Chapter Text
"Please, don't eat me," Gillion said shakily, slowly backing away from a young human child whose first reaction to meeting a fish man was to ask if he could be eaten.
"Well I dunno Gillion, I could go for a fish fry," Chip butted in.
Sensing an opportunity to escape this situation, Gillion offered, "I could take you."
Once there's finally a moment of downtime, the newly sworn Riptide Pirates set out to get a proper meal. Gillion, true to his word, leads the crew to a restaurant by the docks. It's one of many affordable spots, frequented by dock workers needing to eat after a hard day loading goods on and off the ships. The smell of fried food wafts from the open air kitchen.
Along the counter are several trays holding a variety of crispy, golden-brown delights: thick fries, shrimp fritters, onion rings and calamari, individual prawns and fish fillets covered in batter. Gillion's eyes linger on the assortment of whole fried fish, ranging in size from tiny fish just an inch long to large ones that could cover a whole dinner plate. Oil bubbles away in a large round-bottomed pan as a batch of fish balls fry up. The cook deftly pokes wooden skewers through a few at a time and sets them in another tray to cool down. A handful of some colorful disks go into the oil next, making a spectacle as they immediately puff up into light and airy shrimp crackers.
Condiments occupy another space on the counter, glass bottles full of different colored sauces and a wire basket of sliced citrus fruits. The larger lemons and limes were cut into wedges, but the smaller green ones were merely cut partially in half. The most popular sauce appears to be the large half-empty bottle of vinegar, with garlic, onions, and small red chilis floating inside.
"I can bring some back to the others," Jay says, as they order a variety of food by pointing to the options on display. The cook transfers each item from the metal trays into smaller white trays, apparently made of a soft material that can fold like a clam to fully enclose the food. She takes out some kind of clear film and rubs it between her fingers, causing the two layers to separate so she can pour some of the spiced vinegar inside. After tying a knot in the end the vinegar is sealed like a cylindrical bubble.
"What kind of boxes are those? How come you don't wrap it in newspaper?" Chip asks as the food is handed over. Despite seeing her hold the containers, he still expects them to be burning hot and takes them very gingerly. He's pleasantly surprised to notice that the material insulates him from the heat, and that it's merely warm to touch.
"Have you seen how much a newspaper costs?" she asks in return. "That boy won't even sell me last week's papers at a discount. It's not even news anymore."
"Yeah, at that point they should just call it olds," Chip says, proud of his terrible pun.
After paying, Jay takes most of the food back to where Ollie is, while Chip and Gill keep their two orders of fish and chips and continue walking along the docks. The textured metal ground is weathered and rusty from seawater, and Chip's footsteps clank against it. Gillion's footsteps slap wetly.
The two of them find a bench to sit on as they eat. The back is fully connected to the seat, leaving no gaps that Gillion could put his tail through. Instead, it occupies the rest of the seat next to him, on the side away from Chip. From here they have a view of various merchant ships carrying out their business, and a bit further away is their own ship, The Albatross.
Gill looks at the foam container in his lap, wondering how it isn't melting away like any other foam he's seen before. He catches a glimpse of something white floating in the water next to a ship and realizes it's the same type of box as the one he's holding. He has a feeling that this kind of foam doesn't melt away for a very, very long time, and wonders with sickening dread about just how many of these will float out to sea.
Meanwhile, Chip has already opened his up. He bites into the vinegar-filled bubble to pop it open, and squeezes it all over the fish and chips. Not knowing what to do with the leftover empty film, he drops it on the ground. He starts eating, and with his mouth still full, he says, "Damn Gill, this is pretty good!"
Gillion opts not to pop his vinegar. He picks up the fish with his hands, completely unrecognizable after being coated with batter and fried. He would've preferred one of the more fish-shaped fish, but Jay found it easier to order multiple of the same meal. The mystery fish rectangles were cheaper too, an important consideration when nearly all the gold they have isn't theirs to spend. He takes a bite, and it's warm, tender, and flaky.
It doesn't feel right in his mouth. Sure, he's eaten fish countless times before. But there was always the hard crunch of scales, the cold chewiness of the raw flesh, the metallic taste along the spine, and the sharpness of bones. This, on the other hand, was surrounded by a batter that provided almost no resistance to his sharp teeth. The first bite was crispy, but as it cools it rapidly becomes soggy with grease. The fish inside practically fell apart, and carried almost no flavor.
The chips were fine, same as any other human restaurant. Potatoes aren't much of a thing underwater, so there's nothing to compare it to.
Gillion looks at his tail on the bench. Jay assured him that humans would never eat a triton like him, but what if they really DID have an emergency? If they were stranded and had absolutely nothing left, how long could that feed Chip and Jay? They probably couldn't bear to eat their own friend like this, but would they eat him if he was cooked into an utterly unrecognizable form?
Gillion was already eating slowly, but he stops to ask Chip the question that was haunting him. "If there was a dire emergency, would you really think of eating me?"
Chip swallows a bite of food and answers. "If you tasted as good as this, why not?" He catches a glimpse of the look of horror on Gillion's face. "I'm JOKING. I can't believe you're still taking it seriously."
Gill sighs in relief and continues eating the chips, leaving the rest of the fish untouched.
Chip finishes eating his meal and sets aside the empty box. "If you're not finishing that, I can eat the rest," he says, reaching over to Gillion's box. He's using the hand that's missing a finger.
"Chip, I need to apologize for cutting off your finger," Gillion says softly, holding Chip's hand in his own. "I should take responsibility for this." A blue light begins to glow as a cool sensation spreads across Chip's hand and down his fingers. The scars fade from the stump, and his hand is now damp, but nothing else changes.
"It didn't grow back?" Gill asks innocently, genuinely confused why the finger still isn't there.
"You completely cut it off, of course it won't grow back. I'm supposed to get a prosthetic finger to replace it, remember?" Chip says.
"A starfish can regenerate an entire missing limb, so I thought this would be the same," Gill explains.
"Well, I'm not a starfish." Even though the healing is done, Chip still leaves his hand in Gillion's. He turns it slightly so they can hold each other's hands.
"Did I accidentally cut off your ring too?" Gillion asks, still looking at Chip's hand.
"What ring?"
"Your wedding ring," Gillion says. He remembers the moment far more clearly than anyone else, given that he wasn't drunk during the party on Loffinlot. Standing in the river, he crafted two rings out of coral, giving one to Chip and one to Amanda Rinn.
"Uhhh, yeah," Chip says hesitantly. He was silent for a moment, as if trying to remember something.
"You shouldn't be lying to me."
"Fine, I took it off when we left Loffinlot," Chip admits.
Gillion didn't even notice that Chip dropped the ring off the side of the ship as they sailed away, or that he wasn't wearing it ever since. It wasn't until now that he thought to check. "Why would you do that? Your wife-"
"She's not my wife!" Chip insists. "I broke up with her already, so it doesn't count. How could she still be my wife if I'm in love with someone else?" Chip squeezes Gillion's hand a little more tightly, interlocking their fingers in alternating blue and brown. Even missing a pinky, it feels comfortable, like their hands were always meant to fit together.
But Gillion doesn't quite get the message. And he knows for a fact that there are several legal documents recognizing their marriage, even though he doesn't understand what each of them are for. "I urge you not to commit adultery," he says.
"You're making that pretty difficult for me," Chip replies. "First you kiss me, now you take me on a date. Make up your damn mind, Gill."
"I do love you, but-" Gill starts saying without thinking. His stomach twists up in knots at the realization. At the time, it seemed like kissing Chip was the most natural thing to do. But after reading Rose Colored Spectacles, his grandfather's book on oversea relationships, he realized what it meant to kiss a married man. He was nearly as bad as all the people he threw out the window. He was a hypocrite.
"Hey, hey, it's okay," Chip says, misinterpreting the despair that Gillion was expressing. He puts his arms around Gill for a hug, not minding how wet he was. "I love you too, man. I'm glad we feel the same way."
Gillion pushes him away. "I can't do this."
"Shit." Chip backs off. "I guess religious people can't get into relationships."
Gillion is confused. "Yes they can," he says. "My grandfather was a cleric, and he wrote about many of his relationships with people of the oversea."
"Oh. So we're good then?"
"Your w-"
"Forget about her. I'll divorce her if I still have to. But do you want to be my partner after that?" Chip asks.
Gillion isn't sure exactly what divorce means. "Are you going to kill her?" he asks, aghast.
"No, no! It's just paperwork! I can go send a letter."
Gillion turns up his nose. "I wouldn't want to send your wife a letter covered in bird shi-"
"Fine, we'll go back and settle it in person. How does that sound?" Chip suggests.
"Truth be told, I still don't understand most oversea courting rituals, even after reading my grandfather's book," Gillion admits.
"I'll just have to show you," Chip says, smiling as he puts his arm around Gillion.
Gill leans on Chip's shoulder carefully to avoid poking him in the face with coral. His moisture continues soaking into Chip's shirt.
After they spent more time out than expected, Jay comes back to the docks looking for her other two crewmates. At a distance, she spots them from behind, sitting together on a bench.
"Finally!" she exclaims as Apple lands on her shoulder. Feeding Apple one of her chips, she says, "Those two lovebirds finally figured it out."
Once they've sat and held each other for long enough, Gillion stands up from the bench. He picks up the trash that Chip dropped on the ground, puts it into his hands, and says, "Now, let's clean up this place!"
Gill dives off the nearest dock into the water and starts gathering up every goddamn styrofoam box he can see.