Content warnings for this chapter: mention of merpeople eating humans (no regrets, good for the merperson in question, we stan a legend), mention of human/merpeople trafficking

A week later, Felix feels better. His wounds, while some of them are still sore and angry red lines, have fully closed and new skin is replacing the old, and his stomach adjusted to regular meals. Minho and Jisung think it's an absolute delight to have a new person they can cook for who doesn't know every single dish they know how to cook, and Seungmin and Jeongin have proved to be wonderful cuddlers, even if Jeongin likes to pretend he's not. Hyunjin and Changbin have taken to watching movies with Felix when they're not occupied elsewhere.

On one of those afternoons, Hyunjin tells Felix about life on the other side of the world, cold waters, pollution and dying sea life.

"And then," Changbin butts in cheerfully, "Hyunjinnie ate my ex boyfriend."

A surprised sound escapes Felix's lips.

"Wait, no –" Hyunjin smacks his hand over Changbin's mouth to prevent him from saying anything else, "no, don't believe him! I would never ever eat a human, why would I do that?"

Felix giggles. He knows Hyunjin well enough now to know when he's talking shit, and this is one of those occasions. Then it dawns on him. "Wait. Binnie-hyung's ex boyfriend? You ate his ex boyfriend?"

Hyunjin licks his lips and smirks. "You see, I was just chilling in some nice caves, looking for some seaweed and mussels, as one does –"

"Your home," Changbin says, finally yanking Hyunjin's hand from his face, "those caves were your home. And my ex boyfriend and I attempted to contact Hyunjin and his group, but Hyunjin had politely told us to fuck off a couple weeks earlier. So we were just scuba diving, except my ex boyfriend was an asshole and, uh," Changbin looked away, "he might have tried to murder me, and Hyunjin was my knight with shining scales."

"I murdered your ex boyfriend so he didn't murder you, and then I ate him because I hadn't had a decent meal in ages, how is that being a knight with shining scales?" Hyunjin shakes his head, strands of hair falling into his face. Despite his sarcastic words, he looks at Changbin with soft eyes, fingers running over Changbin's arm.

"That's nice," Felix says quietly. He's not sure what to say to a story like that – if there even is anything he can say to a story like that.

Hyunjin smiles, beautifully, showing his sharp teeth, eyes closing, leaning into Changbin's shoulder. "And then I decided I may just leave with Changbinnie-hyung, since he's clearly incapable of surviving on his own. I even learned how to fry an egg for him, because a marine biology degree isn't very useful when it comes to cooking human food."

Changbin rolls his eyes. "Hyunjin-ah, seriously?"

They dissolve into giggles, and Hyunjin drags Felix into the kitchen to 'prove that he can fry an egg that Felix can eat' and they continue their movie with fried eggs for Felix and Changbin and a bowl of clams for Hyunjin.

It's easy to fall into a routine.

Felix lies awake on the sofa. Everyone has offered up their bedroom for him, but Felix always declined. He doesn't want to drive someone out of their space, and he likes interacting with everyone who walks through the living room. He's invited to tag along to the labs or the computer room often, and maybe – just maybe, if he had his own room, he'd never be able to leave it on his own. And he doesn't want to lose the easy smiles, the warm cuddles, the stories they tell each other.

It hasn't taken long for Felix to realise that Chan is undoubtedly the one with the most authority here. Chan is the one they go to when they need help with something, and Chan is the one who calls the UN and requests supplies and food that are delivered by drone. Chan is the one who gives Felix half his wardrobe and Felix knows Chan will be the one who'll ask him how he ended up in the ocean.

Felix closes his eyes. It's not dark. The sun is out all the time now, and it's comforting, and usually helps him sleep, but not tonight.

Shuffling comes from the kitchen, and Felix sits up. Maybe a late night conversation will help? Or, a voice whispers in his head, a bath. He really wants to bathe. Minho has given him wet wipes and dry shampoo, but his wounds are better now and the only thing stopping him from using the merpeople sized tub is cold fingers squeezing his insides and his lungs filling up with dark water, swallowing him, drowning him.

"Lix-ah? You're awake?"

Felix looks up. "Hyung, I can't sleep."

Chan is leaning against the door to the kitchen, a bowl in his hands. "I can't sleep, either."

"Would you like to cuddle?" Felix hesitantly waves towards the sofa.

Chan smiles. "Are you hungry?"

Felix's stomach answers for him with a growl. "Um."

"I'll make you something. Is ramen alright?"

"Yeah, thank you," Felix gets up, pulls Chan's fluffy socks over his feet and follows Chan to the kitchen.

Chan quickly heats up water, and Felix attaches himself to Chan's back. Chan's back is nice and very huggable, and Felix can always feel Chan relaxing against him, and putting his hands over Felix's fingers on his stomach.

The ramen is done in almost no time, and Chan carries the bowl to the low table in front of the sofa. Chan has a salad of seaweed and tuna, seasoned with soy sauce and sesame seeds. Chan's scales shimmer blue, so blue.

"Why can't you sleep?" Chan asks quietly when he's finished.

Felix still has half a bowl, but he's not hurried. He swallows the mouthful of ramen caught between his chopsticks. "Just thinking. What about you?"

"Hmm," Chan hums. "Me too. What are you thinking about?"

I'm thinking about how the sun will set in six months and I'll be in the dark again, he thinks. "About taking a bath, maybe," Felix says.

"Oh?" Chan's dimples appear. "Do you need some help?"

Felix ducks his head. Breathes in the scent of his ramen. It's soothing, warm, spicy, intense, and seriously – it's just ramen, not the answer to the universe. "Yes, please."

"How about now?" Chan's voice is so soft. "Everyone else is asleep, so we'll have the bathroom for us. And it doesn't look like we'll sleep soon."

Felix nods. "I'll finish eating, hyung."

Chan's hands don't leave Felix for the next minutes. He's gently rubbing his back, then resting his hand on Felix's thigh, then tugging a strand of hair out of Felix's eyes and behind his ear.

When Felix is done, they carry their bowls back into the kitchen and Chan makes Felix drink a glass of water before they go to the bathroom. Chan turns on the light and closes the door behind them. There's no window for the bathroom, and Felix suddenly yearns to see the sky again. Then Chan is there, guiding him to sit on the edge of the tub, asking if Felix wants mer-safe bubbles or not. Felix just tilts his head, confused. How would he get bubbles?

Felix watches Chan test the temperature of the water, and then he watches the water rise. Chan covers the floor next to the tub with a towel. Unless he's fully submerged in water and his gills would react to the change in scenery, he can control his shift. Which means he can easily dip his hands or feet into the water. Felix can't. He can drink water, and that's about it. Sure, small amounts of water and moisture are harmless, and if he dries himself fast it's fine, but any prolonged contact will send an ache into his toes and the bones of his legs, and his gills opening despite not being surrounded by water is never pleasant.

Steam rises. Chan tests the temperature with his hand and nods. He adds a fluid from a shiny bottle. Its scent is delicious and soapy and flowery at the same time.

"It's a bit warm, still, but not too much. Are you ready?" Chan looks up at Felix with a smile.

"Yeah," Felix nods. He starts pulling off his clothes, starting with his socks. When he's standing, naked, in front of the tub, he notices he has another problem. If he steps in with one foot, he'll immediately lose all control over his feet muscles until he fully shifts, which means he'll fall very unpleasantly. The tub is big, so he'll land in the water for sure, he'll just have to be careful with his head –

"I'll help you," Chan says, picking up on Felix's struggle without needing him to explain. He sweeps Felix into his arms, one arm around his waist and the other under his knees. "Would you rather I put you in quickly or slowly?"

"Uh," Chan's neck and scales are suddenly very close to Felix's face, "quickly, please."

Better just get it done with.

The water is warm, but not scalding. Felix closes his eyes and sighs, but then Chan sets him down and he's submerged up to his shoulders and neck. He tries to move his toes, as always, and as always he can't, and then his skin shifts and water fills his gills. It burns, rips and tears through his human flesh, and he gasps for air even though the gills on his sides are doing the breathing for him.

He squeezes his eyes shut and holds on to Chan. Chan's arm is still around him, holding his shoulders above the water, his sweater is soaked, but Felix doesn't notice as he buries his fists in the fabric above Chan's heart.

"Breathe, Lixie, breathe," Chan murmurs next to his ear, and it helps.

His tail stops shuddering when the shift is complete and his body adjusts to oxygen coming from both his gills and lungs, and he relaxes.

Chan wipes the wetness from under his eyes before Felix can taste the salt of his tears. "You're okay, Lixie."

"Chan," Felix opens his eyes.

Chan is looking back at him, brows furrowed, frowning, troubled by things Felix can't think about right now. Chan's brown eyes are warm, and that's all that matters. Warm like the water around him.

"This is nice," Felix mumbles, and it's true. Now that the pain is gone, the shifting accomplished, the water relaxes him like nothing else. Maybe it shouldn't, but Felix doesn't pay attention to that thought either. He's more tired than he thought, and now, with his stomach full and water around him, it catches up to him.

"You're beautiful," Chan says.

"What?"

"Uh, I mean," Chan seems at a loss for words. He blushes, cutely, and Felix relaxes more in his arms now that his expression loses some of its worries. "Your tail."

Felix looks down. He looks like he always did – blue-ish scales, a bit of a grey cast that catches the light in the colours of the rainbow. There's soapy bubbles around him, and Felix feels the corner of his mouth curve. So this is what Chan meant with bubbles.

"Is it always this painful for you?" Chan asks quietly.

"Yes, but usually the pain is secondary to uh," Felix avoids Chan's eyes and catches a bubble with his hands, "well, the water entering my lungs drowns everything out, usually, and I can't just try to not breathe, you know? And when I'm shifting, I can't really move, so I can't swim, and the tanks were always deep."

"Tanks?"

"The aquarium," Felix says, and then stops. Oops. "Like, where I lived. It was like... work? Sort of."

Chan releases a shuddering breath. "Will you tell me about it? The aquarium and... how you ended up here? You don't –"

"I don't have to," Felix interrupts. "I know, hyung, thank you." Felix finds Chan's hand and squeezes. "You've been very kind to me."

"It's literally a part of my job description," Chan murmurs. "I'm here to take care of those who need to be away for a bit, and you definitely qualify."

Felix desperately wants to ask who's taking care of Chan, but he knows the answer. They all do. So he nods and smiles brightly. "I was indeed living – working – at an aquarium. But seriously, it wasn't bad, I think the dolphins suffered more than I did, but they were in a different tank so I never even saw them, I just heard the visitors and tourists talk about them."

He talks until his voice is hoarse. He tells Chan about the aquarium, about being forbidden from talking to anyone, watching the TV from afar. He tells him about his worlds falling apart. The first time when he was eleven and the facility closed and relocated. The second time when he thought he'd be okay in the aquarium but then something changed and his whole tank was relocated, first in a moving vehicle and then on a ship. He talks about the darkness of the transport being the worst, worse than the rich politicians and businessmen who traveled on the cruise, where he was one of the attractions together with some very stupid gold fish. And, stuttering and shaking, he tells Chan that someone had reported illegal possession of a merman, and instead of handing him to whichever governments or organisations were responsible for this kind of thing, he was unceremoniously thrown overboard.

Chan shushes him. He carefully extracts himself from their mutual holding on to each other, and undresses in two swift movements. He gets into the tub next to Felix, legs steady, and Felix watches in fascination how his skin only starts to shift when he's sitting next to Felix. Chan's scales shimmer blue, and the shift is over as soon as it begins – and painless.

Chan pulls him close. "Navigating the open sea is hard, even for merpeople who are born at sea."

Felix hums. "After a while the current took me with it, and I think I sunk very, very deep. There were glowing eyes, and then I was... well, 'pushed' isn't the right word. But the glowing eyes got me back to the surface." To the sky. To the sun. To you.

Chan doesn't reply to that, he just holds him closer.

Felix rests his head on Chan's shoulder, closing his eyes. "Can you tell the others? If they want to know, that is. I'd like to just... not linger on it."

"I will," Chan says and starts massaging shampoo into Felix's hair. He doesn't ask if Felix means the aquarium or the glowing eyes. "And I'll talk to Minho, maybe we can figure something out to help with the pain when shifting."

Felix sighs, and let's Chan take care of him.

He may even fall asleep.

He comes back to the present when Chan lifts him out of the water, setting him down on the towel and getting another towel to dry him. This time, when Felix gets legs, he's awake and not unconscious. The pain leaves him shaking, and Chan wraps him in a fluffy towel, murmuring apologies.

"It's not your fault," Felix tells him. "I'm okay."

Chan sighs. "I know, Lixie. I know. I'll get us fresh clothes, do you think you can brush your teeth?"

"Yes, hyung," Felix says. He smiles, to underline his words, and gets up. He's exhausted, and simply wants to close his eyes. Still, he wraps the towel around his hips and steps up to the sink. Brushing his teeth is complicated when his limbs feel heavy with sleep and the warmth he feels from the bath and Chan's hug is making him feel so safe, and the memory of Chan's touch lingers.

Chan, Chan, Chan.

He brushes his teeth, careful with the water touching his skin. Even if he'd shift back into human skin the moment his body realised there was no water after all, he still doesn't want to experience the pain of shifting again so soon.

His own face stares back at him from the mirror. There's a flush to his cheeks, a contrast to his tired eyes. Hyunjin and Minho have done wonders to his skin. His lips aren't chapped anymore, his skin smooth and golden brown. Freckles cover his face, and a couple of scales grow on his neck, irregular and asymmetrical. He doesn't try to look at the tattoo on his neck. He doesn't smile. He's smiled so much in his life.

"Felix?"

Chan is there, then, helping Felix into another one of Chan's big, black, warm sweaters. Chan helps him into a pair of sweatpants that are slightly too big around his hips, and a fresh pair of fluffy socks.

"Come here," Chan whispers, and directs Felix towards him.

Felix leans in, pressing his face to Chan's neck, slinging his arms around Chan's waist, trusting Chan to catch him if he falls asleep. Chan's heartbeat is loud from here, his chest firm and soft and his breathing steady.

Chan guides him towards the living room, and Felix follows. The daylight calms Felix further, and by the time Chan lies down with him, he barely knows what's going on. He grips the front of Chan's hoodie with both hands and hopes Chan gets the message.

Chan, shuffling closer and pulling a blanket over them both, does.