Something Wicked This Way Comes

Chapter 21

A blaring screech echoed from the Nautilus. Lights flashed, sea water swirling wildly.

Carter yelled as the screech got louder, face contorted with pain. He ripped his hearing aids out of his ears, throwing them onto the sand.

Everyone standing on the beach covered their ears as the screeching alarm got more shrill right before the Nautilus dove, leaving waves in her wake. They could still hear the alarm growing fuzzier and more distant. The sea continued to bubble and spew.

"What the fuck was that!" Krel demanded, staring at the water.

Jim reached a hand out to steady a disoriented Carter, brain still rattling from the force of that alarm. "I don't know... Toril?"

The sky god's daughter was staring at the bubbling ocean with wide eyes. "Um.... I don't— I never—"

"Where's Pan?" Douxie asked, eyes scanning the waves rapidly for any sign of the demigod.

"And Archie," Fenris added, also searching the surface for any sign of them.

"Do you think..." Harley started, fingers twitching against the hilt of his borrowed sword. "They got attacked? Pantelis did say the Nautilus was alive. Maybe she left to protect them?"

All eyes turned to Toril. She had her lips pursed and brows furrowed.

"Whatever that was," Antigone said. "It was a warning."

***

Pantelis shoved back against the beast pushing him into deeper water. He couldn't even see it properly, a torrent of white blinding him. But it was big and fond of shoving its narrow face into his ribs.

Something latched onto his ankle and yanked him deeper. Water pressure didn't bother him, so he wasn't too worried about his head exploding as he got pulled into a marine trench. But he was worried about the Kraken-sized monstrous black octopus winding its arms around his leg to drag him towards its massive mouth.

A much smaller black shape zipped by him, sharp teeth tearing at the sucker-covered arms.

"Too deep!" Pantelis warned. "The pressure!"

Archie was smart enough to take his warning, backing off to allow himself a reprieve and time to think of a different form.

A sperm whale, Pantelis thought, but didn't have time to say before a concussive sound rattled his skull.

It definitely stunned the octopus, who released him long enough for a tendril of blue lightning to rocket through the rapidly closing darkness, hitting the colossus straight in its massively bulbous head.

Nautilus! Pantelis kicked upwards, letting a current propel him past the mouth of the trench. He was met with a most beautiful sight. Nautilus' amber eyes were peering down at him, front-facing light shining into the trench. The sub released a deep crooning sound, almost like a trumpet being blown. Pan swam forwards, resting his hand against the amber glass. Thanks.

Archie, or he assumed it was Archie, swam into view, now much larger. He'd taken the form of a great sea serpent, black-scaled with yellow eyes, long neck, and a bulbous stomach. It swam with the aid of humongous flippers. Pantelis had only seen this creature in a book, and heard of it from stories Douxie used to tell him as bedtime stories.

"Is that a Scauldron?"

Scauldron Archie nodded. "They can dive tremendously deep, I thought it would help you."

"I didn't think those things actually existed," Pantelis said, floating still in front of his ship. "I thought Doux made them up."

"They were very real," Archie said, glancing down into the wide cavernous trench. "Perhaps we should vacate the water. It's not safe."