Dark Water

By Willow Taylor

Go Dark Water, Keep on Rolling...

After going through three towns with lousy accommodations and lack of good tobacconist shops carrying decent cloves, Victor Shelly finally stopped in one that had the remedy for both. His entourage of Shaper the weird-ass risen thingee who looked like a goth with bad hair most of the time; and Amalthea, the mute babe of a vampire, who was leggy, albino, and wore about six yards of lavender veil cloth as a dress had stopped as well. Amalthea snuggled with him at night, and Shaper bugged him about it by day. At least the beds were soft, and the cloves were good.

A few days into his stay, Victor was confronted as it were, by the local sheriff. Victor sighed, lit a new clove cigarette and listened.

"Mister... Angel was it? we heard tell you're a supernatural expert. well... we gots ourselves some freaky ass bitch thing killin' folks who go near the well, the river, or the lake. Seeing as those're the only places we gets our water from, we was hoping you an yer friends would help us out with her? she calls herself 'Whitewater' and we'd pay ya right handsomely to be rid'a her, if ya think yer up to the challenge..?"

The hick sheriff wasn't too bright. But at least he had left Victor alone until now.

Victor decided to check out the well first, Amy trailed along behind. after much poking and searching, Victor decided Whitewater wasn't in the well tonight, and turned to go. Amalthea stayed long enough to toss a steel penny into the well for luck. She stared as it sank into the clear water, then gasped as the water began to churn and boil with movement. In seconds, a woman, with soft white hair, wrapped in a gown made of sun-drenched rippled and white foam trimmed with live swimming fish emerged from the well. She giggled not at all playfully, and snagged Amy's hand. Amy mustered enough will to get a small squeal out, alerting Victor.

"What th..?' he said, turning to see the demon-thingee behind him, at the well, holding Amy captive.

"Shit!" Victor yelped, grabbing for his gun - then cursing because the sheriff had him check it at the station when he came into this two-pony town. So, long knife drawn, he leapt at the water wench holding HIS wench. In startled shock, the thing let Amy go, and retreated into the well with a flurry of maddening giggles. "This is not good," whispered the frizzy-haired construct. Amy nodded in agreement and hissed at the retreating thing. They returned to the room for the night.

The next day, with Shaper watching Amy's sleep and the town for Whitewater, Victor got his guns, and went hunting. The beast wasn't in the well, or at the lake. Although he bet it laired in the submerged cave there. He searched the river and came up with a young man's body, and nothing else.

"Maybe she's only nocturnal? Or she's not hungry today." Victor was fully ready to go back and tell the town the man who ran the local tavern was dead when he heard a giggle behind him. The supernatural investigator whirled, guns out. all he saw was the river, and the bridge.

'The bridge!' he thought. ŒI never checked under it! stupid, stupid, stupid!!!!!!' he chastised himself. From beneath the heavy stone bridge, Whitewater emerged, giggling sickeningly at Victor's lapse in caution.

"Hello Honey," she burbled.

"Honey?" Victor said, disturbed.

"Time to die." Water rushed out of the river and ran into him. Water pushed Victor a few steps back as he put up his hands to block the water.

'I'm glad I grease my gun' Victor thought, as the water stopped. The water demon - Whitewater, looked at him and gathered the water of her body about her. Interest peaked in her eyes. The water shifted, and she looked like a nymph. She opened her arms invitingly.

"Why can't I ever meet a monster that just wants to kill me?" Victor asked plaintively.

"Wait," giggled Whitewater, and the water surged, tugging at his ankles. Victor fired at her body and it went through her like, well, water.

"Scratch that idea," muttered Victor. More water pummeled him, as if he was standing beneath a roaring water fall, and Victor stumbled into the shallows of the river. Whitewater giggled again, and started an undertow around his ankles, which Victor successfully fought. The water demoness made a summoning gesture with her hands, and the water rose up, clasping him to his waist. Victor fought his way backwards toward a more shallow part of the river. His foot hit a sinkhole that hadn't been there a moment before, and his head went underwater for an instant before the dark haired drifter was out again, feet planted firmly on the muddy bottom of the river. Frowning, Whitewater dissolved and stream of water slammed into him with surprising force. Turning his head aside to choke a few breaths out, he thought 'I may be out of my league just now.' That's when the waterspout threw him into the air. He screamed. He wasn't that proud.

Whitewater reformed herself, looking about the now tranquil river for Victor's body. He was a strong one. No man have ever held out against her that long. He had successfully escaped from almost every trick. There, floating face down in the water was the body, hair floating forlornly like water weeds, coat caught in the natural soft current, and flapping like the wings of a ray. Whitewater giggled.

"Come now, I know you aren't dead," she burbled and chuckled. "Get up." She flowed towards him. The body remained motionless. A bit of hard water prodded him, and succeeded only in stirring his hair. "Move." Again, no response. Whitewater reached out and clasped icy cold hands around his upper arms and hauled him upright. Victor's dark brown eyes opened and both booted feet lashed out catching her in the stomach. Because she was holding him, she was solid and reacted like any mortal being, dropping him. Victor, chest deep in water, drew a knife and plunged it into Whitewater¹s back. With a negligent wave of her hand, dismissing pain she hadn't felt in oh so long, another wave of water surged over his head. Victor found himself being held underwater by the creature, as she almost entirely ignored his struggles.

'Oh God above me,' thought Victor in fervent prayer, 'don't let me die this way - all the battles I've fought and I'm losing to a tide-pool with a bad attitude.' Things went grey, and then black. Whitewater let him drift to the surface, and snarled at him, pretty face convulsing into its true form. She would eat him. Destroy him utterly. But first... first she would PLAY.

Amy awoke in the evening to Shaper sitting in a chair across the room, gun in hand, and looking worried in his slight slumber. She swept to her feet easily, and padded closer, knowing fully what the worry was for. Victor had gone after Whitewater and wasn't back yet. Amalthea nudged Shaper awake, and motioned to the door, then Victor's bed, the door again, and looked questioningly at the currently unmasked risen.

~Did Victor go after the demon? Why is he not back yet?~ Shaper nodded in answer to her unspoken question. Then spoke to the one he could not answer with a simple nod.

"I don't know. I was waiting for you to get up, so we can go look for him... or his body if he's dead. We owe him that at least." Shaper murmured, clipping his mask to his belt by its chain and handing Amy his extra knife. Thus readied, the pair of night spawned creatures went to the well to begin their search.

Victor woke up, and blinked. He was wet - and cold. Not that cold bothered him much, but this was VERY cold if it bothered him. He shivered slightly, and realized he was chained to a wall in the partially submerged cavern by the lake. Or rather, in a cave UNDER the lake it seemed, as he watched a patch of clear water begin to lighten, and bubble. Whitewater had returned to toy with him. She appeared with the same sick giggling and titters as before, and moved or rather FLOWED towards him. Victor had long since realized she was mostly made of water, if not all of her was water. She reached out a webbed hand and tilted his chin upwards at an uncomfortable angle. The supernatural investigator hissed, his small canines glinting wetly in the dim light.

Whitewater glowed with... phosphorescent algae? Victor wondered to distract himself from what the thing was doing, or rather TRYING to do to his unwilling body. So he studied her in detail. She seemed to be water polluted by evil magicks and made up of algaes, tiny water beasts, fish, and some dark intelligence. Whitewater was no demon at all, just the result of a dark magick spell gone wrong. 'Curiouser and Curiouser' he thought. Whitewater gave up trying to bed him, and drew her long nails across his face to bring him out of his reverie.

"AHHH!" Victor yelped as his blood was drawn. Four lines across his face, one at his forehead, a second and third across his nose and the fourth just caressing his upper lip. Whitewater giggled, and vanished into the waves with a soft coiling whisper that reminded Victor of a vampire calming its prey.

"Ssssoooon... ahhh... sooon..." Then she was gone.

"Soon what?" grumbled Victor to himself. "Dare I ask? Do I want to know?" He licked a bit of blood that had dripped down and hung at his lips. He tugged experimentally at the rusty chains. "All I know, all I can do, and I'm captured for want of a bottle of chlorine." He grumbled to himself. He sighed and tilted his head up staring in the dim light at the locks. Then he looked around the chamber. The entire deal glowed softly, and revealed other bodies, in various states of disarray and decomposition. He tilted his head down and caught the lapel of his jacket in his teeth. After a moment, the supernatural investigator had removed the hidden lockpick. With a little more effort, he got is half-numb fingers to grasp it.

'Not that I have any more chance loose than I do chained, but it's the principle of the thing,' he thought gloomily. 'At least I didn't get caught with my pants down this time.' He sighed. 'That's a cold comfort.' He closed his eyes, listening to the faint clink of the lockpick against the lock. He wished he could get a good look at it. The position he was chained in made it hard to do anything but lie there, half slumped against the wall, ass deep in sludgy water and god-knows what else. There was a faint ping, and the lock came undone. The water over the entrance to the cave began to bubble again.

Victor shivered, actually afraid it was the beast returning to finish him. Then, a few frantic heartbeats later, Shaper and Amy emerged from the murky waters. Shaper had a diver's flashlight in one hand, and Amy's veil-dress was soaked enough for Victor to feel like a voyeur. Amy tittered softly, one of the few vocal sounds she ever made, and moved to him and hugged him. Partly for reassurances that he was alright, and mostly to keep warm. Her blood wasn't made to stand this chill. Shaper picked the other lock open, and soon the three of them stood looking at the entrance, unsure of what to do next.

"We could wait for her to come back, then finish her off?" suggested Shaper.

Victor gave him SUCH a look.

"No. Amy's nearly frozen, we need to get out of here. How long did it take you to get in?"

Shaper thought a moment, and was distracted as Whitewater returned with a flurry of giggles and a burst like a waterspout. She blinked at her unexpected guests, then her face transformed into pure viciousness.

"RRRRRYYHHHHHAAAA!!!!! FOUL THINGSSSSS!!!! YOU WILL PAY FOR TAKING MY MEAL!!!!!!" And then in a flash, the tides literally turned against them. All three of them were crushed against the wall by a torrent of icy cold water.

'It's times like these,' thought Victor, 'I wish I was supernatural.' Amy folded in on herself almost immediately, shivering cold. And Victor frowned, trying to keep the water away from his face. Shaper (who was doing much better) stepped in front of both of them, bracing against the tide for all he was worth. Victor could almost see the ice crystals forming on the chain that went from his belt to the mask he was wearing. Victor took that moment of reprieve to take off his coat, and wrap it around Amy's shivering form. It was soaking wet, and only slightly warmer than the cavern around them, but on the plus side, it was more than a few yards of veil. Whitewater stopped pummeling them and stared, as Victor patted Shaper on the shoulder encouragingly, and the both of them glared at her.

"No!" she shrieked. The water swirled around their ankles and pulled them towards her. "I shall destroy you BOTH." Victor looked at Shaper, and they exchanged a look. Then they leapt in unison, planting fists in Whitewater's solid face. She dissolved.