Part 4: The Moon Island Fishing Club

      Despite tales of boats disappearing from nearby waters and claims of rancid smells blowing across the bay to the docks in Bell Harbor, the island drew no visitors, even before that odd night when they dug up what Cornelius buried.

      They followed Leo over the rocks and through the trees, with no one saying another word. A putrid smell fell over them, and the cracking ground ahead on the beach made it apparent they had arrived.

      Under the light of the moon, the four dug while Henry held the light from above, the bag still over his shoulder. Ground flew from their shovels as they worked in silence. They were shoulder-deep when they saw a glow peek out from under the sand.

      “No more shovels, hands only,” Leo barked.

      The four threw their shovels out of the hole up by Henry, who pulled the bag off his shoulder quietly without the rest noticing.

      “God, look at the colors,” Earl said, gently pushing the earth away. The four used their hands to move soil, revealing what looked like a giant crystal ball uncovered to the shoulder. Then they stood up, surrounding it.

      It pulsed in a heartbeat-like rhythm with varying intensities of white, yellow, and green. No longer needing the light to see, Henry flicked it off.

      “Don’t stare at it,” Henry said from above, untying the rope of his bag.

      But it was too late.

      As the moon peaked overhead, patterns began to appear in the orb, and the visions later recollected by the four who stood around it diverged at this point.

      John and Earl, perhaps because they shared a womb, both saw dazzling purple lights like thrumming polka dots against a sunlight-white background. They later said the thing was a symbol of Christ, set to return the world to its pristine origins.

      Linda saw a soft pink glow and felt it was the heart of the world, risen to bring love to all mankind.

      Leo refused to discuss what he had seen.

      As the four continued to stare, Henry pulled the Redmouth out of the bag and put his hand inside its great mouth. The fish closed its lips around his wrist without biting him and then stiffened its body like metal, resembling an oval shield with long spines coming out of its back. Linda, Leo, John, and Earl stood in a square around the egg and didn’t notice its tentacles rising out of the ground behind them. None of them have any recollection of what happened next, and Henry never told them.

      When Henry jumped into the hole, the thing reacted instantly, intensifying its light.

      “It’s no use you son of a bitch,” he told it as the others continued staring into it mindlessly.

      A large tentacle shot out of the ground and wrapped itself around Henry’s neck, pulling him to the bottom of the hole. As Henry tried to get it off, the Redmouth remained stoic and still at the end of his other arm.

      Images of his angry, alcoholic father hitting him bombarded Henry’s mind, but the wound in his back began throbbing, filling his body with Redmouth venom, and as he pried the tentacle off, the elixir pushed into his veins and the visions went away. He struggled to his feet and stepped toward the egg.

      Linda attacked him first. She had bruises on her jaw for weeks afterward from where he knocked her out cold, though she didn’t remember how she got them.

      Without a word, John and Earl charged Henry, grabbing his arms and pinning him to the ground.

      As he struggled to free himself, Leo stepped forward and began speaking in an unrecognized tongue. His eyes were the same color as the egg now and mirrored its color changes. White, yellow, green; white, yellow, green. He kneeled on Henry’s legs as the brothers held him and began strangling him.

      “Get off me,” Henry yelled just before he lost his breath.

      As his head pressed deeper into the sand, Henry could feel John raining blow after blow upon the fish still attached to his right arm. He tried pushing back against Leo’s hands, but the weight of the man lying on his body was more than he could overcome. The sharp pain of the Redmouth’s teeth was almost a relief compared to the throttling. As the blood poured down his hand into the fish’s throat, he felt a searing pain as the lips became one with his own skin. The great fish—now part of Henry—writhed away from John’s grip, sticking its formidable spines into its captor’s stomach, and the man fell back, doubling over in pain. Leo released Henry’s neck and grabbed one of the fish’s gill plates tearing it off easily. Henry took a great breath and bellowed in pain as Leo pushed his hand into the opening where the gill plate had been, pushing past the exposed gills. The fish tried to free itself again, but Leo pinned it down with his body and forced his arm into the fish’s sternum while bones popped and an exhausted air of death emanated from inside.

      Leo pulled his arm from inside the fish and stood up, holding a heart in his bloody hand.

      The great egg pulsed with delight.

      Leo motioned to Earl, who let Henry’s limp arm go and stood up. A swirl at the water’s edge got their attention. As they climbed out and walked towards the water, a tentacle followed behind them like a snake. The water near the shore boiled with activity as the tentacle found its way into the lake and began to drink. As it did, the ball grew.