Hey,
So I wrote a piece a long time ago that's always just sort of been sitting in the back of my mind, and something I really want to complete. My problem is I'm good at creating worlds, but I'm useless at creating a story within the world. I have no idea what my characters are going to do ... shit, I have no idea what their story really is. If anyone could provide some suggestions or help me map out a rough storyboard I'd be much appreciative.
The back story behind it is that Nazi Super-science sort of went wrong. The more historically minded of us will be aware the nazi's were really big on the whole occult scene, and the idea here is that some scientists funded by the regime and with an interest in the occult have created the Fext. The fext were a creature that spawned around the time of the napoleonic wars and the invasion of russia, an soldier (physiology sort of like vampires) that could only be killed by a glass bullet.
Now the nazis created these monsters, who initially fit right in. However, for whatever reason they decided they had had enough of the regime and wanted to take their rightful place at the top of the tree. The Germans were pretty good and stomping on this behaviour, but unfortunately a number of them managed to flee - and they fled into Leningrad.
The Siege of Leningrad wasn't a Siege, but a containment. Once the soviets learned exactly what they were facing they reluctantly joined forces with the germans in that region (whilst the war continued elsewhere). Of course, they also had their own motives. As much as there is Nazi Super-Science, we know there's Soviet Super-Science to match.
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“Zigarette?”
“Да, спасибо товарищу.”
They were an odd couple to be found together in the middle of a war zone. They had met here many times since the Wehrmacht had come to city of Peter and Vladimir. Now they sat in a foreman’s office looking over the once great city, legs hanging out of the hole in the wall. Fritz chatted idly to his smoking friend who didn’t understand four words in five. Their rifles – one laminated plywood the other maple – sat up against the wall, ignored for the time being. There was a rule about lighting cigarettes with the same match, however both being the opposite’s sentry to the same sector they felt they had little to be concerned about. Their sectors were blissfully quiet this season, with the majority of the purge happening in other areas of the city.
Boris looked at the cigarette with appreciation. “Турецкий?” he asked.
Fritz raised his eyebrow in question, not understanding the cryptic words coming out of the Russian’s mouth. Boris would be almost insulted if he could hear Fritz’s thoughts – he was Ukrainian, сука! The Red Army Sergeant struggled for the appropriate words to describe the former Ottoman Empire, before giving up and drawing a small map in the light layer of snow that had formed on the floorboards.
Fritz chuckled and nodded, “Да.” Unlike the old, unshaven monster of a man that sat next to him the German had at least been attempting to learn a second language.
Boris raised his eyebrows and nodded in appreciation, surprised at how well the Wehrmacht had it if this young Oberjäger could procure them. He chuckled slightly thinking back to the speeches on how the Bourgeois look down on the workers. Turkish cigarettes were an acquired taste. He didn’t know Fritz had never smoked in his life, but bartered away a pair of boots he had taken from a dead Russian to the Quartiermeister for access to the valued commodity.
Placing the cigarette in his mouth, the Ukrainian got up and walked away from the edge of the building into the office, waving the young Bergen baker’s son to stay where he is. He had a surprise of his own. Rummaging in the satchel he brought with him, he pulled out a bundle of bandages – a tin of real coffee, padded and protected against the inactive mines, grenades and other weapons of war that Boris habitually carried with him.
“Kaffee? Echter Kaffee?”
“Да.”
The lack of coffee was something that Fritz had complained about several times, and it had almost cost Boris an arm and a leg. Logically, two days rations would not be worth the 200g tin of caffeine, however the quiet they had in this factory and each other’s company was well worth it. They could both be dead tomorrow.
Fritz scooped up some snow and packed it into his metal cup-canteen as Boris brought out his well battered Swedish self-pressurising camp stove that he stole from the Fins during the winter war. Soon the small stove was roaring between them, powered only by the infinite supplies of the Third Reich. The rich aroma of roasted coffee floated across the devastated industrial area with nothing alive to rejoice in the forgotten scents that were once so common in the former capital of the Russian Empire.
A loud clang of metal on metal broke their peace, and both soldiers scrambled into cover, Boris cursing as the hot coffee burnt his fingers and Fritz trying to douse the stove. There was supposed to be no movement by either armies in this sector. Boris grabbed Fritz’s rifle from the wall and tossed it over, still amazed at how light the Karabiner was compared to his own Mosin. Fritz caught the rifle lightly and pulled his binoculars out from his webbing and surveyed the ground below them. Boris, looking through the scope on his rifle saw the figure run from the Brickmaker’s Workshop at the same time as Fritz and they both relaxed a little.
“Zivilisten” cursed Fritz, as Boris groaned: “Гражданские.”
Boris lowered his rifle and sat back down behind the wall, heart thumping. The civilians were mostly evacuated to safer sectors, or across Lake Ladoga. However some remained on the fronts, scavenging for whatever they could. He chuckled slightly and looked over at his brother-in-arms, just as the boy tensed up. Boris frowned slightly until he saw the look of horror on the German’s face and the Jaeger turn whiter than usual. He leaned out of cover, raising the scope to his good eye and felt his stomach drop.
Two men watched the young man run and stumble across the snow. Even at such a range, the Ukrainian Sniper could tell they were possibly the most handsome people he had ever seen – utterly at odds with the devastation and ruin that surrounded them.
Fritz ducked back behind the wall, dropping to his stomach and crawling out of the foreman’s office to where the radio was hidden. His comrade lowered himself behind the wall and checked the breech of his rifle, ensuring the glass rounds were still loaded.
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As you can see the dialog is written in German and Cyrillic Russian. My initial idea was that any scene involving the two of them would have the dialog written like this, whereas when they are by themselves or with their own people it would be written in english. Your opinion on this would be greatly appreciated.
Sorry if this is the wrong forum as well... I'm not really looking to collab write the story, just to provide background and help me develop it.