Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-25678492-20141113194855

Hey, I'm new to writing. Not just with writing Creepypastas, but I'm not much of a writer in general. Still, I decided to try my hand at writing a story and would like some opinions.

“Hey James, come look at this video!” called out Ryan, a young high school student of 16 years. He's an average kid; he likes music, games, but he has an unusual taste for slasher films.



“Christ, are you still looking at this sick stuff?” responded James as he paused the television and walked over to Ryan's computer. Also a high school student, he's been friends with Ryan for a long time. He doesn't, however, appreciate the horror genre that much. A bit of a self-proclaimed wimp, he never really understood what excited Ryan so much about being scared. Then again, Ryan is the kind of guy that gets easily excited by just about anything.



“No, take a look at it! The person that filmed this must have been an expert!” shouted out Ryan excitedly. He was looking at a website for aspiring horror directors where people could upload their work, though most of it were from kids trying to be “dark” or “edgy”. They were almost always filmed with a poor-quality camera or phone, and always seem to had weird skips and flashes throughout them.



The video that Ryan was watching showed a woman bound and gagged on the floor, crying and trying to scream out for help. Her clothes looked old and run down, so she possibly a prostitute or junkie. After about ten seconds of her crying with the occasional flashes of light seen in all of the other videos, a man walked into the scene with a long hunting knife and stabbed her once in the chest. He left the knife in and walked away, and the video ended shortly after that.



“I don't get it. What's so special about it?” James inquired. As far as he was concerned, it was just a video from a horror director wannabe.



Ryan gave James an odd look and responded with, “You don't get it? The effects looked so real, the person who made this has some real talent!”



“Whatever, dude. I don't get what you see in stuff like this,” said James as he went back to watching television.



The next day at 4:15 PM, James was finishing up with his homework when he received a call to his cell. He looked at it and saw that it was Ryan, so he answered. Before he could say anything, Ryan started screaming through the phone as usual.



<p style="margin-bottom:0in">“James! You remember that website I showed you yesterday, right?! Look at it again!”

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">James groaned and replied with, “Give me one good reason, I've had enough of that site after looking you kept obsessing over it.”

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">“Dude, just look at it! I decided to try my hand at making a video, and they accepted it!”

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">This intrigued James a little. As much as he doesn't like horror, Ryan was always pretty talented when it comes to art and film. Before he could give his reply, Ryan started talking again.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">“Crap, my parents are home! I'm not supposed to use the phone, they grounded me after I snuck out of the house last night.”

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">“Wait, what?” asked James, but Ryan had already hung up. That's unusual for Ryan; as hyper as he is, he's not the type to sneak out at night.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">James pushed the thought aside, Ryan must have just been really excited about making the video and wanted to do it at night for added effect. He walked over to his computer and typed in the URL from what he could remember. Sure enough, the most recent video was one titled “Ryan's First Video”. Just by looking at the title, he started questioning Ryan's imaginative skills. Still, maybe the video would be done better than the title. He clicked on the link, and the video began to play.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">As much as he hated it, James had to admit that Ryan was a pretty good filmmaker. The video, much like every other video on the website, was about somebody being murdered. A man, possibly a young adult, had been tied to a tree. After about fifteen seconds, Ryan appeared with a revolver. He aimed it at the man, and shot him in the head. Despite the decent quality of the video and the great special effects, there were still some flashes of light every now and then. That annoyed James a bit, they were distracting and they hurt his eyes.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">“Why do these flashes keep appearing in all of these videos?” muttered James to himself, “Ryan's better than that.”

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">Out of curiosity, he looked back at the video to where the flashes were. He stared at them for a while, trying to find out what was causing them. He felt a bit dizzy after a while from staring at the screen for so long, so he decided to take a break and eat a snack.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">Later that night, James thought back to Ryan's video. He wasn't sure why, that kind of stuff doesn't interest him in the slightest. Still, he walked over to his computer, opened the website, and watched the video.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">As usual, the flashes and skips were still there. This time, however, they felt different. Instead of painful or nauseating, they felt mesmerizing. In fact, they almost felt welcoming. James couldn't help himself, he replayed the video over and over again. He didn't care about how violent or disturbing it was, something about the website just felt comforting.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">Three hours later, James was walking through the woods with a hatchet. He was dragging a young girl, no more than six or seven years old with him.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">“Why are you doing this to me? I want my mommy!” cried the girl. James didn't respond, he left the girl on the ground and turned his cell phone's camera on.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">“Just keep quiet for now. Don't worry, you're going to be a star. You'll be famous!” whispered James.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">The girl continued crying, no matter how much James tried to calm her. Eventually, he just pointed the camera at her, and prepared to swing the hatchet.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">One week later, the police gained a lead in a major case regarding a recent string of murders. A young teenager named James had uploaded a video involving a little girl being murdered to an underground snuff film website, and then connected it to his Facebook wall. When the police brought him in for questioning, he was very confused. He kept ranting about his talent and art, and did not know why the police were questioning him for making a horror video.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">It did not take long for the website to be taken down. The police figured that it was likely that the sick minds that created the website would put it up under a different name, but for now they were relieved that it was down for now.

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<p style="margin-bottom:0in">Before it was removed, the video that James had uploaded became a local story. The information was kept secretly outside of the local area, but everyone was talking about the video of a little girl being butchered. In fact, despite the poor filming quality and the occasional annoying flashes of light, the video had received thousands of hits.

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So, there you go. I hope it wasn't a waste of your time if you decided to read and review it, but thanks anyway. I'm open to any suggestions and criticism you have, so don't hold back.<ac_metadata title="First story, would like opinions."> </ac_metadata>