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The other man chuckles in disbelief.
“You need to lay off the ale, Marn,” he says.
I grow tired of their conversation.
Once more, I careen forward into their boat, but this time, I spare no strength. My rough, agile form collides with their vessel. The wood cracks and bursts, the boat splitting immediately on impact.
“It’s not the damn tide!” the one called Marn screams at the other. Even from my position below, I can tell that the other man is growing uneasy now, unconvinced that I’m a mere animal or force of nature.
Emerging out from the surface, I grimace upon seeing the other man’s terror as I reveal myself and crush Marn’s head with my beak, savoring his succulent fear on the many tentacles that burst from my mouth.
There’s nothing more delicious than seeing a rational man turned toward insanity in an instant. Marn might have been the superstitious one, but his brain was far too elastic. There was not enough despair in it when I gorged upon it, leaving a bloody husk atop his neck.
I’ll let this one marinate.
The man screams out, begging for assistance from any number of the men atop their boats looking out. In his panic, he might drown himself.
Shooting forward like a harpoon, I find my next target, peering out directly toward the bottom of a larger fishing vessel. As I catch their eyes at an angle, I can see their expressions and deepest thoughts.
They look concerned, wondering what is happening to their dear friend. And before they can act, I hear them contemplating what to do. Perhaps in their final moments, I can show them my face and upturn their reality. It would be so much more enticing than catching them unaware.
I split their boat just as easily but leave them in the water to witness the death of their comrades.
“We’re under attack!” a man from the dock screams out, alerting everybody to the potential danger.
I’ll need to operate quickly if I’m to reach these creatures before they reach the land.
Without wasting another minute, I take out the remaining vessels, the repeated split of wood filling my ears with satisfaction. And on each vessel, I make sure to devour the passengers immediately, leaving only a few survivors left in the water.
I want them to think they’re going to survive. I want to mislead them into thinking their lives may continue beyond this point.
It’s so delicious, wrenching that hope from them and tasting the overflowing despair that courses from their brains downward through their nerves.
The man on the dock, who first alerted everybody, is foolish enough to extend his hand to one of the survivors.
“Thank you!” the other cries out, thinking he’s found salvation from the selflessness of another.
But speeding forward through the air, tentacles trailing behind me and guiding me forward, I jump out of the water to bite into both of their arms at once. I savor the moment as they both look down in horror at the pouring stumps left where their hands were once attached.
Before they have a chance to escape, I charge forward into the dock, splitting the support that holds them up. I know that very soon, it will inevitably be rebuilt. But eventually they will give up. They’ll have no choice but to yield to my power.
Now only one man rests in the water, floating and terrified by what he’s seen. He watches with wide eyes, not daring to blink. The water around him is dyed with blood and filled with viscera.
I can hear him pleading, unable to see where I am in the water.
“You’re no beast I’ve ever seen,” he says, his eyes blank and expressionless.
I peer up at him from under the water, watching as he treads.
“You like people? You like eating people?”
I don’t respond.
“I can send fleets of people your way,” he says. “You’ll never have to starve again. Just… let me go.”
I sneer.
Briefly, I considered leaving him alive because I thought the greater punishment for him would be to live with the same truth he earlier condemned. I wanted to imagine him pleading for people to believe him, being exiled from the outer fringes of society.
