Bound With The Water Dragon

Impending Doom

It’s weight ruined his body. It felt like he was being crushed as the water collapsed down onto them.  Morgan complained freely without his gear disrupting his speech. There were no more bubbles or barriers anymore. It was just them.  

“What the hell?” he exclaimed but the voice inside of him remained silent. 

Water surged around him. It claimed him as an element in the sea. It was as if he was meant to live among it. Morgan’s eyes widened at the thought and felt his body plunge downward into the churning ocean below. The orcas still circled and jumped for their meal. Some welcomed the challenge of charging the falling water but as Morgan plummeted towards the surface the ocean surrounding him protected him. Refracting light crystalized the barrier between them at a moment's notice. Not even their charges could penetrate the wall. 

Morgan still jumped in fear of what would happen if they did though. He braced himself for impact and gasped in response. His breath startled him though. It made him look around for pockets of air that he could be breathing from but none were near. 

The voice echoed in his mind about accepting the water. His lungs filled as if he was breathing oxygen, not water. It felt oddly natural. He didn’t choke or even taste the salt of the sea which was also a surprise. 

A shift in the water’s force that once had him falling now pushed him down. Morgan could feel it on his shoulders as if the ocean was purposely bending him. He found himself leaning forward to dive further down and let the guidance of this sequence take place. 

His headlamp still called to the whales below as he returned to the deep. The dark blue water revealed the same light that raced up to greet him as he fell which was a rush. Morgan did his best to study it as it continuously surged beyond him and up to the surface. He noticed how the hieroglyphics that he had touched earlier seemed to shoot one off in a pattern around him then too. It was the same one that the being inside him had activated with practiced ease. 

The thought of which stumped him. What he went through was an out of body experience. Being controlled, but the thought remained as he swam down only further towards an opening he could hardly see. 

The voice inside of him still offered its guidance and Morgan pushed himself to listen. After what happened with the orcas it would be stupid not to, he thought. 

As he pushed on into the darkness of the passageway his speed increased. The shove forward was unlike any speed he had gone before. Even without his gear he considered himself fast, but this was ungodly fast. The water pummeled against him at such a speed that it felt as though he was swimming through the earth instead. 

Silence had been disturbed by the laughter within him then too. 

“What’s so funny?” Morgan groaned as he was thrown through the water still. 

“You,” it hummed. 

“Nothing about this is funny,” Morgan retorted. 

The voice’s returned silence made Morgan wonder if there was more to this. 

“Where are we going?” he asked instead. 

Morgan then realized himself. It was the second time he had called himself and whatever was inside him more than one person. While he didn’t really know what was there, it was definitely there. 

While he waited for the being to recognize this and answer, he felt the need to look to the side of him where light began to filter in once more. The same light flickering happened along the outside of what seemed to be a tunnel. It was faint but there and glistening in the low light. Morgan watched through the space as the ocean turned different shades of emerald green to a brilliant cerulean blue. 

There the temperature shifted but only marginally. Morgan could feel how his body reacted to it. It seemed ready to change and kept him warm despite it all. His attention then changed to look to the other side of him where seals zipped around in the water while they chased their prey. 

It’s not much longer until he can see in front of him. An enormous iceberg fills his view. Terror runs through him as he does his best to slow down. Morgan attempts to move himself around but he cannot break his position at all. 

The thought of his death comes to mind next. It then morphs into a more realistic venture. One where he’s most likely in a hospital somewhere, recovering from an illness. He then told himself none of this was real. It was all a dream. 

Morgan could feel it again, the shift to take over reaching around inside of him. 

There were no words now. No guidance. He was simply without control again. 

Next the water’s surge slowed down but not enough to save him from this. Instead, the ocean shot them deep within a thin opening. The size of the iceberg made it seem so much smaller that Morgan flinched the moment he reached its opening.

His eyes shut immediately while his body curled in on itself. If he was going to hit something, he was damn sure that he wouldn’t also be the one to be nursing a broken bone in the wake of all of this. Being stuck in the ice in more than one piece didn’t sound like a great way to start this adventure, he told himself.

“Open your eyes,” the voice inside of him commanded. 

While the voice was startling, Morgan couldn’t right away though. He was still waiting to hit a wall or be dropped from a horrible height but then his eyes were forced open. Light struck them first but as his eyes adjusted he found himself entering a wave streaked ice cavern. 

It was absolutely stunning. The walls they narrowly missed looked as if they were in a frozen ocean wave. It rolled around them in an organic flow that couldn’t be copied. It’s natural beauty had him entranced. He took in the unfolding scene around him as the essence raced around the maze before him. There they weaved around and ducked under natural ice bridges before Morgan realized he was flying. 

“Tell me this isn’t real one more time and I drop you,” the voice replied to Morgan’s gasp. 

He can’t help the way he stares as he approaches a creature he’s never seen before. 

“Say another word. Any word about hallucinating…”

Morgan shook his head, ready to listen. His eyes darted back down to the creature. It had a long white body, looking like a large snake with a grey dorsal fin that ran the length of its body. Before he could get a good look at it, Morgan felt his body turn and dip, losing sight of it altogether. 

“What was that thing?” Morgan asked, astonished. 

“That thing does not need to be judged by your query,” the voice snapped back. 

Morgan frowned in response. 

“You’re the one that took me down, or rather, up here. How am I going to know what it is just by looking at it. It’s not like it’s a sheep!”

The being inside of him seemed to take it into consideration. Or at least, that's what Morgan thought of the rumble within him. 

“Is it wrong to call you human, just because you are one?” 

“No?” Morgan questioned. 

“So if I refer to you as the human it won’t bother you at all?” the voice questioned. 

Morgan thought deeply about his question, then countered with his own. 

“What was the creature’s name?” he asked instead. 

The essence inside him hummed with consideration as if he pleased it. 

“The creature you saw was a leviathan. She’s one of our elders who keeps the ocean in check with her family. It’s their sole duty,” he paused, then added, “Her name is Lasaiah.”

“Lasaiah,” Morgan said, practicing it as he flew with the being inside him. “And what’s your name?”

Morgan felt himself sigh even though it wasn’t an action he required. It was as if the essence there wasn’t prepared for such a question. 

“I’m Ejder,” it responded. 

“Are you like them?” Morgan asked. “Are you a creature too?”

“If by creature you mean mythical being to your kind, yes.”

Morgan shrugged off the being’s response. It made him sound more godly than it needed to and Morgan simply wasn’t for that.

“What does that make you then? A cow? People worship cows…”

His body jerked again, this time to lift himself upward through a series of cracks before reaching their final destination. Morgan’s jaw fell at the sight of them all. There were so many different creatures around that he simply couldn’t take it all in. 

“No Morgan,” it replied. “I’m a dragon.”