Time froze. Dea rocked back and forth.

Her arms tightened around herself, knuckles taut and fingers digging. She became aware of a keening noise that filled the air. It took a minute to register that it issued from her mouth.

She kept rocking.

The noise subsided to a whimper.

Dea tipped over the side of the Cypod and thunked to the floor. The pain that blossomed on impact was but a mere prick compared to the white-hot agony within.

She crawled forward, the dizziness making her tilt.

A lone light, caged in black, dispersed stark white irradiance that brought out discolored walls and ugly metal. Holding tanks and containers rose up on either side in featureless greys, casting innumerable shadows.

The collar lay shaded in penumbra. One starfish stud caught the light, bright pink popping out of the bleakness. Something cracked inside her.

Dea's hand reached out and fumbled on the damp floor, as cold as her skin. Her fingers finally closed over the precious item.

Nothing moved. A minute dragged by—and another.

It was as if the universe left her behind while she struggled to cling on to what was no more. Her thumb rubbed the scratch on the band—the result of Burpy rubbing it on a rock the night before she left.

The world spun again. Dea crawled to the wall behind a tank and summoned the Cypod to block the glare of the light.

Then she cradled the band and sank into a fetal position, imploding in on herself like a faulty craft crumpling under extreme pressure.

Her vision swam, and her ears blotted out the sound of waves. Face pressed to cold metal, the vantage point from the floor skewed her view. It faded in and out of focus.

The rocking continued.

Through the fog in her head, she finally sensed movement—vibrations other than the uncontrollable shaking of her own body.

A deep rumble coursed through the vessel—the bellow of a beast awakening from slumber. Patters and clangs formed a melody as dissonant as her keening cry.

Her brain drifted into oblivion.

Sunbeams dappled the seagrass in morphing patterns. It was dimmer than usual, and the waters were a darker teal. Yet, the light danced as if it had a mind of its own. It complemented the swaying of the leaves—the effect outdoing the motion graphics on the city adverts.

Dea tapped her flukes as she waited outside a house bordering the seagrass meadows. Her idle eyes zeroed in on a scud crawling on a flower, covered in pollen. It was a tranquil hideaway not far from her side of the coral atoll. As soon as she delivered the order, she could hurry home and chill in her pod. All work and no play makes Crabbe a dull boy.

However, there was no one home.

She sighed and leaned against the gate, flanked by hewn rock. She tried calling the customer's number, but they didn't pick up. Just when she thought of calling Casa Bava, a text arrived, asking her to leave the food outside.

Dea hastened to balance the waterproof box on a rock and placed a weight on it. Then she rubbed her hands, work finished for the day. As she turned to leave, she bumped into something big and blue-grey.

A squeal ripped out of her mouth, and she backed away—at the same time the unknown bulk withdrew, emitting a chirping noise.

She blinked.

A chubby sea cow surveyed her, button eyes shining.

Dea laughed, her breath bubbling away. She picked a stalk of seagrass and held it out to him. That was all it took to win his trust.

The seagrass disappeared into his mouth, and the plump muzzle nudged her hand.

Giggling, she pinched his cheeks and patted his head. "You big cutie, you! What are you doing here?"

A chirp issued in response.

The scene appeared to change, and the house vanished. It was just Dea and the sea cow in a never-ending meadow of cymodocea. The currents grew stronger, and the waters darkened.

"Burpy, where have you been?" she suddenly asked, troubled.

He emitted a series of squeaky barks.

Smiling again, she reached out to stroke him. No matter how much she stretched her arms, Burpy was too far. An unknown force seemed to pull him the other way.

She chased after the animal, calling his name. The seagrass waved faster—a green blur that streaked by as she picked up speed. A sudden boom shook the world, making Dea's heart rate spike up. The pressure increased, and her chest ached.

"Burpy, come back!" It was getting harder and harder to keep up, and she was running out of oxygen. "It's not safe!"

A cyclone started raging, turbulent currents throwing her off course. In the blink of an eye, the sea cow was gone. She let out an anguished cry.

Everything darkened until barely anything was visible. Dea sank, arms flailing sluggishly. Her lungs burned.

Something shook her—as if to get her to breathe.

I can't! It's water! She wanted to scream. A force compressed her chest. She had no choice but to suck in air.

Dea coughed and gasped. Oxygen streamed into her lungs.

Her head slowly cleared while hands lifted up her limp form and wrapped it in soft material. Her swollen eyelids eased open infinitesimally and blinked against the sudden onslaught of light.

The hands tried to prise open her fingers, but she held fast onto the collar.

Then she sensed herself moving, her whole weight concentrated on whatever held her up. She bobbed up and down to the cadence of a human walk while her back and peduncle ached in protest.

Sounds gained definition, but they melded into a tepid soup of meaningless noise. Tuning it out, Dea sank into a doze.

The sun shone through her closed lids in a warm, orange glow. The brightness chased away the terrors and phantoms that haunted the limbo of her semi-wakefulness.

The bobbing motion continued to the steady rhythm of taps against wood, though now she was buffeted by sea winds and the swoosh of waves. Voices swelled and dipped. Even as her eyes opened into the bleary whiteness of daylight, the last hypnopompic wraith hovered and dissipated into nothingness.

She couldn't tell if minutes or hours had elapsed, but she did have a vague recollection of turbulence, accompanied by sun and sea spray. The rest had merged into her nightmares, making it hard to decide what was real. Dea blinked, trying to shed the last vestiges of sleep. Pain drummed away behind her eyes—one of many aches that clamored for her attention. She wanted to raise her hand and shade her face, but her exhausted arm refused to move, wrapped in the softness that encased her form.

That was when the gravity of her situation registered—a human was carrying her.

She was powerless to resist, but she moved her lolling head to catch a glimpse of a graying beard and dark, tattooed skin. Black fabric jumped out to her in extreme close-up—so near she could see fuzzy strands. Fear jostled to the forefront of her brain before ebbing away to numbness.

As Dea strained and squinted, she knew one thing with absolute certainty—she was now on a different ship.

The deck stretched out all around, and masts rose into the sky. A black flag rippled in the wind. It sported a logo prominently in white—a skull sitting above crossed weapons on the backdrop of an eroded, grayscale globe. Tales of human pirates, treasure and adventure drifted up through the mists in her mind.

It doesn't matter. Nothing matters. Exhaustion consumed her again.

As she writhed in the throes of another terrible nightmare, the finality of loss crashed down and gnawed at her sanity.

There was nothing to hold onto. She was a soul stripped bare, dreams shattered—not unlike the dead corals of the deep sea. In fact, reality had slapped her awake from what was akin to a fanciful simulation she had believed to be true her entire life. Blackness threatened to smother her.

Eventually, she became aware of coolness on her skin. She pried her eyes open.

She was lying in an inflated blue pool in the middle of a small room. Her flukes peeked up above the circular rim. A patch of white on her tail turned out to be a plaster. She merely observed it while the occasional footsteps and voices passed outside the door.

Her head slowly turned to the natural light that flooded in. A round window looked out into cerulean skies, dotted with cottony puffs of cumulus clouds. Dea's gaze shifted to the miscellaneous items and boxes that cluttered the space and came to rest on a chair.

Her backpack sat on it. A splotch of dirt stained the black texture, but otherwise it was unscathed. There was no sign of the Cypod.

Dea flexed her stiff fingers, releasing the grip on the broken collar. She stared at it for a prolonged moment, thumb rubbing the scratch again and again.

A deep female voice wafted in, seemingly speaking on a phone, "Yes, yes, treated. She's alright."

Dea pulled out the ogi from her waist pouch in one lethargic motion. Merlingo was still on, and the battery had drained to the last sliver.

"No, she hasn't said anything," the voice went on. "We'll reach Seren City in..."

The sea drowned out the rest of the sentence, hovering at the edge of detection range. The name of the human city sent a mini earthquake rumbling through her.

A few more words trickled in, too far for Merlingo, "Hari, hari, Anuk. Lang unama kiyannang."

Dea's brow furrowed. She shook her head and sat staring into space for a long time.

Even in the infernal hadal depths, life stirred. The yearning for home birthed in her mind like a feeble spark of bioluminescence. In that instant, she was a Mariana snailfish—her eyes stripped of all light but clinging to life against the pressure of eight hundred atmospheres.

Calliathron's call was strong. Hopes rode on her—that of the captured merpeople and the hapless creatures of the ocean. Her blue world lay all around this human vessel, beckoning her into its embrace.

Dea hoisted herself over the edge of the pool and crawled to the chair. She retrieved her backpack and stowed the collar in with the utmost care. Grateful for the bag's familiar weight on her back, she continued to the door.

It wasn't locked. She let herself out.

A rush of wind greeted her, carrying the taste of freedom.

She mustered up all her strength and fast-crawled across the deck. The sun was hot on her skin, and damp pink hair stuck to her face. Exclamations sounded in her wake.

Dea didn't hesitate as she climbed over the handrail. Then she plunged into the waves below.

Animal: Scud

https://youtu.be/mp707bZ4YI4