Until Kai Durin.
Until Green Sun.
They welcomed him, loved him, accepted him as being as loyal a citizen of The Lagos as any native-born Hokki. For them, the crusade to preserve the stability and legacy of The Lagos rose above genetic distinctions. They did what the government and seamasters would not official y sanction: the cleaning out of il egal “immos.” Ryllen trained,
learned how the immo transit market worked, and helped track down and snare these interlopers, most of whom arrived from the continent spouting dangerous Freelander dogma.
None of it would have happened without Kai.
The rescuer. The soldier. The lover.
Ryllen never asked why Kai snatched him from the streets and gave him a home, beyond the ulterior angle to mold a new recruit.
Nor did he resist Kai’s advances after Ryl en became a member of Green Sun.
It wasn’t love – at least not from Ryllen’s view – but it was tender and passionate, and at times a repayment of unspoken debt.
Instinct told Ryllen it wouldn’t last, that Kai was a long bridge to another journey, but he’d best not hurry to reach the far shore. He wasn’t yet seventeen. Enjoy the comfort, love the new family, stay within the narrows.
This life made sense to Ryllen, which is why Mother and his siblings would never have approved. Sense dictated honoring the family name within the construct of Pinchon society, even if that name had been diminished by four years of social refinery.
“This is beautiful,” Ryllen said from the deck of the Quantum Majesty, a Sonning Class deep-sea trawling ship which was docking at Quay 95 of the Port of Pinchon. Ryllen absorbed the spectacle of the mile-long isthmus on a cloud-free midday. “Growing up, I never appreciated al we achieved in The Lagos.”
Kai, who pul ed hard on his pipe and exhaled white poltash smoke, threw an arm over Ryllen.
“Not surprising,” he said. “You grew up in Haansu. Kilometers away but might as wel be another island. This port builds their estates and fil s their accounts with mil ions of Dims, but they only know it in principle. People in those families don’t work the port or learn the seas.”
Ryllen knew better, but contradicting Kai served no purpose.
Ships of al manner, from the tal -masted Barrier Class now three hundred years old to the sleeker Gnalix cruisers with binding fields to transport their catch, fil ed half the quays. Crews scurried busily among the drone cargo loaders, and giant Kohlna fish – the prize of
the ocean – were conveyed in live pools to the meat processors lining the center of the isthmus. Scrams, rifters, and transports buzzed past the quays in a steady stream. The high season began in the West Hoonan Sea; soon the year’s biggest Kohlna would arrive in port – each beast more than eight hundred pounds.
“Thank you for this,” Ryl en said. “It’s been the greatest time of my life. I miss the open sea already.”
“I wanted you to experience what we’re fighting for. We can’t let Freelanders and immos compromise what’s ours.”
The entire eastern hemisphere of Hokkaido was water, broken up only by The Lagos and a few other islands comprising Greater Oceania.
The Quantum Majesty’s four-day excursion only ventured a thousand kilometers beyond Pinchon, but that was enough for Ryllen.
To see the darkest blue of the deepest ocean? To see the sparkling schools of hemolids turn the surface into a fiery glow at night? To feel the ship dance through turbulent storms? To hear the wail of Kohlna as they are caught and throw themselves toward the ship in a hopeless bout for survival?
This is living.
Ryllen embraced Green Sun’s philosophy: The ocean belongs to the true seamasters.
“But there’s so much of it, Kai. It’s more than half the planet, and the continentals outnumber us, twenty to one. They’re desperate.
They’re losing arable land; clans are fighting in the cities. The more they depend on us for food, the seamasters raise prices. Won’t there be a tipping point where we won’t be able to keep them out?”
Kai handed Ryllen the pipe.
“We’re already there, RJ. I was going to tel you after we disembarked, but now seems as good a time.”
“Tell me what?”
“Lan Chua cal ed for a summit. Tonight. District captains and their lieutenants. You’ve earned your seat.”
“A summit? There hasn’t been one of those in …”
“Ninety-five days.”
“You said it only happened when …”
“We entered a new phase of the crusade. Yes. Listen to me, RJ. You
knew sooner or later this business would turn dirty. I never lied to you about it. The things some of us have done. You understand?”
He did. “The immos who were disappeared.”
“Among others. Yes. I’l tel it to you straight, RJ, because I love you.” Kai glanced about the deck as if making sure no one might overhear. His shoulder-length blue locks waved in the wind. “What we’ve been doing isn’t working. The threats, the beatings, the payoffs, the silent deportations. We’re scaring them, but we’re not making them understand. Even worse, the competitors are finding new and creative ways to smuggle operatives.
“We suspect crews on a third of the corporate ships are infested with continentals. Some of the off-island estates are
