Lying In The Deep

Not long after getting married to my husband, he says he wants to teach me how to scuba dive. My leg cramps when I'm practicing alone in the deep sea. However, my husband, a swimming instructor, chooses to save his unattainable love—she's jumped into the sea to commit suicide. I don't ask him for help. Instead, I allow myself to slowly sink. In my past life, I stopped my husband from leaving. He saved me with gnashed teeth and allowed his first love, Millie Quirke, to drown. By the time he went to save her, she'd already disappeared in the water. He comforted me and told me it was okay, that he was glad he'd saved me. However, one night, he brought me back to the seaside. Just as I let my guard down, he grabbed my neck and plunged my face into the water. Then, he dragged me out before I could suffocate. "You were just cramping—it would've passed! But Millie got dragged away by the current because of you! You can remain in the ocean with her!" When I open my eyes again, I'm back to the day I was scuba diving.

Three hours after my engagement banquet ended, I was stuffed into a burlap sack and thrown straight into the ocean. By the time deep-sea divers found me, my body had swollen into something grotesque and barely recognizable. The police called my fiancé right away to come identify the remains, but he could not have sounded less interested. "So, she's dead. So what? I'll show up at the funeral when the time comes." Left with no choice, the police dialed the second starred contact in my phone. It was my own brother. He laughed so hard that he doubled over. "Dead? Last I checked, it's not April Fools'. Not a funny joke. And do me a favor. Tell Selene Corvin I couldn't care less about her corpse. Throw it back in the ocean to feed the fish. I don't care." He did not know that I did end up as fish food for a very long time. The moment my remains appeared on that massive screen, however, both my fiancé and my brother lost their minds.

In my past life, I was performing emergency pipeline repairs 300 meters beneath the ocean when my oxygen line ruptured. I swam back for help, only to have my wife, Summer Yates, and her first love, Zachary Gibson, lock me out of the diving bell. Not only did they ignore whether I lived or died, but they also started live-streaming an extreme no-oxygen endurance challenge to the entire internet. In the end, I suffocated and drowned. Even after my death, Summer and Zachary smeared my name, calling me a deranged saboteur, while they ran off together with my massive life insurance payout. When I opened my eyes again, I had been reborn to the exact moment I was banging on the hatch. Right on cue, Summer's sweet, teasing chuckle came through the comm. "All units, don't open the hatch. Carter wants to attempt an extreme challenge today. He's going to swim back to the surface without oxygen!" Immediately after, Zachary's voice followed, trembling with excitement. "Babe, the sponsors said if Carter succeeds this time, I'll be the lead director on next month's million-dollar documentary series!" In my past life, I had begged them through mouthfuls of blood, only to be met with Summer's impatient urging. "Stop wasting your energy. You should save your oxygen and start swimming up. You're such a strong swimmer. Just hold on for another half hour, and you'll make Zachary's dream come true!" Now, as I listened to this pair of scumbags plot against me, I sneered and cut the communication. I raised the highest-powered underwater cutting torch in my hand and aimed it directly at the main load-bearing cable connecting the diving bell to the surface vessel above. They wanted me dead, so none of them would be leaving alive either.

The Dark Below is a steam-punk/fantasy world filled with the darkness that rests beneath a wavering tide. Generations ago, Gods from the depths below rose from the black seas and in doing so, caused a great flood that would have destroyed all of humanity if it was not for the ingenuity of survival. Living among The Dark Below has come to pass, but now four warriors must come together in hopes of forging a brighter future.

She's always been alone. Without a name. With out light. Without any idea that this is not what life should be. Until the day she hears her in her mind. A strong, sweet voice that tells her this is not what life is. This is not living, just drowning slowly in darkness, but she can help. What happens when a girl with no name and no memories of a life before the dark, escapes and discovers there is so much more then she thought in this world? What will she do when the life she built, after emerging from the darkness, comes crashing down around her? Can she stand and fight for the light she’s now apart of, or will she find her self Drowning in Her Darkness forever.

The scholarship student, Izzy Waite, whom Craig Green had been funding, decided to seek some thrills by engaging in group intimacy in the open sea. They messed around in a way that drew blood and unintentionally attracted a shark. I risked my life to drag her back to shore. Once we made it to land, I warned her the ocean was full of bacteria and that she should get a check-up, just in case. She nodded and pretended to listen. However, the moment I turned my back, she ran to Craig, claiming I’d slandered her reputation. She even threatened to throw herself back into the ocean in some dramatic attempt to end it all. Craig was furious. Without giving me a chance to explain, he shoved me into the mouth of a massive, still-living shark. I beat against the inside of that monster’s stomach, screaming for help. The fishermen on the beach panicked at the sight. “Mr. Craig, please. This’ll kill her!” Craig simply held the weeping Izzy in his arms and sneered. “I heard people can survive inside a shark for a whole month. Doesn’t she love studying marine biology? Now, she can do some real research from inside.” Trapped in utter darkness, I curled up, gently cradling my belly. “Baby, this time, Mommy can’t protect you…” One month later, Craig finally came to gut the shark himself and bring me home. Unfortunately, all he found on the wind-swept shore was a skeleton.