and let me kick you off a bungee

There came a time when the herd numbers were sorted through, when the few lingering bodies who rarely surfaced were cast out into the dark of night, sent off without warning. It came time for me too, to go to the Mainland and pursue a mother who did not remember me. She was in a daze, ghosting over the sands and seas with hazy eyes and wet cheeks— she did not care to leave the herd, going willingly. She did not belong under any one rule, she was too difficult to handle, too dedicated to someone who no longer lived in the Throat. So she left.

And with her, she brought no one but Sameira. It was me, left behind (her own daughter). I did not want to leave, was not ready to say goodbye to the only place I found comfort in. The outside world was vast and unfamiliar, uncharted territory where the nothingness beyond the edges of my vision held the unknown and the most dangerous thing of all— my mother.

I did not fear anything more than I did her, with her unpredictable actions, sporadic and chaotic. Her touch was cataclysmic, her words were deceptive, and I could not linger by her side any longer. She scared me more than anything else, than those faint whispers of a demon god roaming Helovia, than the howling wolves late in the night or the quiet whispers of lost spirits caught in the wind.

I did the only thing I could before the panic settled in, which was glue myself to the shore on the Mainland, where I thought the bridge to the Throat lay. I could not fly over myself, for my wings lay crumpled at my sides, and didn't know what else to do.

I begin to shout for my father, desperate to get his attention, to have him let me back in. I couldn't be out here alone, I couldn't (I can't, I'm too scared). "Apa! Apa! Én még mindig itt vagyok!" My pleas are a slur of the language he has taught me, a despairing disaster of rough syllables as my brittle lips let loose frantic cries. I am an abandoned child, pushed forcibly from the only place I know. I was removed from the land like some sort of pest, some bothersome rodent swatted away from the suburban families and their picture perfect neighbourhood.  "Kérem, apa!" My voice shatters as I hunch my shoulders and weep at the shore, letting the ocean's rumble drown out my pitiful sobs. I gasp and huff, wheezing as my lungs give in and heart thunders beneath my breast. "Sajnálom," I whisper between heaves, trembling legs threatening to collapse beneath me as I suck in a deep, painful breath. I want him to find me here, pitiful and weak, and take me home.

-- @Volterra, unhappy baby wants to rejoin & spend some more time w her dad