CATACLYSM

Chapter 5: HYDRA

Chapter five: HYDRA

Cas plummeted towards the raging black water. Wind whipped her long braid and rain plastered her clothes to her skin. She braced for impact just as the Tempest Horizon swooped in, and she crashed onto the hull.

“I’ve got you!” Tier’s voice cut through the storm as he grabbed her by the forearm. Cas tried to find purchase with her feet, but against the slick metal she slid clumsily onto her stomach. Tier maintained his hold.

“You got the message!” Cas called back, trying to pull herself up as the Tempest rounded the corner of the library. She heard worried voices somewhere above them. The afflicted must have noticed.

“Give me your other hand!”

Cas tried to free her fractured arm from the sling, but struggled. “I can’t,” she said, but she finally found a nook for her toes and pushed up. Tier had her by the arm and the shoulder, and she spotted some of the crew holding Tier steady from inside the ship.

“Where’s Vektor?” Tier asked, pulling her up.

“He’s dead,” she said, finally getting closer to him, “he was killed by the horde.” On top of the Tempest, Cas relaxed for a moment and Tier loosened his grip. “You’ll never believe what I’ve discovered - they’re sentient. The afflicted here can speak.”

A voice from above screamed out the window, “CASSANDRA!”

Tier looked up, the rain now pounding his face. “That sounded just like…”

“CASSANDRA,” her father shouted again, his head sticking out of the window and his voice hoarse with desperation, “WATCH OUT! HYDRA! GET OUT!”

And then something massive slammed into the Tempest.

The ship flipped fully upside-down in the air, spinning into the water. Cas was thrown off into the rough current. With one arm she managed to surface long enough to gulp some air and see the Tempest stirring its engines, trying to escape, before the undertow pulled Cas down. The ship illuminated the darkness enough to reveal a terrible creature: a snake, a giant, silver snake slithered through the water, circling the ship. It was three or four times as large as the starship, thick across and scaly, with bright red bioluminescent cracks cross-crossing its body. When she made out its long, pointed face, distorted in the shadows, she realized it was not a snake at all. It was a massive wyrm.

The current dragged her down and down, like an anchor, as she watched the hydra batter the Tempest with its dense body. The crew flashed lights rapidly at the creature, and it moaned, turning away long enough for the ship to breach the surface. The hydra dove and curled and thrust itself up out of the water. Cas saw its silhouette against the grey sky almost impact the Tempest, but they managed to dodge. The ship fired a barbed grappling hook - normally used for snatching - and it buried into the monster’s flesh just below its strange head. For a few seconds the Tempest dragged the hydra. They are trying to take it away, Cas thought, Tier’s trying to save me. Damn it, run. Run!

The hydra lifted its head out of the water and screeched. It thrust itself down and dove, down and down and into some oblivion Cas could not see, its long body following on, and on, and on. When the Tempest made contact again with the water’s surface, they disengaged the grapple and fled.

It all happened so fast, but Cas was almost out of breath. For the first time she looked down: there in the deep shadows, all along the river’s floor, were human bodies. Layered and interlocked together, their limbs entwined and engorged by decades of water, they choked the ancient road. Amongst them were some skeletons, flesh picked down to the pale bone; but quickly Cas realized that most, if not all, of the remaining corpses were slumbering afflicted. And the sleeping horde was only a few feet below her.

She needed to surface. She could not fight the current - but she found close behind her the concrete side of a building and grabbed it for support. Up, up, up, she thought, her eyes fixed on the spot of light above her. Her lungs burned for air. Up, up! She tried to climb against the battering waves. I have to make it. Hold your breath. Just hold your breath.

Something touched her shoulder.

She turned and came face-to-face with the hydra.

Cas froze. The tip of its long, pointed face hovered within arm’s reach. Its silver scales glittered in the dim light from the surface. The red lights along its body fading into the darkness, never ending, threatened its full size. She saw the grappling hook - normally a massive instrument - dwarfed against this creature. For a moment, it just seemed to stare at her. Then, it opened its mouth.

And it opened its mouth. And it just kept opening its mouth.

Cas scrambled up the concrete as fast as she could as the hydra began to swallow. The water around her pulled but she kept her grip. Her fingers bled against the stone. She lost nearly all of her breath. The current dragged her harder. She glanced back at the gaping hole of its mouth, its inner cheeks lined with wriggling red wyrms, the points of their faces sharp as needles. Cas looked up one last time at the dot of light at the surface. It’s too far, she thought. Dad, I’m sorry, dad, help me -

A shadow obscured the light above as someone crashed through the surface. They dove between Cas and the hydra - it was Mylo!

Their black trench coat flowed like a fin behind them, their black hair delicate in the terrible hydra’s undertow. Cas would have sworn their skin appeared grey in the water. Mylo threw their hand out towards the hydra’s mouth.

The hydra stopped swallowing. Cas clutched the wall as Mylo swam towards the mouth. They took the upper jaw in their hands and pressed it down. The hydra closed its mouth. It floated there, still and calm. Mylo pressed their hands against the point of its face to push it sideways. And then this massive, dangerous, hungry creature turned and slithered away.

Cas couldn’t wait any longer. She lost her final breath. A hundred eyes below her opened. The last thing she saw was Mylo turning back to her. In the dimness, their eyes glowed bright white.

* * *

Cas coughed back to consciousness on the first floor of the library, her father and Mylo yelling at one another a few feet away.

“Well I did not think one of the ferals would show up this far into the city!”

“You should’ve known! You of all people!”

“You are the one who summoned the ship in the first place.”

“And you’re the one who let them come. Was this the trap?”

“Oh obviously, Castiel, my plan all along was to somehow get a feral hydra to destroy the very starship that the entwined is trapped on. What an immaculate fucking plan.”

Cas sat up. “What’s going on?”

“Cassandra,” Mylo said, running to her side, “you are alive.”

Cas studied their face up close. “Your eyes,” she whispered, “they were so bright. I’ve never seen that before.”

Mylo swallowed. “I do not know what you mean. But I am glad you are awake.”

“As am I,” Castiel said, pushing Mylo aside and sitting next to Cas, “Mylo knew about the ship coming all along. This was their little trap.”

“That is an unkind characterization,” Mylo said, stepping back and putting their hands in their pockets. Their clothes were still dripping. “I only thought the Tempest would come and I could get the entwined back. I did not expect Cassandra to leap out of the fifth floor of a building directly into infested waters.”

“I did not leap directly into the water,” Cas defended herself, “I leapt onto the Tempest. I just fell afterwards.” Cas coughed. “Am I infested? Can’t you tell?”

Castiel looked her over. “I don’t see any signs of infestation. You still have another ten days or os that the vaccine should protect you.” Castiel grumbled to Mylo, “Will you check, too?”

“Of course.” Mylo took a seat next to Cas. They checked her hands, her arms, and especially her neck. They held her face in their warm hands. Mylo studied Cas’s eyes. Her pulse quickened. Mylo must have felt it through the veins in her neck, because they smiled a little. That only made Cas redden. Mylo dropped their hands, but touched every part of her with their gaze before they said, “She’s not infested.”

“Thank you,” Castiel mumbled. “Now go get that feral out of here.” Castiel turned to his daughter, “I think that’s the same hydra that took down Dawn’s Edge. It was the exact same type of attack.”

“But your crew was out over the deep water,” Mylo said, “I do not know why it came so far into the city.” They added, “I just hope it has not made a den here.”

Cas went to the window with the help of her father. The rain came down heavy now, pattering the water with rings like a thousand fingerprints. But the waves had calmed.

“Are the waves caused by the hydras?”

“The moon is still responsible for most of it, I imagine,” Mylo answered, closing their trenchcoat and cinching it at the waist, “but sometimes, yes. An astute observation. Many of the wordful do not even realize that.”

Cas remembered the terrible mouth. “A monster that big moving through the water - it’s gotta make waves.”

“Sure. But it is not a monster. The hydras are just creatures who live here, too.”

Cas scoffed. “We have very different definitions of monsters.” She asked, “What do you mean when you say feral?”

“I can show you,” Mylo said, opening the glass window. They hoisted themselves up and dropped into the water just below. A few seconds passed before they surfaced, riding on the back of a different silver hydra.

“Do not panic,” they called from below, “this is my tamed hydra. Her name is Nora.”

Cas shuddered at the creature, though its face was somewhere underwater. “You named it?”

“Well I had to call her something.” Mylo turned to Castiel. “Keep everyone in the archives for a few hours. I will root out the feral hydra and guide it back to the deep waters. Then it should be safe to go back.” They added, to Cas, “Your copy of Frankenstein is still upstairs, by the way.” They waved. “Try not to drown while I am gone.”

The hydra descended, and Mylo with it, into the black water.

***

Illustrations by John V. Salvino, johnvsalvino.com