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It wasn’t uncommon for the captains on the ship to take time to themselves.
This was fine. This was okay . This is normal.
Gilllion told himself, walking over to his barrel where he slept. He wasn’t running away. He was just tired. It had nothing to do with the fact that Drey was up and moving and wanted to eat dinner with the crew. Nothing to do with the fact that whenever the man is up and functional that Gillion feels that he is one thread pull from unraveling. No. They just had a long day today, he needed to get up and train in the morning, or at least that is what he told Chip when he offered a seat and a bottle of ale for him to join him at the table.
Pretzel chirped at him as he stood at the barrel, hands resting on the rim as Pretzel swam excitedly in the water, nestling in her favorite sleeping spot. He should head to bed. Instead, he just stood there, looking at his reflection.
Green hair, finned ears. Blue skin with under eye markings, a coral crown.
Why could Drey tear him apart with a single gaze? Why was he so willing to spend time with Chip and Jay but the moment Gillion stepped in the room he became colder?
Drey had worked with Finn, his grandfather and mentor, yet told him he was a liar when he claimed to be so. Gillion wrote it off as lack of understanding, but he was starting to get the picture that Drey didn’t believe him. That he believed the faded memory of his crew-mate that he had pictured in his mind more than Gillion’s own spoken word. Chip and Jay looked up to the man so much, it felt sacrilegious to not weigh his words or write him off as old and tormented. He had no reason to lie. Gillion had no reason to lie. Where was the disconnect?
Things used to make so much more sense. When did everything become so complicated? Once, when he was in the undersea, there were only two claims: one was deceitful and the other truthful. Now, there were half truths, twisted truths, misguidance, innocent mistakes, untold information, third parties, conflicting interests. When did the world change? When he came to the overworld? Or did his world change? Too many questions made his stomach turn flips like the rolling tides of the ocean. Before the oversea showed him the intricacies of perspective, what had been hidden from him by false walls and velvet curtains?
Who was lying? Who had lied?
This was wrong. Gillion shook his head, clearing the fog. No. He shouldn’t question his teachings. His home, his people. It was sacred, honorable, and built on the foundation of everything he knew. Questioning these things… could only lead to treason against who he is and where he came from. Questioning these things was like questioning the rule of the gods. If you looked too close or listened too long, there was a scary possibility that you would hear the whispers that they don’t care about you, you don’t matter, everything you are is nothing to the puppet masters of the world, you are to be destroyed with a brush of a hand and lost to the dust of time.
Because that was wrong. Gillion Tidestrider was the champion of the underseas, hero of the deep. Chosen to save his people.
And where are they now? A small voice whispers in his head. They left you. Chewed you up and spit you out.
Wrong . Gillion betrayed them. This is what he deserved.
But saying these words to himself only conjured the vision of Edyn. His older sister, her sharp smile and slightly somber eyes looking at him and apologizing.
What did she have to apologize for?
Chip barely talked about his upbringing. Well, if he did he talked fondly of the Black-Rose, whatever his mind could pull from snippets of his broken memory. Jay, however, had talked about her childhood before.
She was mostly raised by her mom in a small town but expensive house. They were well off, Jay was well educated, her mother loved her. Called her Jay-Jay. Gave her hugs and gave Jay her heart.
Jay’s story of her upbringing only becomes more vague when she talks of stuff that Gillion could relate to. Pressure. Pressure to be a Ferin, pressure to join the Navy, pressure to get into an academy. Jay talks of her hobbies being forbidden from her father in lue of what he wanted, what he wanted her future to look like. Jay often doesn’t share very many details.
Gillion had a good upbringing. He had. He was raised by elders who cared for his education, his training, and his path to becoming a champion. He was given only the best at all times. He had been given everything to become who he was today. But Gillion couldn’t help thinking about what was missing from all three of their stories. Jay talked about her love for tinkering with gears and mechanics. Chip loved to talk about pranks and dares and jokes him and the crew would get up to.
What did Gillion have?
He trained. He liked that, didn't he? But Jay trained. Chip practices. Yet they had other things as well. What did Gillion have?
Wake up in the morning hours, when the Trench was still sleepy from the night before. Before training even started, he would stretch, do maintenance on his weapons and armor, and do some light exercises. It was never said that he had to do them, but they were always disappointed if he didn’t.
Gillion remembered at one point he was so close to something like Jay and Chip. When he was younger, only the first year into his training, he was fascinated by all the creatures of the deep. He would spend hours reading books he had stolen from the library, reading books that he hadn’t had access to before. When his trainer noticed he was more tired than normal, a curfew was enforced. When the books were found to be too much of a distraction, he was forced to return them. The only person who took his passion seriously was his grandfather, Finn, who wherever he had free time would tell Gillion about all his studies and all his ideas and theories, all the things that Finn had seen.
Too bad that only lasted for so long.
Training started after breakfast. Something light, not too much to make yourself sick. Some days they practiced practical fighting magic. Other days they practiced swordplay. But that wasn’t the only weapon that Gillion was well versed in. Anything sharp, anything handheld. A spear, a trident, a knife. He all knew how to attack and defend expertly. After all, this is where the blunt of his education is, training, after the Elders found out that Gillion couldn’t control his magic through spells and potions and tomes like they had hoped.
Gillion in his later ages got better at defending himself for longer, by the end of practice he would be sweaty, out of breath, almost to the brink of collapse. But he would receive a nod for every practice he didn’t have to heal once.
When he was littler, he would be beaten bloody to the floor multiple times, with the command following his fall.
“Heal and stand up. We are not done yet.”
Gillion hadn’t realized he was clenching the side of the barrel so hard that small claw indents were forming. Shocked, he released his grip.
He should go to bed. He shouldn’t be thinking these things.
Instead, he pressed his back against the wooden wall, and let himself slide down until he was sitting with his knees up in the dark of the captain's cabin, lantern light flickering overhead.
Maybe… after all of this is over. Once… everything had settled down. Once Gillion Tidestrider had completed his purpose… maybe he could take after Finn. Sail with his crew. Find and record species of the undersea, explore, research. Live the rest of his life waking up to the rocking of the boat and the face of his crew. Yeah. That sounded nice.
It sounded delusional.
Did he not want to return to the undersea?
Why did he feel like this innocent want was betraying his people?
Gillion was small, still a guppy. His fins hadn’t even grown in all the way yet, his claws not yet as sharp. He was sitting in an armchair in Finn’s office, the older triton standing at a cork board filled with scribbles of notes and sketches on the latest creature he was researching. Gillion was looking up with wide eyes, following every word that was said.
“The Chuul is highly aggressive.” Finn’s tail swayed with excitement, the triton pointing to a penciled out drawing of a lobster looking creature, with huge crab claws and a head that sprouted squid tentacles. “It’s amphibious, like us, and can dwell in caves that border the undersea and oversea. And…” Finn paused for dramatic effect, looking at the young guppy sitting at the edge of his seat. “It has the natural ability to sense magic around it. Almost like a sixth sense. It’s hard for tritons to get near one because of it.”
Gillion looked in awe of the drawing, never getting bored of all the time Finn could spare for him.
Gillion didn’t get a lot of time to do things like this. To do what he wanted. To be with who he wanted. To drop the expectations and just be like another student here studying at the castle.
Finn was special to him like that.
A knock at the door stopped Gillion from asking any more questions. It was one of the guards, she opened the door without waiting for an answer.
“Professor Finn.” The female titan nodded. “It’s five from curfew.”
“Thank you.” Finn nodded to the guard, who didn’t leave the doorway, waiting. Gillion picked up his bag routinely, stuffing his new books and notes into it and slinging it over his shoulder. Before he could leave though, Finn stopped him, grabbing his shoulder and crouching down to his eye level.
“You are one of my best students, Gillion.” Finn smiled, a small tilt to his head as he did so. “I always treasure whatever time you can give me.”
He missed the giant coral reefs of the Trench. He missed the tropical deep sea fish that would swim out and greet him, he missed being suspended in water, he missed the way the dark cold hugged him, like a lost family member. He missed breathing in the water, the way it felt, the way it tasted, he missed seeing his people. He missed when things made sense.
“Where is Professor Finn?” Gillion had asked one day, after spending most of his free time in the late evening looking for the triton. He wasn’t in his room, nor his study nor the classroom. In fact, all three places seemed deserted, like a candle that had been blown out and all that was left was smoke.
His trainer, Miss Nautia, barely turned her head from her work where she sat at her desk.
“He’s gone.” She answered, before flipping the page of her book and picking up her pen to take notes.
“Gone?” Gillion parroted, his voice small as he reached up and grabbed his arms.
“Yes.” Miss Nautia looked up at him, a displeased look on her face. “He has left the castle. Now I don’t want to hear you asking about him again, understand?”
Did Gillion have a choice?
“Yes ma’am.”
Now he is gone. Did people ever ask about him? Where did the champion go? What did the Elders tell the people? According to Edyn, she had been told nothing. She had thought that he was dead.
Maybe they wished he was.
Gillion Tidestrider was older now. It had taken him a while to grow into his skin, but now he was a masterpiece. Miss Nautia wouldn’t allow anything else. He was tall, at least for a triton. He was strong. He was capable in most weapons, and had the drive and dedication of a true warrior. He was disciplined, well behaved, and obedient.
The Elders still found things to nitpick about him, though. Miss Nautia was getting annoyed. He could lift three times what the average triton could be expected to do, yet the Elder’s would not let it rest that he had not yet communed with the Moon Goddess, no matter how hard he tried. Miss Nautia was proud of his ability to make anything a weapon, from a candle stick ripped from a wall to defend from a blade or a fork to stab a throat out. The Elders still held a grudge for Gillion’s attachments, a grudge against the fight they lost for him to keep seeing his sister, as well as keep his pet, Pretzel. Miss Nautia was proud of his hand to hand combat, he could take on a crowd of ten without breaking a sweat, yet the Elder’s still chastised him for his lack of scholarly studies.
It wasn’t his fault that when Finn Tidestrider left, he took Gillion’s desire to learn with him.
Training with Miss Nautia was anything but easy. But when she looked at Gillion, she saw her hard work mirrored in Gillion’s accomplishments. She could be proud.
That was more than what the Elders would say.
Gillion was sitting in the coliseum, wrapping up his hand like he had done hundreds of times, covering a bruise from training earlier that day. He had been warned not to expend any magic before the event, luckily he had a lot of practice of bandaging himself up.
“How are we feeling?” Miss Nautia asked, standing in front of Gillion on the bench, covered head to toe in her golden armor that screamed her status and her past warrior experience. Her hair that started as a violent teal gradiated into a bright tropical red was tied in a long pony, her fin ear lobes hanging like dangle earrings against her collarbone. Her weapon, a warhammer carved to look like a hammerhead shark, was holstered against her back.
She emanated power.
Gillion only did have the best teachers.
“I am ready, ma’am.” Gillion finished tying his hand up, and stood, slipping his golden gauntlet on. An armor set he wouldn’t get to keep when he was banished.
This was his first coliseum fight. As the chosen warrior, he fought on behalf of the people of the Trench. When a prisoner feels they have been unjustifiably imprisoned and wants to fight for their honor, normally they could choose a captain like Miss Nautia to challenge. Today was the day that from now on, Miss Nautia had decided that Gillion was strong enough to take on any challenger.
From now on, Gillion Tidestrider would be the executioner of the undersea.
How old was he again? Fifteen?
He was sick when he cut off the triton’s head. He won’t forget her face. Purple skin, a weathered tattoo of a manta ray and dimples. He had felt like he was going to vomit, the smell of triton blood in the water. He was able to keep himself calm, and he raised his fist in the air as the crowds, his people, screamed in delight.
When he returned back to the interior of the coliseum, the approval on the Elder’s face and the smile from Miss Nautia was the best he had felt in years.
They had told him so many things about so many people. He had believed full-heartedly that every single person he had killed in the coliseum asked for an honorable fight rather than live out their sentences for the crimes they had committed.
They had also told him that humans could never be trusted. That there was nothing in them that made it even worth giving them a chance to beg for mercy. To kill on sight, to protect his people who they would destroy if they got their hands on.
Sometimes in his dreams, he sees Jay’s head rolling on the white marble floors of the coliseum, leaving trails of red. He sees Chip, screaming at him to do it. Kill him. Finish the job.
Sometimes, he wakes up with the taste of blood still lingering in his mouth.
Did everyone he killed deserve it?
Did anyone deserve it?
DO IT! DO IT! KILL ME!
He had given the undersea everything. His body. His childhood. His life. He was nothing without his people, he was a servant, on his knees for what he believed. Scars up and down his body, blindfold across his eyes, lips sealed with stitches.
“Do you realize what you have done, boy!”
A slap across his face. Gillion blinked back in shock, not even recognizing what had just happened. The elder, an eel triton, black skin and even darker eyes, bared his teeth at him in the small study that Miss Nautia had dragged him into along with three other Elders.
“You’ve jeopardized everything!”
“You’ve destroyed this! Everything we have been working for! The clean up we will have to do for this will be disastrous!”
“You’re lucky we didn't kill you here! That’s what the Navy will be demanding, anyways!”
Later, Miss Nautia would swim him out of city lines, dragging him by his wrist.
“What is happening?” Gillion asked, trying to keep up. “I am sorry-”
“Shut up.” Miss Nautia hissed, dipping low in the shadows of the undersea night. They swam forward, before she pulled him behind a stalk of coral, completely hidden from anything swimming by.
“Take this.” She threw a bag into his arms, and he caught it with ease.
“I will atone for my actions, I’m sorry I just-”
“Shut up.” Miss Nautia stopped him, her head swiveling as if looking for trespassers. “Listen, Gillion.” Her harsh words softened a second, and for the first time in ages, Gillion felt her hand touch him gently, resting on his shoulder. “I don’t know what will happen if you stay. You need to leave. I don’t know when you can return.”
“What do you mean, I need to leave? What about my duty-”
“Gillion, listen.” She grabbed his chin, gently lifting his head. “Leave the undersea. Don’t come back until someone you know, someone you trust summons you.”
“I- the oversea- that’s-”
“I won’t let all our hard work go to waste.” Miss Nautia set her jaw, her eyes bright as fire. “Something amiss is happening. Going overseas cannot be worse for you than staying here.”
Then, Gillion lost his vision as she swam forwards, enveloping him in a hug that froze all his muscles.
“Stay strong, Tidestrider.” She settled her chin on his shoulder. When she pulled away, she shook away any emotion from her face, becoming the warrior that Gill had grown to know. “You are the heart of the undersea. Now, go!”
Gillion didn’t know if in that first week of banishment if it was strength or cowardice that kept him from slitting his own throat.
He messed up. He was a failure.
Everything he had ever worked for was whisked away in an instant, like a feather duster cleaning up an old untouched dusty windowsill.
He had made the biggest mistake of his life.
Atone for your mistakes. That was a rule he learned early on.
Miss Nautia wasn’t his first trainer. Originally he had a different trainer. His name was Aqilus. He was originally chosen to teach him how to train magic, before all of the Elders had to swallow the disappointment that he hadn’t grown into his powers as fast as they expected him to.
Aquilus was smaller physically, with veins that glowed green in the dark, flowing with the undersea energy inside of him. Gillion didn’t remember much of what Aquilus taught him, he was so young. He wasn’t good at magic at that point.
However, Aquilus did learn very early on that Gillion was good at one thing, consistently. Gillion was a natural healer.
Gillion ran his hand down his leg, feeling the faded scars. Long past, long healed, almost gone.
He would mess up a spell. He would have to atone.
He wouldn’t be able to connect to the Gods. He would have to atone.
He wouldn’t last five minutes in a simulated battle. He would have to atone.
At first Aquilus did it for him. Later, all Aquilus would do was look at him, a look that said that if he didn’t have marks on him in the morning, he would have wished he would’ve picked up the knife himself.
It was to keep his honor intact, he said. He was supposed to be pure, the gods’ chosen one. He had to be better than everyone else, and if he wasn’t, he had to ask for forgiveness.
It took two years for his sister to find out, and a month more for his sister to get Miss Nautia to train him instead.
What had he done wrong? He had to have done something wrong!
When did everything become so complicated?!
He had to have done something wrong. Where was the mess up? Where did it all fall apart? His vision dimmed on the edges, all he could see was his bedroom, back in the castle. There had been nothing on the shelves. Everything that Finn or his sister had given him he had hidden in a floorboard so as to not get it taken away.
His fingers and lips were numb as he tried to stand again. He needed to… take a walk. Go get some air? He didn’t know. His hands were shaking as he leaned on the barrel for support, but he must’ve been leaning just a bit too hard, or his knees must’ve been a bit too weak. The barrel tipped, falling over and spilling water all over the floor, Gillion finding himself back on his knees.
Water in his lungs, blood in the water. Who was hurt? Who did he need to protect? Who did he need to kill? His hand was shaking as he reached for his sword, it wasn’t there. He swore he had it on him. Where could it have gone? Race, racing, where was he going? His heart was beating in his temples, the rocking of the ocean underneath his feet.
Failure.
Atone.
Your pain is retribution.
What had he done to deserve this?
What did he do wrong?
Attack. This must be an attack, his armor, he grabbed at his chest. He didn’t have it on, just his undershirt. Pulling at the fabric, his thoughts scrambled, scattered, he couldn’t remember where he had put it. Where? Where had he left it?
He could swing a sword. He was good at that.
He was good at ending things.
Electricity burned on the back of his neck. Something was wrong. Someone was hurt. He was sick. He was poisoned. He was dead, he was dying, his crew was dead, his crew was dying, where was his sword- where was his sword where was it-
How old was he when he picked up his first weapon? When it was thrust into his hands?
Noise. Something had snuck up on him. He had failed, he hadn’t been paying enough attention. He hadn’t been able to get his weapon in time. Something touched his arm. He flinched, his hand coming up and scratching at his attacker, his claws hitting something solid as he slipped backwards, his back hitting the wall.
Blood? He had drawn blood? Through blurry eyes he could see it dripping down his hand. Blue, iridescent blood. Triton-?
“Gi-”
“Gill-”
“Gillion!”
His head snapped up, the black fading away despite how the room swayed. His breathing, he hadn’t been breathing enough. His lungs, he had- gasping for air, he felt the pins on the back of his head, the pain causing the image to sharpen.
ATONE!
FAILURE!
KILL ME!
Chip- it was Chip. Brown eyes, splotches of freckles against his sun kissed face. His lips were moving, but Gillion only heard the rush of waves in his ears.
The attack. The ship was being attacked. He must move.
He reached out to Chip, who seemed to hesitate for a second, before grabbing his arms, confused as to what Gill was doing. Then, pulling on the other, Gillion tried to stand.
“Woah, woah there-” Chip gasped as Gillion desperately threw his weight at the man. “Take it easy, take it- here, breath-”
The ship. Jay- Oli- have to get to safety-
“Gillion.” He felt a second hand grab him, and saw first the bright red flames of hair of his co-captain. She looked worried. Not panicking. Not hurt either. “Calm down, okay? What’s wrong, hey-”
So… no attack.
What was wrong?
What did he do wrong?
He was falling down again, he felt Jay grab him, taking on some of his weight. His eyes were blurry, and he barely felt Jay guide him to her hammock, sitting him down.
It might’ve been seconds. It might’ve been minutes. Gillion saw them talking. They crouched down to his eye level. Their lips had moved. Barely he recognized the blood seeping from his arms and legs, and only moved them when Jay grabbed his arm, white bandages in hand. At some point, Pretzel had moved into his lap, and with one hand, he had subconsciously begun to stroke the small frogtapus’s head, his familiar childhood pet nestling right where she was used to being.
Slowly, like the moon rising, Gillion’s heart started to calm.
“Hey. Gill, you with me?”
Gillion blinked a couple times, and looked to his left. Chip was sitting down, his eyebrows scrunched worriedly as he played with his hands. His voice was soft spoken, and Gill closed his eyes one last time, taking a long blink and a deep breath, and opened them once more.
He was sitting in a hammock. A blanket was around his shoulders, Pretzel nestled in the crook of his neck. The barrel was righted, the water no longer spilled across the floor like blood spilling from a body. The lanterns were lit again, if they were ever blown out in the first place. He felt the small purring of the frogtapus against his neck, and a slight throbbing. Looking down at his arms, he noticed bandages wrapped up and down his arms. They felt heavy. Exhausted. Like when walking through a desert and the heat soaks out any coordination you ever had. His mouth was dry, and his lips still felt a little numb, but mostly he felt a small emptiness in the center of his chest, like a music box that lost the key to wind it up.
Looking at Chip, he couldn’t help but be confused. What was he doing here? Did he- did he cause him to be here? There wasn’t an attack. He was just- he was being weird again, wasn’t he? He thought he was older than this, he always thought he would grow out of this. It had been a while since he’d had an ‘episode’. That’s what he had argued Pretzel was for. That’s the reason why he was allowed to keep her. Either have a small innocent pet or deal with your champion breaking down on the random.
He opened his mouth to say something, anything, but words were choked by the voices flying through his head.
Apologize to him.
How dare you worry him.
He saw you at your weakest.
You're pathetic.
Failure.
You are supposed to be the strongest. The chosen one. The one protecting them.
When no words came out, Gillion turned away, looking down at his lap.
“It’s okay, you don’t-” Chip struggled with words, leaning forward, trying his best. “You don’t have to say anything. Just- are you… are you here?”
Still looking down, hair falling in front of his face, he managed a small nod.
“Okay. Okay.” Chip mumbled, still playing with his hands. “I’m glad you're here… you know, I just- um- Jay’s above deck getting some food. Thought that… that might help, you know? She says wherever she cries she’s always hungry afterwards. We have some cinnamon rolls. I think she’s heating… heating up.”
Gillion reached up, touching his face. Sure enough, his fingers passed over tear trails. Oh. He hadn’t even noticed.
“Would you… would you want any?”
Gillion didn’t even try to make any words appear. Whatever energy he had left was put into just living. Into existing.
He did manage to nod his head.
“Okay- yeah. We can have some. And we can eat. You know, Jay makes the best comfort food.” Chip started to ramble, concerned energy overflowing as he sat with Gillion. “Her pot-pies are so good, they remind me of the fall and- and shit. And like, her cinnamon rolls are so good. Me and Jay made some that one time. I think you had some, didn’t you? But not a lot. This time we can split them evenly. Or even, if you want mine, you can have some of mine and Jays-”
Chip was cut off, Gillion leaning into his shoulder.
He was tired. Exhausted.
He wanted to feel safe. He missed Finn. He missed Edyn.
But he had his crew.
Closing his eyes, he listened to the breathing of his crewmate, felt the taut muscles of the man he leaned against slowly relax as Chip leaned back and wrapped his arms around Gill.
The static in his head was too loud. The pressure behind his eyes felt like a hurricane.
He wanted to be okay.
“Hey, Gill.” Chip whispered, right next to his head. “Is this okay? Are you comfortable?”
And even though his throat was closed tight, Gillion nodded his head and buried himself deeper into the blankets, tucking himself against the other.
He was the protector. He was supposed to be strong.
He didn’t care.
Right now he didn’t feel like Gillion Tidestrider. Right now, he felt like Gill. Tired, exhausted, and warm. He leaned into the other, greedily. He was safe, he was something that he didn’t have. Gillion was being selfish, but Chip didn’t seem to mind giving Gillion a little bit of room. There was nothing but the smell of cooking cinnamon, the sound of steady breathing, the vibration of Pretzel who found her way onto Chip’s chest, right next to where Gillion had laid his head and closed his eyes.
Maybe one day he would have to face what the legacy of being the chosen one meant. But that wasn’t right now. Right now, he was a pirate at sea, surrounded by people who loved him who he loved back.
And things, at least right now, didn’t seem too complicated.