Rain and fog, mist and spray. Depths stretching far beyond, black and cold. The wind carried smog and trash from the crumbling city behind him out over the foaming sea. In two weeks he hadn’t seen his shadow; fourteen days of nothing but rain and gray skies. He lit his last dry cigarette and watched the blue smoke meander between the reeds.
There was a monster out there. In two weeks it had killed four people, two cops among them. He was in over his head—but so was everybody else. It had come from the water, that much was certain. And it liked to take its time.
The longer he watched the rough sea, the more he wished he could just walk inside, get swept up by the riptide, never to return. He took a step forward and it frightened him how easy that was. The next step was easier still. Nothing held him back; nothing to fear, nothing to doubt. And so he just kept walking.