Life is like the ocean, it goes up and down - TastyToast - QSMP (2024)

Chapter 1

Chapter Text

“We need to stop,” Fit hissed as they kept moving forward. Ramon was holding onto his shoulders being dragged along. He was exhausted, he had been trying to keep up with them for as long as he could but he had met his limit hours ago, forcing Fit to carry him.

Ramon hadn’t said he was hungry, but Fit could hear his stomach rumbling. His poor kid.

Ramon knew their situation was bad and complaining about hunger would probably sound like him whining. Fit would not have blamed him however if he complained, they hadn’t eaten anything for almost half a day, and it had been a week since they had eaten themselves full.

“No, we need more distance” Spreen hissed as he kept pushing them forward.

“Ramon needs food.” Fit hissed back, not liking the tone he was taking. “He’s still a pup-”

“He will be a dead pup if we stop” Spreen snapped, baring his teeth as he grabbed Fit’s over arm and pulled a little, trying to make him hurry.

Spreen sounded irritated but it was clear it was not anger pushing him forward, but fear.

“As a nanny I’m saying we need to rest and eat” Fit hissed, snapping back at him. Spreen made a quick turn coming face to face with Fit.Fit squared his shoulders as they now were face to face. Both of their teeth were bared, but sails stayed flat against their back, they didn’t want an actual fight, both knew it was pointless and counter productive,

“As a battle-mer I’m saying keep going” Spreen replied without hesitation, he growled the words out as his eyes narrowed. "They might still be hunting us”

Their home had been attacked, humans having found their main home and started to wreak havoc. The rest of their pod had fought hard but they hadn’t stood a chance. There had been so many ships. So many nets. So many harpoons.

So much blood.

Fit, as a nursery-mer whose job was looking after the kid had seen where the fight was heading, they had been losing. People were getting taken by the minute and he realized their pod home where they had stayed and held territory for years was no longer safe and would never be again.

Spreen had realized it as well, that he had failed to protect his home, but could protect the few from their pod that was left. So the three of them ran. Fit had grabbed their only pup and fled , and since then they had not stopped running.

Neither of them were sure where they were going, just that they had to get away, somewhere safe and put as much distance between them and the humans as they could.

The water had gotten warmer, it was kind of nice in a way but they weren’t really in the mood to appreciate it.

Fit let out a deep growl back and just pushed past Spreen as he kept swimming. He heard Spreen let out a huff but he took off after them, swimming behind them for the moment, letting Fit set the pace for the time.

Fit frowned but he knew he couldn’t be too angry. They were all hungry, all exhausted and under a lot of stress. Snapping at each other was to be expected but it was getting more and more common. They had to rest soon, or they would be f*cked.

While thinking so, did something caught Fit’s eye. A fish, he had no idea what kind it was. A lot of fish here were unfamiliar to him, but he knew a good meal when he saw one. Fit carefully removed Ramon from his back. Ramon let out a chirp of confusion, and went rigid, fear at suddenly being removed from Fit’s shoulders.

“Wait with Spreen” Fit said before quick as lightning shot after the fish. It took off, trying to escape, but it had no chance. Fit might be tried but he still had enough energy to catch up. He extended his claws reaching forward and feeling them sink into the fish flesh. It tried to break free, beating its fin but it wa useless. A quick snap to the neck and it stopped moving.

Fit took one big bite into it, feeling the meat on his tongue, the first meal he had in ages. He was hungry but he refused to eat more, instead swimming back, seeing Ramon and Spreen just floating there where he had left them.

Ramon was trying to get closer to the other mer but Spreen was keeping his distance. It made Fit frown but he couldn’t really blame him, Spreen wasn’t used to kids the way he was.

“Ramon here” Ramon took immediately off towards him when he got the clear “Eat” Fit said, holding out the fish. Ramon bit down without hesitation. His claws dug into the scales, ripping the meat to shreds and gulping it down.

“Do you ever listen?” Spreen hissed at Fit.

“It’s just a quick meal” Fit snapped back. “Just give him a moment”

Spreen frowned.

“I know your job is to look after the pups, but mine is to keep us all safe. His happiness and joy is not a priority, his survival is” Fit’s eyes narrowed.

“How far do you want us to flee, when are we safe in your eyes?” he replied but Spreen seemed to have an answer to that ready to go.

“We’re safe when we find a new pod that might take us”

So that was his plan? Just swim around until they find someone else who might take them in? Some new pod that would be willing to help protect them? What if they attacked? What if they were cruel? What if there was no new pod even close to them? Was Spreen going on hope alone?

“And if they see us as enemies? What if they attack? We can’t handle any of us being injured” Fit snapped back, not even trying to hide how much he questioned this plan. Spreen scowled.

“We’ll figure it out when we get to it” Suddenly a chirp escaped Ramon and both snapped their heads towards him and saw what he had spotted, drifting on top of the water was a ship.

Fit felt his heart sink and he with a quick few whips with his tail was by Ramon, pulling him under him, pressing him against the sand while Fit hid him with his body from the surface.

They looked at the boat, waiting to see what type of ship it was.

“Might be a fishing boat” Fit whispered but Spreen didn’t seem convinced, puffing out his chest, his sail raising as he flexed his claws. He was ready for a fight, ready to kill.

There was this unnerving silence as it slowly drifted closer.

They didn’t really know why humans hunted them. Some of the elders had thought they were going after their meat, hunting them the same way they did everything else. But some stories had been whispered about being captured, turned into pets for their humans masters, kept to look pretty or perform tricks as their call.

Fit didn’t know which fate he feared more.

They stayed silent and still, like they were trying to blend in with the white sand under them. They were on open ground, no mountains or caves could be seen where they might find a hiding spot.

The silence was broken by a ‘bang’ and a metal object flew towards them. Spreen took off, shooting up and made a quick spin, hitting it with his tail, making it fly to the side. A ‘crack’! sounded as it opened revealing a net that would have captured them if it hadn’t been for his quick thinking.

He bared his teeth and let out this deep growl and started to beat his tail, going right towards the ship.

“I’ll distract them! Go! I’ll catch up!” he snapped and went at the ship, he flew out of the water just to fall back in a moment later with a human in his claws. Fit saw the human struggle but they didn’t stand a chance. Spreen pulled them down, deeper into the sea, his claws digging into their soft flesh painting the water red and filling it with the smell of blood.

They didn’t have more time to watch as Fit grabbed Ramon and hugged him close to his chest as he took off as quickly as he could. His tail beat as hard as it could, he shot through the water, fish separating in panic as they flew past them.

Fit could hear Spreen let out terrible roars, trying to scare away the humans, trying to make them leave or at least focus on him letting the two of them escape.

Ramon called out, calling for his other guardian but got no response and Fit didn’t even look over his shoulder, his focus only on escaping with the little pup in his arms.

He didn’t feel good about leaving Spreen to handle this, but protecting his pod was what he had been trained for, this was his job, just like protecting Ramon was Fit’s. He just had to trust that Spreen was going to win the fight. Because if he lost…Fit wasn’t sure what he would do.

Fit moved until it felt like his body was heavier than rocks, his movement slowing as he could no longer force his tail to beat faster. He usually had a lot of stamina but he hadn’t eaten well for days and it was really showing.

Fit started to look around, trying to find some place to hide and wait, wait for Spreen to meet up with them. He caught sight of a mountain and moved closer quickly, catching sight of what looked like a caves. Bingo .

He swa to it, swimming around the cave holes, peeking inside until he found one that seemed to fit him. He swam in until he hit the very back of the cave.

There he laid down, his back against the wall while his face was pointing forward watching the exit. He laid Ramon down, his tail going around him hiding him from sight.

There was silence, they were too far away to hear Spreens threats at this point.

Ramon was shaking, but no chirps escaped from his lips, trying to act brave, trying to stay silent and not reveal where they were hiding.

Fit didn’t know how long they hid in the cave, at least for some hours.

Ramon, having lost the fish, ate the few starfish that had crept into their little hiding hole but otherwise they just stayed there, silent as clams as they waited. Waited and listened carefully for any call from Spreen, to hear him call out for them, asking where they were, but it never came.

Ramon and Fit didn’t speak about it, but they both realized what this looked like.

Fit carefully started to unwind from Ramon and snuck up to the entrance and looked out, out over the open ground of sand. He couldn’t spot anything more than some groups of little fish moving lazily along without a care in the world.

He saw no sight of another mer, not even the shadow of one in the distance.

Fit let out a call, hearing his deep voice ring out into the empty waters, echoing across the sand and into the deep blue, announcing where he was, calling out for the battle mer.

His calls were never answered.

He called out for a while longer, his hope slowly fading with each call, his voice slowly faded, getting lower and lower until it stopped escaping his throat and he just stayed silent.

He felt something push against his side and he looked down, seeing Ramon looking up at him with his big brown eyes. The little pup let out a call of his own, a lot higher pitched than Fit’s but it also echoed out over the water.

There was no response, all they were met with was silence. They still stayed, stayed for a moment longer until anxiety got the best of Fit.

They couldn’t stay any longer. The hunters might have heard.Might be coming after them at this very moment.

They left the cave in silence.

Ramon never asked why. Never asked how Spreen was going to find them now when they were getting further away. Never asked to wait longer. They both knew what the silence meant.

He could have been captured, but they both knew what type of mer Spreen was.

He was dead.

There was no doubt in either of their minds.

They swam, Ramon refusing to be picked up again, swimming on his own despite being exhusted. Fit guessed he was trying to lighten his load the little ways he could. Ramon was smart, he knew their position.

Fit’s mind was working overtime as they swam, trying to just comprehend the situation. Spreen was gone, he was on his own now, he had to take care of Ramon all alone.

He could no longer sleep in shifts, one couldn’t leave to get food while the other watched Ramon, there was no one to attack while the other defended. There was no longer one who could sacrifice themselves so the others could live.

He was alone. Alone with his pup.

If Fit got sick, got hurt or even died…Would Ramon die with him? He was so little, he was not good at hunting or fighting yet. One hungry shark and Ramon was doomed.Just the thought of it made Fit's stomach turn.

They kept swimming in silence. They had at least gotten a moment of rest which had helped but didn’t fix a lot. Fit’s body still felt heavy, he was exhausted, the only thing that kept him moving was the fear of what would happen if he stopped.

He saw Ramon beat his tail as fast as he could, trying to keep up, but he was way slower having to beat his tail thrice for Fit’s one.

Fit watched him, his heart so full of love for his little pup but fear also beating so hard alongside that love.

That’s when Fit saw the shadow on the ground.

He stopped dead and looked up. The waves were moving quicker now, making it hard to see but he still noticed it. A ship in front of them. That same ship.

It must have been circling the area trying to find them, trying to find the two mers that escaped.

Fit felt his blood turn cold as he scooped Ramon up into his arm and tried to flee once again. Try to run away from the doom right over them.

But they stood no chance. Fit was exhausted, and the ship was ready.

The net fired, and Fit reacted too slowly and he knew it. As one last action he pulled Ramon closer to his chest, trying to protect him with his whole body as the net went around them.

As it surrounded him he tried to break out, shifting and pushing and shifting, but the more he moved the more trapped he got. Ramon was screaming in panic and fear, trying to claw at the rope with no success.

He felt themselves move as the net was being pulled towards the ship. Fit kept fighting, clawing and twisting around as best he could and in his panic he called out, called out to Spreen, begging the God of the sea that he had survived, that Spreen was somehow still alive and could come and save them, or at least save Ramon.

But no savior arrived and the suddenly was pulled out of the water,

Air filled Fit’s lungs and he stopped his escape attempt, his body feeling heavy outside the water. He tried to curl up even more, hiding Ramon as best he could with his tail.

Ramon was pressing his face into his chest, closing his eyes, not wanting to look, not wanting to see the people that killed Spreen, the people who had hunted them down.

He heard shouts of joy and excitement from the ship.

Fit was unceremoniously slammed into the ground as he landed on the deck of the boat. The cold hard metal meeting his warm flesh. The cold breeze pushed against him, making him shiver.

Fit looked around seeing humans surround him with sticks with hooks and rope.

“We got two!” someone called out in joy “Two for the price one!”

Fit bared his teeth and let out a low growl, trying to scare them off, warning them to not take a step closer.

Laughs escaped the people, standing in a circle around him, but despite their laughs and chuckles everyone gave him a lot of space, not daring to get too close.

Fit heard a whimper get muffled against his chest. The poor little pup was shaking in his arms scared for his life.

He tried to hold him tighter, his arms hugging his pup closer, trying to block him fully from view from the humans, hide his little baby boy away from their cruel eyes.

He kept growling, baring his teeth towards everyone he could see while the humans just kept laughing, their voices clawing at his eardrums.

Suddenly he felt something sharp poke his back and Fit snapped around, almost falling from getting even more tangled but was able to snap at a woman who had just poked him with one of the sticks with a hook on top.

“He’s a feisty one!” she called out with delight, someone else poked his shoulder and this time Fit was faster, able to get his hand out and smack it away.

A yelp escaped the man in surprise and fear and Fit snapped his teeth at them showing off his sharp fangs.

He launched forward what little he could, the man screamed and fell flat on his ass and quickly tried to crawl away. Fit tried to follow but the net just tangled his arm, making him trip and fall, almost squashing Ramon who was still pressed to his chest.

Fit turned to lay on his side instead, not wanting to accidentally crush Ramon under his weight but Fit kept his eyes open, making sure no one would get the chance to steal his baby boy.

The rope was digging into his skin painfully, turning his skin red as its rough surface got dragged against him and got tighter and tighter around him.

Another wave of laughter left the people and then suddenly they just stopped, confusing Fit.

Complete silence reigned over the ship, the only sound being that of the waves crashing against the sides of the boat.

‘Thud. Thud. Thud’ rang out as boots met the metal deck.

Fit looked at them, seeing a man in nice looking clothes approach them.

“Be careful, don’t ruin this one like you did that other one”. Ruin. Lost profit.

They had killed him. Killed Spreen seemingly by carelessness from the sounds of it. They had killed him and all they saw it as was lost goods. A profit that was now forfit because they had killed their trade offer.

Fit felt his blood boil and started fighting harder, wiggling his body back and forth trying everything and anything to get loose. He bit down into the net, his sharp teeth trying to chew through the ropes untill his jaw ached.

“Captain Cucurucho! We got a mer, it seems like a battle mer, it has a pup with him” the woman said “You think that other one was its pod?”

“Possibly” they replied with a cold tone. Their eyes was as cold as their voice, no compassion was to be found there.

They walked closer and Fit snapped his head towards them, baring his teeth and letting out a screech. His sail tried to rise to make himself look bigger, to challenge this man to a fight, but the net stopped him from even doing that much.

They walked right up to Fit’s bound form without a care. They didn’t look impressed nor threatened. They lifted their foot and placed their boot to the side of his head and pushed his head down. Fit tried to strain against it but he stood no chance.

The side of his face got smushed against the cold metal deck. Fit let out a deep growl that shocked his entire chest while Ramon whimpered in his arms at the sight of his dad under the heel of this human.

The captain just looked down at him, not seeming impressed.

“We’ll train you well. Get that fight out of you. It’s only a matter of time”

Chapter 2

Chapter Text

“Stop looking like you’re about to have a breakdown” Mike hissed at him as he pulled the car to a stop at the giant building that said “the fish federation”. Pac looked up at it. It was a fish cannery or something like but a informants information said something very differently.

Mer trafficking.

“I can look nervous. Maybe I’m nervous about cops” Pac said, turning to look at Mike.

“Maybe you’re nervous because we pretty much are the cops” Mike replied, getting out of his seat belt.

They were not police, but they had been asked by the police to spy on this operation. They worked at the Chume labs mer center, they helped hurt and sick merpeople, and merpeople that had been kidnapped by traffickers.

They hadn’t really done this type of thing before, they usually just handled the aftermath, not getting into the thick of it. The police department had said that the people they usually sent had gotten recognized meaning they needed someone else to go and accurately describe how bad it was, so Pac and Mike had volunteered to go.

The plan was rather simple, this certain company specialized in merpeople gladiator games and “domestication” . Which honestly was just a fancy way of saying people could pay good money to see merpeople rip each other apart, or paid good money to get one as a pet. Pac and Mike would go in, look at as much as they could, ask as many questions they could without looking suspicious and then tell the cops everything they had seen, been told and heard. They were both taped with hidden microphones and cameras that Pac begged to god that the people inside would not see or notice.

This whole mer-trafficking thing was a horrendous business, for horrible people who didn't consider merpeople people, or saw them as lesser. A lot of people hated mer in these parts, close to the sea, saying they attacked boats, which in reality was very uncommon and usually only happened when provoked, or “stole” fish from fishermen. A statement which Pac couldn’t think too long about without getting annoyed.

He took off his seatbelt as well and they both stepped out.

They were both dressed in nice looking suits, a dark blue one and Mike’s was this dark green colour. Their shoes were shiny enough to see your reflection. Golden rings covered their fingers and expensive watches were on their wrists ticking away.

Mike checked his tie one last time before looking up at Pac. Pac just stared at the giant metal building with a sinking heart.

It was right by the sea, easy to sneak merpeople from ships and just right into the building, it would be quick and easy, no one would even notice. Effective, but what a cruel placement.

He wondered if the mer could hear the sea from inside, hear the waves crash against the dock, calling them home, whispering its song in their ears while they knew with heavy hearts they could not embrace it again. That it was so close but just out of reach. That they could imagine the salty and open water from inside fresh water tanks where they could barely even turn around.

Cellbit, who had once been in that position himself had said the small space had made him feel crazy, like he could hear the sea inside his head, inside his dreams, that he could almost trick himself to believe the water on his tongue tasted just a bit salty.

Pac got a pat on his shoulder.

“Lets go” Mike said and just started to walk “Remember as soon we get in, we’re assholes”. Pac quickly hurried so he could walk beside him. They walked through the door and the smell of fish was easy to catch. Both Pac and Mike were very familiar with the smell.

The room was small, two brown sofas inside, one on the right side, one on the left. There was a desk where a man was working at a computer, to the side of the desk was a door leading elsewhere.

The man looked up.

“Ah welcome” he called out as Pac and Mike walked up to the desk “How may I help you?” He didn’t look surprised at two very well dressed men suddenly showing up, and Mike and Pac tried their best to look like they had done this type of thing thousands of times before.

“We booked a time. Supposed to meet someone named Elena?” Mike said and the man nodded.

“And what are your names mate?”

“Tazer and Craft” Mike replied, first motioning to Pac and then himself. Clearly fake names, but in the crime business so didn’t that matter. Better to be off the record so to speak.

The man seemed to check something on the computer and then nodded. He lifted the red phone that sat on the desk, pressed a number and then waited.

“Elena. They buyers are here” silence and then he put it down.“She’ll be here in a moment”

Mike didn’t reply and just sat down on one of the sofas, Pac followed his lead, sitting down next to him.

The waiting room truly was bare bones, there was no art, or painting or even a plastic plant. There were just cold white metal walls all around them.

Pac crossed his arms and leaned back, just looking at the watch, around his wrist seeing the seconds tick by. Mike was looking at his fingernails with disinterest as they waited. The seconds felt so much longer in this little room, like each little tick was a minute.

Suddenly the door opened, and a woman stepped out. She was wearing nice clothes, everything about her was just…overly clean? Overly nice? Pac didn’t know how to explain it.

People who worked in their line of business didn’t look like that. Their hands smelled of fish, clothes smelled like seaweed. They wore clothes that were easy to dry and didn’t mind getting wet or were water resistant. A lot simply wore wetsuits.The people who wore makeup wore stuff that could handle some splashing or wore none at all. They wore flip flops or gumboots (nothing was worse than wet socks) but this woman wore heels.

Maybe she was dressed up for them, but something told him that this wasn’t far away from what she usually wore.

Mike stood up and Pac followed him getting up on his feet.

“Mr Craft, Mr Tazer, lovely to meet you” she said, shaking both their hands. “I’m Elena, and it fills me with joy that you have decided to check our business. Please follow me” she said and walked back out the door.

Pac and Mike shared one last look before following. They stepped into a long hallway filled with doors with windows. By looking in you could see all the rooms were simple office rooms, but the last door in the hallways didn’t have a window at all. It was made of metal and looked heavy, like it was made to keep people out, or keep something in.

The hallway was painted white, had this clean feeling to it as well, but just like the waiting room it was barebones. Like it was made to look like an office. Like a mask to hide the true dirt beneath the surface.

“We can talk business as soon as we get through this door.” she said pointing forward “We at the federation make sure to keep a tight buyer and business confidentiality. No eaves droppings, and nothing we say leaves this building gentlemen” She put in a code and opened the door, and they stepped through.

She closed the door behind them and it was clear that now was when they gave up on hiding, gave up on pretending to be a clean normal fish cannery company.

There was cold metal as far the eye could see. The floor was of white stone, possibly marble, which felt just out of place.

Pac looked down at ground seeing marks like heavy boxes had been pushed around but also what looked like claws desperately trying to claw at it.

He looked up and his focus was stolen by a tank in the middle of the room.

It was a big stand with comfortable looking seats where you could sit and just look down into the tank below.

The water was low clearly so nothing would be able to climb out, despite that it was clear such a thing had been attempted, several times. A metal railing was around the tank, making sure none of the eagre viewers would accidentally fall in.

“I’ll show you our setup, and then I’ll show you the goods. That sounds good?” Pac was lost for words, shocked to silence as he watched the place with horror. It all smelled of strong cleaning products, like they had to work hard to hide and clean this place from stains.

“Sounds good” Mike replied and gave Pac a hard pat on the shoulder. “I know it’s impressive but don’t gape,” he said with a smile, but the true meaning was not lost on Pac. ‘Stop staring like an idiot’.

“Sorry, sorry, please show us” he recovered, speaking the first words since he got here. Elena just smiled politely, almost proudly.

“Here is the arena,” she explained, and waved for them to follow. “Here the watcher sit”, she motioned to the seats and then turned her hand to what looked like two lifts on each side of the big pool “We lower down the cages into the water with the mer, open the doors and then watch the show”

The whole thing reminded him of gladiator games, how people would watch humans fight and kill each other for sport.

“So they fight here?” Mike asked, walking up the railing and looking down. “Impressive that it’s so clean” he tried to sound a bit suspicious, like he doubted mer fights really happened here, trying to lure some information out of her.

“We’re the top of the business, the federation isn’t some dirty little backwoods place. Our customers and viewers are premium so our facility is made to reflect that” she replied with ease. “Some say feeding battle-mer’s is the most expensive thing, but the water and cleaning bill is probably the most expensive thing here” she said with a little laugh.

Mike let out a breath through his nose that might have been amusem*nt, but Pac saw it for what it truly was. Anger.

“Tell us more about the mer” Pac said, trying to change the subject.

“Yes of course. We host events here, sometimes fight between our own mer but sometimes other companies bring their own and we have a little competition.” she said with a sickeningly sweet smile.“However the Federation mer’s are the best behaved and the strongest mer you will ever see. We’re on the top of the business”

“You both train for fighting and as pets, right?” Mike replied “I’m mostly interested in the action, but my friend here-“ he gave Pac’s shoulder a pat “always found them fascinating, maybe having one as a pet would be good”

“Oh, yes! We train for domestic life as well, or for water shows” she replied.

“Would you mind explaining that?” Pac asked, getting a warning look from Mike. “I-I have been to some shows, but I don’t know a lot about the process,” he quickly added.

“Of course” Elena said though it was clear she wasn’t used to talking about that part. It was clear the gladiator thing was the big selling point, something she had rehearsed a lot of times, she was moving away from the script now.

“All our mer are trained to a degree, good for when you need to break up fights in the ring. Makes it also easier to handle them so we can treat wounds and not put employes in danger around the mers” she explained “Our domestic mers are mers that we have caught that are especially beautiful and would be a waste in a fight, but most of them are pups we have trained”

Pac felt his heart plummet all the way down into his stomach. Pups? They kept pups here? They stole pups from their pods, out from the arms of the parents, from the cold dead hands of their nanny mers?

“They are easier to teach than adults. Gives us a higher success rate and usually lower the chance of backslides or bad behavior”

“What about merfolk that aren’t made for fighting and aren’t pretty?” Mike asked.

Elena seemed to think for a second, like she was trying to figure out the best way to say it.

“Are you aware of what dog fighters call ‘bait dogs’ ?”

Bait dog, a dog tied up so they can't run, muzzled so they can’t bite back and then the game dog uses them as practice. Practice mutilating and killing other dogs.

“Yes.” Mike replied, voice strained “I get the picture, no need to elaborate” Elena nodded

“Of course, let’s not speak about the dirty work.” she said with ease “Speaking about our mers, let me show you. We don’t have any pups for sale right now, but I can show you our battle mers”

They followed her, but Pac wanted nothing more than to leave. To turn and run, call the police and make them show up right now.

He felt sick, sick to his f*cking stomach. He wanted to throw up just listening to this, to the implications. And now he was going to be face to face with mers?

He had met merpeople from these kinds of places before, he knew about this business, but knowing and seeing it was two different things. Cellbit had come from a place like this, he had told him things like these but the idea that there were so many more in his situation made him feel ill.

He thought about the other merpeople at their center, Bagi who had approached them asking for help to find her stolen brother. Tubbo, who had shown up at the beach after having accidentally gotten cut in a ship's motor, little Sunny by his side trying to cover his wounds with seaweed, using it as makeshift bandages.

People like them getting forced to fight or turned to shreds, kids like Sunny and Pepito stolen and taught to be pets. It was sick. This whole thing was sick and run by sick people.

They were led to a big garage-like door probably made to move the cages easily and, next to it was a normal door. Elena put in the code and they went in with no issues.

The room was one big space, but there were these big walls put up, probably to block the merpeople from seeing each other. From scheming together or if they were too deep into it, keeping them from trying to kill each other.

There were more people around here, some cleaning the area and some seemed to just keep an eye on things, giving Pac and Mike a polite nod when they walked past.

This place was like a god damn prison.

Elena then motioned them to look into one of the little rooms. There was a tank there, inside was a mer just swimming around in a circle. It had so little space it could almost bite into its own tail.

At least the water looked clean.

“Most of our merpeople are stored like this and then we bring them out into some of our bigger tanks we have to train and move.” She explained they walked through, looking into a little room at times, being shown the mers swimming there.

The merfolk just stared at them, some bared their teeth or eyes narrowed, clearly angry and frustrated but none snapped at them, not showing their claws. They were clearly angry but didn’t dare to try to fight, dare to show any more aggression. Those mers made Pac feel weirdly hopeful. Seeing that some had fight still left in them, that they still had some spirit left.

That couldn’t be said for everyone.

Some just floated in the tanks, didn’t even swim around. They looked almost dead the way they just looked at them with half lidded eyes. No growling, no baring of teeth, at most they turned their heads away, not wanting to look at them.

It was heartbreaking to see.

“A bit further here is the hurt mer” Elena explained and they got into the next part of the big room. Pac and Mike looked at them, seeing them not in the water but in iron cages. Hurt, wounded. They couldn’t be in the water as it would ruin the cheap band aids and bandages.

Some wounds were clearly infected and just slapped some big bandaids over, hoping Pac and Mike would be too stupid or have too little medical knowledge to notice a bad infection when they saw one.

There were wounds from claws and bites, but there were also clearly broken bones for some and some wounds that didn’t seem to be made from any mer, but the people keeping them prisoners.

Pac felt his gut turn and he quickly looked to Elena.

“Sorry, but where is the bathroom?” The woman pointed down towards a door a bit forward down a little hallway with two doors.

“Right there, on the left-” Pac started to speed walk towards it, he shouldn’t have eaten breakfast this morning because it felt like it was all going to come back up.

He hadn’t fully listened to Elene, she said…Right? He grabbed the handle and opened the door, looking into a little room that looked like a cleaning closet and he felt his heart stop.

Right inside on the ground was a cage and inside was a merfolk pup.

He was in a dog cage that was way too small, forcing the pup to stay in a coiled up position.

He was looking up at him, his brown eyes staring into his eyes while his pupils were wide with fear.

Pac could even from here count the ribs, they had not given this kid even close to enough to eat. His lips were chapped, hinting that he had probably not been provided a lot of water either.

“The left door!” Elena shouted, but it was too late. Pac just stared at the kid.

The pup lifted his lips to bare his teeth and a hiss escaped his throat. His sail rose, he was doing his very best to look dangerous but it just broke Pac’s heart more.

He was young, maybe just a few years older than Richarlyson.

Pac turned back towards Elena and Mike who were looking at him, well, Elena was, Mike was looking at the kid with a furrowed brow, his mouth a thin line, it was clear he was keeping back harsh words.

“I-I thought you said you didn’t have any pups” Pac said, trying to keep his voice steady.

“Not any for sale. That one…Is a special case” Elena said as she walked up to him and just closed the door, hiding away the pup, leaving him in the dark yet again. “He’s there because a situation with another mer we’re training right now”

Pac wanted to throw the door back open, scoop up the little pup into his arms and just run. Run away from here, all the way back home, where he was sure he would be safe, where he could give the kid the help and love he needed and deserved.

“Which mer is he connected to?” Mike asked, having walked up to them now as well. Elena seemed to cringe.

“He’s not trained yet, not for show-”

“We want to check.” Mike cut her off “Make sure you’re not hiding your shining star from us” She looked between Mike and Pac for a moment.

“Gentlemen, I highly suggest not doing that. That mer is not trained, is very violent and we don’t want to give off the wrong impression” she replied.

‘Wrong impression?’ Pac thought bitterly. What about this was supposed to impress them? What here was supposed to make them look good ?

“It’s a work in progress. We understand. But we still want to see them” Mike replied, not letting himself get deterred by her words.

She stared right into Mike’s eyes, seemingly trying to judge how set he was on seeing this mer she had mentioned. Mike’s eyes were sharper than a knife, and he refused to look away, staring right to Elena’s. He was not going to let this go until he saw that mer, and she quickly realized that.

“Follow me. But keep your distance” she said as she started to walk to another area. It was not long before they came to a door she opened. There was no lock on this one.

As soon the light slipped in through the door they could hear movement. Elena turned on the light. The shop lights turned on, their light harsh to the eyes making Pac and Mike squint for a second and turn their eyes towards the ground..There was blood all over the floor, dried staines littered it, blood drops across the gray stone, like stars across the black sky.

As soon their eyes adjusted they looked up and saw there was a big cage in this room, one taking up almost the entire room and inside was a mer looking right at them, pupils sharp slits.

His tail was bent at an uncomfortable angle, so it was going against the side of his body and had been tied around it. His hands were behind his back, with rope going around his wrists and then ropes around his under arms and over arms making sure he wouldn’t get his arms free at all.

Around his mouth was a muzzle of metal, making sure he couldn’t bite anyone who got a little to close. He was baring his teeth showing off his sharp fangs.

Over his whole body ropes had been thrown over him, tying him to the ground making him unable to lift anything more than his neck.

Pac at once reached out and grabbed Mike’s wrist feeling him tense under him. He held him tightly, knowing that if he let go the battle-mer would be the least of Elena's problems.

The rope had left nasty marks on the mer’s skin, pink and red marks in clear wive from around the rope.

He was big. Probably the largest and strongest looking mer they had seen here. His scales were brown with white patches at certain spots. He was not very flashy, his color muted and would be perfect for hiding in the wild. His body was marked with new scars, but also old once, it was clear he had been fighting long before he got here. Maybe he was a battle-mer before this, protecting his pod.

His claws were long and sharp, looking perfect for tearing deep cuts into the skin of fish or his enemies.

He was growling, a deep rumble coming from him that seemed to almost shake the floor.

Everything about this mer screamed danger, strong and clearly pissed. But despite the scars and the sharp fangs, so did he have a beautiful face. He had hazel eyes, the mix of color almost mesmerizing.

“He’s big” Pac commented, forcing himself to look away “Looks strong”

“Yeah, he’s very strong” Elena replied, though there was frustration in her voice “If he would lose the attitude he would be perfect for the fights.” she sighed “Cucurucho found a way to control him but teaching is still…slow”

“How do you control something this powerful?” Elena smiled up at Pac which made him suppress a shudder.

“What you saw in that room was his pup” The mer started to thrash harder, trying to snap the rope but nothing helped, he was just making the ropes dig into his skin even more threatening to cut through and make him bleed. “We threatened to beat it if he didn’t stop. Works well enough. That’s why it’s not for sale at this point in time” the fighting got worse as the mer strained against the rope making the whole cage shake and the rope strained as it tried to keep him down.

Pac guessed this mer understood english, understood every word that was leaving this twisted womans mouth. As a father himself he couldn’t even imagine how much this must be hurting his heart.

To have their own kid used against you, being told to behave or your innocent son would pay the price.

A roar escaped the mer as his teeth bit into the air in warning, clearly wanting to sink them into the woman and tear her limb from limb.

"Let's go. He’s still just a wild animal at this point” she said, gently but sternly guinding Pac and Mike out of the room and closed the door behind them. She seemed very happy about finally being out of that room.

They could still hear him fighting his restraint through the door but Elena seemed to fully intent on ignoring it.

“So, we have the option to buy your own battle mer for fighting, or you can simply show up here and bet on one of the once we have” she said with that disgustingly sweet smile “Like I said, we don’t have any domestic mer yet, but when this one gets done the pup will be up for sale soon, so I can keep you updated about that”

“That would be great. Thank you” Pac said, trying to swallow down that lump in his throat.

“We have to talk with our bank people. Make sure we can…Spare some money without raising any eyebrows” Mike added, making up an excuse of why they weren’t committing to anything right now.

“Of course. Is there anything more you need help with or wish me to show you?”

“No, I think we’ve seen everything we were looking for” Mike replied.

More than we wanted to; Pac wanted to add but bit his tongue.

“Of course, thank you so much for the visit. I’ll guide you back to the entrance.” They were led back into that tiny waiting room, they said their goodbyes, shook hands and left and Pac had to stop himself from simply running out of the doors.

They were forced to walk, walk like they hadn’t just left hell on earth. They sat down in the car and just…Sat there for a moment. Trying to digest everything they had just seen.

They had to drive to the police station. Give their report and help plan for the rescue. They needed to talk to other merpeople centers, this was bad. No way their center could take all of them.Pac however hoped dearly they would get that mer and its pup.

“We’re going to get them out” Mike replied, gripping the steering wheel harder. “We’re going to get them all out” he hissed out between clenched teeth as he put the car in reverse and pulled out of the parking lot and then started to drive away.

Chapter 3

Chapter Text

There were noises, a lot of new noises. Fit didn’t like it, didn’t like the unpredictable. There was a lot of shouting and screaming both from voices he recognized and didn’t. They sounded angry. He wondered about what. Maybe some other mer had broken out and were killing some of the bastards.

He hoped so.

He hoped Ramon was alright, he hadn’t seen his baby boy for almost 5weeks. "If you’re good you’ll see him” his captureres had told him, but Fit didn’t believe them. They were kidnappers and torturers, why would he in Poseidon’s name trust anything these people had to say?

He barely trusted them when they said they wouldn’t hurt Ramon if he stopped the whole trying to kill them thing.

He had gotten a few hits in before they started to tie him down more severely. He had clawed a woman's leg up so good it had almost reached bone which they had responded to by hitting him with some kind of metal stick. His arm still hurts from that. After that they had beaten him and threatened to hurt his kid if he ever did something like that again.

That was something Fit could believe, that they would hurt them, the only thing he believed about these people were their promises of cruelty. They had shown that again and again.

Fit tried to move, feeling his tail let out a wave of pain. It had been locked in that position for days, it felt like it was stuck like that at this point. He hadn’t been allowed to move or even stretch for days.

The rope was digging into his skin, making it feel like it was burning, and his back was bruised from hits when he (as he would expect his captures to figure out by now) had not listened to his prison guards commands.

He hated this place so much his blood boiled. He wanted nothing more than to escape these ropes, tear apart the muzzle and these bars and sink his teeth into these humans and rip them limb from limb, claw them up and gut them like he would do with a fish.

The shouting was still raging on, but it was muffled from behind the door. He was able to catch a word or two in the chaos, but most of it was lost. He could understand them, he spoke their language, he had however not much to say to the people dressed in white and they didn’t seem to care much for what he had to say either considering this muzzle sat so tight he could barely open his jaw enough to lick his dried lips.

They didn’t want him to speak, only taking it off when he had to eat. It was like they didn’t like the idea of him speaking like a person. They wanted him quiet, like a dumb animal. Maybe their conscience couldn’t take it if they saw him as an individual, that is, if they even had a conscience to begin with.

Maybe they were just evil.

The voices started to quiet down, like the storm was slowly blowing over now. He was curious what that had been all about.

Suddenly the door opened.

Fit immediately bared his teeth ready to start his fighting again, three people entered and they looked…Unusual.

He had gotten used to the people here wearing white. He hated it. He had come to despise the colour white. What had been the colour of pearls, the colour of shells had turned into a reminder of these people, of these white coloured walls.

One of the people he recognized, the pink haired man in a suit he had seen some days ago, but this time he was in a green shirt and some shorts. There was a woman with them, not the vile woman he had scratched once, a new one, and next to her was a man with a blue shirt, black pants and a hat on top of his head.

“Hey man” the pink haired man said casually “We’re here to get you out” He said, with a smile And they all started to walk closer.

Those words were enough to make Fit hesitate . ‘Get you out?’. We’re they going to try to teach him again, to obey commands such as ‘stay’, ‘come here’ and ‘stop’? The lady had tried that.

He was no pet. He was a person but if she refused to see him as that, if she saw him as nothing more than a wild animal then that is what he would become, so he had scratched her good .

Still. He was curious about these people, why they were so different from what he was used to. And maybe, if he played his cards right, he might be able to draw blood again.

The woman had threatened to hurt Ramon, but maybe it was just her?

‘Maybe your boy is already gone? ’ Fit shook that thought out of his head. No, his son had to be here, had to be here somewhere. ‘ She talked about selling him’ He could not be too late. He had to still be here. He just needed to escape and find him. Maybe he could slip past these people and look for him.

He watched the pink-haired man get closer and pulled a knife from his pocket and Fit immediately started to fight his bindings.

He was not going down without a fight! He was not gonna let this person hurt him-!

“Calma, calma, calma” the man said in a gentle voice. “I’m gonna cut the rope, that's all, chill”

Fit froze. ‘Just cut the rope?’ the others usually tried to untie it, there was some trick to it but this person didn’t seem to know it.

The stranger moved closer and lowered himself towards the ground and started to cut off one of the ropes thrown over Fit. Slowly he worked through them, that was easy. Fit could finaly move his tail, but Poseidon damn did it hurt to do so.

Next part was the arms.

They were a bit harder to reach but Fit laid completely still as the man reached in and started to cut into them, starting with the wrist.

Those were the worst. Fit couldn’t see the rope, but he had felt it cut into his skin. He couldn’t see what the man was doing very well, and he had to hope he wasn’t doing anything too nefarious.

Suddenly he felt the rope loosen, it seemed like the human was actually trying to free him from the bindings. Fit was trying to stay still so the knife wouldn’t cut him, but he was ready, ready for the betrayal. Ready for the moment this human would turn out to be just as bad as the others.

He saw the woman move a bit closer, the other man moved towards Fit’s tail area looking at it.

He could feel his heart beat hard and fast in his chest. He felt antsy, wanted to move, turn and watch the man, but he forced himself to lay still, to bite his tongue and try to not fidget.

“Just gonna pull the rope away” The man said and reached for the rope still laying over his wrist. That was the worst, having cut into his skin enough to bleed. The woman suddenly looked worried as she watched this go down.

“Mike I think-”

Pain.

Fit felt himself flip on a dime, panic; like electricity was sent through his veins and he snapped around towards the human, Mike.

With less rope holding him and with what strength he had left he pulled, making the rope snap. He snapped around, hand already raised as he shoved it through the bars and attacked. He saw his claws go through the shirt but it felt too easy. Mike jumped back, his hand going across his chest protecting the rip

Fit saw his clean claws, he had not cut into his skin. What a shame.

“I’m fine-don’t!” something pinched Fit’s tail.

He turned around clawing at it, but instead accidently hitting the bars making a horrible ‘clang’ that made his ears ring and he flinched back, his back pressing up against the cold bars and letting out a screech as he felt the wounds on his back flare up.

He saw the person with the blue shirt look at him with wide eyes and some kind of little wooden pipe in his hands.Mike marched up to them and snatched it right out of their hands.

“I told you to hold off!” he said and smacked the man on top of the head with the pipe. Letting out a ‘dunk’.

“He tried to cut you!” the other replied, rubbing his head.

“I told you to wait for my signal!” Mike replied, he sounded pissed. “We wanted this as a last resort!”

Fit looked down at his tail, seeing something sticking to it. It was a little glass thingy with a red puff on top. He didn’t know what it was but he slapped it away, feeling it sting as it was removed. He looked down, seeing blood escape from a new wound. Whatever that thing was so had it stung him.

Mike looked at him and Fit raised his sail and let out a deep growl.

They were just like the others, they had hurt him. They had freed him partly, but no way he would let them near him again. He was not getting hurt again, he would escape on his own from now. f*ck these people. He bared his teeth showing them what he thought about their presence here.

Mike just looked at him for a long moment, brow furrowed, before he turned to the rest of the humans.

“Everyone out” he said, grabbing the man and shoving him towards the door. “Tina, find Pac, I need to tell him about this and what to do” With hurried steps they moved to the door and closed it behind them. Thankfully they left the light on, letting Fit see things clearly around him.

Fit looked towards the door. He blinked…Why did his eyelids suddenly feel so heavy?

People were being arrested left and right, the whole place was pretty much cleared at this point. The mer people in their tanks were watching with interest some with big smiles and shouts and chirps of joy from their tanks. Some didn’t have as good of a time, trying to look small and hiding in the corner of their cages, pupils wide as they feared what would happen to them now. They were curling up, bringing up their tail fins trying to hide and use it as a shield towards the outside world.

People from the mer centers were finally allowed inside, after the police had taken several pictures and had cleared the space out of the workers. Some had slipped away, some ships had left port before police had arrived, but that was just a matter of chasing them down at this point.

The centre workers were going up to mer’s and looking at them, trying to take in how bad the situations and their states were and document so they could later share information and talk to the other centres about splitting the workload.

Pac didn’t do that, didn’t document or discuss with anyone, as soon as he arrived he walked quickly, almost jogging when he got the clear to go in. He moved to the little area the pup had been. Outside was Walter-Bob who had helped with situations like this before.

“How is he?” Pac said between breaths, not even caring to start with a greeting. Walter-Bob didn’t seem to mind and instead just shrugged.

“Bad, but he hissed at me, so he’s probably not on death's door” he replied “Scared half to death.” he threw a glance at the door. “I took the photos I needed, you’re free to take him, I’ll document you took him. I feel safe leaving him with you”

Walter-Bob knew that Chume labs took care of family and mer pups before, they were good at that. Knew that the pup would be safe in the care of Pac.

Pac threw his arms around him and hugged him tightly.

“Thank you” Walter-Bob gave him a quick hug back before pulling away.

“Take care of him” he said with a pat to Pac’s shoulder before he left the area.

Pac looked at the door and pulled in a deep breath and let it out. He had to be calm, mentally prepare himself for what he would see. He had to be calm, if he was stressed and nervous the pup would pick up on that. Last time he had been surprised, he could not be that now. He grabbed the handle and pulled the door open.

It looked the same as he had left it. The cage was still there with the pup inside. He was looking right at him, baring his teeth showing off his tiny fangs.

Now that Pac had time he watched the scales on the pups face, brown and white, similar to his dad, some of them reached across his face making it look a bit like a moustache.

Pac lifted his hands so the pup could keep track of them as he stepped slowly closer.

“Hey there” Pac spoke softly. The mer just looked at him, eyes wide with fear but his sail still went up trying to look dangerous. He was a fighter just like his parent, that was clear to see.

Pac got closer until he was right outside and crouched down, getting down on the pups level.

The pup crawled backwards as best he could, pressing his body against the bars while he slashed his claws in the air weakly, or what was left of them as Pac noticed they had been clipped. Maybe as a precaution, but he really hoped the kid had gotten one good scratch before it, god knows he deserved it.

An angry screech left the kids mouth before it quickly stopped as instead a horrible cough escaped him. It shook the little kid's whole body and was horribly wet like he was trying to get slime out of his lungs. The damn coughing didn’t stop, his breaths turned wheezy and just listening to it made Pac's throat ache in sympathy.

When it finally stopped the pup fell to the side weekly breathing raspy breaths, his sail had fallen, and he didn’t try to act tough anymore, sickness and fear having drained him of most of his energy already. His little show of rage had been just that, a show. A weak attempt to protect himself.

Pac just felt his heart break in his chest. The pup wasn’t old, maybe a bit older than his own son and the kid had clearly already been through so much.

Pac knew he probably shouldn't , that he should wait for backup, but he couldn't help himself.

He got the lockpick out of his back pocket and inserted it. He jiggled it around the lock until he heard it click and open.He pulled the lock away and opened the door with ease.

The kid got his second wind and tried to escape backwards, pushing himself as far away as he could from Pac but the cage was small, there was nowhere to go.

“It’s okay. It’s okay” Pac whispered, trying to put as much comfort into his words as he possibly could. “My name is Pac and I’m not going to hurt you. I want to help” The kid just looked at him with distrust, which was fair. Maybe he had never seen humans before all of this, maybe his first interaction with them had been kidnappings, cages, separation from his dad and cruelty. Of course the pup would not trust someone when all he had known of humans was their evilness.

Pac took in a deep breath and tried to let out a rumble, the same adult merfolk did to give comfort. A rumble that meant “Safety. Love. Not angry.". He knew it was a bit too high and a bit weird sounding. Bagi had tried to teach him to her best ability. She had said it was like listening to a parrot repeat human words, it was clear it was not the same but you could make out what they meant and was good enough.

The kids' eyes went wide at the sound, and looked both confused and shocked. But that tension in his body seemed to loosen up ever so slightly.

Pac stopped for a moment.

“It’s safe. I’m here to help” The kid watched him for a long moment. He had stopped showing his fangs but his pupils were still dilated. He opened his mouth and a tiny little questioning chirp escaped him. The sound was similar to that of a manatee.

Pac quickly rumbled back.He didn’t know how long he kept that up when slowly the kid crept out from the cage, dragging himself forward. The pup might be sick, but at least he didn’t seem hurt or in pain.

He went to the entrance, but no further. Pac stopped rumbling again.

“Want some water?” he asked, pulling off his backpack and taking out his water bottle, took off the lid and held it out to the pup.

The pup reached out and grabbed it with one hand. He seemed to be getting bolder, more comfortable with Pac there.

The pup sniffed the water before bringing the flask to his lips and started to drink. Taking sips from the bottle and there was pure bliss on his face. He drank until the bottle was empty, only then gave him it back.

“See, I’m not so bad” he said with a smile. Pac took the bottle and barely had time to put it back into his bag before the pup reached forward and grabbed his hoodie.

Pac looked at him, just to see the pup crawl up into his lap. He was pressing his body close to him, seemingly trying to absorb the warmth of his body.

Pac by reflex but his arms around the pup hugging him.

He was freezing, it was like holding a lump of ice in his arms.

“Oh baby. Hold on” Pac quickly pulled off his hoodie, leaving him in his black tank top. He pulled the hoodie over the pups head, and the kid did the rest, stretching their arms out into the sleeves. It was way too big for him, but it would have to do for now, and would at least give him some warmth.

The air was cold against Pac’s now bare arms, but he didn’t care, he wouldn’t let this pup freeze.

Pac held him close, one of his hands reaching up and trying to brush his hair with his fingers. His locks were greasy, and made his fingers feel oily, but he kept it up. The little kid made another chirp and pushed his face against Pac’s chest, like he was trying to hide from the world for a moment.

Pac just held him, making his body go back and forth in an attempt to calm him down, rocking him. If the kid was trusting him after some gentle words, rumbling and water then he can't even imagine how bad this all had been, how so little kindness could win him over.

They were suddenly in shadow as someone came up to the threshold. Pac looked behind him, looking up at the person.

“Pac?” it was Tina, she was looking in and saw the little pup in his arms and she gasped. “Is that the kid?” The pup went rigid in his arms and looked up, fear in his eyes as he watched the stranger.

“It’s okay, it’s okay” Pac whispered gently, “That’s Tina she’s a mom, she won’t hurt you” he said as he kept rocking the pup. “What is it?” he then asked looking up at Tina again.

“Mike wanted to talk” she said, her expression was worried “We had to…Sedate the, you know” Pac’s eyes went wide.

“What?” he asked, standing up, lifting the pup with him. He was so light…He wasn’t supposed to be this light .

“Mike wanted to talk to you about it. We tried to talk to mer and free him, we got the ropes off, then he tried to attack Mike” Pac just blinked.

Sure he knew the mer had been acting aggressive, but going from letting the rope be removed to trying to kill Mike seemed to be a big change in mood. Mike was also used to working with mers he should have noticed if the mer was about to try to murder him.

“What?”

“We thought he would calm down enough to listen if he was out of the ropes. I worked fine and then when Mike pulled a rope away it had gotten, like, stuck in the wound, it hurt the mer and he lashed out. The officer with us panicked and shot a sleeping dart.” she explained “It will take some moments to take full effect, but still. They want to sedate him for a while longer, even after the dart wears off.“

“Where are they?” Pac asked, leaving the little room and walking out into the bigger area.

“Follow me” Tina explained and they started to walk until they found a corner where an officer and Mike were talking. Mike seemed irritated and there was a scratch on his shirt, but he didn’t seem to be bleeding, so the attack seemingly had missed.

They both turned towards him and Tina as they approached. Mike looked at the pup and his brows furrowed.

“Maybe the kind shouldn’t listen to this” he said and Pac realised what he meant. Maybe speaking about how to handle a pup’s dad right in front of him wasn’t the best.

“Oh, yeah. Tina, can you take him for a moment?” Tina lit up, but also clearly nervous. She liked kids but she was also always so worried about messing up. Even with Empenada she was nervous, so holding an unknown kid was probably a bit nerve wracking.

“Sure, let me take him'' She grabbed onto the pup and was about to take him from Pac when this panicked screech asked him. One of those screeches pups only made when they were under great distress, the ‘I’m going to die’ screech.

Tina immediately stepped back and the pup’s arms went around Pac and hugged him even tighter. Yeah, there was no way he was going to let someone else hold him. The pup had found his rock in the chaos, a safe space in the dangerous place, and he was not going to let it go.

Pac looked at Tina then Mike. They were all looking down at the pup with this sad expression but also with knowing looks. Neither of them tried to take him or even suggested trying to hand him off again.

Pac lifted one hand and put it over the pup’s ear and gently pushed his head against his chest, so the other ear was listening to his heart. He hoped it was enough to muffle their conversation.

“What’s this about sedating the mer?” he asked in a whisper, hoping the pup would have an even harder time to hear.

“We can’t transport him like this. And I’m worried about how the health check up will go” Mike replied “He’s too violent and unpredictable. It was a pinch from me removing the rope and he tried to slice me.”

“Sedating him feels wrong though” Pac replied “ We should wait for him to wake up and talk about moving. He’s a fully grown adult, we should discuss it with him” Mike scowled.

“He’s a fully grown adult that has been tortured. Him and his son got kidnapped by people like us, he’s injured and I doubt he would let us help him. I’m also worried he is hurt and its making him aggressive as well”

“So we’re forcing him to calm down? You think that will make him trust us more?” Pac hissed. In his opinion the mer had all the right to be pissed and stressed.

“We’re doing this for his own health and safety and health and safety for the crew” Mike hissed right back.

“We can’t force him”

“He’s not in a state of mind to make decisions. Considering he might never even met humans before he might not even know what modern medicine is and I’m not going to try to explain that to a mer that will be fighting his cage in hope of getting free and killing me” Mike replied “Yes, I didn’t want to sedate him this early, I wanted to talk more, but he’s already going to go unconscious at this point, might as well keep him like that for at least the journey and maybe for some blood drawing.“

There was silence for a moment, the only sound coming from Tina who was writing a message on her phone. Mike continued.

“I know it’s not good, but he might be really sick and he might hurt himself. Better to keep him asleep until he’s in a better area. Maybe he’ll calm down and we can explain more in detail what's going-” Suddenly Tina’s phone started to ring and she quickly pressed accept and put it on speaker.

“Honey, you’re on speakers” Tina said, holding the phone out for all to hear.

“Tina told me about the situation” It was Bagi. “I think sedating is a good idea. I’ll talk to him back at the centre and explain it all. He might be more willing to discuss and feel safer with another mer. He might also be stuck in instincts right now, he’s in a stressful situation”

Everyone was against Pac right now. He understood why they thought this was good, but…

“It doesn't feel right”

“No one likes this Pac '' Bagi replied, “But I think this is the best course of action at the moment. This mer is not in a state to make a decision and he will be sedated now no matter what right now because of the dart” her voice was a bit harsh at the mention of the dart, clearly not happy about that whole thing had happened the way it had.” We’ll just keep it going for a longer time, until he gets to our centre. I’m not for the check up without him conscious however”

“I know he’s an adult and should make health decisions on his own, I’m just worried” Mike explained “He might have unseen injuries as well as those we clearly see. He doesn't trust us, which is more than fair, but if he denies our help and is really hurt, he might die. If he asks us to let him go this injured he will not make it, and that means neither will his pup”

A grim silence fell over them. Mike let out a sigh.

“I know it’s bad, but just think about it”

“We’ll talk about this back at the centre” Bagi replied, “Add enough sedatives to keep him asleep during transportation and then we’ll have a meeting and see what to do next. I’ll talk to the others here and get things ready. Good luck, and oh! Before I forget to say it! Tina?”

“Yeah?” Tina asked, bringing the phone closer to her.

“Love you so much, bye!” and then she hung up. While Tina squealed of joy Pac turned to Mike.

“So it’s confirmed we’ll take him,” Pac asked, looking at Mike.

“We’re closest” he replied “We get him and the kid, they think that will leave us with our hands full so we won’t be getting more”

“That's good” Tina said, having calmed down. “I’m happy we get to hang out with this little cutie more” she said smiling at the pup. Pac looked down at him as well, seeing his chest rise and fall and how he had gone slack in his arms. He must have dozed off while listening to Pac’s heart beat. That was probably a good thing, him getting some rest after the horrors and chaos.

Pac looked towards the door, the door the pups dad was behind and he thought for a moment.

“Is he awake now?” Mike seemed to think.

“Probably. It takes a while to take effect, why?” Their eyes met, Mike understood immediately “You want to show him his kid before he falls unconscious?”

“If I was in his position with our son, I would like to know and see with my own eyes my kid was alright”Mike looked at the pup, brows furrowing.

“But is he alright?” Mike lifted the hoodie slightly, just enough to see the way to visible ribs “Sure there are no wounds, but he’s far from fine. We might just worry and stress the dad more”

“He's sick also” Pac said, voice low “A bad cold at best…influenza at worst” The police officer that had just been kind of awkwardly hanging around them seemed to finally find his voice.

“It’s such an aggressive mer, maybe not giving him more reason to be angry would be a good idea-” Mike snapped his head towards him giving the officer a look that could kill.

“Don’t talk mr ‘tigger happy’” he hissed. The officer cringed and fell silent.

“Poor baby” Tina said looking down at the kid huddling against Pac for warmth. “I think he should see his son” Tina replied “I would want to see Em if we both were kidnapped, even if it would make me worried. The unknown is worse, you can fill it with everything and anything. If he sees him like this, it’s sickness and under feed.Things that are manageable and not something like” She seemed to think “Like, death, or dismemberment”

“Yeah I guess so” Mike replied “f*ck it why not”

“I highly suggest you don’t” the officer piped up again “The mer already tried to take a swipe, letting him see the kid would surely lead to aggressive behaviour and more fighting. And if someone gets hurt I need to write a report why it happened and-”

“You can write down that they can ‘kiss my ass’ ” Mike snapped “Is it you, or we who work with merpeople? Shut your mouth and don’t tell us how to do our job” his voice was harsh and final, it was clear Mike was more than fed up with this guy.

The officer snapped his mouth shut, happy with that Mike turned back to Pac.

“Go in and show him, tell us when he has fallen asleep and we’ll give him another dose and then transport him” Pac nodded.

“I’ll go now” Pac said “I’ll be back soon” and with that he turned towards the door and quickly walked towards it. He hoped he hadn’t fallen asleep yet, that he was able to see his son before maybe able to ease his mind ever so slightly.

Pac would have wanted this if he was in the mers position, to be able to see his kid after who knows how long of a time. He hoped it would ease the mers mind.

He opened the door and stepped in.

He immediately caught sight of the mer. He had been freed from the rope but the metal cage still kept him captured and the muzzle was still locked tightly around his mouth.

He had been clawing at the muzzle but as soon as Pac stepped in he put his hand down and turned to him with a growl.

He was raised high, trying to look big but it was clear he was only putting down weight on one of his arms, the other was only placed on the ground for show, not actually holding him up. It was either sprained or broken if Pac had to guess. The mers sail was high as well, clearly calling for a fight, but as soon he laid eyes on what was in Pac’s arm his eyes went wide and he stilled and the growl vanished, like the air had been sucked out of the room.

There was this tense stillness for a second as he mer just watched his pup sleeping in Pac’s arms.

Pac walked slowly closer, the mer didn’t as much as twitch as Pac approached. He didn’t go all the way up to the cage, keeping some good distance between them for a moment.

The mer opened his mouth and tried to say something, but the muzzle sat so tight around his mouth that nothing he said could be made out. The mer’s sail went down and they lowered themselves to their stomach. Maybe he had calmed down a bit, maybe he didn’t want to act aggressive while Pac carried his pup in his arms, maybe the dart was taking it’s effect, maybe it was a mix of all three.

“I’ll come over, press against the bars and we’ll remove the muzzle.” Pac said, feeling a bit more at ease now that the mer wasn’t literally calling for a fight. “Don’t attack me. I’m not a threat to you or the pup”

He held the pup with one arm. He was so light, it still shocked him.

He saw the mer staring at the pup and then at the iron bars, this look of despair suddenly filling them. The bars were too close together, he wouldn’t be able to reach out and snatch the pup from Pac’s arms, and bring him into the cage with him. But it was clear he wanted nothing more than to do so.

As Pac got to the bars a deep rumble escaped the mer, making his chest shake, but it was no growl. It was that safety rumble, that rumble that wordlessly expressed their love. The pup was half asleep, but a little chirp still escaped his throat by reflex and the adult mer eyes seemed to just overflow with relife.

“Press closer” Pac asked, snapping the mer out of his thoughts and looking at him. Distrust was still in his eyes but obeyed pressing his face against the bar, with the little lock pointing in his direction.

Pac once again brought out his lock pick, had to fiddle a little, the process hard with just one hand, but he soon heard the click.

As soon it was heard the mer pulled back and started to claw at the muzzle, taking it off in seconds and making it fall to the ground with a ‘clang’.

The mer seemed to forget about it immediately. And just looked at Pac and the little pup. He looked at Pac and suddenly recognition lit up in his eyes. Like he suddenly had actually taken a good look at him and noticed who he was.

The mer, almost in a panic, looked at his pup and then back at Pac and then the mer lowered himself to the ground. Pac for a moment thought it was the sedatives taking effect, but that quickly turned out not to be the case as the mer turned to lay on his back and barred his throat.

Surrender.

A show of submission.

“Don’t hurt him. He’s just a pup” Pac’s eyes widened at final hearing the mer’s voice. It was deep like it was making the floor rumble. “I’m sorry. Don’t hurt him. ”

Pac had had the feeling the mer could speak, he had reacted to their spoken words but that he would be so quick to do so was surprising. He just wished the first words wouldn’t have been so heartbreaking.

Asking, no, begging him to not hurt the pup in his arms the few ways he could. By baring his throat and staying belly up. Giving Pac the option to kill or beat him easily if he wished.

Maybe he had remembered Pac, remembered that he had been here with Mike before, and now the attempt at attacking Mike was worrying the mer. Maybe he thought it was time for the punishment like Elena had promised. Maybe he thought this was the moment they would beat his pup in front of him.

Even the thought of that made Pac stomach churn. The idea he would just beat this sick already terrified pup in front of their dad was sickening to him.

Pac crouched down quickly, trying to get on the mers level.

“I won’t don’t worry. We just want to help” Pac replied, trying to make his voice as honest as he could “I will protect him, okay? No one will hurt him. You and him are not in any trouble.”

There was no trust in his eyes, it was clear he didn’t believe him at all. Maybe…Maybe Pac could try to build a little trust.

“I’m Pac.What is your name?” That seemed to surprise the mer. Guess no one had asked him that since he got here.

It took a long moment before Pac got a response.

“Fit”. His name was Fit, that was progress.

“You’re a battle-mer right?” Pac assumed that just by looking at him, strong and so ready to fight were some common traits for battle-mers.

Some kind of sorrow suddenly appeared in Fit’s eyes but it was gone just as quickly.

“I’m…I’m a nanny-mer”

Nursery-mer. Protectors. They were supposed to stay at the pods main place of rest and keep an eye on the young. Defend them from any harm, teach them, be a trusted person. A teacher, a parent and a protector in one.

That one had been caught like this seemingly in the open did not bode well for the pod. The nursery-mer never left their area unless their home was fully compromised.

This all was starting to fill some gaps, a story was being uncovered here and it was a very sad one.

“What is his name?” Pac said, looking down at the pup in his arms. Fit seemed more suspicious about that and hesitated for a while before finally speaking.

“Ramon” He seemed to be getting more and more tired, the drugs probably getting the better of him at this point.

“Ramon” Pac repeated, “It's a good name.” Pac gently rocked the pup back and forth smiling down at the kid, at Ramon.

Fit was blinking slower, carefully he rolled back onto his stomach.He looked at Pac the whole time as he was turning, like was waiting for Pac to snap at him to stop moving. Pac did no such thing, just gave him a little warm smile, trying to look trustworthy, whatever that looked like.

Fit just looked at Ramon for a moment, they were so close now.

“Can I...Can I just touch him?” Fit asked weakly, trying his very hardest to stay awake. He looked up at Pac then “I won’t scratch, promise, I just want to…To touch him”

Pac thought for a second. He had almost scratched Mike, but the sedatives were clearly taking effect making Fit slower and had stolen most of his fighting spirit.. And this was about trust, and trying to make this as little traumatising as possible.

“Sure, just be careful” Pac sat still as Fit slowly lifted his arm out between the bars. He was very mindful of the claws the way he reached out and laid his palm against his pups cheek.

Ramon pushed against the hand but didn’t open his eyes.

Fit’s eyes shone with joy at that and even a little smile formed on his lip before slowly the hand fell down, travelled down, down until it landed on the floor, and Fit’s eyes closed. Too tired to keep fighting.

He was spent and the drug had finally gotten him after having fought them off for so long.

Pac watched him for a moment hearing the heavy breathing. He then looked back towards Ramon.

“I’ll watch him for you. You just rest” he said gently as he stood up and walked back to the door, opening it and going out, seeing the others outside that had been waiting for him.

“He’s unconscious” Mike gave him a nod.

“We’ll take him back to the centre, take pup back there in the car” Mike replied, looking at Pac and Tina. There were some quick nods and then they started to make their way outside.

They walked across the parking lot, ignoring all the cop cars and media trying to get a scoop for their papers. Tina pulled up her keys, spinning them on her finger.

“I’ll drive, you can sit in the backseat with the kid” Pac gave her a nod and a thankful smile. He opened the door and got in, Ramon was completely relaxed not even noticing they had left the building in his sleep.

Pac laid him out over the two free seats with his head on his lap. He combed his fingers through his hair gently.

“Drive carefully,” Tina huffed.

“When don’t I?” She asked, driving past all the cop cars and out onto the main road and just like that they were on their way to the mer centre.

Chapter 4

Chapter Text

They stepped out of the car, Pac carrying Ramon in his arms as they moved towards the building. Tina helped him with the doors, holding them open. As soon as they got in they took off their shoes and put on flip flops, and gumboots instead.

It felt good to be back. The walls were covered with paintings of different sea motifs but also what they referred to as “Family pictures” which was just a lot of mers that had been housed here at one point in time. It was filled with memories and mers smiling at the cameras, and making silly faces.

The walls were half coloured with blue paint, making it look like water. The waves went up and down, up and down. Some cartoon looking islands with two or one palm trees had also been painted along with seagulls, just to give the whole building a more fun vibe. Richas had helped a lot of that, having been more than a little excited over being allowed to paint on the walls.

They opened the door and walked through the hallway, the doors frames were wide or had double doors just so the mers would have an easier time to move around. Mers who lived here had their own rooms with some small pools inside. The floor was smooth and cleaned often so the mers would be able to slide across it without scratching up their stomachs or hurting their hands. Which also meant no carpet allowed which was honestly fine for Pac’s part, made it easier to get rid of water either way.

They went through one of the double doors and got into the med bay.

There were two platforms that could be raised and brought down so the merfolk could easily get on and then brought up. There were also three entrances, one to the hallway, one that led to their main big pool and one that went to their medical pool, for merfolk who for whatever reason needed medical care and could not be with other mers.

Tina opened a cupboard and took out a nice and soft towel before she pressed a button raising the platform up so they could work at a comfortable height.

She laid out the towel and the Pac put Ramon down on top of it. They removed Pac’s hoodie so they could get a better look at the pup. Pac didn’t put the hoodie back on, instead tying it around his waist for the moment and then he and Tina started to make a check up.

They x-rayed him, and found no broken bones, which was good. They then used numbing cream before drawing blood.Ramon was still a kid, making the whole health process a bit easier to handle then Fit. They had to keep the kid healthy and alive, so that was what they were going to do until Fit woke up and was informed. Pac was honestly not sure how that would go, how do you describe the concept of modern healthcare.

They also gave Ramon some basic vaccines just to make sure he would not get any other sickness. So Pac got that out of the way as well while Tina was documenting it all. Ramon's name, parents name, weight, length, blood type, what vaccines he had gotten all that stuff. They would have to send some of it to the police later as evidence.

When they were done they had made the conclusion all he had was a bad cold and was malnourished. Maybe he was not used to human diseases. The people on the centre were all vaccinated from chickenpox to influence but he guessed the people in the federation didn’t care enough to consider that a simple cold could have some horrible effects on a little mer pup.

Even if they felt bad for the little guy so could this be fixed, a bit of medicine and a good diet and he would be healthy again soon enough. Which honestly was a relief, sadly Pac did not have the same confidence for Ramon's dad.

He was worried, even if he hadn’t gotten a full check up yet Pac had a feeling there would be a lot more issues for him than for his son that might also take a longer time to fix. And with Fit being so highly aggressive and distrustful while Ramon had quickly built trust with Pac so did he have a feeling that there was a loooooong road to walk with Fit.

Pac used the towel and tucked it loosely around Ramon, before he lifted him up into his arms once again. Ramon was still asleep, probably so had exhaustion just claimed him, giving him a moment of rest after who knows how long.

“Should we leave him with some of the other mers?” Pac asked, looking at Tina, felt wrong to just leave him in the medbay, but he also knew the two of them couldn’t watch him, there was still so much to do.

“Maybe Phil could take him? We could also call Foolish and that whole pod if they can help?” Tina suggested.

“Who is in right now?” Pac asked, rocking Ramon gently in his arms. The pup didn't wake up, but tried to nestle closer to Pac.

“Just Phil, Tubbo, Bagi and Foolish, I think he’s hanging out with Tubbo, Sunny, Richas and Leo”

“Then Phil it is” Pac said and opened the door out to the big pool.

This area was the biggest in the centre, containing a giant pool. It was here for mers that wanted to hang out in a big open space and swim. They had some smaller pools in another room but this was the main big one.

They didn’t have to look for Phil for long as the water moved as soon as they stepped out and just a few seconds later Phil popped out. He quickly made his way out of the water. His fish lower half looked a bit like an orca, only instead of black patches they were green.

“Hey mate” Phil said with a smile as he got out and shook his head, getting some water out of his hair. Pac just laughed with a knowing smile.

“You want to see the pup?” Pac knew what Phil was like, sure he denied it, saying he didn’t want to look after more than two pups, but he was a nursery-mer at heart.

“Just wanted to check on the new arrivals” Phil said with a smile.

Phil had been here at the centre for a while, his daughter Tallulah had a lot of health issues, mostly asthma which was quite bad, making her need medicine, Phil, Chayanne and her pretty much lived here at this point which wasn’t unusual.

They had a waterway from the sea right into the centre. Even the mers who had left usually came back at times, either to hang out or because they needed something. Some of them didn’t really leave, Tubbo had refused to do so, instead having found his calling with computers, tinkering and being a DJ, preferring to stay as close to the human world as possible instead of returning to the sea and the mer peoples way of life.

Pac laughed and crouched down, showing him the little pup still sleeping in his arms.

“Aww” Phil started to coo immediately but tried to keep it quiet, not wanting to wake the sleeping pup. His eyes then travelled down, seeing the visible ribs and deep sorrow filled his eyes. “He’s a little scrawny thing, but that's easily fixed” he said with a gentle and hopeful smile.

Pac let his hand go down, prushing his fingertips against the ribs absentmindedly.

“I’m worried about what the dad will do when he sees him” Tina said, looking down at Ramon as well.

“When will the dad arrive?” Phil asked.

“In a while” a voice suddenly rang out and they all turned towards it and saw Bagi make her way over, just like her brother the fish part reminded Pac of a betta fish, with a long, very flowy tail end. “Apparently it’s a bit harder to move a muscular full grown battle-mer than a starved pup” she said, getting right up to them, she sighed “Though I’m kind of liking this moment of peace, when he arrives we’ll have to talk about the health issues and how we should handle this”

“What’s the issues? ”Phil asked. Bagi sighed and reached down to the little belly pack she had and brought out her water proof phone and with a few taps she reached her photos and showed them by turning the phone their ways.

It was a picture of Fit, seemingly one taken by the police. Fit was asleep still in the cage surrounded still by the cut ropes.

“Bruises, a lot of them and wounds in general. From reports we found his tail was also kept in the same position for several days so he might need physical therapy to get it moving correctly.” Bagi looked at the pictures and sighed “But to do that he needs to listen to us and accept our help and that might be an… issue” Bagi said with a light cringe.

“He seemed to know english. Might be able to explain it to him” Pac replied, having been the only one actually to hear Fit speak.

“Explaining and making him listen are two very different things” Bagi responded “And dealing with an aggressive battle-mer is not something easily done” That made Pac realise something he had forgotten to tell them.

“He’s not a battle-mer, we assumed wrong” Pac corrected “He’s a nanny” There was a moment of silence as all of them looked at the picture again, inspecting it closer.

“I can see why you think that.” Phil said “Humans see a strong mer and immediately think that”

“I don’t know how you can tell the difference so quickly,” Tina said clearly trying to find some way Phil could tell the difference. Pac had agreed it was hard to notice. He had dealt with mers for years, and still the ability to differentiate the two still usually eluded him.

“It’s easier to tell when they’re awake. It’s mostly a vibe thing, you can kind of just tell. Especially when they scold someone or get frustrated at a person” Phil said with a chuckle. “But you can also usually tell by scars”

Phil zoomed in on the picture and pointed at a scar on Fit’s arm. Pac leaned in closer seeing what looked like a tiny bit mark on Fit’s forearm.

“A pup probably was playing with him and bit too hard. A lot of pups consider battle mers too scary to truly play with and be able to make mistakes with, so that they dare to bite him like this is a hint to him being a nanny-mer” Phil then looked at Fit as a whole “Nanny mers usually have more scars and more dangerous looking ones than battle-mers also”

“Shouldn’t that be the battle mers? They protect pods and sneak in on other territory and start fights” Tina asked, Phil turned and looked at her.

“Battle-mers fight sharks until they kill it. If a battle-mer gets into a fight they can decide to fight or run away. Nanny-mers don’t stop fighting until they’re dead.” Phil said looking at the picture of Fit with this sad expression “That’s why they’re given so much respect by pods. When they take up the role they say they’re ready to fight till their death to protect the pups. They can’t run or give up, so they fight till they die.”

“So he was a nursery-mer” Tina said, voice sorrowful.

“Is” Phil corrected quickly “He still got one kid to protect”

“And that just might be the issue.” Bagi added “If he feels threatened by us, he might fight us until he physically can’t ” There was this tense silence for a moment.

They all knew that was a possibility, that he would be so scared he would not give up. Never back down. What did you even do at that point? Even with Cellbit it had been easier to deal with, he knew when to call quits, he had nothing to protect when he had arrived. He had only cared about staying alive, all Fit cared about was his pups survival.

“Would explain him fighting the ropes” Tina added. There was another moment of silence.

Pac's eyes travelled away from the picture and down at the pup in his arms. He gently rocked him.

“What's the plan right now?” Phil asked, making them all get back on track.

“We wondered if you could watch Ramon for a while, until his dad is here and awake” Pac replied, looking back up just to see Bagi and Phil’s eyes went wide.

“You have his name?” Bagi asked, looking at the pup.

“Yes?” Pac replied “Isn’t that in…The files or something from the federation” Bagi shook her head.

“They called them by numbers, no names anywhere to be found” Pac felt his heart drop.

“They didn’t ask for their names?” his voice was nothing above a whisper.

“Doesn't seem like it” So that was why Fit had looked surprised when Pac had asked that.

“His name is Ramon, the dad is Fit” Pac explained, and Phil smiled at the little boy while Bagi seemed to write something down on her phone.

“Hello Ramon, welcome to our centre” A moment later they heard the doors open at the entrance and the sound of voices coming from the hallway.

“Guess Fit just arrived” Phil said with a chuckle. There was a moment and then the door opened and Mike walked through.

“Took you long enough” Pac snickered and Mike just huffed.

“I swear that mer wears 20 tons. The cops had to help me move him here.” he then turned to Bagi “We need to talk before the drugs wear off. I want to know if we can give vaccines and take blood or not” Phil looked between them before turning back to Pac.

“Maybe I should take Ramon and leave, just in case he wakes up?” that snapped Pac out of his thoughts.

“Oh, of course” Pac handed the towel with Ramon over to Phil. He would be lying if he said it didn’t hurt his heart to let go of the little pup. He knew he was in safe hands with Phil, but still. He didn’t want to let go of that poor little pup.

Ramon had trusted him, trusted Pac to look after him, and now he was handing him off to a stranger in Ramon's eyes.

‘This was for the best at the moment’ Pac had to repeat to himself.

Phil slowly started to bounce and drag himself across the floor, moving towards the hallway, and towards his room. Tina followed, talking with Phil along the way, and helping keep the doors open.

The three left watched them leave before Mike turned to Pac.

“Pac, check on Fit, you were always better on that medical stuff. Dress the wounds and all that” he said “I think it is better he sees you, than the guy he tried to murder” Pac nodded.

“Sure, I’ll start things up” Pac walked back to the medbay and caught sight of Fit, who was laying on one of the platforms.

It felt weird to see him asleep, this big mer that had been fighting for his life, who had bared teeth and growled at everyone and anything was now sleeping peacefully, like he would never hurt a fly.

Pac could hear his breathing, heavy but relaxed, still in pretty deep sleep. Good. He deserves to rest.

Pac started the check up, but without blood testing so didn’t anything really new really come up.

The tail would need some help, as it had been kept in the same position for such a long time had messed with it, but some stretches and training so it would probably be working as normal again.

The arm he had avoided putting weight on was revealed to be thankfully just be a sprained wrist so Pac had done his best to wrap it. At last was the back. Scars and bruises littered it, it looked like he had been badly beaten and even cut.

Pac made sure to clean the wounds out before putting on wound dressings. In the end Fit’s back was almost covered with the giant waterproof band-aids. Pac then pulled out a heat blanket and put it on medium heat and threw it over his back, hoping the warmth would help with the blood flow and speed up the healing process

As Pac had worked on him he had just noticed how many scars he already had. He seemed to have been busy protecting the pups. His mind went back to right before Fit had fallen asleep. How all he had asked for was to touch Ramon for a second, that he had begged Pac to not hurt his kid.

He was a good nursery-mer. He was a good dad.

Pac leaned over a table and activated the computer in the medbay. He wanted to look up if any new info had shown up. Sometimes after events like this, pods could get located, or some mer knew something about the kidnapped mers, who they truly were, or what had happened with their family. Pac however had a feeling no pod would claim Fit.

He was a nursery mer, they did not leave their area or get out on unknown water with their pups unless every other option was impossible. So…Most likely it was just Fit and Ramon against the world now.

Pac couldn't even imagine how scary that must be. Pac was Richas dad, but he was one of many. The idea of him being in Fit's shoes-umm-fins? Anyway, be in his place would have been terrifying, from always being able to as for help, to carry the load to having do it all alone, while death was breathing down their necks. It must be hard. he hoped Fit would soon trust them enough to accept the help they offered.

Pac hoped he would calm down, and find a home among them. He already knew that some pods here and around the centre would gladly take him in. Maybe Ramon and Richarlyson could even become friends. He should introduce them when this all calmed down a little.

Pac went through the files, seeing if anything new was written. Nothing yet, Bagi had seemingly just added the names. That was the latest information that had been added to-

Pac felt something grab his ankle and he was yanked off the chair he had been sitting on. He landed hard, hitting his tail bone and let out a pained grunt. He however had no time to react as he quickly pushed to the ground, feeling the cold floor under him,and soon a heavy weight residing on his chest.

Pac looked up and was met with hazel eyes with long pupils.

Fit.

Fit had woken up .

Pac had not heard him. He had been completely silent.

The way mers moved on land ,unless they dragged themselves with their hands, usually depended on the tail, if it was like a blue whale they usually tried to bounce, similar to a seal, if it was more like a shark they slithered like snakes. Still, they usually made some sound, that Fit had woken up and been able to sneak up on him was honestly impressive.

Fit grabbed Pac wrists before he had time to react and forced them above his head, where he transferred them so he held them in one single tight grip.He held them so tight that Pac was sure it would bruise.

Pac tried to struggle for a second, trying to get his hands free. He opened his mouth to scream, yell for help at the top of his lungs but before he had the chance Fit placed his hand against his throat-

Pac went completely still and dead quiet.

He could feel the ends of Fit’s claws against his skin, on the edge of puncturing it and let the blood flow. His claws on the edge of digging into his throat and right to his windpipe.

Pac was just staring into those hazel eyes. He could barely breathe as Fit’s weight was pressing down against him, it felt like his rib would crack from the pressure. Mike had not lied when he had said it felt like Fit weighed 20 tons.

Fear was pulsing through his veins and he could hear his heart beat in his ears and against Fit’s hand. He wondered if the mer could feel it, feel his pulse, feel how fast his heart was beating, feel the fear.

Fit leaned down, getting closer, his teeth were bared, showing off his sharp fangs.

“Where. Is. Ramon?” Fit whispered harshly, the rage clear in his cold tone “Where the f*ck is my boy?”

Chapter 5

Chapter Text

Fit had woken up confused and disoriented. The room's light was dim, easy on the eyes, way kinder than the one that had been outside his cage. He had been laying on some kind of platform in some new white room.

The cage was gone, there was no muzzle and no ropes holding him down, he was truly free in his movement.

The whole place smelled weird, strongly of something he had never smelled before. It didn’t smell natural, he didn’t know how to describe it. Humans and the human world was so strange to him.

His whole back felt weird, like something was laying over it, being stuck to his skin like some kind of dry and sticky and weirdly textured seaweed. He could feel it shift with him as he moved slightly.

He was warm at least, this fabric laying over him heating up his body. Fit felt something around his wrist and looked down, seeing white fabric wrapped around his hand and writs. His claws and fingers were still exposed. He guessed it was there for his hurting wrist and that it would help.

That's when he had heard the ‘click,click,click’. Fit had looked towards it, his head felt…weird? Like there was this fog over his mind. Like sleep was calling him but, forcefully not by his own body's wishes. It was very very strange, but he shouldn’t be surprised. Of course the humans had done something to him. Humans were weird and had all kinds of things he would need years to learn to understand.

He saw what the click sound came from as he caught sight of a human, the same human that had been holding Ramon before he had fallen asleep. He was tapping his fingers on something that let out a ‘click’ sound each time. He was looking at some weird machine that changed with each click. This too was way beyond his understanding. What he did understand however was that he was distracted.

He felt rage flare up inside him. He had laid down on his back to beg that Ramon wouldn't be hurt and the human had not laid a finger on his son, but that didn’t change the fact that he had taken his pup. He still had his pup, somewhere , he must do.

Carefully Fit let his tail slide down to the floor first despite the pain, while his arms stayed on the platform as he slowly let himself down until he could finally let go. He was absolutely silent as he started to slither his way towards the human.

His heart was beating harder with every centimetre he got closer. And soon…He was right within grabbing distance.

It was so easy.

He had yanked the human to the floor and gotten on top of him with a hand at his throat in a matter of seconds. Fit was looking down at him, right into those big brown eyes. They were wide with both shock and fear.

It had made some noise when he had pulled him down, but he had yet to scream and if he even got the thought so was Fit going to silence him with quick claws to the neck. The human, Pac, if he remembered his name right, seemed to realise that.

The human was breathing quickly, his chest rising and falling fast under Fit and he could feel his pulse in his throat. It was beating fast, he was scared.

Good.

Humans had been having the upper hand for too long. They had been more people, more cunning, further along with their machines but Fit was now putting them in their place. Mers usually were stronger, it was his turn to be powerful. His turn to be in control.

“Where. Is. Ramon?” Fit whispered harshly, the rage clear in his cold tone “Where the f*ck is my boy?”

Pac didn’t say anything for a while, just staring up at him with wide eyes. It was irritating him but something also pulled on his heart, the look of pure fear in his eyes. Fit forced the feeling down. They had taken his son . They were kidnappers, just as bad as the lady and that damn Captain Cucurucho. They didn’t deserve sympathy.

“Speak” Fit hissed, baring his teeth, and getting closer, his breath brushing against the Pac face.

Suddenly the human moved his head back and a terrified whine escaped him that sent Fit’s instincts into a loop. It sounded mer like, and was very similar to a mer surrender, the noise they were supposed to let out if they gave up.

Fit’s instincts told him to let go or kill him, that they had given up and he had the upper hand, that the fight was over. That was how this worked. If Pac had been a mer he would have letten go, accepted the defeat, but he was a human , he was not to be trusted, if he let go he would not honour their tradition, surely he would just turn on him and attack.

“Don’t pull that with me” Fit hissed, making his displeasure known, not accepting the surrender. “Tell me where my son is. Now” Pac pulled in air in and let it out, trying to control his breathing.

“We have him. We want to help him and you-” Fit’s hand tightened slightly making Pac shut his mouth at once.

“I don’t care for your help.” Fit snapped quielty. He didn’t want anything from them. He wanted his son, and he wanted out “ Where is Ramon right now?” Pac swallowed hard, Fit could feel it against his palm and release the grip slightly.

“Please let me just explain-” Pac tried once agin.

“Where is my son!” Maybe that was a bit too loud, but Fit didn’t care. “You had him last, where did you put him? What did you do to him?” he snapped his teeth in the air with a click making Pac flinch.

Fit sounded angry but in reality terror had its grip on him. Pac could be lying, maybe Fit would get nothing but lies from this. Even if he said they had Ramon so could he be lying and sold his baby boy already to the highest bidder, just like that lady had talked about. Fit begged to any god that would listen that wasn’t the case, that his son could still be reached, still be saved.

That's when the door suddenly opened.

They both snapped their heads towards the door, Fit tensed, ready to attack, flee or take Pac as a hostage. His sail went up ready to try to scare them off, but it fell immediately when he caught sight of who had just entered.

There in the entrance wearing a big yellow and green shirt was a human pup.

Fit stopped baring his fangs and just stared at them in shock as he fell silent.

They…They had human pups here? He had never seen one before, they were so similar to mer pups if you ignored the legs.

There was stillness as they just watched each other. There was this intensity in the air, Fit could feel Pac’s heart rate speed up against his fingers. He could pretty much taste the panic that suddenly was radiating from Pac. He felt how he was shaking under him, even more terrified now.

“Richarlyson. Leave. Now” Pac said, voice quiet but stern. “Let me handle this-” The pup, Richarlyson, didn’t listen as he rushed forward right at them without fear, without hesitation.

“Richas no!” Pac yelled but it was too late.

Richarlyson got to them and immediately curled his hands into fists and started to beat at Fit, punching and kicking his arm with all his might while he let out this scream that made Fit’s ears ring.

The hits barely registered, they were clearly made to hurt and the few that hit his back and previous wounds did sting but otherwise they were easy to ignore. The intention was very clear though.

Richarlyson fought until he was out of breath and then started to sign in mer sign language which also was a surprise. A lot of mers knew sign language, their pups took a while longer to build vocal cords able for true speaking than humans, so sign language was used by the pups and some mers that spoke no other language. But seeing a human having learnt it was not something he expected.

He watched as the pup started to sign.

“Get off!” and “Stop!” before he placed his hands on Fit’s arm and pushed at him like he was trying to force him off Pac. When that didn’t work Richas looked at him, saw the wrapping around his back and punched right at it making Fit let out a hiss in pain as an aching wound flared up in pain.

“Richas leave!” Pac screamed, absolute horror in his voice before he looked up at Fit “He’s just a kid-a pup! He doesn't know better! Please don’t hurt him!”

He was pleading for the pup, pleading for Fit not to take his revenge on him…Just like Fit had been pleading to Pac for Ramon’s health.

Was that man under his hand…Pac, a nursery human?

That was a possibility he hadn’t considered. Did humans have pod dynamics as well… If they did..,He-he couldn’t bring himself to hurt a fellow nanny, someone whose job it was to protect pups and ready to sacrifice their life for them. Some pups cared a lot about and trusted with their life. Maybe that's why Pac had grabbed Ramon? His nanny position called him to the pup just like Fit’s was doing for the human pup in front of him.

He couldn’t hurt Pac, and he couldn’t hurt the pup but they wouldn’t stop kicking and punching and it was hurting, it was making his wound hurt so much it felt like he was being stabbed.

Fit quickly made a decision.

There must be more humans around here. He let go of Pac’s throat and slid off him and took off towards one of the doors before anyone even had the time to blink.

He threw it open and got into this big area with a giant pool. Was this the fighting pit? The water was awfully high for one and not seats for watchers. No matter, he saw what he had been looking for. A human, and not any human, it was Mike.

Him and another mer was looking right at him, eyes wide in shock as he had just burst out. Fit didn’t slow down, took the chance and moved forward, going towards Mike, but he never reached him.

The other mer moved fast, getting between him and the human. She was growling, a warning, telling him to step down before the situation turned serious. Her sail wasn’t raised however, not calling for a fight just yet.

He didn’t care for her growls. He had to find his pup, he was going to find him and no human nor mer would stop him.

He watched the human, he was right by the pool. If Fit got to him then surely he would be able to pull him down into water, drown him if he didn’t listen to his demands.

Fit watched Mike, despite the mer trying to block his view, and make him look at her instead.

Had they tamed her? Domesticated her like those white clothed people had spoken about? He had been shown one fight, too see what he was supposed to do, what he was going to be trained for. He then heard and seen the aftermath. How they had put mers against each other and stolen their sanity to the point they fought between themselves till the other was bleeding out for no other reason but to entertain humans.

Had they taught her like that? To start attacking and step down on command? To defend her prison guards? Had they beaten her until she listened to their orders?

Maybe he would feel sorrow for her, but right now he held no pity. He didn’t have the time nor place for it.

He saw an opening and launched himself forward trying to reach the man, but she was surprisingly quick. As he flew forward and past her, she grabbed his tail, her claws digging into his copper shark-like tail and with all her strength held him there. His tail let out a pulse of pain as that weird injury in it flamed up. It felt almost like his tail was locking up, and aching with each movement and her flaws dug deep into it was not helping.

Fit slashed his claws in the air, one last desperate attempt to catch Mike, but he was too quick and jumped away, getting way out of reach.

Fir cursed and snapped his body around lifting his hand slashing up the woman's side instead.

She screamed and let go of his tail, letting him also fully turn around to face her. Their eyes met, both of their pupils nothing more than slits as they bared their teeth at the other. Fit raised his sail and she answered.

And then the fight was on.

She was no battle-mer nor nursery-mer but her claws were still sharp.

Fit felt her claws cut up his skin, feeling blood run from the wound and make him feel sticky. He might still be a bit loopy, dead tired and aching but he was not defenceless.

He gave as bad as he got, his claws scratching her arm, making her let out a yelp, however, this attack was responded by a slash across his chest, deep enough to hit his sternum.

He flinched back and that's when she fully pounced, throwing herself forward and hitting him with all her weight and power.

He tried to stand steady, but his Poseidon forsaken wrist, as she hit him he tried to steady himself, burning pain erupted from it and with a scream he fell to the ground.

She got up on his chest and tried to reach for his throat, Fit didn’t let her, as her arm got close enough he sunk his teeth into her forearm, feeling blood on his tongue, she screamed, while Fit’s other hand went up and dug into her back, feeling his claws go deeper and deeper into her skin.

She looked down at him, rage in her eyes as she pulled her up her free hand punched him right on the side of his head.

Fit saw stars for a moment as he got dazed and she pulled her arm out of his teeth, and next second it was around his throat. Just like he had held that human a few seconds before, so was it with the claws against his throat.

“Yield!” she screamed, voice harsh against his ears but Fit was going to do no such thing. He had to fight, his pup was here somewhere. He was so close to being free, so close to having his baby again. He was not yielding. He would stop when he was dead.

Fit quickly yanked his body to the side, trying to slip away but the other mer was just as quick, shifting with him so he didn’t slip out under her, and in response to his attempts the mer took their free hand and pushed it against his gut forcing a hiss out of his throat. He was still bruised and sore, wounds flaring up in pain at the action.

“Yield!” she screamed again, letting a growl follow her words.

Fit wasn’t going to give up. He didn’t yield but he didn’t move either he just stayed like that. Both of the mers knew that did not count as surrender. The fight was still on.

The stranger pushed down harder and actually grunt escaped Fit. It felt like his body was on fire, everything stung, he felt wounds on his back open and started bleeding again.

f*ck.

She was staring down at him, and he was meeting here eyes, his fangs were bared and so was hers. However there was something in those eyes of hers. This…Sorrow.

Fit didn’t get it.

“I got him here” Someone suddenly called out. Both Fit and the woman turned towards the voice and Fit felt his heart grow cold.

They had brought out his pup. Pac was carrying Ramon in his arms.

Too late. Too late again . The human got him before he had the chance. They held his baby in their arms, in those hands that only knew cruelty.

Regret and fear flooded Fit’s mind.

Was this it? This was the last straw? He hadn’t hurt the humans, just the mer, but maybe they didn’t like their goods and pets damaged. They had his pup, one wrong move from Fit and the human could simply drop him, the fall would surely hurt, and surely a kick would follow.

Fit had lost. He wanted to keep going, but everything hurt, and he knew his duty. His duty was to protect his son, his pup no matter what.

There was silence before he pulled his head a bit up, showing off his throat even more and a low pitch whine escaped him. A sound of surrender. Yielding at last.

The mer on top of him seemed to relax but was not done yet, her hand staying around his throat.

“I’m gonna let you go. But don’t attack anyone else or I’ll fight you again” Fit didn’t respond just looked at the mer. They still had their hand pushed against his stomach. He was breathing fast, and she surely could tell it was not just from the exhaustion of the fight.

There was this weird gentleness in her eyes along with that sorrow that Fit didn’t fully get. Was she feeling pity for him? Was she sad he would turn into a pet for these humans as she surely had? He didn’t know.

“You’re safe, there is no danger. You need to calm down and we’ll talk” The mer finally fully removed her hands, both from his stomach and throat and moved away.

Fit quickly turned so he no longer was belly up.

She moved away further giving him space, room to breathe, but here eyes were still on him, watching his every move, body tense and ready to attack at any moment.

Fit didn’t look at her, instead his eyes on Ramon in Pac’s arms. He saw Pac go down on his knees and speak softly to the pup.

“Ramon, it’s time to wake up” his voice was gentle, the tone of someone who had dealt with pups before. Maybe he truly was a nanny-human.

Ramon started to shift, before his eyes opened slowly, looking up at Pac. His baby boy didn’t scream or thrash as he looked up at the man, instead he just turned, trying to get cosy again, a hand going up to grab Pac’s hoodie, holding onto him with an iron grip.

Fit saw Ramon’s little fingers, clawless, they had taken one of his natural weapons from him. They hadn’t fully grown out to begin with and the human had stolen them from him.

Fit let out a chirp, calling for his boy and he saw Ramon go stiff. He then snapped his head towards him, catching sight of his dad finally and suddenly he was fully awake. He started to shift and slither in Pac’s hold and Pac quickly let the pup down on the floor.

Ramon started to drag and slither himself over to him as quickly as he could. He wasn’t used to moving on land, but was doing his very best. Fit moved forward, meeting him half way and as soon as he reached him he put Ramon under him, standing over him while his tail coiled around his body, completely hiding him from the sight of the humans. Fit then crossed his arm on top of his tail and laid down on top of them, his chest becoming a roof over Ramons smaller body. No one would get him, no one would be able to steal him.

He wanted to check for injuries, make sure Ramon was okay but he couldn’t do it here while he was surrounded by enemies.

They all weren’t doing anything, just had looked at Fit getting his pup back. Why had they given him Ramon like this? For what reason? To make him stop fighting? Were they expecting him to be grateful? To bend down to them now that they so generously had given his pup back? What was their plan? Why were they doing this? He trusted none of it.

He had to flee. Get somewhere safer, away from all these eyes staring right at him. He carefully moved, letting his aching arm go around Ramon. It hurt as he held him, but he had no other choice.

He was light . He was so f*cking easy to carry that it made Fit’s heart sink in his chest. His baby boy, his poor baby boy.

Everyone was looking at them, every move Fit made they watched him, their eyes digging into him, like orcas having caught sight of a seal.

His sail raised and he got a warning hiss from the woman, warning him to not try anything. Would she attack? Even with the pup around? Maybe. He didn’t know what the humans effect on mers could do, and he was not from her pod. Maybe she considered this all her territory, seeing him as an outsider on her turf.

He forced his sail to lay flat again, and the hissing stopped. Not a danger. Not aggressive, just like she wanted.

“Calm down” she said, voice stern, but not hostile. “Just relax, breathe” His breathing was heavy, his heart racing in his chest as he waited for an opening, for a second of them not being vigilant.

Mike turned suddenly and looked at Pac.

“Are you okay?” Pac turned towards him and nodded.

“Yes, I didn’t notice him waking-” Fit moved.

He shot forward both slithering and dragging himself with one hand at lightning quick speed. There were shouts and a hiss but none of them actually reached for him as he went back into the room he had been before and slammed the door shut with his tail making it ache.

He quickly moved to a corner where he once again coiled around his son. Protecting him.

Fit just stared at the door. Waiting, waiting for them to follow him inside, chasing him like he was prey. But none of them did. So he just waited there in silence. He could hear them talking outside, but not what they were actually saying.

He was waiting, heart beating fast in his chest as he just stared at the door, only stopping when suddenly a chirp rang out and he snapped his head down towards Ramon who was looking at him pupils wide with fear.

Fit forced a smile on his lip and placed a soft kiss on top of Ramon's hair.

He couldn’t look scared, he had to be calm, act like he had this all under control, like he was sure they would be fine. He couldn’t scare his pup.

“It’s okay, I’m here now. I’ll protect you. We’ll get out” Ramon didn’t respond, just threw his arms around him and hugged him tightly. Fit quickly let his arms go around him as well, holding him close. No one was going to take him away from him ever again.

If they wanted Ramon they would have to rip him out of his cold dead hands.

“Guess the medbay is off limits” Bagi said with a sigh, before letting out a hiss and placed her hand over the wound going across her ribs.

“Bagi will you be okay?” Pac asked, making his way over to her side. She was bleeding, blood running out from between her fingers, but mers were hardy, she would be alright.

“I’ll be fine, I’ll ask Foolish if he got some natural stuff for this” she said, before looking at the medbay “Damn, he’s jumpy”

“We knew that” Mike said crossing his arms over his chest “However we gave too little sedation apparently. And he was very alert for being newly awake”

“Adrenaline will do that to you,” Pac replied.

“It was still affecting him” Bagi added “If it wasn’t and he wasn’t hurt there was no way for me to beat him” she looked up at Pac. “What happened? We heard yelling, we were about to check it out when he burst out”

Pac without thinking lifted his hand and rubbed his throat. Fit hadn’t left any marks, but Pac could still feel the ghost of his hand across his windpipe.

“He pulled me out my chair and held my throat, demanding I would tell him where Ramon was.” Pac turned his head towards the hallway “Richas heard me fall and Fit yelling since Foolish room is wall to wall with it. He came to investigate and saw it all. Beat at Fit until he stopped holding me down and slipped out, and you know the rest” Mike’s brow furrowed.

“Is Richas okay?” Pac nodded.

“Yeah, Fit didn’t even touch Richas.” he replied “I left him with Phil while I grabbed Ramon to bring him here” Pac lifted his arms and crossed them over his chest. “I’m sorry. I didn’t hear that he had woken up” Bagi quickly shook her head.

“It’s not your fault. It’s not his fault either. It’s just a bad situation and he’s terrified out of his mind.” she frowned. “We have to inform everyone about this and make a plan on how to handle the situation. Safety measures” There was silence for a moment before Mike sighed.

“We’re gonna have to make a report about this, don’t we?” he said and rubbed his face.

“Yeah” Bagi sighed. “First one since-” she shut her mouth with a click and looked at Pac with a knowing look. Pac met her eyes before quickly looking away.

First once since the Cellbit incident years ago. Pac shifted more weight onto his prosthetic.

“So, I guess we’re just leaving him in there for now?” Pac said as he kept looking at the medbay door.

“We’ll let him cool down for the rest of the day” Bagi agreed “Maybe try to earn some trust with some food tomorrow”

“Someone should watch the door’s, make sure he doesn't try to sneak out” Mike added.

“I’ll start,” Pac immediately said. Mike scowled but before he could respond Pac continued “He was going to kill you, he let me go. I don’t know why, but he seems to be less likely to attack me right now”

They all knew this was not good, one threatened, one being charged at, and one actually hurt was not a good group of people to pick from. Guess they would have to call in some more people just in case, but for now so was probably Pac and maybe Tina the least likely to get hurt by Fit.

Mike just looked down at Bagi and sighed.

“I’ll check on Richas and then go buy more bandages, you go to Foolish'' Bagi nodded, before responding.

“Also send Phil out here to keep Pac company.” she said before they started to move, Mike leaving and Bagi starting to slither her ways towards Foolish room to ask for medical attention from the healer.

Pac just stood there, looking towards the door into the medbay in silence, the whole thing playing inside his head. It all happened so fast. It had felt like it had gone by in slow motion when it in reality had just been a couple of minutes.

Fit had let him go. Released him from his grip and moved away. Had left him and Richarlyson and gone after Mike instead.

Why…Why had he done that?

Why had he let him go?

Chapter 6

Chapter Text

A little jingle rang out through the centre, signalling that someone had pressed the button and the door to the sea had just opened. Pac had just been sitting by the water way waiting for Cellbit to arrive and just looked down at the water.

Soon enough Cellbit’s head poked out and moved closer to the ramp. He dragged himself up onto land while Pac stood up to meet him.

“Hi Pac, how are you?” he said, shaking his head, trying to dry his hair a little.

“I’m good!” Pac replied with a smile. “How is the pod at sea?”Cellbit chuckled.

“Roier was throwing a fuss about not being invited and the whole pod turned into one big argument and teasing match” he said with a fond sigh “Happy to talk to Foolish again and can ask him to come back out, Pepito misses him” his expression then turned more serious “What is the issue? Why do you need me?” Bagi had sent a message to Niki who had delivered it to Cellbit about coming back to the centre.

Sure Cellbit and most of the pod showed up here at times to hang out with the people at the center, and meet the rest of the family, but being asked to come back was rare and usually meant something had happened.

“Bagi is going to explain it all, follow me” Pac said, beconing Cellbit to follow him which he did without hesitation.

Tina had agreed to watch all the pups and kids for the day while they had called in Felps to watch the door to Fit’s room. He technically didn’t work here, he was a captain of a cargo ship, but since the boat was currently being towed off land since Felps accidentally ran it aground so was his schedule free. To be honest, Pac had no idea how he was still captain and hadn’t been fired for his constant mess ups returning to ports. He was sitting on a chair watching the door with Richarlyson next to him, they seemed to be in some deep conversation while Felps eyes were locked on the door.

Cellbit and Pac made their way over to the meeting room, a lot of people hadn’t arrived yet, however, Bagi was already there, getting things ready. Bagi was going through papers and as soon as Cellbit saw her he noticed she had several bandages and band-aids all over her. Cellbit quickly made his way over to her.

“Are you okay?” he was trying to sound casual, but his voice betrayed him, his worry peaking through. She nodded looking up from her papers.

“I’m fine, Foolish looked at it and wrapped me up” as soon she was confirmed to be alright did Cellbit begin to scowl.

“Who did this to you? I swear I’ll-”

“It’s a new mer. And you will not bother him” she cut him off voice stern “He was in mer trafficking, trained to be a gladiator, same as you. He also got a kid so do not bother him”Cellbit's eyes went wide at all this information suddenly being dumped on him.

“They found another one?” he asked, curious but there was also something dark to it, something dangerous.

“They never seem to end” Bagi said with a sad sigh, “We didn’t get everyone this time, some boats was out of port when we caught them, managed to escape” Cellbit’s eyes narrowed, his claws flexed slightly.

“Good. Gives me a chance to get my hands on them” Pac looked at those claws, made for cutting skin so easily.

“Be careful,” Bagi said, twisting her body and slapping him with her tail and looked down at her papers once again. “Don’t get in trouble” Cellbit rolled his eyes.

“I’m a battle-mer, I’m just protecting my pod” he said, slapping her back with his tail. “And if some weird mer hunters show up near my territory and all mysteriously drown…Who will notice?”

“The coast guard probably” Bagi replied with a chuckle before her expression hardened and she looked up once again “I’m serious Cellbit, be careful, I know you’re a battle-mer but you’re also a dad and my brother”

“Sure, sure” he replied, grabbing one of the many pillows laying around. He placed it in front of him and crossed his arms on top of it and laid down.

Pac grabbed one as well, and sat down. They had no chair for these meetings. It always felt better to do this at ground level where mer and humans could look eye to eye.

The room soon filled with people, sitting or laying down. Except for Tina and the pup and kids all the people working or living at the centre arrived.

As soon as everyone settled Bagi raised herself up on her arms and spoke;

“Thank you all for coming,”she said, starting the meeting. “I have called you here to either inform you all since you live here at the centre or I think you can have valuable perspectives” she explained.

She lifted the first paper on the pile and cleared her throat before speaking again.

“As the situation stands at the moment there is a nursery-mer called Fit with pup Ramon currently holding up in the medbay. They were rescued from a gladiator pit. So far Fit have shown aggression to merfolk and humans, this resulting in Pac being threatened and held down, Mike being launched at and me actually getting into a fight.” There was a murmur through the room, people were looking at the three who were named, but most eyes stayed on Bagi, noting her injuries.

Bagi ignored it and kept talking.

“He’s anxious and stressed. So for the time being no one is supposed to enter the medbay without my allowance, or interact with him in general.” She flipped the paper over and started reading the back “For the moment we should approach this slowly and gain his trust. We have considered trying to try to create trust with one or a few individuals and then go from there, probably start this trust with giving food.” She put the paper down and looked around.

“Now I’m curious about your opinion or suggestion” she then turned towards Cellbit “You were also in the gladiator pits so I was wondering if you could maybe have some ideas of what to do” Everyone turned to look at Cellbit, waiting for his response.

Cellbit’s brow furrowed as he seemed to think for a long moment.

“I can’t really help in this situation” he said in the end after a bit of considiration “My experiences will probably not be helpful. Our experiences are very different. I am not a nanny-mer and I didn’t have a kid and I already knew you Bagi and trusting you and your trust in other people helped a lot. All I can say is to be careful and always keep someone close by but not together, might make him feel outnumbered or like he is backed into a corner”

“Maybe we should get another nursery-mer here to talk to him?” Phil suggested. Pac understood the idea, having someone who was alike him might be good for trust, seeing someone they had something in common with “We could contact the french owned center and-"

“We’re not inviting bitchboyhalo!” Foolish snapped sail going up in an instant “That guy slips into our territory to be a nuisance enough as it is! I refused to give him an actual invite!”

“This isn’t even your territory bro” Tubbo replied absentmindedly flicking his swordfish tail fin back and forth, while scrolling on his phone, seemingly bored “The centre is forbidden to claim” Foolish turned towards him with a scowl.

“I have no problem letting anyone else around here as long as it is not f*cking Bad” he snapped back.

“Stop complaining about Bad” Bagi snapped back, “The French and their centre are busy with their own merfolk from the federation. We couldn’t get Bad here no matter how much-” she looked at Foolish “Or how little we would want it”

“Has he shown preferns? Does he prefer humans or mer?” Jaiden asked from where she was sitting, leaning her body against Foolish golden great shark tail. “Or does he hate all the same? Some merfolk can get really territorial”

“We think his only interactions with humans are from recent experience with the federation.“ Bagi said and the room turned quiet. They looked at each other with knowing looks, but before they could say more Bagi continued “He seems more hostile towards humans, but he also was very uneasy about me so might not like merfolk a lot either or that could just be a stress thing or unease about how aggressiv we are.”Bagi then turned and looked right at Pac “He seems to tolerate you a bit, maybe we should try to develop on that”

“Don’t base it on one interaction” Mike hissed “He let him go, who knows why, might have been a mistake or slip up on Fit’s part because of the sedative.”

“Might have been with reason” Tubbo replied “How high was he?”

“Not very.” Pac answered “He seemed pretty lucid”

“Give him some kelp and he might calm down” Foolish suggested with a smile, everyone ignored him.

“I don’t want us to put Pac in a position with a dangerous mer where he might be badly hurt, again ” Mike said and shot Cellbit a look that could kill. Cellbit looked away, looking down at the floor. Mike however just kept staring at him, eyes piercing. Pac elbowed Mike in the side.

“Leave it” he whispered at him. He didn’t want to bring all that up now, this was about Fit and Ramon, not him and Cellbit’s past. Mike scowled.

“I’m saying that sometimes mers get so scared they attack without thinking or if they get startled they might rip off a limb-” Pac elbowed him again, harder.

“Someone should be close by” Cellbit spoke, repeating himself “Ready to step in and help”

“How about sending in Pac with a me waiting outside? ” Phil suggested “Just check if Fit still responds alright to his presence. If he dosen't we try something else, if we see progress we build on that”

The room filled with voices as everyone started to discuss it. Ideas, approval and worry it seemed however like most people were on the fence about this. Merfolk was a lot more dangerous than humans with their claws and sharp fangs, so sending another mer would make sense in a way, but also if he showed more approval of Pac maybe they should capitalise on that. There was also always the risk Fit would see the other mer and become territorial or aggressiv because they were not of the same pod.

While everyone else was discussing so had Pac already made up his mind. It would be a bit scary, but Fit had caught his interest. He had just let him go and ran away, for what possible reason? He was also more ready now, he wouldn't let Fit sneak up on him again, if it came down to it Pac could defend himself.

“I can go with Phil waiting outside” he said and the whole room turned silent as everyone turned to look at him.

You could hear a pin drop.

“Are you sure?” Bagi asked “It’s fine if you don’t want to do it. We can find another way” Pac shook his head.

“Ramon already trusts me,” Pac pointed out, remembering how the pup had just fallen asleep in his arms, how he had crawled into his lap searching for comfort and safety. “I can go”

“As long as you’re sure” Bagi replied, there was a hint of worry in her voice, which wasn’t a surprise even if she had been the one to bring up this topic. She then turned to look at Phil.

“And you’re sure you feel up to being a safety net? You have two pups” Bagi pointed out.

“I can stay otherwise” Cellbit replied “I’m a battle-mer and both my kids have several parents around at the moment” Phil shook his head.

“I can still throw down if I need to, I may not be as strong as from my roving days but I’m not old and dusty yet” he said with a grin showing off his sharp teeth.

Pac was glad for that, he really didn't want to see Cellbit be agressive. he was also a bit scared if it came down to a fight Cellbit would get lost in his instincts again and hurt Fit. The same way he had hurt Pac.

“Well that's done for the moment,” Bagi said moving on to a new paper “There is also the issue about both their health. But this is for me, the workers and Foolish to talk about, so we’ll put a pin in that for now. I think we should continue with guarding the door just to make sure he doesn’t sneak out or in case he calls for us. You’re all dismissed” she said and people started to move.

Soon enough Pac and Phil found themselves outside the medbay.

“I’ll be right outside” Phil promised him, voice steady “If something happens scream for me, or if I hear something weird I’ll go in.” he said and Pac gave him a nod.

Pac had put on leather arm guards because Bagi refused to let him go without it, she had wanted him to wear something to protect his throat as well but Pac had refused, worried it would make Fit anxious if he saw him come out with a clunky guard around his throat.

Pac took a deep breath and let it out, trying to calm himself down. It didn’t help much, his heart still beating fast inside his chest. No matter so did he lift his hand andknocked on the door and immediately heard something moving inside, he ignored it and entered the medbay.

“Oi, it’s me, Pac.” he called out as he closed the door behind him and immediately caught sight of Fit.

He was in the far corner because of course he was, protected on most sides. He was looking right at Pac, his tail curled around himself protectively with his body laying over the top.

The room looked untouched, Pac was wondering if Fit had been too scared to explore it, either scared he would find something human made that would hurt him, or that he was too anxious that the moment he moved away from his protective position he would be attacked or Ramon would get stolen from him yet again.

Pac looked at Fit’s tail and had to fight himself not to wince, he knew that tail was hurt, so curling it like that must make it ache.

“Don't your tail hurt when you do that?” Pac asked, pointing “You haven’t really been stretching it out. If you want I can give you some lessons that might help” Fit said nothing, just stared at him. His pupils were thin slits, and his muscles were tense.

He was still covered with dried blood from several wounds, having not gotten them wrapped up or even gotten the chance to clean up since yesterday. It was horrible to look at, Pac wished he could help but he was pretty much sure Fit would not let him anywhere near him.

To Fit's credit he wasn’t acting aggressive yet, just staring at Pac in silence.

Pac looked around like he was searching for the pup, despite already pretty much knowing where Ramon was. Fit had been in this position yesterday as well, hiding Ramon with his whole body so Pac assumed he was doing the same now.

“Is Ramon there hidden behind your tail?” Pac asked, pointing at Fit’s coiled tail again. A light questioning chirp was let out at the mention of the name but from behind the tail but Fit responded by baring his teeth at Pac and his sail rose. The mention of his pup clearly putting him on edge.

Pac lifted his hands up, trying to calm him, seem like less of a threat.

“I’m not going to take him. I gave him back to you, remember?” he asked “I gave him back, why would I take him from you? Steal a pup from their dad is just evil” Fit didn’t say anything but his sail lowered again and he hid his teeth. Pac smiled “We can talk, I know we can”

Fit scowled, but did finally respond with words.

“All the other people wanted was for me to be silent, and now all you want me to do is speak.” he huffed “You think that removing the muzzle made you entitled to my voice? Is that it?” his brows furrowed, but Pac just shook his head,

“We’re not like those people, we're different” Pac replied, “And we don't feel entitled to your voice. If you’re not comfortable with speaking like this we can figure something else out but communication is important. If things make you angry or you need something you need to say that to us.” Pac hoped that would stop what happened yesterday from happen again. Having claws ready to puncture your throat, ready to rip into your windpipe was not...a comfortable experience.Fit just looked at him without saying anything so Pac continued “I speak Portuguese as well if you’re more comfortable with that” Fit just seemed to watch him for a second.

“I don’t understand that.” he replied in the end.

“Then English it is” Fit just let out a huff and fell silent again. It was clear he wasn’t feeling up to a lot of small talk, but at least he was talking which was progress.

“Can you at least tell me what food you want?” Pas asked. Fit didn’t say anything for a moment. The silence was however broken when a cough could be heard and Fit immediately looked down worried for a second before snapping his head back towards Pac, like he was afraid he would launch at him the moment he took his eyes off him.

Pac just stayed where he was as the coughing got worse, that horrible sounding noise followed by wheezy breaths, it made Pac's throat hurt in sympathy.

Fit was staring at Pac but his eyes kept flicking down towards where Ramon was. If Pac hadn’t been there he would surely comforted his pup, held him as that horrible sound escaped him but he didn’t dare it now.

Pac wondered how much Ramon had been coughing, if he had gotten worse. Sure he was with his dad again but he was still sick and malnourished.

“He’s still sick. I have things that could help-” Pac tried but was cut off when Fit growled.

“I want nothing from you!” he snapped loudly “Stay away from my son!” That made Pac jump and he took half a step back, ready to bolt for the door at any second.

Okay, no way he could convince Fit to let him give Ramon some pills or medecin.

“You want me to get his favourite food?” Pac asked instead, at least then with some food Ramon’s body would have a better chance of curing itself “He’s sick and might have a hard time wanting to eat so, some good fish might tempt him…He’s also really thin" Something sad lit up in Fit’s eyes. He knew it as well, knew that his son was way to light. “Tell me. Any fish, I’ll get you it” Fit looked at him, suspicion and distrust in his eyes but he also risked a glance at his pup and a expression of hurt flashed across his face.

He turned back to Pac, his expression ever so slightly softer.

“Do you have…Catfish?” he asked slowly, uncertain, like he was scared this was some kind trick, a trap he was steeping into.

They did not have it in the centre at the moment. They mostly had makrill and tuna, but the fish market was close by.

“I can get you catfish.” Pac said with a nod “Will take a bit, but I can get it" Fit looked at him, his eyes narrow not in distrust or anger, but like he was thinking hard about something.

“What are you?” he asked slowly “Are you a hunter or a nanny human?”

Pac looked at him as the words registered. He wasn’t surprised by him wondering what role he had, many merfolk with little human interaction had issues understanding humans and how their society was built.

“Humans don’t really have roles like merfolk pods do. But I’m a dad, just like you”

“You’re the only parent?” he asked, leaning his head ever so slightly to the side.

“No, Richarlyson has several parents, me, Mike, Felps, he also has some mer family members like Cellbit, Roier, Bagi and Foolish.” Fit looked a bit confused at the answer.

“So it’s a pod?” he asked slowly, not even trying to hide how confused he was.

“Not really, we’re kind of separated, doing our own thing most of the time,” Fit didn’t seem to get much wiser. Pac chuckled and finally let his hands fall from where he had been holding them in the air “Yeah, I know it’s confusing.” Pac knew he was getting into a dangerous territory with the question that was on his mind but he had to ask “Do you have a pod? Or a partner? Or were you a loner?” He knew Fit might take it as a trap, as Pac was trying to get information if there were more merfolk to steal or trick into captivity. But he also knew the chance was high, even if it broke his heart, that everyone else was dead. Nanny-mers didn’t usually leave their home, much less their territory.

Sorrow immediately appered on Fit’s face, that deep sadness that made your heart ache. It quickly vanished, rage taking it’s place, his eyes narrowed and he bared his teeth.

“I used to have one. I used to have Spreen as well but you and your people took that from us as well.” he snapped, wrath filling each word to the brim.

Pac could feel his heart beat faster, a chill running down his spine at the anger.

“I’m sorry that they did that to you” Pac replied, his voice gentle and filled with sorrow. Humans had truly taken everything from him, his pod whoever Spreen was, in a way it had taken his roll as a nanny, not a lot of need for roles if you had no pod.

“I know...I know it doesn't seem like it, but not all humans hate merfolk or consider you lesser. The people here actually wants to help-”

“Get out” Fit suddenly hissed, surprising Pac.

“Are you sure? Like I said I can give Ramon something to help-” he tried, trying to get the conversation to go on a bit longer, but no such luck.

“Get out, now ” Fit yelled and raised his sail, and raised himself slightly, claws flexing. Pac knew a last warning when he saw one. His heart was beating so fast it felt like it was going to give out.

Pac raised his hands again at once.

“Okay, thank you for talking with me. I’ll get the fish” and then he quickly opened the door and left, closing it behind him.

Outside was Phil, it looked like he had been just about to open the door and enter. He seemed very relieved when he saw Pac come out without so much as a scratch on him.

“How did it go?” he asked, settling down again.

“He has calmed down a lot. Seems to be fine with me in there for a little while. Still distrustful however”

“It’s progress,” Phil replied with a light smile. Pac nodded with a smile.

“Yeah. I also have to go and buy catfish” Phil leaned his head to the side confused.

“Catfish?” he asked.

”That’s what they liked,” Pac said, leaving to find a basket he could carry the fish in before heading off to the market.

Chapter 7

Chapter Text

These humans were better than the white dressed ones. They gave both him and Ramon water and food, and even if they were stuck in this room so was neither of them tied up or muzzled and at least they were together. That was honestly the best thing about being trapped here. Ramon was back in his arms and so far so had none of them tried to rip him out of his arms yet.

Ramon was however sick, coughing and wheezing, he was thin but he still didn’t eat much. Pac kept bringing them food and Fit kept trying to get Ramon to eat. His boy was doing his best to eat but the illness seemed to have stolen away any joy of food making it more of a chore. The whole thing seemed to keep ending up with Fit having to eat most of Ramons leftovers as his boy couldn't manage to eat more without feeling nauseous.

Fit, despite not being sick, wasn’t doing very well either. He had used some of the water he had gotten from Pac to clean the wounds from his fight with the woman, and they looked fine, but his tail was hurting like crazy. He was doing his best to hide it, he didn’t want Ramon to be worried but damn did it ache. The things on his back covering the wounds were also feeling weird but he hadn't touched them yet. He didn't really dare, worried it would make the wounds under them worse.

Neither of them were sleeping well either, Fit barely dared to close his and Ramon kept waking up from nightmares, waking up screaming, chirping in panic and grabbing onto Fit so hard he almost broke skin with his blunt claws. Fit took naps when he no longer could fight the exhaustion, resting his eyes for a few moments before snapping back awake at some faint noise or from someone walking past their doors.

He didn’t really know what these humans wanted, they said they wanted to help but Fit didn’t believe them, they must want something from him, must be some hidden motive he just didn't know what.

Pac was the only one coming and going at the moment which was perfectly fine on Fit's part. Pac coming in with food and water and wanting to talk was manageable. He usually stayed far away and just talked until Fit got fed up at which point he would just leave. He wasn’t unpleasant to talk to, Fit didn’t trust him, but at least Pac was polite and actually spoke to him like he was a person, not like that white clothed woman.

Just thinking about her made his blood boil, her and that bastard Cucurucho.

Fit was speaking softly to Ramon, telling a story he had heard years ago to pass the time. When Fit wasn't scared about being hurt or his son being grabbed so was it honestly very boring. He didn't dare touch anything in this weird room so they just mostly just stuck to their corner and talked. Fit had a lot of stories to tell, but eventually you kind of got tired of telling them and he could tell Ramon was slowly getting bored of hearing them.

As he was telling the story so did the door suddenly open and Fit was immediately on edge. Pac came in here from time to time but Fit had a pretty good sense of time at this point despite not being able to see the sun, this was not the time Pac usually came here.

He flexed his claws ready for anything as the door was fully opened.

He immediately stopped as he caught sight of a pup and a human pup by the door.

They quickly walked in and closed the door quickly behind them, the little mer pup grinning mischievously while the human seemed a bit more reserved. How...how many pups were in this place?

Fit couldn’t help but feel his heart sink a little as he catches sight of the mer pup. Had she been stolen from her pod as well? Was her parents held prisoner around here somewhere, and she would be sold as some kind of pet eventually? It made him anxious, but she seemed healthy and happy at the moment at least. From Fit could see she didn’t look starved nor sick and scared which was good he guessed.

The mer pup had a golden tail like a goldfish, black glasses on her face. Fit had seen those types of human face wears before, Spreen had used to have a pair before they had gotten broken them in a fight.

The human pup was staying close to the door, she was messing with her hands seemingly anxiously while the mer pup was smiling like she had no worries in the world.

The pup opened her mouth and let out a greeting chirp, it was friendly, a question if he was okay with her being on his territory or not.

Without hesitation or even thinking Fit made the chirp back.

He had nothing against the pup being around here. He had been surrounded by pups most of life, but having a pup from a pod that wasn’t his own was a bit dangerous. If the parents found out or her own nanny mer saw this they might see him as a threat and attack. He dearly hoped that wouldn’t happen. He knew it also meant it might be safer for both him and Ramon to turn them away…But he couldn’t turn away a pup, his very soul denied him from doing such a thing.

The pup smiled even wider before looking up at the human pup expectantly.

The human swallowed nervously before she let out a chirp-like sound as well. It sounded wrong, it was clear humans weren’t made for mer vocalisation, but it was clear she was trying her very best to make the greeting chirp as well.

She looked nervously at Fit, waiting for his approval or disapproval of her presence.

This took a moment of Fit thinking, but in the end he chirped back. Maybe grown humans were mean and evil, but pups usually couldn’t do as much harm as a full grown one. And the mer pup seemed to want her here.

The human let out a sigh of relief and lifted her hands and signed in mer sign language.

‘Hi, I’m Empanada’ the mer pup then laid flat on the ground and lifted their own hands.

‘I’m Sunny!’ they ended their words with a call, the call that was used as their name under water.

“I’m Fit” Fit replied and moved his tail for a moment, showing off Ramon who stared at them with wide eyes. “This is Ramon” Fit let out his own call, this was followed by Ramon making his own.

The very moment Sunny saw Ramon she made play bow, asking for him to play with her. Empanada lifted her hands and signed again.

'Do you want to play?' she asked, looking at Ramon with a smile.

Ramon watched her and then turned to look up at Fit, look to see what his dad thought about this.

Fit watched the scene trying to take it all in and think carefully about it.

Ramon was still sick and even if Pac had kept bringing them food and water so was Ramon still a bit too thin. But Fit also knew this was the first time Ramon would get the chance to play with another pup similar to his age.

He had been their only pup in the pod when it broke apart, having to settle with playing with him or any teen or adult who had time for it.

Fit glanced down and met Ramon's eyes and he could see the excitement, the wish for playing.

There had not been much time in general, their mind being on survival and the world collapsing around them having left no place for it. No place for games. No place for joy. No place for a childhood.

“You can play. But nothing exhausting” Fit in the end said before he looked up at the two other pups “He’s still sick”

‘No worries’ Sunny signed. ‘We can play…play Cetus, Perseus and Andromeda’ she signed. ‘I’ll be Cetus, Ramon, you’re Andromeda and Empanada you’re Perseus’

Empanada looked around before quickly catching sight of this weird stick with hairs or grass at the bottom she grabbed it and held it like a weapon.

Ramon looked at them before looking up at Fit again. He was waiting for yet another go ahead, he was making extra sure Fit considered the situation safe enough to leave his dads side for a moment.

Fit just nodded before he laid down, arms crossed int front of him with his head on top, trying to act relaxed, hoping it would ease Ramons nerves. He deserved to have a moment of unbothered play, a chance to mess around with other pups without being scared of being hurt, taken or told they didn’t have the time for games. Fit was a bit anxious still but he tried his very best to not let it show.

Ramon crawled up onto one of the low platforms that was in this room. Both him and Fit knew the story, a princess about to be offered to the sea monster Cetus just to be saved by the hero Perseus. That was one thing that had spread from humans to the sea, stories. Usually scouts of the pod who were looking for scrap or mussels sometimes would get curious and speak with sailors, trading pearls for exotic fruits or jewellery, but at times more things were shared. Merfolk telling legends from the deep about squids bigger than ships called krakens, eels big enough to circle around the world, grand cities under water. In return the humans had told their stories of lizards that sprouted fire and flew through the air, about cities made out of pure gold, pirate ships that were controlled by ghosts. Stories were one thing gladly shared along with songs, languages, art and craftsmanship.

So the story was known to both Fit and Ramon and Ramons was acting his heart out.

As was up there he let out half hearted yelps of fear, getting into the roll of a damsel in distress. His role was mostly to lay still waiting to be saved which was good, not much moving around while still being involved.

Empanada stood in front of Ramon the stick raised while Sunny bared their teeth, sail raised and clawing at the air with their little claws. Fit can however see the smile at the edge of their lips.

The so-called ‘fight’ was on, Empanada mostly raising the stick while Sunny mostly slapped and sometimes scratched against it. Empanada jumped to side, and very lightly smacked Sunny’s arm making the pup snap around and snap their teeth at her with a fake growl.

Ramon was mostly responding with dramatics, with happy whistles when Empanada landed a ‘hit’ or chirps of fear and worry when Sunny hit the stick.

Suddenly Sunny launched herself forward and grabbed the stick and was able to yank it from Empanada's hands. It fell to the floor with a clatter.

Empanada having lost her weapon, let out a squeak and started running.

Sunny started to chase her, crawling after her while snapping their teeth in the air like a starved shark. Empanada was squealing happily as she fled going around the table in the middle of the room and started to run around it, Sunny doing their best to keep up.

After two rounds around the table she left and started to run back like she was going to grab the stick again, she got her hands around it but as she got up it got stuck on the platform Ramon was laying on. It yanked her backwards, made her loose her grip of it. She stumbled losing her footing and her knees hit the ground with a bad sounding thud and the whole game suddenly stopped. Sunny stopped the chase and let out a little worried chirp that was quickly repeated by Ramon.

There was silence for a moment before a sob escaped her.

Her eyes were suddenly leaking…Fit didn’t know they could do that or what it meant but the sobs escaping her throat told him enough.

Merfolks and humans may be very different, but their pups and their wailes were the same. She was upset and hurt.

Fit felt old instincts take over as he quickly made his way over and looked at her. No blood or wound as far as he could see, she might have just bruised a little. He didn’t know how to comfort a human, if it was similar to calming a pup, so he tried one of his tricks that used to work.

Fit turned and hissed at the floor and raised his sail and everything putting on a real show of being pissed. He brought out his hand and slapped it on the floor and using his claws scratched it. It didn’t leave a mark but it was the thought that counted.

He was putting on a whole show of his own of punishing this vile ground for hurting her. 'How dared it!?'

Suddenly he heard giggles.

He stoped his angry display and turned and looked at her, seeing her smiling at him.

Good. She was happy. A job well done.

She got up again, standing to her full height.

Fit grabbed the stick and held it back out for her to take. She wiped her face with her sleeves before taking back the stick and took a battle position again. Fit smiled.

“A real battle-human” he said and she laughed at that before her expression turned serious, getting back into her role as the hero.

Sunny watched them and let out a hiss and launched themselves at Fit, about to take revenge for his betrayal. Fit saw them coming from miles away and quickly grabbed them with one hand and with a quick turn of his wrist forced them on their back and he just held them like that with his hand over their stomach. They tried to wiggle free but had no luck.

Empanada took the chance and ran past them and right to Ramon. She quickly hugged him, and grabbed him under the arms and helped him down from the low platform and dragged him away a bit before placing him down.

'Saved!' she signed before she threw her arms up in the air in victory.

Fit finally let go of Sunny who spun back around onto her stomach.

‘Not fair!’ she signed with a huff and crawled up to the other two. ‘I want to play something else’ she told them.

‘How about hide and seek?’ Ramon suggested but the plans didn’t get a lot further as there suddenly was a knock and then the door into the medbay open. Fit snapped around looking at it and let out a danger chirp and the room erupted in movement.

Ramon quickly made his way over to his dads side, Sunny started to snap her head and body around trying to see the danger Fit had suddenly warned about. Empanada just looked in surprise at it all.

They all watched as Pac entered, with the basket he usually had fish in. As soon as he entered he just stopped dead in his tracks. Pac looked around catching sight of Sunny and Empanada and his smile just dropped and his eyes went wide.

“What are you two doing here?” he asked, he sounded panicked “Does your parents know you’re here?”

Empanada started to look guilty, looking down at the floor while Sunny just shrugged.

‘He was busy with boring things’ she told him with ease.

“Bagi told you not to bother Fit and Ramon” Pac replied, voice gentle but Fit could hear the worry at the edges of it.

‘Whats the big deal? They told us Fit was a nursery mer so what's the issue?’ Sunny asked, clearly not caring at all what this Bagi had said.

“They need to rest. And you’re not of his pod”

‘I greeted him’ Sunny defended himself.

He looked worried, Fit remembered that Pac had said he was not a nanny-human but his reaction was relatable. Pups could be a handful at times. And if Fit had been in his place and seen pups from his pod hanging out with a mer from another pod he would also have been worried.

“I don’t mind” Fit spoke, making Pac jump and snap around and look at Fit. “I hold no ill will to pups” pups were innocent, even if he didn’t trust or like the parents so didn’t he hate the pups. Nothing of this was their fault or problem to deal with.

Pac looked relieved at that, but some worry stuck to his brows.

“Thank you Fit” he said with a cute little smile. Fit immediately turned away to look down at Ramon who was staying at his side, but was looking up at Pac with a twinkle of joy in his eyes. Fit wasn't sure how he was supposed to feel about that.

Empanada moved up to Pac and started to sign.

‘Can we stay and watch a movie?’ she asked and then pointed at the box thingy on one of the tables. Pac looked at the thing she pointed at and then back at her.

“I dunno Empanada, I don’t want to leave you here alone” he then quickly looked up at Fit “Not because I think you’re incapable!” he quickly amended “Just-the other parents might be worried if I leave them alone with an unknown mer”

‘Then you should also stay’ Sunny signed ‘Then we won’t be alone’ she finished it with a smile. Pac threw yet another glance at Fit.

“I don’t think Fit would be very happy with-” Sunny turned away from Pac and looked right at Fit.

‘Pac can stay right?’ she asked, catching Fit slightly off guard ‘He’s really nice, and a good friend. He can stay right?’

Fit went dead silent as he just watched her and the looked back at Pac.

Pac...hadn't posed a danger yet. And it was very clear the pups liked him and he cared about the pups. Letting him stay right now would not change much he gussed, Pac had spent time around them before at a distance. Sure Ramon was actually out in the open now, Fit wasn't hiding him away like he had done before. But...Maybe it would be okay, just for a little bit.

“Sure, as long as he stays a bit away” Fit finally relented. Happy chirps filled the air at that from Sunny and Empanada had the biggest grin on her face. Pac looked surprised, like Fit had just pulled some kind of magic trick.

“O-oh okay. What…What do you want to watch?” he asked looking around.

‘Can we watch little mermaid?’ Sunny asked, Empanada nodded quickly and Pac seemed to cringe a bit at that response.

“I think Fit would call the little mermaid body horror” he replied with a tired smile.

'What about Ponyo?' Empanada asked.

“Same thing there” Pac replied without hesitation "No human or merfolk transformation" . Sunny huffed and rolled over on her back

“There should be more merfolk movies where they just stay merfolk” she replied before crossing her arms over her chest with another huff.

‘What about Barbie: The Pearl Princess?’ Empanada asked ‘They’re merfolk throughout the whole movie' Fit had no idea what most of these words meant. He knew pearls and princesses but what was a ‘Barbie’ and what was a ‘movie’?

Pac seemed to think for a moment.

“Yeah, I think that will be fine” He walked up to the thingamajig and pressed a button and it started to glow, quickly Pac started to press his finger on the ‘click,click,click’ sound maker and move something with his other hand. The thingamajig changed its colours and shape and then he suddenly stopped, waited a second and sound started to come out. Pac quickly pressed something and the sound stopped.

He turned around and looked at Fit and he seemed to think for a second before speaking.

“None of it is real. It’s like a play with art instead of acting it out” he tried to explain “Just know what you see isn’t real. I don’t want a repeat of ‘Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat’” Fit had no idea what that meant but he guessed it made sense for Pac, Sunny and Empanada by the way they chuckled.

“Okay?” Fit replied slowly.

“Just-just know none of it is like, real” he said and pressed a button again and the sound was back and the thing was showing moving pictures.

It...It was something truly fantastic. Fit just stared at in awe as the pictures moved. He had never seen anything like it before.

If he was honest he was mesmerised, Ramon also just looked at it with wide sparkling eyes. Pac just sat down on the floor and Empanada moved to sit in his lap. Sunny also moved closer to Pac, letting their head rest against this knee as she looked up at the moving pictures.

Seemed like both the pups felt safe around him, Ramon had mentioned to Fit that Pac had been kind to him as well during the rescue from that other place, had given him water and his hoodie to warm him.

Maybe…Just maybe Fit could ease up around him, just a little bit.

Fit gave Pac one last glance before he laid down fully on the floor, and for the first time in days let his muscle relax fully and he just stared a the moving pictures taking a moment of rest.

Chapter 8

Chapter Text

There was a knock at the door, the current dramatic play between Empanada, Sunny and Ramon came to a screeching halt.

They had come in for a couple of days now to play, they seemed to enjoy hanging out with Ramon and apparently their parents weren't too worried at this point.

The door opened and there was Pac. Standing behind him giving Fit a look that could kill was Richarlyson, slightly behind him on the floor was yet another mer pup. She had a purple with a tail that reminded Fit of a lionfish. She also had some kind of red headwear on top of her head. Pac was holding some papers in one hand, while Richarlyson was holding some kind of cup with pens sticking out.

Fit had started to learn more human words, Empanada and Sunny kept brining with them books with pictures of items and their names, slowly teaching Fit what all these human things were.

“Is it okay if Richarlyson and Leo also are here? Leo's dad is busy and wants to play as well” Pac asked, looking at Fit. Leo made a little greting chirp while Richarlyson was just staring at him without moving a muscle.

It made sense, last time Fit had seen the boy was when he had been threatening his dad, so Richarlyson being on edge around Fit did make sense. But it was also surprising that Pac had brought his own kid here. He guessed it was fair in a way, Pac was around Ramon all the time so Fit being around Richas was kind of levelling the playing field. Pac getting to see and be around Ramon and Fit getting see and be around Richarlyson.

It was honestly calming him down a bit, Pac trusted Fit around his kid, so Fit could give some more trust to Pac around his.

“Sure” Fit replied, before making a greeting chirp back at Leo as well. Pac smiled and held up the papers to show them.

“We took with us some pens and paper to draw,” he explained before laying down the papers on the floor. Richarlyson quickly put down the cup as well before sitting down and grabbing a pen and a paper. All the pups soon was in a circle drawing, getting fully emerged in it, drawing on the pieces of paper with much excitement and gusto.

Fit didn’t draw but he did look at what they were making. He couldn’t recognize a lot of the art, he was unsure if it was because the kids were bad at making the drawings or if it was depicting something human he didn’t know yet.

Pac wasn’t drawing either, instead sitting in the chair in the room and looking down at the kids.

Fit nor Ramon had ever drawn like this before, paper and water didn’t mix well. But Ramon seemed to be having a good time, drawing happily on the paper, at times looking over at Sunny and Empanada to see what they were working on.

“How does your wrist feel?” Pac suddenly asked, making Fit turn and look at him, meeting his eyes. Fit lifted his arm and started to bend his wrists feeling it. It was feeling okay, still ached a bit if he bent it a lot but the pain was pretty much gone at this point.

“It feels good, no issues there” Pac smiled in response.

“That’s good!” Fit looked at him for a long moment. Pac had said he wasn’t a nursery-mer, and that humans didn’t have pod structure, but was Pac more like…A human version of a healer? Fit was still trying to wrap his head around all these new things.

“If you had a pod role what would it be?” Fit asked, trying to get a better understanding for where he should place Pac in his mind.Pac went quiet and seemed to think for a long moment.

“Scout probably, I’m good at being sneaky and getting stuff” he responded in the end. At his response a chirp escaped Sunny, making them turn and look at them.

‘When I grow up I will be a scout!’ they signed ‘I’m going to find so much treasure and so many knick-knacks! I’m going to be rich and so pretty!’Leo scoffed.

‘When I grow up I will start following my apas boat and protect him from pirates and krakens!’ Leo said, puffing out her chest, and flexing her claws, trying to look strong and dangerous.Richarlyson lifted his hands next.

‘I will be an artist!’ he said with a smile and then looked at Empanada seeing what she would say.

'I would like to become a baker or have a restaurant by the sea! Me and Mama Nikki would run it and she could get me fresh fish and crayfish everyday!’ Pac nodded before looking down at Ramon.

“What about you Ramon?” he asked, Ramon looked at him and seemed to think for a long moment.

“Nursery-mer or battle-mer’ he in the end replied. Pac smiled at the answer.

“Like your dad then”

‘Yes, like my dads’ Ramon replied and then went back to drawn what looked like a coral reef. The ‘s’ at the end of dads didn’t go unnoticed, but no one commented on it. Fit, not wanting to stay on that certain topic for too long turned back to Pac.

“That woman I saw on the first day here, what role does she have?” he asked “She was not a battle nor a nursery mer, so much I can tell just by looking at her” No scars was a pretty clear give away to that. Pac shook his head.

“Her name is Bagi and she doesn't have a roll. She goes after human structure and isn’t really connected to a pod like that” Pac explained “She’s a detective” Fit just looked at him with confusion.

“What is a detective?” Pac was silent again, clearly trying to find a way to explain it. It was getting quite annoying having to ask so many questions about humans. Why did they have to be so damn complicated and had to have invented so many things with so many names?

“Her job is to help collect evidence and punish humans that hurt merfolk” Pac explained “Her brother Cellbit got kidnapped and rescued similar to you and Ramon and she’s trying to stop it from happening again to other people” Pac seems to think for a moment before continuing “She hunts for bad humans I guess you could say”

‘Hunter’ that's something Fit could understand. Though, the whole thing was a bit weird in Fit’s mind. She…She was punishing people who kidnapped merfolk? Wasn’t that what Pac and the rest of the humans here were doing right now? Holding him here against his will? If Pac was to be believed Bagi was seemingly not held here against her will but because she wanted to be here.

“Where is the brother now?” he asked slowly, observing Pac closely.

“He hated humans, more than you even.” Pac said with this awkward chuckle “He refused to let us humans help him. We have one healer mer here called Foolish, and he helped him and they got along pretty well. Foolish has a pod a couple of kilometres out at sea so when Cellbit was good to leave he just joined that one and found his partner amongst them. So he's just out there for the most part”

“Good to leave?” Fit asked. Pac looked at him and seemed confused by the question.

“Yes, have...Have we not explained that?" Pac asked and Fit slowly shook his head and Pac seemed to cringe a little "When he was healthy enough to survive on his own”. Pac said, Fit kept just looking at him and Pac seemed to get a bit nervous and quickly kept speaking “The same is going to happen to you. As soon as you and Ramon are healthy enough you can leave”

“What if I want to leave now?” Fit asked, voice lowering as he stared intently at Pac. Pac seemed to tense under Fit’s harsh gaze and he swallowed nervously.

“It’s not up to me to decide when you can leave” Pac qucikly replied “But Ramon is still sick, so it might not be the best idea to send you two out yet. But it’s going to happen, you will be let go and we can even try to find you a pod that might take you in if you want”

So it was up to them to decide when Fit was allowed to leave. Fit wasn’t even quite sure he believed that. They were just going to let him go? Just like that? After giving them so much food? After trying to heal them? This all could be a lie to try to stop Fit from getting any ideas about escaping. The tale of Bagi and her brother could just be little lies trying to paint the humans and this place in a better light, a lie to trick Fit into stop fighting.

Fit knew what merfolk were worth, the white clothed lady had talked about it a lot. No one would want to buy or bet on a sick and hurt mer, it would make sense that they kept him and Ramon around without hurting them while they recovered… But what if it wasn’t a lie?

If they told the truth and just wanted to help? The pups here seemed happy enough, and he remembered Bagi telling him he was not in danger the first day here. Pac was polite and seemed nice. The pups liked him, Ramon liked him a lot. But what…What did they win on it?

Fit didn’t trust it, not fully, not yet at least.

“And Bagi stayed here?” he asked, continuing the conversation.

“Yeah, there are like, two groups.” Pac replied “Those that are at sea and those that stayed at the centre. Foolish keeps switching between them since he likes to hang out with Tubbo, Tina, Jaiden and Philza here but also likes to go out and hang out with the pod at sea” a chirp suddenly left Leo making them look at her.

‘I’m done!’ She held up her drawing. It was of a ship and on the top of it stood a man with black hair that was smiling with a love heart next to his face. In the water was a drawing of a mer with a golden like tail, this one also had a love heart by his face. The two people were looking up at each other, clearly in love.

Pac smiled at the drawing.

“Is it Vegeta and Foolish?” She quickly nodded. Ramon looked over at it and an expression of surpris appeared on his face.

‘Your dad is a human?’ he asked, pointing towards the man on the ship and Leo nodded.

‘Yes! My apa is captain of a big ship and he goes on adventures with his friends. My dad and I are waiting here for him to come back!’ she explained happily.

Fit looked at the drawing as well with furrowed brows. He hadn't really considered the idea of a human and a mer loving each other and taking care of a kid. He hadn’t met humans before they killed his pod. He had seen ships but when they had appeared he had he and pups had just hidden just to be on the safe side. He knew some pods liked to speak to humans and trade but as a nanny-mer Fit had always stayed away. He knew humans and mer could be friendly; he just didn’t know they could be… this friendly. Actually loving each other and being partners.

‘My other pop also loves a human..I think? They fight a lot,’ Sunny signed. ‘He tried to drown him a couple of times’ Fit couldn’t help but let a surprised laugh escape his throat at that.

“Welp, nice knowing someone is out there keeping up the old legends true” that was stories he knew, mermaids getting annoyed by humans and drowning them in response. Sunny snickered.

‘He keeps following his boat to sea to make sure they are okay now, or going off alone so right now it’s just me and pa Tubbo’ Ramon looked down at Leo's drawing again, his eyes locked on the boat and frowned.

‘I don’t like ships’ he signed ‘They’re bad news’ Leo huffed at his words and slightly lifted her lip, clearly not liking them.

‘Not my dads ship, that's a good ship!’ she snapped. Richarlyson suddenly joined in.

‘Not dad Felps ship either, the only thing bad with that ship is that they have a bad driver’ Richarlyson said with a laugh that Pac joined in on, seemed like some kind of inside joke.

Ramon looked between the two of them with this anxious look in his eyes before he frowned his nose ridge wrinkling. Sunny, who was next to him glanced up and seemed to notice it.

‘A ship hurt my pa” Sunny signed, looking at Ramon. She seemingly has caught on that he was feeling like an outsider with him disliking ships ‘He wanted to check it out, he loves machines, and the propeller cut him really bad. He got really hurt and scared me. But this place helped him heal and get better’ she ended her story with a smile.

Ramon looked at her, and then glanced up towards Fit. Fit met his eyes, there was some kind of emotion reflected in those brown eyes but he wasn't sure what. Ramon looked back at his drawing and seemed to hesitate for a long moment before signing.

‘A ship killed Spreen’ Fit felt his heart drop. ‘He tried to save dad and me’

There was suddenly complete silence in the room as all the pups just looked at Ramon. There was no longer sounds of pens scribbling or ruffling of papers. They all seemed to be in a state of either sadness or shock as they looked at Ramon.

Fit wasn’t sure what to do, if he should stop Ramon from talking so openly about it or just let him do his thing.

The first one that dared to do or say anything was Empanada.

‘Mer traffickers ship and fishing ships can be really bad’ she agreed. ‘But not all ships are bad’ most of the pups seemed to agree but it rubbed Fit the wrong way. Like a thorn being pushed slowly into him, digging deeper and deeper into his skin.

“You should stay away from ships” Fit said, voice low and making them all jump and snap their eyes towards him “It’s not worth the chance. A ship might be bad, might be good, don’t chance it”

If there had been no ships so might Spreen still be alive, hell maybe the whole pod would have been fine. He knew the kids were just talking but he didn’t want Ramon to get any ideas of actually approaching ships. Humans and all their ships had caused all of this. These pups might no understand this, but Fit understood this very, very well.

Suddenly Richarlyson laughed as signed.

‘Don’t touch that boat Nemo’ he laughed and most of the pups laughed with him, catching Fit oof guard.

“It’s a movie reference,” Pac explained before Fit even had the chance to look confused. Fit looked at Pac and saw that look in his eyes. There was sorrow in there at Ramons words, him seemingly not having as easy of a time at laughing it off like the pups had. Maybe he was better at understanding the situation than the pups. Fit had an issue fully grasping the horror that had happened to them, so he wouldn't blame pups for not fully grasping it, or not wanting to stay on the topic for too long.

‘We should watch Finding Nemo!’ Empanada said and Pac quickly shook his head.

“Not day, maybe another time” there were disappointed sighs from several pups before they just went back to drawing, and Leo began on her next picture.

Fit huffed and just laid down flat on the floor. In the end, he wasn’t a nanny to most of the pups and kids here. If they wanted to be around ships and boats he couldn’t really stop them, but it left him with a bad feeling.He just wanted to protect them, keep them safe, even if they weren’t from his pod, even if some of them weren't even merfolk and had nothing to fear from boats so did he want them to be safe.

He flick his tail back and forth, his nose ridge wrinkling at the pain it caused him and he quickly stopped.

“We can stretch a bit if you want” Fit turned his head and looked up at Pac and lifted a brow. “I saw you moving your tail and it looked like it hurt”

Fit remembered him mentioning stretching before. He wouldn’t mind getting some tips of how to ease the pain in his tail, it was starting to really bother him. But he didn't want to leave or go to far away from the pups. He glanced towards Ramon and the others and Pac seemed to notice.

“You will still be able to see them. I would suggest swimming a bit as well but if that makes you too anxious we don’t have to”

“I’m not going further away than arms length” Fit replied, putting a clear boundary.

“That’s fine, we can do it here” Pac got up from the chair and walked a few steps away from the kids and sat down, Fit followed stopping in front of him. He preferred when Pac sat down on the floor so they were more similar in hight. Fit was technically taller, but that only really counted in the water, on land he could really just push his body up with his arms.

“I’ll try my best to explain and show you what to do” Pac said, and then they began.

They started making some movements, Fit felt aching muscles strain and bend. It hurt a bit after having them looked in that same position for so long. Pac tried his best to explain how Fit should stretch without having a tail of his own.

“It’s going to take a while for it to get back to normal, but do this everyday and it should feel good soon again,” Pac explained. “I could also look at your wounds if you’d like” Fit couldn't help but snicker as. he looked at Pac.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t be more fit as a healer than a scout if you were a mer?”Pac laughed at that, and it was such a pretty noise.

“Yes, I’m sure,” he said with this big smile on his lips that made Fit heart beat weirdly “I know how to fix scrapes and some stretching, I don’t know how to heal big injuries. Also seeing a lot of blood makes me…anxious. But just fixing your bandaids won’t be a issue. It was me who cleaned the wounds and changed the bandages before.” Pac’s smile then dropped “Or I can get Foolish when him and Tubbo are done and ask him to do it if you prefer a mer checking up on you”

Fit already knew the answer to that. He would prefer Pac, someone he knew, and if he had already fixed his wounds once before, surly he could do it again without issues. He also trusted Pac more than some stranger.

“You can do it." Fit said before his eyes narrowed and he gave Pac a dangerous look "But don't try anything sneaky, or I'll rip you limb from limb” he ended his words with ever so slightly lifting his lip, showing of those sharp fangs. Pac looked at those shape teeth and seemed to freeze for a second. It was just a warning but this look of real fear flashed across his face.

“It will…Sting a bit too removed some of it, but it shouldn’t hurt to bad” Pac said, voice quieter. Fit hid his teeth behind his lips again and shrugged.

“That’s fine” Pac stopped stretching.

“Okay just lay down flat” Fit stopped as well and laid down, crossing his arms and resting his head on top of them. Pac started to move around the room getting stuff and then sitting down next to Fit.

“It’s going to sting a bit when I remove the band-aids. Just warning” he said, and Fit felt him grab one of the things that was stuck to his back, that he guessed was called ‘band-aid’ and started to pull it. It felt weird how his skin stuck to it, it was similar in a way how octopuses would use their arms and just stick to you. It hurt a bit, but not too bad.

Pac removed it fully and let out a hum as he got a look at the wound underneath.

“It’s healing nicely. I think some of the band-aids can be completely removed” he said and kept going, removing more band-aids.

It felt nice in a weird way, Pac’s warm and gentle hands going over his back, changing the wrappings and cleaning it. He kept talking, saying exactly what he was doing, explaining when Fit didn’t understand and warned when something was going to pinch or hurt. He was quick, working effectively.

He had pulled off yet another band-aid and was using a little cotton ball to clean the wound out.

“I'm sorry to ask, and you don’t have to answer but I was just wondering, was Spreen your partner?” Pac suddenly asked. Fit tensed for a moment at the question.

He had tried his best not to think too much about Spreen. They had taken care of Ramon together but they weren’t really…close? Fit was the one who had mostly watched Ramon, even if it was his role to stay with the pup so had Spreen kept away a lot, and left Fit with their pup for long periods of time. He had flaws, that was for sure, but he had also offered his life for them without a second thought. He was a good person, and Fit missed him a bit, even if he was very flawed. Fit knew Ramon's relationship to him was also a bit weird, with Spreen not being very warm towards him and not around a lot. The longest time they had been by each other was after the pod broke apart, the most time Ramon had spent with him had been on the run, with Fit and Spreen arguing all the time and Spreen refusing to stop of food and kept telling them to keep moving, to scared to stop.

It was not good last memoirs of his second parent.

“He helped me raise Ramon kind of, but I wouldn’t really call him a partner in that way” Fit explained, he didn't really know how to explain it "It's complicated". Pac was silent, removing the cotton ball and putting a new band-aid on.

“I understand” Pac finally replied “Thank you for telling me” Fit glanced up at Pac from the corner of his eye. His eyes were on Fit's back, he seemed to be in some deep thoughts.

“Do you…have a partner?” he didn’t know he had even asked, or why asking that question made him feel a bit nervous.

“Nope, still single” Pac replied. Before Fit had the time to process that a sudden coughing fit escaped Ramon, it shook his whole body and it was like he had a hard stop. He just kept coughing and coughing. Sunny and Empanada both looked at him with worry and started letting out chirps. It was clear they didn’t know what to do. Sunny grabbed his hand and kept chirping and Empanada hit him lightly on the back like she was wondering he had gotten something stuck in his throat.

Fit moved away from Pac and up to him, at once Sunny and Empanada moved away to give him space. Ramon just kept coughing. Fit lifted his hand and patted his back, trying to give him comfort and let him know his dad was right by him.

All the other pups just looked at Ramon seemingly scared and worried.

“Richas! Get a glass of water!” Pac told him and Richarlyson quickly got up to his feet and ran out into the hallway. Pac got up and started to look through cabinets, looking for something.

The coughing fit finally ended and Ramon just laid down on the floor breathing heavily. Fit curled around Ramon, trying to hide him with his tail. The pups took it as a clear sign to move away, Pac however had gotten some kind of bottle from a cabinet and a spoon.

He sat down next to Fit and Ramon and poured the liquid from the bottle onto the spoon.

“This is going to help with the coughing” Pac said and held out the spoon and moved it towards Ramon, clearly about to try to make Ramon drink it.

As it got closer Fit got a whiff of it. He didn't recognize it, it smelled like nothing he had ever come across before. It just smelled...wrong, disgusting, and he immediately growled and hit the spoon with the back of his hand, whacking it out of Pac’s grip and making the foul smelling liquid spill across the floor. Pac flinched and looked at Fit with wide eyes.

“It’s coughing syrup, it’s going to help-” he tried to explain but Fit didn't care.

“It smells wrong” Fit snapped back. He didn’t trust it.

“I know it smells weird, and it taste bad, but it will help with the coughing-”

“I’m not giving him it” Fit replied, curling his tail tighter around Ramon, and baring his teeth.

Pac looked at him with this helplessness and despair in his eyes.

“Fit please-”

“Leave” Fit cut him off voice low “He just needs rest and some peace and quiet” He was trying to not sound threatening or angry around the pups, but he really wanted them all to leave. To not look or be around his sick pup. Sure Fit let Pac help him, but Fit was and adult, he could take anything that was dished out at him, but he wasn't as sure about Ramon. Fit cared more about his pup than he did himself and he was not going to take any risks.

Pac seemed to understand that Fit was not going to bend and that he was trying his best to stay calm but was quickly loosing his patience. Pac stood up from the floor.

“Okay, well leave so you can rest. Just know if you need help just call for me” Pac said and then turned to the other pups. “Lets give them some room to rest, grab the drawings” he said as he quickly crouched down and picked up all the pens and left over papers.

Empanada helped carrying some of the papers so the merfolk could use their hands and arms to pull themselves forward, however Sunny stopped for a second, holding one of her papers. She looked at it for a long moment before she turned and looked at Fit and went over to him and held the paper out towards him.

Fit carefully grabbed it and took it from her hand and looked down at it. On it he saw Pac, Sunny, Empanada, Ramon and him all with smiles on their faces watching a movie from the computer.
When Fit looked up Sunny was already with the rest leaving and the door closed behind them without another word.

Fit and Ramon were alone in the room again. It was quiet again.

Fit just looked at the little drawing in his hand, and then glanced down at his son. Ramon was still laying on the floor he was breathing better but he was completely exhausted and at times one or two coughs snuck their ways out of his throat.

Fit felt his heart sting and just laid down so he was facing Ramon, pushing his forehead against his, feeling how hot it was. He just grabbed Ramon with one arm and pulled him into a tight hug.

Chapter 9

Chapter Text

Fit was woken up from his slumber by these loud harsh coughs and the feeling of Ramon shaking against him. Fit’s eyes were open in an instant and he looked down at his boy and it was like cold water had been thrown over him chilling him to the core.

Ramon was shaking like he was suddenly cold despite the temperature not having changed. Fit grabbed him and was going to hold him in an attempt to warm him up just to realise he was burning up. He was so warm, way too warm.

Ramon started to cough again those slimy sounds that refused to stop. He reached his hands up holding them over his chest and between the coughs weak frightened chirps escaped his throat, calling for his dad, calling for help. And Fit was just there, right there by his side watching him struggle without knowing what to do.

He reached out, combing his fingers through his hair, hoping it would comfort him, would be enough for the moment, hoping those horrible coughs would stop soon. Fit started to make the rumble, that deep rumble that shook his chest, trying to convey he loved him so, so much.Hoping that the love for his son would be enough, that it would somehow heal him.

Fit moved his head down, pressing his forehead against Ramon’s. He was burning up. His forehead was hot and wet with sweat.

He didn’t stop coughing. It got worse and worse and suddenly he started to retch.

Fit’s eyes went wide and he pulled away, watching as Ramon threw up on the floor.

He…He didn’t know what to do. What could he do? He felt this tingly feeling in his fingers, and his heart was beating fast in his chest as cold panic washed over him as he realised what was going to happen.

He was going to lose him. The last thing he had was going to be taken from him. His son was going to once again be ripped from his arms and this time he would never be able to get him back.

He had to do something . Do anything . Do everything .

Which meant he had to go to his last option.

There were no options left, he had tried to keep his son safe from human hands but now he was backed into a corner. He didn’t know what humans could do, if they could heal things like this, but at this point he would allow them to do anything as long as his son lived. He had to try to ask if humans could save his son from death. No matter how much hated it and didn’t trust them, so must whatever plan and scheme they had for him be better than death, better than his son coughing up his own lungs.

“Stay here.” Fit quickly told him and rushed as fast as he could towards the door and threw it open.

“Pac?!” he called out just to come eye to eye with a mer he had not seen before sitting right outside the door and Fit just froze.

The mer had blue eyes and blond hair was framing his face. They just stared at each other in surprise and Fit got this deep feeling of regret.

‘f*ck, f*ck, f*ck’ He had f*cked up, what if they thought he was trying to escape or look for human to attack, or they took this as him going on someone else’s terratory.

Fit started to move back and the mer quickly rose up onto his arms.

“No, wait-” he let out a greeting chirp and Fit stopped in the doorway. Fit looked at him. His position was not aggressive, he still looked surprised and curious. Fit hesitantly made a greeting chirp back.

The mer smiled warmly at him, he seemed to also relaxed slightly at the friendly greeting.

“Hey mate, I don’t think we have met before, I’m Philza, but you can just call me Phil” Fit looked at him, he didn’t seem aggressive or like a danger.

“I’m Fit” Philza seemed to just light up at that, his smile getting a bit wider.

“Nice to meet you. Did you need something or do you just want to look around?” he asked. He didn’t seem upset or even worried about Fit having opened the door and peeked out, he sounded almost excited.

“I…I need Pac.” Fit told him and Philza’s smiled dropped slightly and he started to look worried “Quickly” Fit added on.

He needed Pac. He needed him now .

Philza seemed to understand that.

“I’ll get him. Just stay here and wait and he’ll be with you soon” Phil said, and he seemed honest enough.

“Thank you” Fit said and started to back away into the medbay again. Phil gave one last smile.

“No worries mate, we’re here to help” and then he took off somewhere.

Pac was sitting on the sofa taking a sip of his monster before he sighed and leaned back on the sofa.

“It feels like…Like I’m not getting anywhere” he said, speaking out loud to the other two in the room.

“You’re doing great,” Bagi replied without even looking up from her computer. She was laying on her prone pillow and was quickly typing away on the keyboard, busy with work. “He let you work on his wounds, that shows he trust you quite a bit”

“But he doesn't let me near Ramon and I’m getting worried” Pac put the can down on the sofa table “Ramon is just getting worse”

“It is his job to be distrustful” Mike said from where he was scrolling on his phone while laying across the couch on the opposite side of Pac “He’s just trying to keep his son safe”

Pac sighed. He understood that, and that Fit had bad experiences with humans but still.

“Still I’m worried it's going to slow. Ramon seems to get sicker and sicker each time I see him” Pac was worried that when Fit finally trusted them enough to take a look at Ramon so would he already be past the point of no return.

Mike stopped his scrolling and put the phone down, letting it rest on top of his chest and looked towards Pac.

“We might need to start considering separating them and making sure Ramon gets healthy,” Bagi scowled and actually turned her head towards them this time.

“That will put his trust in us back to zero” Mike scowled in return.

“If we don’t the pup might die.” he hissed at her “And what if they hate us? Fit is stretching his tail, his wounds are healing without signs of infection. We could keep them while they hate our guts and then let them go and never see them again”

Mike had a point. Making sure Ramon was safe and alive was the number one priority…But the idea of betraying Fit like that after trying so hard to build a bond of trust, to have Fit hate him a-and other humans, of course , didn’t sit right with him.

But if there was no other way they might have to consider-

The door flew open and in came Philza.

Everyone turned and looked at him in surprise. Philza had been the one to watch the medbay door right now, so him being here and leaving his position was a surprise.

“Phil?” Bagi asked, looking at him with wide eyes.

Phil didn’t look at her, instead stared up at Pac.

“Fit opened the door and called out for you” Phil said, still panting from having rushed over here. “He seemed scared by something and told me it was urgent”

Pac was already out of the sofa and moved past Phil and started to jog down the hallways. He was going as fast as he could, breathing fast while his heart was pounding.

Fit had never asked for him before, asked for anyone or anything before like this. So something must have happened for him to not only call for Pac and then also speak with Philza.

He soon came to the medbay door and opened it.

“Fit?” He asked but it was like his voice was stolen from him when he saw the scene before him,

Ramon was curled up on the ground, his breathing was shallow and he kept grabbing at his chest. Pac saw the vomit and could smell it but he didn’t really care right now.

Fit stopped his rumbling and looked up at Pac, he was not even curled around his kid. He was just by his side.

“Help him” Fit said, his words were not a demand but a desperate plea “I don’t care what you must do, or what you’ll have me do, just save him”

Pac’s eyes went wide.

‘It was that bad?’ he thought in horror. He looked back at Ramon who was not even keeping his eyes opened, it was like all his focus was on just simply trying to breathe.

He…He needed help with this.

He quickly fished his phone out of his hoodie, he had explained what it was for Fit a couple of days ago, still he held it up for him to see.

“Is it okay if I bring Mike and Foolish here? They’re not dangerous, I promise” Fit just looked down at his boy, pressing his forehead against Ramon’s.

“Do what you have to do” Fit replied and he just sounded so defeated. Like he had completely given up, like he had just signed his soul to the devil. He then started up the rumbling again.It made Pac’s heartbreak but he couldn’t do much about that right now.

Pac quickly dialled Mike’s number despite knowing he was in the same building, he didn’t have time to go and fetch him, and he was the only one with some medical knowledge in the building right now except Foolish.The phone rang for barely a second before Mike picked it up.

“What’s going on?”

“Fit’s gonna let us work on Ramon and he’s really bad. Get Foolish and come here now” he could hear ruffeling on Mike’s side, he was probably getting off the sofa.

“Won’t he attack us?” Mike asked, but despite asking that so could Pac hear him moving, clearly about to go to Foolish room to get him. Pac glanced at Fit who was just looking at Ramon. His eyes were just…empty. He knew there was nothing else he could do. A warrior who had met a foe he couldn’t defeat and the realization had clearly shaken him. Pac swallowed down the lump in his throat.

“He won’t. Just get here” Pac said and ended the call. He ran over to the sink and cleaned his hands, put on a surgical mask, and pressed the button to make one of the platforms rise.

He then moved to Ramon’s side and looked down at the pup. He was so little, so sick and so clearly in pain it felt like his heart was being ripped apart.

“Fit, can I hold Ramon? Please” Fit lifted his head up and looked at him. There was still distrust in them, still this deep seated worry but he nodded.

“Just help him” he replied, the words coming out from between gritted teeth. He hated this, it was clear every fabric of his being hated this-

Pac quickly scoped up Ramon into his arms…He barely weighed more than the last time he had held him.

He was way too warm and still he was shaking like he was in arctic water.

Pac put Ramon on the platform.

“Stay still here” he told the pup as he started to move around to get stuff. Fit slid closer to the platform and lifted his hand up, grabbing onto Ramon’s and holding it tightly. Letting his son know and feel that he was still there-

Suddenly the door opened and in came Mike and Foolish.

As soon as Fit laid eyes on Mike he scowled but didn’t do much more. Mike’s eye brows furrowed but he didn’t say anything either he just walked up to Ramon while Foolish followed behind him.

“What is the issue?” he asked, looking down at the pup. Ramon looked up at Mike and the grip around his fathers hand tightened.

“Pneumonia probably” Pac said, finally finding the stethoscope. Ramon had been coughing like crazy, so that was his first guess.

“I thought you ruled that out?” Mike replied, looking up at Pac. “You did a blood test, right?” he asked, getting a mask for himself and Foolish.

“Possibly the cold weakened his system and then the pneumonia had an easy in? Or our test was faulty? I don’t know”

“Maybe one of the cops helping me with Fit had it and it stuck to him and Ramon got it that way? Or one of us or the kids had it?” Mike said and rubbed his chin.

“The real question is who f*cking cares” Foolish suddenly cut in sounding annoyed, putting an end to the speculations. Mike sighed.

“We should check the machines and everything later,” Mike said. “We need a new blood test, but for now we should use an x-ray to check”

Fit just kept looking between them clearly lost for what was going on.

Pac rubbed his hands and grabbed the stethoscope, trying to warm it up at least a little bit. He then put it in his ears.

“It’s going to be a bit cold” he warned and put it against Ramon's chest “I want you to take as deep of a breath as you can and then let it out”Ramon did so at once, wincing as he pulled the air into his lungs and then let it out. Pac listened and he could distinctly hear a crackling that should not have been there.

“A crackling sound” he announced. Mike turned and looked at Fit a soon as he heard that.

“We need to get him out.” he said suddenly “For the x-ray and just in general. We’ve taken too many risks, we can’t let anyone else spread a disease or be around. Might also be better not having him here worrying and I won’t have to worry about being attacked while working”

“I won’t attack,” Fit replied with a hiss, his voice dark. Mike gave him a look.

“I’m willing to talk about trust with you when I’m not trying to save your pup, the thing that you’re most protective of in the whole world and would attack me for in a blink of an eye for”

Fit looked at them, but kept looking up at mostly Mike, clearly he was most suspicious of him. Which wasn’t a surprise, Fit had tried to attack Mike, twice , and was probably worried Mike would try to get some kind of revenge if Fit left him alone with Ramon.But as Fit was looking up at him suddenly Foolish slid forward, going up next to where Fit was holding Ramon’s hand.

“I’ll watch him. I’m great with kids” Foolish said with a smile, before putting the mask over his mouth and Pac quickly agreed.

“You know Foolish, remember Leo talked about him” Pac explained looking at Fit “He’s also a grandma to another pup and Richarlyson. He’s good with pups”

Fit looked at him for a moment, still clearly worried. He glanced up at Ramon who was looking at his dad, his eyes changed between looking at him and Foolish. Then he seemed to come to some kind of decision and he let go of Fit’s hand.Fit kept holding his tiny little hand and his eyes widened slightly. There was a moment of stillness as Fit seemed to think. Mike was the one to break the silence in the end.

“Either you listen to us, trust us and let us help your kid, or you don’t trust us and we’ll not be able to help your kid. You can’t do both. Decide now ” Fit’s brow furrowed and he seemed to think for a long, long moment.

There was another bout of silence, all that could be heard was Ramon’s raspy shallow breaths.

Slowly did he let go of his son’s hand and move away.

As soon as he pulled away did Foolish get closer and lifted himself up crossing his arms on the edge of the platform and looked at Ramon.

“Hello” he said, friendly and the made a greeting chirp before he then scowled “Damn you look bad” Mike, without hesitation took off his flip-flop and smacked the back of Foolish head with a loud 'whack!'.

“Ouch!” Foolish yelped and a weak raspy laugh escaped Ramon but Fit just seemed more worried at Foolish comments.

Pac quickly walked up to Fit.

“Come with me, I’ll show you to a room you can stay in”Pac then made his way to the door and held it open, Fit followed him without saying anything, only throwing a glance back at his son as the doors to the medbay shut.

He followed Pac through the hallway, to a door which Pac held open for him and they entered the room. They did it all in complete silence.

There was a little pool at the end of the room, it wasn’t big, just big enough to sleep in if the mer preferred that over sleeping on land. There was also a mattress in case of the opposite. They had also brought in a second mattress in this room in case Ramon wanted his own to sleep on, later on, when him and his dad felt safer in the center.

They had prepared this room early, having hoped they would be able to convince Fit to leave the medbay and sleep here eventually so they could do work in there again. When they had thought about that idea so had the possibility of Ramon not coming with right away never crossed anyone's mind.

Fit looked at it all in silence before moving forward and touching the mattress, pressing his hand down and feeling the softness of it.

They had tested having waterbeds in the past…until sharp claws and thin layers of plastic showed itself as a bad combination.

There also were a couple of bath towels around, for mer who didn’t want to sleep in a wet bed. Much else wasn’t in the room at the moment, they would be able to get more things if Fit asked for it but for the moment it was pretty empty. Pac wished he had gotten a plant like a cactus or a rose or something, or a painting, anything just to liven it up a bit and not make it feel so…So cold.

Fit looked towards the water but ignored it in the end, just crawling up onto the mattress and laid down.

Pac sat down at the edge of the bed and turned so he could still look at Fit. He thought it was best to try to explain the situation as well as he could.

“We think he’s sick with something called pneumonia. It's a sickness that is in the lungs that's making him cough and giving him a hard time breathing. We’ll have to check which kind of pneumonia it is, but hopefully we’ll be able to feed antibiotics which you eat as a pill a…a pearl sized thing, and hopefully that will heal him after a while” Fit was looking and clearly listened to him, he didn’t seem confused, seemingly having understood the basics of what Pac meant.

He seemed to think for a second before he finally spoke.

“Is he going to live?”

That was the question that was on his mind. He didn’t seem to care much about the technicality of it all, he seemingly would be fine with the explanation being straight up magic as long as his pup survived.

Pac could never promise anything when it came to medical questions. But he had high hopes for Ramon’s recovery and it was best to not stress out Fit even more. Gods know he had been under enough pressure already.

“We’re going to do our very best. Most people recover from pneumonia without issues”

“He’s thin” Fit told him, swallowing hard “I tried to get him to eat but…he tried but he couldn’t ” Pac had his suspicions. He gave them both a lot of fish and still Ramon’s ribs had kept being shown so clearly after so much time without any hints of improvements.

“I know, I can see it and felt it when I pick him up” Pac told him, his voice comforting. Maybe Fit was beating himself up for it, when it in fact had been nothing he could have done about it. “We’ll give him pills that might make him feel less sick and make it easier to eat, worst case we can use a thing call an IV and give him nutrients” Pac explained, before tuning the topic towards the mer he was talking to “Fit would you be okay with getting vaccinated, and drawing some blood? It’s to make sure you’re not secretly sick with something, and vaccination will do so you can’t get some of our human diseases'' Fit just looked at him for a second, staring right into his eyes, like he was searching for something before completely laying down.

“Sure.” he replied with a sigh “You already fixed my wounds so why not” Pac smiled gently even if it was hidden behind his mask.

“Thank you Fit” he said and quickly got up and back to the medbay. In there Foolish and Mike were talking to Ramon, asking questions. Pac ignored them right now, trusting them to have Ramon’s situation under control while he handled Fit. Pac grabbed the stuff he needed and then quickly returned to Fit, and made sure everything was in order. He started with the blood test. He cleaned the spot on the inside of Fit’s elbow.

“You’re going to feel a pinch," Pac warned before taking the blood. It was quick and Fit didn’t even seem to care. Pac guessed when you had been stuck with the federation, um, “hospitality” so was any little pain pretty much nothing to him. Blood was drawn and vaccines used. Fit was probably going to be sleepy in a moment as it took effect.

Pac didn’t like this side of Fit, he’d been this growling, hissing energy filled fighter this whole time and now he just seemed…So docile. Even when he had been with the federation he hadn’t been this low spirited.

Maybe it was because for the first time he had nothing to really fight. What was he going to do? Somehow kick pneumonia's ass?

Pac didn’t know what to do either, it was a bad situation and he had no idea of how to comfort Fit. If Pac had been in his place, forced to give his kid up to people he didn’t trust and just hoped they healed him and didn’t put him through something even worse he was pretty sure he would have had a breakdown by now.

“It’s going to be okay” he eventually said, “Do you…Do you want a hug?” Pac asked and held out his arms.

Fit looked at him for a long moment. Pac could see that he was thinking hard about something before he suddenly rose up onto his arms and let his head fall, his forehead landing heavily on Pac’s shoulder. Pac almost fell backward from it but was able to steady himself, one of his hands landing on a non wounded part of Fit’s back and let it stay there. Not fully a hug, but he still hoped it made Fit feel at least a little better.

“We’re going to do our best. Me, Mike, Tina, Foolish, everyone here are going to do our very best to make sure Ramon gets healthy again” he said. Fit didn’t respond, he just let his head stay there on his shoulder and it felt like they stayed like that for hours and Pac just held him providing what little comfort he could give the mer.

Chapter 10

Chapter Text

Fit hadn‘t slept more than closing his eyes for a couple of minutes which barely counted as rest. For the most part he had been either lying awake staring at the wall or moving around in his room. He hadn't gone into the pool in his room yet he had just watched it for a moment. It wasn't big just big enough for him to sleep in.

He had found a window in his room that had been covered over with fabric. It couldn’t be opened but it gave him a chance to look out over the street outside, seeing people walk and go about their day. It was weird looking at the human world, seeing so many things he couldn't understand and didn't even know what they were called. It was like he had been transported to some kind of dream world.

As he was looking so did some humans spot him and either stared and pointed with interest and some even raised their hands and waved which hand made Fit duck back from the window and hid, not wanting their eyes on him or their attention. It was bad enough he had to figure out the humans in the centre's intentions; he didn't want to interact with more humans than he had to.

He had gone back to just laying on the mattress staring holes into the wall. He missed Ramon and his heart felt like it was rotting inside his chest from the worry. To not have Ramon with him and close enough to protect, to not know how he was doing or what the humans were doing to him. It was tearing him apart. It hurt so much and made him restless, while he also knew he couldn't do anything.

He could try to sneak out and find him, but Mike had told him to trust them and do what they say or not and risk losing Ramon to sickness so at the moment he was doing what he had agreed on. That he would leave Ramon in their care and trust Mike and Foolish to take care of his pup. He begged his trust had not been misplaced. They had kept saying they were trustworthy, that all they wanted to do was help him and his pup and he guessed it was now it was going to be proven if it was true or another lie from the humans. Prove if they were better than the federation or not.

There was a knock at the door and Fit immediately lifted himself up onto his elbow as the door soon after opened and Pac stepped through.

Fit was grateful for him finally showing up, Pac being his way to information to Ramon but also just grateful that he now had something to focus on and do instead of just staring holes into the wall.

“Hey Fit” Pac greeted, “Got some catfish for you” he said, stetting down the basket towards him. Fit grabbed the fish inside and just held it for a moment while he kept looking up at Pac.

“How is Ramon?” he asked, before tearing into the fish, having his priorities in order. Ramon came first, before his own health, before his own life, before everything .

“He’s doing better, we have given him some cough syrup and we’re giving him antibiotics right now.” Pac began “We’re double checking the blood tests to make sure we’re treating him the right way. We also gave you a vaccine against one kind of pneumonia and from the tests so far we think it’s a very common form of pneumonia. But we want you and Ramon to be separated for a while longer just to make sure it’s not spreading to you or other people” Pac then gave him a warm smile and continued “We might be able to let you meet him soon but it depends on the results from the second blood test. There is another mer centre a bit away from here driven by some french people and we sent them one of our blood tests to check in their machines incase ours are faulty, and getting the result back might take a day or two”

Fit gave him a nod. He had a bit of a hard time keeping up with the explanation but he understood it well enough. They were trying to make sure they were healing Ramon and make sure Fit didn’t also get sick.

Pac’s words did help calm his aching heart, Ramon was better and he might be reunited with his son soon. This news helped lift some of that heaviness he had carried ourinde inside his since yesterday.

“Okay.” Fit replied, having finished the fish “Thank you for treating him”

“No need to thank me, this is what we and centres do” Pac replied at once with a smile “Thank you for trusting us”

Fit felt his heart warm at that and without thinking he gave Pac a little smile back, in response Pac’s expression lit up his smile going even wider and his eyes glimmered. Fit felt his heart jump in his chest, but he decided to ignore it.

“Do you want to just hang around the public pool?” Pac then asked pointing towards the door out of Fit’s room “Just might be good to not stay in this room, some of the other merfolk here might show up also”

If that was supposed to temp Fit to leave it failed. He only knew the pups and sure, he got along with them well enough but he hadn’t met any grown mer except Phil and Bagi. One of which he had fought as a first meeting. He had no idea how aggressive these mers were, their pups were well good pups and kind, but he didn’t know if that also applied to the parents.

“I don't want to encroach on someone else's territory” he told Pac who in response shook his head.

“The mer-centre, Chume labs, is unclaimed and no mer is allowed to claim it. It’s no man's land, no one will get angry at you for being there unless you start trying to claim it or start fights.” Pac explained but Fit was still hesitant and Pac seemed to just sense it because he kept talking “You don’t have to if you don’t want to, and if it gets too much you can always just go back in here” he said motioning to Fit’s room.

Well…He had nothing better to do he guessed, so he might as well get a look around. He also had to thank Philza for getting Pac for him if he saw him.

Fit got up, putting his palms down on the floor and pushing himself completely up.

“Sure, show me the way” Pac seemed to get extremely happy at Fit simply agreeing to leave this room and actually socialising with other people.

Pac and him left the room and Pac led him down the hallway and into the big room. Fit recognized it, he had been here the first day, this is where he and Bagi had been fighting.

He couldn’t see her anywhere, they seemed alone here for the moment. He didn’t really know what to do or say if he saw her, if he was supposed to apologise, if it was all in the past of another fight would flare up. He hoped he didn’t have to fight her again, he wasn’t really in a battle mood. He put that thought in the back of his mind and instead started to really take in the room.

The pool was gigantic, giving plenty of space in case you wanted to swim around. Fit moved away from Pac’s side and up to it.

He looked down over the edge, down at the still water and could see something on the bottom. He leaned down, laying flat on his stomach and pushing his head under the surface breathing in water for the first time for he didn’t know how long. He looked down at the bottom seeing how deep the pool truly was.

At the bottom was sand, and in that sand grew a couple of green plants, there also were rocks that seemed to have been made to look like coral. There were also a lot of rocks and boulders. He turned his eyes towards the wall, seeing holes in the walls, seemingly carved out to allow mers to sleep or hide in there if they felt like it.

Fit had his suspicions for a little while but now they were confirmed…this was not a battle arena. It was too deep for humans to get a good view, too decorated, too…made for merfolk to be happy. It was made for them, fitted to make them comfortable, for their enjoyment not for the enjoyment of malevolent humans cruel eyes.

Fit raised his head out of the water and looked at Pac who had sat down on a chair by the water. He met his eyes and smiled

“You can go in if you want” Pac said “I’m gonna stay here”

“Have you ever swam here?” Fit asked, pointing at the water. He knew some humans could swim but not all. Pac quickly nodded.

“Yeah, but it takes a bit to prepare and change from-” he motioned to himself, his hoodie and pants “to swimming gear so I’m just staying here right now” Fit nodded and turned back to the water and just slid into the water.

It felt so good .

To feel his dry skin once again wetted by the water. To not carry around his heavy body weight everywhere and feel light in the water, no longer pulled and chained down. To no longer feel like an eel amongst snakes. He was back in his element. It wasn’t the sea but Poseidon knew it was close enough.

He made a hard whip with his tail pain at once flaming up at the motion and a quiet hiss escaped him. Right…Still hurt tail.

He took it a bit easier, moving his tail slowly as he made his way down to the bottom and he started to look around. There were some cave-like structures put up with the boulders, like a little rock home for those who didn’t like the caves in the walls.

They also laid what looked like red and blue rings on the bottom and more stuff. He guessed these were toys he didn’t recognize. They were all very colourful seemed and judging from how many there were so did probably a lot of pups play here.

One thing there he actually recognized as a treasure chest, he opened it, seeing what looked like a lot of coins, necklaces, rings and other jewellery. These kinds of things used to be found on old ships. Scouts brought them back to their pods showing how they glittered and glimmered, they also loved to propose partnership with them, dressing their partner with pretty glittering jewels.

Fit touched them, quickly realising they were fake. Plastic. Disappointing but understandable. From what he had understood so was gold expensive and important to humans so keeping so much just laying around would have cost a lot.

Fit moved around in the water for a bit, but to be honest…It was a bit boring he was here all alone. And he also to his surprise realised he wanted to go back up. Back up to the surface. Back to Pac.

He turned back, going up to the surface again and soon his head was above water, his lungs filling with air once again and soon the sounds of the surface met his ears and he heard people talking. He turned on his spot catching the eyes of Philza with two pups next to him that were signing at each other.

Philza noticed him first and waved at him.

“Hello Fit, how’s it going?”

There was a little ramp down into the water, making it easy to get in and up if you didn’t have the arm strength to pull yourself up, but it didn’t really need that. Fit moved closer to the edge and grabbed the side and lifted himself up from the water again with ease despite once again feeling heavy.

The pups stopped playing and just looked at him, Fit ignored them for the moment and kept his eyes on Phil.

“Hello Phil” he greeted back, making his way over towards them. However he made sure he was a good bit away from the other mer. Just to be safe, last time he met a mer here it didn’t end well.

Phil didn’t seem to mind and looked down at the two pups. There was one boy with blond hair and one girl with black hair. Their tails were similar to their Philza’s just that the girls had purple patches instead of green and the boys had yellow. The boy also had scales that made it look like his face was painted like a skull with dark lines across the mouth and around the eyes.

“These are my pups, Talluah” he put his hand on top of her hair and ruffled it, before moving it over to the boys blond locks and ruffled his as well “And Chayanne”

Fit made a greeting chirp and they quickly made back towards him. Phil then looked back up at Fit.

“How’s Ramon? I heard from Foolish he wasn’t doing well” Fit had to fight the urge to not cringe.

He didn’t want everyone to know Ramon was sick, that he was in a weak and vulnerable state. People kept telling him he was safe here, that people around here were no danger to him or his kid, but it was hard to shake that feeling when he had been on survival mode for such a long time.

However, he didn’t mind Philza knowing that much, he was a mer, and a father, and he had helped him before. So he had earned a bit of his trust.

“Getting better I think.” he replied, looking up towards Pac for acknowledgement and agreement. Pac nodded immediately.

“We’re treating him and he seems to be getting better but it’s still early in the recovery” he replied “We’re also waiting for the french to send their blood results”

As he ended his words, Tallulah moved up to him and was pulling on his sleeve, before asking him to follow. Pac smiled and got up from his chair and followed her over to what looked like a couple of chests.

With the three of them now distracted, Fit turned back to Phil looking him in the eyes.

“Thank you for getting him to me so quickly,” he said, genuinely thankful got Phil’s help. If Fit had gone after Pac he would probably have gotten lost or run into some kind of issue or fight.

“Don’t mention it.” Phil replied with a smile and laid down on the floor with his arms crossed under his head “I’m glad Ramon is getting the help he needs” Phil was silent for a moment before continuing “I talked to Sunny and she seemed worried about you and Ramon”

Fit let out a deep sight as his heart stung. Poor pup, they shouldn’t have to worry about stuff like this. Sick pups was for parents and nanny-mers to worry about, not pups. Pups were supposed to play, to have fun, to enjoy their youth with minor worries.

“Why me?” he then asked, realising Phil had said to him and Ramon. Fit hadn’t been sick, he had been…well…not good with his tail still hurting and some wounds not fully healed yet but he was better than Ramon.

“She said you seemed stressed mate,” Phil replied. Fit just snorted at that.

“Having a sick pup and being around humans all the time will do that” Phil was silent for a moment, like he was thinking.

“Can I talk to you about something?” he asked suddenly in a serious tone and Fit raised a brow at it, not sure where this conversation was going.

“Sure…” he replied slowly.

”Tallulah has asthma,” Phil said looking at him.

Fit knew what that meant. Maybe all illnesses that affect humans don't exist amongst merfolk but asthma did . He had heard it claimed some pups at times, them being unable to breathe both in water and land, making them suffocate or just having issues keeping up or doing a lot of physical things.

In the worst cases amongst the pups some merfolk parents searched for humans, knowing them as miracle workers, however merfolk were not blind to the danger or reaching out to humans, knowing some were truly evil. However, when your kid's life was on the line you would sell your soul to the sjörå and risk your own life to make sure they lived.

Maybe that’s what Phil had done? Reached out to humans asking them if they could perform miracles and save his daughter. Philza continued his story.

“We’re hoping she’ll grow out of it but it might never happen. She needs humans help to survive.” he then motioned in the air, like he was motioning to the centre as a whole “These people here have helped me keep her alive . I’ve been here for years, I know them. They’re good people, they are trustworthy . They have treated me with nothing but kindness and respect.” he explained.

Fit nodded slowly along, showing he understood. Phil seemed to be certain that what he was saying was the truth, and he seemed to have a good head on his shoulders. Fit was a bit scared to admit it but he was starting to believe that as well. Each day they kept proving they were better than the federation, each day they proved again and again they meant him no harm, but still…Trusting was…it was just so f*cking hard. That doubt and worry stayed in the back of his mind at all times like a thorn from a sea urchin he couldn’t pull out.

“I know you haven’t known me for long, but you can rest.” Phil continued ” You’re no longer with those bad humans, you’re safe”

Fit looked at him and gave him a tired little grin.

“I’m a nursery mer, it’s my job to worry” he said with a chuckle before turning and watching Pac and the pups empty the box that seemed to have been full of toys of some kind “Am I the only nursery mer here?” he then asked, turning back towards Philza.

“Yes you are” Fit let out an amused snort.

“Would explain why they keep letting the kids near me, another nursery mer here and they would have an anxious breakdown” Phil let out a loud laugh at that.

“Some people are taking the chance while you’re here. And the pups also really likes hanging out with you and if pups wants something they’re hard to stop” Phil explained before turning more serious “If keeping the pups with you all the times stresses you out tell me and I’ll tell them and the parents to stop”

Fit looked at Phil, looked him up and down. He was not old, close to his own age. He had some scars, but most of all he had this feeling of wisdom around him.

“You’re a pod leader?” he asked and Phil let out a snort and got back up onto his arms.

“No, I'm a roving mer, until I got the pups. Since then I have been here” he said, slapping his hand on the floor.

“You seem like a leader of this place to me,” Fit said with a grin.

“I’m just listened to and respected”

“…like a leader” Philza smacked him playfully on the arm.

“Shut up” Fit hit him in the side with his shark tail in response.

“You even got the age down” Phil replied playfully making a quick play bow before just shaking his head and laying down again.

“You want to brawl?” he said jokingly, “You and I can’t be that far apart in age, if I’m old then so are you”

Their conversation was put on halt when a door got opened somewhere and soon after came yet another mer, his hair a mix of blond and brown, following him was Sunny.

As soon as she caught the eyes of Fit did she make her way over quickly to him with a smile.

‘You’re out of the medbay’ she signed happily, almost shocked at seeing him anywhere that wasn’t the medbay, and Fit could only laugh.

“I guess I am” Sunny made a happy little spin before looking towards the mer that she had come with. He looked tired, his hair was out of place like he had been sleeping even if by Fit’s calculations it was afternoon.

‘This is my Pa Tubbo!’ Sunny signed before she pointed towards him. Her father made his way closer before lifting a hand in greeting to Fit. ‘Pa! This is Fit!’ Sunny signed to her dad.

“Hello King'' after that he turned towards Philza “Phil get me food I’m hungry!” Phil rolled his eyes, at his request. The mer didn’t seem to have any kind of reaction towards Fit, he didn’t make a greeting chirp either, but maybe he was just too tired to realise. Philza’s reaction to the request made Fit assume this was not very uncommon.

“You’re an adult, hunt your own fish” he replied, he sounded annoyed but there was amusem*nt dancing at the edges of his voice.

“But I don’t want to, I want to play games and work on my music.” Tubbo groaned.

“Get something to eat first, it’s more important” Phil replied “Did you just wake up?” he then asked, sounding something between a mix of disappointed and irritated. Tubbo seemed to ignore that last question.

“I’ll just order delivery from the fish market,” he said, throwing a glance back from where he had come from.

“Bruh” Phil said in a deadpan tone. “How’s Sunny going to learn how to hunt if you can't?” Sunny just giggled and then turned to Fit and tried to play tackle him. Fit allowed himself to get attacked, falling to his side whilst Sunny laid over his side, pinning him down. Tubbo’s and Philza’s conversation continued.

“I’m a great hunter” Tubbo huffed “You know I am, I could knock you out old man.”

“I’m sure you could, you’re stronger than me” Phil agreed, sounding earnest before he looked towards Fit. “Tubbo has rejected mer society for the most part, he likes to live like a humans as much as he can”

“Why would you do that?'' The question was out of Fit’s mouth with zero hesitation and was absolutely filled with judgement.

Why would a mer choose to live their lives up here on the surface amongst humans? Why would they go that path instead of living in the sea like they were made for? Fit didn’t mind being on land for a longer time, but to reject the mers way of life, to live on land most of the time in this place must be so different from what most are used to.

“I like machines! We can't exactly build trains and dj under water, can we?” Tubbo hissed, like Fit was a fool for even asking such a thing.

“I don’t know what either of those are,” Fit replied.

“Exactly!” Tubbo replied loudly “Merfolk don’t know or do stuff like this! Only humans can appreciate my craft!”

“I appreciate you and what you make,” Phil pointed out.

“We’ll that’s just given, you’re basically as human oriented as me” Phil just burst out laughing at that.

“No, I’m absolutely not ” he denied with conviction.

“You live here, has no pod and is married to a human, I would call that pretty f*cking human society integrated if you ask me!” Phil just grinned.

“At least I have a platonic husband and catch my own fish,” Tubbo huffed.

“Okay, okay, okay, stop shoving your relationship status down everyone's throats” Tubbo huffed, seeming agitated.

“It was you who brought it up mate!” Phil defended himself but Tubbo had already looked past Philza and was looking at Pac.

“Pac can we play some music? This place is to quiet” Pac who had been talking with Tallulah looked up at him and gave a thumbs up.

“Sure, let me just connect my phone to the speaker” As they did whatever that all meant, Fit made a quick spin, shaking Sunny off him. She let out a little yelp as she fell off but was quickly giggling.

‘Want to play with me?’ she asked but Fit just shook his head.

“Don't your dad want to play with you?” he looked up at Tubbo “Maybe tag so he’ll learn how to catch something of his own” Tubbo turned and looked at him while wrinkling up his nose ridge.

“I see how it is. All the pensioners are ganging up on me! I see how it is! Jealous of my youth huh!? Jealousy, my back doesn't crack like a kit-kat when I wake up every morning!”

Suddenly this music rang out making Fit jump in surprise. He had not been expecting it but Tubbo and Phil seemed none bothered by the sudden sound. The startle quickly passed and Fit started to listen to the music.

He had never heard anything like it. It felt like it was shaking the building, and his chest, it had so much energy and power behind it, Fit had never heard music like this before. He turned towards the sound, seeing Pac setting up something.

“What is that?” he asked, making Pac look up at him.

“Brazilian funk” Pac replied, “If it bothers you I can turn it off” he quickly added and Fit shook his head.

“I like it” Pac smiled and went back to setting it up.

Fit really liked it, sure merfolk sang but playing instruments and stuff like that was usually for merfolk who lived near shores, where it was easier to play and make instruments sound nice.

Singing was more common, Fit still sang lullabies to Ramon and remembered songs he had learned and heard throughout the years. Song the merfolk themselves handmade and sea shanties overheard from sailors.

But nothing compared to this. This music. He actually really liked it, maybe he could get a way to listen to it, get this 'speaker' Pac had called it. He should ask Pac about it. He also wondered what more music and instruments humans had.

He moved his head slightly to it, while his fin moved back and forth to the music, while he looked at Phil and Tubbo who kept talking. Sure, they weren’t pod, but it felt good to talk to merfolk once again. Speak to people who understood him fully.

Chapter 11

Chapter Text

Tubbo was a bit of an unusual mer, when Fit spoke with him it felt more like talking to a human than a mer. Tubbo had shown him his room, a room that had its own computer, some little machine that was for DJing, it was for music that was as much as Fit had understood. Tubbo had also been keeping this big machine thingy, with wheels in his room. It was clearly a machine. It was pretty long, and seemed to be big enough to lay on. Like some kind of long thin bed on wheels or something.

“It’s my prototype” Tubbo said as he noticed Fit staring at it trying to figure out what he was looking at “It’s going to be a merfolk wheelchair” he explained happily, “Soon I will be able to go where humans go”

“You should lower your expectations” Philza responded, also being in the room “Even humans in wheelchairs can’t go anywhere, society is even less fitted for such a long wheel chair”

“Then I’ll change all of society as well” Tubbo repiled and Philza just laughed.

“Sure thing mate, good luck with that”

Fit looked at the wheelchair with a thoughtful expression, before looking back at Tubbo.

“You really do want to be a part of the human world” he stated, a bit thoughtfully.

“Yeah, we’re so similar, us being without legs shouldn’t stop us” Tubbo declared with conviction.

“But their world is so different from ours” Fit pointed out “And won’t being on land all the time annoy you” Fit hadn’t seen much of the human world, he had seen the centre, some videos on the computers. He had also looked out of the windows, looking at the world go by, trying to figure out what it all meant. The humans seemed so…busy and loud? He didn’t know how to explain it. It was all so much .

“I’m used to it at this point” Tubbo replied, going over and looking at the prototype as well. “And it’s not like I’ll never go back to the sea, I’ll just spend more time out of water, and it’s not like I’m the only one with connections to land” he glanced at Philza and he rolled his eyes.

“My kids need human help, and my platonic husband is a human, but I don’t really care much for humans society”

“Why not?!” Tubbo wailed. “Human society is so much more fun! They have computers! They have music! They have trains! Phil! Come on!” Phil just laughed.

“I’m an old timer Tubbo, I prefer the basics and old ways of doing things, you have fun though”

Fit was quiet for a moment before he slowly spoke, not even sure if he should ask this.

“What…What is it like being a partner with a human?” Fit asked, looking at Phil.

Phil seemed to think for a moment, tapping his claw on the floor as he thought.

“If you wonder romantically you should ask Foolish or Bagi about that, but in general? You’re…bound to land in a new way. We can be on land and in the sea, humans can only be on land, and at short times in the water, even we who lucked out and got together with sailors are still bound to land in some ways.” He thought for a moment more before continuing, a little grin on his lip.

“Missa at times when we’re together just lays down on the floor and crawls around to be ‘on my level’” Phil said with a chuckle. “There are also some culture differences, but once you learn those it get easier” Phil then furrowed his brows and leaned his head to the side slightly “Why do you ask by the way?”

Fit quickly looked away from him and looked at Tubbo working on the wheelchair instead.

“No reason” he said, ignoring how his brain screamed ‘lies’ for some reason or how he suddenly felt very nervous “Just curious”

“Just curious,” Phil repeated in a teasing tone. Fit looked back at him.

“Don’t make up gossip” he hissed “Stop making up stories, I’m just trying to figure out this world” Phil, shrugged with a grin.

“I didn’t mean anything with it” he said looking all smug “Why are you getting fired up about this?” Fit huffed and looked away, Tubbo grimaced and made gag noises.

“Shut it” Philza told him. Tubbo stopped making the sounds but rolled his eyes.

Fit laid down flat on his stomach, trying to hide how red his cheeks were at the moment were.

It's been about three days by now and Fit couldn’t help but fidget, his tail going back and forth as he waited. It had been both three slow and fast days. He had missed Ramon terribly but Pac had kept him updated, even showing him the text he had gotten from the french centre from some Pierre guy confirming that their centre and the centre here's blood tests matched.

While Fit had been waiting for the chance to be with Ramon again so had he hung out with Pac, Philza and Tubbo, mostly Pac.

But today was the day Ramon and Fit would be reunited.

Phil was by his side, just looking at him with a little grin. The other kids were setting up a movie in the human lounge area so they could all be watching a movie together to celebrate..

There was the sound of the door of the medbay opening. And out came Pac, and in his arms was Ramon. Ramon turned and looked towards his dad and this big smile appeared on his face and his eyes just seemed to lit up.

He…He seemed to be full of energy.

Ramon let out several happy chirps at his dad, so excited he started to wiggle in Pac’s arms forcing the human to put him down on the ground so he wouldn’t accidently drop him.

Ramon quickly wiggled towards him and Fit just as fast took off towards him stopping a bit ahead of him.

Ramon reached him and threw his arms around his neck. Fit lifted one arm hugging him as he made a quick turn around so he was on his back and was hugging Ramon close to his chest.

They just stayed like that. Fit was hugging Ramon close to him, holding onto him tightly like he was never going to let go of him ever again.

Ramon was letting out excited chirps while Fit just started to rumble happily, making his whole chest shake.

“He still needs to take antibiotics, and he can’t do too much moving around, but other than that so will he be fine in a while” Fit gave Ramon one last squeeze before letting him go, letting Ramon move away.

‘Where are Sunny and Em?’ he asked and Pac pointed at the room where they were setting up the movie and with that so was he off. Fit just looked at him go with a smile.

“Seemed to have made himself at home” Philza commented, watching the little pup as well.

“Mike and Foolish said he had been well behaved and polite and started to eat more” Pac then looked at Fit “He had missed you a lot however” Fit puffed out his chest.

“He’s my beautiful baby boy, of course he’s polite, he’s the best pup in the world”

“Watch it” Philza replied with a grin “As a father as well think I might not agree with that”

“Though sh*t then” Phil hit him on the shoulder with a slap. Fit just laughed in response.

Philza slid after Ramon but Fit didn’t follow just yet. He stayed behind and looked up at Pac.

“Thank you for helping” his words were earnest. He knew that without the human's help Ramon would have died, he would never gotten the chance to see his happy little boy again. And right now he was alive, moving around and chirping joyfully, and it was thanks to these humans.

Pac just smiled.

“You don’t have to thank me again, I’m just happy to help” he replied like it was not a big deal.

Fit just shook his head.

“You saved my pup, I can never thank you enough” Pac rubbed the back of his neck a bit embarrassed by the praise it seemed like.

“I didn’t even do much! It was mostly Mike and Foolish-”

“Don’t sell yourself short” Fit stopped him, refusing to accept Pac speaking bad about himself “You’re amazing. You’re also the one who patched me up” he then lowered himself down slightly, getting closer to the ground “And…I’m sorry, for attacking you the first day”

The first day had replayed in his mind for quite a while now, trying to figure out what had been going on when he now had more context.

Back then hadn’t known what had been going on, and attacking Pac had seemed like the only option. Today he was so glad he hadn’t killed him back then, he couldn’t imagine himself ever doing that at this point, the idea of even hurting Pac made his gut turn.

There still was a part in the back of his mind worried this would all turn out to be some big grand trap, but at this point there were too many things disproving that. But…He couldn’t help himself, however , he did trust Pac.

It was weird to think about, but except Ramon so was Pac probably the only other person he could say he fully trusted. Everyone else was gone and the rest he didn’t trust just yet, but he had a feeling he would soon be able to name more people.

Fit also knew he had to apologise to Mike and Bagi later, but that was for later.

“Don’t worry about that” Pac said with a smile “I’ve been through way worse! You didn’t even hurt me, just threatened me” Even if Pac didn’t seem to be upset about it, Fit still felt bad.

He had threatened, put the claws to his throat, a common thing in mer culture to demand surrender and Pac had responded correctly, responded as a mer would had and would most likely have upheld their traditions, but Fit hadn’t trusted it.

Pac had been threatened by him and his pleas had been ignored, and still treated him with nothing but kindness. He was way too good to him.

Before Fit could say anything more so started Pac walking again.

“Let's go in before the movie starts without us” Fit quickly followed him into the room, all the pups were inside along with Tubbo, Philza, Foolish and Mike.

They were still working on getting the movie to start. Even if humans had built machines, so did they seem to still struggle with them sometimes.

“Turn it off and on again” Tubbo said, making Sunny giggle.

“You think I haven’t tried that?” Mike huffed, pulling out the little shiny circle thing and blowing on it and gently rubbing his shirt over it before putting it back into the little machine.

He looked at it and then the screen that hung on the wall of the room, light up and something started to play to the sounds of excited watchers.

Pac sat down and Fit moved so he was pretty close to the pups. As he got setted so did Empanada lift a bowl and held it up to Fit.

Fit looked down into it, seeing white clouds like things inside it. His brows furrowed in confusion and the looked back at Empanada. She put the bowl down and started to sign.

‘It’s called popcorn. It’s tradition for movie nights’

“It will make you sick if you eat too much since you’re not used to human food,” Pac warned, grabbing one and eating it. Fit looked up at him with a little smirk.

“I can eat more than fish you know”

“I know” Pac responded “Just saying, that someone once drank way too much chocolate milk and was sick for three days straight” he glanced at Foolish and he immediately got a reaction from the mer.

“Hey!” Foolish snapped, grabbing a handful of popcorn and throwing it at Pac, at which Pac raised his arms, using them as a shield “Listen pal, it was really good and I didn’t know you have to ease into eating human food!”

“We tried to warn you!” Pac replied loudly.

“Yeah! And Tubbo said it was okay and he’s been here longer than me!”

“And you trusted him over the people who work here?” Phil asked, and then looked at Tubbo. Tubbo just smiled.

“Listen, to my defence, it was pretty funny” Foolish just looked at him with a look of betrayal.

“That's crazy!” he yelled “You set me up you son of a bitch!”

“Shut it” Mike suddenly snapped “Movie starting”

There were a couple of more huffs and giggles but then they all quiet down.

Fit looked at the popcorn in the bowl and reached out to take some, just to a second later was his hand touched by Pac who had reached down as well while his eyes were on the screen.

His fingertips dragged over the back of Fit’s hand for less than a second. He snapped his head down, seeing his hand laying there against Fit’s. His eyes trailed along the arm up to FIt’s face and quickly pulled his hand back out of the bowl and Fit immediately missed the touch. Pac’s cheeks turned red and he hid his hands in the hoodie pocket and looked back at the movie while sinking partly down into his hoodie, hiding half his face behind the blue fabric.

Fit suppressed a chuckle and took three popcorns and put them in his mouth.

They tased….weird? And a bit salty? He couldn’t really compare it to anything and they had a weird consistency in his mouth. It wasn’t horrible, just really, really weird.

“What movie did we pick?” Pac asked aloud.

Leo turned around from where he was laying at his fathers side and signed.

‘Finding Nemo’. Next to him was next to Ramon who was currently busy talking to Sunny, signing at her, seemingly paying no mind to the movie.

Pac went stale and threw a worried glance at Fit immediately . Fit didn’t know why he suddenly looked worried, but before he could ask what was up so did the two clown fish on the screen talk…Unrealistic, but whatever, movies were similar to fairy tales, or so he had been told. Almost anything could happen.

The movie was going fine, two fish waiting for their children to hatch, messing and goofing around. Nothing worrying was happening…until…The barracuda.

The mom swam down in the movie to try to protect the children. Bad move. Bad move, but she still did it to protect her children or die trying.

It…It was a bit of a blur after that.

The barracuda attacking, sharp teeth, it all happened so fast, it was barely a fight and when the dad woke up so was…The partner was gone, dead. She had tried to save the kids and had died.

Fit felt his whole body tense up as his heart started to beat painfully inside his chest, beating hard and fast to the point it ached. Partner gone. Left alone with the pup.

Similar to similar.

“Hey” he suddenly heard and he snapped his head towards the person coming eye to eye with Pac. He looked worried. “Let's go out for a moment”

Fit looked around looking at the pups.

“Other parents are here, it will be fine” Fit looked at Ramon, seeing he was still talking to Sunny, signing to her and had seemingly missed the whole scene.

Fit looked back at Pac and nodded and they quietly slipped out of the room back into the main pool area without making any sound.

It felt better here, here where there was more space and a bit brighter than the dark movie room. Pac sat down on the floor, getting on Fit’s level.

“You seemed to be getting stressed, so we can hang out here for a while” Pac said with a smile “Our own little party”

Fit let out an amused snort. “It’s always a party when you’re around” Pac chuckled, before his expression turned more serious.

“Things…stress me out at times as well like that”.

Fit huffed.

“I was not stressed out” Fit replied puffing out his chest “It-it just catched me by surprise” Pac gave him a knowing grin but seemed to go easy on him.

“Sure thing” he replied, before he lowered his voice “We’re big men, nothing worries us”

Fit just burst out laughing.

“That’s right.” he replied, lowering his voice as well while grinning. “Nothing gets to us”

There was silence for a moment before Pac spoke again.

“But if something did get to you you’re not alone in that. I have my own scars as well, and things reminding me of it stresses me out” Fit was quiet for a moment, shifting his back without even thinking about it. It was covered with scars, the federation had made sure of that. Some would fade with time, but most would probably remain. He had seen that Pac had a scar on his cheek, but more than that he didn’t really see.

“Mind showing me?” he asked and Pac just shrugged.

“Sure, if you want to” He pulled up his pant leg revealing what looked like a fake leg. Fit’s eyes went wide as he looked at it. He hadn’t even noticed, or known about it. Pac had walked around in pants and rubber boots all this time so how could he have?

Fit reached his hand out, throwing a glance at Pac who just smiled and stretched out the leg towards him, silent permission.

Fit tapped the leg with his claw, hearing the sound and hitting the hard surface.

“You’re missing a leg?” he questioned looking back up at Pac and he nodded. Walking seemed hard enough. Fit didn’t know how they keep the balance walking and even running while standing on those things, so missing a leg would probably be even more difficult.

“Yeah, I lost it” he replied.

“How?” Fit asked, his brow furrowing a little. Pac seemed to think for a moment, probably thinking about how he was going to explain this, or where to start.

“You remember me talking about Cellbit?” Fit nodded “I was going to clean his room. He was sleeping in the pool and while I was cleaning the floors I slipped into his pool and I startled him awake, and he attacked without even realising what he was doing.” Pac pulled up his pant leg even more, showing where his real leg began. You could see scars there that was clearly from a mer.

“He slashed me up and dug his claws into my leg and dragged me down to the bottom of his pool and just started biting and clawing while I tried to kick myself free.” he swallowed hard. His voice had started to shake at the end, but he seemed to just need a short moment before he continued “When he came to his senses I had breathed in water and lost consciousness. I was taken to a hospital…Cellbit’s traffickers hadn’t been as hygienic as the federation so the risk of infection was pretty high from his bites and… Yup , it go infected and with the scratches that reached bone and chunks of meat missing from my leg it all ended with they had to get rid of it”

Fit just looked at him for a moment with wide eyes before looking back at the leg. He looked at the scars on his thigh, these must have been some of the lighter scratches.

Fit slowly lifted his hand up, Pac didn’t protest or seem worried as Fit laid his hand over them, just to check how his own claws matched the marks.

Cellbit was probably a bit smaller it looked like, but Fit was also pretty big in general, and size did not speak for how much damage a mer could do. Sure, humans had more thinga-majigs, and machines, and inventions, but hand to hand a mer would pretty much always win. Especially in water.

Pac didn't stand a chance, and honestly he was lucky Cellbit had been so freaked out he just attacked the leg and didn’t think and rip Pac’s throat out.

The idea of that made Fit’s heart sink inside his chest, into this cold lump that just sat there.

“I’m sorry” he said, pulling his hand away and looking back up at Pac. Pac just smiled.

“Don’t be, people sometimes get hurt in this line of business” he replied like it was a fact “We try our best to not let it happen, but, sh*t happens, you know?” he said with a laugh.

Fit’s brows furrowed and he puffed out his chest.

“I’m not going to let anyone hurt you again” Fit hissed, conviction in his voice “You saved and protected me and my son, I’ll save and protect you and yours” Fit told him. Pac held up his hands in ‘slow down’ motion.

“Hold on, wait, wait, Cellbit is a part of my family now, you can’t really take revenge against him” he said, looking a bit nervous. Fit huffed.

“This is not only about Cellbit. This is about anyone for all time” Fit told him, his eyes locked with his. “If you need help, if you need anything call for me and I'll answer”

Pac just looked at him before his cheeks started to turn red, he smiled “Thank you Fit” Pac then glanced back at him “If you need any help, call out for me and I’ll help” Fit smiled back losing his serious expression.

“I know. You have already proven that '' Fit replied “Except Ramon, you’re the person I trust the most” Pac seemed honestly shocked at that, but Fit could see this joy in his eyes. This glimmering joyfulness from just being told that Fit trusted him.

“Thank you Fit” he replied he opened his mouth to say something but before he got the chance the door opened and Richarlyson peeked out and looked at the two of them.

‘You’re gonna watch or what?’ he asked.

“Yeah, we’ll be there in a moment” Richarlyson nodded and went back inside. Pac stood up, putting down his pant leg again before looking at Fit.

“Feeling okay enough to head back? I don’t think anything else in the movie is going to upset you”

“Yeah, I’m ready” Fit responded and they went back inside, most of the pups didn’t seem to have even noticed they had left.

Pac sat down on the floor and Fit went around him, his tail pressing against his back while Fit laid down on his belly facing the movie. That’s when he felt this light warm pressure on his tail and he turned to look, just to see Pac leaning his back fully against his tail, using it like a backrest.

Fit didn’t say anything, just smiled like an idiot, feeling the warmth go over to him, feeling the soft material of the hoodie against his skin.

He liked it. He liked Pac this close. He liked-

…

Oh.

Fit felt his heart stop in his chest and eyes go wide.

He liked Pac .

Chapter 12

Chapter Text

How did a mer even love a human? If he decided to go after this feeling he would be bound to land for the rest of his life. Always having a connection to land like an anchor. He could never fully return to the sea again, would never be truly free from land again, but maybe the memories already made that impossible.

Even if Pac would become like this Vegetta Leo had mentioned and move across the sea on a boat, how long would that last? How long could someone make those travels before ages caught up with them?

Fit guessed he could leave and come back, similar to turtles, leaving for the sea just to return to the same beach over and over again. Return home . But, Fit wasn’t sure he wanted that. He wanted to be with Pac, close to him. Wanted to live with him, he didn’t want their lives to overlap at times, he wanted their lives to be going alongside the other. Keep going together.

Would that be possible without completely binding himself to human society? Could they be together without tying Pac to the water's edge? Fit couldn’t go far from the ocean, but he had learnt about the cars, the planes, and land so far in you couldn’t even see the ocean, that thought he couldn’t barely comprehend. Not being able to even see one drop of the giant vast ocean. What if Pac wanted to go there? What then? Fit would just become a weight.

Maybe Pac wanted to be at the water's edge? He didn’t seem to mind working here, working with merfolk. Maybe they could stay at the beach somehow? The connection between land and sea.

He didn’t want them forced away from the other. He didn’t want a Njord and Skade story where Fit would despise the land and Pac despise the ocean and they would be forced to stay apart, he wanted this to work.

…And how could he know if it would work if he never tried?

“Ramon” he asked as Ramon was waking up inside their little room.

‘Yeah?’ Ramon signed his response before yawning.

“How do you feel about getting a new parent?” Fit asked. That seemed to clear up any sleepiness Ramon had. He snapped his head towards his dad, his eyes wide.

‘A new parent?’ he asked but before Fit could even respond, he signed again 'Is it Pac?' Fit felt his own eyes go wide.

“How did you-?”

‘You’re my dad. I know you’ he responded, and to be honest, that was enough of an answer. Fit just laughed and shook his head.

“You know me too well my boy” he said with a grin. “What do you think about it?” He then continued on the main topic.

Ramon gave him a wide smile.

‘Yes!’ he signed before letting out a happy chirp ‘I want you two together!’

Fit enjoyed his enthusiasm. It bode well, he wanted to know what Ramon thought about this first, Ramon was the most important thing in his life, so if Ramon was against the idea then it would be all called off. It was good that he seemed to like Pac enough to perhaps consider him a parent in the future.

“Are you sure you’re okay with me trying to court Pac?” Fit asked, wanting to make sure Ramon had time to think about this “It…it was not long ago Spreen died” he reminded him. He didn’t want to bring up bad memories, but he also knew that must have had some effect on him, that his other parent died, killed by human hands.

Ramon just looked at Fit for a moment, and seemed to think hard about it.

‘He was barely my dad, he was barely around’ it stung a bit to see Ramon talk about Spreen like that. It could be him still coping, but Fit also knew the rocky relationship between those two. Before Fit could respond did Ramon continue ‘Pac would not really be replacing him or taking his place, Spreen was barely your partner and you didn’t love him like that’

“I still cared about Spreen, Ramon. Might not have been romantic and he might have struggled with being a part of a family, but I cared about him, and he cared about us” He must have cared about them in some way, no one sacrifices themselves like that without caring for the people you die for.

Ramon just went quiet for a long moment, some sadness reflecting in his eyes but he seemed determined not to bring it up.

‘I know. But I still want Pac as a dad’ Fit sighed, but gave his son a little smile.

“Okay, we’ll see what he thinks about that, let's take it slow”

‘He will say yes, if he doesn't he has no taste’ Ramon said raising his sail slightly making Fit laugh.

A couple days went by, Ramon was playing with Chayanne and Tallulah in the community pool, throwing rings up in the air and watching them fall and hit the water before sinking down toward the bottom. As soon as they landed on the sand all three divided trying to be the first one to grab it.

Fit made his way up next to where Phil was laying on the ground and looking at them. Fit tried to casually move next to him and not look as tense as he actually was.

“Phil, can I ask you for a favour?” Phil seemed surprised at the sudden question and turned his head towards him, but did nod.

“Sure mate, what is it?”

“Can I fight you?” Fit said, going right to the point.

Phil froze and his eyes went wide as he just stared at Fit for a moment in bewilderment before he suddenly burst out laughing. Fit scowled, his nose scrunching up as he waited for Phil to finish.

“May I ask why?” he said when he finally calmed down, his lips pulled into a grin. “If I crossed you, you have a very polite way of going about it before you attack me”

Fit looked away, mumbled an explanation too quiet for his own ears to even hear.

“I didn’t hear that” Phil replied and Fit huffed and looked back at Phil, looking him right in the eye while his cheeks burned red.

“I need to impress Pac somehow” Phil swallowed down something he was sure had been a laugh before he responded to Fit’s words.

“I think that if we had a fight so would Pac have a heart attack” Fit let out a frustrated sigh, hiding his face in his hands.

“How else am I going to court him?” Fit dragged his hands down his face and then looked at Philza, a grin on his lips.

“So you’re finally thinking about starting the courting?” he asked, sounding frustratedly smug about it.

“Shut it” Fit hissed “I can only fight, I’m not as good as scouting so I won’t be able to find nice things, I can’t sing, and I’m not good at water acrobatics, I can hunt I guess, but humans eat so much more than fish” he then signed again “And either way, I’m still stuck at the centre” Phil lifted his hand and patted him on the back, avoiding the places where the last band-aids had just been removed two day prior.

“You’re thinking in merfolk traditions, those are not the same as humans traditions about this” Phil pointed out which was not very helpful, since it didn’t explain what humans actually did.

“What do humans like then?” Fit asked, Phil was silent a moment seemingly just observing him.

“Just because I’m curious, what do you think humans like?” Fit was quiet, trying to remember what he knew about humans and what he had been told in the past.

“Umm, gold and jewels” he remembered hearing scouts trade the glimmering metal for food and other thingamajigs, so that was worth something “Pearls…” f*ck why was so many things human liked materialistic?! “Songs and stories, they always have and want to hear many of those?” Phil nodded along, seemingly agreeing but it was also clear he found Fit’s answer lacking something.

“We’re going to Bagi, she knows this better and she knows Pac better than me” Phil looked out over the water, seeing the pups at the surface “Kids, we’ll be back in a while, okay, just stay here and keep playing!” he called out to them, he got three chirps in response before Ramon tossed the ring up into the air and watched it hit the water and sink, all three pups diving after it.

Phil made Fit follow him, into the little common room, the same they’ve had the movie night in before. Inside was Bagi, laying on a pillow-like thing while typing on a a laptop.

She looked up from the screen as she heard the door open, seeing the two mers enter and close the door behind them.

She blinked as she looked at both of them, like she somehow by simply watching she would figure out what this was all about and why they had come in here.

“What-?”

“He wants to know how to date Pac” Phil said, motioning at Fit.

Fit stared at Philza in horror, his heart stopping for a second and a weird noise just left his throat that was supposed to resemble words, but even Fit had no idea what he had tried to vocalise.

Bagi’s eyes lit up at Philza’s words and that stunned Fit slightly. Fit thought she would be horrified since last time they had actually met he had attacked her, but it was not fear that resided in her eyes, it was excitement .

She let out a happy little noise and got closer to the two of them, leaving her computer without a second thought.

“Okay, okay, how are we gonna set this up?” she said, smiling widely. Before Philza could start talking so did Fit finally find his voice and spoke

“You’re not worried?" he asked, making Bagi turn and look at him "I attacked him, you and Mike last time we met, I’m sorry about that by the way” he then added his voice honest. he regretted it, she had just been trying to protect the rest and had tried to clam down the situation but Fit hadn't listened.

She seemed fine now, her wounds were pretty much healed by now, and if Fit had to guess so would they eventually fade.

Bagi shook her head.

“I never blamed you, It was just a bad situation, but thank you for the apology” she replied with ease “But also, Pac has been keeping us updated with how you adjusted to being here, he also likes to bring you up and talk about you, a lot”

Fit felt his cheeks go red at that. He liked talking about him?

“You…You think I have a chance at courting him?” In the name of Poseidon did he hate this, hate having to talk openly about this but he had to. He had no idea of how to court a human or if he even had a chance. So he needed help, he needed people who had better insight into Pac and human-merfolk relationships, and this was the best bet he had, even if it felt like his cheeks were burning up and he wanted to hide in a cave for a few hours to calm down.

“I think that if you ask, you’re bound to get him,” Bagi replied. Fit felt his heart speed up and start beating way harder but he tried his best to ignore it. He was failing.

“How am I supposed to impress him, like, should I fight someone?” he asked, tapping his sharp claws on the floor. That was one of the few things he was good at. Fighting. Had to be to be a nanny, a good fighter, but also caring and a good teacher, but those other two properties were harder to show off, showing off one's fighting skill was easy.

“Humans like having a nice time usually” Bagi responded, “Like, sitting with you having a nice dinner, or watching a movie, or playing a game and stuff like that, sometimes gifts but you don’t have to worry about that right now.” Fit scowled in confusion.

“How am I going to impress him or show how good of a partner I am by eating dinner with him?” Both Bagi and Phil let out chuckles, but they seemed to go easy on him by quickly swallowing it down.

“Humans don’t always need to be impressed like that, he already knows you’re strong and a good protector” Phil replied. Bagi nodded along.

“I think Pac would just love to simply spend time and form a memory with you.”Fit was silent for a moment. Just spending time with Pac and doing something nice did sound good.

“What could we do together then?”

“Maybe swim together?” Phil suggested “Ask him to get the scuba gear and join you in the community pool alone” Fit gave Phil a look like he was an idiot for suggesting that.

“It’s a community pool,” Fit reminded them. No way they would be alone there for more than a couple minutes. Philza rolled his eyes, seemingly not considering that a big problem.

“I’ll distract Tubbo, Foolish takes the kids, Bagi you tell the humans to stay out” Phil quickly replied “It’s easy”

Well, when he put it like that, it was simple. He however wondered how Foolish would deal with acting nanny-mer for a day. The kids would be fine, Foolish would keep them safe, he was unsure if Foolish would come out of it alive however.

Well, never mind, Fit’s mind was pulled towards something else Philza had said.

“What is scuba gear?”

“It's equipment that does so human can stay underwater longer, like, breath underwater for a while” Philza explained, “It will make more sense when you see it-”

“They can do that!?” he asked shocked.

“Yes, it's quite a lot of equipment, but they can” Phil said with a nod.

“About an hour if I remember it right,” Bagi added. There was silence as Fit thought about the suggestion.

He would love to spend some time in the water with Pac. Fit had spent pretty much all his time with Pac above water, so a switch up would be fun. However he didn’t even know if Pac liked water, considering the way Cellbit had almost drowned him it would make sense if he never wanted anything to do with it again.

“Does he still like swimming…He told me about Cellbit” Bagi seemed to grimace at that, clearly it was bringing up bad memories but she seemed to quickly push the memory and feelings down.

“Pac is resilient, he always gets up again when knocked down, he’s hard to break, similar to you” Bagi replied with a little smile “He has gone swimming after the accident, he even has a leg just for scuba diving. He will be fine with swimming as long as it’s not with Cellbit”

Well, it seemed like Fit didn’t have to worry about that.

“Is there a courting season?'' Merfolk had courting seasons, it was when there was the most food around, so it was easy to travel alone and most mers wouldn’t get mad when you crossed into their territory trying to get to the meeting point.

Since some merfolk hated other pods getting close to their areas so was starting courtships sometimes hard, so each year single mers went to the same place to meet other singles and see if they found someone they fancied.Also helped that when so many merfolk were in the same place so could you easily start a fight to show off your strength.

Fit had never been to one, he had been a roving mer, moving without a pod until he found his last one and was invited as they had no nanny, it was there he had met Spreen and started a partnership.

Fit honestly hoped humans didn’t have a courtship spots, Fit was unsure if he could compete with other humans, and if it was inland he would have an issue even getting there.

“Humans do it whenever wherever” Bagi replied which honestly was a relief.

“So I could ask for a chance to court now?” Fit asked thoughtfully, unsure if he would even be brave enough to do that.

“Yes. But humans call it dates . You date, then become partners, and then maybe marriage” Fit was starting to get fed up with hearing all these new words.

“What is marriage ?” Bagi seemed to think for a moment, trying to find the words to explain it.

“Like, partnerships, but, religious I guess? Don’t worry too much about that, if Pac cares about it he’ll explain it to you one day” Bagi said, so Fit guessed it wasn’t that important at the moment.

A ‘beep’ could be heard from the pretty much forgotten computer, and Bagi turned towards it and sighed.

“One moment” she said and went back to it, leaving Fit and Phil alone for the moment.

Phil laid down, crossing his arms in front of him before laying his head on top. Fit soon copied him, laying down as well. He was trying to think about more things to ask while they were at it.Fit shifted his tail, making it go back and forth in slow motions. It didn’t hurt anymore, the stretching techniques Pac had showed him helping a lot.

“Phil…If Talluah doesn't need more help one day, would you go back to sea?” Phil seemed to think for a second.

“Probably, I still want them to know the old ways of the merfolk life, when they’re all grown up they can choose where they want their lives to be, on land or in the sea. I don’t care what they chose as long as they’re happy”

“What about Missa?” Would he just be left here to live his life above the waves?

“We’ll meet up with him, maybe we’ll follow his boat at times” Phil explained, but there was something knowing in his eyes. Like he knew Fit was not just asking because he was intressted in Philza's situation “But there is also the option to be like Foolish, leave for the pod at sea and then come back here on a weekly basics”

Well…that was an option. If the pod even wanted him…Did Fit even want to join a pod? Getting into a new pod with strangers and working on that trust could take a long time and a lot of effort. But, Fit needed someone else, he couldn’t take care of Ramon alone. Maybe he needed a pod, maybe he just needed the people at the centre, maybe he just needed Pac? Poseidon his head hurt, he hated having to do all this thinking.

“Do you think the pod here would mind me and Ramon to just stay around the sea here?” Phil shook his head.

“Not at all. They would probably even give you the option to join, or hang around” Phil looked at Fit, observing him for a second before talking again “Pac, Mike or even Bagi will probably ask you what you want to do soon. You and Ramon seem to be on the edge of being healthy enough to be let free to do whatever you want to do. No matter if it means staying here, joining a pod or do something else”

Fit went quiet thinking, but before he could go too deep into thought Philza nudged him.

“Don’t think too much about it right now.” he told him “Remember if Pac agrees to this it’s about all of you , not just you and Ramon, okay? Let's see where this goes first and then where you and Ramon will be” Fit sighed, letting his forehead rest against his arms.

“I’m not used to these kinds of things, I barely was on land or had any human connection before this, this is all new” Phil gave him a sympathetic look, maybe he had been thinking about this as well, maybe he had thought this all through before when Missa and him got together.

“Human and merfolk relationships are old and have been happening for centuries, but the world moves fast for humans. These relationships are still a complex issue, maybe even more now than in the past” he said “Maybe it’s cold comfort but you’re not the first one to have the problem of being bound to the sea and the land, or having to deal with how different human and merfolk are both in culture and technology. But if you truly want to be with Pac, and Pac truly wants to be with you then you’ll find a balance of the two.”

“I’m lucky I like land” Bagi added, from where she was typing away “I’m lucky I felt pulled towards this life and found Tina. But if you don’t feel the same desire for the human world and society so can’t I really help you, I would suggest talking with Foolish, but his advice range from the worst advice you have ever heard and sagely wisdom” Bagi finished with a chuckle, finally turning of the computer and looked towards them “But talking-” The door suddenly opened making all the three mers look towards it and shut their mouths.

And there, by the door was Pac and Mike, they were talking to each other but the discussion came to a halt as they saw the three mers inside. The three mer looked up at them, two with mischievous glimmers in the eye the last one seemingly stun locked.

What happened next happened so fast Fit didn’t get the chance to stop it or escape.

“Mike, come with me and Phil” Bagi quickly said as the two mer took off through the door, Mike looked confused, throwing Pac and Fit a glance but in the end followed.The last thing Fit saw was Bagi's devilish grin as she used her tail to smack the door close behind them, leaving Pac and Fit alone in the now silent room.

“Hey Pac” Fit said, smiling as he looked up at Pac, trying to ignore how his heart was beating so fast and hard he was sure it would give out at any moment.

“Hey Fit, seems like the others ditched us” Pac said with a laugh. Fit nodded, trying to not look nervous.

“Yeah” he said, feeling his mouth go dry.

He had to ask. Ask now before the whole question about what he was going to do when he and Ramon was completely healed would come up. He wanted to know if he had a chance with Pac, if he should even consider that Pac might be a part of his future.

“I, Pac I was wondering something” Fit started. Pac was looking at him, Fit having his full attention. Those pretty brown eyes, to beautiful brown eyes with the round pupils looking right at him.

“Yeah?” his brow then furrowed in worry “Do you or Ramon need something?” Fit shook his head, feeling his cheek grow redder as the moment rapidly approached him. He collected what bravery he had and spoke.

“No I was just wondering if you'd like to put on scuba gear and swim with me in the pool tomorrow, just us two?” Pac seemed shocked and a nervous mixed with surprise laugh escaped him.

“Like a date?” he asked, before turning red in the face, like he hadn’t even thought about his words before saying them. However before he could rephrase or take it back Fit nodded.

“Yeah,” Fit agreed. “Like…courting” he said, making sure Pac understood what he meant, understood how he viewed this.

His heart was racing, he could barely breathe as he waited for Pac’s response. Scared, scared beyond belief. Sacred of a no. Scared of ridicule. Scared he would or even already had f*cked this all up.

Pac’s eyes went wide, dating and courting had sounded like similar things, and Pac knew merfolk better than Fit knew humans. So Pac would definitely know what courting meant for a mer.

Fit watched Pac and saw how his lips started to form this big genuine smile.

“I would love to Fit!” Fit felt air fill his lungs again, and his heart jumped inside his chest.

He had said yes.

Fit felt his mind go blank for a second.

“Great! Yeah! That’s great! Thats good!” he said, feeling like he was simply rambeling.

“Yeah!” Pac agreed.

They were both red in the face.

“Tomorrow?” Pac asked again and Fit nodded.

“Yeah, tomorrow”

“I need to check my gear!” Pac said almost in a panic, like he hadn't check that stuff in a while and just realized. He opened the door. “See you tomorrow at the pool!” he yelled before he took off this big smile still on his face.

Fit watched him leave a big smile on his lip as well. He couldn’t help himself, he did a few spins and excited and happy chirps made their ways out of his throat and he couldn’t make them stop, and neither did he want to. He was too happy. Too happy to be able to contain it all.

His worries melted away for the moment. He didn’t have to worry about the future right now, all he had to focus on was tomorrow. Who cared what the distant future held? He had a date tomorrow!

Chapter 13

Chapter Text

“You’re going to do fine” Bagi told him as she watched him fidget. They were in the break room, Fit being too nervous to stay alone and was spending his time with Bagi and Tina at the moment trying to get some last minute tips on the dating human thing.

Pac hadn’t arrived yet and it was starting to make Fit anxious. He knew Pac didn't live here at the centre and came in each day at the same time, but for some reason it felt like today he was taking an extra long time to show up.

“What if he stood me up and doesn't show up” Fit said, tapping his claws on the floor.

“He showes up every day Fit, he works here” Bagi replied before she looked at the round thing with numbers that sat on the wall, it was telling time somehow but Fit hadn’t figured that out yet. “He still got 20 minutes before he is late, and even then you shouldn’t worry too much”.

“What does that even mean?” he asked, not fully able to keep the frustration out of his voice.

“Well if you imagine the light time and dark time of a day was cut up into 24 pieces, and each of those pieces were cut up in 60 smaller pieces, there are 20 of those pieces left” that went right over Fit’s head so instead he just sighed and laid flat on the floor.

“What if I f*ck this up, I still don’t understand the whole dating human thing”

“But he understands merfolks” Tina replied from where she was scrolling on her phone. “And he knows you’re new to these things. Give him some more credit and Pac is pretty forgiving so if you mess up it's probably going to be fine” Fit already knew Pac was forgiving considering Fit had threatened him with a hand around his throat and Pac had just accepted his apology.

Tina was the only human here at the moment, Mike and Jaiden had been told to take the morning off. Tina had stayed here with Bagi, as she was the only other human dating a mer that was close by and could help out with her experiences.

“What if I hurt him?” Fit didn’t want to freak him out. Fit had already scared him once and Cellbit had taken his f*cking leg, he didn’t deserve anymore scares caused by merfolk. Now that he was also going into the water with Fit he was extra worried, Pac had seemingly almost drowned during the Cellbit incident and he didn't want to freak Pac out like that again even by accident or by making him remember and think about that.

“You won’t” Bagi replied “Don’t scratch him, don’t bite and don’t yank any cables or lines and he will be fine” Bagi had shown him a picture of a scuba diver, and the gear they wore so he wouldn’t be surprised when Pac put it all on. Those computer things were amazing! You could ask to see anything and it showed you it! Incredible!

Suddenly the handle was turned making them all fall quiet and snap their heads towards it, the door was then open and there stood Pac. He had a giant bag with with him which he was carrying in his arms.

He was dressed in new clothes, this black wetsuit with blue sides, his yellow little symbol was on his chest. Fit looked at him and felt his cheeks grow red. He looked nice. Very, very nice.

Pac smiled at him when he saw him.

“Sorry for being early. But I wanted to be here so I could put on the stuff and make sure everything works alright.” he then turned towards Tina and started to talk to her “Can you help me check the equipment?”

“Sure!” she swung her legs over the edge of the sofa and got up and followed him back out into the pool area.

Fit started to follow but before he could get very far Bagi gave him a pat on the shoulder and a gentle smile.

“You got this” she whispered “If you need any help or more advice just call out for us. Now go get your man!” She gave him one last hard slap on the back and let him follow the humans into the pool room.

Fit went into the water but got back to surface at once and crossed his arms over the edge as he just watched Tina and Pac mess with the equipment making sure everything was connected and working right.

Pac’s wet suit also had a little zipper going along his prosthetic that he pulled up so he easily could remove his normal leg, and replace it with a leg with a flipper on the foot. As soon he had gotten that on he just zipped the wetsuit shut again and put on a flipper over his other foot.

Fit just watched him get ready before Pac finally made his way to the edge and dropped into the water. He quickly resurfaced floating with ease. Him and Tina seemed to go over a few more tests that Fit didn’t fully understand before Pac thanked Tina and she walked back towards the meeting room, finally leaving Fit and Pac alone.

Pac turned to look through his diving mask towards Fit, still at the surface he took off the thing he had been breathing though and spoke.

“Underwater I can’t speak, I can make some noise but thats all, so I’m going to teach you some hand signals scuba divers use” Pac explained “I’m not going to bother you too much but thumbs up means I’ll surface thumbs down that i will descend and this means; problem or not okay” he said moving his hand out and wobbling it, something similar to a so-and-so motion. “If somethings go wrong and I seem to panic or make the problem motion and point at my breathing thing or is start motioning upwards without going upwards I might need your help to go up, okay?”

Fit nodded, but he couldn’t help but look worried. Pac seemed to notice because he gave him a comforting smile.

“It will probably not be needed, I have done this thousands of times and Tina and I did all the tests. But just to be on the safe side” and with that he put the breathing thing back into his mouth and made a thumbs down and then he sank under the water.

Fit followed, diving down after him.

Humans didn’t move like merfolk, with one tail and fin, instead Pac was moving both his legs back and forth to move. It looked a bit silly in Fit’s opinion but whatever works he guessed.

Pac reached the bottom first, there he waited for Fit to catch up with him. Fit noticed and with a few quick movements with his tail he was in front of him.

Pac looked at him and waved, his hand movement slow in the water. Fit smiled and waved back happily as they then started to go along the wall of the pool in slow motion.

Pac was slow, well, faster than a normal human without those things on his feet, but slower than a mer by a long shot, Fit was sure even Ramon who was only a pup was faster than him. While Pac kicked his feet a lot so did Fit have to move his tail at a way slower rate than normal, but he didn’t mind.

He didn’t need to be fast as every moment with Pac was precious.

He looked at him, seeing his black air move with the motion of the water in those clam motions. It looked so soft and pretty like this.

As they kept going, so did Fit move down, almost scratching his belly against the sandy floor as he moved under Pac before flipping around so he was looking right up, coming face to face with Pac.

The human hadn’t expected it, flinching slightly but a muffled sound quickly escaped that sounded like a laugh. Pac raised his hand and just booped Fit on the nose, before grabbing Fit’s waist and turning him in the water so he was over him.

Fit was stunned for a second, Pac’s warm hands against his waist, Pac however then let go with one hand and grabbed the breathing thing away from his mouth and just let it off letting bubbles hit Fit’s face and neck making it tickle. Fit shook his whole body and moved away, turning so he was at Pac’s side instead as Pac put the breathing thing back in his mouth and also flipped back around with another muffled laugh.

“Don’t use up all the air” Fit said sternly, but the smile on his lip betrayed his true feeling as he bumped the end of his shark tail against one of Pac’s flippers. Pac lifted his hand and made a motion, it was not one they had gone over, but it was self explanatory, as he opened and closed his hand like it was yapping. Fit rolled his eyes.

"Well I'm soooooo sorry for looking out for you" he said pouting.

Pac stopped making the motion, but when he did he held his hand out as an offering. Fit looked at it for a second before stretching his own hand out to meet it. He was very mindful of his claws as he put Pac’s hand in his, holding him tightly. Pac looked at him and his eyes narrowed in joy and Fit gave him a smile back.

He liked this, holding Pac’s hand with such ease. He had seen Bagi and Tina try it, but holding hands while a human tried to stand straight was hard, always forcing the human to bend their knees, and even then they couldn’t move as Bagi needed both her hands free to drag herself across the floor unless she wanted to move slower than a sea slug.

They kept moving through the water hand in hand…However after a moment an idea entered Fit’s mind and his gentle smile turned devilish. Pac seemed to notice and his eyes went wide when Fit started to move his tail as quickly as he could, sending them both forward at a way higher speed.

Sure, Pac was causing some drag making Fit unable to go too fast, but the speed was already way quicker than before. Fit did that for as long as he could before he just as fast as he had started stopped and turned around quickly and came face to face with Pac again, this time upright.

The speed kept carrying Pac forward, making him bump into Fit’s chest, his goggles pressing against his sternum. As he did his shoulders were shaking and muffled laughter was escaping him as he raised his hands to grab Fit’s shoulders to steady himself in the water.

He looked up at Fit, their eyes meeting. Pac gave him a look that was clearly supposed to be stern but Fit just smiled and shrugged.

“You’re so slow,” Fit said, with a grin. Pac made a sound back, something that clearly was supposed to resemble a mer growl and Fit just laughed. He sounded like a pup the way he was unable to speak without it turning into nonsens, forcing him to vocalise in other ways.

“You’re starting to sound like a true mer” he said with a little laugh. At his words Pac’s eyes seemed to light up, clearly excited he let go of Fit’s shoulders and put his hand against his chest and once again pulled out the thing he was breathing through, and to Fit’s surprise he let out a sound of his own. Fit’ eyes went wide as he realised what Pac was doing.

He had never considered the humans would make up their own water calls, or that some other mer had made one for them. It took him off guard but also made him laugh as the short sound Pac had made, just was his own name but made it easier to vocalise underwater with chirps.

Fit at once made the sound back, trying to call it like a mer would call on another mer. Pac nodded excitedly, seemingly so had he gotten it right. It was sad that all attempts humans made at doing mer calls were not fully correct, humans just seemed to be unable to fully replicate it. They could whistle, they could make clicks with their tongues but they were always falling short of the merfolks call.

If Pac, Empanada and Richas, people who had all been around merfolk for a long time couldn’t make the sounds so was Fit pretty sure no human could do it right, but it was also very clear that was not going to stop them from trying.

Pac put the breathing thing back in his mouth and Fit placed a hand on his own chest and made the call of his name, that chirp that his pod and Ramon used to call for him, his name without letters. Pac at once tried to call it back. Fit repeated the call again and Pac did it back again, still failing a bit but it was probably as close as he was going to get. Sure it was not perfect but it still made his heart make little jumps inside his chest.

Fit nodded and smiled.

“Call that whenever you need me” Pac made the call without a second thought and grabbed Fit’s arm, making the mers cheeks go red as he realised what he meant.

‘I need you now’ Fit just let out a laugh and pulled away, making a quick little spin in the water. Pac watched him, eyes wrinkled with that look of joy again. He started to kick his legs slightly, going towards the surface slowly.

As he started to rise, Fit followed him, spinning round him, sticking as close to him as he could without hindering his swimming. He was almost so he was constricting him the way he kept eeling his way around him, like two parts of a rope. Pac watched him and didn’t seem to mind his closeness.

He suddenly raised his hand and stopped in the middle point of the pool and Fit stopped with him. Looking at the raised hand.

Fit looked at it for a second before slowly stretching his own out. He looked at Pac to see if this is what he wanted and Pac gave him a nod.

Fit pressed his palm against his. His hand was bigger, and the claws also made his fingers seem a bit longer than his. They were just pressing their hands together. Pac then turned his hand slightly letting his finger go betweens Fit’s, interlocking them. Once again Fit was careful as he let his hand do the same. Pac then raised his other hand holding up it as well, Fit quickly did the same to it, leaving both their hands interlocked now.

As they were now holding each other Pac started trying to drag Fit with him into a spin with little success making them both laugh. Fit quickly took over, making them dance in these lazy circles in the water.

Their eyes just stayed on the other face, looking at the other like they were mesmerised. Pac looked so pretty, the hair moving in the water as the light above the surface reached down over them, the light glimmering against his face and skin. He was so pretty. So beautiful. It made his heart beat so hard and fast in the chest it almost hurt but by the gods he loved the feeling.

Fit was unsure for how long they had been doing that before Pac leaned forward his forehead leaning against his for a second before pulling away.

Pac as he was breathing through the mask thing was releasing bubbles, which quickly made their way to the surface. Pac seemingly noticed him looking and let bulbs run out catching them and forcing them down, then putting his fist together and pushing them through the group of bubbles and then to the side, forcing the bulbs to turn into this bubble ring-like thing. Fit eyes went wide as he watched the neat little tick.

He let out a sound of delight before he then smiled and took off to the surface, taking a gulp of air before diving down again. He quickly made his way up to Pac and moved until he was right in front of the human.

Fit lifted his hands up to the side of his mouth and forced the air out and quickly moved his hand in heart motion, making the bubbles move with his hand forming the shape. Pac's eyes went wide and started to clap his hand, which wasn’t very effective in the water as they were slow and the sound was muffled, but it’s the thought that counts.

They kept going for a while. Fit kept moving in the water, he was not the best at underwater tricks but it didn’t seem to take much to impress Pac who just watched his movements with joy in his eyes.

Pac showed what tricks he knew and tried to make tricks like Fit but usually it was not even close to as gracious.

Fit however was still a bit amazed that this was even possible, for a human to stay under water this long, to even try to replicate merfolk behaviour was amazing. It was something so unreal about it, but also very comforting. That humans had worked past the water's unfriendliness towards them, that humans had loved water so much they wished to stay under it longer than they could hold their breaths, wishing to be like mer and stay under the waves, to experience the beauty of being under the water and share moments like this with merfolk.

Fit had to suggest doing this again with Ramon, maybe Richarlyson as well if he could scuba dive.

Eventually Pac made a thumbs up and started to rise back to the surface and Fit followed him back up, already knowing what this was probably about.

Pac made his way to the edge, placing his hands on it and dragging himself out of the water and turned around so he was sitting, his feet still kicking in the water. He took the breathing thing out of his mouth and spoke.

“I’m out of air. Sorry” he truly sounded sorry, apologetic that he could not stay under any more. Fit shook his head.

“It’s okay. That we can even do this much is amazing” he replied as he crossed his arms over the edge and looked up at him. Pac smiled and started to take off his equipment and Fit got this sinking feeling.

He didn’t want it to be over, he wanted to keep going a bit longer, to stay weightless under the water with Pac to not be forced to feel heavy on land and drag himself slowly along the floor as soon as he wanted to follow Pac anywhere.

“Can…Can you be here for a while longer?” Fit then asked, as the tank was laid on the floor. “Just, swimming?” Pac seemed to light up at that suggestion.

“Sure, I still got my snorkel and stuff” he said, tapping the little plastic tube thing that was tied to the googles. “Just can’t be under the water for very long anymore” he then seemed to go quiet for a moment.

“Can…Can we try a trick I have seen?” Pac asked and Fit felt a shiver go down his spine.

“What trick?” Fit said slowly as his mind was screaming.

‘Calm down. Calm down. Calm down. It’s Pac. It’s Pac he’s not like that, he’s not like the people at the federation. It’s not a command, it's not a trick like a pet. It’s not like that to calm down.’ He snapped at himself inside his mind.

“It’s something I have seen several people do, like Bagi and Tina have done it for example, I’ve seen Jaiden do it with Foolish and Roier do it to.” he said “You dive and then put like your hands under my feet and then shoot up and toss me up in the air” he explained “It’s just seems cool and…I just always wanted to try it and I have never gotten the chance.” Pac had said all that with a smile, but then their eyes met and Pac’s smile dropped and he quickly lifted his hands. “Only if you want to of course. If you don’t want to do it so is it fine”

That lump in Fit’s stomach quickly melted and he calmed down. Fit wanted to slam his head into the floor. Pac wasn’t like that, Pac was safe, he knew that. Pac would never hurt him. He trusted Pac, and Pac trusted him.

“Sure, get in” Fit said and sank back under the water and watched from below Pac jump back in. He stayed by the surface now as he moved closer towards the middle of the pool so he wasn’t close to the edges and accidentally got launched up onto land.

Pac then dived down under the water as far as he could go, and Fit made his way up to him, and tried to hold his hands under his feet. It was a bit hard with the flippers but he got a pretty good position before he as fast as he could sent them both up towards the surface and out of the water and he pretty much tossed Pac up into the air.

Fit landed in the water first giving him a second to watch Pac in the air, hearing this loud scream of excitement as he then fell back into the water, landing feet first with a giant splash.

Pac quickly rose back to the surface, smiling wide as a mile.

“That was so cool Fit! Thank you so much” Fit just smiled back.

“Anything for you” he said before he moved up to him and grabbed Pac under the arms.

Before Pac could figure out what was going on Fit moved so he was now floating on his back with Pac laying on top of his stomach and chest above the water. Pac just stared at him wide eyed as his head was suddenly resting against the mer and basically using him as a pool mattress. Merfolk did this with pups at times to get them used to breathing air, just letting them lay on top of them as they floated on the surface, he guessed it worked with humans too.

Pac smiled at him and quickly found his place, letting his body relax on top of Fit’s body. Fit looked at him laying there, and raised his hand carefully combing his claws through the wet locks of black hair. Pac didn’t seem to mind, he actually seemed to enjoy it as he quickly started to make a noise that was clearly meant to be a merfolk rumble. That sound that meant ‘I love you’.

It tried to play it cool but he couldn’t help but do it back, making his whole chest shake.

Fit had no idea how long they stayed like that, just floating up and down on the water but Fit knew he could have stayed like that for an eternity.

Chapter 14

Chapter Text

“No way” Fit huffed, crossing his arms on the edge of the pool.

“You don’t have to go if you don’t want to” Mike replied “But we thought it might be good for Ramon to have a positive expressince with a boat so he doesn't have to be fearful of them”

“He should be” Fit hissed back “It’s better not to risk it”

Sure, Fit’s opinion of humans were better now, all were not bad he still did not trust boats. Some were good he would assume, but he still didn’t trust that, best to stay away.

“So you want him to feel sick with fear when he sees a shadow above him in the water? Each time he goes to the surface to take a look and sees one in the distance?”

Fit bared his teeth, a low hiss escaping him.

“Don’t you dare spin it like that” Mike just gave him a look and crossed his arms over his chest.

“I have a point” he replied “You know I do. Is he going to fear Vegetta and his ship as well? If you decide to join the pod around here you will see ships everyday. You want Ramon to be scared everyday?”

“We haven’t decided where to go yet” Fit snapped. Sure he was heavily thinking about trying to join the pod, but he hadn’t decided yet.

“You have to figure out what you want to do eventually” Mike crossed his arms over his chest.

“Cellbit and Roier will be there too” Pac said walking up to Mike’s side “Incase you want to meet some of the pod members before hand also, see if you match well” Pac suggested.

There was a loud crash followed by a.

“It’s okay!” from Tubbo, Mike turned towards the noise and sighed, walking away towards it.

Pac and Fit watched him leave for a moment before Pac looked back to Fit.

“The boat is safe, Felps own it, a dad of Richas” Pac said, crouching down so he was closer to Fit’s eye level. “I promise it’s going to be safe”

Fit huffed, but he glanced up at Pac, his gentle smile and how could he ever say no to that.

“I’m…Going to think about it” he said in the end.

“Okay” Pac replied before he turned his head to the side slightly “Have you thought more about what you want to do when you and Ramon are completely healthy?”

Fit had thought about that for a long time.

“We won’t be able to force you to go anywhere” Pac then quickly added “If you want to stay here in the centre that's fine, if you want to leave for the ocean that's fine as well. Whatever you want to do”

Fit looked up at Pac, looking him in the eyes.

“I want to be with you” he said, voice steady, getting the most important thing out first.

He wanted to be with Pac. He didn’t care where, he just wanted to be around him in any kind of shape and form. Pac’s face turned red but his smile went wide. He brought down his hand laying it against Fit’s cheek and Fit lifted his own hand laying it over Pac before squishing his face harder against Pac’s palm.

“I want to be with you” he repeated. “But I also want to be in the sea, for Ramon’s sake. So…I’m thinking of doing something similar to what Foolish is doing” Pac nodded in understanding.

“So a bit at sea, a bit on land?”

“Yeah” Fit pulled Pac’s hand away from his cheek and instead just held it and looked away, not strong enough to look Pac in the eyes for this part “I love being with you, but I’m not like Tubbo. I can’t stand being on land like this” Fit didn’t see Pac’s face, but he felt when Pac started to rub his thumb over his knuckles.

“I understand” Fit lifted his eyes to meet Pac’s again and the human smiled “I love the sea as well, could never be away from it. But I also can’t live the ocean life like you, but I’ll always be pulled to it.”

Fit smiled.

“That’s good to hear” he chuckled “That you won’t just get fed up and go away” Pac laughed.

“You’ll have to drag me away from here” he said with a smile “My…My house is close to the beach. If you want to, I can make a ramp to it, so you and Ramon can get all the way inside there, or I can walk out to the sea and hang with you there” Fit just stared at him, blinking a few times.

“Really? You live that close to the sea? And would do that for us” Pac actually burst out laughing at that.

“I want to be with you too! I don’t care how many air tanks I’ll need to buy or how much it’ll cost, or how much a ramp and making my house mer accessible will cost, I’ll do everything to make this relationship easier” he said leaning his head forward, so their foreheads were touching. “I’ll buy a boat and even go out and hang out with the pod. Anything for you” It was Fit’s turn, raising his hand and placing it against Pac cheek, holding it gently against his palm.

“Thank you” Fit said with a smile “You’re too good to me”

They made it to the boat, having followed the coast like Pac had told them and soon they laid eyes on the giant cargo ship.

Ramon was staying close to Fit’s side refusing to get more than a couple of centimetres away from him.

It was the first time they had left the centre in a long while. It felt so good, feeling the salty water on his skin again, on his tongue. It felt like home.

It was an amazing feeling, a feeling that while he had been held prisoner by the federation he thought he would never feel again.

Fit poked his head out of the water and stared up at the ship, seeing Pac by the railing on one. He was looking out over the water clearly trying to catch sight of them. As soon as the human saw them he started to wave his hand before turning towards someone on the ship and yelling something.

A moment later the crane that usually helped lift boxes onto the ship made its way down to the surface, a big wooden platform stuck to it so Fit and Ramon could easily get on it before it got raised up towards the deck of the ship.

Fit was pressing his body down while they were being brought up, not daring to look over the edge and see the big drop down.

Ramon was pressing himself against Fit’s side while Fit tried to act like he was calm, to not be scared or worried. He had to be calm for Ramon's sake, had to act like he didn’t feel his heart beat hard in his chest as they finally were placed down on the metall floor of the ship.It felt like his skin was crawling from the feeling, the cold metal reminded him of the last time he had been on a ship deck.

Pac is there smiling brightly, next to him was Richarlyson who waves hello and next to him was another human that Fit had only seen on photos around the mer centre.

“This is Felps” Pac says, nodding his head to the new man “He’s the captain of this ship” he explained as Felps let out a greeting chirp…It’s the best greeting chirp Fit has heard leave a human so far, if he heard it without context he would have thought it was a mer.

Fit made a greeting chirp back, it took a second longer before Ramon let out a little one of his own. He was still clearly nervous as he stayed pressed against Fit’s side. He was looking around, like he was expecting a net to be thrown over them, like people were going to come out and start poking Fit with their sticks and hooks again.

Pac smiled at Ramon not minding the fear he was showing. He seemed to be calm, casual like being on a ship for him was normal, and for all Fit knew so might it be.

“Want me to show you around?” he asked. Ramon looked at Pac then at his dad. Fit met his eyes and just gave him a comforting smile.

“You can go” Ramon gave Fit a little smile before he turned to Pac and lifted his hands up towards him asking to be picked up. If it was because he didn’t want to eel his way all over the ship, or because he didn’t want the cold metal under him anymore was not clear, maybe it was a bit of both.

Pac at once crouched down and grabbed Ramon under the arms and lifted him up with a grunt.

“You’re getting heavier!” Pac exclaimed, voice full of joy and love at the realisation. Fit just smiled. Ramon was in a healthy state again, the ribs no longer easy to see, his energy was back and they had recently stopped with the medicine as Mike and Foolish had declared him fully recovered.

As the two of them and Felps moved, Fit looked around just to realise something…He was not the only merfolk on the ship.

On the other side of the boat was Bagi with Tina. Tina was with Empanada playing with a mer pup he hadn’t seen before. The pup was wearing swimmers' goggles, and had a pink tail, it reminded Fit axolotl’s tail.

Bagi was talking to another mer with a beta tail, having similar colours as Bagi’s tail. He was covered with scars that were clearly made from another mer, or several mers considering how many scars there actually were. Fit felt bad for him, with beta like tails it was hard to keep them away from the claws of another angry merfolk.

Just like Bagi he also had brown and white hair but for him the white was only one single streak.

Next to him, was another mer, he had a tail that was similar to Leo’s, but instead of purple his was his red and blue.

Bagi caught sight of Fit and waved him over at once.

“Oi Fit!” she called and Fit made his way over, letting out a greeting chirp that was quickly mirrored by all three of the new mers, but the pup only acknowledged him for a second before going back to playing. “Fit, this is my brother Cellbit, his partner Roier, and their pup Pepito” Bagi continued.

“Hello Fit!” Cellbit said with a smile “I have heard about you, glad you’re doing better” Fit forced down a hiss at the mention of the name Cellbit.

Cellbit, the guy who had taken Pac’s leg.

He knew Pac had said it was an accident and that him and Cellbit were good now, but Fit couldn’t help but feel this want to snap at Cellbit, tell him to stay away from his partner but he forced it down. Fit had no right to chase him off, Pac and him way family, and Fit had threatened Pac with death as well in the centre so he didn’t have any right to reprimand Cellbit.

Still, instincts sucked, but he would get over it with time.

Fit smiled and gave him a nod back.

“Hello, I have heard about you as well, nice to finally meet you” he replied.

“Cellbit and Roier is a part of the pod out at sea” Bagi explained.

“Speaking of that,” Cellbit said, looking at Fit “Have you decided where to go once you get out of the centre?”

Pac had told him that the pod at sea didn’t really have a leader, that it was more democratic, having gotten inspired by humans. So, Fit couldn’t really ask on single person to be let in, but both Pac and Bagi had told him it was almost certain he would be let in.

“I…I was thinking of joining the pod, if you would have me” Fit began “But, it would be a part time thing, I want to stay close to the centre” Close to Pac.

“Like my dad then?” Roier said, Fit looked at him confused and Roier seemed to pick up on it “Foolish, he’s my dad”

“Oh, I didn’t know that” He should maybe had assumed something like that, him and Leo did have matching tails “But yes, something similar to Foolish situation”

“You’re a nanny right?” Fit nodded, feeling his heart sink slightly.

He knew it was a bit hard of a position to have in a pod while also only being with them part time. A nursery mer needed to be ready and with the pups at all time , watching them ‘sometimes’ was not possible. It was all time or never, not whenever Fit felt like it. But Cellbit and Roier didn’t seem worried or like they were thinking too hard about it.

“Would be good to have a more experienced nanny with us” Cellbit said, looking at Roier for confirmation. Roier nodded and Fit turned his head to the side.

“You have a nanny?” he asked slowly and they both nodded.

“Yeah, Quackity but…He leaves a lot to be desired at times” Cellbit said with a little polite smile.

“He cusses out the pups at times” Roier said with a grin, not caring about throwing Quackity under buss “And he needs to work on his fighting” he laughed “That mans worst enemie is a Chayanne, a pup ”

“But his heart is in the right place” Cellbit quickly said, as if he tried to not make Quackity sound completely incompetent in front of Fit “I have no doubt he would die for a pup, even Chayanne, just…having someone to teach him some tricks would be good”

Fit couldn’t help but let out a laugh.

He remembered his first years as a nanny, not knowing how to deal with some of the worst misbehaving pups, being so tired at the end of the day of making sure they didn’t die that when the parents came back from hunting to take over he considered them a blessing from Poseidon himself. He had gotten better at it with the years, learnt new tricks, some he would happily share.

“Sounds good, I’m sure I could teach him a thing or two”

“Want to come and hang out tomorrow at the beach then?” Bagi said “We’re celebrating before Felps is leaving again with the boat, some more of the pod will be there as well as the centre merfolk”

Sounded nice enough. A little beach hang out.

“Sure, we can come” Fit said. Would be good to meet and form a bit more connection with the pod he would most likely spend a lot of time with in the future. He had to make sure he would actually get along with them.

As they were talking, the sound of shoes against metal caught his attention and he turned to see Pac walking towards them, Ramon still in his arms. The fear was gone as Ramon was signing happily to Pac, and on top of his head was Felps captain hat.

Fit let out a chirp calling for Ramon who stopped signing at once and chirped back, turning his head towards his dad.

Pac walked all the way up to them before putting Ramon down. He looked at the two adults and greeted them, they chirped back, but as soon as they were done with that Ramon took off towards Empanada, Tina and Pepito. As soon as he saw Pepito he let out a chirp greeting which Pepito replied to and quickly the kids were signing to each other, having their own conversation.

Pac looked at them with a smile before turning to Roier and Cellbit.

“Hey guys, so, have you met my boyfriend ?”He made sure to say that word as slowly and clearly as he could. His smile was wide as a mile as he said it and Fit felt his cheeks grow warm and his heart skip a beat. It felt so nice though, Fit really, really liked that title.

Roier and Cellbits eyes went wide.

“Boyfriend?” Cellbit asked and Pac got down on his knees and hugged Fit. He was holding onto his tightly, but not painfully. It felt very nice to be held, Pac’s warms arms around him, his body pressed against his.

“My boyfriend Fit” Pac said with a big smile. Cellbit blinked, looking between the two of them, before he could say anything Roier hit him with his tail catching his attention.

“You own me. I said it would be a mer” Cellbit wrinkled his nose ridge and looked away. While Pac let out a ‘Oh my god’

“I never made a bet”

Roier didn’t like that as he quickly leaned over and nipped lightly at Cellbit’s ear fin making him snap back towards him and let out a hiss but Roier just laughed. Cellbit huffed at his partner, a low growl rumbling, before looking back at Pac and Fit.

“I’m happy for you!” he said trying to hide he was clearly surprised by this “May this courting be fruitful”

“Explains why you don’t want to stay at sea all the time” Roier said looking at Fit “Humans are to dumb to evolve breathing underwater”

That made Tina scowl, having overheard the conversation from where she was hanging out with the pups.

“We can’t help that!”

“Just grow some gills or something, how hard can it be? We did it, I have been able to breath water and air since birth. It’s easy”

“Yeah, just breathe underwater” Cellbit agreed, making Bagi hit him with her tail this time.

“Be nice to my partner she hissed '' making Cellbit laugh while Roier just nodded, changing teams of the conversation that quickly.

“Be nice to her partner” he said, making Cellbit snap towards him.

“You’re supposed to defend me!” Cellbit growled “Be on my team”

“That is not written anywhere” Roier replied with ease.

“It comes with being my partner ”

“Must have been agreed at the same time we apparently didn’t bet about who Pac would court” Cellbit let out a laugh before slapping his tail at Roier.

“Shut up” he forced out between laughs.

Fit couldn’t help but snort.

“You made a bet about that?”

Roier nodded.

“Cellbit said he would be too anxious to date a mer, and I said Pac was crazy enough to do it. All of Richarlyson’s parents chose weirdly and weird partners.” that was followed by a ‘Hey!’ from both Pac, Bagi and Tina and loud laughs from Fit.

“That would include you” Cellbit reminded him and Roier just shrugged, and smiled.

“I never said it didn’t.”

As Fit was laughing did he feel something bump into him, he looked down to see Ramon looking up at him smiling.

“Having fun?” Fit asked and Ramon quickly nodded before raising his hands. He seemed to hesitate for a moment and then signed.

“I still don’t like boats, but this one isn’t bad” Fit smiled at him, and then looked over at the merfolk and humans talking and Empanada and Pepito played catch with Tina and he smiled.

“Yeah, this one isn’t that bad”

Chapter 15

Chapter Text

“You’ll be able to find your way to hot girl beach?” Tina asked as she stood by the waterway to the sea, waiting for Fit and Ramon to leave.

She had a bag flung over her shoulder, packed to the brim with stuff for the beach, despite that Fit knew she, Jaiden and Empanada had even more things in the car.

“Yeah, Bagi showed me the way yesterday,” Fit responded as he and Ramon made their way into the water, feeling the cool salty water wash over their bodies.

“Okay, me, Empanada and Jaiden will show up with the last things, so we’ll meet you there” Fit gave her a nod.

“Yeah, be safe” and then he dove down seeing the button by the door and pressed it. He heard the jingle ring out overhead before the doors started to slide open, revealing the giant blue sea.

Him and Ramon quickly moved out before the door would close again and they started to swim towards hot girl beach.

It was apparently a spot on a pink sand beach that had been found by Tina. No one usually was there, making it almost a private spot for the centre workers and mer to hang around at times like these. The nickname had been decided by Empanada's parents, and was now kind of stuck to it, even if no longer only girls visited it.

So that's where he and Ramon went, swimming close to the shore line as they moved, following the way Bagi had shown them until they finally reached the beach about 20 minutes later.

They breached the surface and crawled up onto the beach of pink sand and looked around, taking in their surroundings.

A lot of people from the centre were already on the beach along with their pups and kid, and the people from the pod Fit had met, Roier, Cellbit and Pepito was there as well, along with two mers he had not seen before, one was a guy and he guessed that was Quackity the other one was a woman, her tail looking like a pink river dolphin.

They moved further up onto the beach, Ramon following him. The pup shook his head trying to get rid of some of the water, trying to get a bit dryer, an issue that Fit was glad he didn’t have to bother with.

Ramon was then off, leaving his side. Fit wasn’t sure where he was going and before he could see where he was heading Cellbit called for him.

“Hey Fit!” Fit turned his way seeing him waving him over from where he was next to the two unfamiliar mer’s. Fit moved closer greeting them with a chirp and getting a greeting back.

“This is Fit” Cellbit said to the two strangers before looking back at Fit “This is Quackity and Ironmouse” Cellbit said gesturing to the two “Mouse is one of our battlemers and Quackity is our nursery-mer in training as you know”

Fit gave Mouse a polite nod, her hair was bright pink, and accessories hung from around her throat both of gold and pearls, and armbands were around her wrist, glimmering in the sunlight.

“Nice to meet you” she responded. With that greeting done Fit then turned and looked at Quackity, his expression not as warm as it had been to Mouse. He looked at Quackity with a stone faced expression. If this was the guy who might help watch Ramon in the future he wanted to be sure he seemed to be up for the task.

He was smaller than Fit, having to turn his head up to look him in the eye. His tail was similar to one of a bluestripe snapper. He didn’t have many scars yet, making his inexperience with the job clear to see, that or the water around here was pretty safe, which Fit would not be surprised if it was the case.

Fit leaned down slightly so they were eye to eye, looking at each other in silence for a moment. They held eye contact, Fit trying to get a read on what he was like, if he truly had the guts of a nursery-mer, like he somehow by just staring him right in the eye would be able to tell if he would truly die to protect the pups.

Before he got a lot further he caught sight of Chayanne behind Quackity and before he could say anything he saw the pup nipping him in the tailfin.

A yelp escaped Quackity as he snapped around sail up and teeth bared, ready to attack whatever had hurt him. His eyes landed on the pup and his stopped tensing but anger was now filling his eyes.

“Chayanne!” he snapped, sail falling but teeth still barred.

Chayanne just stuck his tongue out and then quickly moved away, just fast enough to dodge when Quackity tried to grab him. Chayanne laughed quickly making his way into the water, swimming out.

“Don’t go deeper than a human's length you sh*thead!” Quackity yelled after him and Fit couldn’t help but laugh.

Oh, he was a young nanny mer alright. Fit knew that tone all too well, the mix of frustration and care.

Tallulah started laughing from where she had watched it and Quackity quickly tried to hide the frustration, his bared teeth turning into a toothy grin instead.

“Hi Tallulah!” he said, voice sweet as sugar “So good to see you” Fit snorted.

“No favouritism here is see” the words were drenched in sarcasm.

“I can’t help Chayanne is an asshole” Quackity defended himself, turning back towards Fit.

“He’s just a pup” Mouse responded with a pout. “Be nice” Quackity wrinkled his nose ridge.

“Easy for you to say! You have a kid, so you don’t get to tell me how to handle pups”

She shrugged.

“Not my fault you're bad at your job” she said before she noticed some people coming down the beach and her smile went wide “Empanada! ” she yelled and left Quackity’s side before he could respond.

She started to snake her way up the beach as quickly as she could. Empanada took off from Tina and Jaiden’s side, running full speed towards Mouse throwing her arms around her once they met. “Empanada! My little warrior!” Mouse said in delight as she planted a kiss on the kid's forehead.

Fit smiled at them before he started to look around for his own pup, trying to see where he went just to find him by Pac.

Pac was sitting down by the picnic blanket. Ramon was already in his lap, just hanging out there while they watched Mike start to take out food from their basket.

Fit made his way over and quickly moved around Pac, like a U he settled down around him, letting Pac then lean back and rest his back against his tail. Fit loved this, loved having his partner and son so close. To feel Pac against him, feel every breath the human took.

“Oi big boy” Pac said smiling at him while Fit just let out a loud laugh.

“Calma, calma, calma” Fit replied between laughs as he laid down on his stomach. Now with both hands free he reached out and grasped Pac’s hand. The human responded immediately by holding onto him, their fingers interlinked.

“It’s so hot” Tubbo huffed from where he was lying on the sand between Foolish and Philza. He had a waist bag around him, Fit had heard him talking about it before, he usually just kept his phone and some other things in it for when he was forced to leave the center.

“Just go into the water,” Philza replied. Meanwhile Jaide and Tina had reached them, Jaiden without hesitation brought out her parasol and placed it down next to Foolish before sitting down under it as well. Tubbo wrinkled his nose ridge at that.

“Why does he get the shade?!” he hissed.

“As his manager I’m looking out for him” Jaiden declared with a smirk before she lifted her fist out and Foolish immediately responded by fist bumping her.

“Manager?” Fit asked, confused by what she meant by this.

“It’s a inside joke from when Foolish tried to run for mayor” Pac responded having heard the question. Sensing Fit didn’t know what that meant so did he elaborate “It’s like…The pod leader but for like, thousands of people”

Fit furrowed his brows.

“For humans?” Pac nodded “That…” Fit didn’t even know how to respond to that “That’s…Weird?”

“He did surprisingly well. That he has no concept of a lot of human things, like money, or public transport, or welfare, or police force, and stuff like that messed him up though” Fit didn’t have a concept for most of those things either, he had a feeling it was a good thing Foolish hadn’t become this “mayor” but in honesty, he was just surprised a mer could even try to get that position.

His thoughts were pulled away from human society and merfolks place in them when Felps came by. He had been carrying around a little box of some kind and handing something colourful out to everyone.

As he came to him, Pac and Ramon he crouched down and held the open box to them.

Pac reached into it without hesitation and pulled out one of the items. It looked like a blue coloured cylinder on top of a wooden stick.

“You want a popsicle?” Pac asked, turning his head to look between Ramon and Fit “It’s a treat.” Ramon rose up from Pac’s lap and looked down into the box before reaching in and pulling a blue one out as well, Fit mirrored him grabbing one as well, but instead taking a red.

“It’s tradition here that the sailors or captain leaving gets the popsicles for everyone” Felps explained “And if a mer is coming with them they get the fish” Sunny and Leo had mentioned that sometimes the merfolk followed along the ships.

“I guess Cellbit is not following this time?” Philza asked, looking at the fish Mike was pulling out from his bag.

“Wanted to stay here for a while” Felps replied “Said he wanted to be with Pepito and close to Bagi” Philza gave him a nod of understanding.

Fit didn’t listen anymore to their conversation instead looking at the red popsicle in his hand. He hadn’t touched it yet, but by simply holding the stick he could already tell it was going to be cold.

He watched the people around him who were licking at and quickly followed their example, pressing his toung to it. It was cold, and didn’t taste much, but by the second lick he could taste something sweet and fruity.

“It’s mostly water and like, fruit juice” Pac explained, his eyes on Fit “It’s pretty tame so even merfolk not used to human food can enjoy it”

Someone who was really enjoying it was Ramon who seemed to love it so much he tried to bite down on it, just to yelp when the cold hurt his teeth. At the yelp Quackity snapped his head towards him, body tense, but relaxed at once when he saw there was no danger.

Fit looked at him and just smiled.

‘Yeah, he had the heart of a nanny alright’ he thought with amusem*nt.

As soon as Ramon was done with his popsicle he crawled out of Pac’s lap instead going to hang out with the other pups and kids who were making sand castles.

Fit looked at them by the waters edge before lifting his gaze towards the seemingly endless sea.

Boats were passing by and floating peacefully further out. The sun was hitting the water making it glimmer like silver. There was not a lot of wind today so the water was just peacefully moving up and down the sand, the water washing over the pups at times and nipping at the kids' ankles, threatening to make their castles of sand, shells, stick and seaweed fall.

He looked at the kid building castles and then at Tallulah and Chayanne who were collecting shells which they kept bringing back to their dad. Philza must have had at least 50 shells gifted to him at this point.

Fit turned back to the current conversation and it seemed like Tubbo had the floor.

“Deep sea merfolk always get the cool stuff” Tubbo said, stuffing another piece of fish into his mouth, despite Mike’s protests “Like have you seen those guys who can glow and sh*t? Or those who are transparent? Crazy” Cellbit let out a snort.

“Are you jealous of Antoine then?” he asked, a smirk on his lip which made Tubbo frown.

“No he’s just weird” Fit had no idea who that was but he guessed it wasn’t that important. He took another lick of his quickly melting popsicle.

They stayed on that beach long enough to get a fire started at which some humans started to cook their fish species and something called marshmallows. Fit got to taste a bit of Pac’s then biting down on either side of one. Fit almost burnt his tongue but otherwise it was alright, maybe a bit too sugary for him.

It was at that point Ramon made his way back to him.

‘Can I go swimming with Sunny, Pepito and Leo?’ he asked. Fit looked up, seeing that Empanada and Richarlyson were playing with a ball with Tina and Felps, using their feet to kick it around on the sand, making it hard for the pups to join.

Fit then turned towards the sea, noticing pups except Tallulah and Chayanne moving around in the water, having not fully gone out yet, still sticking close to shore. Quackity was watching them in the water. Mouse was also in the waves, play fighting with Leo, splashing water at each other and playfully hissing at the other.

Fit hesitated for a second before he let out a sigh.

“Sure, just stay close to the group, okay?”

‘Okay!’ Ramon signed and quickly followed the rest, being in the water in the matter of seconds, chirping happily at the other pups and them chirping back at him before they headed further out, into deeper water.

Fit was pulled from his thoughts as Pac offered him a cooked piece of salmon.

Fit smiled and accepted it, taking it off the stick he was using and putting it into his mouth. It tasted weird when it was cooked.

“What do you think?” Pac, looking at Fit while he chewed. Fit shrugged.

“It taste weird” he responded before he smiled “But I have to get used to cooked food if we’re going to live so close together” Pac snorted, putting a new piece of fish and letting it hang over the fire.

“It takes a while to get used to human food” Pac responded “And I’m fine eating fish with you” Fit quickly shook his head.

“You already know all about my world, I want to learn more about your world. Your food, your traditions” Pac looked at him, his eyes wide as Fit looked right into them with a look of conviction. “I want to learn more about you and your world.” Pac smiled, cheeks growing red.

“Then I’ll teach you, teach you everything you want to know.” Fit smiled squeezing Pac’s hand. Pac's smile just grew wider and he lifted Fit’s hand, raising it up to his face and planting a quick kiss on his knuckle.

Fit felt his cheeks grow red along with feeling this good warm feeling appearing in his chest around his heart.

“Thank you” he stammered. Pac just smiled and looked away, just for his smile to suddenly drop. He suddenly sat up straighter, looking toward the sea. Fit looked up at him just to see that Pac’s brow was furrowed ever so slightly and that warm feeling in his chest fade.

“What is it?” Fit asked, rising up onto his arms.

“I’m…I’m not sure” Pac responded “I just see Quackity out there by that boat”

Tubbo, who seemed to have eavesdropped, turned his eyes towards the ocean as well.He opened his waist bag and took out a spyglass. He lifted it up to his eye and looked towards the water, right at Quackity.

“I think…I think he’s talking with a guy on the boat?” Fit looked towards the boat.

It looked like a fishing boat, like any other, a rope going down into the water from its crane which they used to catch fish.

The conversation between the rest had died down as everyone looked towards the ship.

Suddenly they saw Quackity dive under the surface and vanish fully into the water.

They thought that would be the end of it before he suddenly launched from the water and onto the railing, grabbing it and trying to pull himself onboard.

“Maybe he wants to buy something-” Cellbit’s didn’t get further, as Tubbo screamed in panic, but even that got drowned out by the new noise.

“Bang”

The sound echoed across the water, making the kids who had been playing stop dead and turn towards the sound, looking towards the boat as well.

It was dead silence for a second, like even the waves had gone quiet and seagulls that had been going around the beach fled into the sky and away.

Fit…Fit had no idea what had happened or what that sound meant but the look of pure terror on Pac’s face spoke for itself.

Quackity lost the grip of the boat and fell backwards, back into the water with a huge splash and did not get up again.

Mouse who had been under water peeked up just to dive down as another bang rang out the water splashing where her head had just been and that second bang seemed to kick everyone into action.

“They shot him!” Tina screeched in horror.

“Where are the kids?!” Bagi screamed looking around to find Empanada. When she laid eyes on her she quickly moved up to her and grabbed her arm and pulled her down into the sand so she could curl around her, similar to how Fit had curled around Ramon the first days at the centre.

Felps lifted Richarlyson up into his arms and quickly started to back away from the shore, looking around like he was not sure where he was going to go.

Chayanne and Talluah fled from where they had been looking for shells moving quickly back to their dad who immediately placed himself in front of them, between the pups and the boat.

Fit was stunned trying to understand what had even happened.

Suddenly Tubbo threw the spyglass on the ground, not bothering to put it back into the bag and went into the water almost crashing into Mouse who was dragging Quackity out of the water his arm was flung over her shoulder as she dragged him to shore using her one free hand to drag them forward.

Tina and Mike ran into the water helping Mouse get him out of the water each taking one of his arms. On Quackity's chest was a round hole where blood was spilling out of, mixing with the sea water making it look like it was running out all over his chest. Fit hoped to Poseidon that it looked worse than it was.

“They f*cking shot him?!” Phil yelled eyes wide, he sounded stunned “What in the name of the Ocean Overlord are they doing?! Do they know how close to shore they f*cking are?!”

“Roier!” Jaiden yelled out, throwing off her jacket onto the sand and rushing into the water and dove in as Roier rushed from the beach after her. As he made his way next to her she threw her arms around his neck and took a deep breath before Roier dived down and swam towards the boat, following Tubbo.

Quackity got fully up onto land. Mike and Tina lay him on his back and Foolish was by his side in an instant looking over the wound.

“Okay, okay, try-try not to breath to much, but don’t stop either-”

“They caught the Pepito and Sunny” Quackity was able to force out between gritted teeth forcing the words out through the pain and Fit felt his heart drop into his stomach. “They used a harpoon net, I…I was not quick enough”

“And Ramon, Leo and I couldn't get through it. '' Mouse added, voice panicked. “We tried!”

Cellbit gave Quackity one last look before he bared teeth and snapped his head towards the boat.

“Help him!” He commanded before going into the water and Fit tried to follow. He was not sure what had happened but he understood they had hurt Quackity and captured the pups,

As he turned towards the ocean to follow Cellbit was when he saw it.

The rope was pulled up revealing a net and inside was Sunny and Pepito, it was faint but Fit could hear it, the screams of fear and panic leaving the young pups which made it feel like his heart was ripping apart inside his chest. They were twisting around, trying to escape but instead just got tangled up further.

Outside the net trying to chew and rip through the rope was Leo and Ramon. Leo was dragging her claws against the rope trying to fray it while Ramon, whose claws still hadn’t grown out again, was biting and chewing, snapping his head side to side as he would try to rip meat off the bone, but nothing seemed to help.

His son, his beautiful reckless son was trying to save them, trying to save them from the fate that had befallen him. Trying to save his friends, his family from being captured. From being locked up and starved and beat like the federation had done to him and his dad.

He was trying to save them, just like Spreen had tried.

‘You’ll lose him the same way’ a voice whispered in his ear, ‘Lost profit’ This cold panic grabbed a hold of his heart as he rushed into the waves.

He could not lose him too.

He could not lose his son.

He could not lose him the same way.

He would die before he would let that happen.

As he got into the water a new yell rang out from behind him.

“Fit!” Fit snapped his head to look over his shoulder, seeing Pac rushing towards him having thrown off his hoodie and was now in only his wetsuit “Take me with-” He never got to finish as Fit grabbed his arms and quickly made them go over his neck.

He didn’t want to risk Pac’s life, didn’t want to put Pac in danger…But he had saved them before. Maybe he could do it again? Fit begged to all the gods that would hear him that he wasn’t making a huge mistake.

Pac quickly hugged him, holding him tight as Fit threw himself into the water, beating his tail as quickly as he could as he swam towards the boat.

Chapter 16

Chapter Text

Fit was going as quickly as he could. Pac hanging onto him slowed him down greatly, but Fit tried to compensate by beating his tail twice as hard.

Fit could see Tubbo, Roier and Cellbit in front of him, all of them going as fast as they could.

Tubbo reached the boat first, launching himself out of the water, just a moment later falling back down with a huge splash, a human man in his claws. They had some kind of black shaped L in their hand Tubbo quickly yanked from their hand and let go, watching it sink towards the seabed.

Next to reach the boat was Roier and Jaiden. Jaiden let go of Roier’s neck and just floated in the water and gave the mer a thumbs up.

Roier responded by putting his hands under her feet in a move Fit recognized. Roier then shot both him and Jaide up towards the surface, breaching it and tossing her all the way onto the ship. Roier then fell back into the water as soon as he did he dived down, both him and Cellbit who had now made his way over before together they shot up and onto the boat.

As Fit and Pac finally got to the boat Fit’s heart was beating so hard he could hear it in his ears.

He was moving too slow, it felt like no matter how fast he tried to go he was being weighed down. He had to be quicker, his son’s life was on the line.

Pac let go of Fit, getting into position the same way Jaiden had and Fit quickly mirrored Roier’s action as he shot up pushing Pac out of the water and tossing him up onto the boat.

It was not as good of an angle as Roier and Jaiden had gotten, Fit not having had a chance to train this. However Pac was still able to grab the railing, his hand locking around it in an iron grip. A ‘thud’ rang out as his body hit the boat's metal side hard and Fit suppressed a vince.

Pac let out a hiss but didn’t take even a second to recover as he just pulled himself up and onto the boat.

With Pac on it Fit dove back into the sea before he himself launched up and onto the boat.

It was chaos.

”I’ll send you to the bed of Rán you piece of sh*t” Cellbit shouted, teeth bared before launching himself forward, slamming into a human and the two of them fell overboard with loud splash as they hit the water below.

Tubbo kept jumping up from the water and dug his claws into anyone who was stupid enough to stand too close to the railing, dragging them over the railing while the humans let out cry of pain and a shout of fear before being silenced by a splash.

Fit looked around in a panic.

Where is Ramon? Where is his baby boy?! The answer came as Roier started yelling.

“Leave!” Roier his voice was stern, making it clear it was not negotiable. Fit turned to look his way, seeing Roier by the net that had been lifted up and now laid down on the ship's cold metal deck.

Sunny and Pepito were still stuck in, they were not fighting anymore, instead the two smaller pups were pressing close to the other, trying to get and give comfort to the other. They were pressing themselves down curling their tail close to them, trying to look as small and unnoticeable as possible.

Meanwhile Ramon was still chewing hard on the rope, trying to desperately get through it. Leo lifted her hand to sign something but Roier doesn't listen.

“No, go back to papá!” He grabbed her wrist and without much dignity started to drag her. She started screaming and thrashing, her sail raised as she snapped and growled at her older brother, but Roier didn’t seem to care in the slightest. He brought her to the railing and like she weighed nothing he just threw her over the edge hearing her scream in anger until she hit the water, the water muffling her yells.

Not the nicest way to do it, but it got the job done, she was too small to be able to make the jump back onboard, leaving her with the only option of going back to land or waiting in the water surrounding the boat.

Roier looked over the edge and that was the moment a human launched themselves at him holding one of those sticks with a hook at the end and he brought it over Roier, slamming the pole against his throat, strangling him.

Roier’s eyes went wide and he raised his hands trying to pull it away so he could breathe but seemed to have a hard time to get good leverage.

Fit started to rush over to help, but the person who got to Roier first was not him, it was Ramon.

Ramon had stopped chewing and instead launched himself at the human biting into his ankles with sharp teeth, biting down hard enough to draw blood making the human scream out in pain and loosen their grip just enough to let Roier drag in a breath of air.

The human looked down, seeing Ramon who let go for a second just to bite down again into the human's calf.

“f*ck off you little muskrat!” they yelled and kicked Ramon away, making Ramon let out a yelp of pain as he slid across the metal deck.

Fit saw red .

His blood was boiling and couldn’t even form words, his sail just went up, he bared his teeth and flexed his claws as this shrill animalistic scream of anger made its way out of his throat.

As he reached the man he grabbed his sides, his claws digging through his clothes and into the soft skin in his stomach area. Digging them deeper and deeper into him.

The man lost his grip of Roier at once as he let go of the weapon and instead tried to force Fit to let him go, to pull the claws out of his stomach but that just encouraged Fit to continue, feeling hot blood over his fingers.

Roier, now free, turned around with his claws out and went for the throat.

A choked off sound escaped the human before they slumped, gravity carrying them forward as they landed limp on the floor, bleeding out.

Roier was breathing hard rubbing at his throat a red bruise already starting to form over it.

Fit didn’t have much time to spare for him however instead turning to Ramon.

The anger was still pulsing in Fit’s body but he forced it down as best he could, as he started to talk to him.

“You need to go,” he said, not even trying to hide the panic.

Ramon shook his head.

‘My sister, Pepito-’ Fit loved Ramon, loved his bravery, that he wanted to protect his family but this was not the time, and Fit had no patience for it.

“Get out of here!” Fit snapped “Leave now! We’ll handle this! Go!”

Ramon looked at him eyes wide, not used to hearing his dad take this tone with him. However he still turned to look towards the other pups and Fit could sense the hesitation, knew his son enough that leaving would feel like abandoning them. Fit understood that, but Ramon was just a pup, this was not his responsibility.

“Go!” Fit screamed again, his sail actually raising at that, his voice commanding. He knew he would have to talk to him about this later and apologise, but right now, in a matter of life and death he didn’t have the time.

Ramon gave him one last look before he grabbed the railing and pulled himself over the side and into the water, a splash heard below.

Fit turned then to the net, Roier was already on it, trying to scratch through it. Fit joined him, desperately dragging his claws against the rope.

Sunny couldn't help it anymore seemingly as she let out a scared scream. That scream pups gave out when they were scared for their lives.

“I’m coming poppet!” Tubbo screamed from the other side of the deck where he was wrestling with a man, “I’m coming!” he then was swiftly hit with a punch to the face.

Tubbo seemed to get stunned for a second, and the man pulled something out of his pocket. He pressed something and a sharp blade came out but before he could do anything Jaiden jumped into the fray kicking the man in the head, knocking him unconscious with one single hit.

Tubbo crawled out from under him, grabbing his head in pain but Jaiden instead grabbed the knife and sheathed it back into the handle itself.

She then looked around catching sight of Pac throwing another guy overboard, down to Cellbit who was waiting in the water with this cruel look in his eyes and bloodthirsty grin on his face.

“Pac!” Jaiden yelled, making him turn to her. She tossed it at him, and he caught it with ease “Get the ropes!”

Pac didn’t need to hear more as he ran towards Fit getting down on his knees and sliding the last part and he quickly released the blade again and started to cut through the ropes. It was still hard, beads of seating trailing down his brow as he cut but soon enough he started to get through it.

As he was doing that Tubbo made his way to them, just in time for Pac making a big enough hole to pull both the pups out. He quickly handed Pepito to Roier and Sunny to Tubbo.

As soon as Tubbo got his daughter he started to hug her, holding her tight to his chest.

Roier held Pepito with one arm, Pepitos back pressing against his chest while he kept looking around, making sure no humans were getting close.

“You and Roier go, take Sunny and Pepito to shore” Fit said “We’ll clean up here. Take the pups they’re priority”

“One of us going will be enough” Roier said “Tubbo take Pepito-”

“No” Fit cut him off “I’m not risking it you two go, come back once you’re sure they’re safe, make sure Ramon and Leo make it as well”

Tubbo shrugged and quickly made his way over the railing down into the water, Roier heistate for a second longer looking towards the few humans that were left standing before following Tubbo back into the sea.

Fit let out a breath of relief but his moment of rest was shattered as a voice he recognized screamed out over the ship.

“Get off my ship you f*cking siren!” this was followed with a ‘bang’. Fit and Pac both snapped their heads towards the sound, seeing Cellbit quickly get off the ship, a hole clearly visible in the railing where the bullet had just missed him. The human tried to shoot him again in the tail just as he made his way off the ship but he missed as Jaiden grabbed his arm and forced the black L weapon to point up into the air as another ‘bang’ rang out making Fit’s heart leap inside his chest.

“Drop the gun!” She screamed as she reached for the thing now known as a gun but the man refused, trying his best to keep it away from her and that was when Fit saw the man's face and he recognized it. He remembered that face, and would never forget it even if he tried.

Captain Cucurucho.

So he had been on one of the ships that had been able to avoid arrest, and he was already back getting his hands dirty.

Cucurucho lifted his foot and kicked Jaiden in the stomach, forcing her to let go and leaned forward as she gasped for air but before she could collect herself Cucurucho pistol whipped her across the head and she feel at once, landing hard on the deck where she stopped moving.

Fit was baring his teeth this hiss making its way out his throat. This man had killed his pod, had murdered Spreen, tried to force him and his son to become pets, shot Quackity and now knocked out Jaiden and had hurt so, so many more people. How much pain and suffering he had caused, how much blood was on his hands, Fit had a feeling they would never be able to truly find that out.

He was not going to let him get away with this, he was never going to let him hurt anyone ever again.

Fit launched forward, just for Cucurucho to turn towards and point the gun his way and shoot.

‘Bang’

Fit tried to get out of the way but was just a bit too slow and he felt this hot burning pain in his tailfin forcing a yell of pain out of his throat and his arms buckled making his slide a bit across the floor.

Cucurucho was about to shoot him again when Pac launched himself at the man, grasping at his arms, trying to yank the gun out of his hand.

Fit looked up towards him, he had never seen Pac like this before his teeth was bared and this rage just burned in his eyes.

“Stay away from my boyfriend!” he screamed, wrath and hatred for the man infront of him clear in his voice.

Cucurucho’s brows furrowed ever so slightly and as he moved around he got a clear opening and elbow Pac right on the nose with a loud ‘crack’.

Blood started to run down from his nose and now dazed and in pain Pac took a step back, letting Cucurucho lift his leg and kick him in the stomach.

Pac let out a gasp as he flew backwards and his back hit the railing, he scrambled to stand up straight but he was too slow.

“Don’t move” Pac stopped dead in his tracks as he looked up to see Cucurucho point the gun at him, his expression cold and emotionless.

Pac just stared at him, before his eyes zeroed in on the gun and Pac’s finger twitched but that didn’t go unnoticed.

“Don’t try it” Cucurucho hissed voice cold almost inhumanly, making Pac look back up at him. “Don’t force me to shoot you” he said keeping the gun locked on him pointing it right at his head ”I’m not here to kill humans. I’m here for business”

There was this tense silence. The fighting had been going on all around them but now it was so eerily quiet, all that could be heard was the waves hitting the ship gently.

Pac looked at him in shock, like he could not believe the words that had escaped this man's mouth.

“You just shoot a mer.” he said, getting on his feet and standing straight, he however kept his hands raised so they could be seen clearly “Why would you mind shooting a human?”

“Well, one is a person and one is an animal” was the immediate response “You and you’re little activists can lie to yourself but I’m not delusional”

Pac’s brow furrowed, the anger still clear in his eyes.

“They’re people!”

“They’re fish creatures. Adapted to look like humans to trick us into the water to feed, parroting our voices to lure us. Like the light of an anglerfish we’re supposed to be drawn into a trap”.

There were so many things wrong with the statement that Pac didn’t seem to know where to even begin.

“They got rights!” Pac screamed.

“And so do dogs” he replied “They’re animals, they can learn tricks big whoop. To be honest they should be considered pests. Eating all the fish from fishermen, attacking boats, I’m doing humanity a service while earning a pretty buck and providing entertainment.”

Fit bared his teeth, the pain in his tail was burning hot, like it was burning but Fit let the painful hiss that was about to escape his mouth turn into a growl.

Pac's open hands turned into fists as they started to shake.

“You’re sick ” Cucurucho’s eyes narrowed.

“Says the guy who cares more about a fish than their own people” he frowned “Look at what you made me do” he gestured down at Jaiden with his free hand. She was laying still, knocked out on the floor, her hair hiding her face but you could see blood in her hair from where she had been hit. “You make me hurt our own. You have killed and hurt most of my crew, and you're ready to die for some dumb animals?”

“We’re people!” Fit snapped, Cucurucho glanced over his shoulder at him. He knew it was probably wasted breath but he still just had to speak “We’re like you! We have families, we love, we hate, we’re like you, you heartless piece of sh*t!”

“Not in my eyes” he responded, voice unfeeling, uncaring, like Fit was nothing more than an annoyance. Like he was a dog yapping and barking and the sound was irritating him.

“You’re at worst a monster taking joy in tricking and killing humans. And at best you’re a paycheck” he looked back at Pac “Look, you even were able to trick him into thinking you love him”

Pac bared his teeth and looked about ready to try to strangle the captain.

“He does love me”

“ You love him.” Cucurucho corrected.

“I love him” Fit hissed out through the pain making Cucurucho glance towards him again “I love him. I love my pup. I loved my pod, and you took them from me. You tortured me! I speak like you! I bleed like you! I hate like you! So why can’t I love like you?!” Cucurucho’s eyes burned with rage, burned with hate just like Fit’s burned with hate for him. Well, at least they had that in common.

“Enough of your tricks!” Cucurucho turned his feet like he was going to point the gun at Fit and that was when Jaiden sprung forward on all four and grabbed his legs and yanked him, forcing him down to the floor.

Fit’s eyes went wide.

She had been faking it. Faking being knocked out.

Cucurucho hit the ground hard, letting out a gasp and the gun left his hand and spun across the floor. Pac launched himself at it, grabbing it with two hands and holding it tightly.

Jaiden and Cucurucho tussled on the floor but she was clearly still reeling from the pistol whipping. Despite that, she tried to put her hands around his throat.

“Stop this!” She screamed but Cucurucho didn’t seem to care.

They both got up to their feet, Jaiden was swaying clearly unsteady on her feet and he took full advantage of that, pressing Jaiden against the railing, before he fully was able to push her over it, making a huge splash as she hit the water below.

Fit felt his heart sink, if she had hurt her head bad enough she might not be able to keep her head above water.

“Don’t move!” Pac screamed and Cucurucho froze. He slowly turned around, seeing Pac pointing the gun at him. His hands were steady, around the weapon, no fear to be found.

“I got her!” they heard Cellbit yell from the water, making Fit’s worry ease up ever so slightly.

“Don’t move!” Pac screamed, pointing the gun at him. Cucurucho looked around, none of his men was moving, if he jumped the ship he would kill. He had nowhere to go, it was his time to be trapped.

There was this beat of silence, everyone knew he was done, it was more like everyone was waiting for him to admit it. To surrender and he was trying to put it off with a few more seconds.

In the end he raised his hands up into the air with a huff.

“Well then, you got me. Take me to court.” Pac furrowed his brows.

“You deserve worse,” Cucurucho scoffed.

“What are you going to do? Kill me? You’re going on a count of murder then” Pac shook his head. His expression was cold but something was glimmering in his eyes.

“Merfolk have a right to defend themselves and this is clearly a mer hunting boat, I’m sure there is even more evidence below deck. We’ll get off scot free” Cucurucho’s eyes went wide and Pac smiled, the blood from his nose having trailed down to his lip and left them bloody. “You might not see them as people, but the law does”

Cucurucho’s chest started to rise and fall faster, he was panicking.

“We’re humans . We need to look out for each other, you can’t truly care more about these monsters than your fellow man” There was silence for a long moment, like Pac was thinking over his words.

“There are monsters here but it sure as hell aren’t the mers” and with that he just dropped the gun and rushed forward and kicked Cucuroch in the chest before he could even realise what was happening.

Cucurucho toppled over the side of the ship, landing in the water with a loud splash. Cucurucho rose over the surface with a gasp for air.

Fit didn’t hesitate, despite his fin burning with pain he followed, going down into the water, adrenaline pushing him forward, turning the searing pain into nothing more than a distant ache.

He landed in the water with a splash.

He saw Cellbit holding Jaiden over the water a stone's throw away and Cucurucho kicking his legs in a panic, trying to stay afloat in his heavy wet clothes. Fit turned, looking at him from below, looking at him kicking his leg in a panic.

He started to swim, but he would be forced to go all the way around the boat and they were far away from shore meaning there was no safety to be found for almost a kilometre.

His hands tried to grab something, anything on the boat’s side to get up from the water and to safety but it was just cold blank metal.

And finally with no other options, he looked down, down into the waves and there he locked eyes with Fit.

Oh what a feeling, seeing that look in his eyes.

Fear. Pure fear.

Fit grabbed his leg, claws digging through clothes, skin and muscle, digging down till they reached bone. Red blood mixed with water, filling Fit’s nose with the smell of iron.

He heard Cucurucho yell above the surface, the water muffling it but Fit still heard it for a second before he pulled Cucurucho under the waves, his screams of pain at once silenced by the quiet sea.

He would never surface again.

Chapter 17: Epilogue

Chapter Text

“Looks good!” Foolish said as he checked on Quackity’s wound. Fit was by the side as Foolish finished up the examination, he had already checked Fit’s tail fin and concluded it was healing well and for the moment didn’t need any further medical treatment.

The most injured from the boat, um… incident had been himself, with his fin shot had he been forced to stay once again at the centre for a while to heal, but he hadn’t minded that considering it was a good excuse to hang out with Pac more. It had been a pretty nasty looking wound and it still was looking pink but it would soon turn into a faded scar, but with how many of those Fit already had so would it not be very noticeable all things considered. He didn't mind it; he was honestly kind of proud of it, a sign that in the end he had won, and had been able to get revenge not only for the things the federation had done to him and Ramon, but also against his pod, Spreen and all other merfolk hurt by the federation. He hoped they all could rest east now, knowing justice had been served.

Jaiden had gotten a concussion and been on sick leave for 2 weeks before coming back getting the hero welcome she deserved.

Quackity had been the worst off, the bullet had pierced a lung and they had been forced to take him to a human hospital as the centre didn’t have the equipment to handle a bullet wound like that, but in the end they had been able to save his life and now he was back with the pod, however so was Roier always with him right now when Fit was not with the pod because Quackity was under strict order to not strain himself. So Roier was there to help guard the pups.

Foolish had also stayed with the pod a lot just to make sure Quackity was alright as the only healer close by.

Fit turned his head seeing Leo, Pepito and Ramon play a bit away, chasing after Roier who was swimming laps around them and making comments about how slow they were the whole time. Fit’s lips raised into a little smile before he turned back to Foolish.
“So it's alright if I leave?” Foolish nodded.

“Yeah, you’re both good to go” Fit then turned to Quackity.

“Are you going to be okay if I leave for the day?” Quackity nodded, letting out a sigh as he laid on his back on the sea bed, strictly told not to rest on his chest while the wound was still healing.

“Yeah, Foolish and Roier will be here” he responded “They’ll help protect the pups and I’ll be the voice of reason”

“If you’re gonna be the voice of reason I guess you won't waste much breath” Roier commented as he quickly swam past them, Pepito and Leo just barely missing his tail fin.

Quackity bared his teeth.

“If I wasn’t hurt I would mess you up!”

“You could not do that even at your best” Foolish commented getting a smack right in the face by Quackitys tail.

Ramon swam past as well trying to keep up with the other pups but Fit reached out and was able to grab his tail fin, Ramon made a little yelp as he got yanked back towards his dad.

He turned and looked at him with a look of confusion.

“I’m going to Pac. You want to come with or stay here with the pod?” Fit asked. He had been with the pod for a little while now and considered them trustworthy enough, hell, even if Quackity had failed to protect the pups from Cucurucho and he was still learning to be a nursery-mer so had he been ready to give his life for them without hesitation. So Fit considered him and the pod trustworthy.

‘I want to go with you’ Ramon quickly signed and Fit smiled and turned back to Foolish and Quackity.

“We’re leaving, see you in the evening” they got some quick bye’s and he and Ramon started to swim away. They swam past the rest of the pod waving to them as they left towards the beach.

There were some boats around, but Fit didn’t mind them, swimming past them without a worry in the world. He felt a lot safer now that Cucurcho was dead and gone and the whole incident had ended with the coast guard being around more, checking boats to make sure no traffickers were still around.

The police had been a bit annoying to deal with after the Cucurucho incident but Bagi had handled it on that front and apparently been easier than expected. A simple check under the deck and it had become clear it had not been a fishing boat.

Large cages, muzzles and rope not commonly used for fishing had been found among papers and records of merfolk that had been captured and where they had been delivered. The police had gotten so busy finding these places and stopping the last branches of the federation that they didn’t even seem to care much that most of the crew along with the captain were dead and at the bottom of the sea. Self defence it had been summed up as and every mer and human involved had been let off the hook.

Fit kept swimming towards the beach and soon enough he saw that little dock. Ramon quickly took off going ahead, swimming to it and pulling himself up onto it before he started chirping happily announcing loudly that he had arrived.

Fit smiled and also swam up to it but instead just poked his shoulders and chest over the surface as he crossed his arms on top of it and just stayed like that.

The dock reached all the way to Pac’s patio, all the way up to his double sliding glass door. He had gotten them installed so if Fit and Ramon wanted he could actually get into the house by themselves.

They didn’t have to wait long as the door opened and Pac stepped out having expected them.

He was carrying a tray with two mugs and a glass and he started to make his way down the dock all the way up to them. He placed the tray down onto the ground before he sat down onto the dock, so he was on their level.

He ruffled Ramon’s hair before handing him the lemonade glass that Ramon quickly started to drink. He then placed Fit’s mug of tea next to him with a smile, Fit looked at it and smiled. Pac had bought the mug for him personally, it was a white mug with the text ‘There are a million fish in the sea but only one mer like me’.

The mug was filled with Fit’s favourite tea. Fit had gotten a chance to get used to more human foods and drinks and he was so glad he did. Him and Pac were already planning a dinner date now that Fit could eat more human food and Fit was excited. The human world had so many more flavours and he wanted to try it all.

“Bom dia human boyfriend” Fit said with a mischievous little smile making Pac laugh.

“Bom dia, merfolk boyfriend” Pac replied with a grin as he leaned forward and Fit pushed himself up the last way, his lips meeting his in a sweet kiss.