For The Greater Good.
Gellert came bursting through the door of his Godricks Hollow address. Breathless, he leaned against the wall for just a moment; then quickly, in a panicked state, sprinted up the staircase. Entering his bedroom, Gellert looked ‘round as if hoping to find the answers, a solution, amongst his scattered possessions. The events that just passed still fresh in his mind. “What have I done?!” he shouted out, questioning the darkness.
What do I do? What do I do? Gellert thought over and over. He was in shock, complete disbelief at what had just unfolded. Scattering parchment across the floor, Gellert cleared his bed. Sitting down he placed his gaunt face between his palms, running his fingers through his thin stringy hair now streaked with blood. How could Albus betray him like this? After the countless hours they spent together planning their new world order; then he turns his back on it all for his brother?! That stupid boy! Why couldn’t he have just stepped aside? Couldn’t Aberforth see we would have made things better? With the magical word in charge; Ariana would no longer have to be hidden away in shame. Why couldn’t he have seen the brilliance of Albus’ and my plan? Then none of this would have happened.
Gellert’s eyes were transfixed on the wall. That poor girl, he thought. She didn’t deserve any of this. She didn’t deserve to be hidden away in disgrace. She needn’t have died. His mind in turmoil, Gellert drifted back to earlier in the evening.
“You can’t expect to drag Ariana around with you!” Aberforth barked at Albu, “Who will care for her when you’re too busy conquering the world?! Huh?! What happens she becomes enraged in a fit?!”
“I shall take the best of care of Ariana, she will be no worse of than she is staying here. I would never place my own ambition before Ariana.” Albus answered sternly.
“You can’t promise that Albus! You have no idea where your campaign will take you. Sure, you’ll take care for a month or two. But as soon as you start receiving the praise you so desperately desire, she’ll be put aside and forgotten. All you and him” Aberforth glanced towards Gellert, “care about I your own glory! Or ‘the Greater Good’ as you call it” Aberforth finished in a mock tone.
This was the edge of the knife for Gillert, “How dare you mock our goal! You have no idea of the accomplishments we will achieve, boy! When we are in charge, no longer will your sister have to be tucked away. The muggles will fear us, not the other way around! You stand in our way because you are jealous; jealous that you will never be a great wizard like Albus or I!”
“Gellert!” Albus begged.
“You’re a pathetic excuse for a wizard!” Gellert finished; his eyes now flaring with rage. Who does Aberforth think he is? Gellert slide his hand beneath his robes, grasping his wand.
“You fool! You are blinded by your own arrogance! I will not allow you to take Ariana on your sick muggle-murdering campaign!” Aberforth stood his ground.
Gellert smirked “you think your word matters? You think will top us?”
Aberforth revealed his wand, taking his stance.
“CRUCIO!” Gellert screamed as Aberforth fell to the floor in agony.
“Gellert no!” Albus cried.
Gellert screeched with laughter, ignoring all pleas from Albus.
“Please Gellert, stop!” Albus begged, but Gellert continued. Not knowing what was happening; Gellert was blasted to the ground by an unknown force. He looked up, smearing the blood from his nose across his sleeve, too she Albus, wand raised, standing in front of a whimpering Aberforth.
“Albus! Don’t do this! Don’t be a fool!” Gellert spat out.
“I can’t allow you to hurt my brother, Gellert” Albus replied, staring down at him with conviction.
Angered by this sudden twist of betrayal, Gellert swiftly raised his wand and sent an array of spells flying in Albus and Aberforth’s direction. He dived behind a cabinet, glass exploding around him as he did so. Aberforth was now up again, and entered into this three-way duel. Gellert scrambled to the other side of the kitchen, flinging stunning spells as he went. Ariana’s screams from the basement were barely even audible amongst the chaos upstairs. Gellert didn’t even hear her running up the stairs in panic. Ariana came screaming through the basement door. Before he even realized she was in the room, Ariana was lying dead on the floor; struck by one the the countless curses sent around the room.
Gellert rubbed his eyes. He couldn’t get the image of Ariana’s dead mangled body out of his head. the scream issued from Albus’ mouth still echoed. Gellert raised himself up from his bed, and began to gather his positions. Only what I need, he thought. Albus will never forgive me, not after….his thoughts trailed off. Gellert continued to round up belongings, there was nothing left for him in Godricks Hollow now. He must continue his quest for the greater good without Albus; without his friend.
Hey Isaac :)
ReplyDeleteYou did fantastic with this scene. It's exactly as I imaged it. I think you remained true to the characters and the circumstances that they were in. I also liked reading it from Gellert's perspective.
There are a few grammar things though, that once corrected will make it a lot easier to read.
The first is that you change the narrative mode.
The story starts off in third-person view. "Gellert did this, Gellert did that," etc.
But once the story starts getting into his thoughts, you switch to first-person view.
In fact even in the middle of his thoughts you switch from one to the other.
You start off with "How could Albus betray him like this? " and move to "Why couldn’t he have seen the brilliance of Albus’ and my plan?"
So you see you switch from, "Him, Gellert, it, his," third person, to "Me, my, I," first person.
You could fix this quite easily in one of two ways I can think of. Firstly you could just change all the writing to first person. So rather then talking about Gellert, you could write like he was telling us the story.
Or you could keep in the third person and just put quotation marks when he's thinking.
"What do I do?" Gellert thought. And so on :)
One of the other things is that some of your sentences aren't full sentences or are missing things.
For example, "The events that just passed still fresh in his mind."
That needs to be something like one of these.
The events that just passed, still fresh in his mind.
The events that just passed were still fresh in his mind.
etc
Some parts of the dialog too, are hard to follow.
This part here (sorry to copy and paste it all, just easier to show you what I mean).
“You’re a pathetic excuse for a wizard!” Gellert finished; his eyes now flaring with rage. Who does Aberforth think he is? Gellert slide his hand beneath his robes, grasping his wand.
“You fool! You are blinded by your own arrogance! I will not allow you to take Ariana on your sick muggle-murdering campaign!” Aberforth stood his ground.
I didn't realise until the end that it was Aberforth replying until I got to the last few words. By then, I had read it all like it was still Gellert talking.
One way you can stop this happening is to either put a space between each person talking. So like this -
“You’re a pathetic excuse for a wizard!” Gellert finished; his eyes now flaring with rage. Who does Aberforth think he is? Gellert slide his hand beneath his robes, grasping his wand.
“You fool! You are blinded by your own arrogance! I will not allow you to take Ariana on your sick muggle-murdering campaign!” Aberforth stood his ground.
But I think on top of that you might need to show that it's Aberforth talking straight away. So maybe like this -
“You fool!" Aberforth stood his ground. "You are..." etc
The last thing (sorry ><) is that there are a few typos, or missing words, or other things along those lines.
I think if you read through your story slowly and out loud you might catch them yourself. Sometimes it's easy to skim over what we've written and miss those things.
I'm so, so sorry for writing so much lol. I hope you don't think I'm ripping your story to shreds or anything. I really, really, really enjoyed reading it. You captured the conflict and the emotions well. And I rather enjoyed the idea that Gellert felt terrible about Ariana's death. And you describe things without going overboard and making it boring. Or not putting enough in. The perfect amount hehe x)
Oh wow.
ReplyDeleteIsaac I really enjoyed your story. As someone not too familiar with Harry Potter (yes there is still some people who haven't read them all yet :P) I managed to follow this story quite well and was really drawn into it.
I like the switch from the third person view in the beginning to the first person view in the memories. I hope I haven't gotten that to wrong. By reading Che's post maybe I did.
For me it was some simple spelling mistakes that I noticed. In one place you wrote "Aberforth barked at Albu" I think you meant Albus there. There was also "she will be no worse of than" and I would of gone with 'off' instead of 'of'.
With "care about I your own glory!" I would say to lose the 'I'
In the line "Gellert smirked “you think your word matters? You think will top us?”" Try "You think that will stop us"
And finally in the line "Gellert was blasted to the ground by an unknown force. He looked up, smearing the blood from his nose across his sleeve, too she Albus," I think you meant to say "too see Albus"
Honestly I am not one to criticize about spelling and grammar mistakes. I am sure if you re-read this post or even my own fan fiction you will see a multitude of them.
Again I really did enjoy this and it does make me want to actually read the book instead of just watching the movies. Good work Isaac. :)
Thanks Che and Troy! These are some excellent comments!
ReplyDeleteI have always had trouble with interchanging between points of view, so thank you for pointing them out. I might not have noticed them otherwise ^^
I agree, spelling and grammar also needs some working on. But a lot of it's just carelessness (eg "Aberforth barked at Albu"), much to my embarrassment haha.
Thanks again for the helpful words :)
Hi Isaac,
ReplyDeleteIt's a great story with vivid imagination and it is easy to read and follow. I was totally drawn into your story. Really enjoy reading it.
Well done.
Thanks Minchi :)
ReplyDeleteHi Issac,
ReplyDeleteYour writing is imaginative and thoughtful. You structure your story nicely. You build tension well and create suspense.
I think people reading this, would have to have a good grasp of the Harry Potter book series, to understand the background and why the events take place in your story. But despite this, your fan fiction is an enjoyable read.