Day Zero

by Kresley Cole

  Since their divorce a couple of years ago, they didn't agree on much, yet they'd agreed to cast me out of their lives.

  "What are you thinking about?" Tammy-Something asked.

  What I usually thought about: "Home."

  "A guy like you must have a girlfriend there."

  "Nope." Despite my best efforts. I was just the happy-go-lucky buddy type to males and females alike.

  She scooted in closer to me, her blue eyes locked on me like I was a target. In a lower tone, she said, "Maybe you could take me for a visit, Finneas. I'd kill to see California."

  I swallowed thickly. I was wasted, but I could swear she was putting the moves on me. Natty Light commanded me to kiss her.

  I was leaning in when she grabbed my face and put her lips on mine. She had soft lips. They tasted like strawberries and beer. My eyes slid closed when she touched her tongue to mine.

  She pulled me in closer, kissing me harder. This chick frenched me like Tongue was an Olympic sport and she was on a medal hunt. I was down. We maneuvered till I was lying on top of her.

  In between kisses, she yanked off her shirt, revealing heaven.

  I rose on straightened arms just to gawk. "Whoa."

  With a grin, she pulled a condom from her pocket. This just got better!

  Though I always swaggered around like I'd done the deed, I . . . hadn't. Was that about to change at long last?

  As I watched in disbelief, she wriggled from her cutoffs and panties.

  My eyes widened, my hands fumbling with my fly. We were really about to do this! While she opened the foil pack, I shoved my pants down. She reached for me, and I groaned.

  Holy shit, I was in the glide path! Finally I was going to get laid.

  Nervousness hit me. Would I last long enough? Would I embarrass myself? Natty Light said, "I got you, man." Think about math, think about the environment. . . .

  What would Buck do if he found out about me and Tammy? Wouldn't matter, I'd be leaving soon.

  Then I remembered. No. I wasn't going anywhere. I might be here till I graduated. Would I go two more years without seeing a wave? Had I been completely abandoned?

  Stop thinking about that! Tammy wanted to get laid. I desperately wanted to get laid--

  I might not even get to go home for the holidays.

  The thought gutted me. Something like grief wrapped a hand around my throat and squeezed. Ah, God, my eyes were watering! Finn, you candy-ass punk.

  This close to doing the deed, and I was on the verge of blowing it! Think about something else; think about anything else.

  I sniffled.

  Tammy said, "What's the matter?"

  "N-nothing."

  She sucked in a breath, looking horrified. "What is wrong with you, surfer boy? Are you . . . cryin'?"

  Humiliation. My face burned as I yanked up my pants. Buck kept telling me I was a weak, weird, pathetic loser.

  He was right.

  Tammy scrambled for her clothes, shimmying and contorting around me like she was in The Matrix and I was contagious.

  She was going to tell all her friends what'd happened. Can't wait for school tomorrow.

  After dressing in record time, she gave me a last look--clearly she now shared Buck's opinion of me--then fled, bounding up the stairs.

  Leaving me all alone. Down here in this depressing deer crypt.

  I raised another beer to the mounted heads and chugged it. Then this weak, weird, pathetic loser cried himself to sleep. . . .

  The Priestess (II)

  Circe Remire, Ruler of the Deep

  "Terror from the abyss!"

  A.k.a.: The Water Witch

  Powers: Water manipulation, including tidal wave generation and flood creation. Hydrokinetic combat, shapeshifting, and constructs (can form water objects). Hydro scrying (can perceive through water). Hydroportation.

  Special Skills: Spells and hexes. One spell enables her to remember past games.

  Weapons: Water, trident.

  Tableau: A priestess--with water for hair and tentacles for legs--looms over a sacrificial victim at a bloody altar.

  Icon: Trident.

  Unique Arcana Characteristics: Iridescent blue scales on her arms, with a small fin at each elbow.

  Before Flash: A grad student from Bermuda, attending the University of Miami. Her focus: Atlantean mythology and the Bermuda Triangle. Engaged to a computer programmer and instructor there. Member of campus Wiccans.

  Hamilton, Bermuda

  Day 0

  "Are you tipsy?" I asked my soon-to-be husband. I was sitting with my cheek pressed against the door. He was sitting on the other side. It was well past midnight, so we weren't supposed to see each other.

  "I might be a tee bit wispy, luv," he said, his voice as jovial as ever. No one had ever made me laugh like Ned. "But my wipsiness can't be helped. My family kept raising their glasses to me. They think I'm a boss for landing a woman as beautiful as you." His crisp British accent got more relaxed when he'd had a drink or two. "My sister said if a movie were made of our lives, it'd be called The Siren and the Nerd."

  Siren. I frowned as some memory tried to surface. The ocean's siren song. . . . I raised my hand to my head as a wave of dizziness overtook me.

  Over the last week, the wedding festivities had been going great--until I'd received a long, mysterious wooden box. The accompanying note had been just as puzzling.

  Priestess,

  Hail Tar Ro. I believe this is yours.

  Death

  Ever since I'd touched the contents of the package--a golden trident, engraved with cryptic symbols--I'd been having bouts of dizziness, and nightmares about being trapped under the ocean.

  I hadn't been able to shake the feeling that something bad was going to happen, as if I was on a countdown clock. And my symptoms were getting worse.

  I'd confided them to my grandfather, my best friend. He'd worried that I wasn't ready to marry.

  But I am! Ned was the one for me. We were soul mates. I was lucky to have found him.

  In a fit two nights ago, I'd taken the trident to a headland cliff and tossed it into the waves. But my issues continued--

  "Circe, dear?"

  What had he been talking about? Oh, yes . . . "Siren and the Nerd?" I feigned a huff. "They only commented on my looks?"

  "They might have mentioned your early PhD candidacy, but I told them you were going to cut out all that scholarly rubbish after our nuptials."

  I grinned, pressing my palm to the door. I loved this man like a drought loves rain. "My family also spoke a lot about you tonight--about how you went out on the water without your seasickness patch." My brothers had taken him fishing. They'd reported back that they'd never seen anybody throw up so much and live to laugh about it. "And without your sunblock." They'd also said they'd never seen anyone burn so fast.

  "I did that part on purpose, for my Larry the Lobster impression at the reception. I'm method that way."

  Laughter burst from my lips. I'd never known I could laugh this much before Ned. I frowned. No, there'd been another time. . . . In a dark forest, a green-eyed girl and I had laughed till our bellies ached.

  "You can't deny the lobster-red hotness of my skin. No, seriously. My skin is literally hot."

  I tsked. "And you'll be bright red for all our photos tomorrow."

  "We can always hope I'll be peeling by then." Ned sighed. "How you put up with me is a mystery."

  A voice in my head murmured, Mysteries from the deep. The nightmares. Shake it off, Circe.

  "You're brave to want kids with me, luv. Three no less."

  I'd told him I wanted to get started once I'd earned my degree. He'd saluted me, replying, "I shall enthusiastically contribute to this endeavor. You will know what the word commitment means."

  Now he asked, "What if they turn out to be nerds who get seasick?"

  "Then you'll know you're the father."

  He laughed. "You give as good as you get. God, I'm ready to get this wedd
ing business sorted, so we can get back to us."

  "I know. I feel as if I haven't seen you in weeks."

  "I don't like sleeping in different beds. Custom or not, if you have another nightmare, you need to come get me."

  "I will," I lied. I'd had several each night since that package's arrival. Yet those nightmares had felt more like . . . memories. Maybe I was losing my mind. "You know how much I love you, right?"

  "Ah, but the merest fraction of how much I love you."

  "I'm serious, Ned." I could all but hear him frowning. I glanced at my arm. For an instant, my skin appeared to glitter. Like a fish's scales. "I knew the night we met that you would be mine." I'd been giving a campus lecture on the Bermuda Triangle and Atlantean folklore, presenting pictures of Circe's Abyss, the deepest spot in the Triangle.

  The abyss I'd been named after.

  A deep-water oceanography team had recently completed the imaging of it. Those images had captured an underground aquifer--below the abyss.

  And inside the aquifer was a rock formation so exact that it had to be man-made.

  If the formation was a structure from a sunken city--such as Atlantis--how had it gotten into an aquifer?

  Like a ship in a bottle. . . .

  Though Ned, a brilliant computer programmer, was devoted to hard science, for some reason he'd attended my lecture. He'd grasped anything I could throw his way, asking observant questions. He hadn't scoffed when I'd told him of my Wiccan leanings.

  Afterward, coffee had turned to drinks. Drinks to dinner. Since then, we'd never separated a single night. Until now. "I thought you were adorable," I said. "Your cheeks flushed whenever I looked at you."

  "Because I kept saying to myself, I think I'm bloody in love with her. I didn't know how it could be possible, but there it was."

  I murmured, "There it was." I imagined his palm pressed against the door, opposite mine.

  Strange how the wood burl beneath my hand looked like a whirlpool. I shivered. Clearing my throat, I asked, "Will you finally admit why you came to my lecture?" He'd teased me with different reasons: Because he'd ducked in out of the rain (it'd been clear that day). To sample the free lukewarm coffee. To kill time until his superhero gig started.

  "The truth? What would you say if I told you a mate made me a wager?"

  I made my tone scandalized. "A wager? What were the terms?"

  "He bet me a hundred quid that the woman hosting this Atlantean lecture would be the most beautiful creature on earth." He exhaled. "Best hundred I ever lost."

  I squeezed my eyes closed. "Everyone calls you a comedian, but I think you're really a romantic."

  "God, I'm going to enjoy teasing and romancing you for the next eighty or so years of our lives."

  "Do you really think we'll live that long?" That wood burl on the door appeared to spin.

  "Of course. Laughter and love keep a body young."

  _______________

  I inhaled a deep breath. My big day had finally come. I can do this.

  I'd sent everyone in the bridal party away, needing time to compose myself before the sunset ceremony. In the few hours I'd dozed after talking to Ned, the nightmares/memories had come on full-bore. All morning and afternoon, I'd battled anxiety. Again, I sensed a countdown ticking.

  Toward what?

  I shook my head hard. I just needed to get down the aisle and reach Ned. He would make me feel better. His eyes would light up when he saw me in this gorgeous strapless dress. I would muffle a laugh when I saw the tips of his ears and his nose peeling.

  Bouquet in hand, I took a step.

  In the wrong direction. Left was toward the chapel ceremony; right would take me to the beach. Another step to the right.

  I strained every muscle to get to Ned, but my feet wouldn't obey me. I'm losing my mind, losing my mind! My eyes went wide when I opened the door and headed outside--away from the chapel--from the man I loved.

  I wanted to call for him; no sounds would pass my lips. When I reached the pink-sand beach, the sunset gleamed over the placid water. My arms fell limp by my sides, my bouquet dropping soundlessly in the sand.

  Tears of frustration welled. What force had taken me over? Would Ned think I'd run away? That I didn't want to marry him?

  I struggled to scream, "I love you!" Yet couldn't speak at all.

  The sea had always called to me, but now . . . now its siren song was undeniable. Suddenly, I knew where I was going. Toward that abyss.

  I had always been headed toward the abyss.

  Tears streamed down my face. Ned will think I left him. I reached the water, and the gentle waves lapped at my ankles. A glimmer beneath the surf caught my eye.

  Somehow the trident had returned to me.

  As I dipped to collect it, a tingling sensation flowed up my forearms, and light-blue scales appeared there, like long, iridescent gloves. They sparkled in the sunlight. My elbows itched maddeningly. I scratched them, and my skin sloughed off--to make way for jutting blue fins.

  I sobbed. How could Ned ever want me like this?

  Those cryptic symbols on my trident were now legible to me. They read: The Abysmal Ruler of the Deep.

  In a daze, I cradled the weighty gold weapon in my arms and waded into the water up to my knees. To my waist. To my neck. I did not stop until I was submerged.

  I expelled my last breath, awaiting the burning suffocation of water filling my lungs, but instead I . . . became the sea.

  The weight of my trident made me sink. The pressure didn't bother me. The temperature had no effect. I could see, hear, feel, taste, even scent through the water. This jumble of new sensations made me giddy, as if my soul was soaring--instead of sinking.

  Deeper and deeper I dropped. Although it should have been pitch black as the waning daylight faded above me, somehow I could see. Luminescent sharks darted through me. Plankton and crustaceans tumbled within me as if buffeted by an island breeze.

  I descended till I'd reached the bottom of Circe's Abyss. Rocks parted, revealing a vortex that led beneath the seafloor shelf. To the aquifer?

  I was swept into the vortex, then sucked even lower through a tunnel--as if down a drain. Or down Alice's rabbit hole.

  The water turned fresh. Before me was the structure from those pictures! I flowed around the stone exterior.

  Swarms of phosphorescent creatures teemed on the walls, illuminating carvings in the rock. The symbols were from the same language as the words engraved on my trident. I read:

  Abysmal temple of the Great Priestess, the Ruler of the Deep.

  All who hear the Priestess's call will fear her catastrophal powers.

  TERROR FROM THE ABYSS.

  This structure, these markings, those creatures . . . I was seeing things no normal human had ever beheld. All my life, I'd been obsessed with the sea, with Atlantis.

  I was the sea. Was I also an Atlantean?

  Live coral adorned an entrance, each branch ending in a trident shape.

  Curiosity driving me, I flowed through the opening. Inside was an airlock with steps rising out of the water. I instinctively knew how to regrow my form, to become a woman again. Trident in hand, I arose from the sea and climbed the steps.

  Shafts of that phosphorescent light beamed inside. Shadows rippled.

  Ancient mosaics decorated the walls. I ran my fingertips over the damp tiles. The eerie scenes depicted tidal waves engulfing helpless lands, and monstrous sea life--giant sharks, whales, squids, a kraken--attacking ships. The shadows made the scenes appear to move.

  Chills skittered up my back when I came upon a bloodstained altar, liberally carved with trident symbols. I glanced at my own weapon.

  Could this be my temple? Hadn't Death called me "Priestess"?

  As I eased farther inside, memories from my dreams arose. This place was mine.

  I got the sense that my temple was a refuge. But also a . . . jail? Somehow I knew I would quickly die on land, but slowly die here in this lonely, echoing abyss.


  Solitude would be my punishment, and fear my jailor. What crime had I committed to be cursed like this?

  No, I didn't care about my fate; one way or another I would return to Ned! He would accept these changes in me. I believed in him.

  I ran to the airlock and became the sea once more. I'd almost reached the top of the tunnel when the seafloor above began to quake.

  The water was heating. I gazed up from the tunnel opening, disbelieving my vision.

  A giant submarine was hurtling down, far too fast to be a normal descent through the depths.

  Past the vessel, I could see lights in the sky--as if the ocean above me had disappeared, the water sucked out.

  Though it must be night, the sun seemed to be shining. And I thought I saw a sky full of . . . flames. I was riveted. Until that light went dark--snuffed by the submarine crashing down atop my only exit.

  I was trapped.

  In my lonely, echoing abyss.

  The Emperor (IV)

  Richter, Stone Overlord

  "Quake before me!"

  A.k.a.: Jersey Number Four

  Powers: Pyromancy, magma generation, terramancy. Can create and control fire, mountains, volcanoes, and earthquakes.

  Special Skills: Athletic skill, brute strength.

  Weapons: Rock and fire.

  Tableau: A stony-eyed ruler, surrounded by flames and slabs of granite, holding a scepter with an engraved ankh.

  Icon: Ankh.

  Unique Arcana Characteristics: Lava flows from his bleeding hands, and his eyes glow like fire.

  Before Flash: Right wing for Oshawa Generals, Ontario Junior Hockey League team, NHL hopeful.

  Vancouver, British Columbia

  Day 0

  I hope I broke Number Eight's fucking neck. I kicked back in the penalty box--the sin bin--as they loaded him onto a stretcher.

  Minutes ago, I'd body-checked the shit out of Eight, and our sticks had "accidentally" crossed. Now he was moaning on his side, dribbling teeth onto the ice like they were Chiclets.

  I didn't enforce just for a game. I enforced for life.

  Scouts loved that shit; they were on their phones in the stands now.

  I'd earned my nickname of Richter--because I put players into the boards with the force of an earthquake. Good thing, too. How else was I gonna show the scouts what I was capable of? Fight? Whenever I tore off my gloves and yelled, "You wanna go?" more and more players skated away. Eight was from the States, must not have heard to steer clear of me. Most of the others had. Hell, I thought I'd even dated Twenty's sister.