I'm a Stingray?

Chapter 223: Bag of bones

"A lot of sharks are stalking us." Timothy pointed out the obvious once more as he stared into the distance.

"We have to find another place to hide." Gerlach pitched in, his tone as casual as ever even though the topic in question was rather heavy.

"Right." Osira agreed and began following a path towards the west.

Inevitably, she was sinking a bit deeper towards enemy territory but there was a hole just fifty-meters away or so. It didn't seem marvelously large, but it was definitely what the group needed.

They ended up following her and eventually slipped in the hole without any bad aftermaths worth mentioning. Any shark that could have potentially attacked them, mainly focused on the numerous carcasses that were littered across this perimeter.

The fish around there encouraged cannibalism a lot, and they eventually began fighting over the food. But it only took minutes for the bigger sharks to arrive and feast on the food, they had shunned the smaller sharks away.

Meanwhile, this hole of which the group had entered: was about seven-feet wide and its ceiling was rather closed in, but it had a small entrance which was what they truly needed.

Osira broke the silence first, by asking. "How did my powers run out like that? I didn't know that was possible."

And it was truly so, she did not expect it whatsoever. Because through the travel, she had shot a few fishes down only when they were hungry. While in this more crowded environment, this was the first time she attacked.

Now that they had the ability to think it through, she wouldn't need to attack anyone if the little stingray had not agitated that nosy shark to begin with. But it wasn't the time to play the blame game now.

"Powers do that yes, but yours should be replenished in a few hours. Don't worry about it." Gerlach answered, brushing the situation off lightly again.

"What are you doing in my home?" A sturdy and thick tone echoed in the background, which forced the team in a bit of shock.

As they turned around to face whoever spoke, they noticed a horizontally flat figure popping out of the sand flooring that this little hole carried.

From the looks of it, this was a dungeness crab who stretched a couple of feet wide. Truly massive for its size, it was clear that this one acted as a predator in the wild rather than the other way around.

It would be a bad idea to fight this thing now, when their powers were utterly exhausted.

So Gerlach decided to take charge of the conversation by truthfully answering, "We're just trying to survive, I hope that's not troubling for you, mister...?"

"Joshua." The latter answered, a tad cooperative.

Digging for the kindest words in his vocabulary, the mantis shrimp carried out the conversation by stating. "That's a beautiful name indeed! Rest assured that we will leave as soon as these wretched sharks swim away."

Seeing the tension between these newcomers, the dungeness crab teased. "You're talking like you want to sell me sand, relax a little bit."

That was when the conversation met a whole different turn, as the blue-dotted boy noticed something rather thought provoking. Well everything about such a crab was thought provoking, as they were bulky and strong.

But one thing still stood out heavily, and the sea-pancake craved to steal the lead of this conversation thanks to it.

Which made him ask a rather direct question, "What's that thing on your back?"

"It's a coat." The latter answered with his seemingly typical thick tone, but it was noticeable that he carried a bit of pride.

Rather quick when it comes to pointing out the obvious, Tim questioned. "What do you need a coat for? We all live underwater."

"Well I like coats." The crab insisted with a bit of determination in his tone.

The coat in question, had no wobbly form that would allow it to wave through the waters. On the contrary it was rather solid and carried a dim green illumination, not to mention it seemed oddly cut with no geometrical form to accurately describe it.

Obviously, it was a body part from that same worm whom had saved the hero's life. But telling a stranger that, would end up becoming rather troublesome.

So the sea-pancake decided to take this conversation towards another direction, "What can we do for you to get that coat off your back?"

He thought of Dana as he asked such a question. Because in all ways, this gem can help the lady although he didn't have the faintest clue how that process unravelled.

But the situation became a tad disastrous, because this bulky crab had seen such a question as if it was massively disrespectful. It felt like his honour had been broken thanks to a simple query, rather interesting.

That was why he shouted out, "My marvelous coat can't be given away, you're asking for too much!"

Eager to win that gem over by any means necessary, the stingray insisted. "Common, I'm sure that you want something we can get for you."

After a bit of contemplation, the latter answered. "If you tell me where you got that swimming bag of bones, I'll give you the gem."

Such a statement had managed to push the entire group in a fair amount of furry. But the only one who could withhold their rage, was Gerlach. And as for the rest, they all wanted to rip this crab into quite a few pieces.

[Why are you trying to make a deal with this crab? All Dana has to do is touch the gem, it will solve all of your problems in one go]

From this entire group, Timothy felt like the dumbest right now; because the weird worm had told him such information in the very beginning, but yet he forgot about it; which in exchange led to wasting time on this crab.

Dana could thankfully hear the vibrations that were caused in Tim's mind, which allowed her to pile a sentence together and indirectly hear out what the statement was.

So a bit of emotions curled on her bony-face as a semi-sinister plan began to bloom in her... soul? Whatever she was using to think, it worked well enough.

And she approached the crab after pushing away Osira, who was ready to attack the walking plate of a crustacea. She broke out the topic of which the other desired.

Firmly stating without a single crack in her tone, "I can turn anyone into a skeleton, who do you want me to strip the life out of?"

In all ways possible, this was a lie: but most here didn't have a reaction on their face because they either believed it and got scared, or didn't believe it and went along with the deciphered plan.

But the swimming skeleton had gotten close enough to this mouthy crab, and tried to keep the conversation going for the sake of distraction.

Therefore she encouraged, "I'm sure that you hate someone enough to attack them this way, tell me who it is and I will do the dirty work for you."

Before the creature could even answer, the clever lady had gotten close enough to do a front-flip and simply bashed her tail right against the crab's back.

Which of course, firmly meant that she had touched the same green-gem of which this bulky creature considered as a coat!