The date was August 16, 1869 when we first went under... under the sea that is. Carmen, Lois, Cheryl, Leona, and I invented a new device that could take us under water. We could live and breathe in it too. On the main floor was the control room where there were five cushioned seats, for determined navigators who need to be comfortable while exploring their new surroundings. There was a big shatter-resistant window on the front wall to look out and observe the underwater world. The wall to its right was covered in buttons, controls, and other fancy gadgets, although half of them were there just for decoration. The wall to its left was covered with Leona's drawings, Cheryl's painting's, Lois's posters, Carmen's homemade crafts, and my photography. The wall behind us was completely empty except for a basketball-sized peeking window in the center. We were still contemplating what we were going to put up there. In the middle of the control room there was a ladder that both led to the top exit and down to our living quarters and the engine room. We considered this contraption like an animal and called it the Wild Thang. It took us one year to put it together, and when we finished it we decided to use it to run away from our mean, abusive boyfriends.

We first left notes to our honeys saying that they would never see us again, then we set out on our voyage beneath the waves. Captain Carmen Pitka maneuvered us away from the land we once called home and into our new unknown environment. In our vessel I could feel both fear and happiness in the air as we left sight of land. The silence was horrendous as we descended into the murky waters of the present day Pacific Ocean. The room we were in darkened as we went deeper and deeper into the sea. Suddenly the room was illuminated with candle light and Lois emerged from the shadows.

"Where in tarnation did we install the light switch?" she asked with a muddled face of forgetfulness.

"Way over yonder," I answered pointing at the west wall of the Wild Thang.

"Man, did we put an autopilot thing in this machine?" Leona asked, "We need to start exploring."

"Lee," I answered, "auto pilot hasn't been invented yet, this is the 1800's, remember?"

"I'll shut off the engines and let us linger down here for a while," Captain Carmen said with an eager and ready to explore voice.

When all the engines were shut off we sat in stillness waiting for the monstrous sea animals to approach the Wild Thang in curiosity. The silence was almost deafening as we sat and stared out into the blackness of the ocean. Suddenly Cheryl started screaming and the rest of us jumped nearly ten feet in the air.

"AAAHHGG," she gasped, "what is that thing with the big head and long stringy legs?" She was hiding behind her chair, using it for a shield from the sea creature that was coming closer and closer to the vessel.

"It looks like my boyfriend Oxford," Leona said with both disgust and admiration in her voice. We all stared at the thing for a few minutes and realized that it really did look like Leona's boyfriend.

"Quick, Leona, get out your drawing equipment and make a sketch of it! Since it reminds everybody of your boyfriend, we'll call it an Oxypus," Captain Carmen said as she scrambled around the room looking for a writing utensil. We were all excited and amazed as many other sea creatures came around, wondering what this big metal animal was. The rest of the day we spent naming and drawing the many wondrous animals of the sea that visited us. We had great fun and slept like logs that night. Many of our exploration days were spent this way, drawing and naming animals, but others were spent relaxing and talking about sea life. Some days we would go diving with equipment we'd invented and collected edible foods and other treasures of the water. We knew that this was the life we were supposed to live, having fun and not caring about what was going on in the world above us. As far as we knew there was no possible dangers that lingered in the waters.

One morning after a busy night packed with things to do, I woke up to Lois's voice. "Where the haystacks are we?" she asked still half asleep. Then she lay back down on her bed and was off in dreamland again. I sat up and looked out the viewing window in our living quarters. Captain Carmen and I decided that we should surface and see if we could recognize where we were. All of us then went up and stood outside.

"Hey, we're getting close to those hot islands!" Leona said, noticing that the weather was unusually warmer than Alaska's weather this early in the morning.

"I think those hot islands will be called Hawaii in the future," Captain Carmen said with that distant glance-into-the-future look in her eyes.

"You're such a psycho psychic," Lois said jokingly. "You should start your own eight hundred number."

"Well if you're so good at looking into the future can you tell what that big long leg is doing wrapping around our submarine?" Cheryl asked staring at the front of the Wild Thang with eyes as big as golf balls.

"Holy shinbones! That's not a leg, it's a tentacle of a giant squid!" I hollered as I dashed for the entrance. "Get below before it grabs one of you, quick!" Everyone practically broke the speed of light getting into the sub, but before we could shut the door a thirty foot tentacle was reaching into the control room. Visions of our journey started flashing before my eyes. I tried to block out the thought that this was the end of our little voyage, but it kept rushing back to me like a bitter wind crashing against my head and sending a shiver down my spine. Then suddenly I felt it. The long, slimy tentacle was wrapping around my legs and squeezing out every last drop of blood in them. I fell to the floor, grabbing ahold of anything in my arm's reach trying to keep the giant squid from dragging me to a cold death in the watery grave of the ocean. The squid was too strong for me, though. But just when I thought I would never see my friends again, I hit the floor, hard, and everything went black, The darkness was petrifying. I only saw a little light reflecting off something, maybe a blade... of a knife. I watched it slowly rise above my head and then felt it smash through my chest. The pain shot through my body as I clutched my wound. It hurt to breathe as I was desperately gasping for air.

"Charlotte! Charlotte, are you okay?" I heard Leona's voice, distant and faint, as if she were miles away from me. I tried hard to open my eyes, but a massive weight kept them shut.

"Man you're lucky you landed on a cushion or you wouldn't be here anymore," Lois said, as I lay there drifting deeper and deeper into the blackness.

It took me a few seconds for Lois' words to sink into my head. When they finally soaked in, my eyes shot open in an instant. "You mean I wasn't stabbed!" I hollered.

"Heck no! Why would anybody in here stab you?" Captain Carmen asked me.

"That was what I saw

"Oh! I think I know what you're talking about," Cheryl said. "Maybe somehow in your unconsciousness you saw Captain Carmen stabbing the tentacle of the squid. Then she cut it off and threw it Out the hatch. It was bad, you should have seen it!"

"That was close, though," Leona said with a sigh of relief.

"No kidding, we were almost that squid's breakfast," Lois said, plopping herself down on the floor. "I don't think I want to see something like that again."

"Really," I said laughing. "Let's go to the future Hawaii."

We left right away, desperate to escape from the hideous memory. As soon as we landed in Hawaii we auctioned the Wild Thang off for enough money for each of us to live a life of riches for the rest of our days. We also sold our notes and drawings to scientists who were eager to learn about the sea life we experienced.

That was years ago. We are all much older now and have our own families and a lot of amazing stories to tell our children. All of us kept on living on the hot Islands which did later become Hawaii. We've also kept in touch with the new owners of the Wild Thang , never wanting to forget all of our hard work. No matter what happens to any of us in the future, I know we will never forget the good old days of discovering a new world under the sea.

Charlotte Alstrom