HELP! with WIP I'm pulling out hair (630 words)

[Stephen4444]

HELP! I am having major issues. The least of which is comma use. I keep taking them out to make the story flow better. Secondly, I’m losing my point of view. The story is in Omniscient. I have James Earl Jones tell the story, but the character is injecting his thoughts. Do I italicize these thoughts? (He is alone…) Everything seems to be running together, and I cannot seem to get it together. It seems powerful and I think I got something. I try to change the point of view and it doesn’t work. I've rewritten it several times and it doesn't seem as good.... but this below is not right. It is far from right. Can I keep the power in the prose or is it James Earl in my head?

WIP
*****************************************************

There is no crack… no light will shine down into this torture device. He feels the constant, agony, deep in his lungs. The muscle and sinew was driving his diaphragm, pumping, moving liquid in and out of a useless mouth. The constant visceral wave of amniotic fluid menstruating through his teeth and dulling his taste buds.
The metallic taste is almost gone and the fluid keeps him alive, if this is living.

From his useless mouth, he tries to scream... It only makes his lungs hurt more.

Why Yell?

Why indeed, none can hear you. He needs… no, wants to hear anything. Even if the sound he hears, are his own tortured screams. This is “almost” too much.

No chink

No shine-down

Not a crack

This torture device-

Strange thoughts can come to one when being tortured. Zon wondered,
Is this In Uteri? No… -least a babe can feel the warmness of its mother. -a heartbeat… The thumps… thump… thump… is my own private water torture.

Berry Newer told the stories about slaves being burned alive by his masters. It was illegal for a slave owner to abuse a slave; but justice is not often served in an unjust world. "Burning is one of the worst ways to die. I say the worst because man is to suffer before, during and after the flame touches the skin. Before dying, a person can lay in agony for days. "

"If, he is fortunate he dies quickly."

Drowning is the Episcopal twin, and a close relative of fire death. Some say it is the ‘opposite.’ Burning to death is not the twin of Drowning but the redhead stepsons for both ways are horrible, torturous deaths.
Man has an aversion to having his head submerged in liquid, even if you can breathe that same said liquid. There is a point when primal instinct takes over, and your awareness hit with blunt trauma force.

When his head sunk below the agnostic liquid, the instinct for self-preservation almost set him to panic. No matter he knows he can breathe the Qualopx. Subconsciously He fights to keep his head above the liquid. His head slowly submerging, his body invariably choking, and he tries to cough up the liquid… or swallow it. Against his will, he inhales more. Then is when his vocal chords constrict sealing his air tube. First, the liquid fills his stomach. Unfortunately, this reaction also stops the Qualopx from entering his lungs. In most cases, the vocal chords relax after you pass out. However, sometimes they do not relax causing the poor ******* to dry drown.

He was not one of those. He was not one of the ten percent that die in the isolation field from dry drowning. When the Qualopx seeps into his lungs His mind kicks back into consciousness. Slowly his body goes into stasis. It is the survival reflex, the mammalian diving reflex. Calm came five minutes after sited in the isolation field.

It is in many peoples opinion that drowning is the second worst way to die.

In the stillness of the isolation tank, he overcame the initial physical shock. He detached himself from the torture by allowing his imagination to take over the inner workings of his mind.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

There is no crack… no light will shine down into this torture device. He feels the constant, agony, deep in his lungs. The muscle and sinew was driving his diaphragm, pumping, moving liquid in and out of a useless mouth. The constant visceral wave of amniotic fluid menstruating through his teeth and dulling his taste buds. for torture you can go two ways; removed, which generally means your reader won't get the full horror, or close, which can be hard to red (think 1984) here you do seem to have gone for a bit of both, an it is a tiny bit confusing imho
The metallic taste is almost gone and the fluid keeps him alive, if this is living.

From his useless mouth, he tries to scream... It only makes his lungs hurt more.

Why Yell?[i think you are right, if these are internalthoughts italics would tell me that

Why indeed, none can hear you. He needs… no, wants to hear anything. Even if the sound he hears, "]this comma, to my mind, isnt right. Bear in mind commas are extremely subjective, though, but here it reads as one ststement with no break so i would leave it out.re his own tortured screams. This is “almost” too much.

No chink

No shine-down

Not a crack

This torture device-

Strange thoughts can come to one when being tortured. Zon wondered,
Is this In Uteri? No… -least a babe can feel the warmness of its mother. -a heartbeat… this punctuation confused me. Why the fullstop within the dashes? Even if its a standalone statement the parentheseis doesnt need a full stop, the dash allows it to stand as a seperate clause within a sentence.The thumps… thump… thump… is my own private water torture.[are instead of is, since you have thumps?

Berry Newer told the stories about slaves being burned alive by his masters. It was illegal for a slave owner to abuse a slave; i would go comma since they are linked clauses.but justice is not often served in an unjust world. "Burning is one of the worst ways to die. I say the worst because man is to suffer before, during and after the flame touches the skin. Before dying, a person can lay in agony for days. "who says? You have a wee rogue space before the speech mark, btw

"Ifno comma, again if read aloud, where is the break? he is fortunate he dies quickly."

Drowning is the Episcopal twin, and a close relative of fire death. Some say it is the ‘opposite.’ Burning to death is not the twin of Drowning but the redhead stepsons for both ways are horrible, torturous deaths.
Man has an aversion to having his head submerged in liquid, even if you can breathe that same said liquid. There is a point when primal instinct takes over, and your awareness hit with blunt trauma force.
here it is all a little distant and cerebral for a torture scene to me. Maybe if these words were being used to taunt he victim? If they are it isnt clear to me.
When his head sunk below the agnostic liquid, the instinct for self-preservation almost set him to panic. No matter he knows he can breathe the Qualopx. Subconsciously He fights to keep his head above the liquid. His head slowly submerging, his body invariably choking, and he tries to cough up the liquid… or swallow it. Against his will, he inhales more. Then is when his vocal chords constrict sealing his air tube. First, the liquid fills his stomach. Unfortunately, this reaction also stops the Qualopx from entering his lungs. In most cases, the vocal chords relax after you pass out. However, sometimes they do not relax causing the poor ******* to dry drown.

He was not one of those. He was not one of the ten percent that die in the isolation field from dry drowning. When the Qualopx seeps into his lungs His mind kicks back into consciousness. Slowly his body goes into stasis. It is the survival reflex, the mammalian diving reflex. Calm came five minutes after sited in the isolation field.

It is in many peoples opinion that drowning is the second worst way to die.

In the stillness of the isolation tank, he overcame the initial physical shock. He detached himself from the torture by allowing his imagination to take over the inner workings of his mind.[/SIZE][/QUOTE]

Overall i would like to be in a pov, either, clearly. I am not getting a real sense of utter horror, sorry. Commas were okay, imho, a few additional, some of which you might catch by reading aloud. But i am no expert.

 

[Abernovo]

Hi Stephen.

As ever, any comments are simply my own thoughts. If they're helpful in any way, feel free to use them. If they're not, then you can merrily ignore them.

I've used RED for any issues that I noticed and BLUE for my comments and suggestions. One thing I wasn't sure about was the Point of View. It didn't all read as omniscient third to me, but I'm not the best when it comes to POVs and tenses.

HELP! I am having major issues. The least of which is comma use. I keep taking them out to make the story flow better. Secondly, I’m losing my point of view. The story is in Omniscient. I have James Earl Jones tell the story, but the character is injecting his thoughts. Do I italicize these thoughts? (He is alone…) Everything seems to be running together, and I cannot seem to get it together. It seems powerful and I think I got something. I try to change the point of view and it doesn’t work. I've rewritten it several times and it doesn't seem as good.... but this below is not right. It is far from right. Can I keep the power in the prose or is it James Earl in my head?

WIP
*****************************************************

There is no crack… no light will shine down into this torture device.

I could be wrong on this, but with an ellipsis, I thought there shouldn't be any spaces between the ellipsis and the words, unless it's the end of a sentence when it should be four dots and the next word capitalised.

He feels the constant, agony, deep in his lungs. The muscle and sinew was driving his diaphragm, pumping, moving liquid in and out of a useless mouth. The constant visceral wave of amniotic fluid menstruating through his teeth and dulling his taste buds.
The metallic taste is almost gone and the fluid keeps him alive, if this is living.

If you've got pumping, I do't think you need 'moving' as well.

From his useless mouth, he tries to scream... It only makes his lungs hurt more.

Why Yyell?

Why indeed, none can hear you. He needs… no, wants to hear anything. Even if the sound he hears, are his own tortured screams. This is “almost” too much.

I think you're right. Italics might help you with internal thoughts. I wasn't sure who was speaking/thinking for 'Why indeed(...)you' and wasn't sure if that should have been no-one, none sounds a little old-fashioned or affected almost as if it was being said by a villain for effect.

No chink

No shine-down

Not a crack

This torture device-This seems a little stuttery to me in separate paragraphs. Would it work better as a single paragraph of short sentences?

Strange thoughts can come to one when being tortured. Zon wondered,
Is this In Uteri?(Utero?) No… -least a babe can feel the warmness of its mother. -a heartbeat… The thumps… thump… thump… is my own private water torture.Using ellipses for the thumps created quite a large set of pauses in my mind. Perhaps commas would work better, still giving a pause, but increasing the flow (no pun intended).


From this point on, there seemed to be a shift in narration. I might just be me, but it went from close up to a more omniscient 'narrated' POV. If this is what you want, you might use a line break designated by a # annotation. That might prevent any feelnig of head-hopping
Berry Newer told the stories about slaves being burned alive by his masters. It was illegal for a slave owner to abuse a slave; but justice is not often served in an unjust world. "Burning is one of the worst ways to die. I say the worst because man is to suffer before, during and after the flame touches the skin. Before dying, a person can lay in agony for days. "

"If, he is fortunate he dies quickly."

Drowning is the Episcopal twin, and a close relative of fire death. Some say it is the ‘opposite.’ Burning to death is not the twin of Drowning but the redhead stepsons for both ways are horrible, torturous deaths.

I wasn't sure about Episcopal. This could be my lack of knowledge on ecumenical matters, but to me it simply refers to bishops and churches. Sorry, but I got confused there.

Man has an aversion to having his head submerged in liquid, even if you can breathe that same said liquid. There is a point when primal instinct takes over, and your awareness hit with blunt trauma force.

When his head sunk below the agnostic liquid, the instinct for self-preservation almost set him to panic. No matter he knows he can breathe the Qualopx. Subconsciously He fights to keep his head above the liquid. His head slowly submerging, his body invariably choking, and he tries to cough up the liquid… or swallow it. Against his will, he inhales more. Then is when his vocal chords constrict sealing his air tube. First, the liquid fills his stomach. Unfortunately, this reaction also stops the Qualopx from entering his lungs. In most cases, the vocal chords relax after you pass out. However, sometimes they do not relax causing the poor ******* to dry drown.

He was not one of those. He was not one of the ten percent that die in the isolation field from dry drowning. When the Qualopx seeps into his lungs His mind kicks back into consciousness. Slowly his body goes into stasis. It is the survival reflex, the mammalian diving reflex. Calm came five minutes after sited in the isolation field.

It is in many peoples opinion that drowning is the second worst way to die.

In the stillness of the isolation tank, he overcame the initial physical shock. He detached himself from the torture by allowing his imagination to take over the inner workings of his mind.

It seems a little heavy on the info-dump in the second part (oh, you hypocrite, Aber! ). I think most people will understand the fear of drowning, so less is more in this case. That said, having a torturer there explaining some of the physical processes to the victim might be effective, both in story terms and for breaking the prisoner. I suspect part of it might be your idea of the portentous voice narrating it. A beautiful voice Mr Jones might have, but I'd prefer to hear the story narrated in your 'voice', if that makes sense. Then you're not moulding your story to an external frame of reference. However, that's only my take on it, so a pinch of salt might be required.

Overall, I think you need to tighten it up, but the idea is sound, even though I'm not a huge fan of torture, in fiction or real life. Best of luck.

 

[Hex]

I found this quite unpleasant to read, Stephen, which is what you're going for, so well done.

A few thoughts below.
*****************************************************

There is no crack… no light will shine down into this torture device. He feels the constant,[1] agony, deep in his lungs. The muscle and sinew was [were?] driving his diaphragm, [there's a tense issue for me here -- why the switch to past? [2]] pumping, moving liquid in and out of a useless mouth. The constant visceral wave of amniotic fluid menstruating through his teeth and dulling his taste buds. [bleh]
The metallic taste is almost gone and the fluid keeps him alive, if this is living.

From his useless mouth, he tries to scream... It only makes his lungs hurt more.

Why Yell? [no capital]

Why indeed, none can hear you. He needs… no, wants to hear anything. Even if the sound he hears, are his own tortured screams. [This is “almost” too much. -- I don't understand the purpose of this and I think you could lose it]

No chink

No shine-down

Not a crack

This torture device-

Strange thoughts can come to one when being tortured. Zon wondered,
Is this In Uteri? No… -least a babe can feel the warmness of its mother. -a heartbeat… The thumps… thump… thump… is my own private water torture.

Berry Newer told the stories about slaves being burned alive by his masters. It was illegal for a slave owner to abuse a slave; but justice is not often served in an unjust world. "Burning is one of the worst ways to die. I say the worst because man is to suffer before, during and after the flame touches the skin. Before dying, a person can lay in agony for days. "

"If, he is fortunate he dies quickly." [no comma after 'if' -- you could have one after 'fortunate' if you want]

Drowning is the Episcopal twin, and a close relative of fire death. Some say it is the ‘opposite.’ Burning to death is not the twin of Drowning but the redhead stepsons for both ways are horrible, torturous deaths. [I rather like this -- it's intriguing even if I don't really understand the references]
Man has an aversion to having his head submerged in liquid, even if you can breathe that same said liquid. There is a point when primal instinct takes over, and your awareness hit with blunt trauma force.

When his head sunk [sank?] below the agnostic liquid, the instinct for self-preservation almost set him to panic. No matter he knows he can breathe the Qualopx. Subconsciously He [I don't like the capitals on 'He'] fights to keep his head above the liquid. His head slowly submerging, his body invariably choking, and he tries to cough up the liquid… or swallow it. Against his will, he inhales more. Then is when his vocal chords constrict sealing his air tube. First, the liquid fills his stomach. Unfortunately, this reaction also stops the Qualopx from entering his lungs. In most cases, the vocal chords relax after you pass out. However, sometimes they do not relax causing the poor ******* to dry drown.

He was not one of those. He was not one of the ten percent that die in the isolation field from dry drowning. When the Qualopx seeps into his lungs His mind kicks back into consciousness. Slowly his body goes into stasis. It is the survival reflex, the mammalian diving reflex. Calm came five minutes after sited in the isolation field.

It is in many people's opinion that drowning is the second worst way to die. [something strange about this sentence. Maybe: "In many people's opinion, drowning is the second worst way to die." or "Drowning is, in many people's opinion, the second worst way to die."

In the stillness of the isolation tank, he overcame the initial physical shock. He detached himself from the torture by allowing his imagination to take over the inner workings of his mind.

###

[1] He feels the constant, agony, deep in his lungs

You can have this, I think -- if you mean -- "He feels the constant (and the constant is agony deep in his lungs)".

I think you mean "the constant agony", though. In that case there should be no comma between the noun ('agony') and the adjective that describes it ('constant').

My preference would be for: "He feels the constant agony deep in his lungs." but your second comma (before 'deep') is fine.


[2] There is no crack… no light will shine down into this torture device. He feels the constant, agony, deep in his lungs. [up to here we're present tense -- then you switch] The muscle and sinew was driving his diaphragm, pumping, moving liquid in and out of a useless mouth.

Even if the first sentence is a thought, the second isn't and it's still in present tense so I don't understand what's going on:

There is no crack… no light will shine down into this torture device. He feels the constant agony, deep in his lungs. The muscle and sinew was driving his diaphragm, pumping, moving liquid in and out of a useless mouth.


###

I know nothing about POV etc and I tend not to be bothered by head hopping. I found the tense switching a bit disorienting, though.

I think maybe it would help to distinguish between the internal thoughts of the man and the narration from outside. Would you consider having the voice over in italics? I don't know if it'd work, but it might be worth trying.

There's some very powerful writing here, some strong (and nasty) images and glimpses of a strange and interesting world. I like the style in general. Good stuff.

 

[The Judge]

There's no great mystery to commas, they appear where there is a pause. Read the work out loud. If you pause, for however long, think of putting punctuation there; no pause usually means no comma. Like every rule, there are exceptions, and sometimes I will use a comma to aid readability even if there's no significant pause eg "When she next woke, Amalina was there" -- there's a danger of someone reading that as "When she next woke Amalina" ie getting Amalina up, which isn't right, so even though I wouldn't pause between the words I'll put a comma there to break the line.

There is no crack… no light will shine down into this torture device. He feels the constant [,] [no comma as no pause] agony, [debatable comma, depending how the line is read] deep in his lungs. The muscle and sinew was [why "was" not "is" or (more properly) "are", if the rest is present tense?] driving his diaphragm, pumping, moving liquid in and out of a useless mouth. The constant [repetition. I use repetition a lot, but it has to look deliberate. This doesn't] visceral wave of amniotic fluid menstruating [I'm not sure whether you fully understand what this verb means and you are trying to be daring and experimental in its use, or you are unknowingly using the competely wrong word] through his teeth, [and] [I'd use a comma here to give this line strength which it lacks with the "and"] dulling his taste buds.

The metallic taste is almost gone and the fluid keeps him alive, if this is living.

From his useless mouth, he tries to scream... It only makes his lungs hurt more.

Why yell? [Is this him or JEJ talking? If him, you don't need this to be in italics, but it make might it clearer]

Why, [strictly a comma needed to hive off the "indeed"] indeed, none can hear you. [Again, him or JEJ? And if the latter, why is he addressing the character like this? If this is the character talking to himself, this definitely needs italics, otherwise it reads as if he is addressing us with that "you"] He needs… no, wants... [to balance the other ellipses] to hear something [anything]. ["anything" would be more appropriate if he'd been given the choice of what to hear] Even if the sounds [you have "are" so this needs to be plural. Changing the "are" to "is" is possible, but reads clumsily after the "hears"] he hears [,] [no comma] are his own tortured screams. [This is “almost” too much.] [not sure if this is part of the story, JEJ talking, or your own thoughts about it. Anyway, I'd delete it as it's doing nothing here. And that use of inverted commas is wrong in formal writing and can be irritating in informal. Never use them simply to designate an emphasised or slightly racy word, it looks prissy and old fashioned -- unless of course this is the character speaking in this way]

No chink

No shine-down

Not a crack

This torture device-

[these four lines all need punctuation, either full stops (periods), ellipses if his thoughts are drifting, or long dashes if the thoughts are broken off. What you have after "device" is only a hyphen, as it's short and attached to the word, which is wrong in context]

Strange thoughts can come to one when being tortured. Zon wondered,
Is this In [is that capital "I" for a reason?] Uteri? [I think if you're going to use direct thoughts as earlier, with or without italics, you have to be consistent, so the "Zon wondered" is out of place, but frankly, I'm getting confused as to what is him and what is JEJ] No… -least [punctuation wrong -- you've used a hyphen instead of a long dash, but anyway, it shouldn't follow after an ellipsis, as they're both doing the same thing. And I'd reinstate the "at (least)" since there's no evidence of him (either the character or JEJ) missing off the opening words elsewhere] a babe can feel the warmness ["warmth" surely] of its mother. [again wrong - no need for a full stop within long dash parentheses] -a heartbeat… The thumps… thump… thump… [is] [suggest dropping the verb to avoid problems and increase the power of the line] my [dropping into first person very confusing, since it's been third throughout] own private water torture.

Berry Newer [I trust we know who he is in context] told [the] [only "the" if we've heard them, too] stories about slaves being burned alive by his ["his" or "their"?] masters. It was [not "is"?] illegal for a slave owner to abuse a slave, [;] but [strictly you shouldn't follow a semi-colon with a conjunction since they are meant to be doing the same thing] justice is not often served in an unjust world. [that's a non sequitur -- the first sub-clause refers to the law, not justice. To link the two, the second should be something like "but the law is rarely obeyed by those in power"] "Burning is one of the worst ways to die. I say the worst [they why say "one of the" in the previous sentence?] because man is to suffer [why not "suffers"?] before, during and after the flame touches the skin. Before dying, a person can lie [lay] [chickens lay in the present tense; otherwise "lay" is past] in agony for days. " [who is this talking? Why have you put it here? What relevance has it?]

"If [,] [no comma] he is fortunate, [comma] he dies quickly." [again who is talking? If the same as the other person, why isn't it part of the same quote? If it is the same person, but you want a separate paragraph for emphasis, then no closing quotation mark at the end of the previous paragraph]

I'm running out of time, so I'll end there. I've read the rest, and I have to say even scanning quickly I found many more mistakes, not least errors of word usage and some tense changes, and if I continued to nit-pick it would be a sea of purple.

To be frank, I get the impression you are trying too hard to write in a particularly old-fashioned way, but you simply don't fully understand the meaning of some of the words you have picked up -- eg "Episcopal twin" -- episcopal simply means something to do with a bishop, so here you are saying that drowning and death by fire are bishop twins, which I really can't see makes sense. (I googled "Episcopal twin" to see if it was an American phrase meaning something, but couldn't find anything, so apologies if this is well known over there.)

Re the section as a whole I can understand why you feel this doesn't work, but to be honest I'm not entirely sure what you are trying to do. If you want to show the horror of torture, I don't think you do it by having a long discourse on theory and how people can die, intermingled with rather banal reported speech from someone talking about death from a wholly separate cause. I personally think the beginning shows some promise, but as soon as the "Strange thoughts" arrived I switched off and frankly struggled to read to the end. However, this kind of thing is very subjective, and it may be that the style will commend itself to others.

Good luck with it.


PS I see I've been so slow, everyone has beaten me to it again...

 

[ctg]

HELP! I am having major issues.

Oh dear and you have the James Earl Jones grumbling in your head. Maybe you should go to see a doctor or make yourself a stiff drink before you continue on this project.

There is no crack… no light will shine down into this torture device. He feels the constant, agony, deep in his lungs. The muscle and sinew was driving his diaphragm, pumping, moving liquid in and out of a useless mouth. The constant visceral wave of amniotic fluid menstruating through his teeth and dulling his taste buds.

The metallic taste is almost gone and the fluid keeps him alive, if this is living.

From his useless mouth, he tries to scream... It only makes his lungs hurt more.

Why Yell?

Dear, oh dear. I see what you are fussing about, but it's not as terrible as you think it is. So spare the few curls you still have in your head and listen: "There is nothing wrong in the omniscient narrator."

But...

...if your aim is to keep close taps to your character then you need start paying a close attention on how you write things. This:

There is no crack… no light will shine down into this torture device. He feels the constant, agony, deep in his lungs. The muscle and sinew was driving his diaphragm, pumping, moving liquid in and out of a useless mouth. The constant visceral wave of amniotic fluid menstruating through his teeth and dulling his taste buds. ​

in mostly omniscient, while this:

The metallic taste is almost gone and the fluid keeps him alive, if this is living.​

... is in the close third. And there is nothing wrong if you zoom in and zoom out from the character. Actually it is recommended that you experiment while you make up your mind what you're actually writing.

You could have written:

There was no cracks in the ceiling or walls. Nothing that could have illuminated that damned torture device. He felt constant agony deep in his lungs as the machine pumped liquids in and out through his useless mouth.
​

Getting closer to your POV, you need to start focusing on how you write things. Everything has to come out as if you would be writing from that person perspective. The words has to flow just like they would come from his or her mouth as they are experiencing things. And the easiest way to achieve this is by writing the whole thing in First Person and then translating that back to third. If both reads alike then you have achieved the needed effect. If you not, then you have to go back and think how your approaching your prose.

PS. I'm not going to point out every single instance in this excerpt as the whole thing needs a rewrite.

 

[allmywires]

Hi Stephen. I'm afraid I think you're right in that this piece has a lot of major issues in it.

Your voice shifts from traditional (ish) close 3rd person to an almost essay-like discussion - the voice I assume you want to keep. You need to decide which is which. Either way, it's jarring. You've also got some major issues with tense changing and as The Judge mentioned, you're using some words wrong.

The constant visceral wave of amniotic fluid menstruating through his teeth and dulling his taste buds.

'Menstruating' is a very specific word and I'm afraid is completely wrong here. Likewise, amniotic fluid is very biologically specific. Is he being kept in a pseudo-uterus? (Considering your 'in utero' reference later I assume so). If so it needs to be clearer. Through the teeth? Dulling taste buds? I don't understand the image.

This is “almost” too much.

Why the speech marks? Do you mean to italicise this? That work would better, imo.

You also have plenty of unnecessary capitalisations ('Drowning', 'He').

When his head sunk below the agnostic liquid, the instinct for self-preservation almost set him to panic.

An agnostic is someone who doesn't believe in God/a higher power. If you mean that the liquid has no mercy, human compassion etc. then you certainly need a new word that's less anthropological.

...the mammalian diving reflex.

Directly from Wikipedia, this is the definition:

Every animal's diving reflex is triggered specifically by cold water contacting the face – water that is warmer than 21 °C (70 °F) does not cause the reflex, and neither does submersion of body parts other than the face.

So if he's already submerged, would he experience this? Probably only if the temperature of water changed drastically. In this instance I imagine he would probably just drown. Though I'm no biologist, so I could be completely wrong.

I'm sorry if I sound harsh, Stephen, but too many things pulled me out of this piece for me to enjoy it. You need to think carefully about your tenses, your voice, and your choice of words. A lot of your more experimental lines can be hidden under the umbrella of modernism, steam-of-consciousness et cetera, which don't really bother me - I think the genre needs a bit more of experimentalism in that respect. However, I think the main thing stopping me engaging with this piece is that I really can't picture your images in my head and that's a shame. A little more clarity and tense discipline I think you have a good piece here.

 

[nubins]

There is nothing I would add about the structure that hasn't already been said.. but a bit of information from a pedant

Breathing fluid. I assume this character is human? If so, humans cant breathe fluid unaided. If you have seen the Abyss you will be familiar with the pink fluorowhatsit fluid the chap breathes. That stuff is real and does work, but the problem is our lungs are not strong enough to inhale fresh fluid and expire that which has been used up. So we still drown, because we end up with the fluid equivalent of carbon dioxide in our lungs, instead of liquid air (equivalents, obviously these liquid air is rather cold).

So you might want to add some kind of pumping mechanism .. something that extends into his lungs perhaps? Sounds even more unpleasant so could work for you here

 

[Grinnel]

As has been mentioned above, you seem to have three different POV's here, the omniscient 3rd, the close 3rd and first person. I wouold eliminate the close third and either watch from the long distance or first person (in italics)

 

[JoanDrake]

This is very strange. OTOH I can't really disagree with anything that's been said. OTOOH I'm tempted to say it's fine as is, because the meaning is fairly clear and quite a few readers are charmed by stylistic flourishes as a matter of taste. It could be that the things that need correcting are what gives it the impact it does have.

Maybe stop agonizing and just continue the story on? Let the reader make up his mind as to whether he likes it or not.

 

[Bowler1]

There is no crack… no light will shine down into this torture device. He feels the constant, agony, deep in his lungs. The muscle and sinew was driving his diaphragm, pumping, moving liquid in and out of a useless mouth. The constant visceral wave of amniotic fluid menstruating through his teeth and dulling his taste buds.
The only image that I found myself coming back to and not being 100% sure of was ‘crack’. The rest of your images were very strong and hooked me, but crack, I don’t know, just something that does not link up with the rest of the line. That aside, it was very strong and got my attention.

The metallic taste is almost gone and the fluid keeps him alive, if this is living.

From his useless mouth, he tries to scream... It only makes his lungs hurt more.

Why Yell?

Why indeed, none can hear you. He needs… no, wants to hear anything. Even if the sound he hears, are his own tortured screams. This is “almost” too much.
Very nice on sound.

No chink

No shine-down

Not a crack
The three above for darkness, would describing darkness not be stronger? For you to decide?

This torture device-
I’d zap these three words, covered in the next line with character thoughts.

Strange thoughts can come to one when being tortured. Zon wondered,
Is this In Uteri? No… -least a babe can feel the warmness of its mother. -a heartbeat… The thumps… thump… thump… is my own private water torture.

Berry Newer told the stories about slaves being burned alive by his masters. It was illegal for a slave owner to abuse a slave; but justice is not often served in an unjust world. "Burning is one of the worst ways to die. I say the worst because man is to suffer before, during and after the flame touches the skin. Before dying, a person can lay in agony for days. "

"If, he is fortunate he dies quickly."

Drowning is the Episcopal twin, and a close relative of fire death. Some say it is the ‘opposite.’ Burning to death is not the twin of Drowning but the redhead stepsons for both ways are horrible, torturous deaths. – why a capital D for drowning? If you ever get published, redheads may read your stuff as well…
Man has an aversion to having his head submerged in liquid - Statement, even if you can breathe that same said liquid. There is a point when primal instinct takes over, and your awareness hit with blunt trauma force. These two lines cover the same ground that is covered in the next section, so some repeating.

When his head sunk below the agnostic liquid, the instinct for self-preservation almost set him to panic. No matter he knows he can breathe the Qualopx. Subconsciously He fights to keep his head above the liquid. His head slowly submerging, his body invariably choking, and he tries to cough up the liquid… or swallow it. Against his will, he inhales more. Then is when his vocal chords constrict sealing his air tube. First, the liquid fills his stomach. Unfortunately, this reaction also stops the Qualopx from entering his lungs. In most cases, the vocal chords relax after you pass out. However, sometimes they do not relax causing the poor ******* to dry drown.
This is all he, could you have used the character name here, make it more personal?

He was not one of those. He was not one of the ten percent that die in the isolation field from dry drowning. When the Qualopx seeps into his lungs His mind kicks back into consciousness. Slowly his body goes into stasis. It is the survival reflex, the mammalian diving reflex. Calm came five minutes after sited in the isolation field.

It is in many peoples opinion that drowning is the second worst way to die. – Statement.

In the stillness of the isolation tank, he overcame the initial physical shock. He detached himself from the torture by allowing his imagination to take over the inner workings of his mind.

Some editing as you have capitals in the middle of lines for no reason. You’ve rarely used the character name and instead used he all the time which leaves the section feeling remote from the character. Some narrator statements in there, they work in this section but I challenge you to draw a picture with words and let the reader fill in the statements. Your descriptions of light, or lack of were weak, the only weak descriptions in my opinion. I liked it, you hooked me in the first few lines. I think you could have trusted the reader to fill in the gaps more and let their imagination do some work for you, I refer to the statements here. The dry drowning did way more for me than the drowning images, it’s not described and I had to think that one through for myself, urgggh, gross.

I’ve not read the other reviews, I wonder if the amount of description will sit well with the other members?
Interesting, I still liked it, but then again I'm not a redhead!