I've written my five entries for Cal's contest! I need as much help as I can get with all of them, especially the second one.
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026. Lurk
I clutched Andrew’s arms, digging my fingernails into his rough skin.
“No,” I whispered. “Don’t do it! You’re going to get us both killed!”
There was just enough light in the tiny room for me to get a glance at his beautiful face once more, and I could see into his empty eye socket. I grimaced, remembing when the hijackers had scraped Andrew’s right eye out. There was still dried blood on his filthy face.
“Christine, we need to get off of this ship,” he whispered. I tugged at his arm again, pleading with him as quietly as I could.
“Shush! If they hear us, we’re already dead! Let go of me. You need to trust me, Christine. I’ve been the captain on this ship for longer than you’ve been alive. I know every nook and cranny. You have to trust me!”
I shook my head. “No! No! I need you! I love you! Please don’t do this. Please.” I pressed myself against his chest. There was a musky scent originating from it. It reminded me sickly of blood.
“I love you too. And if we want to escape from this ship, then you have to trust me. I know what I’m doing. The four fools attempting to take the ship will be dead within five minutes. Trust me. I know exactly what I’m going to do.”
He pushed me off him and started towards the locked door. I pleaded with him once again, but he didn’t turn around. His face was stern and unchanging as he fumbled with the lock. I had given him a bit of wire from my bracelet for him to use. I cracked my fingers anxiously. He jammed the wire into the locked door and twiddled with it. Without warning, his hands shot up into the air and he spun around with his finger to his lips. I gasped.
The men were right outside of our door. As they spoke, I could hear their heavy Australian accent.
“D’you think they’re asleep?”
“It doesn’t matter. They won’t have enough time to register what’s happening. Dan, gimme the pistol.”
My face drained of all color.
“Captain Mackey, I don’t think this is such a great idea.” The man's voice trembled as he said this.
“Give me the damn pistol, or I’ll kill you.”
There was a fumble outside of the door. I locked my eyes on Andrew. He was quaking but never muttered a word.
“Sir, should we kill him first or take the girl?” It was a voice they hadn't heard before.
“Shoot the man first. I want the woman to see that we ain’t jesting around. She has the diamond. We need her alive. Jacob, don’t let her out of your sight once we have her.”
“Aye, sir!”
“Alright.”
One of the men stuck a key through the door lock, and Andrew clamped his hand over the knob.
“No!” he roared as the door shot open. He was thrown backwards, and the four pirates entered the room, the moonlight shining behind them.
038. Chess
Check.
A cannonball was sent spiraling through the watery battlefield and plummeted into the side of the enemy’s ship. Splinters flew into the air like a child splashing into a pool of water. The hit was a low shot ▬ low enough to cause the boat to spring a leak. Men could be seen tumbling from the ropes and masts into the deep depths of the ocean.
There were three large ships, each prepared with dozen of cannons on each side. The sky became so full of black soot that it was nearly impossible to see the other ships.
The King moves.
“Don’t let him get away! Don’t let the bloody ship get away!” Captain Thylilas roared, pointing toward the fleeing ship. “Send the bloody bastard into the waters!”
The Odessa creaked and tottered as it sailed hastily in pursuit of the ship. Capt. Thylilas was at the wheel. His face was distorted in anger. Rage built up in his heart until he was almost ready to—
“Sir! Look! Behind you!” a man shouted from on deck. Capt. Thylilas swiveled around and glanced backwards. His allying ship, the Victoria, was sinking quickly. He could hear “Abandon ship!”.
Capt. Thylilas swore as loud as he could. He turned around and bit his lip. He’d have to forget about that ship for now. He needed to sink the Wave Runner, the fleeing ship.
The Queen makes her last move.
Despite her many injuries, The Odessa hurtled through the waters. The wind current was on her side today. She sailed mightily towards the Wave Runner. Capt. Thylilas roared, “Fire!” when he was parallel to it. The Odessa’s cannons shot, and the Wave Runner’s shot back. More splinters, more anguish, and more death. Capt. Thylilas hadn’t thought he had seen such a messy combat.
“Fire everything! If we have to send boots and gloves through those cannons, by God we will!” he roared to his leading commander. Commander Peterson nodded back.
“Aye, aye, sir!” He saluted and ran down the deck.
Capt. Thylilas’ heart was racing as the last of the cannons were shot. The Wave Runner wasn’t depleted just yet. He felt the Odessa lurch underneath his feet, and he stumbled as he regained his composure.
He saw, out of the corner of his eye, a man next to him.
“What?” the captain demanded.
“Sir, we’re sinking. The Wave Runner is too powerful. I fear that we’ll have to abandon—”
“No! Don’t say it. I’ve never sailed a ship that’s sunk. I’m not about to make this voyage any different.” The captain turned to look at the man. The captain had red hair that stood out in puffs beneath his sailor’s cap.
“Look!” Capt. Thylilas shouted, pointing over to the enemy ship. The man spun around and gasped.
A fire was burning on deck, swallowing the entire ship. The flames gave off smoke that blackened the sky, leaving nothing but crumbling ash beneath its hungry mass.
“We’ve done it!” the man shouted and turned back to the captain. He smiled his crooked smile.
Checkmate.
001. Evidence
I don’t remember exactly how Mr. Todd ever came by me. I was an orphan, you see.
Living on the streets of Rue L’chair, Toulon, France. I met him (but never lived with him) when I was eleven years old. I was at the map shop. I’ve always had a fascination with maps, countries and oceans, you see. I wanted to be a cartographer, like Mr. Todd was. Mr. Todd saw me staring a map through a window (‘scum like me’, says Monsieur Lébrah, aren’t allowed in his map store). He asked if I could read it; I lied and said I could. He said he needed me on a big journey to find a box full of treasure. I hastily agreed.
Later that week, I found myself aboard his small ship sailing the Atlantic Ocean. For months, he taught me how to read maps after he learned I lied to him. At first I was frightened that he might cast me into the ocean, but the Christian allowed me to stay aboard. He was such a pleasant man. He taught me how to read maps, and I even attempted to draw them.
“Mr. Todd,” I asked one night, after months of traveling on the sea. “Where is this treasure that you seek?”
“You will see, son. You will see,” was his reply every time I asked him. It always left me feeling mysterious, and maybe even a little under appreciated. If Mr. Todd didn’t trust me with the location of the treasure, then how could I trust him?
One day, I had awakened from my slumber to find Mr. Todd standing over my bed.
“Oh! Mr. Todd, I’m sorry. I must’ve slept in an hour too long!” I muttered, rubbing the sleep from my eyes.
“No, no, in fact, you’re awake a bit early. The sun has just barely sprinkled over the horizon. I want to show you something, Marius. Something very special.”
I hurriedly clambered out of bed and followed him through the ship, up onto the deck. I shivered and wrapped my arms around myself. The pale, pink sun glimmered over the water like a million tiny jewels.
“Marius, there’s something I’ve wanted to show you for a long time. We’ve become close friends, you know, and I can’t help but think about it every day I look at you grow. You’ve practically gained a foot since I picked you up from Toulon.”
I grinned cheekily.
“I’ve been lying to you, all this time. I’m so sorry, Marius. I didn’t know what to do when I first saw you at the map store. I knew you were the boy I was looking for.” I was puzzled, and stared into his eyes.
“You have your mother’s face, you know.”
My mouth dropped open. I was speechless.
“How—” I began. “How do you know my mother?”
“We were never married, you have to understand. We were young, idiotic and in love. When your mother died in childbirth, they’d told me you’d gone with her. I didn’t have any family left to turn to, so I sailed into the sea. For eleven years, Marius, I sailed this sea, hopelessly lost without your mother.”
“You’re my father?” I asked, stunned. He slowly nodded.
“I hadn’t expected to see you, of course, alive. But I saw your mother looking through that window. She was in your face. She was in your heart.” With his pointer finger, Mr. Todd touched my heart. “I knew that if I had you, I had her. I love you, Marius. I do. More than anything. You are my light in the darkness. You are her, in a sense.”
“Oh,” I whispered. I looked up into his eyes and saw that he was crying. I couldn’t hold it in any longer too. We embraced and cried in each other’s arms, with the pink, rising sun in the background.
02. Red
The ocean water was red.
We sat in silence as we watched the first body float past us. Then a second. Even a third.
“What happened?” Liza asked. I didn’t answer; I only listened to the sickening thud as each corpse slammed into the side of our small sailing boat.
“Daddy? Why are all of these people floating in the water?” she asked. I turned to my four year old daughter and said:
“Do you remember when Momma died?”
Her innocent smile washed away like rain. She rubbed her eyes.
“Remember when we had to throw her body into the ocean because she was sick? If we had buried her in the ground, the sickness would’ve spread through the earth and made a million other people sick.”
“So all of these people were sick?” she asked.
I sighed and tried to explain. “It was before you were born, sweetie. You can’t remember anything. There were bad people that were disguised as good people. These people put bad things into the air that made it hard for us to breathe. Soon, there was a big sickness that swept all through the world. We had you get a shot in your arm when you were born, so you are immune to it.”
“What does immune mean?” she asked.
“It means that you won’t ever end up in the ocean, like Mommy.”
“Why wasn’t she immune?”
“Because grown-ups can’t take the shot, or they will get sick with another sickness called cancer. And that kills us even faster.” Explaining it to her was harder than I thought.
“Oh,” she muttered, and leaned over the edge of the boat.
“Sweetie, please come away from the edge. I don’t want you looking at—”
“What happened to that guy’s face?” Liza shrieked. I ran over to her and flung her away from the railing.
“Liza! When I tell you to get away, I mean it!” Her eyes were bulging in terror.
“What happened to that man’s face? It was all red and puffy!”
“That’s what happens when grown-ups try to get immune with that shot. Now, when I tell you to do something, do it with no questions asked, okay? You can get hurt.”
“How? They’re dead!”
“Not all of them.”
028. Crate
“You can’t be pregnant! It’s not possible!”
[i]“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I don’t know what to do! The baby is three months on its way already. There’s nothing we can do but wait.”
“Wait for what? Another man’s baby to come into this world? I think not!”
“Bill, you can’t leave me. Please. Not while I’m like this! Please!”
“We’re engaged, Lorraine!”
“I know! I’m so sorry! I was drunk and stupid!”
“I can’t believe you’d do something like this!”
“Me either! I’m sorry, Bill. I truly am.”
Lorraine was asleep in her bed. Bill took the crate in one hand and the naked infant in the other. It was crying and yelling and screaming and pissing all over the place. Blood was still dripping off of it.
Yes, Bill recognized It was a male, but It was still an it, no matter what. And soon it would be dead.
It was six months after the startling news. The baby had been born. Bill had refused to take her to the hospital. Instead, he loaded her on his boat while she was in labor and snunk out into the sea, despite her protests.
Taking the infant by the head, he opened the crate and lowered the baby into it. Its curly black hair had just begun to sprout and it hadn't opened his eyes yet
As Bill shut and locked the crate, the baby's cry worsened. Grimacing, he picked up the crate.
He heaved it into the ocean.
Later, while Lorraine was still asleep, Bill sat next to her, ready to tell her that the baby had been a stillborn. While he sat, his eyes absent mindly landed on a piece of paper lying by Lorraine’s jeans. Curious, he walked over and picked it up. He unfolded it and smoothed out its wrinkles.
Bill, I never told you how much I love you. I’m sorry for not telling you earlier. I didn’t think you were ready to hear it.
We were both drunk that night. Terribly drunk. I distinctively remember crawling into bed with you. I was scared because I knew you wanted to stay a virgin until our marriage night.
I’m sorry for not telling you. As I’ve said, I didn’t think you were ready. I’m naming the baby after his father:
Bill Coswell.
-Lorraine
. Substitute? 
