StoryTree
you are here

No Country for the Tide

adventure◐ Mature
5 contributors · 4 paragraphs deep

The first pages were ordinary survey notes. Then the handwriting changed. The dead man had found the Meridian settlers' last records. They hadn't fled the rising sea. Year after year, they had fed something to it to keep the island from sinking for good. The bargain had finally broken. Halloran heard the captain's boots stop outside the wheelhouse door.

Halloran tore the broken-bargain page from the notebook and stuffed it in his coat. If the island wanted to be fed, it could starve. He told the captain to take them home and burned the rest of the notebook in the wheelhouse stove. Whatever Meridian had buried, no one would dig it up using these pages. The island sank behind them, still hungry, still waiting for the next fool with a map.

↔ version 1 of 2 of this paragraph — hover its sides to flip. The card below is what happens next.

What happens next?

0 ways forward
Vote share across the top 0 branches
No futures yet — be the one who decides what happens next.