A review of my own work. (Line By Line.) I had others done long before this, but stopped halfway through from an ironic lack of caring. But if you want to see ones worst critic. Here's how you actually review a work. And I also explained my thought process in making something "that could have been." (But wasn't.)

[hider=My Story Review]
[color=fff200]Act 1: Into The Dumps[/color]

It’s small and often irrelevant. The given titles rarely even mean anything. Only a few times do they actively do so much at once. 1. Hints at the main location. 2. Hints at the obstacle in the main character/focus character’s way 3. Even fits the mood of the piece. Though a more literal title, it also could be improved by using “Graveyard”, because it’s more accurate to the overall plot. People are sent here to die. It’s more snappy. More dark. It fits the tone better. And it would have made the closing line, more poignant. Yes. This is really happening. Paragraphs of analyze for three measly words. You can do better.

[color=39b54a]His left eye opened, regaining consciousness underneath maroon gassy masses floating a hundred meters upward.[/color]

The very first line asks the question of “Why did only one eye open when he regained consciousness?” Is the character doing that purposely? No, you don’t really think about that when you regain consciousness, so it’s more likely the character has no right eye. Or cannot open it from damage/injury. Is that what knocked him out cold in the first place?

And where from? Though from the title provided, and the fantastical idea of “A maroon mass of gas” floating a mere hundred meters above. The likelihood of him looking at the sky, is very unlikely. Since clouds tend to be 6000 meters above the ground. Overall, it’s a well crafted sentence that has me thinking a dozen different things. But I don’t have to wait long to get fed more answers.

[color=fff200]Their artificial glow provided dim, albeit sufficient lighting needed to scan his surroundings, not that the place required assistance in tinting its landscape bloody.[/color]

Well “their” can only be describing the “masses of gas”. So now they glow and provide a light source, which helps me go with “Why is it there in the first place?” for now. And we show the character is curious/questioning his surroundings, likely because he doesn’t know where he is. I mean if it was his/your bedroom, do you wake up and first look at everything surrounding you?

Two immediate thoughts should be running through the reader’s head. One is answered. One doesn’t work. One is “Why is the vocabulary/description so mechanical sounding?” It's a lot of big and complicated words used all throughout the story. Does that make sense, or do you like big words? Like there’s not a single doubt in my mind, the things in the sky are artificial clouds. So why not just put clouds? Because it fits the main character, which will soon be hinted at and basically foreshadowed in oblivion.

The thing that doesn’t work is thankfully a little smaller. The sentence “Not that the place required assistance in...” bit. I get the intention. It’s sarcasm/playful description. Possibly showing that the MC isn’t exactly a “robot” (being the prompt and everything.) The whole story is so bleak and dark, that it adds a kind of levity to the sentence. It would also be a clever way to highlight the color of the glow. But you ruined that by mentioning Maroon already. And it’s too long and unnecessary when you’re trying to also dramatize the moment. Cut it, and leave.
 
[color=1a7b30]Their artificial glow provided dim, albeit sufficient lighting needed to scan his surroundings, its landscape tinted bloody. [/color]

[color=39b54a]He remembered three things surviving his plummet into the darkness and then smashing his head into the amalgamation of cold metal and warm corpses, as he tumbled like a rag doll to the bottom.[/color]

This should make anyone reading be very fearful. And not because it's clear that the story foreshadowing horror elements. The amnesiac character trope is the most tired and often laziest mechanic used in storytelling. It gives an excuse for the writer to make a character (whether just introduced or previously established) to act wildly inconsistent. It’s also the laziest way to introduce mystery into your story. So 1. There better be a damn good reason for this. (And we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.) 2. I better not feel like that’s what the writer is doing. (See previous.)

But onto the sentence. Its fine. Good (horrifying) visual presentation of location. More hinting at the type of character that can survive a plummet and tumble into metal, smashing your head. (Also giving us the answer of what he regained consciousness from...) 

But it also hints that the character has the sense to feel cold/hot. Possibly a firmer grasp of what’s living and what’s dead. Since he can’t just say “cloud”. But does know what a corpse is and a rag doll. Which also implies his anatomy is similar to a human’s. (Most characters in stories tend to be bipedal creatures, but it’s nice to have quick confirmation.) Though mentioning the darkness aside from atmosphere, it also can imply that the maroon glowly clouds aren’t always on, or were not there before. Because it sounds like he fell from quite a height, ‘plummeting’ doesn’t tend to be brief distances.

[color=39b54a]The first was those contraptions had shoved him into this hellhole and his second was his immediate desire to leave. [/color]

Good. Gives the reader the character’s understandable and immediate motivation. Being in a hellhole filled with bloody dead bodies, would make me want to leave to. Answers “What caused him to plummet.” Then raising a new question, “What is a contraption?” But because I cheated and know the prompt is about ‘The Metal Age’, assuming this is ‘The Walking Dead’ style of not calling them what they are, because they didn’t exist in this fictional universe. Robots. And pays off the three things he remembered. Leaving the third thing, hopefully a worthy payoff/twist if it’s going to be left unsaid.

[color=39b54a]Attempting to stand himself up and instead keeling over onto his stomach with a clang and a splash. Drenching his forehead in a thick sticky substance pooled beneath, hearing the sound of subtle dripping coming from above.[/color]

Many questions hit me at this moment. One thing is so subtle that I find it could be a very clever foreshadowing/hinting. (if it was entirely planned out beforehand, but it isn’t. Don’t tell me I said that.)

So, obviously the character is injured/stuck in some way. Unsurprising. Also I question if mentioning a “thick sticky substance” is necessary. (Yes, it actually fits the character we’re following.) Blood has been at least indirectly implied but that was more background detail. Also it could be implying it’s a mix of multiple things. That or it’s described as a feeling, because the character isn’t actually looking at it. And now we know the character can also hear. So it works. 

So the splash sounds makes sense, character fell in a puddle after all. But that “clang” is quite an interesting word choice. Yes, we were told there’s metal there. So maybe he fell on the metal. But would that really let out a clanging sound, if a human lets say just fell over on a surface obviously flat enough for a puddle to form? Hmm...

[color=39b54a]Something was wrong with his right foot, flipping on that side and staring up at the long spike sticking up straight, and the lifeless body impaled their upper torso with liquid pouring from their once shrieking mouth. But she looked different from the scrap piles with several fleshy anatomically proportioned limbs, clothed and unmangled.[/color]

More very mechanical and complicated description. (But it’s pretty clear that it’s for a reason.) Two things to note. “Their once shrieking mouths” certainly leaves an interesting visual for a facial expression. My question is why make the random character a “She”? It feels a little cheap for shock factor, if effective. (Why else would every YA book have a female MC after all.) The only details given, thankfully keep it dignified/horrified. So now, if the place wasn’t hellish enough. The unique bit of this corpse is that it actually is anatomically correct. Jebus. That also makes me assume that perhaps they were pushed down here while they were still alive too. So how did everything else get there? (and why?)

[color=39b54a]His attention changing to a pierced plated piece pinning his foot, clenching his lower leg and pulling — it out with all his might — wasn’t plausible.[/color]

Alliteration. Can also almost hear the strain as the MC is pulling...

[color=39b54a]Glancing at the large cleaver within his fingers grasp as he stretched out his hand, struggling to grip the handle before picking it up while the sky released a demonic growl.[/color]

Going full Saw already are we? (My future expectation would be that I don’t want the story to do its most graphic/interesting first, only to never do anything like it again...so if the story finished. I’d expect more of it. And I would of gotten it, in spades. But I didn’t finish it, for good reason.)

[color=39b54a]Not hesitating for even a moment, he concentrated and raised the blade high and swung hard — one chop had severed the affected extremity.[/color]

Here’s the watershed moment, that even if I was a blind, deaf, drunken spastic. There’s not a doubt in my mind that something about this character is inhuman. Not only how this action is carried out. But why the hell would the writer word it as “the affected extremity” and not “HOLY SHIT, I CHOPPED OFF MY FUCKING FOOT!” So either the writer straight up doesn’t know how to write theme, what foreshadowing is, or use word choice properly. If that isn’t the case, it's blatantly obvious the MC is not human, or at least certainly not normal.

[color=39b54a]Wait, why wasn’t I screaming like everyone else?[/color]

Good question. (But, despite the ‘subtle’ foreshadowing that I’ll imagine is still passed over, it actually is still setting up. So just knowing almost right away that the MC isn’t normal, actually is NOT all that there is...which would have been a nice reveal when it finally came up.)

[color=fff200]A bright flash of light flooded the area, highlighting the vast scale of skewered and broken bodies that had been similarly discarded. Followed by an intense boom and sparking a thousand pairs of glowing crimson lights appear from the wreckage as the graveyard of the soulless regained sentience. [/color]

[color=007236]*appearing[/color]

It’s a little provocative in its writing. 

[color=fff200]He watched arms and legs spouting from throughout the grounds and walls continuously. The clamoring of scraping metal and whistling steam was ceaseless, as a discharged projectile struck with another powerful roar that streaked down from the mass in his sight. Whatever shrouded these skies were creating the loud noises...[/color]

A little generic in terms of writing and quite cliched. And another reason the title should have been graveyard. Though the character lacking knowledge of something that this point the reader has already interpreted still needs to paid off. 

[color=fff200]He noticed many of these strange beings held up by tall metallic pikes, shared an aesthetic uniformity. Each holding various, hardly visible numbers etched on the middle of their foreheads.[/color]

These lines just don’t work. (I’d even say it’s just big words for the sake of big words. Even considering the character’s origin.) The larger words really aren’t explaining anything well and the vagueness of it seems off since its the character noticing details. The robot the MC is looking at has numbers stamped on his forehead like all the others, like he was made in an assembly line. But “uniformity” doesn’t actually work here. If this would be described this way, it should be “Similarity”. Since the numbers display the order of creation and we would later find out the character “Owho” was screwed up etching for 0340. 

[color=39b54a]Their entire framework began to sway and dance in a singular repetitive motion like marionettes compelled by a twisted higher power. Machines letting out low pitched buzzing that seemed to be beckoning him to remain put. Seeing this triggered a memory inside his obscured mind presenting temporary clarity, yet it felt like skimming the shallows of an endless sea. His inner voice gave a series of unnerved and eminent pleas.

Escape. I must spare them this suffering.[/color]

I love when I can read someone’s sentences and know how much effort/fucks they gave when writing it. And it’s even better when it's back and forth, when your mind goes ‘Hey, a million other people haven’t wrote lines just like that.’ 

Like those that bash prose, or don’t even attempt to use it write like this-for a contest designed to show off writing...

“He watched arms and legs spouting from throughout the grounds and walls continuously.” Yawn.

“Their entire framework began to sway and dance in a singular repetitive motion like marionettes compelled by a twisted higher power.” 

Great line, same effect. Any person that tells you that the former line is better is lying to you...

Probably the best paragraph for a multitude of reasons. Just from the atmosphere it sets for the scene and how it's described. An entire field of corpses impaled on spikes, beginning to dance and sway from the lightning striking down, which when questioning how? Also could be implied that it’s absorbing the energy/electricity.

The feeling of the character and his paranoia and fucked mind is on full display here, and it also shows that the character is “thinking” this. And has yet to speak or yell…(which you’d think you’d try, if you could right?) So this character is silent on purpose. So in the paragraph, we have...Dramatic scene change, Context clues and tension added, and adds to the character, albeit subtly.

Oh, and just to make fun of me for a second. You really like using water metaphors in a negative fashion, when many others use it peacefully. Almost like you almost drowned once. Ha ha. 

[color=fff200]Catching a glimpse of a recognizable flickering pattern of blue beam in the distance, in-between the drastic changes from dull to blinding brightness repeating every couple seconds. Pushing upright using his hands as leverage, able to balance himself up on his foot unwavering, hopping forward but his movement was halted by the hands grabbing his leg. An instant instinctive feeling overtook his next movements, hastily striking them away with the cleaver. His focus shifting to a mechanical foot, it had the perfect measurements to fit, lunging forth and hacking at it and yanking it off. Receiving a stiff kick causing him to stumble and fall on his hindquarters, beginning to sink into the ground being pulled under the surface. He swiftly sat up with his equipment still tightly gripped, reaching for where he had amputated.[/color]

Very average stuff for action. Probably a little too vague and not visceral enough for the general tone of the story. Comes off a bit half-assed.

[color=39b54a]Thin wires sprung from the object and dug through his flesh like aggressive snakes, completely attaching itself to his leg. Getting up by thrashing about, he ran off toward that strangely familiar blinking signal distinguished among the clutter — what was it?! An S.O.S?[/color]

Neat.

[color=39b54a]He knew that somebody was alive and seeking help, approaching the target with a full sprint past what he considered crowds of demons digging their nails across his legs. Only heeding his momentum with heavy plodding, skidding to a complete stop. Clenching his hands and taking a single step back, close enough to discover their identity, using a light source from his flashing eyes. It was one of those contraptions![/color]

He knew someone was alive and was seeking help from light? After all the dead bodies moving and eyes lighting up? Did he have the script handy? 

Okay I’m teasing, he knows what S.O.S’s are and nothing else is making that signal which I can understand the character checking up on. Though I’d figure he’d just want to get the fuck out of there. But with the line “I must spare them” from earlier, it shows his motivation is for others over himself. Though in this instance, the character (who clearly is not normal) is also acting suspicious toward “one of those contraptions.”

I also kind of like how the sentences have symbolism of someone running toward the light, away from demons trying to keep him down. There’s several moments that share this kind of theme actually. The gate at the end opening up with white glowing light and them ascending to escape Hell. For another example...

(Again, that’s implying it was intentional. Ha ha.)

[color=39b54a]But his forehead wasn’t detailed with numerals and once he stood beside it, the lights stopped and it remained motionless. He crept closer, it appeared to be wearing a suit of torn apart flesh, yet a gentle touch with his fingertips confirmed it was synthetic. It was slumped against a hill of hands, a pair strangling its neck, having both its arms yanked backward and engulfed into entrapment. It spoke, he flinched and recoiled.

“Cut off my arms — please.” Spoken in a monotone voice that also sounded like they were gargling gravel. He stared at the cleaver with pause, and saw the small rectangular device clamped between its bent knees and snatched it without interference. Pressing the button that resided on the top, as it played a recorded message...[/color]

Horror vibe continues, the metal robot is wearing a suit of human-like flesh. But the spoken line does at least two important things. It shows the robots/contraptions can actively speak. But our MC cannot. (If he just decided not to, that would be awful writing at this point.) The second thing shows us just how similar of no fucks it gives about losing a limb to the main character’s non-reaction to his foot getting chopped off.

[color=fff200]Heed my warning. My name is Mikael I. Eden. But you’ll know me better by the pseudonym, Rytok. I’m a leader of a human resistance group. If you’ve recovered this, I’m likely dead. So are hundreds of my followers. Sheer numbers will not intimidate them. Our weapons proved ineffective, and we couldn’t destroy faster than they build. But I’ve discovered their secret! It’s...

Static. A screech fizzled out all audible words before abruptly ending…[/color]

Mikae “L I E” den. And I would have predicted that one, even if I wasn’t the writer. Otherwise, why would it even be detailed/mentioned if the next line just mentioned the name? Plus the whole mistaken identities thing being the main point of the characters/mystery thus far. 

But I’ll complain about this story addition at the end.

[color=39b54a]“Free me and I’ll get you out of here.” After that exchange failed to change anything, the atmosphere grew still and silent just as water droplets pelted them. He gawked at the sky in awe.

Freezing. That frigid sensation brought about nostalgic memories kept buried like — the winter snow — weather...[/color]

Ah, there we go. The rain produced a calming effect. A decent character moment.

[color=39b54a]“It’s a weather machine. It created those storm clouds to produce lightning that’s absorbed by all hollowed vessels, and stored as excess energy needed to fuel their generators — the rain is used wash away the smell…” Finally catching his interest, he examined the contraption and lifted the cleaver up to swing.

Eliminate the threat![/color]

Nevermind.

The exposition/explanation passes, only because of the main character actually expressing keen interest in it and the other character literally trying to get his attention to be freed. It directly ties in with character motivation. So there’s at least a little more going on than most shitty characters back and forth expositing for world building. 

[color=39b54a]An impulse exchanged for perception, he didn’t stop smashing the blade long after the contraption had been freed, slashing at the debris until the cleaver shattered into pieces. The contraptions’ vocal interruption brought him back into reality.[/color]

I actually really like how this line is structured. It's a pretty subtle follow up to the thought. (And intentional this time, Huzzah.) Starting off by sounding like he’s eliminating the threat/character. Though you notice the contraption is being freed, so perhaps he wasn’t following his thoughts? But you realize, he still is, the threat is the things trapping this character/contraption.

[color=fff200]“I’m Rytok-” It explained fusing another replacement arm by shoving it into its dismantled shoulder and affixing its dislocated position with several stiff twists, steam hissing from the cracks. “I can explain the rest — when we’ve left this place. Everything in this facility requires two...including our exit.” Rytok glanced at his forehead. His eyes just noticed the tiny diamond shaped crystal, shimmering blue, embedded inside his mechanical tongue. He pointed at his mouth and glared, feeling his own tongue implant while scraping against his gums. The weather returned forgoing mercy, and the lightning cascaded with flooding water. Rytok pulled his arm, as he unsuccessfully struggled to break his superior powerful grasp as it started dragging him off.[/color]

[color=1a7b30]*Its mechanical tongue.[/color] (It being for Rytok. And he being for Ohwo.)
 
The weather is finally being accurately described after the main character was taught about it. Paid off and it’s a nice touch that one's not paying attention won’t even notice..

It’s also showing that both character had reattached limbs without directly calling attention to their similarities. Also sets up the typical dynamic of two characters for the amnesia story. The one for the audience to get attached to and have the world explained by the knowledgeable one. (But it would have played on that trope a bit.)

While explaining some mysteries, it’s also introducing more elements. I appreciate the decent non-boring/straightforward lines. Even if it’s another/similar negative push toward water.

[color=fff200]“I didn’t do that to you. Our objectives are identical. Stop hesitating, you’ll only giving our enemies more time.” Despite an inflection that couldn’t change intensity, he didn’t even really understand, but he started running to keep the same pace. The weight of the situation pushed him forth, but gravity seemed to be the final thing keeping Rytok grounded. Crossing the dump and reaching an enormous obsidian wall, a large gate with four levers, which required grabbing the handles, two pairs in a horizontal line beside each other on opposite sides of the door. Opening it by pushing them forward at the same time. His analysis was proven correct, as Rytok grabbed both handles on the west side.[/color]

I’d argue the last line doesn’t need to be there. I’d also tell the ‘Mr.Explain The Plot Bot’ to stop being so vague for dramatic effect. But to be fair, he isn’t explaining on purpose and is clearly more concerned about his own desire to leave. In contrast to the main character thus far. 

[color=39b54a]His eyes quickly shifted from the reflective surface of the gate, heading to the east and reluctantly grasping the handles, then looked at Rytok and waited. He expected words immediately after they opened this door, but he received a sentence before Rytok shoved the handles into the door. The sound of churning cogs and wailing screams coming from within the walls in its aftermath.[/color]
Another good paragraph of words. The first line being a subtle character action and more foreshadowing to the reasons for it. Why would somebody whose an amnesiac purposely avoid his own reflection/identity?
 
Aside from another obvious step toward not being normal. It actually shows more than that, and his appearance is something he fears and he literally doesn’t want to face it and the facts.

The middle is building up tension and the end is just more horror and creepiness, bodies inside/possibly built into the walls.

[color=39b54a]“If you’ve forgotten your name, I’ll be addressing you by their failed attempt to code you. Ohwo.” He accepted the given title, his original name evaded him, but convinced it existed. Inserting them in, immediately feeling an immense shock that coursed through out his body, an ineffectual execution method.[/color]

Meh, they tried to kill me. Makes you wonder what he is scared of...

Dark moment of world building, expressing that no normal human would be able to leave this place. Shocking those that open the gate. And it's a creepy thought to be literally standing on the mounds of corpses that failed to escape, assuming their still walking on the piles of metal/bodies. The character gives me hope that there’s still more to him. (And there was...) 

[color=fff200]Ohwo had contemplated more questions, leaving the uproar behind. But few answers on the upheaval that created this misery. Imagining he was in a state of irreparable disrepair, burdens no wider than the gaps of the ascending wall. Their exit creating an entrance, revealing the white glow glimmering from the narrow gates down from a long staircase heading up for an indeterminable length. He followed directly beside Rytok, trying to copy his movements. Though it was apparent cooperation was essential, they couldn’t stop exchanging suspicious glances, paranoid that if either got too far ahead, it meant being kicked back into that wretched graveyard...[/color]

Let’s not mince words, this is being compared to earlier works/other things you’ve wrote. I’m not grading myself on a curve. Because I won’t bitch about honesty. This ending is lackluster at best and it kind of sucks all things/context considered.
[hr]

I’ll give me credit, that I originally stopped writing this for my perception that I created two characters that act far too similar to one another when it wasn’t my intention. But I actually do give these characters more of a selfish/selfless contrast than I thought reading it again.

So the original intention was creating a five act structure that each had a different writing style or tone. Plus the original focus character was Rytok and his story, which would have been done through a 1st person perspective and be as straightforward in its writing as possible. To show just how artificial and planned out it sounds when you write without prose. The first machine/contraption specifically built to look and act like a human and designed/programmed to believe they themselves discovered the way to destroy them and lead the desperate human resistance into a trap. Rytok would be horrified by this, watching his ‘friends’ die and thrown down into the pit. There first non-programmed decision would be jumping into the pit to die/committing suicide and losing his fake “self”. 

The second act was going to be in the dump, with a paranoid and scared character done with a ton of symbolism to show the characters real complications. Done in a the third person perspective switch, which would be clever symbolism to show that this was no longer about “somebody” real. It also would have you believe it was human that somehow survived the fall from the first act. But ending up being Ohwo running into Rytok, and discovering their similar mechanical nature.

But I cut that out/would’ve mentioned it only passively, his past maybe only hinted at, to switch the focus to the more sympathetic/human character in the story. It wasn’t necessarily a bad plan outright. Though it still robs the story of what I originally planned to do. I didn’t change what I was going to do for the other acts and didn’t have time to come up with a better fitting story. 

To very briefly explain how I planned to set up further conflict in the original and how I intended to fix/change it, in a way that I honestly believe severely weakens the story.

The original third act would have focused on Ohwo’s desire to go back to the humans and help them from the recent invasion of the contraptions, doing my world building through action. Not really interested in Rytok’s warning and his incredibly violent tendencies, they seperate and Ohwo ends up in a strange relationship with a young girl, recalling having siblings like her. 

Ending in sympathetic tragedy, turning out the girl’s kindness was a rouse to get him to discover an exit around a large barricade surrounding their land, meant to keep the remaining humans trapped until all could be assimilated while shutting them off from other potential human resistance/survivors. Finding a small hole/gap in the wall, that the girl could fit through and showing the girl where it is. Ohwo immediately gets attacked and has limbs hacked and chopped off while the girl attempts to escape. Then the contraptions find them before they can put explosives in the hole and a one-sided slaughter ensues. The girl gets stuck halfway through trying to escape through the hole. Despite what had happened, her cries reminded him of his lost sister and couldn’t be ignored. Ohwo crawls toward the hole and pushed her out on the other side and blacks out as human tears stream from his face. Showing that the humans aren’t on the winning side, but also showing they’re not pure/white innocent parties.

The fourth would have been Ohwo waking up to discover he had been rebuilt of mostly new parts from the corpses of the contraptions that were fighting. Rytok had been busy killing literally everyone in his ‘race’, deciding they needed to be exterminated for using him how they did/what they were doing. Ohwo begins to doubt everything Rytok is doing and questions if the humans are worth saving, beginning that he was just a machine like Rytok. So he was shown what really happened to him and brought to a torture room area where “Backboarding” happens, which would have been mentioned passively in the 1st Act. Where a human prisoner is stripped naked and laid on their back and held down against thick wooden boards, and it would start with another contraption carrying a large ass mallet and a mechanical mask with one side covered with hot nails, the mask simply laid on the human’s face and the mallet lifts with terror in the humans eyes being the only visible display. The loud hit would have made him touch his face, realizing he had the same plate and he’d feel the numbers etched incorrectly in his head, which would have been from his sister who was also sent there/interfered during the process. 

The shorter explanation is that limbs are removed and replaced with contraption body parts, some purposely are sent to die and kept in the dump to get taken apart to make it easier to scrounge for required parts. The torture was also designed to be mental and have the man-made machines lose all sense of identity and become willful slaves. But thus far has basically all lead to failure/brutal deaths. Ohwo being the only surviving example, but his emotion was still present, literally not being identified as a mere number, causing them to cast him into the pit as a failure.

The final act, both having the same resolve, spend the rest killing the contraptions despite each one giving some kind of logic based defense. A large pillar generator inside their evil base is powering all the contraptions inside this wall, it's hundreds of handles were meant to recharge the contraptions low on energy and have potential to accommodate sizable numbers of them. The discarded body pit used as a limitless energy gathering supply for the generator. 

Both use the bodies they’ve gathered from their combined efforts to kill them, and reincorporating a fake mcguffin given to the MC in the first act to ironically be of real use. (It was a device said to destroy the contraptions in one shot and make them instantly disintegrate, but it was a merely teleporting those bodies to the generator.) These two commit suicide by overcharging the generator to shut it down and destroy the wall and all those inside it. Ending a bittersweet moment and a call to action, for the humans to solve their own problems because it’s statistically unlikely that someone else will do it for them again…

I believe the only actual prerequisite given being “don’t make this easy for characters” being the outright/best example of nailing that in my story/intended atmosphere. So that finally gets into why I fucked my story up by deciding to change it into a 3 act structure with little changed/mostly limited on detail in an attempt to get it done on time. (First Act being the Dump, Second Act a mixture of the humanizing section/torture-porn scenery, The Third becoming the resolution.) By changing the focal character, I screwed up the stakes and the reincorporation would likely become an asspull. Among other problems from things I didn’t really get into explaining in detail. I didn’t have a way to fix it and I didn’t like/hated sections of what I wrote. So I stopped. Consider this writing to be a failure of ambition, even if by only comparing it to my own work/even last far superior entry I wrote.
[/hider]