-8-
Willy's Freedom
By TimeTraveller-1900.
-8-
As he swam through the ocean, free once more and relishing that freedom, especially as he saw the life in the seas with pieces of seaweed and kelp floating around, with the endless fish swimming idly by, a huge contrast to the empty tank he'd spent so long in, liberated after spending months in such a small….space, Willy the Orca (it was not his real identity; every Orca had their own individual name beyond human understanding), but Willy would take the name since three very kind humans were the ones responsible for it, he thought about everything he had gone through.
While the boy Jesse, the man Randolph, and the woman Rae were kind ones, some of the humans were not. The orca did not understand why humans could be so cruel towards the world. They lived here. Every animal in the world hunted each other, preying on each other to survive; orcas would hunt down even dolphins, but they would only catch and eat what they needed just to live on and let the rest go free.
They weren't purposefully wasteful and cruel and tore the whole pod apart, and they didn't slaughter every shark they came across unless they were dangerous.
Humans on the other hand took everything, plundering the oceans of every single fish, young or old. They didn't care about the consequences of their actions, and even when they weren't hunting down animals, they still hunted them, but not to eat.
The orca had been chilled and horrified when he had been cornered, frightened; the songs of his pod had made it clear in times past, the humans had hunted them down for whatever they wanted, cruelly tearing pods apart, killing over and over again until there were few survivors, and upsetting the balance.
But what he hadn't expected was to be locked up in a torturously small pool, or whatever they called it. There was barely enough room for him, and he was a fully grown orca. He was alone. All his life, he had been soothed by the echolocation sounds of the other orcas of his pod, the whistles of the dolphins, and the songs of the humpback whales.
Suddenly he was cut off from it all. He was forced to perform for food, for tricks, in front of crowds of ignorant humans who clapped, cheered, and booed whenever they were entertained or bored with his performance. It offended his pride as an orca to be some kind of performer. He was supposed to be free! The orca was furious with them.
And there was one human in particular, one who had tried to kill him because he was too angry to perform, even stubbornly refusing to perform.
They had tried to kill him, but in the end, the orca decided to let them do it to put him out of his misery.
What else could he do? He was trapped, cut off from the sea, cut off from the wide expanses he had grown up with, and hunted in. The most torturous part was he was cut off from his loved ones, and his family. But not anymore; with the help of the boy Jesse, the man Randolph, Rae, and the other man Glen and his own mate, Annie, he would never have escaped from the pool.
-Mother- he greeted his mother.
-My son, you have returned.- the beautiful song of his mother replied; his mother, wise and gentle was a balm to his soul.
-I have-
-How did you escape the humans?-
-I almost didn't - the orca admitted to his mother, knowing his mother was not the only one hearing this. -Some of the humans tried to kill me-
-Humans. They will never rest until they have finally spoilt the world-
-True, but some humans are better than others; five of them saved my life. If it was not for them, I would have died. When I was caught, I was taken from the sea, and put into this tiny….pool. I was cut off from the sea, from our songs, our calls. There was no fish, they gave me fish. There was nothing to do, except perform for their whims. Some of the humans were gentle, kind even, but others were not. They plotted to kill me. In the end, I met a youngling, a human boy called Jesse-
-What's so special about him?- His little sister asked.
-He has some kind of….toy- the orca was unsure of how to describe it since Jesse had never explained it. -He can make a sound with it, by putting it to his mouth. It might be clumsy compared to our own songs, but somehow he puts his spirit into it-
-Interesting-
-Oh, he is, and he is a deeply….hurt human; he told me about his past, how he never knew his father, and how his mother just abandoned him and he was forced to live alone without other members of his family-
The outcry was instantaneous.
-What?-
-How could a human do such a thing?-
-Is nothing sacred to them?-
-I suppose its true; humans are cruel-
Their mother called for silence. -The ways of the humans are different from ours, but how did this youngling survive?-
-He survived with others of his kind, other younglings. They stole from others of their kind to survive, but he was caught painting my pool walls. I actually liked what he had done, but the other humans hadn't, and they made him clean it all up. He was given new parents, kind, good humans. I met them briefly. After that we became friends. I saw he was a kind, good soul. He tried to make me perform tricks, but I refused, and he decided to run away before he realised one of the reasons why I refused to perform; he saw you, my family, my loved ones…and then he saw some of the humans start a leak to my pool-
-He saw them try to kill you?-
-Yes. He rallied some other humans, including his new parents, to get me back to my home. But the other humans kept trying to stop them. I don't know why they bothered, but if I hadn't leapt over a wall, I could never have escaped from them, and now I am free. I now firmly like and trust five humans-
The other members of the pod absorbed what they had just been told. Calmly they accepted the facts there were good, kind, and caring humans and evil humans. It was an accepted fact many of their race was evil, cruel and even sadistic. But it was a pleasure to discover there were some exceptions, kind humans.
-What do you think we should do?-
-What do you mean?-
-Do you think we should avoid the humans?-
The orcas considered the question and mutually agreed that was perhaps the best decision. The orcas did not even bother debating the question; the experience of the kidnap of one of their own number had made them avoid the humans more than ever; while wild orcas were happy to just be left alone even if there were humans nearby, they gave them a lot of space. But now they had to admit, the thought of just putting more distance was attractive.