snapped Duncan out of his strange slumber.
His eyes flew open, and the ephemeral remnants of the dream—golden fish gliding through the air, their scales glittering like memories—dissolved into the morning haze. What had he just seen? Fish… swimming through the air?
He blinked, sitting up straight as the ocean's roar began to fill his ears. The dream lingered, disorienting him, mixing reality and illusion like ink in water.
He looked at the three fishing rods he'd secured to the rail. None had moved.
Yet the sea had.
The calm was gone.
The Vanished rocked harder now, her hull creaking under the rhythmic pound of rising waves. Whitecaps churned beyond the rail, crashing harder, louder, stronger.
Duncan tilted his head and scanned the sky. No storm clouds. No lightning. Just a restless wind and a strangely awakened sea.
"Probably not the best day to go fishing…"
He muttered as he reached for the rods, considering packing it in. But just as he touched the first, one of the others lurchedforward with a violent crack.
The fishing rod bowed sharply, the reinforced line pulled taut with a high-pitched whine. The rod strained, groaned, and the entire mount shuddered under the weight of something massive.
The sound was unmistakable.
A bite.
And not just any bite—a big one.
In an instant, the exhaustion vanished from Duncan's eyes. The old sailor's instinct, or at least the deeply buried "hope for edible food," blazed to life.
"Yes!" he shouted, scrambling to brace the rod before it was torn free. "I knew I wouldn't blank!"
He gripped the rod with both hands, planting his feet and leaning back. Whatever was on the other end had no interest in coming quietly.
The ship rocked. The waves slapped. The fight was on.
Whispers in the Deep
The Vanished swayed harder under Duncan's feet. But he held firm, wrestling the rod like it was trying to buck him off the deck. Sweat beaded on his brow. Whatever he'd hooked, it was massive, unyielding—and pissed.
And Duncan was done losing to lunch.
As the struggle dragged on, his frustration began to mount.
Then he made a decision.
With a low growl, he let a pulse of ghostly green fire ripple through his palm. The spectral flame snaked down the rod like spilled ink, slipping along the taut line and trailing down into the sea. The moment it touched water, something changed.
A flicker of light beneath the waves—green and eerie.
Then a shadow emerged.
Something vast and coiled, writhing beneath the surface like a living oil spill. The ghostly fire illuminated only the faintest edges: fleshy tendrils, wriggling appendages, a thing not shaped by logic or symmetry, a blur of writhing darkness beneath the Vanished's hull.
The sea groaned.
The line eased—ever so slightly.
The creature was weakening.
Duncan grinned through gritted teeth. "Gotcha…"
He pulled. Hard.
The First Catch
A massive shape broke the surface.
A fish. A monster. Maybe both.
It arced through the air, hung suspended for a second in the light, and then crashed onto the deck.
Half the size of a man, its body was black and slimy, covered in crusted growths and pale, chaotic markings. Its eyes—milky and wide—stared at Duncan with unsettling intensity, like it knew something. Like it judged him.
And then, before he could do more than recoil, its eyes burst.
Two sickening pops, then blood. It twitched violently, spasming like a glitch in reality, and lay still.
Duncan blinked, a little stunned.
"…Huh. Ugly bastard."
It was. Hideous beyond imagination.
But also, unmistakably: fish.
He bent down, inspecting it with both disgust and curiosity. Somewhere in his memory, he recalled a half-read survival manual: deep-sea fish can implode when brought to the surface too quickly.
So this world's fish obeyed similar rules?
Interesting.
But he didn't have long to ponder.
Plap. Thud. Splat.
More fish fell.
Smaller than the first, but just as hideous. Half a dozen of them plopped onto the deck like morbid hailstones. Each one already bleeding, already dying—each one apparently volunteering to join their predecessor.
Duncan stared.
"…It's a fish conga line," he muttered. "Great. The undersea world has a delivery service."
The Eye of the Storm
Elsewhere aboard the ship, Alice was bracing for disaster.
The ship rolled violently beneath her, throwing objects against the walls and filling the air with a chorus of crashing and rattling wood. She gripped a nearby railing just in time to avoid being tossed to the floor.
"What the hell is happening?!"
The groans and creaks of the Vanished didn't sound like mere discomfort. They sounded like the ship was responding—growling in defiance, like an old beast fighting off an attacker.
Alice blinked.
No. Not just sounds. Voices. Incoherent, overlapping whispers rising from walls and fixtures, in a language only the ship could understand. She couldn't make out what they said… but she knew the ship was angry.
And something was threatening it.
She stumbled toward the stairwell, gripping every bolt and beam she could to avoid falling. Half-tripped by swinging ropes, nearly clocked by a runaway bucket, she pushed through the heavy door and emerged onto the deck.
Then she saw it.
Duncan vs. The Kraken Jr.
Lightning crackled in the clouds. The sea raged.
And there, in the chaos—Duncan stood at the edge of the deck, cloaked in spectral fire, the green flames roaring like an inferno.
Three ghostly chains extended from beneath his feet, anchoring his stance. One of them was on fire.
Beneath the ship, something stirred.
Alice's eyes widened in horror as a tentacle emerged from the water—thicker than the ship's mast, covered in twitching eyes. Between each eye, clusters of jagged teeth gnashed and chewed the air.
Then the tentacle lunged.
Alice wanted to scream.
But Duncan didn't flinch.
He smiled.
Like a man about to enjoy the spoils of a really successful fishing trip.
Their eyes met—his and the tentacle's. And in that instant…
BOOM.
Every eye on the tentacle burst at once, blood spraying like firecrackers. The teeth wailed in pain, gnashing with a thousand agonies.
Then the limb went limp.
It detached itself—severed, rejected by its unseen body. With a wet THUD, it crashed onto the deck and flopped once, then lay still. A waterfall of black ichor spilled from its wound, seeping toward Duncan's boots.
Alice stared, stunned beyond words.
Duncan gave the severed limb a look and muttered, "That's what you get for messing with my breakfast."