#mer!hound

[submerged-into-clouds]

Slowly internalizing that I can draw whatever I want forever, so here's mer!Hound again.

[submerged-into-clouds]

I felt like sketching him again :^)

Since this whole thing was fairytale-inspired, I did the sketch with an elaborate-looking capital letter.

[submerged-into-clouds]

So. This is the mer!Hound fanfiction I wrote for @montyuh . I haven't had a chance to properly revise it due to a difficult university semester, — up until now, — but I'm just going to drop it here and skitter away like a cockroach.

Premise:

Mer!Hound / Little Mermaid AU

What to expect from the work and the work itself are under "read more".

What to expect:

I haven't written for purposes of online posting in years, so it is very likely not as refined as it could be.

English is not my first language (a classic, but true)

No dialogue

Written in third person, but mainly revolves around Hound’s thoughts and experiences

Human character is incredibly ambiguous, and is referred to neutrally.

Some other characters get mentioned, but it's left up to interpretation as to who they are

Angst (?) primarily, but has a happy ending

Pure vibes

The flow relies on time skips, they are indicated by underscore separations.

🐟🐟🐟🐟🐟

When the dawn descends upon the crescent shore, shunning away the grey remnants of the early morning, the quiet splashing of the waves is no longer the only sound that hangs in the air. As if on cue with the first rays of sun, a few shallow squawks of seagulls cut through the air; even the wind seems to pick up its ceaseless run bringing upon the smell and sounds unknown from just beyond the lip of the cove.

When the dawn comes, usually he enjoys the shimmering of sun from underneath the surface of the water in the safe haven of a mangrove forest, should he choose to stay by the land, or face it among the reefs where he could bask in its warmth openly. But a limp figure sprawled across his forearm felt like the heaviest anchor this very morning.

Hound is a mer not cowardly, but curious — perhaps against his better will, — and only once his back grew warm and dry did he avert his eyes from the form of the human to gaze at the horizon and the shiny trail of light on the ocean's face. It's much past dawn.

They aren't dead — Hound met dead people: bodies floating in the water, as recent as last night. This one doesn't have the bloated and heavy appearance, and no human blood found its way onto the sand, and in the back of his worried mind he proudly considers it possible with his input.

His memories drift back: the metal massives cutting through the waves with their sharp noses, gliding along. On nights like this, he was invisible in the dark.

He would jump and cling briefly onto the side of the metal ship. Rare crevices and indents in the metal he would bury his clawed fingers in, and stalk around the portholes to take a peek inside.

Their sub-nautical vessels had more of everything. More texture, more angles, more means of propulsion and protection. In comparison, human ships almost appeared bare to him, like a crustacean with the most unremarkable and newly formed chitin, marked by nothing but a rarely experienced scuffle; or perhaps an eroded rock that no life found itself perching upon.

But did those giants carry treasures!

Unlike what was generally known or observed of humans, what ended up in the ocean was an indication of life beyond just the theorised schedules and behaviours. Who had an unopened can of fruits with them? Who lost their embroidered coat? Who was the author of a drawing lost to the sea? What were the numerous orange cat phones?

Items like these carried character and mystery so alluring!

So Hound learned to stealthily follow around and scale the rare ships and boats to see where all of these treasures came from, although unlike this night, he never did it under a stormy sky. Never had a ship begun to sink, either.

__________

A mammal's skin felt so unlike what he yet got to touch! Not stiff, like his cartilage, yet not as smooth as the gelatinous surface of a sea jellie. Their hands look like they've seen work.

The sea calls him to retreat, but Hound spends his last few minutes on the surface hunching over and squinting: their eyes are still under the eyelids, and their lips have grown blue and skin — pale; he stalled on having them be left slumbering at the water's edge.

In a few moments after the sun has finally touched their cheeks, the colour gathers on them — a most positive sign of their blood still flowing. And suddenly, like the breeze itself had brought a faintest sound, he heard a groan, originating unmistakably from beneath him.

With a jolt, and dropping them rather unceremoniously, Hound all but jumped back in to the ocean. Waves splashed together above him, and the space around locked into the serene quietness of the ocean, and nothing else was heard. The water filtered through him like a roaring current, and yet it felt that he could not inhale enough as he recalled how their eyes only began to open.

__________

Hound half-listens when the one called Sea-Witch speaks to him the terms of his deal — tail split in two in favour of a pair of prosthetic limbs; how to sustain himself his bottom would be encased in that armour, like a man half-built.

Not unheard of it was, of course, but any self-respecting scientist would deem the proposed methods dubious and undeniably dangerous.

In a dark and remote cave he found them, where the volcanic formations layered one atop the other, twisting this terrain into a wiggled maze; the red polyps thriving in the heat of the hydrothermal vents, outstretching like a palm leaf, and so many of them were there that the deeper he went the less light there was. It was a place many knew stood, but few sought, as why else would one carry a title of the Sea-Witch in not for a warning?

And should the object of his affection not be willing or unable to find a way to help upkeep this construct — it will inevitably be rejected by his flesh, and he will remain helpless, abandoned by both sea and land, he hears them continue.

In return the Sea-Witch asks for his translator and he gives it up eagerly. Their eyes are many and they shine with an indiscernible emotion as they tell him they know he'll be back to ask to be able to swim in the sea again, that none but them would be able to stitch his tail back to its function, and then he'll be forever in their debt.

When the dawn comes that day, Hound wakes up with a burden in his chest and a splitting pain in his lower half.

__________

Metal prosthetics are heavy and sturdy, holding his weight up diligently, but his newly acquired joints ache. When he stands in the shallow waters on an unfamiliar shore, he feels nothing akin to a gentle touch of a wave — the feeling is empty and flat, more a suggestion than an experience, and Hound finds himself longing for it.

But then the human shows up, and the smile on their face and the sound of their voice is sweet and soothing, like a sea rocking him in its arms and singing him deep lullabies, and Hound finds that whatever wound starts forming in his heart at the memory of his home heals itself in their presence.

His scales aren't as smooth above fhe water, and he finds he needs to cover himself with a protective lotion more often than not — lest they begin to flake. Hound isn't human — just humanoid. He, who now stands on two mechanical legs, can feel the breeze and the sun just like humans do, even if his hearing is impaired and his joints hurt more and more day by day. Whatever was done to him — maybe magic, but more likely incomprehensible to him science was wearing itself thin.

He was lucky he was found by them, and even beyond lucky that the reaction they had didn't happen to escalate into something that would compromise him.

___________

He wishes he could understand them. Without a translator, all of the human's words are hopelessly lost to the melody of their voice, and he can't make his mouth approximate the sounds of their language to even try expressing his thoughts. Only at that point does Hound think back to the one called Sea-Witch briefly: would they have anticipated the barrier in communication that would form once Hound has parted with his device? Did they need the translator for their own purposes? Or to make sure he fails? Or both?

Whatever the answer may be, and however bitter the feeling is, it doesn't really matter now, Hound reasons.

__________

Time after time they attempt to tend to his legs. Hound can't discern what they speak, yet sits patiently when they take time to inspect the properties of the construction — it's metal, partially circuitry, partially hydraulics, and the rest happens to be beyond him. He wouldn't dare to pry open this set-up, of course. Maybe a creature small like them from their perspective would see something he missed? Maybe this person happens to be an engineer in their own human life? He wishes he could ask.

The repeated search yields no results to their liking, it seems. Human body language is so expressive, Hound thinks, with all the pants and exhales and sighs that leave their lungs, they would have raised a storm of bubbles underwater. And in those bubbles fish would play…

He fantasises about it more than a creature in his position should, perhaps. Humans can't go underwater, and their lungs aren't built for it. The few divers he happened to observe from far away, have relied on the bulky weight of oxygen tanks. This accommodation, he supposes, is justifiable. What are his bought legs but an accommodation tool for the terrain he isn't built for? Wouldn't there be a joy to be had in trying? Maybe they couldn't swim as swiftly as him, maybe they couldn't breathe underwater or even hold their breath for a time that would matter, maybe the pressure deeper in wouldn't suit them.

He would help — he is so ready to! If he ever returns, that is.

__________

He does wish at times he was more like the human who visits him, or suitable to their stature at least. It's inconvenient to try to take in their features as a person of his height, as it is even harder to make it subtle. But when he brings his face closer to theirs to look in their eyes — they don't seem to mind. So he does it again. And again. And until they all but lay in his embrace, until when they breathe he can feel the faintest touch of warm air on his skin — he does so. But never further. He keeps himself content with looking at them, deep in thought.

__________

One of his most prized possessions back in the ocean was a human book. Clearly handbound, it held up well to his and others’ surprise. Even wet and salt'd, what they figured out to be an oil based ink clung stout to the paper, which was, perhaps, the weakest part of the entire piece.

How sad, he thought back then, when something so fundamental as pages erode away. The ink won't wash, but chip away, the waxed linen threads will hold on tight, but all that is around them will slip into obscurity.

One day, he sees the human write something in a book that maybe lacked the same intricacy that the one he had, but was a book nonetheless.

He pointed at it. Gently, almost shy of his own movement he laid his hand on the page. The human, after a few short moments of contemplation, shifted where they sat, and suddenly Hound found himself with the book on his metallic lap. He notices the left page covered in sporadic notes, indiscernible from his height, and as he trails his gaze along to the empty page on the right, he feels them open his fingers to put their tiny stylus into.

He turns his head. They say something. He stares. They giggle and gesture in a way he sees as welcoming to an empty page.

At first, he wrote his name. It's a script different from the one on the left in many ways, but deep down there's a flutter of hope in him that maybe they happen to know it. But they just stare curiously at it, take their finger to it, clearly trying to tell the symbols apart, maybe grasp the grammar. Of course not.

So, clumsily, he draws a datapad. An approximation of a base. His favourite fish.

The way their face lights up is worth a thousand broken pencils, and this activity continues long into the evening, until the pages are done and Hound's spine aches, until the human begins to shiver in the wind and swat at a few insects.

__________

He sees their eyes glowing from under the water surface at night. Those like him. Some he knows, some he does not. Those unfamiliar to him would look upon his form with an intensity unmatched, but they wouldn't utter a word. Time would pass, and they would leave, and so quite were they that if he could sleep as easily as he used to, Hound would consider them remnants of a fleeting dream.

Those he knows — they speak to him. Their voices carry tongue he hasn't heard in cycles, but their words are filled with pain and worry. They tell him to leave and seek a person who can help, a mer or a human, doesn't matter. They tell him to hurry. Some break and judge his apparent indecision and apathy.

He smiles gently, cups their faces, touches their shoulders, as he kneels in the cold water where they meet him. He assures them that it will turn out alright, and with a sad smile he shuts down their requests to abandon the human that visits him. Their tails beat foam in the water, and they beg him still, until the dawn begins to shine. Only then they retreat.

__________

Today the human stayed much later than they usually do. They huddled close to him, cloaked in a warm sheet. They held his clawed hand — and oh they are so small against him. Their face contorts into emotion that Hound hopes is worry, but fears is disgust: day by day his scales shelk, and no doubt his body has lost its colour alongside its lustre.

Before he uttered his agreement back then, the Sea-Witch left him with a parting gift of a question — why? In that moment Hound thought to himself briefly, remembering the eyes of the person who nearly found their rest amidst the bottom dwellers — it was the first time he saw a human up close. Now when they lay across from him so close, he sees that shine again, a body full of life, a head full of knowledge, and all they've shown him, and all he discovered for himself — the songbirds, the flowers, the bound books, the sound of surface music, the soft and warm touch of a body when they suddenly lay a comforting palm on his cheek and it feels like an embrace yet to be given. It's curiosity that brought him here. And while, regrettably, he can't tell the stories of what he's found out, of what he thinks and feels, he doesn't regret it.

So he closes his eyes in content even when their hand slithers back to their side.

__________

He was so sure he wouldn't open them again. His body broke out into a fever the next morning, and that brought upon him the weakness and hurt he didn't think possible.

The human cried, he heard faintly, as if the kilometres of water laid above him again, and it was only his head and legs that were on fire. He felt every bone back then, it seemed, and the seam along which his tail was once split felt akin to a metallic zipper on human clothes.

________

He would awake weakened and bruised, but alive, in what he could only describe as a tub, sunlight pouring through the large open window. He was feeling much lighter than he remembers being in this last short little while.

Looking down at his legs, he instead finds a tail again — pale and sickly-looking, stitched and held together by the methods unknown to him; and the shock he experiences could only be rivalled by the pain shooting through him when he involuntarily jolts, and fear that mayhaps the Sea-Witch did get to him after all.

But with his gasps the water fills his lungs, and he feels himself grow calmer. And there must be chemicals put into this liquid, for the fluttering of his heart and his fins would otherwise be unrestricted.

Outside the glass wall he sees a room, clearly fit for a science team. A bit away, he sees a docking pool and the water splashing in it, and the grumpy gaze of another mer like him staying away from the bigger commotion.

Lastly, he sees his human, and past that the sound and visuals are a blur, as with a child-like joy he realises that he understands them. They talk out of breath at him about all that transpired, they apologise for involving the team of scientists they knew, they express relief that he's alive, they apologise again and again, and they speak so sincerely Hound isn't sure they know he can understand them yet. He gently touches the part of his skull where the translator would have been attached — and sure enough, it's slightly sore with the presence of a newly installed apparatus. No doubt that's what that lone mer was here for.

They speak and speak, and their voice flows in and through him with so much meaning, and the sheer comprehension of it is making his head spin. They haven't left, and just like he has them, they sought him out.

So when his tail grows back, marked with a scar, when his scales lay even again, when his soul and consciousness settle from their flutter, when he eventually gets acclimated to the ocean waters once more and swims in it, he knows they will meet again.

In the moment, out of breath, they ask, and he eagerly tells them his name. Smiling, they tell him theirs. And in the sunlit glory of the water their face shone bright.

🐟🐟🐟🐟

[submerged-into-clouds]

I sketch him again.