Mischief in the Water - Flash Fiction Horror

Written as part of Flash Fiction Horror, a series of four tales to tell before Halloween

‘Reptile with Spawn Abundant’ - Doré, Gustave (1832-1883)

“You’ll catch your death, going out tonight,” the fisherman warned. “The fog’s hiding all sorts of mischief too.”

Peter undid the rope tying his boat to the shore, before pushing it off the stony beach and into the shallows. The sliding pebbles punctuated the silence for a moment, before a short splash marked a return to calm.

“Have you gone soft for me, John? Finally ready to give me a hug?” Peter joked. He waded out to catch the boat before it drifted off and placed his lantern inside.

“No, I just don’t want to dredge your corpse out the harbour tomorrow morning. What are you even planning to do out there?”

“What else? I’m going fishing.” Peter swung one leg into the boat, then the other, rocking it worryingly before it maintained a gentle wobble. “Going to get some sole while they’re out and about.”

“I think you’re mad,” John muttered, as he watched Peter paddle away. As he disappeared into the fogbank, John shook his head and turned to walk back into town. It was the last time he would ever see Peter again.

It was an incredibly still night, aside from Peter and his boat. He felt as if he were paddling in a large cauldron, with no more lapping waves than what he stirred with the oars. The only other movement was the silent creeping cloud surrounding him. The only sounds were a bobbing boat and his broken, breathy whistling.

Soon, he felt himself far enough out to start fishing. He could only approximate where he was as there was no point of reference he could see, but his familiarity with the area encouraged unearned confidence. He was just past the cove, he assumed.

He paused his whistling as he set up the bait at the end of the hook. It wriggled in silent desperation, before it was punctured on the barb, its death throes spiralling through the air as it was launched into the cold, inky dark. Peter resumed a state of idleness while he waited to feel the twitch of the line.

It was indeed quite cold, he thought. Colder than he expected before he left his home. He decided he would have a nice, warm bath upon his return, with some warm milk and perhaps some of the leftover meat from dinner. He was interrupted by tension on the line. He held the pole firmly, and as a thousand times before, pulled in his first catch of the night. A sole! His favourite.

Time was absent from his mind while he was occupied with fishing. Within an hour he had caught seven fish, a combination of skate and sole. A very successful catch, Peter decided, though he would prefer an even number for personal satisfaction.

For the final time in his life, Peter readied his bait, slung it into the darkness, and heard a satisfying plop as it hit the water. For a few moments more, some evidence of life, of motion, was given back to the gloom.

The light from the lantern flickered gently, a lonely candle in a sea of night. Though Peter had a simple courage, doubts about his decision to be out for so long started to surface.

“Maybe it is time to head home,” he decided. “Seven is more than enough, anyway. Besides, the damp is starting to get inside.” The coat was indeed failing to keep all the dew away, sapping his heat in the process. But rowing home would solve that problem, Peter knew.

He began to pull in his line. As he did, however, he felt an unexpected tension. He had felt no bite, but something was certainly holding, though not pulling, on the pole.

“Must’ve thrown it near an outcropping and it washed up in a rockpool. Thought I was out further than that.”

Far from wishing to break the line, Peter tried to direct it in various ways to see if it could be dislodged without much more effort. When that failed, he sighed, wedged the pole underneath his seat and picked up the oars.

“Bloody thing,” he mumbled under his breath. With as much precision as he could, he slowly rowed in the direction of the line. Perhaps with a bit of luck, the small rocks would act as a surer sign of where he was, so he may get home more easily.

“With a bit of luck.”

His light did not penetrate far, but it was enough for the thin silk to shift against the fog. Each time there was slack, he wound it up again to be taut so he would not lose his direction. He spied in the water some small ripples heading toward the boat, indicating solid ground blocking the flow. He was near whatever held his hook.

Then, suddenly, he felt a pull. It was quick and slacked the line again as it jolted the boat forward. The boat swayed heavily from side to side as the short acceleration offset Peter, and in the process the lantern was spilled and the candle extinguished. The hook was still not relinquished, but now Peter was sure he did not want it back. He tried to stabilise the boat as best he could but could not stop it moving forward.

Finally, as he was trying to steady himself, they bumped into something gently, stalling all momentum. But instead of the scratch of wood against rock, it was a dull thud that Peter heard. When he looked at the front of the boat, he saw a shape, a shape so large that it warped the cloud around its form, a cliff of skin cloaked in a faint glossy green. He could not see the end of it in any direction, for the light was gone completely. His eyes were tired and salt-stung, and could not adjust properly. Nevertheless, he stared, mouth agape, unable to understand. Was it a whale? A sleeping whale? No, too large. Terribly, unbelievably, horrifically large.

Peter fell back in the boat. At that moment, there was a great opening of dull yellow light, shining through the blurred fingers of fog. An eye larger than the largest townhall, somehow both underwater and stretching high above him simultaneously, was looking at Peter. He screamed before he could think to scream.

The noise was too harsh for the eye. Fully disturbed, it blinked slowly, before beginning to sink. Peter’s fright was not lessened; in fact, he could feel the boat beneath him sinking too, the fishing rod still wedged between the boards and the line stiffening quickly. The creature submerged faster than he could react, and in a moment, he was soaked in cold brine, his boat ripped away from under him and disappearing fast.

Suddenly he was treading water and watching as the rest of the mass made its dive. On instinct he swam away, away from the monster, out into the blackness of the night. He could feel the waves wash over him, a temporary surf washing him away even further, choking him with gulps of seawater as it did. He did not stop swimming until he was overcome with fatigue, at which point he turned around to see how far he had come.

He could no longer see it, but he could feel it in the water below him, and around him, and above him. It was everywhere at once, and yet nowhere to be seen. Peter still felt the waves, however, headed towards him like the product of a cliff sliding into the ocean. A horrible vibration rattled his bones and gripped his heart as he heard the monster call out from the deep – a discordant call that Peter could not place, nor had the mind to.

He closed his eyes and wept uncontrollably, his tears mingling with the rest of the salt on his face. He waited for the end of his life, afraid to even watch for its approach. He was certain he would die. He wanted no more warnings before oblivion.

But the waves petered out, and no more noises of sinking bodies could he hear. He had been left alone in the ocean. He darted around, looking for any outcropping, any rock, any scrap of driftwood he could cling to until morning. But there was nothing, nor was there light to see there was nothing. He began to lose feeling below his waist, then his hands. His coat was heavy too, but he had not the energy to take it off. It was terribly cold in the sea.

Soon, he could barely keep his head above water. Soon after, he could not even do that. As he drifted away, down into the deep, his last thoughts were of his home and the warm bath.

“All for the sake of a sole.”

Then, nothing.

The next day, John saw Peter’s boat was not on the beach. Noone had seen him so far that day, either. He looked out across the bay – hemmed in by the cliffs and coves, before emptying into open ocean and empty horizon.

“’Mischief in the water’, I told him. ‘Mischief in the water.’”