Chapter Text
CHAPTER EIGHT: The Final Battle
Gavin groaned as he slowly blinked awake, his vision blurry and his head pounding. He had been lying on the floor of his cell, his head resting on clasped hands as he stared up at the weirdly pink, pulsating ceiling—bored out of his fucking mind but minding his own fucking business, thank you very much—when a troop of armed guards had stopped outside, that one-eyed shithead Javert at the head. The fucker flashed a grin so wide that Gavin thought his birthday had come early—not Gavin’s, obviously, based on the glint in the other mer’s eye. He winced as he caught the phrasing of his thoughts… as his mind seemed to fully, finally, be accepting what he truly was. What he had always been. Fuck, he was going to feel like such a tool when he saw Nines and Connor again. Hank was gonna have a fucking field day. Probably ask him if he wanted tuna fish for lunch. Ugh.
The guards had entered the cell during Gavin’s absent-minded musings; an outright *HISS!* escaped his lips when he realized how close to him their spears had come. Gavin’s claw-tipped fingers had tensed in preparation for a fight—because he’d be damned before simply going with them of his own volition—but then something hard and heavy hit the back of his head, and Gavin knew no more.
Until now, of course. Now, he was stretched out on a large, flat rock, his back to its weathered surface. His wrists were lashed together with his palms facing out, arms extended above his head. His—what’s that word again?—oh! caudal! fin similarly bound below him, the length of his tail taut against the stone. Wriggling free proved to be impossible; Gavin was trapped, a fish on a hook.
Coming back to awareness after his most recent bout with unconsciousness was a struggle, his stomach roiling, the cacophony of lights and sounds bombarding him from what seemed like everywhere at once—Gavin figured he was probably due for an MRI after one too many hits to the back of the head; and he was sure they’d want to poke and prod at him in order to update his official police file with his newly recognized mer status. Fuck, he was going to feel like such a tool when he saw Nines and Connor again. Hank was gonna have a fucking field day. Probably ask him if he wanted tuna fish for lunch— …wait, hadn’t he had those exact same thoughts earlier? Shit. He definitely needed an MRI. Maybe— Gavin squeezed his eyes shut as he was suddenly overwhelmed—a bright flash of brilliant blue light blinding him; a harsh voice droning louder and louder until he felt his eardrums might burst; the bindings tethering his wrists and his tail pressing deep into his flesh, digging, cutting, burning. Hearing an unfamiliar *keening* sound, Gavin opened his eyes, only to realize the sounds of misery as coming from himself: short, pained cries that pierced the veil of isolation that cordoned him in his despair, and beckoning a pair of glittering eyes and a sharpened blade into his view.
It was a mer he had never seen before, a woman with smooth, mocha-hued skin, tresses the color of ebony cascading down around her face. Her gaze was hard as she stared at Gavin, incantations pouring forth uninterrupted from her mouth that he couldn’t understand yet still trembled to hear.
<Thassa, कुत उव द्र कय
मकह्त्ञो अह्ल्र्य्ह्द्सह्द ल्नय्दिना कुत
Thassa, एह्तक्द्निल्देप्मा
य्क मुह्क य्क ओउइन तजुदेउह दु प्मिअ एक मक्क द्र्य्ह वेज
Thassa एच्’द य ल्नय्दिना
य्द द्र पकेह्हेह्क उव ओउइन इब्गाब्, क्ल्नो उह
ड्ञ्कद ल्नय्दिना ओउइ लुह्द्नुम ल्य्ह्’द प प्मुल्गत द्रेक दिन्ह
Thassa, Thassa>
Gavin’s stomach roiled with nausea. A single name, Thassa, repeated again and again, drilling into his brain, digging under his skin, dancing onto his tongue; his mouth thick and hot as he began chanting, unbidden, uncontrolled.
<Thassa. Thassa. Thassa. Thassa.>
Beams of bright blue light shone from his eyes, his mouth, his nose, the tips of his fingers, the rays and spines of his fins.
<Thassa. Thassa. Thassa. Thassa.>
Each taste of Thassa filling him with unbridled ecstasy. His body spasming, thrashing in anguish, even as tears of joy streamed down his face.
<Thassa. Thassa. Thassa. Thassa.>
He couldn’t stop. He didn’t want to.
—
Amanda smiled as she continued her devotions to Thassa; the ritual beseeching the Elder God to bless their plane of existence with her presence was proceeding exactly as depicted in the ancient spell scrolls. The puffer mer, an otherwise pathetic and useless entity whose mere presence defiled the water in which it swam, was now fulfilling a much grander and nobler purpose as the Bright—the vessel into which Thassa was pouring her power, her very essence. And then, when the bright stones ceased to shine and the mer’s chanting stopped, when the lights began to withdraw back into the vessel’s body as Thassa began to merge with her host, and it was too late for Thassa to return to the void—that is when Amanda would strike. Plunging her blade deep into the Bright’s heart, Amanda would force Thassa’s energies into her own body while severing Thassa’s will; in control of forces a hundredfold more powerful than her natural abilities, Amanda would thus eradicate the Kamski Clan from the Great Lakes entirely, and take their sphere of influence for her own. After that, perhaps the entirety of Michigan. Perhaps the world. She had provided for every possible variable.
A voice broke her reverie. <Amanda! What’s happening?!>
Except one.
What she hadn’t counted on was her children trying to stop her.
—
Sixty snarled as he dispatched the last mer blocking his access to Amanda’s rooms, the flat of his blade knocking Javert unconscious. Connor and Nines had likewise incapacitated the rest of the Royal Guard; though breathing heavily, all three brothers were excellent warriors, and only the slight trickle of blood from a superficial cut and the darkening bruise from a well-timed punch would give away the odds which they had faced.
After that, barging their way into their mother’s chambers was fairly straightforward; for all her careful plotting and scheming, Amanda hadn’t accorded the possibility of her three sons going against her will.
Wild eyes taking in the scene before him—bright blue light emanating from Gavin as he lay prone, bound to a stone altar; Gavin voicing a single word over and over as Amanda spoke a litany of magically-charged incantations; Gavin writhing in apparent pain as tears poured down his face—Sixty wrenched his gaze from the puffer mer and called out.
<Mother! What’s happening?!>
Amanda sneered as she answered, her head snapping up from where she had been bent over Gavin. <What was planned from the very beginning. With the sacrifice of the Bright, Thassa shall take her place in our world once again; but this time, her powers will be mine to command!>
Horrified, Sixty watched as Gavin began to thrash even harder, the puffer’s chanting increasing in volume as Amanda’s concentration became divided and she ceased her litany of supplication. <Thassa. Thassa. Thassa. Thassa.>
<Amanda! There’s got to be another way!> Connor had come up behind his twin, diverting more of their mother’s attention far from where Nines was silently making his way to Gavin’s side, in an attempt to loosen his bonds and pull him free.
<Thassa. Thassa. Thassa—>
<This is the only way! I—!>
The chanting stopped without warning; whatever Amanda had been about to say was cut short at the same time, a blood-curdling shriek ripping from her throat as the room filled with an intense wave of blinding blue light.
Sixty immediately shut one of his eyes tight, keeping the other open in order to better make sense of the incredibly high levels of illumination. However, he finally had to close both eyes as the brightness became too much for him to bear. Amanda’s voice was silenced at the same instant the lights winked out; giving his sight time to adjust, Sixty finally opened his eyes again.
Amanda was gone; no sign was left that she had ever been there save for her experiments, her scrolls, her hand-written notes… the brightstones lay on the workbench, their sapphire brilliance now reduced to lifeless gray. As Sixty watched, cracks spread through the brightstones; they shattered and fell to pieces, the motes swirling lightly in the ebb and pull of the water. The shockwave that emanated from the breaking shards knocked his brothers backwards in a rush of water, with only Sixty remaining untouched from the disturbance.
Turning to where Gavin had been bound to the flat stone, Sixty stopped, eyes wide. Gavin was gone, the tattered remains of his restraints left behind. Sixty choked back a sob of relief as his eyes found Gavin, not even three tail-strokes to the right of the altar.
Except Gavin was no longer Gavin. No longer the self-conscious but feisty puffer mer with the olive-hued flesh and the pale belly, small spines no more able to protect his heart than his pride. Instead, an otherworldly being of power and grace commanded the room, a being with a knowing smile and eyes of bright blue, a creature of elegance and beauty whose large bioluminescent spines cast winged shadows in the dark water.
Sixty felt a burble of hysterical laughter rise from deep within him. He would never have believed that magical stones and incantations would bring into existence one of the most powerful deities in mer lore, yet here she was: Thassa. God of aquatic creatures and the secrets of the briny deep. Immortal of ancient knowledge, of long voyages, and far-ranging searches. Thassa of the Rippling Tides, Thassa the God of Patterns, Thassa, Watcher of the Passages of Time.
<Ga—Gavin?> His voice trembling with uncertainty, Sixty reached out a hand to the ineffable being in front of him. His brothers watched from a distance, battered and wary—Nines leaning up against a wall, cradling his arm; Connor contacting the DPD through his radio in a desperate attempt to deploy the SWAT team ahead of schedule.
GavinThassa smiled, a look of patient amusement that looked out of place on the face of the normally irascible puffer mer.
I am not now. But, I will be.
Pulse quickening, his heart thudding in his breast, Sixty’s hand halted mid-water. <What... what happened? Where is Amanda?>
Gavin’s mouth drew downwards in a frown, fangs bared. Thassa’s reply was cold, the light in herGavin’s eyes darkening.
Change must happen slowly, naturally; lands resculpted, coastlines altered, institutions upended. Life and death are as inescapable as the tide; change comes on the waves, crashing against the shores of time, each droplet eroding what is into what will be. She who you called Amanda has paid/will pay the price for her insolence, in attempting to hasten that which must always come of its own accord.
Thassa looked down at Gavin’s hands with seeming disinterest, flexing sapphire-tapered claw tips.
I would have been ready to fully merge with my archon in the future-past, had not your ‘mother’ interfered with the natural order. As it shall be, I will leave this body so that one day, I may once again return.
Flicking eyes towards Sixty, Thassa smiled once again.
You will look closely after this vessel, Sixt’yan’rathian; of that I am quite sure. You have/will have feelings for Gavin Reed, and he, for you. When I return, he shall be better prepared to receive my essence. As it is now, I am shielding his mind from my presence.
Sixty nodded mutely, not quite understanding; he was all the same suddenly filled with relief. It was/would be alright. Thassa had promised.
Thassa’s gaze softened looking at Sixty, the bright blue illumination fading slowly into a sea of stars, underwater galaxies that swirled in the puffer mer’s eyes. Pressing their lips together, Thassa kissed Sixty, long and deep and gentle.
This is/will be from Gavin.
Breaking away from where Sixty’s arms had risen in the beginning of an embrace, Thassa kissed Sixty again, this time on his scarred cheek.
We will see you again in the future-past. Until then, Sixt’yan’rathian.
The waters darkened as Thassa’s lights dimmed, the God leaving Gavin’s body and returning to the plane from whence she had come. Sixty caught Gavin as he slumped unconscious, his eyelashes fluttering closed. Sixty’s arms embracing Gavin, the white perch mer sighed as he cradled the puffer mer to his chest.
It was over. It was time to bring him home.
/end Chapter Eight (The Final Battle)
EPILOGUE: Bring Him Home
A flurry of activity had followed in the wake of Thassa’s departure. SWAT had finally arrived, the safe return of the captive merfolk to their loved ones of the highest priority. Simon had claimed Markus in a crushing embrace, reuniting in a flurry of kisses and tears; the two had returned to their shop after making Nines promise to come back—with his brothers in tow—for a proper thank you. Gavin, after having been rushed to the hospital for observation and recovery— “Two weeks MINIMUM after your release, Reed!” Fowler had snapped as the detective tried to negotiate his return while being carried away on a stretcher —had spent the rest of his forced convalescence at his apartment, staring glumly at the walls and waiting for the paint to peel. Hank visited Gavin a few times, giving him the scuttlebutt on the events following the operation, updating him on the final closing of the case. Connor, Nines, and Sixty remained at Lake Erie, discussing the ruling of the Stern Clan; envoys from the Kamski Clan had been spotted entering and leaving the palace, and it was rumored that Elijah Kamski himself would be arriving within the fortnight.
The end of Gavin’s recovery period found him riding along in Hank’s car in a loose t-shirt and baggy pants, the Lieutenant driving to a popular launch spot for kayaks and canoes near the heart of Clan Stern’s territory, his oversized bear of a dog—"Sumo, SIT!"—panting in the back seat along with a cooler and a small bag. Apparently, Connor and Nines would finally be returning to the DPD, and Gavin was antsy enough to come along for the pick-up. It wasn’t because he was hoping to see Sixty. Nope. Definitely not. Gavin left the car to Hank turning on his radio, calling Connor to let the brothers know of their arrival. Rolling up his pants and shucking off his sandals, Gavin walked a ways down the shore before plopping down onto the ground, his arms supporting his weight as he stretched out his legs. He curled his bare feet into the sand, feeling the grains between his toes, the water lapping gently at his skin. Closing his eyes, Gavin basked in the warmth of the sun kissing his face, and he sighed.
<Not missing me already, are we?>
The corners of Gavin’s mouth turned up, the heat rising his cheeks automatically at the sound of Sixty’s voice, his smile soft and genuine. He opened his eyes again, to see that the mer had dragged himself onto the beach, caudal fin waving lazily in and out of the water.
Gavin waved an arm out towards the lake. <’Course not. I'm just here for the view.>
<As am I.> A low purr rumbled in Sixty’s throat as he shuffled closer to Gavin, the weight of his tail leaving a huge indent in his wake.
Gavin’s breath hitched as Sixty pressed him into the sand, the waves climbing farther up the shore as the lengthening shadows heralded the change of the tides. He couldn’t say why, but ever since his… interaction… with Thassa, Gavin had felt everything more clearly, more freely… He knew he wanted Sixty, and knew Sixty wanted him. Lips on lips, a gentle kiss lengthening, filling with fervor, tongue against tongue as Sixty’s weight pressed down between Gavin’s legs, and—
<Sixt’yan’rathian and Gavin splashing in the sea,
K-I-S-S-I-N-G!
First comes love,
Then a lusty touch,
Then lots of tadpoles in a merfolk clutch!>
Gavin and Sixty broke apart at the loud, rascous singing and laughter of Connor and Nines as they approached the pair, Hank following in their wake with the small cooler in his arms and a huge grin on his face. The brothers had already shifted back into their land forms, each dressed in loose tank tops and cargo shorts (ah; the bag from the car), several beach chairs under their arms. Sumo bounded along between them, tongue lolling in the air.
Hank set the cooler down on the sand next to Gavin and Sixty, seemingly oblivious to the proximity between the two. “Thought maybe we could use a little R&R now that the case is over, but it looks like the two of you got started without us.”
Flushing with embarrassment, but refusing to move any further away from Sixty, Gavin made a show of rolling his eyes at his commanding officer.
“Yeah, well, not all of us decided to bring along the entire supply of the summer aisle from Five Below. Where'd ya get the beach chairs, Anderson?”
Hank smirked as he took a beer from the cooler and plopped down in a beach chair, popping the top and chugging. “My car has a trunk, you know. Where else did you think you were gonna sit on the way back to the precinct?”
“Hardy fuckin’ har. No thanks, I’d rather swim back.”
“Yeah, I hear you can do that now.” Hank lifted both eyebrows as he nodded towards Gavin’s feet.
Gavin had been so preoccupied with Sixty’s lips that he hadn’t noticed his legs partially shifting as they were repeatedly submerged in the rising tide. Webbing had begun to grow between his elongating toes, and his puffer spines were pushing out the tiiiiiiiiiniest bit from his flesh. Gavin felt himself blushing for the third time in less than ten minutes, and he bit off a retort as Sixty kissed him.
Connor paused in his never-ending stream of teasing from his own lofty perch in another of Hank’s beach chairs to lean towards Sixty.
“Tell us, ‘Sixty’, however did you manage to tame Gavin? He’s quite unruly.”
Nines hummed in agreement, his eyes roaming between the detective and his brother.
“Yes, I need to increase the working efficiency of our partnership. Please tell me what made him so agreeable to you.”
“I think… he’s cute.” Stumbling slightly over the foreign words on his tongue, but nonetheless intelligible, well-spoken, and oh-so-perfect, Sixty grinned at Gavin; ignoring Hank’s sudden bout of coughing as he choked on his beer, and the fake retching noises of Nines and Connor, Gavin smiled back at Sixty, and kissed him again.
Fucking mer.
/end Epilogue (Bring Him Home)
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"Ollo! I'm Damien (or Anti), a young queer digital artist primarily active on tumblr. I like to draw fanart of things I'm into (such as Detroit: Become Human), and my own characters! I have a lot of varying interests, but art has stuck with me for years, and I'm always trying to hone my skills. If you wanna talk to me, come reach out!"
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