Shattered Soul

Chapter 6- A Glimpse of Hope Part 1

My eyes went open wide when I heard Sonia. A way to bring me back to life? Was that really possible? Then perhaps… it was still not too late for me.

"Are you serious…?" I could barely speak from shock

"I wouldn't joke about something as serious as this," Sonia replied with a serious look in her face, "I shouldn't even be saying this to you, but… there's something different about you… from the other souls I've ever encountered,"

Different? What did she mean with different? How different can I be from others ghosts like me?

"Anyway, like I said before, I can bring you back to life, but I'll take time… about two days,"

"TWO DAYS?" I yelled in more shock

"Hey, but if it works then you might be able to see Lenny. But not as a ghost,"

"But why are you helping me? I haven't been nice to you…"

Before Sonia could answer, however, we heard a noise. Lenny seemed to have heard the noise as well, since he quickly hid in the corner where precisely Sonia and I were floating. As always, he did not notice our presence. I looked towards the source of the noise, and realized someone had entered the storage room. it was another fish, but this fish was a female. She had pink scares and a blue tailfin. She was apparently looking for something… Lenny gulped.

"Who's that?" I inquired

"Her name's Angela, most call her Angie for short." Sonia explained to me, "She had been Oscar's best friend since four years ago,"

Lenny gulped again; the pink fish names Angie had apparently not noticed his presence yet… but if she did…

"Can't we do something?" I inquired silently to Sonia

"Like what?" she replied dryly

"I don'0t know! Something like appear in front of her to scare her off!"

"We can't! Only a Medium would be able to help us!"

I looked back at the Angie girl; she was looking around for something. In her search, she dropped something.

"Oh!" she swam down to the floor to pick it up, but she must have caught sight of my brother's tailfin, because she froze in place and looked up… this was definitely NOT good.

"uh… hi?" my bother grinned nervously

Silence, then…

"AHHH!" Angie let out a loud scream and swam backwards, not bothering to look if something was behind them.

"AH!" Lenny screamed just at the same time.

I almost suffered a heart attack; I even jumped back a few steps. Even Sonia almost fell from my head.

"You didn't mention Lenny screams like a girl!" she commented

"You know, I don't reply as I should because I don't like arguing with woman," I replied in annoyance.

Lenny quickly put his fins over Angie's mouth and pulled her closer to him; I hoped no one had heard them both scream. Otherwise, we would have some trouble…

"Sh!" Lenny hushed her, "please don't scream! I'm not going to hurt you!"

I was not sure if Angie believed him or not, but I could clearly see that she was calming down a little bit… I turned to look at Sonia.

"Hey, what were you saying about bringing me back to life?" I asked her

"Oh, that's right. All we need to do is find your body and make a potion." She replied

"That's al-? WHAT? MY BODY?"

"Uh… yeah, we need your body to put your soul back in there,"

I smacked my head in frustration.

"Oh, no…" I muttered, "That's it. I'm staying as a ghost,"

"What's wrong?"

"I'll tell you what's wrong! My body has probably drifted off somewhere far from here and has probably started to decompose!"

"Don't worry. A person's body doesn't decompose until the soul has passed on to the afterlife."

"What do you mean?"

"Your soul and your body are linked. If your soul doesn't pass on, your body can't decompose until the bond with your soul is broken,"

"But even if we find my body, how are we supposed to bring it here! I can't even touch my brother, what makes you think I'll be able to touch my own body? I growled

"You have a point…" Sonia looked at the ground for a while, "we will need the help of someone who's not dead,"

"WHAT?"

I jumped again with that scream. Wow, that Angie had strong lungs. I turned to see her and noticed Angie was no longer in Lenny's fins. She was floating a few steps from him, a look of complete shock in her face.

"Oscar lied?" she mumbled in shock, "he didn't really kill that shark?"

"No… an anchor fell over my brother… that's what really happened…" I could see Lenny was close to tears. I felt bad for my little brother.

"I can't believe he lied to me… to the whole reef…" Angie looked at the ground in sadness and disappointment, and then back at Lenny, "I'm sorry about your brother…"

I could not stand it anymore; I twirled around and swam out of the storage room. I had finally gotten used to swimming through things, and to Sonia following me around. I stopped a few meters from the storage room, and looked at the ground.

"Hey, what's wrong?" I heard Sonia's now familiar voice

"What's wrong? What's wrong? I'll tell you what's wrong!" I could not contain to yell at her, "I can't bear to see my brother blaming himself for something that was not his fault! I can't bear to see him suffer because Pop simply can't accept his vegetarian habits! I CAN'T BEAR TO SIMPLY WATCH AND DO NOTHING!"

Sonia had swum back a few steps, with a look of complete shock on her face. Damn it! I screamed at her! I felt tears forming in my eyes… I tried to blink them away; I could not cry… at least not in front of Sonia… what would Pop or anyone think if they saw me crying? But more tears were forming…

"Don't repress it… let it go…" she told me

Those words had been like a spell, because suddenly I could not contain my tears any longer and felt them roll down my cheeks. I sighed and felt my lower lip start to shake… I hoped Sonia would not tell anyone about this… but strangely enough, I felt… relieved…

"That's right," Sonia whispered to me, "you just let go what you had repressed in your heart and that's what makes you feel relieved,"

I looked into her icy blue eyes… why had I screamed at her? This was not her fault… after all; she was just trying to help me. She was willing to break the rules of the Dead just to make me happy… speaking of which…

"What had you said about needing a living person's help?" I wiped the tears that were left on my eyes

"Oh, yeah. We need a Medium to carry your body back here…" Sonia explained

"And where are we supposed to find a Medium?"

"I don't know… I doubt there is any on this reef…"

Suddenly, Sonia's eyes brightened a bit.

"Wait.. That Angie girl... She had a strange Aura around her!"

"Aura?"

"I'll explain that to you later, my point is that Angie might be able to see the dead!"

See the dead? Angie? But that fish didn't look like she knew about that stuff. But, hey, Sonia was the expert… so I decided not to question her.

"Let's go back to the storage room and hope she sees us," Sonia told me as she swam back to the Storage room.

I followed her, after a while we swam through the wall and into the storage… and what we saw in there was not pleasant in the least…

Angie was leaning against the door, Oscar apparently had just arrived… and Lenny was hiding in a corner behind the door.

"Angie. Hey, what are you doing here?" Oscar asked her nervously, fearing she might have discovered something…

"What, Oscar? Did you forget something?" Angie inquired

Oscar started to swim around pretending to look for something…

"Oh.. Maybe you forgot…" Angie closed the door shut, revealing Lenny in a corner, "… your shark,"

Lenny looked over at Oscar while taking a sip from his soda.

"Hi," he greeted nervously

Oscar tried to save the situation. Man, this was more amusing than watching Luca drop Pop's paperwork all over the floor.

"Oh, come on! You shouldn't enjoy the misery in others!" Sonia exclaimed

"What? You don't see scenes like this every day…" I replied in defense, "besides, this is not misery… it's quite funny, if you think about it… OW!"

Sonia smacked my head. Well, it didn't hurt as much as it would if it had been another shark that hit me, but it still hurt.

So that's how it feels like.