“Is it a happy place out there today, Kimona?” was a question her Lifestyle Team would often ask whenever she returned from her ocean swims.

It started months ago when Kimona came back and tried to articulate the heavy sense of dread she would get when being under the sea.

With each swim she learnt more and more about that feeling and what the cause of it was. She had developed an empathy, an emotional and spiritual connection with the water and marine ecology in which she thrives within. Whenever she was in the ocean she was psychically picking up on the wellbeing and condition of the environment. And what she was tuning into was not a positive vibe.

“The fish just seem so lethargic and not as social as they can be sometimes. It just doesn’t feel very pleasant,” she would answer occasionally.

Sometimes to Kimona, it would feel darker down there but there were also times when she would come back having encountered something that angered her. Rubbish. Things that don’t belong in the ocean.

“It’s actually been a big issue worldwide, Kim. It’s not just a Miami thing,” Adam once explained on a video chat. “It was a different time ninety years ago. The creation of plastics is posing a serious threat to the environment both on land and at sea. It takes forever to disintegrate if not disposed of in a way that can be reused, and it just gets thrown into the sea.”

This outraged Kimona. “But why are people doing that? Don’t they know what harm it’s causing?”

“It’s something that we learn about in school,” Raj said, adding, “because really in the past few decades people are now noticing the effects more.”

Adam agreed, adding, “people found fish served in restaurants or bought from the supermarkets with plastic in them because that’s what the fish are eating. Or sea birds with those can rings round their necks.”

Raj recalled seeing a video on the internet he saw of someone pulling a straw out of a turtle’s nostril, which sickened Kimona. She couldn’t bear to think of an animal being in so much pain.

The reality of the enormity of the situation was dawning on Kimona, and she learnt that the problems were a lot more than just throwing your rubbish in the ocean.

Other threats to marine environments were caused by factories and cars and other industries on land damaging the ozone layer and warming the earth up. For a time, this worry and her need to learn more about it, consumed Kimona. Sometimes she would spend hours in the ocean trying to do her bit, but the task was too mammoth, even with her strengths.

But on this one particular day, Kimona experienced first-hand a different type of threat to life under water. And it was something she vowed to take on herself.

One Sunday morning she was on the beach with Dale from her Lifestyle Team, preparing for her usual daily ocean dive. She would typically be gone for a few hours so Dale was keen to enjoy his new book on the beach and was happy to wait for her.

“…So yeah, I’m kinda excited to find out how the cliff hanger from the last book resolves itself in this one,” he was explaining. “How are you getting on with The Goblet of Fire, Kim?”

“Yeah, I’m really enjoying it at the moment. Can’t put it down at night,” she said, laying her bag down on the sand. Dale walked with Kim to the sea just so he could dip his feet in. Kimona took a step in and froze instantly.

Dale noticed her stop and asked, “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know, but something is. I feel it in the water. Something isn’t right,” she said looking deep into the surf, trying to read and make sense of this new and different sensation she was getting from the environment.

“There’s a darkness spreading in the water Dale. It kills and I feel it. It’s so strange.”

Dale spotted an object in the water just beyond where Kimona was looking. It seemed to be wanting to fly but was not getting very far.

“It might have something to do with that,” he suggested pointing in that particular direction, to show Kimona.

She spotted it too, and brought it to them at the shore line via a protective water column. Kimona was a lot better at controlling water now and could deposit her subjects with grace and finesse. If she wanted to. This time she did and the white ibis came to rest at their feet.

“Oh my God, Dale!?” Kimona cried out, kneeling to sooth the bird.

“Good grief,” he said, grabbing a towel for it.

The ibis, typically white in colour was instead a deep, slick black. Black from the sticky oil it was covered in and had been preventing it from flying.

“He’s going to need to be cleaned in fresh water,” said Dale, wrapping the squirming bird up like a burrito, its head sticking out. “I’ll take it to the lifeguard hut over there.”

“And I’m going out there to find out where it came from.”

“Put your suit on then, because the oil might cause you harm too.” Kimona agreed, pulling out her Agwé-becoming suit and putting it on. She hadn’t been out much in it since being given it and she was by no means in the public eye at this point, so to everyone else, she was just putting on a wet suit.

“I guess we’ll really see how resistant it is,” Kimona said zipping it up. “Go and sort that bird out. I’ll meet you back here.”

Agwé swam a mile out before stopping to reassess. Miami was a busy port city with ships of all varieties and sizes sailing in and out all of the time. And the boats she could see were nothing out of the ordinary. But that ibis had to have got oiled up somewhere nearby because it was struggling to fly, she reasoned to herself. She took a dive below to investigate further.

The noise and hubbub of the sea life, clearly in panic and distress, made it difficult for Agwé to make sense of what was happening.

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A school of red snapper fish rushed past her. “Hey, stop there!” she called out. The school veered back round. “There’s something wrong isn’t there?”

“A dark presence fills the water. It poisons us,” one of the red snappers explained.

“Where from?”

“Everywhere!” they all shouted, swimming off together.

Agwé’s best guess was to head in the direction they were swimming away from. She covered a lot of water in no time and the longer she swam for, the thinner the water became with a higher concentrate of oil. It was very disorientating and she had to surface for a bit. Coming for fresh air she could see the coast of Miami was now further away.

Turning to look out further at sea, roughly three miles away, was a cargo ship looking quite isolated. There were no other boats nearby so Agwé took her chances on guessing that they were behind the oil in the water. They probably have no idea it’s happening, she assumed.

The area immediately around the ship was so thick with oil. She was right- it was coming from this particular ship. Despite it being very difficult to do so, she had advanced under water, but had to come back up when she was next to the hull.

She wiped at her face and ran her fingers through her hair and was relieved to learn that there was not a drop of oil on her. Her skin seemed to be resistant to the harm of the oil. She inspected around the outside all the way round, and that is when she made her discovery.

Two wide pipes were chugging out large volumes of oil into the water. What on earth?! She was livid and repulsed, so flew herself up onto the deck in a surge of water, landing between two hung up life boats.

She stormed towards the back of the boat where the engine room and navigation deck were, climbing the stairs unnoticed. The door she flung open brought her right into the bridge. The crew of around six turned and stared in shock to see Agwé stood there.

“Stop releasing oil into the sea! Turn those hoses off!” she shouted. “Do it NOW!”

“Get out of here- you have no right to be on this boat. How did you even get here?” a man who looked like he could be in charge responded, ignoring the demands Agwé made.

She didn’t want to fight them- that’s not what this was about for her. But she still had some tricks up her sleeve.

“You’re killing the fish, the animals! Stop pumping oil into the sea!”

“Look lady, I don’t answer to you!”

Time for her first trick. A huge surge of water crashed through the windows of the bridge, throwing the crew across the floor. Agwé remained fixed to her spot. The ship’s crew picked themselves up, some putting their hands in the broken glass from the windows.

“Are you going to stop now?” she asked.

“It’s not as simple as that, you witch! I have orders. I’m just the puppet being told what to do,” the man in charge ranted.

“Who on earth would tell you to do this?!” seethed Agwé.

“I’m not going to say.”

“Then I’m not leaving.”

Time for her next trick. With all her will, the ship started to tip. She was manipulating the water to push up on the side with the oil spewing pipes and was slowly turning the boat up so that the oil couldn’t gush out into the sea.

Again, with the motion of the turning ship, the crew were thrown to floor, and those who weren’t holding onto fixed counters were sliding down. There were shouts of protest, begging for the ship to be returned to its normal position.

“I’ll keep going all the way if I don’t get my way,” threatened Agwé, who was clinging to a door frame. She was good, but she couldn’t defy gravity after all.

“Fine, fine! We’ll stop it! Just put us back down!” cried out the desperate boss man. He wasn’t being paid enough to deal with this.

Agwé eased the ship back level but there was still a big lurch as the ship settled. A relieved crew member ran to the control panel on a desk and flicked a few switches, announcing that the dumping had stopped.

“I’m going to look for myself. No one moves,” she instructed sternly.

She left the bridge through the door but stopped. The ship was surrounded by five coastguard boats and a helicopter.

“Boys, on second thoughts, you’re coming with me.”

***

“So my suit has a tracker in it?” Dale wasn’t sure if she was impressed or unsettled by the fact that there was technology capable of keeping tags on people. It was all still new to her.

“It’s for your own safety Kim, please don’t stress. All The Collective guys have them. I saw how far out you were and cross referenced it with shipping radar. I could see you were in the same spot as a ship so I just requested some back up for you.”

Dale’s job was a tough one. Sure, him and the others in the Lifestyle Team were paid for the work they did with Kimona, but due to their close proximity, they actually all became friends. Friends paid to look after her.

“Besides, it was a good job the Coastguard were there. They were able to detain the boat crew and seize the ship. They’ve even begun a clean-up operation.”

“Yes, well that is the main thing. I just can’t believe how comfortable someone was to do that to the ocean. How would they like that done in their house or garden?”

Dale shrugged. “Hopefully you’ll start to see a difference, and a much happier ocean.”

Kimona sighed. “Oh this result is just a drop in the ocean, Dale. I don’t think the ocean will ever be a happy place unless something drastically changes.”

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Coming up in The Astral Sheriff #5, ‘Persistence’...

Do’Lânqwa reflects on his new circumstances as some difficult decisions need to be made.