A New World

My name was Irvine Watson. I was a physicist at Oxford University in England. I was forty-four years old, in good health, and expected to live another forty years in perfect happiness.

I was spending that summer in Australia with my wife and daughter, a sixteen-year-old named Angela. The day after we arrived, we decided to go spelunking. We hired Chris Brown, a local man with a strong Australian accent and a cheerful, warm laugh. I have forgotten the name of the caves we went to, but their location is vivid in my mind.

After a few hours of walking through one of the caves with our torches as the only source of light, we came to a fork. I recall Chris telling us about how the tunnels to the right were very treacherous, and almost nobody has ever come out of them alive. Those who did return did so after many days were always delirious, speaking of vast oceans inhabited by mermen.

I stopped to take a drink from my water bottle, and the others went ahead. As I satisfied my thirst, the bulb of my torch burned out. I began to panic, having a phobia of dark, confined spaces. Not once did it occur to me that I had carried some spare bulbs in my backpack. Nor did I call out to my companions. I was alone in the dark caves, and I was scared.

I stumbled forward, and made my first mistake. Being the absent-minded fool that I was, I confused my left and right. I thought I might be able to catch up with the others, and ran as fast as I could. After a minute, I was still alone. Exhausted, I found a rock to sit down on. My second mistake. The rock I sat on had some sort of creature on it. Startled, I jumped up and tripped over my own feet. As I fell, I lost all sense of direction. I proceeded to what I thought was the exit, but was going the wrong way.

After what seemed like an hour, I was suddenly able to dimly see my surroundings. Overjoyed, I rushed ahead and saw, just beyond the stalactites, a faint blue glow. My eyes adjusted, and I triumphantly strode towards the exit, my strength and hopes renewed. Standing at the mouth of the cave, I gazed upon the new world for my first time...

I stood on the beach of a small island, in a vast and unfriendly ocean. The island seemed to be covered with a forest. There were no mountains or hills; the entire island was only a few metres above sea level. I looked up to the night sky. There was no moon, but the stars were very bright, and the water reflected their light. In the distance a whale surfaced. It was a very big whale, and it had teeth.

I turned inland, and entered the forest. I assumed I had reached the aquatic world Chris told me about. Those madmen were not so mad, after all. Or maybe they were, and so am I, I remember thinking.

The forest, at least, looked familiar. Trees, animals, insects, indeed everything was very similar to those on Earth. Once underneath the wide, all-obstructing branches, one could mistake water world, my name for this queer planet, for Earth. The trees were spread apart, though their roots made navigation difficult and leaves blocked out much starlight.

I began to tire, and regretted entering the forest, when I broke through the foliage and was once again on a beach. The size of the island was clear now. I trekked around the perimeter, constantly glancing at the horizon. This minute island, no more than 1 kilometre squared, was the only land in sight.

Soon I found myself back at the mouth of the cave. It was barely noticeable, hidden in some shrubs - ferns of some sort. Exhausted, I lay on a makeshift bed of seaweed, watching shooting stars until I fell asleep. That night I had a very unusual yet enjoyable dream. I dreamed of floating on a fluffy white cloud to paradise. I was reprimanding myself for having such inconsequential dreams when I noticed how cold I was. Grudgingly, I woke up.

Oh my God! was my first thought. How the heck did this happen? I was floating in the middle of the ocean. In the distance, I could see the island. I started to swim, remembering the horrific sight of the carnivorous whale. I realised that I had made yet another foolish mistake. While I was sleeping, the tide must have risen and carried me away. But how can the tide rise if there is no moon? I started formulating a theory on how the tide affects the moon rather than vice versa, but then remembered my situation and concentrating on swimming.

But the swimming was hard; currents kept pulling me back, and I never was very skilled in the first place. I wondered if my third careless mistake would be fatal, and scolded myself for being such a scatterbrain. I always stopped thinking when on vacation. While fighting with both my thoughts and the current, I noticed a raft, of sorts.

On it were some men, and I use the term men very loosely. They had deep blue skin, flat noses, webbed hands and feet, and large, bulbous eyes. And they were bald. They wore clothes made of the skin of some sort of fish. They stood and moved about like normal human beings; at least they did when on land. One of them dived into the water, and instantly transformed. With the speed of an alligator, agility of a shark and grace of a dolphin, he approached me. Truly, these people had refined swimming into an art.

I was taken onto their raft, and they half pushed, half sailed it away. They tried to speak to me. When I did not understand, they persevered, speaking slowly and loudly, as if that would help. Very similar to what humans do to other humans that speak different languages. Eventually we reached a settlement.

It was, basically, a network of rafts. Houses floated upon the water, tied together by some sort of waterproof rope. From a bird's-eye-view, it would be an intricate spider-web, with blue spiders swimming between the silk threads. There were small sections of the water that were caged in. Swimming pools, I thought, with a smile on my face. Where they got the wood, I had no idea. There were men, women and children, all behaving like normal people. I was brought to one house, the home of my rescuers. There I was fed, bathed, and generally pampered. All the time I was talked to.

The community accepted me, although they were fascinated by me at first. Apparently, there had been others like me, who came from out of nowhere and made a home with them. All of these people, however, had gradually weakened and died in their sleep.

I began to lead a 'normal' life. As people talked to me, I became familiar with the sounds and syllables of their language, even picking up a few words in the process. I learned their habits, rituals, beliefs; their way of life. They had sports similar to water polo, games involving 'playing cards' made of wood. They had alcoholic drinks, yet although they could become very...happy, I seemed to be immune to the inebriating effects of the plia�r, as they called it. They had a democratic government. Their minds were very similar to those of humans. Indeed, they were humans, another race with a different skin colour and different variations on the standard human shape.

They were semi-nomadic, in the sense that their village would float on the ocean, yet it would always stay in the same area. Apparently there was some sort of anchor system, which would let their village cycle through the same area over a period of six months or so.

Therefore, two months later, we caught sight of my island. They had predicted this would happen soon. I could clearly see the cave home, and felt the first pangs of that feeling termed 'home-sickness'. But it was more than that. I missed my wife, my daughter, my friends, my colleagues. I had lived a fairly mundane life, but those are the things we miss most. It is a known fact that the human mind likes what it is used to, and searches for patterns in everyday life. But I digress. I instantly decided to return. Stocked up on clean water and fish, I bade farewell to my hosts. Then I entered the cave, and made my way home.

* * *

My name is Atkhamon. It means the odd one, the black sheep, in the tongue of the mermen. I am a hunter-gatherer of the Lifneii tribe, the same one that had rescued me. I am fifty-nine years old. I have cancer, and expect to live another two months in perfect happiness.

I sometimes wonder what would have happened if I had never made those three mistakes. Maybe I would be living with my wife and daughter. Or maybe I would have starved in the caves. I could have just as easily stayed on the island; not having the courage to brave those caves again. I never would have chanced upon the mer-people, never learned how much life can vary yet stay the same. I must correct myself. These beings are not mer-people; they are people. I could explain how a combination of Darwin's theory of evolution and Planck's quantum theory indicates that they are Homo sapiens, with a few minor twists, but I no longer enjoy thinking of the world as a collection of theories.

After returning home, I found out that my wife and daughter had died. They stayed in Australia for a month before accepting the fact that I was dead and got onto a plane to England. That plane sunk somewhere in the Indian Ocean. Naturally, nobody believed my stories, and I eventually lost my job. Later on I found out I had somehow developed cancer. My life was destroyed. I resolved to return to water world; I would rather die in my sleep amongst friendly people than have a long, drawn out death in a society that ridiculed me. So, fifteen years after that first escapade, I am leaving this note in a hotel in Canberra, and returning to the surreal paradise of my dream, floating on the blue ocean.

Irvine Watson - Atkhamon

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