There Is No Evil Just Animals Surviving As Long As They Can by Hayduke Irish
Medocea has decimated Kiri's tribe, but Kiri survives and dives deeper than anyone before into the watery caves to in an effort to find and kill the creature.
Peace.
She spoke without her voice, directly into my mind, indifferent to our cries. She made the stones grow within me. I felt I would rip open; it had happened too fast, and my skin stretched too tight, though I felt nothing, no pain. I couldn't move my head and neck. The only sensation was of the stones wriggling inside me; I could feel their dispositions as if they were my own, a whirlwind of feelings, the stones with minds I could sense. I was sick; if I were like the ones who went before me, I was dying.
"You must feel guilt for what you do. You are a woman, are you not?"
The bald creature walked over to me naked. They were always nude, as we all were now, indecent under our luxurious white sleeping skins. Never had I been so clean, never had I seen such white. She lowered her head to mine and stared at me with her large, dark eyes, mouth lazily open, exposing the sharp points of her teeth.
There were three of the pale women; the other two worked with the corpses. None of the other women from my tribe were still alive; they'd all met violent ends due to complications from the stones.
She gingerly pulled the blanket from me, and my skin awakened to the open air. I was big, bigger than any pregnant woman ought to be.
"My food is frequently emotional. It is a sadness I bear gracefully." Her words were long and drawn-out, monotone. She never spoke without pausing first, if she spoke at all.
She inspected the tiny thorns that she had inserted all over my body. Her long, pointed nails dragged across my bare skin in unexpected ways that made bumps rise from my flesh.
"You may survive the surgery - an outlier," she said, her face again coming close to mine. "Quite exceptional, your readings. What is your name?"
I considered her. "Kirishima," I replied.
"Kiri. Shima," she repeated, slowly.
"What are you?" I was getting tired; even saying a few words like that took such effort, I would need to sleep for hours.
She pulled the blanket back over me, stopping to make eye contact once more. "Your people call me 'Medocea'." She nodded in respect, an intriguing gesture from her, and then left the room. I had been there for months; it was the most she'd ever spoken to me. I'd seen a dozen women from the tribes die on those beds, and she rarely spoke a word to any of them. She tried to save them all with diligence. They would beg, scream, and wail, and then go suddenly quiet in her presence. She would continue working until they inevitably died in silence. Whatever her goal was, she took the work most seriously, though was most unsuccessful. That I was not yet dead was rare. I was, as she said, an outlier. That I was exceptional at surviving did not surprise me; it bolstered my pride. So wretched was my existence that such a pitiful comfort soothed me to rest that day.
When I awoke, it was to flashes of consciousness. I stared into the sun. The naked woman was standing over me. It was my turn. She pulled the stones from me, tentacled blue orbs that writhed in Medocea's hands. There were so many.
Rest, Kiri Shima.
I drifted off to sleep while Medocea worked.
Mother.
Her whisper woke me. Medocea was there, lightly setting me down.
Rise Mother.
Waves. I twitched my finger. It responded. I could move.
My eyes were still closed. I was comfortable in the darkness; it was the visible world that scared me.
"Get Baraam, it is Kiri! She has returned."
I opened my eyes slowly. Behind my cousin's voice, I heard the waves, the surf breaking just so, and felt the ocean lap at me.
"I hear the sea," I said, my voice cracking and weak. The water came up to meet me again, and I got to my knees, coughing. My hand went to my stomach. My skin there was loose. I was nude. I tried to cover myself with my arms and crawl into a ball as I wept.
"Caravis. Do not look at me. I am rotten."
"Kirishima." I felt my cousin's eyes linger on my pale, naked body, the angry scar running down my abdomen. "Your brother is coming."
"Caravis, please."
He turned away from me, remembering himself. "I'm sorry, Kiri. Your brother will come to bring you home. You are safe now."
"None of us is safe. She knows where I am. I can feel her." I looked up to Caravis for the first time.
He wore a sealskin around his waist, as was decent. He carried a wooden spear. I reached out a hand, and he gave it to me. I leaned down against it and screamed as I stood on unused legs; they betrayed me and sought to crumble. Caravis came from behind, trying to support me by my armpits, but I slapped him away. I did not want to be touched by anyone.
The painful prickling sensation slowly drained from my legs. Caravis looked to me for reassurance, and I gave him a grateful nod. I walked behind my cousin to spare myself the indecency. I used the long spear as a cane to traverse the familiar beach.
It wasn't long before Baraam came running to meet me. He covered me in skins - around my waist, and hung them on my shoulders to hide my chest and abdomen.
"Kiri." He studied me. "What happened to you?"
"Baraam, please," I replied.
"It's a miracle." My brother held out his arms, smiling brightly. "You're alive. Where've you been? It's been almost a year. We thought we lost you at sea; you were certainly dead."
I should have been. We needed to keep moving.
"Bring me back to camp. Please," I said, instead of answering. I would convince him to leave in the morning. I needed clothes and privacy.
Baraam nodded, but looked no less concerned as he led me to camp.
I didn't know how much to tell them. They had questions, clear by their expressions, though they dared not ask. We had beliefs in the stars that guided us, bringing us to the fish from island to island. Whatever had happened to me was not of the sky; it was of the deep, our great provider, the dark seas, below where the light could touch, or breath could reach.
I settled into the camp and lay on a mat of brush, remembering the comforts of the cave and the white sleeping skins.
Kiri Shima. Our family grows.
I shot awake, uncertain what was real and what was the lingering echo of the nightmare past.
Come home, Mother.
I felt the compulsion to return to the rocks. Scared of my own mind, I ran outside.
"Baraam," I stood over him while he tended the fire, "something has happened."
I told him and Caravis of her that night: 'Medocea,' the monster of the sea. Hideous and beautiful, not human-born, perhaps cursed to life by the sea itself.
"We will hunt this creature to extinction." Baraam was furious, slamming his spear into the dirt floor.
"Approach it with reason, Baraam," Caravis replied. "We don't know the strength or intelligence of this being - why did they let Kiri go?"
"What will come of us?" I looked at my cousin. "We cannot abandon the spire. It is our home, it is hallowed ground, Caravis."
"We will survive, Kirishima," Caravis replied. "We make a new home, find a new cave with new treasures, and move on. The Parasa were a tribe long before we found these rocks." He couldn't have known that, and I scoffed at him.
Medocea had found me months ago in the stone-hollow caverns of the great rocks, for which this place was sacred to us.
"I will have her head and with it her powers," Baraam said. "The spire will remain the hunting grounds of the Parasa so long as I draw breath."
"Caravis." I looked to my cousin. He was the leader of the hunt; his words were often wise, and he was not quick to take risks like Baraam and I. "They took eleven." I felt a compulsion, flinching. "For your sister." The words seeped from me like poison. She had been one of the girls with me in the cave. She was so strong, and then one morning I awoke, and she was dead, cold and pale. The sound of her blood dripping kept me company until Medocea returned.
"Those caves are our entire history, cousin," I said quietly, grinding the butt of my spear into the ground. "If we die, we die for the Parasa people, as we always have. It is no different."
Caravis looked as though he'd weep. It was wrong to use his sister to convince him. He nodded. "We will hold the spire," he said, "or we will die for our people." He looked up to me with a warrior's knowing smile and added, "Just as we always have."
The Parasa were a people of sacrifice.
Baraam, Caravis, and I decided then that we would hunt the creature to its end. Over the course of the season, we'd lost eleven girls of birthing age to the tunnels. I heard or saw them die, staining their white bedding red, one by one.
It was common to lose one or even two people, but we had never lost eleven in a season, and all fertile women. I didn't know if I could bear a child now after Medocea's meddling. Beyond that, the spire was our hunting ground - without it, the Parasa would suffer. We would fight to keep our ancestral home, as was our duty.
We would still collect the cave oysters, as their pearls and the trade they facilitated aided us in transit, but on this hunt, we sought the beast who plagued our ancestral lands.
"We'll find her, Kiri." Baraam rubbed my shoulder. "You will have justice. The People of the Great Breath will have its vengeance."
We rose early to fish every morning. For a good while, I merely kept the anglers company, leaning heavily on my spears to walk. It took months to get my body back in shape for the sport, and even then, the scar pulled when I swam. We would soon move on to the warmer reefs of the north, but my recovery and the hunt for Medocea delayed our departure. The rest of the Parasa, some two hundred strong, left our small crew behind, unaware of our machinations. We came to these islands for the nearby sea shelf, which dropped into oblivion below and rose to the sky above. Many generations of my people had secured and maintained rope lines running down and along the massive cliff. We hunted pearls and the Big Fish for trade; the sea bugs sustained us during the hunt.
We looked different from the landmen: we were thinner, our eyes slightly bigger, and it made them uncomfortable. It was natural to suspect that our insides were as dissimilar as our appearance, as the diving skills of the Great Breath were far beyond the capability of the landmen.
They grow. Come, Kiri Shima.
I told no one of the voices that periodically interrupted my thoughts, the nightmares that disturbed my rest, nor how I yearned for Medocea's soft white sleeping skins.
I looked at the familiar outcropping protruding from the water, well in the distance. A sharp knife's edge rose from the sea, stretching back a great distance. Inside was an expansive labyrinth. It was a puzzle the Parasa had been working on since the beginning of our recorded history. The spire was, in fact, our recorded history.
I breathed to prepare for the dive and yipped with my brethren at our arrival and the beginning of the hunt. In our jubilee, we found our bravery. When the time came, we dove together, guided by the ropes our parents and their parents had left when they worked these crags. A rainbow of poison coral, massive in scale, stretched in all directions around the tower, glowing brightly in the moonlight. The ocean, lit up by colorful coral, was surreal each time. As our elders said, the spire welcomed us home.
The water near the island was warmer than the surrounding region, a perplexing phenomenon that supported colorful reef fish, sponges, and prolific coral outcroppings. Residual spirits of fire must have been alive in the old stone; warm bubbles rose intermittently around its base, the location of the vents never the same from one year to another.
I came to the mouth of the sea-cave. The great formation took its long inhale, and I allowed it to swallow me up, like a bug. My mind caught up with my body as I rushed into and through the rock tube. It was mere minutes before I came to the first open chamber. I slowed down as I breached the water and arrived in the enormous room. I carried a spear and a satchel, and wore my tight seal-skins for swimming. I saw a Big Fish, a youngling, lurking in the corner. He was there last year, and I was glad he was well. I was grateful for the moment of solitude.
The Great Room echoed with the distant drip of water. It was our special place; the walls of the cavern were etched and painted with the tribe's tales from countless centuries. It was for this room and what it stood for that we hunted the predator: the entire written records of my people, the story of who we were and where we came from.
I walked around the cavern, observing the drawings. These caves were Parasa, just as I. Dying in the spire wasn't just common for a huntress like me; it was expected, and depicted in so many of the drawings I passed. I would almost certainly fulfill that duty one day.
Our minds contained a map of this place, dark and serpentine, a series of touches and turns rather than a visual representation; the marks we made in stone could be read without our eyes. We trusted our predecessors without hesitation. Faltering in the tunnels meant death. If the mark said twelve minutes, we prepared for twelve minutes; if it said turn, we dared not ignore it - unless, of course, we did, which was no small matter. The thrill of exploration and wanderlust were cherished attributes in our society. The Parasa wanted for nothing, and the great spire made that possible.
I found the section of wall I was looking for. The oldest, the first Parasa. In the crude drawings, some had eyes and hands that were big, like hers. It struck me differently than the last time I last saw it, and made me uncomfortable.
Come, Kiri Shima. Join us. We are near.
I turned around quickly to look behind me, holding my spear at the ready. I was alone with the distant dripping of the cavernous space.
Baraam found his way into the chamber from the entrance.
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She spoke without her voice, directly into my mind, indifferent to our cries. She made the stones grow within me. I felt I would rip open; it had happened too fast, and my skin stretched too tight, though I felt nothing, no pain. I couldn't move my head and neck. The only sensation was of the stones wriggling inside me; I could feel their dispositions as if they were my own, a whirlwind of feelings, the stones with minds I could sense. I was sick; if I were like the ones who went before me, I was dying.
"You must feel guilt for what you do. You are a woman, are you not?"
The bald creature walked over to me naked. They were always nude, as we all were now, indecent under our luxurious white sleeping skins. Never had I been so clean, never had I seen such white. She lowered her head to mine and stared at me with her large, dark eyes, mouth lazily open, exposing the sharp points of her teeth.
There were three of the pale women; the other two worked with the corpses. None of the other women from my tribe were still alive; they'd all met violent ends due to complications from the stones.
She gingerly pulled the blanket from me, and my skin awakened to the open air. I was big, bigger than any pregnant woman ought to be.
"My food is frequently emotional. It is a sadness I bear gracefully." Her words were long and drawn-out, monotone. She never spoke without pausing first, if she spoke at all.
She inspected the tiny thorns that she had inserted all over my body. Her long, pointed nails dragged across my bare skin in unexpected ways that made bumps rise from my flesh.
"You may survive the surgery - an outlier," she said, her face again coming close to mine. "Quite exceptional, your readings. What is your name?"
I considered her. "Kirishima," I replied.
"Kiri. Shima," she repeated, slowly.
"What are you?" I was getting tired; even saying a few words like that took such effort, I would need to sleep for hours.
She pulled the blanket back over me, stopping to make eye contact once more. "Your people call me 'Medocea'." She nodded in respect, an intriguing gesture from her, and then left the room. I had been there for months; it was the most she'd ever spoken to me. I'd seen a dozen women from the tribes die on those beds, and she rarely spoke a word to any of them. She tried to save them all with diligence. They would beg, scream, and wail, and then go suddenly quiet in her presence. She would continue working until they inevitably died in silence. Whatever her goal was, she took the work most seriously, though was most unsuccessful. That I was not yet dead was rare. I was, as she said, an outlier. That I was exceptional at surviving did not surprise me; it bolstered my pride. So wretched was my existence that such a pitiful comfort soothed me to rest that day.
When I awoke, it was to flashes of consciousness. I stared into the sun. The naked woman was standing over me. It was my turn. She pulled the stones from me, tentacled blue orbs that writhed in Medocea's hands. There were so many.
Rest, Kiri Shima.
I drifted off to sleep while Medocea worked.
Mother.
Her whisper woke me. Medocea was there, lightly setting me down.
Rise Mother.
Waves. I twitched my finger. It responded. I could move.
My eyes were still closed. I was comfortable in the darkness; it was the visible world that scared me.
"Get Baraam, it is Kiri! She has returned."
I opened my eyes slowly. Behind my cousin's voice, I heard the waves, the surf breaking just so, and felt the ocean lap at me.
"I hear the sea," I said, my voice cracking and weak. The water came up to meet me again, and I got to my knees, coughing. My hand went to my stomach. My skin there was loose. I was nude. I tried to cover myself with my arms and crawl into a ball as I wept.
"Caravis. Do not look at me. I am rotten."
"Kirishima." I felt my cousin's eyes linger on my pale, naked body, the angry scar running down my abdomen. "Your brother is coming."
"Caravis, please."
He turned away from me, remembering himself. "I'm sorry, Kiri. Your brother will come to bring you home. You are safe now."
"None of us is safe. She knows where I am. I can feel her." I looked up to Caravis for the first time.
He wore a sealskin around his waist, as was decent. He carried a wooden spear. I reached out a hand, and he gave it to me. I leaned down against it and screamed as I stood on unused legs; they betrayed me and sought to crumble. Caravis came from behind, trying to support me by my armpits, but I slapped him away. I did not want to be touched by anyone.
The painful prickling sensation slowly drained from my legs. Caravis looked to me for reassurance, and I gave him a grateful nod. I walked behind my cousin to spare myself the indecency. I used the long spear as a cane to traverse the familiar beach.
It wasn't long before Baraam came running to meet me. He covered me in skins - around my waist, and hung them on my shoulders to hide my chest and abdomen.
"Kiri." He studied me. "What happened to you?"
"Baraam, please," I replied.
"It's a miracle." My brother held out his arms, smiling brightly. "You're alive. Where've you been? It's been almost a year. We thought we lost you at sea; you were certainly dead."
I should have been. We needed to keep moving.
"Bring me back to camp. Please," I said, instead of answering. I would convince him to leave in the morning. I needed clothes and privacy.
Baraam nodded, but looked no less concerned as he led me to camp.
I didn't know how much to tell them. They had questions, clear by their expressions, though they dared not ask. We had beliefs in the stars that guided us, bringing us to the fish from island to island. Whatever had happened to me was not of the sky; it was of the deep, our great provider, the dark seas, below where the light could touch, or breath could reach.
I settled into the camp and lay on a mat of brush, remembering the comforts of the cave and the white sleeping skins.
Kiri Shima. Our family grows.
I shot awake, uncertain what was real and what was the lingering echo of the nightmare past.
Come home, Mother.
I felt the compulsion to return to the rocks. Scared of my own mind, I ran outside.
"Baraam," I stood over him while he tended the fire, "something has happened."
I told him and Caravis of her that night: 'Medocea,' the monster of the sea. Hideous and beautiful, not human-born, perhaps cursed to life by the sea itself.
"We will hunt this creature to extinction." Baraam was furious, slamming his spear into the dirt floor.
"Approach it with reason, Baraam," Caravis replied. "We don't know the strength or intelligence of this being - why did they let Kiri go?"
"What will come of us?" I looked at my cousin. "We cannot abandon the spire. It is our home, it is hallowed ground, Caravis."
"We will survive, Kirishima," Caravis replied. "We make a new home, find a new cave with new treasures, and move on. The Parasa were a tribe long before we found these rocks." He couldn't have known that, and I scoffed at him.
Medocea had found me months ago in the stone-hollow caverns of the great rocks, for which this place was sacred to us.
"I will have her head and with it her powers," Baraam said. "The spire will remain the hunting grounds of the Parasa so long as I draw breath."
"Caravis." I looked to my cousin. He was the leader of the hunt; his words were often wise, and he was not quick to take risks like Baraam and I. "They took eleven." I felt a compulsion, flinching. "For your sister." The words seeped from me like poison. She had been one of the girls with me in the cave. She was so strong, and then one morning I awoke, and she was dead, cold and pale. The sound of her blood dripping kept me company until Medocea returned.
"Those caves are our entire history, cousin," I said quietly, grinding the butt of my spear into the ground. "If we die, we die for the Parasa people, as we always have. It is no different."
Caravis looked as though he'd weep. It was wrong to use his sister to convince him. He nodded. "We will hold the spire," he said, "or we will die for our people." He looked up to me with a warrior's knowing smile and added, "Just as we always have."
The Parasa were a people of sacrifice.
Baraam, Caravis, and I decided then that we would hunt the creature to its end. Over the course of the season, we'd lost eleven girls of birthing age to the tunnels. I heard or saw them die, staining their white bedding red, one by one.
It was common to lose one or even two people, but we had never lost eleven in a season, and all fertile women. I didn't know if I could bear a child now after Medocea's meddling. Beyond that, the spire was our hunting ground - without it, the Parasa would suffer. We would fight to keep our ancestral home, as was our duty.
We would still collect the cave oysters, as their pearls and the trade they facilitated aided us in transit, but on this hunt, we sought the beast who plagued our ancestral lands.
"We'll find her, Kiri." Baraam rubbed my shoulder. "You will have justice. The People of the Great Breath will have its vengeance."
We rose early to fish every morning. For a good while, I merely kept the anglers company, leaning heavily on my spears to walk. It took months to get my body back in shape for the sport, and even then, the scar pulled when I swam. We would soon move on to the warmer reefs of the north, but my recovery and the hunt for Medocea delayed our departure. The rest of the Parasa, some two hundred strong, left our small crew behind, unaware of our machinations. We came to these islands for the nearby sea shelf, which dropped into oblivion below and rose to the sky above. Many generations of my people had secured and maintained rope lines running down and along the massive cliff. We hunted pearls and the Big Fish for trade; the sea bugs sustained us during the hunt.
We looked different from the landmen: we were thinner, our eyes slightly bigger, and it made them uncomfortable. It was natural to suspect that our insides were as dissimilar as our appearance, as the diving skills of the Great Breath were far beyond the capability of the landmen.
They grow. Come, Kiri Shima.
I told no one of the voices that periodically interrupted my thoughts, the nightmares that disturbed my rest, nor how I yearned for Medocea's soft white sleeping skins.
I looked at the familiar outcropping protruding from the water, well in the distance. A sharp knife's edge rose from the sea, stretching back a great distance. Inside was an expansive labyrinth. It was a puzzle the Parasa had been working on since the beginning of our recorded history. The spire was, in fact, our recorded history.
I breathed to prepare for the dive and yipped with my brethren at our arrival and the beginning of the hunt. In our jubilee, we found our bravery. When the time came, we dove together, guided by the ropes our parents and their parents had left when they worked these crags. A rainbow of poison coral, massive in scale, stretched in all directions around the tower, glowing brightly in the moonlight. The ocean, lit up by colorful coral, was surreal each time. As our elders said, the spire welcomed us home.
The water near the island was warmer than the surrounding region, a perplexing phenomenon that supported colorful reef fish, sponges, and prolific coral outcroppings. Residual spirits of fire must have been alive in the old stone; warm bubbles rose intermittently around its base, the location of the vents never the same from one year to another.
I came to the mouth of the sea-cave. The great formation took its long inhale, and I allowed it to swallow me up, like a bug. My mind caught up with my body as I rushed into and through the rock tube. It was mere minutes before I came to the first open chamber. I slowed down as I breached the water and arrived in the enormous room. I carried a spear and a satchel, and wore my tight seal-skins for swimming. I saw a Big Fish, a youngling, lurking in the corner. He was there last year, and I was glad he was well. I was grateful for the moment of solitude.
The Great Room echoed with the distant drip of water. It was our special place; the walls of the cavern were etched and painted with the tribe's tales from countless centuries. It was for this room and what it stood for that we hunted the predator: the entire written records of my people, the story of who we were and where we came from.
I walked around the cavern, observing the drawings. These caves were Parasa, just as I. Dying in the spire wasn't just common for a huntress like me; it was expected, and depicted in so many of the drawings I passed. I would almost certainly fulfill that duty one day.
Our minds contained a map of this place, dark and serpentine, a series of touches and turns rather than a visual representation; the marks we made in stone could be read without our eyes. We trusted our predecessors without hesitation. Faltering in the tunnels meant death. If the mark said twelve minutes, we prepared for twelve minutes; if it said turn, we dared not ignore it - unless, of course, we did, which was no small matter. The thrill of exploration and wanderlust were cherished attributes in our society. The Parasa wanted for nothing, and the great spire made that possible.
I found the section of wall I was looking for. The oldest, the first Parasa. In the crude drawings, some had eyes and hands that were big, like hers. It struck me differently than the last time I last saw it, and made me uncomfortable.
Come, Kiri Shima. Join us. We are near.
I turned around quickly to look behind me, holding my spear at the ready. I was alone with the distant dripping of the cavernous space.
Baraam found his way into the chamber from the entrance.
"We must move faster, brother. Remember the tide," I scorned him for his slowness, and he nodded, a note of remorse on his face. But he had carried the spare spears through - a hard job. I was on edge from the voices. Baraam removed a pouch of poison powder from a leather bag he carried and began carefully applying the toxin to each spear. I walked over to him and put a hand on his shoulder.
"Thank you, brother." His hand found mine, and we shared a breath.
The hunting party set up camp in the main room. Twelve capable divers came with us and slowly trickled into the pool to join the hunt. I wondered which tunnel led to the beds of white where Medocea performed her wicked deeds.
Many of the divers worked in the first room. My team eagerly took inventory of the oysters and bugs in the pool, harvesting the biggest for meat and the occasional pearl.
Not all tubes were passable. Some tunnels were labeled with just the word 'death'. Much of the cave system was off-limits to us, for all would trust an ancestor who made such a mark, as it denoted a great sacrifice. My hand brushed the carvings with reverence. Many of the tunnels that would have put an end to my progenitors would be within reach for me. I looked defiantly at the marked paths, wanting to prove them wrong.
Baraam and Caravis found me studying the map on the wall. We ourselves had added many lines and tunnels to the complex drawing. To do so was an honor. I had discovered six rooms. I ran my finger along my path on the map until I found it, following the long trail. Almost a year ago, after a twenty-three-minute hold, I was spit into a chamber, almost dead, coughing up water. It was the farthest anyone had gone, and for that, I was rewarded. When I looked around, there was a vast pool and a great crack in the sky through which light shone. The most beautiful coral and creatures covered the pool's floor - the Big Fish and the cave oysters were plentiful. I would only need a few. I had been collecting cave pearls for many years, and many of these shellfish certainly carried the rare and lucrative large specimens for which my people were revered.
Only I could reach the spot alive, for no one else would survive the long hold. It was in that tunnel that Medocea took me.
Join us, Kiri Shima.
I felt her around me.
They grow.
I dared not answer. I felt the channel open; it would be so easy to reply, nothing but a thought in her direction, and she would hear.
I prepared my spears for the hunt.
Baraam and I had considered how best to approach as Caravis and the other divers went on ahead with weapons. We were diving Kirishima's Line: a bountiful, recently discovered, but challenging series of tunnels. The hunters who came with me were among the strongest and prepared for what we might encounter, but it was obvious their motivations were the purported bounty of the newly discovered chambers.
I treaded water as I prepared myself. Between Baraam and me, I was the first to go through, as I was faster and had a longer bottom time. Closing my eyes, I breathed, holding it at the height of my inhale for a spell, then exhaling sharply to enrich my blood for the long hold. It was a practice more than religion: a ceremony of survival. My hand found the carving in its customary position on the pool's ledge. I had three tunnels before I arrived at the Meridian Room. I knew this sequence well. With a deep inhale, I sank, holding a rock to help me reach the bottom with ease. I stared into a tunnel about five feet in diameter. The suction of the incoming tide pulled me toward its threshold. I dropped the stone and became weightless, kicking towards the abyss.
I pointed my toes and used my feet as rudders as I whipped through the drain, pulled forward at an increasing pace. My hands were in front of me, outstretched, redirecting my body to change course, avoiding collision with the sides of the ever-changing rock pipe.
The tunnels were of a singular sensation. In the near absence of input, I clung to the tiniest bits of information. In the darkness, it was easy to get lost in thoughts of family and friends. At notable moments of the pipe, abrupt turns, or spots where I could use my feet to gain momentum, I returned to the same memories repeatedly.
When you first enter, your mind is lost in chaos. As the darkness becomes predictable and orderly, so do you, and you establish patterns of peaceful thoughts. You are a pebble in a great wave. When the water has passed, the pebble remains unaffected. That is what we taught our children when they learned to dive: there is no emergency, only what should be dealt with quickly and calmly.
And so, I did not stop at the first room, nor at the second, where I felt a friend in the pipe as I passed. These lava tubes were order to me - for the first time since Medocea took me, my thoughts fell in line. In the second room, I found the hunting party waiting for the diver I'd passed. I did not surface, but gestured to inform them I was moving on. In the third tube, the suction jerked me forward, and I accelerated. Having held my breath for over ten minutes, I raced toward my destination and my next gulp of air. My body began to spasm, warning me it was about halfway to death - I had about ten more minutes until I fainted. I routinely did these three routes together; I knew it would take me sixteen minutes.
On one of the last turns, my hand fell upon something slick: a Big Fish, that felt like it was moving in the wrong direction. A familiarity struck me, then a high-pitched, piercing noise. I lost all sense of orientation. I exhaled, a huge mistake, as I slammed into a wall of the rock pipe, tumbling forward out of control, taking in water as I was spit roughly into the entry tidepool of the Meridian Room.
I rushed to the surface, eager to get to solid ground. I met the earth, coughing up seawater on my knees. Nothing traveled against the current in the tunnels or used echolocation in the cave, except Medocea, yet what I had just encountered was certainly a fish. I looked down into the deep tide pool to see my spear floating midway in the water column. We made them neutrally buoyant they wouldn't be lost. Thousands of bright poison corals of every color backlit my weapon and strained my eyes as I fetched it. The water was humming strangely as I found my way back to solid ground.
The Meridian Room was my favorite place. Above were the stars, below, the dramatic display of a luminous coral reef, unmatched anywhere I had seen, contained in orderly tide pools. In the moonlight, Meridian was the ultimate display of color. The room was only reachable at peak tide, during the big moon. The Parasa were uncertain how the spire worked. During the surge, the water blasted through the tunnels and climbed the tower into the vast pools in the Meridian Room, located high up in the volcano's caldera. There were many ponds, more than a dozen, all glowing with radiant beauty and covering a massive area. In three adjacent pools was a round coral I'd never seen, perfectly organized, ovular, fifty per pool in perfect rows, cultivated, glowing in the moonlight, the tendrils extended and eating of the tides' microscopic bounty.
I remembered the stones Medocea removed from me. They were identical; these were just bigger.
Mother. I looked around.
As I waited for Baraam and my tribe, I harvested oysters and collected a few pearls. I ate the flesh as I went. They were plentiful and good fuel for whatever came next. I drank from the shallow puddles high up in rock pockets on the bowl-like walls of the Meridian Room - rainwater collected from the open sky. It was the only known source of freshwater in the cave system, so I had my fill.
I was nervous; Baraam and the others should have been there already. Breathing up, I prepared my body for diving. I wondered about the Big Fish I passed in the tube, about the sound that disoriented me so, if the voice I kept hearing could be Medocea - if she had been talking to me, or if it was my imagination. Maybe Baraam and the others were dead, or lying in one of Medocea's luxurious beds. The women certainly weren't safe, though I didn't know what she'd do to the men.
The pearls I had collected were beautiful red marbles, and I examined them in the natural light. I carried with me a small fortune. Financially, the hunt was already a success many times over - we just needed to survive.
Once the tide reversed, I knew my party would not be coming until the next cycle. Six hours.
Mother. Mother.
It was a sensation more than words, coming from one of the pools. I was helpless to its allure.
I walked to the tidal pool and looked down into oblivion.
Come. The voice grew, coming from so many directions. Come.
I stared down into the unknown path.
In its traditional spot, I carved the symbol for death with a sharp rock I found on the ground, as was the custom of my people. I was responsible for returning and updating it; if I couldn't, the sign would remain accurate. I did not know what would happen, and that made me smile.
I took a deep breath and dove in, plunging into the unknown. If I died in the tunnel, the mark and my lines would be my contribution to my people. Down, down, I whipped, but not for long, maybe three minutes, before I faced four paths I could take. I chose the farthest to the right and continued for another thirteen minutes before dumping into a massive chamber. I immediately knew I was in a main room. It was rich with light-emitting moss and poison coral that eagerly drank up the light to power their fluorescent display. It twinkled all over the water, the teams of coral and moss that lit the room like candles of fat, in distances that were impossible to distinguish in the twilight pool.
I went to the surface and found only about two feet of headroom. Familiar with the scenario, I found my breath and felt the direction I came from still pushing at me. I reached around me with my hands. Stalactites. I floated on my back and worked up my breath. I lay in peace for a long while, resting. Eventually, I opened my eyes, and the ceiling was further away: the room was draining. I smiled and flipped myself over and dove, spear in hand, toward the bottom. It was about thirty feet deep.
In the cave's blackness, the smallest light was the greatest aid. Besides the moss, a few fish, too, had grown accustomed to life in these caverns. Like patrolmen out for marauders, the fish marched around the room with their tiny torches, drawing their prey to them. While the water exchange was violent, particularly during the great tide, which happened about four times a year, the pools were isolated and safe, and I was but another fish, the great predator of this place, or so I thought, before I met Medocea. I lazily surfaced and dove repeatedly, staying down for but three minutes at a time, keeping a casual pace to my search of the massive new chamber, resting. Now and again, I'd stop to pull at an oyster, take it to the surface and beat it against an exposed rock, tucking away any pearls I found in a leather pouch and the flesh in my belly. I could hunt the fish with my spear, though I preferred my fish's flesh fired, while the oysters I swallowed raw and alive. They were delicious, a truly unique delicacy, unlike any from the open sea. Like many of the creatures, the cave oysters were isolated to this place. From the tiniest of wrigglies to the coral, I had only ever seen these creatures here; even the Big Fish were not like the grouper of the reef, similar enough to be related, but with large eyes adapted to the perpetual night.
I felt then a great conflict in the pool, a disturbance in the water - the flailing of death that I knew too well. I tucked behind a pillar and directed my attention to the area of conflict. It was so rare in this place to see any predation besides our own. A grouper would take meals, but it was quick and clean. This was not. I held out my spear as the water stilled. The water vibrated strangely, obscuring my senses. Something was in there with me. A shark, maybe, but how? I had plenty of breath left, and my mind was still, cautiously observing.
Not a shark. A catfish, maybe, or something of the sort, a snake-like fish, it moved differently than a shark, without the 'womp' of a tailfin. Whatever was in the water was no fourteen-foot ancient beast of the bottom; it was nearer to my size and I was likely outside its consideration for food. It emitted a vibration I'd never sensed, more sophisticated than the great whales. As it grew in intensity, I lost sense of movement in the water, and was left with only my eyes to scan my surroundings.
"Thank you, brother." His hand found mine, and we shared a breath.
The hunting party set up camp in the main room. Twelve capable divers came with us and slowly trickled into the pool to join the hunt. I wondered which tunnel led to the beds of white where Medocea performed her wicked deeds.
Many of the divers worked in the first room. My team eagerly took inventory of the oysters and bugs in the pool, harvesting the biggest for meat and the occasional pearl.
Not all tubes were passable. Some tunnels were labeled with just the word 'death'. Much of the cave system was off-limits to us, for all would trust an ancestor who made such a mark, as it denoted a great sacrifice. My hand brushed the carvings with reverence. Many of the tunnels that would have put an end to my progenitors would be within reach for me. I looked defiantly at the marked paths, wanting to prove them wrong.
Baraam and Caravis found me studying the map on the wall. We ourselves had added many lines and tunnels to the complex drawing. To do so was an honor. I had discovered six rooms. I ran my finger along my path on the map until I found it, following the long trail. Almost a year ago, after a twenty-three-minute hold, I was spit into a chamber, almost dead, coughing up water. It was the farthest anyone had gone, and for that, I was rewarded. When I looked around, there was a vast pool and a great crack in the sky through which light shone. The most beautiful coral and creatures covered the pool's floor - the Big Fish and the cave oysters were plentiful. I would only need a few. I had been collecting cave pearls for many years, and many of these shellfish certainly carried the rare and lucrative large specimens for which my people were revered.
Only I could reach the spot alive, for no one else would survive the long hold. It was in that tunnel that Medocea took me.
Join us, Kiri Shima.
I felt her around me.
They grow.
I dared not answer. I felt the channel open; it would be so easy to reply, nothing but a thought in her direction, and she would hear.
I prepared my spears for the hunt.
Baraam and I had considered how best to approach as Caravis and the other divers went on ahead with weapons. We were diving Kirishima's Line: a bountiful, recently discovered, but challenging series of tunnels. The hunters who came with me were among the strongest and prepared for what we might encounter, but it was obvious their motivations were the purported bounty of the newly discovered chambers.
I treaded water as I prepared myself. Between Baraam and me, I was the first to go through, as I was faster and had a longer bottom time. Closing my eyes, I breathed, holding it at the height of my inhale for a spell, then exhaling sharply to enrich my blood for the long hold. It was a practice more than religion: a ceremony of survival. My hand found the carving in its customary position on the pool's ledge. I had three tunnels before I arrived at the Meridian Room. I knew this sequence well. With a deep inhale, I sank, holding a rock to help me reach the bottom with ease. I stared into a tunnel about five feet in diameter. The suction of the incoming tide pulled me toward its threshold. I dropped the stone and became weightless, kicking towards the abyss.
I pointed my toes and used my feet as rudders as I whipped through the drain, pulled forward at an increasing pace. My hands were in front of me, outstretched, redirecting my body to change course, avoiding collision with the sides of the ever-changing rock pipe.
The tunnels were of a singular sensation. In the near absence of input, I clung to the tiniest bits of information. In the darkness, it was easy to get lost in thoughts of family and friends. At notable moments of the pipe, abrupt turns, or spots where I could use my feet to gain momentum, I returned to the same memories repeatedly.
When you first enter, your mind is lost in chaos. As the darkness becomes predictable and orderly, so do you, and you establish patterns of peaceful thoughts. You are a pebble in a great wave. When the water has passed, the pebble remains unaffected. That is what we taught our children when they learned to dive: there is no emergency, only what should be dealt with quickly and calmly.
And so, I did not stop at the first room, nor at the second, where I felt a friend in the pipe as I passed. These lava tubes were order to me - for the first time since Medocea took me, my thoughts fell in line. In the second room, I found the hunting party waiting for the diver I'd passed. I did not surface, but gestured to inform them I was moving on. In the third tube, the suction jerked me forward, and I accelerated. Having held my breath for over ten minutes, I raced toward my destination and my next gulp of air. My body began to spasm, warning me it was about halfway to death - I had about ten more minutes until I fainted. I routinely did these three routes together; I knew it would take me sixteen minutes.
On one of the last turns, my hand fell upon something slick: a Big Fish, that felt like it was moving in the wrong direction. A familiarity struck me, then a high-pitched, piercing noise. I lost all sense of orientation. I exhaled, a huge mistake, as I slammed into a wall of the rock pipe, tumbling forward out of control, taking in water as I was spit roughly into the entry tidepool of the Meridian Room.
I rushed to the surface, eager to get to solid ground. I met the earth, coughing up seawater on my knees. Nothing traveled against the current in the tunnels or used echolocation in the cave, except Medocea, yet what I had just encountered was certainly a fish. I looked down into the deep tide pool to see my spear floating midway in the water column. We made them neutrally buoyant they wouldn't be lost. Thousands of bright poison corals of every color backlit my weapon and strained my eyes as I fetched it. The water was humming strangely as I found my way back to solid ground.
The Meridian Room was my favorite place. Above were the stars, below, the dramatic display of a luminous coral reef, unmatched anywhere I had seen, contained in orderly tide pools. In the moonlight, Meridian was the ultimate display of color. The room was only reachable at peak tide, during the big moon. The Parasa were uncertain how the spire worked. During the surge, the water blasted through the tunnels and climbed the tower into the vast pools in the Meridian Room, located high up in the volcano's caldera. There were many ponds, more than a dozen, all glowing with radiant beauty and covering a massive area. In three adjacent pools was a round coral I'd never seen, perfectly organized, ovular, fifty per pool in perfect rows, cultivated, glowing in the moonlight, the tendrils extended and eating of the tides' microscopic bounty.
I remembered the stones Medocea removed from me. They were identical; these were just bigger.
Mother. I looked around.
As I waited for Baraam and my tribe, I harvested oysters and collected a few pearls. I ate the flesh as I went. They were plentiful and good fuel for whatever came next. I drank from the shallow puddles high up in rock pockets on the bowl-like walls of the Meridian Room - rainwater collected from the open sky. It was the only known source of freshwater in the cave system, so I had my fill.
I was nervous; Baraam and the others should have been there already. Breathing up, I prepared my body for diving. I wondered about the Big Fish I passed in the tube, about the sound that disoriented me so, if the voice I kept hearing could be Medocea - if she had been talking to me, or if it was my imagination. Maybe Baraam and the others were dead, or lying in one of Medocea's luxurious beds. The women certainly weren't safe, though I didn't know what she'd do to the men.
The pearls I had collected were beautiful red marbles, and I examined them in the natural light. I carried with me a small fortune. Financially, the hunt was already a success many times over - we just needed to survive.
Once the tide reversed, I knew my party would not be coming until the next cycle. Six hours.
Mother. Mother.
It was a sensation more than words, coming from one of the pools. I was helpless to its allure.
I walked to the tidal pool and looked down into oblivion.
Come. The voice grew, coming from so many directions. Come.
I stared down into the unknown path.
In its traditional spot, I carved the symbol for death with a sharp rock I found on the ground, as was the custom of my people. I was responsible for returning and updating it; if I couldn't, the sign would remain accurate. I did not know what would happen, and that made me smile.
I took a deep breath and dove in, plunging into the unknown. If I died in the tunnel, the mark and my lines would be my contribution to my people. Down, down, I whipped, but not for long, maybe three minutes, before I faced four paths I could take. I chose the farthest to the right and continued for another thirteen minutes before dumping into a massive chamber. I immediately knew I was in a main room. It was rich with light-emitting moss and poison coral that eagerly drank up the light to power their fluorescent display. It twinkled all over the water, the teams of coral and moss that lit the room like candles of fat, in distances that were impossible to distinguish in the twilight pool.
I went to the surface and found only about two feet of headroom. Familiar with the scenario, I found my breath and felt the direction I came from still pushing at me. I reached around me with my hands. Stalactites. I floated on my back and worked up my breath. I lay in peace for a long while, resting. Eventually, I opened my eyes, and the ceiling was further away: the room was draining. I smiled and flipped myself over and dove, spear in hand, toward the bottom. It was about thirty feet deep.
In the cave's blackness, the smallest light was the greatest aid. Besides the moss, a few fish, too, had grown accustomed to life in these caverns. Like patrolmen out for marauders, the fish marched around the room with their tiny torches, drawing their prey to them. While the water exchange was violent, particularly during the great tide, which happened about four times a year, the pools were isolated and safe, and I was but another fish, the great predator of this place, or so I thought, before I met Medocea. I lazily surfaced and dove repeatedly, staying down for but three minutes at a time, keeping a casual pace to my search of the massive new chamber, resting. Now and again, I'd stop to pull at an oyster, take it to the surface and beat it against an exposed rock, tucking away any pearls I found in a leather pouch and the flesh in my belly. I could hunt the fish with my spear, though I preferred my fish's flesh fired, while the oysters I swallowed raw and alive. They were delicious, a truly unique delicacy, unlike any from the open sea. Like many of the creatures, the cave oysters were isolated to this place. From the tiniest of wrigglies to the coral, I had only ever seen these creatures here; even the Big Fish were not like the grouper of the reef, similar enough to be related, but with large eyes adapted to the perpetual night.
I felt then a great conflict in the pool, a disturbance in the water - the flailing of death that I knew too well. I tucked behind a pillar and directed my attention to the area of conflict. It was so rare in this place to see any predation besides our own. A grouper would take meals, but it was quick and clean. This was not. I held out my spear as the water stilled. The water vibrated strangely, obscuring my senses. Something was in there with me. A shark, maybe, but how? I had plenty of breath left, and my mind was still, cautiously observing.
Not a shark. A catfish, maybe, or something of the sort, a snake-like fish, it moved differently than a shark, without the 'womp' of a tailfin. Whatever was in the water was no fourteen-foot ancient beast of the bottom; it was nearer to my size and I was likely outside its consideration for food. It emitted a vibration I'd never sensed, more sophisticated than the great whales. As it grew in intensity, I lost sense of movement in the water, and was left with only my eyes to scan my surroundings.
The genuine risk, as with Big Fish, was the creature's potentially territorial nature. One who lived in a cave system like this was bound to be protective of its home. It was a sentiment to which the Parasa were sympathetic.
A second vibration caught my attention. Then a third. Then countless. They were circling in concert, narrowing down my location and taking long sweeps before doubling back and getting slightly closer.
I scrambled to leave the water, crawling up the pillar that was my refuge, desperate to make landfall. Slowly, I pulled myself upward and dared to avert my eyes to glance at my pursuer.
The pack of predators came ever closer. The shape I could almost make out: about four feet long, wide like a tadpole, perhaps amphibious in its earliest stages, adolescent frogs of a massive size. I reached the surface and scrambled to climb out of the charged water, but not before I caught sight of the fish.
Its head was human, and its big black eyes were like hers.
I screamed as I clambered onto the rock, abandoning my spear and scaling the column to its round, flat platform five feet above the surface. Below me, the water roiled, a school of huge predators in a feeding frenzy. I curled into a ball and watched. I waited, evaluating my options; for when the water rose, I would meet this swarm.
I sat for a long while as the water churned, pieces of Big Fish and lantern guards briefly appearing before being recaptured by human-like mouths with fangs like barracuda, ripping at flesh rather than biting, rolling and tugging, jerking with each chomp.
The room rang out with high-pitched squeals that threatened to destroy my ears. I covered my head in pain, but still I was the pebble in the tsunami, unchanged and calm, as the serpent creatures slithered at the surface, sliding and slipping in constantly evolving knots of shiny, reflective flesh.
I did not know how many there were, though I knew there were enough, and I would have to face them as the water rose. Escape would be my only chance for survival. I dove into the water after my spear. Suddenly, I felt something pop and break within me as the intense sound subsided, though I could still feel its vibrations. I was dizzy, suddenly ill, lost in the black. I vomited oysters into the water.
In front of me shot a face, snapping for the predigested meal, inches from me - eyes like Medocea's, big and dark, staring back, understanding. It was a familiar presence. They came as if to investigate and then retreated into the black. It happened repeatedly, recognition in the silence as the creatures cycloned around me, catching my gaze, seeing me. Welcoming me. They were excited, I realized.
And then they were gone. Silence all around.
I went to the middle depths to retrieve my spear. The water was murky with blood and silt. Nothing survived but the moss, coral, and me. I returned to dry land. My head throbbed. My ears felt wrong. I shook my head and felt a sloshing. I realized then that when I left the water, the silence remained.
I sank to my knees, looked at my hands, and shouted, but couldn't hear. I clapped my hands together in front of my face. Nothing. Again. Nothing.
I screamed and screamed; the silence never left.
After a time, I had no choice but to return to the Meridian Room. Neither revenge nor redemption was worth it to face the school I had just met. I needed to get back to my family before the fish did, or Medocea. I made my way to the area of the room where the gate to Meridian would soon reverse its flow, allowing me to return to find Baraam and the others.
I knew they were them, the stones that came from my body that night. I had given birth to whatever those fish were - I recognized their personalities; there were so many, like a pattern in my mind I could never forget.
I felt the tide turn, the moments of stillness where the sea's resolve came into question, as it waffled back and forth, and then relented. The sump pulled me into the siphon of the tower, as the colossal formation took another breath, up and up towards Meridian. The junctions came quickly; my orientation and equilibrium were not what they were when I entered the tower. In the farthest left corridor, I slammed into the wall and spun, barely making the next middle junction, clipping a corner once more with my shoulder, up and out, into the light of the poison coral. I erupted from the water and dragged myself onto dry land. I coughed and hacked and cried out from the pain, but heard nothing. Baraam was on me suddenly, his hands on my shoulders. He was talking - I couldn't hear him. He shouted. There was nothing but a persistent ringing. I looked beyond Baraam. There were a dozen divers, including Caravis. I saw the blood that came from their ears. I pointed to my own and shook my head.
A full net. You brought so many. A good mother.
I did something I hadn't done in the months before: I answered.
Can you hear me?
We can. The voices replied, I sensed now, there were three. We're here, Kiri Shima. Do not run.
"Baraam, we need to leave." I couldn't hear myself speak. My brother looked down at me with questioning eyes. "They're coming. We all need to leave," I tried to say, but I couldn't tell if I was speaking correctly.
Peace, Mother. You are worth saving.
I pushed Baraam off me and stood up. He stood slowly, and his eyes went still.
"We need to leave!" I shouted at them. They were unmoving statues, soldiers of stone with their spears. Their gaze fell not on me, but beyond. Looking into Baraam's eyes, I understood. I took the spear from his hand; with an inhale, I turned and whipped the projectile toward the object of Baraam's attention. It collided with the nude woman, who was climbing out of the tidal pool. She was pushed back, punctured, bleeding red into the little lake. Baraam became conscious for a moment. I couldn't understand what he said. I wanted so badly to hear him. Around us, activity exploded as our hunting party came to life.
Medocea's sisters emerged from nearby pools. My head exploded with pain, and I couldn't stay standing. The ringing attacked my brain, and my knees hit the ground hard. A few of the hunters got a throw off, but I couldn't look to see if any landed; I was in too much pain.
Baraam's eyes found my own.
"I'm sorry," I tried to say. He touched my face, but went still again. The tide pools around me churned with my voracious offspring.
The injured one was Medocea; I knew. My focus was drawn to her, my control so fleeting. I closed my eyes tightly, yet they forced themselves open, despite my efforts. The ringing consumed my consciousness. Upon seeing her, I lost all ability to function, unable to move or speak. I could only bear witness.
The three women walked through my petrified tribe, meeting no resistance, and easily tipped them, one by one, into the tide pools, which boiled with my vicious progeny. Medocea looked into my eyes as she lightly shoved Baraam, taking his place before me. I watched my brother disappear under a writhing mess of shiny, slimy flesh. The surrounding water turned red and thick. My eyes burrowed into Medocea's as the three women stood in front of me.
Peace, mother. Your children are healthy and well-fed, Medocea spoke directly into my mind. There is pride to take in this family, too, huntress. Medocea checked her wound and wobbled. The poison was setting in; she looked at me in surprise as I wondered if she would survive.
Yet, from her words, I found peace of the most dubious kind: indifference. As I lost consciousness, so did she. My face hit the ground in time to see what was left of Caravis surface one last time before Medocea fell in front of me, obscuring the view. I longed for the white sleeping skins of the cave.
You are worthy, Mother, were her last words to me as both our eyes grew heavy.
Together, we dove headfirst into the darkness.
A second vibration caught my attention. Then a third. Then countless. They were circling in concert, narrowing down my location and taking long sweeps before doubling back and getting slightly closer.
I scrambled to leave the water, crawling up the pillar that was my refuge, desperate to make landfall. Slowly, I pulled myself upward and dared to avert my eyes to glance at my pursuer.
The pack of predators came ever closer. The shape I could almost make out: about four feet long, wide like a tadpole, perhaps amphibious in its earliest stages, adolescent frogs of a massive size. I reached the surface and scrambled to climb out of the charged water, but not before I caught sight of the fish.
Its head was human, and its big black eyes were like hers.
I screamed as I clambered onto the rock, abandoning my spear and scaling the column to its round, flat platform five feet above the surface. Below me, the water roiled, a school of huge predators in a feeding frenzy. I curled into a ball and watched. I waited, evaluating my options; for when the water rose, I would meet this swarm.
I sat for a long while as the water churned, pieces of Big Fish and lantern guards briefly appearing before being recaptured by human-like mouths with fangs like barracuda, ripping at flesh rather than biting, rolling and tugging, jerking with each chomp.
The room rang out with high-pitched squeals that threatened to destroy my ears. I covered my head in pain, but still I was the pebble in the tsunami, unchanged and calm, as the serpent creatures slithered at the surface, sliding and slipping in constantly evolving knots of shiny, reflective flesh.
I did not know how many there were, though I knew there were enough, and I would have to face them as the water rose. Escape would be my only chance for survival. I dove into the water after my spear. Suddenly, I felt something pop and break within me as the intense sound subsided, though I could still feel its vibrations. I was dizzy, suddenly ill, lost in the black. I vomited oysters into the water.
In front of me shot a face, snapping for the predigested meal, inches from me - eyes like Medocea's, big and dark, staring back, understanding. It was a familiar presence. They came as if to investigate and then retreated into the black. It happened repeatedly, recognition in the silence as the creatures cycloned around me, catching my gaze, seeing me. Welcoming me. They were excited, I realized.
And then they were gone. Silence all around.
I went to the middle depths to retrieve my spear. The water was murky with blood and silt. Nothing survived but the moss, coral, and me. I returned to dry land. My head throbbed. My ears felt wrong. I shook my head and felt a sloshing. I realized then that when I left the water, the silence remained.
I sank to my knees, looked at my hands, and shouted, but couldn't hear. I clapped my hands together in front of my face. Nothing. Again. Nothing.
I screamed and screamed; the silence never left.
After a time, I had no choice but to return to the Meridian Room. Neither revenge nor redemption was worth it to face the school I had just met. I needed to get back to my family before the fish did, or Medocea. I made my way to the area of the room where the gate to Meridian would soon reverse its flow, allowing me to return to find Baraam and the others.
I knew they were them, the stones that came from my body that night. I had given birth to whatever those fish were - I recognized their personalities; there were so many, like a pattern in my mind I could never forget.
I felt the tide turn, the moments of stillness where the sea's resolve came into question, as it waffled back and forth, and then relented. The sump pulled me into the siphon of the tower, as the colossal formation took another breath, up and up towards Meridian. The junctions came quickly; my orientation and equilibrium were not what they were when I entered the tower. In the farthest left corridor, I slammed into the wall and spun, barely making the next middle junction, clipping a corner once more with my shoulder, up and out, into the light of the poison coral. I erupted from the water and dragged myself onto dry land. I coughed and hacked and cried out from the pain, but heard nothing. Baraam was on me suddenly, his hands on my shoulders. He was talking - I couldn't hear him. He shouted. There was nothing but a persistent ringing. I looked beyond Baraam. There were a dozen divers, including Caravis. I saw the blood that came from their ears. I pointed to my own and shook my head.
A full net. You brought so many. A good mother.
I did something I hadn't done in the months before: I answered.
Can you hear me?
We can. The voices replied, I sensed now, there were three. We're here, Kiri Shima. Do not run.
"Baraam, we need to leave." I couldn't hear myself speak. My brother looked down at me with questioning eyes. "They're coming. We all need to leave," I tried to say, but I couldn't tell if I was speaking correctly.
Peace, Mother. You are worth saving.
I pushed Baraam off me and stood up. He stood slowly, and his eyes went still.
"We need to leave!" I shouted at them. They were unmoving statues, soldiers of stone with their spears. Their gaze fell not on me, but beyond. Looking into Baraam's eyes, I understood. I took the spear from his hand; with an inhale, I turned and whipped the projectile toward the object of Baraam's attention. It collided with the nude woman, who was climbing out of the tidal pool. She was pushed back, punctured, bleeding red into the little lake. Baraam became conscious for a moment. I couldn't understand what he said. I wanted so badly to hear him. Around us, activity exploded as our hunting party came to life.
Medocea's sisters emerged from nearby pools. My head exploded with pain, and I couldn't stay standing. The ringing attacked my brain, and my knees hit the ground hard. A few of the hunters got a throw off, but I couldn't look to see if any landed; I was in too much pain.
Baraam's eyes found my own.
"I'm sorry," I tried to say. He touched my face, but went still again. The tide pools around me churned with my voracious offspring.
The injured one was Medocea; I knew. My focus was drawn to her, my control so fleeting. I closed my eyes tightly, yet they forced themselves open, despite my efforts. The ringing consumed my consciousness. Upon seeing her, I lost all ability to function, unable to move or speak. I could only bear witness.
The three women walked through my petrified tribe, meeting no resistance, and easily tipped them, one by one, into the tide pools, which boiled with my vicious progeny. Medocea looked into my eyes as she lightly shoved Baraam, taking his place before me. I watched my brother disappear under a writhing mess of shiny, slimy flesh. The surrounding water turned red and thick. My eyes burrowed into Medocea's as the three women stood in front of me.
Peace, mother. Your children are healthy and well-fed, Medocea spoke directly into my mind. There is pride to take in this family, too, huntress. Medocea checked her wound and wobbled. The poison was setting in; she looked at me in surprise as I wondered if she would survive.
Yet, from her words, I found peace of the most dubious kind: indifference. As I lost consciousness, so did she. My face hit the ground in time to see what was left of Caravis surface one last time before Medocea fell in front of me, obscuring the view. I longed for the white sleeping skins of the cave.
You are worthy, Mother, were her last words to me as both our eyes grew heavy.
Together, we dove headfirst into the darkness.
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