The Leviathan Show (Fiction)

***

The day Leviathan fell from the sky and into the sea, there were dozens of ships and hundreds of news helicopters waiting for the splash. Someone high up at SeaWorld had heard a prophecy of the specific date and location that the great beast would come to earth, and instead of repenting from his wicked ways, he began construction of a massive enclosure for the thing. The day it happened, our teacher put a live steam of the fall onto the class smartboard and cried silently at her desk as we watched the oily black serpent fall into the sea. Only a few of us in the class watched, some sort of reverence on our faces. The rest of my peers were playing games on their Chromebooks. Ships cast out an enormous net and shot tranquilizers into the water. An hour later, Leviathan was asleep, entrapped, and en route to Orlando.

A few months after that, once the new exhibit had been tested and reviewed (it passed its safety tests, failed the humanitarian reports, and received rave reviews from local travel bloggers), my mother loads us into the minivan and drives an hour or so to SeaWorld. I am apprehensive about the whole affair. Leviathan is a harbinger of doom and the embodiment of chaos, sent from the heavens to ring in Armageddon. It feels wrong to trap it in a zoo and build a show around it, to charge $75 for general admission tickets, to slap its photo on every billboard between Tampa and Orlando. It feels wrong to be excited to see it, but there I am, both excited and terrified. I ask my family about this as we pull into the parking lot, which I’d read was bigger than the enclosure itself.

“Does anyone else feel a little weird about this?” I say to nobody in particular. My sister shrugs, my father is asleep in the passenger seat, and my mother turns down Barry Manilow on the radio and asks me to repeat myself.

“I said, does anyone else feel weird about this?”

“I don’t know, sweetie,” she replies, looking at me in the rearview mirror. “Maybe at first. But then I read some of the reviews and they all said it was the most incredible zoological event of our times.”

“You make it sound like we’re going to the zoo,” I say.

My mother groans and replies, “But the zoo never has this much traffic.”

We’re moving incredibly slow, which gives me time to read some of the signs that we pass. Crowds of picketers gather on either side of the entrance to the lot, one side against the “imprisonment” of Leviathan, the other for it. Those who rally against “Revelation: An Encounter with Leviathan,” as it had been named and advertised, have a diversity of thought as to why they are against it. Some use religion, splattering bible passages on poster boards and praying at the fence to the lot. There are even some people in religious garb, men in clergy shirts and habited nuns standing beside monks in cassocks and imams and rabbis. Mingled together with the religious are the environmentalists and animal rights advocates. They claim The Leviathan Show is an exorbitant waste of water, and that every animal, even those sent from God to bring about the end of mankind, has an inalienable right to roam.

The side praising the show, however, is far more unified. Their signs read that this is proof of the indomitable human spirit. The Leviathan Show is proof that mankind can do anything they put their mind to.

I resonate more with those against the show, but I’m not sure if that’s because I was sensing a disruption in the natural and cosmic order of things, or because I had just recently watched Blackfish. Either way, I can see where the other side is coming from. Since my mother is cursing under her breath as we snake through rows and rows of filled parking spots, I decide to keep my internal moral debate to myself.

*******

The Pope held a vigil in St. Peter’s Square for almost 24 hours when Leviathan fell. Religious folks from all over the world flocked to Vatican City to gather and pray. Nobody knew how the Church would react to what many called the beginning of the end, let alone how it would react to Leviathan’s capture. Politicians, priests, theologians, faithful, and laypeople held their breath as the Vicar of Christ made his statement at the end of the vigil. The Pope denounced SeaWorld and their meddling in God’s affairs. He declared that it was not our place to presume to know how to handle the days ahead. God’s work is mysterious, he said. Just so are His messengers. He preached that faith would prevail, and that the world would not end in violence, but in peace.

*******

We’re waiting outside the arena, having some Damnation Dogs and Serpent Slushies, and I finally get a chance to examine the exterior of Leviathan’s new home. The arena is gargantuan, almost too big to even notice. I could see it from the parking lot, a massive colosseum looming over the horizon. But now that I’m in the park, it’s like I’m standing at the foot of a mountain trying to gaze upon the summit. The exterior walls are lined with television screens and banners, all showing photos of Leviathan while still keeping the true form of the beast a mystery.

I think about the ancient Romans and their gladiators, how they knew of the horrors and violence that occurred within the colosseum, but still could not wait to get inside. I’d never understood that before coming today. I’d always thought that if I were alive back then, I’d be above all that, able to separate myself from the savage and bloodthirsty crowds. But here I am, excited to see The Leviathan Show. I could hardly wait to peek beyond the walls of the arena.

There’s a bit of commotion near one of the gates. I turn to see some security guards chasing a protester, who’s wearing a “Free Leviathan” shirt and throwing fake blood on everyone he passes.

“You all are the real monsters!” the protester cries out.

“How dare you support this crooked enterprise!” He’s running right at us when he’s finally tackled. He hits the ground hard and cries out as guards pile on top of him. His bottle of fake blood goes flying through the air, raining red high fructose corn syrup down on SeaWorld, before landing at my feet. Before I get the chance to pick it up, or really to even examine it closer, a guard swoops it into a bag and swiftly carries it away.

*******

The White House released a statement regarding Leviathan’s sudden appearance and subsequent capture the day after it fell. While the President acknowledged that it would not have been his personal course of action, he understood, and even admired, SeaWorld’s aggressive business tactics. The United States of America saw no national security threat in the serpent, they’d said, and encouraged all able citizens to partake in the nation’s newest tourist attraction. To take the worst of situations and turn it into something that the community can rally around, the President said, was the American way. The construction of The Leviathan Show’s stadium created thousands of jobs, as did the continued maintenance of the park’s expansion. The President and his family were treated to box seats to an early preview of the show. Afterwards, he gave an interview saying that after seeing Leviathan in person, he could not be more grateful that it landed in American waters, hinting that the beast could have been weaponized against American interests.

But there was something different about that interview. A light that was in his eyes before was now gone.

*******

We’re funneled through a small tunnel that leads to an enormous stadium, at the center of which holds the largest pool I’d ever seen. The place is so massive that my ears pop as we climb the steps to a set of four empty seats. The concrete is sticky with spilled soda and ice cream and smuggled-in shooters. Scattered popcorn litters the row and people toss empty peanut shells under their seats. I’m struck by the mundanity of the stadium. Indeed, it’s a marvel of engineering, larger than any stadium ever constructed. But in my little section of the place, where it seems like the only people that mattered were those in my immediate vicinity, it’s no more than every other stadium I’d been to. I can imagine my row of seats at any baseball game or concert. It seems almost disrespectful to have such a normal thing when seeing something so extraordinary.

“Hey, you two,” my mother calls to us.

“Stand up here for me. I want to get a photo.”

“Just take a photo of the stadium, mom,” I reply.

“Why do we need to be in it?”

“You know I always end up deleting the photos with nobody in them,” she says.

“Come on, just one.”

We pose and my mother posts the photo onto Facebook almost immediately. A few moments later, a man and woman walk out onto the stage above the pool. The screens that are scattered around the stadium switched from advertisements for local law firms and restaurants to a video feed of the two hosts of The Leviathan Show.

“Ladies and gentlemen, my name is Nathan!” says the man into his microphone headset.

“And I’m Lizzy, and welcome,” Lizzy pauses here a moment, “to The Leviathan Show!”

The crowd erupts in applause as fireworks shoot up from the stage. Behind me, a baby starts to cry after being startled by the loud noises. The child’s mother, embarrassed and not wanting to ruin the show for those around her, takes the baby in her arms and hurries down the steps and out of the stadium. She curses the whole way down, saying how she was really excited to see this thing and she’d paid good money to be here.

“Now, many of you all may have heard stories about our latest addition to the park,” says Nathan.

“For centuries, our new friend has been called a myth.”

“That’s right, Nathan,” says Lizzy.

“And she—that’s right folks, she—has gone by many names.”

“Scylla,” offers Nathan.

“Tiamat,” Lizzy adds. They take turns naming the beast. As they do, I feel a rumbling

beneath my feet, like a giant door somewhere beneath the stadium is opening.

“Jormungandr.” A gigantic crane arm swings out over the pool. At the end of the arm

dangles the lifeless body of a hammerhead shark. “Lotan. Tunnanu.”

“The Kraken or even the Loch Ness Monster.”

“But we here at SeaWorld only call her one thing.”

“Everyone, meet Lucy!” shouts Nathan as the great serpent swims up to the surface and erupts into the air. Its oily, black scales writhe as it twists in midair to snatch the hammerhead in its gaping jaws. “Lucy’s” tail whips through the air, sending a gust of wind at us. In the stands where the wind hits, hats and newspapers and popcorn and drinks go flying out of the hands of paying customers. A team of medics rush to the seats, checking for any injuries.

Lucy does not seem to have any eyes, at least none that I can see. I can’t see any fins, and I think I see tentacles on her underbelly. I stare in horrified amazement, simply trying to process what I’m seeing. She does not make sense in my mind, and the more that I stare, the more out of focus she becomes until I blink, and her visage returns clearer than before.

Lucy tears the shark off of its hook at the end of the crane and turns back to the pool, screeching as she falls. I wonder then if she has any memories of when she first fell into the sea. I wonder if her screech, which reminds me more of a whale song than anything else, is the same one she cried under the hundreds of nets in the sea.

The impact of her splash sends a wave flying into the lowest section of the stands. I feel sorry for Lucy, then. I shed a tear for her as she’s swimming beneath the surface. The pool is not large enough, so she circles herself like a dog chasing its tail.

*******

A week after “Revelation: An Encounter with Leviathan” debuted, The New York Times published two contradictory articles. One was an opinion column in which the author argued that the captivity of Leviathan signified the greatest evil of capitalism. That we as a species would presume to impose our will on a celestial being for profit proved that morality had flown out the window. The author wrote that should Leviathan truly be a harbinger of the end times, then everyone at SeaWorld would surely end up in hell.

The other article was published in the Times’ travel section. “Revelation: An Encounter with Leviathan,” the article claimed, was the single greatest performance of human history. It was the pinnacle of human artistic achievement and the final form of what circuses had strived for since their inception. It brought the unimaginable to life before one’s very eyes and was worth every penny of the admissions ticket.

In the online editions of both articles, SeaWorld ran banner advertisements on the side of the website.

*******

“Wow!” calls out Lizzy.

“What a treat that was!”

“Ain’t that the truth,” says Nathan after drying off his face from the splash.

“Now, Lucy is an apex predator. Her teeth are as long as a school bus, and every test we’ve tried to run on her bite force has broken our equipment.”

“And, boy, can she jump! Am I right, SeaWorld?” asks Lizzy to a stadium’s worth of cheers in reply.

“Let’s see her do it again, shall we?” Another hammerhead is brought out on some sort of conveyor belt on the crane arm. The crane is raised up higher this time, and Lizzy calls out to the beast.

“Okay, Lucy. Time for seconds!”

As much as I had thought I would hate the show, as much as I had thought I agreed with the environmentalist picketers outside the parking lot, as much as it had saddened me to see such a large creature in such a small home, I can’t wait to see Lucy leap again. I lean forward in my chair, as if a few inches would really improve my view of the beast. There is a gravitational pull to the mystery of her, and it’s strong enough that it overpowers my apprehension about the whole affair. I just want more.

“Holy shit,” my sister says. “This is incredible.”

The shadow of the serpent disappears beneath the surface for a moment before she rockets up and out of the water. This time, however, Lucy does not shoot straight out of the pool, but at an angle. She catches the second shark in her mouth, the same as before, but this time she does not land back in the water. Nathan and Lizzy shout into their microphones to warn everyone to watch out, but it is too late. Lucy falls into the stands opposite the pool from where my family is sitting.

Everyone screams in horror. Anyone who is not crushed by Lucy’s landing scatters. She whips her tail around, smacking anyone too close. Some people are thrown into the pool, others are thrown against the concrete wall of the stadium, where they explode on impact like dropped eggs. The great serpent screeches again, and the whistle tones reverberate off the wall back at us. I clap my hands over my ears, and when I bring them away, there’s blood on my palms.

Lucy starts to slide back towards the pool of water, her body slithering backwards. The spot where she lands is cracked and caked in blood, and Lucy’s body is like a paintbrush dragging the blood after herself. Her head snaps from side to side, biting at the people unfortunate enough to still be alive, and picking up corpses in her mouth. There is much less of a splash upon reentry this time, and I am reminded of videos of cruise ships being launched and christened.

Lucy returns to the pool, dying it red with blood as she continues to swim in circles. I think I can see her biting at her own tail, but before I can look closer, I’m pulled to my feet. My mother is yelling at me, but I can’t hear a word she’s saying, or any sound at all anymore. She pushes my sister and me towards the exit. We hurry out of the stadium in the middle of a great throng of people, all of whom are screaming and most of whom have blood trickling out of their ears.

I wonder, then, what Leviathan is doing. Why’d she go back to the pool when she was free to wreak havoc on our world? She’d been out of the water, soaring through the air only to come crashing back down upon those who’d paid so much to see her. Surely she could have escaped SeaWorld, rolling and flopping her way back to the ocean. I want her to go, to be her true apocalyptic self, the same way I want the lions at the zoo to roam the Serengeti. But at the same time, the lions are always my favorite thing to see.

I crane my head and try to look past the screaming throngs of people to get one last glimpse. Despite the horror of Lucy soaring through the air, a horrific image I relive between each blink, there’s a haunting beauty to it. She crashed down with such violent majesty that I look forward to each blink, and maybe, imprint it on my memory.

The memories aren’t good enough for me, I decide. I wrench my arm free of my mother and start to run against the stream of people. I just want to see her again. I want to be back in the stands, watching. I don’t care if I see more blood, more death, as long as I can see more. The crowd packs in against me, shoving me from all sides. I flail, yelling into deaf and bloodied ears to let me through, but it makes no difference. I only make it a few feet before the current of the crowd sweeps me back. Tears start to well up in my eyes as the rush of people carry me away from Lucy. I just wanted more—is that so wrong? Through the bobbing heads of those around me, I see a tall spurt of water shoot into the sky.

The next thing I know, paramedics are shining their flashlights into my eyes. Then my ears. I can’t hear anything they’re saying; no sound reaches me. They shake their heads, mouthing, “I’m sorry,” but I don’t care that I can’t hear them. I just keep blinking, keep trying to find one more memory of that mythical leap into the air.

Ian Wuertz is a writer and teacher based in St. Louis, Missouri. He received his MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. His work can be found in Out There Literary Magazine and Silly Goose Press. When not writing, he’s trying to relearn how to do a kickflip and perfect his bowling shot.