Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-25024572-20150329223250

(Note: The name of the story might change if I find a better one.)

I posted a little story called "The Final Decision" a little while ago, and got some feedback saying I needed to improve it. I didn't quite agree with what needed to be improved, but I definitely felt it could be better. I'll talk a bit more about the changes after the story itself is done here. For now, take a look at version two of "The Final Decision":

You sit in a room, your only company a gun on the floor next to you. The door’s blocked off, but you know it won’t last for long.

You hear them, on the other side of the door, moaning and scraping. You look at the gun, and remember what you had to do, who you had to kill-

(No, not who. What. Those…things…weren’t your friends, weren’t your family, wasn’t the one you loved. They might have had their faces, but they didn’t have their souls.)

- to survive for this long. Was it worth it, you wonder. You’re probably going to die soon, anyway. There’s probably an army at that door, and it won’t hold forever. And even if it did, those things won’t go away. You’re stuck here until you starve to death. What a terrible and undignified way to die. And having those things come in and eat you is no better. Hell, it’s probably worse.

There’s an easy way out though. The gun.

The gun can provide a quick and clean death. No pain.

No suffering.

Just one shot.

That’s it.

On the other hand, you can probably kill a few of those creatures, maybe enough to make an escape, and live another day. But is it worth it? Is it really worth running and fighting and killing to hang on to one day, to see one more sunset? Is your life really worth living, when everyone you know and love, everyone who made your life worthwhile, is dead, by your hand?

Sure, you tell yourself that those weren’t your loved ones. You tell yourself that to help you sleep at night, even though you know, deep down, that those were your loved ones you gunned down. You know, damn it, you know. So the question is, do you deserve to live after killing them? Do you even want to live?

Well, here’s a better question: if you die now, won’t all those murders be in vain? Don’t you owe it to them to live? Don’t you owe it to them to make sure that their deaths weren’t for naught? So what if you’ve done bad things? If you die, you can’t atone for them now, can you?

So the question still remains:

Do you live?

Or do you die?

Life?

Or death?

Live?

Or die?

Live or die or live or die or live or die or live or die or live or die or live of die or live or…

“I don’t know!” you scream. The scratching at the door stops, as if the creatures on the other side are taken aback by the display of naked emotion. This only lasts for a second, as the creatures now try harder to get in.

Meanwhile, you continue looking at the gun, and wonder if you should shoot them or yourself. It’s a hard choice, but you have to make it.

The door breaks down, those things come in, and you know you have to decide now. You pick up the gun, aim it, mutter a quick prayer, and fire.

END STORY

Alright, let me go a bit more in depth about the changes I made, and why. For the most part, the beginning isn't really changed. It's towards the end that we get the changes. Originally, this story didn't have that final "well, maybe you should try and live" part or the "live or die/life or death" parts. I added those there simply to make the ending more open-ended. See, I created this story with the ending in mind. I wanted it to be unclear if the main character shot him/herself or the creatures.

In the previous draft, I think it seemed more like the main character committed suicide. So that's partly why I added that final part with the "kill the creatures and atone", so it would be harder to tell what happened. It's also why I added that "live or die" part (and also to try and do a Peter David-esque kind of thing). I also took out a line from the very end. Rather than ending it on a body falling to the floor, it ends on a gunshot.

Anyway, what do you guys think of the story? Is it better than the original? Worse? What should I change and why? Please let me know. 