The Eternal Punishment

For a moment, she couldn't believe the Lord of the Dead was letting her off the hook so easily.

She was a convicted murderer after all. When she was alive, her face was on thousands of posters with the words "Wanted: Dead or Alive". Through her life, she might have killed at least a thousand people- men, women, children... it didn't matter to her at all. She killed whenever she wanted, whoever she wanted.

But then, one of the CIA officer, whose child she had killed had found her. His anger got the best of him and kaboom, she had a bullet through her head and her  spirit drifted off to the Underworld.

"Maria Jones," the Lord of the Dead had called out to her. "For all your unforgivable crimes, you must suffer punishment of all eternity." Maria had winced at that. 

"What will my punishment be, my lord?" She had bowed for extra measure. The Lord of the Dead had a gruesome smile on his face. "You shall return to the earth," the Lord stated. "You shall reside in the Seas of the mortal world!"

Maria blinked and barely managed to contain her laughter. 

"Do not laugh, Maria Jones," the Lord warned. "You shall be placed under the supervision of my lieutenant, Aktines." The Lord clicked his fingers. "Farewell, Maria Jones."

Just like that, she found herself in the middle of the ocean. She had the complete swim set- suit, fins, goggles. Maria smirked to herself. The Lord of the Dead was quite stupid indeed. She tried to swim up to the surface, but her head collided with an invisible barrier.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you, Maria Jones." Startled, Maria turned around to face a stingray. His black eyes were full of mirth. "Did you just speak?" Maria exclaimed. Then she realized that she was breathing underwater. Her nose scrunched up at the smell.

"Smells bad doesn't it?" the stingray said. Maria nodded. "You must have done something really bad to get this punishment," he continued. "In the olden times, we used to boil the evils in oil, now those people are sent here." With his fin, he gestured to ocean. Maria gasped.

That was when she realized that there were white structures around them. "What are these?" Maria questioned, pointing to the floating structures. The stingray laughed. "Why, my dear," he said, "this is your doing." His eyes turned fierce all of a sudden. "This is plastic."

Maria whimpered. "Who are you?" The stingray smirked. "I am Aktines. You humans defiled the ocean, now you must suffer its wrath!" The Lord was right, it was never an easy punishment.

Every minute of her afterlife, Maria swam through the Pacific ocean which was littered with plastic. Wherever she went, no matter how deep, it was always there. Chocking her, trapping her and obstructing her path. Every time she stopped to remove the plastic from her face, Aktines would zap her. There was no way out.