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This was different from how Buck had planned for his and Eddie's four-off to unfold when planning a surprise trip for them. Sometimes, something happens that totally upends your life and opens your eyes to a whole new world. That was happening right now to Buck.
"At least the emergency beacon worked, and we managed to call someone before the ship got wrecked," Buck muttered into Eddie's shoulder as he swam with them toward some of the bigger pieces of the ship. "It's not my fault you lost our phones."
"You lost your own damn phone when you got knocked unconscious, and I had to save your sorry ass from sinking to the seabed in the middle of a freak storm. I only lost my phone." Eddie bit out as he looked around for something. "If I didn't know better, I would think you were Bobby's son for real and your family was cursed with bad luck at sea."
"Yeah, honestly, I'm starting to wonder about that myself." As Eddie reached a big, sturdy piece of the splintered-away boat, Buck told him, "I just wish the inflatable lifeboat hadn't been ruined too, or I'd be a lot more comfortable right now."
Eddie glared at him and deposited him on the wreckage; "Yeah, because I've been super comfortable holding up your human ass in the middle of the ocean."
"You're a freaking mermaid!" Buck yells at Eddie. He glared at Buck, hanging on the side of the floating piece of junk he was clinging to. "Umh, mer…man?" Buck corrected himself and took in Eddie properly. His upper half is still the same Eddie, but his lower half, hidden by the sea, looked… orange-y.
The tip of his fin flipped up and broke the ocean's surface. It was totally orange. Then it slammed down again and splashed Buck right in the face. Then he just sighed. "Are you just not going to talk to me ever again? This is not my fault!"
Eddie glared at him again and leaned back in the ocean like he was sunbathing on a beach. More of his lower body broke the surface of the sea, and Buck saw he truly had orange-gold scales all over. The fin itself was also orange, but it was practically see-through and almost like gossamer-fine silk.
The scales glistened in the sun like gold, and for a moment, Buck forgot he was wet to the bone and unwillingly cosplaying Rose from Titanic near the end of that movie. Eddie was ignoring him, eyes closed and still leaning back in the ocean with apparently no worry in the world. The asshole.
"You look really- goldy," Buck says, which makes Eddie crack open one eye and look in his direction. "Like an overgrown goldfish! Did you know they can get really big? Also, did you know they are in the carp family?"
For that, Buck gets splashed again, and harder this time. Buck thinks he saw that Eddie even has a dorsal fin and everything, but at least it did stop Eddie from sunbathing. Instead, he grasps the piece of wood Buck is clinging to and stares into his eyes.
"I'm not a goldfish. Goldfish are an invasive species in the wild here. Don't call me an invasive pest." Eddie gritted out at Buck through clenched teeth that looked a little sharper than usual. It was a little scary, but at least he was talking to Buck again, so he was taking that as a win.
"Sometimes you are a pest. Maybe this explains it. You're part goldfish." And if Buck could safely sit up and cross his arms, he would. But he wasn't going to risk that right now.
"Stop calling me a goldfish, you—you…" Eddie glowered at him, and Buck knew it wasn't the smartest thing ever to irritate someone on their apparent home turf, but he just couldn't help it. They had been in the middle of an argument when the storm hit.
"Me what?"
"Lucky."
"Lucky? What does that even mean?"
"You're like Lucky, the golden retriever puppy that Chris really wanted us to adopt the other day. I told him we already had a puppy at home," Eddie told him, all smug. He could cross his arms because he was right at home in the ocean.
"Haha. You're hilarious." Buck grumbled at him, but he could feel his annoyance leaking out of him slowly, "But seriously, you were going to let me marry you without telling me you're a part-time goldfish?"
Eddie rolled his eyes, flipped his fin out of the water, but didn't splash Buck this time, and lowered it back into the water. "You know I can drown you quite easily here and make it look like an accident, right?" Eddie mentioned it like he was talking about how good the weather was right now.
"How dare you threaten to drown your puppy? That's just animal abuse. Do I need to report you to the ASPCA?" Buck accused him but with a grin on his face and levity in his voice. Forgetting again for a moment that they were floating in the middle of the ocean and it was getting dark soon, "You're such an idiot."
Eddie rolled his eyes again but grabbed Buck's hands and stared into Buck's eyes before telling him straight-faced, "So are you. But you're my idiot and I love you."
"I love you too. But you still need to answer my question. Why did you hide this from me? And what does this make Chris?"
"It's, um, not that I thought you'd reject me or anything. Well, okay, maybe a small part feared that, but mostly, I just couldn't stand the thought of freaking you out like that for even a second." Eddie started to move around Buck and his piece of wreckage like he was looking for something, but he was probably just doing it to avoid eye contact with Buck; "I just didn't expect you to be so open and immediately accept this side of me."
"Of course, I would—" Buck started to say, but Eddie cut him off and continued talking, avoiding eye contact as he focused on the plank of wood Buck was hanging onto.
"Chris is only part-merman or whatever you called us, but Shannon's genes are stronger, so he's more human than not." Eddie finally looked up from the wood and looked into Buck's eyes, "But he has been coming into his fin quite nicely recently, so I can't wait to take him swimming soon."
Buck reached out a hand and stroked down what little of the orange scales were still above water with Eddie this close to him, asking, "Is he also this beautiful golden orange?"
"Not exactly, more a mix of green, blue, and dark purple for some reason. I don't know how it works." Eddie told him, with some sadness in his voice that again broke Buck's heart. "My parents weren't exactly dying to explain everything to me. They don't really like this side of us. They stay on land as much as they can and pretend they are 'normal.'" Of course, his parents were the reason for this sadness, too.
"That's okay. You know what I think about your parents. They can fuck off." Buck told him and grinned at Eddie when Eddie rolled his eyes, but it got a smile back on his face, "But what are we going to do about your lack of pants? I assume they didn't like to get absorbed into your body, under your scales or something?"
Eddie raised one hand and pushed Buck's face away from his, but not so far he'd lose the grip on the wreckage he was still clinging to. "Of course, that's where your mind goes. Don't worry about it. We'll figure something out. We were in a shipwreck; they'll just be glad we survived."
After that, they both floated in the ocean for a while. At least Eddie had found a bigger piece of wreckage for Buck to climb onto, so he didn't have to cling to that plank anymore and could relax a bit more without the risk of slipping into the sea again. He lay on his back and stared up into the dusk-colored sky.
"Wait, if you eat fish, would that make you a cannibal?" Buck suddenly piped up after a while, carefully turned back onto his stomach, and stared at Eddie, who stared right back at him like he couldn't believe that Buck had just asked him that.
"No, just carnivorous like you." Eddie finally told him, before dipping into the ocean for a moment and then coming back up looking more annoyed than he was before the dip, "I'm not a freaking fish just because I come from the same place."
Okay, so maybe Buck hadn't asked that fully in good faith; he does like to sometimes poke the bear or, well, the goldfish this time, "Good, then we don't have to stop eating sushi. I didn't know if you had been secretly mourning each bite or something." Buck told him with a smirk on his face, which made Eddie narrow his eyes at him.
"This isn't The Little Mermaid, I'm not friends with the fish. You know what? I changed my mind. I take back my yes. The wedding is off." Eddie pushed away from where Buck was lying and took a quick dip before coming back up.
"No, you don't! You love me. You just said so. I'm your idiot." Buck grabbed Eddie's nearby hand. He tugged him closer for a quick kiss, with Eddie still half in the ocean and Buck lying on his stomach. "But maybe this marriage proposal could have gone better, huh?"
"Yep, but it's kind of your fault it went so sideways since it was your idea." Buck rolled his eyes as Eddie narrowed his eyes and continued blaming him for everything, "You wanted to go on that boat! You planned it in secret and surprised me. I could have helped you if I had known!"
"Well, I didn't know I had a mermai- man to help me with the planning, sorry. And I didn't know I somehow controlled the weather, too."
For that, he got another splash with the fin, but not as harsh and with the smirk on Eddie's face, probably not meant in annoyance. So Buck splashed him back, using his hands. Sure, it was not as impressive, but it was something.
"Once they come to get us, and I really hope that's soon, my lack of pants is gonna be the least of your problems."
"That doesn't sound as scary as you think it does."
Buck heard the sound of a helicopter in the distance, and it looked like Eddie heard the same. Then he saw the helicopter's floodlights approaching their location. Now that it was fully dark and the sun had gone down, Buck was truly ready to get out of the freezing water, but he didn't know about Eddie. The cold didn't look like it was bothering him at all, which was not surprising but a little annoying.
"Finally. I was not ready to spend the night like this."
"You and I both. I'm getting cold", Eddie told him, and he shivered a little, making Buck laugh out loud. Because yeah, he didn't see that one coming. "The merman gets cold?"
If looks could kill, the look on Eddie's face right now would kill Buck on the spot; "Yeah, because I have to stay up here and watch out for your landlubber ass."
"Landlubber?"
END