Wilfred Scott was not a man that was easily shaken, he never subscribed to the superstitions of most sailors, but he did have his own fears of the sea. The sounds of the ocean at night had been one, the whispers, the way the waves crashed against the ship, like a beast letting you know it has you right in its grasp, or how the noises would contort almost like voices, combining together to claw into your mind like worms through an apple making you question if you could ever really trust your perception. His captain, one James Hawthorne, argued that it was this fear that made Scott such a good sailor, “keeps you aware” he’d say. Hawthorne was an elder fellow, around six decades in age, heavier build, and skin as pale as the barnacles that infested his hull. Hawthorne sailed for time immemorial and in his eternal vigil he learned a few lessons he had passed down to Scott.

 

          “The sea is a fickle woman Scott! Her temple comes down like the wrath of God, but God as my witness you will never meet another woman who’s love is any more sweet” He said with a hardy laugh. “And boyo? So long as you’re on this ship, you keep my Lantern lit.”

 

The Torchlight was an average fishing vessel, it was big enough to house the crew quarters where Scott and Hawthorne slept and a small booth in the middle of the ship where the helm was held but otherwise was unadorned besides the lantern outside the room where the helm was held. The Lantern was what the ship was named after, but Scott found it surprisingly… bland. It was a metal lantern, a wax candle inside emitting a white flame, nothing entirely special about it. Except that when he looked closer on some nights Scott could swear that the lantern never once dimmed no matter the distance he was on the ship. Hawthorne was obsessed with the lantern, he always insisted on changing the lantern himself, and when they had been caught in a storm Hawthorne grabbed the lantern before running to the crew quarters for safety. Wilfred tried for years to get an answer out of him, but it was only when they picked up a researcher from the city that he answered.

 

          “The lantern? Is that why you call your ship the Torchlight” said Thomas. Scott liked Thomas; they had much in common, mainly that they were both relatively young men, who the captain usually regarded with a polite dismissal. Though uncharacteristically the Captain answered. “Aye, the name’s a reminder of me first rule.” Hawthorne said staring out into the void of the ocean in front of him.

 

          “Right, but why the rule? Can’t be for the visibility, it’s a wax candle you’d get better light from the stars that thing.” Thomas continued asking questions, but beyond the first Hawthorne didn’t answer though Scott could see him rising in anger. Scott spoke to break the tension.

                 

          “Tom, whatcha researching out here anyway?” Thomas has joined them on some research expedition, something about an ‘ecological wonder.’

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          “Thomas, not Tom, and yes. The fish outside the harbour have been seen with several peculiarities, the University is sending me out to discover the nature of the anomalies” his answer was calculated to not reveal too much, but Scott and Hawthorned knew exactly what Thomas was talking about.

 

In the past few weeks more and more fish had appeared with varying degrees of mutations. Wilfred wrote down the weird fish he encountered in his journal, one had three eyes, another two tails, see through skin, teeth growing on the scales of the fish. It terrified him, but he chalked it up to some University tampering, to find that they didn’t know what it was either scared him.

 

          “Well… I hope you find whatcha lookin’ for. It would help out the business, believe it or not people don’t like eating fish that has more than the regular amount of teeths” Wilfred said, getting only a polite chuckle from Thomas.

 

It wasn’t long before the night crept up on them, Wilfred usually would have taken over for Hawthorne during the night but the captain usually liked to keep vigil on the first night, and as such Scott led Thomas to the crew quarters for rest.

 

Wilfred awoke in a jolt, the sound of a lighthouse horn screamed in the distance. He stood and gathered himself and moved out of the crew quarters. It was not uncommon for the sounds of the ship’s foghorn or a lighthouse horn to awaken him and as such he went off to enjoy his smokes. He took one out of the pack and stared off into the abyss of water. The water always pulled on him, the way the starlight shone on the water, reflecting the beauty of the world had always made his fears feel irrational. How could something so beautiful terrify him so? He walked about the ship performing his duties before the water pulled him in too deep.

 

He cleaned up the deck, pulled in fish traps, the like but throughout he couldn’t shake the feeling of the air being pulled from him, not quite suffocation. He looked around and notice that the captain was gone, the ship had been moving by itself. He checked the crew quarters only to find Thomas was gone as well, he was alone the only warmth on the ship was the lantern. He searched the ship frantically, once, twice, three times. It didn’t take long before he looked out at the water, scared that the men may have fallen overboard, he tensed when he saw bodies in the water. The bodies were blurry and shapeless in the distance, he grabbed the lantern to make out the forms in the haze. The bodies were waterlogged, skin sagged and yellowed where the rot was creeping in. The bodies rose above the water, sea foam pouring out of their mouths, algae clinging to their skin, and as Scott stared he swore he could see things move about the body pulling on it like a puppet on its strings. As they moved Scott saw it clearly, a small fish with silver scales ate out of the body of one of the corpses. Wilfred’s body loosened, burning liquid was caught in his throat, and as he was about to throw up his ears were bombarded with the sounds of the lighthouse. As he turned to face where the horn sounded, he saw the same silver fish grown to the size bigger than the ship, its eyes hollow as it bit deep into the hull tearing it off as simply as ripping a napkin.

 

The ship began to sink, Wilfred’s grip on the lantern loosened and fueled by adrenaline he ran for the top of the hastily sinking ship, but the further he would climb the faster the ship would sink, until there was simply nowhere else to go. And as the ship sank he could hear them, the sea worms, the slugs, the crabs, the silver fish, and other creatures that he dare not think of. They would devour him, as they did the Captain or Thomas. He felt the reverberations in the water as his head sunk below. Then with a start, Scott awoke.

 

The sound of glass crashing had awoken him with a start, he clutched his throat and gasped for air. Thomas hit his back in an effort to help Wilfred cough out what he had been choking on. Scott finally coughed up the thing stuck in his throat, a few silver scales and sea foam.

 

          “The Lantern!” Hawthorne screamed as he moved towards the shattered pieces of glass on the ground below where the lantern was held, he fell to the ground clutching the remnants of the lantern in his hand with such force that his hands began to bleed. Wilfred, who was still coughing up sea foam, instructed Thomas to grab the medical supplies in the room. Thomas walked over to the Captain, Scott in tow. Thomas attempted to bandage the wounds, but Hawthorne simply threw him off, although after Thomas had tried to bandage his wounds the captain seemed a bit appease, he jumped up, turned off the engine to the ship, and moved to the edge of the boat, pouring the blood from his hand into the sea as Hawthorne recited a prayer.

 

          “Mother of Seas, who’s womb has birthed the world. I ask thee for forgiveness. This soul begs for mercy for the transgressions cast upon you…” Thomas looked at Wilfred who was looking at the Captain with horror.

 

          “Sea Madness, had to be?” Thomas said, Wilfred didn’t answer. He knew there was something in the ocean, Captain had told him to keep the lantern lit and he failed. All Wilfred could hope for was that his dream was just a dream, and that the Captain was just a superstitious fool, god have mercy on him if he was wrong.

 

Scott turned on the engine and tried steering away, only to find the engine was broken. The last thing Hawthorne did was lower the anchor to keep them stationary. The only thing that moved the ship was the breath of the ocean. Wilfred paced around the quarters hoping to find any letters or journals Hawthorne may have kept about the lantern as after his prayer Hawthorne was inconsolable. Thomas began his search for any food that had been packed, but all he found were rotten fish and moldy hardtack. The only food left were the malformed fish Thomas kept for his research. It took only one day for Thomas’ hunger to outweigh his apprehension.

 

Hawthorne and Thomas had eaten the fish. Wilfred held onto his portion simply staring at it. The fish was a mass of scales and tissue the he swore had been staring at him, after his dream the idea of eating fish disgusted him. It had been good that he didn’t eat the fish as a few hours after consumption Hawthorn and Thomas began cramping and experiencing violent bouts of vomiting, he led them to the quarters as he figured out what to do next. He pulled the anchor, hoping the waves might take them somewhere, anywhere really. And in the meantime he’d attempt to repair the engine.

 

As the two men rested, Wilfred could hear Hawthorne’s stomach growling from outside the quarters, when he entered the room Hawthorne had been clutching his stomach like it was fit to burst. Wilfred had moved to him and began attempting some sort of first aid, but as he got closer he noticed that the cuts he received from the glass had been healed, stitched up with silver scales.

 

Wilfred carried Hawthorne to a storage room in the quarters, barricading him inside. While inside he found some notes on engine repair, which helped him get the engine to a barely operable state. As Wilfred manned the helm, sweat pooling on his forehead from what he saw on the Captain. Night descended on them, and in his hunger fueled mental haze he couldn’t tell if this was their second night at sea or their tenth. The waves grew fierce crashing into the hull. Wilfred's eyes drifted like the waves and in his tired state he could not see where he had been maneuvering the ship, rocks disappeared and reappeared in the blink of an eye and when he moved out of their direction and turned it was like they never existed at all. The hunger was getting at him, pains shoot throughout his body, and the water began to become clearer. There were parasites in the water, the same parasites from his dream, the ones that ate his body when he drowned. There was no mistake, they were waiting for him, for the ship, for Thomas and Hawthorne. He was afraid, if hunger didn’t kill him, was it fate that he would die at sea? Devoured by monsters in the water? As these thoughts surged, something broke through the whispers of the ocean, the sound of meat ripped and torn. Wilfred let go of the helm and moved towards where the sounds were emanating, the Crew Quarters.

 

He opened the door. Cartilage and meat had been splattered across the floor. The body of what Wilfred could have only assumed to have been Thomas was splayed in the middle of the room. Vivisected, torn asunder and picked clean. Thomas’ eyes in the pulp of the meat that had been his face stared at the creature that slew him. The creature was tall, wearing the ripped clothes of Captain Hawthorne, its body was composed of silver scales, its head was that of an anglerfish with the light on its head glowing a bright white. It chewed through bone and had been gorging itself on Thomas. Wilfred stared at the creature, frozen in his desire to run, to scream, to hope that by not moving at all the monster would ignore him, and yet he found himself doing none of these things. He moved forward, this creature, this Anglerfish had eaten when Wilfred starved himself. He protected these men, he served his Captain. And both men were gone, no one could judge him if he decided not to waste the meat. After all, who would ask him to eat those mutated fish? The Anglerfish turned towards him, it looked at Wilfred with familiarity before walking slowly towards him, it was not rageful, or malicious, but neutral, doting even. It put a hand on the First Mate, it’s mouth opened more and more until from the depths of its mouth had been as dark as the Oceanic Abyss itself, and from this darkness came a hand, rough and scarred. And it was holding a Lantern. Wilfred grabbed onto it, and the creature returned to the remains of Thomas as Wilfred felt the bumps on the back of his neck turn rough as he recalled the words the Captain told him oh so long ago. “Keep the Lantern Lit.”