Chapter Text
A gray mist swelled in as the ship swayed across the waves. The water frothed and threatened to spill onto the deck as the wind picked up. Shivering at the bow, Prince Langa pulled his coat tighter around him as the sailors pulled nets of fish aboard. They shouted joyfully as they pulled their prizes aboard and Langa wished that he could feel as excited as they were. Normally, he didn’t mind the cold harsh wind and would be as energetic as the rest of the sailors, but ever since his father had died, sailing had lost its appeal. His father had taught him to sail, he had shown him the ropes, both literally and metaphorically. Sailing was their kingdom’s main source of revenue, but it was also fun for Langa and his father. They had many adventures together and Langa used to love sailing more than anything. But, after the king’s death, sailing felt as gray as the ocean to Langa. He appreciated the fact that his mother hoped that this trip might make him happy again, but he couldn’t help but feel frustrated that his favorite activity was now unappealing to him.
As another wind tilted the ship, Langa threw his hand out to catch himself on the railing so that he wouldn’t be thrown overboard. He gritted his teeth and tried to tune out the sailors happily singing about some merpeople controlling the waves beneath them. He didn’t care about the myths. If there was some sort of magic below the waves, then it had done nothing to save his father, and it had nothing to do with him anyway. He carefully began making his way towards the center of the ship, towards the mast, as his attendant, Oka, came up to him.
“Ready for the festivities tonight Langa? The sea has given us many fish and the sailors are looking forward to a fine party this evening. Be sure to make an appearance, as you are the guest of honor after all.” Oka gave him a knowing look. Langa sighed. Today was his birthday and he knew that there was to be festivities aboard the ship tonight, but he could not bring himself to care. He nodded and Oka made his way back to the large fisherman that he always enjoyed talking to. Langa tried to rack his brains for the man’s name. Hiro…Hiromi maybe? Langa should know, but honestly, in his head, he just always thought of him as Oka’s shadow since they always seemed to be together. He looked out at the swelling ocean and thought he maybe saw a fish tail break the surface before he shook his head and headed into the ship’s cabin to take a nap before the festivities tonight. The fishermen continued singing about mysterious fathoms below as he shut the door tightly behind him, leaving him in the dark and quiet of the cabin.
Under the ocean’s waves, the water was calm. Fish swam peacefully through the coral many miles below the ship’s hull. A beautiful castle made of pearls, abalone shells, coral, and crystals rose from beyond the reef. Many fish and merpeople were swimming there for the concert that the queen’s children were putting on that morning to honor the debut of her youngest twin daughters. Queen Masae was the ruler of the ocean and most specifically the merpeople. She kept peace in the ocean with her magical trident and helped her people stay safe and hidden at the bottom of the sea. Since humans were responsible for the death of her husband, she made sure to keep her people, and especially her children, far from the surface. She wanted to make sure that no tragedies could befall them at the humans’ hands.
Masae tucked her maroon tail gracefully into the clam shell chariot that would bring her into the concert hall. She carefully grabbed the reins of her dolphins with one hand while her other hand held her trident confidently. When she heard the fanfare, she flicked the reins and her dolphins pulled her into the concert hall. They took her in a circle around the hall, allowing her to dramatically light the chandelier with her trident, before dropping her off in her box. The crowd cheered as their queen swam from the chariot to her throne and then the hall quieted again as a new announcement was made, this time introducing the queen’s advisor and music instructor, Kaoru. The small pink ghost crab rode in on a much smaller shell pulled by seahorses who bucked wildly causing the crab to hold onto the reins tightly, lest he be thrown overboard. His introduction brought far less cheering than the queen’s. After finally making it to his podium, he released the seahorses, who took off into the crowd. Kaoru scowled quickly before pulling out the music from the shell and gently placing it on the music stand. He brought out his conductor’s baton, whom he lovingly called Carla, though the royal children forever teased him about that behind his back. He raised Carla high, then brought her down and the band began to fill the hall with quick joyful music. Soon, three large sea shells began to rise from the floor of the concert hall in time with the music. The middle one opened and Queen Masae’s oldest daughter, Koyomi swam out, singing in time with the music. She twirled around using her strong strawberry red tail to help her complete tricks in time with the song. She smiled at her mother before watching her younger twin sisters make their debut next. The two shells on either side of Koyomi’s burst open and two young mermaids swam out of their shells. Chihiro and Nanaka may have been identical twins from the waist up, but their tails were very differently colored. Chihiro’s tail was a lilac color while Nanaka’s was a warm orange. Their tails complemented each other as they spun and sang their part of the song. The crowd cheered as the two finished and Koyomi began to join in again.
Queen Masae hummed with approval and Kaoru began conducting the band in the next part of the song. A fourth shell began to rise from the stage and the three sisters circled it, singing to introduce their brother, the oldest of Queen Masae’s children. The shell slowly opened and revealed an empty interior. The young mermaids and the crowd gasped, while Kaoru groaned in frustration. The queen rose from her throne and angrily whispered, “Reki…”
Far from the warmth of the underwater palace and the city that surrounded it, a merman made his way through a dilapidated ship graveyard. He picked his way through the many ships that lay broken and forgotten on the seafloor. While the area was sad and dark, he was brightly colored, his gold tail and bright red hair sticking out in the ship graveyard. He was intensely looking for something, unaware that a fish followed behind him at a distance.
“You know, Slime, you’re going to get impaled on one of these ships’ stupid sharp edges one day.”
The merman startled, dropping his bag, and crashing into the side of a ship before falling into the sand below. The bang echoed through the ship graveyard. The merman groaned, rubbing his side and arm where he had crashed into the ship.
“Miya! How long have you been following me? Where did you even come from?”
The small triangular fish laughed and swam closer to the merman who was still on the sand, but now looking for his dropped bag.
“You know, Reki, you stand out. It was easy to see you slipping away from the castle this morning. I just figured you were looking for trouble and I decided to come and keep an eye on you. Maybe try a disguise or something next time.”
Reki found his bag and picked it up, holding it close to his chest.
“Aw, c’mon, Miya. I don’t get into trouble that often. I just wanted to do a little exploring and with all of the commotion happening at the castle it was easy to sneak away. Besides, I was going to head back soon.” Miya scoffed but kept pace with Reki as he swam to the next ship.
“So, what are you even doing out here anyway?” Miya asked as Reki looked over the ship, seeing if it was safe enough to enter. Deeming it safe enough, Reki swam through a porthole opening and into the ship. Miya groaned and swam in quickly behind him. “Y’know, just looking at human stuff. I mean, come on! It’s fascinating.” Reki swam over to a table where a small silver object glittered. “Like, look at this. It’s such a small trident. Wonder why humans need one this small?” Reki stared at the small silver trident after showing it to Miya. Then, he carefully placed it into his bag.
“Who knows? Humans are weird. Why are you so fascinated with them anyway?” the small green and purple fish asked.
Reki smiled and swam to a different part of the ship where another human object lay. He picked it up, eyeing it from every angle before showing it to Miya. “I don’t know, I guess. The human world has always been interesting to me. They make such wonderful items. I want to understand how each one works. Like this one. What is it meant for? What can it do?” Reki turned it once more, before adding it to his bag with a grin. “I guess that’s why it’s nice we have a contact from the human world,” Reki said with a wink at Miya. Miya rolled his eyes and noticed a large shadow quickly passed across the back windows of the ship. He shuddered and silently swam next to Reki.
“There’s something large outside the ship, Reki,” he whispered as quietly as he could into Reki’s ear. “I think we need to go.”
Reki turned quickly, looking towards the back of the ship's windows where Miya was pointing with his fin, but he didn’t see anything. “C’mon, Miya. Usually this place is pretty safe as long as you’re pretty quiet.”
“Which you weren’t. If I remember you ran into a ship and made a huge crashing sound throughout the ship graveyard,” Miya hissed back.
“Well, to be fair, someone scared me and made me crash into that ship,” Reki said grinning back at Miya.
“Really, Slime? You want to do this now? We need to get out of here.” Miya looked around trying to find the best place to exit when the back of the ship exploded towards them as a huge shark burst into the ship. Reki shook off the bits of glass and swam up to the next deck, Miya following close behind him. The shark swiped at his tail as he swam up, but Reki was able to avoid the teeth in time, leaving the shark to bite the stairs that connected the decks instead. Reki looked around quickly, spotting a porthole exit in the wall across the deck. “Miya! This way! Come on!” He pushed Miya towards the exit, giving the smaller fish a fast enough wave that he was safely able to exit the rotting ship. Reki, however, wasn't as lucky. The shark burst upward through the rotting floors and blocked Reki’s way out. He turned, spotting a large barrel, and swam quickly towards it. He used his tail to smack it towards the shark. The shark was slightly dazed after getting a barrel to the face and Reki used the diversion to swim through the new hole in the floor and out of the porthole he originally used to enter the ship. Miya caught up with him and they began to swim in between the ships of the graveyard, hoping to lose the shark who had made its way out of the ship now. Reki motioned for Miya to follow him between two ships, but didn’t realize that his bag had gotten stuck on a mast’s sharp edge. Reki groaned as the bag’s strap ripped causing his treasures to fall out. The sound alerted the shark to his presence and Reki ditched his treasures for now, trying to come up with a plan to defeat the shark or get away at least. He heard Miya shout and he turned to see an anchor with a large enough ring that he might be able to trap the shark in. Reki pushed his tail even faster, picking up speed as the shark behind him began to get closer. He grabbed Miya as he swam through the ring and didn’t stop until he heard the shark roaring behind him. The anchor held firm, leaving the shark trapped in place.
“Good idea, Miya,” Reki huffed trying to catch his breath as he released Miya from his grip.
“Yeah, whatever Slime. You should’ve listened to me in the first place. Told you there was something here.”
“Yeah, you were right. Now let me go collect my things and we can go see what they are.”
“For real? You’re going to disobey your mom again?”
“Well, uh…if she never finds out, is it really disobeying?” Reki asked, shrugging his shoulders as he picked his items up and tried to put them into his broken bag. Miya swam close, rolling his eyes.
“She’s going to find out. You really aren’t clever enough to keep fooling her forever.”
“Harsh, Miya. C’mon, I want to know what these are.” Reki started making his way to the surface, forcing Miya to speed up or get left behind. The butterflyfish had to stop talking and concentrate on keeping up. He cursed Reki silently in his head for being so much taller and therefore faster.
Reki broke the surface of the ocean, his bright red hair dripping with water. He shook it out and pushed the locks off of his face so he could see better and headed over to the rock where his contact normally was. Miya fluttered slightly below the surface, not willing to break the surface as easily as Reki. To be fair, Miya’s lungs didn’t really support the air like Reki’s did anyway, so he would rather wait until he needed to be in the air. A few minutes later, a black-tailed gull made his way to the rock, settling into the nest that was made in the rock’s natural formations. His feathers were tipped in green, even though most of the other gulls in the area had black tipped feathers. Reki didn’t really understand the coloring, but he just assumed that it was normal and it did make the gull easy to find.
“Kojiro! I brought some new human things to show you. Can you help me figure out what they are?”
The gull looked at Reki and hopped down from his nest to the lower part of the rock where Reki was resting on his elbows.
“Hey kid! It’s been awhile. What did you bring this time?”
Miya broke the surface and glared at the gull. “We almost died from a shark attack getting this stuff, so it better be good.”
Kojiro laughed at first, thinking it was a joke, but then upon seeing Miya’s death glare and Reki looking sheepish, he put his wing to his head and groaned. “What were you kids thinking? Did you go back to the ship graveyard again Reki? I thought you were going to keep scouting the reefs where it is a lot safer?”
“Well, there isn’t a lot to find in the reefs anymore. I found everything already. I was being safe until Miya scared me and then I crashed into a ship and made a lot of noise, which may have alerted a shark, but it’s fine! We made it out and we’re here, safe and sound.”
“Yeah, all thanks to me and my good idea,” Miya muttered, before dropping below the surface to get another breath. He broke the surface again, as Reki began taking the items out of his bag to show Kojiro.
He pulled the small silver trident out and the sun made it sparkle. Kojiro grabbed it carefully with his wing and looked at it from all angles.
“Wow, kid. This is special. I haven’t seen one of these in forever!”
Reki’s amber eyes widened and he flicked his tail excitedly. “What is it?”
“This is a dinglehopper. Humans use these to keep their hair looking nice.” Kojiro carefully pulled the dinglehopper through his feathers making them lie smoothly on his chest, the white blending nicely into the green. He handed it back to Reki, who readjusted so that he could use the dinglehopper on his own hair which was starting to dry out in the sun. He ran it through his red locks and watched as it smoothly went though. “Wow. A dinglehopper.” He carefully set it down on the rock and took out his other item, the wooden one that had him stumped. “What about this one, Kojiro?”
The gull took the wooden item and his eyes grew wide. “This one I haven’t seen in years! It’s a banded, bulbous snarfblat.”
Reki laughed, “What is that? I love the name! How do the humans use it?”
Miya rolled his eyes as the gull launched into his explanation. “Humans get bored, sitting around all day not doing anything. They use the snarfblat to entertain themselves. You know, they use this to make fine music.” He blew into the smaller end, causing water and some seaweed to fly out the other end in a rather cacophonous noise. “Of course, I haven’t played it in years, and music was never my strongest talent.”
Reki’s eyes widened in alarm. “Music! Oh no! My mother’s going to kill me. Miya, I know why it was so easy to sneak out this morning. The concert was today! I missed it.” He began tossing the items into his bag, holding the opening closed with one hand, while waving the other at Kojiro. “I’m sorry Kojiro. I have to go. Thanks for your help!” He dove under the surface, Miya following close behind him, leaving the gull looking confused on the rock above.
As Reki and Miya took off towards the castle, they swam past a seaweed garden, not noticing the spotted garden eel sticking quietly out of the sand all the way on the side of the garden. One of the eel’s eyes flashed gold, sharing the image of the merman and fish flying past, holding their bag of human items, fleeing towards the castle, to a different sea creature at the far end of the reef. While the castle glowed and sparkled on one end of the reef, the other end was quite dark and dingy. The reef ended, leading down to a dark chasm where a large sea creature had once died, leaving behind a huge cave embedded into its bony remains. In this cave, a sea demon known as a cecaelia, dwelled. He watched from the shadows as the golden light appeared in his cauldron, before turning into an image of a merman with bright red hair and a golden tail swimming past with a small fish. Now interested, he swam slightly forward running his nimble fingers through his electric blue hair. One of his pale tentacles reached from out of the shadows carefully reaching towards the image of the merman swimming hurriedly towards the castle. The blue circles on the tentacle glistened in the gold projecting in his cauldron.
“Well, well…if it isn’t little Red getting into trouble again? Guess he missed the debut concert for his youngest siblings. How tragic.”
A red eye glinted out of the gloom, noticing the bag in Reki’s hands. “What could you be hiding in there, Red?”
More pale tentacles covered in blue circles escaped from the gloom, revealing the cecaelia in all his glory. He sashayed through the water peering close to the golden image in his cauldron before calling out to the eel creating the image for him.
“Tadashi! Keep an eye on the queen’s son. He could be useful to me.” The eel back in the seaweed garden gave a small shudder as he heard his master’s order but managed a quick nod. He began removing himself from the sand and making his way to the castle, careful to not be noticeable.
“Reki! What am I going to do with you? How could you have missed the concert today? You know how important it was for Chihiro and Nanaka.”
Queen Masae was rigidly sitting on her throne, staring down at her son. Her trident was in its holder and Kaoru was seated on one of the arm rests of her throne. He had crossed his claws as he looked down at the merman and the small fish floating beside him.
“I know, Mom. I’m sorry. I had totally forgotten about the concert. I-” Reki started, only to be cut off by the queen.
“As a result of your careless behavior,” Masae started, “the celebration was-”
“Ruined,” Kaoru finished seriously. “Your sisters were embarrassed and all my hard work was laughed at.” Even if the small pink crab didn’t seem too intimidating, his sour mood definitely made its way through the throne room. Reki took a deep breath and was about to start again when Miya spoke up for him.
“It wasn’t Reki’s fault. I followed after him but I made a mistake and we ended up getting chased by a shark.”
Reki stared wide-eyed at the small fish. His mother and Kaoru had also focused on Miya. His mother gave a small gasp at the mention of the shark. Miya continued, “We got away safely. But then we were held up again because a loud mouthed know-it-all had to keep squawking away about things he doesn’t understand. I mean seriously, what would a sea gull even know about…” Miya cut off as he realized Reki was looking a little panicked now. He realized his mistake. “I mean, obviously he wasn’t a sea gull, I meant a sea, uh, cucumber, yeah. Haha.” Miya stopped talking and swam behind Reki with a small apologetic face as the queen rose from her throne.
“Reki, you didn’t. You promised you wouldn't. You know our laws. No one goes to the surface.”
Reki backed up a little. He tried to fake a smile. “Mom, I’m fine. Nothing happened.”
His mom groaned, putting her face into her hands. “How many times must we go through this Reki? You could’ve been seen by one of those murderers. By one of those humans! They’re dangerous! Do you think I want to see what happened to your father happen to you?” She swam closer to Reki, her cheeks red and her lips trembling. Masae put her hands on Reki’s face, forcing him to look into her eyes. “Reki, you are forbidden from going to the surface. I don’t know what about it drives you so, but if you disobey me again, I will make you regret it. Do you understand me?”
Reki pulled away. “Please, Mom. You can’t.”
“Not another word. I am never to hear you going to the surface again, is that clear?”
Reki shuddered, his lip quivering, before he turned and swam quickly out of the throne room. Miya followed quickly behind him.
Masae sadly sat back on her throne, holding her arms around herself. She looked down at Kaoru. “Was I too hard on him?”
The crab looked up at the queen, his golden eyes hard. “No, your majesty. Reki has been getting into too much trouble lately. He needs this.”
The queen looked at Kaoru and an idea flitted into her mind. “You’re right Kaoru. He needs supervision.”
“I would even say constant supervision,” the crab murmured.
“Someone to keep him out of trouble. To keep him safe.”
“He most certainly does. Dare I say all the time,” the crab added, nodding along to the queen’s words.
Masae grinned, putting her hands out to the crab, “And you’re just the crab to do it!”
Kaoru looked up at her, his mouth slack. I’ve just made a huge mistake, he thought to himself as the queen listed off the things she would like him to make sure of as he became Reki’s babysitter.