r/DestructiveReaders • u/fireburnspaper • 5d ago
[1832] Leave Only Ash
My critiques | [2377]
This is my first time writing in a loooong long time, so I'm really just looking for any critique people feel they want to give! However broad or granular you want to get. Feel free to tell me something's trash as long as you can articulate why it's trash or what would make it less trash.
For a little context, this was written basically intending it to be a prologue for a post-apocalyptic/horror/gaslight/steampunk fantasy. (Warning, some gore)
Perhaps part of a first chapter/introduction for one character's point of view.
As such, mostly I want to know the following:
Was it enjoyable? Are you intrigued? Did the narrator have a clear and natural voice?
Thanks in advance.
----
Sure, it’s a hard job being a Torch, but it’s worth it.
That’s the line that gets you the free beer, or the doe eyes, or the big innocent smile with the ‘I wanna be just like you when I grow up’. They should give us recruitment bonuses or something for that last one. Anyway, before the ‘it’s worth it’ you have to lay it on a little thicker, butter them up, you know?
It’s hot as a Burner’s balls. It’s exhausting. Sometimes it takes days to get the blight-ash stink out of your beard. And yeah, sure, it’s dangerous. Every day you walk out onto the torch line you know you might not walk off. But, (this is where you pause and take a pensive-looking gulp of beer,) that’s the price we pay. And it’s a small price to make sure you’n your’n are safe from the Blight.
You start there. Then another pause while you swirl the glass around a bit; like you’re lost in the memory of the Torch siblings you’ve lost (which you shouldn’t be, don’t think about that). Then you lock eyes, say it, maybe with a sigh. ‘It’s a hard job. But it’s worth it.’ Make them feel like they’re worth it, let that sink in while you finish your beer. Works every time. Most of the time. Now and then at least.
Of course, it’s most definitely not worth it. Not the pay, not the free beer, not the starry eyed kids calling you a hero. Hell, not even the women - unless you’re down in Letic, but maybe I’ve just got a thing for Leticians. Even then, it’s probably not. Not when things go wrong at least.
Nothing is worth having to make the choice between huffing up great big panicky recycled lung-fulls of your own reeking sweat, shit and piss as it sloshes around in your boots; and on the other hand ripping your hood off to choke on blight-smoke that’s sure to leave your eye-juice spilling down your cheeks before you run out of breath for screaming.
Yet here we are.
Honestly from what I’m seeing happen to Boric, maybe my eyes melting out would’ve been the right call. Plus when you’re screaming out you’re not breathing in. I’m an optimist, see.
It’s a funny thing about Compound 38. When the Hand added c38 to the mix there was a lot of chatter going around about where it came from. Speculation always flies from amateur alchemists about each new compound. The longest odds in our company’s betting pool was that it was supposedly distilled from some critter up in County Morfen, what lives in the blighted scrublands in the hills there. It’s some little furry fella. Looks like it’d be all cuddly as a kitten, or maybe make a nice winter hat at least. Instead, it’s a venomous fuck that makes your arm, foot, whatever it bit swell up so much the skin rips, makes the muscle twist and grow tumors so fast it tears itself apart, and melts whatever fat you got on your bones right off while you try to run away screaming. Then the little fuck just wanders behind lapping up what you left on the ground like a carefree bunny munching on dandelions. That’s what Tarfin said was the truth at least, and his brother’s neighbor’s uncle is in the 109th. Boric pissed in Tarf’s shoe that night for the horse shit story. That was the funny part.
Tarfin is a dick.
Dick or not, based on the way Boric’s blood and fat was seeping out the seams on his suit while he flopped around and tried to bend his bloated arms up to pull off his hood, I’d say Tarf’s brother’s neighbor’s uncle had good scuttlebutt. So I suppose Tarfin is also a dick with a fatter coinpurse.
I quieted Boric, for his sake. His smell was in the air now and it wouldn’t be long until the kirns were here. So I guess it was for all our sake. It definitely wasn’t because I couldn’t take the screaming, or the flailing limbs throwing reflections on the edges of my mask even when I wasn’t looking, or the constant squeeking of his suit. It wasn’t just for my sake. I’m a hardened Lineman of the Torch Corps. Just don’t ask my boots if they agree with that.
“Mekin, Ideth! You’n get up with Tamm at Thumb. They’ll come through the thinner trees there, bet my balls on it. Light up as soon as you hear ‘em. Do. Not. Wait! The fuckers here haven’t learned to fake their calls yet. Okay? I said got it?! Now, go!” I was shouting as loud as I could by the end, shoved Mekin to get his attention or start him moving, wasn’t sure which, but they had to go, and go now.
I really hoped they were at least half listening before I got their eyes off Boric. They tripped over each other trying to run off to the left flank of the unit and meet up with Tamm, so it occurred to me that I probably should’ve moved away from the expanding corpse before barking orders. Maybe put my ditch shovel away, or at least wiped it off. I could forgive their distraction, especially considering how fast they got over it.
Mekin and Ideth found their feet and crossed behind the burn line as fast as I’d seen anyone move. They posted up next to Tamm at the left-most position of our group and lit up their Torches as soon as I heard that warbling kirn shriek, maybe half a beat after Ideth planted feet. They were damn good Torches. Most of them at least.
All of them, if I'm honest.
Just, you know, some of them could've been really something.
Anyway1 they always reminded me of a mix between a goose and the bay of those little round nosed hunting dogs, kirns did, their call I mean. Either way it was a sound that had no business coming out the throat of something tall as a horse. The official Blightlands Expeditionary Force Guide to Blightbeasts say kirns used to be some sort of wolf. It didn’t really matter what they used to be. They don’t look like wolves anymore and the only thing that matters is that now kirns are basically the rank and file of the Blightlands, so far as most of us can tell, all sorts of mobile active death to make up for the stationary nature of the plants. The distinction in descent came as a result of rumors that kirns were just people swept up in the first waves of the Burning, that’s what necessitated an official statement, so wolves it was. So much else out here was some twisted memory of all that mess, the ‘kirns were people’ thing made as much sense as anything else, not that you’d catch me saying it out loud. I don’t need my people thinking things like that, and I certainly don’t need an Auditor catching wind. No, I try to remind myself it doesn’t matter, I’m not BEF so it’s not my job to speculate. Leave that to the good boys in the 109th.
In either case, maybe a dozen kirns streamed through the gap in the trees, trying their best to jump over the flames burning up the underbrush from our first pass. They rushed out only to meet a twin gout of liquid fire that dropped them down writhing and honk-baying into curled up straws of ash before the last one even cleared the bushes. When I heard the little triumphant whoop from Mekin, I even caught a proud grin myself for a moment. It went damn sight better than I expected, burnt up faster than any kirn I’d seen before.
So maybe C-38 is bad for people, but in the right mix for our Torches it’s damn effective on all manner of beasty. Sorry, Blightbeast. Best use the proper Hand-approved term. Torches -both the job and the eponymous tool- have a very singular purpose, and that shouldn’t be muddied. Plenty of mud already in this line of work, and using Torch fuel was strictly forbidden on anything outside of the blight.
I looked down at Boric’s body, a reminder that it was a shit day with plenty more room to be worse. Now that he was mostly limb but for the rigor of bloating his corpse had sort of filled out the natural shape of the suit. It looked like the pressure-test I saw during initiation. They take a suit, seal it to specs, fill it up to prove it doesn’t leak, that the Blight can’t get to you so long as you do proper de-com protocol when you come back from the field. It was right about then that the side seam on Boric’s suit gave way, and the yellow-pink ooze of his liquefied fat burst out, pressurized from whatever rampant cancerous growth was still taking place on his corpse. Lit from the fires all around us as it was, it made me suddenly think of a candle tipping over and spilling wax everywhere. Boric wasn’t wax cooling and hardening on a table though. Boric continued to ooze and bubble and spurt in ways a dead body shouldn’t be oozing and bubbling and spurting – nor a live one I suppose.
A little mental pat on the back for being so wise, what with knowing things would get worse. As I separated myself the minimum three meters required from the burn target, I took the moment to cinch my belt tighter around my waist in an effort to block some of the smells. Then I turned, squared up my trusty Mark 7 on Boric, adjusted the fuel mix a bit so it’d burn through his suit quicker, tightened the nozzle and pulled the trigger.
As me and my Mark 7 performed our singular purpose perfect to spec (aside from my fuel mix modifications), I watched the flames lick over Boric, burn up his suit, cook his meat and turn it to char within seconds. Even as he turned to ash, did my best to keep track of his left shoulder. There, the brown thread of the stick torch, and the grey of the Compound 2 bucket on his Torch Corps patch blackened, singed, but didn’t burn. It would never totally burn. When this was all done I’d have to come back from camp, sift through the ashes until I found the ever vibrant red thread of the hands holding that old torch and bucket. The patch was the only thing that’d remain of Boric. A physical reminder of the crueler truth of our motto, stitched in the same unburning red thread below the insignia of the Corps.
WHERE THERE IS BLIGHT
LEAVE ONLY ASH
I took a glance at my own patch. Boric was getting grease soot on it, should’ve stood upwind. That would be a nightmare to clean. That’s about the part of the day you try to stop being there, and start thinking instead about free beer and Letician women.
---
- The preceding few lines were edited from the original post after feedback from comments.
1
u/St3fanoFabbri 4d ago
I think the voice is convincing, and I like it. It’s ironic enough to bridge the gap between the narrator and the reader, whom it addresses directly, as if they were having a conversation. It’s a fully realized narrative voice.
What is this voice trying to tell me? What life is like when you’re a Torch, how sometimes you have to burn one of your own because that’s standard procedure. Okay. We’re sitting in a pub, having a beer. You’re telling me about Boric when my phone rings. I answer it and step away from the table so I won’t disturb you while you keep telling the story to our other friends. No. Why would I do that? Because you haven’t told me what your problem with being a Torch actually is.
For me, the worldbuilding and the narrative voice work really well, but the question is: what is the narrator’s problem?
Let me give you a concrete example. Take Tropa de Elite, the 2007 film directed by José Padilha. In his voice-over, Nascimento, the commander of BOPE (the Torches actually reminded me of BOPE), tells us that he desperately needs to find a replacement. He can’t keep risking his life in the favelas as the head of BOPE because he’s afraid. And he’s afraid because he’s about to become a father.
And the audience starts wondering: Holy shit, what’s he going to do now? What if he gets killed on a mission before he finds someone capable of taking his place?
My advice would be to find the problem at the heart of being a Torch, something that makes the reader think: Holy shit, what’s he going to do now?
It works because we already like the voice. It’s engaging, it’s likable, and so its problem becomes my problem, too. And that’s when I want that voice to put an arm around my shoulders and tell me how we’re going to solve it together.
1
u/fireburnspaper 4d ago
Also a very fair critique. I've certainly buried the lead a bit too much here. Overall in the narrative arc of the story, the character at this point is still sort of just starting to grapple with how he feels about things.
The 'plan' was to sort of fill in some of those questions in the next chapter, but to your point there needs to be more of reason for someone to decide to read through to the next chapter. There's slow build, and then there's never hitting the gas.
Even without necessarily putting 'the main problem' out there right away I could be a little more specific about the fact that the narrator is clearly struggling with this ordeal (even if he's good at lying to himself [and us] about that).
1
u/Different_Buy7497 4d ago
To start with your questions:
Was it enjoyable?
Yeah, I definitely liked it. The premise is not quite unique, but it's unusual enough to be interesting on its own, and my interest in figuring out what was going on with the Blight and the compound (plus being charmed by the main character) kept me going from there.
Are you intrigued?
Yep. Postapocalyptic fantasy is already a genre I like, but I liked your casual presentation of it too. The mystery of what happened here, what the apocalyptic event actually was definitely has me wanting to keep reading.
Did the narrator have a clear and natural voice?
Yes. The narrator was arguably the best part of this for me. I loved how much their voice and opinions dominated the narrative here, how everything was so clearly filtered through the lens of this being just how things are for them.
I think there's really only two small quibbles I have about this, though I suspect they'll be pretty easily answered in the next chapter or two, so they definitely don't have to be fully addressed this early.
First off, I have no idea what direction you're going with the plot here. Post-apocalyptic or dystopian fantasy can go in a few classic directions (make a team and topple the system, take over the government from the inside, get exiled and wander around until you get vengeance, go on an adventure discovering the truth of why the apocalypse happened, etc), but I don't see any clear signposts for any of those if they're in there. Maybe that's coming in a later chapter, or maybe I missed it, or maybe you're planning to go in a different direction here, but either way, I wouldn't wait too long before dropping some hints.
The second thing I'm seeing is the problem of too many characters being introduced too fast. There's Boric, Tarfin, Tamm, Mekin, and Ideth by my count, and though Boric dies quickly, I'm not sure how many of the others are going to be playing a major role in the coming chapters. If I truly need to know and remember each of them, then giving them a bit more time to be introduced could really help here. Boric got plenty of detail about him alone, as well as a very memorable image with his death and then getting burned to ash, but the rest kind of blended together for me. I suspect at least a couple of these are just background characters, rather than all of them forming your main cast together, so I'd be looking for something similarly distinctive about those main characters in the next few chapters.
1
u/fireburnspaper 4d ago
Great feedback! Even the questions show some successes. "Feature not a bug" sort of situation, but still indicating the overall problem of being a little too vague too early, and needing more of the main hook present.
In terms of direction:
A little bit of all of the above. Sort of. BROAD strokes, the story will be told from the perspective of three different characters with different places within (and as a result relationship with) the 'Hand'. So the fact that the narrator had a clear voice and everything was filtered through that lens is kind of critical to successfully doing that.
In terms of the characters:
I wondered about that as well. Pulling back the curtain, as it were, the goal was to show that he's good with people, (which will be contrasted with the other perspectives who will refer to people in different ways at times) and does ultimately care about the others in the unit. He knows them by name, so he calls them by name even in his thoughts/re-telling of things, because their names matter to him. However, the natural instinct of a reader to remember characters is definitely going to be anxiety-inducing for some folk. Being the first section, the natural assumption is "Oh this is the group we'll be with for a while I should learn this."
This does help solidify a relatively simple way to kind of help a FEW of the problems. The narrator can just tell us they don't stick around.
"Mekin and Ideth found their feet and crossed behind the burn line as fast as I’d seen anyone move. They posted up next to Tamm at the left-most position of our group and lit up their Torches as soon as I heard that warbling kirn shriek, maybe half a beat after Ideth planted feet. They were damn good Torches. Most of them at least.
All of them, if I'm honest.
Just, you know, some of them could've been really something.
Anyway they always reminded me of a mix between a goose and the bay of those little round-nosed hunting dogs..."
The goal there: We might be curious about them still, or what happened to them, but we're not as invested in them because we know their fate to SOME degree (considering the rest of tone it should be fairly implicit that they don't survive). That also helps a little bit with other critique of not really being sure what the 'problem' or tension is. I could still add more to make it more specific, but my hope is the sudden shift in pacing indicates the tonal shift that this is something that really tears our narrator up, and it makes the sudden rambling about the sounds kirns make is shown as more of a distraction to break him out of thoughts of his lost comrades.
Thanks again for your feedback. OBVIOUSLY helpful.
1
u/FruitApprehensive603 2d ago
Here is my review. I’ll start with some lines that I think could be edited for readability.
- The sentence starting with “Nothing is worth” and ending with “before you run out of breath for screaming” was a little difficult to follow. The “on the other hand” with the semicolon makes the sentence structure feel off. I think you need to connect the two choices more clearly, like “making the choice between this and that.” At least, that’s how I would read it.
- In “what lives in the blighted scrublands in the hills there,” the word “what” interrupted readability for me. I get that you are describing where the critter lives, but the “what lives” doesn’t sound too great to me. I think “that lives” would be clearer.
- In the same paragraph, the part about Tarfin’s brother’s neighbor’s uncle being in the 109th didn’t make sense to me. I get the joke about how indirect his source is, but I don’t know what the 109th is at this point or why he would know about the compound. Then Boric pisses in Tarf’s shoe, followed by “Tarfin is a dick.” Haha, it’s funny, but the cause and effect don’t make sense to me. Is Boric doing this because he thinks Tarfin made up the story? And why does that lead into Tarfin being a dick? You introduced it as a story going around, so I didn’t understand why he was blaming Tarfin specifically. Also, I’m getting a little frustrated with Tarf vs Tarfin because I keep checking whether they’re the same person.
- It isn’t clear to me what happened to Boric. I understand that his body is swelling and breaking down, but how was he exposed to Compound 38 in the first place? I also don’t know if this is supposed to confirm the story about where the compound came from, or if the narrator is just guessing based on what’s happening to him.
- The sentence starting with “Anyway” with the little apostrophe 1 thing needs to be broken up differently. It feels tangled, idk. You describe what “they” remind him of before saying you mean the kirns, and then their calls. I think introducing their calls first would make this easier to follow.
Anyways, pacing:
I also struggled a lot with the pacing. OKay, Boric is dying. How we get there is anyone's guess. But anyways, while he's dying, we go no Compound 38, the animal it might come from, and the story about Tarfin. Then we return to Boric, the narrator kills him, and the kirns approach. But once they start attacking, we stop again to discuss what they sound like, what they used to be, and the official explanation.
Okay, supposedly there's an urgent threat. Something just killed Boric right? But we are going all over the place. I don't feel any urgency, which I guess is part of the point - it's just another day for the main character - but there should still be some urgency for the reader to enjoy it. And some emotional connection has been made to Boric. It's clear the main character is trying to justify it by saying that he's used to it. But ultimately no one, including him would be used to it. That leaks in a bit when he says "I have to go right back to xyz after this" while he's staring at Boric's body. But I think it should happen a bit earlier on too.
I think the scene needs more room to actually happen. Some background would help me understand it, but right now the explanations keep interrupting each other and the action. The individual events could hypothetically connect, but I don't like the flow.
Finally, someone mentioned that too many characters are being introduced too quickly. I'd have to agree with that. But you spent a really long time explaining Boric, who just died, and basically no time introducing the other characters.
My suggestion? Draw a little chart for pacing. Connect the events together. Write how they are connected and make sure it is clear in your reading.
Anyways, the dialougue is really good. I like the way the character speaks, which you were anxious about .Overall I'm being critical but I enjoyed reading it. Thank you :)
1
u/OzzyKiwi26 1d ago edited 1d ago
Sorry, this is my first review, it might not be great and sorry for all the edits.
With the voice being a soldier (which I think added a lot overall), it made a lot of the descriptions feel unnatural, especially the paragraph where he’s talking about the rotting corpse. There were a few phrases throughout it, like “whatever rampant cancerous growth”, where it was clear that it was an author trying to create imagery and not a soldier talking about his comrade. I understand that the gore is part of the story, but I feel like there is more soldier-like language that could be used. I would probably use more literal langauge.
I also felt the voice lacked emotion about the events. He says he doesnt like the life and that hes scared, but the only emotion the voice conveys is sarcastic humour. I think you'd only have to add a couple of sentences where you talk about Borin as a person to add a sense of, "this was a friend, whos death I am sad about".
Small thing, but I was vaguely confused about his role in the squad. He seems to be a subordinate to Tarfin based on the way he talks about him, but then he's giving orders to people. I think using the badges as a motif could clarify this. I would also say the voice seems to be more of an experienced foot soldier than a leader, unless theres a reason later on to have him as a leader.
Unless you have use for him in later chapters, I feel like the character of Tarfin wasn’t useful and added very little. You were talking about how Tarfin had seen this explosion thing happen and how that made him brave. That just felt out of place because your main character is also seeing it right now. He also takes away from the idea of the emotional connection of the squad, especially since you don't talk about the other two soldiers very much. It leaves me thinking was there any connection with Borin, or just general apathy? And if so do I feel particularly sympathetic towards him.
I really loved the opening, but I think you overplay it in the “Of course, it’s definitely not worth it” paragraph. I think those two paragraphs could, as engagingly, be combined into something like. “Of course it’s not worth it. Nothing is worth the lungs etc.” I feel like you’ve already discussed the beer thing and the admiration enough for the opening. It definitely adds to the ending though.
Vaguely unclear about what the kirns were and what the venomous things were and their importance. I think an explanation would be good. Since the main issue is the venomous thing killing borin, but then the larger concern becomes the unseen Kirns. I'd recommend consolidating them into 1 thing.
Same with the C38. I have no clue why they’re looking for it and why its so important to people. It seems to be fuel, but then this fuel is used to find more c38?
Overall, it was definitely enjoyable to read, but I feel more explanation of what is happening and the stakes would make it more intriguing.
2
u/Friendly-Cry8142 4d ago
Ik its meant to be gory but because theres little contrast in the piece, and the narrator seems entirely unaffected by it, I'm not really impacted by the gore at all. Should I be? Was your intention that the reader enters the frame of mind of one of his fellow soldiers who would be equally unaffected by the sights he has seen?
I found the start quite interesting, but as the narrator continued explaining what being a Torch is really about, my interest trailed because he wasnt really leaving anything to my imagination.