30,000 Kilometres

*Poemfic by NappyBat to the poem* Finding my Way Home*. Literally me just experimenting with doing a poemfic because I'm awful at them :3*

**But even if the cold and dark does come - and I find myself alone**

**I promise - I'll always find my way home.**

The cold grips the night. The moon is a sliver of white in the deep blue sky. A sharp, howling wind whistles through its feathers. A larger gust nearly knocks it out of the air, but it keeps flying, its head high and eyes narrowed.

30,000 kilometres. And the journey has just begun.

The bird lifts its black-capped head. It knows it is the strongest of birds. Some may be more precise hunters, faster fliers, better fighters, but it is the strongest of all.

30,000 kilometres. From one navel of the world to the other.

Its wingbeats are large and sharp, its tail rocking and reorienting. A cloud covers the moon. Now it is pitch black. But the bird carries on. It knows what awaits it in the Antarctic - warmer weather, more sun, even penguins. The flightless, black-and-white birds... In the Antarctic, it won't have to deal with the darker nights and colder winds coming upon the Arctic at this time of year.

It closes its eyes. It barely makes any difference. The sky is so black, even with open eyes. But the bird keeps flying. South. Due south.

**Whether it be on my knees in my time of need**

**Up rugged rocky hills; over long endless fields**

A few days have passed.

Snow. The bird feels the first flake of it land on its back - soft and light as a feather, but cold. Oh, so very cold. Another one floats gracefully down. Barely skimming the bird's back, but the temperature still sends a bolt of shock coursing through it. More flakes begin to drift down from the now dense clouds. The wind picks up - the bird can hear it howling, rattling the endless oceans beneath it, sending salty spray into the pitch-black air.

30,000 kilometres. Its still got a long way to go.

Now the falling of snow has sped. It is constant. Even the snow flicked off with each flap of the bird's mighty wings is almost immediately replaced by twice the amount a few seconds later.

A blizzard is coming. The bird can feel it in its hollow bones. The wind is now shaking the bird. It is barely able to stay aloft. It can't move; that's for certain. It's blown backwards after each movement forwards. The snow is pelting it at an alarming rate. The wind unbalances it, sending it careening downwards. It could fall. It could give up hope now, and fold its soft, downy wings across its back, knowing it failed... but it won't. It's made this journey before safely. It makes it every year. It won't die. It flaps harder. Somewhere deep in its brain is the steadfast motivation to continue.

**Or swinging swords with muscles taught**

**Through ruined forts that the enemy caught**

What was that wind above it? It doesn't have the force of one of the many gusts of wind it's feeling because of the blizzard. It's a wind like the wind that rolls off the feathers of wingbeats. Off the wings of another bird.

Is there another bird? It feels feathers brush its back. It has the same feel as this bird's feathers. Is it the same type? No one can tell. The snow interferes with all vision.

Then a beak strikes its back. The bird shakes in midair, fear radiating from the tips of its feathers. It swerves to one side. It's another one of its same species, it can tell just by the feel. Just by intuition. Likely desperate. For what, though? Food? Perhaps food. Or maybe it's just grumpy about the long journey. After all, it's 30,000 kilometres.

The other bird strikes again. The blood freezes immediately, forming a crusted layer of ice down he bird's back. It's cold and sharp as daggers. The bird flaps its wings in an effort to stay airborne. The other bird swoops in again, though, this time attacking the bird's wing. It staggers, lopsided. It starts to plummet down. The bird trembles. But the fierce determination kicks in again. It won't stop for anything. It has to get home.

**I'm going to make it somehow, some way**

**No matter the pain: 'tis greater gain - I'll make it there one day**

The second bird swoops at it again. This time its beak plucks out some of the bird's precious white tail feathers. It gives a squawk - a distressed call of pain and alarm. The second bird gives a furious shriek in reply, coming in to attack the bird once more. Its beak fastens around some of the bird's wing feathers. Those are its flight feathers it can't lose them. It still has a long way to go. Without the flight feathers, it won't make it. And it has to make it. It has to see another Antarctic summer.

It lashes out with its talons, meeting the other bird's flesh. Skin and feathers tear under its claws. The bird hears a cry of horror and feels a twinge of pleasure. But it doesn't last long. The other bird retaliates quickly with a sharp nip on the shoulder.

The bird's entire back is frozen with red ice. Frozen blood. It weighs down its wings and stings its eyes. It struggles to continue.

The other bird attacks again, but this time its beak bounces off of the thin layer of icy blood. The former bird uses that time to attack again - tearing out down beneath the bird's wing with its hooked beak.

**Where many have started and few finish**

**The road of toil littered with bodies of those diminished**

The snowstorm begins to let up. The bird can see its opponent now - it's half-starved, skinny, and mad. It charges again, but this time the bird can see its bony silhouette and takes the advantage. It swerves out of the way.

Now the air is alight with the screeches of the fighting birds. Blood flies in frozen pellets across the sky, sharp as hail. The birds dive, they soar, they swoop. They attack, they defend. Neither of them want to be among the ones who fail. Neither of them wants their body to tense, then fall down, down, down, into the abyss of the ocean. But both are merciless. Only one can be the winner, that is clear. The only question is which one.

The first bird is heavily weighed down by an unpleasant mixture of snow and blood. Its movements start to become slower and more sluggish. It's starting to lose hope.

**These highs and these lows - the relentless foe**

**The darkest depths of my soul where my demons go**

The second bird is more confident. It swoops with sharp swerves of its wide wings, before darting smoothly out of the way. It wants to win, but so does the other. It is a fight to the death.

The first one knows this, and it scares it. It's a younger bird, just older than a juvenile. This is its first migration alone. It is hesitant with its attacks. It doesn't want to kill. It just wants to fly. It's been warned about the dangers of the migration - leopard seals, orcas, raptors, blizzards, getting lost, getting tired, but never other birds of its same species. That was quite unusual. It doesn't have the heart of a murderer. It doesn't want to kill.

The other one is desperate. It didn't eat enough food before the journey. Hunting was poor, and the fish were also starting to head south. It left from a point closer to the North Pole than the first one had, and it had been flying for days on end. It had not eaten since it had left. Exhaustion and lack of nutrients had driven it to insanity, and it was mad enough to attack a bird of its same species.

**Mocking calls and jests twill not break my will**

**Call what opposition you will - I march forwards still**

The older bird yells an insult at the younger one.

You twenty-niner!

An insult, meaning one has only completed 29,000 out of 30,000 kilometres. The young one barely falters. It narrows its eyes. It wants to complete this migration alive, and yet it doesn't wnat another bird's blood on its claws.

Call me what you like, is its reply.

The older one tries again.

You sea-poop!

The young bird ignores it. It flies a little faster, but it is smaller and is carrying more weight. The older one immediately catches up.

You weakling!

Still, the younger bird continues to fly resolutely, unmarred by the older one's furious comments.

Slow-poke!

Lost bird!

Orca-food!

**Hence will I with all my heart, mind, and might - try**

**And in this my dilemma will I not die.**

The younger bird pretends not to have heard the insults. It refuses to be fazed. It is strong and healthy. No words can change that.

The older one is growing desperate. More desperate than before. It goes back to its original strategy - attack.

It swoops in, talons outstretched, beneath the younger bird. Its claws catch on its fleshy stomach. The younger one doubles over in pain, and slashes back at the older one in the same spot.

**I will find my way home with or without you**

**I'll go all the way I've chosen- even if I make it alone**

They're both falling. They're going down together, tussling and struggling and attacking each other. The snow around them is tinged red. Their feathers are stained. The blood is running down their backs in such waves it can't all freeze. Now it stays liquid, running onto their talons and between their feathers and in their beaks and eyes. They tug out each others feathers with their beaks. They tear at each others skin with their claws. They're violent and angry. Neither is ready to give up. They are getting closer and closer to the ocean, though... Soon one must give up, or they both will perish. But they seem to think that it would be better to go down together, fighting, than one of them give up.

And then the younger one pulls away. It can't bear to bring them both down. It is going to sacrifice itself. And it would have, too, if there hadn't been a killer whale swimming lazily along at the surface. The young bird lands on the orca's back, a usually deadly place for such a bird. But the orca is so startled by the bird falling on its back that it doesn’t recover from the shock to make a meal out of the young bird quick enough.

**I will not die though the fire doth at length try**

**And though the heavens let fly and hell rains out the sky**

The older bird, moved by the sacrifice the younger one had made, feels a burst of emotion prompting it to save the other one. It dives down to grab some of the younger bird's feathers in its beak, but this time to save it. To carry it out of harm's way.

The younger bird is plump and heavy.

The snowstorm has subdued slightly, allowing for the orca to suddenly realise what had happened. It gives a tremendous leap - a valiant effort, yes, but futile. The two birds are now out of reach.

**I will make it home - weary though I may be**

**I will make it to my resting place though it kill me**

They fly back together. 30,000 kilometres. They catch fish for each other, and guide each other through the cold darkness of the nights.

And at last, after a couple of months, they arrive. The Antarctic - the summer, the warmth, the penguins!

They have made it. From the Arctic to the Antarctic. From the North Pole to the South. The longest migration of any animal.

30,000 kilometres.

The migration of an Arctic Tern,