The Technoquatics - Chapter 16: Lost Echoes
They Laughed at the Old Legends—Until the Ocean Started Taking Their Children
Headmaster Oliver was in trouble. Nevermind that one of the missing girls wasn’t even in his charge. Nor that the first girl had disappeared far from the school. Nor his track-record of never having lost a student in all his years, unlike the tragic failures of previous administrators which had led to his posting in the first place. None of that made any difference. He was going down as the headmaster who failed, allowing history to repeat again.
The city was in turmoil. Two poor, orphaned, destitute girls, both vanishing without a trace. How could Oliver have allowed that to happen? Why wasn’t he talking with the authorities? When would the people get some answers?
Oliver had no answers to give, and he wouldn’t appear before the cameras with nothing new to share. He’d already reported everything to the city guards—it was their responsibility now. Still, the press kept hounding him, ignoring the proper channels, as they always did. Public relations had never been Oliver’s strength; if it were, he might have realized that repeating the same scripted answers would at least get them off his back.
He rubbed his temples, the weight of the missing girls pressing in on him from the outside. He was as distraught as anyone over their loss, but what could he do? If the sentinels were at their wits end, what hope did he have of succeeding where they’d failed?
When Ms. Terri and Mr. Albi approached the headmaster with some kind of a scheme to go out looking for the technogirls, he reminded them that even the authorities were at a loss. Another round of searches, to all the same places, and the second girl hadn’t turned up any quicker than the first. Perhaps it was a shark attack. Perhaps some freak double-accident. They simply didn’t know.
“Except for one thing,” offered Ms. Terri hopefully, “Khrystal showed you the place—”
“They’ve combed over it a dozen times,” the headmaster shot back, “with us, without us. With sensors and equipment—”
“But,” interrupted Mr. Albi, “without these!”
He produced several rock picks and sample bags. “A way for us to crack the shelf. Go down there and have a look for ourselves.”
The headmaster paused a moment before replying, taking a deep breath so he wouldn’t come off wrong. “Albi, Terri, look. Do you really think the city guards would’ve neglected such an obvious thing, if they’d thought it viable? Don’t you think they considered such a plan?”
“A fair point,” said Ms. Terri, “but they didn’t really believe the girls. Not about that merboy. And not about secret lairs far beneath the seafloor, surely.”
“And why would they, Ms. Terri? These tales aren’t exactly easy to believe.” He almost said more, then decided to leave his own experience out of the matter.
“We’ve been doing some research,” Terri pressed, looking over at Albi, “and we’ve found that there is compelling evidence of other races out there. Races we’ve lost track of. In fact, Mr. Albi has a relative who did a great deal of research on the subject.”
Albi looked uncomfortable, but reached into his satchel to proffer a well-worn textbook for the headmaster to see. Our Offshore Cousins, read the title. By Orwen Albi, Pelagic 93/94.
“Your grandfather?” Oliver asked, raising an eyebrow at the name on the cover.
Albi hesitated, then nodded. “Yes, Orwen Albi. Bit of a black sheep in my family, but brilliant. He made a fortune off aquasensory patents—gear that’s still in use today—but spent most of it on idealistic expeditions. Artifacts, maps, wild theories. Half the family thought he’d gone mad.”
“And the other half?” Oliver pressed.
“Thought he was a genius,” Albi admitted, eying the book with a conflicted expression of revulsion and reverence, and even affection, all mixed together. “He refused life-extension enhancements too, even though he could’ve afforded them. And yet, he’s alive to this day.”
Ms. Terri gave a small smile. “Offbeat, maybe, but if he’s still alive, he’s done pretty well.”
“He’s done well in some ways,” Albi muttered, almost to himself, before turning back to Oliver. “And he might’ve been on to something. This research could explain what the girls saw.”
“Perhaps the girls met one of these proto-merfolk out there, under the chasm,” Ms. Terri said. “By all accounts, that’s where this boy was coming from.”
“And if the city guards had taken this research seriously,” Albi said, tapping the book, “well, then maybe they’d have paid that chasm a little more attention.”
The headmaster thought for a minute. It was an enticing notion. And he desperately wanted to get those girls back. The scheme was so crazy, it might work.
“Alright, Oliver capitulated, “let’s get going then.”
There wasn’t much prep-work to do, so within minutes Oliver, Albi and Terri were out the school’s entryway and heading for the city’s edge. As they approached the sentries, one swam over to intercept them.
“Warning’s up, on account o’ them missing kids,” she said.
“Well, ma’am, that’s exactly what we’re on our way to look into,” Albi replied. “The missing kids. We aim to find them.”
The sentinel’s expression shifted, her eyes wide as if she’d been shocked. “Say that again?”
“I said, we aim to find those girls. Now, can we pass, or can’t we?”
She hesitated. “Well, sir, I saw those girls. Both of ’em—together and separate. And I wish I’d stopped them. I feel awful about the whole thing.” She paused, then added, “If you give me ten minutes to switch off my shift, I’ll join you.”
The three exchanged glances and quickly agreed.
“Great! Be right back. Name’s Marla, by the way!”
They called their names after her as she swam off toward the sentinel shack. Less than five minutes later, she returned, out of uniform and ready to join them on their search.
The office of the aquasentinels had been a hotbed of activity since the technogirls went missing. Hardly an hour passed without someone coming in, claiming to have seen the girls or to know something about their whereabouts. The flood of tips left the division drowning in paperwork, with little to show for it now that the case was cold.
Lam and Alison, the two officers in charge, were buried in files, their only escape to keep plowing through. They followed up on the few promising leads they had, though most proved fruitless.
“Al, you think we should follow up on the guy from South Sector.”
“Which one was that?” Lam replied. “The one who saw the girls in a nightclub?”
“Nah, that was East,” Alison said. “This one says he saw them playing in the street early morning.”
“Yeah, no. There’s nothing to that. File it.” Lam leaned back, rubbing his eyes. “You know, what if we’re missing something that’s right under our noses? Something obvious?”
Alison looked up from her stack of papers. “Like the school?”
Lam nodded. “I tell you, there’s something weird about that headmaster. Prissy type, thinks he’s better than everyone. I could see him getting mixed up in something shady with a student. What if one of the girls found out and he took care of them both?”
“He doesn’t seem like the aggressive type,” Alison said, frowning. “And he’d have had to plan it out. They didn’t disappear together—Khrystal was still with us for a while. She could’ve spilled the story then.”
“Not if he was threatening her.”
“Maybe.”
“Wanna look into it?”
Alison sighed, gesturing at the piles of paper. “More promising than this mess.”
Author bio: David Deane Haskell is a fusion writer who’s impossible to pin down. Want new age future-vision with a deep dive into the human psyche? Nominally fictional (nom-fiction) tales that resonate somewhere between fact and fantasy? With that undeniable kind of truth we can still find, even in this messed up, post-truth world?
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Parts of The Technoquatics were originally serialized on Royal Road under the title “Solaria Rising – Book I of the Technoquatics Series”. This Substack version may or may not contain revisions. The final chapters have never been published anywhere, and will debut on Substack exclusively.
This is fun....having the school master who's going out to search become the victim of an investigation him/herself. Sounds like our current government....