PoraBora

Chapter Five

Night on the ocean skipped moonlight over the water's surface. Its light remained solid where its shape was disturbed. The girl, Pe, was asleep on the main hull of the ship, canvas pulled over her and held up by thin and strong twine that Pora didn't know. A slight breeze pushed over them, ruffling Tota's feathers. Pora had washed him the best he could throughout the day. The bird had regained much of his color, but he was still sluggish and sick with oil. Pora had fed him, and given him water, and would continue to do so until he was back to health. He couldn't give up. Not with Tota.

Yet Tota caused him the least worry. He had not seen Bora, or Umba, or Oua, or most of his other turtles even before the black skies had come, but that didn't mean they had gotten clear of it. And Yuppa. Pora's eyes became wet at even the thought of his old friend. Surely if Pora and Tota had made it, Yuppa had a chance too?

He wished he could know. Wished he could be there for his turtles.

Even now he looked for them, slipping regularly into the water while holding onto the boat's gunnel. But there was nothing to be seen in the blue, and less now that it was finished in black.

But it was black as it was supposed to be. Not like the tidal wave that had come from nowhere and--

He didn't want to think about it. What it had done. His fields had taken storms before. His hill had been hit by waves so big they drenched him in his crab. His banana trees had been toppled, leaving him waiting for the roots to bring back life from the dirt.

But the oil would have destroyed everything. If it didn't tear through the fields outright, it would have left them toxic to kill his turtles. If it didn't topple his home and hill, it would have coated them in thick odors and have made him sick to breathe it.

He was sick now. He could feel it inside of him, in his lungs, in his stomach, bubbling in unsatisfying burps through his body. He wanted to retch. To throw it all out. He wanted to gargle saltwater until he was cleaned all the way through.

He could still feel it in his hair, just as he could still feel it on his fingers, no matter how much he tried to wash them in the girl's water bucket.

And she cooked it into their food. She burned it in her boat. She kept the sour smell with her wherever she went, wherever she sailed without a sail. He couldn't avoid it. He tried to breathe water off the bow just so that he could taste something else.

It didn't go well.

Now Pora didn't know where he was. He didn't know where Pe was going. He didn't even know what she was saying. He had asked. She had answered something indiscernible. At first, he had thought it was his own language. He recognized some of the words. Oil, island. She seemed to understand him too, sometimes. He had thought he was just out of practice. He hadn't spoken to another person in two years, after all. Bora, Umba, and Tota were practice, but they never responded in the language of his island home.

No, he'd decided after hours of trying. She spoke something else entirely.

It didn't make anything easier.

She seemed to know where she was, at least. She seemed to know her course. She had also saved him.

The last thing he remembered before waking up was when the first wave hit him. He pieced together the rest. He had been floating, and she had found him.

Pora puttered around the boat. It was larger than any from his island. He wondered why one person would have such a large vessel. Why one person would need it. He wondered why she was on the water in the first place. She was too old to be just setting off. She should have been at a field, protecting a reef.