The sound of cracking rock followed by the entire cliff side tilting forward as the thin outcropping which had been used as an observation point gave all six of them a brief second to realize what was about to happen. Then with a thunderous crash the stone gave way as they began to fall forward, there was no time for anyone of them to react besides letting out a scream or a curse.
“SHIT!” yelled Nate as they all fell the 50 ft distance to the water below. That fall hit them like a tone of bricks, what didn’t help was that they hit the water with a good amount of rocks as well. Lucky the rocks weren’t big enough to trap them under them but the punch to the body of hitting the water was enough to knock the wind out of everyone. Nate was amazed he did not pass out from the blow, reacting on instinct he kicked his way to the surface and took a deep gasp of air. In the fall off the cliff, some hit the water face first, some hit it on their backs or bellies, the Nate had taken the blow on his shoulder and it hurt like hell and he was sure he heard a bone break.
The merpeople where looking at him and the others stunned and for a moment nothing happened as the merpeople looked at the humans and the humans looked at them.
“We need to get out of the water now!” yelled Emiko “Head toward the island.”
The island wasn’t that far away but the water was thick with those creatures. Nate looked down into the water and could see the massive swarm of the creatures rising from up toward them.
“HELP!!! I think I broke my leg on the drop!” yelled Amanda but her screams went higher. Nate turned around and looked back. One of those white creatures had her legs from the knee up in it’s mouth and was dragging her down even as it began to advance upwards on her body. He just enough time to react as he saw one about to bite down on his own leg. He spun around and punched it, that caused it to swim off however as he did another one came down bite down on his shoulder causing him to bite down in pain. He threw it off as he kept moving toward the island.
Beside him Rose was moving ahead of the others, she had been a swimmer in high school and had actually made it to state in the dive. So she was able to take the fall better then the others making into a dive, the water was deep enough that once she was able go down to almost the bottom and kick off heading toward the island. This allowed her to get almost halfway there. It also caused a lot of the creatures to focus on her. She was nearing the point where she could start wadding ashore when one of them bit into her leg. She kicked it off as she limped ashore and looked back, Nate was maybe 10 feet from shore and she saw a hand go up as another one of her friends was dragged down.
“Nate!!!” yelled Rose as Nate got ashore, blood streaming from a wound to his shoulder and his other shoulder looked like his collar bone looked broken as well.
“Did…did anyone else get out?” inquired Nate as they moved ashore, both of them laying in the sand and looking back.
“No.” answered a new voice as they turned to see a pale skin merman who was clearly Japanese with long get black hair which went down to his but or the start of his tail with an even longer pure silver tail which seamed to almost be metallic in nature. “I should thank you, after so many months Meiko my love is going to be with me.”
“You can’t get away with this!” yelled Rose
“We did nothing, it was at least one of you who called the island to you and you decided to stay, if you had left and hadn’t rested the night the island would have disappeared but that doesn’t matter now.” Said the merman “You might as well put your feet in the water and accept the gift.”
“Never!” yelled Nate even as he winced in pain.
“Well this little stretch of beach will be under water at high tide which is about 30 minutes away.” Explained the merman as Rose and Nate looked around, the entire beach was maybe 2 or 3 inches above the water, there where a few large rocks but they were maybe half a foot above the water line. “And the only way out is to swim through the tunnels which are totally underwater and about 3/4th of a kilometer from the nearest entrees and over a kilometer and a half to one of entrees and there are six of them so if you attempt to swim you would have to guess and the tunnels are full of the creatures which will turn you.”
As he spoke those words, realization began to hit, they had fallen into the center of a big trap and they had no way out. There only hope was to possibly climb up the side of the rocks to the place where they fell but with Nate’s injury that would be impossible and given the curve of the wall and the water smoothed rock face Rose lacked the strength to do it and judging by how much her leg where the creature had bitten her was hurting she likely had a broken ankle. They were trapped, their choices where either to wait the 30 or so minutes in horror and in pain as the water levels slowly rose or walk into the water and accept their fate sooner.
“How do you know you aren’t lying, and this is high tide already!” yelled Rose
“Does that matter?” inquired the merman “If I am not telling the truth then you will go start to die from lack of water and food, so what point would it be to lie?”
“He is right.” Cursed Nate “We are trapped.”
“No…there has to be a way out.” Said Rose as she got up only to fall back down on to the sand, her ankle had given out the bite had been as bad as she thought and the rush of adrenaline was fading as tears of pain started to come to her eyes.
“Here.” Said Nate as he helped her up and held her close to him. “It will be alright.”
“Well…” said Rose in between tears as she looked toward the water. “At least we will be with all our friends and together most of all.”
“Ya…” said Nate with sadness and his own tears as he got up, helping his girlfriend up, holding onto her so she did not have to put weight on her bad ankle. He grimaces in pain as he held her up with he bleeding shoulder, his broken collar bone on the other side was hurting just as much. They reached the edge of the water and looked down into the crystal-clear water. There was a swirling mass of those things circling the island but they could see their friends minus Sam, Taylor, Mike and Stacy being tended to by the other merfolk, all of them had those white creatures attached to their bodies.
“When you enter deep enough water, they will bite you and journey up to your hip and begin to fuse with you.” Explained the merman “When that happens you will pass out and awaken in a day or two as the process enters the next phase.”
The two remaining humans paused at the water’s edge and turned toward each other and shared a kiss holding each other tight. Even as they did the blood which was flowing from Nate’s shoulder wound and Rose’s leg wound flowed into the water. That blood caused the remaining creatures to focus on them but they where not deep enough into the water for the creatures to reach them.
“I love you.” Cried Rose as Nate kissed her on the forehead tears in his eyes.
“I love you too.” Said Nate as they took another step into the water, reacting on the smell of blood two of them leaped into the shallow water and latched on to their legs.
Both of them fell backwards, hitting the sand hard even as the pain from multiple bites caused both of them to scream out and beg for mercy. The creatures pushed their way up, somewhat out of the water as they climbed up Nate’s and Rose’s body before reaching their hips and biting down. There was one last scream from each of them as they both passed out even as the creatures began to merge with their bodies.