Under the Sea: Part Fourteen

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Ten, Part Eleven, Part Twelve, Part Thirteen

The flash was so bright that it almost blinded even me. The helicopter started to spin out of control but I didn’t have time to care about that or what happened to anyone else. Without me having to say anything the two girls jumped into the car and we drove off like bats out of hell. When I looked behind me I could see that no one had started following us yet.

“We need to get out here fast,” Kelly said. “There’s no doubt that they are tracking us. They definitely know what car we have.”

“We’ll ditch it right away,” I informed her.

I drove down the road and pulled into a parking lot of another motel. We all got out and broke into another car. As quickly as I could I hotwired it and we were on the move again.

I don’t know how we did it, but we escaped the agency’s radar.

“How did they know where we were?” I asked out loud, not really expecting an answer. “We were running for two weeks but they still knew where we were.”

“We got cheap cellphones and everything,” my sister pointed out.

“Right. Exactly.”

I paused for a moment so that I could think about it. It occurred to me that Kelly might know.

“How much do you know?” I asked her.

She stayed silent for a minute.

“You have ten seconds before I throw you out of this car,” I warned her.

“What?” Alex asked, confused and scared.

“She knows how we were tracked and I want to know.”

Kelly wore a face of guilt and regret. “You used the credit card to get to the hotel didn’t you?”

“No, I pulled out some cash before we got there.”

“Then they knew we were close by.”

“I guess that was a little carelessness on my part.”

“It’s more than that.”

I turned to the passenger seat to look her right in the face. “What do you mean?”

“Where do you think that money comes from?”

I let that statement sink in as it all came flooding into my head: the agency had been the one funding me. The credit card was paid for by them. All this time and I had no idea.

“Damn,” I said.

There was something else that we hadn’t discussed since the day that I had killed Larry.

“Did you know?” I asked her.

“Know about what?” she replied.

“Roy.”

“No.”

“Are you lying to me?”

“I seriously had no idea.”

“But you were always following me.”

“Yes, but I didn’t know that Roy was part of the agency. I’m sure they grabbed someone that we didn’t know so there would be no slip ups.”

I nodded my head. I wasn’t happy but what she was saying definitely made sense.

We were defeated once again. I took the card out of my wallet and stared at it for a long time, realizing how I had taken it completely for granted. I now had no idea how I was going to get any money from there on out. I took the card and threw it out the window…

 

Under the Sea: Part Thirteen

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Ten, Part Eleven, Part Twelve, Part Fourteen

I looked into the car at Alex’s face, which was molded into a look of fear and panic. I felt the same way but I didn’t want to show her that. Instead I gave her a smile with a wink. It didn’t do that much as her face never changed. Kelly put on the same brave face, hiding what emotions really lied beneath.

“You can’t run Wes!” Roy yelled over the sound of the helicopter. Everyone was approaching me cautiously.

I looked at Roy with a hatred I only held for one other person. Well, actually that other person was a phoenix monster but you get the idea. He didn’t flinch or change his appearance.

“Don’t even try, Wes!” he called.

I motioned for the other two to get out of the car. Kelly was the first to get out, accepting what fate had in store for us. Alex was a little reluctant, still afraid.

“Get her out of the car!” Lenny yelled.

I turned to him with a look that I thought could pierce right through his head. All he did was smile. I turned back to my sister.

“It’s okay,” I mouthed to her. “You can come out.”

Alex nodded her head as she fought back some tears. She slowly opened the door and made her way to the other side of the car where Kelly and I stood. I knelt down in front of her so that I wasn’t standing over her.

“Everything is going to be okay,” I promised her, only speaking loud enough for her to hear me.

“I’m scared,” she said. “I don’t want them to take us.”

“I’m not going to let them take us.”

“But you can’t stop them. There are too many of them.”

“I’m not going to stop them.”

“Then how are you planning on getting us out.”

“We are.”

She looked confused.

“What do you mean we are?” she asked me.

“You are like me,” I explained to her. “There is something that I need for you to try.”

She shook her head. “I don’t know if I can.”

“You won’t know until you try. Besides, you don’t know what I want you to try yet.”

Everyone was getting closer and closer.

“What then?” she said, pushing away her fear.

“I need you to dig deep,” I began. “You need to try to bring out a light hidden deep inside you.”

“How?”

“Imagine that there is a weight inside you, pulling you down. You need to try to lift that weight within you so that the light can come through.”

Her face turned from slight fear to doubt.

“You sound really lame,” she said.

“I know it does,” I replied, slightly annoyed. “Just trust me. If we do this together I think we can distract them.”

She nodded her head and I stood up. I took one more look around at all of the approaching agents.

“You might want to close your eyes,” I said to Kelly.

I reached inside myself and flashed my bright light, hoping that my sister was doing the same…

 

Under the Sea: Part Twelve

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Ten, Part Eleven, Part Thirteen, Part Fourteen

I looked around at all of the terrified officers and none of them were dead. Most of them were terrified but they were alive none-the-less. Lenny and Roy were heading up the beach towards me but slower than I would have liked. It looked like they were up to something.

“I think we need to get out of here, now,” I said to Kelly and Alex.

“Good idea,” Kelly agreed.

Alex bolted into the car and Kelly followed right behind her. I was about to get into the car myself.

“Don’t run,” Roy begged. “Don’t make this any more difficult than it has to be.”

“We’ve been over this already,” I began. “I’m not going to prison or my death.”

“You don’t have much of a choice.”

I scanned the area around me again and realized that some of the officers were agents from before. No one was even hurt.

“You didn’t need my help for this,” I pointed out.

“No,” Roy confirmed.

“You almost died every time that we hunted a monster. This was no problem for you.”

“Those were all special circumstances. We were fighting way more monsters than we’re used to and some of them were the first of their kind. That’s more for any human to handle.”

I knew that was the truth and I was mad at myself for not knowing that he was there spying on me. Although, why would I have any reason to think that he was? I hated him for that.

“Look,” he began with an innocent voice, “I’m sorry that I had to lie to you but that doesn’t change what needs to happen.”

“You’re so full of it,” I practically shouted. “You deceived me and now you would see me locked in a cell or dead. Don’t pretend that you cared.”

Roy’s face turned red and his mouth pressed so tight his lips were turning white.

“Fine,” he replied. “Either come back with us or we’ll kill you.”

There was the Roy I had seen lately. Something occurred to me.

“That’s why you were being nice to me when I first got here,” I pointed out, “because you didn’t want me to leave.”

Roy nodded his head, confirming what I was saying.

“You just needed to keep me here.”

“Yep.”

“You really are a donkey face.” I said something a little bit worse than that.

There were twice as many agents as there were when we were back at the motel. Roy and Lenny could have dealt with the mermaids without me with, no problem. Well, it would have been harder but they would have managed. They just wanted to keep us there long enough for more agents to show up.

A helicopter flew above us and the thud of the propeller boomed above as I realized that we were utterly screwed…

 

Under the Sea: Part Eleven

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Ten, Part Twelve, Part Thirteen, Part Fourteen

I moved my head to the left and let the spear cruise right passed me. It whizzed by my ear and eventually dug into the sand behind me without impaling anyone. I was careful to check that no one else was going to get hit by it.

The head mermaid charged at me with some sort of gurgled battle cry. The rest of them followed suit. There were probably 10 of them, nothing too crazy. When the mermaid reached me he tried to tackle me but I sidestepped and knocked him to the ground. Once again it could have been a she.

All of the officers started shooting and a couple of them almost hit me.

“Hey!” I shouted over the gunfire. “Watch your aim!”

I looked over at Roy who was fighting one of the mermaids and wasn’t doing too bad. I mean the mermaid was clearly stronger but Roy was faster. I seemed to have forgotten that he was a good fighter.

“Die human!” the head mermaid shouted as he tried to grab my neck. I grabbed his arms and threw him into a barrel roll.

“I’m not human,” I said to him. “I’m a paladin.”

“I knew I smelled you.”

“Smell? You smelled me? I really am going to kill you.”

One of the other fish came at me with a spear and jabbed it towards my torso. I knocked it out of the way and swung to chop off its head. The problem is that I didn’t have my axes with me so I just punched it in the head instead. Despite how soft they looked they had very hard heads. It still dropped to the ground, though.

“You guys fall down easy, don’t you?” I said to them. It only made them angrier.

That’s when I heard a scream come from the parking lot. I turned around and saw a couple of the mermaids heading for the car that my sister and Kelly were sitting in.

“Damn,” I breathed.

I took off without worrying about anyone that was fighting on the beach. On my way up I grabbed the spear that had been thrown at me before and sent it flying at one of the giant fish that was heading towards my car—stolen car. It hit the thing in the back and dropped it on the spot, but there was still two more.

Kelly got out of the car and looked like she was about to start fighting them.

“Kelly!” I shouted. “Get my axes.”

“I can handle this,” she tried.

“Grab my axes!”

She looked like she wanted to argue more but Alex beat her to the punch and threw both of my axes to me. I grabbed them out of the air and started a fight with the mermaids. They actually put up a better fight than the other two had.

One of them stabbed at my head but I spun, knocked the spear out of the way, and chopped its head off. The other one then tried to take advantage of me with my back to it by stabbing at my shoulder. It nicked it just a little bit but I grabbed the spear and whipped it over my head, slamming it into the pavement. While it was down I drove my axe into its chest. I then turned around and prepared for more of them.

“What the hell?” I said. All of the mermaids were dead, and that is when it really hit the fan…

 

Under the Sea: Part Ten

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Eleven, Part Twelve, Part Thirteen, Part Fourteen

They were mermaids. At least I think they were mermaids. They didn’t look like your typical Disney princess types but more like something out of a horror movie. Granted I didn’t know if they were actually mermaids but they had heads and the bodies of a fish but with arms and legs like a human. They were covered in scales and everything was webbed but it wasn’t something that you would see on a fish.

The creatures climbed out of the water and made their way up the beach towards everyone. All of the officers and other police workers started to back away, some ran. I wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do because I didn’t know what these things were capable of. I thought we were done with monsters that we had never heard of before popping up?

“What the hell are those things?” Walker asked.

“I don’t know,” Roy replied, slowly backing up.

“Mermaids,” I said.

“What?”

“Mermaids?”

“Yeah. What else would you call them?”

“Fish monsters.”

“Like I said, mermaids.”

The fish monsters were getting closer, almost out of the water. They were all holding spears like Atlantean warriors or something. Everyone backed up, including Roy and Lenny but I took a step forward. Nope. Okay, sorry. That was a lie. I backed up just like everyone else because I was a little scared. Don’t act like you’re all brave heroes. You’d all be crapping in your pants if you saw these things.

“What are you things?” I yelled to the creatures.

“Are you crazy?” Lenny whispered.

“Shut up.”

The creatures continued to approach, silently, until they finally were out of the water. One of them, probably their leader, stepped forward.

“Be silent, humans,” it said with a bubbly voice. Not like he was cheery but like he was under water. “We are here to take over your world.”

“Are you supposed to meet Larry by chance?” I asked him, or her.

“Who?”

“The phoenix creature?”

“Yes.”

“Yeah, he’s dead.”

“What?”

“I killed him like two weeks ago. You’re a little late to the party.”

The thing actually looked confused.

“HA!” I shouted. “That’s hilarious. You were supposed to help all of the other monsters and you’re late?” I couldn’t stop my laughter.

“Wes, stop,” Roy begged.

“I can’t.”

“Seriously, cut it out.”

I just continued to laugh.

“Enough!” the fish shouted and threw a spear right for my head…

 

Under the Sea: Part Nine

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Ten, Part Eleven, Part Twelve, Part Thirteen, Part Fourteen

“You don’t see that every day,” I remarked. Sure, I saw a lot of bad stuff but I never saw a severed head come shooting out of the ocean.

The female police officer ran over to the head and kneeled down to look at it.

“What the hell?” she said. “What the hell was that?”

“I don’t know,” Roy said with undoubted certainty. I myself had no idea.

“Heads don’t just come fly out of the ocean and land on the beach. What is out in my waters?”

“I have no idea.”

“We need to get out into the ocean.”

“I don’t think that would be a good idea.”

“I agree,” I chimed in.

“Who asked you?” she asked me.

“No one.”

“You should listen to him,” Lenny informed her. “He’s one of the best we’ve got.”

“I thought you said he was a rookie?” she pointed out.

“We did.”

She walked right up to Lenny and got in his face. As she walked by me I could see that her nametag said Walker.

“Listen to me,” she started. “I’ve had enough of this. There is something in the ocean that just threw the head of a victim hundreds of feet.” She started walking away from the water. “We need to seal off this beach now. No one leaves and no one comes on.”

I looked back out at the ocean, waiting for something to come out of the water. It was only a matter of time before whatever threw the head came out. Clearly whoever threw it was trying to make a statement. They wanted to kill all of us, as all monsters do.

“What are we supposed to do?” Roy asked me. As a knee jerk reaction I wanted to punch him in the face but I quickly put that away.

“We wait,” I said.

“They could come up from anywhere along this beach.”

“I have a feeling that they will come out right here.”

“What makes you so sure of that?”

I pointed out into the water straight ahead of us. There was something swimming towards us. It was hard to see through the salty water but it definitely wasn’t normal.

“Crap,” Roy muttered.

Walker whipped around. “You’ve got to be kidding to me.”

There was more than one of them and when they came out of the water, it was not really something that I was prepared to see…

 

Under the Sea: Part Eight

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Nine, Part Ten, Part Eleven, Part Twelve, Part Thirteen, Part Fourteen

A woman police officer, who looked important, was making her way over to us.

“Who is this?” she asked with a stern voice, pointing directly at my face.

“This is agent Sterns,” Roy answered her.

“Little young, isn’t he?”

“He is a rookie, ma’am.”

“Don’t call me ma’am.”

“Sorry.”

She looked me in the face again.

“Hello,” I said, slightly intimidated.

“You gentlemen got here very quick, didn’t you?”

I didn’t blame her for being suspicious, the attack literally just happened.

“I just put the call out and you guys show up right after we do,” she pointed out.

“Agent Jones and I were in the area on another case and decided to lend a hand,” Roy explained to her. “Agent Sterns over here was off for the weekend visiting family. We called him in.”

“I don’t see why this really concerns any of you. I know this has to do with what was going on recently.”

“You think terrorists did this?”

“Don’t patronize me. I know there was something else going on. Are you going to tell me there were all of these animal attacks and that the terrorists were doing it?”

So many questions popped into my head at that moment. Everyone had monsters attack their town so she would know what really happened, right? Maybe this town didn’t get attacked. None of the TV reports said there were animal attacks, but then again before everything went down there were reports of animal attacks. What the hell was going on?

“I’m not sure what you are talking about,” Roy said with genuine confusion.

“My ass,” the woman officer said. “You guys have any ideas?”

“Animal attack.”

Her face turned a little red as she smiled. “Of course. Let me know if me and my officers can you help you fine boys.” I feel like that was a shot at my age.

She walked away.

“She seems pleasant,” I said. “Why doesn’t she know what happened? What’s with the terrorist reports?”

“I’m not sure what you mean,” Roy said, shrugging his shoulders.

“For cryin’ out loud. Whatever.”

I looked back out at the ocean.

“So are we going swimming?” I asked.

There was a splash and something came flying out of the water from about 100 yards out. It was heading right for us.

“Back up!” Roy yelled and everyone that was near complied.

When the object hit the wet sand there was a thud. Everyone either gasped or screamed. Sitting in front of us was a severed head lying on its side…

 

Under the Sea: Part Seven

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Ten, Part Eleven, Part Twelve, Part Thirteen, Part Fourteen

I trudged through the wet sand—I’m not the biggest fan of beaches—until I reached the crowd. A police officer stepped in front of me and put his hands out.

“Sir,” he began, “I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

“He’s with us,” came a voice from amongst the crowd. I looked around the officer to see Roy waving him off. The officer stepped back and let me by but he still didn’t look happy.

I was surprised that Roy told the officer to let me by. I would have figured that he wouldn’t want me anywhere near the crime scene. I walked up to Lenny and Roy, who were standing over a dead body—what was left of it, anyway.

“What are you doing?” Lenny asked Roy.

“We need to put aside our differences and deal with this for now,” he told him. “We’ll probably need his help.”

“We don’t need his help.”

“Of course you do,” I added. “You’ll always need my help but clearly you and your agency has lost sight of that.”

Lenny looked back and forth between Roy and I.

“I hate you so much,” he said to me with a scowl.

“I love you too, Jenny,” I teased. “Hey! I love you Jennay.”

They both looked at me like I was an idiot, which I kind of am but that was beside the point.

“Forrest Gump?” I tried. “Anyone?”

They continued to stare.

“Okay then,” I said, giving up. “Never mind. What do we have here?”

“A dead person,” Lenny pointed out the obvious.

“Yes, I can see that much. Any ideas?”

“Not yet,” Roy said. “This is obviously some sort of animal. What do you think?”

I had no idea why he was all of a sudden being nice to me. One second he hated me, then the next he didn’t. He was acting like a crazy ex.

“I honestly don’t know,” I admitted. “Maybe a werewolf but I’ve never seen one so close to the ocean before.”

“Me neither.”

“Speaking of ocean, look at this,” Lenny motioned for me to follow. Why was he being nice now?

I followed behind him as we walked along side a trail of blood. It looked like someone was dragged across the beach.

“There were two people,” Lenny informed me.

“How do you know?” I asked.

“The woman lying in pieces back there called in about her boyfriend being attacked. We obviously only found her and judging by the drag marks here it would have to have been a full adult body and not body parts.”

“Okay, logical enough.”

We reached the end of the trail, which ended right before the water. I’m sure that twenty minutes ago it might have gone right into the water but it was low tide at that point.

“What would drag a body into the water?” Roy asked openly.

“I don’t know,” I said.

“Ever hear of any monsters living in the water?”

“No, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t any. The ocean is a big place.”

“I suppose any monster could’ve just swam and brought the body in the water to eat it.”

“I doubt it.”

“Well, what then?”

I thought about it for a long time but came up with nothing. I really don’t think a werewolf or something brought their food to the water just to eat it. It wasn’t like a shark just walked out of the water and ate someone. They can’t do that, can they…?

 

Under the Sea: Part Six

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Ten, Part Eleven, Part Twelve, Part Thirteen, Part Fourteen

No one moved. Everyone looked back and forth at each other, trying to decide what we wanted to do. Clearly everyone still wanted to knock me out but there was obviously something going on.

“What do we do?” Lenny asked Roy in a quiet voice.

“We need to take him in,” he replied, pointing at me.

“I know, but we have to go follow those ambulances.”

Roy looked at me, torn about what he should do. I’ll admit that I wanted to pummel him more than anything but I already explained to them that there were monsters there so I was ready to go.

“As soon as this is over, we’re taking you in,” Roy threatened me.

“You can try again if you like,” I teased.

“Let’s go.” He motioned for everyone to get back to their respective cars.

I walked over to my car. Actually, it wasn’t my car but the one that I had stolen. Anyway, I climbed into the driver’s seat.

“What’s going on?” Kelly asked me. “Are they just letting us go?”

“Did you see the ambulances going by?” I asked her.

“Yeah?”

“We both have bigger problems than each other. We need to go find out what’s going on.”

“Should we leave?”

“We can’t.”

“We’re not going to go investigate with them?” Alex asked me.

“First of all, we aren’t going to investigate anything. I am going to investigate. You have zero experience and Kelly isn’t 100 percent yet. Second, I am going to investigate beside them, because I don’t have a choice.”

“What are we supposed to do?”

“Stay in the car.”

I put the car in drive and pulled out of the parking lot, heading down the road where the emergency vehicles headed.

“What do you think it is?” Alex asked with a little bit of excitement.

“I don’t know,” I admitted.

“Is it a werewolf?”

“I don’t know.”

“Maybe it’s a vampire.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s daylight.”

“So.”

“Vampires burn in the daylight,” I pointed out to her.

“There were vampires at my house,” she said.

I thought about it for a moment and she was right. There were vampires out when the sun was shinning. How did that make any sense? Did it have something to do with Larry? I didn’t even want to think about it right then.

“Wes?” Kelly called for my attention.

“What?” I asked her.

“You’re driving by it.”

“Oh.”

Everyone was out on the beach. I parked in a nearby lot and got out of the car.

“Stay in the car,” I said to the girls.

I shut the door and headed towards the crowd. I should have just left the town when I had the chance…

 

Under the Sea: Part Five

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, Part Ten, Part Eleven, Part Twelve, Part Thirteen, Part Fourteen

The moment I saw the agents show up I knew I wasn’t going to be able to get out of there without a fight. As good as I was I didn’t really expect to be able to take on all of them myself and Alex was not ready to fight yet. Kelly was in no shape to help either. It was going to be tough but I’ve been in worse situations before, as many of you should know by now.

“Wes,” Lenny pleaded. “Let’s just do this the easy way.”

“Shut up, Jenny,” I almost yelled. “We both know that you want this to go the hard way.”

He smiled. “There is nothing more that I would love to see than you on the ground, bloody and beaten.”

“There really is a monster here.”

“Are you done?”

“Yeah. Let’s just get on with this.”

Roy leapt forward with his sword at his side. I quickly uppercut him and knocked him onto the ground. Lenny was right behind him but I roundhouse kicked him right next to his buddy.

“Wes?!” Alex shouted from inside the car.

“It’s okay,” I promised her as all of the agents converged on me. “Just stay in the car and I’ll take care of this.”

As the agents got closer I just started punching and kicking, not caring if they were man or woman. They were going to try to take my sister, Kelly and I in to lock us up or kill us. Leave your judgments at the door please.

At first it was really easy, like fighting a bunch of dummies. Not that I go around department stores and punch mannequins but I imagine that it would be very easy. However, they just kept coming, and they seemed to be coming out of nowhere. Slowly I started to lose my dominance over them.

“Crap,” I muttered under my breath. I was going to lose. That couldn’t happen. A sudden surge of adrenaline coursed through my body, giving me a second wind.

One of the agents tried to lock my hands behind my back, so I brought their arms around my chest and then smashed their face with the back of my head. When he dropped to the ground I whipped him in front of me knocking three of them over. The next one tried to kick me, but I grabbed her leg and broke it. Looking back I feel kind of bad about that one, but again, she might have wanted to kill me.

As the agents came at me I kept knocking them down, until Roy blindsided me right across the face. I fell towards the ground and rolled onto my knees.

“There’s no way you can win this,” Roy pointed out to me.

“That was a lucky shot,” I told him.

“There will be plenty more lucky shots.”

“Yeah.”

I stood up, ready for round two. Kelly opened the door and stepped out of the car, which was now 40 feet away.

“It’s okay,” I said, putting up my hand to stop her.

“Wes,” she tried.

“There’s nothing you can do right now anyway.”

Both Roy and Lenny turned to look at her and then each other.

“Grab her,” Roy ordered to one of the agents.

“I don’t think so,” I said.

I started for the agent when an ambulance went flying by. Everyone stopped to look at it but once it was gone the agent moved towards Kelly again.

“No way in hell,” I yelled as I pressed forward. I was about to jump over Roy and Lenny when another ambulance followed by two cop cars passed by.

It was obvious what was going on: there was definitely a monster there and they were attacking…