"The Fourth Person"

[Jocafer]

This was not Greg Hann's day.


New Jersey, in a stormy late-night...

He ran like no writer had run before. The muscles on his legs contorted with pain. The air that entered and escaped his lungs were short and rapid. His heart throbbed to his every breath. His body felt heavier than before. His eyes blurred. It seemed that the red brick walls that resembled a part of New Jersey's ghetto alleys were a never-ending maze of blood and tears, with no civilian in sight to ask for help. Small puddles of water formed by the hard pouring rain only added more effort to his strides. He knew, then, that his life depended upon his feet. A moment should he stop and rest would risk his life more.

Greg Hann had a simple profile. A New Jersey-born man, this short, blonde and light skinned person in his mid-twenties' lived off on working as a freelance writer for a small and slowly growing publishing house, submitting his originals on every occasion a thought of inspiration entered his left-minded brain. Apparently he lives on a small apartment downtown on which he rented at a fair exchange, except for the old wicked lady who thought it best for "young men" to have strict curfews. Its already late-night, he should have had come home a bit earlier because the old lady wouldn't let him in after 9...

...but now, he will not be able to come home...not anymore.



11:46 pm

Greg felt a sudden jolt of pain on upper side of his head. His vision was pitched black. He can't see a thing. His hands, he can't move them very well. The more he tried to struggle, the more he felt the rope ripping through his skin and the trickle of liquid flowing from his arms. Most probably, as he guessed, that's his fresh blood dripping away.

A large man in a black, drenched coat removed the cloth that prevented Greg's vision. Greg squinted through the ceiling light that assaulted his eyes. He found himself roughly tied to a chair in a rather small, rectangular room clad in dirty white. From as far as he can twist his head sideways, he could only see mirrors. From left to right, only but a mere reflection of himself, a door behind him, and a man infront of him. He adjusted his look to the man. Greg felt another sudden jolt of pain in his head.


He fell down after he stumbled from all his running. A large man was above him. Rain poured hard. Lightning. A crack of thunder. Then, only darkness...


The large man must have been the one who was overshadowing him earlier from the chase, as far as he could remember - the hypothesis aided by the man's rain-soaked clothes. He must have hit him on the head with something, carried him here, and tied him to a chair.

The large man exited from the room, after which a smaller, more "civil" one in the same suit entered bringing along a chair with him. He had eyebags that bulged beneath his eyes, giving them a darker shade of appearance. From his facial features it looked as if the man may be stepping on the thin line separating a father from a grandfather. He sat infront of Greg and they had a brief conversation.

"Hello, Greg.", the man spoke.

"W-who are you? Where am I?", Greg stuttered. His face wrinkled to the pain that had been attacking his hands for quite some time now. He darted his eyes to every nook and cranny in the room.

"Guy. Right now you're being held captive in our facility.", the man said in a professional manner. He had done this many times before.

"Why am I here??", Greg asked.

"Hmm...you write, yes?", the man ignored Greg's inquiry.

"Y-yes", Greg said.

"Ahh...hmm, good. Do you know anything about points of views? First person, second person, third person...?", the man asked.

"Y-yes of course", Greg choked out. This somehow baffled him. The man seemed to be going nowhere.

"Do you-", the man raised his head and thought for a moment.

"--do you think its possible for a fourth person to be involved in a story?", he finally said.

"I..i..", Greg tried to get his words right. The man cut him off.

"Imagine it like this, the first person is in the very scene, the second person is with the first person, the third person is from a fair distance away, 'safe' as I interpreted it; and, well, the fourth person is somewhere farther, way farther. Everywhere and anywhere, to be exact. The only difference between the third and fourth is that..."

"the fourth has control over what's going to happen and what's currently happening."

"Corruption, mass poverty, economic crisis, global warming, and who to blame? The petty government? Ha!", the man laughed to the thought. "You, mr.Greg, you impress me. To think that a lowly freelance writer like you would even have the slightest idea of what's really going on? You almost got us there."

"P-please, tell me why did you bring me here", Greg said.

"That new book you wrote, and probably the last, talked too much about us. I'm deeply curious on how you have arrived to a few near-true facts, but it does not matter. I'm a busy man. Simply we must get rid of you to get this over with.", the man said.

"But-", Greg did not have a chance to answer.

bang.

The man said his final words and left the room with the pale body.


Greg had to die.
It's for the best.

--------------------------------o

did i miss out on anything? comments? constructive criticisms please :D
just an idea I had while I was thinking if it was really possible that there could be a fourth person point-of-view story, hehe. sorry if its a bit naive thinkin' about it. it can happen though, i think...just curious :P

hope ya liked it! :)

EDIT: removed unnecessary words and rewrote a few sentences from the advice of aunt shecky and night eyes, thx! :D

if there's still problems with the story feel free to comment :)

[Nighteyes5678]

I don't have much time right now, so I'll be succinct. There is past tense, present tense and future tense. You have chosen to write the story in past tense - good choice - but continually drift into present and future tense. This makes the story hard to read and hard to understand. Tense consistency is tricky to master, but it's simply a must for good writing.

Do you want me to provide you with examples?

[Jocafer]

I don't have much time right now, so I'll be succinct. There is past tense, present tense and future tense. You have chosen to write the story in past tense - good choice - but continually drift into present and future tense. This makes the story hard to read and hard to understand. Tense consistency is tricky to master, but it's simply a must for good writing.

Do you want me to provide you with examples?

sure dude. also include the parts of the story i had errors with so i can improve it :D

thx for commenting, hehe :P

[Nighteyes5678]

A simple example: "He ran, ran like no writer had ran before." 'He ran' is in past tense, which sets the tense of the story. Thus, it needs to be "He ran, ran like no writer had run before."

Let's take a larger segment, shall we? "The large man to his front must have been the one who was overshadowing him earlier, as far as he can remember, also taking in the fact that the man's clothes were drenched(from rain, maybe?). He must have hit him in the head with something, then carried him here and tied him to this chair he's sitting on right now." This is a little more complicated section. You mix proper present tense with past tense, but slip up a few times. "The large man to his front must have been the one who was overshadowing him earlier," is good, but do we really need to state his location again? We just covered that, so slash that out, and then we have, "as far as he can remember," - Do you see the problem now? To get the past tense inserted back into the story, we have to make "can" into "could" so it reads: as far as he could remember". To be honest, the rest of the sentence "also taking in the fact that the man's clothes were drenched(from rain, maybe?)." seems distracting in this sentence. If you really want to include that information right here, you might make it a separate sentence, perhaps one like: This hypothesis was aided by the man's rain-drenched clothes. - or something like that. Finally, the rest of the section, "He must have hit him in the head with something, then carried him here and tied him to this chair he's sitting on right now." has quite a few bugs. First, "He must have hit him in the head with something," has a problem because the word "in" is incorrect. It should be on the head, unless if the man rooted around in the poor writer's brainpan, which would be awkward all around. "...then carried him here and tied him to this chair he's sitting on right now," is far too wordy for our purposes. Slash out the unnecessary bits, dice up the run-on words and get: "...,carried him here, and tied him to the chair." We can figure out that he's currently tied to a chair - we're smart cookies, have faith in us. So, put it all together and it reads like this: The large man must have been the one who was overshadowing him earlier, as far as he could remember - the hypothesis aided by the man's rain-soaked clothes. He must have hit him on the head with something, carried him here, and tied him to a chair.

Much better!

That's all the mechanics I'm going to do right now. Do you see what I'm getting at, though? Think of it this way: you have to send this story to a friend, but the e-mail service you're using charges you by the word. Go through your story and make sure every word is necessary. If not, cut it out.

Finally, a thought about what you're trying to do here. When reading it, I felt that the switch from 3rd person to 4th person was sudden, abrupt and not smooth enough to get your point across. Also, the plot seems choppy and unclear - it needs some work. Just a thought.

Keep writing!

[AuntShecky]

Try to cut down on needless repetition. A short story is supposed to be about economy of words. Try to say volumes in just a handful of well-thought-out phrases. Show,don't tell.
Let the reader decide whether it's Greg's day or not.

[Jocafer]

A simple example: "He ran, ran like no writer had ran before." 'He ran' is in past tense, which sets the tense of the story. Thus, it needs to be "He ran, ran like no writer had run before."

Let's take a larger segment, shall we? "The large man to his front must have been the one who was overshadowing him earlier, as far as he can remember, also taking in the fact that the man's clothes were drenched(from rain, maybe?). He must have hit him in the head with something, then carried him here and tied him to this chair he's sitting on right now." This is a little more complicated section. You mix proper present tense with past tense, but slip up a few times. "The large man to his front must have been the one who was overshadowing him earlier," is good, but do we really need to state his location again? We just covered that, so slash that out, and then we have, "as far as he can remember," - Do you see the problem now? To get the past tense inserted back into the story, we have to make "can" into "could" so it reads: as far as he could remember". To be honest, the rest of the sentence "also taking in the fact that the man's clothes were drenched(from rain, maybe?)." seems distracting in this sentence. If you really want to include that information right here, you might make it a separate sentence, perhaps one like: This hypothesis was aided by the man's rain-drenched clothes. - or something like that. Finally, the rest of the section, "He must have hit him in the head with something, then carried him here and tied him to this chair he's sitting on right now." has quite a few bugs. First, "He must have hit him in the head with something," has a problem because the word "in" is incorrect. It should be on the head, unless if the man rooted around in the poor writer's brainpan, which would be awkward all around. "...then carried him here and tied him to this chair he's sitting on right now," is far too wordy for our purposes. Slash out the unnecessary bits, dice up the run-on words and get: "...,carried him here, and tied him to the chair." We can figure out that he's currently tied to a chair - we're smart cookies, have faith in us. So, put it all together and it reads like this: The large man must have been the one who was overshadowing him earlier, as far as he could remember - the hypothesis aided by the man's rain-soaked clothes. He must have hit him on the head with something, carried him here, and tied him to a chair.

Much better!

That's all the mechanics I'm going to do right now. Do you see what I'm getting at, though? Think of it this way: you have to send this story to a friend, but the e-mail service you're using charges you by the word. Go through your story and make sure every word is necessary. If not, cut it out.

Finally, a thought about what you're trying to do here. When reading it, I felt that the switch from 3rd person to 4th person was sudden, abrupt and not smooth enough to get your point across. Also, the plot seems choppy and unclear - it needs some work. Just a thought.

Keep writing!

hehe cool I get it now :P
sure imma edit it as you say, hehehe thx again! :)

tense, my numero uno problemo, tsktsk

[Jocafer]

Try to cut down on needless repetition. A short story is supposed to be about economy of words. Try to say volumes in just a handful of well-thought-out phrases. Show,don't tell.
Let the reader decide whether it's Greg's day or not.

cool, cool. thanks for the advice! :D