Evander Resur wakes up in a diving bell stuck under something heavy with no way out, 50 meters below the ocean, he hold his head and squeeze it as if trying to bury the throbbing pain that hammers his head from all sides. He twist and turns but there's not enough space to even stretch, let alone scream inside the iron cage he's confine in. The stinging headache jabs him from after another, only stopping after he feels a heartache, two heartaches.
"The diving bells seem to be supplying oxygen from above" Resur mutters to himself then realize how loud he sounds when he's stuck in a cramp diving bell.
He looks up through the pipe, then stare at the blue canvas of the sky. His memories felt foggy as if he's navigating through a misty ocean but he remembers clearly that he was on a ship heading to Thailand. A giant black oval shaped silhouette with glowing white eyes surfaced out of the water. It stared at all the passengers. Everyone froze in fear, including Resur since he stood the closest to it at the railings. It's head dropped down to look at him, then it lowers it self as it inches closer to Resur. He stood still as his legs started to shake, and no matter how many times he tries to keep it still his body doesn't listen. The, thing stares at him for the longest 30 seconds ever before striking him in his right chest.
It slithers under the ship like some kind of serpent, he could swear he felt himself losing consciousness immediately but in its absence he sees a waves of enormous, weird looking marine creatures covered in spikes, armed with razor large teethes, rushing at the ship. leviathans and other sea monsters sank their teeth through the metal of the side hull, while the other ram their body into the ship, slowly pushing the ship onto it's side.
The other sea monsters manage to leap onto the ship despite everyone thinking they're safe as long they stay on the deck, their jaws catching frozen passengers in their maw. The ship slowly capsized under the increasing weight and like a video but with missing tapes, he sees himself falling into the water as the ship sank, but he couldn't do anything, he couldn't move a single muscle as if his body isn't his own anymore.
Once he plunge through the surface, slowly sinking into the ocean, he felt as if his entire body is about to go cease functioning under the influence of the cold freezing water. He catch a glimpse of a diving bell in the corner of his left eye, and frantically swam to it before those things could find him.
Resur sit and waits for something to happen, he's too weak to move the the diving bell off of the ground. Two hours later he hears the sound of a whale, and he shouts through the hole of the diving bell, asking for help.
"Alright yeah sure a whale would definitely understand what i just said". He scoffs to himself, while slowly losing hope.
Minutes later, vibrations rattles through the bell and sounds of metal scraping against whatever that's outside sang along with the deafening sound. The diving bell lifts off the open bed, freeing him but opening the door to the ocean water outside. He feels an immense wave rushing through the space. It slams him against the wall of the diving bell as it slowly surfaced. He bite down the pain and swam out, dodging the falling rubbles and sediments.
His eyes watch the diving bell ascend slowly like an elevator then he sees a white whale, shape like those cheese stick he use to eat back at home. He has no idea why it helped him, and if it understood him or not, but he want to believe it does. He swims up to it hesitantly, the sperm whale slows down so he could catch up, he gently press his hand on its rough skin, feeling warmth, almost enough to make him forget that he's in this cold sea, he places his forehead up against it's body and rubbed it softly.
"Thank you" he says softly through closed mouths, then repeats multiple time just incase it didn't hear him.
Resur gently pulled away and looked at the whale's eyes, watching the lower eye lid curve up like a smile. The whale lets go of the diving bell from its mouth then swims away, its white rectangular shape slowly disappearing into the dark blue waters. "Sadly it didn't say anything, then again, that red haired lady on the ship did say I would die if it even said a word to me, as if I could understand what she said, something about vibrations?".
Resur looks up into the sky, he sees the sunlight penetrating through the ocean water. He slowly ascends, and once he at the surface he shake the water around his face and lay on the water while staring into the sky, the blue canvas he saw earlier is now decorated with white and orange clouds of all shape and sizes, slowly moving and drifting along with the wind, parallel with the waves taking him. He smiled, realizing his current situation isn't too bad. Then he thinks to himself.
"How hasn't I got hypothermia yet? Or whatever she called it. I even held my breath for so long, maybe that thing gave me fish powers".
He mulled over it and realize it's no use, he swims back to the diving bell, then saw lands of sea weed dancing, orchestrated by the ocean waves. He swims down, and gently tap one of them, giggling inside of how cute it looks when he interrupts it's dance, he stuffs a few into his mouth. "Salty, and chewy, it taste like the ocean, but I don't mind." He thinks to himself
He watches sea turtles swim pass him, biting down on the seaweed while staying a float while he sank. He tried doing the same, engaging his core muscle and positioning his head down as he eats, he failed. Almost backflipping underwater. He giggles inside and follows the turtle around, realizing he's on the cliff of an underwater crater, he looked down and saw different floors full of corals, red, green, blue, a schools of tropical fish, a dark nests of octopus, orange crabs walking side ways, a slow swimming manta rays, a whole ecosystem in this crater.
"I kinda wish I were a fish" He says without opening his mouth to himself, thinking about how easy his life would be.
He looks around then swims to a small red crab. He tries grabbing it, only to get pinched in the thumb very hard, causing him to immediately smash it with his left hand repeatedly. The meat breaks into pieces, floating up with the shell. He caught the one with no shell in his mouth, swallowing salt water with him, "Seasoning, I guess" He thinks to himself.
He feeds the rest to a group of blue fishes with black stripes, reminding him of the officers on the ship. He feels his memories coming back.
"Huh I was expecting my head to hurt like they do in the movies when you remember something." He says to himself without opening his mouth until he remembers their faces as they get devoured by the leviathans, feeling a headache slapping the back of his head for remembering.
After chasing fishes with broken hard corals sticks and eating enough crabs he returns back to the diving bell, feeling comfortable floating as he rest inside it's metal interior, despite the fact his butt is still very exposed, and something might just take a bite of his gluttonous maximus.
He swam back down after enough rest. He chases fishes around for fun for an hour, only halting once he saw a piece of steel hidden in the sea weed. "Nautilus" the name read. He follows a trail of debris, seeing fields full of dead leviathans, but not a single dead body except for the fact there's only some broken bones left on the seabed of seaweed. He freezes momentarily, unable to trust himself, stuck between choosing all the possible scenarios.
"What if it's not dead, what if it's asleep? What if I check on it and it wakes up?" Frozen in fear he slowly sinks down to the bottom.
Resur muster up his courage, pretending the feeling of him biting his teeth is the physical embodiment of strength flowing through him. He grabbed a sharp piece of broken off steel plating, then rush one of the leviathan, stabbing it in the gills. No movement, no shaking, no trashing, no movement. He then immediately turned his back, thinking he's in a horror movie, accompanied with the feeling there's going to be something behind him.
Nothing was there, but there is one at the same place he was facing earlier. The same one he stabbed, the white zebra stripe squid face immediately swipe it's tail across his face, sending him through the water, he almost lose grip of the "sword". He looks around, luckily the water was clear, but the visibility makes fear more easy to travel as he watch it swim toward him at high speed. It open it's squid mouth as it got close. He dodges to the right, stabbing its side while moving, causing blood to spray out, blinding him but giving him a smoke screen in the form of a red mist.
The blood attracts other foes, more leviathan woke up. Resur notices them immediately and swam away, slowly ascending to not get the bends, once he's out of the water he swallow as much air as he can, believing that he'll bite more air than the leviathan can take a piece of him. He dove back down and kept swimming. They gave chase, they didn't lose their speed because they didn't have to surface for air. Not to mention their fins were made for swimming, Resur is but a human, his legs are only for improvisation.
Adrenaline fills his body and heighten his senses, though he's slower than them, he's more maneuverable, dodging their bites by slowing down, and making jokes about breaking their ankles to calm himself despite the fear almost entangling him. If they had any. He repeats this while slowly gaining distance. He got too many near miss with their jaws. Up ahead Resur sees a slope of sand.
Light shines on it like an underwater hill for him to climb. He doesn't know if swimming with straighten legs or bent legs will help or not so he switches between them while kicking faster. Once he got onto shore, he ignore the weight in his chest as he start running away from the shore.
"I seen enough movies, you guys were going to jump out of the water to grab me!" He exclaims to himself.
The monsters eyes stars back at him, hovering around the shore. The flashing colors on their body disappearing slowly as they retreated from shore. Resur drops onto his butt, gobbling as much air as he can while he laughs to himself between the breathing, he then notices his hands and leg were shaking. He looks up at the sky, the palm tree's shadow hugs around his skin, the sound of leave rustling and the ocean waves dragging itself onto shore slowly calms him down. He marks an arrow pointing back to the diving bell before getting up.
Resur got up and started walking along side the beach, trying to get a a good look of the Island he's on. As he followed the shore a black shape came into his view, distances away. Looking like a giant crab with only one claw pointed diagonally to the left sky. As he got closer he realized its a ship, a ship wreck to be exact, the same ship he was on. M
More memories of the past flashes. Born on 2007 July 29, he grew up in this city, his earliest memories he had of his mum was her putting a shirt on him. "Raise your hands" She said. Dad was affectionate, he works for many different NPO, Resur remembers how his dad would always take him to the country side to meet the other kids it was vastly different than the air conditioned house he would get but he enjoyed the trip nonetheless, jumping in the lake, catching frogs and playing with the kids. He smiles then wait for the familiar headache, but none came.
The worst part of his life was going to sleep and being told to back inside the house until his mum died of the Virus, it slowly mutate people into fish monsters or what they commonly called "Leviathans". Dad cried and hugged her, letting her eat him as his tears ran down her neck. 10 year old Resur watched it all happen, frozen, knee locked before running away. Resur feels a headache approaching but stop thinking for a bit then continues as he resume his walking.
The rest of his life was him struggling to survive on the streets, passing by with side hustles, going to community events for food and quick bucks. He saved enough to get out of there, the economy was slowly dying along with the people. Famine spread like the fires caused by riots, sadly his dream sank with the ship that night.
His eyes focus back on the ship, leaving his thoughts he keeps on walking towards it. Barnacles hanged on to the sides of the broken off bow. Resur notices a make shift ladder made out of wood, tied together with some big leaves.
"So someone was here before me" He thinks to himself, picking up a nearby rock, sneaking up onto the deck. Looking around he saw grilled fish on the table. Saliva floods his mouth immediately, but he decided to not eat anyone food without permission.
"It'll be stupid to shout but um, may someone tell me if they're here?" He calls out softly, then hears a thump behind him. A lady with long red hair tied together into a bun, he looked down and saw her triangle shape body, then back up to her face. She has beautiful almonds eyes titled upwards as if she always look curious or smiling. A sharp Nubian nose with a soft curve. Her face shaped like diamond with white clear skin like the sand. Long slender arms, but she's quite built, wearing a black tank top.
"May I ask if you're done analyzing me, Resur?" She said the "May" part with extra emphasis.
Resur gasps from the sight of her, her consideration, and the fact she knows him.
"Sorry, it's just you're the only other human I met today."
"Pfft, it's alright, I saw you on the ship".
"Ohhhhh, you're that marine biologist, I'm Resur, as you know, may I know your name?".
"Thala Sophie, commonly joked around with the word Thalassophile, which mean someone who love the sea or ocean, and you look like you're the ocean itself" She says playfully, smiling.
Resur smiles back from ear to ear. He let those words go through his ear and head as slow as possible to savour it. Bowing his head then thanking her loudly. Thala giggles and walks past him, grabbing the plates of grilled fish.
"May i ask you to join me? Considerate Ocean Boy."
Resur nod and sat across her, eating as minimally as fast as possible to be polite but fill himself.
"Please, you may eat as much as you want i got a lot more." Thala says.
Resur smiled with fish still stuck between his teeth and gobbled them up. Once he's filled he sat up straight and stared at her.
"Uh, mam, I just would like to say thank you, but may I stay here?" He asked nervously.
"Sure, I was going to ask you anyways, it gets lonely around here, and may i ask who taught you to be so considerate and polite?"
"My mum, she's a sweet person but she died from the virus". He said after a long pause.
"Oh I'm really sorry if her death caused you any pain, but I hope you're okay and better now".
"I am, but it stills hurts sometimes, whenever I stare up at the sky I try to find her face in the clouds". He says, feeling few tears escaping through his eyes, descending down his cheeks He turns his head to the clouds, but realize it's no use so he just giggle and wipe his tears away.
"Sorry, i never had the time to hide my emotions, or learn how to, I'll probably say everything that come to my mind". He says while giggling.
Thala smiles. "You may live here with me, Resur". She says softly as she push the chair behind her, walking over to him. She open her arms, inviting him for a hug. Resur step into that space and closed her arms around him immediately, burying himself into her shoulder. Tears rush down his eyes as he repeatedly thank her.
"We just met thoughhhhh." Resur says slowly.
"You said that after hugging me? Funny, well i don't usually trust strangers but, you're considerate, i saw you stopping yourself from eating my food, you showed yourself and dropped that rock earlier, you're the one that trust people too easily Resur. So I think, I can trust you."
Resur cackles in her shoulder, muffle by her skin. He gently pulled away once he's done crying. "I was raised on the street, I couldn't trust too many people, and when i do they usually take advantage of me, but I still want to believe in people, and the world, i won't approach anyone from a hostile stand point but i won't be naive. Can't let one bad apple stop me from tasting the whole basket.
Thala smiles then brief him more about the island, and the ship, what chores they need to share and showed him around the ship, what's around, where not to go. The two walked down the stairs into the hull, Resur lays his eyes on the make shift bamboo bed with leaves lay on it sitting against the corner of the room.
"Go on, you look like you're about to die." Thala encourages him.
"THANK!" He shouts loudly. Thala giggles and walks up the stair as Resur jumps on the bed, He breathes as deep as possible while staring up into the ceiling, smiling in gratitude.
"I got a friend....and a bed" He says to himself, burying his face into old pillows. Though he just met Thala, he have a hunch that she's someone he can trust. She fed him, comforted him, hugged him and even gave him a bed to sleep on, and he doesn't know if its because he haven't slept for so long or if there is a sleeping agent in the food, Resur simply didn't care. He slowly close his eyes and let his consciousness and head sink into the pillow. He wonder what he looks like now.
"Maybe I'll ask Thala if she has a mirror once I wake up" he thinks to himself before he completely passes out.