The old man then stepped into the shed, and brought out with him, the large skeleton of something that looked like a giant snake. It still had some decayed skin attached to it, but it was also falling out, leaving nothing more that bone.
- “What is that?” -David asked disgusted.
- “I think this is the creature’s baby.” -The old man said as he gasped for air. – “Near the fjords, about twenty miles north of Västkil. There are some bays, they form these beautiful marine lakes with submarine caves, with a wide variety of schools of fish, and it’s a really good spot for blast fishing.” - - “And don’t worry.” -He added - “I have a permit for that. That day I went out there and threw a few dynamites in the water, hoping to stun a big school, but instead I ended up killing this thing. I didn’t know what it was at first, and to tell you the truth, I had to bring it back with me, I mean look at this thing! Have you ever seen anything like it? It was upon my return, as I was on the fishing boat that I have seen this creature’s parent, it was a giant snake, it raised above the water poised like a cobra, looking back at me from a faraway distance. And let me tell you, that thing had to be about fifty feet tall. As if that wasn’t strange enough, the creature communicated with me, it talked in my head, telepathically.” –
- “What did it say?” -Britt asked.
- “You will all die for that!” -The old man answered sorrowfully.
- “Great story, now if you’ll excuse us, we have murders to solve.” -David answered cuttingly. however, Britt grabbed him by the arm and pulled him back before he could walk away.
- “He’s telling the truth Dave.” -She said.
- “And how do you know Britt?” -He asked exasperatedly.
- “Because I have seen it, that thing somehow got deep into my thoughts, it exploited them against myself, it made me very… very afraid.” -She concluded.
- “Come on Britt don’t let this fisherman scare you with his folktales.” -He said in a whispering manner.
- “David, I need you to be opened to the possibility, that maybe this time, you can explain this away, and that maybe things are out of your control right now.” -She replied.
- “So what?! Should we just sail into the ocean, and try to find a giant sea-monster, instead of trying to solve the murders here.” -He said sounding a little bit more agitated.
- “What if by finding the monster you solve the murders?” -The old man asked.
- “And what am I going to tell the government? What is my report going to say? That a giant sea-snake with mind control powers has been making everyone crazy in this town? Making them kill each other? Are you crazy?” -David asked.
- “Or we can stay here, and investigate the deaths of everyone in this town.” -Britt asserted confidently. – “This is the opportunity to prevent a tragedy before it happens, we have nothing to lose.”
- “Ok, so what’s the plan, we’re going to go kill the sea-monster? And where? How do we find a monster in the ocean, hell how do we find anything in the ocean?” -David continued.
- “You leave that to me!” -The old man avowed.
Later at dusk, the old man came outside to his porch, just to find Britt sitting alone under the dim blue light of the dying sun. - “It’s beautiful isn’t it? The tundra? -The old man asked.
- “How far are we from the ocean?” -Britt asked.
- “Well this cabin is far enough so that the creature can’t reach us, if that’s what concerns you.” -The old man replied.
- “I saw a diver-suit hanging on your wall, are you a diver?”-Britt asked.
- “No, my son used to be.”-He answered succinctly.
- “Am gonna need a favor from you, but it has to be just you and me alone, David can’t know” -Britt asked daringly.
- “Why not?” -The old man asked baffled.
- “Because he wouldn’t let me do it, but he doesn’t understand, this is personal.”
- “You want to go after the creature, don’t you?” -The old man guessed.
- “All of my life I’ve been scared of something, and I’ve come to realize that I have sought comfort in letting others be brave for me, and fight my fights because it was easier, because the world can be a pretty scary place. And I now realize that I could have prevented many things to go wrong in my life if I had just shown a little bit of more courage, if I just wasn’t so damn scared all the time.” -She concluded.
- “You wanna prove something to yourself?” -The old man asked.
- “Yes, I wanna show myself, that I am not a coward.” -
- “And why would you think that about yourself?” -He asked.
- “About five years ago we were working on this case, me and David. It was about the disappearances of three women, I was the first to point out a pattern, and when the bodies turned up, I was proven right, we were facing a potential serial- killer case. We tailed this guy for months, until one day, I found him, David was not in town that day, it was just me, I called for back-up, but they were going to take forever, I had to apprehend him or he would flee. I entered the old warehouse where he was hiding, and caught him in the act, he had killed another victim which he had kidnapped and kept in that old warehouse the whole time. I took out my gun, and pointed it at him, I told him to not move, but the one who froze was I. and it has happened many times in my life, I just freeze, and put my head down, and wish to do or say something but I don’t. Well when the killer noticed that I wasn’t going to do anything he took off, he ran away. We lost him because of me, and he killed another woman after I let him get away. So, you’re damn right I have something to prove.” -She concluded.
At dawn both the old man and Britt managed to sneak out of the house without making to much noise, the old man drove up to the coast, where his boat was, and without hesitating they both boarded, after Britt has put on the diving-suit. Suddenly a deep scary voice resounded inside their heads: “Britt!” -Said the monster telepathically, making them both fall back on the boat. - “Am really not liking this anymore!”- the old man exclaimed. Suddenly a huge splash was seen in the distance, as the ancient snake rose above the water like a cobra.
- “I’m dropping here!” -Britt announced, and as she sat on the edge of the boat, and strapped the air-tank turned around to old man and said: “If you wanna leave now and save yourself I understand.”
- “Ok, yes, wish you good luck.” -Said the old man terrified as he sharply turned the boat around and sped away briskly pushing Britt off the boat. Britt resurfaced incensed, screaming: “I didn’t mean it don’t leave me!” -But as she realized that the old man wasn’t coming back, she knew there was only one way to come out of it alive, facing her fears.
She took a deep dive, the water was murky, and barely had any visibility, the cold water penetrated to her bones, making her shiver, and making her skip a few heartbeats. It was not long however before the daring image of the two yellow eyes emerged from the darkness, like two horrific burning stars in the middle of space.
- “Give me a reason why I shouldn’t kill you right now.” -The creature said to her telepathically.
- “Because you want to hear what I have to say.” -Britt answered in her mind. – “You think you know me but you don’t you thought I was a coward, but yet here we are.”
- “Here we are.” -Answered the giant serpent.
- “I don’t know what you are, and how you can do what you can do, but you must admit that you don’t know everything. You were wrong about me, and so was I” -Britt said.
- “What’s your point?”-
- “My point is, that us humans are unpredictable creatures, you may think we are easy to control, that fear will always paralyzes us, but all it takes is for a little spark of hope, a little spark of courage in us, and then we become far more dangerous than any monster. You don’t wanna fight us, maybe you managed to kill this whole town, but we know about your existence now, and it won’t be long before they come for you, and they will hunt you, like nothing ever has.”-
- “Do you really think that you could come here to threaten me?! This is my domain! I rule the depths of the ocean; your kind never ventures down here because they freight what lays deep in the darkness. I have seen the rise and fall of many human civilizations, and they are all the same, primitive, unwise, and very… very afraid.” -The ancient creature asserted.
“Yes, it’s true, we are a very disadvantage species, since the dawn of time we have been. And yet we have crawled out of our caves, and fought a scary world, turning it into whatever we wanted it to be, making it suit our needs, and you know the thing about people is… we are many, and when we have a common goal we can work together pretty well, especially to fight a common enemy. Now answer how many of us can you fight at once? How long before you don’t feel so powerful anymore? -After she said that, she could clearly see that the creature’s arrogance had gone away, and that for the first time, the scary monster seemed frightened. “You really don’t seem all that scary anymore.” -Britt stated as a final blow to the creature’s ego.
“What do you want?!” -The creature asked enraged.
“You can live here peacefully, and the world will never know about your existence, no human will ever come after you. But you will stop the murderous rampage. You will leave the village alone, and the townsfolk, and then we’ll spare your life.” -Britt said.
“Hmm.” -Exclaimed the creature. “Only a woman could be so brave.” -Said the serpent before turning around and swimming back into the bottomless abyss.
When Britt resurfaced, she was surrounded by nothing except water. She was too far off the coast to make a swim for it, but it seemed like the only option at that point, suddenly the sharp sound of a siren broke the peace of the quiet sea, she turned around, just to see a police boat coming her way, and on it, David and sheriff. As she climbed on to the boat, she felt an enormous peace she had never felt before, not because she was no longer in sea full of monsters, or because there were men there to protect her, but because for the first time, she was not scared of the world.
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