This place is gonna be pretty empty for… ever.
<DarkStuff>: You know
<DarkStuff>: I never feel that this chat is active enough to have it be effective
<DarkStuff>: But I've come in and seen someone else getting a draft review
<DarkStuff>: It makes me feel that maybe the idea is not to just post things here, it's to bring things here
<DarkStuff>: Like, maybe you get a group to follow you onto The Critters
<DarkStuff>: That sounds more viable than posting here and hoping to get a response
<DarkStuff>: On the other hand, I really do enjoy talking to the void
<DarkStuff>: It's not spam if you aren't pinging or interrupting anyone, I believe. It's like setting up a bunch of "pillow people", or sitting up some dolls, or having your dog in front of you, and talking to them like they're an audience
<DarkStuff>: I basically have 31 little mannequins set up in a small theater, and I can pretend that they're listening, judging, and responding however I'd like them to respond.
<DarkStuff>: Does anyone else work better this way? I know I work better when I'm talking to people, even if they aren't responding. It just helps the creative process
<DarkStuff>: For example, let me begin to expound on a thing I have. Unfortunately, the idea works as a short film, but I have no clue how to translate it to paper. I need to figure out how to think of it in a different medium, because I'm not going to be able to pull off all the visual tricks that I'm imagining when I do it on paper.
<DarkStuff>: Gimme a sec, reading a comic…
<DarkStuff>: Okay, back.
<DarkStuff>: So, my idea. Let me set you up with what I imagine the setting to be:
<DarkStuff>: Imagine a massive, colossal tower. But, like, an office building. A skyscraper, so thick and large (no, stop that) that it makes the other skyscrapers look like toothpicks. Looking at it from the ground, you can't even see the top of it. It seems to extend into the sky forever.
<DarkStuff>: The cityscape below it is covered in fog and mists, so that you can't see the cars and people on the street, only the tops of tall buildings when staring out the window of this monolithic building.
<DarkStuff>: This is all the context that the reader gets. Why this skyscraper is here, why the cityscape is so misty and foggy, and what the city really actually looks like is a mystery.
<DarkStuff>: Now, there is a woman on what of the… well, you can't even say topmost floors, because is it? Is there a top?
<DarkStuff>: But she is high up. Higher than should be possible. She's in her apartment, looking down at the city, and she can't even hear the roar of traffic from all the way up here.
<DarkStuff>: Her clothes are ragged, probably her only change of clothes. The tee is dirty and sweat stained, and the jeans are torn — but clearly not by factory machines.
<DarkStuff>: They are torn, but not fashionably so.
<DarkStuff>: Her room is small. The only source of light is the window, and at night the glow of the city below doesn't reach far enough to give much light. Her bed is the only piece of furniture not being used to barricade the door.
<DarkStuff>: There is a small, separate room (not separated by a door, mind you) that has a working fridge and tap. She has two spoons, and a plastic cup for water. You never see inside the fridge.
<DarkStuff>: There is never any dialogue.
<DarkStuff>: Our protagonist is silent, and rightfully so: she has no one to talk to. Ever. Throughout this entire adventure, this woman would be the only actor required.
<DarkStuff>: Yes, I said "actor", sorry(?) about that. There really doesn't need to be a different word for actors and actresses, I feel. They both act.
<DarkStuff>: So I just default to "actor".
<DarkStuff>: Anyways, she never has anyone to talk to, and one might notice that she is intentionally silent in everything she does.
<DarkStuff>: Outside of her apartment, she moves slowly and carefully. Speaking of the outside of her apartment…
<DarkStuff>: This building makes no sense. Yes, it's physically possible, there are no "spacial anomalies", it's all Euclidean geometry. It just doesn't make any real sense
<DarkStuff>: Her apartment opens into an office space full of cubicles, pens and strewn about blank papers.
<DarkStuff>: Other than this tidbit, a real map of the place is never given, but it the transitions between one place and the next are similarly strange
<DarkStuff>: The rooms are extremely sparsely furnished, and there are no lights in the whole place.
<DarkStuff>: In broad daylight, the majority of the building is still pitch black.
<DarkStuff>: She has to use her flashlight to get around, but she can only use it sparingly: she has no replacement batteries if the thing decides to die on her.
<DarkStuff>: Now, things I am going for:
<DarkStuff>: She is alone. Soul crushingly alone. But also, this place is so amazingly massive, that sharing this space with someone — or something — else and not ever coming into contact with it is not that crazy of an assumption to make.
<DarkStuff>: She is trying to find the elevators to get down, and also trying to keep her sanity.
<DarkStuff>: In her room, there is a big floor map made with many pens and many papers. Everytime the room is seen again, the map is bigger
<DarkStuff>: Also, she makes origami. She is getting very good at it, and she uses it to keep herself sane. Every time you see the room, there is more and more origami
<DarkStuff>: There is /never/ concrete evidence that she is sharing this space with anyone else
<DarkStuff>: But there is always the suspicion
<DarkStuff>: Because: how did she get here? How did she get torn up? Why does this place exist?
<DarkStuff>: It's man made, so
<DarkStuff>: Well, but is it?
<DarkStuff>: I dunno, shit like that
<DarkStuff>: There are a couple key moments that happen. I'm not going to describe these with the dramatic tension that they will hopefully have when written out, but here goes:
<DarkStuff>: She finds a circle of chairs all facing each other. She finds running water in one of the rooms. She finds signs of a struggle (overturned chairs, dents in the walls, and a broken window). She turns the corner to see a room at the end of the hall with the door slightly ajar and a honest to god electric light coming out of it.
<DarkStuff>: She does not go into this room. This is terrifying, anything abnormal is terrifying. She backs away and does not venture down that hall.
<DarkStuff>: She finds origami in a different room, and once when making origami she finds a penciled down smiley face (or similar doodle type drawing) on one of her pieces of paper
<DarkStuff>: Many other scenes are just her finding increasingly weird rooms.
<DarkStuff>: Also, she contemplates the window a lot. Possibly she contemplates jumping out of it and ending it like that. But she never does,
<DarkStuff>: The climax of the whole thing is when she actually finds the elevators. It's one of the only rooms — other than the one down the hallway she didn't go down — that has an electric light. It's like a small lobby area, and she rushes to it to press the button.
<DarkStuff>: The button to call the elevator starts a shrieking, horrible noise coming from the pulleys in the elevator shaft.
<DarkStuff>: It is taking a long time for the elevator to get there. She gets paranoid: she is in the light, making a /lot/ of noise. She sits with her back up against the doors to the elevator shaft, and peers out into the /four/ entrances to this small room.
<DarkStuff>: Each one is pitch black. Her paranoia overtakes her, and she starts checking them with her flashlight.
<DarkStuff>: The elevator sounds are too loud, but… did she hear footsteps?
<DarkStuff>: She is starting to breathe heavier, her eyes darting from one hallway to the next.
<DarkStuff>: She is frantically turning the flashlight on and off, checking each entrance to find nothing
<DarkStuff>: The elevator shaft becomes white noise, just a ringing in her ears, but it is overpowering any chance of making out other sounds. She thinks of going into one of the entrances so she can hide in the blackness, but her fear is paralyzing.
<DarkStuff>: Her hands are shaking like the devil, and her heartbeat is hammering away in her chest. She's sweating a river.
<DarkStuff>: She hears a scuff by the leftmost entrance.
<DarkStuff>: She breaks.
<DarkStuff>: She takes off into a mad dash away from the elevators, towards her room.
<DarkStuff>: just a sec
<DarkStuff>: She's running like she's never run before, tripping over furniture, ramming into walls in the dark
<DarkStuff>: The elevator screeching is getting quieter, but it's not going away. It is reverberating and echoing throughout the whole building, and it feels like it's chasing her.
<DarkStuff>: She finally trips and falls into her room, gets up and slams the door shut, and goes to push the table in front of the door.
<DarkStuff>: But her knees are weak
<DarkStuff>: She is tripping and not able to push the table very much at all
<DarkStuff>: She still thinks she hears footsteps. Dashing, running towards her, coming closer and closer and closer
<DarkStuff>: She can't get the table to the door
<DarkStuff>: She hears something touch the handle, and it's all too much
<DarkStuff>: She smashes through the window
<DarkStuff>: At this moment, the elevator dings
<DarkStuff>: And uh… I don't know a good satisfying ending after that
<DarkStuff>: I mean, she falls to her death
<DarkStuff>: But how would I make that a satisfying ending
<DarkStuff>: Or maybe, skillfully and artfully unsatisfying
<DarkStuff>: But you know, both require skill and I don't know how to do either
<DarkStuff>: On the offchance that ANYONE was reading this… thoughts?
<DarkStuff>: Even if not, I can copy this and paste it for notes
<Varaxous>: So I like the premise (mainly because I absolutely love huge urban sprawling complexes type things) and the fact that there's no light and absolutely massive office spaces definitely adds to the whole idea of 'big'
<DarkStuff>: Yay someone read!
<DarkStuff>: Hey Varaxous
<Varaxous>: Which is one of the biggest parts of the emotional investment, since a lot of people don't realize how scary it can be to have something that absolutely massive
<Varaxous>: (yo)
<DarkStuff>: Massive empty things are terrifying
<Varaxous>: But also so cool. Like, the idea of there being so many secret areas you have no idea about, hidey holes, secret tunnels, is my favorite parts about these things
<DarkStuff>: True
<Varaxous>: I feel that the reaction she has is a natural one, especially having been there so long
<Varaxous>: I feel that for this kind of ending, you want something ambiguous for it
<Varaxous>: Let the reader figure out what happens after she jumps
<DarkStuff>: I definitely still wanted it to be a question whether she was hallucinating noises or whether the thing she suspects is sharing the space with her finally found her
<Varaxous>: Oh yeah definitely. Making it one or the other ruins the atmosphere.
<DarkStuff>: Mhmm
<DarkStuff>: Any other notes, or is that it?
<DarkStuff>: I'm glad someone actually read it
<Varaxous>: I would say that you could definitely plant some more evidence that there could be a person in there (she sleeps and finds that the office space closer to her has some stuff displaced) because you could also place evidence that she is forgetting some things more and more so it still isn't clear if she's just crazy or there's actually something
<DarkStuff>: Right right
<DarkStuff>: And her keeping her sanity is a very real issue
<DarkStuff>: So forgetting things she did and seeing it as evidence of other occupants is a real scenario
<DarkStuff>: That's one of the ideas I wanted to plant with her finding origami elsewhere
<VaraxiOS>: And that's about all I have to say. Good luck with it!
<DarkStuff>: Thank you a lot!