Chapter Text
With a flick of his tail, he could accelerate to great speeds, and with twist, he could change the direction in which he was traveling almost instantly. Toudou Jinpachi was a merman, and at the ripe age of nine, he was already considered the fastest (and most beautiful, he would add) by his peers. He would take pride in his strong, cerulean tail and his flexible, glistening dorsal fin. The child was healthy and talented, and loved to showcase just how great he is by challenging whoever and whatever to all kinds of races. His current tally: 46 wins and 13 losses. Not bad, for a nine year old. He found out that by keeping his hair relatively short, it reduced the strength needed to propel himself through the waters, so his hair never went beyond his shoulders.
Toudou loved the waters. It was his home, and, of course, an environment which he was best suited for. He would sleep in a small, but cozy cave with the rest of his family, where a few ways out was land inhabited by surface dwellers. Ah, the surface. Fresh, open air, and clear, blue skies. Toudou hated the surface: The view from the open waters was that of depression, in which cement and impure air dotted the coast (and the way his hair stuck to his face). He couldn’t believe why anyone would want to live in that dystopia of health hazards and questionable morals, but occasionally, the boy could understand why. At night when all was quiet, when all that could be heard were the whispers of wild or stray animals and the occasional hums of cars passing by, lights would flicker on and illuminate the landscape. From a distance behind a buoy, Toudou would watch the sparkling coast with wide eyes. The lights were mesmerizing, almost surreal. In the ocean, the light from the Moon would not pierce into the deeper depths where he resided. To him, humans were blessed creatures, yet he felt disgusted at their habitat.
This night was no different. After the Sun had long disappeared from the horizon, Little Toudou left the comforts of his home, sneaking past his snoring sister, and quietly swam up to his usual spot. From afar, he spotted an unusual presence at the borders of the pier: Against the artificial lights of the human realm was a small figure, perhaps a youngling, crouched by the rocks. It was a dangerous location that Toudou understood, and since humans were clumsy and dumb, it was his duty to keep this little creature safe. Whether or not the stranger could understand him or not completely escaped his mind.
“Hey you! You should be careful. A drowned human looks like a lump of discarded driftwood down here,” Toudou declared (quite loudly) once he was within earshot, and watched the human gasp and jolt. The boy (Toudou assumed the stranger was a “he”, because by observation, females had longer hair) just stared at him, scowling, and mumbling in a language Toudou had never heard before.
“I’m Toudou Jinpachi, the fastest and most beautiful merman ever to exist, and-” Toudou might be still nine years old, but his ego had already swelled to the size of a boulder, “-you should be grateful for my warning of your potential doom.”
The kid only grunted, whispering some weird phonetic sounds like he was about to eat a barnacle or something. The land dwellers’ language was weird. But Toudou did not judge! Even though the sounds were quite simplistic, and even if sometimes the boy sounded like he was choking, the language might’ve had a long history with the population. Perhaps to this kid, his speech sounded like nothing but a series of screeches and hisses. Toudou shuddered at the thought.
“Listen to me! If you slip, I won’t help you. You soft flesh is no match for the raging waters!” Were humans stupid? Usually, when a stranger swims up to someone in the middle of the night, they tend to point their fingers at him or her, scream, and run off like their life depended on it. This kid was either crazy or really lonely.
“Hey! Heeeyyyy!” The child might’ve finally understood (who knew this sound was universal to both sea and land creatures), because he stood up. In the dark, against the gleaming streetlights, Toudou could make out the barebone features of this human: Definitely a male, a very, very skinny one at that, with ear-length short hair, and a long-ish face. A three at best.
“You’re annoying!” He finally said. “Don’t you see I want to be left alone?” Toudou understood none of that, but from the sounds of it, the boy was quite upset.
“You should at least sit down.” What did Toudou think he could achieve, speaking to someone who couldn’t even understand him?
But the kid only laughed. “Stupid tourists,” he mumbled. “Being all happy and annoying and loud. I wish you’d go away.” The low volume of his voice caused Toudou to misinterpret it as signs of being calm. Wow, one minute sad and angry, and another calm and okay. Humans were honestly very high-maintenance.
“Ugh, just look at yourself: Your hair’s a mess.” Toudou only blinked. He got that the “ugh” sound as unpleasantness, or something similar. If the merboy could understand what the human was saying, he’d probably make an undignified, offended sound.
The boy reached into his pocket, and from it a piece of curved thing emerged. Crouching down, he motioned Toudou to come closer, and being the curious child, he swam up and lifted his upper torso from the waters to edge a little nearer to the kid. What happened next came as a surprise: Toudou’s hair was parted, and before he could protest, that curved thingy was shoved onto his head. He panicked, and slipped, bashing his face into the rock beneath him and promptly slipping back into the waters. He thrashed around at the unusual thing on his head, the spiky edge digging into his scalp like some torture device. It was a trap! A human tricked him! He was going to die a horrible, painful death, and all was because he was kind enough to warn someone of an impending danger! What a cruel fate.
Toudou resurfaced, unwilling to go down without a fight. But all he found was the human giggling. Were humans sadists too? Did they feel joy at the thought of a living being breathing their last? But… Toudou wasn’t (actively) dying, was he?
“Relax, it’s just a headband. It looks stupid on you, but your hair isn’t a mess anymore.” Toudou touched the headpiece. It was nice to not have his hair cling to his face. “I gotta go. You should too. It’s unsafe to be in the waters so late at night. There could be sharks.”
With that said, the boy got up and left, leaving Toudou speechless and dumbfounded. Was this thing a tagging device? To track him around while he traveled under water? Is this thing actively shooting slow-working poison into his veins from its spikes?
After an embarrassingly long time, the child managed to get the thing off of his head, only to see it floating to the surface. Curious, but still cautious, Toudou observed it from afar, as it rocked up and down, following the movements of the waves. He had to admit, the item could almost pass as the garbage humans regularly threw away at the beach, if not for its dark blue-ish color (the headband was actually turquoise, but in Toudou’s defense, it was almost impossible to see an object’s true color at night) and polished surface. With a small flick of his tail, he inched closer, and reached out and grabbed the thing. It was light and simple, which meant that the chances of it packing any electronic devices was small. It was flexible, like rubber, but not really rubber. Was it plastic? Yes, it had to be.
It had just occurred to him that perhaps this thing was meant to be on his head. The shape was designed to fit a human (and merpeople) skull: That, or it was a decoration for smaller-sized buoys. The spikes, Toudou understood, was only there to prevent the thing from randomly slipping off. Hm. This device was… cute. With a sudden, self-declared mastery over the concept of headbands, Toudou gently placed it back onto his head, careful as to not scratch his scalp, and swam off.
Makishima Yuusuke did not expect to meet anyone at the beach, much less so give them the headband he received as a free gift after purchasing enough bottled water to irrigate an acre of farmland (that was an exaggeration: Makishima had only purchased five). It was worth it though, because watching the foreigner’s panic was enough entertainment to keep him laughing for the next week. Not that he took pleasure in seeing others writhe in agony or anything. But still, what type of country didn’t have headbands ? Girls in his class were obsessed with them. Foreigners were weird.
Still, the grade schooler still couldn’t help but think about that weird individual. Why were they in the waters so late at night? What was so special about the ocean anyways? It’s just salted water. He could dump an entire pack of salt into the bathtub, and it would be the homemade equivalent of the sea. Of course, his parents won’t be too happy, but his point still stood.
A better question, though, would be why he was at the beach so late at night. Boredom? Maybe. Makishima just felt like being alone for awhile, and the oceanside at night was as deserted as an over-used outhouse after a three-day food fair, since the place was poorly illuminated. At this thought, in hindsight, the child should’ve completely avoided any interactions with the stranger, because he could barely make out their shape, much less so their face. All he knew was that the person spoke in a goddamn annoying, high-pitched voice.
His mother would probably scream at him for this. With this in mind, Makishima hurriedly made his way back home, all while filing the memories of this particular event into the deep abysses of his mind.