“Who’s he?”
“Chinakru is-used to-ah, he teacher, head’aster, leader on island that I grew to…” Lawrence shrugged. “Island I grew to ‘Lawrence’ on. He knows I! He knows ‘Lawrence’ now too! I told him the title ’Ecky gave! It is a strange title, true, yet it is I now! It is real! I real!”
“That’s wonderful, Lawrence!” Rebecca gushed. “Are you sure you don’t mind the name? It was all I could come up with at the time. Perhaps one less ‘strange’ to your people would be best?”
“No! I Lawrence now!” the Tagranesi declared proudly. “I achieved all that is I as ‘Lawrence.’ Lawrence I stay!”
“That’s swell, Larry,” Silva jibed, “but what’s goin’ on? Why’s everybody out here bobbin’ around on the water to meetcha?” More than twenty proas of all shapes and sizes were in view now, and several had gathered around them, hove to. “Why don’t we take this touchin’ reunion party ashore?”
Lawrence spoke to Chinakru and then listened as the old Tagranesi told his own people’s tale. His voice was grim as he passed the translation. Essentially, though Lawrence was now a “person” in the eyes of his people, his people no longer had a home. They weren’t even “Tagranesi” anymore. The great wave had come in the night, as Lawrence had feared, and many had been drowned. Worse, all the survivors’ livelihoods, their crops, livestock, everything, had been destroyed as well. All that remained were these boats nestled in a cove on the lee side of the island to carry almost three hundred refugees. Perhaps ten times that number had died, or had been left behind to starve.
Chinakru and his best pupils had left the “proving ground,” the “forming” island to help those he now led on a mass migration “somewhere else.” It had happened before, centuries in the past, and now they must endure the greatest trial of all.
“But it’s right there!” Silva protested. “How come they have to leave? What about us? Can’t we at least rest up for a while? Shit!”
The ground had not shaken before the wave, but now it shook all the time. More waves would come, perhaps even bigger. The only “safe” place would be the highest hill on Tagran, and only the “Noble Queen” of Tagran could remain there with a select few to rebuild their people, since there was not nearly enough food for all. The only chance for the refugees was to get as far out to sea as possible before the next waves came, and ride them out. They might not even notice them on the water. After that, they must find a new place or die.
“Jeez,” Dennis muttered, looking longingly at the island so close. “I guess it’s the Philippines, then, after all. Talk about wasted time!” He looked around the boat. “That’s six, maybe seven hundred miles, and the currents won’t be any help at all.”
“But the current carried Lawrence, Mr. O’Casey, and myself in the right direction,” Rebecca protested.
“You were south of here, and lucky too,” Dennis said. “Besides, it carried you nearly straight at Talaud. If that’s what’s causin’ most o’ this ruckus, that’s the last place we want to make for. Cap’n Lelaa?”
Lelaa nodded slowly. “Agreed. Talaud must be the culprit. I hope Mr. Laumer’s expedition has already left that place!”
“What should we do?” Sandra asked the Lemurian sailor, seeking her professional opinion.
“Mr. Silva is right-we must make for the Fil-pin Lands.”
Rajendra growled something under his breath.
“What’s that?” Sandra demanded, but Rajendra didn’t answer.
“It’s our only real option,” Lelaa persisted. “The map from Ajax shows other, closer islands, but they will be as vulnerable as Yap and Tagran, and we don’t know who, if anyone, might meet us there.” She stared significantly at the gathered proas. “We can’t stay here. There’s no food, and I suspect going ashore to take any that remains would result in violence. Personally, I’d rather die than return to Yap, even without the shiksaks. It must be the Fil-pin Lands! Now, if Talaud ‘blows,’ there will be massive waves, much like Sister Audry described. The southern Fil-pin Lands, Min-daanao particularly, will be swamped. We should steer west, northwest, and sail as fast as we can. With the compass, the Heavens, and Captain Rajendra’s quadrant, we will not get lost.” She sighed. “Silva is also right about the currents, if not the distance. I have never been this far east, obviously, but I’ve been off the east coast of the Fil-pin Lands. The currents will be against us. We’re now actually about nine hundred of your miles from our destination, a voyage of… months. How much food and water do we have?”
“Not that much!” Rajendra blurted.
“Have you a better suggestion?” Sandra asked. Rajendra just shook his head.
“We have about a month and a half, usin’ just enough to keep body and soul together,” Silva said. Lelaa nodded agreement. She’d estimated as much.
Sandra sighed, rubbing her forehead. “Lawrence,” she said at last, “your people have no knowledge of the Philippines, correct?”
“None, except I.”
“I imagine those… proas are a lot faster than this boat, with as little sail as it can carry.”
“True,” Lawrence agreed.
“Twice as fast?”
Lawrence didn’t know. The only one he’d ever sailed, he’d built himself, and it was very small.
Lelaa had been looking at the lines of the boats in question. “At least that,” she said, “which would shorten the trip, but those boats do not look as well suited to heavy weather.”
“And ours is? How much food and water do they have?”
Lawrence asked, and discovered that the refugees had less than they did, for all intents and purposes.
“Saan-Kakja may kill me,” Sandra muttered, “but ask them if they want to go someplace way bigger than they’ve ever seen; where no wave can ever wash their lives away.” She looked at Lelaa. “I don’t think Saan-Kakja even has a colony on Samar, does she?”
CHAPTER 26
Talaud Island
“ J eez, Mr. Laumer,” said Shipfitter Danny Porter nervously, watching the distant mountain through binoculars, “I don’t think I can take this much longer! I’m starting to think poor Sid got off easy.”
Laumer stood beside him on S-19’s conn tower, beneath the brown-gray sky. He turned and gave Porter a blistering stare. “Stow that crap right now, sailor! Sid didn’t give up, and neither will you.” Laumer paused, taking in the hellish scene of desolation surrounding the boat. The island was a dusty, skeletal corpse, and the strange winds and twisting thermal eddies kicked up random vortices that danced among the wooden bones. The air was full of an ash so fine that it resembled a smoky haze, and everyone who came up from below wore bandannas. They didn’t help much. The whole crew had hacking coughs, and some were coughing blood. The dust was everywhere, and even below, red, puffy eyes streamed constantly.
“Look,” Irvin continued, less harshly, “I know you’re scared. Everybody is. This is the screwiest situation imaginable. But think about it like this: you were at Baalkpan, under Chapelle, right?” Danny nodded. “I wasn’t even there,” Irvin said with a touch of bitterness. “I was at Sembaakpan with the ‘women and kids.’ Tell me this-which was scarier, this or a couple hundred thousand Grik coming to eat you?”
“Well… that was,” Danny confessed, “but there was fighting, see? We were doing something! There wasn’t all this time… just sitting and waiting.”
Irvin nodded. “Yeah, we’ve been waiting a few days, but we’ve been busy too. We’ve been working on the boat and waiting for the lagoon to clear enough for us to get out of here. That was a chance Captain Reddy, you, and all the ’Cats never had at Baalkpan-a chance to get away from what was coming. By all accounts, you didn’t lose it then, and you’re not going to now. Got it?”
“Aye, aye, sir.”
The steel beneath their feet reverberated with a gasping, metallic groan, and black soot mixed with rusty red dust exploded from the port exhaust, aft. For almost a full minute, they listened to the labored, clattering rumble of the port diesel, before it belched and died.