Archive of Our Own

Clint was pissed and thought this looks bad. Of course it looked bad his whole crew had been switched out with Hydra goons and were currently pushing him off a board in the middle of the ocean. He had chains around his waist and hands and no matter how much he tried he couldn’t move out of them.

So last night he just accepted his fate and was slowly walking to his death to the bottom of the sea. Of course the new Captain had to ask if he had any last words. Clint really couldn’t resist and hey it wasn’t true anyway…he hoped it wasn’t and it was just a drunk story the new Captain told him.

“Yeah your new captain likes to fuck pigs the ones that walk on all fours not you guys but hey that might change since you all look like pigs anyway and you’re already groveling at this guy’s feet already. Behold the pig fucker,” he laughs before jumping off into the sea. He didn’t want to get shot and attract the sharks. Plus he kind of had a plan…maybe 12% of plan. He thought as he was submerged in the sea.

He holds his breath as he keeps plummeting toward the bottom of the sea. He doesn’t have a lot of time as he uses his spare pick trying to undo the manacles on his hands as he keeps sinking deeper and deeper into the water.

Bruce had been following a human vessel for some time now. Not with any specific intent, but simply because the wooden floating device had gone over him while he was hunting, and he’d seen a few strange, interesting activities going on on-board, so he’d struck out after it, swimming in circles around it. There were two-legs of all shapes and sizes on-board, and they were a good distraction from the loneliness.

He’d gotten distracted by a small pod of color fish at some point during the day, swimming happily through their ranks and catching one, only to release it and chase another.
It was not until he heard shouts and gunfire echoing overhead that he turned towards the vessel once more and saw the human’s scurrying about on their strange legs on-board.

He watched with interest as the humans went about some strange game, pointing sparking things at one another and falling to the wooden floor with shouts. It seemed a strange ritual, and it became all the stranger when they brought one human to the edge of the boat, shoving him with metal about his wrists and ankles.

Bruce swam closer to watch what they would do with the human, curious, until he went over the edge, hit the water with a splash, and dove downwards quickly, slicing through the water like a knife.

For a moment, Bruce simply watched him descend; and then he remembered that human’s cannot breath underwater, and this human was struggling against chains to get out—Bruce had to help him.

He shot down after the man, tail working furiously.

Clint was still struggling to get the manacles unlocked when he final feels a click and grins as the manacles drop off. It is getting harder to breath and the pressure is popping his ears from moving too fast to the bottom. He tries to kick back to the surface with no success since he still has chains wrapped around his body. His eyes begin to droop and he swears he must be hallucinating or already dead because all he sees before he blacks out is something swimming towards him that looks beautiful.

He shuts his eyes and begins to fall down further into the sea.

Bruce hesitates when he comes level with the unconscious human, clawed hands reaching but not yet touching. The tales of what humans do to the mers are well known among his people, and he feels that inkling of fear, just before he plunges in and grips the human by the arms, swimming furiously, the weights holding even him down as he heads for the surface. But he didn’t want this human to die; Bruce did not like death. So he pushes through, cresting a moment later, clinging to the human and heading for the only place in miles that could keep him alive—an island cove, with an underwater cave system Bruce had become accustom to sleeping in when he wanted to hide from predators or humans. That was where he would bring the human.

Clint hangs limply on Bruce unconscious as he is introduced to the air bubble pocket of the underwater cave. He’s not breathing at all and is starting to turn blue.

Bruce rolls the unconscious body onto the rocks of the cave floor, pulling himself up beside it, tail half in the water as he hesitates over the breathless body. What should he do? He has never saved a human before; he does not know how to wake the man. But he thinks he has an idea when he opens the man’s mouth with one inquisitive finger, leaning down when he felt no breath pass. Air—the human needed air.

This he knew how to fix.

He pressed his cold lips to the human’s own, sharing his breath in one long puff, before he straightens and turns the man on his side, thumping his back to expel the water from his lungs.

Clint gurgles as he spits up water and starts breathing heavily as he is leaning over on his side. He tries to push himself up with his hands but can’t at the moment he only steadies himself as he tries to take in as much oxygen as he can and get his breathing back to normal.

His eyes dart around the cave as he wonders how he got here. Did someone save him? That’s impossible he was sinking to the bottom of the sea it must have been a current or some weird twist of fate. His arms can’t hold him up anymore so he rolls onto his back and looks at the cave breathing heavily trying to relax and rest for now when he hears a splash by him. He quickly looks over and sees a man?

“Did you save me,” he asks the man not seeing his tail since he is still a little out of it. His eyes are taking time to adjust to the dimness of the cave. There is only a small amount of light coming off the water.

Bruce watches the human sputter and cough, cocking his head as he scoots further away from him, not wanting to be too close to the human when he’s fully awake. He’s still slightly worried—what if the human tries to take his tail, like they do in the tales? What if he has fangs, like Betty had once whispered to him when a boat passed over the clan.

But what he really sees when the man flops onto his back once more is a man gasping for breath, teeth blunt, not sharp like Bruce’s, with a handsome face and bright blue eyes.

Bruce leans a bit forward, tilting his head, and jerks back, tail splashing when the man’s eyes land on him. He scoots back further, nodding, curls dripping in front of his eyes.

Clint rubs his eyes and feels the weight of the chains around his waist. They are uncomfortable but he has no energy to remove them. He stares at the ceiling of the cave still disoriented, “thanks…how did you find me? What are you secretly a fish,” he jokes rubbing his head.

He could have sworn he saw a tail in the water but maybe his eyes were messing with him. Trying to see in the saltwater did hurt and he was exhausted escaping from death. He would make sure those who mutinied against him paid.

Bruce splashes his tail once more, anxiously, and covers the gills on the side of his throat with one hand, trying to wriggle back so he can slip away without frightening the human. He stays silent, shaking his head mutely.

Clint looks at him entering the water and grabs Bruce’s hand that is covering his throat and pulls him on the land, “hey don’t go you don’t want to drown do…oh,” he says as he sees Bruce’s gills moving on his neck. “You’re a merman? I thought there were only mermaids…you’re not going to eat me are you? That would suck having to kill half a cutie after drowning,” he nearly slurs. His brain must have suffered some loss of oxygen since he is speaking so freely to the merman.

Bruce made a surprised sound, brown eyes staring at him owlishly as he gripped his wrist. He didn’t know how to react—the human was like a furnace, with how much heat it gave off, and it talked of violence, which Bruce had seen enough of to last a lifetime.

He floundered his scarred tail, shaking his head. “No, no,” he managed at last, pulling his arm out of the man’s grasp, ready to flee.

“Hey wait a second how am I supposed to get out of here,” he asks him as Bruce gets out of his grip.

Bruce looks around the cave, eyes wide and thoughtful, before he looks nervously back to Clint. “Stay,” he rasps, shifting so that his tail is completely submerged in the ocean. “I bring food.” He drops down completely and disappears in the murky depths, leaving Clint in the dim lit cave on his own.

Clint watches the merman sinks back into the murky depths and makes himself sit up leaning on the cave wall, “oh boy Clint what have you got into now,” he rubs his face and looks around the cave and sighs, “I don’t think there’s even enough room for me to stand up.”

He begins to work on getting the locked chains off his body. A few tweaks and clicks using his pick make easy work of the chains. He tries to stand up to get the chains off but has to hunch over so he doesn’t hit his head on the cave ceiling, “let’s see how fucked up your day has been. You found out your crew wasn’t your crew, they mutinied you, you jumped off the ship, almost drowned and are being cared for by a merman…at least he’s handsome,” he shrugs falling down to the ground in a sitting position and waiting for the merman to return. The simple movement of walking and getting the chains off has used his energy.

Bruce didn’t return for at least a half of an hour, skittering through the ocean, feeling panicked and jittery. He had caught a human. He’d saved a human and was keeping him away in his cave. It was exciting, it was terrifying, it was /fascinating/. Bruce only wished he was a more impressive merman—his tail was a dull purple, littered with scars like the rest of his body, and he was all together pale and unimpressive.

But that didn’t matter yet; what mattered was that he caught a fish for the human, bringing it back into the cave and peeking his head out of the water, watching the human for a long moment before he made himself visible.

Clint was bored and Clint being bored was never a good thing. He was a terrible captain when there were no winds to help move the ship. Ok so there’s a merman and he went to get him food…is the merman fattening him up? What is this merman’s angle and this would be so much more fun if he could pace or even move in the cave.

He growls and lays down on his side not facing the water, “if he’s going to eat me he can eat my backside first for all I care,” he grumbled mostly because he was bored and also because he was hungry.

Bruce was not sure what to make of this grumbly human, and was very careful when he swam to the edge of the rocks, laying out the large fish he’d caught before swimming back, splashing deliberately to call the humans attention.

“Food,” he half-whispered, though in the silence of the cave it was easy enough to hear.

Clint shrieks when the merman splashes the water on him and turns around getting up and hitting his head, “damnit. The hell is…oh food,” he says looking at the big fish and looking around the cave for something to cook it with. He shakes his head and laugh, “I bet you can’t find any matches in the sea can you.”

He sighs and sits down by the fish, “hey you can come out of the water. I won’t hurt you and it’s kind of weird just staring at a pair of eyes above the water.”

Bruce nervously swims closer, resting his arms on the edge of the rock and looking at Clint, and then down to the fish.

“Matches?” He asks, confused—does the human want a second fish? That would not be hard; but he does not think that is what the human meant. He did not want this to be complicated; he just wanted to feed the human.

“Eat,” he says, though his voice is meek and his eyes downcast. “Good fish. Healthy.” The human had been hurt today; eating good fish could always help someone heal faster, and kept up their energy, this Bruce could attest for.

“Yeah you know matches to make fire? I can’t eat raw fish or I get sick and it’s really really bad…hey you understand me when I talk. How do you know to speak human?”

Bruce dipped a bit lower in the water, looking away. “Listen to humans,” he murmurs, embarrassed. “Study. Learn language.” He gestures with one clawed hand, before he glances to the fish, frowning. “No match. No fire.” He furrows his brown, concentrating for a long moment. “Can eat clams?” He asks, looking to the human.

Clint watches him and shrugs, “so you’re smart then. I can’t eat food like you can,” he says trying to figure out words how to explain it, “not cooked food makes sick, can die,” he says trying to explain it to the merman before he pauses, “what’s your name?”

Bruce’s eyes widen slightly. Die? He doesn’t want the human to die, he just met him, he just /saved/ him. Bruce pulls further out of the water, wondering what he should feed the human if not fish. Could he bring him things for fire? But water put out fire, so…

He paused, looking to Clint with wide eyes. “Uh…” He pauses, glancing down and tilting his head with thought. “Bruce,” he says finally, frowning.

Clint watches as Bruce gets further out of the water and notices the scars. He doesn’t say anything but the scars look vicious almost deliberate. He won’t ask about them unless Bruce talks about them. His tail was purple his favorite color.

Ok so maybe he was starting to get attracted to the merman but it’s not like he could do anything with him. He couldn’t have sex with a fish…well Bruce now since he said his name. “My name’s Clint Bruce. I need to get out of this cave. Can you take me to a way out of this cave?”

"Clint," Bruce murmured, feeling the foreign name on his tongue, before he frowned at the human. He wanted to leave. Bruce didn’t want him to go yet. Maybe he would stay on the island above the cave, stay with Bruce. It got so lonely wandering the ocean.

“Take you out,” he said, nodding a bit sadly and pointing to the water. “Through and out.”

Clint smiles before wondering why Bruce would be sad. Didn’t he want the him to leave. Clint sighs and looks at the water again cursing it in his head.

“Ok I’m trusting you not to drown me. Well it’s either drown or starve so I guess drowning is the better one instead of just dragging it out.” He jumps into the water and paddles in the water looking at Bruce.

“Lead the way Bruce,” he says preparing himself to take a deep breath.

Bruce looks at him curiously when he dips into the water; the human does not swim correctly. Surely it would be better if Bruce simply carried him as he had before. And so he does, swimming over to the blond and scooping him into his arms, gentle as could be as he allows the man to hold his breath, before taking him down and out, trying for speed so that the human would not drown.

Clint watches Bruce grab him and shrugs as he takes a deep breath and they swim under the water. He tries to keep kicking to help Bruce but it seems he can swim fast enough on his own with his tail. Clint looks around and sees the cave keep going on and on and wonders when they will reach the surface.

He doesn’t have to wonder long as Bruce swims up with him out to the surface and he gasps for air as he swims towards the beach with Bruce and lays on the sand.

“Thanks Bruce,” he breaths heavily trying to catch his breath.

After dumping the human onto the shore, Bruce is careful not to get beached, moving back until the waves can properly cover his waist, and he watches the human with wide, worried eyes. Would he leave now? Go far in land where Bruce could not follow? He hoped not. Bruce didn’t want to be alone again.
“Welcome, human,” he replied, softly, propping his chin up in his cupped hand to watch the man.

“Yeah thanks man, or merman,” he shakes his head and looks up at the sky, “past noon I better start a fire soon.” He sees Bruce still in the water and shrugs, “hey you gonna stay Bruce? I’ll make you some cooked fish.

"Cooked." Bruce cocked his head to the side, curiously. He’d never had cooked fish before; he was not sure what it would taste like. "I stay." He says, nodding with a faint smile. So Clint wasn’t leaving yet. That was good. He didn’t want him to leave.

“Yeah cooked fish. Look how about you go back to the cave and get that fish while I start gathering wood and get the fire started,” he says pulling his wet pants and coat off so he’s only in his underwear.

Bruce’s eyes widen slightly as he looks the human over curiously for a moment. He was a beautiful creature, that was for sure. His skin was a warm, tanned color, and his body was tight with muscles, and littered with little scars, far smaller and less noticeable than Bruce’s. He must have won more fights, then.

“Get fish,” he murmured after shaking his head, looking away from the human to slip once more into the folds of the sea. “Be back,” he said before he disappeared.

Clint looks at him confused seeing Bruce daze off in the distance? He then hears him say he’s going to get fish and nods his head, “alright see you soon.”

Once Bruce has disappeared Clint starts heading to the edge of the jungle trying to find some decent firewood. He brings some back to the island and goes searching for more getting deeper and deeper into the jungle. Once he has found enough wood to last him for the night he heads back towards the beach.

Bruce is a much faster swimmer than Clint is a gatherer, and he returns to an empty beach, frowning when he pulls himself half ashore and holds onto the fish, waiting for the human; but half way through waiting he lays the fish down with a sigh, stretches out, and suns himself on the sand, eyes closed and hands behind his head. The human takes too long.

Clint makes it back to the beach safely with the last bit of wood and spots Bruce beached on the sand sunbathing. He drops the wood and looms over him grinning, “didn’t know I was going to eat merman today. You’re getting burnt better get back in the water Bruce.”

Clint begins to set up the fire. It takes him a few tries before he gets a flame that stays and catches on the sticks. “Where’s the fish Bruce?”

Bruce blinks his eyes open groggily, and turns on his stomach when Clint looms over him, blocking out the sun. “No. I not food,” he says, frowning slightly and looking to the fish he’d caught. “Fish food, not Bruce.” He holds it up by its fin, holding it toward the human.

Clint takes the fish and washes it off before he guts it, “I know you’re not food I was messing with ya since you’re baking in the sun. So laying on the sand and sunning doesn’t hurt you,” he asked as he stuck a stick through the fish and put it over the fire.

Bruce watched him with fascination—his hands were very skilled, Bruce decided as he watched the human effortlessly gut the fish and set it over the fire.
“I…” He paused, trying to think of the word. “Sun a lot. Not hurt. Keep tail wet, though.” If his tail dried up, well…he’d be in a world of trouble.

“What happens if you’re tail doesn’t stay wet,” he asked as he stroked the fire and turned the fish to cook the other side. Clint look over at Bruce as he lays his clothes out on the beach to dry instead of just being crumbled up on the beach.

Bruce followed the human with his eyes, tracking the muscles in his strange legs, watching the way they moved, before they traveled back up to his face. “Get sick. Die.” He shrugged, laying his head back down atop his arms. “Bad for me.”

He shrugs, “huh don’t want that do we,” he says checking the fish one more time before sitting by Bruce. “So the whole mermaids turn into humans is wrong isn’t it.”

Bruce makes a face. “Mer’s /human/?” He asks, before he laughs. “No, no, /human/ human, mer is mer.” He sniffs the air, shifting so he can sniff the fish, before his mouth begins to water and he smiles excitedly. “Fish?”

Clint nods his head and laughs, “yeah fish is almost done Bruce. Wish I had some spices to make it taste better but beggars can’t be choosers.”

He digs his feet in the sand and looks out at the ocean, “do you know the name of this island or place?”

Bruce is quiet for a long moment, resisting the urge to touch the human’s legs. “Bright place,” Bruce says, shrugging. “Hide place.” Those were its names for him; it was a bright place where he could hide comfortably. There wasn’t much else to it.

Clint groans, “well that’s not a lot of help and hide? How can you hide on the beach if you can’t leave the water,” he asked as he checked the fish and pulled it off the fire and stuck it in the sand to cool.

“Don’t touch it, it’s too hot.”

"No humans," Bruce said, gesturing vaguely around the island. "Sun alone." And then he nodded his head. "Hide in cave. Sleep." It was attached to the island after all.

Bruce looked over to the fish where it cooled, frowning thoughtfully. Wait to eat it? That seemed stupid; if it took so long to eat it, why would you ever cook it? He reached a hand over to poke at it thoughtfully, before pulling it back.

Clint had been right; it was too hot. “Ow.”

“Oh you sleep in the cave where we were,” he says before sighing and grabbing Bruce’s hand, “I told you it was hot,” he says looking at his hand. It was long and slender even with the claws and soft. He makes sure Bruce’s had isn’t too burnt before making him soak it in the water. “Water will help with the hand but it’s not too bad.”

“How long have you lived here by yourself? Don’t you want to meet the right mermaid and have kids?”

Bruce was surprised by how soft the human’s hand was, even with how dry and warm his skin was, and he thought about that as he splashed his fingers in the water, knowing he would heal within minutes.
He didn’t lift his head when Clint spoke of ‘mermaids’ and ‘children’.

“Alone,” Bruce said, soft and sad, keeping his head low. “Forever.” His tail splashed anxiously and he shifted to look back to the fish.

“Cook stupid. Should eat raw,” he said, changing the subject quickly.

“Why are you alone forever? Are the mermaids and your people dead,” he asked before grabbing the fish and checking it. He rips a piece off for Bruce to try, “here, it’s still warm but not hot.”

Bruce took the fish carefully in hand, but was silent for a long moment, his face going carefully blank. He rubbed at a scar over his collar bone, swallowing. “Exile. Alone forever,” he repeats, before he huffs and turns his attention to his fish, sniffing it carefully and taking a bite, sharp teeth tearing into it gingerly before he blinks in surprise. “Good fish,” he says, looking to Clint. “/Very/ good fish.”

“Exile huh,” he says biting into the fish, “that’s not fun. I just got mutinied so wanna be in exile together? It’s gotta be pretty lonely with no one around.”

He laughs, “ha you like cooked fish hmm I thought you only wanted it raw.”

"Raw fast," Bruce huffs, finishing off his fish. "Cooked good." He smiles briefly, a small quirk of the lips, before his face falls and he looks down to his fingers, clawing absently in the sand. "Exile because…" He searches for the word, drawing a small heart in the sand. "Love. Wrong girl. Trouble for…love her."

Clint hands him another piece of fish and winces, “Loved the wrong girl huh? What was she a princess you slept with and her dad got mad,” he asked chewing on the rest of his fish.

“The way I see it you’re in exile and she’s free. Why don’t you try and kidnap her and bring her into exile so you guys can love on each other and have tons of little Bruce’s?”

Bruce nods, frowning. “Betty princess,” he murmurs, scratching out the heart he’d drawn. “No take away. Betty sad without other mer’s.” He rubs at his gills, feeling them flicker lightly beneath his hand. “Merpeople no live alone. Die sadness.”

Clint’s eyes widen at the last bit, “seriously you guys die when there are no more mer-people? What if you had a human? Would that stop you from dying or does it have to be a mermaid,” he asks worried. He didn’t want this merman to die. He was cute and interesting to talk to even if it was broken English.

Bruce looks up at Clint, nibbling at his fish, before he brightened slightly as he realized what Clint was asking. “Not alone is good,” Bruce said, offering a small, hopeful smile. “No matter if mer or human.”

“Good,” he says throwing the fish bones into the ocean, “us exile people gotta stick together…I’ll need to make some shelter if I’m going to live here for the next few months. Until I can make a boat.”

"Get things to help?" Bruce asks, pushing himself up so he can wiggle back a bit further in the water, the salt water dried on his gills. "Good sleep place," he says, pointing towards an outcropping of rock a distance down the beach. "No waves. Safe."

“Uh sure if you can find a really sharp rock or some tools or dry wood that would be great,” he said looking at his dried neck. “How about you get back in the water and I’ll follow you to the good sleep place.”

Bruce nodded, gesturing at Clint. “Follow,” he says, before he flips back into the water, submerging fully and wiggling in the water, before he begins to swim, his back fin just above the water so Clint can follow him easier. He knows where to find sharp rocks. He will find them when he shows the human the safe place.

Clint watches as Bruce flips and begins to move in the water, “whoa hold up Bruce,” he says as he gathers his clothes that are still damp and carries them as he follows Bruce on land.

Bruce goes at half speed, checking now and again to make sure the human follows, and he tries to make sure he doesn’t get distracted by Clint’s lack of clothing. His legs are still rather distracting.
The outcropping of rock isn’t far off, and it’s mostly flat and smooth, reaching out further in the water than the sand.

Clint follows Bruce the fish to the bed like rock and lays his clothes out on the edge of the rock to sun and dry. He walks the rest of the rock bed and sticks his feet in the water, “damn sand is hot,” he says as he cools his feet off.

“This isn’t too bad. Not good for storm weather but not bad.”

Bruce surfaces next to Clint’s legs, resting his arms on the edge of rock. “Good place. Sun easy. I come up sometime.” He pats the stone, smiling softly, before he dips back into the water. “Get rocks now?”

Clint shrugs, “if you want to get the rocks now you can. I have to figure out where to get the wood and how to shape it.”

Bruce pauses, before he smiles, pulling himself up onto the rocks, tail and all this time, and flops down so he can lay out and look at Clint from beneath his wet curls. “Find wood. I wait here for you?”

Clint flushes as Bruce jumps on the ledge with him. How is he even that limber if only he had legs he would be all over Bruce. “Uh yeah I’ll get wood. Don’t dry yourself out,” he says getting up and going down the rock and entering the jungle to find some good wood.

Bruce watched him go, smiling softly as he went, before he rolled onto his stomach, resting his cheek on his arms and closing his eyes, enjoying the feeling of the heat on his back. He knew he couldn’t stay completely out of the water for too long, but the feeling was nice.

Clint comes back hours later with some wood that is dry and needs to be cut to be used. He lays down on the rock and pants, “need water.”

Bruce had fallen asleep half-way through, and woke up feeling dry and itchy, frowning as he turned on his side and scooted to dip his tail in the water, rubbing at his eyes. He stayed like that for the rest of the time, before Clint came back, and he became distressed. “Human okay?” He asked, pulling out of the water to come and flop near Clint, reaching out to touch him. “Need water?” He looked towards the ocean. “Lot’s of water.”

“No need fresh water,” he says laying down, “I couldn’t find a stream when I was bringing back the wood.”

Bruce blinks, cocking his head to the side. Fresh water? He racks his brain, trying to think of a place he could take the human. He was looking worn, and he didn’t want his human to get sick. “No salt?” He asked, trying to think, before he gasped, poking the human’s side. “I know place! Clean water!”

“No salt Bruce,” he says as he gets poked, “it’ll make me sick.” Clint sits up aching and looks down at Bruce, “you know where some clean water is?”

Bruce nods, tail flopping a bit as he grabs Clint’s arm, gentle but excited. “Clean water. Taste funny. Good for my human.” He tugs on Clint’s arm, pointing towards the rocks. “Come with. I show.”

Clint nods his head as he follows Bruce towards the rocks thirsty, “where is it Bruce?”

Bruce pulls himself, before he drops down into the ocean, popping back up to open his arms for Clint. “Not far. Take human. Get human water.”

“Uh ok,” he says getting in the water with Bruce again. “Is it underwater?”

Bruce shakes his head, wrapping an arm around Clint’s waist and swimming along around the outcropping of rock, following the shore line of the island for a bit. “No. You see. Soon.” He keeps swimming until the come to a small cove, much like the underwater cave, except with an above ground opening, and Bruce swims over to it, swimming to an outer wall, where the ocean can’t get past. Since it was high tide the water was reaching high on the outer wall, and he pointed inside to where a small waterfall dashed down the rocks. “Clean. Strange water. Good for human.” He let go of Clint, pulling himself onto the rock ledge, before holding a hand out to Clint

Clint swims with Bruce as they come to an area of sharp rocks and a cave. Bruce shows him where the water is and he laughs excited as he rushes towards the water. He let the water fall pour down on him as he drinks until he is full. “That is good water…I need to make some water sacs to carry it.”

“Come on Bruce can’t you take a sip of this stuff,” he says drinking some more, “or will it make you sick?”

Bruce cocks his head, watching Clint with wide eyes beneath the waterfall, before he looks up to Clint’s face and shakes his head. “No sick. Just can’t reach.” He flops his tail, nodding at how far away the waterfall was. It wasn’t too far, but it hurt to drag himself, dug all into his scars.

Clint stops drinking the water and looks at Bruce, “well that ain’t fair,” he said as he stuck his hands under Bruce’s fin, “hold onto my neck,” he said as he picked him up and carried him until he was at the edge of the water fountain.

“You’re tails in the water so you should be ok right?”              

Bruce blinks in surprise, making a soft sound of protest as he’s hoisted and throws his arm around Clint’s neck. Bruce has not been touched like this in ages. The feeling is very strange for him, and he wiggles in Clint’s arms, scars making it difficult to be comfortable.

The waterfall distracts him, at least, and he tips his head back beneath the water, feeling it wash away the salt on his skin, running cold down his chest and across his tail.

“Good. Nice water. Feel good,” he murmurs, closing his eyes and smiling softly.

Clint smiles, “good glad you like it,” he smiles as he gets in the water with him and sits by Bruce. “I need to ask you a personal question. How do you have sex?”

Bruce’s eyes snap open and he looks to Clint, face flushing red. He’s not sure how to respond for a long moment, before he shifts his hands onto his scarred tail, rubbing anxiously at his scales. “L-like human?” He asks, confused slightly, shifting his tail a bit. “W-with, um,” he trails off, gesturing vaguely towards the area where a regular human anatomy would be. “I…no explain. Only show—no, no, not /show/,” he corrects, covering his face and shaking his head.

Clint stares at Bruce getting flustered and grins. He’s cute when he’s embarrassed and the blush travels quite a bit more than his face. Clint reaches over and grabs his hand, “it’s ok Bruce. So just like human sex then,” he makes a motion with his hand. “Ok pretend this is your sex organ and then this is a mermaid sex organ so it’s like this,” he says showing the movement of his hands in and out.

Bruce nods his head, most of his face hidden behind his hands as he watches Clint. “Yes,” he murmurs, biting his lip. He looks down after that, making a soft sound of embarrassment, before he peeks over at Clint. He can’t think of human sex now. His human is too close and beautiful; he’s been in exile too long, and he wonders how much Clint knows about things like that. Bruce doesn’t know much; he never had the chance to try it.

Clint grins, “hmm interesting. We’ll have to test that theory out some time, once the threat of starving or dying of thirst is met.”

Clint grabs Bruce’s hands and pulls them away from his face, “Bruce you have nothing to be scared of,” he says as he caresses his face. “Do you know what a kiss is?”

Bruce looks at Clint, nervously, and his gills tremble slightly before he reaches to tap his lips with two fingers. “Kiss,” he says, softly, apprehensive as he watched Clint with wide eyes. Bruce had kissed only twice before, each with Betty; he at least knew what it was.

Clint notices Bruce tremble and pauses as he figures out what’s wrong. “I’ll be gentle and you can kiss a person anywhere. Doesn’t have to be the lips but that’s for another day. We’ll take it slow.”

He wants to repay Bruce for saving him, plus when will he ever have a chance to pleasure a merman again? Bruce the merman is just too cute to pass up. If Bruce had legs Clint would have already charmed him into his bed the moment their eyes met.

Clint gets closer to Bruce and stares into his eyes a few centimeters from his lips and staying in that position until Bruce’s trembling calms down some before he kisses Bruce on the lips. He runs his hands through Bruce’s curly hair and tugs on it a little to see what Bruce would do as he uses his other hand to hold Bruce’s face. He pulls back gently.

“You ok?”

Bruce watched Clint when he paused, breathing stuttering in his throat, and melted against him when the other kissed him, slow and gentle and sweet. He made a soft whine of pleasure when Clint pulled his hair, and he was flushed and dazed when Clint pulled away.
“Good,” he whispered, gills fluttering and tail moving to curl against Clint.

Clint smirks when he feels the tail wrap around him, “that good. Would you like another one,” he teases as he puts his hand on Bruce’s fin.

Bruce sucks in a surprised breath, before he looks down at Clint’s hand on his fin, reaching down to cover it thoughtfully. “Touch?” He asks, confused. “Ugly. No touch?” He gestures at his tail and its scattering of scars. It felt nice, to have someone touch his fin, but he didn’t understand why Clint /would/.

“Yeah I want to touch your fin,” he smiles before frowning, “It’s not ugly it’s gorgeous and a good shade of purple my favorite color,” he leans down and gives the fin a quick peck with his lips.
“See it’s gorgeous enough to kiss…oh right only lip kisses today my mistake,” he grins. He runs his hand along the fin gently, “does that feel good?”

Bruce makes a soft, rumbling sound in his chest, and his tail quivers slightly. He nods. “Feel good,” he murmurs, leaning his head against Clint now, humming his enjoyment. “Soft. No one ever touch.” His tail curls closer, and his blush goes from his cheeks to his chest, bright red behind his freckles. “Bruce touch?” He asks, lifting his hand, hesitant.

Clint smiles and kisses Bruce on the lips when their foreheads touch. “Yeah you can touch all you want,” he grins as he rubs down Bruce’s tail again to get that cute sound again. He sees Bruce is already flushed red down to his chest. It makes him look so beautiful.

Bruce makes another soft, pleased sound, eyes fluttering closed for half a moment, before he allow himself to reach for Clint, running his fingertips lightly over the man’s chest, slow and gentle, and wandering his fingers downward, stroking along Clint’s side.

Clint growls softly in a pleased tone, “Mmm that felt good but you can be rougher if you want.”

Bruce makes an inquisitive noise, pleased by the sound he gets from Clint, and scratches just a bit, hand moving ever lower. He moves, gingerly at first, to kiss along Clint’s jaw, nibbling gently and wondering what other strange sounds he can get from the human.

Clint smiles down at Bruce and hisses a little at the scratch before growling a little at the kiss. He gets closer to Bruce and readjusts himself, “you sure you’ve never done this freckles,” he teases him, “I think you might have been lying.”

Bruce hmm’s softly, pulling back only to look at Clint for a moment, looking innocent. “No, first time,” he murmurs, running his claws lightly back up Clint’s side, watching with fascination. “But learn quickly.”
He smiles, before he moves back so he can kiss at Clint’s throat, tasting his skin.

Clint chuckles, “sly devil,” he says as his chest contracts and goosebumps form on his skin because of Bruce’s claws. His throat vibrates and he lets out a moan when Bruce kisses his neck. He smiles and pushes Bruce away flushed and grinning, “my turn keep your tail in the water,” he says as he pushes Bruce down onto the ground and straddles over him before nipping at his neck.

Bruce sucks in a breath of surprise, arching beneath Clint and running his fingers through the human’s blond hair. He’s never felt so strange before; hot and tingling all over. He wants more, absolutely /needs/ more.

His voice is a breathless murmur. “Good, this good.”

Clint grins as he stops nibbling on Bruce’s neck and begins to suck on it instead his hands exploring Bruce’s chest. It’s awkward as he tries to buck against Bruce he keep sliding and doesn’t know where to situate himself on Bruce tail.

Bruce murmurs out a soft groan, before he feels Clint slipping atop him and gently grabs his hips, bucking his own hips up to get the right friction between them. The anatomy may have been different, but not so much so; Bruce felt the ache all the same.

Once Bruce helps Clint steady himself on his fin Clint starts to build up a good rhythm as he dry humps Bruce while sucking his neck and moving to his chest to leave marks. He moans in pleasure when Bruce bucks against him.

Bruce let’s out soft little gasps of pleasure, before the feeling is too much and he has to pull Clint down, rolling so he’s on top of the human, fin resting between his legs as he pulls Clint into a searing kiss, grinding down on him.

Clint feels Bruce make him roll over until he’s on top of him and moans when Bruce’s grinds and kisses him. He pushes Bruce up so they are not kissing anymore, “just keep bucking me,” he says moaning as Bruce bucks against him, “wanna see your face.”

Bruce is flushed red, and he props himself up on his arms, gills a-flutter as he looks down at Clint, eyes dazed and lips red and open. He nods, distracted, and shifts down harder against Clint, grinding against him and watching his human’s face, biting his lip with one sharp tooth.

Clint keeps Bruce steady as he grinds him. He starts to pant and clenches his legs as he moans. He looks up at Bruce and smiles, “you’re beautiful.”

Bruce kept his eyes locked with Clint, panting lightly, hips trembling slightly, and he held himself up with one hand as he touched Clint’s cheek with one claw, slow and careful. “My human beautiful,” he murmured, breath stuttering in his throat. “Love my human.”

Clint freezes when Bruce says the ‘L’ words and stops Bruce from moving as he turns over and sits up scratching his head and rubbing his face. “Bruce you can’t love me,” he looks into Bruce’s eyes, “I’m not going to screw you up. I just want to release some tension and let us have a little fun understand?”

Bruce realizes he did something wrong immediately, and let’s go of Clint, tail shifting anxiously as he props himself up. He looks at Clint with curious, worried eyes, cocking his head to the side with a frown. “No love?”

Bruce had almost forgotten; love got him in trouble. He didn’t want to have to leave again. He didn’t want his human to make him leave.

“Sorry, sorry,” he mumbles, looking down. “No love, sorry, /sorry/.”

“Whoa Bruce it’s ok slow down,” he says rubbing his back, “look you don’t want to love me you’ll get hurt real easily and you’re kind of my buddy so I’m not going to do that to you. Plus you can’t love me we just met so it’s probably just lust,” he says rubbing the back of his head. “do you know what lust is?”

Bruce took a deep breath, gills fluttering, before he looked to Clint, confused. “Lust?” Bruce didn’t know this word. He thought he loved his human; this was how he’d felt with Betty, he was sure it was the same. But his human seemed to know much more than he did.

“Lust is,” he sighs trying to think of the best way to explain it, “it’s when you find someone attractive and want to show that you like them by kissing and having sex and that’s the end of it. Love is when you would do anything for them but you know not to be blind and let them do anything. You protect them keep them safe and if they start getting old and losing their looks you still want to kiss them and have sex with them.”

He rubs his head, “lust is just wanting to fool around and have sex with someone because they look nice or seem like a nice one to be with. Love is more like forming a bond, a brotherhood,” he grimaces thinking of his crew, “someone that doesn’t betray you and make you walk the plank and sink to your death.”

Bruce listened very closely as Clint spoke, nodding his head slowly as he processed this new word. Bruce did find Clint very beautiful, and he loved to touch him. But he did not know if he felt those other things. He would not let his human get hurt, and he would be very careful and protect him, but was that enough to say love?

Bruce wasn’t sure. The idea confused him. “So…no love,” he murmured, claw absently scraping at the stone beneath him, eyes down. The thought made him sad, but he knew the rules; love got him in trouble for a reason.

Clint sighs, “well I guess no love? I don’t know what you’re feeling Bruce,” he says moving his feet in the water. “I mean maybe later whatever we have can turn into love or maybe we’re both just lonely and find comfort in each other right now. I don’t know I just know I screw up relationships all the time so I’m not going to move too fast on you.” He smirks and nudges Bruce, “and you sure are a quick learner are you sure you’ve never done that before?”

Bruce looked off thoughtfully for a long moment, wondering if he was just lonely. He…he was lonely. Did that mean he didn’t love right? He ran a thoughtful hand over his scarred tail and frowned, before Clint nudged him and he looked up, shaking his head, smiling softly.

“No…first.” He gestures at himself. “Ugly. No one else want.”

Clint’s grin falls, “you’re not ugly. You’re beautiful Bruce. Why do you think that you’re ugly? Is it cause of the scars?” He pauses to let him answer.

“I have scars and you don’t think I’m ugly so you can’t be ugly either. I think you’re beautiful. Really your hair is so curly,” he says stroking Bruce’s hair, “you’re eyes are the perfect color and shape, and your nose is small, you’re lips taste nice, and don’t even get me started on the freckles.”

"Everyone say…" Bruce murmurs, furrowing his brow as he looks down, trying to figure this out. "Everyone say ugly. Say monster." He looks up when Clint touches him, frowning in confusion.

"Like…eyes?" He asks curiously poking at his own face. He’d never seen himself before, not in anything but the waves of the ocean. "Nose?" The idea felt strange to him. "Like…" He pauses, reaching out to touch Clint’s cheek, pausing. "Eyes. Like pretty sky."

Clint smiles when Bruce touches him, “have you never seen yourself Bruce? You’re beautiful,” he gets up suddenly getting an idea, “my compass it has a mirror. Let’s head back and I’ll let you see yourself,” he smiles as he picks Bruce up and puts him back in the ocean before getting in the water with him.

Bruce is startled by the sudden shift, before he wiggles his fin in the salt water, glad to once more have the ocean around him. It’s much more comfortable. He grabs Clint around the waist, nodding. “Okay,” he murmurs before he shoots off in the water.

Clint holds onto him as they swims back to where they were before. Once there Clint shakes off and goes over towards his dry clothes. He looks in his vest pocket and pulls the compass out and removes the mirror. He comes back over to Bruce and hands it to him. “Look in the glass and you’ll see yourself.”

Bruce takes the mirror very carefully from Clint, and looks up at the human with slight worry for a moment. What if he was horrible? What if he wasn’t pretty, and his human lied?

He lifted up the mirror, slowly, and when he looked inside his face flooded with shock.

He leaned forward, staring with wide eyes as he touched the face in the glass, the smaller scars scratched along his cheeks, the splatters of freckles along his face, the long lashes and the soft, fluttering gills. He didn’t know what to do, so he just stared.

Clint watches Bruce excited as he looks in the mirror before he frowns, “hey that’s just you in there it’s not another merman. You’re not getting scared are you?”

Bruce shakes his head, watching the way his curls moved as he did so. “No scared,” he mumbled, watching the way his lips moved with curiosity.

He looked away after another long moment, his eyes questioning. “Beautiful?” He asked, looking into the mirror once more.

Clint smiles, “yeah gorgeous, beautiful, whatever you want to call yourself.”

Bruce nodded, before he held the mirror up to Clint, smiling a sharp smile. “Beautiful,” Bruce said, gleeful as he pulled himself up onto the rocks with one arm, sitting down heavily as he tried to show Clint himself in the mirror.

Clint pushes the mirror in his hand, “hey I don’t need to look in a mirror to know you’re beautiful I ‘m seeing it right now,” he smiles. He stands up and begins to take his under clothes off and lay them on the rocks before pulling his pants on. “This feel weird but I need my under clothes dried…Bruce what’s wrong?”

Bruce’s entire face went bright red, and he slapped his hand over his mouth, before he ducked his head down and shook it, gills all a-flutter, tail flicking water as he bites his lip with embarrassment. He hadn’t meant to see. He was curious, just a bit, like he was curious about the legs, but he didn’t think he could bring himself to ask something like /that/.

Clint looks at his red face and pauses thinking about what he just did, “oh…yeah all human look like that. Don’t worry plenty of people have seen me naked not a big deal,” he says shrugging it off even though his face is flushed.

Bruce looks up from his embarrassment, blinking a bit curiously at him, even if he’s still as red as he can be. “Human, come,” he says suddenly, gesturing for Clint to sit beside him, wide, curious eyes on him.

Clint goes over towards him and sits beside him confused, “uh ok why did you want me to sit here?”

Bruce looks at him for a moment, before he gets a determined look on his face. “Touch?” He asks, holding up one hand near Clint, cocking his head to the side. He wants to touch Clint more, but mostly to figure him out.

Clint grins, “oh you’re in the mood for more,” he laughs, “sure touch me Bruce,” he says getting closer to him.

Bruce blinks at him, before he reaches out, curiously running a hand down Clint’s side, touching over where Bruce’s side fins would be, but he lacks them. “Human body strange,” he murmurs.

Clint chuckles, “yeah well why is my body strange? We look about the same body wise,” he says shrugging.

Bruce’s fingers traveled down until he could trail along the edge of Clint’s hip, just along the line of his pants. “No gills. No fins. Legs.” He shakes his head. “Walking strange.”

He raises and eyebrow, “well all those things are strange to me too except for walking but the way you swim is interesting.” He sees Bruce put his hand on the waist of his pants, “do you want to get a closer look at the other leg,” he grins.

Bruce’s face goes a bit red again, and he glances down, gently tugging at the line of his pants with one claw. “Curious. No peek, though.” He looks up at Clint again, biting his lip.

Clint sighs and puts a hand over Bruce’s, “Bruce if you want to see everything I don’t mind really I’ve been naked in so many different situations it doesn’t bother me anymore.”

Bruce cocked his head to the side, absently tugging at the waist line. “Look?” Bruce murmurs curiously, before he smiles. “Look no bad?”

“Yeah looking isn’t bad,” he said standing up, “but only you can look right now,” he says as he undoes his belt and pulls his pants off and lays them on the rock, “so this is what a male human body looks like.”

Bruce cocked his head to the side, less embarrassed now that he thinks about it more clinically, and even if his face goes a bit red, he doesn’t look down. “Oh,” is all he says.

“Oh,” repeats Clint a little ashamed, “that’s all you can say about this,” he says motioning to his organ, “well it hasn’t really been used on you has it,” he says grinning looking at Bruce. “Where’s yours?”

Bruce’s face goes red. “No mean ‘oh’,” he says quickly. “No mean offend.” He didn’t know /how/ to react. Bruce’s face went an even brighter red and he cleared his throat. “It, um…” He curls his fin, glancing down and waving absently. “Hide ‘til…” He looked at Clint, biting his lip. “Til good touches.”

“So you don’t see it at all until you get aroused,” Clint asks shaking his head, “how do you guys have sex then? Do you have to do a lot of “good touching” before anything opens up?”

Bruce face turns redder as he nods his head, “good touches needed for both. How do humans,” he asks blushing as he points at Clint’s crotch.

Clint thinks for a minute, “hmm well we don’t need good touches to open anything up. It’s already there but it makes it easier and nicer. If it’s a woman you find her hole and do this,” he says making a rude gesture, “but if it’s a guy you go through the butt.”

Bruce looks at him confused, “butt?”

Clint nods his head, “same thing as a man and woman having sex except it’s a different hole with guys get it,” he says straddling him naked and grinning.

“You want me to give you some good touches or wait another time,” he teases.

Bruce let out a soft noise of want, reaching up to touch Clint’s hip, biting his lip as he looked up at the blond. “Now?” He asked, soft and needy. “Like now.”

“You sure about that,” Clint teases moving up and down on Bruce’s fin.

Bruce lays his head back, making a soft whine in the back of his throat. “Yes,” he replies, eyes fluttering closed. “Want now.”

Clint grins before he leans down and sucks on his neck still moving on Bruce’s fin.

One hand grips Clint’s shoulder, mindful of his claws, while the other digs into the rock as he bucks up. It’s not long before Bruce’s want is noticeable and insistent. “More, more,” he mumbles, whimpering faintly.

Clint grunts and begins to feel Bruce’s fin, “where’s the hole,” he asks biting on his neck.

"Like human," Bruce mumbles, giving a startled gasp of pleasure as he bucks up against Clint. "P-Part like human."

Clint quickly turns Bruce over to his backside and finds it. He spits on his hand as he begins to prepare Bruce.

A few hours pass and Clint is curled up naked next to Bruce on the rock. He has one arm over Bruce protectively and so he can not swim away.

Bruce curls against him as well, fast asleep, only the end of his tail dipped in the water as he enjoys the after glow of their time and the heat of Clint’s arm around him.

Clint slowly begins to wake up and stretches as he curls around Bruce and gives him a kiss behind the ear, “hey there beautiful.”

Bruce mumbles something in a different language, yawning and stretching, before he finally flutters his eyes open and looks over at Clint, smiling. “Hello,” he murmurs softly, smiling lopsided.

Clint chuckles, “what did you just say? It sounded like another language. It was pretty,” he grins.

Bruce furrows his brow, before he smiles softly, still looking tired. He repeats what he said before, words that no human has ever spoke, and chuckles. “Mean ‘good morning, moon and star’.”

Clint nods his head and tries to repeat the sounds, “huh harder than it sounds,” he laughs.

Bruce nods his head in agreement, before he flutters his gills. “Sound from gill,” he said, softly and shaking his head with a smile. “Human no gill, human no make sound.”

“Aw man that’s not fun at all. Do all your words speak with a gill?”

Bruce shakes his head. “Some throat,” he says, before he murmurs something that sounds almost Latin, but isn’t. “Mean ‘eye behold beauty’.”

Clint tries to say the words with Bruce’s name, “ Tried to say Bruce behold beauty did it sound right?”

Bruce snickers, before he says what Clint was trying to say very slowly, adding Clint’s name at the end. “Like that,” he says, patting the human’s cheek gently.

Clint tries saying the phrase again for Bruce, “I kind of said it right,” he sighs and gives him a kiss on the lips soon after, “action is more of my style than words,” he grins.

Bruce makes a soft sound of pleasure at the kiss, shifting to nuzzle against Clint. “Good action,” he mumbles, smiling.

Clint grins and holds him closer and gives him another kiss before standing up, “Bruce I need to start building my boat today. I got everything except something to carve the boat. Do you think you could find some sharp rocks today? You’ll get a reward if you do,” he grins as he sucks on his neck.

Bruce blushes bright red and nods, excited. “Find sharp rocks,” Bruce agrees, smiling coyly. “Lots of sharp rocks.” He’s already edging a bit closer to the water.

Clint grins and gives him a long kiss on the lips, “use that as your motivation.”

Bruce nods excitedly, before he grins. “Back soon,” he says, before he slips into the water and disappears in its depths.

Once Bruce has disappeared Clint stretches and gets his pants and shirt on as he begins to lay out the wood how he want it.

Bruce goes down into the water, slipping deep into the murky sea, and stays gone for at least an hour, perhaps more, in his search.

Once Clint has the wood set up the way he wants it he lays down on the stone in the sun. He tries to think of a way to get some more fish. Maybe he should start a fire and ask Bruce to get some fish for them to eat. He shrugs and keeps his feet in the water.

It’s after Bruce has found his sharp rocks and begins heading back to Clint that he smells it, in the water; the sent catches his attention straight away, like the smell of death on the wind.

He nearly drops his stones as he scrambles in the water, swimming in one tight, frantic circle, before he shoots up like a rocket toward the surface.

Clint hears a splash and looks out in the distance and sees Bruce swimming quickly back to him. Something is either wrong or he really wants to have sex again he thinks to himself as Bruce gets closer to the shore.

Bruce swims through the water, and when he surfaces and spots Clint he heads for him like a bullet, nearly crashing into the rock, before he yanks himself to a stop, tail smacking in front of him, splashing water across the human.
“Human, out water,” he says, tossing the sharp rocks to clatter on the stone before he moves to shove at Clint. “Up, out, go,” he says urgently.

Clint begins to get worried, “I’m getting out of the water and you’re coming with me then,” he says as he picks him up and carries him to dry land and just holds him in his arms. “What were you swimming from?”

Bruce shifts anxiously in his arms, looking with wide eyes out towards the water, claws curling and uncurling fretfully. “No. Back in. Keep human safe,” he says, looking to Clint. “I fine. Go back. No safe.”

“No. How long can you stay dry like this? I’m not putting you back in with whatever you ran away from. Protect Bruce got it,” he said frustrated.

Bruce flicks his tail anxiously, looking between Clint and the waves. “Not long out water. Bad. But thing—badder.” He shakes his head, looking to Clint, shaking his head. “Bruce fine. Okay. No get hurt. Only human danger.”

“I’m not going to put you back in the water with whatever that thing is…can you hold on until we make it to the water fall area?”

Bruce huffs in annoyance, before he nods. “Human dumb. But I stay with human.” He looks at Clint, frustrated. It was so hard to explain without the words for it! But there was no point arguing when Clint had already carried him too far from the water to crawl.

“Human is not dumb. Human is being nice,” he sighs, “can you at least call me Clint instead of human,” he says as he carries Bruce to the area where the waterfall is.

"Sorry," Bruce says, frowning as he concentrates. "Clint," he says, carefully, before looking at him. "Clint stubborn." The names a bit harder to say, but he decides if it pleases his human, he’ll use it.

“The most stubborn pirate to ever travel the seven seas,” he laughs as they reach the water fall and he puts Bruce in the water. “Alright what was that thing you were swimming from?”

Bruce wriggles his tail, looking up at Clint nervously, before he glances away, shaking his head. “Bad thing. Can’t tell.” He glances away, frowning. “Bad thing for Bruce, not Clint. Clint no need bad thing.”

Clint raises an eyebrow at him, “yeah well bad thing just got on my list of things to kill. Cause I’m not letting whatever is in there get you. You’re mine and I’m selfish like that.”

Bruce wriggles with annoyance, shaking his head. “No kill. /Can’t/ kill,” he says, rubbing absently at a scattering of scars across his stomach. “Bruce try. No kill. Only make worse.” He frowns, before he looks up at Clint.

“Clint too stubborn. Clint get /hurt/.”

“Well tell me what it is cause I’m sure I can kill it. I’ve killed loads of things from the sea and humans too…”

"Not like human," Bruce says, eyes unfocused. "Not like Bruce, either." He shutters slightly. "Bruce punishment. Bruce /executioner/." He swallows. "Abomination."

“You’re not an abomination Bruce…so this thing is your executioner? How does he find you?”

Bruce shakes his head, before he taps his nose. “Smell. Follow. Always follow. No stay in one place…He find.” Bruce furrows his brow in anger. “He would hurt. Hurt Clint. No hurt Clint.”

“Huh so no reasoning with him to leave you alone for a certain amount of gold then,” he sits there thinking. “Do mermaids have magic or is that a myth too?”

Bruce pauses, looking to Clint curiously. “Some magic. Certain mer.” He points to himself, shaking his head. “No Bruce. Friend, back home; had magic.”

“So can’t you use magic to kill it or at least make it like you, or track a new scent to kill?”

Bruce made a muted gesture with his hands, before he sighed, shaking his head. “Magic not like that.” He pauses, before he tips his head up and touches his throat. “Song. Sing magic, nothing else.”

“Humans can sing too what makes it so different?”

Bruce cocked his head to the side, staring at Clint like he was crazy. “Sing /very/ different.” He said, shaking his head. “Song of /heart/, song of /life/, song of /death/.”

“Humans sing about that stuff all the time how is it different,” he asks before grinning, “can you sing the creature to death?”

Bruce sighs, rolling his eyes. He would show Clint, but his songs were always so…terrible, they always ended up hurting someone. “Can make bad things happen; can make good. Can make love, too.” That was where the myth of mermaids dragging pirates to their deaths came from; they would sing, and lure the men into the ocean without realizing it.

“So sing at the thing in the sea and something will happen right?”

Bruce waved his hand. “Maybe? Never certain.” He made a face, running his claws absently over his fin. “Tried once.” He traces a deep set of bite marks, wide and large. “Not work.”

Clint looks at Bruce’s fin and frowns before getting an idea, “can you trick him into getting on the land? Maybe if you get him on land I can spear him and you can sing to him about dying and kill him that way?”

Bruce was quiet and thoughtful for a moment. “Need go in water to lure,” he says, waving towards the ocean. “Won’t come out otherwise.”

“Well I need to make spears anyway. I’ll get the sharp rocks and use those,” he says getting up to head back to the rock over the ocean where Bruce dropped the rocks.

Bruce nods, but he feels anxious with Clint out of his sight, and sits beneath the fall of the fresh water, upset that Clint had left him behind.

An unseen mass waits beneath the waves just at the edge of the rock, watching as the human steps ever closer.

Clint heads over to the rock and pauses as he looks out at the sea. The water was too calm not a good thing. He has to make spears though and protect Bruce. He kneels down on the rock gathering the sharp stones.

The water was calm. Very calm. It did not lap at the rocks, nor did it show any sort of shape beneath it.
Not until a tentacle shot out of the water and wrapped around Clint’s ankle, yanking his feet out from under him until he smacked into the rocks, before he began to drag him toward the water.
He really should have listened to Bruce.

Clint thumps on the rock painfully as the tentacle begin to drag him to the sea. He curses as he stabs the tentacles with one of the rocks making it release its grip from the pain. He rushes further back on land and tries to calm down. “Yeah and stay back asshole.”

The tentacle whips back into the water, before four more take its place, grasping at the rocks, and a roar like thunder comes from the water, shaking the land beneath Clint’s feet.
Bruce hears the sound from where he sits, the long distance off, and his desperation is great; /Clint/ is all he can think, flopping onto his side and dragging himself the distance towards the water. Needs to distract it from Clint.

“Oh fuck,” he says as he runs up the beach trying to get to the jungle area since the giant whatever it was with tentacles couldn’t get him.

The tentacles kept groping across the stones, until a large, green hand reached out and gripped the stone, cracking it beneath its fingers.

It was dissatisfied by what it found, obviously. An empty rock. Oh, the human had run away in fear. Of course. It thought he couldn’t escape the water. It took a bit of effort, but soon enough Bruce had dragged himself to the edge of the rocks, and dipped down into the water, swimming in a tight circle before shooting off.

Clint reaches the edge of the jungle and looks back at the beast, “ok tentacles and hands? What do sea people drink,” he says out of breath before he freeze, “Oh no Bruce.” He runs over to the waterfall and doesn’t see Bruce anywhere and begins to panic.’

The creature drags itself ashore, tentacles sucking at the rock for grip, and it is nearly all the way on land before Bruce zips through the water, grabs with sharp, deadly claws, and yanks one tentacle, sending the beast crashing back into the water.

Clint watches as the creature is yanked back into the ocean, “Bruce you idiot get out of the water,” he shouts racing towards the shore.

Another roar like thunder rocks the little island, and a dark mass beneath the waves shifts and jerks about, violently.

Clint tries to steady himself as the island shakes and shout for Bruce, “Bruce!”

There’s a long beat of silence, where the water stills and the shape sinks down further in the ocean, before Bruce comes shooting up like a rocket, breaking the surface with wide, desperate eyes. “Clint run!” He calls, just before he’s yanked beneath the water once more.

Clint dashes to the water grabbing the sharp rocks before he dives into the waves swimming after Bruce. No way was a monster going to take Bruce away from him.

Bruce scrambles against the tentacles hold, clawing at it, but finds no response, getting dragged deeper and deeper, and suddenly he fears he might die here. He had alluded the beast for so long, dodging about from place to place so he could not trace him…but pausing, for even a day with Clint…
Clint. Bruce looks up to see his human dive into the water, and he screams with fear at seeing him come into such dangerous waters.

Clint holds his breath as he keeps diving after Bruce and the monster. He reaches the monster and stabs him trying to distract him enough to free Bruce. He swims to another area and spots Bruce he stabs at the monster again.

The monster, mostly a cloud of black tentacles, spins and roars, exposing itself fully to Clint as it releases its grip on Bruce for just a moment; a hulking green beast, with tentacle gripping at anything around it, its fists snapping out to curl around Clint, snarling in his face even as Bruce comes from behind to grab him.

Clint is pulled by the green thing and struggles to get away. He feels Bruce pulling on him and stabs another tentacle hoping to wound the monster enough to get released from its grip. His vision is getting blurry he’ll need to breath soon or he’ll die.

The creature doesn’t let go, beginning to squeeze Clint, before, in a fit of desperation, Bruce let’s out a scream, voice a violent boom, and the creature releases Clint to cover its ears, bright green eyes wide with surprise as Bruce wraps his tail around Clint and goes shooting for the surface once more.

When the creature squeezes Clint he struggles before letting out his air bubbles and falling limp in his arms. He sees Bruce screaming and that’s all he remember as his eyes close.

At the surface Bruce swims back to their island, unheeding of any pursuit that may be after him; he knows only the terror he feels at the fact that /Clint is not moving/, and he presses his human upon the rock, pulling himself up and leaning frantically over him, snapping a snarl of rage towards the tentacled creature that seems to be trying to resurface, wounded and dazed.

Clint doesn’t move at all and lays on the rock where Bruce had put him. He’s starting to turn blue.

Bruce lets out a sound of fear, brown eyes frantic as he runs his hands over Clint, trying to think of what to do, before he stops and grabs Clint, pinching his nose and tipping his head back. Drowning, he must have had water in his lungs! Bruce desperately presses their lips together, and Bruce’s gills quiver as he presses air into the mans lungs.

After a few tries Clint spits up the water and chokes, “we gotta stop meeting like this,” he coughs grinning at Bruce, “you ok?”

Bruce nods, looking dazed, before he practically collapses against Clint, half sobbing as he pulls him close. “Stupid human. /Stupid human!/ Never listen, stupid human, almost /die/!” He pulls back enough to glare at Clint, gaze a laser focus of anger. “STUPID human try die cause /stupid/!”
He has nothing else to say and collapses against Clint once more, shaking.

Clint’s eyes widen at what the merman is saying and starts to argue before stopping and grins, “but I’m not dead cause you saved me. You’re a smart merman aren’t ya,” he smiles. Before getting serious, “I also wasn’t going to let that thing take you away. So I had no choice and did what I had to do.”

Bruce still trembles against him for some time, before he lets out a long, wobbly breath. “Human okay,” he murmurs, kissing the side of Clint’s neck. “/Clint/ okay.” He let’s out a soft, nervous laugh. “Bruce /love/ Clint.”

He smiles and runs his hand through Bruce’s curls, “Clint ok and Clint love Bruce too.”

Bruce pulls back to look at Clint, eyes wide. “Clint love Bruce too?” He asks, feeling slightly hopeful. He thought maybe Clint still didn’t love him, still thought it was ‘lust’.

“Well I better since I almost killed myself trying to get you away from that monster,” he teases before getting serious, “I do love you Bruce. I got scared when that monster was hurting you and didn’t want you to die.”

Bruce’s face lights up in a smile like the sun, before he dives down and wraps his arms around Clint’s neck, laughing gleefully. “Clint love Bruce!” He says, hugging him tighter. “Bruce love Clint!”

Clint gets squeezed and pats Bruce on the back, “Bruce I need to breathe,” he says laughing, “Love you too Bruce.”

Bruce releases his hold carefully, before he rolls onto his side, burying his face in Clint’s shoulder and sighing. “Love Clint,” he murmured again, softly.

Clint pulls him closer and smiles and plants a kiss on his head, “me too Bruce.”