Duuno who's around here, criticism welcome but please be gentle ;-;

I wrote this for an English assignment (albeit I did more than I needed), so it's not even near completion yet, but I plan to pick up on it soon.

up every day for the past six months. Without fail, every day, I’ve woken up to see the clock change from 6:29 to 6:30. I tried to talk to a doctor about it, but nobody was available. I put on my nearest set of dusty tan jeans, my ragged old gray tee, and headed out. I live on the third floor of a stack, also known as a makeshift bus-apartment. My stack was one of the lower-class ones. Some old rusty, bent, and sometimes broken girders held together about 12 retired military and school busses. I say around 12, because one of the top ones was struck with lightning last year, and it burnt a hole straight through the roof of the thing, burning up whoever was inside. I jumped out the rear exit (exiting through the normal one would be a 3-story drop), and headed around to the hood. I lifted up on the front, and started cooking my morning meal. Today, as usual, was toast and eggs. Eggs were one of the few things you could get your hands on today with relative ease. There were always several airships dropping of cargo crates full of eggs. I made my breakfast on my makeshift friction stove, and headed out. My daily schedule sends me to the tinker shop a couple of miles down from my stack. I started my trek down the overcrowded streets, ducking and weaving, as most have learned, through the mass of people commuting. It was a long walk, and not exactly easy to do. You had to be careful of thieves, since the crowded, noisy streets gave the perfect cover for stealing. I, of course, had made myself a little device to protect the little money I had. Between the seams of my jeans, there was a string attached to a slider that popped the wallet out from between my waist and pants, right at the hip.

After an hour or so of walking, I came to my favorite resting place. I drifted to the right, into a small alley, only a couple feet wide, led to an opening. The opening wasn’t exactly big, only three or so square meters, but the view was nice. I could see over the entire city. I was even eye- level with some airship pilots and crew members. Airships are the most common way to travel now aside from walking. there wasn’t enough space for land vehicles like cars and motorbikes anymore. Biking was also tricky, because the few designated bike paths were riddled with sketchy characters. Airships, however, were only limited by freezing point of the balloons that carried them. They also looked kind of cool. They were big boat-like ships with various types of rear-facing propellers and thrusters. The more advanced ones even had sleek metal hulls, with various ion thrusters and rocket propellants. Though, that’s not really what intrigues me. What really catches my eyes are the dark-flagged battle and pirating airships. They’re usually made of thick oak hulls, and iron straps that line the gunports around the hull. There’s even rumors about a mysterious pirate guild that seemingly comes out of nowhere and attacks whole fleets of military convoys. The locals call them the “Masked Robins” guild. Kind of lame, but it’s the name everyone knows.

After a ten-or-so minute break, I continued my trek to the tinker shop. After another hour I reached my destination. Before me stood the familiar wooden sign labeled “Ciff’s Tinker shop”. I grabbed the dark metal handle and pushed down on it to open it. This told Ciff that it was me, and not a customer. I walked into the cluttered shop and took a seat on the stool right next to the door. I looked around and took in the familiar surroundings. The main room wasn’t too impressive. The wooden floor was cluttered with old machines, and some dirty display cases were filled with hundreds of watches and miscellaneous tools. A few dusty lights hung from the ceiling, illuminating the room with a yellow glow. To my left was the counter, where my buddy Jake worked. He wasn’t that good with machines, but he was with people. He had this kind of aura to him that made him easy to talk to. Behind the counter was the towel hanging down separating the work space from the lobby. I got up and walked past the counter and pushed the stiff cloth to the side as I entered, Inside were two large wooden tables cluttered with tools, cogs, bolts, you name it. It seemed like neither Ciff nor jake had arrived yet, so that meant no orders were coming in, and i got to work on my own project. The building that Ciff set up shop in used to be a two-story quadruplex. At some point the second story collapsed, but the wall that faced the street wasn’t destroyed. It was the perfect area to start my little airship-construction project. I read up on all of the mechanics and had been working on it for a long time. A whole bunch of wood was leftover from the second-story collapse, so I had plenty of materials for the outer shell. The ship all together was about the size of a small sailboat, 20 feet or so, but with the architecture of a larger exploration ship of the 1800’s. At least from what I’d read. The Back half of the bottom was mostly machinery. Two engines, a backup generator, and the wiring. For balance reasons, I put the fuel container in the front of the ship, weighing it down quite a bit, but not enough to completely counterbalance the weight. Because of this, Instead of having the steering mechanisms at the rear, I had them at the front. The winglets at the side were at the rear, as well as two extra helium-filled balloons to keep some of the weight down. I picked up the cloth for the balloons from around town, as well as from an old shipyard where old boats were turned into airships. A bunch of cloth had been discarded, since it wouldn’t hold any helium. Luckily, I know a few tricks to make cloth air-tight. I had first tested how well candle wax was. it was great for waterproofing, but it didn’t hold heliums as well. Lamination however, helped the balloon keep it’s form better, and also held all the helium in. Most of the ship was done, and all I needed was some patch work on the main sail (or balloon), and some fine-tuning of the winglets.

I climbed the stairs and opened the door to the second floor workspace. My ship, brightly illuminated by the sun, towered before me. It was twice my height, so I had to climb a makeshift ladder I had nailed to the side to climb up. Once aboard the ship, I opened the toolbox, and pulled out my needle and string. The string I was using to sew the main sail was modified by melting some stiff plastic onto the outside of the string. The extra strength helped the sail from coming apart when filled with helium. An hour passed by of me just sewing, and I was just about to finish when I heard the ring of an employee coming in. I packed my stuff, folded the sail, and headed downstairs. as I entered the workshop I noticed Ciff was the one who had come in. He was putting on his work apron as I walked down.

“Hey, Dave” he said nonchalantly.

“Oh hey Ciff, anything for me to do today?” I asked, walking over to the table I work at.

“Yes, actually.” he replied, with a slight grin.

Ciff was a pretty sneaky guy as I knew him, but he was being a little more suspicious today than normal.
Cautiously, I asked “So what… am I going to be doing?”. Now he lost his composure and broke into a full out smirk.

“You’ll be training” he replied, but with a tone that implied there was more to it.

“But I’ve finished my training, Ciff, I finished my training three years ago.”
I crossed my arms as I heard some shuffling in the other room.That’s weird, I thought,since I didn’t hear the ding of a customer coming in.

“I didn’t say you’d be training yourself, now did I?”
He walked over to the towel that separated the rooms, and held it to the side. A girl around my age walked in, avoiding eye contact and generally looking awkward. She had brown hair tied into a short ponytail. She was wearing similar attire to myself, but with a jacket wrapped around her waist. That’s odd, I thought, the weather around here never reaches below 70, even in the winter.

“Isn’t training new people your job?” I asked Ciff with an accusing tone. After all, he was probably going to go fool off somewhere like usual. The weekends tend to be slow, since everything is repaired when it’s broken, which is during the week.

“I have some business in sector 33” he answered.

“Okay, what’s she going to be doing? There isn’t enough space here for her to tinker. And Jake’s already at the front. And don’t tell me you fired Jake.”

“Oh no, I didn’t fire jake, he’s far too good at what he does. She’s training to be a pilot.”

“We don’t have a ship though. The one I’m working on isn’t even completely finished. On top of that, how am I going to teach her if I have never flown?!” I was ranting furiously, almost shouting, which must of upset the girl. She slouched and sat on a stool and started fiddling with things on the desk.

“Calm down, sheesh.” he said.

“She’s the daughter of a friends of mine. She couldn’t afford the piloting lessons so I told her I could help. You know more about this stuff than I do anyways. It wouldn’t hurt to help her out a little, would it? Besides, she could help finish up the ship.”
I calmed down a bit before responding.

“Okay, how long until you’re back?” I asked, more calmly this time.

“A week or so. You can handle yourself for that long, right?”

“You’ve been gone longer.” I replied sourly. Seriously, this was his shop, what’s up with being gone so often? He walked out of the workshop and to the exit. He opened the door but didn’t leave.

“Oh, and try to stay between larger military ships, they tend to block a lot of wind. Bye!” he said, right before leaving. I noticed something odd though. Whenever he left, he said

“See ya” or “Later”, never “Bye”. It kind of mismatched his personality. I walked back into the workshop, suddenly remembering the girl was there.

“Oh, yea.” I mumbled to myself.

“So I guess we should start finishing up the ship, then. Come on, uh… What’s your name again?” I asked, dumbly. She murmured something in response, but I didn’t catch it.

“Speak up, The noise from outside isn’t completely soundproofed, y’know” a few seconds passed before she answered,

“Maria.” she finally responded.

“Finally. Come on, let me show you what I have so far”. I showed her the craft. At first she looked a bit worried, as if it might roll on her or something. After the tour, though, she eased up a little bit.

“You know how to sew?” I prompted her.

“Yes, though I’m not all that great at it.” She responded shyly.

“Neither am I, the tools are in that box there, and I need you to sew the rest of the sail”. I gestured towards the folded sail and headed under the deck. I checked up on all the machinery, everything was good. I unscrewed the plate protecting the winglet steering mechanism, and started tightening and loosening the chains and bolts. After a few hours, I noticed a dark figure standing near the stairs. I jumped and dropped my tools. After my eyes adjusted, though, I noticed that it was only Maria.
“Jesus, you scared me. You finished?” I asked, regaining composure. I knelt down and packed up the stuff I was working with. Everything was finished below deck, so all that was left would be the sail.

“Mhm” she responded quietly. We walked up the stairs to the deck. When I picked up the sail I was surprised. She didn’t just finish what I’d started, she redid it completely. All of my uneven and roughly threaded stitches were fixed, and the job looked really well done. We tied the ropes of the boat to the sail, and sat down for a break. Finally, what I’d been working on for so long has been finished, and it was ready to fly. It seemed like an eternity, but now it was all said and done. We went downstairs and had lunch together in the workshop. I had brought some chicken and some cup ramen. A mismatched meal, but it’s what I had. She unpacked what seemed to be a dream in a box. Deli meat, cheese, and lettuce resting between two delicious looking pieces of white bread. Those kinds of things were hard to come by, and they didn’t come cheap. After we finished lunch, we headed back up to the ship and started filling up the sail. The ship was tied down, and from what I had figured out, it should be the perfect amount of lift. In ten minutes or so the sail was filled, and we boarded. It was a bit odd stepping on it, the ship swayed back and forth as we moved, and keeping balance was especially difficult. We got used to it after awhile, and we walked to the front and back without problem after a few minutes. After a small checkup on all the engines, we cut loose and headed out. Luckily we had a lot of room above and in front of us (behind the building). Before I did anything else I checked the wind. Apparently, today was the perfect day for setting out, no wind! I flipped the lever next to the helm to forward, and the engines rumbled as they shook themselves to life. The ship thrust forward and we set off on our first test run. The ship flew well for what it had been made with. In my bliss I nearly missed a larger vessel ahead, about three or four times our own size. I swerved left and then right again to dodge around it. On the right turn, though, my hand slipped.

My hand jolted down on the right hand part of the steering wheel and I fell, hitting my shoulder on the lever that controlled the engines on my way down. I hit the ground and grunted, but another voice drowned mine out. There was a scream, a scrape, and then a clap all in succession. as the boat tilted more and more to the side, I started tumbling down and I landed on the railing around the edges, Something was jabbing in my back, and when I looked down a small gasp escaped my throat. Maria was hanging on to the railing underneath me. Somehow she had grabbed onto the rail on her way down and held on for dear life. Had she not been able to grab on, though, it would have been an eight story drop to near certain death. I flipped myself onto my stomach, groaning as I used my sore arm. I stuck my arm over the splintering rail and extended my fingers, signaling her to grab on. She let go for a second but quickly grabbed the railing again.

“Come on!” I urged, doing my best to stretch and reach further towards her. She Shuffled her hands a little to come closer to the edge and let go again. This time instead of reaching back for the rail she quickly grabbed my arm roman-handshake style.

“Grab onto me with your other arm!” I shouted down at her as the ship started to turn faster and faster. She looked scared, and for good reason. Letting go of that railing meant letting go of the only real support that was there. She was probably afraid that she would be too heavy and pull me off the edge with her. After a short wait, though, she mustered the courage to let go. Her hand dangled to the side of her hip for a second, then reached up to grab my arm. With both her hands secured to my forearm, I fumbled onto one knee, and then placed my second foot on the rail. Using all of my strength, I heaved her over the rail. We wound up face to face, with my back against the floor of the boat. A little too close for comfort, she spun around and leaned back against the floor next to me, not letting go of my arm. I reached up and tried to push the wheel and turn us to the left again. Unfortunately, the force was too much, and the wheel wouldn’t budge. I had to find a way to fix this before more problems arose. After a bit of urging I managed to get maria to unclasp her iron grip from my arm, and headed to the bow. When I reached the end of it, I started using the port side rails as monkey bars. One hand in front of the other, I climbed my way above the helm. Looking down was a frightening sight. People the size of fleas and matchbox-sized houses covered the scene below me. One misstep in this plan could lead to the end of my life. I aimed my feet as well as I could and let go of the railing. I hit the helm with a thud. My weight shifted in an odd way, and I lost my balance. I r

This is some great literature, I'm looking forward to the next part, (if there is one).

Good piece. Haven't read a futuristic steam punk-esque story in a while... Come to think of it, I've only ever read one. HOWEVER, that's not why I am typing on this thread. I have some positive reinforcement for you. The kids around here call it CnC, but that just sounds like crack or something.

Anyway, first of all, the massive walls of paragraphs you have going on. It makes jumping from one idea to the next a bit exhausting and daunting. My eyes hurt as I find myself rereading the same sentences, because I lost my way halfway through.

I put on my nearest set of dusty tan jeans, my ragged old gray tee, and headed out. I live on the third floor of a stack, also known as a makeshift bus-apartment. My stack was one of the lower-class ones. Some old rusty, bent, and sometimes broken girders held together about 12 retired military and school busses. I say around 12, because one of the top ones was struck with lightning last year, and it burnt a hole straight through the roof of the thing, burning up whoever was inside. I jumped out the rear exit (exiting through the normal one would be a 3-story drop), and headed around to the hood. I lifted up on the front, and started cooking my morning meal. Today, as usual, was toast and eggs. Eggs were one of the few things you could get your hands on today with relative ease. There were always several airships dropping of cargo crates full of eggs. I made my breakfast on my makeshift friction stove, and headed out.

So here for instance is what I get: I get dressed. I leave my bus shack. Bus shacks consist of this and this. The top one was hit by lightning. (Great, the story built up to this point. We get where you live and why you refer to it as "around 12" and not actually 12. But then...)I leave. Jumping out of the 3 story drop not the best idea. (cool. but were you leaving because there was a fire that one time when lightning hit, or are you not reminiscing anymore? If you separated the paragraphs here between the mini history lesson and the continuation, we will know that we are done talking about the past and we are now back to the present per se.)

What I am getting at is that you never really know when one idea has ended and a new one began, because its all on top of one another. "There were a lot cargo crates full of eggs" and then "I made my breakfast." It's as if the character didn't really mean to say it. It was forced. Like a kid doing an oral assignment and just says everything in one nervous go without pausing at the right places.

Here's my suggestion:

I put on my nearest set of dusty tan jeans, my ragged old gray tee, and headed out. (This goes with the previous bit of the paragraph. The character is dressed. The idea has been dealt with and we are moving to the next scene)

I live on the third floor of a stack, also known as a makeshift bus-apartment. My stack was one of the lower-class ones. Some old rusty, bent, and sometimes broken girders held together about 12 retired military and school busses. I say around 12, because one of the top ones was struck with lightning last year, and it burnt a hole straight through the roof of the thing, burning up whoever was inside. (Okay cool, a bit about the living conditions and giving us an idea of why its not a pretty sight. Setting up environment. Good. Done, end it here and move to the next idea. The character stood still to explain this and will be moving on from now)

I jumped out the rear exit (exiting through the normal one would be a 3-story drop), and headed around to the hood. I lifted up on the front, and started cooking my morning meal. Today, as usual, was toast and eggs. Eggs were one of the few things you could get your hands on today with relative ease. There were always several airships dropping of cargo crates full of eggs. (okay, so cargo dropping eggs seem like the worst idea, because eggs break and whatnot, but that's not what I am here to discuss. Explained the breakfast ritual. Great. Air drop. Good. Adding about the makeshift stove could've been added before the part of the air drops. But because this "idea" has been dealt with, you move on to the next paragraph.)

I made my breakfast on my makeshift friction stove, and headed out.

This is just the example of what I found wrong with it. Otherwise it seems like a good story. I am sure you can tweak it here and there, but I am not a nitpicker. More of the bigger picture kinda gentleman.

One last thing:

6:30. That’s the time I’ve woken up every day for the past six months. Without fail, every day, I’ve woken up to see the clock change from 6:29 to 6:30.

Lies! If he wakes up at 6:30 everyday he would never see the clock change from 6:29 to 6:30! Muahaha! That was just my first thought after the first two lines. But its just to lighten the mood.

Carry on sir. Keep up the good work.