Vuela

Chapter 5

They spend a couple more days at Celia's house as she makes the phone calls to find a crew and captain to join on this extremely well-worth quest. The girls use this opportunity to get a new passport slate for Vuela since the fire destroyed her old one. As long as the girl has her identification card, which has been spared since that's been hidden in her satchel, that's all she needs to get an updated slate. Once Vuela has her information in her possession, Celia can apply for a crew and an exploration cruiser.

She makes contact with her laboratory coworkers for recommendations on treasure hunting crews before calling the Sea Explorations Bureau for final settlements. Unfortunately, there are not many of those who stay in belief of the San Martín tale after their teenage years, especially after centuries of passing the story down from generation to generation.

The story of San Martín to those who study literature has been believed to be based on a real pirate, but lack of information has only transformed the real life event into a children's tale. While some believe that there is a trove out there due to the little recovery of treasure that the police found at the time, others think it's nothing but a legend.

While Celia is busy with the contacts, Max makes do with temporary job searching on his friend's computers, giving himself less time to spend with the others in the house. Vuela doesn't mind because she sits in Celia's film library, watching lecture films about anything wide open ocean related. She learns about the currents, the different types of species that roam in the waters enroute to the Isle of San Martín, and how water reactions can detect a storm. The more films she watches, the more it rots Vuela's brain as well. By the third day, she barely can remember what science stuff she just witnessed, and she bugs Celia to see if she has more interesting films to watch instead.

Celia gives Vuela her password for her entertainment collection to give the girl more time to spend. "Why don't you watch some Hassey Buckle or something?"

"Isn't that a baby show?" Vuela grumbles. For all she knows, that series is about an adventurer woman who sails to jungle islands and escapes death every single time in the most kid-friendly ways possible. Hassey Buckle has a tri-colored eagle as a sidekick who can speak multiple languages in order to get by. How Vuela remembers that is a mystery since she hasn't seen the show since she was four years old.

"It wasn't forty years ago."

"How do you know that?"

"My uncle guest-starred in a few episodes. Look him up. Parrish Q. Rathbone."

Vuela researches what Celia is talking about and comes to the discovery that a live version of the show exists back before even Celia's conception. The show is way more gritty and violent, and it makes Vuela squirm after the first ten minutes of the first episode.

"Celia! Never again will I touch that! Where's that movie about that place called Kansas?"

While Celia is on the phone one night, which she has been all day, the most phone calls she's made, Vuela finds a copy of the San Martín book in Celia's library and reads it from front cover to back cover for research. She takes note of the book's every detail, starting from how San Martín invades Atlantica Point's treasury to how San Martín supposedly stored his loot "in the center of the machine." Unsure of how it relates to the map she's going to be using, a refresher can probably be just as helpful.

She lets the narration audio play as she sits next to her sleeping brother, who has stopped listening after the first read through. Looking over at Maxime, she can't help but remember how excited the both of them were as they would reenact the legend together as kids. Oh, all the times that Max would pin her to the bed as his win since he has the strength to play Rodrigo San Martín. The last time the siblings ever listened to the San Martín story was when their dad was still alive and healthy enough to read along as the narrator spoke. Sebastian Hawkins had the best San Martín impression Vuela ever heard. Whenever she opens the book, from when she reads on her own and at present, the voice she hears coming out of the pages' speakers is her father's.