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“Who are you?”, a hoarse and yet quiet voice reached his ears.
Dick had his entire body firmly pressed to the ground. There was close to no wiggle room, no matter how hard he tried.
A still mer is a dead mer - that’s what his father had taught him.
Dick was supposed to be in constant movement, his body shooting through the water, like a hunter chasing his prey.
Or he should be jumping out of the water, twisting his body in the air until he breached the water again while crackling as droplets and waves hit his sleeping parents who were sunbathing on a warm rock above the surface.
But he could do none of those things anymore.
His parents - taken by poachers or hunters,
Dick refused to care. He just knew they were humans. And that was enough knowledge for him to avoid not only the surface but any contact with the land-dwellers if they ever dared to enter his world.
But even then, traces of humans could be found everywhere, even below the surface.
A throwaway net which humans used to catch fish and mer alike, had wrapped itself around his entire body and cut into his skin. The scales covering his dark blue tail provided protection against the sharp edges but where his skin was softer, the lines left deep cuts.
Blood in the water was never a good sign. It attracted predators.
While Dick had expected sharks and other, bigger mers, a little merling curiously swimming circles around him, had not been anticipated.
Small specks of red scales cluttered the little one’s face - a sign of a merling who was still clearly below the age of maturity. Dick imagined, if he poked a finger against them, they would give away slightly, showing off his young age.
The fins on the sides of his head were fanned out. Usually a sign of aggression but with merlings, it was often hinting towards curiosity and wonder. Dick would have tilted his head if he had been able to. The soft tissue in between the merling’s cartilage was ripped and torn in various places. It was often seen in older and aggressive mers, remedies of territorial fighting, not in merlings.
His dark red tail was still stubby and short, not strong enough to flee from predators, to protect himself, or even to hunt for small prey - a merling like him shouldn’t be alone, he should be with his pod, safely hidden between seaweed or protected by a giant tail curled around him.
But the merling was alone, speaking to a strange mer - an adult mer.
Dick himself was barely an adult, evident by the residue of blue scales scattered around his eyes. But he had stopped growing, the sign of maturity for all adult mers.
It wasn’t common for an adult mer to kill merlings but the chance was never zero. If the adult mer felt threatened or saw their pod in danger, they could lash out even against the tiniest of merlings. Parents often taught their offspring to stay away from adults outside the pod, especially the ones who felt cornered or threatened.
A mer like Dick.
Being nearly immobile, Dick would be the prime example of a mer, which should not be approached by a merling but yet, there he was, swimming circles around him.
There were two possibilities in this case.
No one had taught the little merling about the danger he was in right now or he was desperate enough to try and find shelter with a stranger.
Dick hissed, pulling his lips back, exposing his sharp teeth which could rip the little merling in front of him to shreds if it weren’t for the net separating the two of them.
“Are you hurt?”, the little one tilted his head curiously, swimming closer. “I saw some humans nearby, you should probably leave.”
Had the merling approached him because he wanted to warn him about the humans?
“Cute ,” Dick thought instinctively.
But the little one was right, he couldn’t stay here, not with humans in the perimeter.
“I can’t.” Dick tried to rip through the harsh fiber with his sharp claws but the net didn’t give way.
Dick swallowed with difficulty - it felt like he had swallowed a stone. But instead of a stone, there was dread resting on the bottom of his stomach.
He couldn’t let humans find him, not after what they did to his parents.
There was something deep inside of him that willed that eventual confrontation into existence, something evil and grieving, the animalistic urge to tear a human to shreds just like they did with his parents. Just to show other humans that he could.
When his parents were dragged up to the surface, Dick had followed the scent of their blood for ages. He swam and swam and swam until his tail refused to obey and he sank to the bottom of the sea, laying there exhausted, unable to move his body, and ready to join his parents.
But, unlike his parents, he woke up.
He woke up in a strange and unknown environment, completely lost, with no idea of how to get home.
Instead of giving up, he had followed his parents’ advice. The sea was his home, wherever he was, they would be with him, even if he couldn’t see them.
Eventually, he was forced to make those new waters his home. During the years on his own, he learned how to crack the shells of shellfish on his own, he learned how to hunt fish, and how to navigate through school and pods but no matter where he went, he was alone.
Until now.
“Do you need help?”
Dick could clearly see the mind of the merling work. Curiosity and hesitation were fighting against each other and it seemed like curiosity won. The little merling inched closer, small and chubby fingers wrapping around the fiber of the net.
“Be careful,” Dick warned. “Those nets are sharp, you’ll hurt yourself.”
In the corner of his eyes, he saw a distant light move towards them. It was clear to Dick that it was a human edging closer.
The little one’s eyes followed Dick’s and flinched when he saw the light inch towards them. Big eyes slowly returned to Dick.
The merling watched Dick intensely as the bigger mer’s tail thrashed against the netting again. He could feel the net wedge itself under his scales and draw blood but injury was a risk he was willing to take.
“You need to leave, little one, or they’ll catch you,” Dick warned, fingers digging into the net. The sharp pain was pushed back into his mind - he needed to get the merling to leave him alone. “Leave! You don’t know what they will do to you!” Dick growled deeply and he felt the guilt rumble through his body as he saw the little one flinch.
But against his better judgment, the little one swam closer. He gathered something from behind his back and took the netting in between his fingers again.
“I can help you.” He offered. Inside his little palm was a small rock. The merling carefully rotated it, so that the sharp-looking edge pointed towards Dick. Then he started cutting.
It was strange watching the young mer work. His tongue was sticking out of his mouth in concentration while he carefully and with precision cut through the net. Before Dick could ask him who taught him those tricks, he saw something that made his blood boil.
Something was stubbornly wrapped around his stubby red tailfin.
A net.
A net made from the same material as Dick’s current captor.
It was tightly knotted and tangled around his tail and the merling was probably too small to reach this part of his tail without any help from another mer.
The little one knew how to free Dick because he had been stuck in the same situation before.
The net didn’t seem to be cutting off the tailfin’s blood flow but it couldn’t be comfortable swimming around with a net dangling off his tailfin. Especially since he was still so young and oh god so small . The merling would still be growing and even if it didn’t bother him now , it would hurt him soon, possibly stunting his growth or causing permanent injury if not removed.
The light of the humans edged closer, nearly illuminating them completely.
They had to leave.
Now.
Even if the little one wasn’t completely done with his job, Dick already wiggled and twisted himself out of the net. The merling turned around in surprise, the net still resting in his tiny, little fist.
The first thing Dick did was stretch his cramping muscles. Being stuck in the same position for a while made his muscles sore.
“What’s y-your name?”, the merling stuttered, slowly edging away. His mood suddenly changed, the little one looked scared of Dick, now that his task was completed.
Dick seemed to have spooked him, towering over the merling with his entire body.
He wasn’t a big mer, Dick would consider himself average sized but he still loomed over his little savior, whose eyes constantly switched between the human light and Dick.
“Please… don’t- don’t let them…” The merling suddenly whimpered, eyes wide. Dick’s face wrinkled in confusion.
There was a shadow visible behind the human light and Jason’s eyes were locked in on it.
“Please don’t…”, a sob escaped his throat, the little one unconsciously swimming closer to Dick. “Please don’t let them hurt me…” He whispered, his voice suddenly void of any emotions, his eyes empty of the former curiosity but instead filled with tears.
Dick didn’t need to think as his dark blue tail carefully wrapped itself around the merling, showing him that he stood under Dick’s protection - that he is now part of his pod.
It was almost instinctual.
“Dick.”
“What?” Dick's voice ripped the little mer out of his thoughts. He turned his head and looked at the adult mer with big eyes. A little fist immediately wrapped itself around one of Dick’s smaller tailfins. it was something siblings did to each other...
“My name is Dick.”
The little one hid a grin behind his fist.
"What's so funny?" Dick laughed.
“I’m Jason.”
“Need help with that net around your tail, little one?”
Dick nudged Jason’s tail with his own.
Jason turned around and wrapped his little hands around his tail, inches away from the net. On closer inspection, Dick could already see scarring beneath the net. Jason must have desperately pulled at the netting, fruitlessly trying to remove it from his tail.
Jason nodded, his eyes nervously returning to the human's expected whereabouts.
But the light had suddenly disappeared and Dick knew what that meant.
The human was on the hunt.
Dick was well aware that Jason couldn’t outswim a human, especially not for long. He was still too little.
But Dick easily could.
“Want to leave here first?” Dick offered.
Without hesitation, a little hand found its way around Dick’s backfin.
The back of an adult mer was normally a place where merlings rested on when they needed to be carried, often due to exhaustion. A little merling couldn’t swim for long periods of time, they often grew tired fairly quickly. Or sometimes they just got grumpy and refused to swim on their own.
Dick could still recall how he nestled between his father’s shoulders, hands wrapped loosely around his backfin. He knew he’d be safe there, with his mother swimming over them and his father’s presence below.
“You ready, little one?”
Before Jason could nod, Dick beat his slender but powerful tailfin a few times, catapulting the two mers away from the human, into safety.
At first, Dick was worried that he had scared the little merling too much but when shrieking giggles hit his ears and Dick could see big eyes full of wonder staring at him, Dick smiled right back.