“What Pegman saw” is a weekly challenge based on Google Streetview. Using the location provided, you must write a piece of flash fiction of no more than 150 words. You can read the rules here. You can find today’s location on this page, from where you can also get the Inlinkz code. This week’s prompt is Roscanvel, Brittany.
Roscanvel is a rocky peninsular in Finisterre. The literal translation of Finisterre is ‘The end of the world’…
Finisterre
How the wind shrieks in the rigging! The frigate tacks desperately, seeking sea-room. Surely the storm can’t get any worse?
The cannon are silent, lashed to stanchions. God help us if one of them breaks free. The portholes are tight shut, but water spurts through cracks as the vessel heels and the opening is submerged in the swell.
The gunners, too, are silent, apart from gasps of exhaustion. They pump like demons to clear the bilges. Wilkinson lies, spent. The others glance at him with contempt, even as they dread that they, too, will succumb.
It is worse on deck.
A handful of seamen struggle desperately to reduce sail.
Crack!
The main mast splinters.
The vessel yaws helplessly. She smashes into the rocks with a shock that throws many into the breakers.
A few of us cling to the rigging, from where, one by one, the raging ocean plucks us.
Autumn Leaves 