by P. K. Tyler
Our fishermen and children ran out to collect the fish. No doubt the market that afternoon would be glutted with fresh fish caught from the beaches.
As the waters receded, many Atlantians ran out to see what was happening. I had been reading a book in my father’s house, which sat high on a hill overlooking the waves. I peered out the window and saw the shape of waves form. Nothing wrong with that, except this was different.
A great stillness hung in the air, a haze that had nothing to do with the warm weather. I watched as the waves grew in size and height until they formed monstrous walls of ocean. Like a savage beast, these walls of water came hungrily to our little island, not curling or breaking on the beach like ordinary waves. The children and fishermen stood on the hot sands, their arms full of squirming fish, and stared at the great shadow looming above them. Their mouths opened in mute horror as the first of many waves crashed down on them and washed their lives away.
I screamed.
Waves mercilessly ripped apart trees and tore into our homes like they were parchment. They moved with a single purpose: destruction, leaving nothing in their wake. They destroyed without thought or mind, flowing through every waterway and stream, demolishing every alley and path.
As the water streamed through our fair city, those who could not run clutched at trees, buildings, posts, even each other as Mother Ocean wreaked her vengeance on us all, locking many into a lasting embrace.
The window frame shook. The building’s foundations trembled beneath me. I was no longer safe. The earth below me had become covered with water, and there was no safe place to hide, so I turned and ran up to the top of the house until I reached the roof.
I sat atop my home, under the beating sun as the building rocked beneath me, swaying dangerously, while far below the tide washed the city clean of humanity.
Soon the smells of the city, the dirty unwashed buildings, Atlantians’ sweat, urine, all of this was lost. The fresh tang of sea spray filled my nostrils, evoking a sense of calm on the yellow sands of our island. As I looked up from the devastation into the burning sun, I wondered if perhaps that was the gods’ intention, to return our fair island to the simple place it once was. Could I see the shapes of great figures above, mighty gods and goddesses that wore golden armour like a second skin, and who argued in the clouds? Did they look down at us from on high watching the destruction of my home? No. It was a trick of the light, surely.
The building beneath me shook and crumbled, taking me with it. I screamed and fell flew through the air in a perilous drop, my hair flowing around me in tumbling blonde waves. My simple black dress flew up around my legs and sandaled feet as I plummeted with the building, my screams mixing with the yells of others to make a horrible cacophony of sound.
I plunged into the water, screaming and clawing at waves filled with floating corpses. We cascaded in a jumble down the alleyways like animals in a maze, flowing wherever the water took us.
Near me, a young mother clung to a post, a squalling babe in her arms. She reached out to a young man as we floated by, and he lunged for her, dragging her into the water with him. She released her babe in shock and opened her mouth in protest. Saltwater choked her. She clawed at the surface, gasping for one last breath. The young man pushed her down, stamping down her body as dead weight to buoy up his own. He saw me then, and moved toward me, another weight to give him added seconds of life. I tensed. What was the monster here, the waves or the man?
I didn’t wait to find out. The babe sank into the watery depths, still crying. I dove beneath the waves, seeking the child before it drowned. I kicked my way away from the man and encircled the swaddled babe. Pushing aside debris, I kicked powerfully toward the surface.
We emerged a moment later, spewing saltwater. The babe coughed and choked, and I smacked its chest, urging it to expel the water as we drifted downstream. Farther down the current I heard a woman scream. I looked but saw only water. We were alone.
I hugged the babe to my chest, letting the current take us out through the rapidly sinking maze of buildings, temples, houses and shops. I kicked and pushed at debris to keep from bumping into things or people. Our world had gone from a vibrant metropolis to a watery maze. After what I had seen, I kept a distance from the other survivors.
As we floated, the waves grew calmer and they no longer threatened to drown or pull us into their embrace. We rounded a corner and I saw the great temple to Poseidon, our crowning glory to the oceanic god, sink into the sea, its fine columns and mighty statues knocked over like children’s toys by white-crested waves.
The current carried us away from our sinking island and washed us out to the sea. As the saltwater sprayed our faces, I realised I had nothing left. My family, gone. My loved ones were likely dead. My books, my precious clothes, my favourite foods, all gone. All I had left were the wet clothes on my back, my life, and this small baby in my arms.
I looked at the child. It had coughed up more saltwater than I thought its little body could hold, but it remained motionless, its eyes closed in a grim parody of sleep. No pulse beat from its soft flesh, nor could I make out any breath from its tiny mouth. Salty tears filled my eyes. I silently prayed to the gods, hoping they might take mercy on us, and yet bring some life into its little body. After a few minutes, I stopped. The child’s body lay lifeless in my arms.
Tears streamed down my face. I had not known this child. I didn’t even known its name. Never would it get to taste the delights of our spiced Atlantian delicacies, never would it see another golden sunrise or deep purple sunset over our fair city. This babe would never know the pleasures of our hypnotic Atlantian dances or learn of our treasured offerings to the gods. It had simply died.
I looked up at the sky and cried out, but it came out as nothing more than a strangled whisper.
A wave crashed over me, snatching the baby from my grasp. It floated away and sank beneath the waves. I dove underneath the surface, scouring for the tiny body. It was the last semblance I had of my fellow man. Even if it was dead, it was something beautiful to behold, the last Atlantian babe.
As my tears mixed with the blue watery world around me, I saw something odd. The baby floated through the water, sinking gently as if in the arms of an unseen mother.
I kicked my legs, urging them to move faster, swim harder, to reach this small child. My limbs were so heavy, they felt like I trudged through mud. My thick leather sandals and black dress hung on me like dead weights. I ignored them and struggled harder, desperately trying to reach this small baby body before it disappeared forever.
I resurfaced and took in great gasps of air, filling my lungs before I sank back down. My limbs ached, but I did not care. As I sank back into the watery world I panicked.
Where is the babe? Where?
It floated nearby, as if unseen arms had laid it to rest on top of a coral shelf, built just to hold the child. I watched as its body shimmered. Its lavender swaddling cloth gently unfolded, and the baby’s body shone as if coated with a pearl-like sheen.
Then, as if Poseidon himself had heard my call and shared my mourning, the baby’s feet began to disintegrate. One by one the toes withered into small, angelic, rounded orbs that floated away with the current.
First the toes, then the legs began to follow suit, the small fleshy limbs lifting into hundreds of tiny pearls that drifted away.
I swam over to it, heedless of my burning lungs, not caring about my clothes that dragged and threatened to pull me farther down into the dark depths. I swam, clawing and pushing away the currents with my hands until I reached the child.
By the time I reached it, all that remained was a tiny hand, splayed open like a miniature starfish. I took its little hand, curling it around my own pinkie finger. I watched as it too became hundreds of tiny pearls and like delicate bubbles, floated away. In seconds, the only thing that remained in my palm was a small pearl.
Perhaps the legends were true. Maybe inside every Atlantian is a pearl. Perhaps the baby’
s body were Poseidon’s tears come to life.
Above me, a massive creature cast a shadow that chilled the water around me and blotted out the sun. The water had stilled but for a single current surrounding a giant mass. As I looked up I realised just how far I had sunk below the surface for it truly was huge, with large waffled fins that glided gently through the currents. Small fish tugged at its fins and hung on for the ride, melding perfectly with its dark spotted body and smooth white stomach. This giant fish moved and floated above, uninterested in me for the moment.
I reached up and traced my fingers against the whale shark’s silky white belly, distracted. Something sharp hit me, and I sank into darkness.
I woke later to something nudging me. Like a kitten wanting affection, something gently prodded me. I opened my eyes.
A dragon’s pearly eyes stared back.
I screamed, but only an awkward squeak of bubbles came out. The monster jumped and darted behind a bit of coral, snorting startled little bubbles at me through a crimson snout. Another creature in blue and purple with darting pearl-like eyes and silver ribbed horns peered at me curiously. The bony fixtures on its body were in fact delicate rings made of bone, so strong they saved the horse from the brunt of any hard surface, yet provided a sort of symmetrical beauty to the creature.
I gasped. Why hadn’t I drowned? Why wasn’t I dead? Had I survived the destruction of Atlantis just to become a plaything for dragons of the sea?
The creatures bobbed forward and I tried backing away. Were they going to eat me?
Were these dragons the mythical creatures of old? Did they actually exist, except not in the air or earth as we thought but underwater? Then it hit me. They were not dragons, but seahorses.
I glanced at my hands and up at the surface. Everything was so much bigger. Had these creatures always been so large, just lurking beneath the surface, or had I somehow shrunk? A bony one with orange tips on its fiery red, knobby body nudged me with its head and delicate nose, blinking its little black pearly eyes at me with wide blinking movements, as if each curious blink was a gasp for breath.
The seahorse floated next to me, brushing my side with deep red wings that fluttered faster than I could see. The creature sank farther down to the sandy ocean floor, sending wisps of white sand waving by as it landed. It pushed me up in the water with a powerful nudge of its head, and within seconds emerged beneath me, supporting my bottom and legs with its knobby back. The seahorse must have expected me as a passenger, for as soon as I sat astride the creature it took off, bobbing and weaving along the sea currents.
It swam with reckless abandon, sinking on a cool ocean current here, speeding and bobbing along a strip of plankton here, nosing along the waving tip of an anemone there. Fish swarmed around us in bright schools of colorful flashes of fins and gills. The seahorse’s movements were erratic, bobbing and weaving forward and back yet with an odd sort of grace. I held onto its crimson fin, my legs planted above and around the tops of its delicate wings that fluttered madly like hummingbird wings. I wondered where we were going. Perhaps it was taking me to safety. Maybe I was a prisoner, on my way to be fed to its young. I didn’t know. But the ride was incredible.
My fiery red steed bobbed along, darting here and there, ducking behind rocks and wrapping its curled tail around coral, blending in behind plankton and waving sea kelp and flowing anemones, their tendrils a deep purple that rivaled our Atlantian sunset. I choked on the thought. What used to be our Atlantian sunset. Now it was lost forever.
We stopped.
We hid behind some rocky pink coral, the seahorse’s curled tail keeping us in place. We waited and I relaxed, when suddenly a large sea creature floated by, destroying currents and creating new ones in its wake. Its body was long and grey, and it looked so rough it might cut you if you reached out and touched it. Its mouth hung perpetually open, and the sight of those curved jaws was not a sight I would soon forget. From the tip of its blunt pointed nose, the mammoth-sized fish swam by lazily, slowly, drifting, its black eyes murderous in their intent. I was seized with an instant fear and could not move. Now I knew why the seahorse had hidden us.
We waited as the fish eventually swam by. It drifted past on warm currents, lazily letting the swirls of fish and small plumes of sand driven up by hiding creatures move it along, close to the sandy bottom but always aware, always watching, its black eyes waiting for that special moment when—snap. One fish nearby had been unlucky.
When it appeared safe to move again, I held onto the seahorse’s back and together we rode the waves, first hitching a ride against the curve of a giant spotted turtle’s shell, its mottled green and pale yellow marbleized frame dazzling our eyes. Later my fiery companion brought me to Poseidon’s resting place below the waves, where scaly mermen and diaphanous sea nymphs attended him.
The seahorse bowed its head and I slipped off its back. I was struck by the cool presence before us. We bowed, for we floated in the presence of a god. I dared not raise my eyes for fear of being struck down. If this was the ruler who had destroyed our island, I thought, what would he do to one who dared meet his gaze?
The god plucked the question from my mind and spoke within my small brain. Not with words, but gestures. He would not destroy me. He pointed to others just like me, other former inhabitants of Atlantis, now survivors. What was to become of us?
With a wave of his hand, a number of my fellow Atlantians changed before my eyes. Some developed green and gold scaly tails instead of legs and grew in size, taking their places with the mermen and women. He motioned for a dolphin, one of the chattering creatures, to approach. Its constant clicks and rattling noises sounded like noise at first, then began to form words, phrases, and then a story.
It clicked and rattled that the fall of our island was through no fault of our own, but due to a disagreement between the gods. In our latest sporting match, Athens had faced us and lost. We had made matters worse by being arrogant winners, crowning our victory with mock battles and a week-long festival. Athena, the patroness of Athens grew angry at this, particularly since she had lost a wager on the match with Poseidon. In a fit of rage, Athena smashed the ocean with her fist, sending our little island into the sea.
The gods took pity on us then, for we had always worshipped the sea and respected its waters. For that, and because Poseidon was amused at having beaten Athena, he rescued us survivors and let us live in his realm. But to do that, we must alter our shape to survive, and so by his grace we changed. But as the mere sight of us was a constant reminder of Athena’s defeat, Poseidon dared not let her see us again in human form. As he wept, those of us destined to die, caught by Athena’s furious wave, disintegrated with Poseidon’s tears, becoming pearls for clams to snatch and secret away. For our lives, all we had to do was shed our human shape, much like a snake sheds scales or a shark loses teeth.
Our master builders turned into great fish, with noses shaped like the mighty hammers they wielded to threaten any who came too close.
Our warriors became the bulls of the sea, lurking in dark corners with armor the texture of rough sand, waiting with pointed jaws, ready to strike. Our sentries turned into seahorses, guarding our coral buildings and rocky caverns, our remaining fragile temples to Poseidon.
And me? For my long blonde hair and love of black clothing, I shed my skin for scales and turned into a Moorish idol, a simple fish.
Now, when an Atlantian dies we crumble into Poseidon’s tears. Our bodies disintegrate into pearls, and drift like bubbles to the surface where we are claimed by mollusks and captured by divers.
I once lived in a world of wind and air. Now I live in a world of water, light, and darkness. I dwell in the ocean with my kinsmen, where we shall always be.
History may see us as a tragedy, remembered in a post-script, but that is not the truth. We are all around you, just beneath the surface.
About the Author
E.L. Johnson is a short story writer who loves to write about fairy tales gone
wrong, ogres with hearts of gold, and dragons. Her short stories have previously been published on Amazon in anthologies.
E.L. Johnson is a member of the Hertford Writers' Circle and won the Sci-Fi London Film Festival's 2014 48 hour Flash Fiction challenge. E.L. Johnson also runs a chatty book club in London and is the lead singer of the gothic progressive metal band Orpheum.
You can find her band on the web at:
www.orpehum.co
The Curl of Emma Jean
by Michele Tracy Berger
Summary: Two sisters under stress come to different conclusions about a strange child and what she means for their family.
Jessa
Jessa is one signature away from freedom. She takes comfort in the fact that she will never have to tell her sister, Chelsea, the truth about her three-year-old daughter, Emma Jean. Hoping her sister will get to the point soon and talk about her inheritance, Jessa sits perched on the edge of the white wicker sectional, fidgeting and tapping the backs of her flip flops against her heels. She sees none of the official papers she needs to sign. No lunch either, just some almonds in a red ceramic bowl. Her stomach gurgles. Where is Mr. Cartusciello, the family lawyer? Her intuition tells her something is amiss, but she squashes her concern. Wasn’t it better to do this business sitting on her sister’s patio than meeting in his office?
While she waits, Jessa mentally ticks off the all the ways she’s been good. No denying her at this annual “fitness” meeting, the last one she’s obligated to attend by their father’s will. Clean for three and a half years. Check. Gainfully employed. Check. Money saved (well, a teeny amount). Check. Community volunteer. You bet!