Wheeling Gull Isle paperback dreams in their deep dose,

Caracal must have died and, despite all his piety, he went straight to hell.

The current level involved watching helplessly as his only remaining adopted child was tortured by various oceanic forces. The riptide wound up for the pitch and the “blackfish” swung for the fences, with poor Ava standing in for the baseball in this terrible metaphor.

Somehow, he dove in and swam out to her before either one consumed her. He swallowed a lot of seawater in the process—she probably did too—but Caracal dragged Ava’s limp body back to the island where the two of them collapsed on a spit of wet sand just beyond reach of the surf.

Ava, Caracal tried between heaving breaths, gently shaking her as he glanced at the incoming tide.

She wasn’t responsive, so he grabbed her salt-soaked scruff and dragged her further up the shoreline, just in case the “blackfish” decided to come after them. Ignoring how shaky and weak he felt, he bent over Ava and began some crude imitation of CPR.