The Kraken Game
“They're here”.
Rony had gone swimming early in the morning. When he returned, Sheena was waiting for him in front of the big tent.
“The children are here”, she told him. “Yuri's showing them around, the greenhouses and how to use the equipment to take care of what we planted. Come, let's look at their fles.”
Rony took a towel, wiping the colorful remains of ocean water in his hair.
“Okay, show me their files.”
Sheena turned on the laptop screen.
“We've got two girls and three boys. First girl: Zenna, fifteen years old. She ran away from her rich parents to join a fighting club. She used to gamble her daddy's money until she got interested in kickboxing. She's probably a fierce temperament and needed to blow of some steam, being the only child, restricted to a house she wasn't allowed to leave. The sport suited her well, but it also got her in trouble. She got into some fights and broke a guy's jaw. Finally, she was taken into custody by the rehabilitation camp. And now we've got her.”
“Great”, said Rony, looking at the picture of an athletic redhead, with steely green eyes and pointed chin. “I get the idea. Go on to the next.”
Sheena scrolled down the screen.
“Next girl: Penelope, seventeen years old. She's rather quiet and reserved, but highly intelligent.”
“So what's wrong with her?”
“Nothing's wrong, she's just a type of rebel against the system. She was caught stealing books, so she was sent to rehabilitation camp. She escaped from the camp twice and was brought back.”
“We'd better keep an eye on her then. She seems unpredictable,” he said looking at the picture of a tall girl with big brown eyes.
“That's right: we must be careful with her.”
“If the girls are so promising, I wonder about the boys”.
Sheena smiled.
“Yes, here are the boys... first one, Joey. The youngest, fourteen years old.”
The pilot looked at the picture of a short slim boy wearing a cartoon t-shirt and jeans.
“What's his story?”
“He's emotionally unstable, very vulnerable. He faked epilepsy attacks to get into hospital and steal medicine with euphoric effect. His father left the family when he was three years old, so he grew up without a male model. He was in rehab institutions many times, but the problem is his emotional neediness. He's very anxious and became addicted very early to all sorts of drugs. If he gets nervous he becomes agitated and will do anything to get something to change the chemical balance in his brain.”
“Okay, I understand. Joey needs attention. What about the other two boys?”
“Martin is a trouble-maker. Eighteen years old, very short tempered. He beats others up. He's very impatient and needs lots of physical activity. We should give him work at the greenhouse, hopefully he stays out of trouble.”
The blond boy with icy blue eyes was staring at them deflyingly from the laptop screen. Rony looked at the boy's arms and noticed the round shaped muscles and assertive posture.
“Hmm... I predict a fight between him and Zenna”, he smiled.
Sheena shook her head.
“Heavens forbid, I hope not!”
Then she scrolled down the file.
“Last but not least, fifteen year old Buddy. He's a smart boy, but he gets lost easily.”
“What do you mean he gets lost?”
“His brain can process information like a computer, but he can't remember a place if he leaves it. He doesn't know how to get back, he can't recognize the way.
It's as if he sees every scenery, every landscape for the first time. Somebody must always take him from one place to another because otherwise he gets lost on his own. He likes to talk and follow people around, so he really must be supervised in case he wanders of somewhere. He has a habit of going wherever his feet take him.”
At that moment Yuri entered the tent, staring at the laptop with his blue innocent eyes.
“I've brought the kids back from the greenhouse. Rony, they're waiting for you. I told them you'd show them how to set up a tent.”
“Thanks Yuri”.
He went outside. The teenagers were waiting, sitting down, lined up by the big tent, absently glancing in the distance. They seemed awkward with the new situation and disoriented. Rony sensed they weren't fully comprehensive of why they had been sent to Asterius. They were taking it as a sort of punishment and were expecting harsh attitudes from the adults.
Rony walked past them, taking turns to recognize each one by the pictures he'd seen.
“Hi there. I'm Rony the pilot”, he said to them.
They raised their eyes, watching him distrustfully and observantly.
“Are you the chief of this camp?” the curly haired boy asked him.
“If anything, I'll be the chief!” the blonde boy interrupted, defiantly.
Rony spoke patiently:
“Martin, nobody's come here to act as a chief. You're here to learn to behave and become better people.”
“And the grown-ups too?” the curly haired boy insisted.
“Yes Buddy, the grown-ups must also learn to be better people.”
“Okay. I can accept it then.”
Martin was still resentful.
“I wish they'd sent me to a labor camp instead! It's gonna be so boring here!”
“Shut up already, you're so annoying!” the smallest boy shouted at him irritated.
Rony admired his courage to stand up to the most physically ft of the group, despite his frail appearance.
“You must be Joey”.
The thin boy looked at him with big green eyes like clear water and something lit up his face in a friendly smile.
“Yes, I'm Joey. How do you know my name?”
“I've seen your id info a while ago.”
“Did the authorities gossip to you about us?” one of the girls asked sarcastically.
He turned to face her. Big brown eyes from beyond a long chestnut fringe were sizing him up and down, as if from a room full of information about him.
“Hello Penelope. Nobody gossiped about you yet...”
“They will, and you too. I'm just trouble for you.”
“Why?”
“Because I'm agile and sneaky and sooner or later I'll get out of here.
Tomorrow I'll be back on the satellite, I'll steal your shuttle before you wake up.”
“Don't make me laugh!” Martin intervened again. “There's no shuttle for you to steal! I would be the first to leave otherwise.”
“You always have to be the first at something,” Penelope replied with irony.
“Why not be the first to shut up for a while.”
Then she turned her eyes to Rony, with a hidden smile: “Do you have a library around here somewhere?”
“I'm sorry, but we haven't built it yet. Maybe you'd like to do that, while you're here?”
“Sure, why not... Just bring the books, and I'll build a place for them.”
“Or run away with them”, Joey laughed genuinely amused, already imagining a funny vision of Penelope running to the horizon with her arms full of books.
“What are books?” Martin asked in contempt. “And who needs them? Losers!”
“I told you to shut up”, Penelope replied. “Your ignorance makes you the loser around here.”
The only person who had not said anything yet was Zenna. She was listening somehow absently, her steely green eyes cutting through the white dust of the rocky hills around, her long reddish hair touching her athletic knees. She seemed ready to jump and sprint out of sight.
“Hi Zenna”, Rony said to her, extending a hand.
She looked at him attentively and shook his hand with a firm grip.
“Hi pilot.”
Her eyes flickered for a moment with a friendly light of recognition. Rony understood she appreciated something about him – the uniform, the job, the mission, the attitude... something sparked her interest to actually look at him and smile. It was as if she already knew him from somewhere else.
“Nice to meet you”, she added.
“Nice to meet you too. Have we met before?”
“Nope. But I've checked your file online before coming here” she confessed. “I wanted to know who I was dealing with and if you are who you say you are.”
“And? What's your conclusion?”
Zenna shrugged simply.
“You're the pilot. You said so.”
He was a bit confused about why she had checked his profile before arriving on the planet, but he couldn't figure out what was on her mind, so he just left it at that.
“Ok everyone. First we're going to set up the tents for you.”
“I can do it myself, I don't need your help!” Martin said in a hostile tone, bragging proudly.
“I don't think so”, Rony explained calmly. “These tents are special. They're designed to stand up to storms blowing white dust with a speed of two hundred kilometers per hour. They're also designed with a resistant skeleton that automatically switches on a wireless signal in case of burial in the storm or landslide.
You'll be perfectly safe inside these tents, but setting up also requires a certain procedure. I'll show you and you'll learn to do it by yourselves soon enough.”
He started walking to the unpacked tents.
“Come on! Let's go team!” he said and the teenagers got up, following him.
In a second, Joey was already walking by his side.
“What's this?” he asked, touching the electronic key chain attached to his belt.
“It's an infra-blue lamp. It can light up a laser beam one kilometer distance.”
“Wow! Awesome! Can I try it?”
“Right now it's not the best time of day to do that. The sunlight will fade the laser beam and you won't see much of it. I'll let you try it later.”
Before he noticed, Buddy was walking on the other side and had grabbed his hand.
“What about the power of the lamp? Is it sunlight regenerated or does it run on battery?”
“It recharges in sunlight, but it also incorporates a battery in case of prolonged eclipse.”
“Cool! Do we get to have such a lamp ourselves?”
“Would you like to?”
The boys answered at the same time, with convinced enthusiasm: “Yes!”
“Okay, I'll give you lamps later this evening.”
“Yay! We're getting lamps!”
The unpredictable, unrestrained joy and exuberance was changing the atmosphere of the camp in an instant. Silence was replaced by laughter, loud talking and cheerful action. After installing the tents, which the teenagers were very interested to learn about and skillful at getting it done, Rony told them about the beach.
“There's an ocean beyond that hill”, he said. “If you want, we can go for a swim.”
The enthusiastic cheering covered the sound of his voice. He couldn't stop them, as they started running to the top of the hill.
“Yay! Swimmiiiing!”
The boys were first to get into the water. The girls were also eager to go find the beach, so Rony was left around the tents by himself. He had to leave everything and run after the kids, hoping they knew how to swim so he wouldn't have to jump and save them from the ocean. When he arrived at the beach they were already up to their knees in the waves, soaking wet, splashing colorful water at one another and having so much fun that he didn't want to deprive them of that happiness, so he just let them play. None of them was going to deep water, they were only playing at the shore, catching the waves or throwing pebbles in the distance.
Rony sat on a rock, watching them amused and captivated.
He didn't notice when Sheena came next to him, probably intrigued and alerted by the noise.
“Look how happy they are”, she observed. “They've forgotten they're far away from home. This beach is like paradise for them.”
“I'm not sure what to do with them. They're so unpredictable.”
Sheena smiled.
“You're already doing great, believe me. I think you're just what they need. I saw you explaining how to set up the tents, and now this... they need this freedom.
These moments are what will stay with them – what will make them better.”
“I'm afraid I can't insist to discipline them enough. What if I can't make them better people?”
“Don't worry, they're already better people. Look at them: they're bonding by playing together. Let them do that. No discipline can replace real connection.”
“Maybe you're right... but they've got the mentality of ten year olds. They're so impulsive.”
“You have to understand these are children who grew up on a satellite. They don't have enough life experience to be too mature about it. And I don't think they were chosen randomly.”
“What do you mean?”
“Think about it, Rony. We're like a micro-society here, reconstructing the foundation of a new world, at a smaller scale. Each of these teenagers represents something. For example, Martin is the anarchist, Penelope the rebel, Buddy could be the inventor, Joey the justice and peace keeper.”
“And Zenna the revolutionary.”
“I see her as the leader.”
“Do you think they'll grow up to become like that?”
“Nobody knows how they'll grow up, but they were put together and sent to us because each of them is an element of energy that is necessary and inevitable for a micro-society that needs to evolve past its own frames. They were certainly chosen because of their ability to go beyond what is established. I think they'll become an invincible force if they learn to work together. The tower is probably counting on that.”
The children kept playing, unaware and undisturbed, splashing drops of galactic sparkles from the moving ocean.
Rony was so absorbed in watching their frenzy that he hardly noticed how time went by.
“Hey pilot!” Zenna shouted from the waves. “Come and join us!”
“Yes, come and play with us!” Joey and Buddy shouted too.
Rony hesitated for a moment, but Joey and Buddy had already come out of the waves, dripping wet. They reached him and grabbed his hands from two sides.
“Come on! Come with us!” they pleaded cheerfully.
“Go”, Sheena smiled, waving him of.
He realized it was no longer an option not to participate, so he took of his boots and ran to the water, disregarding the fact that his uniform was getting wet and sparkly from the splashing waves.
“What are you playing?”
“It's called the Monster Kraken. You're in the middle and you have to try to catch the others underwater by their feet. If you can sweep someone else of balance, then they'll be the new Kraken,” Buddy explained.
As he submerged under the water, he caught Joey's ankles and lifted him in the air. The boy was light as a feather, laughing and soaking wet, so happy to be the next to chase others' feet under the waves.
As they took turns pretending to be a giant octopus, Rony noticed their dynamic in the game: Martin was trying to overthrow the one in the middle, testing his own powers against everyone's; Buddy preferred to stay out of conflict and was chasing the girls more; Joey liked to shock and surprise others, diving completely under the water; Penelope withdrew from the game at a certain moment, retreating to the beach and Zenna kept trying to be the winner, but somehow was looking to interact with the pilot, seeking his approval and attention. He thought it must have been because she saw him as a power representative and being an impetuous temperament herself, she was instinctively drawn to that perception of him. In a few hours, everyone was so caught up in the game that they forgot their own motivation and started enjoying just being there and laughing together.
When the sun dimmed its neon glow, Rony decided it was time to get back to the camp.
They returned happy and tired, having the feeling they had spent an entire week on the beach, not just a few hours.
Nicole gave the teenagers rations of soup and biscuits for dinner, then they were sent to their tents to sleep. As expected, they didn't go to sleep immediately.
Instead, they kept chatting, giggling and whispering. Buddy and Joey were trying to annoy the girls by playing with the laser lamps, sending the lights on the opposite tent and making shadows.
“Cut it out, boys! Let us sleep!” Zenna commanded from inside the tent, even though the two girls had no intention of sleeping either, as they kept talking and laughing.
Eventually, the teenagers left their sleeping bags and gathered in a bigger tent to play some more games with a water bottle, until Evgheni visited them and scattered the party, on account of having to get up early in the morning to work at the greenhouse.
Then the bio-engineer came to Rony's tent to complain about the noise.
“These kids need some sedatives. If they keep it up, I'm leaving this camp!”
“You already said you'll leave the camp many times now. Go to sleep, Evgheni.
They're just children,” the pilot replied and zipped his tent shut.
Going to sleep after such a full day was a real luxury.
For the first time in many days, he didn't think of anything and didn't worry about the next step of the mission. He just closed his eyes and rolled in a deep slumber, in the blue light of the moon.