Chapter Text
Sarah had her arms full as she walked along the dock. She helped a family friend with cleaning their boat out from Scuba Diving season. Her flip flops squeaked against the creaky old wood of the dock.
“Hey! Sarah!” Benny piped up, smiling brightly and waving her over.
She almost dropped the tank in her arms and had to set it down to steady herself. “Oh,” she caught her breath, “What’s up?”
“I’m just trying to figure out what’s going on with my Zodiac, it won’t start.”
Sarah rolled the air tank to a safe position on the dock and jumped into the Zodiac. “I could help.”
“Oh sure, thanks.” Benny turned around, “Let me grab my toolbox, one sec.”
Sarah hummed in response, watching as Benny walked off towards the land, and started on the engine. It didn’t start- she could have gotten that from what Benny said, but always best to double check. Looking closer, she realized it had nothing to do with the engine itself, but with the spark pull. Mainly, that it was missing. She looked up to hop off in the meantime, realizing only then that she had drifted away from the dock and was now floating in the middle of the marina. She waved her arms at Benny and he ran over from where he was with his toolbox.
“I am so so sorry.” He called out to her.
“You seriously didn’t tie it down?”
“I untied it when I got on, I didn’t think I’d have to fix anything.” He lamented as he followed the boat down the side of the marina.
Sara sighed, sitting down. “Well, your spark plug is missing.”
“Really?” Benny scratched the back of his head and watched as she got closer to the edge of the marina.
“Yup.” She looked out at the ocean and dug her head in her hands. Odds were, she would have to jump out. Not that she wasn’t already wet, but she had already rinsed off on the boat, she would have to get completely soaked again and re-wash her hair. “Probably got stolen, if I had to guess.” The calm in her voice betrayed her, she was angry as all hell. But Benny didn’t deserve her fury, this was an accident. And she wouldn’t take it out on him if she could help it.
“Sarah, I am so sorry, I’ll fix this I-”
Benny was cut off by someone from the other side of the marina jumping into the Zodiac. A blur of blonde hair all but slammed into Sarah, who caught herself before going over the edge.
“What the hell?” Sarah straightened herself out, “Is this some kind of rescue attempt? Because you’re missing so-”
Rory perked up, popping the collar of his colorful button up. “You mean this?” He held up the spark plug.
“Rory, you little-” Benny was cut off again by the motor starting.
As the engine sputtered up, Rory steered them out. For a ‘no-wake’ zone, he was going pretty fast, but Sarah didn’t say anything.
“Why’d you do that?”
“Because you were floating out to sea.”
Sarah shook her head but smiled. “No, dipshit, why’d you steal the spark plug.”
“I dunno. It was funny.”
“Fair enough.” Sarah laughed, enjoying the ride.
They took a full tour of the oceanside. Rory pointed out all of the beaches and landmarks in an announcer voice, which usually would have been pretty cheesy, but it was just two of them and Sarah honestly didn’t mind his jokes. He could be funny every now and then. They were nearing what Sarah assumed would be the end of their ride, crossing under a bridge, when she spotted Erica walking along a path, reading something on her phone.
“Erica!” Sarah yelled out, catching her friend’s attention.
“Hey,” Erica said hesitantly, “What’re you doing?”
“Long story, wanna join?”
Erica looked around. There wasn’t anyone else along the path. She shrugged, smiling and ducking under the railing to join them in the Zodiac.
“H-hey Erica.” Rory tried to wink, but ended up scrunching his face at her.
“Hey.” Erica sat opposite of Sarah at the front of the small boat, “Am I allowed to ask what you’re doing now?”
“Rory stole Benny’s Zodiac, we’re taking a joyride.”
Erica looked more confused than when she had gotten into the boat. “Benny Weir? Why?”
“Because it’s fun.” Rory took a sudden turn, “And Benny always goes too slow.”
“Alright.” She said curtly, pushing her glasses back up.
The three of them kept going around, the same way they had before, Rory pointing ashore and making lame jokes about each beach. And sand. And salt. And anything. For her credit, Erica did laugh at most of them. She only complained when he would turn too quickly and splash her Splash (1984) one of a kid t-shirt, claiming the salt water would stain.
Somewhere along their ride, they had agreed to go out to Mako island. Mako was a good ways off the coastline, it always took awhile on a regular boat, but they were in for the ride. Surprisingly enough, their time together wasn’t as bad as it could have been. Halfway there, the motor cut out.
“Dang.” Rory sighed as the engine sputtered out.
“What’s wrong?” Erica swung her head back around to him, her ponytail catching in the wind.
“We’re out of gas.”
“What.” Sarah clenched her teeth for the second time that day, this time remarkably harder. “Do we have paddles?” She asked absently, always the peacemaker, though neither of her friends seemed too plussed.
“Here.” Erica handed her a small plastic paddle and kept one for herself.
By the time they made it ashore the sun was beginning to set. It was a beautiful scene, and would have been made better if not for the situation they were all in. They beached the Zodiac and sat along the beach.
“There’s a campground on the other side of the island, maybe we can make it over there?”
“How far?” Erica had her knees pulled up to her chin, staring out at the water solemnly. Her shirt was now soaked and starting to discolor.
“I dunno. It’s pretty far, but it beats being out here when it gets dark.” Rory got up, dusting himself off and looking out at the treeline.
“He’s right.” Sarah used Erica’s shoulder and get up, following after him in her speaky flip flops.
Erica mumbled some indecencies and flung herself up. They started off into the woods. None of them were very versed on the island layout. Rory had been to the campsite with Ethan and Benny on their annual trip, but they never ventured too far. Him and Benny had tried to sneak off one time after Ethan fell asleep. They got as far as a river and turned back, scared off by the amount of bugs. Ethan had scolded them in the morning about camping safety.
Rory felt like the area they traversed was familiar, but the whole island felt that way. He found a stick and was using that to shake away cobwebs. Sarah flinched every time a piece of the forrest floor touched her feet, which was every other step. Erica was just trying to keep up with them. As a group, they were all upset and very much lost. A crossing of rocks came up. Rory jumped it easily, turning to help Sarah across, but just as he did she slipped fell into what looked like a cave. He glanced down. Erica leaped after her.
“Are you guys okay?” Rory yelled down the tube.
Erica dusted herself off, her glasses fogged and crooked. Sarah helped with Erica’s glasses and readjusted her foot. “I think I sprained my ankle, but we’re okay.”
Rory responded by sliding down to them, crashing into Erica’s back and sending her sprawling back out onto the sandy area in front of them. “Woah!” Rory got up immediately and ran towards the opening, finding a moon pool and kneeling down to brush his hand back and forth in the water. Sarah stumbled after him and sat with her feet in the water.
“Just wait until Ethan and Benny hear about this! They’ll freak!” Rory smiled lopsidedly up at Sarah, his hair all messed up from the slide down.
Despite the situation, Sarah smiled and ruffled his hair. “I bet they will.” She couldn’t take away from Rory’s enthusiasm, he was too happy for her to be mad.
“Why did you do that.” Erica spit out the words. “You could have gotten us a rope or something.”
Rory tilted his head up at her. “Where would I get a rope?”
“Fine, whatever.” She crossed her arms and sat next to Sarah.
Rory fired back to life, pointing to a place below the surface brightly. “You know, Ethan was telling me all about volcanic tunnels, and usually in ones like this they’ll have an outlet at the bottom somewhere for the water to come in, how cool is that!”
Erica face palmed. “Which means we could swim out.” Her voice held little weight in the echoing corridor.
“Which means we could swim out!” Rory beamed.
Rory took a second to gather himself and jumped into the pool. Sarah winced as he did so. There could be rocks or sharks or any number of things at the bottom and he just jumped in so recklessly. Maybe she had been spending too much time with Ethan, even her internal dialogue was starting to sound like him. She sighed and reached for Erica next to her, who obliged with her hand.
“It’ll be okay, yeah?” Erica cooed, wrapping Sarah’s hand in both of hers.
Rory’s head popped up from the water and he shook out his hair. “There’s an outlet, we could swim out no problem.”
Erica sighed, taking out her ponytail and rolling it onto her wrist, taking her glasses off and sliding them under the band. “Alright, let’s do this.”
“Hey, on the bright side, this can’t get any worse.” Rory shrugged.
“Don’t jinx it.” Sarah took off her flip flops and wrapped the straps over her forearm, hoping to god they wouldn’t break.
Erica stepped into the pool slowly, pushing herself down and dousing her hair before pulling herself back up and brushing it back out of her face. She helped Sarah into the pool, careful not to put pressure on her ankle. Just as she had started wading in the shallow pool, an air engulfed the room. It was more humid than before, and brighter. The pool began bubbling and she held onto Erica for security. Rory reached for the edge of the pool. And just as suddenly as it started up, the light and bubbles subsided back into the water.
“Let’s go.” Sarah ran a hand through her hair.
“Agreed.” Rory took Erica’s hand not occupied by Sarah and started guiding them down and out. It took longer than any of them thought, and they surfaced gasping and throwing their limbs around the water.
All any of them remembered was the lights of a boat, big fluffy towels, and their parents picking them up at the dock. The next morning came quickly.
Sarah woke up two hours early from a nightmare, sitting up straight in bed. She hardly remembered her nightmares, but this one was clear as day. It washed over her that maybe that wasn’t a dream, that her nightmare was the reality of what had happened the night before. Sure enough, a fluffy towel was sitting on the floor, right in front of her bed. She hadn’t taken a shower last night. Tired and groggy, she climbed out of bed and started up the shower. She glanced in the mirror, her reflection foggy. The image straightened out after she rubbed her eyes. And without thinking much, she stepped into the shower, with her clothes still on. She figured it wouldn’t be bad to rinse them before throwing them in the wash.
As steam began to rise, something felt off. Like pins and needles, almost a numbness in her legs where the water hit. If Sarah didn’t have a shower tub, she wouldn’t have fallen over. But the tub was slippery and where she legs had been, there was no longer any suction. Taking a deep breath, Sarah looked over her shoulder to find an orangish pink tail.
“Shit.” She murmured, quickly throwing the faucet off and attempting to roll herself out of the tub.
She grabbed a towel off the rack and attempted to roll herself off on the floor. It worked well enough, and she was able to dry off in a matter of minutes. Her legs reappeared as soon as she was liquid-free, the same feeling of numbness engulfed her. Something dropped in her stomach. Would she be able to drink water? What about helping out at the dock? Pool parties? And finally, Is this because of last night?
Running into her room, Sarah dialed up Erica frantically. Sounding annoyed and mumbling, Erica answered.
“What?”
“Erica, did it happen to you too?”
“Did what happen?”
Sarah could hear her rolling over in bed on the other end of the line.
“Nevermind, nevermind I-” She was interrupted by an incoming call from Rory. “I’ll call you back later.” She hung up with Erica and took Rory’s call.
“Saraaaah.” He drawled, “You’ll never believe what happened this morning, I was getting ready to do my laps, and I slipped, but turns out, I didn’t slip, I had a tail, how crazy is that?”
“So it happened to you too?”
“Yeah, I finished my set like ten minutes faster than usual.” Rory mused.
“Okay, okay.” She tried to steady her breathing, “Rory, meet me at the cafe at nine.”
“Sure thing! Wait- does this mean you have tail too?”
“Yes, can we talk about it later?”
“For sure.”
“Okay, bye.”
Sarah set down her phone and fell back into bed. Today was going to be a long day.