Svsss modern-fantasy au where XF and SY picks up two stray merpups.
(Part 1.)
Like okay so uhhhhh XF’s in college (writing’s his side gig) and he’s joined a few programs to put on his resume--mostly things with just enough wiggle room in the scheduling for him to be able to be able to take a break. Anyways so XF ends up in this marine life studying program. He ends up getting lucky and ends up winning a draw for an "all expenses paid" trip across the country to get some hands on experience. Well obviously XF takes up on this trip because who would pass a thing like that up?
So he packs his bags and goes to meet his roommate (another lucky person that won the draw for the trip) and move into one of the coziest sea-side places he's ever seen. The trip's only for 6 months and during the 6 months they have to collect various samples and photographs of the sea life there. This of course means that they have to venture out to sea and go diving.
Anyways so XF meets his new roommate and it's SY ofc, and they become friends after a bit of living together. The identity reveal happens somewhere after a month and XF is surprised that he doesn't hate SY for all of the rude shit SY's said in the comment section of his works (works plural, SY has read more than one of XF's works. Despite the spiteful comments SY believes that XF is a talented writer and enjoys the worldbuilding XF does in his other less-smut-driven works). Instead of genuine resentment all they do is bicker like an old married couple for like a good chunk of the trip.
Anyways so moving past that one of these days, XF goes out like super late at night for a walk on the beach because he has really bad writer's block and is also a bit stressed because of some lingering family issues. While on this walk he trips over a little lump and he's like "what the hell is that" and it's a small child--thing that's washed up on shore. XF freezes because what the fuck, is this a genuine mermaid? even if it's not why the hell is there a child washed up on shore like this? The mermaid(?) is bleeding and XF knows that there are some fish in the water that'd probably snap this little guy up if XF were to return it to the water.
Ssssoo... XF dunks the jacket he'd worn out into the sea water, wraps it around the weak body of this merchild (?) and books it back to the condo. SY is awoken by the sound of XF slamming drawers open in a wild search for salt. When he groggily gets up to question why the fuck XF is being this loud at like 12 in the morning, XF motions to the kitchen sink, where he's temporarily placed the bundled up mermaid.
SY's all like, "holy shit" and the two of them rush to get a tub of water filled so they can check up on this merbaby. They treat the wounds they best they can and then freak out about the fact that they found a real like honest-to-god mermaid.
They stay awake for a good while before they're like "okay we've done what we can, all we can do is wait" and go to sleep. Well SY wakes up first--completely forgetting about the fact that they kept the injured mermaid in the bathroom--and heads to the bathroom to brush his teeth. He opens the door and it's like a warzone. There's a few cracked tiles on the floor, shampoo bottles that've been bitten through, a bunch of products have been knocked to the floor, the hand towels have been shredded to bits, and the mermaid is nowhere in sight. Shen Yuan's jaw drops.
He was going to go wake XF up but he didn't want to leave the mer to do any more damage (how did he even cause that much damage so quietly?) so he instead grabs a broom from the storage closet near the bathroom and arms himself with it, stepping into the danger zone. He searches like everywhere for it--almost giving up hope in the process. It's only when he goes quiet (to sort out his thoughts) that he barely notices a soft hissing noise. It comes from the cabinets--ones that he's sure he'd checked.