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Everyone sits at the dining table. Glaukos hands Finley back to Treena as the others shoot confused glances at each other.
"But I don't understand." says Brandon.
Glaukos responds, "You're the father?"
"Yes, I am."
"You changed destiny when you tried to kill your son. You showed your love for the people of this earth by being willing to sacrifice the child you love. You were willing to pay the ultimate price." Glaukos pauses and smiles. "The God's were touched." he glances around, then stares at Arianna. "Rum...I need rum."
Arianna grabs a bottle and pours the rum into a goblet, slides it to him. "How is it that you can now breathe the air of this earth?"
Glaukos sniffs it, takes a small sip. "It's been a long time." he utters as he downs the rum.
"The air?" Arianna again asks.
"Ahh, that. Yes, it was always my wish to breathe the air and walk upon the earth again. I had a little help with that." he shouts toward the water. "Belladine!"
Everyone looks toward the water as Belladine, also known as Annabelle, slowly emerges from the water and ambles to the table. She stands next to Glaukos, rubs his shoulders.
Jessa, shocked, asks, "Annabelle?"
"Yes dear, it is I."
Jessa is confused. "I'm sorry but I don't understand."
Glaukos cuts in. "I shall explain. This is the woman I was going to marry hundreds of moons ago when I was a mortal man...but she disappeared. As a result of that, this...this is what I became." he pauses, stares at Annabelle with a hurt look on his face. "Why my love...why did you leave me?"
She points to Thanos. "Because of him."
Glaukos glances at Thanos. "Him? How is that possible?
"Yes, it is true. He was jealous of you. You see my dear Peter..."
Arianna interrupts. "Peter?"
"Yes, Peter was his human name." Annabelle glances at Glaukos. "If I did not leave, he was going to kill you."
Glaukos glares wickedly at Thanos. "You scoundrel dog!"
"I was left with no choice but to leave."
Glaukos, both surprised and saddened, responds, "I never knew."
Annabelle rests her head on Glaukos' shoulder. "I have missed you so. Even though I felt cursed by love and lost my way so many times, I never stopped following my heart."
"As did I." replies Glaukos. "I prayed to the God's for this day...prayed we would be reunited" he pauses, stares at Annabelle. "Do you have them?"
"They have never left me. As long as I still had hope, I kept them by my side."
Annabelle pulls a wrapped, rolled cloth from her waist pouch. She sets it in front of Glaukos and unrolls it. It is a small bunch of what looks like wheat stalks.
All glance at each other in confusion. Glaukos picks up the stalk, first sniffs it, then stares at it. He turns his stare to Annabelle.
"Is this what you want? A mere, mortal man, with no powers?"
Annabelle smiles, "This is what I have always wanted."
"Then so be it. Step away."
Glaukos eats the stalks as quickly as he can.
"Burrrrrppppp!"
Brandon grins. "That was a winner!"
Glaukos grins as a fog surrounds him until he can't be seen. The fog swirls a bit, thickens, then gets lighter. It instantly evaporates. All jerk, then GASP!
In the chair now sits Peter, the fisherman. He is in his forties, dark, shoulder length hair, dressed in peasant rags of the fifteenth century. It is stone, dead quiet.
Peter stares at his hands, his legs. He stands, feels his hair. "Is it I? Is it Peter?"
Annabelle has changed into a much younger woman, mid-forties, like Peter. She is beautiful. Tears roll down her cheeks.
With a weak voice, Annabelle responds, "Yes, my love, it is you."
They hug. Brandon stands and claps, the others follow. Brandon wipes a tear from his eye as he whispers to Treena, "Now that's love."
Thanos, who has laid motionless on the ground, jumps up and confronts Peter with an icy stare.
"You are a fool! You just proved all humans need to be controlled by us."
He slaps Peter, which knocks him a few steps back. Peter rubs his cheek, lunges at Thanos but he grabs Peter around the neck with one hand and lifts him off the ground as Peter chokes.
The others stand and stare in shock, frozen, afraid to move.
Thanos coldly stares deep into Peter's eyes. "Get it now Peter? You are a fool! When you changed back you gave me all of your powers. I cannot be stopped!"
Brandon rushes Thanos who shoots his free hand out to Brandon. A light ray slams into Brandon, who jerks backwards and plops onto his back.
Thanos stares at a struggling, choking Peter, who is almost passed out. "You are no longer worth it."
He throws Peter to the ground. Annabelle rushes to him, kneels, pulls his head onto her lap. Thanos strolls to Treena who squeezes Finley tight. His eyes turn into a bright shade of red as he stares at Treena. As he holds him arms out to Treena, she obediently hands him Finley.
Thanos grins, "We have destiny to follow."
He sets Finley in the clam shell on the table, grabs it and strolls into the water. He looks back, smiles, turns and dives in.
All look helplessly at each other.
Brandon grabs the berry-soaked sword. He stares at Peter. "Will this work in the water?"
"Yes." Peter answers.
Brandon turns to Derek, "How much time do we have left?"
"Fifteen minutes."
"More than enough." agrees Brandon.
Brandon slides the three-foot sword into a sheath, then slides the sheath down the inside of his pants. He clips it onto his belt.
Treena says, "I'm coming with you."
"No, it's too dangerous."
"Do you forget when I said that to you? And what did you do?"
Brandon rolls his eyes.
"That's right. Hurry, we're wasting time."
Both run and dive into the water as Treena turns into a mermaid. Six dolphins swim to them. Brandon grabs a fin and the group shoots into the tunnel. Soon after they hit open water, Brandon and Treena catch up with the sharks. Finley sits in his shell, strapped on top of a shark. He laughs as he jerks his arms up and down.
All four sharks turn and face Brandon and Tina. Slowly, the lead shark, Thanos, who looks like a great white except he's black, moves toward Treena and Brandon.
Treena stares at Brandon, sends him her thoughts. "Brandon, don't, he'll kill you."
"It was always going to come down to this baby...me or him."
Thanos turns and watches as Brandon swims away from Treena.
Well away from Treena and the dolphins, Brandon stops, waves his hand to Thanos to come to him.
Thanos starts slowly toward Brandon but picks up speed and now moves quickly. As he nears him, Brandon smiles and remains still. Thanos opens his giant mouth and snaps his teeth as his jaws open wide. As Thanos reaches him, at the very last second, Brandon spins upward, pulls his sword and stabs Thanos as he swims underneath him. Thanos' shark body jerks and shakes as the sword hits its mark. As he floats, Thanos' shark body turns back into a merman. Blood pours from his wound.
He sends his thoughts to Brandon. "I should have killed you when you were twelve years old."
Brandon stares at Thanos. He drifts back to when he was twelve years old and confronted by a merman.
1988
An empty thirty-foot boat rolls on the waves of the open sea. Underwater, Brandon, a semi-chubby, short hair, nerdy looking twelve-year old, scuba dives with his father in a clouded sea, his dad swimming only three feet away. They cannot see more than fifteen feet in front of them. His father taps him on the shoulder and points to the surface. Brandon nods his head as his father swims upward. Brandon starts to swim but jerks as a large fish shoots toward him from the side. He stops as the fish quickly disappears.
In front of him, he spots a large, dolphin like tail. Intrigued, he swims toward the tail but it stays far enough in front of him that he can only see it flap. He kicks his feet harder, tries to catch up to see more of the tail but, it again disappears.
Brandon tires and slows down to rest. Suddenly, the hazy, muddy water starts to clear, almost like a fog lifting to expose a city. As he watches, he sees the tail gently move with the current.
As the foggy water becomes unclouded, he sees a pair of hands, then flowing blond hair and, as the water completely clears, a horrendous looking merman. His lower torso from his waist down is a dirty green, scaly covered fish tail. From the waist up he's a man, not quite a normal man, but with a man's features.
From his forehead to near the back of his head, he is bald but covered with round, shell like spots scattered around his scalp to his ears. His thick, blond hair starts near the back of his head and is shoulder length. His ears are large and pointed, his nose wide and flat. His webbed hands have long, thin fingers with razor sharp claws.
As they stare intently at each other, the merman appears instantly floating in front of Brandon.
He yanks Brandon's mask and breathing device off his face and slings it through the water. Brandon just stares at him but doesn't move. He has no trouble holding his breath or seeing clearly. He inspects the sea around him, shoots a slight grin as he realizes he can see and hold his breath so well.
The merman snaps his full mouth of razor sharp teeth at Brandon, like he's going to bite him. Brandon remains motionless, unafraid. The merman roars, waves of water toss and jerk Brandon around, but he regains his composure instead of being gripped by fear. He again stays in one spot, eye to eye with the merman.
The merman inspects Brandon, head to toe, with his black eyes. He moves his head close to Brandon, sniffs his chest area, swims to his back, sniffs more. He swims around to the front of Brandon, stops, curls his lips so his teeth are exposed, then shoots through the water like a torpedo and disappears.
Brandon returns to the present. "Why didn't you kill me back then?"
Thanos replies, "Because you were a child...because I was weak. But because, most of all, I knew you were to become the father of Kreios."
Thanos shoots an empty stare at Brandon. Slowly, he sinks into the deep waters and disappears under his trail of dark blood.
Brandon swims back to Treena and both swim to the three watching, passive sharks. None of the sharks move as Brandon unstraps Finley. He hands Finley to Treena and they head back to the tunnel, followed by the dolphins.