Chapter Text
The sea spoke in pressure and pulse before it even learned the language of men.
Languid whistles, short clicks and snaps used to share memories, thoughts, feelings. Carried through the open waters through vibrations alone. A language older than the first vessel.
Connecting those that were lost to those that had found home. Even the strongest storms or the iciest of streams could not dispel the exchange of knowledge throughout depths man hadn’t reached yet. The songs would always ring true. Could always be heard, even if not always understood. Such was the way of the sea. Such was the only way you knew.
The cold sea water gliding past your skin like a guiding hand, parting for you and your family with mutual respect. The sun breaking through the surface and reaching as far as the depths might allow it to paint the surroundings in a beautiful, otherworldly vast blue. More saturated than the sky at the surface when you broke through momentarily to breathe. To fill your lungs before diving once more into the vast blue filled with songs that had shaped your life. Familiar tunes that guided you even where the light wouldn’t reach its long fingers. Songs you could trust wholeheartedly, that you answered with young naive glee each time. You listened. You learned. You heard the creaking of icy glaciers around you before they split and got carried by the current that you could follow or defy. For the ocean was yours as much as you belonged to it.
Guiding songs made sure your voice would ring as true as theirs. That the clicks and whistles would portray exactly what you wished. That the tunes would be heard as far as you desired. As far as you needed. One voice clearer than the rest. A scarred tail bumping you around when needed. Injuries not from violence but simply from time. Influencing not only you but all those around you with a gentleness that gave respite in even the harshest conditions. Sharing the wisdom of the deep in songs older than man. Teaching hands showed you how to move most efficiently. How to attack, defend, hunt and protect. How to move with the masses around you as if you were one.
The beautiful symphony that was once the only thing filling the surroundings got disrupted by a creaking not made by ice, a howling not made by creatures. A deep aching sound that closed in too fast. That was too foreign and new to be identified in time.
Then came the spears, before the first warning clicks carried through the ocean. Barbed metal breaking through the surface with greater speed than any predator of the deep. Yanked up by ropes after being deployed, with or without catch. The once true blue tainted by blood that should not have been spilled as such. Beautiful songs turning into a cacophony of clicks and whistles too loud and too plentiful to be fully understood. But the urgency it portrayed was clear, and yet it didn't come soon enough. A whirlwind of pale white, deep black and red.
The deepest voice stopped reverberating through the depths. Just a dull tune sang above the surface, heard clearly when lungs needed to be filled again despite the threat. For drowning in the ocean's embrace was just as lethal. The carrier of the voice returned but the songs did not and would never again. The clear waters turned completely opaque. A coppery tang mixed with the usual salty taste in a way that was too potent to be natural. The voices disappeared one by one, their songs burning up faster than the sea would usually allow. The attack of the harpoons relentless.
New shadows loomed over the surface, breaking it quickly. Though the shadows remained unseen in the tainted waters. Snatching, stealing, biting into skin thick enough to withstand arctic waters. Hands reaching out, tugging on metal and rope helplessly as the sea slowly turned quiet. Save for the few overwhelmed panicked cries that were far from the melodies they should be.
A splash.
Constricting forces.
A drag.
Then another splash and the drag stopped. But so did everything else.
A blunt hit instead of barbed piercing force splitting flesh.
Perhaps it was luck or something bigger. But when sensations return, it isn’t screams and creaks that greet you. No endless depths of true or tainted blue. It’s the screech of a gull and drying winds biting your skin. It is sharp pain that keeps you from moving. Jagged rocks that press into your ribs and arms too much. Your whole body felt heavier than normal, too heavy to even shift away from the pain.
And a shadow blocking out the sun. A shadow singing in a foreign tone that didn’t hold the melodic qualities you were used to. It was rough, weak even. Scratchy like cliffs rubbing together. But when you call in the only way you know, the shadow answers in its own way, One you can only presume doesn’t mean immediate danger.
But the rocks stop digging into your skin, then the ropes and hooks fall away and even the dry winds stop attacking your skin like they blamed you for everything.
When your fluke scraped uselessly against rock you understood that the sea was not safe anymore. And perhaps it never will be.