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“You know, rumour around the port is that there’s a siren in these waters, luring sailors to their deaths,” Captain Kayama teased, joining her first mate in leaning over the railing at the prow of the ship.
“I don’t believe in baseless rumours,” Aizawa replied, looking up and shifting to lean his hip against the rail, folding his arms over his chest.
“Ah, they aren’t baseless. Lots of sailors have gone missing around here, you know,” She replied with a soft laugh. “You don’t think there’s things in the sea we don’t know about?”
“I think there’s plenty we don’t know. I don’t believe in magical beasts like sirens, though.”
“Logical as ever, Shota,” She sighed. “Though sometimes I wish you’d believe in things like beautiful mermaids. Stuff like that keeps morale up.”
“I’m not interested in maidens,” He grunted, turning back to the railing and staring out over the horizon.
“As you’ve said many a time, my friend. One day I’ll see you married to something other than the sea,” She joked, nudging his shoulder. He grunted in reply.
“You should introduce yourself to the new hands, you know. We’ll be sailing with them for a few months and it’ll serve you both well to get to know each other,” She suggested, though she expected the refusal she received in response.
“I’m not interested in temporary friends,” He explained.
“I know that all too well. I half hope we do find a siren in these parts, maybe an irresistible voice would finally loosen your laces~”
“Are you implying that I’m stuck up?” He responded, sneering slightly.
“You are a bit. At least try and introduce yourself, Sho. Take a bottle of rum if you want,” She offered.
“I have things to do.” He replied flatly. Kayama sighed and patted him on the shoulder as she turned to walk away. She figured that with this many excuses, he wasn’t going to go unless she forced him, and she wasn’t of a mind to take such drastic action yet. The new crew members could meet her first mate in their own time.
When Shota turned back to the water after watching Kayama leave, he could swear he saw a shadow of a person swim under the keel.
“Probably a shark,” He muttered to himself, though he wasn’t certain whether there even were sharks in the North Atlantic near England.
*
Hizashi loved to follow the ships that sailed over his territory. Mostly to see them out of his territory, but also because sometimes they would drop strange items into the water that always confused and fascinated him. He’d made his home in a dead one, and found its belly full of what he assumed were surface-cleaners that got caught in whatever killed the ship originally. (He used to call them surface-whales, until he had learnt more of the surface people’s words.) He’d removed the cleaners - they were already rotting when he found them - and most of them had been scavenged by local sharks and lampreys, but a lot of the things inside he’d kept for decorating his nest.
This ship seemed very large indeed, he’d seen what must have been at least 100 of the surface cleaners on it. One of them didn’t seem to be a very good cleaner at all though, because he’d seen it just staring down at the water a lot. It had dark, floppy whiskers all falling down from its head, like a weird catfish.
The ship seemed to be deliberately staying around his territory, and it was starting to annoy him. He wasn’t a particularly large siren - he wasn’t much bigger than the surface-cleaners - so it wasn’t like he could kill the ship himself… He hadn’t seen any teeth on them yet, but by how much bigger they were than himself, he didn’t want to find out if they ate sirens. He debated with himself what to do about it as he followed it, staying far away from it so as not to make it feel like he was threatening it or anything.
Hizashi had been following the ship around his territory for a few days now, and he was getting hungry. The ship was scaring off a lot of the fish, though, and his singing could only reach so far in the water. He’d barely eaten, and had been using up a lot of energy following it around. On a whim, Hizashi decided he’d try and sing for one of the cleaners of the ship. It wouldn’t mind missing one, right?
*
“Where the hell is it?” Shota grumbled to himself, staring out over the starboard of the ship with his spyglass. “It was supposed to be here yesterday. Don’t tell me some other crew already got to it.” He wasn’t talking to anyone in particular, but as he was complaining to the sea, Kayama waltzed up and clapped him on the shoulder.
“It’ll show soon. I have it on good authority,” She assured him.
“Captain,” He acknowledged. “If you’re sure.”
“Of course. Just a little longer, and then we’ll sail to England’s ports to fence the loot. Have you seen anything unusual out there?” She asked, looking out to the horizon with some distant craggy rocks.
“...Mm. It’s probably nothing.”
“You’ve seen something?”
“I… I keep thinking I’m seeing a- a person, swimming around under the keel. It’s always the same person.”
“... You think it’s a siren?” Kayama asked, tone light and teasing, though the slight concern was evident in her expression.
“It’s probably nothing. Just a mirage, a sleep deprived sailor’s trick of the eye. Probably just sharks.”
“You know, if it was anyone but you I wouldn’t entertain the idea, but I’m starting to think maybe we should get out of here,” She joked, adjusting her hat.
“No. I’m fine. We stay til the ship comes.”
“Alright. But if you see it again, I want to know.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“Just call me Kayama,” She laughed, leaving to check on the rest of her crew.
Shota sighed and took a swig from his flask, resuming his watch of the rocks in the distance.
*
He was so hungry. ‘I’ll just take one,’ He thought to himself, as he swam ahead of the ship to some rocky shallows. Here he managed to catch a bite of a few small fries, but nothing to satisfy his appetite. Watching the approaching shadow, he picked his moment carefully and heaved himself up onto the rocks with all his strength, turning back to the ship and opening his mouth to sing - hopefully this worked.
*
“Captain!” Shota shouted, panicking as they approached the rocky outcrop and he saw someone haul themselves out of the sea. He scrambled up to the helm, but before he could properly explain, he was cut off by an all-encompassing, melodic, beautiful song. He turned to watch the crew, though most of them seemed to just be confused as to where it was coming from. No one seemed to be making a move to jump overboard.
Shota, however, was filled with the desire to row himself over to those rocks and see it for himself - a siren? It couldn’t be. Those were wives’ tales. If he was going to believe it was real, he wanted to properly see it. Not through a spyglass, but with his own two eyes and hands.
Hands? What the hell was he thinking? That made it sound like he was a fishfucker or something.
“Shota? Are you alright? You look like you’re about to do something stupid,” Nemuri asked, shaking his shoulder to get his attention.
“I’m- fine. Let’s just steer clear of it… I think we should move to a different point on the shipping route, Captain.”
“Are you sure you’re alright? You’re not about to jump overboard are you?” She persisted, because he still hadn’t looked her in the eye.
“I… I could take a rowboat over there and shoot it.”
“Is there much merit to killing it?”
“We could probably sell its body for a pretty price,” He suggested. He was still staring at the rocks. He didn’t really want to kill it. He wanted… he just wanted to see it. Maybe catch it alive.
“True… Are you sure you want to do that? Can I trust you’re gonna come back to us after?”
Shota finally turned to look his captain in the eyes. “You can trust me, Captain.”
“I don’t know why I’m letting you do this… Lower one of the rowboats!”
“I won’t take long, Captain.”
“Promise to come back in one piece. If you take too long, we’re coming to get you, Shota.”
“Promise.”
With that, Shota ran down the deck and threw himself into the rowboat being lowered to the ocean, loading his pistol and throwing his hat to one of the crewmates on deck. When it hit the water, he untied the ropes and grabbed the oars, starting to steadily row himself towards the rocks.
*
After a minute or so, Hizashi was about to stop singing and give up - he couldn’t hold his breath up here much longer - and resign himself to finding a school of fish further away from the ship and lose track of it. However, he soon saw what looked like a baby ship swimming towards him - and it was carrying one of the surface-cleaners on its back. Maybe he’d get something to eat after all.
He slipped into the water and swam over to the baby ship, relieved as he could finally stop holding his breath. He circled below it, watching it come to a stop. Hizashi thought about the best way he could bring it down - a hit from his tail would do damage, but probably not enough to kill it. He could try biting it, or using his claws, but from his time around ships he knew their skin was very tough, and that might hurt his teeth. Perhaps he could just grab the cleaner off the top, and leave the baby ship -
“Show yourself, siren!”
Oh, the surface-cleaner was talking to him! An opportunity to learn more words! Hizashi pressed himself up against the belly of the ship, to stop it running away, and hauled his torso up out of the water to lean onto its back.
*
Shota reeled back as the creature lurched out of the water, wrapping itself around his boat. He drew his pistol, but part of him didn’t want to shoot it. The way the afternoon sun glittered across the water on the smooth muscle of the dark tail, the strangely beautiful large green eyes that watched him with fascination, and the fluttering of the large, pale yellow fins framing the creature’s face enamoured him, in a way.
“What do you want?” He tried, still clutching his pistol. The creature tilted its head at him and continued to stare.
“Do you want to kill me? Or are you after the ship?”
“The ship,” Hizashi repeated, recognising one of the words. His voice was somewhat melodic, though with a slight hiss to it.
“Why?” He questioned, furrowing his brow. No matter how beautiful this creature was, if it was after his ship he’d have no choice. Shota would kill for his ship, his captain and his crew - or die trying.
“Why?” It repeated, and Shota frowned. Was it just mimicking him?
“What do you want?” He tried again, emphasising the last word.
“Want?” Hizashi mimicked again. He wasn’t sure what these new words meant yet, but he would find out eventually.
“You’re just mimicking me, aren’t you?” Shota reasoned, sighing and pinching the bridge of his nose. “Well, I can’t leave with you wrapped around my boat like this.”
“You,” Hizashi picked out. He liked this, just repeating words, but his hunger was getting to him. And this surface-cleaner smelled like food…
He uncurled his tail, and pushed himself up onto the boat, crawling closer to the surface-cleaner.
Shota crawled backwards, holding onto the sides of the boat as it rocked and listed slightly. He readied his gun.
Hizashi leant over the surface-cleaner, following the strong smell of food down to the middle. He was going slightly delirious with the smell…
“What? My- Are you smelling my jerky?” He reasoned, from the way the creature was staring at the pouch it was contained in. He moved slowly, cautiously opening the pouch and holding out a piece to the beguiling creature. It sniffed it, and ate it so fast he was worried about losing his fingers. As he came to his senses, he panicked slightly as he realised how much his boat was dipping into the water, and that he needed to get back to the ship; Aizawa hastily untied the pouch from his belt, and threw the entire thing into the water, as far from him as he could manage.
Hizashi needed more of whatever food that was, so when the place it came from was thrown into his ocean, he readily dove after it. He swam around, catching each and every piece as they spread out, sticking his nose into the bag after.
Aizawa took the opportunity to row as fast as he could back towards his ship, heartbeat heavy in his ears.
Upon arrival back to the ship, he was hauled aboard and Kayama greeted him by shoving his hat back upon his head.
“So did you kill it?” She asked, one hand on her hip. He took a few moments to catch his breath, glancing around at all the crew staring at him. Kayama took the hint, and yelled at the crew to get back to their work, and shuttled Shota into her quarters to talk. “What happened out there? You look like you’ve seen Davy Jones or something.”
“I… Uh… Well, I didn’t kill it.”
“Right.”
“It, uh… it climbed onto the boat, and just… stared at me, for a while?”
“Is that all?” She questioned, raising an eyebrow.
“No, it- it sort of, mimicked me. Kept repeating words, but I don’t think it really knew what I was saying. It uh, it crawled on me - it was quite beautiful actually, incredibly lean and muscular-”
“Sorry is my hearing damaged, did I just hear you call it beautiful?”
“Uh, yeah,” He responded awkwardly, sitting up stiffly and blushing slightly. “I mean in a specimen sort of a way. The way a well built ship is beautiful.”
“Riiiiight. Carry on.”
“It crawled on top of me, and it was staring at my rations pouch so I threw it into the ocean to get it off me and rowed back as fast as I could before the rowboat sank.”
“Right. Okay. So it doesn’t… seem dangerous? It wasn’t trying to eat you, just your food?”
“If anything he seemed curious, almost… child-like? Like it was excited to see me, or something.”
“...Uh huh. Are you okay mentally? A few hours ago you adamantly denied sirens existed, and right now you’re talking about it like you want to go find it again.”
The silence was deafening.
“Please tell me you don’t want to go find it again, Shota.”
“Well… Maybe I can learn more about it. If I take food, it might trust me, and probably won’t try to eat me.”
“Did you suddenly gain a death wish?!” Kayama exclaimed, looking at him like he was insane. “How the hell would you even find it again?”
“Go back to the rocks?”
“Shota… It was stupid to even let you go out there. You’re not going back. We still have a ship to loot anyway. We’ll talk again after, okay?”
“...Yes captain.”
“Okay. Now, I want you to keep an eye on the crew and keep them all in line. The ship should be approaching our location soon,” Kayama ordered, and Shota nodded and left to return to dedicating himself to his work.
*
Hizashi found himself following the big ship again. He wanted to find that surface-cleaner again, to learn more words. He still wanted to know what all those words from before meant, and at least that one didn’t seem scared of him. Plus, it gave him food.
Another ship was approaching, and Hizashi idly wondered if this was the big ship’s mate or an enemy.
CRASH!
Large pieces of the new ship’s skin splintered off and crashed into the water around him, and he panicked as one of them nearly hit him. Enemy then! He stuck to his ship (when had he decided it was his?) but flinched every time the loud boom of its attack on the other came. The skin and surface-cleaners were falling off it very fast, but it wasn’t moving or trying to dive.
Hizashi had eaten recently, so he wasn’t terribly hungry, but since the opportunity was there… Curiosity got the better of him, and dodging the debris, he swam over to one of the surface-cleaners and took a bite.
Ew. Way too chewy.
Shota grabbed his spare gun and loaded it, grabbing a pouch of ammo as well on his way up to the main deck as they readied to board the enemy vessel. Out of the corner of his eye he thought maybe he saw the siren, but he focused on his job and didn’t falter as they boarded the ship to loot it of its sugar.
He swung over, shooting two men in their legs before he’d even landed. He directed the crew as the others swung over - to the rudder, to the bilge, to stay on deck and fight. In the scuffle, he lost his hat overboard, and one of his pistols - but they had minimal losses and escaped the ship with the bounty before the cannons fired to sink the ship.
Hizashi swam curiously around the sinking ship, looking for any treasures he could take back to decorate his nest with - two things caught his eye especially. A strange stick and a strange shell. The stick was shiny and curved, almost looking like a shell, and the shell he felt like he recognised. It looked like the shells that the surface-cleaners on his ship wore. Maybe he’d try and give this one back; if they wore shells they probably needed them.
He followed the ship with the items in hand for a couple hours–it was swimming very fast away from the dead one–and he struggled to keep up. Eventually though, it slowed down, and Hizashi realised they were probably out of his territory by now - he needed to be cautious. He had no idea if this territory was claimed by another siren or not. He watched the edges of its back for the dark-whiskered cleaner that he found before.
Shota was helping direct the crew and propagate the captain’s orders around the ship, though when everyone seemed to be set in their work, he resigned himself to leaning against the prow of the ship, bandaging his arm where he’d been clipped with buckshot in his elbow. A knife had cut badly under his eye as well, but right now he didn’t want to deal with bandaging his face. He settled for pressing his handkerchief to it, and took a deep breath. He found himself leaning over the edge of the ship, trying to clear his mind by staring into the deep, calm waters of the evening. In the twilight, the ink dark waves lapping gently against the hull was a soothing metronome to slow his racing thoughts.
Or, they were, until the waves were breached by a familiar face–and hat.
He startled at seeing the siren this close to the ship, calmly swimming alongside. “Uh, Captain! Captain!” He called, turning away from the railing and marching up the deck to search for Kayama. She was in her quarters, he heard from the coxswain, and he frantically rapped at the solid wooden door.
“Who is it?!” She barked from the other side.
“Aizawa, captain.”
“Oh, come in!” She replied, her tone noticeably less hostile.
He burst through the door and slammed it shut behind him. “The siren is following the ship. Wearing my hat.”
“What?” She replied, looking up from her writing with a mildly concerned expression. “Why?”
“I have no idea, but I thought it best to inform you.”
“It’s not singing?”
“No, just following us on port side.”
“Hmm. Go watch it. You know the most about it. See if you can get your hat back from it.”
“Are- are you sure?”
“Well, if it’s not attacking us, and we stand to gain nothing from attacking it except an enemy we don’t know the capabilities of - I see no reason to scare it off.”
“That’s true. If it moves to attack the ship or starts to sing, can I have authority to order full speed?”
“Of course.”
“Thank you captain.”
Aizawa turned on his heels where he’d stayed leant against the door, closing it softly behind him and marching over to the port-side railing to stare into the waters. It took a few moments for the siren to reappear, but sure enough it did. It stared up at him.
“You have my hat.” Aizawa called to it, gesturing to his own hatless head. “Hat.”
“Hat?” Hizashi responded, touching the shell on his head in a mirror of the surface-cleaners actions. Is that what these shells were called? Hat? “Hat!” He called out, holding it up towards the railing.
Aizawa nodded. “Hat,” He affirmed, and grabbed a rope to abseil his way slightly down the edge of the ship with his good arm, wincing as he held his hand out for the hat.
Hizashi placed it into Aizawa’s waiting hand, making a happy chirp and spinning in the water when he placed it back onto his head. He held out the strange stick as well.
“Ah. My gun,” He murmured, holding his hand out for it again. “Gun.”
“Gun,” Hizashi parroted in his melodic-hissing tones, and placed it too in Aizawa’s hand. He pointed to himself and uttered his name - though it was a siren name, and he wasn’t certain if Aizawa would be able to repeat it.
“Uh… Ha-sash-shi?” He tried.
Hizashi repeated his name, slower this time. Aizawa furrowed his brow in concentration as he tried to replicate the unfamiliar and otherworldly noises. “Hi-se-shi?”
A third repetition. “Hizashi?”
Hizashi decided it was close enough, and gave him an affirmative chirp.
Aizawa hummed to himself as he thought of what name to give to this siren to call him by. His nickname, Eraser? His family name, Aizawa? Or his given name, Shota? He settled on Shota, considering it seemed the closest in sounds to something the siren might be able to say.
“Shota,” He introduced, placing his hand on his chest.
“Shhh…ata?” Hizashi tried.
“Shota,” He repeated, his arm growing tired of holding his weight up against the side of the ship. “Uh, I have to go now. Thank you for my hat and my gun.” He gave an awkward wave and started struggling to climb back up the ship, shouting for one of the hands to help him up by hauling up the rope for him.
*
Hizashi chirped happily to himself as he continued to swim alongside the ship, repeating the surface-cleaner’s name over and over. Shota, Shota, Shota. The more he practised, the closer he got to sounding how Shota did, he thought proudly. Maybe Shota would teach him more words if he stuck around the ship for longer - plus, it was somewhere now that he could dive to find food whenever he got hungry, so he didn’t have to leave the ship’s area for a long time yet.
*
Aizawa laid awake that night in his bunk, staring at his hat and gun on the nightstand. He had so many questions he needed answers to…
*
Hizashi and the crew of Kayama’s ship ended up into a steady sort of companionship eventually - Shota spent as many evenings sat in a rowboat still tied to the main ship, conversing in broken English with him, gradually trying to teach him new words, as he did on board the ship with the rest of the crew. It was one of the few occasions on which Shota found himself comfortable talking at length; usually he was a man of few words, preferring to be concise and efficient with his language. However with Hizashi, he found himself more open to simply talking about whatever was on his mind - what they’d looted recently, where they were heading, and things like that. Maybe it was the knowledge that Hizashi didn’t really understand him yet, or the fact he didn’t need to worry about conversational turns or anything like that.
After a week or so, Hizashi had left to return to his nest to clear it out of the things he sincerely wanted to keep - a large sheet that he tied around his waist, and a few of his favourite trinkets that he fastened over top with a piece of rope. It took him some time to locate the ship again, but when he did, he was incredibly excited at the chance to show Shota the items he used to keep in his nest. He supposed that now he’d be somewhat of a nomad, and that he wouldn’t have a nest anymore. Some other siren would probably move into his old nest, but somehow he couldn’t bring himself to mind.
Shota was surprised when Hizashi returned with a sail tied around him, and a rope covered in flasks, bottles, a cutlass, a compass, and a torn up piece of patterned fabric that probably used to be someone’s bandana. He happily taught Hizashi the words for what they were, and even attempted to teach him how the compass worked (which was surprisingly successful - apparently Shota wasn’t a bad teacher).
Over time, Hizashi picked up more and more English, and whilst he still couldn’t exactly hold conversation, he was more than content to listen to Shota talk and try to understand as much as he could without having ever seen some of the things he talked about. Mostly he learnt about sailing, though he did hear of some human customs and rituals from the shore that were different.
Hizashi helped out the crew by fetching them anything that fell overboard, and by scouting ahead of the ship for any reefs or rocks that would risk causing it damage. On occasion, he’d sing for them, and the crew taught him the tune of a few shanties so they could sing along with him. Kayama encouraged it, seeing what it did for the morale of her crew, despite her original wariness of the siren. In return, the crew would help catch fish for him, and give him trinkets to carry around.
It didn’t go unnoticed by the crew that Hizashi played favourites with Shota, and that Shota seemed to return it. They probably would have teased Aizawa about it, if most of them weren’t at least a little intimidated by the first mate. Aizawa wasn’t particularly aware of it - it was mostly circumstantial after all, if someone else had been the one to run into Hizashi that first time, they would’ve ended up in exactly the same position. He was made aware of it by Kayama one evening though, when they were eating together in her quarters.
“So, what’s going on between you and Hizashi?” She asked. Shota had told the crew Hizashi’s name when he’d made the decision to continue travelling with them.
“What do you mean?” He asked, looking up from his plate with a quizzical expression.
“Well, I’ve never seen you so close to any other living thing, except maybe that time a cat got onto the ship.”
“...It’s just circumstantial. He trusts me the most out of the crew.”
“Yeah, well, trust sure has something to do with it. Still, I’ve seen you down there in the early hours. Why?”
Shota stiffened slightly, ducking his head again. “...He’s a good listener, that’s all.”
“Riiight. You don’t have, I don’t know, feelings for him?”
“For Hizashi?” He paused, resting his hand against the table. “I see him as one of the crew, that’s all.”
“Yeah, but you don’t talk to the rest of the crew like that. You know I’m not gonna judge you for it, Sho,” Kayama laughed, taking a drink of wine. “I think it’s good you’ve finally found someone you like. Though the irony of him living in the sea and you always saying you’re married to the sea isn’t lost on me.”
“It’s not like that.”
“Uh huh. I think it’s adorable~”
“How would that even work? We’re quite literally worlds apart.”
“You figure it out, sailor. You seem good for each other either way,” She laughed again, revelling in Aizawa’s flustered tone and expression. He quickly finished his food and excused himself to go back to his own quarters, deciding to take a nap.
He supposed it was true he did think Hizashi was rather beautiful, though that was just a natural appreciation for the very athletic and sleek sort of creature that Hizashi was. He was certain he’d think the same of any siren. Plus, their conversations weren’t exactly the most sophisticated - sure they’d moved past the one-sided conversations and repeating the same words over and over at each other, but Hizashi’s English wasn’t exactly advanced yet. Still, he did enjoy the time they spent together, and he did find himself missing it whenever they were in ports or he was too preoccupied with duties to find time to spend in the rowboat.
Whatever his feelings were, it didn’t matter anyway - it wasn’t like Hizashi would ever reciprocate, and they wouldn’t ever have a traditional romance even if he did.
Not that Shota had ever been interested in traditional romance.
*
The days turned to weeks, weeks turned to months, and before they knew it a whole year had gone by. Hizashi picked up English remarkably fast, and when more of the crew had started to help him learn he only picked it up faster. By now he could hold reasonable conversation with the crew, though still he’d regularly run into words he didn’t understand.
The ship was in port to fence some recently acquired loot, and Shota stayed with the ship with a small party of crew to make sure that if authorities caught wind of them the ship wouldn’t be left defenseless. This was also a rare occasion when Hizashi could follow the ship into port - the sea floor fell away fast here.
“Come swim with me,” Hizashi asked, leaning up onto the pier in front of Shota, making sure he was still out of sight of the few people still around the port this late in the evening. The invitation caught Shota slightly off guard, but he didn’t say anything as he thought about it for a few moments.
“Okay,” He agreed, pulling his boots off, swiftly followed by his hat and belt and finally his shirt. He left them in a tidy pile at the end of the pier. Hizashi stared up at him, eyes shameless in their visual exploration of Shota’s scarred but muscular chest. Shota noticed him watching and hummed for a moment before he dove into the water beside him. Hizashi immediately dipped down and watched him swim back to the surface with intrigue. He hadn’t seen a human (he’d learnt that they were called humans and not surface-cleaners some time ago now) swim before.
When Shota surfaced, he pushed his hair out of his face, and he regretted not tying it up. Hizashi surfaced after him, grinning with his mouth full of sharp teeth. Shota had taught him how to smile a couple of months ago, and whilst it was Hizashi’s instinct to see it as a threat, he’d been assured it was a friendly gesture.
“You look weird when you swim.”
“Yeah, we don’t have tails like you, so we have to make do,” He chuckled.
“You look pretty.”
Shota blushed and faltered for a moment. “I- what? You know what that means, don’t you?”
“I know what it means. I like looking at you in the water,” Hizashi elaborated, swimming circles slowly around him, his fins brushing against Aizawa’s legs as he was treading water.
“Uh. Thank you. You’re pretty too.”
Hizashi ducked into the water again, deliberately splashing Aizawa in the face with his main fin. Aizawa’s retaliation was to dive under and grab him by the tail with the intention of dragging him up to the surface,but which Hizashi took as an invitation to drag him around at full speed. He remembered that Aizawa had to breath air, though, so after only 20 seconds or so he breached the surface and dragged Aizawa up with him.
“Ah, holy shit Hizashi-” He gasped upon surfacing. “That was fast.”
“Sorry.”
“No, don’t say sorry, it’s fine - do it again,” He asked, grabbing Hizashi’s wrist instead of his tail this time. It had given him quite the rush to move that fast underwater, though being thrown around by Hizashi’s tail wasn’t the most pleasant. Hizashi stared at him for a moment before diving again, dragging Aizawa up, down and around with great pleasure.
In the back of his mind, he thought this was almost like a siren courting dance. That wasn’t Aizawa’s intentions though, he didn’t even know about courting dances most likely. If he were human, he’d be blushing.
Their fun was interrupted when they resurfaced near the dock to let Shota breathe, and Captain Kayama was smugly looking down at them.
“Having fun, boys?” She teased.
“Captain! You’re back,” Shota spluttered, swimming over and pulling himself onto the wooden dock where he’d left his things.
“We’re done fencing. The crew are in various bars and clubs, but I’m not surprised to find you in the sea instead of on the ship,” She laughed. “No trouble while we were gone?”
“No captain,” He replied, wringing his hair out and shaking off some of the water before he pulled his shirt on.
“Go get changed, we don’t want you getting hypothermia traipsing around in wet breeches,” She ordered, waving to Hizashi as Shota agreed and left.
*
The way Hizashi looked at Shota after that changed somewhat. Maybe it was just the time of year, or his age - most sirens already had their partners (sirens mated for life) by 30 - making him think about courting Shota late at night when laid in the rigging net hung off the keel of the boat that acted as his hammock. He found himself wondering if the traditional courting methods would even work on Shota, him being human and all.
He started to mentally go through the list, and try to figure out how those would work for Sho- for humans. In case he ever wanted to court a human. Hypothetically, of course.
Bring them food- that seemed like it’d be easy enough. Sure, humans didn’t eat raw fish, but he’d seen them catch them for eating anyway, so they must do something with them. Maybe he could try to find some human food somewhere.
Follow them - that also seemed like it could work. He sort of already did that, though Shota stayed on the ship and he had to stay in the water under it. Shota didn’t go on shore much - or, rather, the hypothetical human he would be courting would have to be around the ocean a lot for him to be able to follow them.
Jump out of the water as high as you can, to show them how strong of a swimmer you are - oh, that he could definitely do. He hadn’t tried it before, but he figured with a little practice he should be able to jump fairly high. Bonus points, Shota would totally be able to see it from the ship, wherever they were.
Build them an impressive nest - Ah. That may be tricky. Usually, sirens built their nests in protected structures on the ocean floor. It depended on the place what would be available - like Hizashi’s old home in a shipwreck, where he’d planned to build the nest for his eventual mate. Shota couldn’t really see underwater easily, and he also couldn’t breathe either. If Hizashi wanted to build a nest for him - for a human, hypothetically! For a hypothetical courtship of a human, he’d have to build the nest near the shore or on the surface, where they could reach it.
And of course, fight off any other sirens that might be trying to court the same siren as you. Well, he didn’t think many sirens tried courting humans, much less any given specific human Hizashi had thoughts of courting. Purely hypothetically, of course.
*
Shota found himself once again sharing dinner with the captain one evening in her quarters, drinking some expensive alcohol to celebrate a successful looting of a very well stocked trade vessel. As conversations often did around Kayama, the topic turned towards relationships and such.
“I swear I’ll find myself another strong female captain one day. And we can captain a fleet together, and it’ll be glorious! What about you, Sho? Are you gonna get settled one day?” She asked. “Well, as settled as a man like you will ever get.”
“Mm, probably not,” He figured. “I’m not interested in marriage. Not interested in women.”
“Well, yeah, but you could marry a man on this ship if you want to. Find yourself a guy and your own ship, maybe captain your own fleet one day. That doesn’t appeal to you?”
“I suit being your first mate just fine, captain,” He replied, taking a long sip of his drink. “I wouldn’t want the pressure of a fleet or even a crew of my own. If I were to find someone, I’d want to stay travelling with you for as long as you’ll keep me.”
“That’s cute, but you’ve gotta have a life sometime. Find someone to love. Grow old with. We’ll all have to retire eventually,” She pointed out, quite literally, as she gestured at him with her fork.
“Sure, I guess. I love the sea too much.”
“Well, what about Hizashi?”
“What about him?”
“Do you love him? You two seem very close, I wouldn’t be surprised if you ended up fucking - could you even fuck a siren?”
“Gross.”
“You didn’t answer my question!” She protested.
“Which one?”
“The first one, dumbass. God, sometimes I swear your skull is thicker than the leather of your boots. Do you love him?”
“What? No. I’m not in love with Hizashi, don’t be stupid.”
“Could’ve fooled me,” She replied, sipping from a glass of red wine.
“What makes you say that?” He questioned, pointedly avoiding eye contact to try and hide the blush creeping onto his cheeks that threatened to betray him.
“Well, you spend so much time talking to him. You seem so happy with him, like with no one I’ve ever seen you around before,” She clarified, leaning on the table with her elbow as she continued; “Plus, you get incredibly defensive over him, and flustered when I ask about him.”
“He’s just a close friend. Those are all perfectly logical things to apply to a best friend. Just because I enjoy spending time with him doesn’t mean I’m in love or anything so stupid,” He denied, glaring at her through the messy hair that hung over his face.
“There you go getting defensive again! See! You’re totally into him.”
“…Can we talk about something else?” He asked with gritted teeth. Kayama sighed and relented, and they changed to talking about literature and weather and other such things.
*
The conversation played back in Aizawa’s head that night. He found himself lying awake in his hammock, playing back all his most significant interactions with Hizashi and trying desperately to analyse his responses and emotions. Unfortunately, one of the things about emotions is they don’t often follow logic, so he found himself having some difficulty determining exactly what words would fittingly describe his feelings towards Hizashi. He didn’t exactly have a lot of romantic experience.
He knew that he cared incredibly deeply about the siren, and was willing to be more patient than usual with him. He knew that talking to him didn’t feel like talking to anyone else—when usually talking to people was so draining, he felt like he could talk to him (or more recently, listen to Hizashi talk) for hours on end without feeling the need to retreat to his quarters to recharge in silence. He knew that he wanted to spend many more years travelling with Hizashi.
Was this what love was? He’d always heard it described in such abstract, flowery language that made no logical sense, that he felt like he couldn’t be sure. Truly, the only other person who came close was Kayama, but that was strictly platonic. He had no interests in her romantically nor sexually, but when it came to Hizashi he wasn’t so sure.
He surprised himself with that realisation. The idea of sex with most people just wasn’t something he wanted - he didn’t hate it, it still felt good, but he didn’t seek it out like he’d seen other sailors do. Usually the idea of sex with people was neutral at best, and actively repulsive at worst. When it came to thinking of Hizashi that way, though, he found himself almost… curious. Almost wanting it.
*
Hizashi had started to bring fish to the ship - he’d take a net from them, and use his singing to draw in a large number of fish, then catch them and haul them back to the ship. He always tried to give the net to Shota, but he always called over other humans to haul it up onto the ship and empty the fish into the stores. They all thanked him when he did, but it didn’t help because they weren’t who he was trying to get the attention of.
He’d decided to try courting Shota only recently - he’d reasoned that if Shota understood his advances and reciprocated then score! He’d found himself a mate. If he understood the advances but didn’t, Hizashi could play it off as a misunderstanding and that he wasn’t actually courting him, just having fun and trying to help. If he didn’t understand the advances, well then Hizashi would have to try and learn more human courtship rituals, and that was a problem for later.
Evidently the food thing wasn’t working - his next idea was trying to impress him with jumps, and so he lessened the frequency with which he went fishing for the crew and started trying to practice his jumps. At first he only managed to get a small section of his body out of the water at a time, and not very high. He found that his tail fin could make an impressive splash on the way down, though, and that certainly seemed to get attention for now.
One evening, a few days after he’d started trying to do jumps, Shota was down on the rowboat and asked him about it.
“I’ve seen you making splashes with your tail recently,” He started, casually leaning his back against the side of the boat from where he was lounging in the bottom of it. Hizashi had his arms on the opposite of the boat, tilting it slightly.
“Yeah? Do you like it?” He asked, eyes lighting up.
“It’s uh… impressive, I guess. Your tail must be quite strong to make such big splashes.”
“I’m practising something. You’ll see in time,” Hizashi replied, idly flexing the fins on the sides of his head.
“Yeah? I’ll try to watch you more,” Shota replied, smiling softly.
“You should!”
Shota chuckled softly. “What are you practising?”
“Jumping!” He replied, grinning wide.
“Jumping? What do you mean?” He asked, confused what Hizashi’s understanding of the word was.
“I’ll show you,” He replied, pulling his arms off of the boat and diving into the water without a moment for Shota to say anything. Not that Shota really had any objections, so he just steadied himself in the rocking boat and sat up somewhat to carefully watch the water in front of him.
Hizashi dove down several metres, making sure to take a moment for his tail came into position properly underneath him before he swam full force nearly directly upwards. He breached the surface, and felt himself rise up much further than he’d managed until now, focusing as he arched his body and tail to cleanly dive back down on the other side of the arch. His tail made less of a splash this time, but it was certainly more of a show. When he came back to surface near the small rowboat, he found Shota staring at the water where he had been.
“That was… impressive,” Shota muttered, snapping to look at where Hizashi was now before sinking back into the boat in an invitation for him to lean on it again. Hizashi obliged.
“You like it?” Hizashi asked, hopeful that his courting was working. He still couldn’t quite tell if Shota knew what he was doing yet, and he found jumping to be pretty fun, so he figured he could keep practising this for a while.
“I like it.”
*
Well, Hizashi’s fear seemed to be true. He’d given Shota food, jumped for him, followed him around as much as he possibly could, and fought off all the hypothetical and non-hypothetical threats to his courtship attempt. The only thing left for him to try was building an impressive nest, but he was a nomadic siren now - and Shota was kind of a nomadic human. The closest thing they got to a nest was the rowboat- that was it! The rowboat! He’d decorate that!
At the next opportunity, he asked one of the crew to lower the rowboat and leave it lowered for a while. They erred, and replied that they’d have to ask about it. Hizashi waited for them to return, and they agreed to lower the boat and leave it down for him. Hizashi thanked them, and now came the hard part. If this was to be their nest, it needed to be full of beautiful and rare things to show Shota what a clever and suitable mate he would be.
He started his search right then. It was difficult finding things in the open ocean though, because he couldn’t dive deep enough to reach the ocean floor here. What he managed to get was a couple pieces of driftwood, and some kelp. It was a start.
Of course, when Shota next came to talk to him and found the boat already lowered, he was confused but climbed the rope down to it anyway. He was only more confused by the stuff in the boat. He started to clear it out, tossing out the kelp first.
As soon as Hizashi noticed, he rushed over.
“You don’t like it?!” He cried lamentingly.
“This is trash,” Shota replied, tossing out another piece of kelp. “You put this here?”
“I’m sorry! It’s hard finding things!”
“What are you trying to find?” Shota questioned, furrowing his brow.
“Decoration,” Hizashi replied, and that only made Shota more confused.
“Why?”
That was something Hizashi wasn’t sure how to answer. He couldn’t just say he was building a nest, could he? Surely Shota’s rejection of his progress so far meant he wasn’t interested, and if he told Shota he was trying to build a nest, he’d leave?
“Hizashi, are you okay?” Shota asked, concernedly.
“I’m okay,” He assured.
“Okay. Then what’s all this stuff for? Why are you decorating?”
“Uh, tradition! It’s a siren tradition! Decorate home for the siren you care about. Shows… alliance…” He bluffed, hoping that his half-lie was believable.
“Oh. You consider this my home?”
“It’s the closest I can get. I don’t know where you go in the ship,” He explained. “I’m sorry I can’t find better things. You don’t like the tall-plant?”
“It’s called kelp. And no, I don’t like kelp,” He explained.
“Ok. You like the rest?” He asked hopefully. Shota looked down at the couple pieces of driftwood around his feet.
“Sure. I like the rest.”
“Great! I’ll find more!” Hizashi enthused. Maybe it wasn’t a total disaster, but still. Shota now thought he was just doing this as an alliance thing. He’d explain properly once the nest finished.
*
Finishing the nest took a lot longer than Hizashi would have liked. He’d planned to have it finished in a few days. They spent longer in the deep ocean than he would’ve liked, so when they finally got to shallower waters two weeks later where he could dive to the floor he took full advantage of it and spent as much as time as he could scouring it for good things to put in the nest. He turned up with shells, clams, pieces of broken coral, a fishing net, and a glass bottle.
Aizawa was surprised at how quickly the little rowboat had filled up. It also took him a little by surprise to realise the care with which everything had been arranged - his two usual spots on the bench and floor of the boat had been carefully left clear, but the rest was filled with pieces of coral and beautiful shells. When Hizashi surfaced next to him, he was smiling softly.
“You got all this for me?” He asked, picking up one of the shells to look at more closely.
“Yes! Do you like it?”
“I like it. I like it a lot. Is it okay if I take a couple things back to my hammock?” He asked.
Hizashi practically buzzed, and if he could blush he’d be bright red. His courtship was working! Shota wanted to take some of the things to his home!
“Yes! Shota… do you know what this is?” He asked, and his shy tone caught Shota’s attention.
“You said it was decoration for alliance, right?” He replied, raising an eyebrow.
“I was wrong,” He admitted. “It’s a nest…”
“A nest? Like… like for eggs, sort of nest?” Shota asked. He didn’t know much about siren biology or customs and that was just now starting to bother him.
“Yes. I am trying to-“ Hizashi cut himself off as he realised he didn’t have the proper words to explain what he wanted.
“You’re trying to make a nest… and you care if I like it… Hizashi, are you- is this you flirting?” He asked, eyes moving from where he’d been staring at the shell in his hand over to Hizashi.
“What’s that?”
“It’s when- it’s what you do when you like someone. When you either want sex with them or a romantic relationship,” He explained carefully, heart pounding against his ribcage.
“What’s that?” Hizashi repeated, and Shota realised of all the things he’d explained, he’d neglected to explain sex and relationships. Mostly because those weren’t things he thought about much, and so he never really thought they’d come up in conversation.
“What word?” He asked, trying to clarify what Hizashi wanted explained.
“Sex and romantic,” He replied. Aizawa internally cringed. Well, the sex talk wasn’t something he was expecting to have to have with Hizashi, but here he was.
“Romantic describes when you want a relationship with someone that involves things like cuddling and kissing and spending a lot of time together. It’s when people agree to be with each other and help each other and live life together,” He explained, deciding to get the less awkward of the two out of the way first. From Hizashi’s nod he knew he could carry on explaining, that Hizashi understood now. “Sex is… when two people try to make children, but it also feels good, so people do it for fun.” He was hoping that was enough explanation for Hizashi to catch on.
Hizashi nodded, and thought back to earlier in the conversation. Shota had asked if he was ‘flirting’, which meant he wanted a romantic relationship or sex with Shota. Well, the purpose of the nest was to get him to accept him as a mate…
“Yes.”
“Yes?” Shota parroted, confused, having almost forgotten what he’d asked.
“Yes, I am flirting,” Hizashi clarified, leaning on the edge of the boat to be closer to him.
“Oh. You… you want a relationship with me?”
“I want you to be mine,” Hizashi tried to explain with his somewhat limited vocabulary.
Shota blushed deeply at that phrasing. “Can you try and explain more?”
“I want you. Sirens keep one person for life. I want you as my person.”
Aizawa sat there and stared at the siren leaning over the edge of the rowboat filled with coral and driftwood and shells, and considered everything that had led him here so far. He considered his thoughts and realisations of a few weeks ago.
For life? What a weighty decision to loft upon a man without warning. Still, he considered his situation and feelings carefully. It was certainly true that he had never cared so deeply about anyone - with maybe the exception of Nemuri - like he did about Hizashi. Spending time with him was always easy, relaxed, and something he yearned for after a particularly hard day. He wasn’t sure whether his desire to spend time with Hizashi came from a place of romance or not, but it didn’t seem to matter to him. This wasn’t just flirting, this was asking for a commitment. An expression of a desire to spend the rest of their lives together, to move through the world as both separate entities but also a joined unit. An offer that the more he thought about it, the less he could refuse.
It was probably only a minute or so, but the silence felt like hours.
Finally, he replied.
“Yes.”
“Yes?”
“Yes, I’ll be your partner Hizashi. Your one person.”
Hizashi couldn’t help himself from chirping and singing loudly, swimming circles around the little rowboat and rocking it slightly with his motion. Shota laughed at him a little, and reached out to grab his hand.
“I want to try and explain some of my thoughts first, though,” He stipulated, and Hizashi calmed himself to nod and still, absolutely willing to listen. “…I don’t know exactly how I would describe my feelings about you. I just know that I enjoy my time around you, that existing around you is easy. There’s no expectations or standards for me to uphold. I can just be me, and enjoy you being you. I’d be glad to call you my partner, and I… want to spend my life around you.” The way he finished the thought sounded like as much a revelation to himself as to Hizashi.
Hizashi stared at him with puppy dog eyes. “I want to spend my life with you. In whatever way that is. I don’t care, as long as you’re there somewhere.”
Shota nodded and looked down at their joined hands for a moment.
“Let me show you some human traditions for relationships,” He offered, leaning far over the edge.
“Yes. Show me,” Hizashi enthused, curling himself around the rowboat and bringing his face close to Shota’s, maintaining eye contact. He was always eager to learn about humans, but doubly so to learn about whatever Shota was about to show him.
Aizawa reached out a hand and held Hizashi’s face still - he was surprisingly warm from swimming in the tropical waters - and hesitated for a moment before leaning in to softly kiss him. It was brief and chaste, and of course Hizashi hadn’t kissed him back, but it still made him flush and feel his heartbeat in his ears like he was some stupid lovestruck teenager.
They spent a while that night, talking about nothing and everything. Later in the evening, Aizawa returned to the ship’s deck briefly to retrieve himself some rum, and from then there was not so much talking, and a lot more Shota ‘teaching’ Hizashi how to kiss. At some point in the early hours of the morning, when the moon was bright, the world quiet and the water still and cool, Shota had ended up in the ocean. It was very late - or rather, very early - when he finally, mildly drunk, climbed back into the rowboat and bid Hizashi goodnight as he scaled the side of the ship and hurried himself back to his quarters before the others woke up from the noise.
*
The next morning, Aizawa found himself in a pretty good mood despite being slightly hungover and incredibly tired. When he visited the mess for breakfast, he gave a curt greeting to the other crew sat around a table having just woken themselves. They all shared a confused look, but said nothing directly as Aizawa took his food with him back to his quarters. He desperately wanted carbs and more sleep.
Kayama found him around an hour later, when he was checking the ship’s position to ensure they hadn’t drifted off-course overnight. He needed something to focus on to distract himself from his thoughts, hangover, and sleep deprivation. “Morning, Sho.”
“Morning, captain,” He replied flatly, not turning to look at her.
“Well shit, it’s true, you are in a weirdly good mood today. Did you finally get a good lay? Was it Hizashi?” She asked, leaning against the mast behind him. He visibly stiffened and turned to her then.
“I didn’t- am I not allowed to be in a good mood?” He questioned, glaring at her. He didn’t feel like he was in an especially good mood. She laughed.
“There’s the Aizawa I know! Seriously though, what’s going on?”
“I… We can discuss this later, in private.” He told her, eyeing the several crew members milling about them.
“Sure, whatever, tight-lace. Come find me in my office when you wanna talk,” She assured him, clapping him on the shoulder as she turned to leave. He tsked and turned back to the task at hand, slightly dreading the conversation that he was inevitably going to be forced into having. Damned if he wasn’t going to try and put it off as long as possible, though.
Unfortunately, Kayama wasn’t dropping the topic any time soon, and it had just passed noon when she found him and all but dragged him back to her quarters. The door was barely closed when she spoke:
“So! What’s going on?”
“I don’t know what you mean.” Aizawa folded his arms and leant against the doorframe.
“You know damn well what I mean! What’s going on with you Hizashi? I need details!”
He sighed, and thought about lying to her, but figured she wouldn’t buy it. Not in this circumstance. “We… had a conversation last night.”
“And? What about?” She pressed, leaning slightly into his personal space.
“About… lots of things.”
“Ugh! You’re impossible sometimes! Are you fucking yet?!” She demanded. He cringed.
“No.”
“Then why are you being all weird?!”
“We’re…” He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “We’re partners.”
“Partners? Like… matelotage kind of partners?”
“...Not exactly, but something like that.”
“Well I’ll be damned. I didn’t take you for a waiting-till-marriage type.”
“We’re not married!” He barked.
“Sure, not yet. I’m happy for you, Sho! It’s good that you have someone important in your life. I hope he makes you happy.”
“He… does. Not that I would need your approval.”
“Uh huh. Okay, go on–you can go back to work now.”
“Oh, thank you, gracious captain,” He replied, his words dripping with sarcasm as he opened the door with his left hand and pivoted himself out.
*
That evening, Shota found himself climbing down the side of the ship once more - though he pointedly didn’t bring rum this time.
“Zashi,” He called to the water, settling himself amongst the decor in the little rowboat. It only took a few moments for his new partner to appear.
“Shota,” He returned, one hand on the side of the boat.
“I want to talk about something.”
“What?” Hizashi questioned, tail lazily moving back and forth just under the water’s surface.
“We’re partners. You said sirens mate for life. What does me being your partner mean, in your terms?” He asked. “What would happen if I were a siren?”
“Hmm, if you were a siren I would find a good nest location with you, and we’d have a courting dance. We’d hunt together and if we found a baby siren maybe we would raise it.”
Shota sat in stunned silence for a moment, processing just how domestic and romantic that all sounded. He was still unsure whether his feelings for Hizashi were romantic, but considering he didn’t absolutely detest the idea of settling down with him, maybe it was something to think about. “You… want kids?” He questioned.
“You don’t?”
“Not really. I like kids but the idea of having my own is weird.”
“Hmm. Not that we can have kids together. Even if we were the same species.”
“…Yeah.” Aizawa tried desperately not to think about siren anatomy, and his cheeks felt hot with the struggle.
“What if I were human?” Hizashi asked, leaning his head on his folded hands.
“Well. I don’t exactly live a conventional human life,” Aizawa started. He’d never considered how someone else might fit into his long-term plans of being a pirate til he was either killed or got too old.
“Well, what would a human partner do in your life?” He pressed.
“I don’t know. Share my finances, protect each other in battle, stay with me. Either avenge my death or grow old with me, I guess.”
“I’d like that.”