Don’t you?A curious voice whispered from a deep pocket of his mind, a voice both foreign in its liquid cadence yet familiar as his own heartbeat.
The lake's surface trembled ominously, concentric ripples spreading outward like the rings of a disturbed spider's web, small waves whispering warnings ahead of the swelling mass beneath. A primordial rage—hot as magma yet cold as the deepest trench—surged through the creature's ancient consciousness, dormant for decades but now awakening with the sharp-edged vengeance of a forgotten god. Its memory, perfect and crystalline despite the passage of time, recalled the humans who had invaded its domain—their tobacco-stained breath, their hatred glinting in bloodshot eyes, their grotesque cruelty as they sought to kill its beloved. Their bloated remains had long since settled into the sinister depths, becoming foodfor bottom-feeders, yet the creature never forgot the darkness humans were capable of—the unique cruelty that existed nowhere else in nature.
The pontoon’s lights spilled yellow across the obsidian surface of the lake, while bass-heavy music thundered downward through the water column, vibrating through the creature's gelatinous form like an electric current. The humans' drunken laughter—harsh, staccato barks that sliced through the night—carried the same bitter malice as the tobacco-stained threats of those men who had dragged Quinn into the lake decades ago. Now these new intruders aimed beer cans like missiles at the young man's skull—the same young man whose childhood laughter once rippled through these waters, whose small fingers had once stroked the creature's tentacles with innocent wonder.
The water rose rapidly, surging across the surface toward the boat like a miniature tsunami, moonlight gleaming off its unnatural crest. It hit with the force of a battering ram, flowing beneath the hull with deliberate malice. The craft lifted and tilted forty-five degrees, its aluminum railings groaning under the strain as the passengers’ screams pierced the night. Beer cans and coolers slid across the deck, smashing against the railing.
The swell subsided with eerie suddenness, causing the boat to drop heavily like a stone, its flat bottom slapping the water with a thunderous crack that echoed across the lake. The creature dove deeper, its gelatinous body undulating with purpose as it swam in tight, vengeful circles below, accelerating until the water above formed a perfect vortex, generating swirling currents that spun the craft like a child’s toy in a bathtub drain.
Graham's jaw unhinged. “What the fuck...?” The words escaped as a strangled whisper, barely audible over the violent churning of water. The lake’s surface erupted into a frothing maelstrom around the pontoon boat. Rooted to the spot, muscles locked in terror, he watched Ryan and Wendy scramble as they lost their grip on the metal railing. Their bodies cartwheeled through the air before hitting the water with twin slaps that echoed across the lake. As they surfaced, gasping and sputtering, the whirlpool dragged them into its spiraling maw.
The vortex suddenly calmed, the water smoothing unnaturally fast. Then the pontoon’s rear section rose from the depths, water cascading off its metal underside in silver sheets. It climbed higher, higher, until it stood perfectly vertical, like the Titanic's final salute to the living. The boat's lights sliced wildly through the darkness as a cacophony of terrified screams and desperate profanity shattered the night. The remaining passengers abandoned ship, their bodies creating staccato splashes in the black water.
Graham couldn’t move; his sneakers embedded in the silty mud beneath his feet. Fifty yards away, Deke and the others thrashed through the inky water. They paused to look back, their faces bleached of color, as the thirty-foot pontoon craft bobbed in place. Then it crashed forward with a sickening metallic groan, slapping face down in the water with a thunderous splash that sent waves rippling outward. The deck lights flickered once below the surface before going dark. Air bubbled from beneath as the vessel capsized, its underside gleaming wetly before the lake began swallowing it whole.
Jesus.Graham swallowed hard, his throat clicking dry despite standing in a lake. His heartbeat rattled his ribcagelike machine-gun fire, each pulse sending spots dancing across his vision. His eyes bulged as the lake swelled again over the wreck site—a massive, glistening dome that caught the starlight in oily patterns—and moved with deliberate intelligence toward the bobbing passengers. Their screams pierced the night, primal and raw, as they thrashed toward shore, leaving frantic white wakes.
His paralysis shattered, Graham plunged into the water, each stroke carrying him beneath the weathered dock where shadows pooled like ink. Splinters jutted from the underside of the planks, inches above his head, as he treaded water, his breath coming in ragged gasps that echoed in the hollow space. Algae-slicked posts offered meager shelter as he pressed his spine against the slimy wood, chest heaving.
His “friends” thrashed toward shore, fingernails clawing at mud and reeds as they hauled themselves onto land. Their soaked clothes clung to their bodies, dark patches spreading beneath them on the dry ground. From his hiding place, Graham watched, transfixed, as the lake’s massive dark swell receded like an exhaled breath, the water’s surface settling into an unnatural stillness that reflected the cold pinpricks of stars overhead, betraying nothing of its violent awakening moments before.
“Where’s Graham?” Wendy's voice cracked, high and brittle in the night air.
“Who the fuck cares?!” Brian bellowed, his words echoing across the water, spittle flying from his lips. “Let’s get the fuck out of here!”
Graham crouched neck-deep in the murky water, hidden beneath the gangplank’s rotting underbelly where spider webs clung to his eyelashes, and algae slithered against his skin. His gaze remained locked on the lake’s black surface, searching for ripples, swells, anything. His body trembled violently, teeth chattering against each other—not from the chill in his bonesbut from witnessing the impossible. The memory of the pontoon rising like some mechanical leviathan replayed behind his eyes. He watched the glassy surface for any disturbance, his pulse a deafening kettledrum at the base of his throat, each throb constricting his windpipe until each breath became a desperate, ragged wheeze.
The vehicles roared to life with a guttural snarl of engines, tires spitting gravel like machine gun fire as they peeled out down the dirt road. The empty boat trailer bounced and clanked behind Deke's Ford F-150, its chains rattling like angry ghosts. The instant their taillights vanished into the pines, Graham emerged from beneath the dock, his waterlogged clothes clinging to his skin. He thrashed through the shallows, each desperate stroke sending ripples across the glass-black surface, and scrambled up the muddy embankment on all fours.
His fingers dug trenches in the soft earth as he collapsed onto solid ground, his lungs burning. He twisted around, chest heaving, eyes bulging with terror as he stared back across the lake. Ten feet from shore, the water began to swirl—not the gentle eddy of wind or current, but a deliberate clockwise rotation that dimpled the surface like a finger pressing into flesh. Graham’s throat constricted around a strangled gasp as he scuttled backward, his fingernails tearing into the soft earth. He scrambled upright, his sodden sneakers slipping on dewy grass, leaving twin smears of lake-bottom silt as he fled toward the cabin.
Bursting inside, he slammed the door with such force that the hinges shrieked and the cabin’s windows rattled in their frames. His sodden clothes left dark puddles on the splintered pine floorboards as he stumbled to the window, leaving muddy footprints in his wake. Graham pressed his face against the cool glass, breath fogging the pane in rapid, uneven patches. With no moonlight, the lake was nearly invisible in the night, a black voidwithin the darkness, reflecting nothing but pinprick stars that seemed to float in nothingness.
Graham’s legs gave way beneath him. A violent tremor seized his body, starting in his fingertips and surging through his limbs like an electric current. He sank to the rough-hewn floorboards, splinters catching on his sodden clothes as he collapsed. His arms wrapped around his torso, fingernails digging into his own flesh. His knees pulled up close to his chest, vertebrae curling forward one by one until his forehead pressed against the damp denim of his jeans. Hot tears spilled down his grime-streaked face, dripping from his chin to darken the already soaked fabric clinging to his shivering form.
What was that—what the FUCK was that?!
The shakes intensified until his teeth clacked together and his fingers curled into useless claws. He lurched to his feet, stumbling twice before reaching the dresser and his sports bag. His numb fingers fumbled with the zipper of his jeans, which clung to his skin like a cold, dead thing. The wet denim slapped against the floorboards. He peeled the shirt from his torso, revealing skin mottled with goosebumps and streaked with lake grime. He pulled on a clean pair of boxer briefs that caught on his damp calves, then a white T-shirt that pasted to his damp chest.
The mattress springs whined as he crawled into bed, yanking the quilted blanket up to his chin. His eyes, hot and swollen, fixed on a knot in the wall that resembled a deformed, screaming face. Terror, grief, and a multitude of other emotions collided in his chest like derailing trains, and he buried his face in the blankets. His sobs came in jagged, hiccupping bursts that tore at his throat, the sound of a drowning child gasping for air.
His fingers clutched at the space beside him, searching for his grandpa's calloused hand—aching for his presence, hissafety, his comforting words assuring Graham that he wasn’t alone… and he wasn’t losing his mind.
9
Graham’s dreams were a mashupof images and scenes that didn’t quite fit together, some almost sensual, others tense and somewhat frightening. He woke up with a headache—not a hangover, as he hadn’t consumed but one beer the night before—but a tight band of pressure that felt like it was crushing his skull, likely a result of the stress and tension from last night.
Last night.
Had that really happened? He didn’t have theinebriationexcuse to explain it away this time. Did that mean the night before last… wasn’t an alcohol-induced dream, either?
Tension crept back into his muscles and made his head hurt even more. Graham left the bed and walked to the window. The lake appeared calm, peaceful… non-threatening. But was that simply a façade? The frightening image of the pontoon boat rising out of the water, then capsizing and sinking, remained vivid in Graham’s mind. How was that not the embodiment ofthreatening?
Whatever it was… may have saved your life.If one of the beer cans had struck him in the head…
Graham rubbed his eyes and turned away from the window. The throbbing in his skull intensified as he tried to apply reason to the events of the previous night, when nothing made sense. The things he witnessed—and experienced—couldn’t have happened. Maybe someone ruffied theonedrink he’d had.
He took a couple of pain relievers and sat on the bed, his head in his hands. He didn’t know how to move on from this moment, how to processreality…or what that even entailed anymore. When he was younger, Graham vaguely recalled having dreams about the Lochlan Lake stories, where he visited the lake with his grandfather and played in the water with the creature.
