Lyra gazes at the sun. Ripples of water wash over her upward turned open eye, the amber corpulence of the sun filling her pupil. Vapors rise from the surface as tendrils stretch out from the sun’s great body, vying to touch one another. She dreams of joining those vapours and being enveloped by him.
Lara, her mother, nudges her from below. Her grandmother, Mara, is swimming off ahead. She pulls away from her fixation and joins them as they sweep down, away from the light.
Rana, her uncle, comes into view from below, and Lara hums to him. Lara often whispers forlornly of another whale to Rana, supposedly her father. Lyra doesn’t believe her. She knows who her father is. She looks back up at him, burning his presence throughout the sky. He is a wonderful father, the only one she needs. If only she could be so grossly incandescent.
Lara warns her not to spend so much time with her eye above the water. She says that though one must take breath from that world, it is not theirs. She says the light burns their skin, that it will damage her. Lyra has noticed a strange prickling heat on her skin after her times communing with him.
As they descend, sharks swim by, their tails flicking, their jaws tight with hunger. The pod’s flank closes, Rana wafts them with his powerful tail, and they come no closer. Mara clicks that the world has cursed them with sharp teeth and small mouths. The whales sing of their gratitude for their great bellies and fine teeth.
They continue down into the gloom, seeking shoals of plankton. Mara says there are ancient songs of a time when the ocean was bottomless, when one could swim so deep that the sun’s reach was gone completely. Lyra shudders at the thought.
In Lyra’s world, the bottom is far, but reachable. Her family swims to the ocean floor sometimes to graze on the tiny creatures down there. Purple beams of lights still grace them, reminding them of his wonderful presence.
Mara sings songs of a time when lanky pink cousins swarmed the world, on floating coral. They say they left long ago in great streaks across the sky. Now the only thing left in the sky is Lyra’s father, and the soft stars that peek through when he is sleeping.
At that time, the dry place was filled with noise and things and movement. Now it is dead.
The whales are finding less food nowadays in the tropics. Where once there was bounty, hunger looms. Mara calls them to swim north, into colder waters in search of food. Mara sings of a time when the water in these places was so cold it turned white and floated. Lyra is not sure she believes her. Besides, Lyra loves the warmth of her world. Even the tepid waters up here are cold for her.
Rana is happy. He delights in showing them the relics he remembers from his youth. The vast tubes that stretch along the seabed. He says the land-dwellers made them, perhaps needed to sing to each other across the ocean. The vast grey structures of sharp coral that the land cousins once piloted, now embraced by the fish in their afterlife.
A year passes, and the current shift ever more. The teeming life of the north of a few months ago runs low. They head south again, seeking the blessing of the currents. Lara and Rana grumble in worried voices, but Lyra is simply happy to feel the water warm as they pass south, and to spend more time with her father.
The currents have blessed them, and the bounty is good. Lara’s tail is taut however. She knows that with all bounties, many creatures come.
From the depths, the sharks arrive, their eyes straining from the emptiness of the bellies. Lyra and her family take off, but the sharks see they are weakened from their travels. As Lara races ahead, Mara falls behind. Lyra turns to look, but Rana pushes her onward from behind. Mara sings her old song, failing to hide the fear in her voice, and her once booming clicks grow weaker. They swim further, and then stop, realising the sharks have halted in their pursuit. Rana turns with a frantic tail flick, but Lara pushes him onwards. Lyra hears the dying song of their pod growing quieter through the expanse, and sings back, knowing this is their final contact.
Lara pushes Rana and Lyra onwards, knowing the danger that remains present, and Lyra begins to join them, before noticing the full glory of her father above her. The sun is closer now, its vast opulence filling the sky. Lyra’s fear ebbs as she basks in this new glow. She swims up, until her upward turned eye surfaces above the water, her skin starting to burn. Columns of steam drift from the ocean, reaching up and up. If only Lyra could follow them and truly know the heat of her father’s presence. Lyra gazes into the sun.
