The Spiralling
Bonus Feature: Writer's Commentary Part 7
Chapter 5: An End at Dawn: Basically, 'An End at Dawn' refers to the supposed end to the story, which took place in the morning when the raid on the Demoness began and ended in ernest. Note that there is a part 2, and yet there was no part 1. This is to catch the readers off-guard, to hide away the fact that this chapter isn't what it appears to be at first glance. At the end, Kick-Ass was able to save Hit-Girl from an otherwise certain death, and was about to carry her away from the apartment to the hospital when the story fades away and cuts. This is to give the illusion of an optimistic end to the chapter.
Although the purpose of this chapter and the next was to draw the readers in and make them think it was over only to surprise and even shock (heck, or even terrify a few of them- if you read the next chapter you'd know what I mean) them, there must still be signs that something seems to be amiss. To achieve this, I've placed something right at the beginning of this chapter, or rather, I've not done something at the start. Between Chapter 4 and this part, notice that there was a break in the story. In chapter 4, Dave returned home with alot of bleeding around his body- the chapter ends with him patching himself up. Chapter 5 starts with him and Mindy making preparations to counter-attack Demoness.
'What the hell?' Some of my readers would no doubt start thinking- and immediately they'd know that something was just not right. Of course, the problem is, it could go both ways in this case. Some may just dismiss it completely as an acceptable lapse in time between the two chapters, to skip away some boring parts as Dave fixes himself up so that we could get on to the action. However, some may also think I could have forgotten to upload a chapter or accidentally deleted a few paragraphs. The former is still acceptable, as such readers would still be vulnerable to the surprise/shock/terror in part 2, but the latter isn't. Thankfully, I've only received a single inquiry about this part, so safe to say this worked.
More signs that this could be a dream sequence was how perfect some of Kick-Ass's manoeuvres went. We knew in real-life that Dave could never possibly kick open a door, and shoot Demoness in the head without aiming, and yet he did it. Again, this can be hard to spot, considering that anyone who read this unofficial sequel would willingly suspend their beliefs. The cheesiness can be another sign- Demoness reading a book on the occult, Kick-Ass and Hit-Girl proceeding to fight crime like Batman and Robin... Though, this hint isn't very strong.
Anyway, as you can see, even in a dream, Kick-Ass was still quite an incapable average Joe- rushing into the apartment recklessly, he got himself shot and fell out of the skirmish almost as soon as it started, leaving his partner alone against the new menace. This serves the same purpose as in Chapter 3: Crimson on Blue- to show that he has alot, alot to learn despite his past experiences. When this idea was conceived in my head, I chuckled to myself. 'This could work,' I thought to myself. It did to me at least, in the same way Dave was stabbed and knocked down by a car in his first attempt at crime-fighting. I guess in both cases, he failed so badly and suffered so damn horribly for it that it became horribly funny- hey, it works. I've successfully (at least I think so) replicated that same feeling you get watching the movie. Great times.
Other than this, this chapter was a great opportunity to stage a rare Hit-Girl versus Demoness fight. Due to their similar fighting style and strength (though Demoness was slightly better), it became an interesting match- I knew it would be, if I could make it so. For this fight, I drew my inspiration from John Woo and Wu Xia choreography in general. What I regret here, though, was that I wasn't able to translate all the imagery in my head into words. I may have written that they were flying around and dodging each other, but I failed to elaborate on how they did it, and the motions of the combat. I left it to the imagination of the readers, but such a complex scene... I wasn't sure if everyone could imagine a good fight scene without some literary aids.
Chapter 6: An End at Dawn Part. 2: Drops the bombshell. Chapter 2 reveals, in a hopefully shocking way, that all along, the last chapter and the start of this chapter had all been a scary nightmare after all. This was designed to not be immediately obvious though. I knew that for there to be horror, there must be a build-up of suspense and sometimes, 'weirdness'. I tried to achieve this by gradually breaking down the logic of the dream.
I started with the ominous word, 'Wait...' It halts the dream from ending with a happy ending immediately, with Kick-Ass and Hit-Girl going to hospital happily ever after. Instead, it shows that there was something else, either something very good or something very bad was going to happen. Then, the logic starts breaking- first, Dave referred to the mask as a uniform, assuming that Mindy wanted her uniform taken off. While this may not be totally wrong, it's either Dave has a problem with vocabulary or Mindy was not being specific enough.
Then, the 'What the fuck' thing happened. Mindy's mask came off, but it took with it Mindy's face- something that really, really shouldn't happen in real-life. There was another face underneath, and it turns out to be Demoness's. Now how could that be possible when Demoness was already killed? Even if Demoness and Hit-Girl were disguising as each other, Hit-Girl would not have tried to kill Dave nor keep silent about her real identity. As you can see, logic was thrown out completely, and the dream becomes a nightmare when Mindy, who was actually Demoness, proceeds to bite Dave in the neck.
This entire dream sequence has another function however that is for the big picture. This serves as a foreshadow of things to come. However, like any good foreshadows, this was meant to be invisible until a second read-through. The dream sequence could just easily be dismissed as a really bad dream that was born out of Dave Lizewski's bad experiences in his first brush with the Demoness, and the physically agony he was forced to endure. If it was me, I'd sure have a nightmare along those lines.
This foreshadow however, may be a wee bit too obvious, and I knew it, so there were a few chapters after this that serves to dampen any suspicion that may arise that Mindy was Demoness. The most significant one was when Mindy returns from her supposed 'vacation' to find out her stepfather was gunned down by Demoness- genuinely, she showed great remorse and shock, seemingly ruling her out as Demoness (in the end, we found out that she was indeed the culprit, but only because she had Dissociative Identity Disorder). If that wasn't enough, Mindy broke down before her stepdaddy and Dave, and vowed to catch Demoness.
Other than that, Chapter 6 was also another great opportunity for another rare match-up- that of between Red Mist and Demoness. It turned out to be something like a fight between two Samurais. From here, it was pretty much established that Demoness was indeed very much sadistic, always attempting to get as much mileage as she could with each person she kills, though she knows when not to do it, such as when there was little time.
Overall, Chapter 5 & 6 were, I feel, well written enough, though I wished I had written the fight scenes better- better described and elaborated upon, longer, more interesting and dynamic, etc. However, I had limited experience in terms of writing out action sequences, especially fights between such colourful individuals. I guess though, there is always a start for everything...