Yay, the 100 word challenge is finally coming back to life!
4: Dreams
It was nearly midnight, perhaps past – and in the small cabin below the decks of The Grand Fife, the one just to the left of the staircase – Samantha Hawkins lay awake, blue eyes wide open.
She was slightly frustrated at herself for this: after all, sleep was essential for the health and strength of the human body.
Without proper health of both the mind and the physical form, it would be impossible for her to retain the near – inhuman strength that she had worked so hard to build for such a long time.
On the other hand, she did not want to go back.
Not back to that – that which only reminded her of what she did not have.
Samantha Hawkins did not want to dream.
It was like a bittersweet hell to her whenever she did – the visions taunting her in her own mind, inescapably, over and over and over again without relenting – and although she dreamed not of death or of disaster, it brought dread to her all the same.
Countless times, almost every time, her mind had been confronted with the vision of the grey – eyed, black – haired privateer, with her slightly – slouched torso and her firmly planted legs, creating the perfect image of her Captain, the privateer Sydney Underhill – but it was not the Sydney Underhill that was now so familiar to her.
There was no scowl on her face, no snarl that curled the corners of her lips, no dark circles under her eyes. Her cheekbones were not shadowed and her flesh was not greyish and sunken – rather, she looked unusually healthy.
And she smiled, as well. That was the worst part, the buccaneer had concluded, that was the worst part, for the smile only served to remind her of what she had no longer.
She vaguely remembered a time when Sydney smiled so, and it seemed so distant, so far off. The privateer had morphed into a different person now, and for the worse.
Back then, Sydney was the kind, welcoming teenage girl that had decided to show more compassion than expected after finding a stowaway buccaneer below the decks of the enormous black ship, which had visibly dominated any other ship that the blue – eyed girl had every seen.
Instead of engaging her in combat or growing furious at such a finding, she had extended a helping hand – an offer, per say, to finally live her potential as opposed to the life she was originally destined for.
Pulling in ships and tying them down, day after day, as an apprentice of the dockmaster of Skull Island, was what she owed her impossible strength to, but had she been forced to continue that for the rest of her life, Samantha would have gone mad.
It was a limiting job, and it held her back from what she was truly capable of doing – being a contributing agent of the Resistance.
Sydney had given her such an opportunity, and she had been ever grateful.
Samantha dreamed of that day, she re – lived that moment nightly, for she truly and dearly missed the Sydney Underhill that she had encountered on that day, before the privateer had turned sour and bitter, like a fruit gone rotten.
She often wondered what it was that had made her Captain's personality change so drastically – was it the added stress of finally breaking ties with the Resistance? Or perhaps the burden of supporting two other people in addition to herself?
If there was a way to fix you, Sydney, Samantha had often silently pleaded, tell me.
Let me be useful for one time in my life.
But no words would come from the privateer, and Samantha would be left to wallow in her own unending worry and her dreams of the past.
She wished she could reverse time, to when Sydney had been so full of optimism and motivation instead of exhaustion and irritation.
Such a leader did not deserve to be in such a condition, not with her kindness, not with her talent and ability. She should have her dreams fulfilled, Samantha believed, and her health in a constant optimal condition. It was like a sickness, some sort of virus, this onset of monotone and the sudden lack of all emotion, expression, and drive, and there was no cure in sight.
Let me help you.
No, Sydney would silently reply, let me be. You would not dare, she would wordlessly say, to question my intent.
But there is something wrong with you.
This was not the future that the buccaneer had dreamed of when Sydney had first extended that hand several years ago, and it saddened her greatly.
It made her break a little, internally, although she would not dare to show it on her outer image, every time that she would see the Captain emerge from her cabin after yet another long, sleepless night, her torso unbalanced on her tired legs and her limp eyelids threatening to fall uncontrollably over her thoroughly – bloodshot eyes.
Sydney had been all that she could ever ask for, at first – welcoming, organized, structured, calm, supportive – and to have that wrenched away from her in the short span of a year's worth was almost unbearable.
I dreamed of a sister.
Sometimes, Samantha would dare to compare it to a chronic disease of sorts.
I dreamed of a friend.
She did not want to be useless anymore, not now, not when she had needed the privateer's support for the last several years of her life and was being given the opportunity to repay that debt.
It was her turn to be the stone wall now, to shield her Captain from the unavoidable, taxing bothers of daily life while she repaired herself, for she had gone without such repair for far, far too long.
But Sydney would turn her away – the privateer's stubborn pride would get in her way and take control of her mind. It seemed to be the only thing remaining of the woman that she had once known, that pride.
On most nights, Samantha dreamed that the rust had been removed from her idol, and that it shone with everlasting brightness once again.
And here we have a little backstory, as well as a look inside the mind of Samantha Hawkins.
Do review! I'd love to know what you think!
- Severina