Work Text:
The foghorn blared.
Star Coral Cookie, after all this time, had gotten used to its thundering roar; she was always the one to sound it off. She took pride in her work. It was dirty, exhausting, stressful even. But she had purpose here. The horn may have practically made her half-deaf after so many years, but by now it was almost like her one friend on the island.
As she made her way down the winding stairs, she felt the dull aches in her feet with each and every step. Even for someone of her occupation, today had been particularly demanding. Her joints creaked and her head throbbed. Exiting through the lighthouse door, never before had she felt so eager to lie down.
Star Coral Cookie creaked her cabin door open. The cool air inside was inviting, welcoming—even with it being so humid she could almost swim in it. She shut the door and a chill ran down her spine, a chill she felt every day, a chill she loved. It grounded her just enough to calm her thoughts at the end of a long shift.
She beat her hat against her leg to get any leftover seawater out and hung it on the rack. The coat didn’t need such treatment; its resilience was something to be admired. However, it was water-resistant, not waterproof: it was heavy and damp. After tugging the coat off, Star Coral Cookie shook it with as much strength as her dough could muster until she felt it was good enough, then hung it on the rack as well.
She felt like she could pass out.
After everything else was taken care of—as much as she had the energy for, that is—Star Coral Cookie slammed her body into her mattress. She didn't even have time to think about the next day before she fell unconscious.
The foghorn blared.
She sprung awake and grabbed the alarm clock on the endtable next to her.
02:37 A.M.
Why had it woken her up so violently? The horn was so loud, much louder than she had ever heard. She still had a pounding headache, and her legs still felt like rusted iron. She was about to lie back down and close her eyes, then she realized something.
Who sounded the horn?
Adrenaline surged back into her dough. Jumping out of bed, she scrambled to snatch her coat and hat off from the rack. She hopped into her boots, swiped her lantern, and swung the door open. Rain was pouring down onto the pier, harder than any rain she had experienced in years.
It was pitch-black; by no means was she averse to darkness, but tonight was new. She looked towards the sea—or the direction she was sure the sea was in—and all that stared back was an abyss. If not for her lantern, it wouldn’t have felt as if she were anywhere at all.
But that didn’t stop her. She hurried forward, skipping multiple planks with every stride.
With every few plonks of her boots on the wood, a new question arose. Who was in that station? Why were they here? Why did they sound the horn? Was it meant for someone?
Was it meant for her?
After what felt like hours of walking, Star Coral Cookie had made it up to the station door. She put her ear up to it in hopes of hearing anything at all from the other side, even if the roaring tempest around her was drowning out everything else. She didn’t hear anything odd, and the lights were off. The door was locked.
Regardless, she grabbed the station key out of her pocket and fumbled with the lock for a few seconds before getting the door open. She flicked the lightswitch and was momentarily stunned by the dingy, off-yellow flash, as her eyes had already adjusted to the deep behind her. Clasping her lantern to her belt, she called out. There was no response. Now there were two possibilities: either Star Coral Cookie had gone insane, or there was something she was not meant to know.
As much as she wanted to bolt up the stairs to try and catch such an intruder, her fear had gotten the better of her. She eased up the staircase, one step at a time. Each step felt heavier than the last, but when it came to the last one at the top she whipped her body around the railing to try and catch whomever it was up here off-guard.
Nothing.
The foghorn didn’t appear to be tampered with. It wasn’t even powered on. Yesterday must have gotten to her, she thought. She must have been imagining things—yes, that was it. Maybe the foghorn was the end of a bad dream.
Star Coral Cookie left the station, locked the door, and went back to bed.
The foghorn blared.
Star Coral Cookie jolted up once again. This time, she was sure. It felt more real than the last. Swiveling around on the mattress towards her endtable, she looked at—
1:43 A.M.?
Surely her clock was broken, or faulty, at the least.
Other than the horn, she hadn’t heard anything from outside; she guessed the storm had stopped. That, or quieted down.
Her breaths felt heavier than normal. She was certain the horn had sounded again, didn’t it? Was it even worth investigating? What if it’s another waste of time? Her sleep schedule had already been skewed enough, and that wasn’t even including tonight’s events.
Star Coral Cookie had two options: She could go back to sleep and investigate when she had more energy and without the pain racking her dough, or she could go out now and—best case scenario—find some answers and finally rest with a quiet mind.
She sighed and crawled out of bed.
She may have well been on autopilot the entire time she got dressed. From an outsider’s perspective, she would have appeared to be preparing for any regular shift. She slipped on a turtleneck, buttoned her coat, pulled up her boots, and put on her hat; securing it with a slight twist. After taking her lantern and flicking it on, she opened the cabin door and—
It was broad daylight.
Now, Star Coral Cookie was truly lost.
She looked down towards the planks, they were usually a darker chocolate color when wet—not this time. Their luster was matte, as if there had been no rain at all. She lowered a foot onto the pier. It let out a high-pitched creak, rather than the deep plonk she was used to hearing from them after a storm. Kneeling down, she touched her hand to the wood. It was bone dry.
She lowered the arm carrying her lantern and looked down at it as if it was a ghost, then fastened it to her belt. Maybe it was time to get a new alarm clock. She must have overslept. Yes, that was it. She was overworked that day, that’s all.
Even after all of this, she couldn't abandon her duty. It was her job to protect this island—to protect the lighthouse. She marched on, yet all the while her vision kept flipping between the station and the pale sky above, even with every jolt of pain in her joints. Were the lights on? There weren’t any clouds. The paint was chipping. There wasn’t a bird in sight. Would the horn go off again?
Would it go off again?
The only sounds she could hear were her own footsteps: leather on wood. Not even the squawk of a seagull filled the silence. However, it did give her room to think. Had Grams seen anything like this? Of course not, she would have mentioned it in one of her stories, surely. What about the others? Was this new? Was she encountering something unknown?
No, she overslept. She was tired. This was all nonsense. She was investigating a break-in, there was nothing else to it.
With only a few more steps until she reached the station door, Star Coral Cookie turned around to get another look at her surroundings. She had been so used to blinding fog and crashing waves, peace like this felt… wrong.
She turned around and produced the station key from her pocket. Again, she fumbled with the lock. Turning the knob, she opened the door and peered inside.
The sound of a scratching groan caused her to snap her head back outside.
It came from the lighthouse.
She rushed over to the lighthouse’s base and glanced through a window, cupping her hands against the pane to get a better view. The lack of light made it impossible to see anything. Star Coral Cookie stepped back and let out a deep breath.
This was it.
She turned the knob of the lighthouse door and opened it just a crack. It was much too dark. Even with the drapes curled open, not a single ray of light was entering the room. It was as abyssal as a new moon. Flicking the lightswitch was fruitless; it was busted. She grabbed her lantern and thrust it forward. The ticking of the grandfather clock towards the back of the room felt more like a timer. A timer for what, she couldn't say. She walked up to it and looked at its face. It was near impossible to read.
1:59 A.M.
Something fell behind her.
She spun around and, again, thrust her lantern forward. She wanted to speak up—to demand an answer—but her lips felt sewn shut. All that came out instead was a muffled grunt.
The clock struck two, followed by the intense clang of its bell.
She jumped at the intrusion and turned to face it. A few seconds passed. The hands on the clockface then zipped a full cycle from two to three, and with it, the bell clanged again—louder this time. Too loud. She yelped and jolted to cover her ears, dropping the lantern. It clacked onto the hardwood floor, and the light rolled away. The appendages of the clock's face zipped once more—to five. Louder again. She felt the clang ring through her skull; she collapsed onto her knees, her hands squeezing her head like a vice. She could not dare look up—the clanging now seemed to blast of its own volition. She turned her head just enough to glance out the window, and saw the ocean tides rise and fall in time with the random intervals of that ungodly noise. It was raining now—backwards—with every drop rising up towards the sky.
Time was no anchor here.
She pressed her face onto the cold planks below her and locked her eyes shut. The lights began to flicker—somehow—with the epileptic back and forth of black and white still managing to sear through her eyelids. She heard a ship’s horn outside. It then sounded a second time. And then a third. With each instance it became louder and louder; the ship was getting closer. The tides climbed, the rain lifted, the lights raved, the ship blared, and the bell rang—the latter two of which had become deafening at this point. Each sound together had congealed to become one meshed, horrid noise. The ship’s horn now seemed to be right up against the pier.
Tears fell down her face. She had never felt so helpless. So alone. There was nothing she could do. Nothing she could do except wait for—
And then it was quiet.
She opened her eyes, unclasped her ears, and glanced around. The lamps above were unpowered, but the room was scattered with moonlight. The waves outside lay calm, relatively. Looking through the window, there were no forms of precipitation to be seen, nor clouds to house them. Any semblance of a ship had disappeared. Her lantern sat next to her, still glowing.
She braced herself before checking the clock face behind her.
2:03 A.M.
The foghorn blared.
She jumped.