Sam closed his eyes, letting his head lull to the side. He could hear the water outside the hull, lapping against the side of the boat. Rhythmic. If he focused on it enough, maybe he could pretend he was in it, safe, floating along in the currents, instead of tied to a chair, waiting for his capturers to get a move on. He stuck his tongue out, tasting the blood dried on his lips as he prodded at a cut.

It wasn't all bad. Fiona had gotten away, Mikey wasn't here, and his warning had got through to them so there was no reason for them to come after him. They'd be safe. If he was lucky, his capturers would drop his body off the side when they were done with him. If he wasn't gonna get a military funeral, he'd like to go back to the ocean in the end.

The door opened, and Sam reluctantly pulled himself away from the waves.

"Well, it's your lucky day. Your boss really wants you back. Guess that's loyalty for you."

"You think he's gonna deal for me?" Sam cracked his eyes open, laughing. "He's playin' with you." Mike wasn't going to walk into a trap. Not for him, he was smarter than that, but he didn't doubt that Mikey was already working on a plan to take these guys down.

He didn't mind being the collateral. These last months had been the best he'd had since getting discharged. Mike had given him a purpose again, if it took dying to protect him, Sam would do that in a heartbeat.

The only regret he'd have would be leaving Ronnie without so much as a goodbye.

"Oh, really?"

Sam let his head roll back towards the hull, the ocean still calling to him. "Hmm, I got caught. He's gonna kill me himself. Believe me--" The lies died on his lips as Harrick grabbed his face, nails digging into his cheeks. Sam blinked. He'd done this before when he was in here but there was a different sort of intensity to his eyes now. He pushed Sam's head further to the side. A finger ran across his neck, and Sam felt his heart sinking towards his scales.

"You're a Mer."

"Nah, those are just body modifications. All the cool kids are doin' it these days." The words were half-muttered due to having his jaw held tight. The man had been up in his face only hours ago, Sam had been counting his blessings then that the man hadn't cared, it hadn't crossed his mind that he might not have even noticed the gills. They always seemed so obvious to him, showing what he was to the world if they weren't carefully hidden away.

"You know, maybe we won't kill you after your team shows." His face was let go as Harrick grabbed a fistful of hair instead, pulling, and Sam hissed at him. "Mers fetch a nice price on the black market," his eyes roamed him, appraising, "even the fat ones."

"Yeah, well, I got news for you, buddy, I'm not gonna play ball."

He grinned. "You think you have a choice?"

"Do you really think you're gonna get anything for me? You'd be better off selling my legs." He jerked his head away, feeling a few hairs get yanked out but making the wannabe slave trader let go.

"I'll do that too, but it'll be more fun breaking you."

𓇼 ⋆｡˚ 𓆝⋆｡˚ 𓇼

Sam was breathing heavily. It had taken more out of him than he'd thought it would to get the chair over to the door and throw himself against it, hopeful that slamming the door would give Mike the edge in the fight happening against it on the other side. Hearing the gunshot, he'd thought for a second it hadn't worked, then Mike's voice carried through the crack, and Sam let himself slump.

The pain in his chest didn't feel like a broken rib, bruised maybe, enough that breathing hurt. The ocean was calling his name again, if he could get to it, his lungs could rest and let his gills do all the work for a while.

Maybe the flow of the water would ease the pounding from his head too. He couldn't remember what he'd said that had taken it from punches to getting pistol-whipped, but he could feel dried blood matting his hair.

Just a little sip of water would be nice.

"Sam?" Mike's hand cupped his cheek, raising his face up. "Hey, hey, Sam, look at me." Mike patted his face gently until he opened his eyes.

"Told you to stay away, Mikey. Tried to warn you."

"I was never good at taking orders, Sam." He pulled his hand away, and Sam found himself trying to follow it. "That's why you were a soldier, and I was a spy." Once he was untied, Mike frowned. "Can you walk?"

"Yeah."

"Good, we need to go."

He kept a hand on Sam's back as they went. It wasn't as fast as they should be moving, he knew that, but Mike wasn't pushing him. He should be. They needed to get out. Sam tried to move faster. One foot caught on the other. It was barely a stumble, but Mike stabilized him, hands lingering, questioning.

There was a yell and then someone was throwing himself at them. At Mike.

It sent Sam's instincts into overdrive and thought vanished. The man barely touched Mike before he was ripping him back and into him, pain forgotten for a moment as blood played against his tongue and screams filled his ears.

"Sam!"

At first glance, Mer teeth appeared the same as a human's. They were not. While the overall size and shape were the same, their incisors came to thinner, stronger, and sharper points, their cuspids were as good as fangs, and their jaws had a bite force of 743 PSI.

Suffice to say, the legends of mermaids luring sailors overboard to feast on them did come from somewhere.

He was hurting and he was tried and he was thirsty and hungry and this prey thought it was a predator. Its struggles and screams were dying as the blood flowed like a river.

Pressure against his back, and he growled low around the meat in his mouth, the blood soothing his parched throat.

"Sam! Sam, come back." Something brushed his cheek, gently, coaxing.

He looked to see what was distracting him from his meal.

It was just Mike.

He chewed and swallowed but the hand stayed on his face, thumb brushing over his cheekbone.

"Sam?"

He licked the warm blood from his lips.

"You with me?" The question was soft, begging for an answer.

The body--limp, dead weight in his arms, with its blood running over him--suddenly felt like it weighed as much as the ocean, and he let it slip from his grip.

Sam wiped at his mouth. It didn't help when there was blood on them too. "Uh, yeah. Yeah, Mike. I'm with you."

The hand returned to his back, guiding him away from the corpse.

There was another body on the deck, Fiona's work, probably.

"Mike, I--"

"Later."

Later didn't come. Sam had kept the urge to jump overboard in check, thinking it would. They'd gotten in his Buick, and the drive back to the loft had been silent with Sam spending most of it downing the bottles of water he kept the car stocked with. Blood was ninety percent water, and it had helped, but they hadn't given him anything to drink since realizing what he was and with his injuries, he needed it even more. They'd just pulled up to the loft when Mike's cell phone beeped with a text and some vague directions to follow. Mike borrowed the car. Sam went inside.

It wasn't the same as being submerged but the water coming from the loft's shower did its job of washing the blood from him. The shirt and pants had gone straight into the trash bin. The gun he kept concealed in his leg--so close the whole time he'd been held there but completely out of reach, maybe they would've left him his legs when finally untied him and he could've stopped himself from going sold--was on the bathroom counter. His prosthetics were waterproof but the seal on the compartment had always leaked, no matter how many times he replaced it.

He needed to brush his teeth. All that water and he could still taste him.

Instead, he stayed under the flow long after the last of the blood was off his skin, sitting on the tiny bit of floor the shower offered.

He'd fucked up.

Worse, he'd let Mike see him fuck up.

Mike had seen him fight with his teeth before, it was a natural defense, but he'd always been careful. Always kept himself in control. Whatever he bit off, he spit out.

From a moral standpoint, Mers weren't supposed to eat humans. But they were omnivores, and humans were meat and they weren't their species any more than fish were. Hell, there were still a few small groups of Mers that viewed humans as a delicacy, they were the ones anti-Mer movements dragged into the spotlight to show how dangerous they were.

Nothing like video footage of a school of Mers ripping some guy apart to sell the line. No one ever mentioned that the Mers in those videos were almost always visibly starved.

He wasn't starved. Not enough for that.

He turned the shower off, if he stayed under it too long, his tail was going to take it as a sign to start regrowing.

Sam went through the motions of drying off and pulling on a pair of boxers.

Mike was gone. Mike might not be coming back.

It still felt wrong to walk around the loft naked.

He picked up his gun.

Sam stared at the stairs leading to the upper platform and the couch he'd been sleeping on since sleeping on most nights kicked out of the park--some nights, he broke in and slept in Ronnie's tank. No one else would know as long as he was gone before morning--and bypassed them, heading for Mike's bed.

He dropped into it, wiggling under the covers, and not even taking off his legs.

His sense of smell wasn't any better than a human's, but it didn't matter, he could still smell Mike on it.

He slid the gun in his hand under Mike's pillow and kept it gripped tight as he fell asleep.