Short Stories Volume 1

"The Dead Sea"

Salt is one of the oldest known items in the entire world. Besides gold and clay. It can be found in some fossils, mountainous regions, deserts and places that have been sealed off from the rest of the world for thousands of years. It has many uses.

One of which can help cure meat, preserving it making it last longer. And even though it can be extremely painful, it can help clean wounds. Because of this it had been adopted into many beliefs that salt can repel and even contain evil spirits.

Having said that, one of the largest known places of salt is the dead sea.

So salt became one of the most sought out item in the world. People went crazy mining the substance from everywhere they could. At one point, it became impossible to find salt on land anymore. Soon people turned to the oceans and rivers. Which meant eventually the sea became a mining site.

But as the mined the salt they began to clean the water as a result. The dead sea suddenly wasn't so dead anymore. Ever more they mined and ever more the sea became alive.

But there's a reason it was made so.

As said before, salt was made to repel evil. With it drained, what was once locked away began to awaken.

The sea wasn't just some inhabitable place on earth but an actual prison. Greek mythology called it the Kraken. Norse called it Jörmungandr. For the aztec it was called Cipactli.

Either way you get my point.

It was something that was supposed to kept dead, hidden and locked up. Little by little the world began to have earthquakes. But not just a rumbling at random but more like a huge foot had been moving underneath the blanket. Disturbing everything that was on top.

Only the huge foot was a monster and the blanket had been the surface of the earth.

When it started breaking through it began in the deep in the middle of nowhere of the ocean. The navy was the first to get any signs of it. It didn't show up on their radar but they could see it through the scopes. At first looked like black sludge or oil coming from the ground. But it didn't move like it normally would when those two would be in water.

Instead it looked like dye being poured in hot water. It was being dispersed unevenly and without any sort of pattern. Yet it almost looked like a jellyfish in the water. Some fishes that were introduced to the ecosystem were swimming by and swam right into it. Seeing that it did nothing to them, divers went out to investigate it. They tried gathering samples of it but some of what ever it was seeped through their goggles and masked. Immediately the screams of the men could be heard through their earpieces.

Once inside, medical help was attended and when they removed their gear their faces were being burned by the sludge as if it were acid. When doctors tried to remove it from their faces, it went straight through the gloves and onto their hands. Their reaction was the same as the previous victims. Burns and skin melting, but not falling off. All six individuals who came into contact with the black sludge were slowly being devoured. Not wanting to risk contamination, they were locked in the medical bay.

Within an hour, they could see on the camera that nothing except clothing remained of the people. When it was done, each piece of sludge that was formerly attached to someone all moved to the center of the room and morphed into one. It tried going for the door but it was sealed shut. Little by little it was inching itself all over the room looking for cracks to crawl through. Reaching the sink it went down the drain.

It was later reported that three ships had been reported missing were found but with nobody on board. A week later there was panic at the beaches. What was supposed to be summer fun turned into a nightmare as people were retreating to land with the black sludge on them, screaming as they were being devoured. All other life forms were ignored. No fish, dog, cat and in between ever came close to it. When a person did have animal with them, the black substance simple went around the creature to get to the human.

With every person it devoured and returned to the center mass, its form began to take a more solid form. No longer would it look like sludge or dye. Although still the purest and darkest black that it appeared shiny, the monster had six long legs that stretched for two city blocks and what appeared to be wings on its back. When unfurled, the wings would encompass an entire town.

It would stay put like that with its wings outstretched like it was creating a dome until it was done feeding. And every once and a while it would return to the sea. The only hope came from when it came into contact with the city of Ramallah after heavy snowfall. As it is custom for safety, the roads were covered in salt. So when the monstrosity tried to blanket the town with its wings, it recoiled with a shriek.

Piecing it together that it wasn't until the sea was devoid of salt that the monster came it out and now with its fleeing of the town because of the salt on the roads, did the plan to imprison it again begin. They started gathering every grain of salt that they could find and waited until the creature went back to the ocean. From the shores, boats and planes above was the mineral dropped into the water.

People remained hopeful and prayed it worked. But in truth, it was unknown if there was enough salt to seal it again. After all, it was the reason they targeted that body of water. The answer would have to come the next day to see if it emerged from the depths or not.