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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/45963
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/45963
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

In the short passage I am writing, the starting point is that one character is being held at gunpoint, and the end point is that she now holds the gun, having disarmed the opponent.

The idea is that this sequence happens very rapidly. She is an expert at it, and makes no mistakes. The reader does not know that though, so I need to show it.

I have rewritten this passage multiple times and I am still dissatisfied with the result:

- getting into the head of the character slows everything down: it seems to detract from the spike of surprise due to the sudden action in favor of a slower buildup of psychological tension. I do not need psychological tension in this passage. There is psychological tension in the paragraphs leading to it, and this passage should just burst it like a bubble.

- I tried a description of the action. _She quickly grabs the gun, and simultaneously hits the wrist; before the other can react she twists the barrel, and steps back..._ and it sounds choppy like a laundry list of what-to-dos advices from the youtube videos I have been watching. 

- I also tried skipping it altogether. She is held at gunpoint in one sentence. She is grinning with the gun in her hand in the next. This would work if I had showed it once, but this being the first time happening, I need to show something.

- I finally tried being more abstract with metaphors and similitudes relying on the ideas of speed and force. _Her hand hit like thunder, and she whirled the gun away from the other's fingers. It was a wet rock slipping under the greater will of the sea._ And while it may be appropriate for martial art fiction, it is breaking the style and setting of my thriller.

**Question:** I imagine that this issue is more general to quick combat scenes, which resolve in less than a few seconds. How to get a pacing that surprises the reader and renders the swiftness of the action?

Original score: 24