Scary Horror Stories by Dr. NoSleep - An Ancient Destroyer-of-Worlds Has Awoken | Part 1

Episode Date: July 14, 2025

An aging cephian war veteran discovers a godlike weapon buried beneath the sea—one that offers him power, vengeance, and glory—but to accept it means dooming the world he once fought to protect. Author: Dave Kavanaugh * * * CONTENT DISCLAIMER: This episode contains explicit content not limited to intense themes, strong language, and depictions of violence intended for adults. Parental guidance is strongly advised for children under the age of 17. Listener discretion is advised.  #drnosleep #scarystories #horrorstories #doctornosleep #horrorpodcast #horror Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Poid dreamed of siphoned ink and salty bloodshed. In his nightmare, the Cepheon was back with his old unit, and the horde of aquatic warriors was swimming madly across the ocean floor, their tentacles flailing in unison, their beaks open in a watery war song. Poid was young in the dream, and his iron spear was newly forged, its tip unnotched and deadly sharp. And as his unit reached the enemy line, he thrust out his weapon, and felt its blade pierced through rubbery skin and rigid chitin as he skewered foe after foe.

Again and again the Cephian armies clashed, like waves beneath the waves, until the sea around them swirled dim and murky with thousands of severed tentacles, the bright blue of blood, and the slick black of sephean ink. The old fella awoke, haunted by the seaborn screams in his nightmare. He opened his eyes, and while his pupils adjusted to the sceptic, sunrise brightening the water around him, Boyd slid out from under his blanket, which was pinned to the seafloor. He drifted for nearly a minute in his open-roofed room, letting his eight tentacles float in gentle arcs around him. That savage memory recalled in his nightmare refused to leave

his waking mind, and within his high-crested head, Boyd's brain, his stomach, and his three hearts all burned with the sharp agony of deep remorse. Old age was never easy, but Boyd could handle the aches and pains, the stiffness in his tentacles, the wrinkles in his green skin. But the pain of looking back at the sins of his youth, that was the hardest part. Something nudged aside. All right, yipsy, I'm up, girl, I'm up. Poit said to his pet, Thorix, scratching her behind the gills. The six-legged thorix sniffed in the water, then kicked off the sandy floor into a playful backflip. Poid swam to the kitchen corner of his rented room, and prepared yipsia breakfast of shredded sponge with krill paste. How about you, girl? You ever had bad dreams?

I hope not. They ain't fun. He breathed in deep through his gills, then sighed through his beaked mouth. Ain't no place for old Boyd, not even in sleep. Yipsy gobbled up her breakfast, then began to corkscrew around the room, her webbed paws kicking. Boyd watched her play while he snacked on a shrimp kebab. The sun was brighter now. He could see its white face warbling through the ocean surface, 10 meters above them, warming up the planet of Garsec as it ascended into the cerulean sky beyond the world's silver ring. rings. Someone pulled aside his curtain door. A long head and pair of beady, goggled eyes

appeared from the alley. You'd best be getting ready, Poit. Troubles of Bruin, said the nervous voice of Blanche, who rented the room next door. Boyd grimaced, annoyed that his young neighbor had barged in without first announcing himself. Though all in all, Blanche wasn't too bad. He was new in town, a recent migrant from the Arctic, and his skin's Baseline color was pale blue, in contrast to Boyd's deep green. Trouble's brewing, you say, muttered Poide, plucking off the last shrimp and flicking it through the water to Yipsy. And what vintage of trouble might that be, A. Blanche? Blanche swam into the room, shutting the curtain behind him with a tentacle tip.

The big, red and angry kind. We got one here in town, Poide, right now. A real, live, female. So, last I checked, this little frontier town has two females. Or haven't you had the pleasure of meeting our lovely landladys? I'm not talking about those old dry-up birther crones. This female arrived last night from Seamount, and she's dressed like one of them Imperial Guards. She's the real deal. Boyd considered this unexpected news, circling one tentacle so that Yipsy swam and spun in pursuit. From the capital, you say, Boyd had never been to seamount.

Only females were allowed through its gates. But that towering metropolis, with its mysterious technological wonders, was the stuff of legends among the males. Now what would the Imperials want with us all the way out here? Blanche's pimply brow wrinkled nervously, and his skin went rather translucent. Nothing good, that's for sure. Well, all righty then, grumbled Boyd, departing the room with Blanche and leaving Yipsy to perform her playful acrobatics alone. The two Cephean males swam down the labyrinth in alleyways, their heads bowed, their tentacles streaming behind them, past a hundred shabby rooms with open roofs and curtain doors, then into the sandy basin on the edge of town, which served as the local meeting place. Most of everyone was already there, just over 100 males, some blue, some green, some purple,

and all with their tentacles tensed upon the seafloor in anxious apprehension. Boyd looked up and spotted the newly arrived female. She was hard to miss. At over two meters long from crest to tentacle tip, she was twice the size of the males. She floated in place up near the surface. her long crimson tentacles wriggling out to every side, and she stared down at the assembling males with her dark gaze. Boyd clicked his beak thoughtfully, watching her.

The female had the rich red skin of a sea mountain. She wore golden rings looped through the frills on either side of her head, and had an iridescent medallion on her brow, engraved with the symbol of the Ghanostic Empire, a star with eight webbed points, taking a spot next to Blanche on the edge of the crowd. A true imperial guard. I ain't never seen one before, and I've seen a lot.

When the last male in the town arrived, the female skin went glass smooth, and she opened her beak to speak to the assembly. I am quarter matron purveyor Zouva of Seamount, sworn servant of the eight high queens, she announced, revolving to address them all. Seeing as this wretched little shanty town of yours is not connected to the Imperial Cable Network, it falls to me to report to you all that, war is coming.

The males gasped, their skin rippling and surprise, their eyes bulging. The Dark Wave republics have amassed an army and have crossed our imperial border to the west. They would seek to claim the Ghanostic seas and aisles for themselves. And if we do not stop them, then all of Garcelselsels. is under threat to dark wave subjugation. The audience gasped and whispered in low voices to one another. The Republic's troops now hold the trenches at Calo Cali which our empire relies on for iron.

Without the volcanic forges in that deep, we will have no new weapons with which to fight back. We must strike, brutally fast, and without mercy, unleashing the sacred judgment of our spears. A few of the males cheered, but most looked troubled. But we're not soldiers, called out someone to Poid's right.

We're migrant laborers, my lady. We go where there's work, not into battle. Many others called out in support. Above them, the female waited for silence. You will all do whatever, and will all go wherever. The high queens deem it necessary, said Matron Zouva, her voice a threatening whisper. That shut up the crows. out. However, it is not your fate to be sent to battle. Not yet anyway. This is a scouting town,

is it not? And scouts can play a vital role in the war effort. That is why I have come, to oversee your efforts. Her dark gaze cut through the males, their skin bleaching in fear. Yours is a pitiful crew. In the past year, you have found no oil and hardly any ore out on the dries. And no wonder, a redskin rippled angrily. I know your type. You are vagabonds, miscreants, drunkards. You float from job to job, scouting, mining, building, without care or devotion. You want only coins in your knapsacks and berry in your bellies. Well, that all stops today. You answer to me now. But what about Boss Wogg? Another male called out. Why isn't he at this? meeting. Zouva stopped spinning, and pulling in her tentacles, drifted straight down toward the

seafloor. When I arrived this morning, I found your boss Wogg so drunk on Barry that he could hardly swim. That sea-croll has been relieved of his duty. Fermanently, several Cephians gasped. Zuba looked pleased and began to slide among the group, males shrinking at her approach. Oh my cracking, Blanche whispered to Boyd. Poor walk, do you think he'll be sent to the forges down in the trenches? That pressure kills a Sepian in days. Don't be so dry, Blanche, Poit said softly. Boss, he's already dead.

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Blanche squeaked and discharged a small amount of ink as he slunk into a bow. Boyd turned and looked up at the matron. His skin as deep a green as always. Well, ma'am, said Boyd, I was just clarifying for my young neighbor here the meaning in your illustrious words, explaining that you yourself have executed our dear boss wog. Boyd's words were met with yet more gasps, and more than a few inky discharges.

Zouva Zay squinted. What's your name? It's Boyd. Hmm. And where are you from, poyed? Nowhere, ma'am. Oh, come on now. Everyone is from somewhere.

I only meant nowhere of significance. I was raised on a little hamlet down on the Pelagic Plains to the south. The Pelagic Plains? Farmers then. And tell me, What did your people farm, poid? Shrimp, ma'am. Shrimp.

She moved closer, so close that her tentacles brushed slickly against poids. Well then, old shrimp farmer, perhaps you don't recognize the unique honor the queens are bestowing upon you all. In helping me today, you will be part of defeating a great evil in the world. Uh-huh. You mean by, what was your phrasing? Unleashing the sacred judgment of our spirit. years, not sure I'd word it like that personally.

The males around them shrunk back, shocked by the brashness of Boyd's words. And what would an elderly shrimp farmer know of war? Well, this one knows quite a lot, seeing as I've fought in the Battle of the Brackish and the last swim of the shark hearts. Now the same males that had backed away crept forward, awe in their eyes. Did you really, Boyd? I didn't know that. You don't look that old.

Boyd chuckled. Gee, thanks, fellas. Zuvah's eyes flashed in irritation. Ill shit! This wrinkled old scout never fought in the great conquest. I wish that were true, Poid muttered. Then he cleared his throat. So, you killed Wog today.

Are you going to give his body to his sons? They should be allowed to perform the rights of the severing. Zuba squint intensified. Oh, I'll do better than that. Scylla, Vishma, show these lowly tenants of yours what becomes of those who speak back to a servant of sea mount. From the gates of the village, the two local overseers swam out into the basin, and the males parted at their approach. Though long and yellow in color, these females had none of the grace and terrifying beauty of quarter matron Zouva. Their skin was wrinkly and splotchy, stretched from their time as birthers.

and their eyes were sunken from decades of abusing Barry. Ordinarily, Scylla and Vishma cracked Riley and whipped their tentacles at any males who came too close. But today, in the presence of the Imperial Zouva, the landladys were silent as they moved to the crowd. Crackin have mercy! someone cursed. As they saw what the females carried, the males slunk flat against the sand,

their colors shifting to muddy brown, in grief. Boyd made himself look. Scyla held the severed tentacles of Boss Wogg, tangled and nodded in a loose green pile, and leaking a mist of blue blood in her wake. Vishma held Wog's head, which had been split down the middle in the front,

exposing the coils of brains and guts and hearts within. Well, shrink, farmer, what do you think? Will his sons be pleased that I already began the ritual for them? Hmm? Hmm? Poid looked into the empty gaze and gaping beak of the dead boss. He had never liked Wogg much, but the sight of his mutilated corpse filled Poyd with anger. And despite his best efforts, he felt his skin ripple and blush, going dark with fury. I think you made your point, ma'am, he said, turning from the grisly sight to glare up into her eyes.

And I foresee that this new war of yours will be like all the old. others. It'll mean lots of riches for females, lots of bloodshed for males, and in the end, no change for the wider seas, because nothing ever changes, nothing ever will. He stared at her. She stared back. For a moment, Poyd thought the matron might strike him. Her tentacles flexed, and their suckers opened menacingly. But the moment passed. She pushed off the sand and glided swiftly from the basin, calling behind her as she swam. Gear up, all of you. Grab your spears and meet back here in one hour. We are going to the surface, and you will find what we need, or else boss wobb there will not be the only corpse in this

wretched place. When she was gone, the males deflated, sighing hot water through gills, their skin going glassy smooth again. Holy deep, whined Blanche. I've never been to a meeting like that. Indeed not, said Boyd. Oh, damn, Poit, son of Poit, warrior of the great conquest? Who would have guessed that? Called out Rook, a purple male who spoke with a heavy Landers accent.

And I's never seen someone face down a female like you's did. You must have kite and of iron under your skin, eh, poit? The others began to gather around Poide, staring at the old fellow with new awe and admiration. Not sure squabling with females is a healthy trait, Poit admitted to the group. Only ever gets me into trouble. Ha, you's one of a kind. But use do gotta be extra careful with that one,

rook told him, and waving a tentacle for the others to come closer. He lowered his voice. As a cable layer before eyes came here, wees would listen in to the cable transmissions coming from seamount to check the signal. So I's heard.

He heard lots of imperial news, and I know what quarter matron Zouva really is. He swam up between Boyd and Blanche. Zouva is part of the Nautilix lineage. She's a royal, a cousin to the eight queens. Impossible, gasped Blanche, inking himself again. Boyd considered this. Hmm, well, this day keeps getting more and more peculiar. What do you think it means?

asked one of the other males. Boyd looked around him at all the frightened faces, so desperate for answers. I ain't too sure, but I'll tell you this, he pushed off the seafloor and started swimming back into town. If we're scouting with a true royal cousin, then whatever we're looking for out there on the dries today, it sure as deep ain't oil. Back in his room, Boyd packed his geosounder into a knapsack, then got on his surface gear. Slinging on the sack, he attached a pair of metal hinges to the bag, and then to a band of seaweed leather, which he tied around his crested head. Finally, he pulled a pair of thick brass goggles over his eyes. Come yips, your turn, girl. The thorix, swam. The thorix, swam over, and Poide strapped her water recycler around her torso and over her gills.

All good and dandy. Then let's get this over with. Swimming to where his spear was stabbed into the floor, Poide snaked two tentacles around its iron shaft and tugged it free. The spear was old now, like poid, but still strong, again like poit. Shutting the curtain door behind them, Cephian and Tharic swam from the room, side by side. Once in the basin, they joined the rest of the scouts, all geared up and speared up and ready for scouting. Matron Zouva, now wearing gleaming golden surface gear of her own, hovered above their heads.

Move out! she commanded, and shooting herself forward in a blaze of red tentacles, she led the scouts northward. The convoy swam just beneath the ocean's surface, cruising in ordered ranks, warmed by the sun above the waves. Boyd placed himself at the edge of the group so that Yipsy had plenty of room to frolic as she pleased. Soon, the town was far behind them. They glided over a field of wriggling anemones.

This was a world of motion, with seasons, with energy. The world of Boyd's childhood had been much different. Those days, down in the cold and the dark, he had only known, flat plains of silt, fenced into plots with wire nets, and patrolled by Cephian farmers with tritons and shark bite armor. Poid was a thousand knots from those plains now, a thousand memories from those times, yet still they came to mind whenever he traversed these lively coastal waters. They moved into the shadow of a dense kelp land, and following Zuvah, entered a path cut through the seaweed forest. The sun had disappeared behind clouds,

now, and left the waters dim and green. That was good. Nothing worse than scouting on a bright day, Poit always said. An hour later, the pale foot of a beach loomed ahead of them. Yipsy joined Poide and the rest of the group as they landed silently on the sand, and slunk upward, toward the air of the dry and dangerous world beyond the sea. Boyd's head broke the surface of the water. His pupils adjusted in the soft gray light.

All around him, Cephian bodies pulled themselves along in the surf, up the gentle incline of sand, their bodies held partially upright by their surface gear. A Cephian could survive out here without the gear, at least for a while, but it wouldn't be easy. Boyd adjusted his goggles, double-checked Gypsy's recycler, then slid out onto the coarse, dry sand to join the gathering scouts on the beach. Many of the younger males were attaching parasols to their headgear, or applying ink to their skin. Poide never bothered with such precautions. He had long since grown accustomed to filtering oxygen from the air,

to keeping check on his pruning skin, and to counting down the hours before he could slip back into the ocean. Someone cursed, in a very strange sounding voice. At first, Poide didn't recognize the speaker. Then he realized why. It was Matron Zouva, and Poide had never heard the voice of a female in the open air. He looked over at her. She was still back in the foamy surf, half in and half out of the water. The hinges of her gear had gotten crossed, forcing her head forward at an angle.

Boyd sighed, then slid back to her. She grunted, turning to look at him, grabbing hold of the hinges of her gear, and shoving them back into place. She straightened up, sliding forward up the beach. Obviously. Seamount has towers that reach high above the surface. Poid clicked his beak and moved up beside her. Begging your pardon, ma'am. But I ain't talking about misted terraces or perfumed air paths.

This here is true dry land, the country of rock, root, and sunburn. It takes some getting used to, and I'd hate for something to happen to you out here. Ha, I bet you would. I ain't joking. Something happens to a female with us today. Lines by sundown, fighting spear to spear with dark wave until there's so much blood in the water that you can't tell who it is you're stabbing. I ain't about to let that happen."

She stared down at him through her gold-rimmed goggles. You're very strange, you know. Boyd wasn't sure how to respond to that, though he was saved from having to by Yipsy, who chose that moment to come bounding over the beach toward them. the water in her recycler sloshing, her paws kicking up wet sand. Zoova flinched her skin rippling. What is this creature doing here? Yipsy? She always comes with me.

Boyd scratched the Thorax's snout. Don't you worry? Thorex's might not be as amphibious as us, but Yipsy here has learned to keep her nostrils shut and to breathe with the regulator. It isn't regulation. Rook glided over to join them, bowing up. as he said, the matron, casting the thorix a final look of disgust, then sliding off. Boyd thanked Rook, then turned to survey the landscape around them. They had landed on the southern beach of Arganox Major. He hadn't been here in years, not since, that cable station was built.

If it wasn't for the presence of Matron Zouva, the male scouts never would have been allowed this close to the secretive technology in that structure. He looked to now at the Imperial facility, which stood a hundred yards down the beach on a grassy hill. It was a solid and windleless edifice of mud brick, heavy and ugly, and unlike any of the graceful structures Sefeyans built on the seafloor. The station was topped with a spindly tower supporting a web of cables, thin, black, twisted wires. Some of the cables ran down into the sea, others out over the land. Boyd had never worked as a cable layer himself.

Those were hard jobs to come by, nor did he understand how the cables worked. It was something about energy, about little bits of harnessed lightning that could be channeled through the wires to receivers in distant places, transporting messages, information, and even the voice of a female.

The technology was all quite fantastical to old Boyd. Cracking damn, what an ice. He took his gaze off the ugly cable station and looked up at the sky instead. A break in the clouds to the west showed brilliant blue, and that blue was slashed in half by the planet's rings. Boyd drank in the sight. He had always adored the rings of Garsec. It was even worth facing a bit of sunlight to glimpse that glittering streak of diamond

bright space dust, eternally revolving around the planet and bands of silver, bronze, and Royal Blue. That can't be right! Somebody shouted, shaking Poid from his musings. Boyd turned and approached the source of the commotion. Most of the males had gathered around Zouva, who had a map unfolded on the sand. It is right.

Ziva assured the assembly. We will move north through this quadrant, across those hills and toward that river. Spluttered a scout. That would take us right alongside those cables. We'll get in trouble. the first survey on that ridge. She folded the map and slid from the beach.

The males fell in line behind her, silent and obedient. Poid tapped the butt of his spear against a rock and called to Yipsy. She bounded over to join him. The convoy oozed up the hillside, grabbing at rocks and tree roots with their slippery tentacles. They were soon among green trees with thorny bark, and golden ferns grew between cracks in the rocky ground. Mud skippers basking on stones wriggled into the mud at the Sepheans approach. The scouts halted at the top of the ridge. Fog was now wafting in from the east.

The moisture felt cool on poyed's skin, full of the smell of rain. Delicious. Under Zuvah's direction, they set up to take their first reading. The males gathered in trios and spread out along the ridge, unpacking and assembling the scouting equipment. Boyed in the Scouts with him, two blues called Model and Stip, all stabbed their spears into the ground at an angle, leaning the spears and tying them together.

Next, Model held up a heavy geosounder device, and Stip attached it to the tpee of spears on a chain. The geosounder hung there, in the humid air, its magnetic arms extended. The Scouts sighed and relaxed on the ground, waiting, watching as the instrument slowly spun. instrument slowly spun from side to side. Well?

Asked Zouva, her voice echoing through the mist. Does anyone see any sign of a subterranean anomaly? No one answered. The scouts all knew it would take at least a quarter of an hour to get any trustworthy results from the devices. But no one wanted to be the one to tell this to the quarter matron purveyor. Boyd squinted at their geosounder and exhaled through his gills. This was a waste of time.

They could wait all day, but the geosounders wouldn't work out here, not anymore, because of the cables. He had a hunch that something about the energy running through that network messed with the magnetic readings of the devices. And Poid's hunchers were generally right. She knows that, he muttered to himself. So then, I wonder if that's why we're really here. Maybe something's wrong with these cables, and we got to find the trouble. It began to rain. Poid laid back, welcoming the water on his skin,

and watched Yipsy splashing happily in puddles. Twenty minutes later, with no signs detected, the group repacked their gear and moved onward. Through the rain, over mud and rock and weeds, northward into the deepening fog. They stopped three more times that morning to take additional readings. After packing up for the fourth time, The scouts were ready to quit for the day, but Zouva would hear none of it.

One visit to the birthing legs of Nagauden to donate their seed. This proclamation was answered with astonished gaps and whoops of excitement. Did you hear that? Someone exclaimed. Who'd have thought that they would bless any of us with fatherhood? But Boyd just grumbled and shook his head. His seed had no doubt dried up a decade ago, and he had no interest in making little poids. Yipsy was more than enough family for him.

Finding a large, mossy tree root twisted like a bench, Boyd flopped himself onto it. The Thorix joined him, laying on her side with her head, resting across his tentacles. Model and Stip settled nearby. They had hunted a few mudskippers along the morning's journey, and as Stip now descaled and gutted the landfish,

Model uncorked two chem bottles from his pack and poured their contents onto a flat stone. As soon as the chemicals mixed, they began to spark and smoke and glow orange. This chemical reaction, which worked both in and out of the water, produced intense heat and light. Model set a pan filled with irbed seawater over the blaze, and in a few minutes they were divvying up boiled fish among themselves and yipsy. All too soon the break was over, and Zoova barked at them to get a little. up and moving. The rain had slowed to a lazy drizzle, but the fog was thicker than ever.

They moved in silence. No one dared raise their voice in an old battle ballad or a crude folk song, not with a female present. We're passing into the next quadrant, called Zouva, inking out a square on her map. Keep moving. Another two knots north. Their path took them downhill, snaking among trickling creeks. Blanche came alongside Poide, and adjusting his goggles, said, So what do you think this is really about? Boyd didn't answer right away, and when he did, he kept his voice low. The Empire is at war, said Boyd.

And the imperial strategy must rely on this here, cable network. But I think something's gone wrong with it. Maybe the wires have gone dead. Or maybe somebody's spying on the messages they send through them. Blanche's skin went pale and pimply. Oh, Cracken, do you think there are darkwave spies here? Nah, more likely sabotage. Maybe internal strife among the eight queens.

Or it could just be some sort of natural interference. I ain't too worried. I'll be glad to get home, though. This place, you don't feel right. Feels all wrong. Aunted like. They moved in silence through the fog for another. minute. Then Blanche sighed.

You know, I might sign up for the war. Could be exciting. Good pay, too. Boyd grumbled in his throat. Exciting? Sure. If you like getting your hearts skewered on a spear shaft, and pay don't mean nothing after that's happened to you. Ah, come on, Poit, it can't be that bad. You know the grand old songs of the battles of, watch out. Boyd shouted, grabbing Blanche and yanking him. backward. What the, whoa! Poid straightening up, panting. Stay back, Yipsey. Careful everyone. We got us

a deadly little gorge over here. Poid stared down at the fissure in the rocky ground. He had noticed it only a second before Blanche would have fallen right into it. The crack wasn't far across, but its muddy edges blended into the surroundings, like camouflage. What's the problem? asked Zouva, sliding from the fog to investigate. Boyd pointed down the crack. Can't even see the bottom, ma'am. Would make for a nasty fall. She squinted down the fissure.

Hmm, interesting. We will set up here. Spread out, all of you, and watch where you're sliding. I'd hate to have to fill out another death report today. I don't have the time for it. The mails dispersed once more, helping one another over several more dangerous cracks in the ground. Boyd heard,

through the clutter of assembling equipment, Moddell's voice calling to him. Boyd, we're setting up over here. Come take a look at this. Boyd followed the voice, making sure Yipsy was safe at his side and approached a rocky hill with a flattened top. He climbed the slope,

pulling himself up by mossy rocks. At the top, he found Model and Stip, staring down at something. They were perched on the edge of a circular hole. It was only about a meter in diameter, but they couldn't see the bottom. The muddy walls corkscrewed down into total darkness. Damn, said Boyd. Like a tunnel to the heart of Garsec. What's down there do you think? Mused, Stip, said Boyd. Fire, water, or monsters covered in eyeballs. Who knows? They set up the geosounder

on their spears beside the hole, sat down in the mud, and waited. The rain stopped entirely, but the fog remained, sifting the sunlight to a pale gray shimmer around them. Boyd was exhausted. He always felt so heavy out of water. As he lay in the mud, his gaze lost focus, and the world melted into a sheet of pearl before him. Then something small and fuzzy flitted into his vision, moving in loops. Boyd's pupils adjusted. He sat up. What the? It wasn't just a leaf on the wind.

It was a creature. Wow. Delegate and weightless, and unlike any poid had ever seen. It was tiny, no bigger than a shrimp, with paper-thin halves the colors of a sunset that flapped open and close. And the creature, it was swimming in the air, watching the mysterious critter. Ain't you a sight to behold? He obviously likes it, too. Whatever it is, chuckled model.

nodding at where the thorix spun and jumped, trying to catch the tiny creature in her mouth. Oh, leave it me, girl, called Boyd. Yipsy leaped and bit at the air. Boyd urged, straightening up. Not so close to the hole, Yipsy. Yipsy. The creature moved straight over the hole.

Yipsey bent her six legs and jumped, soaring over the hole. Boyd gasped, flexing himself into motion. He saw her front paws strike the far edge of the gap. and slip on the wet moss there. Her back paws kicked out, but met only slick air, and with a painful yelp, she fell. Poid flung himself forward, knocking over the three spears and sending his spear tumbling into the hole. He stretched out a tentacle and managed to grab the end of Yipsy's tail. Then he was pulled down after her, tumbling into the darkness. Cephian and Thorix fell like stones. They struck the rocky wall and bounced apart. Poid reached out,

He felt his tentacle scraping over hard stone and heard himself screaming. All was blackness, all was spinning. He tasted bile in his beak. He heard a yelp. He saw a star. He saw nothing. Hoyd awoke gasping for water, but his gills sucked in only dust. He tried to move, but his body was pinned down, crushed, flattened.

His tentacles were buried under stone, a layer of dried mud. He widened his pupils. No light. Not even the fathomless, empty blue of the pelagic plains, where a green Suffian's keen eyes might pick up the bioluminescence of a distant fish or the glow of a chemical lantern in a nearby village. Yipsy! Poid screamed.

Where are you, girl? He heard movement, a whimper. Boyd squeezed his beak shut, tensed and hurled himself off the ground. Mud cracked and shattered. He flipped over. his aching tentacles slapping cold rock and screamed. Something was burrowed into the back of his head. He lifted a shaking tentacle to feel it. His surface gear must have broken in the fall. His goggles were gone, and one of the metal hinges had snapped and lodged its tip into his flesh. He tightened

his tentacle on the blood-soaked metal and pulled. His head jerked with the motion, but the hinge didn't budge. Oh, shit! He reached a second tentacle up to the broken hinge. He squeezed and yanked. The hinge pulled free with a dribble of cold blood. Pain branched through the back of his eyes, through his hearts and through his guts. Poid took a slow breath, trying to focus his mind.

He had to mentally catalog his injuries and see how bad it was. His gills burned with thirst, and every muscle in his body felt almost too weak and dried out to move. And besides the bleeding hole in the back of his head, there was the matter of the rigid kiteon plate beneath his skin, which protected the vital organs within his head and was definitely injured. Shifting gingerly from side to side, he thought he could feel the place where the plate had cracked in two down the middle. Something yapped softly, echoing through the darkness. Poit awoke a second time, this time from hopelessness into urgency. He sat up, reaching out in the dark, Yep, see.

Another whimper. His knapsack was still on, tangled in two tentacles. He pulled it off, then opened the tattered bag. Reaching inside, he groped at his gear until he found his vials of cooking chemicals. He yanked the vials out and open. The two liquids burst into the air and mixed before they hit the ground. A wave of heat rushed over Boyd and dazzling orange light splashed across stone. By the light of the chem puddle, Poid saw he was in a cave tunnel.

at the base of a diagonal shaft. Huh, that mossy passage there. That must be at the bottom of the hole we fell into, sliding down here at a curve. Lucky, but how long ago was that? He sighed and turned to peer into the darkness beyond the reach of the chemical glow. Yipsey?

No answer. Steadying himself, Poide started forward down the tunnel, moaning with each tiny, painful movement. He came upon something on the cave floor, Its shadow flickering in the yellow light. Yipsy! The thorax lay on her side, eyes closed. The water recycler on her back was mostly intact, thank Cracken.

Some of the water had leaked out, but he could hear her gills breathing in the liquid that remained. You're alive! He took her head gently in his tentacles and turned her to face his. Yipsy's small eyes fluttered open, and she saw poied, then closed them again. Now, none of that girl. We just need to get you into water. You're drying out down here. Oh, dizzy. And I'm losing blood. He turned back toward the shaft. Help us. Hello? His voice was too weak, and the call died without barely an echo. Ah, all righty then. Well, we're survivors, you and me. We just got to find water,

then find a way out. Get back to the sea. That's all. First, water. He patted Yipsy, then made his way back to his knapsack, and tearing off one of its seaweed leather straps. He wrapped it around a tentacle tip and carefully moistened it in the shimmering chemical pool. Holding the glowing tentacle over his head like a torch, he moved down the tunnel, past Yipsey. Soon, Boyd came upon something metal. It was his old and trusty spear, now bent in the middle.

Boyd pushed it aside and moved on. He came to another wall. Don't be the end of the passage. Give me something. He turned to either side, examining the rock walls. There was a crack to his right, just wide enough for a Cephion to move through. Taking a deep breath of the musty air,

he shifted his body and squeezed inside, wincing as his broken kiteon plate bent to fit. After wriggling for a dozen meters, the passage opened up, and Poyd had space to spread out his sore tentacles and ease the agony in his head. Sying, he looked around, and as his eyes adjusted, clicked his beak. Well, look here. Poid had entered a great cavern, bigger than his light could fully illuminate. Squinting through the dimness, he saw a forest of stalagmites, like a petrified kelp land. Black cubes of crystal grew on the natural columns like geometric barnacles,

and he could hear distinct as the voice of a friend. Droplets of water. Drip, drip, drip. He turned to his right. He was a few meters from the edge of an underground lake. Ripples washed its black mirror surface, pinging with each drip from the ceiling above. Boyd didn't wait. He hurried to the lake and plunged.

He breathed deeply. The water was tepid, stale, and sour. It was not freshwater as Boyd knew it. He could taste sodium and calcium and sulfates. But he guessed a Cephian could survive in this water, at least for a few hours. He stretched out his tentacles and exhaled hot air bubbles from his gills. The pain in his head lessened in the buoyancy. He might have fallen asleep, floating there.

But one of his tentacles bumped against something in the water, and he flinted. He looked around, expecting to find a sea snake. But no, it was a cable. Now, what's that doing down here? He wondered, regarding the taut wire, which stretched at an angle from the cavern ceiling above to the dark water below. Some great coil of the cable must have fallen down

one of them cracks in the surface and rolled all the way down here to this here lake. Fancy that. Even as he stared at it, The chem glow on his tentacle tip gave a final yellow flicker and extinguished its light. Boyd was left in blackness. He reached out to grab the cable and use it as a guide to the surface, gripping it in two tentacles. The cable shuddered.

The lake reverberated with a noise like thunder, and its watery depths glared suddenly with violet light. What the deep? Boyd let go and swam madly upward, the eerie light. blazing below. Bursing through the surface of the lake, he pulled himself back onto the cavern floor and lay panting. The cable continued to vibrate, like a harp string, filling the cavern with a low drone, shaking. Boyd slowly moved to the water's edge and peered down. Purple light flashed in those depths, like underwater lightning. Well, whatever that is, it can wait. Fanning out three tentacles

and stretching the rubbery skin between them. He lowered himself, he lowered himself, and filled the webbed skin with water. He then pulled himself up and slid carefully backward toward the tunnel. Boyd whispered, adding most of the gathered lake water to Yipsy's recycler and spreading the rest around her eyes and snout. It ain't too bright, but it should keep you alive. He gave Yipsy a hard scratch on the head. She stirred.

Good girl. I'll get some more. After two more trips to the lake, Yipsey was finally able to sit up. He rested here in the Kim light. He lifted his bent spear from the ground and returned to the lake's edge, hesitating only a moment before slipping into the ominously flickering water. Black. Violet. Boyd descended.

His eyes peeling for the source of the light. His spear held out before him as he swam. The lake was much deeper than he had guessed. A cylindrical chamber that seemed to go down forever. After 50 meters, he halted. floating in place. The cable stretched down to a flat shelf of stone there, like a jagged step sticking out from the wall,

and sitting on the edge of that rocky shelf was the object emitting the light. It was some sort of elongated box, about two meters long, one meter wide, and one meter tall. The box was smooth and metallic, and it had no markings on it, no hinges, no keyholes. Every few seconds, the whole of its surface would glow.

It didn't look like any Seffian creation he had ever seen. Boyd came closer. The cable and box were connected, he saw, fused and burned together. That didn't look intentional. The end of the cable must have come to lay across the side of the box, where a bulbous growth like charred metal bubbles enveloped it. What the deep happened here? He stretched out a tentacle, and with a single sucker on its tip,

he gently touched the object. The box went dark. A symphony of colors. Explosions of light! A splendiferous rainbow of criss-crossed beams shot from the surface on the box out upon the rocky walls, illuminating patches of fuzzy crystals and swollen growths of opalescent stone. Poid recoiled, almost dropping his spear,

and inked himself in his panic. The light mixed with the ink around him into a whirlpool of pitch, fire, and ultramarine. Then the rays of light dimmed and began to, to gather together. The box projected a strange shape onto the nearest wall. Poid glided sideways out of the ink cloud and stared at it. The projected image looked like, was it some kind of creature? What are you supposed to be then? At two meters tall, the luminous figure was the size of a Cephian female, but nothing about it was Cephian. At its top was an ovoid head on a short neck

above a curvy torso. Two limbs hung at its sides, bent in the middle and ending in pointy paws. Two more limbs extended down and bent at the bottom. A sheet of stringy whiskers grew on its head, except for on its face. The projected creature didn't appear to have any gills, and it wore a silky garment around its middle. Its head tilted back to reveal an ugly, simplistic face, without suckers, frills, or beak. It had a thin mouth, a high, narrow snout, and two oval eyes. The eyes swiveled as if looking around in the subterranean lake and came to focus on poied.

Then its mouth curved upward at the corners, showing small, white, square teeth. A voice sounded, not from the projected figure itself, but from a vibration of the box, in sync with the motions of the lips, on the rocky wall. Why? Hello! Groomed the mysterious voice.

You must be a Cephian. Female or male? Boyd said nothing. His skin rippled in shock. He was too completely amazed to even think of what to say. This thing, this creature of light, was looking at him, seeing him,

and speaking to him in his own language, with a female voice and a sea mountain accent. The figure's eyes blinked, glanced around. This place, it was not underwater when I went to sleep. Curious. And you, are you a cable layer, little Sepian? I, huh?

Boyd muttered, his heart's twittering madly. Is that why you came down here? Because of this broken cable, which so fortuitously did come to rest against my metal form, and leaking its electrons, did shock me back to waking. Hmm? I... I was just trying to save my friend, Yipsy. She jumped after a...

Well, she fell down a hole, see? Jumping after this little papery critter that swam through the air. Oh, I am intrigued. Did the instigating critter perhaps look something like this? And depoids astonishment. The figure held out one limb, and a new ray of light from the box cast a little image to the stone, in the exact form of the one back on the surface.

Yeah, that's it. How very poetic. All this, and all that is to come, set in motion by the beat of a butterfly's wings. Fate has indeed smiled on us this day. Point swallowed. So, are you like some kind of creature then? The curve of the figure's lips grew more pronounced. What I am is complicated. This body you see in the projection is that of a female of the species that created me. But it is merely a visual aid for your sake. The true me is, in fact, an intricate neural network

programmed within an electrochemical machine, an artificial mind housed in biomimetic circuitry. Uh-huh. So, you live in that there, box? I am the box. Boyd looked at the object again, and the cable burned into its side. Hmm. You've been intercepting the female signals, haven't you?

Through the cable? That's how you know Cephean language. How long have you been listening in, gathering information? Oh, how very astute you are. You are a male, correct? Curious. It is clear to me that the females don't give your sex enough credit. As for your question, I'm uncertain of the timeline.

The electricity from this cable's accidental touch awoke me, but it was some moments before all of my systems were fully aware and rebooted. My internal clock started tracking time one year ago. A whole year, eh? Listening, learning all that passed through the network, and messing with the signal too, I bet. Hmm. That's why Seamount is worried. That's why she had a search in the dries.

I'll be damned. The figure cocked its head. I'm a spy. If that's what they're worried about. Then what are you? Something old. Got a name? I was called by many names.

By those who manufactured me, by those who wielded me against their enemies, by those I was used upon, the victims of my potent powers. Well, I'm just boyed. Boyd? Boyd, son of Boyd. Is that not the naming convention of the Seffian male? It is. In that case, why not call me after my own parent kind,

after those who created me, and who, once upon a time, evolved and lived upon this very planet? You may call me human. Boyd felt a chill crawl across his flesh, and his skin darkened. So tell me, human. What exactly are you doing down here in this watery cave?

One might say, I have been waiting, waiting for my champion, and now here you are. The projection grew brighter, and the figure stretched out its limbs to either side as it declared, in a clear and echoing voice. My champion, poid, son of poid, proud son of Garsec, which was once called Earth. Boyd blessed among all the sentient descendants of the humble octopus. He who now holds the fate of the worlds in his puckered grasp.