Medusa
Fry were forbidden from swimming into the drop-off.
It was a rule that Swift Current had known for as long as she had been swimming around the deep sea shoals that she called home, and it was not exactly a warning unfounded. She'd heard the tales of frightening creatures that stalked the depths, where even the sunlight from the sky above dared not tread. Strange creatures that would lure an unsuspecting seapony in, only to snap their jaws shut around them, ending their existence in a moment...
Swift Current knew the dangers, and she was careful.
There were other stories, too. Other... 'monsters', that roamed beyond the drop-off. Some of them were mythical. Others...
Well, Swift Current had heard stories of Medusa.
It was where she was swimming now, with the warnings of her family and her teachers still ringing in her ears. This far out, there was no other seapony to stop her. The only other sign of life was a marlin backlit by the sun to her right, and a scurrying school of baitfish swimming back up from the drop-off. They stopped to curiously examine Swift, no doubt intrigued by the wicker basket full of smelts and seaweed that Swift was holding in her right forefin.
The sunlight faded as she crossed over the ridge and began her descent. She was searching for a small cave on the side of the rocky shoal, several hundred feet deep. One of many that dotted the ridgeline... some even had use by the seaponies, as homes or for storing artifacts plundered from the surface. Others housed dangerous creatures and warnings for others to stay away. One such cave was Swift's destination.
Medusa's lair.
The stories repeated in her head as she swam deeper. Tales of a former seapony turned monster, shunned by the rest of the school. Regarded with fear and sympathy in equal measure by Swift's peers, a living warning to listen to their Queen and stay away from the surface at all costs...
For which of them had never looked up at the hulls of passing ships, or the speckled smoke of machinery in the distance, and wondered what life was like above the waves? A warning like Medusa was necessary, after all.
In Swift's eyes, a seapony-turned-monster was still a seapony, somewhere within.
Ahead of her, she could see where the dark ridgeline suddenly grew darker, in a jagged and vaguely circular arrangement. An opening, cast by darkness, with a single sign made from a slab of current-smoothed rock erected on the edge.
BEWARE!
HOME OF MEDUSA.
STAY OUT!
Swift checked her basket of smelts one last time. She'd lost one or two during the swim, but it was still a generous helping all the same. She'd even taken some time to arrange them nicely, lying on a bed of seaweed as though she'd been preparing a luscious platter for Queen Novo herself.
Breathing in a nervous breath through her gills, Swift Current swam into the cave.
---
The ocean was alive.
She could feel it, the way it ebbed and flowed and came and went. Many lived within, but the ocean itself was alive, too. A body that had consumed her. Pulsing. Alive. There was her, and she knew she lived. But she was within something greater, too. A part of a whole.
She existed in a void of blackness.
It hadn't always been this way.
Her thoughts were fleeting, fragmented, and never quite what they should be.
It hadn't always been this way, either.
She was just a little ill. Just a small infection. A parasite, the kind they would sometimes find on the fish they caught. A bad fish in the batch, to be discarded.
Had she been discarded?
She willed herself forward, wanting to swim around the blackness. Her body allowed it, for which she was grateful. It was so hard, simply lying in her cave and waiting for... whatever it is that she was waiting for. She hated being stuck with her thoughts.
Hadn't she a name once?
Hadn't she a family once?
Was this really all that was left?
She could feel movement. The change in water pressure. She could feel the way it brushed against her jellyfish dress, swaying gently in the living pulse of the ocean. She didn't wonder why she could feel the movement on her dress as though it were her nervous system. She didn't think to think. Since her eyes had gone--the first things to go, when she'd first become ill--she'd felt as though her other sensations had grown stronger. She'd been blinded when her eyes had been devoured, but that hadn't made her any less aware of the ocean around her.
It was swimming. It was in her cave now. She turned to face the approaching current, and she heard a gentle, frightened gasp.
"I...brought... food."
A voice. So young. It was hard to hear it through the tissue that had formed around her ears, but it was pleasant to hear all the same.
Food. That was nice. It had become impossible to hunt on her own. Perhaps that's why they had moved her here? Why she couldn't leave?
She tried to open her mouth to respond. Her body refused. Not a necessary movement, and even if it was...
She swam towards the voice.
Another frightened gasp. She sounded like such a sweet filly.
She wished more than anything she could see her.
"I... I'll go..."
Please don't.
She stopped. Her fins had brushed against something. An offering. She could feel its scent, and feel her hunger beginning to grow.
"T-that's for you. Food. I can bring you more, again..."
She opened her mouth to feed, and her body allowed it. The jellyfish hood over-top her shifted and changed and engulfed the offering she had been so thoughtfully provided. Fish guts spattered against the wall and drizzled down the jellies clinging to her scales.
A rush of water, as a young tail fled.
And Medusa was alone.
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Tense, gripping, and totally unique concept, especially with the inspiration. Their ocean is not so different from our own... but for those who live in the depths, the dangers of the ocean leave them much more fickle. There's plenty left to see with the concept of a kingdom that rules by hard examples, sequestered away from the more innocent and just ponies above. You can dig up a buried grave and fill it in, but you can't do anything but look at the example floating in the abyss.
A disturbing, but distinct example of what horrors might be found in the pony oceans, and a great translation to pony principles at the same time: strikingly optimistic, despite the unknown. Great work fitting this into 1000 words; I would love to see more of the concept in further detail.
Poor thing.
Delightfully distressing, and a great use of your thousand words. I like how you leave Medusa’s actual condition to the reader’s imagination. Best of luck in the contest, fellow competitor!
I can relate
She turned herself into a pickle. I don't know whether to laugh or be horrified. Well done.
This is awesome. I love how you prime the reader to assume Medusa is a monster by going into a long tangent about the dangers of the ocean and by using the name of a very dangerous creature, only for then to reveal how (just like actual mythological Medusa) is really a victim, kept alive out of pity. But what would be "just" a sad story is further elevated by the grim body horror you utilize here, I'm really impressed with how much is said with how few words.
The Horror category is already proving to be really fierce, between this and the self-aware Twiggles story I'm sure the judges are facing quite the task.
Beautifully done, I love how alien the ocean setting feels, already associated with the horrifying and ugly creatures of earths deep sea. It primes you for a big monster, only to find a victim. I feel like some inspiration from Frankenstein was taken here!
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Intresting fact about Medusa. Medusa as a rape victim was added by the Roman poet Ovid to show the horrors of absolute power and how those with absolute power can destroy innocent and make the innocent into criminals. (Ovid was exiled by the Roman Emperor Augustus. And as such turned very anti-monarchist.)
In the orginial myths Medusa is just a monster with no backstory.
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This is accurate and was on my mind when I titled this fic/Medusa's character.
There's certain significance in how Swift Current views Novo in the first part of the story.
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Thats really amazing. Rereading this and seeing the view of Nova. I love the connection to Ovid. It's really amazing that you added that.
ah such a funny equivalent of “foal” for aquatic species
hehe, someseapony must’ve done some underwater basket weaving to make that
so true, thus is the function of myths in a culture
aww! what a good heart
oof, those fish parasites sure do get weird! then again so do land parasites. parasites are just fucked up in general and great fodder for horror concepts
whew, i’m glad the filly (fry) survived! and what a tragic tale, possibly with implications for just how Queen Novo kept her seaponies isolated during their time in hiding. beautifully rendered, with the feeling of myth and tragedy. love how at-home it feels in the world of Equestria, where things are wonderful and nice within the walled garden. thank you for writing!
Oh. That kind of medusa. That’s very clever.
Fascinating, disturbing, and heartbreaking by turns. You performed the shift from building tension into psychological and body horror exquisitely, and the story feels much larger than the word count would seem to allow. Excellent work throughout. Thank you for it and congrats on the bronze.
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Thank you both for the comment, I'm glad you enjoyed.
Your prose is so beautiful. This story was haunting, and while I knew about the lice, the fluke were something I could have gone my whole life without learning about. So thanks for that...
This is why you never visit the surface
Hello! A slightly belated courtesy note for my review of this. Body horror, feels and a clever (and disturbing) parallel with our world. One of my favourite fics in the contest. Have a like and a favourite.
i don't want to be a fish.