Stanley Pines, Our Hero (TEOC series #1)

The Reveal

*3 weeks later*

           

Ford was below decks on the Stan O' War II, while I steered, keeping an eye out for icebergs and dark-dwelling sea horrors; we'd already had our fair share of both of those. I checked the compass again to make sure we were still heading north.

Our mission was going great so far. True, we hadn't found the anomalies yet, but Sixer's convinced it won't be much longer. Sailing together now was just as I'd imagined when we were kids, only with less babes and more freezing temperatures. Not to mention something tryin' to kill us every day so far.

Luckily, almost all my memories had come back by this point. Usually, it would be something I did or something someone said that unlocked another door in the memory hall - that black-and-white hallway, with its chained-up doors. But at night, when I'm just lying in bed, I've been able to travel down to the corner of my mind with the memory hall and go through the unlocked doors to view my memories. Sometimes I'd see a memory that triggered another door to be unlocked. Slowly, piece by piece, I was putting my life back together.

Poindexter came hurrying above decks at that point, his head buried in one of his journals, with the other three tucked under his arms. Turns out that, even though Bill had burned them, Ford's journals had been restored after the demon's erase, just lying right outside the Mystery Shack.

"Stanley, I think we're almost there!" Ford exclaimed, closing the journal he was reading to show the maroon cover with its golden six-fingered hand and the number 4. He had gotten another journal to dedicate to whatever anomalies we found on the journey, though unlike the others, this one was half research notes and half scrapbook. All the pictures I'd taken at various points on the trip so far he'd taped to the pages.

"Yeah?" I scanned the horizon in front of me, but there was still nothing aside from fog, the occasional chick of ice, and churning waves.

"It should be comping up in a couple of miles," Sixer said, walking over to stand next to me and pulling up the hologram map on his sci-fi nerd watch thingy. "My radar's been going crazy all morning. I wonder what kind of anomalies will be there."

"Let's just hope they're nicer than those green octopus-things that almost strangled us yesterday," I recalled dryly, steering the ship to avoid another floating chunk of ice.

"Those weren't octopi, Stanley, I told you," Ford said. "They're grindylows."

"Oh great, now we know what they're called," I retorted. "So that when we meet one of them again, we won't be shouting, 'Curse you slimy octopus water demons who want to eat us!' We'll be shouting, 'Curse you grindylows who want to eat us!'"

"Stanley, that's not funny," Poindexter chided, despite the fact that he was laughing. I laughed too.

We sailed on for about ten more minutes, me making sure we didn't replay the Titanic, and Sixer scribbling frantically in his journal behind me. The sound of pen on paper was going to be the death of me, I'm sure of it.

Then, when it was only a little after eight AM, Ford jumped up suddenly. "Stanley! Prepare to land; I think we've arrived!"

"Are you sure?" I asked him. "I can't see a thing through this fog."

"That's not saying much." Poindexter took out a handheld telescope and opened it up before pressing it to his eye.

After a few moments he cried, "Yes! Straight up ahead! I'll steer, Stanley; you get the anchors ready."

I headed over to a storage area at the rear of the ship and pulled out the anchors, tying their ropes to the loopholes on the sides of the boat. Then I loosened the sails, giving the boat time to slow down, and waited for Ford's cue to thrown in the anchors.