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Beyond the Sea - Chapter Two (Patron Reward)
🕑 Added 2020-06-20 17:59:43 +0000 UTC[This is a pledge reward for a patron~ Thank you so much for the support!]
The fire sparked and danced in front of its audience, a quartet of patrons looking to dry themselves by the hearth. They laughed as they spoke, their conversations as lively as the flame that warmed the tavern. Over their heads, the hum of rain patting against the roof drummed alongside the lute player, making the most of the rhythm as he sat at one corner of the bar where others had gathered. The final rounds of ale were being poured by the bartender, but the regular faces intended to stay seated for a couple more hours into the night.
Thunder rattled the walls, but the chef was unphased as he served a bowl of soup, last from the pot. “This is one mother of a storm,” he joked to the bartender, as well as to the sailors seated there. “I bet you boys are glad to be out of that weather. I can’t imagine sailing like this, the sea sounds like it’s being ripped apart.”
“We can ask Durok what it’s like when he washes in here,” one sailor joked. “If you smell a salty, wet dog, you’ll know he’s made it to Port de Désir after all!”
“Captain Durok is still out there?” the chef questioned, relieving the group of dirty plates and bowls. “God’s glory, even a man like him should know when to stay ashore.”
“He couldn’t,” another sailor belched. “Ya’ heard, haven’t ya’? The Queen is gatherin’ every privateer for the war.”
“Says enough about our navy,” another sailor scoffed, a sideways glance keeping an eye on the other corner of the tavern. Men in navy uniforms drank messily, complaining about the sea as they watched water cascade down the window pane.
“We’ll be in good hands if Captain Durok is here,” the bartender added, watching the same group of navy sailors. “He evaded three British ships, I heard -- all at once. And he’s braved storms even worse than this.”
“But can he find his way to shore?” a sailor teased. His fellows joined him in a laugh, “Apparently not so easily!”
A white flash of lightning flooded through the windows, and the howl of wind escaped into the tavern from the illuminated entrance. The activity of the tavern ceased as everyone turned to the door where a soggy silhouette greeted them, dripping rainwater onto the wooden floor where she stood against the frame. Her eyes surveyed the tavern, a hand hastily wiping back the mess of wet hair that had fallen in front of her vision. The rush she came in was blatant, what with the muddied boots and sleep attire, but now she was fatigued and in need of a rest she couldn’t afford yet to take.
Although she stumbled in looking like a mess of a stranger, the tavern staff and regulars identified the lightkeeper quickly. “Clara?” the chef said, his foot halfway back into the kitchen. He spun back out, putting down the dirty dishes and replacing them with a rag. “We haven’t seen you in months.”
“You must be thirsty,” the bartender said, a partial joke. “C’mon, I can still pour you something, no need to break the door down--”
“No! N-No, I’m not here for a drink,” Clara said, entering just one pace further into the tavern. If any pairs of eyes hadn’t been on her, they were now after hearing the shrill, aged voice in such a fluster. “Y-You haven’t seen it? None of you know?!”
“Know what?” the chef asked, offering the towel to Clara, but she ignored it. She passed him right by, dragging her way to the tavern’s middle. The chef exchanged worried looks with the bartender. “Uh, Clara, i-is something amiss?”
Clara looked around, her gaze bouncing from one judgemental patron to the next. She straightened out her hunch, preemptive anger biting her lips. She stuttered, “A giant is attacking the lighthouse.” The patrons were puzzled, and they didn’t respond -- “A giant monster! A-As tall as the lighthouse itself!” She stood on her toes, her hand raised high to vaguely represent the unreal height. “It must have come from the sea, during the storm! If we don’t do something then it will surely come for town next!”
An uneasy silence swept the tavern, moved by the rainy breeze of the open doors. Clara panted, binding her cloak tighter to her chest; nobody responded, only nervous and strange glances at her.
Then, laughter rolled in. A loud chuckle from the sailors at the bar, and then the navy men joined in. Clara whipped a glare at each person laughing, but when the whole tavern lit up with amusement, she hadn’t enough eyes to sternly look anyone down. The chef, the only one not amused, insisted the towel onto her, but she continued to ignore it in her distraught.
“Why?” she asked plainly, though her question was weak underneath the revived life of the tavern. “Do you think I’m joking?! Th-There was a monster, as tall as a building!”
“Oh, Clara,” the bartender chortled, shaking his head and waving her over to a stool. “The fumes have gotten to you again. What did you see out at sea this time? It was probably a ship coming too close to the plateau.”
“It was not a ship,” Clara scoffed, standing her ground in the center of the room. “Do I look like a ship?! Do you?! Because what I saw looked… human! I-It was a giant! It picked up Sophie--” Her head plunged down, weighed by anguish until she lifted it in a mad hurry. “Sophie is still there, sh-she was picked up by it!”
“Are you sure?” the chef asked timidly. “Perhaps it was just a dream, Clara. Monsters, err, don’t exist. It had to be something else.”
“It wasn’t!”
“The lightkeeper’s lost it again,” a sailor snorted. “She’s dreamin’ up monsters now. Must have seen somethin’ flash from the lightning and the coot runs all the way to town to tell us ‘bout it. Poor Durok is out there right now, crashing into rocks, probably!”
Clara stomped up to the sailor, ambushing him at his side. “I did not run my horse through mud-covered streets just to be laughed at by a boy like you!” She jabbed a finger into his muscular chest, almost making him spill his drink. “I know what I saw, and I saw a giant!”
“You rode a horse here, madam?” From the window, Clara was called over by a navy marine. He pointed outside while his companion gawked in that direction, “Is that your...?” Outside the window, a horse galloped and whinnied in distress, until eventually it circled around and was on the loose to anywhere else. Underneath all the commotion, it went unnoticed how the silverware shivered on the tables and the bar, or how the floorboards rattled -- it was just the thunder, they assumed, or the rain rolling in harder.
Clara’s shoulders slumped in dismay, but the tavern patrons responded with amused hollering at her misfortune. One sailor, jolly but restraining a laugh, stood up and moved to the exit, assuring Clara he would fetch the horse before it got too far. Clara grimaced, backing away towards the bar in embarrassed frustration. “I-I know… what I saw…” she muttered aloud.
But then, there was a bang at the door. It was slammed shut, and the sailor was there, rushed back in before the rain could wet him, his back pressed against the double doors while his chest puffed in and out. His teeth jittered, too much to speak coherently. “C-C-Clara… C-Clara was… Th-Th-There’s a… a…”
His fellow sailors looked to each other before standing up as a group and taking to the exit as well, one of them grabbing a wall-mounted torch to be thorough. A few other patrons followed them to the door where they waited beside the first sailor, watching from a distance as the others went out in the dreary weather. They looked up and down the street, each of them holding a palm over their brows to keep their vision cleared. Their suspicions remained unconfirmed, only deepening the question of what spooked their companion so badly.
“Hah… We’re all goin’ a little crazy,” one sailor chuckled, his nervousness hidden. He shrugged towards his other sailors, turned around, then stopped-- paralyzed. The next second, while the others studied him, his hand jetted towards the sky with a shaky point and no words to say.
The others rushed to where he stood in the rain, but the weather was the least of their concerns as their heads tilted up and up, looking to where he still yet pointed. Each at a time, their color drained upon seeing a shadowy stretch of a figure, just up the road behind the tavern. The peak of the creature, a silhouette that only vaguely resembled a human in the darkness, was a height beyond any of the buildings -- even the bell tower atop the church, just one block away, failed to truly rival such tallness. The giant swayed and twisted where it stood, its process slow and calculated, unflinching to its audience until it took notice of the small flame held by the group.
The structure of the tavern creaked threateningly, and dust trickled from the ceiling down onto the dining floor. The patrons inside didn’t know why, that the creature lurking overhead was leaning over their building, applying weight to its roof. The sailors stumbled backwards until they were on the opposite side of the street, gawking and babbling over the monstrous thing that had neared them in a hurry, a size that dwarfed the tavern and a weight that promised to crumble it.
The torchbearer couldn’t move, so two of his companions grabbed him by the wrist and forced the fire forward. Its light shined to the tavern roof, where the giant’s huge and curious eyes greeted them, her form halfway spilling over the building. The rain froze in midair during the seconds it took to comprehend the massive thing; dark flesh and a swamp of dripping wet hair, a heavy upper body lifted by two muscular arms each thicker than the four sailors combined.
No one had the courage to say anything, except Moana. “Hey!” she spoke -- a bark, fast and surprising, for she was alert and hurried. The sparse crowd hopped and the sailors huddled into each other. “Did any of you see one of you run by here?! On a-- uh, an animal thing?!”
Fear flustered the four, and the center sailor squeezed most away from Moana; his torch slipped between his wet fingers, and the torch immediately fizzled into a muddy puddle. With the light gone, so was Moana, shrouded again by the night. The reaction was hectic, with all the witnesses startled out of their wits. Some dashed back inside while others scrambled away from the tavern. Even the sailors, the toughest and saltiest of those there, were left cowering in the place they stood, until one was pushed forward into a terrified sprint back into the building.
“Clara!” he shouted over the patrons. The woman, her hands tightly held together in prayer, urged backwards towards the bar upon being called. The roof creaked again. “I think it wants you!”
“No!” Clara gasped. “Why?!”
Moana leaned in closer; without that light, she had only the nearby lamps to spot people on the street. She sat down behind the tavern, her hips and legs flooding the road she occupied; there was restlnesses there, of course, where townsfolk awed at the spectacle from the sidewalks or their windows. Moana focused only on the group in front of her, expecting one of them to eventually aid her.
But, like the others she met along the way, the sailors tried to escape. They split off in opposite directions, but Moana cut off their paths with both her palms. Like walls, her hands squared the remaining tavern patrons into one spot, slimming their chances of fleeing. Moana smiled nervously, realizing just how easy it was to corral these people how she needed -- but there wasn’t time to be concerned over that.
“D-Don’t h-hurt us, e-easy now!” a shaking sailor pleaded. Another whined, shivering as much, “Wh-What do ya’ w-want with us?!”
“I don’t want you! I want that-- that lady!” Moana replied, but she doubted the sailors were comprehending her. “From the light… tower… the tower with the-- the light! Back there, s-somewhere! Urgh!” Cornering them was easy, but explaining this weird world was another task. She leaned forward more, puffing her chest outward and pointing to it. Sophie, a ragdoll in her unconscious state, ungracefully stretched out from the cleavage upside-down. “Her! Err, she was there! Does anyone know her?!”
The sailors, befuddled at first, eventually stuttered the name, “Sophie!”
And from the tavern’s entrance, the sailor there repeated them, “Sophie?”
And from the bar, Clara gasped, her hands to her mouth, “Sophie?!”
Clara spun to the navy men, who had stayed passive the entire time at their booth. She slammed on their table, spooking them worse than the giant did. “That’s my niece! My niece! For goodness sake,” she shook the table, “put that uniform to use! Help her! Help her!” Both soldiers followed the command, bumbling to their feet but skeptical of what they could do. One was grabbed by Clara, caught by the collar, “Help me too!” she stressed. “Help Sophie b-but help me too!”
“Err, r-right, right!” the soldier panted, shuffling himself and Clara towards the back. “P-Perhaps, this way…?”
The sailors in the front bickered instead of answering Moana, arguing whether to give up Clara or not. Moana hurried them for an answer, unaware that her target was slipping away from under her. Using the back exit, Clara and the soldier made their getaway, but not without basking at what loomed right over them. The giant’s body was like a bridge, built spontaneously to arch over the tavern, supported by two knees that cracked into the cobblestone road. It was the soldier awestruck the most, hesitant to sneak past the legs, while Clara hustled both of them ahead.
Moana groaned, and so did the structure under her. “Listen, I promise I won’t hurt anyone!” she tried to speak to them, but her volume wasn’t helping. “Her tower thing is on fire, and this one just fainted! I don’t know what to do, so please, can you just--”
Snap. The roof caved in, its weight limit surpassed. Moana’s torso breached into the tavern, the ceiling breaking inwards. Debris formed a dust cloud, and those sheltered inside broke into screams and shouts, expecting the worst to be upon them. The bartender bunkered under the bar and the chef under a table, but the giant did not break into the building any further. She flinched back the moment she realized, risen up and away from the tavern as far back as her seat allowed.
Moana’s face was stiff in shock, her mouth ajar. “... That’s fixable,” she nodded, her lip bitten hard, “I will definitely fix this, I can totally fix this, I used to make fales all the time, this is so fixable.”
She examined the damage, and so too did Clara. The crash and crack of the roof giving in had brought her and the soldier to a standstill, not far past the giant’s immediate reach. While Moana surveyed the destruction from above, it was then that she noticed the citizens around her, and then the lightkeeper -- “You!” she popped.
Clara dashed forward, spooked into speed. The soldier stumbled but followed behind her, ripping his gaze off of Moana just as the giant took a stand. Feet larger than wagons broke into the cobblestone pathways, splattering gravel and mud as immense weight pressed into the ground. With the mass of several houses, the huge figure kicked off into a jog up the road, giving chase to the two ankle-tall people.
Due to her extensive legs, Moana was fast to catch up. Footfalls bombarded the street, delivering a personal earthquake to each shop and household she rushed past. Clara had no need to look back, not when she could hear the pounding grow increasingly nearer, a heavy but unstoppable pace that threatened to overcome her. When the opportunity was there, she seized it; she leaped into an alley, hoping to throw her pursuer off. The navy soldier had gawked back at Moana when Clara changed course, and so he nearly tripped over himself when hurrying down the same alley a second later.
Moana smirked, figuring she finally had them cornered. The alley was too thin for her to walk through, or even squeeze through, and so her arm wedged between the two houses like a narrow crevice to be reached into. Her muscles may have cost the roof gutters, but it was a successful grab. She retrieved her finding quickly, bringing the little body into the rainy air.
But in her hand wasn’t Clara, but instead the soldier that had been escorting her. The uniformed man was a trembling mess, babbling prayers while pushing hard against Moana’s web of fingers. Moana flinched at this squirming, unsettling feeling in her hand, but more than that, she was disappointed that she had failed. She hurriedly looked to the alley again; there was Clara, slipping out the other side and to the other road.
“Wait! Please don’t-- urgh!” Moana grunted, tossing her arm to the side and tightening her fist. A coughed-up groan had her remember that the soldier was still in her grasp, and so she looked frantically to release him. She deposited the man atop one of the roofs, which he grappled onto vigorously. Moana raised a warning finger at him, “Don’t-- Uh. Don’t… do anything.” She nodded, already hopping back towards Clara’s direction.
The rain-slick alley opened into a new road for Clara to find herself in. All the chaos had stirred more than a few slumbering folks to wander outside and inspect the noise. Clara studied their gazes, all tilted high to where the giant loomed. She kept running -- it was all she imagined she could try.
Moana wasn’t distracted for long. Peering over the buildings, she immediately spotted Clara a short distance up the other road and hurried to meet her. A row of houses separated the two, but Moana had an answer for the obstacle. With her ordinary, unbound agility, Moana sprinted forward and leaped over the homes. For a solid and hard second, there was a titanic weight hovering over unknowing roofs, more than enough power for gravity alone to leave the structures smashed to pieces.
Clara froze, as though the rain had flashed to frost on her. There was no breathing while watching Moana fly through the night air, not until the huge gasp that came with the devastating landing. Clara’s vision was filled with Moana’s shape falling into view, overtaking the view of the church up ahead. Geysers splashed up from the puddles where the giant appeared, and a rumble ripped through the ground and shook Clara right off of her feet and into the mud.
Moana smirked confidently when she lifted her head to see Clara fumbled on the road. Her tactic to cut off her path had worked, and all that was left was plucking her prize. Before Clara could recover from tripping, Moana had knelt down and picked her up in her hand. The woman immediately sprung into kicks and twists, but Moana affirmed her grasp with both hands, lifting Clara up to her face.
“D-Don’t hurt me! Be c-careful!” Clara whined, guarding herself with one arm.
“I’m not-- Why does everyone think I’m gonna hurt them…?!” Moana groaned. She began walking forward, allowing herself precious time to catch her breath and gather her thoughts. “I just want to know why I’m here! And, maybe, why all of you people are so small, b-but, other things first.”
“Let go! Release me!” Clara continued to protest, even over Moana’s light explanation. Her yelling ended in a gasp while looking down the titan’s large frame, her shock pointed at the rain slick chest. Seen between the heavy weights of flesh was a sprawl of arms and an unconscious head rolled onto the skin -- her niece, Sophie, held hostage in a precarious position, donned not unlike the decorative necklace adorned by the giant. “No no no-- Wh-What have you done?! Y-You monster! You savage beast...!”
Moana rolled her eyes. “I get that I may have startled you all,” she admitted, “but I’m-- I’m nice! I love animals, and the ocean, a-and people too! I am not a beast!”
Moana put a jump to her step to hurry forward, but she was slowed by an obstacle up ahead. Around the bend of the road, a gathering of torches and lanterns illuminated a mess of people, some in uniforms and some without. They congested the path, armed with weapons and their outrage. There was no easy way to step around the crowd for Moana, so she was forced to a begrudged halt.
One man stepped forward from the mob, his uniform cloaked under a robe against the weather -- a captain. Behind him was a fine row of soldiers, but after that, it was an uncertain crew that was on edge looking up at the giant and using each other as a shield. The captain raised a lantern high towards Moana, “Beast! This mayhem must cease! Surrender yourself to God’s land of France at once!”
Moana sighed, glancing at Clara as though she would sympathize. “I don’t know what a France is, and I don’t surrender,” Moana explained to the people below. She waved to them, not thinking of how she was waving with Clara’s body. “Besides, I’m on my way out! So if you’ll excuse me--”
“Aim!” the captain barked, and at his command did those behind him raise their muskets towards Moana. A crack of lightning -- “Fire!” Bullets launched from clouds of smoke all at once, whistling through the air at their target. Civilians and soldiers alike watched with wonder as the pellets hit their mark.
Moana flinched away, spooked by the noise and the sparks, but ultimately didn’t feel anything. On her exposed legs and arms did she feel a few pinches, but the bullets could barely break the fabric, let alone pierce her skin. She paused, checking if there was any more to that attack. Her onlookers, including the captain himself, were speechless.
Likewise, Moana didn’t have anything to say to these little people and their little assault. She shrugged and began treading forward again, her first footfall stirring the crowd into dispersing. Her next step hovered over the mob, and those beneath it quickly cleared out, giving her space to land between them. Only the captain’s rank was unbroken, stewing in his astonishment even as two legs passed over him.
But the crowd was not content with this conclusion. Some furious among them went beyond watching their navy defenders waste ammunition on a giant, and they took matters to their own tools. As Moana’s foot was still while the other went forward, a group yelled and charged at her with shovels and pitchforks as weapons. Some of the tools snapped upon being swung into Moana’s toes or heel, but anything sharp proved effective in injuring her. Where the muskets failed with their bullets, their bayonetts made due, piercing into most sensitive areas of the stomping feet.
“Yow!! Wh-What are you--?!” Moana gasped, stomping her other foot down so that she could lift up the one that was struck. It was as if several bugs all at once had viciously bitten into her, enough of a pain that she wasn’t confident continuing that way. “Do you all want to be stepped on?! Because this is how you make me step on you! … Accidentally!”
The successful strike inspired others to do the same, and so where Moana’s other foot had landed, a part of the mob was there to attack. Torches were raised towards her anklet wreath of flowers, the embers catching the petals and threatening to be stroked into a fire. Every time Moana lifted a scratched-up foot away from the mob, the other foot would be attacked, and then the other again. Moana had to dance away defensively, hopping onto each foot while always wary of what was underneath her. Water troughs were shattered and wagons slammed aside by her feet, but one greater misstep could see a carriage obliterated, or a street lamp busted, or a townsperson--
“Stop!” Moana fearfully demanded, her backpedal suddenly paused. Glaring down behind her, she could see emboldened navy officers already awaiting the next footfall, their weapons ready to lunge. There was no easy place to put her foot, and so she urged them again, “M-Move! Get out of here, get out!” She winced; her one standing foot was still under attack, and the violence against it increased steadily the longer it lingered.
As enduring as Moana could be, even she had her limits. A stab between her toes pushed her over the edge and she began stumbling backwards, hopping uncomfortably far as to avoid the people directly beneath her. The slick roads did not receive her awkward footstep well, and so she slipped into a greater imbalance, her feet kicking into the air as she tripped over herself and back the way she came.
“Look out!” Moana shouted, a sentiment shared by her audience. Any onlooker behind her rushed to the sides of the street, clearing a path as Moana lost her battle against gravity. Like a titanic tree being felled, people watched with bated breath as the huge body tipped over, but where she would fall was their greatest wonder. Behind Moana and in her path was a significant building, a bell tower that was almost as tall as she was; the local church.
A great crash, but no thunder. Veiled in the darkness and the rain was the scene of Moana’s body plunging into the church, described to the townspeople only by the violent sounds of brick and wood walls being crushed to pieces, the structure crumbling in on itself as its integrity was unraveled. Somewhere lost in the cacophony was the church bell’s final ring, dropped somewhere in the wreckage under Moana’s fallen form. Glass continued to shatter as the giant groaned and moved in the wreckage, an image of despair that was illuminated to the crowds by flashes of lightning.
Torchlight flickered in Moana’s blurred vision. She winced as she moved in the rubble, feeling broken wood and stone jabbing into any exposed part of her. At her feet where she lay was an encroaching crowd of people, marveling at what she had destroyed from a distance that respected such tremendous strength. Moana was uncertain what to say, or what to do, as even standing up just seemed like it would cause more problems.
Moana did not stir alone. Bubbling up from the wreckage was another woman, far more dazed and confused than the giant. Clara, wet and battered, crawled out from a pile of cobbled stone, coughing up dust and pushing aside debris. During the crash, she had slipped out of Moana’s grip, something Moana herself hadn’t yet comprehended. When given the opportunity, Clara didn’t ask questions and she hurried to escape the disaster, as fast as her weary body could move. Two navy men were there to catch her as she stumbled out from the church, joining the dozens of others that gawked at the results.
The rumble of rainfall was gradually replaced with that of a murmuring, angry crowd. Many were in stunned disbelief, arguing that this wasn’t real, while others openly wept at the flattening of their holy place. Some grew restless, and it was up to navy officers to quell the outrage and prevent anyone from hurting themselves, but of their ranks, many of them were equally upset. Moana slowly awoke and heard these complaints, feeling their ire like an unpleasant humidity.
Moana stuttered to speak, but her apology failed upon looking at her hips and her feet, how they cratered into the church. She clenched her hand -- Clara was gone, and so all this really was for naught. Embarrassed and pressured to do so, Moana stood, a motion that saw the remains of the church tested once more as the tall body moved within it. Debris on her clothes was dusted off as she looked down at the unsettled crowd.
“I’m… s-so sorry,” Moana tried to explain, her voice more reserved than before. She kept her arms and legs close, afraid of what else she might step on and destroy. “L-Like I said… I can-- I will fix this, I just had nowhere to step, a-and you all--” Her excuses meant nothing to the people who hissed and barked back at her. There was no reasoning with all of them, but Moana was anchored by the pit growing in her heart for having caused so much trouble. She wished to stay and correct things, like she had wanted with the lighthouse, but--
Bang. A pop of smoke, another bullet fired. Someone with a loaded musket took fire again, but if he had hit his mark, not even Moana knew. It didn’t matter, for like the others in the mob, he was angry and did only what he felt he could possibly do. Moana flinched, and her fear was noticed. Less and less were concerned for their own safety, and so they began to approach Moana, threatening her with whatever weapons they could gather.
Moana trembled backwards, pushed back by the approaching people. She couldn’t fight them, and she couldn’t calm them -- ultimately, she was unwelcome here. Everything she had touched since arriving in this weird world had fallen to ruin, one way or another. People shrieked at the sight of her, they sprinted away in fear for their lives. Moana had lived a life of acceptance, surrounded by people who loved and respected her, her people. Here, among these tiny buildings and the strange technology their occupants boasted, she was an outsider, and her very presence there was tarnishing their simple lives.
Not one more apology was given by Moana before she turned down an empty road, a path that went opposite of where she entered from. Her heart was heavy, but she chose then to abandon the town all together, lest she did more harm to its community. She whipped her head away from them, looking to where she might leave the town’s borders, and then hurried in that direction. Away from the town, away from the lighthouse, away from anyone and everything -- that’s where Moana wanted to go, wherever that could be.
Where else could such a place be for Moana, if not close to the ocean? The night was still dark and foggy, but the washing sighs of the ocean lured Moana to the beach. She wandered aimlessly, her only reference being the lights of the town dwindling away as she continued forward, guided by the coastline. The rain had quieted into a drizzle, but still was her body drenched and heavy, every step wanting to be the one that collapses into slumber.
Dirt became sand under Moana’s feet as she neared closer to what could possibly be shelter. She had discovered a cove that the beach detoured into, a cave wide and tall enough for her to walk into, albeit with a slight hunch. Anything to escape the weather was fine enough for Moana, and she claimed the hole for herself, crawling into the deepest corner and huddling into the nook. There was no blanket and no mat, only her arms to warm herself and only jagged stones to rest upon.
Daylight reflected off the ocean. It sparkled against the fading night sky, like twinkling stars scattered across the water. The light gently seeped into the cavern as the morning barely began, but that wasn’t what caused Moana to stir. She was exhausted still, tired enough to sleep twice as long, but only a few hours into her slumber did she feel an itch -- more like a tickle.
“Rnngh…” Moana groggily rubbed at her cheek. As she awoke, her circumstance pieced together again, and she slowly remembered how she ended up here. Realizing that only encouraged her to roll over again and sleep, but the itch irritated her. She scratched at her chest and rolled onto her back, a long sigh venting out from her lips.
But there it was again, that itch. Moana swiped at it again, but it still persisted, much to her curiosity. As she awakened further, she understood that this was no stray itch, but something between her breasts -- something moving, kicking, and even making noise. Moana froze, but it struck her then what this could be, what it was she had forgotten of before falling asleep. What rustled from her cleavage had been the first lightkeeper, and only then did Moana realize that she had kidnapped someone.
