Luz waited for a long time; however, she initially blamed it on the fact that she was now alone and with no one to talk to, and so every second probably seemed as long as a century, so she didn't think too much of it. However, when he saw that the sun was visibly changing position in the sky he began to understand that something was wrong. Maybe something had happened to her friends? It wasn't impossible after all that their parents or someone who knew them had caught them skipping school and therefore they had received a scolding and punishment. However, Luz preferred to wait a little longer instead of going to check, in case they would return sooner or later. After all, it was late to go to school now and by going around Bonesborough asking for them she would only risk running into Eda or Lilith or someone else who knew her and ending up getting discovered. So it's better to stay there on the beach and wait.

By noon her stomach was growling loudly. Normally at those times she ate in the canteen, but now she had nothing available. With few options left, she climbed into a nearby olive tree and picked a few olives and ate those. They weren't very substantial, but at least they filled the stomach. In her heart she was starting to worry: even though she wanted to believe that nothing bad had happened she was starting to fear a little for the fate of her friends. She felt the urge to go look for them, but she resisted and waited longer.

Towards the end of the early afternoon the silhouettes of Amity, Boscha and Skara finally appeared in the distance. Luz breathed a sigh of relief: they seemed to be fine. When they got close to her, however, she noticed that they were laughing rather evilly. "I don't believe it! Have you really been waiting here all day?" Boscha exclaimed with a laugh.

Luz had a bad feeling. "Where did you guys go?"

"Oh, we went to school" Skara replied with a grin.

Luz's heart sank. "What!?"

"Of course! You don't expect us to actually want to risk ruining our school careers?" the dark-skinned girl said again, and her mocking smile only widened.

Luz clenched her fists. "You... you've made fun of me!" she exclaimed. "Why did you do this? What did you gain by making me skip school and make me spend the whole day here?"

"Oh, come on. It was just a joke" Boscha said in a strangely satisfied voice. "And then we had excellent reasons to do it"

Luz's eyes trembled with anger as she heard those words. She looked at the three girls one by one, and found them all grinning and amused by her naivety; even Amity, who had remained aloof and wasn't saying a word, was still looking at her with a rather mocking smile and amused eyes, and even though Luz saw a strange trembling light in them, she didn't stop too long to investigate it since she was fuming with fury in that moment. "And what are those reasons?"

"Oh, come on, you know it very well. Aren't you ashamed of showing yourself so precise and so diligent in class every day? Aren't you ashamed of studying so hard, how do you do it?" Boscha asked her. "Aren't you ashamed to get compliments from teachers? Aren't you ashamed to earn the admiration of other students?"

"What... what does it matter to you? You do it too!" Luz exclaimed.

"Yes, but we are us and you are you. How would we look if a puppet became more popular than us?" Skara said with a wink of her eyes. "There are specific hierarchies in the world, in every place, including school. All the other girls know that they have to look to me, Boscha and especially Amity as role models. But what about you? Since you appeared, you have shaken this hierarchy. You make others admire you more than us. We certainly couldn't let this continue, so we decided to teach you a little lesson"

Luz was shaking with anger. "So that's it? You made me skip school just because you were afraid I would threaten your position?". She looked at Amity with eyes that seemed to send flashes, so much so that the girl involuntarily took a step back: "Someone here once told me that strong people, when faced with their limits, strive to improve and overcome them... but apparently this only applies if others have to do it, right? When it's your turn, when it's time to try to grow and improve and behave in a more pleasant way for others, it's much better to deceive that person out of the way. that is making you fade, instead of working hard to overcome it!"

Amity felt the urge to bury her face in her hands, but she stopped herself. She couldn't afford that moment of weakness. So, despite feeling the bitter taste of hypocrisy in her mouth with every word, she replied: "I never said that deceiving and humiliating people who try to stand before you is unacceptable. That too is part of life. Strength doesn't lie only in the hands but also in the brain. If the other person cannot accept that they have to use cunning, then it is their fault. This is the difference between those who are at the top and those who crawl on the ground"

Luz narrowed her eyes and gritted her teeth. "So you think I'm stupid? Is that what you think?"

Amity felt as if someone was trying to hold her back, as if a person was desperately grabbing her and trying to put a hand over her mouth to stop her from speaking; she could almost hear a voice in her ears begging her not to say what she was about to say, a voice that strangely sounded a lot like hers even if a little muffled. But still she ignored all this and answered: "You think you can become a real girl, what should I think? If you accepted that you can never be more than what you are now, maybe I would tolerate you more"

Luz felt for a moment as if she had been hit in the chest by a boulder rolling down a mountain; it was such an intense sensation that she actually staggered and his legs felt weak. She knew well that Amity didn't believe in her dream, and she didn't blame her for it: after all, what person with common sense would ever think that a puppet could become a real person? Luz accepted the fact that she didn't believe it. But... this was the first time she heard such disgust in Amity's voice and that she spoke to her so directly. She was making clear to her that not only did she consider her dream ridiculous... she considered her, Luz, inferior and incapable of improving herself. And this awareness seemed to twist the puppet's heart as if claws were grasping it.

Tears began to form in Luz's eyes. Nothing had changed: the same thing as long ago had happened again, with Adrian and Terra. She convinced herself that someone was her friend and then those friends repaid her by stealing something she cared about so much. Luz had given up on school, on her intentions to behave like the good girl her mother would have wanted her to be, to honor her memory by stopping being lazy and listless, all for nothing. It was always the same situation that repeated itself over and over again, because she was too naive to see the true nature of people. She looked at Amity, she looked at that smile that until the day before she had found cute, but which now didn't seem like it at all, and actually reminded her more of fangs horribly curved to form a grin. It was as if up until that moment she had had a veil before her eyes and suddenly it was torn, revealing that what she had believed up until that moment was a lie. The three people she had thought might become her friends now seemed terribly distorted, as if they had become dark shadows. Her body shook with anger, and almost without realizing it she began to advance threateningly towards Amity. Matt, who in the meantime had woken up and observed the whole scene in silence hidden in her collar, raised a claw and pinched her ear. "Don't do it, Luz!" he whispered to her. "This will only make the situation worse!"

"Shut up! You said I have to make my own decisions, so let me!" Luz hissed, ignoring him completely, continuing to walk towards Amity as if her own life depended on the girl's destruction. Noticing the imminent danger, Amity stepped back, and Skara and Boscha stepped in front of her. "Hey, loser, what's wrong with you?" Boscha grumbled, placing a hand on her chest to stop her. "Now calm down. You can't..."

Luz moved her hand so quickly that Boscha couldn't even see it, and an instant later she felt a sharp pain in her right cheek from the puppet's wooden palm; it was so violent that she almost fainted on the spot. Skara let out a yelp at seeing her friend bumped like that and grabbed Luz by her schoolbag and uniform and pushed her back, knocking her to the ground and spilling all her things onto the sand; her books and pens rolled on the floor. But the puppet didn't lose her furious look in the slightest and continued to stare at Amity, who swallowed so hard she could be heard three meters away. "Luz, that's enough! It was just a joke..."

"No, no way! You'll pay for this, loser!" Boscha growled as she stood up while rubbing her swollen cheek. She clearly didn't take the slap she received well, but she also hadn't built up enough anger to lose her mind and was still able to understand that fighting a person made of hard wood was a bad idea, so she exploited another tactic: she grabbed one of the books of Luz, an arithmetic manual that definitely weighed a lot, and she threw it at the puppet, deliberately aiming at the right shoulder to avoid hitting any vital points; even though she was furious, she certainly didn't mean to hurt Luz seriously. But the puppet dodged the book, which flew straight towards the sea. Luz realized it too late, but instead of despairing, she ran after it and jumped into the water, raising her hands, managing to grab it and keep it out by a hair's breadth, preventing it from being ruined.

"Tsk! At least you took a bath, loser!" Boscha hissed sourly, satisfied with that little revenge. She hadn't managed to hurt her, but at least now the puppet was completely soaked: the only part left above the water were its hands holding the manual.

Luz quickly got to her feet and emerged again, dripping water from practically every part of her body. The sea near that beach was quite deep, and in fact the jump she had made was enough to bring her to a point where even if she remained standing the water reached her waist. It took her a moment to get it out of her eyes and she tasted the briny taste of salt water in her mouth.

Wait...

Without any warning, her heart seemed to start running a marathon. The sounds and smells seemed to fade away, leaving only the sound of the waves and the salty smell, both amplified a hundredfold. Luz's eyes lowered on their own and looked at the expanse of water that now surrounded her.

Water.

Salt water.

Not fresh water like Otabin Lake. Not good water like the one we bathed in at Eda's house. Salt water.

Sea water.

She was in sea water.

She was in the sea.

Shewas immersed in the sea.

Around her only the sea.

Just like that time...

Luz's breathing accelerated like never before in her life, so much so that she felt like her lungs were about to explode; her body began to tremble as if she were in the midst of an earthquake, and her pupils widened so much they looked like they were about to pop out of her eyes. The world around her seemed to grow dark and dark, and it seemed as if there was something monstrous around her ready to grab her.

She was in the sea.

She was in the sea!

SHE WAS IN THE SEA!

Matt, standing on her back, could clearly hear both the rate of the puppet's heartbeat and the force of her breathing, as well as the way she was shaking. He immediately understood that something was wrong. That wasn't just a panic attack, it was something much more serious. He had to do something... but what?

Amity, Boscha and Skara, although they were distant on the beach, realized too that something was wrong. Their bold look disappeared completely and a veil of fear appeared in Amity and Skara's eyes, and even Boscha looked worried. "Luz...?" Amity tried to say.

Luz didn't even hear her: she instinctively brought her hand in front of her face and started rubbing her fingers against it; if she had had flesh and nails instead of wood, she probably would have left deep grooves. Before her eyes the world disappeared completely and small flashes of light showed very rapid yet very clear images to her.

Vee.

Masha.

Viney.

Jerbo.

Barcus.

Captain Salty.

Every member of the pirate crew.

Her mother's smiling face, full of joy at having found her again.

The sea that opened with the violence of a volcano.

Two immense blue eyes like the corpses of two dead stars that stared at her with an immense desire to possess and consume.

A monster as tall as a hill emerging from the water.

A hideous laugh so disturbing it makes the ears bleed.

Clawed paws.

Tentacles.

Thousands of small eyes full of evil.

Waves.

An immense mouth similar to a black well that opened wide swallowing everything that remained of the ship.

Her mother falling in...

"Luz? Luz!" Amity yelled at her. There was something very serious going on, she was sure of it. She seemed to see herself when her mother pointed out a flaw in hers... but this was much, much worse. She couldn't remember ever seeing someone so scared in her entire life.

"Do puppets have any problems with water?" Skara asked worriedly.

"Well… not that I know of" Boscha muttered in response; she was seriously starting to get scared too.

Luz didn't hear a word of everything they said: her ears had become deaf to what came from the outside world, and other words were echoing in her mind...

"Don't worry, I forgive you everything!"

"We will be a big happy family...!"

"Sorry, Luz. I know you'll hate me for this, but... it's the only way you can survive"

"There is no way for us to escape"

"I'm sure you'll find someone. You always have a way of sneaking into people's hearts"

"KILL! CONSUME! CONQUER!"

Suddenly the world exploded in front of Luz; in front of her there was no longer a beach, there was no longer the sea, there was no longer the sky; there was nothing left; everything was black, except for two immense blue eyes that were staring at her with a lust for possession that went beyond any human limit.

"You're really funny. I like the little fish like you who think they can save themselves... entertain me some more!"

"You managed to resist life's oldest imperative... I was right, you are truly promising"

"Because that's how the world works, little puppet. That's how it's always worked. The strong prey on the weak, and the weak can only accept being the plaything of the strong"

Luz stared into Belos' eyes, losing herself in their light, and felt her soul being sucked into them; by now she was shaking so violently that it was a miracle she was still standing, and the tears streaming from her eyes were so many that anyone seeing her would have thought she would make the sea overflow. She desperately wanted to run, hide, scream, but her body wouldn't respond or allow her even the slightest movement, forcing her to look at the sea monster laughing in front of her, all while opening her mouth wide and showing her her mother, Vee, Viney, Masha and all the others, and then violently closes it and swallows them with deep satisfaction, basking in her desperation...

Amity ran towards her, intending to immediately pull the puppet out of the water; she didn't know what was happening, but she was absolutely sure that she shouldn't leave Luz there immersed in the sea for a second longer. Matt immediately understood the danger and tried to make himself noticed by waving her away without screaming, imagining very well what a single sound could trigger, but Amity didn't even look at him and actually called even more loudly: "Luz, please tell me something!"

Even though she was screaming, that voice reached the puppet's brain very muffled, but it was still perceived, and it was enough to activate Luz's survival instinct; and unfortunately none of those words were understood, drowned out by a much stronger and more thunderous voice.

"Soon you and I will spend a lot of time together, and we will have the opportunity to get to know each other better... after I'll devour you!"

Every fiber of her body snapped like a spring, and still convinced that she was looking at the horrible face of Belos in front of her, she threw the book she was still holding at it: "GET AWAY FROM ME, MONSTER!"

The book flew through the air at breakneck speed and hit Amity square in the forehead, just above her right eye; the girl took a couple of steps back, then she turned white as a sheet and collapsed to the ground without saying another word.

"AMITY!" Skara and Boscha screamed in unison, immediately running to help their friend. Boscha took off her jacket and wet it, then she placed it on Amity's forehead, while Skara frantically began checking her breathing and heartbeat. "Damn, she must have hit her in the temple! What do we do? Amity? Amity, answer me!"

The desperate screams of the two girls entered Luz's ears and seemed to mix with what she was seeing; on the one hand they became more screams of horror as Belos emerged from the sea, on the other they seemed like something completely different. It was enough for Luz to connect her brain to reality for an instant and notice Amity's inanimate body on the beach. Then a new panic crept into her, almost worse than before, and her body moved on its own and she ran away.

In the original book, Pinocchio is tricked by some of his friends who invite him to skip school to go and see the terrible dogfish (remember, the analogue of the whale Monstro in the Disney film); once on the beach they try to convince him to become lazy like them, but in response Pinocchio starts a fight which ends with one of them, Eugenio, being hit in the temple with a book; Pinocchio is the only one to help him while the others flee, and is therefore held responsible by two gendarmes who throw the dog Alidoro at him, which then leads Pinocchio to meet the Green Fisherman. In this AU the situation is different: to begin with, the final part of the gendarmes is not present, given that the whole story of the Green Fisherman has already happened in the previous chapters; furthermore Luz is not tricked into going to see the terrible dogfish, because in this AU it is Belos and she is terrified of him, and furthermore if Belos had appeared near Bonesborough practically everyone would have noticed him immediately, so the excuse that Amity, Boscha and Skara use is to search for the mysterious Titan. Furthermore, unlike the original book where Eugenio is hit by a non-specific person during the fight, here it is Luz who hits Amity by mistake because she is prey to hallucinations due to the psychological trauma she has suffered, and which was reactivated by the fact that she found herself immersed in the salty sea water.