Songs of Thalassa

by Brian Tissot

  Sage tried desperately to pull Dina away, shouting, “Help, Milo, Moshe! Help!” But she knew they were probably too far away, her voice drowned out by the pelting rain.

  Georgia screamed at the top of her lungs as she hit the creature. “Goddamn you, let go!” She picked up a huge rock and brought it down on the creature’s head over and over. “Get the fuck away from us. Let her go, damn you!”

  In the middle of the pounding and screaming, the creature paused, looked at Georgia, then scrambled into the water with Dina firmly gripped in its tail, carrying Sage along as she held onto Dina’s arms with all her strength. Georgia jumped over and grabbed Sage’s legs as she slid into the raging brown river. For what felt like an eternity they went back and forth on the river’s edge: the creature pulling the girls down, Georgia dragging them back up the slippery river edge, with Sage’s head occasionally emerging out of the water to grab a breath.

  Gradually, Sage began to run out of air, and her grip on Dina weakened until she finally slipped away. Georgia fell back, and Sage sat up on the river bank screaming, “No, Dina, no!”

  Sage started to jump into the raging torrent, but Georgia held her back. “There’s nothing you can do!” She fought to escape her arms, then they collapsed on the ground together, tears running down their faces.

  “Goddammit, not Dina!” Sage screamed out. “She’s the only family I have left.” Georgia dragged her away from the river, and they sat down as Sage sobbed and pounded the ground. “Not Dina!”

  Sage didn’t know how long they sat there before Georgia wiped her face and pulled her to her feet. Sage couldn’t stop staring at the muddy scene with large pools of blood in drag marks near the river, shaking her head.

  “Come on, we’ve got to find the guys,” Georgia said softly.

  Leaning on each other in shock and grief, they headed back up the valley. Above the red lichen line, they found Milo and Moshe near the entrance to a cave.

  “What the hell happened?” Milo asked. “We’ve been waiting here for hours and…hey, where’s Dina?”

  “She’s…gone,” Georgia said, a hitch in her voice. “Stay away from the river. We came across one of those horrible creatures down there, and it…it took Dina.” She slid along the cave wall to sit on the mossy ground, then leaned her head back and closed her eyes. “It’s like a strange mix of crab and squid, a bizarre chimera.”

  “Oh shit,” Milo said.

  Moshe put his huge arms around Sage, who was still stunned by the sudden loss of her close friend and mentor. She squeezed her arms across her chest and swayed under the weight of it all. “Damn, I should have been more careful! The video was a warning, but I didn’t pay attention. It’s all my fucking fault.”

  As more tears spilled down her face, Sage turned and looked at the island, barely visible through the mists and light rain. She remembered how exciting it was to see Dina surfing after she thought everyone was dead. She recalled all their amazing times together, both the grueling preparations and the great surf victories. But most of all she remembered her steady presence and support. Now she was gone. A huge part of her life—her professional surfing days with Dina—had disappeared, leaving her feeling even more empty. Dina had her back and had protected and guided her on Thalassa, to the point of ignoring her ambitions and career. Then, through the haze of sadness, a memory of her monstrous Colossus tube on Kekoa emerged in Sage’s head. I wouldn’t have caught that wave without you, Dina. When I get back, I’m gonna show that wave to the world and tell them about you.

  Looking out at the sunset as it briefly peaked through the clouds, Sage tried to smile at her memory and feel her enduring love. “Aloha, Dina,” she said, as tears flooded her face.

  Chapter 25.

  Ruins

  Unable to sleep, Sage spent much of the night watching the orange glows of lava menacingly advanced down the valleys toward them. Gusts of wind whipped up the valley, carrying the smell of sulfur in the air. The earthquakes were growing in their intensity. When dawn broke, revealing a cold gray morning with rain flooding the mouth of the cave, she awoke from a brief sleep feeling exhausted, sad, and frighteningly angry. Damn it, Dina! How could you leave me?

  Once again somebody close to her had disappeared. And although she knew it was beyond Dina’s control—it was my fault!—she couldn’t help but feel abandoned again, losing the last one with connections to her life as a child. Dina had been an inspiration since her youth: the model big-wave surfer, a mentor, and a close friend. She had been someone to look up to, which had her wondering how much more reckless she might have been without Dina’s reassuring support and guidance. Like her father, she had thought Dina was invincible, seemingly immune from the normal physics of the universe. I can’t believe she survived so many big-wave challenges in her life only to die as a meal for some wretched creature.

  Her anger grew to include Milo, and she seethed at his secrets, his lies, his self-centeredness. Sure, he had pulled strings in Cutten and sweet-talked her into coming, but now she needed to go home and tell everyone the truth. To tell everyone how people had died to feed his ego; to feed her ego. The hell with whatever it was I was supposed to do. Sorry, Tutu, all I want now is to leave this awful place.

  She sat up and saw Milo and Moshe huddled at the mouth of the cave, speaking in hushed voices with occasional glances back toward her. Again, more scheming, and now that Dina was gone she felt vulnerable. She clenched her jaw at the sight of them.

  Georgia, once her worst critic and now a close friend, came over and hugged her. “How are you doing? Sleep OK?”

  Sage managed a weak smile, delighted at her support and affection—something she had never imagined after they first met. “OK, I guess. It’s still hard to believe what happened. She was the strongest woman I knew, and that thing just grabbed her like a…a…” She closed her eyes in disbelief.

  Milo walked toward them. “Good, you’re up. Let’s get the hell out of here before something else happens. Can you show us where you saw that plateau near the river? The tide is out now but will be back midday, so we should get moving.”

  Sage nodded in silence and dragged her aching body up off the cold, wet floor as the group emerged from the cave into the relentless pouring rain. Will this shit ever end? Staying away from the river, they shuffled carefully down the valley. As they walked, they saw several caves belching smoke, and the ground shook, occasionally knocking them down. Georgia explained that the eruptions would likely continue.

  Instead of the awe and respect Sage had felt days before, the planet’s growing violence and rosy glow of lava showing through the mist now just added to her misery. What else can this fucking planet throw at me? Raging tides, torrential rain, earthquakes, lava, black soot, hot rocks, a burning moon, and now you’ve killed my best friend. Fuck Thalassa!

  As they approached the area where Dina died, she avoided looking at the river and instead scanned the area downslope like she had the day before, quickly recognizing the curiously shaped bumps in the landscape once again. She pointed at the area, and Milo ran down the valley with Moshe close behind. They began pushing sediment and lichens away from one unusually high mound.

  At first she thought his sudden enthusiasm was bizarre, until she realized how badly he wanted to go home and be the world-famous surfer. He didn’t care about the people that died. He wanted to upload that video. Yeah, she had forgotten about that part of their mission. Looking back, it all seems so petty now. But obviously, it’s still important to him and, I guess, to me. She tried to remember the deep serenity she felt on her giant tube ride, but her anger quickly swept the thought away. Why all the secrecy? She knew she was missing something.

  As Milo dug through the muck, slugs and bugs were flying everywhere. He uncovered something hard and metallic, which Sage realized was part of the wreckage of the Proteus, perhaps one of the thrusters.

  “I’ve got part of an e
ngine here!” he shouted.

  “Oh my god, Milo!” said Georgia while looking at the object. “You’re right. We need something with a graphene battery, anything will work, like an emergency beacon or an HD-powered flashlight. Find the main cabin.”

  Everyone began scrambling around, the idea of going home driving them on as they frantically uncovered every bump in sight in the pounding rain. Sage ran over to a small square mound, while everyone else began uncovering something long that lay closer to the river.

  Georgia was the first to find something else. “I think we have the main fuselage here, but it’s collapsed and eroded away. I’m not surprised: volcanic gases are highly acidic and have dissolved most of the metal.”

  Sage was excited at their discoveries and quickly pushed away the lichens, slugs, and mud on the mound before her, pulling back as a large bug nearly hit her in the face. A small square box emerged from the muck with a NASA emblem. It was an emergency flashlight coated with thick resin, and it appeared largely intact. Overjoyed at the sight of something her father had touched, she realized the significance of her discovery.

  “I’ve got something!” she said, and everyone came running over as she cleaned it up. Moshe, dripping with mud, towered over her to partially block the rain.

  Georgia grabbed the flashlight and turned it on. “It still works!” She opened the back, revealing a long round battery. After looking at it for a few seconds, she smiled and raised her arm in celebration. “Yes! This will work! It’s the wrong shape for the remote, but it’s the right voltage and has enough power, so I’m sure I can rig something up.”

  The sound of water rushing up the valley caught Sage’s attention. With the cloud cover they had forgotten about Hina, and she figured it must have been approaching perigee with Thalassa soon. Then she counted the days and when she last saw Lona and did a quick mental calculation. It was between Procyon and Thalassa, so the forces of the two moons would combine to create a big tide.

  One of Byron’s lectures popped into her head: When we’re there the white dwarf will be in periastron with Procyon. The two stars will be at their closest distance in 40 years! They were all lining up: Lona, Hina, and the white dwarf. With no time to explain, she grew serious as she thought of the consequences for their escape. “There’s a big tide coming. Let’s get this done.”

  Georgia swung into action. “OK, I still need a few inches of threaded circuit wire, some insulation tape, and ideally some needle-nose pliers to make this work. Everyone start looking!”

  As they searched amid the ruins, the rain slackened, and Procyon broke through the clouds, bathing them in warm sunlight. But their respite was brief as a short but intense earthquake knocked them all to the ground. Sage got back on her feet and faced the sunlight with her eyes closed, imagining she was back in Hawaii. The sulfur smell reminded her of Kīlauea and Mauna Loa—the volcanoes on the Big Island—and her excitement grew at the thought of going home.

  A few minutes later they had some tape but no wire, and the rising tide began to spill onto the edge of their site. Moshe pulled out a flat piece of debris from the collapsed fuselage that turned out to be a badly degraded circuit board with wires sticking out. “I have some wire!”

  Georgia came running over. “That’ll work. And I can make do with the tools we have.”

  Milo was frantically looking around with fear in his eyes. “Either way we’re out of time and need to get to higher ground. This tide’s higher than anything we’ve seen; it’s passing the red lichens. All these ruins will be underwater in minutes.”

  “Let’s get the fuck out of here,” Sage said. “We should move higher up the valley.”

  “But we have to find a place to land the Duke,” replied Milo.

  Sage scanned the area but saw few good options for a vessel that size on the rugged valleys that bisected the area. The flat coastal plain was all underwater. The only place that might work was a large plateau two ridges over. But it looked difficult to access, and she could see orange glows advancing toward it. Milo pointed it out, and there were immediate objections to his choice. Even Moshe shook his head.

  “That’s crazy, Milo,” said Sage. “It looks high enough, but the water may surround it in a few minutes, and we don’t know how high this tide will go.”

  “Plus,” Georgia interjected, “we’d be trapped between the tide and the lava. Not a good choice. Let’s wait until we find a better place. Even if it takes a few days, we’ve got a remote now, so we’re set.”

  Milo jeered back. “Unless you have a better idea, we need to make a decision and fast. This place is getting more unstable by the minute, and I don’t want to wait another day, or even another hour, to find out what happens next!”

  Sage looked at Georgia, who shrugged. They all wanted to go home. “OK,” Sage said, “since there doesn’t seem to be a better idea at the moment, let’s go for it.”

  Chapter 26.

  Syzygy

  As Sage scaled the slick, steep slopes of the ridges toward the plateau, she slipped and fell while being chased by the ocean water surging up behind her. Upslope, she saw the orange glow of magma moving down the valleys on both sides. Even more terrifying, as they scaled the final ridge to the plateau, she saw the water flood in and surround the landing area, effectively creating an island. Milo’s plan had better work, she thought, or we’ll all be swept away.

  As she joined everyone on the plateau, Georgia began frantically working on the Duke’s remote as the red-brown water surged around them, 20 feet below the cliff edge. Sage turned to look toward the offshore islands in the vast blue-brown sea and witnessed an unforgettable sight.

  Procyon peaked through the clouds, casting bright rays of light onto the ocean’s surface. Between the clouds, she could see both moons, close to each other, moving toward the sun. Water filled the horizon as far as she could see except for the tops of the larger islands, which were now tiny bits of rock jutting out of a vast sea and dotting the horizon in both directions. The island they had been on, their reunion island, was completely submerged.

  Her thoughts drifted to the Nesoi, Melia and Maka, and their wonderful time together. Although Sage wanted to go home, she reflected on the affection she felt toward Melia’s family and the safety of being in their ‘ohana. In many ways, it was like her family in Hawaii, which she now missed more than anything. She felt sadness around leaving these magnificent creatures and their warm embrace and marveled at how they could survive on such a violent world.

  Deep in thought, she was pulled back to reality when she heard Milo talking about the Nesoi—her Nesoi. “…and grab one from the beach. If not, we’ll find their cave with the submersible. Let’s target a small one; it’ll be easier to transport.”

  Sage stomped over, her rage exploding. “What the hell are you talking about? You can’t possibly bring one of the Nesoi back to Earth. Are you frigging crazy? They’re not yours to take. They belong here. You’ll kill them!”

  “Get real, Sage!” Milo shouted back, his nostrils flaring. “How do you think we’re paying for all of this? Did you think surfing was the only thing we’re here for? Science? No, of course not! I told you this was a commercial enterprise, but you didn’t listen. We need everything we can get to make this profitable, and the goddamn seals will be a big hit in Cutten’s oceanarium. Not to mention the bacterial cultures we found. We’ll be mining this planet for decades! We’re all going to be rich, including you! And famous. Just wait until the video gets out! We surfed the largest waves ever! Have you forgotten about that?”

  “No, but…,” she replied, her voice stuttering. “You just can’t…take a Nesoi, it’s wrong.”

  “Would you two shut up so I can concentrate?” Georgia shouted. Using duct tape, she bound the wired battery to the remote then flipped a switch, and a red light on the remote flashed on. “It’s on, it’s working.” Then a green light blinked back. “And
the ship is responding!”

  Milo yanked the remote out of her hands. “Good, I’m calling down the Duke’s surface vessel so we can get the hell out of here.” As he pressed the remote return button, several other green lights began blinking. “OK, it’s heading down to our signal. It’ll be here within the hour.”

  “What were you all screaming about?” Georgia asked.

  Sage was visibly shaking. “Milo plans to capture a few Nesoi to take back to Earth. He’s also coming back—or at least Cutten is—to mine the planet for everything. What a fucking joke of an expedition! So much for surfing, exploring new planets, and discovering new life forms! It was all a scam.”

  “But don’t you get it?” Milo said, shaking his open hands. “That’s how it works. With the funds from those seals, which I’m sure will be very popular, plus the patents on whatever bacterial sequences we discover, you can do all the scientific research you want.”

  “Yeah, just like on Earth,” Sage said, her anger rising with every word. She echoed the words of her auntie Kēhau: “Rape, pillage, destroy the planet. All in the name of progress and science so you and your buddies can live in luxury. Earth can keep its industrial engines burning so it can conquer the galaxy. I do get it, and it’s the same old story, over and over. And it’s not happening here, no way.” Although she knew she should hold her tongue until they got back home, her anger broke through. “I’ll fight you every step of the way, Milo. Back on Earth I have allies, people that support me, and my family. And for the last time, they are not fucking seals!”

  “Sage is right, Milo” Georgia chimed in. “We can’t do that here. Look at what they’ve done to Mars. Some of those Martian cities feel—and worse—look like mini-LAs. We’ll never know if there was an indigenous microbial community on Mars because human carelessness destroyed it. And we’re starting to do the same thing on Proxima. When will it end? This place is special. Really special. Study it? Of course. But not at the expense of destroying it in the process. I think we have learned that doesn’t work.”