Preview (Kinda) Mad Heir

I'm adoring the coding I've come up with for the Mad Heir (it's one of few games where I go insane with the coding to have a weird experience in story) and so I'm gently shuffling onwards with the writing. And I've already rewritten the first scene. I just wanted to the type of stuff I switch between when I do rewrites:

First Draft:

When you awoke, it was to bird song. It was a rare occurrence, with your windows always being sealed tight. You slowly opened your eyes, feeling sluggish and slow, turning your head to look at, what you knew, was going to be a hole where the window used to be. Only to find a little semi circular one, on a latch to let in the sounds of the morning and a little bit of light.

Hm. The hole would have made more sense. You somewhat remembered that. Not this.

Nor the bed. You had a nice bed, soft, one that molded to your body, it made it easier for you to sleep. This one... Felt hard. Uncomfortable. No better than lying on the floor with a thin blanket to protect yourself.

The world became sharper, less hazy, but there was some fog lingering as you looked around. There was dust covering most things. An oversized closet that had sunk into the floor and was leaning precariously. Sloping ceilings, with the overwhelming scent of mould. You shifted, and pain spiked sharply up your legs.

Looking down. Your legs weren't there. Just two bandaged lumpy... Things. They didn't look like that before. These couldn't be yours. Maybe Braithwaite had weighed your legs down with these things, and the real ones were stuffed under, numb from it. Your caretaker did have a small mean streak whenever you got on their wearied nerves. You had once stolen the sacred pocket-watch and when you accidentally locked yourself in one of the dilapidated rooms, the caretaker had pretended to not hear your bangings on the doors and walls. Mean. No doubt this was going to be something similar, and Braithwaite wasn't going to believe you that you didn't mean to fall out the window. Not your fault it was open!

Shifting your hips, you tried to pull your legs up, only to be met with a flash of pain, frying your nerves and making you bite down on your tongue sharply. Sweat started to bead your brow and you tried again, even sticking a finger underneath the white wrappings, only for it to strike again.

Oh dear. You stared at the mangled lumps before you. Then looked around the room. Back to your legs.

They were broken. You were... In the attic room. The lumps belonged to you. You were in a lumpy bed in the attic room.

--You opened your mouth and everything went black when the first scream ripped through your throat.

Second Draft

It awoke. The bird song had roused $them from a fitful sleep. Windows barred, nailed shut, no sound slipped past except for the sound of the Gardener tending to the garden. New, new, new thing to wake up to. $cthey tried to twist, but couldn't. Legs bound tight, bulging strangely, bones pressing on the skin, fall, shatter, twist, grate and grinding and marrow gushing free. $cthey finally opened $their eyes. Head, bandaged, wobbly stitches criss-crossing from one eye up into $their hair. There was blood in $their eye, flaring out from the outer right side corner. Blood vessels popping, straining, veins bulging.

$cthey look around, senses dulled and drugged and dried, cracked lips Eyes drag to the window, throbbing memory trying to fix an open wall to it, burst open. None. Little window, standing tall, looking like a sunrise over the horizon, letting watery light in, spilling across the sheets.

Not $their window, not $their bed, not $their legs. Not $their legs. Lumpy and shattered and numb, numb, numb. Sluggish and slow and stupid, patting and pulling and unable to understand that jumping from their caged room had gotten $their wings clipped. Crumbled, snapped bone. Bird, broken on the floor, neck wrenched the wrong way, open eyes, open beak, no sound. Just flapping one wing until it stops.

Does $he know? Tucked in the attic, weighed down by useless, misshapen bone. Do $they know?

No. Not if going by $their ceaseless scratching and rising panicking. An animal, in a cage, bashing its brain in.

--It opened it's mouth and everything went black when the first scream ripped through it's throat.