2 Tickets to Muslandia

[sam221766]

I got 92 views on my previous story, and one follower on my blog , so I decided to write another short story. I hope this one isn't too offensive, it's about army stuff in the middle east. As per the last time, I'll post it here and you can read it and please comment, either here or on my blog, and both stories are on my blog now. So without further ado, here is:


Aww it won't let me post. Probably a banned word in there. He's the first part and you can find the rest on my blog...
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It's not letting me post at all. Read it on my blog please. :(

[sam221766]

my blog is my username, sam221766 on wordpress dot com.

[sam221766]

Oh it was probably the url ban...I'm totally finding better forums, maybe google on writing forums...anyways, here's the new story. Hopefully.

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2 Tickets to Muslandia
“Evil has been discovered again”, my commanding officer said to me one day. So I asked him what exactly was going on, and how it affected me.

He said that a small geopolitical government located near a country I was already familiar with, Iraq, and that they were enslaving Americans and foreign people as well as attacking their neighboring countries and doing a variety of other illegal things, that were of course legal there due to a dysfunctional dictatorship.

They were racially homogenous too, all Muslims and a darkish hue of those, and half way around the world from our apartment in California.

So I asked if the army was going to handle it, and he said that before the bulk of the army moves, we need solid proof of these accusations that I personally believe in, due to the cost in fuel and man hours of moving the bulk of the naval and other forces into position to attack a geopolitical entity.

So that’s where I came in. As an experienced soldier and former POW of a similar situation in Panama, I agreed to go to a place code named “Muslandia” that was controlled by a specific sect of Muslims that were mostly ignoring the common geopolitical boundaries of countries as they’re commonly observed in the NATO countries.

They had a kid for me to work with too. A young female, maybe 8 or so, was dressed as a child slave in restraints and in my car when I approached a suspected facility. I was 22 at the time, dressed in Army pants and no shirt, since it was hot. Tucked into my belt was a desert eagle fifty caliber hand gun with two reloads in my cargo pockets.

We rolled up to the gate in my car with the preteen and myself, and there was a camera there. I stopped in front of the gate and camera, and then the gate opened for us, instead of say them calling the local police, which was another thing that could have happened.

We entered the facility, and it was a series of wooden buildings, painted with windows some two stories tall but none taller.

An American group met us and spoke English. They didn’t ask me who I was, and I assumed they assumed we were all here to do a slave exchange. They asked me if I was selling, and I said I was buying. There was a briefcase of money in the trunk of my sedan, along with an m4 assault rifle.

They seemed a little suspicious of me, and I noted that they looked at my pants a few times, probably wondering if I was actually a slave trader or some kind of undercover military operative trying to get them busted or dead. It was a legit suspicion, but one that I really didn’t want them to have or determine accurately.

They wanted to separate us, and at the risk of exposure and also being outmanned and outgunned by a mysterious number of people, I agreed that they could take the preteen, who I had informally named teen agent, into the facility to talk to her.

I wasn’t sure how well she would do in an interrogation, probably not so good was most of my info on that topic, so I got a little agitated and started questioning the remaining men if this was some sort of set up or trap and said I wanted to see more slaves and I wanted that one back since we had bonded a little.

I was kind of looking for an excuse to take my gun out and wave it around, and thought of bribing them first. So I asked how many slaves I could get for a briefcase full of money, it was around a half million dollars in stacked $100 bills that I was supposed to not lose to them, along with also some mention on bringing teen agent back with me in one piece.

Then teen agent came running out. She had slipped her restraints via a hidden mechanism that was built in to her custom restraints, and she ran towards me and said that she told them what was going on.

So I took my gun out quickly, and as I guessed there was a guy jogging behind her and so I quickly brought my gun up between us, sighted quickly down the barrel and pulled the trigger. The bullet deployed correctly and struck him in the face and exploded the back of his head nicely, a rainbow of colors from the eyes and meat and brains as well.

At that point they were skeptical about my intent as well, but due to me having a gun out and obviously not bluffing with it, they were suddenly a lot more eager to do what I told them to do. It also prevented the guy from saying what teen agent said to him, which probably sounded a lot like “US army special forces recon” or something similar.

So I said to bring me some slaves, that I was now robbing them instead of buying. As I said this I pointed me gun at one and then the other, kind of flexing it and pushing on the back a little like I was going to push against the recoil, and it was effective and scared the **** out of them.

I suppose at that point they were hoping that I was a slave trader criminal, that was also willing to rob them. Those crimes kind of go together, and army pants are easy enough to come by. So to calm me down, they agreed to bring some slaves out. One of them said he’d go and get them.

So he went into one of the buildings, and came out with five children, around the ages of 6 to 15, all naked and restrained. So I stacked them into my vehicle, with teen in the front seat, them in the back seat and trunk, and thanked the men there for the slaves and said I wasn’t going to kill them if they didn’t cause me any more problems.

And then I drove off. Right to the waiting helicopter at the meeting point to the east. The kids were looking all concerned until we pulled up to the group of men all dressed fully in US army uniforms. Then they started cheering and crying tears of relief that their really, really explicit ordeal was over, and we got plenty of evidence from the camera in the car, the wire I and teen agent were wearing, and the testimony from the kids I rescued.

[Calidore]

You won't be unable to post because of naughty words, as those will simply be replaced with *s. New posters are unable to post links to cut down on spam, as well as people joining just to increase traffic to their blogs/YouTube channels, etc. The more of a presence you are here, and especially the more you offer feedback on others' works, the more you'll find people commenting on yours.

One question: In your other story post, you specifically requested "positive feedback." Did you simply mean praise, or positive in the sense of "useful and constructive"?

[sam221766]

I'm going with useful and constructive. Sometimes I get feedback like "YOU SUCK" or "TL;DR" or "Banned", those are less helpful. But yeah I'm happy to get feedback about the stories including if you don't like them, but please include why you like or don't like them so I can improve my future stories and hopefully a future novel contract that will make me rich and famous. :)

Also any idea on how to make money with short stories, like submitting them to magazines and getting paid or writing for blogs or that kind of thing?

As for reading other people's, I really should, although the ones I did read had kind of low quality...seems like the stories I read would be helped by more real world adventuring to have more things to write about that are less common.

Also thanks for responding. Your post was helpful and informative.

[sam221766]

I tried adding the blog address to my signature...now I'm testing it to see if it works.

[Delta40]

The story itself is not my cup of tea. The major problem is it is all tell, tell, tell. There are many opportunities for you to put in dialogue between the main character and others that you interact with to build up a real show of tension for the reader but you skip all of this as if you were reciting it at some bbq.

Readers don't get the chance to relate to any characters when stories are written in this way or to appreciate the full gravity of the situation because the writer hasn't 'put them there' and that is the value of showing them rather than telling.

Try rewriting it by giving a voice to the commander, the 8 year old and the slave traders as well as the main character and bring the story to life.

[Calidore]

Delta's spot on. This reads like a story outline rather than a story. Best suggestion I can offer is to read lots of short stories of the type you want to write, and read them with an eye to learning from them.

[Steven Hunley]

Delta's spot on. This reads like a story outline rather than a story. Best suggestion I can offer is to read lots of short stories of the type you want to write, and read them with an eye to learning from them.

The problem I had with it was realism. By the first paragraph I knew I was having difficulties. Seriously, I would have been happier if it had been full of vampires and zombies and wolf men and women instead. The government has an 8 year old work for them? Not actually. Some dude on a secret mission is packing a Desert Eagle, the most impractical hand gun in the world? Not likely. The dude must have a big belt to tuck it in.

Realize there are vets out there who read this stuff. It's not comic book material to them. They know the territory, the rules of engagement and the weaponry. Talk to a vet, watch a movie, or do research, or all three.

Not until a story is believable is it any good.

Oh, just leave a significant letter out of your 'naughty' words and they'll pass. But not being able to insert 'naughty' words isn't what this story lacks.

[sam221766]

Yeah okay, I can expand it a bit. I did type it kind of fast in one sitting, and am not used to writing longer stuff yet. It's kind of like exercising, I guess...that as I write more, I'll be able to write longer more detailed stories. Making the characters more relatable is probably good...not sure how to undercover investigate human traffiking without some bait, and I bet if I fleshed out the teen agent character a bit better, maybe give her a baby eagle, and uh I'm pretty sure the desert eagle works great and fits in a belt, it's not that much bigger than a colt .45...plus it has more penetration without having hollow point bullets and is one of the preferred guns of the armed forces, right? So as for realisticness, perhaps it's a bit debatable, but it's a lot more so than vampires or zombies...

Although I could totally do a zombie story about a biological virus weapon that makes people selfishly want to spread it to find a cure faster, along with fitting in, and also they all start starving and eating people and using weapons to eat while the virus corrodes their bodies...

Although yeah it might be a good outline, I might rewrite the paragraphs into longer stories each, juggle it around a little, and of course

Thanks for the feedback! You guys are awesome. :)

Also a wordpress question...I got 3 emails from wordpress saying I got a follower, and two saying someone "liked" my newer story. But when I check my wordpress stats, it only shows 1 visitor to the blog...and there should be at least 3 or more...and is the 'liked' a facebook thing? I don't see a like button when I browse to my own site...

[AuntShecky]

If you're serious about writing fiction, you have to start reading. There is no short cut. Read every short story you can get your hands on, from a variety of eras and sub-genres. As you read each story, ask yourself not only what the author is trying to say, but how he or she is saying it.

Avoid mundane, outworn, commonplace expressions; strive for a lively style that doesn't put readers to sleep. SHOW, don't tell.

Unless you have spent uncountable hours of research on a specific topic, stick to subject matter more in line with your personal experience. That doesn't necessarily mean "write what you know," it can also mean "write what you want to know." Even so, I don't buy anything in this particular story at all; not one word of this quasi-military tale rings true.

[sam221766]

Yeah ok. I'm thinking of doing a jet story next. In the interest of making it realistic, that is important, right ? That the fiction be realistic, and I ponder if demographics are an issue in that...I'm not sure how much the commenters liked the story, although I plan on making it a bit less overview and more immediate and descriptive. Anyways now I have to parse through bank records to find that 3d computer screen purchase so I can warranty my 3d screen that broke with the 3d glasses...maybe a story about a holodeck in the distant future? Does that have to be realistic, or just internally consistent?

[Calidore]

If you don't understand what someone's saying, it's much better to respond with questions than snark, lest you find the good advice you desperately need drying up.

Real and realistic aren't the same thing. Zombies aren't real, but they can be handled realistically, which means as if they're real. As well, the fictional people who encounter these fictional walking dead also behave realistically according to their individual personalities when encountering the zombies.

Likewise, the Muppets aren't real--they're essentially just people's hands moving in decorated sleeves--but they behave realistically, and so people identify with them.

As Stephen and Auntie said, nothing you wrote above feels real. Nobody has a personality, there's no real dialogue, it's all this happened, then that happened, etc. You need realistic characters, settings, and atmosphere. Reading published stories is a good way to see the basics of storytelling in action. They may not all be great, but they at least met a professional standard, which is a start.

[sandy14]

Two tickets, but I don't know either character's name, or what they look like. Do they have accents, what languages do they speak, what are their names - it helps. Give the (fictional) country a name too.

Think about your descriptions a bit more. Stuff like; "the common geopolitical boundaries of countries as they’re commonly observed in the NATO countries" NATO covers mostly Western Europe and the USA - a very small part of the world and there is some debate about how well NATO respects the borders of other nations. If they are causing international incidents on the border, just say that. Nato/the UN hasn't got anything to do with the story anyway.

On the firearms business, why would agents on an undercover mission wander around with big American gun? It's a bit of a giveaway.

It might be worthwhile taking a look at a couple of the Agent Nick Carter books to see how these spy thrillers are constructed if you are looking at the pot boiler spy thrillers (they're fast and furious, but not subtle) or maybe Tom Clancy's stuff (bit more subtle, but longer). Ian Fleming also wrote some short and long for James Bond too. You need to show us stuff, rather than tell us and I think they'll show you how it can be done in the genre you've chosen. At least it's a start. This means your story will be a lot longer, but it needs to be so you can fit everything in. I think that rather than a short story, you're looking at a short novel.

[sam221766]

I'm having a hard time getting inspired to write another story...maybe it seems like too much work, although I feel an urge to follow the suggestions mixed with really knowing the bbq storytelling style a lot better. Also the desert eagle is an israeli gun, although I guess I could use a colt .45, a very common gun also in use by the US army...although yeah I should do a more detailed, perhaps shorter story, maybe something about piloting a SR-71 with its ramjet engine, high altitude observations, the tension and chatter inside the large aerial vehicle, a photo of one, and a bit about getting into it, maybe named "Almost an Astronaut". Does that sound good? Also could I get scores from 0-100 with 100 being an A+ and 59 being an F? Thanks. :) Also got my 3d screen working and it's bigger and a very crisp, nice image compared to my older lcd display. I'd totally recommend the nvidia 3d stuff, or possibly a new 120hz 3d screen if you're not into (somewhat buggy) 3d games. Did I mention I play a lot of video games, and occasionally go on absurd adventures that get people hurt or killed when they try to imitate what I did, and then I get banned from the knife carving forums. :(

[sam221766]

Here's a picture of a desert eagle, as portrayed in the story.
Can I post pictures on this forum???
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:DesertEagle_50AE.jpg
From wikipedia, note it's just a normalish looking black gun. Most guns can be customized too.
Awww the wikipedia image didn't work. Now I have to find one on google images.
https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRW0g3xPdYkm94apQPO1uI_XzquUXmCd N1MKS2p73n-KE1VdEQgHQ
https://encrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcT2sQvdqYusWOka85hSwxXaRMRREftIb 7RKIsPuC15qRtqKG6o4
Hope these works. Note its size when held and how it would look tucked in a belt.

[sandy14]

Rather than start a new story, why not develop the one you have got? For example the hostage negotiation scene would probably work very well as an exercise if nothing else. The scene starts with the protagonist entering the room where the negotiation takes place. You can describe the protagonist, the room, the people negotiating, and include the dialogue - what do they say, how do they say it. The end point of the scene is when the protagonist leaves the room with some kind of agreement. The motivation of the protagonist is to get the hostages - the motivation of the hostage takers is to get as much cash or guns as they can.

This might be a chapter, or half a chapter of a thriller - so aim at probably 1,500-3,000 words on this part.

Focusing on smaller scenes with a definitive start and end point will help you flesh out the characters a bit more. Most successful spy thrillers use the same character throughout a series of novels - Bond, Jack Ryan even George Smiley. So it might be worthwhile working on smaller scenes than can form part of a whole story to help you develop the character. Once you know your main character a bit better, it might be worthwhile developing more stories involving this character. Other scenes that might help you - first day at training academy/boot camp, first mission, first kill or death of partner, first arrest and so on. Small pieces that you could eventually use in a series of novels.

[Delta40]

There are back stories in stories. For example the eight year old girl. What is her name? The dialogue that could take place between her and the main character is endless but the reader might like to know how that child became a slave, why she was chosen, what happened to her parents, what are her dreams, is she a feisty lippy eight year old with real attitude and a thirst for revenge or a shy, frightened child? (These personality traits may direct the kind of dialogue depending on how the main character responds to her. Ever met someone who gets your back up? Or you feel immediately sympathetic toward?) All these things can be shown to the reader through simple conversation written in while they are driving in the vehicle. It will also give the reader an insight to the main character and the type of person he is.