Beatrix’s Living Nightmare
by Holly Braendlein (age 17)
Beatrix cowered behind a towering, sharp rock, one of many that jutted out from the beach. She shivered from deep within her soul. What horror was behind her, such that would keep a child awake at night for the rest of his life. Beatrix squeezed her eyes shut and resisted the urge to scream.
The ground shook as a huge gurgling roar erupted from the direction of the sea. Beatrix crouched even more and covered her ears, whimpering.
“Oh Father God, help,” she whispered desperately.
*
“I’m in a very philosophical mood right now,” remarked Beatrix as she and Frederick made their way to her apartment.
“Uh oh,” said Frederick. “Let me get my helmet, and then we can go down that rabbit hole.”
“What do you plan to do after graduation?” She asked, ignoring him.
“First of all,” he said. “That wasn’t a philosophical question. And second of all, I don’t know. First and foremost, I’d like to be a husband, and I know that whatever decision I make for my future will impact my future bride.”
Beatrix’s heart skipped a beat. “Do you have the lucky bride picked out?” She asked playfully.
Frederick looked at her briefly and smirked. “We’re here.”
As Beatrix opened the door to her apartment, there was a rapid beeping noise coming from her bedroom. Beatrix rushed to check her computer and silence the noise.
“I gotta go,” Beatrix said as Frederick walked in. “Something big needs my attention.”
“Okay,” replied Frederick. “Have fun.”
“You know I do,” grinned Beatrix. She pressed her watch and disappeared within seconds.
*
She reappeared on a beach lined with sharp, jutting rocks at various intervals. The sky was overcast, and the sand was soggy from sea spray. A fierce wind played with Beatrix’s long, red locks, neatly done in a braid.
She stared at the horizon, and from deep within the earth came a low rumbling that shook the stray pebbles on the beach. Beatrix kept her hands splayed at her sides, the hair on the back of her neck standing on end.
There was a massive breach in the water, and a thick, slimy arm shot out of the water, reaching hundreds of feet in the air, and then splashing back down and sending water all over the beach.
And then she saw it. Beatrix’s heart froze in her throat, and her knees went weak at what rose out of the water.
It wasn’t a mutant at all. It was a hideous sea creature of enormous size. His body was composed of miles and miles of wrinkly, slimy skin over a blob of a body. His tentacles flailed about wildly, each arm comprised of short barbs on the underside. He opened his mouth wide and roared, revealing four rows of teeth neatly hemmed in by quivering lips. His eyes bulged from his head, roving the horizon madly.
It was the dreaded Scargix.
The Scargix finally spotted Beatrix. He gave a furious holler and started inching his way toward the beach.
Beatrix lifted her trembling arms, aimed, and shot a blast of ice, only to miss and hit a rock slab instead. She tried again. This time, she hit one of his bulging eyes, and the creature screamed in pain. He opened his eyes, now bloodshot, and roared in Beatrix’s direction. The Scargix heaved onto the beach, and Beatrix turned and ran.
As she ran, she summoned the courage to turn around momentarily and shoot ice over her shoulder, but her aim was terrible. She finally stopped running and faced the Scargix.
Beatrix put her ice on full blast, both hands shooting the cold element at the Scargix, but he didn’t stop moving. Beatrix tried harder, but he kept coming toward her, ever closer. He let out a strangled holler.
The next moment, he was towering over her. Beatrix stopped her ice and let out a scream. A huge arm wrapped tightly around her, his barbs sinking within her flesh. He lifted her into the air toward his gross-looking eyes.
Beatrix gripped his slimy skin with her hands, gasping through the pain, and sent blistering cold ice running through his veins, freezing his arm stiff. He screamed and let her go. She fell hard, got up and limped hastily toward a protruding rock. She cowered behind it, tears running down her face, blood staining her suit.
“Oh, Father God, help,” Beatrix whimpered.
*
Frederick’s head shot up from his homework, and he looked around. He frowned. His gut was telling him something was wrong. No, someone. Beatrix.
He peered at his watch. Nothing odd. Yet, no response from her either.
He quickly got up and opened a portal in the air, stepping into Beatrix’s bedroom. He leaned over her bedside computer. He spotted her superhero logo positioned behind a huge rock on the radar, and a different, even bigger beacon swiftly coming towards her.
“I’m coming, Beatrix,” muttered Frederick. He opened a portal and stepped through.
*
Frederick reappeared at the beach. The wind tossed the foaming waters, and he spotted the Scargix from afar.
He heard a whimper, and he looked down and spotted Beatrix cowering behind a nearby rock with her knees pulled up to her chest. She was breathing hard. Frederick bent over and touched her arm. She jumped and looked up.
“Frederick,” she gasped. “How did you find me?”
“Your bedside computer was still open,” he said. “Are you alright?”
He peered down at her bleeding wounds, her torn suit, her tear-stained face. Beatrix shrugged. The ground shook as the Scargix roared furiously. Beatrix shook her head.
“Oh, Frederick,” she cried. “I can’t do this. This is too advanced for me. I should just call this in and have a professional take care of this.”
Frederick squatted beside Beatrix and brushed some hair out of her face. “Philippians 4:13 says, ‘I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.’ You can do this.”
Beatrix continued to sit and shiver.
Frederick sighed and patted her shoulder. “I’ll do it,” he said resolutely.
“You can’t!” She cried, looking at him with wide, frightened eyes. “He’ll kill you!”
Frederick stood up. “Or God will give me strength to defeat the enemy.”
He stepped into view of the monster and walked towards him. Beatrix scrambled to the edge of the rock and watched in horror. The Scargix spotted Frederick and shot out a barbed arm at Frederick’s face. Frederick opened a portal in front of him and redirected his arm at his own face. The Scargix tried again, but with the same result.
Before long, the Scargix was wielding all of his tentacles, and Frederick’s body moved faster as he opened portals here and there and redirected each arm, tangling them up as he did so. Beads of sweat stood on the boy’s brow.
Frederick began to falter, his attempts more and more clumsy. He missed an arm. Beatrix screamed as the beast grasped him tightly, raising him hundreds of feet in the air. The Scargix gargled in triumph, squeezing Frederick ever tighter in his sharp, barbed grip. Beatrix saw his head flop and knew that he had passed out.
‘I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.’ Beatrix scrambled onto the wet beach and faced the Scargix. Beatrix looked at the sharp, jagged rocks, then to the Scargix, then back to the rocks.
She knew what she had to do.
She braced her feet in the sand and directed her hands at the monster, spraying him with ice to get his attention. He looked over at her and snarled. Beatrix shot more ice at him. He shook his massive head and roared, scooting toward her.
Beatrix started inching backwards towards the sharp rock, still shooting ice at his face. The ground shook as the Scargix growled fiercely, following her.
As she neared the rock, she hurriedly constructed an ice staircase up the face of the rock and climbed to the top, standing squarely in front of the approaching monster. She had to time it just right. The Scargix grew closer.
“One,” she whispered to herself.
Closer.
“Two.”
The Scargix was towering over her now, and Beatrix saw her chance. “Three!”
Beatrix turned around and jumped, sliding down the back side of the rock, landing in a heap on the sand. The Scargix wrapped his arms around the stone, his limbs scattering sand all around as Beatrix hightailed it from the rock.
The Scargix started to climb over the obstacle, slowly gliding across the top until he reached the jagged point. There was a loud pop, and a spray of green liquid spewed from his side. The Scargix let out a deafening scream as it doubled over the rock, its skin stained brownish green.
Beatrix eyed the scene for any hint of Frederick. A monstrous arm shot out and released Frederick from high in the air. He was hurtling toward the sand at breaking speed.
Beatrix limped as quickly as she could near his falling form, summoned all her extra strength, and shot forth ice to make a steadily descending slide that would take Frederick down safely. Frederick’s body gently hit the ice and slid down the slide until he encountered sand, where he rolled to a stop.
Beatrix dropped to the ground and succumbed to unconsciousness.
*
The air about her smelled of disinfectant. And starched sheets. She squinted and opened her eyes.
She was in a clean white bed in a strange room. She lifted her arm and found tubes inserted under her skin, and clean bandages wrapped about her wounds. Her head hurt, and she was inexplicably tired.
“Frederick!” She suddenly uttered aloud. It was then that she noticed a nurse sitting at a computer in a corner of the curtained room. She looked at Beatrix.
“Don’t worry, hon,” she said reassuringly. “Your boyfriend’s in the next bed over.”
She got up and pulled back the curtain that separated the two sections. Beatrix turned her head and spotted Frederick’s unruly hair laying on a pillow in the next bed. Beatrix sighed in relief.
The nurse got up and left. There was a shuffle from the next bed.
“I’ve been waiting for her to leave for the past twenty minutes,” Frederick muttered from out of the corner of his mouth. Beatrix let out a stifled laugh.
They turned to look at each other.
Beatrix sighed. “This is the second time I’ve landed you in the hospital,” she said.
“Technically, I came of my own accord this time,” quipped Frederick.
“I love that you’re trying to shift the blame onto yourself,” remarked Beatrix sarcastically. “I still got us into this mess.”
“Hey, I wasn’t shifting the blame,” said Frederick. “I know it was you.”
Beatrix laughed.
“You were brave, you know,” said Frederick, lowering his voice.
Beatrix snorted. “Right. I was so brave, you had to come and rescue me. Brave isn’t exactly the first word I’d use.”
“I didn’t rescue you,” Frederick said. “If you remember, I passed out like a child up there in his tender grasp. By the time I came to, the Scargix was boiling in his own blood over a rock. I was safely on the ground at the base of a huge ice slide, every bone in my body intact. Who rescued who, Beatrix?”
Beatrix shook her head. “I was so scared, Frederick,” she whispered. “I never wanted to face that monster at all.”
“But you did it anyway,” said Frederick. “Bravery is not a feeling, it’s an act.”
Beatrix pondered this. “How come you’re so wise, Frederick?” She asked finally.
Frederick wiggled his brow and puffed out his chest. “Wisdom just oozes from my pores.”
Beatrix laughed. “Apparently, you’re my boyfriend.”
“That would be suicide on my part,” remarked Frederick sardonically. “You’re not the easiest girl in town.”
“Frederick and Beatrix, boyfriend and girlfriend,” remarked Beatrix, ignoring him. “Sounds kind of odd, doesn’t it?”
“Not at all,” whispered Frederick to himself. “Not at all.”
About the Author
Holly Braendlein is a recently graduated homeschooler, aged 17, who loves to tell stories in any way she can, but especially the ultimate Story. You’ll find her other written works in previous issues of Pure in Heart, as well as the Christian Canadian magazine entitled Reformed Perspective. Holly currently lives in Kent, WA.
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