Page 27 of Currents of Desire

I don’t flinch.

I roar back.

My bioluminescence explodes. I don’t just glow, I strobe. I turn my body into a weapon of light, flashing a blinding, stroboscopic pattern of white and red design to confuse and disorient.

The leader hisses, shielding its sensitive eyes with a webbed claw. “Female,” it rasps. The language is old, a series of clicks and grunts that hurt the human throat to produce. “Breeder.”

“Leave,” I say, the word dripping with venom. “This territory is claimed.”

The second creature, smaller but faster, lunges. It moves with a terrifying speed for something out of water. It launches itself off the sofa, clearing the distance between us in a single bound. Its claws, black and hooked like gaffs, aim for my throat.

I don’t dodge.

I meet it.

I drop low, letting its momentum carry it over me, and as it passes, I strike upward. My claws, now hard as obsidian, rake across its soft underbelly. Hot, black blood sprays across the hallway walls.

The creature crashes into the wall behind me, shrieking in fury. It scrambles up, ignoring the wound, and turns, but I’m already moving. I spin, my heavy tail whipping around with the force of a falling tree, and catch it in the knees.

Bone snaps. A wet, crunching sound that’s audible, even over the storm.

The creature goes down, thrashing, its legs useless, but the leader is on me.

It hits me like a landslide. Its weight is immense, pinning me to the floorboards. The wood groans and cracks under our combined masses. Its hands, thick and slimy, clamp around my throat, cutting off my air. It doesn’t care about the claws I rake down its arms, its hide is like tire rubber.

It leans close, its foul breath washing over me. Its jaws unhinge, revealing rows of teeth designed to crush crab shells. It intends to bite my neck, to sever the spine and paralyze me so it can drag me back to the deep.

I can’t breathe. The edges of my vision begin to gray.

The sound is deafening in the confined space. A blast of heat seared the air above us.

Jack.

He stands in the bedroom doorway, the flare gun smoking in his hand. He didn’t fire at the creature but at the ceiling, creating a shower of sparks and blinding red light.

“Get off her!” he screams, racking the gun to load a fresh flare.

The creature on top of me flinches, distracted by the sudden fire and noise. It turns its head toward Jack, its dead eyes narrowing. It snarls, shifting its weight, preparing to launch itself at the new threat.

“No!” I scream.

The thought of those claws touching Jack, tearing his soft, warm skin, snapped something inside me. The fear and strategy vanish. There’s only rage.

I don’t need air.

I need leverage.

I coil my heavy tail inward, wedging the thick, armored muscle directly against the creature’s chest. With a roar that tears my throat, I unleash the full strength of my lower half, muscles designed to propel me through thousands of miles of ocean.

I thrust upward.

The creature launches backward. It flies through the air, smashing into the kitchen island where granite cracks and wood splinters.

I’m on it before it can recover. I don’t give it time to stand. I leap, landing on its chest, my claws pinning its arms to the debris. I look down into its face, my lights burning a furious, blinding white.

Its eyes widen. It finally understands I’m not just here to breed. I lunge, sinking my teeth directly into its throat. Copper and rot flood my mouth, but I lock my jaw, biting down hard until its windpipe snaps. I wrench my head back, tearing flesh. The creature thrashes once, hard, before going completely limp. The room falls dead quiet, broken only by the rain, my wet breaths, and the pathetic whimpering of the second one with the broken legs out in the hall.

I stand up slowly, shaking. My chest heaves. I’m covered in gore, black, viscous blood that slicks my scales and drips onto the ruined floor. My hands are claws, and my mouth is a ruin of red.