A lot of things can happen in a week. In a week, you can come to terms with the fact that not only do monsters exist, but you’ve been unknowingly tasked with keeping them from tearing through a magic seal and ripping through an entire town of innocent people. As it turns out, you can also, in a week, realize that you don’t have a choice in the matter, and that you’re essentially stuck with that responsibility until you either get eviscerated yourself, or some other poor schmuck comes along and takes your place. Even if that second one happens, I don’t think Mercer Corp is letting me off the hook that easy. Odds are, this is my life now. Yay me.

It’s been a week since my last update. In that time, my life here at Cardinal Lake Amusement Park has only gotten more complicated, and it seems every question I have answered just leads to three more. It’s frustrating, but as much as I’ve tried to keep my head down, I’m starting to realize I can’t sit by and ignore what’s happening behind the scenes. I’ve kept rigorous notes on my life these past seven days, so I’ll start off by recapping what happened after my previous entry ended.

Day One:

It took about twenty five minutes for Mel to return to the breakroom. Upon hearing a beep at the door, I quickly stuffed this journal back into the file cabinet it’d come from, unsure whether or not I was committing some cardinal sin by writing things down. Paranoid, maybe, but I’d still just met these people.

“So, here he is. Banged up but otherwise fine.” Mel came in first, motioning in my direction to a woman who’d followed behind. Victoria was about a head taller than me. Unlike Mel, she seemed to take the uniform a little more seriously, shirt buttoned, wearing the Mercer cap, dirty blonde hair pulled up into a messy ponytail. She appeared to be older than him too, early to mid-thirties if I were to guess (I haven’t asked).

Victoria looked me up and down with a squint, assessing me. I immediately felt embarrassed, recognizing this was the same Victoria who’d been screaming at me over the radio all night to get my ass into the break room. She was pale, a set of freckles dotting her cheeks, but what struck me was her eyes. They looked tired, almost cynical. I suppose working somewhere like this does that to people.

“Hi,” I tried, “thanks for the help earlier. You’re Victoria?”

“Grab the Gill Man.” Her voice matched her eyes: devoid of life.

“Sorry?”

“Grab. The Gill Man. We’re taking him outside.”

“Okay then.” I positioned myself at one end of the table. The Gill Man’s corpse reeked of death, its slack jaws spilling needle teeth from its gums. Mel strode past the both of us, crashing into the swivel chair behind me, near the camera setup in the back. “What are you doing?”

“Hey, my job’s done. All I got to do now is sit on the cameras. You have fun though.” Mel reached under the desk, retrieving a case of diet soda I hadn’t noticed until then. Enthusiastically, he cracked it open and stuck his feet up on the counter, content with himself.

“Just ignore him,” Victoria said, “let’s go.”

Fortunately, she didn’t expect us to carry the monster all the way by hand. Outside the breakroom was a wheel barrow, which I was made to push on my own. Victoria led the way, hands in pockets, staring dejectedly off at the lake. Halfway through our trek, sweating, I asked her why I was being made to push it by myself. “Consider it on-the-job training. Besides, you’re the one who ran off into the park instead of waiting for me.”

“Right, right.” I kept trudging on, trying to look anywhere but at the gaping maw of the creature, rebar rod still stuck hard in its skull. Instead, I glanced at the lake, shining my light on the distant waters. The eyes were still there, the Gill Man’s brothers and sisters no doubt. I could see dark blobs poking through the lake’s surface, half-submerged, melon shaped heads. “Why do they just stare like that?”

“Their eyes are light sensitive, so they can only come up here at night.”

Eventually, the wheel barrow death march led us to a lone container crate sitting halfway into the forest at the edge of the amusement park, just on the lakeshore. It was rusted red, one of those big crates they use for shipping. While I caught my breath, Victoria cycled through a truly impressive number of keys on a keyring. She found the right one, stuck it in a large padlock, and swung open the creaking container doors.

I shined my light inside. “Oh. Oh no. Really?”

“Yes, really. Now put this on.” She handed me a folded wad of plastic. “You’ll need it.”

Clad in clear, plastic rain ponchos, together we pulled out a large machine on wheels, what I can only describe as a modified wood chipper. Big, silver, and entirely unpleasant knowing what was coming next. Once we positioned the machine next to the lake, Victoria flipped a large lever on the side, and the machine revved up, teeth churning with a loud buzz. 

She placed a boot on the monster’s face, yanking out the rebar slick with inky blood. “Okay, just stick him in. You might have to hold him there for a minute.”

“Is this really, really necessary?”

Victoria folded her arms. “Company policy. We have to eliminate all evidence of the creatures we find while on the clock. Our primary goal is to keep the Gill Men’s existence an absolute secret. It’s in the handbook, or did you bother reading it?”

I sighed, resigned to my fate. Tentatively, I eased the Gill Man’s head into the threshing machine, and like a starved animal it snatched the body from my hands. A sickening crunch followed the breaking bones. The thing’s gross, black blood sprayed me and kept coming, most of the chunkier viscera being deposited via chute into the lake itself. First the head, then the torso, then I had to shove its tail in there too, keeping my eyes shut the whole time. I’ve never had to dispose of a body before. It was a brutal, ear-rending process, and when it was done, when I sat there, covered in dripping guts and bits of fish-scale, I never wanted to again.

Victoria sat by and watched the grisly work. When the deed was done, she flipped the switch and the teeth stopped spinning. She pulled out her phone, checked the time. “Okay, kid.  Get out of here, get some rest. You’ve done enough tonight, the company’s not going to care.”

I didn’t argue. I clocked out, walked the forest path back to the employee parking lot, and drove home in silence, just the hum of the engine. The things I’d seen that night were still fresh in my mind. Every blink was met with a flash of teeth in the dark. I kept glancing into my back seat, expecting a shadow or those creepy, vacant eyes, but nothing. There was this tension in my shoulders, my whole body, that wouldn’t let up. My thoughts were stagnant; get home, take a shower, go to bed. First thing in the morning, I was out of here. Job be damned, I wasn’t sticking around to be eaten alive for the sake of a place I otherwise couldn’t give less of a shit about. I was leaving Cardinal Lake and never looking back.

I pulled into my space and ran from the parking lot all the way to the door. Once I got moving, I couldn’t stop. I slammed into my door, and just before I shoved my shaking key into the lock, I paused. Shoved into the crux of the doorframe was a small, red envelope. I looked around. My apartment complex is like a motel, with outdoor hallways and staircases on either end connecting floors. There was just an hour until dawn, not a soul was up yet. I plucked the envelope from its place in the doorframe and pushed the door open. It was just an envelope, but seeing it gave me this sinking feeling. When I finally opened it up, and saw the contents inside, all the horrors of the night came crashing down upon me, and I felt my stomach give way.

I was a little surprised when Victoria picked up so fast. “Who is this?”

“What the hell is this?” I could hardly breathe, white-knuckling my phone.

She went quiet. “You received an envelope, didn’t you? Where are you, kid?”

“I-I’m in my bathroom… on the floor.” My head was still swimming from retching up whatever food I’d had the previous day. The floor beneath me was a cheap floor mat I’d brought, the fibers of which I was now plucking in clumps. The photos were laid out in front of me. They were pictures of my family. Mom, Dad, my sister Liza. They were taken from bushes, from car windows. I recognized my house, the three of them sitting at the dinner table. There was one last thing in the envelope: a note.

“We advise you not to abandon your position at the park, Mr. Hawkins.”

• Signed, Management

“I don’t know what to do.” It felt strange breaking down over the phone to someone I’d just met, but I thought she might have some sort of explanation. Instead, she did something else.

“I clocked out a few minutes ago,” she sighed, almost annoyed. “Meet me at this address. I can try to fill you in on what I know in person. What was your name, again?”

“Um, Rory.”

“Right. Rory? Before you get here, take a shower.” And the call ended.

It took me a bit to peel myself off the bathroom tile but eventually I grew a pair and started the drive over to the address Victoria had texted me. It wasn’t like I had anything else to do. Graycott is already a small town in the pacific northwest, but I was still intrigued when the GPS started to pull me further away from the main road and into the forest. Dawn was breaking through the canopy, and before long I saw a small cabin on the hillside, a green jeep parked in the driveway. This place was even farther from the lake than my apartment.

Victoria answered pretty quickly after I climbed the creaky wooden steps and knocked on the door. Her outfit was entirely different from the efficiency I’d seen in the park: just an army tank top and pajama bottoms. “Hey. You drink?”

“Uh, yeah, I drink. What is this?”

From a side table near the door, she grabbed a warm can of beer. “This,” she cracked it open with a loud fizz, “is what I wish someone had done for me after my first night. Come on.”

For the record, we weren’t getting wasted. Sitting out on a porch with a beer was pretty nice compared to a night of screaming, blood, and pain. With the first rays of sunlight, I had this newfound feeling of clarity, like I was finally safe. The first thing I did was ask about the envelope, and why the hell it had pictures of my family stuffed inside.

“They’re threatening me? Why?”

Victoria leaned over the railing with a long sigh. “Mercer Corp is the parent company of the park. If we go, the park goes, and Mercer likes its money.” She took a swig of her can. The beer was warm, and tasted like watered down piss, but it went down easy enough. 

“So I can’t leave…”

Victoria took another swig. “None of us can,” she bumped my arm with her can. “Not that I’m aware, at least. It’s a martyr position. They tricked us and now we’re stuck here. The way I see it? It’s best not to think about it.”

I think she noticed my expression sink. Her eyes dropped to the wooden planks below, as if she recognized she’d gone a little too far. “Sorry, kid,” after another moment of silence, “how’d you end up here? Aren’t you a little young to be out on your own?”

I rolled my eyes. “I’m twenty three, thanks, and to answer your question, I don’t really know, man. I went to college, I just never had a plan. I kept partying with this stupid ‘live in the moment’ attitude. I had my girlfriend though. Holly was great. Super smart, and funny, and she chose me, for some reason. She’d do all these things for me, and… well I guess I was just too in my own head to give her anything in return. Just kept drinking, partying, ditching class, and she dumped my ass the first chance she got. God, I was such an asshole back then.” I sighed, folded my arms on the railing of the porch. “Maybe I deserved it.”

Victoria was quiet for a moment, before I felt a patting on my back. “Yeah, that’ll do it.” She removed the hand, took another swig of beer. “I’m going to ask you something weird.”

“Okay, shoot.”

“How did you die?”

I nearly spat my drink. The question took me by surprise so much I was coughing out over the railing. Sliding my drink to the side, I asked, “what kind of question is that?”

“Have you ever died before?” Her face was entirely sincere, eyes open wide and peering into mine. “You can tell me if you have.”

I avoided her gaze. For those reading this, I don’t like talking about this moment of my life, and I’ve thought long and hard about including it in this account. But, something tells me it’s necessary to bring up, so here we go. “Yeah. I did.”  She rested an elbow on the rail, fist in her cheek, egging me to continue. “Car crash. I was fifteen. I tried taking my dad’s car out late to go meet my friends at a party, and then I got t-boned on the way there. Next thing I know, I’m sitting in a hospital bed. The doc told me I was clinically dead for thirty seconds. Since then, I try to live every day like it’s my last. Why do you want to know this?”

She leaned back, taking it in, almost like she expected that answer. “I died too, when I was still in the Army. Stepped on a landmine out in Afghanistan, and then pow, I’m out like a light. Got revived in a triage tent. Fifty three seconds.”

“No way, you stepped on a landmine?” Victoria reached down, pulled up the leg of her pants. To my surprise, I didn’t see skin under there. Instead, it was a metal prosthetic: a titanium stick that ended in a metal foot which slipped into her shoe.  “Holy shit, lady. That’s insane.”

“Yeah, not glamorous but it gets the job done. Something I’ve noticed is that, for whatever reason, all of the employees here had NDEs. I think that’s why Mercer reaches out to us specifically. I still don’t know why, but your story just confirms the theory even more.”

“Oh my God. That’s… that’s crazy. What about Mel? He’s died, too?”

“Mel?” Victoria ran a hand through her hair. “Don’t tell him I told you this. For a long time, Mel worked as a roadie for some rock band years ago. Part of that lifestyle included a lot of drugs, and one day, the guy overdosed. He doesn’t like to talk about it, but it was sort of a wake up call for him. Got him clean, totally straight edge, and eventually he just drifted here one day. Never even needed an envelope. Honestly, I think he likes it here.”  That was a bit heavier than I thought the conversation would go. There was a heaviness in the air, suddenly. I knew it wasn’t going away.

“I don’t know what to do now. Is this really my life now? I’m stuck on a haunted lake?”

Victoria gave it some thought. “I had a girlfriend like you, once. Well, she was my wife. I got with her right out of the Army, and for a few years, I figured I had it together. I didn’t. When she left, things took a turn for the worse. Lots of drinking, not proud of it. Eventually, I took Mercer’s bait, just like you, and ended up here.” She leaned against the barrier again, and I met her eyes. “It’s not the route I would’ve taken, kid, but sometimes you have to make the best of a bad situation. The best thing you can do is take it one day at a time. We’ll stay alive.”

I took in her words. I’d barely known this woman for twenty four hours and yet here she was giving me a pep talk on life. Still, I’d be lying if I said it didn’t help at least a little. “Thanks.”

Eventually, we said our goodbyes for the morning  and I was sober enough to drive home. On the way out, I stopped on the porch. “Hey, Victoria, I got one more question for you, and I want you to be as honest as you can.”

“What is it?”

I wasn’t sure how to say it at first. It was more of a hunch, but I wanted to ask anyway. “How many night guards have you given this speech to? Before me?”

It took her a moment to respond. “Four. Four others came before you.”

From her somber voice, I didn’t need to ask what’d happened to them.

Day Two:

When I reached my place again,  I felt more dead than alive. My body ached, and my eyelids were growing heavier by the minute. So, when I reached my door, and heard someone call my name from down the hall, I was more than willing to tell them off and go straight to bed. That was, until I saw the police badge.

“Excuse me, are you Rory Hawkins?” The man approached me in full blue uniform, ID in hand. He was impressively tall, six foot four at the least, with an unkempt bushy beard and straggly brown hair dangling from his scalp. He talked with the voice of a chainsmoker, and I’ll admit, I was already shaking in my boots.

I dropped the key from my door. “Yeah, that’s me?”

“Uh huh, figured as much.” The officer dropped his badge, returning it to his belt. “My name is Officer Leeds, I was wondering if you could answer a few questions for me.”

I blinked. “Am I in trouble?”

“No, you’re not. I’m on an investigation and I’m working through the employee list of Cardinal Lake Amusement Park. You were recently employed there, yes?”

“Yep.” What else was I supposed to say? I had no idea what the protocol for this was. “How can I help you, sir?”

I wouldn’t call the following talk an interrogation, but that’s what it felt like. Having this giant of a police officer cram himself into my tiny kitchen table in my still very unpacked apartment was about as uncomfortable for me as I’m sure it wasn’t for him. Everything about his demeanor felt calm, collected. Officer Leeds carried himself more like an old west gunslinger than a cop, and his chainsmoker voice did nothing to sway that notion for me. I wasn’t sure what to say at first. In an attempt to seem hospitable, I heated up some old coffee, which he begrudgingly sipped from one of my mugs labeled “I wish this was beer.” Once he was done, and my heart rate was nice and high, he began.

“So, Mr. Hawkins, it seems you’re new in town.”

“Mhm.” He took a look under the table and saw my bouncing leg.

“You can relax. You’re not in trouble.” I might as well have been. “Since you’re so new, I’ll keep this brief. Are you aware of the high number of missing persons cases in Graycott?”

“Yeah, it’s hard to miss. The whole town’s littered with flyers.”

“Look at this for me.” Leeds pulled out a manilla folder and spilled its contents on the table. He sifted through the file, putting aside plenty of papers and images until he came to one in particular. The image was a printed out screenshot from Google Maps, complete with a watermark. “Greycott has always had an alarming number of disappearances. I’ve taken the liberty of marking each one on this map here, going back forty years. You notice anything in particular?”

I did. The red dots were spread around town, but they all clustered together around one particular area: Cardinal Lake. “The closer these people are to the lake,” he explained, “the more likely they are to drop off the face of the Earth. I know this is a long shot. You’ve only been here so long, I understand that, but you work on the lake. Have you seen anything you’d call suspicious? Anything… out of the ordinary?” Yes, of course I have. Below the table, my fingers dug into the fabric of my pants, but it’s not like I could tell him that. All I could think of was that red envelope. If I wasn’t careful with my words, there’d be hell to pay. “Sorry sir, I haven’t seen anything. From what I can tell, the lake’s just a lake. Nothing else to it.”

I could see the gears turning in his brain. Whether or not Leeds believed me or not, he didn’t say. Instead, he tore off a corner piece of one of his file papers, and scribbled down a number. “If you see anything, anything at all, let me know. Have a good day, kid.” And just like that, he was gone, leaving me to my own devices. The last thing I did before collapsing into bed was plug that phone number into my contacts list. Maybe it’d be useful at some point.

Day Three:

I’d never driven a golf cart before, but as Mel said, it was time for me to learn. The moment I clocked in, Mel pushed me right back outside the breakroom.

“You hear of Mystic Rock, yet?”

“Nope. Tell me.” As Mel put it, Mystic Rock is Graycott’s very own “Lover’s Lane” spot. Every now and then, the local high school kids would get together and throw parties on the shoreline. In particular, they like to meet at a large rock overhang on the opposite side of Cardinal Lake to the park, the titular Mystic Rock. Officially, the mysterious carvings on the rock were from a native tribe. Now I know their real purpose.

“That rock is one of the thirteen seals keeping the lake in check. So, take a look.”

Mel handed me a pair of binoculars. I raised them to my face, aiming them across the lake. Cardinal Lake, being as large as it is, can’t be seen fully from the park, not at ground level at least. I couldn’t see Mystic Rock, but what I could see was a thin plume of smoke drifting into the distant night sky. “Oh. I see where this is going.”

“Mhm. Take the golf cart, go check it out. Odds are, it’s just a bunch of teenagers goofing off and getting drunk. If they give you any trouble, threaten to call the cops. That usually does the trick. Kick them out, report back here. Simple out and back. Don’t die.”

So that’s what I did. Awkwardly, I maneuvered the golf cart to and fro through the winding streets of the park until I reached the treeline outside its limits, driving onto the system of backroads that encircled the lake. The way to Mystic Rock was tense. I was surrounded on all sides by dark, looming trees, and the presence of Cardinal Lake itself felt like sitting next to a live grenade, ready to blow up in my face at a moment’s notice. Periodically, I’d get a look at the inky, dark waters through the breaks in the trees. Lit by the sliver of moonlight in the sky, it was peaceful, pretty even, but when I’d look hard enough, the water would begin to ripple, disturbed by something unseen, hidden just beneath the water like a trapdoor spider. When I finally saw Mystic Rock for the first time, it was a breath of fresh air.

Peering through the binoculars, I felt bad knowing I’d have to kick them out. On a large rock overhang that overlooked a lakeside cove was a group of eight, sitting or standing around a still burning campfire. At this distance, I could hear the distant bass from a song I couldn’t recognize, but the music was a comforting change of pace from the monotonous tune of crickets and cicadas. I was maybe twenty minutes away. My radio beeped.

“Rory, you there yet?” It was Mel.

“Not yet, but I see the fire. You were right. Just some teens.”

“Good. Give them the boot and come on back.”

When I made it to the rock, I parked the golf cart at the edge of the treeline. It was only when I got closer that the alarms began going off. At first, I assumed the lack of voices was due to the blaring music covering them up. Not the case. The campfire on Mystic Rock, still burning, was abandoned. The whole area was strewn with trash: crushed beer cans, solo cups, snack wrappers, even a sleeping bag, all scattered across the ground. The source of the music, a bluetooth speaker, sat alone near the rock’s edge. They were just here. Where’d everyone go?

“Mel? They’re gone. Everybody just vanished before I showed up. There’s stuff everywhere.”

“That’s weird. Maybe they saw you coming and dipped. Any sign of where they went?”

I wandered back over to the trees, shining my flashlight all the while. Far from where I’d parked the cart, the trees thinned out significantly. Much of the grass was flattened, two divots leading off into the forest. “Looks like they drove off, but they left in a hurry. Their stuff is still everywhere.” It was then I felt something crunch under my boot. I lifted it to see a smart phone, its screen cracked and half buried beneath a layer of mud and grass. I snatched it up, and to my surprise, it had been left recording.

Squatting next to the fire, holding the forgotten phone, I ended the recording and watched the video back. It was nearly forty minutes long. The beginning was about what I expected. Some guy, evidently named Tony, was shouting into the camera. The group had been drinking for some time now. One couple was sitting on the sleeping bag, the girl laying on the guy’s shoulder. Some other guy had taken off his shirt, beer running down his bare chest as he tossed the can into the fire. It looked like a decent function. I skipped forward in the video.

“Hey,” one of the girls came on screen. Black hair, doe eyes, arms tight to her chest. “I think someone’s out here with us.”

“What? Seriously?” Tony sounded concerned.

“Yeah. I went to go pee, and I heard some branches breaking? I’m scared.”

“Relax. Probably a deer or something,” came someone’s voice from off screen.

I was just about to skip forward again, but then, “WHO IS THAT?!”

Screaming. A lot of screaming. The camera shook, racing towards one of two trucks, and then at some point in the scuffle Tony had dropped the phone. The video feed was static, that was until I came along, just eight minutes later. I felt exposed. The music was too loud, but then, I realized the music was playing at all. I dragged down from the top right, noticing the phone was connected to the bluetooth speaker. I paused it. I paused the music just in time to hear the crunching of grass from just behind me.

I whirled around and screamed. It was a hunched figure, dressed in a black cloak and just a few yards away. When they were caught, they lunged, breaking into a sprint, coming at me and wielding a knife. They made no noise, just the stomping of boots against the rock face. In my haste, I fidgeted with the holster on my belt, trying desperately to undo the latch. The cloak was almost upon me, the raised knife gleaming in the fire light, coated with red. I tripped falling backward onto my ass, and the gun came free. I fired, and the cloak flinched. Screaming, I kept firing, but they dashed to the right, behind the smoldering fire. I scrambled to my feet, gun in hand, and kept firing, but by then, they’d already reached the treeline. Before I knew it, the cloak was gone. Whoever they were, they didn’t come back.

The golf cart’s tires had been slashed. I called Mel for backup, waiting anxiously for him to come get me, again, watching the trees all the while. Together, he, Victoria, and I combed the woods for any sign of the cloaked figure. We found two things: a torn piece of black cloth on a low hanging tree limb, and a set of footprints in the soft dirt. We followed those footprints down the steep slope to the shore of Mystic Rock. There, we found another pentagram, as well as another gutted fish. I think we found who’s been sabotaging the seals.

Day Four:

I didn’t get much sleep the following day. Blackout curtains didn’t help. Instead, I tossed and turned in my bed, flinching at every little noise from the apartments round me. When my shift rolled around the following day, I reached the employee parking lot at sunset, only to notice Mel and Victoria had beaten me there. Shutting my door, I walked over to meet them. Victoria had a cigarette, leaning against her jeep, and Mel was squatting on the ground, scrolling his phone.

“What are you guys doing?” I asked.

“Well,” Victoria went first, dropping the cigarette and stamping it out, “if we’re getting attacked by knife wielding maniacs outside the Lake, I figured we might as well go into work together instead of separately.”

“Alright, let’s go then.”

So that’s what we did. Together, the three of us made our way down the employee trail to the park. All the while, we kept our heads on a swivel. Dusk was setting in. The flurry of three different flashlights in the dark only caused the shadows to leap out at us. Every figure in the dark was just a dead tree, or a bush, or nothing at all. The three of us had taken to carrying our service pistols outside of work. They did nothing to sway our anxieties. When we finally reached the gate, I let out a sigh of relief while Victoria went to undo the padlock. That is, until I noticed a stray footprint in the dirt to my left.

“Oh no.” I moved back  a thicket of thorny bushes for us to see. Just off the beaten path, someone had cut a hole at the bottom of the fence. There was even a divot in the ground where they’d crawled under. We had an intruder.

Immediately, we rushed straight through the park to get to the breakroom. If we could get to the camera footage, we might be able to see where they’d gone, or what they’d been doing in the park. But, when we got to the Fun Zone, our worst fears were confirmed.

“Son of a-!” Mel rushed right through the wide open door to the breakroom, much to Victoria’s contempt. The keycard reader had been dismantled, bypassing the electronic lock that kept it shut. I walked in after him. Nobody was inside, but even if the door hadn’t been opened it was clear someone had been inside. Mel was at the camera set up, clacking away at the keyboard with fury. I’d seen him less concerned shoving a metal rod through a Gill Man’s face. “They took the drives! The hard drives! All the camera footage from last week is gone!”

“Why the hell would they take the camera footage?” I asked.

Mel was freaking out. “You don’t mess with a man’s space, man! It’s not natural!”

“Calm down,” Victoria droned, “they couldn’t have gotten far.”

“How do you know?”
“I don’t. They could still be in the park though, and we have to do our job.”

I had stepped outside by then, not wanting to hear them argue. Then, gun shots.

BANG! BANG!

The sounds broke through the nighttime ambiance I’d gotten so used to over the last few nights, and I was scared shitless. They weren’t close, but I could hear them from across the park. Victoria emerged from behind me. “Get in the golf cart.”

I hadn’t even clocked in yet, and I was already in the back of a speeding cart, gun in hand. The gunshots were clearly coming from Big Wave Bay. Victoria was driving (apparently she doesn’t trust Mel at the wheel) and I was in the back, trying not to throw up while loading my service pistol. The gunshot noises kept coming, only once we got closer did they finally cease. We got out at the entrance to the zone, crouching behind a set of trash cans. As the only veteran among us, Victoria led the way while Mel and I followed; crouched down, moving fast, nerves shot to all hell.

We got spotted almost instantly.

“Hey! You down there!” It was a gruff, older voice, clearly a man, coming from above us. Immediately, we took cover out of the street, but I misjudged where we were going. I was on one side of the street, in a dark alley between two merch shops, while Mel and Victoria were squatted behind a brick and mortar foodstand across from me. I peeked out, and could barely see the man’s dark silhouette in the moonlight. He was positioned halfway up another slide, a few yards down the path and up two stories high.

“Put down the gun, sir!” Victoria shouted. “Put it down!”

“I don’t have no damn gun! Get out of here! Now!”

He wasn’t lying. Whatever was in the man’s hands, it didn’t look like a gun. It was then that the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end, and I realized the warm, humid breeze I felt in the alley wasn’t coning from the lake. I looked behind me to see a dangling light, floating in the dark. It was ghostly blue, and just bright enough to illuminate the enamel of needle teeth. The beast unhinged its jaw.

“BANG! BANG!”

I screamed, trying to get away, but the Gill Man pounced. It leapt onto my back, pinning me in place with its hideous claws, digging into my shoulders, pressing my nose into the hard concrete of the street path. I heard my coworkers shouting. The thing was big, bigger than the one that chased me that first night. My cries were muffled, drowned out completely by the thing’s ear rending shrieks. I thought I was a goner, feeling its slimy claw press my head to the side, its slimy fingers gripping my head. That was, until there was a loud shunk, and suddenly the pressure was gone. The thing fell limp, falling over to the side. I gasped for air, flipping around to see it dead on the floor, bleeding from the mouth. Sticking out the side of its head was a large, metal rod: a crossbow bolt.

I leapt to my feet, and my coworkers emerged from their respective hiding spot. Victoria shouted up to the slide, “just who the hell are you?”

“Relax,” the voice called out again, “I wasn’t aiming for the kid.” It took a minute for the man to come down from his perch. Mel and Victoria had their guns trained on him. All the while, the man had his hands up, yet his stride was brisk, carefree. At first glance, he looked ridiculous. His silhouette was that of some medieval fantasy archer: long coat, wide brimmed hat, a goddamn crossbow in his right hand. He was like a living cartoon, yet his face was familiar.

“You’re kidding me.”

“Evening, Mr. Hawkins,” said the man I thought to be Officer Leeds. He’d settled the crossbow across his back, looking out at me with tired eyes from between his massive hat and somehow more massive beard.

“Rory, you know this guy?” Victoria hadn’t put down her gun, that was, until Mel put it down for her.

“He came to my apartment a few days ago. I thought he was a cop?”

“I ain’t no cop,” said the crossbow man, dropping his hands. “Never have, never will be. Name’s Quint. Pleased to meet you.” He’d dialed up the southern twang considerably.

“Wait, I’m confused,” said Mel, “who are you and what are you doing in the park?”

“I’m an agent, of sorts. My organization has taken an interest in your little amusement park. You can only rack up so many missing persons and urban legends before someone comes knocking. That’s where I come in.”

“So what, you’re here to shut us down?”
“Shut you down? No! I’ve been undercover trying to get a lay of the land. When that failed, I just broke into the park myself. That’s when I found the missing link, here.”

Mel pointed, “so you’re the guy who dug that hole in the fence!”

Quint cocked his head. “Nope. No, that wasn’t me. I hiked in from the other side of the lake. You folks have some kind of intruder?”

“Yeah,” I started talking again. “Someone broke into the breakroom and stole our camera footage. That wasn’t you?”

He shook his head. “Wasn’t me. No need for it. I got my evidence right here.”

Victoria wasn’t buying it. “Cut the shit. How do we know you aren’t the one who’s broken in? Hell, how do we know you aren’t the one who’s been sabotaging the lake seals?”

Quint didn’t answer. Instead, he kicked the body of the dead Gill Man laying between us. “I get the feeling he’s telling the truth,” I grabbed her arm. “If he wanted to kill me, he could’ve just done it in my apartment. He wouldn’t need a cloak and knife.” She shook me off.

“BANG! BANG!” 

From deeper in the park, there came another set of “gunshots” causing everyone to jump. The artificiality in them sounded obvious now. “Tell you what,” Quint said, unslinging the crossbow from his back, “let’s go hunt down the remaining fish man, and I’ll fill you in on the details later. Deal?”

Victoria didn’t say a word, but Mel spoke for the rest of us. “Alright. Let’s do it.”

With that, the three of them took off on foot. I moved to follow, but my leg was aching from being pushed over by the monster, causing me to limp. I wasn’t looking forward to dealing with the Gill Man’s corpse. That meat grinder had become my sworn enemy. However, just before I left it, I heard something new. It sounded like something being knocked over. I looked off to my left. Normally, all of the food stands that weren’t just carts on wheels had their shutters closed at night, which made it all the more strange when I noticed one of the food stands had its shutter opened just a few inches, revealing the blackness within.

Curious, I drew my gun again, tiptoing my way to the stand. If someone was in there, they’d gone quiet, and shining my light through the slot didn’t cause any monstrous screams. I steeled myself, not wanting to get tackled for the second time that night. I grabbed the metal shutter, and threw it upwards. It folded against the ceiling like a garage door. I shined my light inside and there was… nobody. Not a thing. I peeked over the counter, only to see one of those hot pretzel stands shattered on the floor. Something wasn’t right, still. I slung one leg over the counter, pulling myself into the food stand. Then, it was obvious. Landing on the inside, I was met with a pair of eyes.

It was a girl, probably around my age, crouched down in a cavity under the sales counter. She was dressed in a beanie, a large hoodie, and converses. With a gloved hand, she held a finger to her lips, and in the other was a small pocket knife, blade thrust in my direction. It was shaking. She wasn’t going to kill me. She was scared.

“Woah,” I whispered, putting up the gun,  “just take it easy.”

“Leave me alone. Just let me go, and you’ll never see me again.”

“You’re the one who stole the footage, aren’t you?”
“I need it.” Her voice was full of venom. I noticed a large backpack crammed into the space behind her. She moved her body in front of it. I weighed my options.

“I’m not going to take it from you. Look, whatever you need, I can help. I’m not going to hurt you. I’m a security guard, not a cop. I just need to ask you a few questions, and then you can go, and you’ll never have to see the lake again if you don’t want to. Deal?”

“Why are you trying to help me?”

I wasn’t entirely sure myself. “I don’t know. Maybe you have a good reason to break in.”

The knife wavered for a moment, only to come right back up. “Shut the window.”

“Okay, okay,” I reached up, watching her all the while. She didn’t move. I dragged down the shutter, locking us in the dark. The only light source now came from my flashlight, giving our interaction the same lighting as a campfire ghost story. “Okay. First, who are you?”

She stared at me, knife raised. “No, I go first. What the hell are those things out there?”

I grunted, squeezing my eyes shut. “Gill Men. Lake monsters. They’re real.”

When I opened them, there were silent tears trailing down her cheeks.

“What’s wrong? They didn’t get you, did they?”

She sniffled. “No, I’m fine. It’s my brother. He came here a few nights ago, and he hasn’t come home since. I thought if I could look at the camera footage from that night, I could figure out where he went, but then those things showed up, and now I’m here. Please, have you seen him?” She dug into the pocket of her hoodie, pulling out a smart phone. Her lock screen was a group photo, taken at night, probably a party judging by the solo cups in hand. She pointed to someone near the front, and I felt my eyes widen.

“Have you seen him?”

“I have.” Even without his shirt off, and without the entourage of annoying friends, I recognized the boy in the photo. Anyone would remember those eyes: one blue, one yellow. Pool-guy. “His name is Cole. He was here a few nights ago. He went down one of the slides, but then we got attacked, and we got separated. I don’t know where he could’ve gone. I’m sorry.”

She curled up into herself. “The cops are doing nothing. Just a few days in and they already gave up. They said that he ran away. That’s bullshit. Cole wouldn’t just run away, I know him. You people didn’t do something to him, did you? Did he get eaten by those things?”

“No, I don’t know what happened to him,”.I was never good at these moments, but I was locked in here with her. I couldn’t just say nothing. “Hey, if Cole pops up again, I can let you know, alright? He might still be out there, just hiding, or something like that. What’s your name?”

She looked up at me. “Cass.”

“Okay, Cass? I need you to get out of here. I won’t tell anyone you were here, but Cardinal Lake isn’t safe. Go back out the way you came, and if I find Cole at some point, I’ll let you know, okay? I just need the camera footage. Please.”

She went quiet again, reaching into the bag and handing me a large black hard drive. “Okay. I’ll go.”

“Just be careful.” So, I opened the shutter, and Cass ran off into the park. I told the others I’d found it by chance. If they didn’t buy that excuse, they didn’t tell me. Mel seems happier at least. I ended the night feeling conflicted. I’m not stupid. The odds of Cole being alive still were slim to none. Just how many people had been taken by the lake? I don’t think I’ll ever know the answer to that question. Maybe I don’t want to know.

Day Five:

“So you built this whole board, huh?” Quint was standing in front of the corkboard in the breakroom, looking it up and down. He’d taken to smoking a cigar inside the poorly vented room. To be fair, Victoria was guilty of that too. The two of them didn’t exactly get along, but I think she was a little glad to not be the only smoker on the night shift.

“Yep,” she said, standing next to him, a cigarette between her fingers. “When I started out, I figured I’d try to gather everything I knew about the lake in one place. One thing led to another, and a few years down the line, it looks like this.”

“It really brings the room together.”

“Oh, shut it.”

I was sitting at the round table in the center of the room, and for the ninth time, I checked the clock on the wall. We’d all made the decision to meet with Quint at the start of our next shift. Mel drew the short straw, and pretty soon, he’d be back from patrol. In the meantime, I had to listen to these two bicker.

The door beeped. Mel pushed his way inside. “Sorry I’m late. All the seals are secured.”

“Oh thank God.” I was just about ready to jump into the lake if I had to hear them trade sarcasm one more time.  “Okay, let’s get this over with. Quint, what’s this plan you’ve been cooking up?”

“About time. Gather ‘round.” Everybody sat down at the table. Mel eyed the other two, and they begrudgingly stamped out their respective nicotine sticks on the ground. Quint reached under the table, grabbing a truly massive duffel bag, reaching inside and pulling out a set of plans, splaying them out on the table with a grin. “So from what you folks have been telling me, for the past few years, your company has been keeping you all on the defensive. You’re all reacting to problems when they appear. That’s not sustainable. It’s a losing war. If you want to win the war, you have to go on the offense.”

I was staring down at the blueprints before me. Before us was schematics for, well, a bomb, a big one. A really, really big bomb. “You want us to BLOW UP the lake? Are you nuts?”

“Son, that’s not a lake. For lack of a better term, it’s a goddamn mouth to Hell. Or, somewhere. See, those creatures aren’t of our world. They’re from somewhere else. Somewhere, at the bottom of that lake, is a gateway. A portal, if you want. No matter how many of those things you kill, there’s going to be more. Seal the portal, no more Gill Men.”

“How do you know any of this?”

Quint looked at me, and there was something in his expression that I couldn’t place. “This isn’t the first time this sort of thing has happened, son. I’ve seen what happens when these things go too far. Things from beyond the veil come crashing into our world, and it ain’t pretty.”

That shut me up for a bit. Victoria went next. “So how do we blow up this portal?”

“Well, first we have to find it.”

“And how exactly do we do that?”

“We use a boat. Scan the lake.”

“I’m out.” Victoria stood up, much to Quint’s chagrin. “You want us to paddle out on the lake at night? That’s suicide! We’d be mauled to death in minutes!”
“Got no choice. These portals can only be opened for a certain window of time. Can’t find it during the day. It has to be at night.”

“How do you expect us to go out there and not die?”

“I was gettin’ to that.” He moved aside a set of papers. “I’ll have the materials by tomorrow. There’s a way for us to get out on the lake without being eaten alive. Camouflage, if you will. I just need you all to trust me. We pull this off, it’ll be the biggest victory you’ve ever had on Cardinal Lake.”

I was staring at the blueprints. It seemed too good to be true. Surely, this couldn’t be done. Could it? It was a complete gamble. Then, Mel stood up. “I’m in.”

I gave him a look. “Wait, just like that?”

“I came to this job at rock bottom, thinking I’d never fit in anywhere else. I’m good at what I do, and I’ve been doing it for years. But, I don’t want to do this forever. If there’s even a sliver of a chance that we can end this, and I can move on with my life, I’m in.”

I’d never heard Mel speak like this before. It was a kind of hollowness in him that I had never seen. Part of me wondered if he was right, if this could be my out. Maybe I’d be able to see my family again, or maybe I’d be able to get off the nightmare train that’d become my life. “Alright, I’m in too.”

Everybody was looking at Victoria now. She had crossed her arms, looking at us with something between contempt and sorrow. Somewhere, inside her, I think she knew this could work, but some part of her was holding her back. Something kept her from acting on it. Fear, or maybe hopelessness? She’d been here longer than any of us. Maybe she’d given up on ever leaving.

“Come on. You in, or not?”

Victoria sighed. “God damn it. Fine. Let’s blow up Cardinal Lake.”

Day Six:

Let me ask you, reader. How do you get safely across a lake of deadly fish monsters while not being eaten alive? The answer? Quietly.

Quint and I pushed the rowboat onto the quiet waters by the dock at sunset. Armed with an expensive sonar device, courtesy of whatever mysterious group Quint works for, we slowly paddled our way into the inky black of Cardinal Lake. I lifted my flashlight above my head, aiming it across the park, towards Frostbite Falls. Three quick flashes. The top of the tower returned mine with its own set of quick flashes. Victoria was in place. I waded into the water and stepped into the boat. I turned to the other side of the lake, and did another set of flashes. From the treeline, and Mel returned them. No radios for tonight. For now, at least.

It was a strange feeling, intentionally throwing ourselves into the fire. My hands were shaking. The only sound on the lake was the chill of wind and the lapping of water against the boat. It was as though the usual nightlife had gone on holiday, leaving the whole place eerily quiet. That, or maybe they knew just how forbidden what we were doing really was, as if tickling the lion’s tail.

Forty minutes. Forty minutes of agonizing tension, waiting for us to get into position. Every now and then, below me, I’d see a small blip of light pierce the blackness. Two or three at a time. Gill Men lures. I tried not to think of just how many of those things were swimming beneath us. Tens? Hundreds? According to Quint, any and all geological survey results of the lake were likely forged by Mercer Corp, trying to cover up their secret and save profits. Nobody wants to vacation on the lake with an otherworldly trench-portal in it, after all. If we were to discover its true depth, we’d need to get as far out as we can and start blasting the depths with sonar. The only problem was that sonar is loud. Real loud. Fortunately, we’d planned for that too. As much as we could, at least.

Quint and I didn’t talk the whole ride. Couldn’t. We’d painted the rowboat entirely black, smeared it with moss and dirt, and did everything we could to camouflage it, right down to disguising our scents. You don’t want to know the details. With all that, we weren’t going to give away our position by talking now.

Once we were deep enough, I moved my hand above the button to activate the device. The monster hunter gave a silent nod. Any sort of easygoing he’d possessed prior to tonight had bled out of him over the course of the evening, as the danger of our task finally washed over us. I shut my eyes. This was meant to be an ordinary job. Not this. I tried to picture what I’d find once this was all over, if it would be over at all. The worst part? I had no idea what that might look like. I pressed the button.

For us, the blip was loud. For the lake, it was deafening, a piercing bleep that reverberated across the entirety of Cardinal Lake. A few seconds later, we heard it. A cry from the deep. The hoard had heard us, and it screamed in agony. We’d gambled on this. In all likelihood, the sonar ping had bought us seconds. Minutes at most. Quint started to paddle like mad, aiming for the shore. I reached for the back of the boat, fumbling with a large, waterproof box we’d packed earlier that night. I unlatched the container to find our saving grace: emergency flares.

“Do it! Now!” Quint shouted, caution to the wind. I grabbed one of the red sticks and ripped off the end. With a hiss, the stick burst to life, and my hand felt suddenly hot. As far as I could, I tossed it, and it fell into the deep, disappearing into the black waters. I grabbed more, and more, tossing them as far as I could, two at a time if I could. Four, seven, thirteen, I kept going. Before long, I saw those red fires begin to be snuffed out, blocked out and swarmed by a hoard of teeth and claws. This was our one chance: bank on the Gill Men’s attraction to light and hope they’d miss us.

I felt the boat rock. Something had found us. I tossed another flare, and the pressure disappeared, a shadow, blacker than black paddling through the water to consume and attack the red fire. The waters were starting to churn. The hoard was coming. I was running out of flares. The boat jerked violently to the left. I turned around to see a large, webbed hand having grabbed hold of the rowboat’s side. Right when I saw it’s bulbous eyes breach the surface, I pulled my pistol from my belt and unloaded on it. The thing screeched, dropping its arm and sinking back into the lake. “Start the rudder!”

“Hang on tight, kid!” Quint whirled around and I hit the deck, falling onto my back with my pistol aimed at the sky. As he desperately pulled at the rip cord for the boat’s engine, I noticed more hands start to grab hold of the sides. More dangling lures started to emerge from the water. They found us. From across the lake, I heard a pop, and then one of those hands suddenly had its fingers blasted off. Victoria had joined in, and her aim was dead on. Still, there were so many. Quint was beginning to take notice. “Come on, start!” A muscled arm grabbed hold of his leg. He shook it off, planting his boot straight into the beast’s head. The entire lake now seemed to hiss and screech. The boat was going to go under at this rate. I started firing rapidly, like some demented rail shooter. There was no way for me to get up, the space above me was now scales and teeth and lights and claws. Victoria’s shots were becoming erratic. The sky itself was beginning to grow shrouded as the beasts climbed onto the boat, crushing it with the added weight. My pistol clicked. Then, the engine started.

vvvvvRRRRRRRTTTTTTTTT!

Quint was thrust onto the engine itself with the force, the boat suddenly coming alive with mechanical noise. The wind had picked up as the rowboat skidded across the lake’s surface. It was just enough to knock the Gill Men off balance, throwing them off and back into the water. I pulled myself up, but we weren’t out of the woods just yet.

“Grab this!” Quint kicked another box across the boat’s bottom, which slid to a stop at my feet. I threw myself onto it, digging it open to find more ammunition. I slammed it into my pistol and started firing into the glowing waters behind us, screaming all the while. It was then I found a new problem. My feet were starting to feel wet. With horror, I looked down.

“We’re taking on water!”

“Well, use the signal!”

I opened another compartment of the boat. The flare gun was meant to be a last resort, but we weren’t left with any other options. I aimed the gun upwards, and fired. The flare soared into the air, lighting up the sky with a hellish red. From across the lake I heard another boat engine start. Mel was on his way.

The boat’s speed was dying off as the water mounted around me. The tears in the boat from the Gill Man’s claws grew by the second. I pulled at a roll of tape with my teeth, trying to patch the growing chasms in the boat, but the damage was done. Our safe haven had become dead weight skidding across the water on borrowed time. Mel was coming at us at full speed. He’d have mere seconds to slow down. My eyes landed on the sonar device, slowly sinking into an ever widening tear in the hull of the boat. I threw myself onto the deck again, grabbing hold of it with all my might, only to see the bulging eye of a snarling Gill Man look back at me from below. I cried as its arm rocketed up through the boat’s hull, grabbing onto my leg and digging in hard with its claws.

Mel had arrived, shouting at us to move, to jump on, but I couldn’t. It was pulling me, desperate to drag me down into the abyss with it. Quint was on me now. From within his coat he produced one last flare, tearing it open with his teeth. The light ignited, and he drove the stick down into the thing’s arm. There came the searing of flesh and scales as the thing hissed, driving its arm back through the slit in the boat. I was hauled by my arms as Mel started the engine again. I leapt, and fell hard onto the second boat, slipping across the deck. My free hand scrambled for purchase, but met nothing.

“Got you!” Quint grabbed me by the forearm. He’d grabbed onto one of the boat’s handholds for dear life. Mel threw the boat to the right, and headed straight for land. I looked into the water behind us, and the glowing waters still followed. There was no chance to slow down. The shore was coming at us as 

“Brace!” Mel cried.

It’s hard to describe what happened next. Probably because I hit my head really, really hard. I remember a loud slamming noise. Then, I was in the air. After that, I saw trees, as the boat hurdled itself straight into the woods. Things went black after that. The next thing I knew, I was lying in a heap on soft, sweet dirt. My vision flickered, and I saw Mel stumbling towards me, probably just as confused.

“Y-you okay?” He asked, rubbing his head, stained red.

“I think so. Where’s Quint?”

I heard a loud grunting noise from the boat beside me. It had nearly shattered in half, slamming into a particularly stubborn tree trunk. Quint crawled out from underneath. His face was puckered with dirt, soil, and blood. He flipped around, and fell against the boat’s hull, taking a breath. With a pained grimace, he looked over at me. “You got the sonar device, right?”

I suddenly became aware of my own fingers again. I looked down to see the box cradled in my arms. Beaten, but functional. My radio bleeped to life on my belt.

“Rory? Mel? You two alive? Answer!” It was Victoria, just as pissed off as ever.

“Yeah,” I answered back, “we’re alive.”

Quint motioned, and I handed it to him. Sitting side by side, Mel watching over my shoulder, he navigated a digital screen. The lake’s bottom sloped downwards gradually, a reasonable depth. “Come on, come on,” he whispered. Then, the bottom dropped. It dropped, and kept dropping, going down, and down, and down; a trench, thousands of feet deep. He chuckled.

“What’s so funny?” I asked.

“This.” he pointed to the screen with a bloodied finger. “We found their home.”

END PART 2 OF 3.