Revenge So Sweet

Overboard

When Danielle got back to her room she threw open the drapes.  The storm didn't look like it was subsiding.  It was quite dark out but clearly not night yet.  Danielle suspected that though she couldn't see it, the sun had not yet set.  The ship was making it's way out of the harbor already and they were heading back to sea.  She looked at her watch and found that it was only 5:38pm.  Most days the sun had gone down a little after 6pm. 
"Perfect."  She said out loud to herself and quickly got undressed.
A low alarm could be heard through the ships intercom, and a voice interrupted the alarm.
"Attention!  Attention!  This is Captain Kirkland speaking.  All passengers please make your way to your cabins safely.  Once again all passengers please make your way to your cabins safely.  Do not run and take stairs where able.  Hold on to any rails nearby.  Please stay in your cabins until further notice.  All activities will be closed for the duration of this storm.  Thank you for your cooperation."
She was already safely in her cabin and so his warning did not faze her.  Danielle jumped into the shower, taking care to wash the sand out of her hair and other areas it had found it's way to.  She was dressed in gray sweats and a large black sweatshirt with a Mickey Mouse graphic and the word "Disney" on the upper back area in white.  She planned on sleeping early and so made no effort to put a bra on.
Feeling comfortable already in her sleep attire, Danielle sat barefoot out on the balcony and waited.  It was possible that she had missed it, but she stayed just in case.  Absentmindedly she reached for her necklace and ran her thumb over the textures of the symbols in the pendant.
Then she heard it.  Although this time the voice was much softer than usual.  This could have been because it was partly drowned by the low rumbling of the thunder.  Lightning flashed across the sky.  She closed her eyes hoping to improve her other senses so she could hear the song.  Oddly, Danielle determined that the song was definitely not coming from the same area she usually heard it coming from.  The soft song came to an end.   Danielle opened her eyes as thunder rumbled and lightning flashed 2 seconds after.  The storm was getting closer she realized.  
A freak storm the captain had called it.  Apparently they had not anticipated it turning so sour.  Danielle looked off into the distance.  A sheet of rain could be seen like a wall coming towards the ship and quickly.  Danielle swiftly turned behind her and put her hand on the balcony door preparing to open it when she heard it.  It was very soft.  But it sounded like a small cry.
It was too late.  The rain came down on her and it sounded loud as it pummeled the ship.  She could see the waves were becoming more and more violent as they steered onward.  Just before this the waves were affecting the ship very little as it sliced through the ocean, but now almost in the blink of an eye the weather had become frightening.
Danielle heard it again.  A small muffled cry.  She peeked over the balcony rail gripping it for balance as the ship teetered.  That's when she saw it. A flash of purple on the deck below.
"Honey!" Danielle yelled as the thunder overhead boomed once again.  She could see a wave crash against the ship and roll over the deck.  A flash of purple again.
'What was Honey doing?  Didn't she hear the announcement?'  Danielle frantically thought to herself.
She had to do something.  Honey wasn't young and had likely been at the buffet but heading back because of the captains orders, but was now caught on the deck.  Knowing Honey, she had probably thought she had time and ignored the urgency of the captains words.  Guilt racked Danielle as she thought she should have been with the older woman.
"Honey I'm coming!"  She yelled as loud as she could but the roar of the thunder and the pounding of rain on ocean and ship drowned her out.
She ran through her room and quickly out the door.  The ship tilted and Danielle was heaped on to the opposite wall.  She clung to the rail, pulling herself, what felt like, up hill towards the stairs that led to the lower deck.  Luckily the hallway had been carpeted and she found her bare feet could grip on to it making it a little easier to climb.  She pumped her legs climbing the hall with both hands simultaneously pulling her weight.  The hill of a hall started to become even and the ship shuddered.  She could hear the metallic groan as it fought through the opposing waves.
When she finally approached the top of the stairs she paused a moment.  Her heart hammering against her chest, she needed to calm herself.  So she took a deep steadying breath.
Slowly Danielle made her way down the 4 flights of stairs, stopping occasionally when the ship would tilt too dramatically.  It was disorienting, like being in one of those carnival funhouses and it continued to put her on edge.  But she moved as fast as she could.
When she finally made it to the bottom landing she kept one hand firmly grasped on the bottom rail of the stairs and the other reached as far as she could to unlatch the door with the "DECK" label above it.  The ship tilted again and she lost her balance falling backwards her hand still holding tight to the stairs rail.  She felt a pop in her shoulder and just knew she had dislocated it.  The pain was throbbing but she couldn't stop until she found Honey. 
When the ship righted itself, and before it could change again she lunged at the door quickly unlatching it with her good arm.  The door swung inwardly from the force of the wind outside and it nearly took her out but she had stepped back just in time.  Stepping out onto the deck she grabbed hold of the outer railing.  Looking towards where her cabin balcony loomed over she saw another flutter of purple at the end.
The aisle seemed like it was miles away.  Steadying herself she inched forward.  The wind whipped her now tangled hair in a frenzy above and around her.  The rain felt like little icicles stinging her exposed skin.  Her body shuddered with the temperature drop of the outside storm.
A massive wave was approaching on her side of the ship.  She crouched down and made herself very small and held the rail tight with her good arm and hooked her sore arm around the rail to join her hands and held as tight as she could.  She held her breath.  The power of the wave hit her hard, pulling and ripping at her body but she held on for dear life.  When the wave had passed she gulped air into her lungs and wiped her face in a useless attempt to clear her vision.  With her heart raced and her adrenaline pumping she almost forgot the throbbing pain in her shoulder.
Ahead of her the purple material fluttered again.
"Honey!" She screamed.
She inched her way again forward.
"Hold on Honey!"  She screamed again "I'm coming!"
She inched further.
Danielle looked around her and she almost collapsed from the sheer fear of what she was seeing.  She wiped at her face again hoping she was having some fear induced hallucination.  It looked as if the ship was about to go over on oceanic cliff as the water level below and along the side of the boat was dropping, as if someone took out the stopper to a drain.  The ocean that was in front of the boat had disappeared and all she could see was the stormy sky above.
'Was the boat sailing into the sky?' She thought as panic and confusion gripped her, but then when realized what was happening.
A massive wave was forming and the ship was on it's peak going over.  At the front of the ship it looked like the surface of the water was getting lower and lower but she knew the truth.  The wave was getting bigger and they were rising on its peak about to take its dive straight down the face of it like a surfer positioned to ride.  But this was no surfboard and when the ship finally edged forward with all of its weight onto the waves face it came down with such force and then buoyed upward again, bouncing on the black waters.
The power of that violent and sudden motion broke her hold and only lifeline to the boat as she was thrown over the side.  The free fall was shorter than she thought.  She hit the water and was immediately submerged in darkness all around her.
She kicked and used her good arm to pull as much water fighting as hard as she could, her body going into panic mode fighting to get to the surface and to breath air.  She almost didn't make it, but when she finally broke through to the top she gulped air but also a lot of salt water making her cough and sputter.  She could see the bright lights of the ocean liner, a beacon in the blackness.  It was far.  Too far to swim.  She couldn't have been under that long she thought frantically.
"Help!" She screamed and waved her good arm frantically while kicking to stay afloat.
She looked around her remembering Honey and wondering if Honey had been thrown over too.  But there was nothing.
The rain was thick and the boat was quickly disappearing into it.  Thunder boomed and lightning struck above her casting an eerie glow onto the water.  She didn't know what had happened until it had toppled on top of her.  A wave had hit her hard from behind, as she kept trying to focus on where the ship had gone.
The wave had dragged her under.  She was caught in it's torrential tumble, reaching out into the nothingness for anything to stop her.  When the wave had dissipated she was too weak to fight anymore.  She was in complete darkness.  Lightning flashed and she could see where the surface was, having lost it's direction in the confusion.  But she couldn't reach it.  It was so far above her and she had no more strength.
Fear but acceptance washed over her.  The deeper her body sank the lower the temperature of the water dropped and it had a numbing effect on her.  With one hand she reached to her chest for the necklace.  She ran her thumb along it's grooves and closed her eyes.  In her head she sang the song that had captivated her for days now.
"Sailing 'cross the treacherous seas,
Be they pirates, be they thieves,

Hope to plunder then swiftly leave,
She'll find his treasures all indeed,

Revenge did guide her to her love,
And gold may not have been enough,

We loved her port we loved her stern,
But love did take her life in turn,

When storms did blow her mass did bend,
And where hope fell no man may ken,

Dove into depths, revenge did follow,
Alas with riches deep she wallows,

So raise a glass to revenge so sweet,
And to hope her love to keep

Oh sweet revenge your secret kept
Neath time and murky waters depth"

She could feel the burn in her lungs as her body starved for air.
'This is it.' She thought and dared to open her eyes.  It was dark.  The surface completely lost to her now.
She heard a loud booming noise that caught her completely by surprise.  But even more curious was that she felt the pendant in her hand give a swift pull drawing her in a direction of which she had no idea.
A dim light came into view but from where she couldn't tell.  What had illuminated however, was a dilapidated and decaying ancient looking ship.
The necklace which had been so securely fastened around her was starting to cut into her neck with the strength of it's pull.  In her weakness, Danielle could not hold on to it but the coin had stopped pulling.  She now floated near the old ship.
She could no longer fight what was now taking over her body.  She was blacking out, and her body involuntarily began to convulse.  She heard a loud ringing in her ears and it became deafening.
The water was spinning.  Kind of like what happens when you flush a toilet.  It was as if someone had flushed the ocean.  The ringing in her ear was ever present.  Fighting to keep conscious just a little longer she peaked back at the ancient ship.  It was moving.  It was spinning too.  The force of the water had pulled it from the muddy floor it had been lodged deeply within for who knows how long.  Pieces of it were falling off of it.  Or was it reassembling itself to it?  She wondered.  Death must be near.
Unable to hold on, Danielle closed her eyes and everything became still.  She succumbed to the grip that death surely had on her and she knew no more.