THE NIGHT LOCH NESS OPENED ITS EYES

I remember the winter of 1937 not because it was the coldest winter of my life, nor because the work was any harder than the years before it. I remember it because that was the year Loch Ness stopped being water and became something else entirely—something watchful, ancient, and aware. Back then, the lock was not yet the subject of newspaper sketches and tourists with binoculars. It was just home. A cold, deep, stubborn stretch of black water nestled between the Highlands, fed by storms and old legends people told only when the nights were long enough to excuse the telling. I believed none of those stories. I believed in routine, in the weight of nets, in the hum of an engine well maintained. I was twenty-three, too young to know what fear really meant.

Our skipper, Angus, knew fear better—though you’d never see it in his face. He was a man carved from the cliffs themselves: broad shoulders, a beard the color of winter frost, and a voice that spoke only when necessary. My cousin Callum, five years older, carried the calmness of a man about to become a father. He checked knots twice, watched the weather three times, and said little that wasn’t worth saying. And then there was Fergus—loud, restless, and convinced the lock was “boring” compared to the open sea where he’d worked before joining us. He’d crack jokes even while tying lines, though he tended to keep his mouth shut when Angus was near. As for me—Euan MacLeod—I thought I knew Loch Ness by heart. I’d grown up with its breath against my window, its mist curling over the hills, its moods changing like a living creature’s but never more than that. I was wrong.

That night, we pushed off later than usual. The sky was a heavy blanket of cloud, thick enough that even the moon couldn’t break through. Our lantern glowed a small, warm gold that barely reached the water. The hills on each side were black walls, their silhouettes sharp only when the wind shifted the mist. The cold was the kind that seeped into teeth and lungs. When I exhaled, the breath left my lips like pale ghosts fleeing into the dark. The engine started with a low growl, steady and familiar. It vibrated through the deckboards and into our boots, a comforting beat that meant we still owned some small piece of the night.

But the deeper we went, the quieter everything became.

Far behind us, the village lights softened to faint sparks, then dimmed, then vanished behind the slope of land. The silence of the open lock was nothing like the silence on shore. Onshore, silence was stillness. Out here, it was expectation. Sound felt swallowed—our voices, the creak of oars, even the engine seemed hesitant, as if reluctant to disturb whatever slept below.

We reached the first location, a place older fishermen favored in winter because the colder currents gathered fish there in clusters. Angus cut the engine, and the Morag drifted. The sudden absence of noise made the water’s small movements louder—the slap against the hull, the groan of a rope, the distant hoot of an owl carried strangely clear across the lock. “Lower it,” Angus said softly. We obeyed. The first net slid into the black. The floats bobbed once, twice, then drifted out of the lantern’s reach.

For a while, everything felt ordinary.

But as we moved to set the second net, I sensed something change. The bow met a resistance—not like hitting debris, but like pushing through thicker water, as if a slow current pulled against us despite the wind being steady behind us. I placed a hand on the side and felt it: a subtle vibration stirring through the hull. It came and went, faint but unmistakable. A pulse. A rhythm.

“You feel that?” I murmured.

Callum didn’t answer at first. He pressed his palm flat against the rail, waiting. Then his brow furrowed. “Not a current,” he said quietly.

Before either of us could say more, Angus gave a short order. “Second net. Same depth.” His tone shut down questions, but his eyes flicked toward the dark water, following its surface like a man reading a face. We obeyed again. The net slipped into the lock, disappearing into a depth that swallowed everything. When we moved on to the third position, a thin mist began to form—not a drifting fog, but a low sheet that clung to the water just ahead of us. It didn’t spread across the lock. It followed our bow, always a little ahead, as if retreating but not dispersing.

I didn’t like it.

But I kept my mouth shut.

When the first net had soaked long enough, we circled back. The lantern illuminated the float, spinning slowly in a tight circle. Too tight. Water doesn’t move like that unless something is disturbing it from below. Callum hooked the line. “It’s caught on something,” he muttered. He braced his legs and pulled. Something tugged back. A slow, heavy drag—not a snag. Not debris. Something alive.

“Hold,” Angus muttered sharply.

Then the line went slack—so suddenly that all three of us stumbled backward. The net surfaced moments later… or half of it did. The lower half was gone, torn away as cleanly as if someone had ripped cloth with their hands. Long strands dangled in shredded curls. The mesh wasn’t cut by rocks. It wasn’t tangled. It was devoured.

Not by teeth.

By force.

Fergus, for once, said nothing. Angus stared for several long seconds, eyes narrowed—not confused, not afraid, but calculating. “We mend it later,” he said. But his voice had lost its usual certainty. Something had taken that net. Something strong enough to tear it apart silently and vanish before we could even feel the final movement.

The second net, miraculously, was intact—but even that brought little comfort. Because by the time we hauled it aboard, the lake’s surface had descended into patterns that defied wind or current. Wide patches rose and fell without rhythm, some rippling like disturbed glass while others lay unnervingly smooth. Watching them felt like watching the breathing of something asleep but stirring.

When we reached the third net, the float jerked violently.

Not bobbing.

Jerking.

Pulled.

Callum and Fergus hooked the rope and pulled together. The net rose an inch, trembling against an unseen resistance. Then the rope snapped downward again—not slipping, but yanked with deliberate strength. Callum’s boots skidded across the wet deck, and Fergus grabbed him to keep him upright. The rope shivered with a slow pulse… a living beat.

“Cut it.” Fergus hissed.

“Not yet,” Angus growled.

But the lake had other plans. Something below gave a violent tug, harder than before, almost a warning. Angus exhaled harshly.

“Let it go.”

And so we did.

We watched the float drift away, carried by nothing but the quiet of the lock.

No one spoke for the next minute.

But I knew—deep in the gut where real instinct lives—that the lake wasn’t empty. Something was down there. Something large. And it knew where we were.

We moved toward the fourth net. The air grew colder. My breath came out thicker, whiter, as though the temperature had dropped suddenly by ten degrees. The mist thickened. The water darkened further—if such a thing was possible.

That was when the first heavy thud struck the bottom of the hull.

A dull, resonant hit.

Not wood on rock.

Not floating debris.

A knock.

A knock from below.

Callum’s face turned white.

Fergus’s mouth fell open.

And Angus… Angus, who never lost composure… tightened his grip on the tiller until his knuckles blanched.

The lock had woken up.

And it knew we were there.

The thud beneath the Morag was not the kind that driftwood makes when drifting under a hull. It was deep, heavy, deliberate—like a knuckle rapping against a door, testing its strength. The wood vibrated under my boots, sending a cold pulse straight through my legs. For several seconds, none of us moved. Even the lantern seemed to flicker more weakly, its light shrinking into itself as if afraid to shine too widely.

Another thud came—closer this time, angled upward beneath the bow. The boat gave a short, startled lift. Fergus stumbled back, nearly dropping the gaff hook. Callum reached for the railing, and Angus’s jaw tightened into a granite line.

“Steady,” he muttered, though his voice had lost its usual iron weight.

The water around us remained still, too still, like the surface of a lake painted onto canvas. It felt wrong—not calm, but held. Something beneath us was choosing not to break the surface.

But it could… whenever it wanted.

We drifted slowly toward the fourth net, the engine still off, each man silently listening to the water, bracing for another impact. The mist thickened into strips, coiling along the surface like pale smoke. The hills closed in, their slopes rising like dark ribs around the lock, shutting us inside a massive stone throat.

The float for the final net appeared ahead, bobbing in tight, nervous dips. Water churned around it in small bursts despite no wind stirring the surface. Something was under it. Something pacing.

Angus guided the Morag closer.

“Hook it,” he ordered.

Callum hesitated. I could see the tension clenching his jaw.

Then he reached.

The instant the hook caught the rope, a force yanked downward, sharp and violent as a predator striking prey. Callum’s arms jerked, his shoulders snapping taut. Fergus lunged to brace him, teeth bared from the effort.

“That’s no current!” Fergus spat.

The rope pulsed with a heavy rhythm. Not jerking. Not shaking.

Breathing.

Something beneath us was breathing against the line.

“Ease it,” Angus commanded. “Don’t fight it.”

“We’re not fighting it,” Callum hissed. “It’s fighting us.”

The rope gave a sudden downward bolt—so hard that both men nearly toppled overboard.

“Cut it,” I whispered, my voice barely my own.

“No!” Angus barked. “Not until—”

The rope went slack.

Instantly.

So abruptly that all three of them staggered backward, crashing into the side of the cabin. The net floated free for a heartbeat before sinking—dragged down by something too fast for the eye to follow. Only bubbles surfaced.

And then… nothing.

The lock returned to its impossible stillness.

Angus exhaled slowly. “Engine on.”

He didn’t have to tell us twice. Fergus scrambled to the stern and tugged the line. The engine sputtered, then roared to life. The familiar vibration returned beneath our feet, and for a few precious seconds, it almost felt like safety.

But Loch Ness was not done.

We turned toward home, the Morag’s motor chugging low and loud through the stillness. The relief I expected never came; instead, a cold certainty settled in my gut: something was following beneath us. Not chasing… tracking, studying.

We were leaving its territory.

And it didn’t like that.

As we pushed toward the wider stretch of water, I looked back at our wake. The lantern reached only a few meters beyond the stern, slicing a short path through the dark. But just at the farthest edge of the light, I saw it:

A long, dark shadow gliding just beneath the surface.

Too big.

Too smooth.

Too controlled.

When the lantern flickered, the shadow vanished into the black. I blinked hard, but my stomach already knew—I hadn’t imagined it.

Fergus moved to my side. “You saw it too.”

His voice was hollow.

“We don’t speak of it,” Angus growled from the tiller, though his grip had tightened again.

Callum, at the bow, didn’t turn. “It’s been testing us since the first net.”

None of us argued.

The lock changed again. The surface rose and fell in slow, massive heaves that lifted the Morag inches at a time. The waves were not wind-born; they rose from BELOW. Deep, powerful swells spreading outward from something large moving under us.

The boat climbed another slow bulge. The deckboards creaked. A deep pressure hummed through the hull, vibrating in my ribs.

Then came the sound.

A low, resonant groan—so deep it felt more than heard. It vibrated the water around us, a whale-like rumble but heavier, older. It rolled through the lock, through the Morag, through my bones. My breath hitched.

“That’s not possible,” Fergus whispered.

Then the creature surfaced.

Not fully—just a long mound of back breaking the surface twenty meters behind us. It rose in a smooth arc, dark and slick, glistening in the lantern glow. No waves broke over it; the water parted cleanly around its form, as if the lock made space for it.

The mound slipped under again, leaving only the wake of its passing.

“Full speed,” Callum said.

Angus was already pushing the throttle. The engine answered, louder and harsher than before, and the Morag surged ahead. But even at full speed, we could feel the creature beneath us, pacing, rising, falling, each swell marking its shadow.

Then, without warning, the stern lifted—hard.

Something had passed directly beneath us.

The boat tilted, throwing Fergus to the deck. A spray of icy water slapped against my face. Angus fought the tiller, muscles shaking under his coat.

“Hold on!” he shouted.

The Morag dropped back down with a heavy slap.

No one moved for three seconds.

Then the creature hit us.

The blow struck dead center beneath the hull. The entire boat jolted upward, wood screaming in protest. My boots lifted off the deck for a moment before I slammed back down. The lantern swung violently, shadows whipping across our faces.

A second impact struck the starboard side—angled, strategic. The Morag veered sharply. I slid across the wet deck until I caught the railing. Angus cursed, wrenching the tiller to correct our course.

“It’s herding us!” Callum roared.

I wanted to deny it. I wanted to say the creature was confused, panicked, territorial. But its movements were too precise. Too knowing. It was steering us. Guiding us deeper into the narrow trench instead of allowing us toward the open water.

Something massive surged beneath us again, and this time, it surfaced.

Only a few meters behind the stern, a neck rose from the water—long, sinuous, dark as pitch. The head that followed was small compared to the body but unmistakably alive. Smooth skin glistened, water streaming off like threads of glass. The creature lifted its gaze toward us.

Its eyes…
God help me, the eyes.

They were not animal eyes.
They were deep, dark voids that didn’t reflect light—they absorbed it. Looking at them felt like staring into the oldest part of the world, the part humans were never meant to understand.

Fergus let out a strangled cry.
Callum froze mid-breath.
Angus whispered something under his breath—something like a prayer.

The creature held its head there for several seconds. Studying us. Measuring us.

Then it sank.

Slowly. Quietly. Intentionally.

The water folded over it in smooth silence.

But the nightmare had only just begun.

Ahead of us, the trench narrowed. The hills drew closer. The air thickened. The creature’s wake surged behind us again, lifting the stern until the engine whined in protest.

Then came the worst moment yet.

The creature rose directly beside the boat.

The neck breached first—closer than before, so near I could have touched its skin if I’d dared. It towered above us, dripping, moving with eerie control. The head tilted slightly, its eye passing over each of us one by one.

It looked at me.

Not past me.
Not through me.
At me.

And in that moment, something ancient shifted between us—a communication beyond words, beyond fear.

Then, with a slow turn of its long body, the creature glided forward, positioning itself ahead of the Morag.

And for reasons none of us could understand…

It began to lead us.

The creature glided ahead of us, its long back carving a dark path through the lock, barely breaking the surface. The Morag followed not because we chose to, but because the water left us no other option. The creature controlled the lake around it—the swells, the pressure, the currents. Every movement it made shaped the world we floated in. Angus tried to turn us slightly to the left, toward a stretch of shallower water, but the instant he moved the tiller, a surge of water rose on that side, pushing us back into line.

“It’s leading us somewhere,” Callum said, his voice trembling despite the steadiness of his grip on the railing. “Or keeping us from somewhere.”

“Which is worse?” Fergus whispered.

None of us had an answer.

The creature’s dark silhouette moved with impossible grace, a fluid arc cutting silently through the black surface. Sometimes its back appeared, smooth and wide as a hill rising from the water; sometimes it vanished entirely, leaving only the unnatural ripple of its presence. But it never went far. It wanted us near.

Then—without warning—it vanished completely.

The water ahead flattened, growing stiller than before. Too still.

Angus slowed the engine slightly, eyes narrowed at the dark path ahead. “Where did it go?”

“Below us,” I whispered before I could stop myself. Every hair on my arms stood on end. The air felt charged, like the second before lightning strikes.

Then came a sound that didn’t belong in any lake.

A deep, resonant groan surged through the hull, a vibration that traveled up through our boots and into our chests. The creature was directly beneath us—massive, close, and rising.

Suddenly, the Morag lurched upward.

A force from below lifted the stern nearly a full meter out of the water. The engine screamed, propeller whirring uselessly in air. I slammed into the deck, hands flying out to catch anything. Fergus shouted something incoherent as he tumbled against the cabin wall.

“BRACE!” Callum roared.

The stern dropped back down with a thunderous slap that rattled the nails in the timber. Cold water flooded the deck, splashing into our boots. Angus fought to regain control of the tiller.

But the creature wasn’t finished.

A second impact struck the port side, harder than the first, angled perfectly to send us spinning sideways. The Morag careened, lantern swinging wildly, ropes and crates sliding across the slick wood. The world became a blur of water and tilted horizon.

“BALLAST!” Angus barked. “SHIFT YOUR WEIGHT!”

We scrambled desperately toward the high side of the boat. Had we hesitated even a second, the Morag would’ve flipped. The hull groaned under the unnatural pressure as she slowly righted herself.

But the moment we started to breathe again, the creature surfaced.

Not behind us.

Not beside us.

Directly in front of the bow.

The long neck breached first, rising higher and higher until the head loomed above us like some living remnant of a prehistoric age. Water streamed off its skin in shimmering curtains, each droplet catching the lantern light for a brief, trembling moment. Its eyes—those black, depthless eyes—looked at us with an intelligence that felt older than the mountains around us.

Angus stopped breathing.
Callum’s grip tightened until his knuckles turned white.
Fergus made a small, choked sound—the sound of a man realizing everything he thought about the world was wrong.

The creature lowered its head slowly, almost curiously, until it was only ten feet from the bow. I could see every detail: the subtle ridges across its skin, the long lines of water trailing down its neck, the slow dilation of its pupil as it studied our lantern’s glow.

“What does it want?” Fergus whispered.

I wasn’t sure the creature didn’t hear him.

For a moment, the world froze. The hills disappeared. The air stopped moving. Even the lock itself held its breath.

Then the creature exhaled.

A heavy gust of warm, damp air washed across the deck, carrying the deep scent of river mud and ancient water. It wasn’t a roar. It wasn’t a threat.

It was a warning.

And then all hell broke loose.

The creature dropped beneath the surface with shocking speed, the water folding over it with barely a splash. The lake erupted in a massive swell that slammed into the Morag, pushing us backward. The boat rocked violently as waves crashed over the bow.

“It’s under us again!” Callum shouted.

The stern jerked sideways. A powerful current twisted us sharply, spinning the Morag like a leaf in a whirlpool. The engine struggled, whining helplessly as the propeller fought water that moved with the creature’s will, not with the lock’s natural flow.

Then the creature rammed us.

This time, full force.

The blow came from directly below, lifting the entire boat upward as though it weighed nothing. My stomach lurched into my throat as gravity vanished. The lantern tore free from its hook and shattered on the deck, plunging us into near total darkness except for the faint glow of the moon behind the clouds.

Water exploded around us as the Morag crashed back down.

A massive shape rolled under the surface, brushing the hull—smooth, endless, impossibly vast. The sound of it—like a heavy rope sliding beneath the boat—made my blood turn to ice.

“It’s trying to capsize us,” I yelled.

“No,” Callum said, horror tightening his voice. “It’s trying to separate us. Scatter us.”

Angus slammed the throttle forward. “WE’RE GETTING OUT OF THIS TRENCH!”

But the creature controlled the trench.

The moment we gained speed, another swell rose, turning the bow. A second swell held the stern in place. The Morag fought desperately against the impossible currents, groaning like a living thing in pain.

Fergus screamed, “THERE! PORT SIDE!”

I turned just in time to see the creature’s long back rising parallel to us—so close I could’ve reached it with an oar. Water streamed down its curve as it paced us, matching our speed, controlling our path.

Then it turned inward.

Straight toward the Morag.

Angus tried to steer away, but the creature moved faster. The water swelled and the head rose again, now beside us, neck arching with power and precision. It looked at us with a chilling calm.

Then, with terrifying clarity, the creature struck the hull sideways.

The impact sent us skidding across the water, the deck tilting at a sickening angle. Fergus shrieked as he lost his footing. Callum grabbed him a moment before he went overboard. I clung to the rail so hard the wood cut into my palms.

The Morag righted itself—but barely.

And the creature circled again.

I watched the swells forming in a widening arc around us, one after another, trapping us in a ring of churning water.

“We’re dead,” Fergus whispered.

“No,” Angus growled. “Not while I’m breathing.”

But even he didn’t sound convinced.

The creature resurfaced directly behind us this time. The rising neck cast a towering silhouette against the faint moonlight. Its head tilted again in that eerie, intelligent way—as though weighing the value of letting us live.

Then it lunged.

Not to bite.
Not to drag us under.
But to take control.

It shoved the stern, lifting it and forcing the Morag forward at a speed no engine could produce. Water sprayed up in huge arcs as we shot through the trench like a stone across ice. The creature’s massive form guided us with terrifying precision, keeping us balanced, steering us not toward danger…

…but toward a decision it had already made.

I realized then:

It wasn’t hunting us.
It wasn’t panicking.
It wasn’t confused.

It was herding us toward the shallows.

Pushing us away from the deep trench.
Forcing us out of its territory.
Or out of the path of something even worse.

And for the first time that night, I felt a new kind of fear.

Because if this was the guardian of the trench…

What in God’s name was it guarding us from?

The Morag rocketed forward through the trench, not by the strength of her small engine but by the force of the creature’s massive body pushing water beneath and behind us. The bow sliced through the black surface like a blade, spray exploding in shimmering arcs. My fingers dug into the rail as the cold air tore past my face.

“What is it doing?” Fergus shouted, voice nearly lost to the roar of rushing water.

“It’s driving us out!” Callum yelled back. “Driving us hard!”

But Angus shook his head, gripping the tiller so tightly I thought the wood would snap. “No. It’s not chasing us.”

He looked terrified when he spoke again.

“It’s saving us.”

A chilling silence fell in my chest—not around us, not in the lake, but inside me. Something about the way the creature moved now… something about the urgency, the precision… Something had changed.

It wasn’t attacking.

It was escaping.

And using us to get clear of something rising behind it.

I turned. Slowly. Terrified of what I might see.

At first, the water behind us looked like a rolling dark hill, a broad swell lifting the black surface higher and higher. But then the swell kept growing, spreading, splitting into two currents swirling violently around a central point.

“Something else is coming,” I whispered.

Callum’s breath caught. “No. That can’t—”

Then the lock itself seemed to inhale.

The swell behind us collapsed. A deep rumble rolled up from the depths, vibrational rather than audible—something so massive it shifted the water in every direction.

The creature—the one we’d spent hours fleeing—rose again beside us, but only halfway. Just enough to keep pace, just enough to maintain control of the boat’s direction. It did not look at us this time. It looked behind us, toward the trench.

And for the first time…

…I swear I saw fear in its eyes.

“What is it seeing?” Fergus whispered.

No one answered.

Because we all knew:

If a monster feared something…
That thing must be beyond anything we could imagine.

The trench behind us pulsed again—an enormous column of bubbles tore upward from the deep, sending white foam boiling across the surface. The water heaved violently, rising in a mound higher than the Morag’s bow.

“FULL SPEED!” Callum shouted.

“We’re already at full speed!” Angus barked.

The creature rammed the stern again—not to harm us, but to accelerate us. The Morag jolted forward so violently my teeth slammed together. We barely held onto the deck as the boat shot out of the trench like a fleeing arrow.

Suddenly, the hills opened wider. We were approaching the shelf—the area Angus had prayed we’d reach.

“Come on,” Angus muttered, voice cracked. “Come on, girl. Just a bit more.”

The boat surged over the shifting threshold where the lake’s depth shallowed. The water around us brightened slightly, the moonlight catching small ripples instead of endless black.

The creature slowed.

Its massive back dipped closer to the surface. The swells around us calmed. It glided to the side of the Morag, no longer pushing us but simply following, escorting. For the first time since the nightmare started… it felt almost gentle.

Behind us, the trench erupted.

A massive plume of water rose thirty feet into the air, a geyser of black spray illuminated faintly by the moon. Something moved beneath it—a shape too huge to comprehend, shifting like a living shadow beneath the foam.

Callum grabbed my arm. “Is that… another one of them?”

Angus didn’t blink. “No.”

Fergus’s face went white as chalk. “Then what is it?”

“Something deeper,” Angus whispered.

The geyser collapsed. The water roared. The lake swallowed the disturbance almost greedily, as if sealing something away again. The waves chased us, rolling out from the center in widening rings, but the creature beside us lifted its head and the swells seemed to break harmlessly around its body.

It turned toward us one last time.

Moonlight reflected off its dark, intelligent eyes. Steam drifted from its nostrils. It studied each of us—Angus with his trembling hands still on the tiller, Callum clutching the rail, Fergus plastered against the cabin, and me frozen in a mixture of awe and dread.

Then it did something none of us expected.

It dipped its head.

A gesture.
A warning.
A farewell.

And then…

…it slipped beneath the surface with such quiet grace that the lake barely rippled. The water folded over it as if it had always belonged there, as if the lock itself welcomed it home.

The Morag drifted in the shallows, engine still running, but no creature followed us. No waves rose. No unseen force breathed beneath the boat.

For the first time in hours, the night was just night.

Angus didn’t wait another second. He gunned the engine and steered us straight for the village lights flickering faintly along the distant shore.

When we reached the jetty, the Morag gently tapped the wood as if relieved to be home. Not one of us spoke as we tied her down. Not one of us looked back at the water.

We didn’t need to.

We all knew it was still there.

Or they were.

Fergus was the first to break. He sat on the dock, elbows on his knees, hands covering his face. “I’m not going back out there,” he whispered. “Not ever. Not for any price.”

Callum placed a hand on his shoulder but said nothing.

Angus stared out across the lock. His voice, when it finally came, was rough.

“That creature tonight… it wasn’t the danger.” He swallowed hard. “It was guarding its trench. Watching it. Keeping others away.”

“So the stories are true,” I said quietly.

Angus nodded without looking at me. “Aye. But they’re wrong about which creature to fear.”

The lock lay still, perfectly calm, as if mocking us.

I turned away last.

Just before I followed the others up the stone path toward the sleeping village, I caught one final ripple in the moon’s reflection—a small, deliberate wave breaking the otherwise still surface, far out in the dark.

A signal.
A reminder.

A promise that some things remain hidden because they must remain hidden.

And that we had been allowed to leave not because we escaped…

…but because we were permitted.