I do hate boats. They are crowded. There is nowhere to go to escape. The Ocean Blue had a dinghy with an outboard. It had two diesel engines onboard, making manoeuvring out of the harbour easy. We sailed all day, and Ata taught us how to crew. We sailed through the night, and I took the watch through the early hours of the morning. That was good. I will keep doing that.

  We had supplies onboard for two weeks. It should take a week to get to Fiji, but we may not go direct, depending on what I sense. Ata wanted more supplies, but the animals took up a lot of room. By animals, I mean Rich. It is not just him. It is his food.

  We stopped at dawn and lowered the sails so we were just drifting, and all of us semi-humans went for a swim. A long swim. I had flippers and a spear gun, but the ocean was fairly empty. It was good to extend all my senses, smell the ocean, and listen to it, both with and without the essence filters.

  Soph and Ata only went for a short swim around Ocean Blue.

  Carla tested the water with her Vine form, and she was definitely allergic to saltwater in this form. Tomorrow, she was going full shark. She was fully nude, so her green ‘leaves’ were exposed to the light. They extended down over her butt.

  When I got back on board, I asked, “What is the Vine form like?”

  “Stiff. It is hard to move, but I have lots of energy from lying in the sun and photosynthesis. I do not have to eat much but need lots of water. I am going back to skin today and then Shark tomorrow morning.”

  She was not so afraid of changing now. Soph and Barb’s skills reduce the pain, as well as the time it takes.

  Soph raised the sails. She was only wearing a bikini bottom.

  Ata had a full bikini on as she wanted support for her enlarged tits. She had g-string bottoms so they did not interfere with her feathers that extended down over her butt. Her baby bump was very prominent, but that is normal for twins, I am told. She said, “Are we still heading straight to Fiji, Bob?”

  “I am thinking of heading more northeast. There is a deep blue sense coming from there somewhere.”

  She set the course, and I saw Carla setting a couple of fishing lines to trail us as I headed below to sleep.

  When I woke, the wind had got stronger, and we were practically skimming through the waves. It was also colder, but there was fresh fish for my late lunch.

  The first thing Carla did was change to skin. I looked carefully at her bark and leaves. I wasn’t sure what I could do with those or whether they would keep. We will see.

  “There is a long technical email from Amanda,” Carla said. Eliza was perched on her shoulder. In the main cabin, everybody had to step over Rich. Barb was pecking seeds from a bowl, but I didn’t see Murray.

  “Grab an eye patch, and you would make a good, sexy pirate,” I said. “What did she say?”

  “Apparently, my blood is packed with nutrients, especially Copper and Vitamin K. She wants another sample after I change back to see if it is permanent. That will have to wait. She confirmed the photosynthesis and wants to know what it is like for me.”

  “Just tell her it gives you an excuse to lie around in the sun and do nothing,” I said.

  “You see, that is just it,” she said with a grin, “if I lie around in the sun, I am not doing nothing. I am photosynthesising.”

  “What does Vitamin K do again?”

  “Blood clotting, strengthening bones. There are good amounts of vitamin B as well. The leaves are a layer on my skin, and she wants to do more tests. The bark is just like vine bark, but my muscles have some wood fibre in them, which is why it is hard to move.”

  “Did you try boosting it before you changed?”

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  She looked at me like I was an idiot. “Of course. It makes it pretty solid, and I don’t have to use energy when holding a weight in one place. It was hard to measure, but vines are tough, and this made it extremely hard. Ata used a knife and barely made a mark, but the saw teeth from the back of your machete hurt.”

  “Interesting.”

  She nodded.

  “Where’s Murray?” I looked around, “and Soph?”

  “Murray is having panic attacks, and we have moved his dirt into our cabin. Soph is there now trying to settle him. It is not good.”

  I went back to my model on the laptop. Every time Carla changes, I add more. I have four colours going: red for her base form, white for the fish, blue for the shark, and light brown for the vines. The thing is, they are all present all the time in her pattern. Essence just flows through different Channels. I am thinking maybe she could mix and match, but I have no idea how, and I haven’t mentioned it to anyone yet.

  We all have dinner together. Soph had Murray in a pouch, snuggled against her fur. Every now and then, he trembled.

  Ata spent time with me in the helm station after dinner, showing me what her plan was. We were heading more easterly at the moment, and the plan was to turn north at about 2 am. She was going around some rough weather. I was to call her in a number of circumstances, and we reefed the sails as the wind was picking up and squalls of rain were coming through.

  The helm was able to be fully enclosed from the weather, so it was comfortable enough, though the waves built up, and we were getting a little battered. Fucking boats. I was feeling a little off with the movement, but concentrating on things helped.

  My nightsight didn’t help much in the rain, but between the squalls, I could see well enough, especially if I boosted it.

  My electroreceptors were telling me the blue was getting closer. We were well out to sea. We really needed an anomaly within a day of land so we could build a base for the land members of the team. The direction we were heading was more towards Tonga than Fiji. If we found one out here, we would investigate it and carry on to Fiji, as we knew there must be something up that way.

  We are being cautious as an anomaly out here could be as old and undisturbed as Yagoonya. Or older. The essence flavour I am picking up says it is large. I had visions of the giant mutated saltwater croc from Yagoonya. What is a pod of whales going to be like? They won’t even notice us when they squash us. I am glad Ata got a fast catamaran.

  I woke Ata at 2 am for the course change and for her to check on things. She is the expert. She wanted a quick fuck before going back to bed. She blamed it on hormones. The helm station is quite small, but we made do. I usually prefer long fucks, but I was not complaining.

  Ata was much simpler than Carla. Her pattern only had two places that lit up, so I could easily see where her eyes and her feathers were in her pattern. I should have started with her. Her pattern was still complex but nothing like Carla’s.

  Soph was as complex as Carla’s. Her fur was easy to trace, but her bonds were a mess. It was good she was focussing so much on Murray as I was able to spend time mapping that out. She had colours as well. Red for her, yellow for Rich, green for Eliza, white for Barb and brown for Murray. I was spending a lot of time on this and seemed to have a very long way to go.

  By morning, the weather had cleared, but there was still a swell. Some of us went for a quick swim. Carla chose to stay in skin for now.

  “How far do you reckon, Bob?” Ata asked.

  “We will probably find it sometime tonight, I figure, but I have never done this before.”

  She looked at her chart. That would put the edge about here,” she said. “We best all get some sleep today.”

  I slept first. When I got up, poor Murray was almost constantly trembling, and Soph didn’t know what to do. Ata had offered to head for the neared land, but it was three days to New Zealand and three days to Tonga.

  “This is the closest,” she said. “Raoul Island. It is uninhabited and a reserve, but we could get there in a day. There is a conservation base that is staffed a lot and seismic sensors as it is a live volcano between two seismic plates. Looks like the last eruption was in ‘06 and killed a conservation worker.”

  “I am pretty sure they don’t want rabbits on a reserve,” I said, getting dirty looks.

  “He’s male. It is not like he is going to give birth to anything. And it is an emergency,” Soph said.

  “Wasn’t there a dinosaur movie about creating only female dinosaurs so they couldn’t breed? I am sure that ended badly,” I said.

  “Bob. This is not a fantasy movie or a book. This is Murray, who needs land. Now.” Carla was cross at me. Fair enough, I suppose. I backed off, and Ata changed course.

  I looked up the Island. I couldn’t find whether it was currently staffed. There is a lot of intermittent seismic activity. The ‘06 eruption was a small one, but it still killed a conservation worker. We should only need to be there a couple of days to settle Murray and make a run for Fiji.

  I am getting a bad feeling. If this was a novel, this is the set-up for a disaster. This is not a novel or a movie. We go in, spend a day on shore and leave.

  Yeah, right.