The Clan Of Munes had captured my imagination like no other story before. It was a children's book, written by one of my ancestors. He had written and illustrated a story about a medicine man of the Pacific Northwest natives that had created living creatures from driftwood. His magic had helped him find the ingredients that had some of the leftover power from the creation of the world. Then his magic had helped him to shape them roughly into humanoid beings and to bring them to life. He gave them their powers, including invulnerability to fire. In the end, however, the medicine man could not command them. In their revolt they destroyed his home and drove him from their island, never to return.

Besides his one book he was a skilled artist that specialized in seascapes. The author's art designs had fought in the war as more than just simple patterns. The Navy called it camouflage, but it was more than that, for his efforts actually protected all the ships that were painted. His spirit was one of guidance and harmony and his powers of protection and blessings were genuine.

I needed those protective powers. I needed his guidance and wisdom. I had completed my training with the Coastguard and my first adventures quickly taught me of the power and rage of the sea. I had to experience multiple failures that resulted in the deaths of three people that I was responsible for rescuing.

I sat in the dark at Black Whale in North Cove, sipping my misery very slowly and savoring the bitter burn. Outside the sea had claimed the land, carrying away nearly a thousand feet of shoreline since the beginning of the town. It was the world's fastest eroding coastline; cursed by those whose land this once was.

"Used to be a mile to the shore from here." McReady said to me from his table. We were the only two drinking that night at Black Whale.

After a few minutes of silence followed his words I said quietly and firmly:

"Don't talk to me." And then I looked up at him and he saw I meant it.

He had a pitcher of amber ale, the kind with a lion on it. When he finished it he decided it was now okay to talk to me and began with some insults. All I could do was nod and agree, frowning with the menace of my threatened emotions. He was saying:

"Couldn't help them when they hit the Columbia Bar? Too dangerous for you? Just let them get torn to pieces by the waves? Pieces of them kids washed up. Sea washes away the land and spits out the dead." He was reminding me with a little too much mirth and mayhem in his voice.

The bartender was clearing his throat at McReady. Mcready ignored him and offered me some more of his slurred prose:

"Graveyard of the Pacific. They don't stay buried, do they? You didn't have to pull on a dog's leash. Not your job to pick up what's left of them when the sea spits them back out. Body bags had sand in them." McReady said and then raised his voice to say the last part again: "Body bags had sand in them. Sand and dead bodies, obviously."

"Goodnight McReady." The bartender cut him off and offered the old Marine a salute.

"Johnny boy here thinks he likes it. He looks like he's listening. Couldn't hear a damn thing over the crashing waves, couldn't hear their screams, could you?" McReady surmised for me. "Could you hear them screaming kids, their voices raw with the saltwater and their eyes white with foam? Can you hear them over the roar of the mighty sea when you sleep? When you look down from the sky and see their open mouths, the sea swallowing them up, can you hear them?"

"That's right." I tried to speak but the sound was choked and hoarse. I just nodded instead. I wanted to get angry with him and fight him, but it was no good. The man was Jonah, the prophet, and Black Whale was Nineveh.

"That's enough, Mcready. Get out, go home. You and Johnny are friends here, so knock it off." The bartender chastised.

"That right, Johnny boy? Are we friends?" McReady looked amazed at the revelation. "I didn't know either of us had any friends."

"I'm your friend, McReady. If you are trapped out there, I come to save you. That's my job. I am with the Coastguard."

"So, does that mean that Matilda wasn't your friend?" McReady suddenly sounded too sober for my liking.

I stood up with instant regret at the gesture. His words had hurt and I felt the need to fight or run away. Instead I controlled my instinct and sat back down, patting the table gently. I was then biting my own mouth in a variety of facial contortions of a man struggling with rapidly changing emotions. I shook my head very slowly and took a deep breath. I was only halfway through my shot and decided to just finish it. I don't enjoy alcohol and when it was done I would gladly pay for the poison.

"I tried." I looked up and said defensively.

"Lots of good it did her. She didn't even wash up on shore like them kids from the first adventure. Just lost at sea, forever." McReady's voice sounded appropriately drunk when he told Matilda's story. I nodded appreciatively and got slowly up as I tossed some green wadded paper onto the old wooden table.

"Goodnight McReady." I said as I left Black Whale.

The eroded shoreline was like my eroded soul. I was no hero nor savior. I was just a messenger for the ways of the sea. Just a pall bearer of misfortune. I was nothing but a failed rescuer. What was the point of all my training and my so-called courage if it only amounted to watching people die?

The darkness of the Pacific stood in silent emptiness for unfathomable distances. The moonlit clouds watched me and judged me. The stars held their conference in cold and uncaring eons of an endless void. My eyes reflected the washaway of my soul and the sea collected all of it. The sea was a vengeful god punishing a mortal for challenging its boundless majesty. I felt damned.

"I know you!" I suddenly had to let it all out and I was screaming at the waters. "I know! Damn you!" I let it out like a howling wind, my lungs swelling painfully in my chest until I had to breathe. I fell to my knees, my head a whirlpool, my hands clutching the grass of the sand dune in front of me. There was a kind of echoless silence that lasted until I heard an owl ask me if I was done with the disturbance. I was done so I made myself get up and to begin walking along the shore.

I wasn't sure where I was going. Then I reached the ruins of the old Coastguard base, destroyed by the unbridled revenge of the sea and wiped out from the untempered waves as they came rolling and crashing in. I felt like a ghost while standing there looking at the halfway submerged foundations. Nothing made sense anymore, not while I felt so unfulfilled.

I had dedicated my life to the job and at twenty-three I had joined. I had always wanted to be in the Coastguard. It was stupid, a commercial for a career in the Coastguard had inspired me when I turned thirteen. I had insisted on swimming lessons although I was actually afraid of water. I wanted it so badly, to be the man I had seen in that commercial, that I had forgotten to be afraid. I drowned on my first day at the pool, before the lesson had even started.

It did nothing to make me remember how to fear the water. I was truly inspired and I came back for every lesson. I became an advanced swimmer, athletic and dedicated. I became a lifeguard and worked out in gym. I had no interest in girlfriends or video games or much else. Instead I could feel myself growing into the man I had envisioned I could become.

I learned all about the history and traditions of the United States Coastguard. I learned every kind of appropriate skill, long before I ever applied. I knew how to sail, how to tie knots, basic navigation and survival skills. I loved camping or going sailing so I could practice my skills. When I was twenty I got into a flight school and within two years I had over three hundred hours of combined helicopter and airplane piloting.

From there I went and got my scuba diving certification. During that winter I dated one of my diving classmates, my first girlfriend. When Lilith learned how important the Coastguard was to me she backed off. She explained that she didn't want a widow's watch, wouldn't marry a sailor who was so brave. Before she dumped me: she made love with me. Then she was gone.

My application in Tukwila was a monumental day for me. It felt like I had prepared for that moment my entire life. My recruiter didn't know what to say to me and it was only later that I understood that he had never met anyone like me before. I graduated at the top of my class from the Coastguard Academy. It was then that I understood what I had brought with me to the table. I had almost realized my dream. Only one thing remained:

I was to be put to the test.

I was stationed near Grayland in a beautiful and God-fearing community called North Cove. I was trained for the most dangerous job that they had to offer: rescue diver. It was not long before my first call.

I was not killed during my first mission. Only those I was supposed to save died. Later their bodies, or what was left of them, washed up on the shore.

I was haunted by my own mortality. I was nearly killed in the deadly moment of truth. Those who had relied on salvation from me had looked up to find nothing. Although I had tried, I was unable to save them.

I did not have enough time to resign afterward. As soon as I had decided that I was a failure, and that I needed to quit, there was another mission. It was worse, as fire and horror claimed her life and there was nothing I could do to save her. I wished I had died on the missions so I wouldn't have to face the discovery that I was a worthless coward.

I could not look at my own reflection. I had learned that I was not the man I had meant to become. I had learned that no amount of bravery could pave over true and utter cowardice. Just because a man faces danger and dives into those raging waters doesn't mean he is worthy. I was not worthy.

The true coward knows his own lies. The great liar can rush into a maelstrom of terror, telling himself that such an act is selfless and heroic. He can reach for the drowning and catch only the dead. Then the truth is there for all to witness, that this man is not a hero, he is only an accomplice to a false hope. I did not have the true courage to face my own failures and continue as a symbol of 'not quite good enough'. I had to be a hero or nothing at all.

I could not wear a false face of pride, a mask, a parody, a mockery of the man I had tried to be. I thought back to that stupid commercial. Ten years ago and I could still remember it like the night sky was the projection screen of my sundered dream. It played silently, ghost-like on the sheets of clouds.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

I stood there for a long time, shivering. I looked upon a strange sight on the beach. I saw a fire of burning driftwood with nobody around. I went to it and sat there, wondering who had gathered the wood, set it ablaze and then disappeared. Nobody showed up while I sat there. When the fire burned low, I stood up.

From that moment onward I had begun my journey towards truth and manhood. I had sat at the light of the Great Spirit and stared deeply into it. I had enjoyed the warmth of the spark of creation and knew a feeling of renewal. Immediately the pain inside my own stormy seas became calm. Ancestral echoes swept over me, carried on the four winds into me.

A strange new courage was in me. My vision quest had begun from where I became lost in my own destroyed coastline. Had I known the terrors and awfulness of that place I would never have strayed upon it. To trespass into one's own darkness, in such a terrible night, was to learn that ultimate fear exists. No amount of bravery can protect a man from such a destiny.

I walked to the edge of the water where the fog was rising as ghosts. An unseaworthy dugout was there. Painted upon it were the designs of the people of this land. Long gone were their ways, their medicine men, their magic. They were all but gone themselves. I climbed into the canoe and found the pointed oar. The wood felt alive and warm where I sat and where I held the oar.

I began to paddle out into the darkness, somehow the waves did not stop me. I should have flipped into the waters before long, but instead the sea was unnaturally calm and the fog quickly took away the land. There was no going back.

I stopped rowing and just sat and savored the emptiness I felt. Then I could hear it, the wooden tapping and sweet flute, a song like the rings of the sun. They played there upon the beach of an unknown coast in the firelight of dead bark and roots. The canoe was drawn to their shore and I climbed out, taking the oar with me out of fear of what I had seen. Perhaps I would need to defend myself.

My feet left footprints as I trembled at the sight I had glimpsed and approached. Climbing the rocks of their world, I hid and watched them. They danced around their fire, celebrating my defeat. Each of them was like a short twisted comedy of nasty design.

I stared, horrified by the spectacle and enthralled by their beautiful music. They had voices like those of men and women and they sang in a language completely unknowable, for it repeated the voice I had given them, with the knowledge of damnation that I had screamed. This is where my echo had died and upon the shore where the wave of my despair had broken.

The horrid little monsters flailed and leapt and ran and danced with creaking swaying branches for arms and legs. Their bodies were carved totems and their eyes sat asymmetrically within the wooden skulls. Their heads were carved pieces of wood that evoked both animal and demon. They were celebrating around and around their fire with their human voices raised in a song of words that belonged to their language.

The realization that I was seeing the mythical creatures, the Munes, gradually became a thought in my clear mind. They were entirely real, as impossible as that was, and I was witnessing them as they partied late into the night. It was a pandemonium of their wicked shapes spinning and gesturing so that I knew the meaning of their festivities. These creatures were happy that I was spiritually vanquished.

My fear kept me hidden. If they saw me then they would vanquish me the rest of the way. Each of them held a spear longer than their bodies which they thrust into the darkness with obvious menace as a repeating part of their dance.

Then the clan's native music was blasted by unexpected light and noise from the water. Another boat had arrived without warning. They did not seem to realize what was happening on the beach and responded with Del Shannon's Runaway. Their light scanned the rocks I was on as they were passing my hiding place. I stood up and tried to wave to them a warning with my thumbs across my palms and by closing my fists. I followed that with throwing back motions, hoping they would realize I was warning them, they should at least fear that there were hidden rocks ahead. Their light was on me and they still couldn't make out what was happening on the beach.

The creatures scattered and took up hidden positions, leaving an abandoned beach fire like the one that my adventure had begun with. I tried to shout to the boat: "Danger! Danger!"

It was to no effect. They crazily drove their boat up onto the sand, still blaring their odd classic selection. They got out of their boat and began to head towards the flames, like suicidal moths.

I came running out of the darkness at the teenagers yelling: "Get back! Get out of here!"

"What is the matter?" Their jock asked, grinning stupidly.

"I'm with the Coastguard. This island is very dangerous. You all have got to leave, right now!" I told them with deadly seriousness in my voice. Even after descending the rocks and running at a mad dash to their position I wasn't even panting. The jock noticed how fast I had moved and without losing my breath.

"Your in hella good shape." He acknowledged.

"I'm trying to save your life! This beach isn't safe! They will be back any moment." I looked around into the concealing darkness all around, every piece of driftwood and rock could hide those creatures. They could approach us where we stood and surround us and we wouldn't know it until they attacked. I had seen their murderous spear stabs. The Munes were a bloodthirsty band, intent on hunting whatever the sea had to offer.

The song they had brought ended, evidently on a cassette tape. Nothing else began playing and their radio went silent. They stood there blinking at me in the firelight and it was then that I took a step back.

Were my eyes playing tricks on me? The two boys, the same as the ones I had lost? And the young woman:

"Matilda?" I gasped in horror. I completely forgot the Munes closing in around us and stared at the dead.

"How did you know my name?" She asked.

Coldness washed over me and I began stammering and taking slow steps backing away from them. None of these people were alive! Panic swept through me like a scythe of ice harvesting the last of my nerves. I felt the chill bite of the blade in my heart and I could see my breath there in the flickering light.

"Dear God!" I cried out, pointing feebly at the apparitions before me. I looked to their boat and saw how it was unsmashed from a thousand shattered splinters. It was more impossible than the Munes. All three of them were already dead, I had seen all of them die. "Dear Jesus." I added and felt tears of rejection at the horror of an impossible reunion.

"You okay, man? What's going on?" The other boy asked.

"Yeah dude, what's up?" The older boy, the jock, asked.

"Nothing." I gasped unable to take a breath as the grip of terror sucked the air from my lungs.

We just stood there in the silent firelight staring at each other. Whatever fun they had hoped for was gone from their smiling faces. Whatever hope that I had that this was the end of my nightmare was gone from me.

While we stood there the slow wood tapping sound began rhythmically all around us. Then the hollow beat of wooden sounders, ridged instruments rubbed with a stick, joined the tapping. This was followed by a solemn humming from their human sounding voices and then a solitary flute joined them. This was different than their earlier song. The Munes were playing a bone chilling melody that drove terror into my heart. They were close by and all around us.

Slowly and quietly their chanting words began. I knew what they were singing. They were welcoming the young to die again and for me to a greater death to watch helplessly as they were killed. I knew the wicked creatures intended to attack us and to massacre us on the beach. The Munes were promising that I would only die when I accepted that I could not save the kids.

"We have to go." I told them.

"What is that?" Matilda stared into the night all around us as the female voices joined into our death song.

"No. Just go. Go to your boat. I will try to hold them back." I shook my head to her request. "Now!"

The three of them started back towards their boat, impelled by my command to take flight.

The Munes were not so easily evaded. They gave chase from behind every log and rock in the darkness. Pieces of gnarled wood stood up and lifted hidden spears from sand. The devilish brutes stopped singing with a wild shriek, delighted that the hunt had begun.

I swung the oar at one and struck it, knocking it back down into its cavity in the sand. As it sprang with agility back to its feet I had to ward the attack of another. They were all around me within seconds. I fought them as fiercely as I could, connecting the oar with their abominable driftwood bodies with loud knocks.

My weapon did no harm to them and barely kept them back. They were proclaiming their superiority from all around me in a cacophony of human voices in their old language. Their spears teased and stabbed and lanced at me from all around, but they did not want to kill me until they had the others first. I knew that is what they meant to do.

Matilda and the boys were screaming as the creatures rose up inside their boat. They had completely cut them off from retreat. When I saw their doom I could not accept it. I roared in a defiant scream that made everything look red and blurry.

With a great crack I struck one of the creatures with such force that the tip of the oar flew off in one direction and the creature flew the short distance to the fire and landed in the high flames.

The warrior of the Munes leapt out of the flames, completely unharmed. It let out an angry warcry.

All of the creatures around me hesitated for just an instant at my sudden burst. I broke through their circle and rushed towards the kids, blasting the Munes aside as I went through their ranks to reach the boat.

We had to get off the beach. "Follow me!" I was hollering raggedly to them. They were wide eyed and trapped and had no choice but to have courage and to run behind me. Again I charged through the ferocious creatures, sweeping them from our path by swinging the oar at them with all my strength.

We reached the rocks I had spied upon the Munes from. They clambered up while I turned around to face the charging horrors. Their game was up and now they were just going to kill us all, I could see it in their enraged eyes. The clattering of thrown spears on the rocks signaled their approach as surely as their furious warcries.

As soon as the kids were at the top I began my own climb, keeping the oar. Matilda had spotted my canoe in the moonlight and led the boys down the other side of the rocks towards it. They were shoving it into the water when I reached them.

"Go! Go! Go!" I yelled as splashed towards them. Behind me the Munes were leaping recklessly on the downside of the rock pile. They had caught up by not needing to climb down, but rather just plummeting with their wooden bodies.

I got into the canoe, nearly tipping it in my haste. I began to paddle us away from the island, finding the mild waves were helping us. When we had some distance from the deadly beach I began to slow down, tired already as I had exerted myself to the extreme.

"Is that it?" Matilda asked, panicked hysteria recessing from her voice.

"I think so." I sighed from the ordeal.

"No, look!" The older teenager pointed behind us.

The wicked Munes had loaded into the captured boat with spears and torches and figured out how to use the outboard motor.

"Shit!" I gaped. They were coming for us and quickly.

I dipped the broken oar once more and paddled for our lives. If they caught us they would burn us alive!

They were closing the distance with an overloaded motorboat against a dugout canoe. I rowed and rowed with all my remaining strength, giving it all I had. The sacred fog was just ahead of us.

My arms felt like the bones were swelling inside and my lungs burned with the air I was taking. We were moving at the maximum speed of the canoe and they bested that by reaching the top speed of the motorboat. I realized they would sooner ram us than let us escape into the fog.

I could hear their evil laughter and the motor and the crackling of their windfed torches as they came up behind us. The fog bank was just ahead of us like a finish line. The kids were looking at me and I saw in their faces that they believed we were going to make it. Encouraged, I summoned a strength beyond what my body had left.

From someplace deep within me something awoke from a primordial slumber. It came rushing out of me like an explosion. The paddle detonated on the water and for a split second the dugout rose out of the water, sailed the distance like a flying fish, and landed safely into the fog.

As we drifted into the dreamy, starless darkness: there was a silence enveloping us. The sound of the frustrated creatures was behind us. They knew that they could not cross the boundary that had given us sanctuary. They were no more a part of our world then we were of theirs.

As they skirted the edge of the fog I could understand their words for a moment, somehow I knew what they were saying among themselves. They feared getting lost in the fog and caught by the morning upon the open water. They would be trapped and become as dead driftwood. Such was their curse, that they could not leave the place set aside for them in creation by the Great Spirit.

As we drifted slowly through the cold whiteness our fears subsided. There was a calm that came after the storm. In the darkness I knew I was among living people. They were not ghosts, nor illusions. I could not understand the terrible adventure we had just experienced, but I thanked the Great Spirit for it.

The fog took us safely back to shore. I watched as they climbed from the canoe. While they stood there I got out of the canoe and it began to drift away, back out into the fog. I was left holding the remains of the oar. I stared at them, I had saved them, somehow, despite fate. The Great Spirit had smiled upon me and given me a second chance.

"We're alive!" They kept saying. I just smiled, my eyes watering at the sight and said:

"Yeah. You're alive."