Coming face to face with people in suits always makes me hyper-aware of how badly I dress. Since I knew I was going to meet up with Mary Markov today, I intentionally put some more effort into my appearance. I picked out a pressed shirt to wear over my leggings. Since it was far too big for me, I threw my wide yellow belt into the mix. Thus satisfied, I called up Elijah Carter and asked whether he wanted to come along. He agreed readily enough so I had him pick me up and drive us over to Mary’s office. It was nowhere near the hospital and not in the vicinity of her news channel headquarters either. It was located in a slate gray concrete building that was quite confusing to look at.
No outside observer could have mistaken it for a residential house, for there was hardly a less homely or comfortable place imaginable. It was utterly repellent in its rough, dreary nature. It couldn’t have belonged to some kind of business either, though. There were no marked parking spaces for employees, no signs or advertisements. Altogether, it reminded me of something out of a cheap or unfinished video game.
“Sketchy,” Eli remarked, eyeing the slab of concrete with a similar lack of enthusiasm. “Looks almost abandoned. How weirdly fitting for a semi-secret government operation.”
I nodded. The warm air had taken me by surprise and I found the weight of my jacket suffocating, so I took it off to leave in the car. “What is it?” I asked, noticing the way Elijah squinted at my outfit.
“What are you wearing?”
“Clothes.”
“You don’t say.” He snorted. “Looking kinda funny there, Shirley.”
“I look professional,” I corrected him.
“I suppose.” He grinned to himself. “Depends on the profession, though.”
We rang the bell and a highly official-looking security guard let us in through the heavy double doors after confirming that Mary Markov was expecting us. He gave the necessary directions, sending us down several flights of stairs. The better part of the building was in fact underground, like with an iceberg. Eli made a remark about how it’d be safer if outsiders weren’t allowed to roam the place by themselves. It seems to be a habit of his to vaguely analyze and point out flaws in the structures of government institutions. Then again, maybe it’s just flaws in general he’s fascinated with.
Upon arriving outside Mary’s office, we were called inside to find her sitting behind her desk. She lifted her head, giving us a polite, if cold, smile. “Good morning. You’re on time. Wonderful.”
“Would you please give me an honest appraisal of my outfit?” I asked.
The newsreader frowned in confusion, her eyes briefly roaming my form. “You put effort into your appearance today,” she concluded. “It’s appreciated.”
“Wait, what do you mean today?” I inquired.
“Note also how she did not actually answer your question,” Elijah added.
I huffed, flinging myself into one of the chairs in front of Mary’s desk. Eli sat down beside me, folding his hands in his lap and leaning back. “Thanks for letting me come with Shirley,” he told her.
“Naturally. I assume you’re her emotional support human.” Mary Markov’s lips curled slightly. “At any rate, you had contact with the Collective yourself, so this does concern you. As far as I’m concerned, it can’t hurt having an ex-cop in the mix, anyways. Despite the regrettable reasons you had for leaving the force.”
Elijah’s brows lowered, the muscle in his pronounced jaw twitching. “How do you know about that?”
Mary looked innocent. “It’s very important that I’m fully informed, of course. Don’t worry. We don’t need to go into it, and I don’t judge you, either. The effect the incident at that highschool had on you is completely understandable.”
“I didn’t ask for your assessment.” My friend’s voice had sharpened. “Can we move on from this?”
“Of course.” If the sudden shift in tone had rattled the agent, she wasn’t letting it on. Sifting through the neat stack of papers on her desk, she pulled out a thin brown file which she slid over to me. “Miss Shirley, you remember the female member of the Collective we took into custody? She has already been questioned by the local police. Unfortunately, I don’t have the authority to lead such an interrogation, but I was present for it and I want you to have this transcript.”
I perked up and began leafing through the folder.
“You may take that with you to read in peace,” Mary told me. “But don’t expect too much, lest you’ll be sorely disappointed. The girl hardly said anything at all. The most helpful information she gave us was a name she kept referencing. Jewel. At first, we thought it was a sort of code word, but it seems to be what the other person she was with calls themself.”
“Jewel,” I echoed.
“Sadly enough, that’s all we have. We’ve never provided our services to anyone of their physical description. There are a couple clues, but they don’t amount to anything helpful. There’s the fact that you met them at a convenience store with relatively high prices. Maybe I’m just grasping at straws, but that could indicate a cushy financial situation. On top of that, the store is rather far away from here, so they might be an out-of-towner. They also might be able to influence the way others perceive them, considering the way they seemed to hypnotize you in the woods merely by holding eye contact.”
“How come they couldn’t do anything to Frank Preston?”
Mary Markov twinkled at me. “They couldn’t? Huh. That rather intrigues the philosopher in me. Jewel works through eye contact and it is said that the eyes are the window to the soul.” She cocked her head at me.
“Are you saying Blondie doesn’t have a soul?” Eli asked, raising a skeptical brow. “Is this one of those Plato-Schopenhauer-whatevers?”
The newsreader shrugged artfully, watching my reaction. “We could discuss this for hours on end. I only meant to draw attention to the implied distinction between an organically born entity and a being who was originally an inanimate object.”
“I beg your pardon?” I said slowly.
“Oh, nevermind; that’s neither here nor there.” Her tone told me that she did, in fact, consider it to be both here and there. Not wanting to go further into this with her, I made a mental note to ask Frankie later.
“There’s more,” I added, trying to gently prepare her for what I was about to say. “I want to get Kit Sutton back.”
Mary’s lips thinned. “Excuse me?”
“I don’t mean for the town to get flooded in the process. I think we can find a solution to help her, if we work together. I’m convinced we can figure something out, but I don’t believe in abandoning her anymore. Which is essentially what we’re doing if we leave her to her fate.”
“You do realize what you’re asking of me? Your former roommate isn’t some kind of minor water spirit. Her father appears to hold tremendous power over the seas, or at the very least our part of it. He has countless similarly dangerous individuals at his service so he might be considered a ruler of sorts, if not a deity.”
“So Kit’s the little mermaid, basically?” Elijah asked, equal parts joking and genuinely intrigued.
Mary grinned an actual, amused grin. “I must ask you to take this seriously, Mr Carter.”
“I am!” he chuckled, raising his hands. “I swear.”
“Anyways, Miss Shirley, the point you make is an individualistic one, but I see why you’re invested in the girl’s fate. I want to help, I do… But we need to proceed with caution. If you can suggest to me some kind of sensible approach, then I’ll do what I can. That’s all the promises I can make at the moment.”
I thanked her and got up, Eli following me as I headed for the door. “Miss Shirley,” Mary called out and I stopped, turning back around to face her. “If you like my style, we could perhaps meet up to go shopping sometime? I could show you some quality stores. It wouldn’t be anytime soon since I’m currently swamped, but I figure—well, just in case you might like to.”
I nodded. “That sounds pleasant enough.”
She smiled brightly and waved us out the door. “Excellent. I’ll be in touch.”
Back inside the car, I tossed the file onto the backseat to read later. “Would you like to go to the beach?” I suggested.
“Why not. Wait, is this for a stroll and ice cream or do you want to kickstart the mermaid-rescue-operation?”
“I can’t see why it shouldn’t be both,” I replied comfortably. “We’ll need to take your flashlight, though.”
“You know I don’t like getting myself into trouble unless it’s paid.”
“Yes, but you also find me endearing and want to protect me from danger, which you can only do by accompanying me.”
“You’re a terrifying tentacle beast from another dimension. I don’t know that I’m all that scared for your safety,” he grunted.
I gave him an affronted look. “You have now hurt my feelings.”
“Have I?”
“Plenty, but I’ll forgive you if you come with me.”
Elijah Carter sighed deeply but started driving anyway. I let my arm dangle out of the open window, allowing the warming spring air to wash over my skin. The closer we got to the shore, the stronger the scent of salt mixed into the breeze. The cries of seagulls became audible over the sounds of the road and the streaming wind and was finally joined by the crashing of waves when we pulled into a parking spot and got out of the car. Taking along the heavy duty flashlight he always kept in the passenger seat footwell, I led Eli to the mouth of the cave, explaining what Nettie and I had seen along the way. He looked commendably calm, simply turning on the torch and entering alongside me.
The tunnels were just as damp, dim and quiet as the last time. Before long, we had reached the spacious canyon room with the lake at the bottom. “I want to go across and see if there’s anything important in the rest of the grotto back there,” I reminded him. “Please hold on to your bearings.”
“I’m not repeating your mistakes,” he replied gamely. “What do you think? This oughta be connected to the ocean somehow.” He let the beam of the torch roam the mirror-like surface of the lake. It seemed almost deceptively quiet. My eyes followed the lengthy stone ledge. Eli stepped close, and after receiving a nod of approval, he grabbed me around the waist and hoisted me onto the rocky protrusion. I straightened up, instantly pressing my back against the wall. A wave of nausea hit me as I glanced at the water below. “Chill,” Elijah muttered, climbing after me with ease. “Nothing will happen. You’re not gonna fall.”
I merely shook my head. “You didn’t see what’s down there.”
“And I won’t, because we’ll be careful,” he answered steadfastly.
I started walking, the warm light of the torch upon my back, illuminating the path ahead. The shelf narrowed as we reached the end. I swiftly clambered down, relieved to place my feet on wider, solid ground once more. Now looking over the lake from the other side, it had an entirely different feel to it. It seemed darker somehow, but also less big—I attributed it to the change in perspective. We were standing in a cramped little nook with two passageways leading off into separate directions behind us. Elijah Carter eyed them pensively. “Which do you reckon?”
I pursed my lips. “The right one. Because it’s right.”
“Makes sense.”
We proceeded into the passage, the tight space pushing us closer together. He had to duck his head, uncomfortably hunching his shoulders, and for once, I was grateful for my own short stature. The corridor seemed to go on forever. The darkness and silence created a feel of unnatural solitude, and for more than once, I got the distinct impression that I must have jumped dimensions again. It was as though Elijah and I were enclosed in some kind of bubble, cut off from everything outside; a place where time was a foreign concept and the only sun was our flashlight. Needless to say, I was distinctly uneasy. I allowed myself to lean back, brushing against Eli’s chest whenever I could. Eventually, I cleared my throat.
“Could you touch me?”
“What?”
“Just so I still know you’re there.”
His palm came to rest on my shoulder, his thumb digging into one of the tense, painfully rigid muscles of my upper back, forcing it to soften. “Good?”
“Yes, thank you.”
He hummed. “You’re scared.”
“Yes.”
“Me, too.”
This caused my resolve to falter. “Maybe we should turn around after all,” I said quietly. “Who knows how much longer—”
“Look.”
I perked up. Before us, the tunnel grew wider, opening into a large, spacious room. We picked up our pace, tackling the remaining distance in a light jog, and finally found ourselves standing in another hall. The beam of light traveled the floor and high walls, revealing a sight that took our breath away. We were standing in front of another lake, only slightly smaller than the last. The water glittered in violet hues and strange, pale plants climbed up the walls, some of them looking rather like starfish. Multiple rocky protrusions formed an almost complete bridge across its middle. With a bit of light climbing, we’d undoubtedly be able to get to the other side. Wordlessly, Elijah Carter swung himself up onto the platform closest to the edge of the water, pulling me up after him. The flashlight switched hands a couple times as we maneuvered ourselves along.
Soon, we reached the middle of the lake. I risked a glance at the water below. All was still and perfectly quiet. Eli was about to take on the next rock when suddenly, I felt something heavy and gooey drip onto my head from above. I flinched, then slowly pointed the torch up to the ceiling. My stomach dropped. My throat had turned paper-dry, and I frantically tugged on Eli’s arm. He tipped his head back, following my pointing finger. His eyes blew wide and his face fell.
There was a creature clinging to the high walls, its pale, enormous body describing a streamline curve as it pressed itself against the hollowed stone. The closest thing I can compare it to would be a sort of olm, except probably a hundred times larger. Its snout looked large enough to swallow either of us whole. It hung open, secreting a thick fluid that slowly dripped down to hit the rocks or create ripples upon the water. Its blind eyes seemed to be trained on us, and I could spot tiny, sharp teeth lining its maw. It wasn’t moving, not even an inch, but somehow, I knew it was aware of us.
I looked up at Elijah, the panic in his eyes mirroring mine. Both of us had freezed up mid-motion, not daring to take another step. My mind was running wild; I was thinking feverishly. We’d have to turn around for sure, but how? The olm was already highly alert, if we were to start scrambling back to solid ground, it would undoubtedly hear us straight away. Eli looked equal parts terrified and furious, and I could tell he was scolding himself for not thinking to check the entirety of the room before proceeding across the lake. I could understand the sentiment, we’d definitely made a grave mistake. I figured it had been the misleading beauty of the cave hall that had taken our edge off. Glancing over into the direction we’d come from, I found myself wishing to be back in the endless dark corridor. The entrance to the passage seemed miles away.
The olm lifted a three-toed foot, shifting its massive form to a lower spot on the wall. It was taking a tentative step towards us, extending its snout as its body bent into our direction. Elijah had grabbed onto my arm, his fingers clamping around it like a vice. He stayed silent and unmoving, but he held my gaze with clear, sharp eyes.
“Don’t move,” I mouthed, and he gave me a curt nod.
Slowly, I reached around to push my shirt out of the way of my unfurling tentacles. Elijah took a quiet step back to make room for my changing form, something of a resolute expression settling on his face. I opened my mouth, relieved when my teeth acted according to my will and elongated. I didn’t know to what extent I would be able to defend against this absolute giant of an amphibian, but at least it would give us a chance. I took a deep breath, trading glances with Eli once more before darting off to the side, bounding onto the platform next to our current one. Elijah followed suit, grabbing onto one of the limbs I extended to him for support. Despite the swiftness of our movements, we were anything but quiet, and the olm reacted in an instant. It slithered down from the wall, sinking into the lake below to make its way to the rocks we were standing on. As we headed for the next stone, it darted out of the water, splashing wildly as its snout breached the surface. Its jaws snapped at us, missing me by a mere foot as I jumped across the gap between the protrusions. Droplets flew as the creature dropped once more, but instead of retreating, it swam around the platform. Its massive, snake-like body was bobbing up and down as it circled us.
“Oh fuck,” Elijah breathed, his chest heaving. “Keep going! Move, move!”
I took a short running start, then flung myself onto the next rock, using my extra limbs to land safely. I then helped him cross again. The olm rose from the depths of the lake once again, and I lashed at it with one of my tentacles, hitting it on the snout and forcing it to dive underwater again. We kept working our way back towards the other side of the lake, slipping and sliding as we went. The water surrounding us seemed to hum with unrestrained energy, the white salamander’s tail whipping up waves and splashing around. We were finally getting close to solid ground again, or at least it looked like we were for a moment. That’s when the creature took a massive leap, draping itself over the final stepping stone, effectively blocking our path.
“Shit,” Eli hissed beside me as we came to a skittering halt.
I’d have to try and fight this thing. There was no way around it now. I clenched my sweat-laced palms into fist, trying to slow my rapid, shallow breaths. I can do this, I said to myself. All I’d have to do is send it back into the lake for long enough so we could run back into the tunnel. There was no way the olm would fit through the passage—once we were in there, we’d be relatively safe. I stared at the dripping, writhing animal; stared at its bared needle teeth, and the less hopeful, more realistic part of my brain told me that I would, indeed, probably not be able to do this. Just as I was contemplating the degree of our screwed-ness, an unseen someone called out from behind us. I didn’t understand a word they were saying, but I recognized the language, and more importantly, the voice.
It was bright as a bell, girlish but with a rough, warm edge. Even before I could turn to face her, I knew who it was.
The gigantic amphibian perked up at the sound, lowering its head and withdrawing into the murky depths with a splash. Elijah Carter let go of a long-held breath, dropping his shoulders before tensing up again, realization setting in. He shot me a look of utter disbelief.
“Wow,” the newcomer spoke up again, this time not in the tongue of the deep ones. “You two have to be actually crazy or something to show up here.”