[ open ] operation: baby sea turtle rescue is a go!

[lyingheart]

WHO: ALL IMPORTS.
WHERE: An Atlantic-facing beach in Eastern Florida.
WHEN: Saturday - Monday
WHAT: Baby leatherback sea-turtles have been stunned by the temperatures of the water at their hatching beach, and must be rounded up in their thousands to be relocated to warmer waters, either to struggle out through the surf on their own, or to be boated out and released directly into the sea!
WARNINGS: ... How can this log have warnings ImPorts rescue baby sea turtles! More information located here.



The long stretch of beach the ImPorts find themselves on is littered with baskets, coolers, styrofoam containers, anything the rescue workers could use to hold the baby sea turtles for transit. Dozens of nests have all emptied of turtles, and gulls roam overhead, looking for opportunities to snatch the stunned baby sea turtles tumbling around in the waves. The shock of the unexpected temperature on their tiny systems renders them incapable of moving, and ImPorts will soon find themselves ushered to the water line to grab tiny, tumbling turtles out of the water.

When enough are collected, a portion of the volunteers and ImPorts are pulled aside to ride with the baby turtles down the coastline to warmer waters, where they'll either be asked to cart the containers down to the waterline to release the baby sea turtles and watch that they don't end up shocked all over again, or instructed to go out to sea on any of the chartered or volunteer-driven boats and release the sea turtles directly into the warmer ocean waters.

Water and lunches will be provided, dinner is haphazard, come as you go. Bright search floodlights are set up on Saturday night so that collection rescue efforts can continue without much interruption. If the same is needed on Sunday night, it will be provided.

For some ImPorts, this will be the first time their arrival isn't treated with great fanfare. People with abilities that assist in the collection and redistribution of the baby sea turtles will get relieved displays of gratitude from attending volunteers and any press drawn to the scene, but much of the fervency seen elsewhere will be largely absent.

Comments

[blondtactician]

Thanks! [Armin's answer, as well as his move to subtly right himself, are pure reflex. Not that he's so petty as to be purposefully rude to Annie when she's helped. For those few seconds she is solid, assuring, and he knows she won't drop or hurt him.

Nor he her, right now. With a stunned expression Armin pulls a single step away, watching as his hat is pulled further and further out of reach. Armin frowns, calculating the risk of going further out for it. If he moved quickly, he might have a chance at it, but the thrashing about and time that would take would detract from the issue at hand. Almost as suddenly as if he'd toppled, he crouches in the water. He scoops up a turtle, gently tickling its head before turning to Annie.]

Room for one more?

[lyingheart]

[ Annie takes her own distancing step, though much like Armin's sudden crouch down, it's followed by another scoop of a stunned little turtle into her hand, and into the tub. She's straightening as Armin finds his own, and merely nods, shifting the tub around so that it's still balanced against her, but offered toward him.

Glances past him, noting his hat tumbling in the water. A turtle's riding the brim, by accident and chance. She breathes out in a sharper exhalation, not quite enough to be a sound of amusement, but almost. In another lifetime. ]

Maybe another seven or so. What duty are you on?

[ Without a container of his own? There are a variety of tasks that need handling, not the least which is extra hands to find the turtles. ]

[blondtactician]

"Turtle collecting, same as you," Armin said, "Since there weren't any tubs free they said I should just help someone who had one. And maybe double check that no one out here needed to take a break. They have water and food over there." It's not actually the same as expressing concern whether or not Annie's eaten or staying hydrated if he says it like that, after all. Besides, she's always taken care of herself.

"...Is that turtle using my hat as a boat?" Armin almost laughs too. "I guess I'd better get it." Careful not to overthink his movements, he sloshes toward the hat, now needing to be careful not to upend it and lose the turtle passenger.

[lyingheart]

"Must mean they're making a run down to the marina soon." Annie glanced back toward the vans conscripted for transportation duties, wondering if she'd prefer to make the trek down to the boats and out to sea. Annie had found that after her first run in with unexpected seasickness, she was better able to handle the open waters than she'd thought. There was still a strange sort of gripping fear, when she considered all that water, the sheer immensity of it, but within sight of shore it wasn't enough to do more than make her pause every so often to remember to breathe.

Much like the skies being endless caused a strange sort of sensation to coil in the pit of her stomach, the endless illusion of the sea could get under her skin.

She stepped forward, regaining sturdy footing on the wet sand being pulled away from her by the retreating waves. It was a game, seeing how much of the ground beneath her would be eaten away in a matter of minutes, a quiet game she played with herself. Armin was an unwitting part of that game for the moment, the inspiration for which direction she stepped, holding onto her tub and offering it out toward him on his return. "It doesn't know what it's doing. None of them do." Their imperative was to get to the open sea, but the very waters they wanted to embrace were acting against them. Annie could almost sympathize.

[blondtactician]

"I wonder if they're frightened by what's happening, or they're still just trying to get out to the ocean." Armin has done some research marine animals because of course he has, tapping through his phone to read about leather back sea turtles on the journey out here. There is some argument as to whether or not animals feel the things that humans do, some say they're not capable of it, that research into such things is simply projecting human emotion. Others are dead set on the belief that animals do grieve, do feel something like love and affection, go through life experiencing such things. There's probably no way to know unless people find a way to ask them. "I wonder if they know, and they're still trying."

Armin picks up another turtle, still attempting, carefully, to make his way out to where his hat has drifted away to. He tickles this little turtle on the head, too. "I think they'd say your brains aren't big enough, but I wonder," he says to the distressed little creature before placing in the bucket. Now close enough, he grabs the hat on both sides, but the extra weight of the turtle on the brim causes it to fall back into the water. "No...!"

[lyingheart]

"They're driven. Are they allowed to feel fear past that drive?" There's no movement from Annie, and the sentiment behind her words is directed squarely at Armin. The Scouting Legion would know all about fear in the actions they took... even against the government. Annie wonders how that story ends.

Shaking up the Human Empire. Things that have needed to happen, brought about from interesting sources.

Annie would find any argument about emotion silly. If animals feel, they feel. How complex it is, or to what degree, does it matter? Turtles only needed to be turtles. Humans only needed to be human. If they could communicate in some form, or at least respect each other's right to living, cohabitate instead of destroy, did those thoughts, those emotions, those possible similarities and differences matter?

The turtle plops back into the sea. Annie stays steady, even as the sand is eaten away from under her feet. He'll find that turtle again, or if not that one, another. They weren't able to get far, with the shock of the cool water. Funny how different this temperature was for a reptile over a mammal. Annie found it pleasant, all things considered.

Silent, she watches, and waits. It's about all she can do without turning around and leaving Armin to his sodden straw hat and sinking sea turtle.