by Jenn Reese
“Shhh,” said Dash. “Do not interrupt a word-weaver.”
“He’s not making up the words,” she said. “He’s reading them. It’s not the same.”
“Perhaps not to you, but —”
“‘Dearest Sarah,’” Hoku repeated, louder this time. When Dash and Aluna settled down, he continued:
“You say you’ve made up your mind, but I can’t let you go without trying one last time to persuade you to stay. I will start with this: We do have a future. We have a future both as a race of people on a struggling planet, and as a family.
Even now, in my own lab, Ratliff and Nazarian are close to the cure. Not only can they stop the spread of Super-Z but they can make sure nothing like this ever happens to humanity again. They want to keep testing, but I know, in my heart, that it works, and that it will save us all. In fact, we’ll be stronger than ever before.
If only you were willing to give me more time. . . . Ah, but I know you. When your mind is made up, you are a bulldog. (There won’t be bulldogs in your new underwater colony, will there? No bulldogs, no fireplaces, no long, slow hikes at dusk. . . . Can you really give up all those things? Will your new race of Kampii ever love you as much as I do?)
I’ve enclosed two items with this letter. Do you remember the photo? We’d taken Tomias to his first soccer game. He ate two hot dogs and cheered for both teams. He was so healthy then, and we had so many plans.
The second item you will also recognize. It will pain you to keep it, knowing that I carved it with my own two hands. But you will not be able to throw it away, knowing how much Tomias loved it. Knowing how he put it under his pillow at night and insisted on bringing it everywhere he went. Do you remember that night in San Diego when we spent nearly four hours scouring the beach for it?
Tomias is gone, but we can have that happiness again. We can have another child, or two more, or even six! I can guarantee they’ll be safe. I can guarantee that they’ll live forever. I’m not giving you empty promises. Not anymore. Not ever again. I can make miracles now.
I can, I will, do anything for you, Sarah. Just don’t leave me.
With more than an ocean of love,
Karl”
Hoku pulled the photograph out of the box. Three faces smiled up at him, presumably Sarah Jennings, Karl Strand, and their son, Tomias. Sarah was tall and brown skinned, a much younger version of the sculpture on her monument in the Kampii city. Her crinkled hair was pulled back but not quite contained in a bushy ponytail behind her head. The grinning boy was about six years old and held a spotted black-and-white ball in his hands.
Karl had a shock of brown hair, nicely mussed, and wore the biggest glasses Hoku had ever seen. The man stood slightly shorter than Sarah and had sand-colored skin. One of his arms was around Sarah’s waist, and the other rested on his son’s shoulder. They stood on a field of green grass, with a blue cloud-spotted sky behind them. It was hard to imagine a more perfect vision of Above World family bliss.
Hoku picked up the wooden dolphin. It fit nicely in his hands. Although it had been crudely carved, certain places along its nose and dorsal fin had been worn smooth. He ran his thumb along the wood, imagining the child Tomias doing the same thing centuries ago.
Hoku closed his eyes for a moment and felt his mother’s arms around him. The sounds of dying Deepfell faded into the warm memory. He could smell her hair, could hear the sound of her voice when she was trying to scold him about something she didn’t really think was too bad. He could picture her as she talked, trying to keep her face stern, trying to keep the smile from her lips. He didn’t always make her proud, but she always loved him. Always, always. And he had left her without even saying good-bye.
“Hoku!” Aluna said.
He snapped his eyes open and the real world came crashing in around him like a tidal wave.
“What else is in there?” she asked. “Weapons? Secrets? Anything we can use?”
He shook his head. “No,” he said, dropping the dolphin back into the box. “Nothing except the dreams of dead people.”
ALUNA TOOK A STEP toward him. “Hoku —”
He shoved the water safe into her hands. “I’m going for a walk,” he said, afraid that if he didn’t get away he might do something humiliating and unforgivable, like burst into tears.
He turned his back and headed off before she could stop him. Zorro started to follow him, but Hoku shook his head and said, “Zorro, no.” The raccoon sat back on his haunches immediately, eyes pulsing green. Hoku kept walking.
He wound his way along the edge of the cave wall, his brain a jumble. He wanted nothing more than to be back in his family’s nest with a big net of fresh clams, planning his next experiment and listening to his parents talk about their day.
A strange squeak invaded his thoughts. He looked around for its source and saw a wounded Deepfell lying on the sand. She squeaked again, louder, and looked straight at him. He headed for her pallet, careful not to kick sand in her face as he walked.
She couldn’t have been more than a few years older than he was. Most of her torso was wrapped in cloth spotted with blood. Even for a gray-skinned monster, she looked pale and frightened.
“Akkikoki,” she squeaked. “Okok kikka kikka.”
He shook his head. “I don’t understand.”
She reached out a webbed hand, and he took it in his own. Her flesh was smooth and rubbery. It should have been firm and slick with water, but here in the cave, it was dry and soft. Almost frail. He never thought he’d say that about a Deepfell.
He dropped to his knees and stared at the wounded girl. Her eyes were wide and black, set farther apart on her face than his — probably so she could see in more directions while she swam. She didn’t try talking again. She sat there and held his hand. He watched her breathe. Her body jerked with each inhalation, as if even the act of drawing in air was painful to her.
He pictured his mother in the Deepfell’s place, pain contorting the lines around her eyes and mouth. He pictured Calli, her huge smile replaced by a grimace as she tried to be brave for him. He pictured Aluna, always so strong, barely able to keep her grip on his hand.
He dropped his head and cried.
The Deepfell girl did nothing. She just lay there, breathing slowly, her hand in his hand. Then, ever so softly, she started to whistle. The sound was high-pitched and faint, the melody haunting.
The Deepfell was singing to him.
He cried while she sang. All the danger and running and fear — it had all been building up inside him. The letter from Karl had made him sad. Sad for Karl and for Sarah Jennings and for their son, Tomias. He was worried about Calli, out there in the Above World all alone, because of him. He was scared, not just for himself, but for everyone he loved.
None of these things were terrible by themselves, but together, all at once? Crushing, as if he’d swum too far into deep ocean.
Eventually his tears stopped and only the Deepfell’s song remained. It was beautiful and melancholy, but there was a note at the end of each verse that lifted his spirits. A single note that offered hope. How could the whole song be redeemed by such a small moment?
He thought about Aluna and Dash, Calli and Zorro. They were just like that: small notes in a great big song of despair. The Above World felt vast and cruel and hopeless, but maybe their actions could change the tenor of the world’s song. Maybe they were those little notes of hope.
When the Deepfell finished her song, Hoku squeezed her hand gently.
“Thank you,” he said, looking into one of her deep, dark eyes. He’d never meant the words more.
Grandma Nani had always said that the Deepfell gave up their humanity to live in the deep ocean. Nani was wrong.
The Deepfell let go of his hand and smiled.
Thinking about his grandma sparked a memory. When she’d given him the water safe, she’d said, Maybe it holds her memories of the Above World. Maybe it holds far more.
The space inside the box should have h
eld much more than just a letter and a picture and a wooden dolphin. What if those items were decoys? The whole water safe seemed designed to look sentimental: the silvery mermaid on the lid, the letter, the photo. Grandma Nani said Sarah Jennings was smart. Well, he was smart, too.
He waved good-bye to the wounded Deepfell girl and sprinted back to the others.
WHEN HOKU GOT BACK to the command center, he ignored Aluna and Dash and even Zorro and headed straight for the water safe.
“Are you okay?” Aluna asked. “Did something happen?”
He punched in the combination, popped open the box, and removed the letter, photo, and dolphin. Now that it was empty, he could easily see that the container part extended only halfway through the box’s depth. He ran his fingertip slowly along the smooth plastic bottom, feeling for anything unusual.
Then he found it. A small depression at the back, no bigger than a few grains of sand. A button? He pulled out an Extra Ear, straightened one of the wires, and poked the end into the hole.
A small square flap in the bottom of the box swung open, revealing a hidden compartment. He pulled out a thin black rectangle, no bigger than the palm of his hand and thick as a finger. He looked up at Aluna and Dash and grinned.
“I examined that box thoroughly,” Dash said. “How did you do that?”
“Because he’s Hoku,” Aluna replied, as if that explained everything. “What is it?”
“A piece of really old tech,” Hoku said. “Wait, I bet there’s a way to turn it on.”
He found a series of buttons along one edge and pressed them in succession. As soon as he hit the second, the tiny video screen filled with the glowing, spinning symbol of the Kampii seahorse. A moment later, it was replaced by the face of a familiar dark-skinned woman in a small domed room full of air. He recognized her high cheekbones and strong, tired eyes immediately.
Sarah Jennings. Moving as if she were still alive.
“Amazing,” Aluna whispered, and crowded closer. Hoku felt Dash on his other side and angled the device so they could both see.
On the device, Sarah looked over her shoulder, at something they couldn’t see, then forward again. If he didn’t know better, he’d have thought she was looking right at them.
“Hello, Kampii descendant, whoever you may be,” Sarah said. Her accent twisted the words strangely, but she spoke with a slow, stately grace that helped him keep up. “I don’t have much time, so I will make this brief: I fear that my compatriots, the other men and women who will become the ruling council of our new society, have a different view of the world from mine.”
She looked down at something in her hand. He could just make out the dorsal fin of a small wooden dolphin.
“There were bound to be differing opinions,” she said. “I recruited strong men and women for this great experiment. It is the rare individual willing to give up everything he or she has — all material, emotional, and cultural ties to the world — and begin a new life, with a new identity, somewhere as dangerous and unforgiving as under the sea.”
Aluna snorted.
Sarah Jennings continued, “We need to hide, to stay safe, while the world is so broken. On that point, we are all agreed. But for how long? My fellow leaders would have us hide forever. They would have the City of Shifting Tides become our home, now and for all time. The coral reef would be forever the limits of our world.”
She leaned forward, her brown eyes intense. “The world is broken, but it will not always remain so. Eventually, it will be ready for us again. We have a duty — a responsibility — to help it heal. The world needs us, and we need each other. We must not hide forever.”
Sarah looked over her shoulder again. When she looked back at them through the screen, she tucked a rebellious twist of graying black hair behind her ear. Her voice came in whispers. “This outpost, Seahorse Alpha, houses information about the world — facts and figures and scientific data, but also the stories of its people. Art, literature, languages, cultures, TV archives, movies . . . every last bit of digital information I have been able to find and download and encrypt in the last few months. Let it be your window to the past . . . not so you repeat the mistakes we have made, but so that you learn from them.”
She pulled the mermaid box into view. “Because the people in power are the least likely to encourage change, I will give this recording and this box to my assistant, Christopher, for safekeeping. He’s smart and resourceful and has been a good, loyal friend. I have filled the remaining space on this device with information that HydroTek does not want me to have: passwords, formulas, schematics, and the like. They will be useless to you without the computers to interpret them, but I feel better knowing that someone else will have them.”
“And so farewell, descendant of mine,” Sarah Jennings said with a sad smile. “I wish you swift currents and Godspeed. And remember: we are not alone. We were not meant to be alone.” She reached forward, and the screen fell to blackness.
He didn’t understand everything Sarah Jennings had said, but he understood enough. Aluna had been right about the outpost holding secrets. The Elders had been wrong — so, so wrong — about what Sarah Jennings wanted for her people. But best of all, formulas! Schematics! Passwords! All hidden in an artifact so small he could shove it in a pocket.
“I need to see it again,” Aluna said. Quiet tears dripped down her cheeks. “Please.”
Dash stood quietly beside them, and said only, “A wondrous woman. She must come from a strong bloodline.”
A loud screech echoed through the cave, interrupting the spell Sarah Jennings had cast over them. Every Deepfell turned his or her head toward the sound, listening.
Eekikee pulled himself to the clearing while the alarm still blared. He had to gulp air before he could coax his throat to speak. “Cap-turrre,” he said finally. He leveraged himself onto his tail and held out his hand fin. A small pearled hair stick sat in his palm. Hoku had seen dozens like it worn by the Kampii women back home. In fact, Aluna’s sister —
“Daphine!” Aluna cried.
“No,” Hoku said quickly. “It could be anyone’s.”
“It’s hers. It’s my sister’s,” Aluna said. She snatched the hair stick from the prince and pointed to one of the shells. Her finger shook. “I borrowed it last year and broke it.”
Hoku squinted and saw a faint line where the shell had been snapped in half and glued back together with sticky jellyfish goo. “No,” he said. “It can’t be.”
Dash muttered a curse.
“What happened to her?” Aluna said, her voice cracking. “She was probably looking for me. This is all my fault. Did they kill her? Tell me!”
The prince looked surprised at her outburst. “No keeeel,” he said. He motioned to his neck and said, “Slaaave.”
The words hung in the air. Hoku had never seen Aluna both crying and ready to rip something’s heart out at the same time. Her fist closed around the jewelry. He could see her gritting her teeth, trying to calm herself down enough to speak.
“I’m going after her,” she said finally, her voice low and scary.
Hoku shuddered. She looked just like her father.
“But we have no army and no plan,” Dash said. “Your death will accomplish nothing.”
“I don’t need a plan,” Aluna said. “I’ve always trusted my instincts, and I’m trusting them now. There’s no time to squabble like Elders, discussing plans and never actually doing anything. I need to go. Now. I have to save Daphine, or I have to die trying.”
“Then let us go with you,” Hoku said. “Me and Dash and Zorro, we can help you! And maybe Calli —”
“No,” she said. “Daphine wouldn’t have been captured if it weren’t for me. I couldn’t bear it if you got captured, too. You have to stay safe, Hoku. Don’t you see?” She grabbed his arm and pointed to the video device in his hand. “You’re the one who has to save us. Sarah Jennings herself just told you so. And I can’t protect you when I’m trying to protect my sister.”
>
“But what if —?” Dash said.
“I said no,” Aluna shouted. “Do whatever you want, but you’re not coming with me. I catch either of you following me, and . . . and you know what I can do.”
She glared at Dash, then turned and glared at Hoku, daring either of them to disobey. Hoku wanted to, but she scared him. Aluna-his-best-friend would never hurt him, no matter what. But the Aluna in front of him now? He didn’t know her at all.
Aluna turned to the prince. “Thank you for saving us from the Upgraders,” she said. “I think our people make better allies than enemies. I hope we can meet as friends again after all of this is over.”
The prince bowed.
Aluna smiled grimly. “Can one of your people show me how to get inside the dome?”
Eekikee squeaked and a Deepfell dragged itself over. The prince called some orders, and the Deepfell took off toward the water.
“Stay here and be safe,” Aluna said to Hoku and Dash, half ordering them, and half begging. Then the steel returned to her eyes, and she raced after her guide.
As Hoku watched her go, his hands curled into fists. Again? She was leaving him again, after everything they’d been through? Dash still had a broken arm, Calli was out there somewhere on her own, probably afraid and in danger, the Kampii still needed to be saved, and he . . . he was supposed to be her best friend.
No. He was done taking orders.
Hoku turned back to Dash, Zorro, and the prince. “If we’re going after her, we’ll need a plan.”
ALUNA FORCED HERSELF to breathe slowly, despite the pounding in her chest. What was happening to Daphine? Were Fathom and his Upgraders hurting her? Was she really a slave? It was hard to think about anything else, and she needed to focus. A good hunter stays relaxed and ready, Anadar always said. Panic was making her stupid.
In the distance, the domed city of HydroTek floated on the water, looking like a giant gleaming jellyfish. Inside the huge translucent cap, buildings in shimmering silver twisted and flowed to amazing heights. She couldn’t make out any details, even when she and the Deepfell crested the water for a better look. Below water level, pipes and machinery and long, thin buildings swayed and churned like a mass of tendrils. She had no doubt that, just like a real jellyfish, those tendrils could sting.