Castle Wolfenstein - Prologue

[dsm]

Howdy, I've threatened you with releasing a Wolfenstein story so here goes.
Story-wise and concept-wise, it's going to be based on mostly Return to Castle Wolfenstein, but I'm also going to include a few, tiny elements from Wolfenstein 3d and maybe even the first Castle Wolfenstein game as well. The story is going to be very similar to that of RtCW - consider yourself warned :-P

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Castle Wolfenstein

Prologue

August 1995, The Bavarian Alps, Germany

It was an excessively warm day. The sun was shining from a cloudless sky and the silence was only broken by the sound of the wind and the humming bees.

A large, broad-shouldered old man looked at the peaceful scenery. The remains of his thin, gray hair were brushed back from his solid, wrinkled forehead. He was older than he looked and he knew that his long, eventful life would not last much longer.

Hard to believe that this is the same place! The man thought. His expression was far from at peace. He swept the rocky plain with a stern expression in his narrow, penetrating blue eyes that were but dark lines in the wrinkled, yet rough, sunburned face.

But then again...

He stood with his enormous, wrinkled hands folded over the handle of his stick, staring silently at the cold, bare plain.

He had visited this place before, albeit mostly in his nightmares. These nightmares were always the same: He woke up in a dank prison cell. At his feet lay a blood-soaked corpse. When he poked at the corpse with his foot it suddenly came to life, got up before him and turned around to face him. The undead creature had blazing yellow eyes and its face was all but rotted away. Suddenly, he found himself surrounded by dark shapes with blazing eyes and he could hear a hoarse hissing coming from their mouths as they reached out for him. And then he would awake, bathed in sweat.

This place had once been dreaded by everyone – even by those native inhabitants who lived near it back then. This was the accursed place where a castle, which had been called “an impenetrable fortress of evil” by the inhabitants of the nearby villagers, had once stood tall over this very mountain.

The old man took a trembling step forward, lowered his eyes and thought back on the events that forever changed his life and understanding of the world. These experiences had begun and ended here.

This was once the location of the mysterious Castle Wolfenstein...

...
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Please lemme know what you think of my introduction :-)

[Bad Luck Ranger]

Cool... I take it the old guys is obviously Sarge?
I always assumed that he aged slowly due to somehing that happened in that castle. Afterall he only appears to be about 50 years old in the opening sequence for QuakeIIIArena.

[dsm]

Bad Luck Ranger said:

Cool... I take it the old guys is obviously Sarge?
I always assumed that he aged slowly due to somehing that happened in that castle. Afterall he only appears to be about 50 years old in the opening sequence for QuakeIIIArena.

Uh, tell me, what does Sarge have to do with Wolfenstein 3d and RtCW?
No it's not Sarge (I thought it was pretty obvious who it is).

He was older than he looked and he knew that his long, eventful life would not last much longer.

Sarge is not at the edge of the grave like this guy is, besides I made no mention of scars - Sarge wears a lot of scars.

Sorry, but you've got it all wrong.

[pritch]

It's sure as hell got me wanting more! A good Wolfie story is long overdue.

I tend to find that writing in an almost abstract way when setting a scene like the one you are creates a kind of mysticism in itself which complements the setting. Focus on things like bits of rubble, gnarled trees, other dynamic points?

I am looking forward to the rest of this story.

[Bad Luck Ranger]

Wait, I'm confused? Who is the old man then?

[Naked Snake]

Bad Luck Ranger said:

Wait, I'm confused? Who is the old man then?

The main character of Wolfenstein 3d...DUR

[Bad Luck Ranger]

Yeah but dsm said that Sarge wasn't the old guy. I originally said Sarge.

[Wildman]

I have been looking forward to this one. Great start.

The only place that seemed awkward to me was this line:

But then again... the man thought with a thoughtful expression.

You have thought then right after thoughtful, which sounds a bit strange to my ear. It is obvious he is thinking (since you have a "thinking example" in the previous paragraph) so I would just append the But then again... to the end of the previous paragraph, with no explanation:

Hard to believe that this is the same place! The man thought. His expression was far from at peace. He swept the rocky plain with a stern expression in his narrow, penetrating blue eyes that were but dark lines in the wrinkled, yet rough, sunburned face. But then again...

Look forward to the rest.

(BTW, I am just about done with the final installment of TY. I have gotten way behind I'm sorry to say. It should be out shortly.)

[Spike]

Let's see - Sarge was a vet' of the Stroggos War (Q2) right? Just checking.

Also, i like the premise of the story, DSM - reminds me of 'Saving Private Ryan' a bit (where he visits the graves, then remembers the war)

[dsm]

Thanks for the criticism Wildman - that's exactly the kind of feedback that I'm always looking for.

I have to admit that I always have trouble with things like "...he thought" - it gets boring and repetitive if I always just write "..he thought" and nothing else, so I usually add some "fillers" ("...he thought wearily"), but sometime I've got trouble coming up with some good ones.

I'll edit this right away.

Bad Luck Ranger: Sarge is the hero (or main character) of Q3A (if you could talk about any specific hero of Q3A), besides, it wouldn't make much sense if Sarge was the hero in this story. The main story (this is only the prologue) takes place during World War 2 at the time where the US has just got involved in the war (actually, it's a bit later than that - the US got involved in 1941), and Sarge (judging by his outfit) is a hero from a future time period (would you call 1995 a future time period?).

I don't want to give away who this old man is (although it's obvious to just about everyone else than you it seems), but I recommend that you play Return to Castle Wolfenstein, or simply take a good look at as much RtCW media (screenshots, etc.) as you can and you might come across the "young" version of this man ;-)

[DemilinX]

Nice beginning! I'm looking forward to the rest of it.

/me Rushes off to read the rest. :)