My Competition Entry

Cannot be bothered posting the first part of it, I didn't write it after all so it don't really matter. This is my bit. (Basically a girl called Lucille is in her cabin when the boat she's on in caught in a storm and a hole is created in the wall then this bit happens)


The ship rocked and rolled beneath her and she watched the view of the sea through the hole in the wall. The sky was grey above her, with huge clouds bucketing down rain that sprayed her. The sun was setting in the distance, setting the bottom of the clouds on fire. She gasped as the ship tilted further and further in the exact direction she wanted to avoid. She felt her steady seat on the floor begin to give way. Her sweet silky dress felt like a mistake as it gave her no grip. He fingers scrabbled at the floorboards, bloodying the tips as her nails broke against the rough wood. She screamed as she felt her toes hit the remaining wood underneath the hole. It buckled against her oncoming weight and she prayed one last time that it held.

Seconds that felt like hours passed, the wood was firm against her feet, the boat still tilted further. She felt a glimmer of hope; if she could push against the board she could reach the bed that was firmly attached to the wall and pull herself away from the danger zone of the weakened wall. Gradually she began to extend her arms in front of her, lying face down on the floor. Her fingers brushed the bedpost and she gritted her teeth. With one last push, she practically jumped off the wall.

Then it broke. She screamed as she felt herself hurtle backwards off the boat. Briefly she caught a glimpse of the boat, tilted on its side against a huge wave, the crew attached to the boat with thick ropes around their waists. Falling, she wondered what drowning felt like – but only briefly. The water slammed into her back, breaking her weak spine. She knew she should have felt pain but none came, only numbness. The water crept up behind her ears, flooding them and muffling the noise. Salt water reached her nose and mouth and she gasped at the burning cold that make her skin contract and hurt. At the shock her eyes shot open but then began to burn against the salt so she shut them quickly, the damage already done, grating pain made her want to rub her eyes but she found that the muscles in her arms wouldn’t obey her.

The breath that she was holding on to for her life escaped her lips, creating perfectly formed spheres that drifted away from her like a soul leaving a dying man. She took a tentative breath and began to choke on the salt water that flooded her lungs, causing her to inhale more of the cold hurt. The pain began to fade and her breaths faded into stillness, a complete ecstasy washing over her. Death crept upon her disguised deceptively as extreme happiness. It curled its long fingers around her heart, crushing the weak beats with a morbid chuckle.

“Another child.” Death said, chuckling to herself. She was pleased with her work; the storm she had conducted was truly a beauty to behold. The rumble of thunder over the clouds was her roar of laughter at taking a strong heart of a spoiled girl. She felt the squirming life between her fingers and placed it in the stream of souls that floated around the nowhere. Death herself took no form, just a power that could chill the hearts of her victims and paralyse those who took her fancy. She stretched herself and felt a wash of boredom. Her hunger for new additions to her prized collection of souls never ended and with a passion for drama she began to conduct another theatrical performance that ultimately lead to the most impressive of all endings: a meeting with Death.