Chapter Text
"The sea takes the strongest swimmers first, as if it is afraid of what they might become."
The morning after Tsireya’s tearful confession felt wrong, as if the tides themselves had forgotten how to turn. Ao'nung woke to a silence that grated against his nerves, the empty space in the communal pod where Rotxo’s easy laughter usually lingered now heavy with a suffocating stillness. Outside, the bright turquoise waters of the Reef continued to shimmer with an indifference that felt like a personal insult. Every rhythm of the village— the splashing of ilu, the rhythmic scraping of weavers, the distant calls of hunters— felt out of sync, a fractured melody, now that a vital note had been ripped away.
For the first time in his life, the vast horizon of the ocean didn't look like a playground.
How was any of this fair?
He reached out to touch the woven wall of the pod, his fingers tracing the patterns Rotxo had helped mend only weeks ago, but the fibers felt cold, stripped of the life they once held. The air itself seemed thinner, as if the village were exhaling a breath it was too broken to draw back in. It didn't feel real.
None of this felt real.
He's never felt grief this intense, not since Neteyam. Not only did he lose his best friend, but he lost his mother— all in the same fucking night. It was a joke, it had to be. What kind of sick act was Eywa trying to pull on him?
All he can do is remember. Even as he hears the village begin to stir, as more and more of his people venture past the comfort of their pods and out into the open air, Ao'nung finds himself unable to do the same. He can barely lift himself upright, all he's doing is staring at the ceiling, begging to wake up for real this time.
To hear his mother's voice snap at him for being slow. Just one more time. To listen as Rotxo's teasing lilt in his voice sung to him. Just one more time. He wanted them to break the horizon. To watch as they headed back to shore.
But, it's no use living in a fairytale. Yet, that's where he feels like he belongs.
He remembers the smell of the salt air and the way Rotxo sharpened his blade. Ao'nung should have seen the way the light hit his friend's face— like a goodbye he wasn't smart enough to read yet. What if he had gone with Rotxo? What if his voice had been as loud as the waves that crashed against the beach, begging for Rotxo not to participate in a war that was not their own— Would he be alive?
"Ao'nung! Get up, the morning meal is ready. Father is already waiting." Tsireya’s voice drifted in, bright and fragile, though he could hear the tremor of her own grief fraying the edges of her command.
He didn't move at first. He stared at the empty space beside his mat where Rotxo should have been kicking him awake, the silence there so loud it made his ears ring. He had to move. He had to be the son of the Olo’eyktan. Slowly, he forced his limbs to obey, his muscles feeling like leaden anchors as he pushed himself upright. He adjusted his loincloth and smoothed his hair with trembling fingers, schooling his face into a mask of stone-cold indifference.
"I'll be there," he croaked, the words catching in his throat. He stood up, the world spun for a sickening moment, before he took a deep breath, and stepped out into the light, carrying the crushing phantom of his best friend like a shroud he wasn't allowed to show.
Ao'nung looked down to the right; A learnt habit. He reminds himself that Rotxo wouldn't be there to walk with him, and he forces himself to head on, despite the lingering grief that weighed him down.
Once reaching the main marui where he usually ate a hearty meal, Ao'nung entered without saying a word to his sister or his father. It was just them now.
He sat hunched over his bowl, the steam from the fresh broth hitting his face without providing any warmth. He stared at the contents, feeling his appetite slowly dissipate, leaving a hollow ache in his stomach that sustenance could not retain. Beside him, Tsireya sat with her head down, poking at the fish that floated on the surface before taking a forced bite.
Their mother’s seat remained empty— a gaping wound at the table— but the silence was louder where Rotxo should have been, cracking jokes and stealing extra portions of fruit from Ao'nung's bowl, fighting over the fresh piece's.
Tonowari broke the silence, his voice a low rumble that vibrated with a forced, stoic strength. "Your mother fought with the heart of the ocean," he said, staring into the distance as if seeing Ronal’s spear piercing the waves one last time.
"She returns to Eywa as a tsahìk and a mother. We must honor her spirit by leading our people through the recovery." He paused, his gaze shifting briefly to the empty space beside Ao’nung. "And we shall offer prayers for Rotxo. It is a pity his life was cut short before he could truly serve the clan. He would've made a strong warrior."
Pity. That's all Rotxo deserves? Ao'nung feels his jaw clench, and an ugly bile of anger simmers in his chest. Grief can alter everything, and in the wake of it, Ao'nung felt the urge to bite a response. To snap at his father for acting like Rotxo hadn't been a part of their family for a long time.
"He didn't 'fall short', father. Rotxo died. You speak of him as if he were a lost tool, but he was more than that." Ao'nung bit out through a tremor of his voice, as he recalled how much Rotxo meant to him.
How he often anchored Ao'nung to reality.
"He should've made it home." Ao'nung professed quietly, turning to face the archway of the pod to prevent them from noticing the way his eyes shimmered with unshod tears. The grief was fresh, and if it felt this heavy, and this damning— how in Eywa's mind was he meant to walk this path?
Tonowari paused, his large hand hovering over a piece of fish, his brow furrowing at the defiance in his son’s tone. "I speak of the reality of warriors, Ao’nung," he replied, his voice a low rumble that lacked the warmth the boy craved. "We mourn, but we move. To dwell is to drift."
That was a personal hit and Ao'nung couldn't help but allow his grief to speak for him. "You honor Mother’s spirit in every breath you take; you speak her name with the reverence of Great Mother herself. Why is Rotxo not worth the same?" He trembled out, as he felt Tsireya whisper a plea for him to calm down.
But, he couldn't.
Not yet.
The silence that followed was no longer cold; it was weighted with the realization that the war was changing them, hardening them in ways that threatened to erase the very love that defined the Metkayina. "She meant more to our family than he did. You know this, son." Tonowari remarked gruffly, keeping his tone steady.
His response only fuelled Ao'nung's guilt, because he knows that he should not be taking Rotxo’s side. That their mother, indeed, mattered more to them than Rotxo does. Ao'nung acknowledges this— but, he knows that he can't just play it off. He can't pretend that Rotxo’s death was in vain, solely because he chose to fight against the Sky People. To defend his village, and their friends.
"I do, father," he admitted, swallowing thickly, before continuing, "I acknowledge her worth, I do. But I won't accept that Rotxo’s life is a lesser debt just because he didn't hold a title."
A tense pause swelled, as Tsireya avoided getting involved, her own guilt lingering, but not intense like her brother.
"He was a child of the Reef. He came to us with nothing, and he gave us everything he was." He remarked despite the swell in his throat. No response.
The silence that followed was suffocating. Ao’nung looked at his father’s stoic face, searching for a flicker of the man who used to lift Rotxo up alongside his own children. A bitter thought tasted like ash in his mouth: if Rotxo had died with a title— a Great Hunter, a Lead Warrior— would his father be mourning now?
"Why won't you acknowledge him?" Ao'nung confessed, as the tears welled with an overwhelming hit of anger that he couldn't control.
Still, no response from his father. As if he was deliberately trying to erase Rotxo from their history.
"If he had died with a name that carried weight, would you have found the breath to honor him?" He stood abruptly, the breakfast forgotten, his heart aching for the boy who had simply wanted to belong.
He realized then that in his father's eyes, Rotxo was just a fragment of the reef that had been swept away by the tide, while to Ao'nung, he was the very current he had learned to swim in.
The tension in the pod curdled into a suffocating silence as Tonowari’s hand slammed onto the low table, the force rattling the bowls and sending a spray of water across the floor. He rose to his full height, his massive frame casting a shadow that seemed to swallow the morning light.
"Enough!" he snapped, the command vibrating in the very bones of the lodge. For a heartbeat, his father's mask of stoic leadership slipped, revealing the frayed nerves of a man trying to hold a grieving village together. "You speak of honor as if it is a gift to be handed out to every boy who fails to return home!"
The words leave him before he had a chance to think. He had allowed his grief to overwhelm him. Tonowari did not desire to argue with his son, but after losing his wife— he was incredibly lost. The weight of responsibility settling on his shoulders, alone.
He saw the way Ao’nung recoiled as if he’d been struck, the boy’s eyes widening with a raw, agonizing shock. Beside him, Tsireya let out a small, broken sob, pulling her hands to her chest, unable to stand them fighting. The silence that followed was worse than words. Tonowari’s chest heaved, his fingers twitching at his sides as the weight of what he’d just implied, that Rotxo’s death was a mere consequence of incompetence, settled like an unwelcomed tide in the room.
"If that is all he meant to you," Ao'nung started, swallowing back the tears, "then you didn't truly know him at all." Without another word, he turned on his heel and left, walking away from the pod and down the raised pathway, wiping the first few tears that finally spill.
Tonowari remained standing, his hand still resting on the table, the wood grain biting into his palm. The silence was thick, suffocating, and broken only by the ragged, uneven breathing of his daughter. He didn't turn to look at her; he couldn't.
"Father," Tsireya whispered, her voice a fragile thread. He finally turned his head, seeing the tears tracking through the faint bioluminescence of her cheeks. She wasn't looking at him with the usual reverence of a daughter to an Olo’eyktan; she was looking at him with a quiet, devastating fear. "He loved us. Rotxo didn't have a mother or a father to guide his hands, so he looked to you. He practiced his breath-holding until his lungs burned just so he could keep up with us. Just so he could be worthy of being... here."
Her words only cause him to stiffen. The realization of what he said, crashing over him once again.
"He was the one who shared his catch with me when I was too tired to dive. He was the one who stayed behind to fix the nets so Ao'nung could rest." She let out a small, broken laugh that sounded more like a sob.
"He didn't have a mother to weep for him, Father. He only had us. He thought he was your son, too. He died thinking he belonged to someone. Let his spirit believe that." She whispered through tears, wiping them away with deft fingers, before standing up.
"I'll head out to check on the Sully's." Then, she was gone.
The cove was a hidden sliver of turquoise tucked behind the jagged spine of the eastern cliffs, a place where the tide whispered instead of roared. Only he and Rotxo knew which narrow underwater passages to take. Ao'nung slumped back against the sand, staring up at the vast sky, as the sun shone down on him, but brought little to no comfort.
"You’re a fool," Ao’nung whispered, his voice cracking against the sharp gusts. "A complete and total sky-brained fool."
Just twenty-four hours ago, the village had been feasting. Rotxo had finally earned his markings. The ink was still dark and fresh on his teal skin, tracing the lineage of a true Metkayina warrior.
"Look at this, Ao’nung," Rotxo had laughed, puffing out his chest and preening like a forest bird. "I look like a leader. Do you think Kiri will notice? Or do you think she’ll be too busy looking at the 'mighty' forest boy?"
Rotxo had spent the whole night joking about how he’d walk past Kiri the next day, making sure the sun hit the ink just right. He was so full of life, so soft in that harmless, beautiful way he had.
The memory shifted, turning cold and bloody. The battle hadn't been a glorious song; it had been chaos. Rotxo, fueled by the high of his new status, had pushed too far. He had tried to intercept a RDA gunner to prove he was the warrior his skin claimed he was.
"Why were you such a fool?" Ao’nung snapped now, the sound echoing off the damp cave walls. He slammed his fist into the stone. "You weren't ready! Those markings didn't make you invincible, you skxawng!" His voice broke at the knowledge that status did not equate to strength.
The sob that left him was gut wrenching. Yet, he hoped Rotxo could hear him. Hear how deeply scarred his absence had made. He hoped Eywa was listening, too.
"I should have stopped you," he whimpered. "I saw you go. I was the future Olo’eyktan... I was supposed to lead you, to protect you. I just watched you dive in because I wanted to see you win." Now, if only he had stopped Rotxo for even just a second, maybe things would've been different.
Tsireya had insisted on going with Rotxo to the eastern flank. Ao’nung had let her. He had stayed back to secure the main pens with his father.
"It should have been me," Ao’nung choked out, splashing the water in a sudden burst of rage. "Tsireya is a healer, a singer. She wasn't ready for that kind of heat. You were trying to protect her, weren't you? You took the hit because she couldn't move fast enough."
He could almost see Rotxo’s spirit now, shimmering in the mist of the grotto. In his mind, Rotxo wasn't a hero; he was just a boy who had died too soon, leaving a hole in the world that no prayer to Eywa could fill.
Ao’nung closed his eyes, and all he could see was Rotxo’s face— not the face of a soldier, but the face of the boy who used to rescue trapped reef pups.
"That was your problem," Ao’nung whispered, his voice trembling. "You acted like you were Olo’eyktan. You had more heart than the council elders combined, and it’s the very thing that killed you."
He remembered how Rotxo had charged forward when he saw Tsireya cornered. A seasoned warrior would have signaled for backup, waited for an opening. But Rotxo didn't wait. He didn't think. He just was. He was love and loyalty wrapped in a fourteen-year-old’s body, throwing himself into the path of a storm he couldn't survive.
Ao’nung looked down at his own hands. They were shaking. He was the Chief’s son; he was supposed to be stoic, to accept that Eywa gives and Eywa takes away. But tonight, he hated the Great Mother. He hated the 'balance.'
"They’ll tell stories about your bravery," Ao’nung spat at the empty air, "and they’ll forget that you were still learning how to properly dive the deep trenches. They’ll call you a hero so they don’t have to call you a child."
Rotxo shouldn’t have been at the front. He should have been at the bottom of the lagoon, seeing who could hold their breath the longest. He should have been making crude jokes about the forest people or trying to impress the girls with a clumsy dive.
Instead, the village was wrapping his death in the finery of a soldier. If they admitted he was just a child, they would have to admit they failed him. By calling him a hero, they made his death feel necessary.
To Ao’nung, it was nothing but a theft.
He didn't want a funeral pyre. He just wanted his best friend back.
"Eywa has a thousand sons in the deep. Why did she need the only one I had?"
But even Eywa could not find it in herself to answer his question.