Angel was halfway to the shoreline now. The sand sunk away beneath her bare feet, restricting how fast she could run. The Sun’s orange was burning into a deep crimson as it fell across the horizon. The tide was coming in, fast. The longest reaching waves were already lapping at Faith’s knees, her unconscious body still face-down in the damp sand. Angel resolved everything she had left to get to her before the tide swallowed her, but the sand was limiting her speed more than exhaustion.

Her foot dipped lower than expected and she lost balance. She twisted and tumbled down a dune, turning over herself three times before she levelled out. She staggered to her feet but tripped again; the sand was in her eyes now. It wouldn’t stop her - she must reach Faith. 

Only a few hundred paces remained, she faced the sunset. The disc of the Sun was so weakened in its final minutes that she could bare to stare directly at it. A trail of scarlet reflection snaked across the waves from the horizon to the shore. The reddened water reached from the ocean like clasping fingers, and it was now at her sister’s face. 

She arrived, and fell to her knees to slide the final stretch. Digging two long trenches out behind her, which the desperate ocean soon filled. A bubble travelled with the last of a wave’s energy, skimming the shallow water and sticking to her sister’s face. Angel seized her sister’s arms at the elbows, and started to drag her away from the wavefront. Her feet slipped and sank into the wet sand as she scrambled to pull Faith to safety.

They were just about clear of the water when a large, familiar hand grasped at the back of Angel’s head. The King held her hair tight and wrenched her backwards, her wet hands slipped from her sister’s arms and Faith’s body hit the sand again with a wet slap. 

Angel clawed at his hand but was soon thrown to the ground. She fell into the shallow waves and her elbows hit the sand. Shaken, she tried to right herself into a seating position but he was already on top of her. His knees pinned down her thighs and his hands were quickly around her throat. His grip was tighter than it ever was before. He wanted her dead. 

Her arms flailed and splashed in desperation. She scratched and grabbed at his hands but his grip wouldn’t loosen. She tried pulling at a single finger with both hands and it gave slightly. He screamed in anger and brought his hands up, jolting her head up with them - before swiftly bringing his grip down and slamming her head into the sand. 

Her head pounded from the impact and the lack of air, she hadn’t recovered before the wave came. The water rushed over her, it filled her ears and The King’s scream was muffled. Her vision blurred and all she could see was the dark outline of her attacker against the red sky of dusk. When the wave retreated, she naively attempted to gasp for breath, but her lungs remained in their painful strain. 

She brought her hands up again and scratched at his face, swiping at him with ailing strength. She managed to grab his hair with both hands, shoving her thumbs as hard as she could into his eyes. His shriek was inhuman, he released one hand from her throat and snatched at her left arm, seizing it by the wrist and pinning it down - the force sinking both their hands into the sand. 

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Angel strained her eyes to spot Faith, she was still unconscious, her hair floating in the waves - her mouth and nose were underwater. Another wave came and Angel was again underwater. The pain was approaching unbearable. Her lungs screamed in desperation and the skin of her throat burned against the force of his grip. She could feel her consciousness fading, and knew she only had a few seconds of effort left in her. 

Her right hand was still free. With her last strength she grabbed blindly at the sand, grasping a wet handful and throwing it into his face. She tossed a second, then a third. The wave retreated but she still couldn’t breathe. She grabbed a fourth, smacking the clod into his face and trying to push the grains into his eyes. Her arm dropped in exhaustion. The world was going dark now, the burning in her lungs peaked to a numbing inferno. Her fingers weakly curled into the sand as she attempted a fifth, but her arm was so tired that the wet sand dripped away out of her grip as she meekly brought an empty hand to his chin.

Exhaustion won over and her arm dropped back into the water. She looked at him in the eyes as her vision faded, then the final wave came. She didn’t really feel it, her mind was too full of pain and panic to resolve anything philosophical before the end.

As the last wave retreated, she felt something odd under her hand. It was something different from sand, it was solid, spongy. With the very last of her will, she gripped the soft head of the jellyfish and brought it to The King’s face.

When the first tentacles struck his face, the rest came alive, wrapping around his head. Gripping at his cheeks and face the tiny barbs began to inject their paralysing venom. He howled in pain and released her. He rolled to the side and started pulling the creature off of him, the tentacles held their grip and his face was pulled into a distorted and almost comical state as he wrestled the jellyfish off. 

Angel gasped for air, feeling the pain from her lungs dissipate with each breath, but her neck still stinged with each gasp. The King finally pulled the jellyfish away, its long asymmetric tentacles dangling lifelessly beneath its bell shaped body. He tossed it away, but before it had even splashed back into the sea, Angel was on top of him.

She screamed a primal and wordless shriek. She wrapped her hands around his throat and pushed him into the sand just as a wave crashed over his head. Bubbles rose and broke against the surface as he yelled, Angel turned to check on Faith. Her sister was now floating face down, lazily shifting back and forth in the waves.

The distraction proved fatal. She didn’t see his fist, but a heavy and well-placed strike to her face sent her tumbling off of him. She rolled through the retreating wave, and tragedy returned within seconds, as he assumed his position on top of her again. 

She gagged at swallowed seawater, but this time was different. His grip was already noticeably weaker, the jellyfish venom already working in his muscles. Within a few seconds his grip was even weaker. She couldn’t help but smile, as she brought her hands to her throat and wrestled herself free with a single quick and forceful motion. His legs buckled below him and he fell to his elbow as another wave crashed. 

Angel pounced forward, they fell together into the wave. The King splashed onto his back, his arms hovering awkwardly unable to stop his fall. She screamed into his face, blood dripping from her nose and mouth as she strangled her tormentor. His arms and hands batted weakly at her body, his legs shifted underneath him with shrinking vigour, digging himself into the sand.

His head shook and writhed as another wave submerged him. She pushed her hands down hard, sinking his head into the loosened sand. His ears went under first, then his eyes, then his mouth. He pushed against her strength, a ghostly visage of his face rose from the sand like some absurd mask.

She pushed down harder. Another wave crashed and his face was completely gone, nothing but flat sand, her hands were submerged beyond her wrists. A few tiny bubbles pushed their way up through the sand - then there was nothing.

She held him there for a few seconds, then pulled her hands up from the ground. The sand dripped off in a thick, brown sludge. Angel crawled away and hurried over to her sister. She lifted her head from the water and dragged her to dry land.

They both collapsed into the powdery sand. Angel was at an absolute zero, she could not move a single muscle in any way. She watched as the half-buried foot of The King was swallowed by the unrelenting tide, as her sister coughed and spluttered awake.