Tsaheylu

Payakan

I see the colour drain from Lo'ak's face when he reaches Payakan, his hopeless screams for us to come and help him useless as we were already there. Neteyam shoots in front of everyone and jumps onto the Tulkun, doing his best to try and dislodge the tracker with his brother. Whatever bad blood they had between them was clearly being pushed to one side as they helped one another the best that they could.

Tsireya is the next to get to Payakan, shouting obscenities at Lo'ak but helping him nonetheless. Part of me wondered what would have happened if Lo'ak hadn't have tried to come after him, but I can't focus on that. There's no point.

Neteyam offers me a quick hand up when I reach them, Kiri and Tuk now beside us as well while we all try to pull the tracker from Payakan's fin. "Here!" One of the boys down in the water shouts, tossing up a rope from god knows where. "We'll try to pull it out from down here!" They shout, and Neteyam immediately gets to wrapping the rope around the red tracker.

"Lo'ak, call dad now!" He orders, and though I see Lo'ak go to protest, the looks from Tsireya, Kiri and myself tell him to listen. He steps away from the group and presses the black device in his ear, talking animatedly as we all shout between us. The four of us tie the rope to the device and knot it off, but then Lo'ak comes back over in worry.

"Uh, guys. We have company!" He shouts, his eyes glued to the large boats that were now heading in our direction.

Fuck.

"Quick, pull!" I shout, diverting our attention back to the ever growing situation before us. Rotxo and Aonung start to swim with their Ilu, pulling the rope tight as we do out best from our end to pull it away. It feels as if it won't budge, and the hope in my body fires away as we start to pull harder, paying no attention to Payakan's cries of pain.

We have to get this out.

The boats are slowly closing in on us.

The device budges a little under the force, and a small smile arises on all of our faces. "Push together, ready?!" Neteyam orders, then counts down before we all push with all of our might.

To our surprise, the device comes flying out into the water below and we all let out a chorus of sighs. But it wasn't over yet. Smaller boats were being deployed from the larger boats and I finally understood the weight of our situation.

We can't go back to the village.

"We can't go back!" I cry, looking into Neteyam's eyes that seemed to not buckle under the pressure. He leaps down into the water and grabs the device before clambering onto his Ilu's back. "I'll lead them away. Do your best to lose them, then go back to the village!" He shouts up to us, and everyone else jumps into action except Lo'ak and I. My eyes are glued to Neteyam as he looked straight back at me, an unreadable expression on his face.

"Ai'ina go! It's not safe for you!" He pleads, my heart sinking in my chest. "It's not safe for you either!" I shout back, the tears welling now. "I'll be fine! Go!" He tries to order, but I can't move. "Ai'ina go!" He shouts again, a little more forceful this time but it doesn't change the fact that I am frozen in fear.

Without another word, Lo'ak grabs my arm and pushes me into the water below, tumbling down beside me as we meet the warm water.

My arms struggle to swim over to Mevaya as I realise the small boats are right on our tails, but my Ilu sees my struggle and rushes to me. I hoist myself onto his back and make the Tsaheylu, and before I can even tell him to move we have delved down into the water with the others.

The fear propells us through the water as we dart in and out of the coral reefs below, and when we start to think we have gotten a headstart, things start being thrown into the water with us. They were thick, and black, and something about them told me if I wasn't careful to swim away that they would eventually explode. Then the explosions come from above the water, and I realise that there isn't a ray of hope that was left in me that we would all make it out of this.