Page 21 of Call of the Fathoms (Deep Waters #4)
Twenty-One
Alexia
A massive undine, a depthstrider, with the ability to kill anyone and anything with just the slightest amount of energy, was terrified of chickens. Now that was something she didn’t expect.
Nor was a floating island that was clearly man made. She’d seen the gears and all the strange vents that kept it floating from beneath, but it was the top of the island that surprised her most. This place was eerily similar to pictures she had seen of one of the Original’s houses.
Original Jessup was one of the few men who intimidated her. He was the first to kill if anyone disagreed with him, even an Original. She’d been there the day he had killed one of his own in a message that there would be no infighting. All Originals agreed with each other. End of story.
In his wing of Tau, there were pictures on the wall. Lots of pictures. All of them were from Above, and the life he had lived long ago. One of them looked like this. A small log cabin at the edge of the sea. A bed of emerald grass surrounding it, dotted with purple and white flowers that spread in a lush carpet all the way to the waves. It was... stunning, really. A beautiful dream that so many people had shared back in those days.
At least, that’s what Original Jessup had always said. To find something like this , floating where no one should ever find it? It was strange, and perhaps a little too convenient.
Eyes and ears open, she ushered the chickens back into a pen that had seen better days. Though the house didn’t seem to have aged, the rest of the island was showing wear and tear. The pen for the chickens was made out of wood, and even that material had worn throughout the centuries. Time had taken its toll on everything it should have. At least, if she believed this place was built by the Originals, and she... did.
Closing the gate, she looked around to see there were even more animals. Beasts that shouldn’t exist. Three cows were in the field just beyond the house, along with a donkey and what looked like two horses on the horizon. These were animals that had gone extinct long ago, at least according to the Originals.
But here they were. Living on an island that shouldn’t exist.
Her stomach churned. It felt wrong to be here, like she was trespassing and just waiting for someone to come on over a loudspeaker and scream at her. Or worse, a bullet to the forehead.
Taking a deep breath, she walked toward the log cabin. She wanted to know what all the fuss was about. If Fortis believed this would make her help, then surely he had a good reason for that. Her people were terrible. She agreed with that fact. But she needed to know what had made him hate them this much.
The log cabin felt like she was walking to her death. Still, she moved forward. She walked right up to the front door, cringing in front of it as she waited for retribution. But nothing happened.
Swallowing hard, she put her hand on the front door and pushed it open.
It wasn’t a house; she realized. Stepping inside, she was surprised to see there were only benches lining the floor. No chairs, no kitchen, no living area. There were pictures all along the wall, though. Photographs with little placards underneath each photo that explained the contents.
“A museum?” she murmured, shocked that there was even a building like this.
Who would build a museum floating in the middle of the ocean? No one could come here. There were far too many storms, and no human came to the surface, anyway. But this place was still pristine. Someone had been taking care of it.
Leaning closer, she looked at the first picture on the wall and was surprised to see many familiar faces. All the Originals were in this picture, standing beside each other like old friends. Some of them had their arms around others, some were grinning at the camera or making obscene gestures. Just regular people, long before they became immortal.
It was odd to see them like that. Leaning forward, she read the note underneath, “The dreamers who saw a need and decided to serve.”
The story she knew was that the Originals had seen the world ending, so they had created the cities beneath the sea. Perhaps this was the time before the world’s end. When they had yet to see the entirety of their lives starting to crash and burn.
The next five pictures were designs that made sense. Each of them was a different version of one of the cities, blueprints that had then been used to create the actual cities. There were also things she had seen before, although the blueprint of Tau itself was different from what they had below the surface.
Alexia traced her fingers over the words underneath. “The safest city in the world.”
For them.
It had always been the safest city in the world for those who lived in it, but she wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not.
She turned around, eyeing all the framed portraits here that defined her entire life. There were photos of the first animals that were taken underneath the sea. Cows were deemed far too wasteful, and they emitted too much CO2. They were dangerous and therefore not worth keeping. After all, the milk they produced wasn’t as helpful for those who were lactose intolerant, and quite a few Originals were.
Then there were pictures of the cities as they were built underneath the water. So many people had helped with that. Engineers, architects, artists who had spent countless years developing everything that was needed to save the world.
Another set of photos caught her eye on the far side of the wall. She hadn’t seen these before.
Walking closer, she realized this was the start of the genetic program, and a face there made her entire body ice cold.
“Alexia Barron, the first brave soul,” she read aloud as she looked at a woman who wore her face in the photo. She was much smaller than Alexia was now, of course. But she was still a hard-looking woman who appeared far more capable than those surrounding her.
That version of herself had willingly joined this group of people. She’d chosen to be experimented on, and all other versions of herself were then forced to do the same. Anger bubbled up inside of her. She wanted to go back in time and slap this woman across the face, because surely she should know what she did to herself and to so many others.
There were so many versions of Alexia who had been tortured and tormented to get to this version. So many who deserved so much more than death on a cold table because they had emotions.
Taking a deep breath, she moved onto the next picture that depicted a strange machine. It jutted out of the coast, metal pieces all gleaming in the sunlight. A single tall pillar, with a ball of electricity at the top.
“The first weather manipulator,” she read out loud, the words sticking in her throat. “The first of many. A failed experiment that led to...”
She stopped speaking because the next words were almost impossible to say. Not out loud. She refused to give them breath.
A failed experiment that led to true perfection beneath the sea .
Was this admitting that the Originals had affected the weather? It couldn’t be. They were the ones to save the world, not end it. She moved to the next picture, and the next, each one solidifying the truth.
She saw the scientists who worked to create the weather device. Then a photograph of the first hurricane guided to an enemy country. They then created a device that beckoned earthquakes and called about a tsunami that killed thousands. The next photo was of the first storm that got out of hand, a hurricane that stirred up the sea so much that most of the east coast drowned. More and more devastation as the experiment took on a life of its own.
In their quest to create something worthwhile for their egos, the Originals had destroyed an entire planet. They were the reason everyone lived under the sea, and then they had gone even farther with it. They’d genetically enhanced humans, forcing people like Alexia to work for them. Lie for them. Create and enforce stories that other people took to heart.
All because of their own egos. Because they were a group of friends who thought they were better than everyone else.
And then, at the very end of all those pictures, there was a large framed piece of paper. It almost read like a manifesto, and it turned her blood to ice in her veins.
We are the Originals.
We are the few who will survive the end of the world.
We will never die.
We will rule over this new world that we created.
And we will be the only ones who know.
Underneath the words were signatures. Each one familiar to her.
With a shaking hand, she reached out and traced Harlow’s name. It wasn’t that there was any love lost between the two of them. Alexia hated the woman for everything she had put her through, but also some part of her had hoped the other woman wasn’t part of this madness. She wanted to believe, for even an instance, that Harlow had protested this evil.
Pressure built in her chest. Anger, fear, anxiety, guilt. All the emotions she had never been allowed to fear because she had been their puppet. She was built to keep them safe, because they knew without people like her, they had good reason to be afraid.
The end of the world hadn’t been caused by natural disasters or unexplained events.
It had been caused by human arrogance.
Tears burned in her eyes. A lifetime worth of tears that had built up inside of her. She had worked for these people. The Originals had convinced her that she was at least working for those who were trying to do the right thing.
But they weren’t. They were the reason for the nightmarish existence all humans were now subjected to.
A keening cry echoed out of her mouth as she folded in on herself. This wasn’t just their fault, and she knew that. It was her fault too. Her fault for keeping them safe all these years and dedicating her entire life to them. She had spent countless hours trusting that they were making the right choices, and all she had to do was follow their orders.
Her entire life until this point had been a lie. And even worse, it had affected the entire world.
She’d justified her actions by believing at least she was working for the lesser of the evils. Beta was filled with power hungry fools who couldn’t make change happen. Alpha was full of beauty and wit, but nothing of actual substance. And, of course, Gamma was a prison city where no power existed. There were so few cities for her to go to, but Tau called all the shots. Tau was the most powerful and therefore had to be the best.
Now she knew even that was a lie.
She mourned the loss of everything she knew, and everything she had been. Shoulder shaking sobs wracked her entire body, purging her very bones of all those dark thoughts and memories that ate at her. And by the end, once she had mourned the death of her previous self, Alexia felt as though she could breathe again.
Because there was another path now. A path that would lead her toward so much more.
Somehow, she felt stronger for it. These emotions, these thoughts, these worries. They had weighed her down even under the cloak of the medication. Now she got to get rid of them once and for all.
Leaving the museum, she stepped out into the sun as a new woman.
She took a deep breath of the fresh sea air, not as stale and stagnant as it was under the ocean. She was free now. Finally, and completely free.
Fortis waited for her in the water. He wasn’t close to the sand, but she hadn’t expected him to come up here and wait for her, anyway. The chickens were a very real threat to his sensitive scales.
Her chest ached looking at him. This massive, horrible monster had fought her as no other creature ever had, and now everything she had carried for so many years was gone. All the guilt, the weight, the struggle. She could move on with her life.
How did she thank him? He had given her the greatest gift a person could ever give another person. He’d broken her chains.
One foot moved in front of the other. Then she was running across the sands and into the water. The icy waves splashed against her thighs, but she didn’t stop until she plunged into the sea.
Alexia nearly laughed at the shock on his features, and then the slightest hint of fear. As though he thought that something in the house was chasing her. Or worse, the chickens.
Ridiculous that he was so afraid of them. And she adored him for it.
She just... liked him. If she was being honest with herself, she’d liked him from the beginning. Even when he’d trapped her in that ship, there was a part of her who had still admired him for what he was.
She swam to his side and threw her arms around his neck. He looked at her in shock, or perhaps like she had lost her mind, but she didn’t care. She grabbed either side of his head, his gills sliding through her fingers, and kissed him.
Alexia had never kissed anyone before, but she’d seen plenty of kisses. This was one of thanks, appreciation, and all the good things that bubbled up inside of her now that she had seen the truth. It was a firm kiss, probably too hard considering his teeth were sharp, but she didn’t care. His lips were cold and her entire body flared white hot at the touch.
She drew back to thank him for everything, for the truth he had revealed, but then he palmed the back of her head and tugged her back to him. This kiss was hot, his lips sliding over hers before his tongue plunged inside her mouth. He tasted of brine and male, a strange combination that made her head spin.
Suddenly, this wasn’t just about thanking him. It was about indulging herself in the feeling of his muscles flexing against her belly, his fingers in her hair, the rough glide of his other hand down her back as he pressed her more firmly against him.
Relaxing into him, she kissed him back. Tentatively. Just a gentle stroke of her tongue against his, but it was like she had lit a fire underneath him. He groaned, the sound long and deep as he pulled her even harder against his body. Any other human and he might have squished them, but she was stronger, sturdier, capable of rough handling.
When a waved splashed over them, soaking her face with icy water, she drew back. Water droplets clung to her eyelashes and obscured the sight of him, but she knew he was staring at her with that dark, almost unhinged gaze once more.
“What was that for?” he asked.
Her fingers slid through the gills on the sides of his face. Gills that intrigued her far more than she wished to admit. “Thank you,” she finally got to say. “For setting me free.”