Chapter Text
Luca grinned as he imagined the look on Alberto’s face when he discovered his surprise. His friend was constantly doing nice things for him, and this time, for his eighteenth birthday, Luca was going to make sure he returned the favour. Spectacularly.
Hence the waking up at the crack of dawn and the thief-like skulking as he transported an entire table from Massimo’s house to the shallows where they had first met. Thankfully, there was nobody around to see the way he’d strapped the wood to his back and flailed about like an inelegant turtle, cursing his lack of strength. Then came the cherry-red and white checkered tablecloth, the chairs, the candles he’d gotten for Christmas and finally, the wicker basket stuffed to the brim with Alberto’s favourite food, the recipes of which had cost Luca many a burnt finger.
It was all going to be worth it, though, to see the look on Alberto’s face. Luca was positively giddy as he crouched behind a rock, watching his friend dart through the waves. Alberto always liked a swim first thing in the morning, and Giulia had helpfully lied to him that Luca was busy at the bookstore catching up on schoolwork. This was slightly early for him, as the sun’s rays had barely begun to pierce through the water, giving it a hazy, dreamy effect, but Luca wasn’t complaining. The flutter of butterflies in his stomach had been kicking up a storm since last night.
Stealthily, he crept to the shadow of another boulder as Alberto advanced, shamelessly admiring the rippling muscles across his back that had only grown in size over the years. He was so distracted that he only noticed a beat late that Alberto had already vanished amongst the seaweed.
Oh, for Poseidon’s sake. He needed to get a grip.
The cool water tickled his scales and he sighed happily. The shallow clearing was their spot, had always been, and by subtly stalking- he preferred the term observing- his friend for the past two weeks, he gathered that it was a frequented spot no matter the weather.
He caught sight of Alberto again, just by the passage of rocks that lead to the clearing, and his heart banging in his chest, he crept forward to the curtain of seaweed he had strategically placed. He was going to see the surprise in one, two, thr-
“Aaah!” There was a loud yelp as Alberto was suddenly strung upside down, his tail caught in an elaborate web.
“Alberto!” Luca streaked out like a rocket. “Oh, no no no, Alberto!”
“Luca?” Alberto asked incredulously. “Thank God you’re here!”
“Hold on, I’m going to free you! Does it hurt?” Luca asked, anxiety furrowing his brow. The butterflies were snakes now, coiling and writhing.
Alberto winced as Luca worked to free the knots. “A- a little.”
Thump . A large metal boot landed behind them, attached to a similarly attired body that held an array of sharp objects. Alberto’s eyes widened. “Hide!” he hissed, and before Luca could comprehend what was going on, he was shoved into the clearing.
A head ducked down to where Alberto was and Luca was falling, falling, his heart in overdrive at the look of the bloody harpoon in the figure’s hand. He made to burst out and attack the figure, but one look at Alberto’s insistent expression made him stop.
What? He mouthed, wondering if that sharp-looking rock was a good enough weapon-
Alberto just shook his head, a familiar determination burning in his eyes. I got this , he mouthed back, and despite everything, Luca did as he said. He stayed put as the figure clomped its way across the sandy ground to where Alberto was suspended like prey.
Oh, God, please let Alberto’s plan work, please let it work, Luca pleaded to any listening deities above, his nails digging crescents into his palm. Why wasn’t Alberto struggling? Why wasn’t he moving? The figure was nearing them now, and with one gloved hand, it plucked Alberto from the trap. Luca bit back a scream. His heart was thundering, waiting for Alberto’s signal, for a follow my lead, for anything at all, but nothing came.
Alberto was unceremoniously shoved into a coral cage and hauled up by a hook onto the shadow of a boat above. The last Luca saw of him was the flash of reassuring green eyes that said, I’m okay, and Luca hoped to God that was true.
But he wasn’t struggling, hadn’t struggled at all, and that was not the headstrong, defiant Alberto Luca knew. As the boat chugged off, sending foul bubbles spewing into the waves, Luca coughed back his tears and resolutely followed, mapping the boat in his mind. White-painted with a blue hull, unassuming at first glance, but a jolt shot through his veins at the sight of the name painted on the side.
Because now he knew why Alberto had been compliant.
♡
He was tired, his tail scraped on the side of too many harsh surfaces to count, but he swam on, his gaze never leaving the tugboat. The familiar seascape had transformed into hostile territory where even the seaweed seemed to leer at his failure. Idiot! The schools of passing fish mocked. You couldn’t even tell that he didn’t have a plan. He was just trying to protect you, and you let him!
Coward , coward, coward, jeered the very seawater itself, clamping around his arms, his tail, his neck like a noose of shame, and he clapped his hands to his head, swimming on and on and on while his mind tormented him. Luca could have saved him.
Bruno, said the boat in plain black script across the side, and Luca should have known, of course he should have known that Silencio Bruno had never been just imaginary!
Marks on the wall of their tower like a prisoner counting the days in blood, the betrayal freezing his expression as Luca betrayed him all those years ago, the way he cried and cried and cried when he finally admitted that his father had abandoned him. Crystalline tears slipping down that beautiful face that Luca had wanted to kiss away. What kind of monster left his child and came back only to capture and torture him again? He wanted to throw up, the same thought circling his mind like a cawing crown of vultures.
This never would have happened if Luca had tried to save him.
And you say you love him? called the sea grass, their laughter audible even over the shrieking fan of the boat, and Luca could only think AlbertoAlbertoAlberto as his exhausted body fell helplessly to the sea floor and everything went black.
♡
The first sensation he felt was the scratch of linen against his cheek. He blinked groggily. “Alberto-?”
Giulia’s blurry face swam into view. He was in Massimo’s house. “Oh, Luca, thank God!” She turned in the direction of the kitchen. “Papa! He’s awake!” she called over her shoulder.
“Giulia?” Luca tried to sit up, only to have his muscles betray him and he slumped back down onto the sofa, boneless. “What’s going on?”
She pressed a cool washcloth to his forehead just as Massimo entered the room. “You disappeared for an entire day,” she said worriedly, brows creased. “One of your sea neighbors found you just before sundown. You’d fainted.”
“You worried us, son,” Massimo said gruffly. “Are you all right?”
And it all came flooding back to him- Alberto, the capture, his failure. Again.
“No! Alberto,” he breathed. He turned urgently to Giulia. “Alberto got kidnapped by a human, probably a hunter, and I think he’s his dad. His biological father,” he amended at the shock on both Massimo and Giulia’s faces.
“His own father...captured him?” Giulia’s fists were balled. “How do you know?”
“The boat,” he said weakly, his head hurting as though it had been shoved through a too-small ring of pulsing metal. “It said Bruno on the side. And Alberto never struggled.”
Massimo had gone white. “No,” he whispered, sinking down heavily on the couch. “No!”
Giulia put a comforting arm around him. “It’ll be all right, Papa, we’ll find him.”
Luca tried desperately to absorb the conviction from her words. Despite the familiar environment, all he could think of was the way the room had an Alberto-shaped hole. He could see it all so clearly- Alberto, shivering in a cold room on a rough rocky floor while Luca sat useless in the warmth of his home. He would be curled up on himself, knees to his chest, the way he had been when Luca betrayed him all those years ago. And Luca had just gone and done it again.
What did his father want with him?
He thought of the slashes on the wall of the tower, the tremor in Alberto’s voice when he finally admitted that his father wasn’t actually there. How dare Bruno? How dare he abandon Alberto and capture him again? Oh, god, was he another Ercole, wanting to kill a sea monster for fame?
No, that didn’t make sense. Bruno had to be a sea creature too. Didn’t he?
Luca tried to summon a mental image of Alberto smiling in his familiar sunshine-yellow tank top, trying to comfort himself, but to his horror, a phantom choir in his mind began to wail as he found blood blooming across Alberto’s chest, his face ashen. A harpoon lying discarded besides him and Bruno’s barking laugh echoing off the stony walls. In his dream, Luca knelt desperately besides Alberto, trying to coax him back to life as though his mere will were strong enough, but his friend’s beautiful green eyes were dulling, greying, dying.
On his birthday.
You got me off the island, Luca. But you failed to save me when it really mattered.
“Luca? Luca!”
He was jolted back to reality by the sound of Giulia’s voice. “Huh?”
“Breathe,” she instructed, lifting a glass of water to his lips. “Everything’s gonna be okay.”
He turned to see that Massimo had risen and was speaking urgently into the telephone. Luca caught the words “...must help him, please.”
“Papa’s organising a search party,” Giulia explained. “You’re not coming though,” she said sternly. “Absolutely not!”
He struggled to his feet. “Are you crazy? Of course I am! He’s my friend !”
“He’s my brother,” she retorted. She planted her hands on her hips. “And you are in no shape to go out, mister. You’re staying here to get some rest.”
“She’s right,” Massimo said, having hung up on the last person. “We can’t risk having you injured again.”
Clearly seeing that he was unconvinced, Giulia jumped in. “We won’t be able to save Alberto if we have to save you, too.”
“Fine, I won’t go,” he conceded, swallowing the lump in his throat. The images of Alberto suffering remained unbanished from his head. “The boat Bruno took him away in was blue and white. I won’t go tonight, I promise.”
“Thank you, son,” Massimo said softly, clapping a hand on his shoulder, and Luca turned away, hoping neither of them would see his face.
His left eye was twitching, as it was wont to do whenever he lied.