Keeping Fantasia: The Third Book of the Fantasia Series

Chapter 105: Dinglehopper

Chapter 105: Dinglehopper

Gwen was halfway through her morning run when she saw a woman jump off Pirate's Point.

"Oh my goodness!"

Gwen sprinted across the sand. She frantically began dialing emergency services, but quickly realized there was nothing she could do. The outcome was inevitable.

Unable to look away, Gwen grimaced as the woman plunged into the sea.

No one could survive a fall from that height. At the speed she was going, the water would feel  like concrete. The woman would die upon impact.

Sickened, Gwen finished dialing. The phone rang. Heart pounding, Gwen scanned for the woman's body until the Fantasian Coast Guard answered her call.

She practically shouted into the speaker.

"Hello? Hello!...Yes my name is Gwen – I'm calling to report a suicide attempt!....I'm by The Docks, Western Sector, I think this is Pirate's Point? Tiana's Palace is a little ways back - I've passed three lifeguard towers going north. Oh - describe the person?"

Gwen closed her eyes. She'd only had a fleeting glance, but the woman had one very distinguishable trait.

"It was a woman with red hair."  Gwen said. Thinking of the fatal descent, she added a gruesome descriptor. "Red as blood. Please hurry. If she survived she doesn't have much time – "

Gwen fell silent. Frowning, she cocked an ear to the phone.

"I'm sorry are you...laughing?" Incredulous, Gwen put a hand on her hip. "What do you mean don't worry? Didn't you hear me? A woman just fell to her death! You need to come out and – "

The emergency service member chuckled something about Gwen being too young to remember, but he suspected the woman was a Fantasian guardian. A lot followed that didn't make sense. According to the service member, military sonar was detecting large scale anomalies reminiscent of the Silent Siren, and Gwen might start to notice increased marine activity –

Flash. From the corner of her eye, Gwen saw something skim out of the water.

Falsh. Flash. She caught the movement again, this time twice.

Flash. Flash. Flash. Three more glints, each slicing between waves, but this time much closer to shore.

Gwen lowered her phone. She had gone surfing with Aunt Lilo long enough to recognize those dark, sinister movements.

"Sharks."

The sharks reappeared, almost like they'd heard. There were three in total, including a mako and hammerhead, but the largest (a great white) broke the surface as they swam by. Gwen swore it licked it's chomps at her before heading for the cliffs.

Gwen's spine quivered.

Off shore shark-sightings were rare, but seeing three different species of sharks was unprecedented. Sharks were solitary hunters. Those three fish had no business swimming together.

Gwen assumed the sharks had been aroused by the woman's remains. That would explain the strange gathering, but oddly enough, Gwen didn't see a dead body. She didn't even see blood.

What she did see was a golden glow. The glow shimmered under the water, right where the woman had crashed. At first the glow was faint, but then it began to swell as if the sun were rising from the ocean.

Sharks forgotten, Gwen approached the shoreline. She gaped as the glow expanded to where she stood. Sparkling waves slid over the sand like liquid gold. The grains twinkled in the morning sun.