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The season had faded - the bitter cold of the winter slowly retreated into a slumber, to remain as such until next year. With changing temperatures came changing wants and obsessions; for Grian, that meant this spring, the playful whispers and musical chuckles of waves against the shore seemed almost irresistable. So, after brushing thick swathes of sticky cobwebs from a faded, hewn net and plugging holes chewed by woodlice and termites, he headed to the never ending singing of the sea.
Stretching out for miles all around, the waves playfully pushed and batted at the small - definitely too unstable - boat. The crisp, sea breeze tousled with Grian's hair and skipped along the peaks and troughs of the watery expanse all around. The calm was infectious. Above, clouds glanced down idly and seagulls chattered and screeched as they rode the bucking and prancing wind. Grian took a breath, losing himself in the sheer beauty of it all, before casting his net.
It was just a glitter, many metres below, that caught Grian's eye. The flash of what was probably a school of fish. Eyes glued to the now glassy surface, Grian did not notice as the sea birds ceased their screeching cacophony, noor felt the gentle breeze carrying the reassuring smell of land peter off. The world stopped. The world anticipated. The world beheld as this moment unfold.
Below the surface, a dark shape stirred. An eye opened with the quietest 'snick'. A millennia of silt sloughed off in a cloud. Twisting kelp seemed to pull back, petrified, as the shape began to ascend.
Grian's eyes skittered over the inky depths. There. A movement. G's eyes widened - first in shock, then fear - as the sea floor seemed to rise. Ice cold terror wormed its way through his constricted veins, flooding into his brain and telling him to 'RUN!'. Sweaty hands scrambled and fumbled for oars too slick with seawater to grasp: the shape rose out of the water.
The world exploded into cascading droplets.
Water streamed down it in boiling rivulets. The eye - for it was only the eye - blinked slowly, its bejewelled eyelids glittering in the midday sun. Grian could only freeze, caught in the shadow of this freak of nature, like a fish in one of his nets. The golden fractals in its iris flashed with the sun. Its pitchy pupil seemed to burn Grian's skin with the intensity of its glare: he could do nothing but tremble.
Seconds seemed to seep along like pitch through an hourglass. Days seemed to pass, staring at the hulking, scarred form. Its navy skin was encrusted with layers of barnacles, absent only where silvery scars sliped along the surface of its skin. It breathed; so did Grian.
Slowly, as though pulling limbs from greedy quicksand, the shape descended once more. Grian stared entranced as the water rippled, then ceased. The birds started up their laughter. The wind greeted Grian with a gentle tousle of his hair. The world let out a breath. The world moved on.
Grian did not.
Days of sun and sea evolved into weeks: soft hands became bitten by rope; blistered by salt; crowned by callouses; lacerated by his own teeth. His experience thrummed through his brain - a live wire never to turn off. Winter rubbed her bleary eyes. Grian still fished. Searching. Desperate. Forever unsatisfied.
The season had faded - the bitter cold of the winter slowly retreated into a slumber, to remain as such until next year. With changing temperatures came sour stagnation. The world spun on.
Grian remained.