The same old feeling crept in—disgust, thick and unshakable. Like a lump of spoiled meat just sitting in her stomach, refusing to digest or come back up. That's how Mellisa felt every morning as she cleaned the beach. The used condoms. The beer bottles. The cigarette butts. The silent evidence of people who came here not to enjoy the beauty of the ocean, but to dump pieces of their chaos.
Once, she'd imagined this beach as sacred. Now, it was just another place people ruined without a second thought.
Four years. That's how long she'd been at this job. Four years of sunrises, sea salt, and scraping muck off the shore. She used to joke she was like a fridge in a Nigerian home—always there, always working, even when no one appreciated it.
And her dreams? Gone with the tide.
The fantasy of crossing into some "uncharted territory" with a man who'd sweep her off her feet? A joke now. One she told herself sometimes, just to feel the sting and remind herself to stop dreaming.
She raised a cigarette to her lips, letting it rest there for a moment before flicking her lighter. The flame danced in the wind, stubborn. She cupped it, lit the tip, and took a slow drag. A habit she picked up from hanging around the kind of people who moved through life without shame or apology. People who didn't care how broken the world was.
Then came the car.
It rumbled onto the beach, its tires crunching gravel before sinking into sand. Three hooded figures stepped out. They didn't look lost. They looked…planned.
Mellisa froze.
They moved to the edge of the water, forming a perfect triangle. The lead figure lifted their arms, and a low chant filled the air. It wasn't loud, but it was heavy—like it pressed into her bones.
The ocean responded violently.
Water surged, spiraling high into the sky, forming columns around the trio like giant sentinels. A boundary of madness. Mellisa tried to run, but her body locked up. Her arms, her legs—nothing obeyed. Only her mind raced.
She'd seen signs before—red cloth-wrapped padlocks, pictures in bottles. But this? This was something else. The water stilled. Then, at the center of the triangle, from the tops of the water columns, glowing orbs formed. They hovered, then merged, growing brighter, denser.
The ball of water launched at her before she could even scream.
It hit like a wall of cold, cruel hands. It filled her—mouth, nose, ears—drowning her from the inside out. She couldn't breathe. Couldn't move.
Just as her vision began to darken, she saw them.
The three hooded figures turned toward her. Still faceless. Still silent. Still moving in formation.
And then—blackness.