad”
“Karno relax! This is just a regular run, we break in, loot every plasteel cylinder we find then we scarper! Same as every other damned theft we do! Except this time we are stealing from dead people!”
“what about all the Laigreks that are meant to be scurrying around down there? Their sure as hell alive!”
“that’s what these are for” Twitch raised his pistols and spun them on his long, green fingers before re-holstering them with a look of immense pride on his face.
“look Karno, either you come with us and help us haul some booty or you wait here and we make sure you don’t get a single credit when we get back to Talus! Your choice..” Karno sighed a sigh of defeat and zipped up his jacket.
“into the belly of the beast!”
“and then out its ugly ass!”
“always a stylish exit for you, huh Twitch?”
“you betcha!”
Standing firm as they had during the Enclave’s destruction, the large steel doors-faded from whatever colour they once were- blocked the raiders path.
“got the plasma torch Zordan?” the Wookie screwed up his fury face.
“eh? Oh sith-spit! I left it at the camp” Twitch’s eyes widened.
“…. I hate you sometimes Zordan.. I really do, guess its me who’s gotta go back.. As usual!” he limped off toward the bridge which led to the camp, cursing under his breath.
“stupid bug” said Zordan as he pulled a plasma torch from beneath his ragged garments and began to mercilessly beat the door with it until there was a small gap through which a small humanoid could climb through.
Tayra gave a loud ‘hum’ before speaking her opinion.
“its very nice Zordan, just your size”
“well my slender figure is something of a legend among my people” he chuckled.
“get the ’strongman’ out, I want this door cleared before Twitch gets back” Karno raised a large metal box, placed it in-between the gaps then looked back at Zordan for support.
“this thing is a lil heavy, care to whack ‘go’ before I drop it?”
‘strongman’ was an impressive tool. It had slowly ejected two long steel hands which made light work of forcing the door aside.
“Zordan you wait out here with Twitch, Karno and I will check out this section of the Enclave. After that we all head into the sublevel, that’s where the REAL fun begins” Karno shivered.
***
--Dantooine, inside the enclave ruins--
It was said to be the part of the Enclave, of the academy, Where the Dantooine Jedi council once stood. During the Jedi civil war, the legendary Sith Lord Darth Revan was said to have come before the masters of the order as a Jedi knight once more- not knowing of his past or his true identity- to receive a mission to defeat Darth Malak and his vast Sith armada.
‘he clearly didn’t succeed’
Tayra thought angrily. She hated the Sith, they had ruined her life and forced her into the life of a common thief. (though she enjoyed her occupation greatly)
“the council chamber is supposed to be straight ahead” Tayra said, trying to reassure Karno. It was now more apparent than ever that he truly was scared of this place- for whatever reason.
The duo clambered over the remains of what seemed to be a giant plant-pot, unaware that the air around them was becoming thinner as fog descended upon them like bullets of rain during monsoon season on Talravin.
“Tayra..” she stopped and turned, irritated at his apparent cowardice.
“what!!?”
“please, lets go, we shouldn’t be here, the Enclave isn’t supposed to be disturbed.. Please, we have to go!”
“no! don’t be such a coward! We’ve come this far and your gonna be scared by a few dusty librarian corpses?! that’s just pathetic Karno!”
“this place isn’t like all the others! Cant you feel it? The… Echo?”
“what echo?”
“I don’t mean an actual echo I mean like… like a… gee I don’t know what I mean”
“then zip it and keep moving!”
Tayra moved forward through the hallway, its floor scattered with crumbling debris, until she realised she was moving alone.
She turned back, squinting- the fog was heavy In here
What fog?! She thought.
“Karno…” she raised her blade.
“.. either you move or I move you!”
She could no longer see him but she knew where he had been stood.
“Karno are you!?-” she stopped dead.
A small crack in the dirt-ridden floor had allowed a flow of dark, red liquid to trickle slowly toward her left boot- ‘blood?!’
She tried to move forward, but her feet wouldn’t let her. All the strength she had was gone, torn away by fear of what was hiding in the mist.
“its not blood… he’s just playing games with you… its not blood… not blood.. Still alive” her whispers were so inaudible that she thought for a moment that the words were not her own yet they were, and they scared her.
After nearly a minute of fear forged stillness, the voice of Tayra’s courage muttered in her ear and commanded her:
“step forward” to discover Karno’s fate.
She stepped forward with her hand on her vibroblade’s hilt but was once again paralysed with fear as she heard the gargled gasps of Karno as a shadowy figure- barely visible through the fog- chocked him against the wall.
Tayra drew her blade and swung it toward the hooded figure without hesitation, however, when the blade collided with the cloaked humanoid- it didn’t!
“wha-!?” she pulled her blade back, through the metaphysical body. The figure turned to face her, releasing his chokehold on Karno. To Tayra’s surprise, Karno- his face drained of blood- remained pinned against the wall, his throat still visibly being squeezed but with no apparent source. The figure was dressed in a hooded black cloak with no interesting features- save the ‘leaf-shaped’ white mask, large black holes ‘decorated’ the area where the eyes would be if they were visible. It was haunting. But the voice in which the figure spoke was even more haunting, more chilling than anything Tayra could imagine.
“herr sharr neeesh creey shaa klaarr greesh!” the figure hissed violently. It outstretched its hand to grab her.
“no!” she swung her blade through his arm but as before it passed through it as if it were gas.
Fearing her life- as Karno had his own- she turned to run further into the Enclave.
{}
Well, I haven't had a chance to play or even look at the new MMO but I can look at your fic ;)
The first thing that grabs my attention is your grammar and punctuation issues. I'm not an English major but when I see alot of errors I get into anal mode but I won't do that here. What seems to be an issue is the fact that when you type in dialogue, there is lake of grammar yet when you write a normal, descriptive sentece you are good. I understand if English is not your first language but that's okay. You can learn alot here.
The basic rules regarding paragraphs with dialogue are that when you quote someone, (i.e. Tayra walked up and said, "You are a Kowakian monkey lizard.") The first letter is captialized since you are writing a sentence within a sentence. Don't forget to add the comma like my example before or even after (i.e. "You are a Kowakian monkey lizard," she said.) The only exceptions are if you have an exclamation or question mark. Other than that you are good.
There was one other thing that got me and that was that you have a bunch of dialogue but nothing much to describe what the characters are doing while they are interacting. It is almost as if your fic reads like a movie script and to tell the truth sometimes gets me all tangled up. Usually what I tell people is that you may know what your characters are going to do but we, your audience don't. My usual metaphor is to try to imagine your audience as if they were blind and you need to tell us what we need to see.
I think you could do with a bit more description of the surroundings. Your initial one with the ruins was good. Kind of mysterious and I like that. You should add more, especially when characters are interacting with one another since you and I both know people tend to do things when they talk like play with something in their pockets or chewing gum. Nice thing is that it's your story and you can make then even do cartwheels.
What would really make all the difference is if you separate who is talking. General rule is that a new paragraph is started when a new person talks. When you clumped dialogue together that gave some confusion a bit.
Overall you have a good start. What I highly recommend is that you proofread before you post your chapters. That way you can look for mistakes that you may have made while writing. Also use the Resource Center since there are articles about different aspects of Star Wars ranging from military formations to Mandalorians and even a thread to ask questions. Also there is a thread to request beta readers. To have a beta is good because they usually catch things that you may have missed.
Remember "Practice makes better." The more you practice, the better you get at developing your writing style. Also you allow yourself to think more about your content and creativity. Hope that helps and I look forward to seeing you post more here in CEC.
Thanks for your comment, punctuation has never really been my strong point lol but hey i'm only 14, got plenty of time to learn lol :)
Welcome to the forums Tayra!
I think that it definately has a lot of potential. As JM12 said, "practice makes perfect", I have to say that it is definately true. It is the only way to progress, and get better. I think that you should also describe the characters more, more of what they look like, what they are wearing, maybe even give them more personallity. It only helps. Good start though.
I look forward to reading more of your writing. :)
Actually it is "Practice makes better" since nothing in life is ever perfect ;) --JM12
^My teacher always told me that. Ever so true. :D
Excellent first Fic, Tayra! I look forward to more, just take the suggestions of the others before me and you will definately improve, much potential there is! "Practice makes better!"
*two thumbs up* :D