He was sinking for the last time, his lungs screaming with the desire to suck in more air. His limbs, leaden and weak, floated aimlessly as he sank. Surrounded by darkening shadows, he looked up at the fish swirling like a swarm of bright autumn leaves on the wind beneath the glassy lip of the sea. His drowning eyes fixed on one, glimmering like a bright coin in a well, flick its tail – just a wriggle really – and shoot out into the light that crawled and flickered its way across the stained glass walls of the cathedral ship, as it fell soundlessly past him, into the depths. The intonations of the engine-penitents onboard smothered by the seaweed draped arms of the sea.
Accepting the torpor offered by the cold embrace of his watery demise, he jerked at the caress on his calf and kicked, up towards the life giving light and air. His thrashings futile as the grip on his ankle increased with teuthic strength and hauled him into the deep, his last gasp transmuted into a string of bubbles filled with a scream.