Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-25907694-20150120183338/@comment-26007602-20150122234312

At a glance, the grammar appears to be fine. The second sentence is missing a period however. "Wait, so you DON’T mash buttons and hope you hit someone?" You should change DON'T into don't as italics are much better for placing emphasis on words.

I'm torn on the beginning. On one hand, it is completely unnecessary to the story and not very interesting to read through. However, I see that your intention was to try and remove Luke as the culprit. The problem is that he is the only other character in the story, so it's not a big of a surprise as you were aiming for. I saw it coming from a mile away. I'd rewrite the beginning completely, as coming into this I thought for sure it would be some videogame pasta.

That's what you should focus on. The beginning needs more tension and less focus on Zeke's rather mundane life. You could start with the character receiving a phone call from the criminal making vague threats, lead him to investigate his apartment, and then call his friend Luke to help sort out the situation. This way, you introduce Luke, throw off some suspicion, and start building a creepier atmosphere.

I see Luke as a very underdeveloped character. He wants to torture his best friend and his family for no other reason than, "I just thought it’d be absolutely hilarious and fun!" (He also references The Dark Knight; don't do that as it comes off as rather cheesy). I understand that people like this live in the real world, but it's just not interesting for the reader. So many people write stories and give their creepy villain no motivation; this puts readers off. He can have a flawed motivation, but just doing this for the hell of it is rather weak.

I also don't believe that Zeke doesn't recognize his best friend's voice.

Now, near the end, it becomes very, very confusing. Luke invites the narrator to his "secret lair" (Please call it something else), surprises Zeke with his kidnapped brother instead of his parents (Why not just use his parents? If this is supposed to be a twist, it doesn't really matter) and somehow captures him. The problem is that I have no reason to care that Zeke's family is in trouble as there are just a couple lines written about each of them.

I realize this isn't finished. Perhaps if you continue the story, the creepy factor will be ratcheted up and the story will make more sense. The idea isn't particularly odd; it's a scaled down version of the Joker's scheme (The character has the last name "Wayne" too. Not sure if this is intentional). I don't know if the creepy factor will work in the way you describe it to. Whatever the case, I hope you found this useful.