Olari
Legacy Name: Olari

Part 1

The pod of whales moved cautiously through water still agitated from a recent storm. Ociano called his family to close the circle, his rich hum familiar to even his youngest calf. Olari ignored the order, staring in wonder at the strange shapes floating above her head. She sent her mother a question with her mind.

“It is the wreckage of a ship, little one. Ships are what humans use to travel over the water but sometimes they break apart in a storm.”

Every whale knew humans had lost the ability to harmonize with Mother Earth. Those unfortunate beings could not even share thoughts with fellow land creatures. Olari noticed a new shape floating on the surface; its strange pale fins coated in a loose skin the color of a sea anemone. She aimed another questioning thought at her mother.

“Yes, Olari. That is a human bull claimed by Mother Earth. The sharks will feast on him to keep the life balance, just as they will someday sink to the floor for the crawlers to eat. It is the cycle given to all creatures by Mother so that we will appreciate the time granted us.” Oriana’s mind voice filled with sadness at her next thought. “Humans are part of the cycle too but they have forgotten their promise to Mother.” She gently brushed a fin along Olari’s flank, guiding the young calf in the direction of the nursery.

Ociano did not like his family to dwell on thoughts of humans. He sent them waves of reassurance reinforced with images of the feeding grounds. The lagoon where they feasted was a paradise where every whale could have enough to eat and the water was always perfect.

Olari blocked her father’s croon. A flash of gold on the water sent her shooting to the surface. The human calf with sunlight in his hair coughed and stirred, yanking his hand back from the cold touch of the water. Olari swam around the crate on which he floated, unable to feel even his basic emotions. There was something very faint, something that reminded her of the safety of nuzzling her mother for the pleasant warmth of fresh milk.

The mind voice of Ociano was faint but even at a distance she could feel his anger. He pictured sharks for her, ripping her small body apart because she was careless enough to leave the safety of the herd. She tried to ask if the same fate awaited the human calf but Ociano brushed the thought aside.

“Let him return to Mother, my daughter. It is a better fate than most humans deserve.”

Olari was shocked. All the whales, even gentle Oriana, were in agreement.

“But father, it was you who told me whales are peaceful creatures. We are supposed to protect all life on the ocean, no matter its form.”

Olari cowered beneath a wave of persuasion. She was very young and could not long hold out against the wishes of the herd.

“Let her go, Ociano.” Old Blue was like a shadow, following the herd and living on scraps, but when he chose to speak, every whale fell silent. His milky eyes did not focus on the pod’s leader yet there was no doubt who he addressed. “I watched humans spear my mate with a calf in her belly. There is none with more reason to hate them, but leaving this boy to die is not the will of Mother. If we succumb to the hatred of men, what distinguishes the mighty whale from the tragic human?”

He turned to Olari. “You must leave your family if you are to save this boy. You must find him a place to grow strong, for Mother has a task for him of great importance. I believe it is possible to communicate with the humans still, but training one to listen will not be an easy task. Mother will go with you, Olari. She will look after you so that you are never alone.”

Olari did her best not to listen to Oriana’s pained cries as she turned her back on her family.

Part 2

Even atop the crate, the boy weighed almost nothing. Olari swam with care, balancing her precious load while keeping an eye out for sharks.

A gentle tug compelled her to seek the island where tropical fruits grew in abundance and birds of paradise flocked to raise their chicks without fear of predators. The air above the surface was dry on her back, making her long for the cool relief of deeper waters. She focused on the boy’s heartbeat, so similar to the rhythm of the herd. For a moment she saw an image of a human cow with sunny curls and eyes the color of the ocean. The boy spoke a string of strange sounds. Was it human song? She didn’t know.

She hesitated at the place where the water grew shallow. She sensed the boy needed food and warmth, but how was she to care for him? She closed her eyes, feeling for the comforting presence of Mother. She knew the boy was important somehow but she was a very young calf who knew so little of the world. She began to sing, welcoming the strength that flowed through her veins. Her song cut off abruptly at a tingling in her fins. They lengthened, each toe slowly taking form. The water still felt good, but the air no longer bothered her. She took her first few wary steps, grunting at the strange grass which tickled her new feet.

The boy slid into a nest of ferns. He gasped, opening his eyes and stroking the leaves in wonder. His eyes were wide as he took in the land whale but he was not frightened. Somehow he knew he could trust her. Waves of gratitude washed over Olari as she covered the boy in a leafy blanket. She left the boy to sleep, gathering fruits and roots Mother named for her.

A sharp pang of hunger brought her trotting over the golden sand, her finds wrapped in an enormous palm leaf. The boy eagerly fell on the feast. When he was done, he flung his arms as wide as they would open, placing them on her massive neck. She could not understand his words yet, but the pure affection of his touch told his meaning just the same.

Part 3

The first thing she decided to teach the boy was her name. Old Blue was right. Even with a basic mind link, teaching a human was hard. His thoughts were alien, full of odd human objects and faces. She gathered that his name was Mick.

The woman with curls was constantly on his mind. She was the one who dried his tears and kissed his brow when he fell. She bought him things called toys that made him very happy. He had loved her very much until she met Goat Man. He got very annoyed when Mick asked where he kept his goats. He had no goats, but he had something called a goatee that he was very proud of. He also never stopped complaining.

“Laurie, this soup is cold. Can’t you even cook a can of soup?”

“I don’t care if you have to drive to the other side of town. If you can’t get me the right razor blades, don’t bother to buy any.”

“Can’t you keep that kid quiet for five minutes? It’s no wonder his dad got tired of the noise.”

It had been Goat Man’s idea to send him to school on the other side of the world. He claimed it was to help the boy become a good man, but Mick knew it was because Goat Man didn’t want him around.

Mick became very sad when he thought about his real father. Olari focused all her energy on the letter O from the boy’s alphabet song. She gave him the face of his mother. She thought of herself. She did this every day until at last the boy’s eyes widened with understanding.

“Olari? Your name is Olari?”

She trumpeted her delight as he laughed with pleasure.

Part 4

The boy learned to weave wraps from leaves. He climbed the tallest palms, scoring coconuts and swiping bananas with a laugh at the indignant monkeys who guarded their golden crop with great envy. They did not dare threaten the friend of the land whale who could level a nesting tree with one swing of her massive head.

It was five years after their arrival and the boy could communicate his every thought through the mind link. He spoke rarely, using words only when he was very happy or upset. Now he was excited almost beyond words.

“Human things on the beach, Olari. Like the ones you found with me!”

Olari surfaced, swallowing a mouthful of delicious kelp. From Mick she had learned the value of sampling new flavors. She even joined him for a tropical fruit feast every now and then. She sprayed him with a stream of water, earning a playful swat on the flank as they raced the length of the beach.

The crates opened easily, scattering human garments on the sand. Mick giggled, holding up a purple sundress and imagining it on Olari. She was not amused, though she did take a liking to a pile of Hawaiian shirts. When she pictured Mick in the green one printed with pineapples he eagerly put it on, strutting down the beach and doing his favorite Tarzan yell.

His foot caught on a lacy pink strip. He examined his new find as he spat out a mouthful of sand. His mother’s face was a faded memory Olari would not allow him to fully forget. She did not want him to lose all connections to the human world. His mother had worn one of these strange cloths every day on her chest. She had yelled at him once for trying to use one as a sling shot for aiming water balloons at the neighbor’s dog. Mick’s face lit in a mischievous grin.

It was a very elastic bra, capable of launching coconuts a long way down the beach, but not one made it to the sand. Olari dropped her catches at Mick’s feet. He laughed uncontrollably at seeing his dear land whale wagging her tail like a dog.

Part 5

Mick was no longer a boy. He had gone through the trials of the teenage years and emerged a strong and curious man.

He studied the shells that washed up on the shore, carving their patterns into bits of driftwood. He planned an orchard for his favorite fruits, saving himself a walk across the island when he was in the mood for a pineapple or mango. He charted the stars in his mind until he could navigate by their light alone.

Olari could feel his growing longing. It pained her to know there was something she could not give him. Sometimes when Mick was deep in sleep, she would swim out far enough to exchange greetings with the local pod. She may be the only one of her kind, but she could still speak to the whales in the language of whale song. Mick needed other humans to talk to.

When he showed her fuzzy memories of being carried to the island, she knew what he wanted. She pictured the cave where they sheltered during storms, then pictured him in the clothes he did not like to wear. He would need them to go among humans. She made him carry a bag on his back filled with good things to eat. He walked at her side to the water’s edge, his hand on her flank. He climbed onto her back as she slid into the water, raising his tanned hand in a silent farewell to the island.

Part 6

The land whale and her sandy-haired rider were an instant sensation in the human world. Mick was rushed to an observation room where he was bombarded with a confusing mess of questions. His jaw ached from too much use, a problem that never would have risen with Olari. He could sense that she was nearby but she blocked her emotions.

He had his first steak dinner at the mayor’s house and had to be shown how to use a knife and fork. He was dazzled by a blinking green light as a pretty reporter with lobster-red lips asked him to describe his life on an uncharted island. He had a marvelous time playing with the air conditioning vents in the limo that took him to meet all sorts of glamorous people. At night he was returned to his room to sleep in the uncomfortable bed that smelled of disinfectant. He would have preferred a nice bed of grass but the nurses only laughed at his suggestion.

He was reunited with his mother three days after the Coast Guard plucked him from the water. Goat Man had left her ten years back; around the time he was teaching Olari to play fetch. Her curls were all gray now and she no longer wore pretty scents. When she embraced him for the first time, the touching moment was seen live by twenty million people.

She kept the reporters from disturbing him when he fell asleep and read to him from a book of nursery rhymes he’d loved as a child. Once again she made him feel safe.

He asked for Olari. The doctors in the fancy coats pretended not to understand. Laurie was thrilled at first, believing he was remembering her name. It was not until she drew a picture on the back of a napkin that she understood.

“Your pet is so unusual Sweetie. She’s being cared for by a group of scientists that specialize in marine biology. They’ll take very good care of her and return her to the wild when they’ve finished their tests.”

They had run tests on him, sticking him with needles and asking him questions that left him stuttering. He had watched Goat Man flush dear Scaly the goldfish down the toilet, sneering and asking how anyone could get so worked up over a stupid fish.

His mind screamed a denial. His mother fainted, crumpling to the floor with wide eyes still staring at the ceiling. He rushed into the corridor, pointing one of the nurses in the direction of his room. Two went to prop his mother up as he stepped into the hall. The nurse at the visitor desk smiled as he approached, his hospital gown billowing around his lean body. He showed a preference for evening walks they liked to encourage and he never gave them trouble. Their smiles fell away as he stepped into the elevator and pressed the bright red close button.

He could not read the labels above the buttons but he had gathered enough to realize this was no ordinary hospital. He hit the button that looked like a fish, sensing that this was the floor where he would find Olari.

The door dinged, letting him out on a metal grate that hurt his bare feet. Without the many walls between them, Olari could not hide her pain. She was three tanks down, past a giant colorless squid and a sinister machine made to look like a ray.

Her skin was flaking and her eyes were dull. One leg was wrapped in a bandage that would dissolve after a few days. The food they offered was disgusting and the water was much too cold. One great eye focused on him. He could feel her love and trust even now, in this horrible place.

Her joy at seeing her boy so strong and healthy was not strong enough to hide the truth from him. She was dying.

“NO!”

He did not see the uniformed men drawn by his shout. He took no notice of the woman coming out of the elevator with a syringe, talking to him in a soothing tone as she inched closer. They were all too far away to stop him from hitting the release button on the wall.

He leaped over the glass edge, whirling helplessly down pipes that would release their contents into the ocean.

Olari opened her eyes, legs churning instinctively as she realized she was free. Mick clung to her back, cheeks bulging as he tried to preserve his precious supply of air. Despair swamped her thoughts. They were too deep. With her injured leg she could not hope to get him to the surface in time. She had failed to save the human calf. Old Blue’s faith in her had been for nothing.

“No, Olari. I understand now. My people broke the link with Mother but we’re not beyond hope. We can change. I’m going to need your help.” Though his body was weakening, Mick’s mind voice had never been stronger. Mother was speaking through him.

Olari hummed a joyful tune, the same melody that had given her legs. Her hurts were healed, the bandages dropping away. She felt she could swim the world in a day and she knew she could save Mick, but the song continued.

Mick was surrounded by golden bubbles. His lips parted in surprise, allowing them to enter his body. Two small slits grew on the sides of his neck as thin webbing stretched between his fingers and toes. He took a deep breath, his lungs welcoming the gift of filtered air.

He swam to Olari, hugging her just as he had that first night on the island. “I understand now about Mother. There will be others like us, Olari. Humans and whales who will become land whales and merfolk. Together we can heal the world.”

Mick took Olari by the hand and together they swam for the open ocean.

Profile by Ringo
Story by Pureflower