In those long, humid afternoons on the Drua, the air just sat on their skin like a wet, heavy shroud.
Later, the brothers stood in a perfect circle under the sun. Their cheekbones had become sharp, horizontal ridges, and the hollow orbits of their eyes were darkening, making their gaze look deep and intense.
Kanka's muscles, his arms were very strong and fit, looking like tough, twisted ropes under his skin.
He placed his hands on his hips while he stood tall.
Konto held four slivers of starfruit in a Kato ni Ika (fish basket)—made from green coconot fronds. "We only have these left, after that we're out."
Kanka's head drifted to the side, his neck moving with a slow, heavy stiffness. He let out a long, shaky sigh that seemed to empty his entire chest, his eyes slid shut.
Tambo didn't move a muscle. He looked like a block of dark stone, his eyes fixed on Konto with a flat, hollow stare, features were frozen and unreadable.
Tantei's hand was rubbing against his jaw. His fingers, rough and stained with salt, tracing the line of his chin as he stared out at the ground.
Kanka (Voiceover): The betraying of our own kind, the oaths we used to make along with Tolu's death added to our trauma.
A sudden thump-thump sounds echoed as mahogany-tan feet jumped into the water with a heavy splash. Their legs weren't flesh, they were like pillars of polished wood.
When they shifted their weight, the tendons in their feet didn't move like human tissue—they snapped and reset with the dry click of a crossbow being cocked.
Kanka's dreadlocks were wild and lossened, catching the salt spray in the twilight hue. Their jawlines were as sharp as straight-edged razors.
When they laughed, the skin didn't just stretch, it bunched tightly over the muscle as they splashed water on each other.
Their smiles were predatory-bright, beautiful, but a little too sharp, a little too hungry.
(Kanka voicover): When you're lost and your body is on the brink of death, you don't care about anything else. The ones that are close to you is what matters.
The afternoon sun was heavy and hot, turning the ocean into a blinding sheet of white light.
(Kanka Voiceover): We had to think sharp, adaptive if we wanted to survive longer.
Kanka sat on the edge of the big wooden boat, his body looking thin and hard. He was no longer the Lean-Explosive man he used to be. Now, his skin was pulled taut over his ribs, and his muscles looked like thick ropes under his mahogany skin.
Kanka sat quietly, sharpening a long piece of ironwood in the center of the deck, hunched over a slab of rough, porous basalt—a ballast stone taken from the hull's belly.
Beside it lay a dried strip of Stingray skin, its surface a natural sandpaper of thousands of tiny, glass-hard denticles.
He didn't move with speed, he pressed the tip of the moto against a piece damp basalt and began a slow, circular grind. —Grit-grind... grit-grind— The friction produced a fine, dark silt that smelled of old earth and wet wood.
Finally, he took the Stingray skin. He wrapped the abrasive leather around the point and pulled it back and forth in a fast, tight blur. The sound changed to a dry hiss, Ssssh-shhh-ssssh that polished the wood until the fibers were crushed into a single, lethal point.
When he finished, the tip wasn't just wood anymore. It had been compressed and honed by the grit until it possessed a metallic, oily sheen.
He ran the pad of his thumb—cracked and salt-stained—near the point. It didn't just feel sharp, it felt hungry, the kind of edge that could slide through scales and muscle without a single vibration.
He held the spear up in front of his face, checking the balance. The sunlight hit the sharpened tip, making it glint like glass.
His eyes, now sunken deeper into his head, stayed locked on the wood. He looked like a statue carved from dark timber, steady and silent.
Kanka stood at the edge of the boat. His legs were thin, and he didn't have much energy left. He stood there, balanced on his bony feet, holding the spear high above his shoulder.
In the water below, a fish appeared. It was a big bluefin trevally, its scales shimmering with a bright, electric blue color.
It swam slowly, unaware of the danger, its tail moving back and forth in the clear water.
He squinted his eyes, focusing everything he had on that one spot. He took a short breath and threw the spear with all his might.
The spear hissed through the air and pierced the surface with a sharp thwack. It was a perfect hit. The ironwood went straight through the fish, killing it instantly.
The blue trevally stopped moving and rolled over on its side, its silver belly flashing in the sun.
Kanka let out a raspy cheer, his face breaking into a wide, happy grin. For a second, he looked like himself again.
He didn't hesitate, he jumped straight into the water with a loud splash to grab his prize.
(Kanka voicover): When you suffer that much for someone, you stop being a person and start being a tool.
Back on the deck, the four brothers huddled together in a circle. They looked like ghosts of the men they once were. Their skin were dry and leathery from the salt and sun, the visibility of their shape of every bone in their chests and arms were stark.
They shared the fish, pinching it into small, raw pieces.
(Kanka voicover): You trade your life for somebody the world can just take away. The greatest truth people don't like to admit is that being a hero to the end is just ignorance hidden behind charming muscle and a smile. If we could turn back the moment, we wouldn't repeat that mistake.
Konto's face was thin, his cheeks hollowed out so much that his jaw stood out sharply.
He gripped a piece of the fish with his bony fingers and shluped it into his mouth. He sucked down the moisture and the meat, his eyes closing as he tasted the first real food they'd had in days, his throat move as he swallowed.