Living on Writer's Block

Inside, an astounding sight greeted her. The first thing she noticed was the captain. Samuel had his back against the wall beside her, his navy shirt fluttering with innumerable shreds and tears, stained dark with blood that seeped from the horrible gashes she saw on his body underneath. His black pants had multiple dark stains, splashes that reached all the way up to his thighs, and there were even splatters of the same dark stain on his shirt. His hair, generally pulled back in a neat ponytail at the base of his neck, had fallen loose and hung over one eye. Those eyes were mere slits, staring sightlessly at the ceiling. She heard a clatter as her foot crossed the threshold and looked down to see that his nerveless, black-gloved fingers had dropped his blood-stained cutlass to the floor beside him. She looked up as a flickering flash caught her eye. The Matron was advancing on him, again bound into her pointless corsets and wearing her signature pink, lacy dress, the pearls that draped across the skirt like a fishnet strangely glowing. But that was not the source of the flickering glow. The Matron stood there with a handful of purple flames in her palm. The woman paused when Ramona entered the room, and a slow, cruel smile curved her thin lips. 

“Well, now, Bloodhawk darling, this is an unexpected pleasure!” she gushed. Her tone changed then into a rather disinterested drawl. “I thought the old man had quite finished with you, when your screaming finally stopped; I was glad it did, too, I was getting quite the headache, my love.” She smiled wider. 

Ramona stared balefully at her from nearly-black, flaming eyes. “I told you you weren’t going to win forever, old woman.”

“Oh, I’m sorry dear, but it seems I already have. As soon as I’ve finished with your friend here, you’ll be next; and I’ll deal with every other little rebel the same way.” She raised a hand to fling her purple fireball at Samuel, slumped against the wall, his eyes half-closed. He was definitely not alert enough to get out of the way in time. As the witch’s hand came around, Ramona acted without stopping to think. She sidestepped into the path of the fireball, between the witch and the captain. Samuel was brushed by her hand as she raised it to ward off the witch’s attack, and he slid sideways to the ground, well below the flame’s path now. Feels rather familiar, this scene, Ramona thought. Except now, I have to help him, instead of the other way ‘round.  The flame struck her, licked across her back and down her arm, before suddenly vanishing into her shoulder. Ramona stood still, staring impassively with dead black-grey eyes at her ex-mistress. She felt only a warm tickle in her shoulder where the fireball had hit her, a faint tingling that spread down to prick her fingertips. The Matron’s mouth opened in horror as Ramona raised her hand and turned it over. In her palm there danced a scarlet ball of flame. A tired, bitter smile touched Ramona Redhawk’s lips as she raised her hand to the eye-level of the witch. 

“I don’t know where you got this, witch, but it seems I have it now.” She widened her smile triumphantly. “Thanks,” she said coolly, and bent her arm, raising it a little above her shoulder, curling her wrist towards herself. She paused, letting the woman’s fear grow. “I told you I’d live to see the end of your tyrannical reign, old woman,” she said softly. With that she snapped her wrist out towards the terrified witch, and the flames immediately spun off her hand and smashed into the Matron’s  chest, flinging her backward to the floor. The witch wailed, scrambling upright, her corsets abruptly bursting under the rapid movement, aided by the flames licking at the taught laces, instantly snapping them. The woman expanded rapidly around the ruined garments, rolls of fat engulfing the few remaining laces which were strained beyond their capacity, and jutting over sharp whalebone shards. She screamed as her heavily-powdered face was struck by the flames, the chemicals in her makeup igniting and flaring brightly. Her flesh began to boil. Her hands flailed wildly, beating uselessly at the flames despite the fact that she was so fat that she could not reach more than a quarter of her own body. She looked a little like an obese penguin, her arms stuck out from her  shoulders and held there by her now-viciously broiling layers of fat. Her skin was blackened now, and splitting in some places like a sausage, and Ramona hid her eyes, nauseated. No doubt the magical qualities of the fireball sped up the process of burning. The young woman responsible for the witch’s demise stood with her eyes screwed shut, arms crossed over her face against the heat of the flames, desperately trying to ignore the horrible smell of burning flesh and melting fabric. The witch stumbled backwards suddenly, then crashed out the curved glass window at the end of the room. With a blood-curdling screech the Matron smashed through the glass and plummeted out of sight into the sea, engulfed in blood-colored fire, limbs still flailing uselessly. 

Ramona blinked in a sudden wind that whistled through the shattered glass, her weakness returning, compounded by the apparent effort it had taken to harness the fire. She looked down at her trembling fingers, wondering how in the world she’d done that. Her bright red skirt flapped and swirled around her ankles in the wind, and her knees buckled sharply. She crashed to her hands and knees, gasping for air, quivering with horror. Her insides quivered too, a little too much. She began retching, violently, her stomach heaving what minimal food she’d had that day into a slimy puddle in front of her. She scrambled away in disgust as her gut calmed, and then she remembered Samuel. She spun on her knees to face his prostrate form, which was bleeding heavily onto the floor beneath him. She crawled over and put out a tentative hand, then drew back again, hesitating. Finally, biting her lip, she reached out her hand again and laid it on his shoulder. She shook him gently.

“Samuel? Samuel, come on,” she breathed weakly.

He groaned and opened his eyes groggily. “Redhawk? What’re you doing here? Where’s the old witch?” He sat up slowly, a hand pressed over his eyes. 

“I don’t exactly know what happened, I can explain it to you later. But now —” she shuddered suddenly and folded her arms tightly across her middle, shutting her eyes tightly and curling around a sudden vague emptiness inside her, an emptiness that seemed to reek of sickness and death and loss, as well as an odd sense of foreboding.

Samuel’s head went up, his eyes sharpened a little beneath their confusion and weariness. “Redhawk?”

She looked up at him, her pained eyes only half-open. “I don’t know what’s going on, what’s wrong — I was going to tell you you had to get up so we could go — but instead, I need your help again, one last time,” she murmured weakly, her voice tight with pain. “We have to get out of here, now, and I can’t — ungh,” she groaned sharply, shuddering, and shutting her eyes tightly. She bent forward, her forehead almost touching her knees. “— move,” she barely managed to whisper. She clenched her jaw tightly, lips curling in agony over bared teeth. This was no sickness. There was something more than physical wrong with her, she was sure.

Samuel’s jaw set. He stood up carefully and pulled Ramona to her feet, but when she crumpled again, even with his hand supporting her, he knew it wasn’t enough. “Sorry for this, Redhawk, but we won’t get anywhere with any speed if you try and walk on your own.” So saying, he suddenly bent and picked her up and began carrying her toward the door. When she gave no word of protest, merely screwing her eyes shut and folding herself tighter around the strange, evil void that only she felt, he knew she was in bad shape. Placing one foot at a time in front of the other, clutching at the last dregs of his strength, he carried her out the door and went toward the hatch he’d entered through earlier where, now, silver moonlight rained down, and where he could hear voices celebrating drunkenly, as well as his own crew asking all around for him. After what felt to him like days of painful toil, he reached the foot of the steep stairs that led up to the deck, and laboriously climbed them, nearly overbalancing many times with his heavy and delicate burden. When finally his head appeared above the deck, the first thing that flung itself on his senses was the number of men running towards him and crowding around. As his foot finally left the top step and hit the deck, his own loyal crew pressed around him and the girl, rejoicing at the fact that he was alive. 

Samuel carefully lowered Ramona to the deck and fell to his knees beside her, his half-lidded eyes like those of a corpse. “Get Wilhelm,” he rasped, then sharply crumpled to the deck.