Always with the current

Luca Rosner

by Luca Rosner

Story

Finally arrived! Deep blue surrounds the newly hatched turtle after its escape. “What, you arrive here all alone?!”, she is immediately asked between the protective bands of brown algae.

With a racing heart, the little thing explains, that it doesn’t know why it made it. Only fragments of memory return to her consciousness.

The unnatural pulsating noise on the beach, the many colorful threads and objects, that blocked the paths, and then of course dozens of threatening creatures.

The creepiest thing, however, were glaring moons, one of which she had to choose to follow.

Dozens of siblings crisscrossed in different directions. Pure chaos!

She also remembers how desperately she tried to avert her gaze from the remains of bones on the beach.

“No wonder”, replies her counterpart, to whom several survivors had already reported, “your species has been hunted for a long time. It’s your own fault. You’d better adapt to the new conditions. Or do you think others would do it differently?”

The child is shocked.

She promptly tries to look less tasty or pretty.

As she does so she notices the funny thing around her neck. “Do you think this ribbon will make me less attractive to predators?”, the turtle squeals.

Sarcastic laughter is the answer: “Nobody knows your biggest enemies and you can’t escape them either. Either they are there, or they are not. But you will only know if you meet them when it is too late for you. They seek the flesh of defenseless mothers, their eggs and also shield sheets. The elders suspect from the smell of some UFOs (Unknown Floating Objects) that they use your fat. They will also raid your nests if you can find ways to build them. The best thing to do is to get to Madeira or something like that. You might have a chance there.”

“You don’t have to tell me”, the hatchling thinks and senses the direction. The little turtle only needs to follow the magnetic field in the Gulf Stream and not listen to these show tales.

Until it is large enough, it will hide and forage in lake kelp forests of the stream.

© Luca Rosner 2022-10-28