Pelagic 101

Before he became the respected Headmaster of The Shallows Colony School for Orphans, Oliver had been an idealistic apprentice at the very school he would one day lead. He was among the first to take up residence there and accept the full-time rigors a place for the downtrodden deserved. A school had long been needed, as mergirls often slipped through the cracks, becoming channel surfers or worse—gutterstuck, a term for those unable to swim, left to struggle on the streets alone.

The inability to swim, something so innocuous in the human world, was a great handicap among technoquatics. Even babies were waterbound, straight into the birthing pools. Oliver aimed to fix that, planning a program of rehabilitation and welfare programs, so they wouldn’t wind up on the streets.

Oliver was joined by Headmaster Callen and a team of fresh and ready teachers who wanted nothing but the best for the girls. However, they were in for a shock when word came down that funding had been slashed, before the school had even opened its doors.

“What are we supposed to do now?” one of the newer teachers asked, “we had hardly enough resources to run things beforehand. How are we even going to feed and clothe them with these cuts?”

The other teachers, Oliver included, nodded in glum agreement. It felt as though their grand experiment was over before it’d even begun.

“Is it because of the missing ones? They know full well it wasn’t out fault. It’s not fair for them to withhold funding when everyone knows they were lured out by…”

“Now hang on,” Callen said, raising a steady hand to quiet the group. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. For now, we’re fine. The funding cuts don’t go into effect until next quarter. Meanwhile, we set up the school as planned, and take it one step at a time. We’ve got students to greet, facilities to tend to. So let me worry about the finances, and you all just worry about the students. Does that sound reasonable?”

Leaving the meeting, Oliver thought they’d really lucked out. Their headmaster was the calm, collected sort a school like this required. There would always be financial issues. It was how they handled it that mattered, and Headmaster Callen was just the technoquatic for the job.

When Oliver walked in to find Callen quietly weeping, then, he froze—feeling as if he’d entered the wrong room.

He turned to leave, but Callen sniffed and waved him in. “I’m sorry, Oliver. Caught me in a moment, I’m afraid.”

“Are you alright, Headmaster?”

“I will be,”—he took a deep breath, then grabbed for some paper and blew his nose—”it’s just, well…you know how it can be. Things get to you. Things you can’t change. And you just want to make it better but it never goes easy.”

“Of course, sir.”

“Alright then, Oliver, what’d you want to see me about.”

Oliver considered whether to bring up money, decided against it, and took a seat. “I just wanted to see how you were holding up. Thought you might need an ear to bend.”

“As a matter of fact, I could use just that. And I’ve been meaning to have a conversation with you anyway, we have things we need to discuss…

* * *

Their conversation didn’t simply last the day, but turned into a series of deep talks, ranging from the welfare of the young ones in their charge, to who was controlling the purse-strings, and what those powers-that-be expected of the school, and her headmaster. All told, Callen had taken Oliver under his wing for the better part of a Pelagic Year, in order to properly prepare him for a role he'd never expected, nor particularly wanted.

But that’s why it has to be you,” Callen had said in response to any objections. “I need someone to succeed me who realizes how damaging the position can be, if the desire to play fast and loose were to come into this office for even a moment. And in the end, the girls would be the ones who would lose. That’s nothing to trifle with. The school had been through enough already, with wayward orphans having gone missing at an alarming rate, so much so that the administrators of The Shallows had put pressure on since before Oliver had arrived for a change of leadership. Though he’d only learned about that slowly, and in bits and pieces.

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* * *

When Oliver sat with his boss a final time, surveying the office that might soon be his, the "Headmaster" plaque on the desk a daunting reminder of the position he was being considered for, he still didn’t feel ready. He ran his hands along the smooth, worn desk—one of the few remaining relics from the shoretimes—as if its groovelines might reveal secrets about the job he'd soon inherit.

At only 45 pels, he was considered young for such a role. The lifecurrent of a modern technoquatic often stretched past the pelagic centurion mark, meaning younger ones often had to bide their time. But sometimes circumstances dictated change, and because of that the job was his, now—if he wanted it. Time would tell whether the elevation would be bold, or premature.

Headmaster Callen, his mentor and predecessor, was a figure as solid as the coral pillars that braced the city walls. Callen’s greying streaks and weathered skin told the story of years spent keeping this orphan school afloat, even as the ebbs and flows of politics and economics threatened to tear it apart.

“So, what’s the verdict?” Callen asked, arms crossed, his voice conveying a calm Oliver had grown accustomed to. “Are you going to dart, or do I finally get to retire?”

Oliver gave a shaky laugh. “I’ll do it. Just wish I’d known what a sinking ship we’ve been steering.”

“We’re all at the helm of sinking ships, my friend,” Callen said, his gaze drifting to the window where channel-water rippled through the glass. “In one form or another. Question is, can you keep it from going under?”

Oliver felt a gnawing pain that betrayed his lack of confidence, but he nodded positively anyway, ignoring his gut. But as the pain intensified, he realized how much more they had to discuss.

“What about the seafloor rumors? How’s that going to change things?”

The headmaster chuckled and shook his head. “Rumors are always a grain of truth away, aren’t they? That’s the way they want it though, make it so we don’t know what to think.”

Oliver looked at his mentor, curious as to what he’d say next. His boss had a way of leading up.

“They’re going to cordon off the deeper zones. Keep us away from any ‘dangerous sealife’ that might threaten our survival. Or, more to the point, our perspectives on things.”

“So it’s true? Oliver asked. “The mindreaders they captured from the chasm, and then all hell broke loose?”

Rumors of mindreaders and the chasm's depths felt like fables, but why then did every mention spark a fragment of memory, as if he too had brushed the edge of the unknown?

“Until they formed a truce. Yes. And we retreated to our familiar spaces. Oh, they’ll allow the grown Technoquatics access to limited areas out there, but we all know the rules now. We need to keep the children safe, though. The idea is to keep it from them. Let the rumors subside and fade, so that within a generation or two we’ll have no more danger of interaction with those—creatures.”

Oliver shivered. He never knew his mentor to be prejudiced, over the years, though opinions on the threat the mindreaders posed was mixed. The simple fact that encountering them could be the start of a sudden bout of forgetfulness that extended beyond the encounter itself was troubling, but at the same time, reports of their request that they be left alone made it clear they weren’t out to do damage. Still, this was a power that frightened even the most hardened of technos, that some being could simply get into their heads like that.

Still, to refer to such beings as ‘creatures’ spoke to something primal, and visceral. Oliver didn’t know Callen was such a person.

Then it struck him. “You’ve seen them, haven’t you?”

“You know,” the headmaster answered, his voice drifting, “I really couldn’t say. I seem to remember. It all seems so clear. But then, it’s as if it couldn’t have been. Like it was from another life, or…”

The words hung in the air, a story told to a group of pre-schoolers around a cooking pit, a warning of unfamiliarity. Yet from the collective memory at the same time.

It made sense. Strange things like that happened whenever rumors of encounters were brought about. People couldn’t quite recall, though they had some vague inkling.

The headmaster drew a sharp breath and looked up. “But one word still resonates in my heart from that memory—or whatever it was. One word, I got it from them. Unspoken.”

Oliver wanted to stay respectfully silent, but his curiosity needed an answer. He made as if to ask, but the headmaster stopped him.

“I’ll tell you, Oliver. But I warn you. Once you hear it, you won’t forget. And trust me, you’ll want to.”

Second guessing, Oliver wondered if he should just end the conversation. But they’d gone this far.

“Was the word the same one they told us when we were little? The one everyone was told to forget before they made us forget.

Callen nodded. “The same. You know it, then? You remember.”

"Solarian," they whispered together, bonding to each other in a sublime moment of understanding. The word, hanging in the air like an enchantment, promised wonder, but at the expense of all that was familiar.

“That, I remember,” Callen went on. “Like it was yesterday. Solarian. But the rest…”

“Like seeing a ghost?”

Callen nodded, his face pale.