Chapter Two

Gi turned at the sound of Linka's cry and was just in time to see the red head disappear below the edge of the craft.

"He is out cold!" A frightened Linka exclaimed. "He will drown!"

Leaving the controls, which were largely useless anyway now that the wind planeteer was holding them up, Gi rushed to the door, and with almost no hesitation dived in after their team mate.

"Can you take us down?" Kwame's calm voice penetrated Linka's rising panic but she shook her head.

"We can go down, but I will not be able to lift us up again." She swallowed. "I cannot hold us here for long either, I..."

"I have called some of our sea friends for help." The youngest planeteer said. There was fear in his voice but he was obviously still thinking clearly. "Gi is a strong swimmer, she will keep herself and Wheeler afloat until the dolphins arrive."

Kwame nodded in approval. "The sooner we get to land, the sooner we can come back for them."

His voice was steady and reassuring and Linka nodded, though her face was pale and Ma-Ti could tell how frightened she was for their friends.

Knowing that time was of the essence for their team mates, every moment of that trip seemed to take forever but Linka couldn't move them any faster on her own. By the time they reached land, the wind planeteer was near to passing out from exhaustion.

"Stay here with Linka." Kwame ordered. "I will find us a boat."

"I am coming with you!" Linka exclaimed, thinking it was bad enough that she'd had to let Gi go after their fiery friend alone without abandoning them now. If she felt a hint of jealousy at the thought of the Asian being the one to save Wheeler, she refused to acknowledge it.

"I will not leave you behind, I promise." Kwame reassured her. "But it might take some time to find someone willing to take us out in that storm, you need to rest for as long as you can."

Linka turned her head away, knowing he was right but hating to feel so useless.

While Kwame was gone, Ma-Ti tried to keep up a flow of cheerful chatter but the Russian did not feel up to responding and he soon ran out of things to say.

Linka was trying not to think about her two friends out on the freezing ocean in less than ideal conditions, but she could think of nothing else. She couldn't quite shake the idea that she was the one who had failed, that if she'd been stronger, more in control of her ring, they would all be there together.

I will work harder, train to be better... She promised silently. Just let them be ok!

"I have found someone willing to take us, and the local coast guard has already set out." Kwame's voice announced, and the wind planeteer nearly sobbed with relief. She was still exhausted and had completely lost track of time – it felt like days since she'd last seen Wheeler – but she would ignore her body's weakness until her friends were safe, she wouldn't fail them again by slowing them down.

Trying not to show her impatience as she was made to put on a life jacket, the Russian positioned herself near the front of the boat in the hope of being the first to spot their lost companions.

As it happened, the first thing they saw were the dolphins jumping playfully around the lifeboat as the rescuers pulled someone on board and wrapped them in blankets.

"They have found them!" Linka exclaimed, trying to see if they'd already retrieved the other member of their team. The pitching of the water made it difficult however and the boats owner had to slow down to approach the other craft without becoming a menace to the happy dolphins.

One of the beautiful creatures broke away from the rest and came to greet them, she seemed to want Linka's attention and the wind planeteer laughed, reaching out to pat her. "Thank you my friend. Ma-Ti, can you tell her we are grateful for their help?"

"I… I have Linka but she…" The young man looked pale. "She knows somehow… that is… she is trying to comfort you…"

The colour drained from Linka's face and she looked back to the lifeboat. They were close enough now to see that it was Gi that had been pulled from the water, and she was crying.

"Where is Wheeler?" The Russian's voice was too quiet to carry to the other boat over the wind and rain so at first no one answered, but when she repeated it more loudly, her voice taking on a shrill note that matched the fear she was feeling, Gi looked over and met her eyes. She shook her head.

"Nyet!" Linka screamed, turning to the small boats owner. "We must go on, we must find him, they should never have left!" Kwame tried to put a restraining hand on her arm but she shook him off. "We need to go now! Tell him!"

Ma-Ti had tears in his eyes. "It is too late, Linka. The dolphins searched much longer than a human could, he was just gone."

"We have to go back Linka, there is nothing we can do for him now." Kwame spoke gently but it didn't make what he was saying any easier.

She shook her head in denial, sinking down helplessly as her own weakened state caught up with her.

As the dolphins bid them goodbye, the small boats turned towards the shore forcing Linka once more away from where she wanted to be.


Linka's face was wet from the spray and the rain, the others probably thought it was mixed with tears but it wasn't, she couldn't cry.

Everything felt remote to the young girl, the trip back to the land, the hot drinks that never quite seemed to penetrate the numbness or the cold, Gi's tearful explanations of how she'd looked for their friend until she couldn't feel her limbs and had had to be rescued herself. All of it had an unreal quality to it and Linka was watching it happen as if it was happening to someone else.

When the storm cleared Kwame and Ma-Ti went out to start fixing the Geo-cruiser while the girls continued to recover their strength. They couldn't help but notice how quiet Linka had gotten, but they knew she was grieving and really didn't know what to say to her. Gi had even tried to apologise to her but the Russian had continued to stare at the open fire in the public house they'd been taken to without answering, and she wasn't even sure if she'd heard.

The water planeteer was still crying quietly when the boys got back and Linka looked like she hadn't moved. "We cannot fix the 'cruiser here, we have called Commander Clash, he will be here in a couple of hours."

Gi nodded, Linka continued to stare at the fire.

The Commander made a great rescue service and he was always more than happy to help Gaia, so the planeteers felt little compunction in calling on him, besides this was exceptional circumstances.

Clash airlifted them back to their home and offered to stay and help them with repairs, which was fortunate since it was usually Wheeler that assisted Gi with putting their equipment back together. He'd noted the young Russian's condition but had thought better of saying anything.

On arriving in the Crystal Chamber, Linka surprised them all by making a sudden announcement. "Ma-Ti and I will take the eco-sub back to the area where we nearly crashed. We owe it to Wheeler to bring his body back and Ma-Ti can track his ring."

The coldness of her voice chilled them and even Gaia shivered slightly. "Kwame can go with Ma-Ti." She offered softly and the Russian shocked her again.

"I was not asking for permission. Ma-Ti, you have quarter of an hour to dry off and change, if you are not ready I will leave without you." Linka turned and walked from the Crystal Chamber without looking back.

The other planeteers looked at Gaia for guidance, they'd never seen Linka like that and it was hard to know what to do for the best. "Let her deal with it in her own way. Ma-Ti are you alright to accompany her on your own or would you like one of the others to go too?"

"I will be fine Gaia, thank you." He still sounded choked up but then none of them would be able to deal with what had happened overnight. "Please look after Suchi for me though, he does not like being in the sub."

The little simian skittered over to the spirit and she made herself solid enough for him to climb up to her shoulder and nestle there. "Gi you should take a hot shower and get some sleep."

Thoughtless humans and eco-villains made Gaia angry, sometimes they upset her, but losing Wheeler seemed to have made her incredibly tired, as if all her years were suddenly weighing down on her.

Ma-Ti led them unerringly to Wheeler's ring as it lay in the deepest part of the ocean, he could only be relieved that it wasn't attached to a corpse. He knew Linka had wanted to find him and perhaps she needed to see that he was gone, but the youngest planeteer had no desire to see the lifeless body of his best friend.

It was dark down there, they needed flashlights to avoid the rocks and without Ma-Ti's ability they would never have found the fire ring. The pressure was also so great that they couldn't go outside and had had to use mechanical means to retrieve the ring.

Linka sat staring at it as she cradled it in her hand. Up until then she'd been all business, no nonsense, Linka with just a brittle edge to the way she spoke. Now all the fight had gone out of her.

"What do we do now?" Ma-Ti asked softly, as if he thought she would suddenly turn on him. "We can keep looking…"

Linka shook her head.

"Back to Hope Island?"

She nodded.

When they docked back in their home port, the young girl didn't move, nor did she show any signs that she'd noticed their arrival.

"Linka? We are home." Ma-Ti prompted gently, and when there was no response. "We need to report back to Gaia."

The wind planeteer rose obediently and made her way to their command centre, her young friend trailing nervously behind her. She held the ring out for the spirit to take but she was staring right through her, and her eyes were still dry.

"Thank you both." Gaia took the ring and suggested they got some rest.

Again Linka obeyed but as Kwame commented later, she seemed to be suffering from some form of delayed shock.


The next few days went by in a blur for Linka. She felt completely numb, detached from her feelings and everything that was going on around her.

The others were having whispered conversations, most of which were about what to do about the wind planeteer's current condition. The only thing they could agree on was that, however long it took for her to recover, they couldn't abandon her.

Linka wasn't sleeping properly either, whenever she closed her eyes she couldn't help seeing what she considered to be Wheeler's final moments. He gave her one of his cheeky grins and then something slammed into them, the ship juddered and his head whipped back against the door frame. There was a sickening crack and his eyes rolled up into his head just before he fell, lifeless into the churning waters below.

Over and over she saw it, and no matter how hard she tried to recall something before, some happy image of him, it was all she could conjure, even his voice seemed to be lost in the fog.

And yet she still couldn't grieve, no tears, no sobs… not even anger. Linka had no energy, she just wanted to sleep and let the world fade away. If she could have chosen to go to sleep and not wake up again, she would have done… but doing something to cause it? That took effort and a willpower she just didn't have.

Gi would come and tell her to get up and put food in front of her and though the Russian didn't need any assistance with what she was ordered to do, if no one told her to do it, she would just sit there and stare into the distance. About the only thing she did of her own volition was to visit the bathroom, but that seemed to be instinct rather than a choice.


To Be Continued...