Written by: Aayotrie Chaudhary - 27019, Grade VIII
Posted on: 07 September, 2022
It's a cruel world for us merfolk, for, it is us that have to stay underneath the crashing waves fearing the stories we heard about the humans above, but I am not worried, all those stories are just fairy tales. My favourite one however, is not about humans, my favourite one is called ‘The Curse of Neptune’ Let me begin the story….
Neptune is a mermaid,a beautiful one in fact, she has stunning features,but most stunning of all, the bright blue scales on her tail. Oh how she longed to see her tail in the direct light and not just in the light that filtered in through crashing waves above. One night, her curiosity struck again, she swam up to the surface while everyone else was asleep. When she reached the surface the first thing she noticed was the giant red thing in the sky. It was the moon. She turned to look back at her scales shrugging the redness of the moon off, maybe the moon had always been red? Then her eyebrows shot up as she saw the tail, it was no longer a simmering blue color, instead it was a deep red color. Neptune started to panic before reassuring herself that it was just reflecting the moonlight. She decided to swim back home, she had scared herself enough for one night. She, however, did not look at her own face in the reflection of the water,if she had, maybe, things wouldn’t have gone so wrong.
The next day bodies had to be buried. So many buildings and coral had been destroyed, and there were bodies everywhere, all that was left, a single…bright…blue….scale. Now legend says that in the year of the 50th anniversary, on the day of the red moon, another beast will emerge as the descendant of this monster who had wiped out an entire village of merfolk in just one night.
Soon it will be the red moon and I’m honestly, extremely excited for it! After all that story is, well, a story. My friend Avisa doesn’t really understand what the whole fuss is about even though I’ve probably told her ‘The Curse of Neptune’ a thousand times. She did, however, say she would stay up with me to see the red light filter in, that’s why we’re best friends, not because she said she’ll stay up with me.but because she lets me believe in what I want to believe. When it reaches the night of the red moon I can hardly wait! Just as we’re about to go outside and see the red moon my eyes slowly start to drift close. Then I woke up. The night feels like a blur at first, I can hardly remember the night, the only thing that rests in my memory is fuzzy images. Then it hits me, I groan, I had missed seeing the red moonlight filter in. I take the time to look around and what I see horrifies me. I leave immediately, but the images of what I had seen in the village still pester me. The destruction, the blood, and the lifeless bodies of people I had known, finally the last image comes to my brain, Avisa’s already cold, dull, face. I shake my head and try to shake away the tears too, but they just keep coming. At that moment of time, I realized I couldn't go back. Now I start to swim away from the place I had called home my entire life, I decided I will never speak of that night again.
