9. Friend of the World

The voice bounced off the walls of the room. Everyone searched for its creator. Slupper swam quickly through the opening, but the next room over was also empty. He heard stones shift; the group of four lights burned again.

He turned around and saw a turtle jump on top of Solomon, trying to tie him up.

“Socipi?”

“Ha, Slupper, I’ll be right there. I just have to—”

Loudly screaming, Solomon jumped up and threw Socipi against the wall behind him.

Slupper yelled. “Leave him alone!”

“Who? Solomon or Socipi?”

“… both!”

“What did I say,” said Vivienne, “you can’t do both.”

Slupper was no longer listening and hurried to Socipi. He scrambled up, although his shell was severely damaged from the blow. Small red spots appeared between the green streaks on his shell.

Solomon stormed at them. His fin hung threateningly in front of Socipi’s head.

“You switched it out, didn’t you? Didn’t you? You threw away the sacred book of Truth, purely to thwart me!”

“Why do you think I’m the devil or something? I would never destroy such a valuable treasure. I live here, in the outskirts. Since the day everyone laughed at me and labeled me a liar. My mother took me away. She said: come, they don’t deserve us, we should have left much sooner.”

The room went dead quiet. Slupper stood close to Socipi, but suddenly didn’t dare touch him, afraid of his own friend.

“My mom was right, seeing what you’ve become.”

Slupper didn’t know if he said it to Solomon or to him. Probably … both.

Socipi pushed the threatening fin aside. “No Solomon, I see right through you. First you want the Primal Turtles back. Then you want them to make weapons for you. And subsequently you want them to conquer the entire world, which they failed to do back then.”

“Is that true?” Slupper slowly slid away from Solomon.

Socipi whispered in his ear. “You know, Slupper. You know in your heart who you can trust. If we attack together, we can take him. By the way, you’ve really grown since I last saw you! You’re a big boy now, aren’t you? The last time I saw you, you were still only—”

“Oh stop it, you sound like my grandma.” The friends grinned at each other.

Solomon stomped away and already stood in the opening. “And now what? You threw everything away, every chance we had. How do you want to save the city now? In a few months, we’re so far from the coast that nobody can lay eggs anymore!”

“Yeah, you’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Socipi said. “Lots of eggs, so you could turn as many of them into Primal Turtles as possible, or something.”

“Nonsense! Listen to me, Slupper. Your friend has no clue what his words entail. Remember your lessons. Don’t let our species end!”

“Slupper, friend, don’t listen to him. We can leave. My parents are helping build Shellsong, closer to the coast.” He stepped closer. “Together. Away from the city. I’d even accept your hyperactive fish. Seriously, how did you ever meet? How is she still alive?”

“She is not my girlfriend.”

“He keeps fooling himself,” Vivienne whispered.

Slupper remained silent and moved no fin. His eyes darted back and forth between his friends—he dared think it again—and Solomon. Vivienne sighed and Socipi impatiently tapped the stones.

Until Slupper yelled deafeningly loud.

He ran at Solomon and headbutted him.

“Oh,” Socipi said. “Apparently we’re doing my plan. Aaaaaaah!”

Socipi and Vivienne did their best to support Slupper’s attack. Together, they managed to floor the Companion. Socipi bound his fins with clumps of seaweed extracted from the seafloor. Just to be sure, they even blindfolded him.

“I am a Companion! How dare you? If the Council of Kame hears about this, they will sentence you to death1”

“Fortunately, they’ll never hear any of it. We deliver you and you, voluntarily, cede your companionship to Slupper.”

“You’re designing your own demise. You’re obsessed with revenge. You don’t even consider the turtle town, the survival of your colony.”

“Oh no, I have a solution. However, I only wanted to mention it once you were disarmed. I’ve had twenty years—twenty years—to research this matter. And I am very good at breaking unnecessary rules.”

The four of them swam through the chambers, back to the entrance, while pushing Solomon ahead.

“You really have a plan?” Slupper asked. “Or was that bluff?”

“My old home contains the last drawings you need to actually reveal the Truth. The ones you never gave to Solomon.”

“How … how did you know I collected those carved symbols?”

Socipi laid his fin on Slupper’s shell. It was hard, now that the friends were wildly different sizes, yet it felt comfortable. “I was the shadow in your back, unseen. Never left ya, Slupper. And when I heard how you talked about me to Solomon …”

Socipi knew many shortcuts. In no time, they crossed the tunnels again and surfaced somewhere in the underwater jungle.

“Aren’t you … mad?” Slupper finally asked as they approached the town. “I … watched while your teacher took away your freedom and Solomon cast you aside.”

“Mad? Why would I be mad?” He smiled. “You didn’t invent the stupid rules. Growing up without school was way more fun! Besides … friends exist precisely to support you during the hard times. That is my Truth.”

They swam past the four signposts on the central square. All turtles stopped what they were doing and gazed at the gigantic shadows. “Now you, Slupper, should tell your parents the truth.”

Socipi left him, gripping Solomon tight. Slupper’s parents already awaited him, chatting with other turtle parents. He couldn’t read their faces, so he took Vivienne in his arms and headed for them with as much confidence as he could muster.

“Mom. Dad. I have to tell you something. All these past years, I didn’t play in the jungle with friends. I … had no friends. I received lessons from the old Companion, Solomon. I’m sorry. I should have—”

“But, my boy, we already knew that.” His parents showed a crooked smile. Vivienne laughed even harder. “We were so glad to see you happy, we didn’t want to ruin it. If you weren’t an adult now, we would be forced to give you house arrest. And two weeks of eating the nasty seaweed. But we’re just happy you finally told us.”

Today was a good day. So much weight fell off his shoulders, that his shell suddenly seemed to drop. Until he remembered how all of this started.

“We’re … we’re still in grave danger! The whole town is drifting away from the coast!”

“Oh. Sweetheart, that you could have said much sooner.”

Slupper led a panicked mass of turtles to the place that was supposed to solve everything.

They turned left at the square, over the wide stairs, right through the narrow alley, and straight into the only house that still had its lights on. And still had no door.

Socipi studied the wall. He supported his head with his fins. Solomon mumbled and kicked about, but the ropes stayed tight.

“Any wiser yet?”

“It doesn’t make sense,” Socipi said. “Each symbol means a different word, there’s no connection or something. Here, this circle with two turrets in the middle means city. But, a little further, the same symbol appears with an X through it—no city.”

He pointed at various symbols with all his limbs. “Here’s an arrow pointing up, combined with a weird stretched out circle, and an arrow scratched through it. An arrow to the right means movement, but this arrow points left, and I don’t understand the rest.”

“Hmm. City no city movement.”

Solomon groaned even louder than before. “I think he wants to say something.”

Everyone looked at Slupper, as if he were Solomon’s caretaker. He swam to his mentor and removed the large blindfold.

“Lesson 462: everything has a reason. Lesson 463: sometimes the answer is right in front of your nose, you just have to see it differently.”

Slupper jumped back to the wall. See it differently.

He swam half a circle until he hung upside down.

“There! The circle is a shell. And when you look at it upside down the arrow points the right way. And here, between city and no city is a spiral, or in other words—the city is not a city! Wait, that doesn’t make sense.”

All the creatures in the room now also lay upside down. Passersby thought they were doing a new sport. It didn’t take long before Socipi happily jumped from the wall.

“Yes it does! The city is not a city, it’s a turtle in motion! Wait, that also doesn’t make sense.”

Solomon sighed, long and deep, until bubbles filled the entire room and he had everyone’s attention. “That does make sense. I … hope you remember I gave you valuable information. I was a good mentor, right? For when you turn me over to the Companionship.”

Slupper nodded carefully. He remained his guide, all those years his only friend.

“This city is built on the back of the very first Primal Turtle, Abrahon. That’s why it’s in motion. I set it in motion to give you, Slupper, a reason to help me. If he walks back, will you let me go?”

“I know something better. Ask him to come up and make this beautiful city an island again.”

Solomon nodded and fell flat on the ground. Whispering, he seemed to massage the city. While his fins circled and slappend, he mumbled words like Abrahon and Midterra. For a while, nothing happened. Until they heard a hellish noise and the entire room tilted.

The floor pushed against their shells. At a rapid pace they, together with the entire city, were lifted up, as if they stood in a strong current that only went upwards. They stood stock still, and yet their world spun, swaying as if they stood on a ship.

Soon they felt the fresh outside air. The water swirled and flowed out of the houses, the streets, even the always full square, to drip down the Primal Turtle like waterfalls, back into the sea.

Even dinosaurs would bow to this creature. With the layer of seaweed washed away, Slupper clearly recognized he stood on the crooked green scales of a very old shell. At the edges, black petrified lava was caked on, so that Abrahon’s head could never come out again.

The inhabitants didn’t understand what was happening, but enjoyed the sun. Half the city gathered at the square to sunbathe on their bellies. The other half often had to return to the water.

Slupper now saw he was exceptional, but not alone. There were other descendants from the Primal Turtles, much larger than their neighbors. There were enough other turtles with his weird feet that worked better on land than in water. And now their city was an island again, that kind would only grow. Them on the island, the sea turtles around it.

Even the strict teacher gave her class the afternoon off. Vivienne, of course, had to stay wet and was thrown back into the water regularly. From that water, the Primal Turtle, and their city on its back, were only more impressive. Like a living cave radiating magic, whether you stood on it or swam under it.

Evening fell before Slupper finally spoke with Vivienne.

“So … what now? You completed your task. You stopped Solomon. Tomorrow we travel with him to the Council of Kame.”

“I would like to stay. Really. But you have to build an amazing colony here, above water.”

“But … what do I need an amazing colony for, if I don’t have you? To protect me from nasty Companions? I’ll stay underwater, if you want.”

“No no no. I have my own adventures, we’ll run into each other again.”

Vivienne enjoyed the red evening sun with her eyes closed. For the first time, she didn’t fidget and lay against Slupper.

“Adventures like?”

“A panda asked if I’d help wreck the secret cave that held the book. She wanted to make sure the secret of Electro stayed secret a while longer. An impatient panda, oddly enough, especially considering her powers.”

“So this is goodbye?”

“For now. But who knows, maybe I’ll grow as old as you. Toodeloo!”

She jumped back into the water. He waved her shadow under the surface goodbye.

For a while, he stared thoughtfully at the ripples, until a fin on his shoulder made him jump.

“Phew, I was afraid you were meditating or something.”

Socipi lay down next to him and sighed deeply, that famous smile in his eyes. Slupper shook his head in disbelief. His friend was an idiot—and it was the person with whom he wanted to spend the rest of his life.

“You did switch out the book, didn’t you? Just admit it. You hid the real book of The Truth somewhere.”

“No way! When I first came into that cave there was a book, with Meaning in the title or something, but it contained nothing magical. Still, it’s a shame I lost it. There was a funny story in it about a green egg, frayed and covered in seaweed. The very first turtle egg. It was the First Ice Age and Feria saw the egg wasn’t going to make it.”

“So?”

“The gods enchanted the egg to be super strong. A colossal demigod hatched from it, a turtle. Bigger than a thousand elephants stacked up. This demigod founded a city and grew ever stronger and more powerful, until the gods became afraid. Animal creatures could not be trusted with divine powers. Even the mighty apes of Apra were powerless against Primal Turtles.”

“Then what defeated them?”

“The world was no longer in balance, the Primal Turtles the primary foe in the First Conflict. What to do? The gods made a volcano erupt and sent some earthquakes to the island. And just like that—Abrahon sank to the bottom of the sea. The Primal Turtles defeated, seemingly.”

Socipi rolled on his back with a crooked smile. “I have no idea where anybody would get the inspiration for such a wild made-up story.”