Gaiaruel

"What the fuck are you doing, bud? Did you bring the fish?"

Alex jogged down the hill carrying the rainbow trout, passing the pines. The sun was finally overtaking the mountain, beginning to beat down on the ice and snow. The air was cool and sharp as it was pulled into Alex's lungs, the only part of his body that couldn't be saved by the layers of rags that were keeping him warm. At the bottom of the hill, just by the shore, Eugene sat with the poles, a tackle box, and a drill. Alex reached Eugene and handed him the trout before putting his hands on his knees to catch his breath.

"Why do we need" Alex panted, "a trout when we brought worms?"

"The trout ain't for the fish. This is your first time here, ain't it?" Eugene asked. Alex shook his head.

Eugene explained, "We leave a fish on the shore for good luck, it's something them Syilx people came up with." He took some tobacco out of his pipe, sticking it in the trout's mouth before setting it on the ground. "And we leave some tobacco so we don't fall through the ice, that one I came up with."

"I've never had to do that before, and I've been Ice fishing plenty of times before in Quebec" spouted Alex.

"It's different here in Kelowna, the Syilx say that this lake has a spirit residing in it. One that will pull you down into the depths and feast on you before you can drown."

"You're making this shit up"

"It's true. I saw a boy go under with my own two eyes, the tail of a serpent wrapped around his torso before he even hit the water."

Alex stared at Eugene for a moment, watching the smoke rise out of his pipe before Eugene let out a hearty laugh.

"Come on, bud, lets go catch ourselves some fish." Eugene turned around, grabbing the drill and a rod, and began to walk onto the ice. Alex grabbed the other rod and the tackle box before joining Eugene. They both walked until they were at the center of the lake. Finding a good spot, Eugene began to drill his hole in the ice. With just a little patience and some force, Eugene finished his hole.

"Alright hand me a chair" Eugene said.

"Shit, they are on the shore" Alex replied.

"God damnit Alex, go get em while I drill your hole" 

"Alright"

Alex walked back to the shore with relative ease and picked up the chairs from where they were sitting on the shore. He turned back towards the ice before freezing. Alex set down the chairs and rubbed his eyes with his gloves before seeing it again: there was a hole in the ice, right at the shore, and the trout was gone. 

Alex shouted across the ice, trying to get Eugene's attention but he just kept fishing. Realizing that he'd have to walk to Eugene, Alex picked up the chairs and began to tread lightly through the snow. By the time he got back, Eugene had already caught a Kokanee.

"What took you so long, bud?"

"There's a hole in the ice!"

"Yeah I got yours done while you were fuckin around"

"Not that! There was one at the shore, and the fish was gone!"

"The Ogopogo accepted it then"

"We need to get off of the ice! If something can crack it at the shore we might fall in!"

"Listen boy, I remember picking you out of the line of people begging for a job and paying for a meal before coming out here. Whether you like it or not, I'm at least getting that money back before you go running off." Eugene paused for a second, allowing the flame in his pipe to burn out. "We made our offering, the Ogopogo accepted it, and now we are gonna stay out here and catch as many fish as we can."

Alex stood there a second, before setting down one chair and taking the other to the open fishing hole, casting his line down to the bottom.

“So when am I getting paid?” Alex grilled.

“When I get back to the fish market and sell your fish. I’ll count the money from your fish and pay ya then”

 Eugene relit his pipe with one of the loose matches in his trouser pocket and cast down into the depths. In just seconds, Eugene had hooked a fish, set the line, and yanked it all the way back up to the surface; all before sending his line back down. The only noise that traveled through the air was the casting and reeling, until Alex heard something under the ice.

It was a minute noise at first, a tap tap on the ice from right below his chair, barely recognizable. It traveled up the chair in small waves, into the back, and entered Alex's spine. Tap tap, tap tap through the spine, into the arms, and down the line. As the line moved up and down, a Burbot noticed the bait and bit down. Alex yanked to set the line and reeled. The Burbot fought against him, grasping for freedom from the hook but having that freedom reeled away to the surface.

Alex pulled the Burbot onto the ice, its back fin thudding the ice. 

"Nice one bud, but you gotta gut that one and throw it back"

"Why would I have to do that?"

"To show appreciation for the Ogopogo, you brought one of my fish so you haven't earned its safety yet."

"But-"

"Don't worry, you'll catch another. The Ogopogo seems to like you more than some of the others I've brought out here."

"What's the Ogopogo?"

"Don't you listen? Its the spirit I told you about, the one that took the trout. Didn't you feel the tapping? Didn't you see the line bouncing up and down? That's the Ogopogo at work. Rewarding us for sacrificing our catches”

"Will it help more if we sacrifice another fish?"

"Nah, sacrificing multiple fish don't get its attention too much more than sacrificing one. Unless you get something with a bit of heft to it, then it'll help more."

"Just a bit of heft..." Alex said to himself, casting his rod back down into the ice. It wasn't long until the tight tapping returned to the line. 

Tap tap, tap tap; the line bounced up and down.

A fish swam up and clamped the worm.

The fish got hooked and yanked all the way up the ice.

Slam slam, slam slam; the fish tries to bounce off its brothers to reach the water.

Yank after yank after yank after yank, the pile of silver and rainbow grew as the sun now sat directly above Alex and Eugene. Alex cast again and had an immediate bite of the hook. A force dragged him out of his seat, laying flat on the ice but fighting to pull the fish in. Standing up, Alex yanked with all of the force in his body, finally pulling the fish up to the surface, just to see another Burbot.

“Fuck! Another Burbot”

“What’s wrong with another Burbot? That’s another fish I can take to the market”

“I haven’t caught a big fish yet!”

“That’s fine, I need as many fish as I can get for the market. Big or small”

“Will I get paid more for a bigger fish?”

“That’s for the market to decide”

They went back to casting, settling their hooks down below. The tapping was gone and the only thing they heard was the water splashing the ice. Alex casted a few times, bobbing his rod up and down to dance his hook at the bottom. Nothing. Alex gazed down at his hands, studying the callouses that coated them, visible through the holes in his gloves. His fingernails were packed with dirt and grime. He began to speak.

“You know, before this I was working in a factory. It paid pretty well, too. I’m hoping this pays just as much”

“Focus on the fishing” growled Eugene, pulling his reserve tobacco pouch out of his inner coat pocket.

 Alex threw his hook once again and stared down into the water. The previously murky water was now a deep black that sat right below both Alex and Eugene. Alex casted his line down. It traveled a few feet before falling flat onto the mass below.

"I think there is a big one below me" Alex said.

"Let me come take a look at it" Eugene said, standing up from his seat and walking over. "Nah, that is the Ogopogo. I think its ready for the big one." Eugene said.

"But I don't have any big ones to give it"

"I know son" Eugene said.

"What do we give it?" Alex asked.

"I'm sorry bud" 

Eugene pushed Alex into the hole, letting the Ogopogo claim his meal. The serpentine tail shot up above the ice and plunged down, piercing Alex's body and dragging him all the way down to the bottom of the lake.

Have you looked up in the sky at the new moon yet? The one that NASA says we have until 2083? The one that they say we won't be able to see?

I saw it

Last night, I perched in my lawn chair on my balcony. The concrete sapped heat from the soles of my feet as I swirled a glass of hooch, enjoying the cranberry-grape flavoring. I looked through the  falling leaves and tiny branches of the bald cypress in front of me to see the night time street. The rows of cars were slowly emptying out to our little college town bar. The wind carried the faintest hint of salt with it, flowing all the way from the shore to our campus. It made the tree away back and forth, knocking just a few more leaves out of it. 

I swirled my glass, watching the purple-red liquid slosh around before seeing a light flicker on the fluid. There was a shooting star in the sky. It flew fast, painting a red line in the sky as it fell. It fell and fell, all the way down to the earth, disappearing behind the trees, towards the shore.

Crash

The concrete shook, scratching at my feet as the hooch reverberated in my glass. The metal legs of my lawn chair grinded against the floor and I could hear the decorations on my wall crash to the carpet inside. The tree shook all of its leaves off, falling down to the chalk-drawn pumpkins and leaves of the sidewalk below.

And then it stopped.

I took a fast swig and this time I could taste the burn a bit more. I looked up to the sky again and the trail still floated all the way up there. Some of the stars it crossed were now filtered to a red light, small bleeding pinpricks in the sky. 

I saw where the line started. Everyone who felt that crash did.

It sat up there in the sky, a misshapen ball half the size of the original moon. Did that make it smaller or further from us? There was no mistaking that the star came from it. The line connected perfectly and splashes of red can be seen near the top. There were plateaued mountains and caverns up there, creating a jagged shape in the sky. What is i-

The new moon breathed. In and out, in and out, in and out. Then it gushed. Blowing four more stars out of the mountains and down towards the earth. They tainted the sky on their way down, painting more of the sky red as they fell into the ocean. Nothing.

Then 4 more convulsions of the Earth, trembling the ground as if the trees around me came crashing down. It started to rain, a very salty smell dominating all of the air.

When I was a kid, my family would always vacation to Myrtle Beach. It was a nice break from all the rain and dying stores of Northeast Ohio. I always loved to go to the beach when we were there because I'd always find something interesting in the sand. I'd find sand dollars, dead jellyfish, and if I was lucky, an unbroken conch shell.

When I grew up, I moved to Myrtle Beach. The beaches were how I remembered, soft sand interspersed with sharp shells; lost toys half-berried; "F+J" written in the sand with a heart around it, ready to be washed away by the sea. The beach was the perfect place to clear my mind. I would strut down the sand in a trance-like state until the wind forced me back. It started with just walking on the beach every Saturday, and over time I started to walk on the beach more and more until I walked every night. Something about that beach, was, hypnotizing.

One night, I was doing my usual walk until I noticed something, footsteps stamped the sand. By the time I was out there, the beach was abandoned for the night. Tourists retired to their hotels and the water washed away all signs of life. These footsteps were uncalculated but they weren't drunken, and they were walking towards the pier on 14th. I followed them under the dyed pier until they disappeared into the water. I paused and looked out. The full moon sat atop the sky with a pantheon of stars, illuming the water as if bioluminescent algae was on the shore. The waves rolled in calmly, painting new shapes onto the beach and sliding over old ones with a crash. I stood there for a few minutes, tasting the sea water on my skin and feeling the sky above me. That's when I noticed it.

The waves in the water emanated from one spot, probably 10 yards off of the shore. A rhythmic pulsing of the water, much calmer than the chaotic crashing of the ocean. The pulsing pushed me closer to the water, closer to that perfect sky. I extended myself out to the sky, I wanted to reach the moon, but something pulled me down. An electric tendril wrapped itself around my leg and began to tug me down into the ocean.

I tried to fight the stinging, but each electric pulse forced my muscles to disobey me. The electric started by dancing left and right on my tongue, subduing my tongue to its command. Next it stole my face, then my arms, and my legs until all I could do is watch. The infinite abyss conquered my essence. The water plunged my lungs and I could feel my vision falling into my brain, my last sight of the world being the full moon.

When I woke up I saw that white, sterile ceiling. I felt that electric sting in my legs and an IV dripping fluid into my arm. They said they found my body on the beach, a blueish hue draped on my lips.