Chapter 7
Foster wouldn’t lie, he was scared shitless.
Fuck a massively ugly duck. It would have helped if someone would
have told him that Formaci and his buddies were giant fucking
squids. Fuck... seriously? Okay, in a way it was fascinating to see
one so close, but it was beyond terrifying as well, even if he was
hiding behind a coral reef not too far from where Jabari and the
hippocampus trio were having a standoff with the nasty bugger and
his friends.
The damn things were ugly... seriously fucking
ugly. They really did have ten appendages dangling in the water and
a long head that was a boring sandy brown color, and the eyes...
shit, they were like these gelatinous orbs that you couldn’t tell
which way they were looking.
“Okay, Foster think. What did the national
geographic say about these things?” Foster asked himself.
They had ten dangly bits and two were longer
than the rest. Those two had suction cup thingies that they used to
catch their prey so that the eight could snag you and use nasty
teethlike things to pull you into their beak mouth thing and eat
you. That shit sounded painful.
Foster remembered a YouTube video he had watched
about a diver who was trying to study the things getting grabbed by
the fin of one, but then a bitch ton of the bastards came at him
and wrapped those suction things onto his neck and body, and they
worked together taking him deeper and deeper into the ocean. The
guy finally snapped out of the shock of what was happening and
started fighting until they finally let him go, but when he got to
the safety of the boat he had a bitch ton of lacerations from the
seventy-two thousand teeth hooks the fucking squid had. He
definitely didn’t want this to happen to Jabari or the hippocampus
trio.
Noticing movement next to the cave, Foster
glanced in that direction and saw another squid trying to make his
way towards Jabari. Foster was ready to scream for Jabari to look
out, even if Goboli had warned him to stay quiet, but he didn’t
have to because Polaris did this puff-up thing and Foster couldn’t
help but draw in a deep breath when the hippocampus grew larger and
larger until he was towering over the intruder and forcing it to
turbo away.
“Just how many of these things are here?”
Foster asked himself, thinking about what Polaris had said to
Jabari.
There was only supposed to be three... at least
that’s what Sacrin had reported, but Foster had counted five
without the one that had just tried to sneak up on his mate. That
meant more had come at some point, and most likely more would be on
their way. Something wasn’t right. This squid thing was up to
something and.... oh shit! “He’s buying time!”
Needing to get Jabari’s attention, but not
knowing how unless he called out, which would bring attention to
the fact that he was even here, and that could cause the suction
crew to try and get to him... not a way he wanted to go... Foster
tried to figure out what to do.
Okay, what about the stair game? He used to play
that from the window of his room when he was too sick to go
outside. It’s where he would look out the window and pick a kid and
just watch him until the kid would start looking around until he
finally looked up to see Foster... fine, it wasn’t a real game, but
when you had little to do it helped deal with all the time Foster
had on his hands when he was sick.
Knowing Jabari needed to keep his focus on the
largest squid, he seemed to be in a mental conversation with,
Foster focused on Goboli. He started looking at the hippocampus and
didn’t take his eyes away. He didn’t blink. He didn’t move. He just
stared and started and stared some more. It didn’t take a lot of
time before his new friend looked his way.
“Thank fuck.” Foster whispered, waving for
Goboli to come to him.
The damn hippocampus shook his head, but Foster
just gritted his teeth and waved harder. Finally Goboli looked at
Polaris and must have used that mind link thing before making his
way towards Foster.
Goboli pretended to be looking around the area
at first until the other squid were no longer paying any attention
and made his way to Foster.
Once Goboli arrived, the damn hippocampus hissed
low, “What? I told you to stay down and quiet.”
“I am, but I think you guys better either get
some help or get prepared because that squid thing is buying time.”
Foster stated, pointing at Formaci.
“What are you talking about?” Goboli asked.
Rolling his eyes, Foster explained his way of
thinking. “When Sacrin first contacted Polaris, he said there were
three of those nasty things here, but when we got here there were
four and since then another has showed up. I think he’s just
wasting time until reinforcements arrive. Right now there are the
four of you, and I highly doubt that five of the nasties are a
threat, but if there are ten or more, you four would be mush and
they could get to the kids.”
Seeing another dark shadow, Foster pointed,
“Look, anther one is coming.”
Goboli turned in the direction Foster pointed,
hissing out, “Shit.”
Goboli suddenly let out a braying sound like a
horse would when pissed as he took off towards Polaris, Jabari, and
Sacrin. He must have used his mind link thing, because one minute
Jabari and the others were standing there looking constipated...
because they were mind talking... at least that’s what Foster hoped
was happening because he didn’t want to consider anything else...
and the next second they were in a fighting stance and Jabari was
snarling, “Get out of here now or die!”
Formaci must have realized the jig was up
because he turned a bright red like Foster had heard they did when
angry, and lifted his long tentacles to snag Jabari as another went
for Polaris and the other went to grab Sacrin.
Polaris used his puff-up thing, but the large
squid didn’t let go as he pulled the hippocampus in. Another showed
up to attack, but Goboli let out some kind of pulsating tone that
had the other squid flying backwards and away from Polaris as well
as made Foster’s ears pop.
The fight was on, and Foster watched as his mate
swiped at Formaci’s tentacles. It was also then he noticed no one
was paying attention to the cave the kids were inside. Giving a
cautious glance to his surroundings, he made a decision. As long as
the squids were distracted, now was the time to get those kids out
of that cave.
Rushing as fast as he could, Foster made his way
inside, only to see four young boys huddled together behind a sharp
jagged rock. They couldn’t be more than thirteen or fourteen in
age, and another slightly older boy was standing in front of them
with a rock in hand. Seeing their fear and not wanting to get a
rock in the face, Foster quickly said, “Hi, I’m Foster, Jabari’s
mate.”
“Jabari is a devil. He has no mate. Evil doesn’t
get mates. My dad told me that.” The boy with the rock said.
Raising a brow, Foster replied, “Is that so?
Evil? How did you come to that conclusion? Has Jabari hurt you or
your people?”
The boy shook his head, “No, but my dad said so
and he would never lie.”
“Oh, I don’t think you dad is lying, but surely
your dad has made mistakes?” Foster asked.
The boy thought a moment, then shook his head,
“My father is smart and...”
“And you’ve never heard him say he was sorry?”
Foster asked.
Again the boy thought a moment, then answered,
“Well, yeah. Mom was upset because dad tried to fix the crack in
our dwelling roof himself and the malagnites started coming
through.”
“Okay, I don’t know what a malagnite is and it
doesn’t really matter. The point is, he didn’t really know what he
was doing and it happened. That’s a mistake. Just like he doesn’t
really know Jabari and he is mistaken about him.” Foster tried to
reason.
The boy shook his head, “No. It isn’t just my
father that says Jabari is evil, all our parents do.”
The other boys behind the kid all nodded, but
Foster thought about something. “And you always agree with your
parents?”
The boys all looked at each other, but said
nothing, but Foster wouldn’t give up. “I know I never always agreed
with my parents. They wanted me to do things and I didn’t want to
do them, even though it might be the right thing for them, it just
didn’t seem right to me.”
“What do you mean?” One of the younger boys
asked.
Not wanting to go into great detail, but knowing
he needed to help these kids before the fight outside caused
problems in here, Foster said, “I have been sick since I was a very
young boy, and my parents kept letting doctors do things that hurt
and made me throw up all the time. When I got older, I told them I
didn’t want that anymore and they didn’t agree. We had to go to
someone that finally made them stop. I know it means I will die,
but I’m okay with that. My parents just don’t agree.”
“You’re a surface dweller?” One of the boys
asked in awe.
Nodding, Foster replied, “I am. How did you
know?”
“Because no one in Atlantis gets sick, but we do
watch things on the internet of the surface dwellers. Movies,
videos, and other things. Your world is interesting and I’d like to
go there one day, but my mom says it isn’t safe.” Another boy
said.
Foster took a moment to look outside and saw the
fighting wasn’t slowing down. He knew they needed to get to safety,
but at the moment the fight had come too close to the cave. Turning
back to the kids, Foster said, “Why don’t we sit down and you guys
can introduce yourselves?”
The older boy with the rock sat, but didn’t let
the stone out of his grip as the others joined them. A small
blond-haired boy said, “I’m Tetley and this is my little brother
Marclo.”
“By two minutes, Tet. I’m your younger brother
by two whole minutes. When are you going to let that go?” Marclo
asked in frustration.
Tetley smiled, “Never.”
“I’m Corvan and this is my friend Gavil.” A
dark-haired boy said, pointing to another dark-haired kid with
longer hair.