Plastic Sea (FR) — What's Left, Page 28
By Inkroost · Published
Log in to see this page
Page 28 of What's Left is for signed-in readers. Logging in brings you straight back here — and an account is free if you do not have one.
Transcript
Roka descend du dernier barreau d’une échelle dans la cale de récupération bleu-vert sombre. La lumière du jour tombe à travers une grille au plafond sur une caisse orange couverte de balanes, posée sur une bâche bleue mouillée, avec des algues accrochées dessus ; une pince de drague rouillée est suspendue dans un coin. Roka : « Quelque chose qu’ils ont repêché… » « … doit bien valoir quelque chose. »
Image description
Roka descend de l’échelle et pénètre dans la cale de récupération sombre, puis observe une caisse orange couverte de balanes sous un rayon de lumière du jour.
About this chapter
In the dark at the bottom of the sea, something is counting. On Candyreef, a candy-coloured island of floating trash, Roka wakes to a water bag in the face from his street crew, lifts breakfast from the old woman who would have fed him anyway, and tells the kid who follows him that he doesn't owe anybody. Then the gulls lift all at once, and a Maw eats half the island. A day and a night alone at sea later, the Garden Ship fishes him out and orders him to walk its treadwheels for fish heads. Roka is nobody's slave, so he goes looking for something to steal instead, and breaks into a barnacled case dredged from the seabed. The silver dust inside climbs into his arm and says hello. It is polite. It is curious. It wants every human dead. And it has just started counting again.