Chapter Text
Noriaki Kakyoin should have been used to seeing things other people didn't. His companion and only friend was a figment of his imagination made solid by will alone. He had once met a vampire in one of the sunniest places on earth. A couple years ago, he'd seen the sky open and show time run in fast forward, an event no one else seemed to remember. Maybe, as a man in his forties who'd never once found someone to be friends with on this earth he constantly traveled, Noriaki saw these things simply because he was often the only one looking.
Still, Noriaki thought, as a gray storm rolled in over the secluded beach, a huge fish dashed against a tide pool rock shelf was a surprise to him all the same. As he picked his way across the beach, Hierophant Green unraveled from its home. Sharing space with Noriaki's soul, it was never far away.
"What type of fish do you think it is?" Noriaki asked his companion, "A tuna? Marlin?" He guessed, seeing hints of blue, "Maybe a shark thrown into the shallows by the surf?"
Hierophant Green tilted its head, eyesight no better than Noriaki. Not so much male or female, Hierophant Green never cared what Noriaki called it, and they were long past the teenage phase of categorizing, but their connection had no name that Noriaki had found. Even after forty two years together there were things Noriaki didn't know about his ghost creature friend, such as whether Hierophant Green had a true personality or only reacted to its master's questions because Noriaki wanted it to, but talking with it was as natural as calling it forth. In any case, the conversations helped Noriaki practice whatever language he was learning on his travels. At the moment his native Japanese was very rusty and Hierophant Green's lack of judgment at Noriaki's mistakes had given back some confidence.
"Thank you." Noriaki murmured as his friend helped him over the ridge of sharp rock that ended the sand and began the tide pools.
Noriaki had thought the distance made his eyes mistake the size of the fish, the thickening rain further obfuscating his view, but as he got within twenty yards he found he had seen correctly. Hierophant Green pushed at Noriaki to stretch out and see the fish first. It shared its master's curiosity.
"Let's stay together, Green." Noriaki instructed, taking its hand like they had done since Noriaki learned to walk.
Now that he was closer, detail told Noriaki it wasn't a shark laying on the rocks. The blue had gotten brighter, segmented in armor-like scales. Noriaki didn't know of any ocean fish with scales like that. The arapaima fish in the Amazon had armor-like plates, but Japan's coast was a long way for something like that to travel. It was possible it could be dangerous.
"Maybe it's an undiscovered deep sea fish." Noriaki said, "We could name it, then."
Hierophant Green sent a shiver across their connection deep on the inside of Noriaki's being.
"Don't worry, the fish is not moving, and you can tie it up if it does." Noriaki assured it.
If Hierophant Green was condensed down into one word, it would be protective. Two words: fiercely protective. An unconscious defense against Noriaki's tendency to let curiosity overpower natural fear.
Noriaki was a mere two steps from the fish tail now, finding it to be man sized, actually larger-than-most-men sized, with an almost feathery tail fin that was limp and translucent in a tide pool. Delicate looking, and shredded, the membrane showed a shimmery opalescence. The scales, even more like armor up close, were rounded and uniform but held a deeper luster than the fin. They were not the darker stripe on the top and lighter on the bottom as tuna and marlin were usually patterned, the scales were different hues of deep blue, darkest at the end of the tail, almost black, growing paler to a midnight where the middle of the fish sloped out of view into the sand and water below the two-foot-high rock shelf. Noriaki touched the fish, the scales were as tough as they looked, though a few were torn loose showing blood and pulp. The ones higher on what would be the hip, as Noriaki let his hand run caressing the smooth scales, were the size of his thumbnail. Noriaki leaned over to see the fins and head. Maybe he could guess the species by those characteristics. He doubted it, he was no marine biologist, but that wasn’t going to stop him from trying.
Noriaki's blood reversed direction at first glance of what lay beyond, and the beginning of cold rain on his skin wasn't nearly as frigid as the chill that ran down his spine. He looked back at the tail. Fish. Full fish. Nothing but fish. Leaning once more over the rocks, Noriaki saw only human. A man, with dark locks of curly hair flowing with the movement of the water. Tanned skin. Not scales or shark skin, human, soft skin scratched by the rock, submerged in the water.
Without a second thought, though Hierophant Green did try to slow him a little, Noriaki dove into the thigh-high water and pulled the torso from the waves. He had divorced the fish side and the human side in his head and thought for that fraction of decision time that the man was drowning. As Noriaki lifted the man, a fluttery bit of skin on his neck drew Noriaki's eyes. The slits flapped a couple times, then sealed into lines of darker skin and the man's lips parted in a deep breath. Noriaki's ogling followed the muscled chest and midsection, still half submerged in the ocean, to where skin mingled with scales until the wide section he'd rested his hand on a few minutes prior became completely fish.
Only Hierophant Green's insistent tugging brought Noriaki back from the confused daze brought on by another impossible thing confronting him.
"Green, please tell me you see a merman in my arms. Please tell me I've not finally lost my goddamn mind." Noriaki pleaded.
Hierophant Green acknowledged his shock and awe.
Noriaki dared to look a little closer. The man part looked middle aged, no cute mermaid for Noriaki, wrinkles showing ample time in the sun. Dark lashes and thick eyebrows that matched the blue-black hair, the right side bisected by a scar running the entirety of the face. Full lips, a square jaw, that sinewy neck with the three darker lines that reminded Noriaki of something, and cords of muscle everywhere. The thick trunk of the torso set solidly on a proportional fucking fish tail.
"Help me, Green." Noriaki decided he'd at least get the creature fully in the water.
The awkward position he was in couldn't be good for the merman, it made Noriaki's lower back cramp just noticing the twisted angle.
Hierophant Green unwound a little more, looping inch thick, flat tentacles of itself around the fish part of the man. Both tail and body were the cool temperature of the ocean, Noriaki noted, wondering if this mermaid was cold blooded like most fish or warm blooded like most mammals. And was he a mammal or a fish? Sharing his massive weight with Hierophant Green said he was all dense muscle. As the team they'd long trained to be, Noriaki and his companion lowered the merman into the ocean. The gouges in the tail left ribbons of blood as Hierophant Green gently sunk the delicate fin into the water. Noriaki let his half sink, too, until the flaps- gills?- reopened.
"Now what do we do?" Noriaki asked, unable to take his gaze away from the rhythmic movement of the shimmering tail fin, the rainbow colors playing across the tattered surface. "The storm is just starting. If we leave him here unconscious, he might be thrown against the rocks and hurt further…"
What if this merman was already injured internally? Noriaki thought grimly. What if he had dried out in the open air before the rain started, or was subject to some other non-human ailment? Hierophant Green's nonverbal communication was growing louder inside Noriaki, it was worried about Noriaki out in this weather more than this stranger. But Noriaki couldn't abandon the merman. Besides his deep curiosity, letting anything die unnecessarily was against Noriaki's very being. Maybe he could wake the man-fish.
The zip of adrenaline that preceded Hierophant Green taking action tightened Noriaki's grip on the merman's shoulders.
"What are you-?" Noriaki got out before Hierophant Green shot into action.
Restraining tentacles criss crossed over the scaled tail just when it thrashed and flung Noriaki back. His heel found the edge of the sandbar where it gave way to deeper water, at the same moment as the merman moved, a heavy wave pulled Noriaki over the lip. His clothing, for keeping warm and dry so long as he didn't impulsively dive into the ocean, pulled his head under. Noriaki called for Hierophant Green.
Let the merman go! Help!
He'd given Hierophant Green permission to tie up the fish, he remembered, before hitting one of the larger rocks that formed the pool, and losing the little breath he'd gotten in his lungs before the water rolled over his head. Hierophant Green had to untangle itself from the merman's tail before helping. It wouldn't be able to do so fast enough before Noriaki lost control of it. Noriaki's lungs already burned with saltwater, inadvertently inhaled when he hit the rough rock, and the urge to cough was nearly impossible to avoid. The stormy sea surface sparkled deceptively close as he struggled to untie his outer coat. The knot was too tight, and there was a line of buttons still to unfasten. Noriaki's hands felt clumsy as the light dimmed by the moment. He had to breathe in, water or not, his body demanded it. The push of the ocean into Noriaki felt crushing. The water pressed against him like hands and shoved him.
No. Wait.
Hands were grabbing him.
In an explosion of sound and sea spray, Noriaki was tossed on the tide pool rock shelf. He coughed up a lungful of water, thinking he imagined the last few minutes. Probably slipped, hit his head, fell in the water, and cerebral hypoxia brought him the idea of finding a giant fish. Hierophant Green had pulled him out just in time.
"Thank you." Noriaki said to his friend.
"You're welcome." Answered a deep voice that needed a wide chest to bounce around in to rumble like that.
Noriaki's eyes snapped open, finding said body type looming over him. Two muscled arms braced the man on either side of Noriaki's head, and a singular teal-green eye bore into him. Something heavy lay beside Noriaki's left leg, something cold and rigid. A tail, if Noriaki believed it, a tail like a fish but the size of a man.
"Nice to meet you." Noriaki blurted out his usual phrase, the traveler's most trusty response when he wanted to remain polite but wasn’t sure where to start.
The merman snorted through his nose and leveraged himself a little closer. Noriaki felt like a bug about to be squashed. The merman's eye took him in slowly, almost leisurely, and Noriaki decided he was more like a specimen under a microscope. He was being studied. Noriaki had done the same thing already, so it was only right to let this man have a minute or two for the same.
"You put me in the water." The deep, pleasant voice spoke again.
The quiet tone was conversational and almost drowned out by the storm. It wasn't a question, but Noriaki got the idea he was expected to respond.
"Yes, I'm sorry if that was the wrong thing to do. I was worried the rocks would hurt you." Noriaki said, not realizing he'd spoken in Japanese instead of English like they'd already exchanged until he finished.
"Thank you. What is your name?" The merman responded in a fluent Japanese that only brought out a more pleasing tone of voice.
"I'm Kakyoin, Noriaki Kakyoin." Noriaki answered.
"Are you alright?" He was asked.
"Yes, and you?" Noriaki asked in kind.
His answer was a rumbling sound but no words. It meant nothing, but Noriaki was still too awed to think this was real so his typical word vomit stayed behind his chattering teeth.
"You must go." The merman said at length, his studying eye shifting to look at the premature darkness of the heavy clouds above.
"Will you be alright?" Noriaki was more worried about the high waves rushing the shore, "The water looks really choppy."
The merman looked back down on him.
"I mean- well, I'm not saying you aren't a strong swimmer! I'm just- oh, I'm sorry if I insulted you." Noriaki stammered, feeling out of place for several reasons, not the least of which was the very handsome face giving him attention. Noriaki was known to scatter when anyone beautiful paid him time. "You were bleeding." He finally spat out, "Are you okay to swim?"
"Yes." The merman said, maneuvering his tail. The heavy appendage scraped against both Noriaki and rock as he not gracefully, but in a practiced movement, slid back into the water. He sat on the sand with his tail curled to one side, and the iridescent fin rippling irritably. "When the storm is over, return here."
"What?"
The cloud head broke with a bright flash of lightning. When the afterimage faded, the merman was gone. The rain grew heavier and the wind cut through his wet clothes as Noriaki sat in shock. Eventually, stiff with cold and only with Hierophant Green's help, Noriaki stood and wandered back to his hotel.
★‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵★
Morioh Grand Hotel was the type of place that was usually above Noriaki's station as a wanderer. He paid his lifestyle with remote work, and his reputation waxed and waned, so he was trained in scrimping. He was also too old to not think about building a nest egg and travel only got more expensive as the world modernized. But an old acquaintance had passed along a discount for the hotel, and it was the off season, so Noriaki was enjoying the luxuries usually out of his reach. Including the full sized bathtub.
After peeling his wet clothes from his skin, Noriaki showered, then climbed into the tub to soak. Hierophant Green unwound around Noriaki's legs and buttocks, helping the chill warm faster through their shared senses. That sharing was what stopped Noriaki from shunning the figment when his family had tried to convince him Green wasn't real. Hierophant Green was the realest thing Noriaki had in his life.
"Feel better?" Noriaki asked.
The slithering mass happily braided and twisted under the water, one thin tentacle separating to wrap around Noriaki's chest in a hug, making his master smile.
"You eel." Noriaki teased.
Hierophant Green made a quick loop and squeezed it to squirt Noriaki in the face. Noriaki laughed. He never got bored with his companion around. The tentacles that made up his friend settled back down to soak, laying over Noriaki's legs with comfortable weight. The near solid, white webbed membrane of the creature gave way to a deep green center that was veined and glowed faintly. Noriaki never tired of studying the pattern of his soul companion. It was an amazing blessing, having it near.
"That was some crazy shit today, Green." Noriaki said, "A merman."
Hierophant Green brushed against the small scratch on Noriaki's back. The rock had cut through three layers of clothing when he hit it.
"Yeah, can't deny it." Noriaki knew what Hierophant Green was communicating, "Too much evidence, old friend."
A mer-species. The implications were enormous. This world was filled with unbelievable creatures, but mermaids had been pretty far down on Noriaki's believability list. Under unicorns and fairies, which he gave up on as a child.
Noriaki's eyelids dragged. He was tired, he wanted to go to bed, but he remained in the tub until the water cooled because Green was having so much fun wallowing. As he let his friend handle the blow-dryer and brush for his hair, Noriaki studied himself in the mirror. He was steadily gaining weight, toned muscles losing to age, but that didn't bother him like it used to. Aging was proof of life, after all. He even thought the wrinkles on his face were distinguishing. His red hair had darkened from cherry to burgundy over the years, too, but that matched the emerald color of his constant companion better. Even if no one but him could see Hierophant Green, he liked what a complementary pair they made. When the blow-dryer quit, Hierophant Green came together and pressed its face against Noriaki's cheek while it finished brushing his hair.
"Thanks, Green, go rest now." Noriaki told it.
Curling up inside the mysterious space he inhabited on Noriaki's insides, Hierophant Green bedded down for true rest. It was unaware for a shorter amount of time than its host, as far as Noriaki could figure, but Green needed sleep, too.
The bed called, but before Noriaki fell into the king mattress a sparkle caught his eye from the desk in the corner. Merman's scales. Three blue merman scales. Noriaki had found two stuck to his pants when he undressed and Green had found the third cut into the hard sole of his shoe. Only thinking of warming up when he came in, Noriaki had put them aside. Now, he took a moment to study them. One was the midnight blue that Noriaki had noticed around the merman's waist, it was the one that sparkled, a galaxy hidden in its depths. One had a greenish tint to it, that one was chipped and sharp, and Noriaki was immediately drawn to it due to the color. The last and smallest one, the size of his pinkie nail instead of his thumb, had a purple hue in it. In the wet and the dark, they'd all looked blue, but there was more variation than that. If it weren't for the scales, Noriaki might have dismissed the encounter despite the scratch on his back. Too bizarre. Better to sleep on it than obsess over the encounter, Noriaki lined the scales back on the desk and went to bed. The storm roared over his thoughts, making it easy to slip under.