In one hand, she grips a torch, its gleam not enough to vanquish the gloom of the ancient cavern. In the other hand, she holds the heartstone level with her eye, overlaying the sail. The double koru emblems match perfectly.
She thinks about how the two desires have always thrummed within her: to lead her people, and to sail upon the sea. Two parallel courses, spiraling off into murky oblivion and never intertwining. How she had wished they could unite into one, the way the sky and the sea met and merged into one beautiful stripe!
Now, it seems as though there is precisely a way for that to happen. As (future) chief, it's her duty to protect her people in whatever way she can, and at this moment, that way seems to be sailing across the sea to restore this heartstone. It's almost too convenient that the tiny voice that has whispered inside her all her life can now be answered.
But everyone around her is pushing her towards the ocean. The revelations about her ancestors, and the weight of a thousand years' tradition of voyaging. Gramma Tala, whose gentle, mysterious smiles had always guided her back to the shore; who had commanded Moana with her dying breath to go. Even her mother, who had always counselled her to obey her father, had not stopped her but instead helped her pack when she stumbled upon Moana in their fale.
Has the ocean always been calling her? Is there a reason she's always had that urge to go beyond, despite all the efforts of her father to suppress that needling voice?
The ocean chose you, Gramma Tala had told her.
But Moana thinks that if the ocean chose her, she is also choosing the ocean. That she is seizing fate with her own two hands, just as she slams the basket below deck firmly, just as she closes up the sails, just as she heaves the canoe forward with her own two hands. It's her whimsically stubborn streak reasserting itself, wanting to believe that she had something to do with this, that it isn't some contrived tale of fate, that she shouldn't feel guilty for discovering such concord when her island is crumbling around her. Questions, that ultimately matter to no one but her, clamor to be answered.
She surges forward, barely flinching as she passes under the gentle cascade. She'll be getting soaked a lot once she's out on the open ocean.
Moana rows out of the grotto and into the night. She cranes her neck around: one last glimpse of her home. There is a lull, a moment of anticipation, before Motunui falls dark and a shudder grips the island. It starts from the village and ripples outwards, through the trees and to the shoreline.
Then an enormous manta ray, luminous as the moon, materializes in the shallows. It- she- glides easily through the water, leaving a glowing trail of blue and white behind her, a trail for Moana to track. A trail she chooses to track, like every turn and every trail ahead of that she will choose.
She follows the shimmering course faithfully, opening up the sails, thrusting her oar into the water. She crests one wave, then another, much larger swell.
And she makes it past the reef.
She paddles with bold confident strokes, her breath escaping her in gasps and pants. All the questions in her heart subside to a murmur. Wind tangles in her hair, salty spray nips her nose, moonlight casts everything in a milky white glow, and the ocean rumbles all around her.
Here is where sky meets sea, and chief meets voyager. Where duty and desire rhyme, and she is buoyant.
Perhaps here is where her questions will be answered as well.
A/N: My first ever Moana fic. "How Far I'll Go, Reprise" is probably my favorite song from the movie, even more than the actual "How Far I'll Go". Moana's determination and tenacity is so beautifully conveyed through the lyrics, Auli'i Cravalho's singing, and the animation as she leaves behind everything she's ever known, motivated both by the desire to save her island and her desire to sail the sea. I wanted to explore what is going on inside her mind, and I hope I've done justice to her character here. I might also be writing a sequel of sorts, set during "I am Moana" if I get the inspiration and if anyone wants to read it. Please let me know what you think!