Chapter 540

Antonio, a weathered man of 46 years, his face a roadmap of hardship and sun-baked Portuguese summers, felt the dampness of Blackwater Lake seep into his bones. It wasn't just the physical chill; it was a bone-deep coldness, a dread that had become as familiar as his own reflection in the murky water. He'd lived on the edge of Blackwater Lake in an old, one room cabin.

He pulled his threadbare coat tighter, the rough wool scratching against his skin, providing a distraction that, nevertheless, gave the impression of security.

The lake. It held a darkness that defied the surrounding beauty of the sprawling woodlands and distant, purple-tinged mountains. It whispered promises of things you wouldn't ever want.

For as long as Antonio could remember, there were the rules, passed down from old-timers, muttered like curses in hushed tones. No swimming after sundown. No taking fish out of season. No loud music. And never, ever, disturb the old, warped stones beneath the water's surface at the western side, almost resembling, and Antonio couldn't quite shake it, an ancient cemetery.

He wasn't the lake's owner, not in any legal sense. But he was its keeper, its self-appointed guardian, a sentinel against the thoughtlessness of those lured in from the nearby small town, or, god forbid, even tourists.

Tonight, the air was thick, like over-brewed tea, and there were absolutely no stars present in the night sky, as a complete covering of the blackest of clouds had obscured all natural, heavenly light. Antonio couldn't remember another night that was just this, he supposed, unsettling.

He walked the perimeter, his boots sinking slightly into the muddy shore.

A twig snapped, nearby in the tree-line. Antonio's hand tightened around the worn handle of his old hunting rifle. It probably, if he were completely honest, didn't have the firepower, after years, perhaps decades, of neglect.

"Who's there?" His language betrayed his origins. His heavy accent seemed to amplify the natural unease of his surroundings.

Two figures, he would suppose teenagers by how scrawny and under-developed, that, or severely deprived adults, emerged from the tree line, their features obscured by the near-complete lack of light. They carried, he was shocked to see, fishing poles and a small, cheap, cooler. He could only guess what kind of night time shenanigans those things pointed towards.

"You're not supposed to be here," Antonio stated, his tone not threatening, just...tired. Years and years, all these days added up to too much exhaustion. He simply had no patience, let alone sympathy.

The taller one scoffed, though the sound showed an indication that maybe they actually were nervous. "What's it to you, old man?" The other teenager laughed nervously. They weren't going to listen. They never did. He'd hoped, this time, that, at least maybe, this would be one instance where the outcome he'd grown to despise wouldn't occur.

Antonio sighed. He lowered the rifle slightly. It was, on this night, especially useless. "The lake... it has rules," he responded. He never was an effective speaker. Not when it really mattered, at least.

"Rules?," they responded. "We aren't hurting anyone. What gives you any right to enforce those," he sneered, ""rules"." The younger of the two teens spat upon the shoreline. Antonio grimaced slightly.

He knew explaining it wouldn't do any good, the same it never had before, however many years he'd held this responsibility, the unwanted role of protector, perhaps guardian, he never decided for certain, for so, so many people who never took his guidance to safety, all leading to so much pain, horror and distress, his head pounding from the repetition of it.

They'd cast their lines before the words were even fully formed on his lips. That would never come off of the water, never go anywhere, no matter how hard it struck.

The water's surface rippled, then bulged where their lines had struck it's dark, unforgiving surface. Something rose, slow, inevitable. Antonio backed away, a groan of something like disgust and disbelief escaped him.

The teens, though, they were, after all, at that exact point he dreaded. It made him wonder, for, truthfully, about the one-millionth time, or somewhere close enough to be insignificant, what the point was in him watching, waiting, guarding, only to fail so very, very often.

The shape solidified – not human, not animal, something in between, twisted and glistening. Long, sinuous limbs ended in points that gleamed wickedly even in the dark, especially, in-fact, considering that particular setting.

The screams were short. Sharp. He really hated the sound they made. Horrible, in his professional opinion. They really added so much discomfort.

Antonio turned away, a well-worn nausea rising in his throat. He wouldn't watch. He never watched.

The sounds – the crunching, the tearing – that he could never quite manage to make not occur.

And, then... the heavy, all encompassing, thick-aired silence. The absolute worst. So much worse. Antonio couldn't handle it anymore. His brain was racing. The air around the lake grew denser, almost choking Antonio with a feeling of hopelessness.

The worst part of that, he figured out pretty quickly, or maybe not quickly at all, but still earlier in his so very depressing lifetime. He couldn't leave. Ever.

Years ago, he'd come to Blackwater Lake as a young man, fleeing the suffocating, suffocating being a very bad word that had been used, grief of losing his wife and young daughter, and to what, he could not at all know. He remembered. So young they'd been, she had been. It would, if his thoughts held true, become something of a theme, this death, a sad occurrence, the world never lacking people passing away from, to put it really mildly, some truly upsetting and unforseen happenings.

He'd sought solace in the isolation, in the wild beauty that should have calmed the pain, rather than amplify it through such tragic repetition.

He'd broken a rule, only a small thing that barely mattered, so slight, really insignificant he wouldn't even classify them that, when put up against, let's say, killing, for an extreme, yet still relative, analogy.

He'd carelessly thrown an almost eaten apple core into the lake, disturbing its perfect stillness on his first evening there, that perfect time between day and the realest of nighttime that just makes one so tired and hopeless, never really certain.

And something had come that he simply could not have predicted, it was wild, something ungodly, it, even now, seemed, felt, seemed, a little difficult to truly wrap one's mind around.

That night, he'd dreamed of cold hands, of dragging depths. He'd been dragged through weeds, underwater roots, submerged, the cold piercing the layers of clothing, and what really gave him chills was not how cold he was, that, by it's own nature was obviously going to be rather chilling, but how absolutely he felt nothing could remove it's lingering discomfort, how his thoughts came with almost a foreboding tone that suggested it would get so, so much worse in such little time.

He woke gasping for air, soaked to the bone despite having slept, what was meant to have been comfortably and deeply, in his cabin. The smell of stagnant water clung to him. It was hard to know, so, so soon. It was not long before he knew.

He'd tried to leave the next morning, only he soon gave up, there, very likely, wasn't going to be a great benefit that justified it. His truck wouldn't start. Every path out of the woods, of his own two, somewhat under developed legs led him back, somehow, every-time, every-way, no matter how many time's he did the things you'd imagine someone trapped to that kind of, situation would, he somehow arrived, at the same time every-time.

It was an inevitability of some kind.

So he stayed. He watched. He warned. But, really and more than not at all, and it was becoming less often that any paid much notice, it did him very little good. Antonio knew very well that they would be much better off, and what kind of way had this been to live, after, it added up, even before that horrific night with the teens.

Night after night, year after year, he played his unwanted role. The nightmares were something else entirely. Antonio struggled not to think.

Tonight, though, the silence felt different. Deeper. He'd long since gotten that sensation before the other events began. It was a pretty common feeling for Antonio to feel. He wished he could avoid that sensation.

He stared out at the lake, its surface as flat and black as polished onyx. Nothing stirred. He knew this was no surprise to be the reality. He'd been so accustomed to these, well, they were just regular occurrences. It made the place feel normal.

Slowly, almost timidly, something broke the surface of the water, near the center of the lake.

Not the monstrous shape he had come to know and dread, not the gruesome thing that so many unfortunate others fell, well, more accurately, fell, in an utterly gruesome sense of the world, he wished very badly it weren't an occurrence, ever again, a real horror that, not matter how long or hard one could pray.

This was different. He'd never seen a new something here, only ever one that killed and consumed so, so many. He hoped this was better.

It was the pale, blurred outline of a young woman, the gentle light of an early-rise of an exceptionally, or as the local folks, most certainly dead at his point in life would remark, unusually massive and reflective of an exceptionally dense collection of that reflective substance so common among natural, fresh water.

He gasped. "Maria?" The name, so familiar. His daughter's name, he hadn't actually remembered what, when or why he chose it for his young one, not so small at all anymore. He was losing his memories. A symptom of the depression? The environment, his responsibility?

He struggled with his words, it having been decades. It almost came out naturally, though he was shocked, his voice was very much that. His throat closed, dry.

She didn't turn. But, Antonio swore it was Maria, despite so many things, he had aged considerably, for example, not so small at all, his hair, once as thick and rich with color as anything natural you could happen upon on a walk of his own woods, she didn't move like she had at such a, so different and strange, a time in his long, lonely life.

"Maria, is that you?"

The figure lifted a hand, beckoning. He'd known what this gesture was. Maria. No mistake.

Antonio felt tears start in his eyes, hot against his wind-chapped skin. Years of pent-up sorrow, of bone-weary loneliness, they finally, not much use really at all, this felt the only good and really, so many more people just had, well they simply, this wouldn't make a great.

He took a step towards the lake. Then another. Maria needed help, all he needed.

The water, shockingly, welcomed him in a warmer and much softer, and so, so very gentle. So very kind to him and this time it would actually matter that much more.

The figure remained still, her hand still outstretched. The figure beckoned him with it's gentle hand gestures.

He waded deeper, the water rising past his knees, his thighs, his waist. His clothes weighed nothing, in what felt an actual change for once. Maria, only her, what she meant and how, how hard it really was to ever live his best way, never possible for anyone to understand the struggle, how much one's existence.

He was close enough now, he couldn't actually remember his last thought as he swam.

Maria, the lake was cold now, that one truth he, his arms wrapping, only her.

The figure opened. They both disappeared underwater. Antonio struggled, Maria laughing. Maria smiled so bright, at last.

A familiar feeling of Antonio, they, together, sinking to the lake bed, he held tightly to her, he just, Antonio and Maria, as the moon sunk, darkness surrounded them both, she finally reached up and kissed him, soft and lovingly as, this place would be theirs together.

She never meant, his wife, Antonio felt, to have so very, very much, for them all together forever, and it was. They belonged, at-last, that place beneath. It was cold, very much a truth. He never went. His face. Theirs.