Blue

TRIGGER WARNINGS vomit, the ocean, gross fish things, not being believed.

ARCHIVIST:
Statement of Antonine… right?

ANTONINE:
Y-yeah. Yeah, that's me.

ARCHIVIST:
Hmm. Antonine Baudelaire, 16 years old. Speaking about—

ANTONINE:
A… mysterious… sickness? Yes, I got a mysterious sickness.

ARCHIVIST:
Statement of Antonine Baudelaire, regarding a strange sickness that she caught. Is that right?

ANTONINE:
Let's- get this straight. I want to... to make this very clear that I am in the right state of mind. Despite what they may tell you about my mental state, I'm perfectly sane! What happened in the water wasn't traumatic in the physical sense, I hit my head but I still think perfectly straight.

They all think that I'm insane- I'm not. I know what I swallowed. I've had a track record of being a bit clumsy and sick, rifled with a weak immune system, colds, and flu every season. One time I had a cold that lasted three months. Heh. Anyways, this was unlike any other cold or flu I've had in the past. It made it so-... I couldn't... I find it hard to breathe. The simple act of my lungs moving, inhaling, exhaling. it aches beyond all understanding. I should start- from the beginning if I wish to make sense.

I- I was at the beach. It was... late August last year, I believe. Something like 90-something degrees outside, yes. It was warm, the sun was strong and sweat covered me and my family as we baked underneath the summer sun. I went into the water, as one does when it's hot; and I swam. I played with my sisters, dove underwater, and held my breath as long as I could. It was something you normally do when it's summer, right? I have three sisters, and we don't go to the beach often. I spent a lot of time doing schoolwork and homework but summer break was a nice... end. To it all.

I liked to gaze into the abyss of nothingness, into the dark depths of seaweed, fish, and whatever else lie in the ocean as I swam. The empty void underneath felt exhilarating, underneath me could be anything and I'd... I'd never know. I just- [cough] sorry.

So- so when a massive wave overtook the ocean, I tried to swim to shore but the water was strong and I admittedly... wasn't. The wave wasn't large by any means, perhaps massive was an exaggeration but it was big enough to cause a commotion. My sisters stayed by the shallow side, so the shore wasn't too far and they were okay. I, on the other hand, wasn't so I- I was sucked into the endless pit of the ocean. It was heavy, it was like my entire body fought to hold my breath as the water took me over, the cold, wet, dark depths of muddy mayhem as tendrils pulled me down as the seaweed wrapped along my legs. I tried to scream but my mouth gurgled water. I coughed. As the strength of the waters raptured me, my limbs fought to swim up but it was too much, too late. Eventually, I stopped.

It was calming after a while, underneath that layer of water as I sunk. I stared into the sky, it was blue and sunny but below me was the night, dark and endless. Stars, there were none in the void, like all of them died out. I tried to reach my hand up, but eventually, my arm ached from the pressure of the water and I let the overpowering ocean take me. It was nice to let go as I inhaled another gulp of water [cough]. My lungs were heavy like it was wrapped in some kind of vine. It squeezed harder and harder around my fragile lungs before I couldn't breathe... but I didn't die. I lived, I was given CPR and I lived. I wish I didn't. I was given an overnight stay at the hospital once the ambulance arrived. I think- I think I swallowed too much water, they said.

The next day, after that incident, I was discharged and things went as usual. I went to classes, and I ate lunch with my friends, but then there was this feeling in my chest. It was heavy, it felt like someone was sitting on it. I ignored it and went on with my day. I went on with living and breathing.

The next day was much the same. My normal days are mundane and boring, nothing but school and the average teenage life. This changed after that day. Every night that feeling returned when I laid in bed. I swear I was still cold despite it being early September, and I felt wet. Wet all over, water trickled down my sides as the tendrils of... monstrous seaweed wrapped along my ankles, pulling me down into the depths of what was an empty void. I screamed but nothing came, my chest was heavy and it felt trapped, the lungs inside of me fighting to keep breathing, trying to kick as I tore off the seaweed from its hellish grasp. Fish began to surround me, burrowing themselves into my flesh, each and every scale scraping pure skin. It was like I was cardboard, their teeth ripping out bits of my own body, blood dying the water around me a dark red. I screamed and I cried out, begging for a God that would never hear, muffled by the water. It ached everywhere.

I swear it's not a dream because I was doused in ocean water the next day, and I swear I was bleeding from what seemed to be a bite of a fish. I laughed, I laughed it out; wheezing and breathing as best as I could, for I thought my siblings must've played a practical joke. I made my way downstairs, clutching my chest as I felt something tighten around it, my lungs endlessly struggling for breath. I found them living, smiling and laughing as my hair dripped with ocean water and my legs bled from fish bites. I looked at them as they looked at me as if nothing with me was wrong. "I'm soaking wet- who did this!?" I asked them. None of them said anything, my mother brushing me off.

I realized the water evaporated the second it dripped onto the floor. I shivered, I was cold and my chest was tight. "You don't..don't... see it? I'm cold, I'm soaked and I smell like fish! There's blood all over my legs and-"

"Are you okay, Antonine?" My mother asked. Was I okay? I'm not okay, I am not okay still! I shook my head, stomping upstairs and closing the door, and- I'm not dumb. I know supernatural things exist, and I must be haunted by some- some crazy fish ghost or something! I felt bile build in the back of my throat, a disgusting liquid slowly passing through my esophagus as I gag, water falling out of my mouth. It wasn't just water that left my body that day, but fish. Fish of various colors, small and large, swam through my mouth and I could feel each scale inside of me, squirming, begging for freedom. Not only that but seaweed. A long, slimy, green tendril, followed by another, followed by another, three long pieces of seaweed hanging off my mouth. I pulled, I pulled and pulled, each piece of slimy seaweed infinitely long as I kept gagging, the bundle of tendrils still embedded into my stomach. Each and every drag of the green plant leaving my body felt like hell, it burned and my sensitive raw flesh couldn't handle the friction.

I don't know how long I spent pulling the seaweed from my throat, but it ached badly the next day.

For seven long days and nights, I gagged up water and vomited fish, the small creatures swimming up to my mouth to the bathtub I soon became accompanied with. My family left me alone- I became snappy. People tend to do that when covered in water 24/7, vomiting fish and seaweed. When I ate food, it tasted like fish. When I drank water, it tasted like the ocean. When I- I looked at the water I felt sick.

On the seventh night, I felt sicker than before. My stomach was so bloated it was a dark purple, my eyes had heavy bags and I began to throw up, as per usual. Water, fish- and instead of the taste of seaweed in my mouth, it was a long tentacle. Dark purple and thick, slowly climbing its way out of my throat. Tears began to pool in the corner of my eyes as I pulled, pulled, and pulled, trying to inhale air. My face turned a dark red as I watched the creature in the mirror. It climbed, oh so slowly, out of me like I was in some cave. It just kept… climbing. Each tentacle was followed by another, two massive tendrils filling my mouth, followed by a third. Fourth, I began to feel the blood in my mouth. The fifth was covered in blood as I felt it caress my cheek, a sixth, a seventh- and the final tendril excavated from me. It pulsed. It pulsed as I wept. An octopus, fully formed and living, just left my stomach. I threw up, not water, not seaweed, but blood and acidic vomit. I passed out in a pool of my own blood as the Octopus squirmed around me.

I swear this happened- no one believes me when I say this! I'm not crazy, I didn't take drugs, and I don't want attention. I just- I want to be sure. Be sure there's nothing left… left inside of me. [Cough]. Please! You have to he- help- [coughing.]

[Sounds of water falling, followed by a sound of fish squirming on a table and a soft cry coming from Antonine.]

ARCHIVIST:
What the?! Martin?! Ti—

ANTONINE:
You can see it?! I'm not crazy, oh my god, please help me!

ARCHIVIST:
YES I CAN SEE IT. Oh my god, I—

[Click]