Secrets of the Underwater Dome

Chapter 1: The plank of wood, elves, and three very wet people

A whirling storm beats and batters the ships all around leaving none standing. The wind howling like an angry wolf blows down sails and pulls up the floorboards of decks. People screaming and babies crying fill everyone's panicked ears as they search for safety, safety that doesn't exist.

Swoosh, swoosh went the waves underneath them calmly rolling after a not-so-calm storm. The bright glistening rays of sunlight shine down on them, toasting their skin. The heat warms their faces leaving them like a tomato. Waylan Thorthhill's eyes burst open, his pupils dilated, and his chocolate brown eyes jerked around observing his surroundings. The waves crash up against the plank of wood which thankfully saved him and a few others, and being slowly drenched in icy salt water Waylan looks around. He looks around and next to him are two more people. One he recognises as his neighbor Nate Fairebourne, and the second a girl. A girl with sun-coloured hair with periwinkle dyed tips, laying sprawled on the piece of plank, delicate and fairly pretty. That didn't last long though because a couple of seconds later her eyes flew open revealing a sapphire blue iris. She sat up glaring around with a wide frightened eye trembling from the cold. As the girl's eyes came to rest on Waylan, she stopped. Waylan, who was finding this just as awkward as Annalise, broke the silence, not with cheerful small talk but humming. This made it even more awkward. They were right now floating through a mass of destruction above the waves. Dead bodies floating aimlessly, their blank eyes like marbles reflecting the sun. Annalise could smell dead fish as well, it drifted up her nose causing her to cough and splutter. Waylan and Annalise, still not knowing each other, sat in silence. Around 7 minutes later Nate stirred and eventually woke up. Looking like he had just fallen into a deep hole, he looked around. His head of hazel hair waved around in the wind as he turned his head from side to side looking at both his neighbor, Waylan, and the random girl, Annalise. They all stayed silent for a second until Annalise gasped, the limp body that was floating behind Waylan was ... her poor father! Tears began to roll down her pink cheeks, soothing the burns and scratches on her face ever so slightly. Yesterday she was the happy daughter of a happy man, and today sat on a plank of wood in the middle of the sea, with 2 brainless boys. Because both Waylan and Nate were both staring out to the sea of destruction they didn't notice her silent sobs. After the devastating pause, Nate said "Is it just me or did I just wake up from a very bad dream where-" "The ship crashed and everyone else on it either drowned or went missing?" interrupted Waylan. "Nope, not just you" answered Annalise nervously. "How did we end up on this piece of ..." "This plank of wood. I don't know but what I do know is that we are being pulled to safety by 2 gnomes' ' Annalise said, looking down into the sea. "I think you must have hit your head or something, because no gnomes are pulling us along," Waylan cautiously said. "I most certainly haven't!" exclaimed Annalise "Have!" "Haven't!" "Have!" "Stop it both of you!" Nate shouted over them looking annoyed. "Bickering, what a very human thing" came a small squeaky voice from below them. "Us, she call gnome, us!" came a second very broken sentence. Waylan pushed himself back quickly, leaning over the edge above the sea. "Um, hello," Annalise said sweetly to the two little creatures. "Hello miss" came two squeaky voices in unison. "Who are you and what are you doing near us!" said Waylan aggressively. "You are so rude you wouldn't care how that would make someone feel!" Annalise said angrily "I am human you know!" Waylan said back scowling "A human with the emotional range of a sock!". "Human, haha" "They think they're human, haha," Said the two little people. "Did you just say we are not humans?" Nate snapped at them "Did we say that?" "I don't think we did" "Let's go back to the conversation" and so they did. The two little things rose from the water, dry as the muffins Waylan makes. They both wore matching sea green overalls and had wiry red hair that stuck up on the end. They both had big round noses that popped out of their faces. They were about 12 inches tall and displayed a sense of dottiness, which made this interaction slightly awkward. "Yup, we have gone back through our memory, and we did not say you weren't human," One of them said. "Sorry, who did you say you were?" Annalise asked politely. "Barney and Barry" "I'm Barney" "Barry is me" "we are here to help you" "Save you". It was like you were hallucinating listening to them talk, the way they talked. It's like they knew exactly what the other person was saying. "Time we are losing," said Barry "We should get moving", so just like that they both dived back down underwater.