DARK WATER, BLUE DEATH

There sits my sister who drownéd me.
-The Ballad of Binnorie

Several days later, someone touched Sara's shoulder as she worked and made her jump. "Juna! Don't sneak up on me like that!"

"Sorry."

"You walk as one who has cat's feet," observed the songstress. "What're you doing here?" They were in the bottom level of the common hall. Tribal artifacts such as shields, masks and spears hung from the wooden posts and beams of the shady place, and some love sticks leaned against the open walls. The Avatar wondered why Sara had so many.

"I just came to watch you make those sticks," she said, sitting down on the rough-hewn bench beside her. "Could you teach me?"

The pretty shaman raised her eyebrows. "Whatever for? I mean, surely as a foreigner and outsider you find this custom of ours quaint and backward."

Taken aback by the harshness and vehemence she heard in the other girl's voice, Juna was speechless for a moment.

Sara sighed and lowered her head. Her knife stopped whittling. "I'm sorry. You've been nothing but a boon since you arrived here, but... I can't help it." She looked directly at Juna. "I'm naturally mistrustful of people who come from the outside."

Juna saw the barely-concealed pain in her eyes and, despite not wanting to seem overly nosy, couldn't help asking, "Why?"

Sara shook her head and held out her work. "Here. I'll show you how to make one. You're a woman, so you need to­–"

Their hands touched as Juna took hold of the stick. The world in her mind's eye came alive in sepia-toned memories. Unprepared to deal with the Drop of Time's onslaught after being free from its powers the past few days, she gasped and arched her back, her head jerking to look up at the bamboo-slatted ceiling.

------oOo------

Blood. There was blood coming out of the crook of her—Sara's—arm, flowing through a small needle into a collecting vial. The needle hurt and she wanted to pull it out, but was prevented from doing so by the eager clutch of the wizened, eyeglass-wearing old man on her forearm.

He chuckled, and the sound sent shivers traveling up Juna's—Sara's—spine. "Now, now," he said softly. His voice was reptilian and cold and cruel. "This won't take long. There, finished." He pulled the needle out of Sara's skin and placed a bandage over the puncture.

Frightened and feeling violated by his rough actions, the young girl spun around and ran away into the jungle, crying.

"Thank you for your cooperation," the old man called after her.

------oOo------

A tall, muscled man with a moustache, wearing ceremonial garb and a feathered headdress, and holding the same staff Sara carried with her, looked down sternly at her—Sara and Juna—after addressing the old man. The scientist had just left her alone with him. "Do you know what you have done, my child?" the man asked, his voice quiet and low, heavy with disapproval. The air was muggy, still, and oppressive. "Always, always remember the bird-person. How many times must I remind you of that?"

"Father..." She felt the dull pain in her arm and wished the earth would suddenly come alive and swallow her up, so great was her shame.

------oOo------

Juna gasped again, as a drowning person would, and popped out of her dream world. Beside her she heard an intake of breath akin to her own and found Sara sitting stiffly on the seat beside her, her eyes wide and unseeing. Her rigid fingers pinned Juna's to the half-finished courtship stick.

"Sara!" Juna called, trying to shake her hand free of the painful grip. "Sara, wake up!"

The other woman came out of her trance and slumped forward. Juna caught her just in time to keep her from banging headfirst into the work table.

As she came to, the shaman shook Juna's hands off her shoulders and stayed seated, silent and hunched over.

"Sara... did you–"

"Yes. Yes, I did." She twisted around to stare at Juna, a look of mingled fright and wonder and suspicion on her features. "I betrayed my father's trust, and my people as well. And for what? A tawdry necklace, a mere trinket!" The fright grew into suppressed terror. "Who are you, Juna Ariyoshi? What enables you to see into my heart and mind? Are you a bird-person, awake at last, come to destroy my people and the whole world?"

"No!" Juna answered emphatically. Her hand still in the other girl's, she was caught up in the maelstrom of Sara's feelings. "Of course not!" She finally pulled free of Sara's grasp, and the stick rattled as it fell to the floor.

"You came from the sky," the shaman insisted. "You are a stranger and an outsider, and I have only your words to vouch for you."

Juna's heart grew cold and she became quiet. She stood up from the bench. "My words are all I have, Sara. I came to you bearing nothing but myself. If I do not use them, how can I prove otherwise that you're wrong, that I'm not your dreaded tori no hito, that I mean you no harm? If you didn't want to trust me, why did you take me in?"

Sara gave no answer, and Juna, feeling herself hurt beyond the power of speech to describe or remedy, stalked out of the room.

------oOo------

Juna Ariyoshi sat on the sand, her legs bent, her arms round her knees. She looked out at the blazing reds and oranges of the sunset, and paid no mind to the quiet shush-shush behind her, signaling someone's approach.

Sara Nome sat down beside her and also gazed at the sunset. It was a while before she spoke.

"I'm sorry."

She was startled to see a wet track down the other girl's cheek. Have I upset her that much? she asked herself. "Juna..."

"Tell me, Sara," the girl interrupted her, her voice sounding lonely and pained. "Tell me, why do people hurt each other?"

"What?"

"Why must they judge so quickly? Why do they say things they don't mean? Why do they lie?" Juna sighed. "When I came here I thought there would be no troubles for me anymore. Despite what you told me, I thought this was a little slice of Heaven. Instead I find here the same suspicion and mistrust I'm forced to deal with in my own world. And from you, of all people." She dug up a handful of sand and let it trickle through her fingers. "I'm getting sick and tired of it."

"Juna." The shaman looked at her. "Stop wishing the world were perfect, because it will never be. People will always hurt each other. Whether it's deliberate or accidental, whether it's caused by confusion of loyalties, stupidity, ignorance, or outright malice, you will never avoid it." Then, shyly, she added, "The only thing to be done is to to prevent it from happening again."

The Avatar brushed her hands clean. "You know, Sara, the reason I wanted to learn how to make a love stick was so... I could give it to someone."

"Someone you love?"

Juna nodded. "Only I'm wondering why I'm even bothering thinking about such a thing, since it's plain to see that he's lost interest in me."

"Lost interest in you?"

"Yeah. He's sort of involved with someone else now..."

"You outsiders," Sara said quietly. "Always forging kadoun when there should be none. Fight for him, then."

"I have." Juna scratched her hair as an exasperated person would. "Heaven knows I have."

"And?"

"I still don't know what he thinks about the both of us, my friend and I."

Sara smiled. "I've never been in love, so I find it funny I'm even talking about this with you. It's a nice feeling." She looked out at the sunset. "For much of my life I've always been busy with my duties, taking care of Mao and my people. I never had much of a chance to tend to myself. To just be a girl growing up..."

Juna turned to her with understanding in her eyes. "Don't worry, I'm sure you'll find someone someday and learn more than you care to know about love. Who knows, he might just drop out of the sky, like I did, and you might have to be the one to nurse him back to health."

"The gods forbid," chuckled Sara after a moment's reflection. "That would indeed be a mixed blessing. Come back to the house, Juna. I'll show you how to make a love stick."

The young lady, after a second of thought, nodded. Both of them stood up and left.

------oOo------

Juna spent two more days with Sara and Mao, but relations were never quite the same as before. She and the shaman were reluctant to open up any more to each other, fearing that doing so might cause offense to the other. Juna reflected upon this with sadness, and thought once more how words could lead people astray and, even being left unsaid, could cause a wall to spring up between them. Perhaps the same thing was happening with her and Tokio? She couldn't recall having true talk with him, ever since she caught him with meeting with Sayuri—behind her back—several months ago. She could remember the glances burning with suspicion and guilt, the long silences on the phone, the heartsickness and despair that things would ever be right between them again, the deadly silence of the Drop of Time on the matter... perhaps it was time she sat down with him, cast caution to the wind, and tell him how she really felt. Even if it meant baring her heart once more and exposing it to his whims.

Assuming, of course, that she would ever get back to her own reality. What was it going to take for her to do so? Get atomized by another nuke? But she was enjoying herself too much to ask Sara to send her home.

She busied herself with chores and tale-telling those days, acting as Mao and her friends' reservoir of information about the outside world. In exchange for her stories they would often ply her with little gifts; a coconut drink on one day, some fruits the next. She was too embarrassed to refuse them, so she secreted them in the corner of the room she slept in with the two Nome girls, making them disappear by placing portions thereof among their meals.

On the eve of the second she found herself walking on the same deserted beach under a reddish sky, balancing an earthenware jar on her shoulder. Sara, who had accompanied her out and been waiting for her on the sand after picking some fruit and vegetables, saw what she was doing and came up to her.

"You shouldn't be doing this," she complained, tucking her sack of goodies in her belt and taking the jar from Juna's shoulder. "This is too heavy for you."

"Hey, it's alright," said Juna, trying to take the jar back. "I'm more than glad to help you. Doing all this hard work is tiring, but satisfying."

"Well, I think Mao's been duping you into doing more of her chores than usual."

Juna raised her eyebrows. "Really?" She thought about her elder sister Kaine. "Smart kid."

The two girls looked at each other and burst out laughing.

"If she ever leaves the village to live somewhere else, I'm sure she'd be able to take care of herself..." the host to the Avatar of Time began. She stopped as a sad look came over Sara's face.

"What's wrong? What did I say?"

"Nothing." The shaman balanced her load and began to walk away.

"Sara..." Juna broke her stricture against touching people and laid a hand on Sara's shoulder.

The shaman froze, putting the jar down on the sand. "What?"

"I know you told me I should resign myself to people hurting each other, but... it doesn't have to be this way between us."

Sara turned to look at her. "You're right. Forgive me. I'm not that good in dealing with people, especially outsiders. I just wish Mao wouldn't think of going away. Who would be shaman after me, and keep our traditions alive? We keep losing the young ones because they leave to look for a better future in the outside world." She would have said more, but was interrupted by Juna's sudden stiffening and cocking of the head.

"Hey! Did you hear that?"

"Hear what?"

Without answering Juna stood up and began running down the stretch of beach, her feet kicking up rooster tails of sand as she sprinted towards something Sara could not discern. The shaman quickly ran after her.

------oOo------

"Help!" Mao Nome screamed towards the darkening shore. "Help us!"

She was in an outrigger canoe with two other children. They had decided to take a little paddle and swim before the sun went down, and now one of the boys with her was bleeding from the exploratory bite of a shark on his left thigh.

They had heard his screams as he surfaced and quickly dragged him into the boat. As the other, uninjured boy pulled his friend in, Mao beat off the shark with her paddle. Her hand slipped and she lost the heavy mahogany implement in the water. Now, with an injured friend and a drifting canoe, they were in deep trouble. To make things worse, the shark did not leave them. Instead it took to circling the boat, its wicked dorsal fin surfacing every now and then, dissuading the children from trying to swim to shore.

"Oolo," she said to her uninjured companion, "how is Tafara?"

"I've got the bleeding stopped," the older boy answered. He had taken his shirt off and used it to bind his friend's wound. "How could you lose our only paddle like that?"

"I'm sorry!" Mao wailed. "Try pushing off a fifteen-footer the way I did and see if you don't panic too!"

There was a dull scraping sound, and the canoe rocked. The shark was bumping it again.

"Help!" yelled Mao once more towards the shore. Behind her, Oolo lit one of the torches kept in the boat for emergencies and raised it in the air.

------oOo------

Juna stood transfixed at the water's edge as she spied the little dark mass that was the canoe with the children. And, with her sight augmented by the Drop of Time, she also saw the triangular shape that rose and disappeared in the water near it. A flickering light came on in the boat, two silhouetted figures stood up, and she saw the light wave frantically.

Sara caught up with her. "Whoever's in that canoe," she said, panting, "is in trouble!"

"It's Mao," Juna reported as she peered into the distance. "She is frightened and afraid. A friend of hers is lying injured in the boat. There is a shark in the water. They cannot swim to shore. They have also lost their paddle."

As both women watched, the canoe rocked violently, and the two standing figures pitched sideways into the water. The light vanished.

Juna looked around, at the deserted beach, and heard the cry again, fainter this time. There wasn't anyone else to help.

"Sara," she said quickly, "go back to the village and tell them what's happening, will you? May I borrow your knife?"

"Eh?" Sara quickly handed over her wood-whittling knife, which she had kept stuck in her belt. "What are you going to do?"

For an answer Juna waded out and quickly disappeared into the waves sparkling with the last of the sun's dying light.

------oOo------

Oolo was a brave boy. When he and Mao were knocked into the water by the shark's bumping of the boat the first thing he did was try and get her back in, despite getting the thrill of his life when he felt something brush against his legs. The sides of the canoe were too high, however, and Mao kept thrashing and slipping. Finally, he gave up and shouted for Tafara to throw him the spear he had brought along with him. The injured boy complied, and with it in his hands, Oolo turned around and desperately searched the water for danger, encouraging Mao to keep trying to get into the boat.

Perhaps two minutes or more passed. He couldn't be sure. All he knew was that time seemed to slow down, and that he seemed to sense everything around him, from the coldness of each drop of water dripping from his hair onto his shoulders, to the sight of the beach getting dimmer in the gathering darkness, to the slapping of the water against the hull of the canoe, to each swell as it lifted him up and carried him back down, to the orange clouds high in the sky above them.

So it was that when something broke the surface of the water beside him, his heart leaped in terror and he instantly jabbed at it with his spear. He was rewarded with a yell of pain.

"You idiot!" swore Juna, pushing the spear shaft away from the side of her face. "Watch what you're doing with that thing!"

"You're the idiot, scaring me like that, outsider!" shot Oolo. He saw the line of bloody red across Juna's cheek. "Sorry."

"Never mind! Give me that!" Juna grabbed the spear from him. "Can you make it to shore? Including your friend who's been bitten?"

Oolo wanted to ask her how she knew about Tafara, but there was no time. "Yes. I will drag him, if I have to."

"Good. Now go, while I distract the shark."

Tafara, who had been listening from the canoe, slipped into the water under Mao and Oolo's urging. He grunted as the salt water stung his wounds, then gamely began to swim to shore, assisted by his two friends.

Juna swam after them, keeping her distance and hanging back, and scanning their surroundings constantly for signs of the fish. "Swim for the beach!" she urged the children, trying to keep her voice as even and encouraging as possible. "Look, it's very near now!"

She ducked underwater and searched some more. Why did the Drop of Time refuse to work now, of all times? She had tried to turn into Arjuna as she swam over to the canoe, but nothing happened. She couldn't even fly, or swim faster than usual. All that she could do now was sense where the shark was.

There. Coming out of the gloom, a large torpedo-shaped fish, with a partially open mouth and yellow catlike eyes that stared at her from across the intervening distance as it veered off to one side and began to circle her. Juna worked her cheek, unmindful of the pain, and raised a hand and began to slap the surface of the water in an arrhythmic fashion.

Raira, raira, won't you come to me? she thought, singing in her mind a song she had heard the women of the village chant jokingly at the side of their nighttime campfires. My lover's been unfaithful, I'd like you to eat him for me. Please, raira, please. Free this heart from the torture it receives. She wanted to laugh, like she did then, but instead gripped the spear tighter.

------oOo------

"Tafara, you know something?" Mao asked as she felt the tips of her toes brush the sandy bottom.

"What?" the eleven-year-old groaned.

"You weigh a ton."

"But I'm no fatter than Oolo here," the wounded boy tried to joke. He grimaced as he began to support his weight again, as they came out of the water and staggered onto the beach.

"Look," said Oolo, pointing. "There's one of the fishing boats coming round the sand bar."

"Better late than never," Mao said, helping him lay Tafara down on the sand. "Where's Juna?"

"I don't know." Oolo looked at Mao, who turned away to gaze questingly out at the sea.

------oOo------

Sara had been lucky. Rounding the spit of land that separated the beach from the village and kept it from sight, she had come across one of their large fishing boats returning to the village at sunset, as they usually did, and shouted to the men on board the situation. The crew of the vessel promptly turned around and headed for the spot, disappearing from the shaman's sight behind the trees and rise of land.

She couldn't run anymore, so it took her about twenty minutes to walk back to the beach, where Mao and her friends, along with the fishermen, awaited her, impatiently, it seemed. The fishing vessel had run up on the beach. The small outrigger the children had been using had been left to the mercy of the tides.

As Sara walked towards the little knot of people gathered on the shore, her little sister came running out to her.

"Mao!" she exclaimed in relief as her sister hugged her. "Thank goodness you're alright!"

Mao raised her face to look up at her. There were tears running down her cheeks.

A cold dread descended upon Sara's heart. "What's wrong?"

"Juna..." sobbed Mao. She pointed towards the middle of the throng of people, where, on the sand, a blanket-wrapped bundle lay.

"No!" From somewhere deep within her tired frame Sara found the strength to run to the bundle.

------oOo------

She was still alive. Juna's face peeked out from the blankets the men had wrapped around her.

"What happened?" Sara knelt beside her. Her hand reached out to touch Juna's forehead. The Drop of Time was deep blue and icy to her touch.

"I was stupid, that's what happened," the Japanese girl replied, her voice barely audible. "I'm not in any pain, Sara. Don't worry. But I'm so cold... so cold..."

Sara leaned down to remove her blankets and see Juna's wounds for herself, but one of the fishermen held her hand and shook his head.

"No..."

A vision flashed in her mind. She jerked once under the deluge of its images, then removed her hand from the cloth cocooning Juna.

She looked up at the men surrounding her. "Quick! Help me take her to the sacred pool! We can still save her!"

One of the fishermen shook his head dubiously and was about to say something, but an old fellow stopped him with a glare and nodded at the young shaman. "Alright," he said. "Come on, boys, let's get her in the boat and go back to the village."

------oOo------

Quick as the seas and their feet could take them, the group carrying Juna made their way to the village, then up to the base of the mountain with the cross-shaped mark on its face, where the spring was. Sara instructed the men to place Juna in the middle of the pool, then leave.

"I will not be able to work my power if you are here," she explained. "Go and wait for me. Do not peek. I will know instantly if you do, and you will be responsible for the death of our 'visitor.'" The men complied with their shaman's wishes and left.

The wizened old chieftain of the village, who had accompanied them, lingered for a moment and asked, "Sara, aren't you worried that her blood will attract a kadoun here?"

Sara knelt down in the water and cradled Juna's head in her lap. She shook her head. "I do not hear the wind and the water protesting. Besides, she saved the children. I will do everything I can to help her, even if it means sending her home prematurely."

The old man nodded. "As you wish. But I'm afraid we will have to draw our drinking water from somewhere else in the meantime..." He turned his back to her and disappeared into the jungle.

Left alone at last, the young shaman looked down at the bluish-gray face of Juna. Red was already beginning to stain the blankets wrapping her.

"I cannot thank you enough for saving my sister and her friends," Sara said quietly.

Juna smiled faintly up at her. "You fish-people have had your revenge and swallowed up one of the bird-people," she whispered. She looked past Sara's head at the slivers of sky visible through the jungle canopy. "I shall never see my home again..."

"Please, Juna," pleaded the shaman, blinking her tears away. "Don't talk like that. This is all my fault, for not sending you home sooner."

"No, I was relying on something I thought would be there, but wasn't." Juna coughed and grimaced, and a little trickle of blood issued from the side of her mouth. "Don't blame yourself." She gathered her breath. "I wouldn't want either of us to have that on our consciences."

"You're badly injured, and yet you still think of others... thank you," Sara said awkwardly. "Even if were really a bird-person, still I would have you as a friend." She held Juna's hand—how cold it was, she noted—and brushed strands of black hair away from her face. "I have nothing material to offer you. But I would give you a name, in the fashion of my people, as my thanks. Please accept it."

The Avatar nodded, the gesture almost imperceptible in her weakness.

Sara laid a hand on her forehead. "We don't ordinarily do it this way," she said softly. "We would usually have a big gathering with lots of food and drink and singing and dancing whenever we gift someone with a name... I name you Ranukalla, in honor of Ranukele and Ranumati, heroes of our village. It is said that Ranukele was a navigator of great renown, while Ranumati herself fought a sea monster to save my people. The name means 'child of the Ranu family.'" Her hand cupped Juna's wounded cheek. "I am sorry I doubted you."

"It's okay." Juna closed her eyes. "Thank you."

The sight of her ashen pallor and immobile countenance made Sara's heart tingle with fear. She sent a silent prayer that her gamble in sending Juna back home to where someone could help her would be answered, that her will for this once prevail over death, and closed her eyes.

------oOo------

Mother Earth, receive her into your embrace, and take her home, the shaman of the Mayan people beseeched, trying to calm herself enough so she could concentrate. Or let her die in peace, if such is to be her fate. Then she began to sing.

Dans le calme du soir
Lève les yeux afin de voir
Apparaître et scintiller
Toutes les étoiles

Dans le repos brille Arkan!
Illumine la terre soura Mayan
Ainsi la mer reflète Ohra
Qui s'élève vers l'infini soura-misône

------oOo------

On reaching 'rise into the infinite,' several things happened. The pool began to glow with a white light that obliterated their surroundings. The Drop of Time suddenly burst out into brilliant blue life, sending its light straight into Sara's eyes and blinding her. She blinked and rubbed them. As she did so, she felt the weight on her lap decreasing.

When she finally regained her sight, she found herself staring up at Juna, floating upright in the air before her, still swathed in her blankets like an infant. Gone was the pale color of death on her face, and the tan she had gained. Her eyes were still closed, and the Toki no Shizuku was no longer a deep, quiescent blue, but the color of a vivid summer sky, and very much alive.

The blankets fell away from Juna as she thrust her arms out to her sides. She was unclothed, and her body was shining with a light that made it painful to look at her. Her raven hair defied the pull of gravity and floated all around her, surrounding her glowing face with its darkness.

"Juna?"

The being's eyes opened and looked down with all their startling crimson color at Sara. She shook her head. "She sleeps for a while. Thank you, Guide of the Wind. You have saved me, but not for yourself, as you yourself well know. I must go home now. But before I leave, I have a warning to give you: beware the bird-people indeed, for their coming will be the fall of your tribe. But not all of them, not all of them. See past your legends and myths and face the reality. One of them will sing your songs... one of them will make you happy." Juna drifted down to Sara's side and, to her surprise, enveloped her in a light-fingered hug. "Above all," she whispered, "know that this life is not the only one, and but a gateway to the next. Love. Love is the key, Sara. Always keep love in your heart, even when despair seems to overwhelm you. It is your hope... and mankind's salvation." Juna backed off, closed her eyes and started to disappear in her light.

"Wait!" Sara stood up, stripped her headband with its feathers off, and shoved it into Juna's hand. "Goodbye!"

Her body already fading like fulgent mist, the Avatar smiled an inhuman smile. "I will remember the name you gave me. Ranukalla I will be, when next we meet. Farewell. The stars in the night sky will speak your name to me long after we have parted." Then she was gone, vanished as if she had never been, and along with her the light that illuminated everything.

Sara stood in the middle of the pool for a long time, alternately exulting that her powers had worked and pondering over Juna's cryptic words. She had the impression someone else had been talking to her, but then she knew too little of the girl who fell from the sky to really judge what it meant. Love was the key. But it was a key that needed someone to believe in it in the first place. Whence would come the strength for her to do that? She gave up wondering, met the men waiting for her in a glade a little down the mountain, and proceeded to explain what had happened. There was a chorus of disbelief, and she had to wait as some of them satisfied their curiosity by going to the now-empty and silent pool. With meek and chastened faces—and a new respect in their eyes—the doubters returned and they all went back to the village. On the way down, as she hung at the rear of the group talking with the tribe's chieftain, she found a small metal container on the trail before her.

"Those men," she sighed. "Always cluttering up the place." She picked it up, pushed her unbound hair back, and looked at it once before tucking it away in a fold of her dress, to decide on what to do with later. It was an empty can, yellow and silver-burnished, of Appare Genki orange juice.

------oOo------

"Her blood pressure's rising," the lab-gown-clad technician reported, rechecking his readouts and staring up at the tall Plexiglas tube filled with the greenish fluid. "Oh-oh. She's moving. It looks like she's about to wake up."

Teresa Wong looked worriedly at the tube. "Very well. Call the medical team. Get ready to transfer her into the infirmary if necessary."

"What if she goes wild while coming out of the anesthetic?"

"You let the doctors worry about that," answered Teresa. "I don't think we could stop her anyway."

She glanced across the vast room, at another tube twin to the one she was staring at. She hoped Chris Hawkins, suspended in it, senseless and in a trance, knew what he was doing.