DISCLAIMER: That's not mine, that's not mine, that's not mine either... you know the drill.

AN: All the sailors superstitions below are real. And those are just a sampling of them. I could write three more chapters and still not cover them all... sailors are seriously weird people.

It was a couple hours after dinner, which Abby decided to sleep through rather than eat the blind, twitching eels that Koleniko and Jelly were teaching everyone how to catch and butcher. As she reckoned it, they had about forty hours or so left, less than two days. She could go without food for two days, or at least she figured she probably could. There had been that time in tenth grade when she'd gone to the lake for a week with a friend's family, who were some kind of fanatic organic vegans and ate mostly tofu and sprouts. She'd survived for five days on two apples, a handful of carrot sticks, and three of those tiny cheese-and-crackers packets, which she was given by a sympathetic stranger. If she could do that…

Her stomach didn't seem to be in favor of this plan, however. It later occurred to her that unlike tenth grade (during which her chief physical activities had been walking through the mall with her friends and playing ping pong), over the last few months her body had become used to fighting, hauling lines, hard work, and generous helpings of breaded, fried fish and hardtack several times a day. In any case, what it boiled down to was that she didn't get any sleep. She had given up on the whole nap idea and was staring out into the darkness beyond the ship, trying to figure out if the motion that she'd just seen was the kraken or just her imagination, when she felt rather than heard someone come up beside her. She glanced over to see the spined crewman that she was fairly sure went by the name Urchin. She swallowed, attempted a smile, and said,

"Let me know if I'm in the way of anything. Or if I'm being too female and you need me to go belowdecks so I don't cause bad luck. Or, uh, whatever." She shifted uneasily. A lot of her classmates had seemed to take the eerie, inhuman crew members more or less in stride after they'd been introduced and talked to them a little, but she still felt like they could look right through her and see what a complete wanna-be she was.

"No point in worryin' about that now," Urchin said matter of factly. "Not with thirteen women already on board, an' three of them redheads. Might as well've brought flowers an' rabbits." There was the slightest hint of some sort of accent in his voice that Abby couldn't quite place.

"What? Flowers and rabbits? Why?" Abby was totally baffled by that one.

"Bad luck."

"Flowers and rabbits? are bad luck?" she asked for confirmation, forehead wrinkled.

"Aye. 'Specially the rabbits. Powerful ill-fated. Even worse than Mister Dennis."

"Who's Mister Dennis?" Abby was completely lost.

"Ah, ye know. Mister Dennis, Master Hog. The pee-aye-gee."

"What pig?" Urchin winced at her use of the word, then shrugged apologetically.

"Any one. Bad luck to speak of. It goes ill for the catch if someone talks 'bout 'em."

"And… you have one named Mister Dennis," Abby said slowly, trying to get this straight.

"Underwater? Are ye daft? That's just what ye call them."

"Why?"

"Dunno. 'Cause it's safer that way, I guess."

"Yes, but how do you get from 'pig' to 'Mister Dennis?'" she persisted.

"Dunno."

So she gave up on that line of questioning, but later, after a grammar rant—er, a very enthusiastic grammar lecture—from Siren, she recounted the conversation, to everyone's considerable amusement.

"We should have named the sponge Mister Dennis," Sarah decided.

"Ironic how he's missing out on the underwater portion of the experience," commented Summer. "He's probably still back on the Dauntless."

"Superstitions," Siren mused. "You know, I'd planned on a lesson about those at some point, but what better time than now? The Flying Dutchman is nearly a superstition itself. Maybe we could… hmm, let me go talk to the Captain."

"Better not," Holly warned her. "He's carving something into the old table in what used to be the mess hall and he got pretty hostile when I came in to ask him a question earlier."

"I guess I'll try Maccus, then." Siren strode out of the room and returned about fifteen minutes later to herd them out of the room.

"Okay, all hands on deck, people. I've convinced everyone except Piper, Manray, Jimmylegs, and the Captain—oh, and Crash and Quittance, but they don't talk anyhow, so yeah—to teach an impromptu class on sailors' superstitions. This should be interesting."

"They din't even know about Mister Dennis," Urchin was telling Morey, who shook his head disbelievingly as the students found places to sit on the deck facing the crew.

"Right lot o' landsmen," Wheelback said scornfully.

"Landswomen?" Grace suggested. "Or landslasses. No, that sounds too much like windlasses."

"I forgot what a windlass is again," Cate admitted quietly. Siren tried to clap her hands to get everyone's attention, but the sound was almost completely muffled underwater, so it more made her look silly than anything else. Finally, the Kraken quieted everyone by swimming up to the ship and looking at them with an uncomfortably enormous eye, which made even the crew of the Dutchman back away a little, though Becca gathered the courage a few moments later to run up to it and wave.

"Where did ye want us to start?" Maccus asked the group in general.

"Let's start at the very beginning; a very good place to start," Linsey sang, then was quieted by other people's elbows in her ribs and looked contrite.

"The beginning would be when a ship is built and christened, right?" Tierza asked.

"Stolen wood," Ratlin said immediately. "Good luck to build a ship at least partly from stolen wood. Not just pirate ships, all ships. Makes 'em sail faster."

"And the christening of it, if the bottle don't break, that's an ill omen," Bootstrap said, scratching a barnacle on his ear.

"Are there any rules about naming ships?" Nina asked.

"Ye mustn't use names that end with 'A'," Angler told her.

"But plenty of ships have names ending in 'A,' Linsey argued. "Like… I don't know. The Lusitania, the HMS Victoria, the… the Andrea Doria." There was a momentary pause.

"All three of those ships were wrecked, Linsey," Holly pointed out. The crew around them nodded as if that were only to be expected.

"And never, ever change the name of a ship," Greenbeard cautioned them. "She don't like that."

"Why is it always 'she'?" Sarah asked, to everyone's surprise. "Because of the figurehead?"

"But figureheads can be animals and all sorts of other stuff," Angel pointed out.

"Ships're always female. Just how it is," the twin who Abby thought was called Baltasar responded succinctly.

"Yes, but why?" The crew thought over this one for about a minute, murmurring amongst themselves.

"I reckon…" Broondjongen said, scratching his chin. "I reckon it's 'cause… men go inside 'em?" That got a few snickers.

"But women go inside ships t-" Too late, Abby realized what she was saying and bit her tongue as the crew's leers became overt.

"That they do, that they do," Clanker murmurred.

"I knew a girl in Guangzhou once…" Hadras reminisced happily.

"Okay, I think we get it," Siren cut them off.

"Could be 'cause she carries us all in 'er belly," Ogilvey unexpectedly offered a PG-rated solution that was met with murmurs of agreement from the others.

"Aye, like a mother," Wheelback agreed. "That'd likely be it."

"Only ye can curse at 'er wi'out gettin' a hidin'," Penrod added.

"Though not the keel!"

"O' course not the keel. Ye never curse the keel!"

"Why not?" Becca wanted to know.

"Because… because it's the keel!" Finnegan turned to give the students an exasperated look. "The keel!"

"Yes?" Cate prompted him.

"Bloody 'ell, this is why it's so much trouble to try an' educate women. Y' asks questions that ain't got no answers to 'em. Look, girlie, it's just the way things are. Ye don't steal from a church, ye don't fight on board a ship, ye don't curse the keel! It's… a center! It runs through the ship like a backbone, holds the rest of it steady!"

"You just made a very good argument that women should be educated, I'd say," Siren told him. "We asked a question that you didn't think had an answer, and because we did, you learned something you didn't know you knew."

"I—ye--- it—" Finnegan scowled at them, trapped by his own words. "Never said women shouldn't be educated," he muttered. "Just said it was a damned nuisance doin' it."

"But ye're right about the keel," Palafico put in. "She's the backbone o' the ship. 'S why ye can't change the plans fer the ship after the keel is laid."

"With a gold coin in it for luck," Jelly said.

"Aye, and that."

"There's a gold coin in the keel?" Angel asked, looking down at the deck beneath her with a look of speculation. "Where?"

"Not a soul knows but the builder," Urchin said, to her visible disappointment. "An' that's why," he added ruefully. "Any pirate worth 'is salt'd have it out in a second if it didn't mean tearin' up 'is own ship lookin'."

"Did we tell them about Fridays?" Chris asked his twin.

"Don't think so. Fridays are bad," Baltasar told the students. "There. Now we did."

"Nuh-uh," Kat objected. "I have to disagree with you on that one. Fridays are good."

"Aye, they are, to be sure, as long as ye don't lay the keel or christen the ship or set sail on one of 'em," Bootstrap told her. "Bad luck. Not sure why. Somethin' to do with Christ, I think."

"Was killed on one," Clanker contributed.

"What, you were killed on a Friday, or Jesus was?" Kelsey asked. Clanker thought for a moment.

"Both."

"That one ain't a myth, though," Ratlin said matter-of-factly. "English Navy went an' proved it. Thought it was ignorant nonsense an' reckoned they'd show us fool sailors it was just talk. So they build this ship, ye hear? Lay the keel on Friday. Christen the ship on a Friday. They even name the bloody ship the Friday. An' it sets off fer its maiden voyage on a calm, sunny Friday mornin', as fine sailin' weather as ever ye've seen…" He paused for effect. "… An' not a soul ever sees it again."

"Cool," Summer said with a wide smile.

"So is there anything else that's bad luck when you're starting a voyage?" Siren asked.

"Don't throw a stone over the ship, avoid folk with red hair the day ye're setting off, or at least speak to any redheads ye do meet afore they can speak to you. And step onto the ship right foot first," Angler said. "Never take the first step onto the ship with yer left foot. Or, worse, sneeze to the left as ye're boardin'."

"Never sneeze to the left while stepping onto a ship left foot first." Koneka repeated. "That's awfully specific. I mean, how often does that happen?"

"Whenever someone with two left feet gets a cold?" Grace suggested.

"Hey, I just realized, this is Things You Should Not Be Doing on A Pirate Ship, Part Two!" Holly exclaimed, looking gleeful.

"Not even gotten to that bit yet." Old Haddy glanced at Siren. "That what we're tellin' em next?"

"Yes, please," Siren said over her shoulder as she leaned out dangerously, balanced precariously on the railing. Abby felt reasonably certain this was another Thing One Should Not Do on A Pirate Ship and was about to say so when Siren jumped back down onto the deck.

"Sorry. Trying to figure out if the Kraken's male or female." There was a pause while everyone thought about that.

"Well," Tierza finally said, "That's not very polite. Why don't you just ask it, instead of looking for a…" Another pause. "…clue?"

"How is it supposed to answer me?" Siren asked with an expression of affronted innocence. "It doesn't talk."

"It could raise a tentacle," Linsey suggested.

"And that would mean what?"

"Um… that it heard you?"

A tentacle reached upwards, its tip vanishing into the darkness at the limit of the eerie lantern light.

"It appears that you are onto something," Siren said. "Hey—um, Sir or Madam Kraken… raise another tentacle if you understand what we mean by male and female." There was a pause, and then another tentacle snaked upward. "Great! Now raise another tentacle if you're female." A larger tentacle was raised this time, causing the ship to rock slightly as the motion displaced the water around it. "We have an answer! Thank you, milady," she said to the creature, who began to slowly move away from the ship again.

"Milady?" Cate asked.

"I somehow wouldn't feel right calling a kraken ma'am." Siren shrugged. "Sorry for the distraction. We will now return to your regularly scheduled programming. Things You Should Not Be Doing On a Pirate Ship, Part Two."

"Well, there's turtles," Greenbeard said obligingly. "To kill a turtle without eatin' it is bad luck."

"Or to kill an albatross, whether ye eat it or not. Or a seagull. Some say if ye kill a seagull, ye go blind," Ogilvey elaborated.

"Yeah, well, they say that about a lot of things," Abby said dryly, and pretty much everyone snickered.

"But some animals are good luck,too," Wheelback said over the laughter. "Cats. They're lucky little devils. A cat on a ship means good luck."

"Not on the longer voyages," argued Urchin. "A real long voyage, ye'll need those rats fer yer own eatin'."

"You eat rats?" Becca exclaimed.

"'S meat, ain't it?" Koleniko said. "But if a cat's on board, it stays on board, even if it does mean a less varied diet. Throwin' a cat overboard's as bad as whistling. Storms," he added when the students looked blank. "It brings storms. Not that ye'd throw it into the ocean anyway, if provisions were that low."

"That is gross and horrible," Kelsey said, shuddering.

"Nah, tastes fair enough if it comes to that," Jelly told her, misunderstanding her disgust. "Rather clean animals, cats."

"So whistling also brings storms?" Nina wanted to know.

"It calls the wind. The ringing sound off the rim of a glass, as well," Angler told her.

"Another thing that's bad luck," Clanker put in, "Is wearin' the clothes of a dead man during the same voyage that he died."

"And when a man does die on board ship," Penrod added, "Ye need t' bury 'im sewn up in 'is hammock with two cannonballs placed at 'is feet t' keep 'im from followin' the ship."

"And a stitch through his nose so he stay in his shroud," Hadras said.

"What?" Koneka asked, her brow furrowing.

"When you stitch the hammock shut around him," Broondjongen explained, "The last stitch goes through his nose, to keep him in."

"It sounds almost like you're planning to bury someone alive," Grace commented frankly, but Wheelback shook his barnacled head at her.

"Nah, a live man'd know how to tear through the stitches an' get out. Dead men don't think. All they've got is the last thing they knew in life. That's why a dead mate'd follow a ship. 'E wouldn't know any better."

"Well. That's nice and creepy," Summer said quietly.

"If the dead person's not a crew member, does one still worry about them following the ship?" Sarah asked.

"No, but that's worse. If the man wasn't crew, the corpse'll need to be brought back to 'is kin for burial, which means it stays on the ship. A nasty thing, that," Baltasar answered her. "And it's got to be the very first thing as leaves the ship when it does."

"There's the flag, as well," Angler said, obviously somewhere else on his own train of thought. "Blood on the water is bad, but blood on the flag is good. Ye don't hand it through the rungs of a ladder and ye don't mend it on the quarterdeck."

"An' blood spilled on deck'll break the hex if someone wishes ye good luck," Bootstrap said.

"Wait, so it's like the stage? You have to say 'break a leg' instead?" Kat interrupted, her face lighting up a little as she was reminded her of home.

"Breakin' a leg's a bit much," Bootstrap said to her, looking taken aback. "It doesn't take maiming a man, just a drop or two of blood. Bloodyin' their nose'll do well enough."

"No, it's an expression. Saying break a leg. It means good—you-know-what," Kat explained.

"Like 'in boca al lupo,'" Siren said. "It's an Italian expression that means the same thing. Literally it translates to 'in the mouth of the wolf,' which has about as much to do with luck as 'break a leg' does."

"Don't think there's anythin' in the lore 'bout wolves," Ratlin said, and the crew members looked at each other, thought, and shook their heads.

"There's a bit about lions I 'eard somewhere," Urchin volunteered. "Ye're not supposed to tie an overhand knot in the tail of a live lion…" he trailed off and looked a bit embarrassed as everyone, even the other crew members, stared at him.

"I… agree that that would be a bad idea, but… who… and how…." Linsey said slowly.

"Never 'eard the bit about the lions before," Jelly said, looking unsure. "Who'd need t'be told?"

"Though ye notice even the fangirls ain't askin' why about it," Finnegan said as if pointing out the brighter side of the situation.

"We're curious, not retarded," Kelsey said.

"Means stupid, daft," Angel translated for the sailors, who were looking blank at the unfamiliar word.

"Sorry. Wrong century," Kelsey apologized. "I mean we're daft, not --. I mean, we're not daft... darn it!" Now everyone was laughing.

"So what else brings bad luck?" Cate wanted to know.

"Brown shoes, gray mittens, three seagulls flyin' together… driving a nail into anything on Sunday… oh, and ye can't open things upside-down," Clanker listed. "And bananas are cursed, I've heard tell."

"You're not serious." Tierza gave him a skeptical look, but he nodded.

"A banana is an ill omen." The students exchanged glances, none of them quite able to keep a straight face.

"But… really, what can possibly be ominous about a banana?" Linsey wanted to know. "What, like when it starts turning brown and you have to eat it before it goes bad? Do people slip on the peels?"

"When there's bananas aboard a ship, good men die," Penrod claimed, and was nearly drowned out by the giggles.

"Okay, settle down, people, there is actually an explanation for this one!" Siren stood up in an attempt to be tall enough to get people's attention. "There is a good reason bananas were considered bad luck. Penrod's right, ships that transported bananas had suspiciously high rates of unexplained deaths."

"The bananas killed them," Summer whispered to Abby, whose repressed laughter snorted out her nose in a cloud of tiny air bubbles.

"The bananas did not kill them," said Siren, who had heard that. "The banana spiders did. There is a spider native to South America. It's sometimes called the Brazilian Wandering spider, sometimes the Banana Spider, and it is the most venomous spider in the world. They very often end up as inadvertent stowaways among a cargo of bananas because they often live in and around banana plants and they like to crawl into dark, covered places like crates. There are a bunch of different subspecies. Some of them are only about as venomous as a black widow- which means they won't kill a healthy adult- but others are basically death on eight legs. With most highly poisonous animals, the general rule is 'leave them alone and they'll leave you alone,' but not these guys. They're aggressive. They'll just attack. Sometimes they'll do what's called a dry bite, which means they just bite with no venom, but when they do use venom, even a small amount can cause agonizing pain for days."

"That's why, is it?" Greenbeard asked. "Spiders?"

"That's why," Siren confirmed, nodding.

"Funny. 'S bad luck to kill a spider on board ship, y'see."

"P'raps the killin' of it would be balanced out by the not lettin' it make a corpse o' one o' the crew," suggested Chris.

"Can you do that, then? Balance out superstitions so that you can do something unlucky as long as that lets you do something lucky?" Nina asked.

"Nat'rally, aye," Wheelback said. "Because it's bad luck if a woman's aboard, right, but it's good luck if she's pregnant, 'specially if the child's born on the ship."

"So it's unattatched or unmarried women specifically that are the problem," Siren rationalized.

"I did wonder why some of the captains in our history books saw no problems with taking their wives to sea with them," Grace said. "That would make sense, then. Only if young, unmarried women are bad luck at sea, why are so many figureheads given the faces and bodies of young women?"

"Yes, but figureheads are naked women," Broondjongen told her patiently. "Which is entirely diff'rent."

"Entirely," Ratlin agreed. "Naked women're always good luck."

More than two hundred years, Abby thought, listening as the rest of the sailors enthusiastically confirmed that statement. Men haven't changed a bit, have they?

"THE CAPTAIN IS NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES TO BE ADDRESSED AS:

Davy-Boy

Dave

David

Mr. Jones

Monsieur

Big Guy

My Dear Sefelapod"

It was a rather impressive list, carved deeply into the table in the mess hall. They were gathered around it, each silently trying to figure out who was responsible for which item on the list.

"A good try at spelling Cephalopod," Becca finally said, breaking the silence.

"I don't think Siren should see this."

"I don't think she should either," Angel affirmed. "We'll get in trouble."

"I was thinking more for her own good," Holly said, shaking her head. "Because he's in a pretty bad mood over this already, and you know she'll have to correct his spelling."

********************************************************

AN: The Banana Spider's bite is even worse if you're a man. The neurotoxin in the venom can also cause priapism, which is a painful erection that lasts so long that it literally qualifies as a medical emergency because once it does go down, it may never come up again. (I am not making this up.) The possibilities for banana-related double entendres are just endless.