"Dad? Dad!" Mia shouted, her voice echoing tight with panic. The freezing water wasn't just rising anymore—it had nearly reached the roof.
She had scrambled up onto the rim of the sink, balancing on her tiptoes at the highest point in the room.
She pressed her face hard against the ceiling, straining to catch the very last, shrinking pocket of air.
But the freezing tide was already washing over her mouth. She couldn't fight it.
Realizing there was nowhere left to breathe, she took one final, desperate gasp.
One. Two. Three.
She slipped completely underwater, plunging into silence.
Out in the hallway, David sprinted toward the main emergency locker near the companionway stairs—the standard spot for safety gear on a boat this size.
He tore the heavy cabinet doors open, his eyes darting frantically in the dim light.
Ropes. Heavy flashlights. Duct tape. Screwdrivers.
Where is the axe?
There.
The bright red handle of the crash axe gleamed at the back of the shelf.
He ripped it from its mounting bracket and sprinted back down the narrow hallway.
"Mia!" he shouted.
There was no answer this time.
Seconds later, he was already standing in front of the bathroom. He looked the heavy wooden door up and down. He was sure the axe could break through it.
"Mia?" he called out again.
Still no answer. He needed to be quick.
He planted his feet, gripped the heavy handle, and smashed the steel blade into the door.
"Ugh! Ah!" He grunted with every vicious swing, the wood splintering and tearing under the heavy blows.
CRACK.
Freezing water began violently spraying through the splintered gaps.
"Ugh!" He gave it two more heavy hits, and the hinges groaned, buckling under the sheer, terrifying weight of the water trapped inside.
"Yah!" He swung it one last time.
The heavy cabin door finally exploded outward. The wood violently surrendered to the pressure, blasting a massive wave of freezing, water straight into the hallway.
The sheer force hit David in the chest like a freight train, instantly sweeping his feet out from under him.
The red crash axe slipped from his grip as the torrent swallowed him, tumbling him violently backward until he slammed hard against the opposite bulkhead.
Mia washed out with the surge. Her limp body was thrown into the corridor, dropping heavily into the rushing current.
The freezing water was now surging through the entire lower deck, rapidly filling the space knee-deep and crashing into the built-in cabinets and the small bed in the adjacent stateroom.
It was a complete disaster.
Thousands of pounds of water had just flooded the lower cabin, and David could already feel the floorboards groaning.
The boat was tilting sharply to one side, thrown completely off balance by the massive, shifting weight.
David scrambled to his hands and knees, fighting the heavy, swirling current.
"Mia? Mia!"
He dragged his legs through the freezing water, desperately wading toward her.
He quickly pulled her upper body above the surface, but her eyes remained closed. Her face was dangerously pale.
"Mia!" he shouted, quickly scooping her up into his arms.
He looked around frantically. The bed on the other side of the room was still barely above the rising waterline.
Dragging his heavy, waterlogged legs through the flood, he rushed over and laid her down on the mattress.
"Mia?" He pressed two trembling fingers to her cold neck.
A pulse. It was still beating.
He grabbed her shoulders and shook her firmly.
"No. No. Mia," he pleaded, his voice breaking. He shook her again, harder this time. "Hey! Wake up!" he shouted.
In pure desperation, he slapped her cheek sharply twice.
Suddenly, Mia's chest hitched. She violently gasped for air, turning to the side as she spat up water.
She choked and coughed uncontrollably, her eyes fluttering open as she slowly regained consciousness.
"Dad?" she rasped, shivering violently.
Before David could even feel a wave of relief, he heard the sickening, continuous sound of rushing water.
He snapped his head toward the shattered bathroom.
The water wasn't stopping—it was still pouring in from a massive breach hidden somewhere behind the bathroom walls.
It wouldn't be long until the bed went completely under.
"I've got you," David said, immediately scooping her back into his arms.
The water was rising past his calves now, making every step heavier as he turned and rushed for the companionway stairs leading up to the main deck.
They had to get out before the lower level became a tomb.
David gently set Mia down on the bottom steps of the wooden companionway stairs, just above the swirling floodwater.
"Stay here, okay?" he ordered, his breath coming in heavy pants. "If the water rises to your feet, go upstairs to the deck. Don't wait for me."
"Dad, where are you going?" Mia asked desperately, shivering as she gripped the handrail.
David looked back down the flooded hallway. Water was still aggressively surging out of the shattered bathroom. Even if he managed to find the breach in the hull, there was no way to stop it now. The boat was tilting too far.
"The radio," David said, his voice grim. "The boat is going down. This is our last hope."
He turned away from the stairs and quickly waded back into the lower cabin, his legs dragging heavily through the waist-deep water.
He pushed his way toward the main communications panel bolted to the far wall.
The lower cabinets were already submerged, but the mounted handheld emergency radio was still clipped to the wall just above the waterline.
He ripped the radio from its charging cradle, his wet thumbs fumbling over the rubber dials as he frantically switched it to Channel 16—the international emergency frequency.
"Mayday, Mayday, Mayday!" he shouted into the speaker, the static hissing sharply in the damp air. "We're taking on heavy water! We are sinking! Our position is latitude five-two degrees, three-two—"
Before he could even finish reading the glitching screen, the boat violently lurched to the side. A massive surge of water washed completely over the main communications panel, slamming into David's chest.
"Mayday! Mayday! This is an emergen—"
POP.
A spark shot from the console as the freezing water swallowed the radio unit. The static died instantly, replaced by nothing but the terrifying, heavy rush of the flood.
"Shit!" David shouted, dropping the dead microphone.
He quickly looked around. The water was still rising, and he couldn't even use the radio anymore.
"Ugh!" He slammed his fist hard against his own leg, as if it would help with anything other than venting his pure frustration.
He looked back toward the stairs.
Suddenly, he remembered something else. It was a desperate option, but it was better than nothing.
He frantically pushed his way back toward the companionway stairs, fighting the heavy current as the freezing water surged above his waist and splashed against his chest.
When he reached the bottom steps where Mia was waiting, he tore open the emergency locker where he had found the axe.
His hand dug blindly into the dark shelf.
There.
A heavy, bright orange flare gun. That would have to do. He gripped it tight.
"Mia, go! Go, go, go!" he ordered, pushing her up.
They both scrambled up the wooden steps, desperate to escape the rising tide, and burst into the upper pilothouse.
David leaned heavily against the wall, pressing a hand over his face as he took a deep, shuddering breath. He let out a long sigh, trying to force his racing pulse to slow down.
Mia, now fully conscious but trembling, quickly turned to him. "Dad, what's going on? I felt something hit us and then—"
"I know, I know," David said, his chest heaving. He looked down at the floorboards before continuing. "I don't know... I saw this light underwater. It could be anything. A submarine. Or..."
David walked over to the glass windows of the pilothouse. He leaned in, peering down at the dark ocean water. He didn't see any signs of the eerie blue light anymore.
The thick wall of fog and the dead-calm surface were completely undisturbed.
"I don't know," he spoke softly, the tension thick in his voice.
Mia looked out the window beside him, still a little dizzy from losing consciousness. "It doesn't seem like there's anything to me. At least not now."
But as the fog in her head cleared, a sudden wave of dread washed over her. She was with her dad. Just her dad.
"Wait, Dad?" Mia asked, her voice trembling as her eyes darted frantically around the rocking cabin. "Where's Lucas?"
David's expression dropped. A cold dread hit the pit of his stomach.
That's right.
Lucas had just been in here playing with his toys.
But the pilothouse was completely empty.
His plastic T-Rex and his other toys were scattered on the floorboards, but Lucas wasn't there.
He wasn't on the flooded lower deck, and he wasn't inside the cabin. He was nowhere to be seen.
Where is he?