Chapter Text
The weight in Celine's grasp was heavy, a burden she struggled to maintain a hold of as the extra mass slowed her racing steps and caused them to catch sluggishly on the forest undergrowth. Gnarled roots and razored stones rose out of the darkness, snarling on the sopping wet clothes that cling to her body.
Sweat dripped from her body, trailing down her face, her neck, her back– soaking into her clothing and blending indistinguishably with the water already drenching her. Screams and shouts ricochet off the trees surrounding her, echoing in a way that made it hard to ascertain the exact positioning of the angry mob encroaching from behind. She didn't dare look over her shoulder to gauge their pursuit, too focused on not losing hold of the adult mermaid in her arms.
If not for the arms wrapped around her neck, her precious gift would have long since fallen, and they couldn’t risk such a mistake at that moment. Not with the swarm of humans trailing somewhere behind them, flashlights slicing through the dark as they drew closer, murder in their voices.
A hidden rock caught her foot, slicing her heel and making her wince and stumble. The arms around her neck tightened as a distressed warble sounded in her ear. Celine smacked her shoulder in a tree, but the impact caught her fall and kept her footfalls moving forward. The strike caused the body in her arms to slip again, and Celine scrambled for purchase while maintaining momentum in their escape. She wished she could respond to the terrified cries, to comfort the fearful shakes of her grown child with gentle words, but every gasping breath was dedicated to keeping Celine in motion.
A wave of relief crashed through her as they broke through the tree line, knees going weak at the sight. The shore’s lapping water glimmered with faint white ripples in the dark before being swallowed by inky black. She didn’t hesitate, didn’t slow down as she scrambled to the water’s edge leading to the East Sea.
The salt in the water stung her bleeding foot as she waded into the swash zone. The waves fought against her every step as she plunged deeper in, glancing behind her. Little dots of human shapes appeared at the treeline, approaching quickly.
Frantically, Celine waded out until the water reached her hips. She squatted, allowing the liquid abyss around her to cradle their weight. The arms around her neck tightened.
“Rumi?” Celine choked out. “You need to let go.”
The head shook desperately in her shoulder, the purple hair she had braided by the lake's edge just that morning now splashing in the water from the movement.
The braid she may never get to make again.
Celine shoved the thought to the back of her mind, knowing she needed to focus if her child was to survive this night.
“Please, Rumi,” Celine demanded, her firm command breaking on the name, softening the words unintentionally. “Let go.”
Rumi's arms shook, but after a firmer squeeze from Celine, they relented, slipping away. Celine let her hands drift to her daughter's shoulders, and as Rumi pulled back in the water, Celine took one final moment to memorize her. The inky black sea had swallowed the majority of Rumi's body, but her face remained above. Celine felt her throat tighten as she traced Rumi's face with her eyes, ingraining every detail to memory, knowing she would never get the chance to again after this.
She brushed the small, deep purple scales around the edges of her face tenderly, trying not to cry as Rumi pushed further into her hands in response. Rumi’s own mismatched eyes filled with tears as well, and she wasn’t sure if the trail down the cheeks were from the splashing sea or Rumi’s sorrows. Though her one brown eye looked near black in the darkness, the golden glow of the other provided her own eyes a place to rest.
“I love you, my little minnow,” Celine said, meeting her gaze firmly. "I love you so much." She needed Rumi to hear it. She needed her to know it. “Now, I need you to listen. Swim as fast and as far as you can go, and don’t stop for anything, do you understand?”
The trails were from tears after all, more following the path as Rumi nodded urgently.
“And you can’t come back,” Celine said, words finally breaking under the command. “If you do, I can’t keep you safe. I need you to stay alive.”
Rumi keened softly at that, the pitiful trill rattling in the air around them and ripping apart Celine’s very soul as Rumi's shaking hands rested on hers in protest.
“I know,” she said. The the voices were getting closer now. Too close. “I’m sorry." She was. She would always be sorry. "I love you." Always. "Now go.”
She guided Rumi backwards, away from her as she let go. Even so, Rumi faltered, despair in her expression. Celine glanced behind once again and felt her heart lurch as the first of the snarling humans charged through the tree lines. She whipped back around, stern as she yelled once again, “Go!”
A bullet sounded, whizzing by and splashing with a muffled smack into the water beside them. Celine refused to even flinch, but the shot caused Rumi recoil, and a moment later, she saw Rumi dive away, vanishing with one final flick of her brilliant scaled tail. More bullets sounded, followed by splashing of feet entering the water, but it was too late. Rumi was safe, and Celine was once again left all alone.
“Goodbye, Rumi.”
~~~
Zoey plopped the large tackle box onto the seat in front of her. She tucked her fishing pole beside it, then clambered into the rocking boat herself. Untethering the rope from the small dock, Zoey shoved away, letting the bobbing waves of the water pull her further out for a moment. Grabbing her oars, she began rowing away from the shoreline.
Fighting the slightly choppy waves gave her muscles a satisfying burn, venting the excess energy she always had bursting within. It seemed to help her prepare for the extended time of relaxing in a single spot without getting too physically restless, so she never bothered upgrading her little boat with any sort of motor. It seemed counterproductive in her mind.
Once she found herself in a decent spot of the water, she pulled out her waterproof mini speaker and turned it on. It gave a little musical scale to signify it had connected properly to her phone, which she opened to put on her main music playlist, “Jam Juice.” A playlist not for the weak, as it hopped from genre to genre without mercy, but it felt perfect for her hyperactive attention span.
A few minutes later, Zoey tossed her prepped line out into the water beyond. The fishing bobber plopped into the water and began dancing along with the waves. Zoey settled down, nestling into the comfortable seat that Mira had built for long fishing excursions. Mira wasn’t much one for fishing herself, but she would join for company from time to time. After one bad experience that left Mira rubbing her tailbone once they got home, Mira had decided more ergonomical seating was required for both their sakes. Zoey couldn’t protest, too touched that Mira was willing to join again, albeit with some minor comfort adjustments.
She definitely wasn’t complaining now, either, as she leaned back her seat and basked in the sun. She adjusted her yellow bucket hat to better block her eyes from the blaring sun while still watching the line beyond.
She loved these moments on the water, the ones where her body could relax for a few moments and she could just let her thoughts float by undisturbed in an endless stream of consciousness. It was almost meditative, letting her brain just rush by without judgment or the effort of wrestling them into a socially acceptable form. They could take as many rabbit trails as they wished as she just observed them going by.
She always would get little breaks from it whenever her line would come to life, or a fish would leap from the water, or a bird would fly overhead. If she got too bored, she even had a sensor she could set up to make a noise when her line started to go, and she let herself be distracted by the old DS she often packed with her (in a waterproof baggie for safety).
But today, after a long day of manning the local grocery store of Honmoon Village, she was ready for an evening where she could just watch the water and the glittering of sun reflecting from the ripples and waves lazily floating by.
She leaned back, tucking her hands behind her head as she settled in. The wind drifting softly across the water cooled her sun-warmed skin, and the boat gently rocked in a steady pace, allowing her worries to float away beside it. Peace settled over her as she listened to the sounds of lapping waves and distant seagulls overhead. It was the perfect ending to her day.
A sudden yank on her line spurred Zoey to life, and she scrambled to snatch up her pole before she lost her first bite of the day. She gripped the pole and yanked before reeling desperately. She was getting it pulled in fairly easily, hinting at a small or medium sized fish on the other end, but it still wasn't one she was willing to give up. The first bite of the day was always a little extra special.
She let out a surprised yelp as a sudden force—much stronger than the one moments before—pulled on her line. She stopped trying to pull it in, just focusing on not losing her fishing pole to the new strength of the… it couldn’t be a fish. Not with the way her boat was suddenly being tugged along with it. She tried to find a moment she could grab her knife from her pocket to cut the line, but she knew if she even let one hand go, her whole pole would be gone, and her fishing trip would come to an abrupt and unsatisfying end.
She let out a gasp as her caught critter on the other end of her line broke the surface of the water and came to a sudden stop. The head of a northern fur seal appeared, turning to watch her as Zoey blinked in shock. As her little boat continued to drift from the momentum past the big-eyed seal, she noted how the beautiful animal held a fish in its teeth, which was flopping around with Zoey’s hook and line still stuck in its gaping mouth.
“Hey there, big guy,” Zoey breathed reverently. She didn't want to scare it away with the giddy emotions bubbling inside her. “Seems you have something of mine. I don’t think you wanna eat that until I get the hook out.”
The seal barked, bobbing its head happily with the fish as if to show it off to her. Zoey couldn’t help the giggle that came from her at the goofy sight. Seals could be highly dangerous, but this one seemed pretty mellow. She wouldn’t dare reach for the fish right now, so she could only hope the adorable sea puppy would release it on its own for its own good.
In the meantime, Zoey pulled her phone out and crouched down. She started a recording, aiming it at her new friend to show off to Mira later. Mira loved seals, and she would be distraught for having missed this. She would be even more upset if Zoey failed to get a video of it for her, so as a good girlfriend, Zoey continued to film the beautiful creature. It gave a little spin, as if it knew it was being admired and wanted to show off a bit more. The spin caused the fishing line to twist around the neck of the seal, which made her a bit more concerned for the seal’s well being.
Zoey leaned out over her boat, giving her and her pole a bit more reach. She was just about able to get the tip of the pole over the seal’s head, and she grunted with effort as she worked to undo the fishing line issue by swirling it the opposite way over the head. Just as she finished, she lurched and nearly fell in the water, scrambling back a bit to steady out her boat again. She glanced back at the seal, which was barking in what seemed like amusement at her. Zoey grinned anyway, re-aiming her camera at him.
“I don’t know why you are laughing, mister,” Zoey mused. “You still have to let that fish go so I can take the hook out for ya.”
The barking immediately stopped, and it blinked dumbly at her. She muffled a giggle, the look of zero thoughts too cute to resist. Then its eyes flickered with awareness once again as it drifted its gaze downward. Zoey blinked as a small cluster of bubbles appeared beside the seal's head, only to cease a second later. Water erupted in a mini geyser from the same spot, causing Zoey to fall back from the sudden assault as a pair of human arms broke from the water's surface, coiling around the seal’s neck and yanking it downward as it gave a startled noise. Zoey sank in her spot, watching wide-eyed as the line was pulled under, the bobber still submerged somewhere in the depths. Zoey sat stock still, attempting to process the very random, very human looking appendages that had just wrestled a full-grown seal into the water like it was nothing.
A human she had seen no sign of. There was no person swimming over, no boat they could have dove from, nothing. As time passed with no person surfacing, and a small bit of red began to taint the water, Zoey’s concerns on the well being of those underneath started to rise.
She leaned over the boats edge, trying to catch a glimpse into the depths for some answers. A few small tugs on the line later, and then it trailed a little further out. Where it now sat, her bobber popped up, followed by a purple-haired woman’s face. Or rather, half of it, the lower portion still submerged beneath the waves. The eyes narrowed at her, and even from this distance, Zoey could see the two mismatched eyes, both of which had black instead of white around the outside.
She sat there speechless at the sight, unsure if she should offer help or call for help for herself. Two hands rose from the surface beside the face, one holding the fish that was now bleeding from where the hook used to be, and the hook and line in the other. The woman chucked the line at her, making Zoey yelp as it landed with a racket into the front of the boat. The seal’s head appeared just inches away from the woman, eyes wide and wanting at the fish in her hand. With a flick of the woman's wrist, the fish flew through the air directly into the jaws of the elated seal that gulped it down with enthusiasm. With one more narrowed glare towards Zoey, the water woman shoved the seal, and both vanished from sight.
Zoey was left sitting there, flabbergasted at the unexplainable interaction she just witnessed. It took her a moment to realize she was still holding her phone. She frantically paused the recording and played it through. She felt a wave of vibrating energy course through her, causing her to bounce in spot as she came to realize she had managed to catch the whole thing on video.
Mira was going to lose her mind when she got home. Zoey already was.