Too Real

[Daxis]

Too Real
By Daxis


I opened my eyes, and then I was greeted with a modest view of the world.

"Is this it?" I asked aloud.

A voice came from the speakerphone inside my helmet. "Not even close to all the capabilities," it responded.

I paused. "Fuuka!" I said. "It's you who is overseeing this, aren't you? What about the others, like Amely?"

The voice giggled. "Yeah, Amely was supposed to do it, but I convinced her to let me do you this time." She paused. "This is your first time, isn't it, Camille?"

I nodded, and then realized I didn't know if she would be able to see me nodding. "Yeah, this is my first," I replied. "What do you recommend?"

"Well, you are a soldier and part of Her Glorious Army," Fuuka started.

"Only in registration and name!" I said, laughing. "I haven't even entered the base to begin any training or anything yet!"

"Let's bring in an enemy for you to defeat," Fuuka said, obviously ignoring me. "Simple level right now, with only modest AI."

I paused. "So the Artificial intelligence is..."

"Simple," Fuuka replied, and I rolled my eyes. There was the sound of typing, and then a tingling was felt in my hand. Feeling something solidifying, I grasped the object that was node appearing in my hands.

"Your sword is here," Fuuka told me, and I held it, marveling at it majestic beauty.

"This is pretty amazing," I said.

"Wait till you see the enemy," was the response.

Indeed, barely any time later there was the formation of the enemy AI. The figure was a complete human, although the person wore nothing but black clothes with clear white lining to mark the joints. A mask enveloped its head, and only its eyes could be seen.

It bared a blade at me, ready to fight.

"Err..." I looked around, wiping a drop of sweat from my head. "If I get... hurt, then it won't... I mean, I won't die or anything, right?"

"Yup!" Fuuka said cheerily. "It'll sting like a cheap bitch, though."

"Fine," I said with a tired sigh. "Let's go."

"Alright!" Fuuka exclaimed. "Simulation battle between first-timer Camille din Roile and AI entity Class 1 model Ashton, Begin!"

The moment Fuuka declared the match, the AI charged forward at me. I was as prepared to defend as much as it was to attack though, and with a flick of my blade, the two swords interlocked, and we paused.

Before me, the AI breathed. Before me, it took in a breath, and then exhaled. A sweat of drop fell from its temple. Its clothes moved as if this was real life, and muscles in the body and face seemed as if they were really straining.

I also noticed blue eyes.

I pushed it back, and several sparks flew from our blades. I paused, and it charged forward as I brought the blade up again.

A slash, and I parry. Twisting, the AI kicked, and I blocked. The AI brought forth another slash, this time a cut upwards, and I barely held the blade. We both were pushed backwards, my hand aching from the pain.

"...Oops..." I heard.

I scowled. "What was that?" I asked, my voice becoming enraged.

"Umm..." Fuuka seemed hesitant to answer. "Well, you see, I wasn't actually paying attention when I loaded the AI, right, talking to you and such, you know? And um..."

"The AI seems abnormally hard," I said, growling.

"It's a class 6," Fuuka explained. "A bit more powerful... a lot more powerful than I originally planned."

I groan, grasping my head. "Fuuka! What the hell? What if I lost my balance or something?"

I glance at the AI, who continued to stand there, as if waiting for the conversation to be completed. He seemed... so real.

"Don't worry," Fuuka replied. "I’ll just delete the current AI incarnation, change the class level, and just load it back in. At worst, it'll take half a minute! How ‘bout it?"

I glanced at the AI before me. Generic clothes, tall figure, and a powerful stance. It cocked its head at me, as if asking if I'm ready to fight.

"...No," I said, almost unaware that I did so.

Fuuka paused. "Wait, what?"

"I'm gonna try out the current level," I said, feeling my heart pumping. I gripped my blade harder.

"Err... Camille, are you sure that's a smart idea? You don't die here, yeah, but like I said, the pain? Hurts really, really bad."

"I'll do it," I said. "I wanna test out the skills that everyone is calling prodigal anyways."

Narrowing my eyes, I rushed forward. The AI, as if just waiting for this, responded in turn.

We clashed, and I shouted in excitement. The AI attacked, and I parried. I thrusted my blade back at it, only to be sidestepped. A grin crossed my face, and blade bit at blade.

The enemy came at me, and I blocked, as expected, but it suddenly turned, all the while holding pressure on the blade, which surprised me. Kicking my leg, I fell, and its sword came after me. I rolled over,
but the weapon nicked at my arm, and the wound was not as shallow as I would have liked.

Angry, I extended my foot, and tripped the AI over in turn, and there we were, lying on the floor. I got up first, and attacked downwards, which it barely defended against. As I pulled the blade back, the AI kicked up, and got up as I staggered back.

The AI was panting, and I heard it. Looking back, I did manage to damage it; the wound was quite deep, as a matter of fact.

I rushed forward again, planning to strike at the head, but the AI suddenly kneeled, and then attacked upwards, faster than I would have thought possible. My momentum brought the blade into me, and cold, sharp pain entered my body. I spat out blood.

"...It's painful, isn't it?" a voice suddenly said, and I froze. The voice came from the AI.

It just spoke to me. I couldn't believe it, the AI spoke. The voice was... male.

"It's always like this," the AI continued. "Nothing but... pain."

I screamed as it... no, he removed the blade, splashing the empty land with red. I fell to the floor, clutching the injury, while he then proceeded to stand before me.

"Camille!" Fuuka screamed. "Dammit, I'm ending this right now!"

My eyes strained open as I glanced up, and saw the shadow of the enemy AI. I saw blue eyes, I saw sweat, and I saw pain.

"Die," he told me, and buried his blade into my body.



"Ahhh!" I screamed. Very un-feminine like, but then again, that was never me.

I shot up, and promptly removed the helmet from my body, taking out the wires that were connected to my nerves.

"Calm down!" Fuuka yelled at me. "It's over, the pain's all in the mind right now!"

It burned. It burned, a cold and burning flame, where he had cut me. My hands moved down, to assess the wound, to see that it was really there, the agony, but there was nothing. My skin was smooth, my stomach held no marks or scathe. I was perfectly fine, but it made no sense. My body continued to hurt, and as I remembered myself before the AI, I could only remember more pain.

"Fuck!" Fuuka exclaimed. "Okay, I really should not have let this happen! It was only your first time...!"

"He... spoke," I managed.

Fuuka glanced at me. "What?"

"The enemy AI... he spoke," I told her.

Fuuka gave me a look. "What are you talking about? Enemy AI do not speak in this simulation."

"I remember it, I heard it," I continued.

Fuuka sighed. She pointed to the large monitor in front of her, and from there, I could see my dead body on the screen, bloody and chopped in two. More importantly, I saw the enemy AI, the same one I had fought and lost to. He stood there, his hand holding a bloody blade.

"You're just having a nightmare from the pain," Fuuka said, sighing and shaking her head. "It's going to be so much better once they release the patch to decrease pain in the simulations."

"But..." I shook my head. Additionally, the pain from where I was cut was gone. I didn't understand. I heard him, I know I heard him.

"I'm going to end this simulation now," Fuuka told me. "Looking at your corpse for too long gets weird after a while."

Fuuka typed in a series of commands into the touchpad, and slowly the world of the simulation was dissolved apart. The terrain was digitalized, and slowly faded into nothing. My body in there, now just another object to apply methods and commands to, started to disappear, and became nothing.

The fade upon the AI's body was different, mostly because it was still active when the termination sequence was wrought. Its feet dissolved, unraveling. This process proceeded upwards, until finally the dissolution reached its face. To me, I believe that I saw him look up, and again, I saw the blue eyes, the sad blue eyes, before they disappeared into nothing, and the screen was devoured by black.

 

[luv_kitty12]

I must admit that I like this. <3 It's close to the technology and scientific things which I adore. I am looking forward to read more of it!

One question: Camille is a girl, right? ._.

 

[Daxis]

lol thanks, it was part of a series of flash fictions that I was working on, and became about 3 times longer than i inteded. I'm not sure if I'll continue it, but well, the idea's there at least.

And yes, Camille's a girl. I noticed that this fact wasn't very prominent at first, so I added a small thing on the first line of the final part., the un-feminine thing.

 

[Stardust]

There were a couple of words that need to be put in the past tense:

I groaned, grasping my head. "Fuuka! What the hell? What if I lost my balance or something?"

I glanced at the AI, who continued to stand there, as if waiting for the conversation to be completed. He seemed... so real.

But yeah, this was excellent!

 

[Sgt. Cookie]

You are a damn good storyteller. I tip my hat to you. *Tips hat*

 

[dadevvtsvre]

okay so one of the biggest problems with this is that i don't really care about any of the characters. characters should be at the center of most pieces of fiction but your characters here don't really have any discernible personality. it's really just a bunch of stuff happening with no real cohesive plot or story to tie it all together.

also, you should really be careful with when you describe your characters. most, if not all, character description should be near the very beginning. readers like to form an image of characters right when they meet them. when you toss in what gender they are halfway through the story, and your reader envisions the character as a guy, then we have to compeltely rethink what this character looks like. readers are lazy, we don't like doing that! cater to our needs!

your actual writing isn't that bad. there's a lot of awkward wording and superfluous description, though. i'll point out some of the biggest offenders.

The voice giggled. "Yeah, Amely was supposed to do it, but I convinced her to let me do you this time." She paused. "This is your first time, isn't it, Camille?"

a voice can't giggle. it's just a voice, a distinctive sound a person makes. a person giggles, not a voice.

"Let's bring in an enemy for you to defeat," Fuuka said, obviously ignoring me. "Simple level right now, with only modest AI."

i don't think it's entirely necessary to point out that she is ignoring camille, considering she doesn't answer camille's question. but that's personal preference.

"Simple," Fuuka replied, and I rolled my eyes. There was the sound of typing, and then a tingling was felt in my hand. Feeling something solidifying, I grasped the object that was node appearing in my hands.

this is the passive voice, not the active one. avoid using the passive voice in writing; it makes it boring and sounds strange. if you don't know what the passive voice is, it's when the action is the subject of the sentence, not the thing the action is acting upon. for example, "the chicken crossed the road" is the active voice, but "the road was crossed by the chicken" is the passive voice. see the difference?

"Your sword is here," Fuuka told me, and I held it, marveling at it majestic beauty.

saying the beauty is majestic seems kind of unnecessary to me; if it's beautiful, we already assume it's majestic as well. especially if camille is marveling at it.

Before me, the AI breathed. Before me, it took in a breath, and then exhaled. A sweat of drop fell from its temple. Its clothes moved as if this was real life, and muscles in the body and face seemed as if they were really straining.

i think you overlooked this. if it isn't a mistake then it is terrible writing! shame on you!!

I glance at the AI, who continued to stand there, as if waiting for the conversation to be completed. He seemed... so real.

unnecessary ellipses. i get you're trying to create tension but this is not the way to do it.

uhhh i've written a lot so i'll just end it there for now.

again, i think there's a lot of awkward wording in there. the first sentence, for example, doesn't read all that well. i don't know if you do this but what i like to do is read the story out loud imagining you're a person whose never read it before. it's a great way to see what sentences flow well and what sentences don't.

sorry if i sound like i'm being overly critical but those are my honest thoughts! keep practicing!!

 

[Daxis]

Cool.

As for passive voice, i actually like using it. I like using all the forms of verbs and active/passive voice of the english language and shit, and thus I like to switch it up now and then, at least for some works. It makes the work feel refreshed, in my opinion.

Most of this was made by winging it with an overall idea of what to do. My original idea was to sorta have her kill the AI, and wake up, with a sickening sensation of killing a person while people around her made her feel better by telling her it was only an AI, not a real person. The core is still there, but definitely different, aye?
And of course, by winging it, some stuff were added on the whim, such as the fact that the sword was beautiful, and a variety of lines.

And as this was part of a series of flash fictions i'm working on, I really didn't give much thought to character or too much development, besides the fact that Fuuka was a cheery girl that effs up a bit and that camille had an ability to fight with swords (which was a duex ex for the fighting scenes itself).
Oh, the fact that they were girls was superfluous as well. -__-;

yay lots of critique

 

[dadevvtsvre]

As for passive voice, i actually like using it. I like using all the forms of verbs and active/passive voice of the english language and shit, and thus I like to switch it up now and then, at least for some works. It makes the work feel refreshed, in my opinion.

From this site:

With the previous section in mind, you should also know that some instructors proclaim that the passive voice signals sloppy, lazy thinking. These instructors argue that writers who overuse the passive voice have not fully thought through what they are discussing and that this makes for imprecise arguments. Consider these sentences from papers on American history:

The working class was marginalized.
African Americans were discriminated against.
Women were not treated as equals.

Such sentences lack the precision and connection to context and causes that mark rigorous thinking. The reader learns little about the systems, conditions, human decisions, and contradictions that produced these groups' experiences of oppression. And so the reader—the instructor—questions the writer's understanding of these things.

It may seem like you're just changing up your writing but switching from the active to the passive voice not only is jarring but gives off an impression of inexperience. It's not a good idea to use it.

The site is aimed towards essay writing but the general idea carries over to creative writing too.

 

[candle]

It was decent and I liked it, but as others have said, watch your tenses and focus more on the characters. That said, there were some points I wanted to make on the structure and wordiness of your writing.

I opened my eyes, and then I was greeted with a modest view of the world.

"Is this it?" I asked aloud.

A voice came from the speakerphone inside my helmet. "Not even close to all the capabilities," it responded.

Notice how that first sentence seems to repeat and is overly long? That is what I am talking about. The second "I" is entirely unnecessary. It would be much better as, "I opened my eyes and was greeted with a modest view of the world." In the next sentence, "aloud" is not needed because when you speak, it is assumed you do it out loud. If it was not spoken out loud it would be a thought. Furthermore, "asked" is useless as well because the question mark serves that purpose (when continuing through, also remember to eliminate said as often as possible. If someone is laughing, say "he laughed," not, "he said, laughing"). And if that word is gone, "I" is useless as well.

In the third sentence, speakerphone should just be speaker. Granted, that is a stylistic choice, but it shortens words without losing meaning and flows a little better. "It responded," is repetitive because we already know who is speaking (I'll give you a clue: it's the voice from the speaker in the helmet).

Also, you only need to break paragraphs whenever dialogue switches speakers. Put it all together and that first passage should read something like:

I opened my eyes and was greeted with a modest view of the world. "Is this it?"

"Not even close to all the capabilities," a voice responded from the speaker inside my helmet.

Next, I want to talk about names. Camille is alright. Fuuka and Amely, however, are not. First of all, they are an eyesore to look at. Seriously. I mean, come on. Fuuka? first time I saw that I thought Camille (whose name I didn't know until halfway through by the way) was swearing for some reason. And secondly, I have no idea how to pronounce them. Is it Foo-kuh and Ay-meh-lee (similar to Emily)?

I'm sure there are plenty of other things I could pick on, but I'm sure you get the point. I'm also way too lazy to hunt through your entire text looking for every little odd detail. That said, keep working on it, and you'll get there.