The War Below the Lighthouse

ACT I — A MAN ALONE

The lighthouse loomed atop the cliff, a crooked pillar of stone and glass defying the endless gray churn of the sea. Decades of storms had flayed its white paint to a weary ash, windows scabbed with salt. Wind hissed through gaps in warped frames, rattling them like loose teeth. Waves crashed against the rocks far below, each impact reverberating up the stone spine of the tower.

Rowan Mallory moved with a limp earned in distant wars, oil lamp in one hand, the other trailing along damp stone. As if the touch alone might hold the walls together. His boots left wet prints across the cold floor. The storm had been building all day, but it was the night that always worried him: the dark brought memories he couldn’t drown with drink or the sea’s roar.

He checked each bolt and latch with the discipline he once reserved for Humvees and compound gates, each hinge squealing like an old ghost. The lamp’s glow danced across faded charts tacked to the walls—maps of coasts he’d never sail, places he’d never see.

He descended into the cellar. The door stuck as always; he forced it open with his shoulder. Lantern light spread over crates of salted fish stacked like pale, sad bricks. A few crabs scuttled across the floor, legs ticking like clockwork.

He paused, eyes catching on a single crab lingering with claws raised in defiance.

His mouth tightened. He stepped forward, kicking it hard enough to send it skidding across the stone with a hollow clack.

“Coastal rats,” he muttered, voice flat as a gun barrel.

He turned and moved on without a second thought.

That night, the storm arrived in sheets. Rain lashed the lighthouse in a relentless rhythm. Rowan sat at his table, boots crossed, tea gone cold. He listened to the beacon’s steady rotation above, the only heartbeat left in the world.

He woke before dawn to find his boots overturned, heels facing each other like dancers frozen mid-step. His eyes narrowed. The storm still raged outside. He set them right and scanned the room. Shadows shifted in the corners. Nothing.

The next night, he woke to a distant metallic clink. Lantern light revealed his compass on the floor, needle spinning wildly. He bent to pick it up, but a faint scratching retreated under the stove.

He stared into the darkness.

“Just the wind,” he lied to himself.

Each morning brought new oddities: a spoon balanced on the lantern, a wet fish scale stuck to his pillow. Small things, each one landing like a stone dropped in his gut, sinking him deeper into dread.

His old field journal filled with terse notes:

April 15, 0610: Boots displaced again.

April 16, 0430: Object movement confirmed. Patterns emerging.

ACT II — THE WAR ESCALATES

Morning dawned unnaturally calm, fog pressing against the windows like a suffocating hand. The storm had blown itself out, leaving a silence so deep Rowan could hear his own breathing echo.

He tried to read a warped paperback, but every creak set his nerves jangling. His eyes darted from shadow to shadow, expecting movement.

That night, he woke to a soft, rhythmic creaking from the hallway. He rose slowly, knife in hand, lantern light barely cutting the gloom. Peering around the corner, he froze. Crabs scurried in precise formations, loops of fishing line slung over sticks like crude harnesses. They hauled something heavy with a synchronized heave.

Rowan’s eyes widened, breath fogging the lantern glass.

“That’s… that’s a damn pulley system…” Awe and horror tangled in his throat.

He stepped forward, floorboard squeaking. The crabs scattered instantly. The pulley rig swayed gently in their wake, one of his boots dangling at the line’s end.

He slumped against the wall, rubbing his temple.

“How many crabs does it take to steal a man’s boots? Twelve. It took twelve.”

He spent the day stringing tripwires across doors, setting nail boards behind barrels, wiring cans to rattle at the slightest touch. His hands moved with a soldier’s muscle memory he despised. He scribbled crude diagrams on torn pages: Kill Zone Alpha. Fallback Corridor.

The first traps worked. He woke to find a crab impaled on a spike by the cellar door, legs twitching in a slow, pathetic circle. He flung it into the storm.

But soon they adapted. He found tripwires chewed through, lines of tiny prints arcing around traps. Crabs moved in small teams: one probing ahead, others following carefully. His maps vanished one night, shredded into damp confetti under the stairs.

The war spiraled. Rowan laid a trip flare on the cellar steps, rigged to burst in blinding red. One night it fired, searing the dark with a brilliant flash. He caught a glimpse: a massive crab, shell cracked, claws missing tips, dragging itself away with grim determination.

He reinforced everything, hammering planks over unused doors. But each morning brought new breaches—tiny tunnels dug through soft mortar, fishing lines woven across halls, tools stolen from his workbench.

His journal darkened:

April 19, 0200: Enemy adapting rapidly. Signs of coordinated command—like a mind behind the claws.

One night, drifting into uneasy sleep, he woke to a deliberate clack-clack-clack—a rhythmic sound rising from below, like a war drum. He crept down with lantern held low. Lightning lit the cellar: dozens of crabs moved in rows, shells dark with stormwater, claws lifted in perfect unison.

A massive crab, eye missing, claw splinted with driftwood, stood at the front.

Rowan’s breath caught.

“They’ve taken the high ground,” he whispered.

ACT III — THE BREAKING POINT

The storm returned with a vengeance. Waves smashed the cliffs, thunder boomed overhead, rain slashed sideways. The lighthouse groaned with every gust, each sound a reminder of how thin the walls were between him and the sea.

Rowan moved through the halls with his knife drawn, lantern flickering. Traps lay sprung, barricades breached. The lighthouse felt alien.

He descended to the cellar one last time, boots splashing through rising water. Lightning stuttered across the stone walls, illuminating a frantic scene: crabs huddled around hatchlings, ferrying them onto floating driftwood. Scarred claws shielded tiny bodies from the icy water.

He stopped dead. For a moment, he saw something more than enemies—he saw refugees.

In a blurred rush of memory he saw: a child’s terrified eyes. A Humvee exploding under a sun-bleached sky. His ex-wife’s voice in court calling him dangerous. The phantom burn in his ruined leg.

His breath came ragged.

He dropped the knife—felt its cold weight leave his hand—and staggered to the storm doors. Hands trembling, he fumbled the latch, then flung them open to the screaming wind. Rain blasted him, cold and clean. Crabs streamed past his boots, claws brushing his ankles as they carried their young into the drier halls.

He looked down at his trembling hands, flexing them in the lantern light.

“They look like pincers,” he muttered, a ghost of a smile crossing his face. “Guess it’s time to cut the past loose.”

Man and crabs stood side by side beneath the storm-torn sky, battered but unbowed. Two weary veterans greeting the dawn, each having survived their own endless war.