Scratch

Anyone?

Andres-Vander wrote:

If you have thought sensing technology, how would "Craig" (who?) not be able to find the exact location of the guy?

I don't get what you mean by that.

Andres-Vander wrote:

And the turrets are glass? Why would you do that?

No, the turrets aren't glass, but they are inside (well, the end of the barrel isn't, obviously) a glass dome kind of thing, which is sticking out of the side of the station. Like the bumps on a Dalek. And it's glass so that the people using the turrets can see all around.

Andres-Vander wrote:

calebxy wrote:

Andres-Vander wrote:

If you have thought sensing technology, how would "Craig" (who?) not be able to find the exact location of the guy?

I don't get what you mean by that.

If it's so advanced to have technology that can sense an individual person's thoughts, why would he need to manually ask Will where he is instead of just using space magic to find him?

I didn't think of that.

But forgetting that one detail, what did you think of the chapter overall?

Last edited by calebxy (2012-05-11 03:20:22)

I've updated it with considerably more.    Please give your thoughts.

Where's the rest of them? I'd like to read them. I know the first two (or one?) are in misc.

Alright, here's the first chapter:


William, in his combat armour, ducked behind a crate as a laser shot past his head. The crate was actually an armoured computer, with information stored on it. There was a small screen on the front. He opened up a flap on the armour on his wrist, and he held it next to the screen on the crate. After a few seconds, the information was downloaded onto the mini computer in the armour.

Suddenly, a small, round object landed on the ground in front of him. It was an EMP grenade! William dived backwards over the crate, landing on his back on the smooth, crystalline, pentagonal tiled floor. He shuffled backwards a few meters, to make sure he was out of range of the grenade.

Out in the open, William quickly looked around him. He couldn’t see anyone, but he could hear someone running towards him. He looked in the direction of the noise, pointing his wrist-mounted LPE gun in front of him. The noise was coming from a platform above his head.

Suddenly, the person jumped down from the platform and landed next to William. They both swivelled round and pointed their LPE guns at each other. William was going to shoot, but then he realised who it was. It was Jacob, who was on the same team as William; the blue team.

“Oh, it’s you,” William said, and breathed a sigh of relief.
“We have to run,” Jacob replied, out of breath. “There’s a whole gang of the green team coming this way.”

They both jumped down to a lower set of corridors, with William still looking behind them, checking if anyone was following them. Jacob continued running forward, but William stopped and rested his back against the wall of the corridor.

“He’s over here!” he heard Alex, someone from the green team, shout, talking about Jacob.

Alex ran towards the corridors and jumped down into them, not realising that William was waiting at the base of the wall, ready to fire. As Alex landed, William shot him.

“You have been shot by William Page,” said a computerized voice from inside his helmet. “You are out of the game.”

The floor directly beneath his feet rapidly lowered to an enormous room below the battle ground. Alex stepped off the panels which made up the floor, which then rose back up again.

Henry, another member of the green team, was about to follow Alex and jump down into the corridors, but then he saw Alex descending into the floor. Realising that he must have been shot by someone, he skidded to a halt just before the edge. He peered over the edge, and saw William waiting there.

Unfortunately for Henry, William had noticed that he’d stopped. He was already looking up by the time Henry peered over the edge, with his LPE gun ready. Before Henry could dodge, William shot, hitting Henry’s armoured helmet. The armour was covered in sensors, ready to detect when the player was hit by a laser or EMP blast or anything else that would send them out of the game.

Once again, the floor lowered, taking Henry down to the room below. Several others on the green team saw this happen. One of them, Ryan, grabbed one of the EMP grenades attached to his arm and tossed it down to William. All the devices were thought controlled, so the grenade could go off as soon as he wanted it to.

William saw the grenade fall through the air right in front of him. Before it landed, he quickly swung his arm up, knocking the grenade high up into the air. During the brief moment when the grenade was activated, after William had hit it up into the air, it flew up past two other members of the green team who were standing on a platform.

The EMP grenades didn’t really send out an electro magnetic pulse, nor were the lasers actually dangerous. The grenades sent out their own unique signal, which the sensors on the suits detected, just as they did with the lasers.

The sensors on the suits of the two members of the green detected the signal coming from the EMP grenade, and shut down their suits. The two players collapsed, before each being lifted into the air by a mechanical arm coming from the ceiling. Part of the ceiling opened up, the players were lifted through, and it closed again.

Ryan signalled to his team mates behind him to get back, but one of them decided to attack anyway. The student’s name was Adam. He was a spiky haired, arrogant person, usually very reluctant to follow orders. He’d only recently moved into the academy. Ignoring Ryan’s signal, he sprinted towards the edge of the floor and jumped into the set of corridors.

As he jumped, he spun around, ready to shoot William. But by this time, William had already gone. He landed on the ground, confused. Suddenly, William peered round from behind the wall of a corridor and shot Adam in the back. Again, a small section of the floor opened and Adam was lowered into the room below.

While William was already pointing his LPE gun in the direction of some other players from the green team, he thought he might as well take a shot at them. He just managed to shoot one of them, Collin, before Ryan shot back. He missed by a few inches, as William darted back into the corridor.

Ryan, along with two others, jumped up and grabbed onto the edge of the platform above them. They quickly pulled themselves up, ran to the edge of it and jumped onto another one a few feet away. The platforms were suspended in the air by hover plates on the underneath. As the platforms weren’t fixed in place by anything other than the hover plates, they had a tendency to wobble about in the air.

Ryan and the two others jumped from one platform to another, looking down on the set of corridors, scouring the place for William. By this time, William had found another of the computer crates. He once again opened the flap on the armour on his wrist, and transferred the information from the crate onto his mini computer.

After only a few seconds, Ryan spotted William in the corridors below. He took aim, and fired. But somehow, William just carried on with what he was doing. Ryan realised that he must be out of range, so he jumped down to the floor below the platform and then jumped down to the corridors.

Moving as silently as he could, Ryan reached a corner and peered round the wall. He could see William crouching next to one of the crates, with his back facing Ryan. He probably wasn’t going to get a better chance than this, so he pointed his arm at William and fired! The shot hit William in the back, and he heard the devastating words from inside his helmet.

“You have been shot by Ryan Hadley. You are out of the game.”

As the floor beneath him lowered, he turned round to see Ryan, waving at him teasingly. Suddenly, Ryan was shot in the back by Jacob! He could hear Jacob chuckling to himself as he watched Ryan being lowered into the room below. Jacob then ran over to the crate near where William was standing, and downloaded the rest of the information.

In the room below, William was talking to some of the other players.

“I have to say,” commented someone from the green team, “that was an amazing move you did earlier, hitting that grenade back up at us.”
“I’m glad you liked it,” William laughed, as he walked over to one of the exits.
“How on earth do you have such amazing reactions?” the one standing next to him said.

William shrugged, and took his helmet off.

“A whole lot of practice, I suppose.”
“You know,” began Ryan, who had just jogged over to them, “I don’t think Adam likes you. In fact, I’d say he despises you.”
“Why’s that?” asked William, concerned.
“I think it’s probably because he’s jealous of you. He once told me that he thinks you’re an annoying, arrogant, rich kid.”
“I’m rich? Well that’s news to me.”

All four of them laughed at this, as they walked through the exit and into the changing room. There were TV screens on the walls, showing what was happening in the training room, with all the students sitting on the benches, eagerly watching to see who would win.

“What are you laughing at, you overrated loser?” demanded Adam, aggressively.

William couldn’t help but laugh even more at that.

“You,” Ryan replied, unclipping his armour.

The armour the students wore for training was made up of five separate sections: the head, the arms, the torso and the legs, all held together by clips on the suit. When they were unclipped, the separate sections folded away, similar to how a cardboard box folds. Ryan placed his index finger on the fingerprint scanner next to his locker, opening it, and stuffed his armour inside. He then sat down on one of the benches, and joined the rest of the students in watching the training mission.

Jacob, having not been shot or otherwise sent out of the game yet, was hiding round a corner, in the set of corridors. He could hear someone running down the corridor, so he held his arm out, pointing at the corner. The person who Jacob could hear, Sam, a member of the green team, skidded round the corner and straight into Jacob’s arm. Before Sam could do anything, Jacob shot.

He then stepped back as the floor beneath Sam’s feat lowered. Someone else from the blue team, Tom, came running round the corner a moment later, almost falling into the hole in the floor.

“Don’t worry,” Jacob said to him. “I got him.”
“Good,” replied Tom, out of breath. “Where’s William?”
“Ryan shot him.”
“What?!” Tom gasped.
“Keep your voice down,” Jacob whispered, looking around nervously.

Suddenly, two players from the green team jumped down into the corridor, one either side of Tom and Jacob. Jacob jumped at one of them, tackling him to the ground, while Tom dropped to the floor as the other one tried to shoot him. As he dropped to the floor, Tom shot the person in the leg.

When one of the players is shot in a non-lethal place, like a leg or an arm, the motors in the armour on that limb jams, preventing the player from moving that limb.

So Tom shot the player from the green team in the leg, preventing him from moving that leg. Tom jumped to his feet, and was about to shoot the person in the chest, before they hoped up on their still functioning leg and kicked Tom in the stomach.

Meanwhile, Jacob had the other player pinned down to the floor, grabbing hold of both of his arms. Struggling to overpower Jacob, the other person slowly managed to push his arm up towards him, but Jacob was still holding the person’s arm horizontally, preventing him from shooting at Jacob.

After being kicked by the player from the green team, Tom stumbled backwards and fell over. He fell onto Jacob, knocking him off the other person from the green team. A second later, the person who’d kicked Tom pointed his arm at him and Jacob, and shot them both.

As it happened, Tom, Jacob and the two players from the green team were the only players left in the training mission. This meant that since Tom and Jacob were shot, the green team won. As Tom and Jacob were lowered down into the room below, there was an automated voice coming from speakers in the ceiling.

“The green team has won. Players: Peter and Adric left remaining.”

Both Peter and Adric breathed a sigh of relief, and were then lowered down to the exit, along with Tom and Jacob.

“That was a really good move,” Tom called over to Peter.
“Thanks,” Peter replied, taking off his helmet.

As they entered the changing room, several of the students, including William, walked over to them and congratulated Peter and Adric for their victory.

“That was a fantastic kick you did at the end,” William said to Peter.
“Yeah,” Tom laughed. “I really wasn’t expecting that.”
“I could have beaten you easily,” Adam smirked.
“I’d like to see you try,” replied Peter.

Of course, Peter didn’t actually mean that as a real challenge, but Adam accepted it anyway. Even though they were only a few meters away from each other, in a relatively small room, Adam sprinted towards Peter and jumped at him, with his leg out stretched. Peter managed to block his foot, but he was still slammed against the lockers behind him.

Adam then swung his fist at Peter’s head, but Peter again blocked the attack and shoved Adam in the chest, knocking him back. After regaining balance, he lunged at Peter with his fist, but he grabbed it a few inches away from hitting his face. Before Adam could do anything else, Peter punched the underneath of his arm.

William rushed over to the two of them and yanked Adam away by his collar, throwing him on the floor.

“Stop it, you two!” he yelled.
“He started it!” Adam shouted back, furiously.
“No I didn’t,” stated Peter. “I wasn’t even being serious about what I said! And even if I was, that would have been a challenge for the training room, not here!”
“I’m still better than you!”
“Says the one on the floor,” remarked Jacob, unable to help himself.

Several people in the room laughed. Adam picked himself up off the floor and walked out the door, angrily.

Okay, I'm officially freaked out. Do you go to my school? There is a William, a Jacob, and a Henry all in my class. xD But I really like the story, it's great! :]

Here's chapter 2:


There was a knock at the door. William carefully placed the soldering iron he was using back in its holder and walked over to the door. There was a screen on the door, showing who was outside. It was Jacob, with his robot dog sitting down next to him. William pressed a button next to the door, unlocking it.

“Hello Jacob,” William said as he opened the door.
“Hi,” Jacob replied, smiling.
“What are you doing here?” asked William, slightly confused.
“I was just on my way back from playing football, and thought I might pop in here for a moment, if that’s ok.”
“Sure. I’ve almost finished building my laser, actually. Do you want to see?”
“Yeah, I’d love to. Wait, so, it’s a real laser, is it?”

William nodded.

“A real, deadly, laser?”
“Well, it’s only deadly if I shoot it at something living,” William joked.

Jacob followed William into his room, and saw what he presumed was the laser he was building.

“It looks good,” Jacob said.
“Thanks.”

The laser was on small, metal table, with a soldering iron next to it. William sat down on a chair next to the table, and picked up the soldering iron again.

“So how does it work?” Jacob asked.
“I’ll explain after I’ve finished it,” replied William. “Would you mind helping me test it afterwards?”
“Ok. So anyway, I wanted to ask you something.”
“Go on.”
“Have you received your results yet? For graduation, I mean.”
“No, I haven’t yet.” William answered. “Have you?”
“Yes, I have,” Jacob said, with a smile.
“Let me guess. You passed?”

Jacob’s smile turned into a grin as he nodded in reply to William’s question.

“Awesome,” William said, grinning along with Jacob.
“So when do you get yours?” Jacob asked.
“This Monday.”

By this time, William had finished soldering his laser together. He picked it up, and showed it to Jacob.

“What do you think?” William asked.
“Very nice,” replied Jacob, rather impressed.
“Let’s test it now, shall we?”


The next day, Monday, William was back at school. Or, The Littlehampton Space Academy, as it was officially called. The Academy held exactly 2000 students, creating a bit of a problem for the lockers. The corridors in which the lockers were held were so vast that, despite being very orderly, they couldn’t help but seemed almost like a maze.

William was hurriedly piling his books back in his locker, as it was lunch time and he was already late. The corridors were deserted, or so William thought. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw something moving. He turned to see what it was, and just managed to spot someone as they darted into another corridor.

Curious, William closed his locker and, as quietly as he could, tiptoed over to the corner where he saw the person and peered round. He saw Adam, standing in front of Peter’s locker. Since Adam wasn’t looking in William’s direction, he continued watching, eager to see what Adam was doing.

From his pocket, Adam got out what looked like a latex glove. William instantly recognised what it was, and quietly got out his iPhone X4. He set it to camera mode, and began filming Adam. Adam carefully put the glove on, and placed his gloved index finger on the fingerprint scanner next to Peter’s locker. The locker opened, and Adam once again reached inside his pocket and took out a small canister.

Just as Adam was about to put the canister inside the locker, William moved all the way round the corner, and slowly began walking towards Adam, still filming. Out of the corner of his eye, Adam saw William, startling him. He dropped the canister on the floor, very quickly taking the glove off and stuffing it in his pocket.

“Oh, don’t stop there, Adam,” said William, teasingly. “I’m sure the headmaster would love to see what you were going to do next.”
“Oi, what are you doing?!” Adam yelled.
“I was about to ask the same question, actually,” William replied, still recording.

Adam ran towards him to try and get the iPhone, but William quickly stopped recording and shoved it back in his pocket. Adam swung his arm at him, but William grabbed it, spun him round, and tripped him up. After picking up the canister from the floor, William sprinted over to the hall where his class has launch.

When he got there, he spotted a free chair at the table where Peter and Jacob were sitting. He walked over to there, and sat down.

“Hello Peter,” William said, smiling. “Guess what I just saw.”
“What?” Peter asked.
“Adam breaking into your locker, trying to put this inside,” William replied, placing the canister on the table.
“What?!” Peter gasped.
“Don’t worry, I stopped him. I even filmed him doing it.”

William took his phone out of his pocket, and after getting the video up on the screen, he passed it to Peter. Peter started the video and watched, with Jacob leaning over to watch as well. They watched the video intently, and then Peter handed it back to William after it finished.

“So what does the can do?” Peter thought out loud.
“It realises smoke, lots of it,” Jacob replied.
“How do you know?” asked William.
“Because I’ve got lots of these at home.”
“Have you now?” William said, with raised eyebrows.

Jacob nodded, grinning slightly mischievously.

“Anyway, I’m going to send this to the headmaster now,” said William, opening the email app on his phone.

He attached the video file to the email, as well as a brief explanation of what it was about, and that William had the canister in his possession. After sending the email, William finally began eating his food.

“So have you got your exam results yet?” Jacob asked, changing the subject.
“Not yet,” William replied. “I’ll get them this afternoon, when school finishes.”
“How well do you think you did?”
“Err… well the maths was quite easy, and so was the English, but I didn’t quite finish that in time…”
“No no no no,” Jacob interrupted. “I mean the important exam. The SCW exam.”
“Oh, that. Well, I think I did rather brilliantly, if I do say so myself,” said William, smiling. “I’m sure I’ve passed.”

A few minutes later, Adam was sitting at a desk in a room all by himself, with his lunch in front of him. He was in detention, thinking long and hard about how to get revenge on William. He considered just beating him up, but even if he was able to do that, it wouldn’t be as long lasting as he would have liked.

After some more thinking about it, he remembered that the exam results were being revealed today. Since Adam had been learning computer hacking for 3 years now, he reckoned that he could probably hack the school computer system, and change around the results of the exam.

If he did that, then as well as being able to make William fail the exam, he could also give himself a better score. The more he thought about it, the more he liked his idea. But unfortunately, the exam results were going to be revealed in a 2 hours, and Adam was going to be in detention for another hour, so that only left him with a short amount of time to do it.

An hour later, the lock on the door of the room Adam was in unlocked, activating a small green light next to it. He had eaten his lunch, and was waiting eagerly to get out of detention. As soon as he noticed the green light, and quickly got up and hurried towards the door.

When a student is taken to detention, they have to put all their electronic devices in a box inside the room, next to the door. That is then locked along with the door, and is also unlocked when the door unlocks. So as Adam walked over to the door, he lifted up the lid of the box, pulled out his iPhone ZS, and walked out the door.

Almost an hour later, the students in William’s class were all on their way to their lockers, eager to find at what score they got for their exams. Since he had already received his results, Jacob was walking alongside William to find out what he had got. They arrived at William’s locker, with Adam quietly watching from the other end of the corridor.

William placed his finger on the fingerprint scanner next to his locker, unlocking it. He had so many thoughts running through his head at once, the world seemed to slow down as he opened his locker. Inside, there was a small envelope. He took it, and carefully tore it open. Pulling out the contents, William scanned the page for his grade and score.

Within a second, he found it. William could hardly believe his eyes. It was a D! After a few seconds of making sure his eyes weren’t deceiving him, he looked for the score. He’d only got 45 points! William couldn’t believe it. He was 100 percent sure that he would pass.

Jacob was concerned. He hadn’t seen the score and grade yet, but judging by William’s expression, they weren’t good.

“What is it?” asked Jacob.
“I… I didn’t pass,” replied William, confused.
“What?!” Jacob exclaimed, shocked. “How could you not have passed?!”
“I don’t know,” William shrugged, still unbelievably puzzled about his failure. “It says I got a D, and only 45 points. But Mr Bradley said that I was excellent, and that I would definitely pass.”
“Maybe you should talk to him about it,” suggested Jacob.
“I will,” replied William, folding the piece of paper is his hands and placing it in his pocket.

Moments later, William was walking through the corridors as quickly as he could without give the impression of running. He was on his way to Mr Bradley’s office, to talk to him about his SCW exam result. A few corridors away from his office, William was stopped by Peter, who had spotted him as he was walking past.

“Hey, William,” Peter called, smiling. “Just the person I wanted to see.”
“And why’s that?” asked William.
“Well,” replied Peter, “I’m having a graduation party at my house on Saturday this week. Everyone who’s graduated is invited. At least, everyone in this section.”
“Sounds good,” remarked William, trying to hide the fact that he hadn’t actually passed. “What time should I be there?”
“It starts at 7, so you can come any time after then.”
“I’ll be sure to be there.”

William continued on his way to Mr Bradley’s office, and Peter continued on his way out of the school. William jogged down the last corridor, urgent to talk to his teacher before school closed. Just as he was about to knock on the door, it opened, and out walked Mr Bradley.

He was a fairly tall, very strong man is his mid 40s. He used to be part of the Space Defence Operations many years ago, but now he worked for the Space Academy, teaching students to follow in his footsteps.

“Oh, hello William,” said Mr Bradley, surprised to see William standing just outside his door.
“Hi Mr Bradley,” William replied. “I just wanted to talk to you about my SCW exam result.”
“Ah yes, how did you do with that?”
“Well, this says that I only got a D, and 45 points.”
“Huh, that’s strange. I was sure that you would pass.”
“So was I. I thought I was doing fantastically during the exam.”
“I’m afraid I can’t really talk right now. I have to be home by 5. But I’ll be sure to look into it,” Mr Bradley assured William as he continued walking.
“Thanks,” replied William, waving goodbye.

He stood in the hallway for a few seconds, thinking about how he possibly could have failed, before heading off towards the nearest exit.

That week, on Saturday, William was getting ready to go to Peter’s party. It was 6:45, so he was about to leave. Incidentally, his parents were also supposed to be going out for the evening, but it was cancelled at the last minute. The party that William was going to, however, was still happening. Peter had emailed William the full details of it earlier in the week.

Exactly fifteen minutes later, William was at the door of Peter’s house. It was an enormous house; almost a mansion. On the wall outside, there were cameras and all sorts of other sensors hidden into the nano-paint. They detected who was standing at the door, checked if they were on the invite list, and if they were they would automatically open the door.

William’s house didn’t have this, though, as he was nowhere near as rich as Peter. He was about to ring the bell, not forgetting the cameras, when the door opened. He stepped inside, instantly being greeted by the sound of incredibly loud music. He could see loads of boys and girls he recognised from his school, all dancing to the music.

The first room was more like a very large hall, with speakers subtly embedded in the walls, and lights flickering all sorts of different colours. William walked through the different rooms, seeing what things there were to do, being greeted by various people along the way.

It was a very large house, so there were a lot of large rooms to explore. After a while, William found Jacob in one of the many games rooms. He was playing a virtual reality game, with a whole bunch of other students watching him intently. Jacob was wearing a special suit, detecting his movement, and also wearing some glasses with screens instead of lenses.

As well as being on the inside of the glasses, the gameplay was also being shown of the walls of the room, alone with the sound from the game being blasted rather loudly from the speakers in the walls. Some of the other students were also wearing the special suits, ready to start playing as soon as Jacob was finished.

William walked over to him, and tapped him on the shoulder. The game paused itself, as the special suit Jacob was wearing detected the organic object touch, leaving his character in the game frozen in midair. Jacob took of the glasses, and turned around to see who it was.

“Oh, hi,” said Jacob, surprised to see William at the party.
“Hello,” William replied, smiling.
“What are you doing here?” whispered Jacob, confused.
“I graduated, remember?” William quietly replied, subtly nudging Jacob’s foot.
“Oh, right, ok,” said Jacob, getting the hint.

He passed the glasses to one of the other students, who then continued playing the game.

“So how are you?” William asked, as they both walked out the door towards the main room.
“I’m fine, thanks. You?”
“Well, other than passing my exam,” William replied, quietly, “I’m fine.”
“So you still haven’t sorted that out yet?”
“No. I talked to Mr Bradley, and he said that he would look into it. And then a few days ago, on Wednesday, he got back to me and told me that there was definitely no mistake.”

Both the two of them could say any more, Peter spotted them and hurried towards them. Peter was a tall, very strong teenager. He was he best at hand to hand combat in William’s section of the school. The school was split up into 5 sections, each with 16 classes, in turn each with 25 students.

“William!” he greeted with a beaming smiling. “How are you doing, mate?”
“Fine, thanks. How are you?”
“I’m great, thanks. What have you been doing lately?”
“Not much,” William replied.
“Ok, cool.”

He then turned to Jacob, and greeted him in the same way.

“So what would you two like to do?”

Jacob shrugged.

“Well,” began William. “There’s a rumour that your dad has a collection of swords.”
“Ah yes, he does. Would you like to see them?”
“Yes please.”

A minute or two later, they were in one of the many rooms of the basement. The walls were decorated with all sorts of swords, from rapiers to Katanas to longswords. William was suitably impressed, since he was fascinated with weapons of all sorts. He slowly drifted over to one wall, which had tons of rapiers attacked to it.

“Can I hold one?” he asked, not taking his eyes off the swords.
“Err… ok,” Peter answered, hesitantly. “Just be careful with it.”

The swords didn’t seem to be held in place by anything. There were no straps, clamps, bolts, or anything. The swords were just suspended on the wall. William grabbed one, and with a slight tug, it came off. He waved it around a bit, getting the feel of it.

“Careful with that,” Peter reminded him.
“Let’s have a sword fight,” Jacob suggested, eagerly.
“No no no no,” Peter hurriedly replied.
“Oh, come on, it will be fun,” Jacob insisted.
“Yeah, it will great,” William added, still waving the sword about.
“Oh… fine,” said Peter, finally giving in. “But you’re not using these real swords. I’ll make replicas of them.”

He walked over to William and grabbed the sword from him. With William and Jacob following, Peter quickly ran over to another room, with a 3D printer and scanner in it. He tapped at a few buttons on the scanner, activating it and raising the lid. Peter carefully placed the sword on it, and then closed the lid.

After little more than a second, the scanner had finished. The printer, though, took a few more seconds to finish its task of replicating the sword, which it also had to do twice. After it had finished, the printer opened up, revealing two perfectly identical swords. William and Jacob both took one, and eagerly got into battle position.

“Do either of you two actually know how to sword fight?” Peter asked, more than a little concerned.
“Kind of,” William replied.
“Not really,” said Jacob, “but how hard can it?” he joked, grinning.

Before Peter could say any more, William, with his sword outstretched, lunged at Jacob. Jacob hoped backwards, blocking the strike at the same time. Jacob then swung his sword at William, who blocked it. He then once again lunged at Jacob, who spun round to the side. Using his momentum, Jacob swung his sword at William. William ducked, and then leapt at Jacob.

Jacob simultaneously parried, spun round, and fell over. William stumbled slightly, but managed to keep his balance. He circled around Jacob, waiting for him to get up. Jacob leapt to his feet, and continued the fight. They continued fighting for a few more minutes, getting faster and faster, trying more and more daring moves, in the large, computer filled room, before finally deciding that they should probably get back to the party.

“Can I keep this?” William asked, holding the sword up.
“Sure,” replied Peter. “But just don’t flash it around in front of the bunch of teenagers upstairs. They’d kill each other!” he joked.
“Do you have a scabbard for it?” William asked.
“Err… yeah, I get you one now.”
“And a belt please,” William added.
“Ok,” replied Peter, as he walked out of the room.
“Me too!” Jacob called a second later.

A minute later, Peter returned with a scabbard and a belt. After realising that he had left the authentic rapier in the scanner, he took it out, and then replaced it with the scabbard and the belt. Once again, after a few seconds, the printer opened up, with two scabbards and two belts inside.

Both William and Jacob took theirs, and after a little bit of trouble fastening their belts and scabbards, as belts were no longer used at that time, they were ready to go. Jacob practiced quickly pulling out his sword a few times, enjoying himself massively.

“Come on,” Peter said, heading towards the door. “We should get back upstairs now.”
“Ok,” replied Jacob, catching his rapier after flipping it in the air.

He slid it back into his scabbard, and followed William and Peter out the door. They quickly jogged over to the nearest set of stairs, as there were many in such a big house, and began making their way up.

“Err… why are we using stairs?” Jacob asked.
“Exercise,” replied Peter.

Jacob sighed.

“That’s what the academy is for,” argued Jacob.
“With that thinking you’ll never beat the best,” Peter told him, with a slightly cheeky smile on his face.
“Well of course I’ll never beat you,” Jacob replied. “You have all this training equipment in your house.”
“Oh, you never know how far a flight of stairs can get you,” Peter joked, getting up the stairs considerably faster than the other two.


After a rather long time at the party, William decided that it was time for him to go. There was going to be a graduation ceremony in a few days time, and William needed to get everything sorted out by before then. He was still convinced that there was a mistake in the results.

“I’m afraid I’m going to have you go now,” William informed Peter.
“Oh, are you sure you can’t stay any longer?” Peter asked.
“No, sorry,” William replied. “It’s past midnight, and I need to get my sleep. I’ve got important stuff to sort out,” he added.
“And what’s that?”
“Importantly classified,” William joked, backing up towards the door.
“Is it, now?” laughed Peter.
“Yeah. And I can still keep the sword, can’t I?”
“Sure, go ahead.”

William waved goodbye, and walked out the door. It was a very cold, dark night. He could see little robotic birds flying about, picking up bits of litter, measuring the temperature, and just generally helping and monitoring the world around them.

Suddenly, William heard a metal clanging noise from an alleyway. He walked over to it and looked to see what it was. He saw one of the robotic birds on the ground, with one of its wings destroyed, and the rest of it badly dented. There was a teenager standing next to it, who then kicked it into the wall.

“Hey, stop that!” William shouted, running over to the teenager.

The teenager looked about the same age as William, though possibly a bit older. He was wearing a rather bulky, black jacket, and had extremely dark, floppy hair. In an instant, he turned to William, glaring.

“What did you just say?” he demanded, slowly walking towards him.
“I said stop that. That’s vandalism,” William replied, slightly worried.
“Well why don’t you give me your money, and maybe I’ll stop,” the teenager said, pulling out a blaster from inside his jacket.

He pointed it at William, still walking towards him.

“Or,” began William, “you could just put the gun down now and leave, before you get spotted by one of the Echo-birds.”
“If any one of those things comes near me, I’ll shoot them.”

By this time, the teenager was standing only a few away from William, still pointing the blaster at him. As discretely as he could, William placed his hand on the hilt of his sword. As fast as he could manage, he simultaneously pulled the sword out of his scabbard and spun round, slightly ducking. The sword wacked the blaster out of the person’s hand, sending it flying into the wall.

The teenager looked at William, stunned. He hadn’t noticed the sword. Just as he was about to run for the blaster, William jumped moved in between him and it, pressing the tip of the sword against the person’s chest.

“Leave, now,” William said, firmly.

After a few seconds, the teenager slowly took a few steps back, still glaring at William. William also stepped back a bit, and after very briefly taking his eyes off the teenager, he picked up the blaster. He slid the rapier back into his scabbard, and began pointing at the person with the blaster instead.

After they had gone, William folded his arms, concealing the weapon as best he could, and continued on his walk home.

Thanks.

Last edited by calebxy (2012-06-07 10:16:25)

I've updated it.

wiimaster wrote:

I admire your determination! When I start a book, I usually don't get as far as you. You wouldn't believe how many unfinished stories I have lying around.
Its good that you started working on this again!

It would be cool if you added it to this when it is done :3

Same here. I've only ever finished 2 stories (not including short stories). Once, I tried to write several books of a treasure hunting series at the same time, and I only wrote a few paragraphs of them.    Though actually, I did fairly recently write one of the planned stories, and I got relatively far with that.

And that looks cool. I shall add this when it's finished, but that probably won't be for quite some time.