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>Boot Sequence...3...2...1...

>Valient Labs Automated Tracking Probe Software Build 1.6.3

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>Scanning for Biomechanical Construct 'Leviathon'...

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>Scanning...

>Construct not found

>Scanning water composition...

>Seawater composition 98.8 % normal levels

>Foreign component detected

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>Iron Oxide present...1.2 %

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Joshua cracked his eyes open from an unexpected sleep, like two fissures of the earth splitting apart. He blinked, staring up at a loose bit of wood from his thatched roof that stuck out at him like a broken finger on a hand. His right leg and thick tail both hung from the edge of the bed, his body having barely hit the worn mattress before passing out. The air compressor hummed away quietly in the corner, filling up one of his three scuba tanks. Perhaps it was louder than he realized, having grown so used to it he simply tuned it out.

The otter stretched his arms out in the air, splaying open his hands to expose the webbed flesh between his fingers, before letting them flop back onto the bed. He didn't feel any desire to go back to sleep, nor did Joshua find any particular reason to get up. So he simply laid there, bobbing his tail idly, and tried to enjoy the quiet. Although, other than the compressor, it was precisely the quiet that bothered him.

The gulls that usually circled the bay and cleaned up the occasional dead fish hadn't returned for nearly a month. It was common for them to leave, to scatter to the winds, once _It_was lurking in their waters. The world went silent when It was around, as if holding its breath to not make a scene. Fishermen tied up their boats, divers hung up their gear, even treasure hunters kept out the water. The closest they all came was the high-ground peninsulla a mile west of the village, overlooking the bay. Even those that couldn't or wouldn't make the journey their still waited on the beach to watch. A huge mound of water, like the ocean itself had suddenly grown a mountain, sometimes dipping below the surface but never for very long. Its whale song of rusted metal grinding and moaning could be heard for miles. Younger observers swore they'd seen abright reddorsal fin or even a tail, but it was never taken too seriously. Never outside of the water, never rising above the surface, It owned the seas, totally and completely.

Machine god of the ocean.

Leviathon.

Joshua had the fortune of being out of town during the last visit of the enormous creature. By the time he came back, it seemed like most of the locals had moved on for good. Most of the beachside shelters and shacks had been boarded up and left, some even all-out abandoned. It wasn't much of a 'town,' anyway. An old fisherman, long dead, set up a dock and a shack on the edge of the bay to make a living. Eventually, others followed his lead and had the beginnings of what could have been called a town in about five more years. At least, until Leviathon began to make It's visits.

With a grunt, Joshua rubbed his eyes andlurched up into a sitting position, dangling his feet and tail off the edge of the bed. His shack wasn't much more than the hunk of junk he knew it was made out of, but home was home. It was almost totally barren of furniture, with only a ratty old mattress with some blankets thrown on top of it. The space instead was taken up almost entirely by diving equipment.Respirators, empty tanks,cold-weather wetsuits, night diving gear, masks, gloves, weights, bags, tie lines,anything and everything one would need to make a living as a salvage diver. For most jobs, Joshua could simply rely on his natural abilities as an otter, but it was always good to have the tools needed for any kind of dive.He wasn't in a position to say 'no' to an offer, after all.

He stood up from the bed and stretched, running a free hand down his chest. His fur was uncomfortably dry. He hadn't been in the water for a few weeks. It had been too soon since the last Leviathon encounter.No one really knew quite why, but it was understood that the water itselfwas simply too dangerous once the collossal machine had been there. Nevertheless,Joshua hated feeling dry or dehydrated. It was probably why he never lived very far from the water.

Wearing nothing but a pair of compression shorts, he padded across the soft, sandy floor to a collection of covered buckets in the corner. He pulled the top off the closest one and dipped a cup into his store of collected rainwater. Standing tall, he ladled the water over himself, sighing contentedly as it dripped down his fur. He shook, flinging water from his whiskers, before he repeated the action.Once his fur was sufficiently slick and shining with moisture, he drank his fillfrom the bucket, but just enough to keep it at least half-full of water. With his body feeling lithe and flexible and his thirst quenched, Joshua finally felt awake.

First order of business was to check on the air compressor, a large machine powered by a generator, which took about a year of savings and six months worth of trading to acquire.He never liked to leave it on while he slept, so his first thought upon waking was to make sure his precious air tanks hadn't been overfilled. Joshua sighed in relief, finding that none of the tanks were even completely filled yet. It was a twenty minute wait, at most.

Moving to a small cooler in the corner of the room, he rummaged around inside to remove a cut of cured, dried fish he'd bought from a local fisherman. He preferred to catch everything himself, to save money and trading supplies, but he wasn't any good at curing and didn't want to eat anything that had been in the water when Leviathon had been lurking around. He didn't even bother heating it, simply holding it by the stick it was on and tearing into the meat with his sharp teeth. It tasted salty and needed more chewing than he'd prefer to soften it up, but one or two of them would hold him through most of the day.

Joshua idly walked to the makeshift table next to his bed while chewing on the dried fish. Something had fallen off the edge and laid half-buried in the sand on the floor. If he hadn't noticed it then, it would have likely been completely submerged and lost. Holding the fish in his teeth, Joshua squatted down and brushed the sand off his memento. It was a small, opalescent shell that he'd found in the river not far from his birthplace, where he and his family had lived. He couldn't remember if it was somewhere on Lyx or elsewhere in the galaxy. After seeing the dusty, arid,lifelessplanet Lyx was, he doubted anything here could be as green and lively as his memorywas.

He stood and set the shell carefully back on his table, nexto to a cluster of other shells and rocks he had collected, almost instictively. One of his favorites was a green stone he'd found on the beach that he'd later learned to be a piece of glass smoothed by the ocean current. He picked itup and rolled it around his palm, attempting to catch the light through its smooth, dark green surface. He set it back down next to a small, warpedphotograph. It was of another otter, a woman, holding her small babyin her lap and grinning at the camera. Joshua wasn't sure who the pup was, as he almost certainly rememberedbrothers and sisters from long ago, but something deep inside told him the woman was his mother. He'd never questioned it, only wanted to believe that she was still alive and he'd find her one day. Until then, at least he had a face to hold onto in his memories.

Joshua jumped at a hard, quick rappingagainst the corrugated metal of his door, like someone was trying to knock a hole in it. He sighed, closing his eyes and regaining his composure. It wasn't often he thought about his childhood, especially during the daytime. He crossed the sandy floor of his shack to pull the door open, not bothering to get dressed.Joshua frowned, his whiskers drooping.

Standing on his doorstep was Gycks and his brother Nylz, the two 'Gecko Twins' infamous around the bay settlements,who considered themselvesaggresively competitive to Joshua and his rival diving service. Joshua himself would rather the two left him alone; it was all he could do to put up with theirmore-than-occasional gloating. The fact of the matter remained that the twins simply knew the bay better than he did, needed less equipment than he did, and got more business from the other settlements. As much as he despised Gycks and Nylz, it was better to put up with their egos and keep them on his side, rather than against him.

"Morning,Joshy," Gycks said, grinning with his sharp teeth. He was mostly black, covered with mottled splotches of deep blue skin.His brother looked nearly identical, though with a different pattern of spots that were a lighter shade of blue than Gycks's. Both of them had the same color eyes: pale green irises with dark slit-pupils behind an extra lid of clear eyelids for swimming. Reptile eyes always gave Joshua chills,like they were looking inside of him and see things he tried to hide.

"Gycks," Joshua nodded, hiding his discomfort. He turned to the quiet brother. "Nylz."

"Hadn't been in town lately," Gycks nodded, shouldering his way inside without asking permission, followed closely by his brother.Joshua quickly stepped out of the way. The Gecko Twins were constantly coated in a kind of slime that helped them glide through the water more easily, but Joshua didn't want to know how hard it was to get out of fur. At least they were wearing clothes this time.

"Took a trip," Joshua explained, closing the door behind him. He flipped a makeshiftlight switch connected to the generator, the bare lightbulb on the ceiling blazing to life. The geckos winced, pupils shrinking from diamonds to simply lines of black, making them look even more otherworldly. "Not much to do with Leviathon hanging around."

"You scared?" Nylz asked, his voice higher pitched than his brother's.

"A little," Joshua shrugged. "Mostly, jobs just dry up. People get supersticious. Say that it taints the water. Seemed time for a vacation."

"Where'd you go?" Gycks asked.

"Away," Joshua said, curtly. Walking over to the bed, he stooped down and pulled out a cooler from underneath. "You want a drink?"

The twins nodded.

Joshua pulled out one beer, pulled the tab, then pushed the cooler back under the bed. He took a long, satisfied sip, before nodding to the corner.

"There's water in the buckets you can have."

They frowned. Joshua shrugged, drinking more beer.

"So you ain't got nomore jobs?" Gycks asked, sliding his tail across the floor.

"I might," Joshua said. "Not sure yet. Might just go test the waters and see if there's anything to be salvaged from the mouth of the bay."

"Good...good..." Gycks said, grinning strangely.He flicked his tongue out between his teeth, tasting the air. Joshua grimaced behind his beer as he drank.

"That's what we was gonna do," Nylz said from behind. He squatted down next to the air compressor and rapped a knuckle against one of the tanks, producing metallic sound that told Joshua the tank was full. "Pretty fancy shit you got here," Nylz said, turning back to him and grinning as he very conspicuously flapped his gills. More than anything, the twins liked to lord their diving abilities over mammals, especially Joshua, who had learned long ago that arguing was pointless. He simply continued to drink his beer, keeping an eye on Nylz to make sure he wasn't about to break something.

"Lotta ships go down once Leviathon comes around," Gycks said cryptically. He stooped down to the buckets and filled up one of the plastic mugs with water. He tossed it back like a shot,swallowing all of it with snout pointed to the ceiling. "Lotta money get made, you find the right one."

"It's not a nice buck to be made," Joshua agreed. "But money is money."

Gycks pulled over a box from the corner and sat down, grinning hungrily at Joshua while he flexed his talonsthrough the sand. Nylz hooked a diving mask around his finger and spun it idly as he stood and took place beside his brother, wearing a similar expression. Joshua glanced between them, frowning.He sighed, clearlychecking their attempt to intimidate them.

"I'm staying," he said, sliding the cooler out from under his bed and sitting on it. "I didn't think we'd have to go through this again. I don't care if the money dries up, if I leave, I leave because I want to. Not because you jerkoffs scare me off." Joshua leaned foward, staring calmly at the twins, whiskers twitching. In the pause he drained the rest of his beer and tossed the bottle under his bed.

Gycks and Nylz stole a glance to each other, then turned back simultaneously with fresh smiles. He tried not to show it on his face, but it wasn't the reaction Joshua had expected.

"That's what I mean, man," Gycks nodded, clapping his brother on the shoulder and nodding toward Joshua. "That's what I mean. Guy's got balls, don't he?"

"I don't know, man," Nylzsaid, shaking his head. "He sure talks big, but guys like him don't like to get dirty, you know what I'm sayin?"

"Ok," Joshua interrupted, holding up a webbed hand. "I know you're trying to goad me into something, butyou dancing around it is getting embarassing. Get to the point."

Nylz glanced up at Joshua, annoyed, his tail thumping against the sand. Gycks grabbed his brother's arm to keep him from standing up and flashed an even bigger smile.

"I feel ya, Joshy, I feel ya. We wasn't bein straight with you, but you ain't stupid." He paused, licking his lips and blinking his huge eyes. "And you ain't scared of no Leviathon mother fucker neither, right?"

Joshua slowly sat up. It was the first thing Gycks had said to grab his attention.

"I don't know," he said, carefully. "I know I don't like the idea of getting _eaten_out there in the bay."

"I knew he was chickenshit," Nylz muttered.

"I'm not scared, but I'm not_stupid_ either."Joshua replied. Even he couldn't stop himself from getting a little defensive. "Look...I do what I need to get paid. Get to the point, what's the job?"

"I like it, I like it," Gycks said, clapping his hands together and grinning. He stuck out his tongue to quickly lick across one of his eyes, a motion Joshua couldn't help but recoil at. "So you was outta town, right? For a couple weeks, yeah?"

"For the month," Joshua nodded.

"So you don't know nothing about that ferry?"

Joshua shook his head. "What ferry?"

"You hear what happened up at Shard City?"

"Just rumors. No details."

"That's right. Nobody really knows. It's just up and gone one day, yknow? Lights in the sky, ground shakin, whole city worth of people dead."

Joshua nodded, rubbing his chin and looking away. Shard City was just the latest proof that life on Lyx was cheap.

"But there was this other rumor," Gycks said, leaning in close like they were being listened to. "That some people knew_what was gonna happen. That the survivors got out _before shit went south. All the 'essentials,' yknow? Rich fuckers and scientists and these important types. They're the ones that left the day before Shard City went up in smoke, yknow?"

"Do you really think that's true?" Joshua asked. "That there's some kind of conspiracy?"

"I don't know if there is or isn't, man." Gycks said, shaking his head. "But here's what I know. 'Bout two weeks ago, day before Shard City got blasted, there was a big ferry comin' across the bay, headed straight here. 'Cept, yknow...they was the only boat in the water..."

"Big Red came and took em out," Nylz finished, nodding excitedly, using Leviathon's colloquial nickname. "Ship went down like a goddamn rock. No screams or nothin'."

"Where did it go down?" Joshua asked.

"Middle of the bay. Deepest water," Gycks said.

"And you wanna go out there and raid it before the bodies even have time to decompose," Joshua said, frowning.

"Nah man, it ain't like that," Gycks began to explain. "People 'round the bay are superstitious, yknow? They don't touch the water after Big Red's been in it. It lasts longer ever year, now. Used to be everybody'd wait a couple days for the water to clear. Now it's almost a month."

"What's you're poi-"

"The_point_, man," Nylz interrupted. "Is that the ferry full of Shard City's 'important people' is still out there. Nobody's gotten to it yet. It's pure, untouched salvage. A goldmine. We might as well be thanking the big bastard that took it down. Who the fuck_knows_ what kind of shit was on that ferry, yknow?"

"Lots and lots of corpses," Joshua said, grimly.

"Don't gimme that. You ain't been down in that bay without seein' a body or two, yeah?" Gycks countered. "There ain't nothing noble about digging through shipwrecks, man."

"And there might actually be somethin in there!" Nylz chimed in. "They was rich enough to afford a ferry, after all. What do you think they'd wanna get out of the city?"

"I don't fucking know, kids? Their families? You're not even sure where they came from!" Joshua yelled, momentarily losing his cool. He sighed, running a hand over his head. His fur was starting to dry out. It was making him anxious. "You're just assuming too much, guys. That wreck probably isn't worth-"

"Alright, Joshy, alright," Gycks interrupted, raising up a webbed hand. "You made your point. You think the shit's worthless. But the important thing is, we don't. You should be fuckin' happy we came all the way out to your stick-hut to tell you about it."

"Oh, I am," Joshua mocked. "I'm goddamn honored you'd set foot in my home without my permission. To tell me about some bullshit 'perfect lead' you guys have. You wanna go dig through dead bodies to find a bunch of nothing, you go right ahead. Make sure to bring me a souveneir."

"What the fuck are we even doin here," Nylz said, shaking his head. He stood and kicked over the box he was sitting on, blinking his strange eyes at Joshua and clenching his fists. "Joshy's always been a piece of shit fuckin amatuer." He swung his tail and knocked over a couple of Joshua's air tanks like bowling pins. But before Joshua could even stand up in time to knock Nylz's teeth out of his slimey head, Gycks had already grabbed the base of his brother's tail to stop it from knocking anything else over. Nylz and Joshua both stared surprised at the gecko, who himself was fighting to stay calm.

"I was hopin we could convince you on your own, first," Gycks said. "Basically, me and my brother want to get at that wreck. But we can't. It's too big a job and too far out for just us. We need another diver for backup. You'll get paid a third of whatever we make from the salvage, but me and Nylz get first call on what to sell."

"You..." Joshua pointed to himself, sitting up in surprise. "You want to_hire_ me?"

"No," Gycks said, shaking his head. "It's a...'temporary partnership.' You'll be makin' somethin off of this, but no gurantee of what. Could be a little, could be a lot. We don't even know. But we need a third man."

"And you're asking...me?" Joshua said, pointing again. "What about uhhh...that alligator from the Swamplands that used to live around here? Gordan?"

"We ain't seen Gordan in weeks," Nylz said. "Nobody has."

"Then...how about...the old dog that lived on the dock? Fixed engines? Samson. He could dive, I'm pretty sure-"

"Dead," Gycks said, bleakly. "Somebody shot him. Took his boat, too."

"Fuck..." Joshua said, sliding his fingers down one of his whiskers. "Then...what about that frog and his father? Hector something?"

"Packed up and left." Gycks shook his head. "No note or nothing. Just woke up one day, they weren't there."

"Them too?...Alright...then how ab-"

"You're the only one left, man," Gycks said. "Divers around the bay all left or died, 'cept for you."

Joshua blinked, not sure what to say. He hadn't been back for long, and had never really associated for the other divers and salvagers anyway. But to know that he and the twins were the only ones left...he wasn't sure what to think. On one hand, it only meant more business for the three of them. On the other, maybe there was a reason all the others were gone.

"...You really think there's something worth finding in this wreck?" Joshua asked.

"I don't think we'd be askin' you if we didn't," Gycks said, grimly. Joshua nodded. At least he was honest for once.

Joshua clasped his hands together and looked away, tapping his foot and the tip of his tail against the sandy floor. Gycks and Nylz were far from the most trustworthy guys he knew and were more likely to stab him in the back to get what they wanted. But if that were the case, they could go out by themselves to salvage the wreck and not even tell him about it. If it was even there, of course. Regardless, the jobs and opportunities weren't flowing in like they used to. It was getting hard to go day-to-day without having to fish or hunt for his own food. Real or not, the brothers' tip was the most lucrative opportunity he had on the table.

Joshua sighed one more time, slicking his fur back and shaking his head.

"...When do we leave?"

>Initalizing...

>Boot Sequence...3...2...1...

>Valient Labs Automated Tracking Probe Software Build 1.6.3

>Loading...

>Scanning for Biomechanical Construct 'Leviathon'...

>Scanning...

>Scanning...

>Construct not found

>Scanning water composition...

>Seawater composition 96.5 % normal levels

>Foreign component detected

>Scanning...

>Iron Oxide present...17.2 %

>Logged

>Warning: Foreign component detected within intake valves

>Excess buildup of Iron Oxide

>Suggest immediate repairs

>Connecting to server...

>...

>...

>...

>Connection failed

The morning air across the bay was cold. Not quite a healthy, winter cold, but something more empty. Gray. Like the cold of a desert in the middle of the night. Joshua sat at the back of the boat, already in his wetsuit. He probably wouldn't need it, but the bay could be impossibly cold in the early mornings, and he wasn't in the mood to take chances. He kept one leg slug over his diving bag, filled with goggles, respirators, an extra tank, and other less essential knick-knacks he dove with just to make himselffeel comfortable.

Nylz and Gycks sat beside one another in the front of the boat, with Nylz at the wheel and Gycks reading him a map of the bay. Every so often, Gycks would point to the horizon of water while Nylz made slight adjustments toward the direction his brother pointed. The two of them had suggested to diving in the evening to not draw attention to themselves, but Joshua had refused. He barely felt comfortable being on a boat with the two brothers, let alonediving with them at night.

By the time the sun had fully risen, they were already far out into the middle of the open water, with the surrounding mountains even farther away than they normally did. If he squinted, Joshua could make out the village on the edge of the shore, but it was already fading out of site. He glanced down at his feet, stretching his webbed toes. He took a shakey breath, held it, then sighed. It wasn't easy, but he was able to hide his anxiety about the dive. No matter how bored and disinterested he appeared on the outside, his heart still pounded uncomfortably in his chest.

It had been a long time since he dove in the bay. Even before he had left, Joshua's jobs had begun to dry up. The wrecks and ships on the bottom of the ocean he used to salvage from were stripped dry of anything worth selling. But beyond that, he was still nervous about going into the water only a few weeks after a visit from the Leviathon. It seemed that the water was 'tainted' somehow, every time it came, and it usually took a month before anyone felt confident enough to go back in again. Even if the dive was profitable for the three of them, this would likely be Joshua's last job, at least without picking up and moving altogether.

Gycks killed the motor, dropping the boat down to a gurgle through the water and let it coast quietly across the surface. Still keeping on hand on the wheel, he stood and flanked his brother, who was still fussing over the map and charts. Joshua watched them, warily. What concerned him more than all was being so close and helpless alongside the Gecko Twins. Even if they were telling the truth, and that they and Joshua were the only for-hire divers left in the valley, it would make more sense for them to try and get him out of the picture instead of looking for his help.It wasn't their style to join forces. The twins trusted each other and nobody else, and made sure everyone knew that. But while Joshua didn't make as much money as the twins, nor could he breathe underwater like they could, they always made the fatal flaw of underestimating him.

He stood and stretched, thrashing his tail around in the air to work its muscles, before padding over to the twins. At first listening quietly to their banter of opinions on where or where not the wreck was, Joshua sighed frustratedly.

"Look," he said, interrupting their argument, "I don't dive blind. I get that you don't know exactly where the ferry sank, but you need to at least agree on where to start." He paused, taking advantage of their attention on him. "And anyway, I wanna know everything about this wreck that you could possibly know."

The twins glanced at one another cartoonishly, Nylz in particular wearing an expression suggesting he was about to toss Joshua overboard.Fortunately, Gycks was able to dissuade his brother's frustration by passing him the map entirely while he spun in his seat to face his passenger.

"Right. So." Gycks began, leaning back and kicking one slick, webbed leg on top of the other. "We ain't spend too much time this side of the water, yknow, but a few months ago, we heard talk some slick fucker came in with an old, fixed up ferry-boat and tied up near one of the settlements. Heard he was charging people to get to the other side of the bay, shit like that. People scared of this place, yknow?It's the closest Big Red ever gets to the cities. Way people talk, you'd think he was around all the time."

"So he had some kind of ferry service," Joshuaadded, getting Gycks back on track. "What kind of boat was it?"

"We seen it movin," Gycks said, licking his eyes. "But we ain't ever seen it up close. Big, though. Two decks. Looked old. Fallin apart. But it got people across the water, where they was headin. Heard it was called 'Merryweather.'" He shrugged. "Whoever he was, the guy made some coin."

"What about the sinking?" Joshua asked. "Did you see it happen?"

"Did we see it?" Nylz added, glancing over his shoulder. "'Bout everybody round the water saw it happen."

"Yeah, we saw it," Gycks said. "We was out near one of the big settlements when everybody started goin to shore, pointing and yelling and shit. Nobody could believe there was a boat out there with Big Red in the water. 'Bout halfway across the bay, right in the middle, He took em out. If they was screaming, we couldn't hear em."

"Jesus,"Joshua complained.Gycks grinned widely, licking his eye and blinking his clear, second eyelids. Behind him, Nylz leaned over Gycks and pulled the accelerator to a stop, causing the small boat to lurch forward in the water as its momentum came to a quick stop.

"We're here," Nylz said, glancing back at the map again to double-check. Gycks stood and snatched the chart from his brother, holding it flat against the seat to examine it for himself.

"You said it went down in the middle, so all we really need to know is the longitude," Joshua said. Pulling his leg away, he hefted the mesh diving bag onto the seat next to him and laid it on its side to better access its contents.

"I said we was here, didn't I?" Nylz said, with overinflated confidence.

"You don't know heads or tails of this fucking thing, Nylz," Gycksdismissed as he still pondered over the map.

"We both saw it go down over here, so why the fuck wouldn't it _still_be here, huh?" Nylz complained, gripping a corner of the map in preparation to tear it away from his brother.

"Well we're not gonna find _anything_if we keep screwing around up here," Joshua said, rubbing a non-fogging gelinto the facemask he planned on using. "If you two slimeygirlswant to throw a bitch-fit, be my guest. I'll be getting in the water."

Nothing riled up the Gecko Twins like blows to their masculinity. Predictably, Gycks threw aside the map and marched to the bowof the boat with Nylz in tow. Meanwhile, Joshua was calmly affixing one of the full tanks he'd brought alonginto its harness and screwing in his regulators and pressure guages to the valve.As much as the twins liked to make fun of his need for extensive diving equipment, Joshua was fortunate as an otter to not need as much as other mammals. His natural lung capacity was already exceptional and his webbed hands and feet made fins and gloves a non-issue. Even a wetsuit was a pointless accessory at times compared to his naturally slick fur, but diving without it wasn't always the best option. But regardless of it all, Joshua did need to, in fact, breathe. It didn't matter. Even if he had gills like the twins', they'd inevitably find something else to make fun of.

AsJoshua snapped together the harness and was ready to tie on his weights, Nylz padded back from the bow with an arrogant swagger. He and his brother wore little more than a pair of tight shorts, theirskin slick and shining with their natural fluids. They both wore bare harnesses and tool belts covered in tools of the trade, most importantly bags and knives needed to carry and pry off anything valuble from the sea floor.Nylz flexed his webbed toesand smirked, thumping his thick tail against the floor of the boat.

"You ain't done yet?" he mocked, glancing between the equipment Joshua already had on and the half-full bag beside him. The otter ignored him and shot Nylz a disinterested glance before he started adjusting his BCU.

"Alright then," Nylz said, quietly annoyed at not getting a reaction. He stepped to the side of the boat and stood high atop the wall, tilting the entire thing to the left. "Try to keep up." He stepped off the side, dropping through the dark surface of the water with a loud splash and rockedthe boat violently as he did so.

It took long enough for the boat to settle for Nylz to even break the surface again. His wide eyes slid above first, his translucent second eyelids closed, before the rest of his head followed suit. His previously inert gills flexed on the side of his neck, flaying outward. His pupils contracted to think slits as he glanced between Gycks and Joshua, who were both still getting ready.

Gycks finished connecting his supply harness before he performed some final tasks around the boat. He turned the radio on, dropped anchor and waited for it to hit the bottom, and made sure the outboard moter was raised out of the water. Joshua watched curiously as he removed what looked like an extension cablefrom a box under one of the seats. He plugged it into a floor outlet before he switched it on, causing a small, but powerful lightbulb to flare to life at the end. Gycks double-checked that the plug was secure before throwing it overboard, likely to hang underneath the boat and give the three of them an easier refrence point of current drift and how far from the boat they were. Joshua admitted to himself it was a bad idea.

"Don't take too long, Joshy," Gycks said, grinning as he took a running leap over the side of the boat, splashing water into it. Joshua sighed, finally thankful for the peace he wanted to get ready. The sound of the water was deeply calming, like a lullaby, and the soft rocking of the current to lull him to sleep just as easily.He hadn't dived in a long time, but nothing other than the Gods themselves could keep him out of the water.

Joshua finally strapped in his scuba tank and fitted the regulator in his mouth, purging it to test that it was working properly. He stood, the familiar weight pulling against his back making it awkward to walk, and shuffled over to the side of the boat. He was thankful of the eagerness of the gecko twins to get a head start, as he had time to check one last piece of equipment. Tucked against his back, below his wetsuit, was a pneumatic, underwater pistol he'd hidden that morning. Leaving the zipper slightly undone, he was able to reach it with only a little strain on his shoulder. He checked the magazine, loaded with flechlette rounds that worked so much better underwater than bullets. Slamming it back into place, he double-checked the slide and the hammer, set the saftey on, then put it back in its holster. He trusted the twins far less than they thought he did and wasn't planning on letting them try to take advantage of him.

Once everything was in place, Joshua exhaled, gripped the regulator in his teeth, and strapped on his diving mask. He leaned back and fell head-first into the water, the descent as momentarily heart-stopping as if he'd fallen off a building. But once the water caught him, his own bouyancy keeping him suspended in the moment, all his anxieties faded away. The surface world was too hard, too heavy, too overwhelming to his senses, but being in the water just felt so clear and comfortable that he could hardly believe why would ever leave.

He opened his eyes to the vision of the boat floating above him, eclipsing the shining sunlight. The lightbulb Gycks had thrown overboard was doing a good job at marking it against the diffused sunlight cutting through the dark water. Joshua stretched his arms and legs, shaking his tail excitedly as he felt his body cut through the water like it was the only thing he was meant to do. Extending his fingers and toes, he used his webbed hands and feet to kick farther down, pushing himself a few feet away from the boat itself. Bubbles rose to the surface above him, glinting like silver in the light.

Joshua flipped himself over in the water to face straight down. A good twenty feet beneathhim, Gycks and Nylz floated just above the sandy bottom of the bay,turning on arm mounted flashlights and double-checking what little equipment they had brought with them. Blowing out another mass of bubbles, he kicked his feet and pushed his hands through the water as if digging. Soon enough, he was nearing the bottom, floating just a few feet away from the brothers. He had his own mask-mounted flashlights, as well as a few chemical lights dangling from his harness that he cracked to life. Soon, the three of them were bathed in and eerie, green glow.

Joshua took a deep breath and purged his ears to equalize himself to the pressure. The twins looked bizzare underwater, their gills flapping outward and rhythmically sucking in water. They waited in place for an awkward few minutes, where on the suface one of them would have inevitably started an argument. Joshua glanced at Nylz, who uncertainly glanced at Gycks. He nodded, looking up to check the position of the light hanging from the boat, then glanced at the underwater compass he kept on his wrist. Nodding, he motioned for Nylz and Joshua to follow, then began to swim off toward the west,kicking up plumes of sand as he moved.

The twins gained a fair bit of distance on Joshua as the three of them swam along the bottom of the bay, but he was content to just follow along. The geckos even swam strangely, wriggling their bodies like fish and only using their hands and feet for pushing off the bottom or around rocks. They seemed even more alien than on the surface, their motions strange andunreal. He did his best to keep behind them, but it was an uphill battle against all the equipment he needed. His tail was sore already. He should have stretched that morning.

The longer they spent underwater, the more aware Joshua became of all the changes that had come over the bay, and maybe even the water itself.It was as if they swam through a dusty attic or a condemnedbuilding or somewhere equally abandoned. Fish were almost nonexistant, with Joshua only occasionally spotting a silver glint of a small school out of the corner of his eye. Other than that, the ocean seemed dead or dying, the sand more like ashthat kicked up and threatened to engulf them completely.The water around them was unusually murky, too, with small particles of matter getting caught on Joshua's wetsuit often enough that he needed to brush it off before too much of it hindered his movement.

The swam downward on a gradual slope, the light from the surface growing more and more dim the deeper they went. The floor of the bay was shaped similarly to a wide bowl, each side tapering down to a deep middle point. Joshua had dived to its deepest point only a few times before and hoped that he wouldn't need to again. The darkness of the water was beginning to crush in around them, but their flashlights were strong. Beams of light from both the twins and Joshua cut through the murky darkness, searching for anything close to the wreck they hoped to find. Most of thesalvage dives Joshua did were much closer to shore, so it was more likely that any wreck they'd find down there would be the 'Merryweather.'

Nylz stopped, his arm outstretchedwith a beam of light falling on a thick, jagged mound in the distance. Joshua stopped swimming to look, while Gycks noticed last and had to double back for them. As they approached, with three divers' worth of lights trained on the object, it became clear they were looking at a metal hull.

Nylz swam ahead of the other two, obviously eager to have been the one to find the wreck first. Gycks was right behind him, hungrily scanning his light around the area looking for any dropped valubles. Joshua, however, was hesitant. Something seemed wrong, but he wasn't quite sure of it. He swam nearly twenty feet up to get a good look at the wreck itself from above. Sure enough, emblazoned on the side in fading red paint, was the word 'Merryweather.'

Joshua blinked inside his mask, baffled. He swam down to inspect the hull, running a finger gently across the metal. The brothers say that the ferry had sunk two weeks ago, but the rust buildup on the metal was heavierthan he had ever seen. Thicksplotches of it, some in a sickly green, but most in a copper red. It was rough enough to cut through skin, if pressed hard enough.

Joshua swam along the hull, keeping his light trained on it as he followed slowly behind the twins.The more he saw, the more patterns began to emerge. The rust was unlike anything he'd ever seen. Even with the level of salt in the water, it should have taken years to spread as far as it did. Inch-thick plates of metal were already beginning to flake off and break from decay alone. Parts of the Merryweather barely resembled a ship at all.

Cresting over the ship's overturned bow, he found Nylz and Gycks a few feet away, treading waterabovea thick door granting access to the enclosed cargohold.Nylz flipped over and grabbed the handle, jerking on it harder and harder with each pull as he grew visibly frustrated. As Joshua expected, the door was so rusted shut that getting it open on its hinges was impossible. Gycks had apparently realized this as well, and was digging in one of his bags for a tool. He pushed his brother aside when he found what he was looking for: an advanced, water-tight, self contained blowtorch that even Joshua was impressed with.

Bracing himself against the door, Gycks started up the torch, a tiny blue flame sparking to life at the end of the nozzle. He started at the top-left corner of the door and slowly cut his way around the frame. An angry stream of bubbles erupted from where the torch made contact, instantly boiling the water around it. Even through the muffled water, they could hear the groaning and moaning of stressed metal as the torch cut through it.

After minutes of waiting, during which even Joshua was beginning to get impatient, a metallic_thud_ indicated that Gycks had finally completed the circle. Motioning Nylz to help, the two of them gripped the handle, pushed against the hull of the ship, and heaved upward. Just as Joshua was considering going over to help them, the twins succeeded in wrenching the door open and off its ruined hinges. They pushed the door to the side and eagerly shoved past each other to swim into the hold. The wreck was already giving him an odd feeling, so Joshua opted to stay on the surface instead of possibly confining himself inside a rust-covered undersea tomb.

He waited, touching down gently against the metal under his feet.Taking advantage of the extra time, he checked his air supply and depth guage. They had descended farther than he had imagined, so after checking his pressure guage, he purged a small burst air from his tank to equalize it. He did the same to the pressure in his ears, digging a finger into them to help clear them up. Hisears uncomfortably throbbed.It had already been too long since he'd last dived, let alone as far down as they were.

With a momentary flash of light, Gycks and Nylz returned from inside the ship, but curiously empty handed. Joshua caught eyes with Gycks and raised an eyebrow under his mask. The gecko scowled back and simply made a shrugging motion. Nylz angrily tore off one of his flashlights and threw it down, where it clanged heavily against the ship's hull. Gycks didn't make anygestures, but the clenching of his fists and the rapid fanning of his gills showed how angry he was. Joshua swam over and stuck his head through the doorway, using the light on his mask to illuminate inside. The cargo room was almost completely empty, with nothing but a few basic ship supplies floating around freely.There were a few empty bags, a poncho, some first aid kits, extra supplies for the ship itself, and a few articles of discarded clothing. But what struck Joshua more deeply was the lack of any bodies.

He took a deep breath from his tank and sighed. Truth be told, the possibility of running into any corpses was his greatest apprehension to the job. But what seemed so much stranger was the total _lack_of any around, or even inside, the Merryweather. The twins didn't seem to care as they single-mindedly went about the wreck looking for more ways inside or absolutely anything of value. Joshua kept separate from the two, examining more closely for anythingelse out of place. Something about the wreck disturbed him, but he hadn't figured out why yet.

As he swam over the other side of the ship, he jumped as the blowtorch started up beneath him. The twins were treading water in front of yet another rusted door, this one leading to what may have been the engine room. While Gycks was busy concentrating on the torch, Nylz looked up and shot Joshua an angry look, likely out of impotent frustration that he wasn't helping them. The otter blinked back, unphased, before swimming off to search the surrounding area.

Leaving the two geckos to tire themselves out, Joshua calmly floated feet above the sand, sifting through debris piles with a silver diving knife. One of the reasons he preferred to dive alone was how long and methodical he tended to search for any valubles. He could go through nearly three tanks of air by himself in a single afternoon by just sifting through the outlying area and finding hidden treasures half-buried in the sand.

He pulled out a small, yet sensitive, metal detector that he used to more thoroughly search for anything he couldn't see. But as he flipped it on, the meter instantly jumped into the red and beeped at nothing. Joshua jumped, scanning it over the ground to see what he'd suddenly found, before he realized that it wasn't anything in the sand that was making it react, but the water itself. He held up the detector, pointing it toward the far away surfaceof the bay, and found it reacted exactly the same way. A small, red flake in the water flowed past his flashlight beam, as if on cue. Gently, he caught it between his fingers and rubbed it flat, watching the small orange cloud stick to his fur. It was the rust. It was so thickly in the water that the bay itself was more metal than seawater. Joshua turned off the metal detector and clippedit back onto his belt. It wasn't going to do any good.

Looking back, he could still barely see the Merryweather in his flashlight beam, with the occasional glint of light from the twins as they searched inside. Joshua turned back and, looking up, blinked in surprise to find himself standing on the precipace of a drop-off he hadn't noticed while swimming so close to the sand. But what struck him more was a collection of strange objects sticking out of the sand almost fifty feet away. Unclipping a stronger, more industrial flashlight from his belt, he held it up to see what looked likedark, jagged tree-trunks jutting out of the sand, each one a few feet from another and all roughly the same height.

Turning back toward the wreck, Joshua saw the lights of Gycks and Nylz emerge from the engine room. He turned the heavy flashlight toward them and toggled the switch on and off to signal their attention.Eventually, the far away lights turned in his direction and began to approach, the silhouettes of the twins coming closer behind them. After a while, during some of which the geckos spent looking through the sand like Joshua had, they emerged into the light near the drop-off's edge. A few of their pouches sagged with some found machinery, but their sour expressions told him they hadn't found much of anything worthbragging about.

Joshua turned around and pointed with his light toward the tree-likeobjects, pointing with his free hand for good measure. The twins swam closer to the edge themselves and joined their lights together with his. With the three of them illuminating them, what looked like 'trees' a moment ago more resembled coral, withtheir jagged edges and growths spanning off of them. If it was coral, then it had somehow settled in a group, yet with gaps of nearly five feet between each other, and had all grown to the exact same height. It struck Joshua that it resembled a farm or planted crops, yet with less organization.

Nylz was the first to swim past him over the edge. Struck with a bizzare, instinctual fear, Joshua shot out a hand and grabbed onto the gecko's shoulder, stopping him in the water. Nylz spun around, alarmed and angry, yet his expression softened slightly at the look on Joshua's face. Joshua slowly shook his head, without beingentirely sure why. After a pause, Nylz irritated expression returned. He flared out his gills, bared his teeth, and jerked his shoulder out of Joshua's grasp. He continued forward, with Gycks behind him. Reluctantly, Joshua put away his flashlight and followed from behind.

As they swam closer, the water became murkier and thicker with debris, so much that the twins were started to bat it out of their faces.Joshua saw it as, of couse, more rust particles, floating through the water so heavily it resembled copper colored snow. Even the sand below had been stained red in parts, like a broad expanse of diseased and infected flesh. He shook the comparison out of his mind as they continued closer.

Nylz, the closest of the three to the mysterious garden, did something unprescedented: he stopped. Nearly twenty feet away, he halted dead in the water, dropping his flashlight in the sand. He turned back, glancing alarmedly at his brother, who had also stoppedto gape. Joshua scrambled for his flashlight and found out exactly what the strange tree-coral objects really were.

Corpses.

A farm of nearly sixty corpses.

Thedead passengers of the Merryweather were buried up to their knees in the sand, those who still had arms were floating above their head as if reaching toward the surface, swaying gently in the current. Those that still had eyes were wide-open and milky white, staring upward at nothing. Many of them were simply pairs of legs jutting from the sand, their torsos having detatched and floated off long ago, bare spinal columnsin their place like antennas.What Joshua had thought to be outgrowths of coral were actually grotesque buildups of even more rust. Somehow,their bodies had accumulated even more rust and metallic decay than the ship itself. Those that had fur were rendered nearly bald as it spread beneath their mottled and pale flesh like a virus. It spread through their veins and ripped through their flesh like jaggedvines.

Joshua gagged beneath his regulator, only barely holding his breakfast in. His heart was pounding against his chest like it wanted to escape andastream of bubbles poured from his mask as he begun to hyperventilate. The gecko twins were also in near hysterics, their gills fanning rapidly in the water. Against all logic, Nylz swam closerto the bodies. Gycks raised an arm to pull his brother back, but his hand shook weakly and he pushed farther away instead.

He neared what had been an old feline woman, her arms and head raised as if in reverance. Spirals of rust entwined her head from her ears, snaking down her through her blood vessels and rooting her to the sand. Her white eyes bugged out in their sockets, the metal inside evidently pushing against them form behind. Joshua couldn't help but notice the grotesque similarities between the corpses, from theirstrange poses, to theirsedentary roots into the sand. The parts of them that weren't ragged and torn apart by the rust infection were grotesquely bloated. But what he hadn't noticed before was how each body, of every species, had their mouths wrenched wide open. Their split cheeksand broken jaws opened into impossibly wide, pitch black holes in the middle of their faces. Many of them were lacking teeth, some of which had fallen to their feet in small piles.

But what made Joshua panic, what finally sent waves a cold fear spider-webbing through his body, was the fact that the corpses were still breathing.

The water seemed to go cold around him as he dropped his flashlight tocalmlysettleinto the sand below, the light falling with it and paintingthe bodies in deep shadowsacrosstheir ragged forms. As he watched in horror, Joshua realized that the bodies weren't breathing; they were eating.While they remained perfectly still, each corpserhythmically flexed its throat in a swallowing motion, even those that barely had any skin left. They didn't make any bubbles, as they were long deprived of any air, but they still mindlessly drank and ate and swallowed the water around them, likely passing it completely through their ruined intestines.They were far from alive, far from needing anything to sustain themselves. So what animated them to eat? What force kept them just barely animate for the sake of swallowing like grotesque plants?

Suddenly, the rust made sense.

Joshua, beneath his mask, let out a muffled series of shouts, nothing coherent, but enough to try and get the twins' attention. Gycksfloated away from the gardenhelplessly, no air in his lungs to make sounds with. Nylz was still a good five feet away from the feline, curiously examining her. At last, he cocked his head toward Joshua's screams, turning his attention to the otter. Joshua batted his hands in the water, miming as best he could for Nylz to get away.

With a sharp crack of something breaking, the feline's arms pivoted in their sockets, crushing the rust between her bones in a cloud of red dust. She wrapped her sharp fingers around Nylz arm and pulled it to her mouth. Nylz jerked in the water, kicking up sand in a panic, as the corpse tried to swallow his arm hole down her yawningand ruined mouth. Nylz'sjaw flapped open in a silent attempt to scream, impotently flailing as he was unable to muster the power to push himself free.

In a motion that seemed totally beyond him, Joshua reached through the strategically cut hole in his wetsuit and jerked the pneumatic pistol free. Not even bothering to aim carefully, he fired a frantic handful of shots toward Nylz, thepointed rounds whizzingthrough the water like small torpedoes. The first two missed altogether. The third hit the thigh of the feline without a reaction. The fourth sailed between them and hit the sand. The fifth clipped Nylz's captured arm and spilled a plume of his blue-green blood into the water. The sixth shot, miraculously, struck the feline in the neck, directly behind her jaw, and severed her spinal column. Her hands went limp around Nylz arm, nearly elbow-deep into her gaping throat. He tore it loose, seemingly ignoring his gunshot injury, and scrambled away in the water faster he had ever swam before.

Joshua had already been backpedaling in the water, his tail wildly thrashing, and Gycks wasn't far behind. Nylz swamtoward them, posessed by fear and trailing blood behind him in the water, and caught up easily.But behind him, out of the darkness, came more. The rest of the bodies, including the feline with her head lolling against her shoulders, had begun to move as well. They turned toward the escaping trio like sunflowers turning to face the sun. They thrashed in place, clawing through the water impotently and jerking against their immobile legs. More than a few, in silent clouds of rust and coagulated blood, wrenched themselves free from their lower bodies and tried to swim after them, their broken jaws swaying limp underneath them.

Thankfully,as persistent as the freed torsos were, they weren't able to catch up to the three divers in their fully panicked scramble to the surface. Shedding gear on the way up to move faster, the gecko twins easily outswam Joshua, who was forced to keep his tank on. He was tempted to even discard it and swim uninhibited toward the boat, but the thought of drowning and becoming something like those monstrosities changed his mind. He did throw away most of his heavier diving equipment, while clutching the pistol in his hand with an iron grip.

The twins had swam far ahead of him by the time he started to near the surface. He barely had any idea where he was until he glimpsed the boat's lightbulb from far away. He sighed, for once thankful of the ingenuity of the geckos, and made his way toward it. But as he neared it from underneath, a loud cranking sound caught his attention as the boat's outboard motor began to sputter to life and spin. Toopanicked to be angry, Joshua took a deep breath from his regulator, then quickly ditched his tank and the rest of his equipment. Feelingboundlesslyliberated, he swam straight up toward the boat as fast as his limbs could carry him. Right as the boat had begun to move, Joshua crashed through the surface the water and grabbed hold to the side with his free hand, the other still holding the gun.

Joshua threw his head back out of the water and took the most satisfying breath of fresh air he'd ever had. He'd spent all his energy trying to reach the boat, but now that he was on it, he didn't have the strength to pull himself up. Unexpectedly, it was Nylz of all people that grabbed Joshua by the shoulders and helped lift him onto the boat. The two of them collapsed on the floor, just happy to have something solid between them and the horrors at the bottom of the bay. Joshua tore his mask off and blinked in the noon sunlight, his eyes adjusting to see Nylz sitting beside him, one of his eyes almost swollen shut. It twitched and watered from a recent blow, but his free arm was occupied withclutching the wound on his other one.

"I-I-I-I tried to stop him! He was gonna leave without ya a-and I tried to stop him for ya and wait b-b-but he-" Nylz stammered. Joshua turned to notice Gycks standing at the wheel and glaring daggers at his brother.

"It-It doesn't matter," Joshua croaked as he leaned flat on the floor. "Just get us the fuck out of here."

>Initalizing...

>Boot Sequence...3...2...1...

>Valient Labs Automated Tracking Probe Software Build 1.6.3

>Loading...

>Scanning for Biomechanical Construct 'Leviathon'...

>Scanning...

>Scanning...

>Construct not found

>Scanning water composition...

>Seawater composition 91.5 % normal levels

>Foreign component detected

>Scanning...

>Iron Oxide present...49.8 %

>Logged

>Warning: Foreign component detected within intake valves

>Critical buildup of Iron Oxide

>Suggest immediate repairs

>Connecting to server...

>...

>...

>...

>Connection failed

A hazy Joshua, his head swimming, groaned out loud in his small roomat the heavy pain throbbing in his joints. He laid nearly comatoseon the bed, nearly naked, a canteen and white bottle in arm's reach on the side table. He shifted to grab one of them, but grit his teeth at the pain of moving and simply lay still, panting. His tongue hung out of his mouth as he stared at the ceiling, hoping and praying he didn't have an additional fever to contend with.

Four days ago, during his quick and panicked ascent from thefloor of thebay, he had forgotten aboutone of the most fundamental dangers of diving: decompression sickness. Because he hadn't stopped to regulate his breathing on the way up, the bends struck him by that night and had him incapacitated in bed by the next morning. For hours he suffered through the ache in his arms and shoulders that had slowly crept down to his legs, leaving them heavy and useless. His tail rested between them, equally sore from simply the physical exertion of swimming for so long and so fast.

Gritting his teeth, he braced against the incoming pain and turned over on his side to quickly grab the small bottle on the table. Screwing off the top, he tossed back three white pills into his mouth, paused, then added a fourth before swallowing them with a swig from the canteen.When he was still barely able to walk, but recognized the pain that was coming, he had traded one of his two remaining scuba tanks for a bottle of painkillers. They worked surprisingly well, but didn't last as long as he'd like them to and left him feeling uncomfortably dizzy at times.

Setting down the bottle, but not the canteen, Joshua laid back onto his lumpy pillow and down mattress, letting himself sink in and relax as much as he could. He shook the canteen, hearing a pitifully small amount of water sloshing around inside. On his trip away from the bay, he had stopped to bottle some clean river water as a treat for himself.He was thankful of his momentary sentimentality as he'd been steadily drinking through that water over the past four days. He left his buckets of rainwater where they were, afraid what the clouds above might have picked up from the bay. After seeing all the rust still floating around in the water, he wasn't going to let a single drop near his mouth.

Screwing the top back on, he set the canteen down and laid as still as he could. Over an hour, he felt a soft haziness cover his body as the pain slipped away into an afterthought. He smiled quietly, feeling the euphoria pad against him like warm clouds. Just as he was about to fall asleep again, the still rational part of Joshua's brain jerked him awake. He needed to get up. Now, before the painkillers wore off.

Sighing, he abandoned his relaxation to gingerly sit up and crawl to his feet on the sandy floor. While the drugs were doing their job on the joint pain, his legs felt rubbery as he stood on them. He hoped he wasn't about to vomit again. Joshua shook his head, smacking it a few times with an open palm for good measure, and knelt under his bed to grab the handle of his red cooler. Lifting it on its back wheels, he tugged it along behind him as he pushed the door open into the afternoon sun.

He winced at the afternoon sunlight, wishing glasses weren't so hard to find, and simply shaded his eyes with his hands until he got used to the light after four days of gloomy darkness. He'dfinally eaten through his collection of dried fish he'd bought before the salvage trip, mostly as something to put on his stomach before he took any of the pills.He wasn't in any state to go fishing, and he'd rather eat handfulls of sand than anything coming from the bay. So, for the second time that week, he'd need to go trading.

Joshua lived on the beach about half a mile away. Far enough to keep to himself, but close enough that he could access people when he needed to. He tugged the cooler behind him, wishing he had the peace of mind to jump into thewater to cool down from the oppresive sun. He wore only a pair of shorts, his fur as dry as it had ever been. He had been pouring riverwater over himself a few days ago to stay comfortable, but that was beforehe was down to one last bottle. By the time he'd made it to the settlement, he was panting and dragging his feet through the sand.

Joshua was at least a little pleased to see life back in the town. Grizzled old fisherman and their steely-eyed wives had never budged from their spot in the first place, but some of the younger locals moved back in as well. An ocelot, not much older than Joshua, was busy outside his shack with a hammer, prying off the boards he had set up. He turned to watch Joshua plod through the sand before giving a sympathetic nod and turning back to work on his house.

The settlement was shaped like a long, inverted 'U,' with the mouth opening toward the bay. Toward the back was something of a gathering center with a fire pit in the middle. To the left of the pit wasJoshua's destination; the trading stand of the old white fox Cyrus, who'd been there longer than anyone. As the otter struggled up to a chair at the bar, Cyrus had his back to him while he cooked a collection of fish over a spick, the fire crackling and roaring comfortably. The smell alone was enough to remind Joshua of his own hunger, but he needed to know where they came from, first.

One of Cyrus's ears swiveled on his head at the sound of the chair creaking under someone's weight. Heflipped over one of the fish to cook evenly before he turned. For the first time Joshua had ever seen it, the fox's expression changed from grizzled indignation to wide-eyed surprise at seeing him.

"Fuck,"Cyrus said, his voice like adiesel engine. "We thought you wasdead."

"Whatever gave you that idea?" Joshua responeded, sardonically. His vision blurred, but he shook his head to clear it, flashing Cyrus a weak smile.

"You look like hell," he said.

"I feel like it," Joshua said, leaning in the bar. "I got hit up with the bends pretty bad after my last dive. Been trying to get over it at home for the past...four days, I think?"

"Saw you with those gecko boys," Cyrus said, looking over his shoulder to check that the fish wouldn't burn. "Thought they'd killed you."

"They don't think I'm worth the effort," Joshua said. "They just look after themselves. Same as anybody else around here."

"But nobody else around here is as smug about it as they are," Cyrus said. He turned back to Joshua, dropping his voice low, despite barely anyone around. "Truth be told, Joshua, you wereone of the last people to talk to those two."

"What?"Joshua said. "What happened?"

"Nothing_happened_ so much as nobody's seen em in almost a week," Cyrus said. He nodded toward the bay. "Their boat's still here, 'long with all their shit in it, but ain't nobody'sheard head nor tail of emsince they came into town last."

"So they were here?" Joshua asked. "While I was gone?"

"S'why we thought they killed ya," Cyrus nodded. "Came to me, matter a' fact. They looked worse than you do, yknow. Flappin out their gills and such. Not talkin right."

"What did they want?"

"Well," Cyrus chuckled a bit, "just about everything. They done bought up nearly everything I had. With cash, too. Tried to make some trades forwhat I had left but..." He shook his head. "Seemed wrong. I told em no deal for the rest of it. Got real mad, caused a scene. Thought Mabel was gonna have to do some barkin' for me," Headded, patting the bar, referring to the bullpup shotgun he kept underneath it. In a drunken mood, he'd told Joshua once that it was named after his first wife, apit bullwho, in his words, 'could spit fire when she got mad enough.'

"Doesn't seem like them," Joshua pondered before moving on to the more important question. "So...what have you got left?"

"Not much," Cyrus shrugged, thumbing over his shoulder. "Why you think I'm fryin' up my own lunch?"

"...Those aren't from the bay, are they?"

"Yeah?"Cyrus said, glancing at them before turning back with a suspicious look. "Why?..."

"...What...You got anything else?"

"Maybe,"Cyrus said, defensively. He folded his arms. "Whatabout you?"

Gripping the bar for support, Joshua leaned over and flipped open the lid of the cooler. With his free hand, he grabbed and set on the bar three warm, yet unopened, bottles of beer. Cyrus took one of them and examined it, holding it up to the light and testingthe bottle cap. Taking the other two, he dropped them out of sight in his own cooler behind the counter before popping open the third on the edge of the bar and took a long swig. He swallowed, sighed comfortably, then smirked.

"I'll see what I got." Cyrus disappeared behind the stand, likely treking across the sand to his own shack where he kept most of his supplies. In a few minutes, he returned with a dirty cardboard box filled with dry goods and canned food.

"Now the question," Cyrus said, dropping the box heavily on the counter. "Is what _you're_lookin for."

"I just..." Joshua hesitated, not wanting to say too much. "I'm getting tired of the food around here, if you know what I mean."He paused, before adding. "I want something that'll keep. Might be going on a trip soon."

"Got some dried flounder back here. Salted. It'll stay good as long as you do," Cyrus said, raising a curious eyebrow and flicking his tail. "...Caught'em myself."

"...That's okay...I'm..." Joshua glanced at the box of canned food. Cyrus caught his gaze and pushed it to the side, leaning on the bar in front of his vision.

"Look, I know everything that goes on 'round here," Cyrus said in a low whisper. "But I gotta know, what happened out in the water? With you and them geckos?" He nodded to the cooler under the bar. "Trade you a drink for a story?"

"Cyrus," Joshua sighed, slicking back his fur as he shook his head. "I wouldn't evenbelieve myselfas I told it to you. Just...don't worry about it."

"Somethin had those twins spooked all to hell. Is there somethin out there y'all found?" Cyrus swallowed. "Didy'all...run into Big Red out there?" He voice shook as he mentioned one of the only things he was still afraid of.

"You think I'd be sitting here if we did?" Joshua said. He looked around, making sure he and Cyrus were outside of earshot. "Listen...it might be time to pack up and move. That's all I'm saying." He leaned over to look around Cyrus, then pointed to the fish. "And I wouldn't eat those if I were you."

"Hmph," Cyrus grunted, sitting up. "Fine. You don't wanna tell me, that's your business." He turned his back on Joshua and tended to the fish. He gestured toward the box. "Take what you need."

Joshua leaned over and dragged the box across the table. He'd been around long enough to know that what Cyrus meant by 'take what you need' was 'take what you paid for.' He dug around in the box, sifting through the dried vegtables and boxed dinners, before he'd assembled a small collection of cans. Somebeans, a can of broth,pickled vegtables, and others. Sitting back down, he waited. Cyrus continued to cook his fish, silently. After a while, he turned around and glanced at Joshua's choices. He picked two cans out of the collection and wordlessly set them back in the box, then nodded.

Joshua quietly gathered up the cans and put them in the cooler. He stood up to leave without a word of goodbye. When Cyrus was done talking, he was done listening, so it was pointless to say anything else. Joshua took the cooler by the handle and walked off. On his mind was the lie he'd told, about leavingsoon, and realizeditmight not havebeena lie after all.

Behind him, Cyrus took one of thecooked fish from its spick and set it down on the bar to cut. Pulling out his knife, he paused,glancing between the fish and Joshua's back as he walked away. After a moment's pondering, Cyrus took the fish and dropped it into the trash before leaving to rummage around for something else to eat.

>Initalizing...

>Boot Sequence...3...2...1...

>Valient Labs Automated Tracking Probe Software Build 1.6.3

>Loading...

>Scanning for Biomechanical Construct 'Leviathon'...

>Scanning...

>Scanning...

>Construct not found

>Scanning water composition...

>Seawater composition 85.2 % normal levels

>Foreign component detected

>Scanning...

>Iron Oxide present...66.7 %

>Logged

>Warning: Foreign component detected within intake valves

>Critical buildup of Iron Oxide

>WARNING: CRITICAL SYSTEM FAILURE IMMINENT

>SUGGEST IMMEDIATE RECALL AND REPAIR

>Connecting to server...

>...

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>Connection failed

Just two days later, much of Joshua's decompression sickness had faded.His joints, while still sore, weren't nearly as stiff as they had been and moving around wasn't as arduous an experience. But as his strength returned, he had finally set his resolve to leave. The sound of the waters lapping against the shore used to soothe Joshua, but knowing about its contamination was too much tosimplyforget.

By mid-afternoon, he had begun to gather up his belongings. Everything he wouldn't or couldn't take with him was loaded on a sled to drag across the sand. Gulping down his last bottle of riverwater, he spent half an hour dragging his load back into the village, ignoring the confused looks of others. By the time he got it up the slight hill to Cyrus's bar, he was already panting.

The old fox was cleaning out a glass when Joshua arrived. He didn't bother to help and simply raised an eyebrow as he finished polishing his glassware. Once Joshua stopped in place, letting the rope handle fall to the ground, he put the glass up and padded around the bar. Joshua took a seat against the table and stretched his arms, his fingers almost wired into place after dragging it for so long. The first thing Cyrus picked up was a clear bottle of half-empty, single-malt whiskey. Joshua had purposely set it on topto get the fox's attention and make him more likely to trade.

Cyrus set the bottle on the bar, farther separated to the left side. After which, he squatted with a loud groan as he sorted through the Joshua's stash. There were some pretty valuble commodities in there; still working car batteries, valuble diving equipment, extra sets of tools, metal odds and ends like nails and screws, even more stashed bottles of alcohol and emergency rations, alongside nearly everything in Joshua's shack that wasn't sentimental or too big to carry.

"You goin somewhere," Cyrus said, standing. It wasn't a question.

"Far," Joshua said, simply. He looked up at the sky over the mountains. "Just some placefar away from here."

"Mmm," Cyrus grunted. He nudgeda couple of objects to the side with his foot, separating the most valuble ones from the rest. "What you lookin' for?"

Without a word, Joshua pulled out a ragged piece of paper with a list scrawled on it in thick handwriting. Cyrus spun it around on the counter and pondered over it, chewing on one of his claws while he did so. He frowned, sitting on one of the stools himself and holding the list closer to better examine it. His tail swished underneath him, the tip just barely grazing the sand.

"Some o' this I got," He said, pointing to a few items. "Most of this I don't. Not yet, anyways." He tapped a few more, before sliding a finger down to the last item on the list. He dropped the list onto the table and tapped it with his claw, making a hard rapping noise against the wood. "But_this_ I can't help you with." The last item of the list was 'rifle + ammunition.'

"I'll give you everything here for you to just try for me," Joshua said, nudging the sled with his foot. "I'm not leaving for a few days. You'll have enough time."

"Time ain't the problem," Cyrus said. "Firstly, ain't nobody that got a gun real keen on gettin rid of it. Second," Cyrus shook his head and nudged the sled himself. "I can't use most of this shit."

"Take it, then," Joshua said, shrugging. "Sell them, give them away, keep them.I can't take them with me and I sure as hell don't need them."

"Does it look to you like I need any more junk 'round here?" Cyrus said, pointing back to his stand.

"Throw it all away, then, I don't care. As long as I get what I need."

Cyrus sighed, turning back to the sled and shifting his eyes between it and the list. He turned and reached over the counter to pull out a thick folder full of ragged and crumpled papers he called an 'inventory.'

"In return for all this," Cyrus said, rubbing his chin, "I can give you nearly all your food. Don't got no MREs now, but what I got is just as good. I can get you a bag, but it won't be no good one, I'll tell you that much.And..." He checked the list again, before glancing up at Joshua. "I'll_see_ about the rifle. Can't promise any more than that."

"Fine."Joshua nodded. He hadn't expected much to begin with. "What about the rest?"

"Most a' this I simply do not have," Cyrus explained. "I'll do some askin around. Can't take more than a week."

"I hope it doesn't," Joshua said, nodding. "One more thing: I just need the name of anybody willing to sell a boat."

"You ain't got nearly enough for-"

"I have more back home," Joshua said, referring to his air compressor. "All I need is a name."

"If you say so," Cyrus said, unconvinced. "If we can add this all to credit, all along with-"

Cyrus's quiet drawl was interrupted by a loud crash just a few houses down. He and Joshua both perked up their heads at the sound. It was followed by more bumping and struggling, with a screaming voice at the same time. The two stood up and hurried quickly to see what was wrong. A number of other villagers had stopped what they were doing to listen as well.

The sound came from a larger shack built up against a sand dune. The observers glanced awkwardly between one another. Before anyone could muster up the courage to go see what was happening, a heavy force slammed against the closed door, shaking sand from the roof and startling everyone watching. Then, with a heavy crash, the door flew open as Gycks was kicked down the steps by the home's occupant, a gruff tigerfisherman who stepped out onto the porch to glare at the floundering gecko. Gycks scrambled all fours, looking up at the tiger with pupils slitted in anger.

From the inside, Nylz crashed through the window, clutching a wooden bucket in his arms. The tiger, reacting quickly, pulled out a spear from beind the doorframe and pinned Nylz's tail to floorboards. He didn't react to the pain at all, not even when he purposly detatched his own tail to free himselfin the way geckos could. He scrambled down to his brother in the sand, dropping the bucket between them.

"You sons of bitches!," roared the tiger. "Stay the hell out of my house!"

The twins ignored him completely as Nylz tore the lid off the bucket and threw it aside. Grasping inside with clawed hands, they eachtook out a handfulof freshly caught fish, some of them still wriggling. Then, in front of everyone watching, the gorged themselves on them. The twins devoured the entire bucket in minutes, grabbing each fish one by one andswallowing them whole without even bothering to chew. Thefisherman, his fists still clenched in rage, stared puzzled at the two as they ravenously tore into nearly twenty whole fish, leaving the bucket clawmarked and empty.

The twins stared at it mindlessly, then turned back toward the fisherman's house. The tiger stomped on Nylz's still-wriggling tail to pull his spear free andheld it back, primed to throw.

"I said stay back, god damn it!" He screamed again. Gycks simplystared back into the fisherman's eyes while Nylz slowly crept forward. Before anyone could jump in to stop him, Nylz raised a hand and snatched his wriggling tail fragment off the porch. He scuttled back to his brother and sunk his teeth into it, to a chorus of disgusted groans from around them. He tore off the meat, his own blue-green blooddripping down his chin,swallowing it while staring up at the sky. Gycks pulled the slab of his brother's meat from his hands and bit into it himself, the still-working muscles thrashing around between his jawsas he stared up at the sky as well, letting blood flow down his throat.

Without a word, the gecko twins stood on their hind legs, but slouched over as if under a massive weight, and staggered off toward the bay, dribbling blood from Nylz's tail as they took turns stripping it to bone. They passed in utter silencearound the corner, shuffling out of sight.

"Jesus..." Cyrus said, panting."Outta put 'em out of their misery." He shook his head."Looks like those two finally snapped."

"Looks like it," Joshua agreed, silently hoping that was all that happened to the twins.

>Initalizing...

>Boot Sequence...3...2...1...

>Valient Labs Automated Tracking Probe Software Build 1.6.3

>Loading...

>Scanning for Biomechanical Construct 'Leviathon'...

>Scan failed

>Scanning apparatus damaged

>Excess buildup of foreign material

>Scanning water composition...

>Seawater composition 79.0 % normal levels

>Foreign component detected

>Scanning...

>Iron Oxide present...81.4 %

>Logged

>Warning: Foreign component detected within intake valves

>Critical buildup of Iron Oxide

>WARNING: CRITICAL SYSTEM FAILURE IMMINENT

>SUGGEST IMMEDIATE RECALL AND REPAIR

>Connecting to server...

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>Connection failed

Joshua woke at dawn. It wasn't like him to be up so early, not naturally at least. It seemed like something had woken him, but the silence betrayed nothing.The waves outside crashed against the shore as they always did. He could tell from the small cracks in his shack that the sun was just beginning to rise. But as he listened, Joshua could just barely hear the sound of passing footsteps leading down the beach. He climbed out of bed and padded quietly through his nearly empty home. He cracked open the door to the early-morning daytime, the sky still orange with the rising sun. It was cold, colder than it was supposed to be that time of year. He shut the door and turned out to the bay, and felt his blood run cold.

It was here.

Leviathon had returned.

The dark mound cutting above the water, streaked red withcorrosion. Foghorn like sounds of its collosal metal body groaning, echoing off into the distance. A miasma of death rising from the sea like a palpable fog. The waves crashing against shore as it displaced the water of the bay. A rainbow effect of contamination spreading from its unseen body like gasoline.

Joshua stepped back and fell to the sand, his entire body cold again. It had come again. So soon after last time. So quickly, so quietly. There wasn't even an alarm. Thediseased machine of the ocean marking its visit without so much as a fanfare. Joshuastood, tears falling from his eyes inadvertently. He wanted to leave. He wanted to abandon everythinghe had just to escape the bastard god.

He stepped forward, his toes almost reach the water. He caught motion from the corner of his eye as two figures made their way down the beach. He ran as quickly as he could through the sand, his legs and abs burning with exertion by the time he'd caught up with them.

Gycks and Nylz stoodon the beach, completely naked, staring out at Leviathon while ankle-deep in the water, letting the tide wash over them. They turned in unision to look at Joshua. He didn't know what he'd hoped to find, but his most nightmarish fears had been realized. They twins' eyes were almost completely whited over, halfcovered by both sets of lids as they stared through Joshua like he wasn't there. Their gills were fanned outward, flapping open and closed uselessly in the air. They were stained a dark, copper red color that seemed to spread all the way inside, down into their lungs. Rust had spread out from Nylz's gunshot wound, engulfing his entire forearm in hard, red growths. Theysmelledlike rot.

Most hauntingly of all, most of their teeth had fallen out, pushed out by new, jaggedshards of red metal growing from inside their jaws. Their mouths were stuck into wide-open, mindless gapes, both jaws completely broken open and swaying from their heads.Joshua could see deep back into their throats, which were also stained a dark red color.

He stepped back quietly, staring down what was left of the Gecko Twinsand getting ready to run. But to his luck, they weren't interested in Joshua. Instead, they turned back to the ocean, gazing their blind eyes out at Leviathon. With another groan of metal, like the call of an enormous creature, the twins walked forward, unceasingly, into the water. They were buffeted by waves and the tide until theyinevitablysank completely beneath the surface of the bay.

>Initalizing...

>Boot Sequence...3...2...1...

>Valient Labs Automated Tracking Probe Software Build 1.6.3

>Loading...

>Scanning for Biomechanical Construct 'Leviathon'...

>Scan failed

>Scanning apparatus damaged

>Excess buildup of foreign material

>Scanning water composition...

>Seawater composition 70.2 % normal levels

>Foreign component detected

>Scanning...

>Iron Oxide present...91.3 %

>Logged

>Warning: Foreign component detected within intake valves

>Critical buildup of Iron Oxide

>WARNING: CRITICAL SYSTEM FAILURE IMMINENT

>SUGGEST IMMEDIATE RECALL AND REPAIR

>Export Message:

>FEED ME

>FEED ME

>FEED ME

>FEED ME

>FEED ME

>FEED ME

>FEED ME

>FEED ME

>FEED ME

>FEED ME

>FEED ME

>Connecting to server...

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>Connection failed