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Author's Note: This entire fic is based on the Moana Medley by VoicePlay and fanart by leokiings on Tumblr. Check them both out, they're wonderful.
The idea in summary: Rachel Potter (the wonderful guest singer) is Moana, Layne Stein (the beatboxer) is Hei-Hei, Eli Jacobson (the Tenor 2, I believe) is Tui, Earl Elkins Jr. (the high tenor) is Maui, and Geoff Castellucci (the bass) is Tamatoa. Due to this, both the chicken and the crab are now humans and have much development. And as for how the rest of it fits in... well, you'll have to wait and see. And now, the story!
Tala liked weird kids.
Now, being the village crazy lady, this was to be expected. Quirks love company, after all. It did her heart good to see the sprouts of them running around in these little ones, like the promises of greatness. So of course, whenever she got the chance, she tried to nurture their oddities. Help them grow up big and strong. Life was more fun that way!
But sometimes, it felt like more than making life fun. More than sometimes, actually. And, well, crazy as she was, she knew her own self. She knew every twist and turn of her mind, though she let what came out of it surprise her day to day - and she knew where things came from once they appeared. But this? Oh, this was different. With this, she couldn't tell where it came from. That was how she knew it didn't come from her.
Well, she didn't mind. If it were something bad, she would be able to tell. This was only a niggling little sense of looking for something, and of never finding it, or always finding it. Sometimes both at once. (But this wasn't too strange: paradoxes came with the job, or at least understanding them.)
Whatever it was, it was always there, something stranger at the back of her strange mind, more just present than prominent. Even on the days when it was most about the fun of it all.
Like today!
Today, she was living up her role as Old Loon by telling the village kids a thousand-year-old horror story - the best one, about Maui and the Heart of Te Fiti - and telling it with extra gusto and frightening detail. Most of the kids (largely toddlers) huddled up and gaped aghast. She admittedly rather liked messing with them, and always had. Usually, every last one of them got terribly freaked out.
But not today. Today, she found two of the weird ones staring up at her, unafraid.
When Tala demonstrated the rising of Te Ka from the abyss, all of the kids gasped and ducked their heads: all but two. One of them squirmed gleefully at the excitement, but made no other reaction. The second one didn't even notice until several seconds later, but when he spotted the others all ducked down, he exploded noiselessly over backwards, flinging his rock in the air.
Oh, those are the weird ones, for sure. She could see it in the eyes: those two little kids were different. It's always the eyes. The eyes always tell me just how strange they are. And they were certainly telling now.
The strange, scrawny little boy's eyes were half the time turned down contentedly on the rocks he played with. But they leaped up, then filled with fire, as she spoke of the darkness that would devour their island and their people. The eyes of the sweet baby girl - Tala's little granddaughter - were always on the storyteller, delighted with every awful detail. But they shone with a new wonder as she spoke of the prophecy and of heroes, the ones who would save them all.
"And some say," Tala added, looking at each in turn, "that on the day the Heart is restored, all things shall come together - Earth and Air, Light and Shade - and the souls of the living and the dying shall fly to Te Fiti's mountain, and sing the Ocean's song."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" came a familiar voice, stepping up suddenly into the midst of them. "Thank you, Mother, that's enough!"
Tala smiled with a knowing patience. Ah, my Tui. You were a weird one for sure.
Oh, he was a good one, too, certainly. His sense of responsibility toward his family and his people were as firm and steady as the earth he so loved to stand on. It always had been, and it made him a good chief. But those eyes. You can't hide the blue of the sea in them, no matter how hard you try. Nothing in those eyes could be hidden - however steady he held himself outside, you could always see the waves inside, if you knew where to look. And Tala knew.
At the moment, the waves were rising a little in sharp caution, but they would soon settle again... as soon as he reassured the half-pints that the world was perfectly safe in every way. No surprise. He always tried to put a stop to her scary stories nowadays. Especially this one. This used to be your favourite too, you know, she thought, giving him a slight side-eye, folding her arms. But then again, that's why you're trying to stop it, isn't it?
"No one goes outside the reef," continued Tui, scooping up the strange little girl who called him "papa" and holding her up close. "We are safe here."
Tala stood back, smiling knowingly, waiting.
"There is no darkness!"
He turned, in just the direction Tala had hoped.
"There are no monsters!" With that, he gestured out with his hand, accidentally hitting the pole beside him.
Tala grinned. Perfect timing, my boy.
As soon as his hand collided with the pole, numerous pictures unrolled, all around the little building; tapestries of all the monsters from myth and legend, partially blocking out light. And all the kids screamed and freaked out again. Even Tui could not calm them then. (She had rigged it, of course. It was high time for a good prank around here.)
But as she watched the scene of chaos with some amount of glee, her eyes once more caught the strange ones. And they were made even stranger through their reactions.
There was the boy. His rocks, before just playthings, were now weapons. He threw them hard at as many posters as he could, not afraid but angry at them, still silent as ever she knew him.
And her little granddaughter? Tala just managed to spot her tiptoeing out through a glowing crack in the curtain, quiet as a mouse, yet unperturbed by the manic noise.
She smiled, then turned away to argue with her son over whether the legends were true. She would not convince him, but it was worth saying again. Yet even as she turned, her mind was still on those who were unafraid of the darkness, and on the strange sense, getting stronger, of having found something she'd been looking for.
Oh, those two weird little kids are gonna go far.