#kind_of_long

[stegrossaurus]

Free

Free

by Reese

I stare hard into the mirror. I’m a little surprised by what I see: myself. I guess that part was wrong.

I’ve had plenty of reasons to hate my own reflection in the last 29 years, but quite a few of those reasons are fading. Teeth that have resisted two rounds of braces have slid into their proper places. The receding hairline that my dad had graciously passed down to me is beginning to fill back in. The extra pounds I’ve been carrying around have...not budged at all, but there’s some muscle growing underneath. 

But the biggest change is the neck. And the long jagged scars on either side. They’re wide and thick and at least a centimeter deep, unnervingly close to my carotid. My donors must have been very hungry. But as nasty as they are, they’re better than Bridget Dearbon’s.

I slowly reach my hand to the shaft of sunlight in the hallway. The news hasn’t been very clear about this part, but I have to try. The light touches my fingertips and I brace myself, but it doesn’t hurt. It feels a little uncomfortable, like I’m being dried out, but there’s no pain. Anywhere, in fact. The back-aches and headaches and joint pains and sinus pains that have wormed through my body since high school are all gone. 

I step fully into the light and adjust myself to the harsh winter sun. It still doesn’t hurt, but I need my glasses again, my newly perfect vision failing in the brilliance. I step outside. The dried out feeling is a little stronger, but the 30 degree cold doesn’t raise so much as a goosebump. 

Back inside, I feel my heartbeat, slow and quiet, but still there. I feel scared, but with a pulse that can’t seem to quicken, the fear can’t evolve into panic. So instead, I just look at the note again.

Hey, Dumbass, guess what! You   Try and hang in there, Reese. Your life’s about to get a lot better! I guarantee! Just keep your head out of the oven and we’ll see you soon, buddy.☺️

I’m not sure how to feel about this. Bridget’s life certainly didn’t get better, and most of the other people who were bitten have died, too. That should be a good thing, it’s why I went to the Blood Moon Circus in the first place, but still…

I look into the mirror again and try to imagine what I’ll look like if I have Bridget’s luck. Her picture on the news almost made my mom throw up and if I had eaten anything at the time, I’d have been right behind her. The twenty-year-old’s lower jaw was stretched to nearly twice it’s size, with fangs as long as plantains pushing her original teeth out of her gums. Blonde hair had fallen out and sparse, black fur had started to grow. Her nose and left ear were shaped like garden spades when they finally fell off and her enlarged, blood red left eye hadn’t been far behind. The world’s first conclusive encounter with vampirism was a nightmare. And it only ended when the girl’s father burst into the hospital with a wooden stake and sobbingly put her out of her misery. 

Is that what Mom’s going to have to do?

I don’t want to think about this, any of this. I can’t hyperventilate and my heartbeat is still unmoved, but the fear doesn’t dissipate; it just curdles in my brain. My muscles lock up and suddenly I realize that I’ve been standing still for 20 minutes. I hadn’t moved or even blinked.

The nation’s been on the hunt for vampires for the last week, but I decide to risk it and go for a walk.

I’m glad the sun stymies my new superhuman senses. I don’t think I can deal with smelling and hearing all of my neighbors right now. At the house, the familiarity stopped all of the smells from becoming overwhelming. I’ve lived in that house for 25 years and scents of crumb-filled carpets, rusty tools in the spare room, and unwashed bathrooms are almost comforting. I can even smell every pet we’ve ever had since we never quite got around to cleaning their fur out of the chairs. Out here, smelling every dog that’s relieved itself on every lawn might be a bit much.

As I keep walking though, I almost want a distraction so I don’t have to think too much. There are almost no people out today, but then again, they probably have jobs. And I don’t.

No job, no friends, no lovers, a metric fuckton of student loan debt, a family that thinks I’m a retarded failure, and the knowledge that they’re probably right. Suicide attempts weren’t exactly something new for me, they were just another type of failure. 

The Blood Moon Circus had been in town for about a week by that point and there had already been quite a few disappearances. Half of the missing people had turned up dead although no one could prove that the circus was behind it. Then the news report on Bridget Dearbon showed everyone what was going on under those red and black circus tents. She could just barely talk during her first hour of hospitalization. After that, all she could do was screech and foam. I was so scared I almost threw away my plan. But I reminded myself of the particularly shitty year I’ve had and how many times I’d promised myself that I would end it. I reminded myself that I was a few months from thirty and I still lived with my mother who always looks at me with disappointment.

So I went to the circus that seemed to churn out death on what was certainly going to be its last day before the police shut it down. I wandered around, waiting for the worst part of any suicide attempt: when I chickened out, lied to myself about how it was going to get better, and went home to suffer for another year.

The last thing I remember was taking a rest on a bench on the edge of the circus grounds. Despite the Bridget story there was still a decent crowd. People who hadn’t seen or didn’t believe the story or people whose curiosity outweighed their fear. Maybe even a few who wanted to die but were too afraid to do it themselves, like me. I munched on some red-colored popcorn and watched people spin themselves sick on a red Tilt-a-Whirl.

“They really went for a color theme here,” I’d muttered to myself, wondering if this was a mistake. Maybe this was just an ordinary circus with vampire window dressing. “Guess I’m not dying tonight. Yay for me.”

I was going to get another black coffin-shaped cheesecake-on-a-stick when I felt a cold hand on my shoulder.

“Don’t be so negative,” a voice croaked wetly. “It’ll make you taste sour.”

I woke up on the beach next to the Circus, my insides churning and my neck sore. And here I am a day later, walking around the neighborhood to distract myself from the fact that I’m at least semi-dead. And I still don’t know if I should feel relieved, ashamed, terrified, or what. 

I don’t know what the bitten were feeling before they mutated and died. Maybe they thought they were fine, too. The only ones to survive didn’t develop any kind of power, just rabies. And if I do survive, does that mean I’ll have to eat people?

Forever?

I head down the forest trail, which might have been a mistake. Between the canopy and the clouds beginning to cover the sun, it’s dark enough for some of my senses to return. The smell of rot comes first; there’s always something dead in nature. Decaying stumps and logs, a carcass being picked at by something, those are the things that I start to smell. My mouth starts watering. Fear is next. I can hear the animals closest to me seize up, quicken their breathing, and scurry away. I think I can smell adrenaline and maybe even feel their movements.   

When a squirrel darts out of a bush and heads for a tree, I realize that I haven’t tested any of my other new abilities. 

In a split-second, I make a decision and jet forward. The big, soft body I’ve always felt trapped in moves with more grace and speed than I ever thought possible. I overshoot the squirrel and slam into the tree it was going for a second before it touches the trunk. Bark splinters out from the impact and creatures already living in the branches quickly evacuate to neighboring trees, but my shoulder doesn’t hurt.

The squirrel looks at me with terror. I can feel it’s mind spinning, flooding its body with stress hormones and forcing the heart to beat faster. My heart’s beating a little faster, too. It wants to run, but it can’t. I won’t let it. Some part of my mind is clutching the squirrel’s and it can’t command its legs to move.

I didn’t want this. I just wanted to test how fast I am now. But I didn’t realize how hungry I am. What happened next wasn’t pretty, but at least it was quick. I finish licking the blood off my fingers and sit. And think. And worry. And remember the feeling of something dying in my sharp teeth.

“Pathetic.”

If I could jump in surprise, I would. But my heart’s slowed down again and won’t pick back up. So instead I just turn my head around slowly and face the man behind me. He’s a tall man completely surrounded by his black clothes and a severe expression just barely visible under his wide-brimmed hat. 

“Slobbering on the ground like an animal,” he continues in disgust. “You look like a toddler with all of that on your face.” I guess I still have a little gore on my mouth. “You’d better shape up, boy. Fast.”

“Who are you?” I ask dully. The fear I’m feeling doesn’t creep into my voice but neither does any confidence. 

“If you do any of that in front of or to a human, I’m the last thing you’ll ever see,” he sneers, pulling a crossbow off of his back for me to see. “Do you understand?”

I nod. Satisfied, the man turns and leaves. I wait a few minutes after he’s gone before I get up to leave myself. I want to cry on the way home and that in and of itself makes me want to cry more, though I don’t think I’m capable of that anymore. A 29 year old vampire and I’m still getting bullied. Maybe I really am pathetic.

Once I’m home, I sit down on the bed I’ve had since childhood and think. No good thoughts come to mind; only failures and regrets. Being surrounded by old toys and books and smells reminds me of how little I have to be proud of. I feel like I’m made of dust, hollow and meaningless except to show how stagnant and unmoving something is. Gloom and self-loathing build in my chest and I begin to wish I could cry. Maybe I can force it, but I don’t think it would be the same.

I hear Mom pull into the driveway and look in the direction of the sound of rubber on gravel. Even through the various walls and doors, I can see as much as feel a blob of electricity walking towards the door. It’s just like in the forest, but stronger.

She enters without saying hello and spends the next hour without acknowledging that I’m in the house. I spend that hour staring off into space and stewing in my misery. I wonder occasionally if I should talk to her, but I nix that idea each time. Mom can get a little abrasive as fall ends and winter starts. The end result of a year full of stress and disappointments, I guess. Or maybe it’s just another year of me that she's sick of. Either way, I don’t blame her too much for her coldness, but I don’t think it’s something I need right now. I could call Dad or Ryan, but I don’t want to bother them. So in the end, I just sit in my dark room, listening to the bugs crawl in the wall and the neighbor kids playing next door.

Until my stomach starts to growl.

Hunger seems to be able to bridge the gap uncoupling my emotions from my body. Suddenly, the bugs, the kids, and the blob of electricity downstairs all look rather tempting. 

Once I’m sure Mom’s in the living room, I hurry down the stairs and into the kitchen. Mom’s a vegetarian so I don’t need to worry about sharing the hamburgers or chicken. I shove some nuggets down my throat as I start pre-heating the toaster oven for the patties. When I feel the nuggets heat up and dissolve in my throat, I forget the oven and unhinge my jaw so I can shove the beef down as well. 

I’m surprised to feel my stomach rumblings lessen, but unfortunately, the smell of the warm body in the living room behind me still makes my mouth water. Is this how it’s going to be forever? How long before I finally snap? Who will be next to me when it happens?

“Reese?” Mom calls from behind me. She’s standing in the doorway, looking irritable and put-out. “Are you using the oven?” she snips impatiently.

I shake my head and back away so she can prepare her own dinner. I should tell her. I know that. But I don’t know if that’s a good idea. As embarrassing as it is to admit, she holds a lot of sway over me. This current cold shoulder treatment has lasted over two months and there have been far longer ones. The same woman who told me that I was handsome no matter what my size would drag me in front of the mirror to talk about how ugly I am. The same woman who said she’d support any decision I made laughed at me when I applied for college. The same woman, my mother, who told me that I could always come to her when I was having suicidal thoughts didn’t notice or care when I didn’t come home that night. Or that I have scars on my neck now.

“Mom?” I venture. She turns, annoyed. “We haven’t really talked in a while. I just wanted to see how you were.”

She sighs. “What’s there to talk about, Reese? Have you found a job? Are you going to move out? Are you going to do anything?”

I’m quiet for a bit before I can respond. “No.” My body freezes up and I feel...dead.

“I thought not,” she snaps. Another sigh. It’s an ugly sound. “It’s just-- You’re not even trying anymore, are you? You don’t even care if you ever succeed so why should I? I’m tired of it. I’m tired of you.”

She almost looks sorry for a second, like she understands how much that stung. But then she sighs a third time and gets back to her dinner. I walk upstairs without so much as a shiver, but my insides feel like tar.

Once I’m sitting on my bed, I let the black feeling inside of me fester for a few minutes. Then it starts coming to the surface. Maybe there’s too much to keep inside or maybe I’m willing it to emerge, but either way, I start to cry. 

My first assessment wasn’t far off; my tears are thick and black and pungent like tar, but they taste salty. And there’s a lot of it. My vision sharpens further and my teeth begin to lengthen as the same brackish ooze drips from my mouth. My skin thickens. My face widens and my lips shrink. My attempts to sob or say, “You’re such a bitch, Mom” come out as rasps and croaks. And now the walls seem a little too close. 

Before I can talk myself out of it, I jump out of the window. 

I land on my back in the grass with a thud but no pain. The dark, cold, and open space feels lovely. And the sky; so much more color and depth than I ever saw as a human! I can feel my heart slowing back down and my face going back to normal. As the change reaches my eyes, the sky’s new galaxies and nebulas begin to fade. I can still see smatterings of their pinks and oranges and the stars and moon still shine brightly.

I stay on my back and stargaze for what has to be a half hour. None of my problems leave my mind, but they feel...smaller? Less pressing? More manageable? If vampires really are immortal, it’s not like I won’t have forever to solve them. But I’ll need to get used to being around people. So I get up and walk to the town.

The downtown shopping center is a few miles away. I’m almost halfway there before realizing that I don’t have or need shoes. The gravel tries in vain to jab into my feet. Just like the snow, I can feel it but it can’t hurt me. The closer I get to the glimmering Christmas lights of the shops and restaurants, the more I feel like that applies to all of my problems.

I know this is just the upswing of my depression; first I’m miserable, then I’m hopeful, then I’m suicidal, then I’m ecstatic, around and around. But I don’t want to feel the way I was just feeling at home, so I let myself ride the endorphins and enjoy the sights and smells.

The buzz of electric lights and living bodies is a little overpowering, but I just slow down a bit as I walk. All the colored lights shine so much brighter than they did with my human eyes and the smells or gingerbread and chocolate mix mouthwateringly with the smell of human flesh. 

My heartbeat starts to speed up again. This time, I try to hold back the change, just to see if I can. And so I don’t get staked in the middle of the street. It feels like holding back a smile, when something is ungodly hilarious. My face twists a bit, but I keep the change from happening. Mostly. 

I keep walking, a little stiffer than before, until the sound of the river overpowers the sound of the Christmas carols. Not that it’s louder, I just hate carols. I cut through an alley to get to the river. It will be easy to tell if anyone approaches so I’ll know if I can give my new form a whirl. I might even test that whole running water theory.

Before I clear the alley, one of the three people lurking there steps forward. I’m sure he thinks he’s being spooky, but I already knew they were here. I thought they were just vagrants or something, but now I can see the knife in his hand.

“Hey, boy. Where you off to so quick?” he rasps through chipped and yellowed teeth. His cohorts, a man and a woman, advance behind me.

I point to the river at the other end of the alley, glad that I can’t show how scared I am. I don’t know how much damage a vampire can take and I’m certain that guy from earlier wasn’t bluffing. So whether I can or can’t beat these guys, I might be in a lot of trouble.

“A little late for a swim, isn’t it?” the woman sneers. She glances at my bare arms and feet. “Well, give us your wallet first, darlin’. Then you can go freeze yourself all you want.”

The man next to her doesn’t wait; he lunges forward and tries to shove me up against the wall with his hands on my pockets. He doesn’t succeed in finding anything or moving me more than an inch. The fear is starting to reach the surface and the hunger’s rising even faster; I won’t be able to hold either of them back for long.

“Where the hell’s your wallet?” the attacker snaps.

“At my house,” I say evenly. “I don’t take my money when I’m going for a walk.”

Any hope of that dissuading them faded when the first man held his knife to my throat. The other man and woman held my arms. 

“Don’t fuck with us, son. Just give us your money and you can go.” He didn’t sound like he was joking.

Fear and hunger begin to spill over. I feel my heart pound and my face change. This time, I don’t try to stop it. 

The knife-wielder’s electric signals flare up like a firecracker and the man goes down, struggling to howl in pain through clenched jaws. The other two back away from my monstrous face, but I force my arms out before they can get clear. The woman hits the wall so hard, I hear a crack and feel her life start to ebb. The man hits the dumpster, smearing its sharp corner with blood. I grab him with stiff, meaty claws as he starts to get up and bring his face to mine. My mouth feels like it’s more teeth than throat or tongue, but there are enough tastebuds to detect the difference between his skin, hair, eyes, and brain. Once I’m ready to finish the knife guy, I can tell something’s wrong. My vision’s as sharp as ever, but the alleyway starts to blur together. The whimpering mass of meat completely catches me by surprise, stabbing me in the stomach. Or at least he tries to; the blade bounces off my new thick skin. I’m pretty sure it’s dented when it hits the ground.

I crunch the man’s entire head between my jaws and have a feast. I can’t believe how much this fills me up compared to the chicken and beef. The changes in my vision don’t reverse, but I’ve adjusted enough to see that there’s someone in front of me in between the alley and the river. Someone who doesn’t show up on my electric sense.

Without his hat and jacket, the man from the forest doesn’t look like the dangerous and cool vampire hunter from before. He almost looks scared.

“What the fuck are you?” he asks dully. I can tell his emotions have been dampened just like mine, but his fear is surfacing. “We don’t do that. They never said we could do that.” he’s stuttering now. He grabs his crossbow and fires. A bolt bounces off my shoulder. “No no no. That’s not right! We’re not supposed to-- Stay back!”

I’ve started walking forward on feet that gouge into the pavement. The man drops his weapon and transforms. His bare arms thicken with muscle and cover with gray fur and his shirt rips to let a patagium spread between his sides and his arms. His head expands into that of a bat’s, with a deep red shadow occupying the otherwise empty eye-sockets. His wide snout opens as broadly as mine and a stream of grey wind jets out between his fangs. It hits me like a punch and would have knocked me out of the alley, but something braces against the ground and keeps me upright. It’s a tail.

My vision fractures and so does my whole face. I’m barely aware of my clothes ripping as something builds in the left part of my throat. When I choke it loose, a stream of fire streaks through the alley and hits the vampire’s side. 

He screams and lets up his attack. I take my chance, charging even as I try to get used to my new vision. I manage to catch his ankle in my claw as he tries to fly away and I squeeze. My hand and arm are covered in a thick craggy armor and my fingers look more like crab claws. I throw him to the ground and roar, hiss, and foam with three distinct mouths. A second pair of arms sprouts through my shirt. The scars on my ever widening neck split open and air from my mouths flaps through my new gills.

I don’t think I’m a vampire.

“Wait! Please!” the bat begs, trying to pull his foot loose. He probably could if he kept at it, but he’s more interested in capitulating. “I wasn’t actually going to hurt you. They just wanted me to keep an eye on you. Just to make sure you weren’t too...uncontrollable.”

I try to ask who “they” are and what being “uncontrollable” would have resulted in, but none of my mouths can speak well.

“They want all of the new vampires watched,” he pleads. “I was just turned a week ago. Please don’t kill me.”

I consider it. I still don’t know what he would have done if I was deemed uncontrollable. But he looks really pitiful right now. As I mull it over, something catches my eye that makes me forget all about the miserable bat, who quickly uses the distraction to escape. 

A broken mirror at the end of the alley shows me what my right head looks like. An eel’s snout filled with barracuda teeth and topped with glowing yellow toad eyes. Yeah, definitely not a vampire.

After about a minute, I know where I need to go. I sink into the river and let the water tingle my scales. Then I turn right and start swimming upstream to where the beach is a few miles away. If the Blood Moon Circus is still there, then that’s where any answers are.

On the way, I swivel my right head on my thick, flabby neck and look at the rest of my new body. My left head looks like a slender gold-scaled dragon, no eyes, but strong teeth in my snout and a big, well-developed nose with sensitive barbels surrounding the nostrils. They tickle a little when I exhale fire. My middle head is the shortest. The serrated teeth and electrosensitive organs of a shark surrounded by the black armor of a crab. Four beautiful navy colored eyes rest on the top of the head, constantly gazing at the stars. My legs and back are covered in the same armor as my middle head and top arms. My more flexible lower arms are covered in indigo scales with fins that shimmer tropical pink and green, as are my chest, stomach, and tail. And I’m large. Very large. Super-glad-this-didn’t-happen-in-the-house large.

When I get close to the clearing where the circus was, I can only find one electric signal. Still, vampires don’t register on my electro-sense so I decide to lumber out of the water and check it out with my own various eyes.

I lope over to the signal, hoping to scare away whoever it was before they got caught in something. Then I recognize it; the bench I was sitting on. That shouldn’t be a big deal and it wouldn’t be if the young man sitting on it wasn’t waving me over. I’m a little unnerved. But I’ve come too far to back out, so I follow him as he jumps off the bench and over the railing to the beach.

“Wow!” the young man laughs as I get close. He smiles with perfect teeth and looks me over with swampy green eyes. “I knew you’d be a winner, Reese. How's that better life I promised you so far?” He laughs in a perfectly normal way that shouldn’t be as chilling as it is.

I try and fail to answer. He just smiles and strokes my dragon neck.

“Don’t worry about it, big guy. You’ll get the hang of talking in this form soon enough. I’m betting this head is going to be your talking head. Has the best lips.” He pulls back and raises his palms to me. “For now, though, let’s just have a look at you, kid.”

Given that I’m just south of thirty and he looks just north of twenty, it’s a little weird to be called ‘kid’ by him. But I can sense and smell that he’s far older and stronger than he looks. So I don’t resist as he examines my fins, claws, webbed hands, even my teeth. 

“You’re a little small, but I’m sure you’ll fill out more once we get you a bit below sea level. That’s where we really shine.” 

If I could stand without hunching, I’m pretty sure Icould see into a second story window. I’m a little afraid to find out how big a-bit-below-sea-level Reese is. When I accidentally breathe a little fire on him, his face lights up with delight.

“Fire. Fucking fire! Can you believe it? My boy’s got fire breath! You don’t know how rare that is, kid! Erica’s gonna be so jealous she’s gonna shit herself!” He puts a hand on my middle head’s triangle shaped forehead. “And I can tell this one has electro-sense. Pretty strong, too. Bet you can fry someone’s nervous system. What about this one?” He cups my eel head in his hands. “Bet it has acid or sonic pulses or something, right? Or right, you can’t talk. Here, big guy, how about I help you back to human form?”

His hands thicken into warty green frog feet, the kind of things you’d expect to be yanking victims into murky bogs. The warts on the palms open, revealing red eyes. They illuminate with a warm, suffocating light and my body feels like it’s drying out and tightening. A few seconds later and a mostly naked but fully human-looking Reese Lorenzini. I have just enough pants left to be an inefficient loincloth.

“Thanks,” I say a little raspily. “Um, you probably explained this already but...”

“Who am I and what the hell’s going on?” he finishes cheerily. I nod. “Name’s Salem, buddy, and I’m the guy who sired you. That’s what we call it when you’re changed.” He lets his teeth grow sharp and his eyes glow red, but his smile remains friendly and his tone remains helpful. “Now ask away, Reese. I’m here to answer.”

“So what are we?” I ask.

Salem shrugs. “Sea monsters? We don’t have a proper name. And our powers and appearances are so varied, it’s hard to tell that we’re all the same species. Few things in common though: we’re big, we’re powerful, we don’t age, we live for at least a century or so, and we’re not huge fans of sunlight.” He waves his warty hands at me and I remember the warm light. “It’s a deep sea thing.”

“And the vampires?”

“Are idiots. They’ll sire anyone without checking to see if they’re compatible or not. That’s why there are so many… rejections.” Salem casts a regretful look towards the remains of the circus. “Look, kid. There’s some… stuff brewing and we’re having a bit of a recruitment drive. The sea monsters, vampires, werewolves, witches, boogeymen, even the fae and yokai tribes are all making as many extra hands as possible. And since those bat bitches have blown our cover, we’re really desperate.” He irritably exhales a puff of green gas. “Not like it wouldn’t have been blown soon anyway.”

Salem puts his hands on my newly muscled shoulders. “We can use a guy like you, Reese. The world could use you.” 

I’m not sure how to respond other than staring blankly into my sire’s eyes. My heart’s beating at its standard steady rate, so no panicking, but I still can’t quite wrap my head around it. Salem must notice, or maybe he went through this once, too.

He smiles reassuringly and says, “No one's gonna force you into anything, but I’d like you to come with me. Just see what we’re about and make your decision then. No matter what you pick you can always come back here. No one’s asking you to live under the sea forever.”

Oh. Choices. That’s new. A few days ago, my choices were be miserable, kill myself, or be miserable and then kill myself. And then be miserable in death. Now I feel like I did when I jumped out of the window and gazed up at the unending sky: free.

“Alright,” I say. I let my happiness, hope, and anticipation put a real smile on my face. I’d almost forgotten what that feels like. “Let’s go.”

Salem looks relieved. “Attaboy. I can’t wait to introduce you to the others. You’re gonna fit right in.”

He shucks off his clothes and puts them in a plastic bag. Then he morphs into a train-sized dragon with lattices of coral growing out of his warty frogskin. I morph next, feeling the liberating expansion from a tiny, fragile human into a massive sea monster. Salem leads me into the briney waves. I follow, keeping four eyes on that gorgeous diamond sky, even through the foam of the ocean.

I’m sure you’re wondering about the stuff that’s brewing, but don’t worry. It’ll become apparent soon enough. Just remember while you’re loading up your armies which monsters are on your side. Anything that’s not eating you is here to help. Oh and Salem was right, in case you’re wondering. I am much, much bigger under the ocean. We all are.

Don’t worry. You’re in good hands.

Or claws.