The Needle's Eye by Nick

[fivestarloony]

Hi! This is what I started for nano. I won't be reaching the deadline, of course. (Hahaha *shoots self*). I value what little GPA I have. However, I'll post what I have so far here.

Info/warnings: There is a lot of murder and crime in this, as well as bad writing. Also, there will be mentions of the gay, as my two main male characters are together. I reserve the right to describe murder/torture/rape and any other hideous things I do to my characters in some form of detail, although there is really only the murder thus far. Child abuse on a horrific level will be mentioned, as I like torturing my characters. There may also be a strange, sci-fi ish conspiracy eventually coming up, and dissent toward the government is a given at all times.

Oh, and demons, ghosts, MPD, thievery, etc are all also givens. XP

If I use Japanese words, ask me for a translation, because I honest to god don't notice. ;_; This takes place in japan. I need to correct my use of detective vs inspector in this, and if "tantei" is used after a police name, it should probably be "keibu" or "keiji" depending on rank. I'll fix it eventually. XP

Japanese name order is used, eg, if you would introduce yourself in English as John Smith, you would be Smith John in JP name order.

Summary: While Detective (...inspector?) Sonobe Hiroshi is on the trail of a violent serial murderer who targets westerners, and Japanese citizens of mixed descent, he begins to fear that his boyfriend, Dr Kega Erik, will be the next victim. Meanwhile, Erik is trying to do battle with a ghost of the past that's a little more literal than he'd like, and their friends are being caught up in a sinister conspiracy of epic proportions...

(Why yes, I do suck at summaries.)

Suggested rating: Uh, eventually? A hard R. Because I really, really like torturing my characters. XP

The Needle's Eye
By Nicholas M

“Those who have seen the needles eye, now tread,
Like a husk, from which all that was now has fled,
And the masks, that the monsters wear,
To feed, upon their prey
Wandering stars,
For whom it is reserved,
The blackness of darkness, forever.”

--“Wandering Stars,” Portishead

[fivestarloony]

~*~
Prologue
~*~

There was light on their wings
As I slipped into the water
There was light on their wings

("The Room of Sixteen Shimmers," David Sylvian)

~*~

It’s cold, the concrete under his feet slick from the acid rain, and dim yellow light pours out behind him from a flickering, low-power eco-bulb. He can’t help but twist his lip in reaction to the ash and grime that is peppering the edge of his long grey trench coat, and he holds the gun a little tighter in his grasp as he takes a step forward across the roof. Several feet ahead of him, propped on the ground against the building’s utility shed, is his target. The other man shivers in the chill November air, his chest heaving, and hot mist spills from his mouth to ghost upwards in the harsh winds.

It’s only now, as he takes a step forward and allows the flickering light from the stairs to hit the man, that he notices the cracked blood that’s trailing down from the man’s lips, and unnaturally crooked angle his nose has been set at. He smiles for a moment, alighting as the scent of salt and iron penetrates his brain, and he licks his lips. The grime and drying blood in the man’s hair colours it almost brown, and he smirks.

The other man tenses, straining with heaving breath against the wall, before collapsing in on himself like a battered doll. He coughs into a hand that has two broken fingers and a nail torn bloodily off. As the spasms cease, he shivers, and draws his wool coat tighter against himself – trying to shield away the cold as he glares up at his attacker.

The man lets the smile fade off his face before speaking. “For what it’s worth, Mick, I’m sorry.” A trace of the smirk returns as he speaks, and again he tries to stymie his amusement. He was, after all, a little sorry to see the Irishman so quickly departed. It’d been a fun night.

They so rarely have so much fight in them, he thinks, and raises the gun with a touch of sorrow. “Really, I am.”

“No, you’re not.” The man says, lilted voice broken by the weight of the cold, and a half-crushed windpipe. “Stop dawdling and just fuckin’ do it, you sick fuck—”

The recoil from the shot surprises him; his hand is stiff from the cold as it goes off, bullet tearing through the other man mid-sentence, and he almost drops the gun. “Fuckin’ hell-!” He shouts, as the sound of the gunshot echoes like a crack of thunder across the rows of abandoned warehouses, and shoves the pistol into a large pocket.

Before following the bleeding man up the stairs, he’d taken off his gloves so he could better grip the gun. Stupid, he thinks, and jerks into action. Tearing out a pair of leather gloves from another pocket as he shakes out his left hand, he bites his lips and stares for a moment at the now cooling corpse, before pulling out a small bag from the same pocket. A few snowflakes begin to drift lazily towards the earth, small and dry, sticking lightly to the roof.

He steps a bit forward, kneeling down in front of the corpse. Reaching towards the man’s head, he pulls out a few strands of matted hair and places them carefully in the bag, and then secrets it in his pocket. Letting out a long breath, he shuts the man’s eyes, and shifts him from his position propped against the roof, so that he’s laying flat against the concrete. Finally, he takes the man’s arms and crosses them over his chest. He stands up, and takes one last, lingering stare.

And then he turns, hurries down the stairs into the main building, and steps carefully in his boots of the broken glass and bits of abandoned machinery on his way out. Ignoring the haunting ghosts of the old rusted paper mixer and still singeing burn of the ink in his nostrils as he books out into the night. Even the old ash that had pumped to the roof from the incendiary and collected on his boots and coat begins to wash off as the quickly pilling snows meets his body and melts.

Down three alleys, two streets, six shady doors, and back into inhabited territory, he enters his car, whispers a short prayer, and turns the engine on.

He has just enough time to head home, take a shower, and eat dinner before going to work.

----
(Yes, I know that sucked. XP)

[lusive]

Ohh. I like it. There are moments where the wording gets a little choppy and you have to read it a few times to make sense of it, but those wouldn't be difficult to repair. The important things-- the setting and ideas are wonderfully described. I would only suggest slowing down a bit and making the sentences a bit more solid.


For example:
It’s only now, as he takes a step forward and allows the flickering light from the stairs to hit the man, that he notices the cracked blood that’s trailing down from the man’s lips, and unnaturally crooked angle his nose has been set at. He smiles for a moment, alighting as the scent of salt and iron penetrates his brain, and he licks his lips. The grime and drying blood in the man’s hair colors it almost brown, and he smirks.

Here you seem to be trying to say a bit too much in a sentence. Its difficult to tell which man you're talking about until the part about the blood- where I assume that it must be the victim.

I would break the sentences up a bit more and say something like:
It's only now that he has taken a step forward that he can see by the flickering light of the stars that the man he presues is bleeding. His nose has been broken and blood trails down from it over his lips and chin. The man in pursuit of him smiles for a moment, alighting as the scent of salt and iron penetrates his brain. The grime and blood drying in his victim's hair colors it almost brown. The murder slowly licks his lips at the sight of him and the corners of his smile twitch into a cruel smirk.



I dunno if that helps?
Its very difficult to talk about two separate people without using some form of names. I think perhaps it might be easier to write if you give your murder-character the title murderer, and maybe call the victim the victim, or Irish man. Just something to help identify one man from another.

Other then that, this is really good so far. :D The setting is lovely. Marvelously bleak. Don't get discouraged by the minor flaws- they show up in all writing.

I look forward to investigating more. Muwahha.
-Lu