 Horror/Scary: June 01, 2016 Issue [#7668] |
  Horror/Scary
This week: Terrors of the deep Edited by: Arakun the twisted raccoon  
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Quote for the week: If you throw a pebble into the water on one side of the ocean, it can create a tidal wave on the other side.
~Victor Webster |
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Everyone remembers the great white shark of "Jaws," but this vicious eating machine is only one of the mysterious, frightening creatures that dwells in the sea. Inhabitants of the ocean, both real and mythological, are great subjects for horror stories. The ocean is one of the last frontiers on our planet, and except for the area near the beaches, it is largely unfamiliar to most people. While many marine life forms are beautiful and harmless, others can be frightening or deadly.
Marine species include some of the largest animals on earth. Whales have captivated humans ever since we developed the first boats durable enough to go to sea. While the world's largest living animal, the blue whale, is a harmless filter feeder, what if a dangerous creature could grow to this size? Some marine invertebrates also reach gigantic proportions, including the giant squid and its even larger relative, the colossal squid. Very few of these huge squids have ever been captured alive, but dead specimens washed up on beaches may have given rise to legends of sea monsters such as the Kraken.
Some extremely small sea dwellers are proof that size does not always matter. Imagine that you are swimming in the beautiful warm water on the north coast of Australia. Suddenly you feel a minor burning sensation to the muscle of your upper arm, but nothing seems to be there. About five minutes later, your head begins to pound, and your face feels as if it is on fire. Excruciating cramps hit your limbs, and pain shoots through your back. As rescuers haul you to shore, you thrash around, screaming in pain between bouts of nausea and vomiting. You are so certain that you are going to die that you beg your doctors to kill you now and get it over with. You have just fallen victim to one of the tiniest terrors of the deep, the Irukandji jellyfish. This little stinger is only about a half inch long, with a delicate, nearly transparent body. Its sting sends 50-100 people to the hospital every year and has been responsible for several deaths. While the Irukandji jellyfish is less likely to cause death than its larger relative, the sea wasp, victims say they wished they were dead while dealing with the symptoms. When asked to rate the pain on a scale of one to ten, with ten being the worst pain imaginable, one victim rated it a twelve.
Because sunlight cannot penetrate waters deeper than about 600-1000 feet, the ocean bottom is a dark place. If you live down there and you want light, you need to make it yourself. Bioluminescence is the production of light by a living organism. We are familiar with the bioluminescence of surface creatures such as fireflies and glowworms, but almost all animals living in near the ocean bottom use body chemicals to produce their own light. One example is the anglerfish, a small fish with a huge mouthful of teeth. However, prey animals swimming close to the anglerfish don't see the teeth. They see only a small, wriggling bioluminescent appendage which appears to be a struggling worm. The prey animal swims closer, and...GULP!
The oceans are one area of the planet where hundreds of species currently unknown to science may exist. Put your writer's imagination to work and design a previously unknown sea creature for your next horror story.
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