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A chilly breeze rolled through the dislodging leaves in a shower of red, orange and yellow from their trees. The little sheets of colour gently drifted along the wind, piling up along the banks, and falling into the surface of the river, causing ripples to expand and crash into one another in a display of Autumn’s beauty.
Danny surfaced from the water, careful to keep only his eyes above it. As much as he tried, breathing air came difficult to him. Technically, he wasn’t even supposed to be here, and his scales – how weird it was to say scales instead of skin – shivered at being far away from Bruce, from his pod.
But it also ached. Nothing made sense underwater. The smells, his instincts that took control at seemingly random times, the pain that he feared would never go away.
He always used to play in the leaves with Jazz in Autumn.
Another pair of eyes surfaces beside his, these pure green with a black sclera and pupil. Without Damian’s help, he’d have never found his way to land.
“How do you feel now, Daniel?” Damian clicked. Danny pouted. The older guppy never called him Danny, no matter how many times Danny asked him to.
Without even thinking, Danny’s fins flicked, and his mouth closed on Damian’s shoulder in a gentle bite.
“Stop that!” Damian shook his shoulder, but Danny just wrapped his tail and arms around him underwater, latching on even tighter. Damian clicked in disapproval, and dove back to the river bed, shoving Danny into the ground. The quick motion had Danny squealing with laughter.
“Only if you call me Danny!” He emphasised his point with another nip at Damian’s arm fins.
“Tut. It displeases me to use childish nomenclature.”
“What’s gnome-ter?” Danny’s ear fins perked in curiosity. “Sounds made up.”
Damian released Danny from his hold, and crossed his arms. “Now I know you are trying to rile me up. Come. We do not have much time before Father notices our absence.”
Danny swam back to the surface, marvelling at the way the leaves fell and drifted and spun around in the air and floated on the river. One of them even landed on his nose!
Danny squirted a stream of water from his mouth, causing the leaf to land on Damian’s eyes, and the older child to sputter in surprise, sinking again. Danny giggled. When Damian popped out of the water with vengeance in his eyes, Danny swam for it.
His dorsal fin cut through the water. His tail swished back and forth and sent the floating leaves scattering in a triangle, like splitting the Red Sea. Although Damian was stronger, Danny was smaller and nimbler.
Danny swam as fast as he could, chirping at the thrill of the chase as the calm river opened up into a huge lake, still coated by orange and red leaves. With much more room to move, Danny lead Damian around in circles as the bigger boy trilled angrily.
The chase ended as Damian latched onto Danny’s tail with his claws, yanking the boy back. Damian’s arm trapped the smaller boy, while his other hand reached up to Danny’s hair. “I have always wanted to do this to someone.” Damian said with an evil smirk.
Danny knew exactly what was coming.
Damian’s hand rubbed his head rapidly, and Danny squealed at the burn of the noogie. “I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry please forgive me Dami!!” Danny begged
Damian huffed. “I was about to set you free, but that insulting nickname has me reconsidering.” Then, he sped up.
By the time his punishment was over, Danny was floating belly up in the water, eyes crossed out. Damian wore a smug grin.
“You’re so mean, Dami.” Danny said wistfully.
“You say this to the person who took you here out of the kindness of his own heart?”
“Yes, because you’re a bully! You bully me, just like my big sister did!” Danny pouted.
Then, his face fell. He hadn’t realised just how much he missed his sister’s teasing.
No teasing remark came from Damian. Instead, the older boy patted the dirt beside him. “Sit with me. What was she like?”
For a long while, they sat on the lake bed, gazing up at the rustling branches as Danny talked about his human life. How his sister was always there for him, how his parents… weren’t always, but they still tried! His parents still loved him!
Damian’s face remained carefully neutral.
Soon, the energy left Danny’s body. He slumped against Damian, the older boy gently stroking Danny’s fins and head. Danny spotted something he hadn’t noticed before.
“Are those apples?” he asked. They were unclear through the rippling water, but he was sure it was some kind of fruit.
Damian looked up again. “They appear to be so. Would you like one?”
Danny hadn’t had an apple, or any land fruit in ages. The boy nodded, but how could they get such forbidden fruit without legs, or even the ability to breathe air in Danny’s case?
Damian grabbed a handful of pebbles lying in the lake bed’s dirt, and swam for the surface. “Watch and learn, Daniel.” Danny stuck his tongue out.
Damian reared his arm back, and threw a pebble. It soared through the air, and hit nothing in particular. Danny giggled. Damian tutted, and threw another one.
This one hit its mark. Damian’s throwing arm was strong, and the pebble knocked an apple off its branch, falling to the water with a gentle plop.
Danny cheered, his fins stimming happily as Damian collected his prize. It was a little bruised, but still bright red and fresh. “Enjoy.” The older boy said, handing it off to Danny, while he went to extract his own.
Danny bit into the apple, and trilled gently. It was so, so sweet and fresh. Its juices flooded his mouth with fruity happiness. Before long, all that was left of the apple was a sad core that Danny chewed on like a bone.
“Can you show me?” Danny asked after the third apple was extracted. Damian raised his eyebrow skeptically.
Try as Damian might, Danny was no natural thrower. The different in density between water and air threw the little fry off, and most of his pebbles either went wild, or barely even got off the ground (or water, so to speak) before falling back on Danny’s head. Poor fry.
“You have to use your whole body. Use your fins to twist yourself, and then throw the pebble with the extra power,” Damian instructed. The bigger guppy circled around, inspecting Danny’s form, poking fins into proper position.
When Danny threw the pebble, he made sure to flick his fins as Damian had instructed. Immediately, the pebble went flying. “Yay! Aren’t you proud of me, Dami!”
“It was satisfactory.” That made the little fry glow with pride.
So much so that he didn’t even pay attention to where the pebble had landed.
“Ouch! What’s the big idea???” A boy’s voice shouted. A human boy’s.
Damian grabbed Danny and dashed. He quickly dug ditches in the dirt and lay in them while shovelling more dirt over their bodies with their hands and fins. All the while, Danny squirmed and chirped in confusion. Damian shushed him, using a particularly sharp call, and Danny stilled.
Not a moment later, a young human boy wearing a blue shirt with a red logo of some kind appeared at the edge of the lake, looking around in confusion. “Hello? Is anybody there?”
Danny quietly whined. Why wouldn’t Dami let him say hi to the human? He looked friendly!
The human boy looked down into the lake. Damian shifted his hand very slightly so it would cover Danny’s mouth. Even Danny felt compelled to stay still. The human stood there for what felt like hours, before finally leaving.
They stayed there for a bit longer, before Damian finally decided it was safe to leave. They shook the dirt off their scales, mourning the fact that they would never be able to hide the lake scent from their bodies now.
“What was that for?” Danny whispered. “Why’d we have to hide?”
“You know what Father said, Daniel. We’re not supposed to interact with humans without his supervision.”
“We aren’t supposed to go up rivers either,” Danny said. Why was Damian being mean?
“Tut. It is different. You have me to protect you, but even I know that messing with humans is more trouble than it is worth at the moment.”
Danny prepared another protest, when a series of plops came from the surface. Damian grabbed Danny again, ready to hide, only to realise that they were more apples, having fallen from the tree. The apples drifted from the surface, as if they had fallen on the ground and rolled off.
The two guppies looked at each other. Cautiously, Damian poked an apple from underwater. Danny looked past the surface, into the bushes and trees. He didn’t find anyone watching.
The boys hastily grabbed the apples, and sped back home.
Meanwhile, a young Jon Kent perched on a branch on the opposite side of the lake, peering into a pair of binoculars. “Holy cow. Mermaids are real!” he exclaimed.