The Trench Wings

Hidden.

authors note-

so my chapters are not going to be extremely long, as this chapter was two and a half pages long... for seven hundred and fifty words. i love this story so far, and if you saw my old account you would see a massive improvement! i really hope you enjoy this book, and please vote, comment and add this too your library so i know you guys like it!  sorry for any grammar errors, i am inexperienced in writing. ( I'm 14 what do you expect..?)

Orca closed her eyes and flashed her glowing black scales. each flash of a bright light meaning something. She had never spoke or uttered a word, only knew the oceanic language. Words were meaningless here. Flash. Flash Flash. Orca opened her eyes to see the room more clearly. Seeing in the dark or not, this place was pitch black. She continued flashing her scales for light when she found what she had been searching for. Instead of yelling out a "haha! success!" She simply flashed it. She only knew the language oceanic because of a book she discovered in a chest when she was three. She folded her wings, and the flying sensation faded.

She had always wanted to fly. She sighed. She couldn't leave. The Trench-Wings needed her. "Not really" said a voice in her head. She shut the voice out and grabbed the book. The book of language. Orca wanted to learn how to speak. Not underwater, but up at the surface, but she couldn't leave. Reading the ancient pages, orca formed the words with her mouth. How peculiar... a roar meant a word. She shrugged and gently put the book in her bag. She wondered who wrote the book and how.

Some trench wings didn't even speak a language, they watched body signals to figure things out. She was opening a school, to the few hundred who could read. She shuddered and swam out of the tiny cave, through the tunnel, and out of the massive cave. she swam, folding her wings down into her family cavern. They all had learned the oceanic language and she was going to teach them this one. Her family was middle classed, because they had blue eyes. The lower class had green eyes, and the higher class had red.

Royalty had purple eyes. She looked at her wings and wondered what they were even for. Trench-wings didn't even fly. She imagined flying was like swimming, and swam into the cave and flashed- "mom mom mom!! i found the book!" Her mother swam into the room and flashed- "hon, i told you to stop doing that when i'm not in the room!" Orca rolled her eyes and flashed her message again. Her mother squealed, making a shrill sound in the water. Orca winced, and pulled out the book. Silence was so common that noise sounded odd. Then again, her whole family was odd. She opened up the book, showing pages and making the sounds that went with them.

Her mother was gone, studying the book for the rest of the day while Orca was setting up her school. The overall school was about the language oceanic. Orca was only four and was already setting up for her forever job. She sighed. Teaching was helping, but she wanted to impact everyone and not just the few who could read.

She found her legs going weak and swam to the middle class feeding vent to feed on some bacteria. Meat was a rarity in the abyss, and a solution to that was bacteria feeding vents. After a few generations, those who couldn't survive the bacteria feeding died and those who could survive lived on. Natural selection. It was so cruel yet so sensible, killing those who couldn't survive and letting the strongest live.

Orca swam from the very bottom and glided into the large school cave. Orca was very small, so smaller caves appeared huge to her. She easily glided through the classroom, wondering about what was beyond the trench. setting up rocks and objects that wouldn't be completely destroyed from the extreme pressure.

The only reason she was living was because of her power of surviving extreme water pressure. All trenchwings had this power. Natural selection. Those who didn't died. Their bodies were not meant for living in this trench. She was certain they had moved after discovery.

So why hide?

They would get discovered again anyway. Orca shook her traitorous thoughts from her head and finished setting up her class. Students would start coming tomorrow. Orca didn't care if she had to give up safety and freedom of her students. She needed to teach language so she could talk to someone other than her family.

She snuck in to her room quietly, finding her book on the bed. Something great was out there. No trenchwings had an official oceanic language like these scrolls were talking about. She was missing something. A big something.

And she was determined to find out.