The silence of Oakhaven Lake was usually a salve for Barry, a thirty-year-old city slicker who considered himself an outdoorsman by virtue of occasional weekend trips and a subscription to an adventure magazine. But today, the quiet was merely an amplification of his triumph. He stood on the rickety wooden jetty, the evening sun bleeding orange and violet across the water, a gargantuan shadow draped over his shoulder.
It was, without a doubt, the catch of a lifetime. A monstrosity of a fish, something he’d only ever seen in blurry deep-sea documentary footage. Its scales, a mosaic of dark green and metallic grey, shimmered with an unnatural iridescence, reflecting the dying sun in glints of what looked suspiciously like oil. Its eyes, large and bulbous, were a cloudy, opaque white, staring blankly ahead, or perhaps, Barry thought with a triumphant chuckle, through him. He estimated its weight to be well over eighty pounds, a true leviathan for Oakhaven, a lake known more for modest bass and pickerel. This wasn't just a fish; it was a legend. His legend.
“You beauty,” he whispered, his voice hoarse from excitement. He’d wrestled it for nearly an hour, his arms aching, his muscles screaming. The fight had been brutal, almost personal. He’d nearly lost it a dozen times, the sheer power of the creature threatening to snap his line, drag him into the murky depths. But he’d held on, fuelled by a primal need to conquer. And conquer he had.
The cabin, a rustic, two-bedroom shack he’d rented for the week – a vain attempt to escape the incessant hum of urban life and reconnect with something "real" – seemed to radiate warmth, beckoning him. He’d string up the fish for a photo op, perhaps send it to his buddies, rubbing their noses in his unparalleled angling prowess. Then, he’d clean it, cook a portion, and freeze the rest. A week’s worth of fresh fish, courtesy of Barry Vance, Master Angler.
Humping the monumental weight up the short path to the cabin was a struggle. The fish’s body was surprisingly rigid, almost dense, its tail fin scraping against the dirt, leaving a strange, faintly glistening trail. He opened the cabin door by nudging it with his elbow, the wood groaning in protest. Inside, the familiar scent of stale pine, damp earth, and old dust welcomed him. He dragged the fish through the living room, past the worn armchair and the dusty chessboard, into the cramped kitchen.
He laid it out on the old wooden counter, which bowed perilously under the weight. It practically covered the entire surface, its head hanging off one end, its tail off the other. He pulled out his phone, ready for the glamour shots. The light was fading, but the flash would compensate. He took a dozen photos from every angle, his grin growing wider with each click. He even tried to get a selfie, holding his phone out, the fish’s massive, blank eye staring past him. He paused, looking at the screen. For a split second, a flicker of something, a faint shimmer, seemed to emanate from the fish’s pupil. He shook his head. Just the flash, catching the light wrong.
He propped his phone up against a spice jar, starting a video recording. "Alright, social media, check it out! Barry Vance, conquering the deep! This, my friends, is why you get out of bed in the morning!" His voice was loud, almost too loud in the sudden quiet of the cabin.
He fetched his filleting knife, a long, thin blade he kept meticulously sharpened, and a large bucket for the offal. The initial cut, just behind the gill plate, demanded more force than he anticipated. The scales were incredibly tough, almost like armour plating. He pressed down, grunting, the knife finally breaking through with a sickening crunch. A viscous, dark liquid, not quite blood, seeped out, pooling on the counter. It had a strange, coppery smell, mixed with something else he couldn't quite place – something metallic, almost chemical.
He worked slowly, carefully, his initial euphoria giving way to a more methodical focus. As he peeled back the skin, the flesh beneath revealed an unusual hue. It wasn’t the pristine white of cod or the delicate pink of salmon; it was a murky grey, shot through with darker, almost black veins. And the smell… it was intensifying. No longer merely coppery, it was now sickly sweet, like rotting flowers mixed with rust, a cloying odour that began to cling to his clothes, his skin.
He tried to ignore it, attributing it to the unique biology of such a massive, unknown species. But then, as he ran his hand along the exposed ribs, feeling for the central bone, his fingers brushed against something hard, unnatural. He shifted the flesh, peering closer. Embedded deep within the muscle, near the spine, was a dull, dark object. It wasn't a fish-hook, or a piece of debris. It was roughly spherical, about the size of a golf ball, made of a material that looked like oxidised iron. It was cold to the touch, and strangely smooth despite its pitted appearance. He tried to dislodge it, but it was fused to the bone, or perhaps, part of it.
A shiver ran down his spine. This wasn’t right. He dismissed it as an anomaly, perhaps some strange parasite that calcified over time. He pushed it deeper into the flesh, out of sight.
He continued, the smell growing more oppressive. He was sweating now, not just from exertion, but from a growing unease. He felt a faint pressure behind his eyes, a dull throb in his temples. He glanced at the fish’s head, still largely intact, its cloudy eye staring at him. He could swear, just for a moment, that the pupil, that opaque white, had twitched. A trick of the light. His mind is playing games.
He finished one side, the filleted slab of grey flesh lying on a platter. It looked less like food and more like something dredged from a murky bog. He started on the second side, the knife struggling against the resistant flesh. As he cut deeper, another anomaly: the internal organs were not what he expected. They were disproportionately small, shrivelled, and dark, almost black. And amidst them, he found another one of those metallic spheres, this one smaller, nestled in a network of what looked like desiccated veins.
His stomach clenched. He felt a wave of nausea, the sickly sweet, metallic smell overwhelming his senses. He snatched up the metallic sphere and dropped it into the bucket with a clatter. It felt heavy, denser than rock.
He glanced at the raw slab of fish on the platter. It seemed to pulse faintly, a ripple running just beneath the surface, like muscle spasms in a recently deceased animal. He blinked, rubbing his eyes. Stress. Cabin fever.
He decided he’d had enough. He’d clean the rest tomorrow. He needed air. He bundled the head and skeletal remains into a large garbage bag, double-bagging it. The weight was still immense. He dragged it out the back door, intending to toss it far into the woods, away from any scavengers.
The moment he stepped outside, the air turned frigid, despite the lingering warmth of the evening. A gust of wind, unnaturally cold, whipped around him, carrying the cloying stench with it, amplifying it. He managed to heave the bag a few yards into the darker shadows of the trees before scrambling back inside, the door slamming shut behind him with a resonant thud that echoed through the cabin.
He locked the door, a sudden, inexplicable surge of fear sizing him. He felt exposed, vulnerable. He looked at the cabin’s windows, suddenly seeming too large, too transparent, too welcoming for anything that might be lurking outside. He pulled the thin curtains shut, plunging the living room into near darkness.
He turned back to the kitchen, his gaze falling on the filleted fish. In the dim light, the grey flesh looked even more alien. He felt a prickling sensation on his skin, like hundreds of tiny insects crawling over him. He knew, with a certainty that chilled him to the bone, that he hadn't imagined the pulsing. It was there, a slow, rhythmic contraction of the muscle fibres.
He stared, his breath catching in his throat. Then, the fish head, still on the counter, though now separated from the filleted body, moved. Not a twitch, not a reflex. Its large, opaque eye rolled slowly in its socket, turning to fix on him.
Barry let out a choked sound, a strangled gasp. He stumbled backward, tripping over his own feet, landing hard on the rustic wooden floor. The smell was suffocating now, filling his lungs, burning his nostrils. He scrambled to his feet, casting desperate glances at the door, at the windows. He was trapped.
The eye of the fish head continued to stare, unblinking. And then, slowly, impossibly, a sound emanated from it. A low, wet gurgle, like water displacing heavy mud. It was followed by a faint, clicking noise, like bones grinding together.
Terror, raw and primal, seized Barry. This was not a fish. This was something else. Something ancient, something wrong, something that had been waiting in the depths of Oakhaven Lake for a fool like him to pull it from its slumber.
He scrambled for the knife, still on the counter, his hand trembling so violently he nearly dropped it. He brandished it at the fish head, a pathetic defence against an impossible horror. Before he could even think, a tendril of something black and slimy shot out from beneath the counter, wrapping around his ankle.
He cried out, falling again, the knife clattering away. The tendril tightened, cold and strangely strong, pulling him. He looked down, horrified. It wasn't a tendril. It was a fragment of the fish's skin, a piece he must have peeled off, now reanimated and elongated, stretching towards him like a living limb.
He thrashed, kicking wildly, but the grip was unyielding. The gurgling sound from the fish head intensified, a wet, rasping laugh. The metallic, sweet smell became unbearable, infused with a new, putrid note, like decaying meat.
Then, from the darkness of the living room, a faint scratching began. A dragging sound. It was coming from the garbage bag he’d left just outside. Had something gotten to it already? Or was the fish… reconstituting?
A wet thump echoed through the cabin. Then another. And another. The dragging sound grew louder, closer. Barry could hear the distinct sound of something heavy being pulled across the wooden floorboards, heading towards the kitchen.
He screamed, a high-pitched, desperate sound that ripped his throat. He clawed at the black, slimy "tendril" wrapped around his ankle, his fingernails tearing at the tough, scaly skin. The fish head on the counter began to convulse, its gurgling growing louder, its single, cloudy eye bulging.
Suddenly, the kitchen doorway was filled with a hulking, shifting mass. It was the garbage bag, but it wasn't a bag anymore. It was ripped open, disgorging its contents. The fish's skeleton, half-covered in patches of grey, decaying flesh, was dragging itself forward, propelled by a grotesque, pulsing heart that beat visible beneath a translucent membrane in its chest cavity. The head on the counter, still locked in its terrifying stare, was now merely a detached part of a larger, reanimating whole.
The black tendril tightened its grip, pulling Barry towards the counter. He saw the filleted slab of grey flesh on the platter begin to twitch, then curl, rolling over itself as if trying to reattach.
"No! Get away!" Barry shrieked, his voice cracking. He kicked out again, managing to connect with something hard and bony. The animated skeleton paused, emitting a wet, tearing sound. It listened to one side, then righted itself, its empty eye sockets now seeming to focus on him.
Barry scrambled, twisting his body. His hand brushed against a heavy cast-iron skillet on the floor. He seized it, desperation giving him strength. He brought it down with all his might on the tendril around his ankle. There was a squelch, and the tendril recoiled, a patch of its black "skin" torn and oozing the same dark, viscous liquid he’d seen when he first cut the fish.
He didn't wait. He scrambled backwards, away from the abomination in the doorway, away from the twitching flesh on the counter. He needed to get out. He fumbled for the back door, his fingers clumsy with terror. The knob was cold, slick with sweat. He turned it, yanked. It held fast. Locked.
He’d locked it himself. An hour ago, for safety. Now, he was trapped.
The reanimated skeleton, impossibly, extended a bony, fin-like appendage, reaching for him. The gurgling intensified, the sound seeming to come from every part of the cabin now, as if the very air was speaking. The smell was so potent it made his eyes water, his throat spasm.
He looked around frantically. The front door. He lunged for it, tripping over a rug, scrambling on his hands and knees. The horrifying sounds grew louder behind him – the wet dragging, the clicking, the incessant gurgle. He could hear fleshy tearing sounds, as if the pieces of the fish were beginning to merge, reform.
He reached the front door, his hand slamming against the deadbolt. He fumbled, fingers numb, unable to grasp the cold metal. He cried out in frustration.
A cold, wet touch brushed against his bare calf. He screamed, kicking out wildly. He risked a glance back. The skeleton was there, right behind him, its head – the one he’d cut off – now reattached, though horribly askew, its single, cloudy eye fixed on him, oozing a dark, oily substance. The metallic spheres he’d found within the fish’s flesh were now visible, embedded in patches across its re-forming body, glowing faintly with an internal, sickly green light.
He could see the grey, raw flesh from the platter beginning to fuse with the skeleton, patching holes, adding muscle and mass. The fish wasn't just reanimating; it was rebuilding, reforming into something more monstrous, more complete than before. And it was hungry. Not for food, but for something else. Something Barry had unwittingly awakened.
He tugged at the deadbolt with all his might, his muscles screaming. It clicked open. He threw the door wide, lunging out into the inky blackness of the night.
He didn’t look back. He ran. Ran through the rustling trees, through the whispering leaves, his bare feet slapping against the damp earth, ignoring the sharp stones and roots. He ran until his lungs burned, until his legs gave out, until he collapsed in a heap, gasping for breath, the metallic, sweet stench still clinging to him, still burning in his nostrils.
He lay there, trembling, huddled in the undergrowth, listening. The sounds from the cabin had faded, replaced by the chirping of crickets and the distant croaking of frogs. But he knew. He knew it was still there. Waiting. He had woken up something. Something that had been sleeping in the depths.
He never went back for his car, for his fishing gear, for his phone that still contained the triumphant photos of his catch. He walked until dawn broke, a broken, babbling man. He told his story to anyone who would listen, but few believed him, dismissing it as a psychotic break, a side effect of isolation.
But sometimes, when a fisherman on Oakhaven Lake reports a strange, oily sheen on the water, or a local claims to have seen a shadow, impossibly large, beneath the surface, a shadow that seems to pulse with a faint, green light, Barry's face flashes through their minds. And sometimes, they swear, a faint, sickly sweet, metallic smell drifts on the wind, a scent that whispers of something ancient, something hungry, waiting in the deep, for the next fool to celebrate too loudly.