Greed

[Attack! Attack!]

I wanted to give a try. If it's successful, don't expect chapters too often, maybe like once every one or two weeks. Regardless, I'd appreciate comments and criticism.

Greed
Chapter 1

Troy began as an average kid, he was sixteen and trying to perform well in High School. Troy was only slightly above average when it came to intelligence, he struggled to maintain a strong 3.3 grade point average in school. He studied hard, did his homework as best as he could, and always put forth extra effort in school work. It wasn’t hard for him though, he always had a lot of time on his hands, and he didn’t have any friends really and spent most of his time in his room, occasionally leaving to eat dinner or enjoying brief moments with his family. Joy wasn’t something he was used to, home life was miserable for him; his parents were always either drunk or awayfrom home. His room was his own sanctuary, the bed was large and comfortable, he had a laptop which he spent a lot of time on, and his own television. Most people in this situation would be completely happy, but Troy felt empty, he desired more. He had so much already but always felt that there was more he should and could have. There was nothing that he could really do about it though; he lived in a small town where a job for a teenager was out of the question. His uncontrollable greed could not be satisfied and has lead Troy to endless sorrow.

Another day of High School had begun; he calmly paced the hallways searching for his first class, ignoring one of the girls who had been admiring him as he passed. Troy’s sense of fashion always caught the student body’s eye, he always dressed in what he thought looked cool and somehow it turned out to actually look really cool to the other students. He often started a lot of fashion trends in his school and found a lot of kids dressing in a style similar to his own. His first class was a literature class that was discussing mythology and fantasies in literature, mainly the genie. The genie was a magical spirit stuck inside a magic bottle or lamp, once the lamp was rubbed three times the genie would be released and as reward for freeing the genie, the person would be granted three wishes. After all of the wishes were used up however, the genie would be trapped again and the lamp would be relocated. In the middle of writing down some notes the fire bell had rung and the kids scattered throughout the classroom, carefully exiting the classroom. The teacher always left first to make sure everyone left, which allowed Troy to quickly finish up his notes so he could study that night. Once finished he tried to rush out before his teacher would notice, which required for him to travel down a decent sized staircase. He was concerned that his teacher may discover his absence, if he were to get in trouble at school and his parents got word of it, it would mean them yelling at him and most likely grounding him from his pleasures, and there was always the chance that his father would be drunk at the time, which would bring about the possibility of violence between he and his father. His concern caused him to not pay attention as he hurried down the stairs; stairs are always tricky structures to travel down, Troy himself always despised them and took immediate caution when traveling down or up them, which was of course when he was paying attention. As he rushed downwards, his foot scraped the surface of one of the steps and caused him to fall. When falling down the stairs a persons thoughts generally race and spin so fast that it becomes difficult to comprehend what’s going on. The feeling was the same for Troy as each roll against the jagged steps sent a shockwave of pain throughout each section of the body it contacted until he finally hit the bottom.

A roll down the stairs won’t exactly cause anything to serious for a boy his age, and the stairs weren’t that long in the first place, so Troy woke only a few minutes later. He had some scrapes and a bruise, but it was all ignored as he caught eye of something unique. Underneath a plant nearby was a dirty red object implanted into the ground. Still only half-aware of where he was and what was going on, he picked it up curiously, removing it from the dirt he discovered it was a bizarre object that was very dirty and incredibly rusty, which allowed him to draw the conclusion that it must have been there for many years. Admiring the object, he wasn’t able to notice that his teacher was heading towards him, followed by what seemed like an army of sluggish kids groaning as they knew they would be returning to their boring classes soon. His teacher was concerned at first, he asked what happened to him which gave him a true awakening, reality was setting in and he began to worry incredibly. He spoke hesitantly “Oh…I uh…fell…”, afterwards he got quiet and so did everyone else. It was only after a few moments of strange silence that the teacher addressed him once more, “Well…head to the nurses office, but after that you can expect a referral for staying behind when you were supposed to be evacuating. Just feel lucky that it wasn’t a real fire”. Troy bowed his head and silently nodded as he stood up and brushed the dirt off of himself. He wanted to run as fast as he could, he wanted to just start over again, but he knew it couldn’t happen, he just walked as fast and at the same time calmly as possible.

Troy could almost cry as he arrived home. His horrible expectations were exceeded as he arrived and found his father drunk out of his senses. Troy defined his father as a “random drunk” due to the fact that his father’s life was wonderful, yet he still drank like crazy no matter what the occasion. “BOY, I THOUGHT I TOLD YOU WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IF YOU WER MISBEHA-IN AT DA DAMN SCH-SCHOOL”. It was almost difficult to comprehend what he said because of the lack of syllables in certain words and because of how slurred his speech was. “I’m sorry Dad; I fell down the stai-““I DON GIV DAMN WHA DA HELL HAPPEN GIT DA FUC IN YER ROOM BOY”. He spoke violently and sent a fist into Troy’s chest, causing him to fall over. Troy didn’t hesitate; he quickly lifted himself off the floor and ran into his room, being extremely careful not to close his door to hard so that his father would not misinterpret it as anger. He stomped in front of the mirror to examine the injury. The mirror really revealed his features, his long black hair which always annoyed his face by blanketing it. He didn’t get much exercise so he was a bit scrawny and pale, which accentuated his eye color which seemed to be a mix of green and blue, only it was not forming its own color, the colors were coexistent within his eye. There wasn’t any visible damage but it still hurt, and only fueled his hatred for his father.

A few hours passed, he didn’t bother to eat dinner, he just lay in his bed staring at the ceiling waiting for the torment to stop troubling his soul. Eventually he got bored and grabbed his backpack to search for his homework. While doing so he discovered that object he found earlier which he placed in his backpack. Troy took it out and laid back to examine it comfortably; the markings on it were bold and hard to distinguish because of the age of the object. He had forgotten to rub all the dirt and other miscellaneous things that plagued the objects design off earlier. Troy gave it a few rubs and brushed some of the dirt off until he could finally get a rough image of the object. Just as he was attempting to determine what it was, he dropped it and grasped his hand in sudden pain; the object had heated up spontaneously and unexpectedly. Just as the pain stopped he looked back towards the object as it shook violently for a few moments until it vanished. It was silent for awhile, Troy was shocked and astounded at one of the most bizarre things to ever happen to him. Just as he was about to speak out loud to himself he heard “Hello”. Troy jumped in surprise, accidentally knocking into his dresser, sending a yelp of pain flying from his mouth. His father yelled from outside his room “WAS GON ON IN DER BOY?” Troy quickly responded so that his father wouldn’t come back here “Nothing Dad, I just stubbed my toe”. He waited for a moment to see if his father would say anything, but after a few moments he realized he wouldn’t respond. “Who the hell are you and how did you get in my room? He spat to the tall figure that now stood in the corner of his room. The figure was about six and a half feet and wore a dark blue business suit with a top hat of the same color and white scarf. Everything about this figure was strange and shrouded in mystery; his glasses gleamed in a strange way that covered his eyes completely. Before it spoke, it bore a fiendish smile, revealing a set of large teeth. “Why, I’m your servant”. “Servant?” I replied and he replied just as quickly “Yes, you set me free from my entrapment.” “You mean kind of like a genie?” “I guess you could say that, the humans seem to have given us that title. There’s really not a name for what we are”.

“Uh…this is a bit strange and hard to believe, can you prove that you’re a genie or something?” “Sure, the myths are correct about us, you are granted three wishes when you set us free…wish for something”. “Well…hm…I guess I wish for…a…sandwich?” The figure smiled that fiendish smile once again and removed his hat to reveal bright blonde hair. “It is done” he said in a dark tone and in the next moment the sandwich that Troy had imagined had suddenly flashed on to the bed in front of him. Troy was speechless, he continued to stare wide-eyed at the sandwich and muttered to himself “It’s real…”

Once again things got silent only to get broken as Troy was suddenly overcome with a feeling that he’s had for a very long time. He was voracious for possessions and personal gain, he was ready to use his remaining two wishes to make him the richest man in the world, but before he could spit the mistake from his mouth, he realized something. “Can I make a wish for infinite or more wishes?” It laughed. “Most people ask that, I usually say no, but I think I’ll swing things different this time. To prevent humans from becoming entirely too powerful, we do not allow for infinite amounts of wishes, we do however allow other forms of wishing with the promise of a larger amount of wishes. To balance this, we were forced to make a rule that would cause the human to die once they used their entire new amount of wishes”. Troy was too overtaken with greed to care “I’m not dumb, I know I won’t be using up all of my wishes. Really it’s a dumb rule, they can use all but one of their wishes, they still have plenty of power”. It laughed again “There a few methods you can wish for at once, you may wish for a notebook that grants any wish you write down, or you can type them on a computer or maybe you can draw out a wish to reduce vagueness”.

“Give me the notebook I guess, but I’d need at least one other form in case it were confiscated or someone caught on. For now I’ll take the notebook until I can think of another way”. He laughed again and snapped his fingers. Troy looked to find a new notebook placed gently on his pillow, it looked like a regular spiral notebook so that no suspicion could be aroused regularly. Troy opened it up, there were blank pages as expected, but on the back of the cover was the number “100”. In the corner was another interesting detail, the words “Created by Mr. Jack”. Troy assumed it was his name, but paid
little attention to it, he was more interested in the fact that this Mr. Jack fellow was gone. Troy called out to him, but there was no answer, so he assumed he was gone and didn’t care much at all; he was intent on his new notebook. It was time to test it, Troy took out a pen and opened the notebook again. He pressed it down and wrote a quick segment and smiled as he finished. On the first page in the notebook was “I wish my father would die an immediate, horrible death”. The number on the notebook turned to 99.

[Nevermore]

Impressive! I'll admit, it started off very slow (almost to the point of stopping me from reading it), but the "genie's" character has me absolutely hooked (it makes me think of Tyki Mykk with the Earl's glasses and pale skin from D.Gray-Man). I can tell you're a fan of Death Note as well, lol.

Now for some critique:

1) This seems to be a common problem here, but please put spces between dialog. It makes it much easier to identify the speaker. Look at the my stories (in sig) if you need an example.

2) Inject some life into Troy. He doesn't have a lot of emotion and depth right now, which stands out since he's the main character.

3) Don't overuse "-ly" adverbs. They make the writing seem a bit amateur-ish when used improperly or to excess. For example, you used "silently" to modify "nodding". The reader knows that nodding is a silent action, so to add the adverb feels redundant.

Overall, excellent work! I'm really looking forward to more!

[Attack! Attack!]

Thank you very much, finally someone who gives some useful criticism. I will make sure to begin spacing dialog, I have to agree that it would make it more appealing to read. I'll make sure to cut back on the -ly words too, I guess it's just a habit of mine. As for Troy, I agree that he is a bit boring right now, but he will advance as the story goes on, this was the first chapter and basically sets the ground for the rest of the story.

[Enchanted Rose]

Not bad at all, Rem.

However, I really think you could make the link between Troy's literature class, and the actual appearance of the genie a bit less forced, and more stylish and subtle.

Building on from that, I wasn't particularly keen on the first paragraph introducing Troy. You've given us fact, fact, fact about him, and personally, I'd prefer if you interlaced a description about him with some action. Perhaps his situation could be less self-pitying too. People don't usually want to read about someone who has few friends, neglectful parents and is in a generally miserable situation.

There are many good things about this story. The interaction between Troy and the 'genie' reads especially well, and your writing style is great. The description of the genie is creative but more realistic so it resonates well with the reader.
I also disagree with kazu's comment about injecting more life into Troy. I think you've managed to give us hints towards Troy's more devious personality - his greed - which is introduced in the first paragraph with his desire for more than he already has, and then expanded on as he contemplates wishing for wishes. There is a nice contrast between this, and the submissiveness and quietness which he shows in other occasions, such as at school.

Hope that helped xD

[Attack! Attack!]

Chapter 2
“Plot “

Screams, beautiful screams, screams that filled Troy with pure joy and satisfaction. These screams had originated from his mother who wasn’t drunk at the time so her common sense was functioning as normal. She yelled for Troy and told him to call 911 from out in the living room, all Troy could do was smile. Troy walked out to the living room without any form of haste and in a voice that sounded almost sarcastic, Troy told his mother “Why Mom? What’s the matter?” In the living room he found his mother soaking with tears and sobbing over her husband’s blood-drenched body. Troy almost busted out laughing; it took all the force in his body to stop himself which proved difficult because he also had to dabble in some acting as he tried to sound worried and shocked. “Dear god! What happened to him?” Troy spoke and picked up the phone at the same time dialing as slow as he could so that there would be no possibility of his father surviving.

The ambulance didn’t take long to arrive, and during the wait his mother informed Troy on how his father died. The wish may have overdid it, though it would not have if Troy had been more specific, a flaw of vagueness. She said he was so drunk that he had stumbled around and tripped over his own feet, as he fell the bottle he was holding had fell and broke before he landed, leaving a large shard of glass to pierce his neck. The shards size was so large that it almost decapitated him, leaving him to resemble a pez dispenser, yet he managed to remain alive. He had then grabbed a sheet on the kitchen counter, which had a container of knives atop it, sending them soaring toward his body, each one sinking into him in several different places. Troy didn’t care how heartless and malicious he was at the moment; he was overjoyed at every juicy detail of his father’s death. This side of Troy never really existed; it remained dormant and festered within him for many years, and only concerned his worthless father. The remainder of the night was long and tiring, there were many questions Troy had to answer and he spent a lot of time in the hospital with his mother only to end up faking lamenting emotions. After hours passed the night concluded with Troy arriving at home with his mother whose face was wet and sticky with tears. Troy would not be required to attend school for awhile which pleased Troy, and would also give him time to tinker with his wish book. The time was nearly four in the morning and Troy was forcing his eyes to stay open long enough to speak with his mother for a brief moment until she told him to go to bed and that they would discuss it in the morning. Troy lay down on his bed, implanting his face into his cloud of a pillow, falling asleep with a deviant smile.

The doorknob jiggled and twisted and sprung open to reveal a man in a loose dark-grey business suit. He walked in muttering to himself in anger, slamming his keys down on the table and turning on the light that bathed the decent sized house. He had no wife, the man was alone, a fact that really never bothered him because he always preferred this lifestyle, and because he was a lawyer who spent most of his time away from home. This was the fifth time he had come home angry, and each time it was for the same reason; he didn’t win. As a lawyer his sense of justice was strong he wanted to prosecute the vile criminals that inhabited the world, but that emotion has now died when he learned the truth, he learned what the justice system was really like. People lied on the stands, and even paid off the judge to win cases or protect clients, he knew because this happened in every case he was involved in. It hadn’t just him angry, it also disgusted him to the point that he often spent nights spitting on case files, on the television screen when he was watching shows like “Law & Order”, and on the American flag, which he had burned three cases ago.

Picking up the remote, he clicked on the television and began surfing through the channels with the bright lights and flashing from the change of each channel gleaming in his eyes. After a few moments he ended up stopping at the local news, and of pure coincidence, a small segment of the news had begun discussing him. “Local prosecuting attorney Samuel Keyes ended up losing his fifth case in a row today, we spoke with some of the firm and they say that failure like this is not representing them well and that the people can be assured that one more failure will result in his removal. They also added that they take things like this serious because they want people to know that they work hard to make sure criminals are put away and the streets are kept safe”. “RAAAAAAAH” Samuel yelled in utter fury, using every force at his disposal to prevent himself from destroying the television. He clicked it off and left himself there in silence to huff and puff breathe as hot as hell itself. He had become so angry that his face had burned red with intense heat that caused him to sweat torrents of liquid down his face. “They’re mocking me, laughing at me…WHAT CAN I DO? This whole damn system has ****ed me, IT ISN’T MY FAULT!”

“Of course it isn’t” was heard from a voice that resonated from the depths of the shadows. The words shot at Samuel’s ears like fresh bullet still smoking from the barrel and ripping through the air. Samuel was still at first, trying to act as if he didn’t hear it, then he ran into the kitchen and grabbed the largest knife he could find and turned on the kitchen light. “Who the hell is out there!?” A laugh could be heard from the living room, and then footsteps. A figure stepped into the grace of the light, revealing a tall man in a dark-blue business suit, a top hat of the same color, and a scarf that resembled a snake composed of snow. “Stay back! I’ll put this right through your heart!” The figure just smiled and responded. “There’s no need to worry poor soul, I’m here to help you”. “Help me? What would I need help with?” said Samuel. “If you lose another case, you’ll lose your job, and even if you were to move and try to get a job there, your record will follow you, your life will be over”. Mr. Jack removed his hat and placed it on the counter. “I can help you, and as a result, help myself; do you know what I am?” Mr. Jack managed to hold that same smile that was sending a chill down Samuel’s back. “No, you just like some guy, to be honest”. He laughed again. “I am what your kind calls the genie, or sometimes referred to as the djinn. I was freed a few days ago and I need your assistance to stay that way”. Samuel lowered the knife, and allowed it to slip from the grip of his hand and slam to the floor. “So, can you grant wishes?” Mr. Jack walked towards Samuel, trying not to alarm him, which didn’t succeed, Samuel moved to the right and out of the way. Mr. Jack opened the fridge and began to browse through its contents with voracity until he found a large roast that was leftovers from the day before. As if he were savage, Mr. Jack sunk his teeth into the roast and began ripping away at it, devouring it piece by piece, leaving the juice to run down his face. When he finished, he wiped his mouth and answered Samuel’s question. “Yes, but not right now, my power is not with me right now, but we can get it back, you can get it back, tomorrow…”

Troy had not woke up until three in the afternoon, but when he did he went straight to the notebook. At first he just felt it and flipped through the pages, admiring each detail of the book. When he was ready, he made another wish. The first wish he wrote was that his family was now billionaires and that they lived in a bigger and better house as a result. He could now buy whatever his heart desired, but he still desired more; he next wished for what any teenage boy would wish for; a woman. He wished for a particular woman that would love him and always desire sexual intercourse, a celebrity he always had a crush on, Megan Fox. Troy was still a virgin, and thought about sex a lot; he was teenage boy so it isn’t much of a surprise that he would make a wish like that. Troy also made sure she only came in his room upon request, and even made another wish that his mother and everyone else would not ask any questions concerning the relationship. This was required because he could not have her in the room with him all the time or else she may discover the book, though he still had her in the room a lot of the time for sex. Troy continued to make wishes; he wrote down a wish that he would never catch any disease, including diseases transmitted by sex. He wished that he could play any song on the guitar which he spent a few months learning to play by will, eliminating the hard work that came with the mastery of an instrument. He also wished that he was strong enough to bench over two-hundred pounds, and fast enough to outrun Olympic runners. At about six ‘o clock he had decided to stop, the number on the book now read 88, which he had to remember that these had to last the remainder of his life. With the notebook, Troy would not have to attend college and he could drop out of school, it may seem like a stupid decision, but Troy didn’t care, he was set for life and now happy.

Troy and his mother went to the Mall that night to purchase the things they’ve both always wanted. Troy bought a water bed and another soft king size bed, a large plasma screen television, surround sound systems, a laptop, every video game he ever wanted, and tons of other things. They had to bring a moving truck to the mall with them just to get it back to the house. Troy’s new room was huge, nearly four times the size of his previous room, so all of this stuff would end up fitting. His closet was nearly the size of his previous room and contained rows and rows of clothes. Troy was now beginning to believe that the people who say money can’t buy happiness were idiots, because Troy was happy for the first time in his life. He got home that night and began moving things into his room, he finished and then had sex with his new girlfriend and allowed her to sleep in the room with him that night. He awoke late in the night with one thought driving his mind, he got up and searched his drawer for the notebook; he nearly woke up Megan by slamming the drawer on the ground, allowing it to smash into pieces; the notebook was gone.

“Excuse me sir, I think there’s a case you should have a look at”. “Are you serious? I haven’t had a case in ages”. “That’s because you’re the best sir!” said the gruff man. “Yes, yes, I know, you’ve told me many times, now if you’re done flattering me then lets see the case”. He was handed the case file and opened it while simultaneously sipping at his strawberry milkshake, which he put down with great agility and implanted the file in his face with mimicking speed. The detective began muttering small pieces of the file out loud. “Father Dies in drunken accident…family wins billions…actor Megan Fox begins dating average kid. Wow, how lucky, I’ve wanted Ms. Fox for years and now she just decides to date this kid. I thought we had something Megan…” There was an awkward silence between the detective and the gruff man who gave him the case file. “Sir, what do you think?” There was still silence for awhile. “Oh, right, well I can see why a minor case would be made on this; luck like this is bizarre, almost supernatural. It’s been three years since I’ve had a case, the last case I had was the murders that took place in a town nearby where people’s heads were exploding at random. I had done six other cases with outrageous circumstances before that, each time to triumph. Once again I’ll do so…lets just hope this kid isn’t really lucky. Detective Omar is now on the case…”

I was going to make the character speech different colors for this installment but I don't have the time right now, I may do it later. Comments would be appreciated.

[Amalthea]

I really liked how you described the genie's scarf the second time "a snake composed of snow". Very cool.

My only problem with this chapter is that there were no breaks when you switched characters. Like when you switched from Troy to the lawyer, you should put in a larger break, or a solid line or something, to let the reader know that something different is happening.

Otherwise, I really liked it. You got more into Troy's character, and I think you did a great job describing his father's death...so tragic... :cry: (lol)

P.S. Megan Fox is an actress, not an actor...lol

[Nevermore]

@ dragonrider932

Actually, both genders are referred to as actors now (apparently, actress was too much of a sexist term, lol)

Anyway, I enjoyed that much more than the initial chapter. Troy is coming along splendidly as a character, and the two you've introduced seem off to a good start. Of course, Jack is still my favorite (love the way you portray him).

As dragonrider932 said, you should put a dashed line or something between scenes. Otherwise, the reader gets confused. You also should run this through a word processor to weed out some of those formatting errors (particularly, the ones involving commas). Finally, expect me to hound you on proper dialog until you fix it :P

Example:

"Hi," he said, walking up to meet her.

"Hello," she said, giving a brief wave.

Nice job! Looking forward to more!

[Amalthea]

I simply like Jack's scarf. You do a good job at describing things. Keep up the good work! :)

And why the change in 'actors'? That's stupid. (<<<<immature me shining through)