Creature

The return

Overwhelmed with pure excitement, Carter, Scott, and I sprinted to the docks before anyone else got there. We were wanting the returned to feel welcomed back from their long trip out on the sea. Well, we also were impatiently waiting to see each of our parents since they went on the trip too. Carter's mother and father, Scott's father and mother, and my father. My mother stayed behind to help take care of us children on the land, and the ill. Melissa, my mother, was known to care best for the children and those with an illness. She had been given the title: Healer.

Scott was two years older than Carter. Carter was one year older than me, which makes me the youngest. We weren't the only children in London, but we were the closest friends out of all the kids. None of us were sure why, but the three of us just sort of "clicked" and have been inseparable ever since. As we each were dangling our feet off the edge of the dock above the waters, Melissa calmly walks up behind us. "See anything yet boys?" Each of us shrugged as if that should've answered her question. "No, but they can't be too far out, hopefully." After a few moments of just listening to the sounds of the calm waters, Scott shoots straight up from his slouched sitting position. He squints out towards the sea as far as he could. Our hearts pounding hard, Carter pipes up, "What do you see?"

Silence. No response. The rest of us stood and looked towards the direction Scott is. Seeing nothing, I finally decide to ask the same question Carter did. "Scott, what is it?" He shushed me fairly quickly, leaving a few moments of nothing but heavy waves crashing together to fill the silence that was one surrounding us. "I think I see a ship, but..." he trails off. "But what?" Melissa finally adds to the conversation. Eager like the rest of us. Scott stutters, "I...I think I see smoke."