Chapter Text
Dylan heaved a sigh, for what felt like the tenth time in the last half hour. She sat at her desk, twirling a pen around her fingers as she stared down at the paperwork, eyes glazing over with boredom. The pen had touched the paper numerous times at this point, but each time never went further than placing a single dot.
She wanted to be out there, underwater conducting research, not sitting at a desk doing the boring part. A quick glance at the clock had her slump further in her seat once she noticed how early it still was.
Her eyes wandered around the rest of the bright room, illuminated in blue from the large tank that took up the whole back wall. It looked relatively empty; filled with moving boxes that still needed sorting, but without the time to do it. The few diagrams and posters she’d plastered to the walls gave it a little more colour though, she supposed. She was lucky to be given such a spacious room, and while the tank was unused, it still gave a pleasant view and light to the office.
Her thoughts were cut short from a few sharp raps on the office door; with a familiar tune that had her exhaling in relief. She called them in to enter, already knowing who it was from the knock pattern. Finally, something to distract her from the lousy mood she was in.
Nikolai, the kid from the accounts office and one of the few co-workers she actually tolerated, stepped over the threshold. He looked a little dishevelled, with his long brown hair up in a messy ponytail and wonky shirt collar, nursing a hot cup of coffee in one hand and a fat stack of papers under his arm.
Only one mug, she noticed with narrowed eyes. Typical.
“Did you hear the news? They caught a big one down at the docks today,” he told her excitedly, flashing her a toothy smile.
Dylan raised an eyebrow. “Who's 'they'?”
“Who'd you think?” He rolled his eyes. “Karl, and his lackeys.”
She hummed, suddenly uninterested. Karl Heisenberg… an asshole fisherman that constantly caused her problems over the local wildlife. The less she had to do with that cretin of a man and his crew, the better.
Her fingers drummed across the desk, lost in thought as she glanced back down at her paperwork.
“You look busy,” he commented, giving her a sympathetic look once he noticed the workload she had.
Dylan groaned, flicking the pen across her desk before shoving her face in her hands. “You have no idea…”
Nikolai regarded her with a curious tilt to his head. “Pretty sure you can afford a short break, you know. Go check out the market,” he suggested, “you won't get much work done by just staring at the paper.”
He leaned over for a better look and snorted. “I could play dot-to-dot with what you’ve got down so–”
“Shut up. You just want me to come back with the gossip,” she accused, jabbing a finger in his direction.
He laughed with a small shrug. “Guilty as charged.”
She watched as he set his coffee and files down before reaching for the back of her wheeled chair, pulling her backwards and away from the desk. He wheeled her towards the door, tipping the chair forward, so she had no choice but to grumpily stand.
“Go on, sourpuss, break time!”
Dylan scoffed, tugging on a jacket as she went. “Can’t wait to find out this catch was only a sturgeon,” she muttered.
Her boots squelched across the wet cobblestones as she made her way through the market, stifling a yawn into her hand. A distant bell rang across the town, signalling that the auction was about to begin, and she set off through the crowds towards her destination.
The market was a lot busier than she expected, full of local fishermen sending shouts throughout the crowd. Merchants hastily chucked their catches on display as customers browsed their wares. Rows upon rows of fresh fish assaulted her nostrils as they were spread across shelves of ice, causing her nose to wrinkle slightly from the stench. Multiple stalls stretched far into the town's streets, teeming with people who perused their goods.
When she arrived at the auction stage, the crowd swarmed like a shiver of sharks, clamouring one another for a better view. She wondered if the lot of them were trying to grab a glimpse of the big catch, and whatever it was, it seemed to have caused quite the stir amongst the townsfolk.
Dylan wove her way through the throng of people, elbowing those that wouldn’t budge until she made it to the middle of the crowd. Snippets of conversations caught her attention, and she listened in to the hushed whispers with interest. She slipped in a little closer, curiosity getting the better of her.
“Did you see it?” one of them asked, with excitement apparent in her voice.
A short, balding man shook his head sadly, “No, but by Gods, I ‘eard she’s gorgeous–”
“I 'eard she put up hell of a fight,” another replied eagerly, “left a few poor blokes in hospital–”
“–reckon whoever gets it would pay a pretty penny to ‘ave her served up on a silver platter.”
“No… Do you really think people want to eat half a fish?” someone asks with a sharp gasp.
“Either that, or its a display case that awaits her–”
“I’ll believe it when I see it,” the other replied snobbishly, “but if this turns out to be another one of Karl's stupid little pranks–”
She pulled away, feeling sick as she shouldered her way towards the front of the stage. She'd heard enough to become a little concerned with whatever was being auctioned off. The more she heard about whatever this catch was, the more uneasy she felt. The way these people spoke of it made it feel like it was more than just some regular fish.
Loud, booming taps of a gavel hitting the wooden podium made short work of silencing the room, save for a few who continued to talk in quiet tones. A large, box-like shape had been dragged onto the stage through the chaos; a tank, perhaps? Whatever it was, it was covered with a lumpy green tarp.
The shabby looking man at the podium peered through the crowd through small, black lenses and scraggly hair, with his eyes landing on each face before he turned towards the tarp, gripping onto it with a tight fist.
“Gentlemen… ladies,” the man's eyes landed on her with a wink, and she grimaced.
Of course, it was him.
“At approximately eighteen feet long, may I present to you… every young sailor's dream.”
With a quick yank, the sheet was pulled free with a flourish. An echo of gasps rang through the crowd, along with her own as the creature was revealed.
“A mermaid!”
Dylan's hands clenched tightly into fists as her eyes landed upon a woman, or half of a woman at least. A large, greyish-white tail hung from one end of the small glass tank, with her head and arms hanging out of the other side. She couldn't believe her eyes, and yet the proof lay coiled up inside the tank before her.
The size of the tank was pitiful, much too small for a creature of this size. Her eyes followed along the large tail, which now that she looked a little closer, it reminded her somewhat of a shark's. The water in the container was barely deep enough to submerge her body, leaving her skin dry and cracked as the gills on her ribs fluttered weakly. The mermaid's inky black hair clung to her shoulders and face, tangled and matted to her peeling scales.
Her soft, ivory skin was littered with bruises, cuts, and what looked like rope burn, which she assumed could have been from a fishing net. The mermaid's head lolled to the edge of the tank, with her golden eyes clouded as they landed on Dylan's hazel ones.
The reveal caused havoc amongst the townspeople, who all began to shove each other out of the way to get closer to the stage for a better look. Dylan had to fight to keep her position in the crowd as hands made to push her backwards and out of the way.
“Oh, what a beauty! Twenty thousand lei for her!” someone cried.
“Twenty thousand!” the man at the podium repeated, pointing at the bidder, “do I hear twenty-one thousand?”
“Twenty-one thousand! My master would love to have her for his circus!”
As the bids began to roll in, the more sickening each conversation became, all talks of cruel ownership or eating the poor thing. It angered her, knowing that whoever bought her would most likely be a clueless, rich snob.
“Do I hear twenty-two thousand?”
Dylan couldn't take it any more, hating how easily these people could talk about the destruction of something so unique.
“Twenty five thousand lei!” she declared, slamming her fist against the wooden stage.
The crowd had quietened slightly, left with soft murmurs and stares. Faces swivelled in her direction then, but she couldn't bring herself to care. Her eyes remained fixed on golden ones, quelling the urge to rush forward and help the poor creature.
“Do I hear twenty-six thousand?” the auctioneer called, “going once… going twice–”
“Twenty-six thousand!” she heard someone yell, and she grit her teeth in frustration.
Barely thinking, Dylan raised a hand. “Thirty thousand lei!” she shouted back, turning to face the direction of the previous bidder with a snarl.
The auction house had settled with a mixture of shocked gasps and indignant comments.
“Thirty thousand! Do I hear thirty-one thousand?” the auctioneer asked, raising the gavel slowly.
Dylan waited impatiently, glancing about the crowd as if daring anyone to outbid her. She was by no means rich, this money she was using to bid just happened to be her life savings, but like hell she would sit back and let a mermaid fall into the wrong hands.
“Going once, going twice… sold, to the lovely blonde at the front!” the auctioneer declared with a slam on the gavel.
Cheers and shouts echoed through the house as she leapt up onto the stage, surging towards the tank. She let her fingers trail along the mermaid's neck, frantically searching for her pulse just below the closed gills. A weak thrum against the pads of her fingers made her sigh in relief. She still had some time.
Dylan yanked her jacket off and dipped it inside the tank, making sure it was soaked through completely before throwing it over the mermaid's naked chest, hoping it would keep her skin somewhat moist enough for the journey to her aquarium.
Once the mermaid’s transportation had been complete, Dylan had her rushed towards her office and into the disused tank, after making sure the water temperature was heated up a little. She brought the mermaid down into the tank gently, carefully not to jostle her too much in the rubber sling and pulley system.
Upon closer inspection, she found the mermaid to be more roughed up than she originally thought. Deep gashes pierced the flesh of her soft stomach, likely made from harpoons during her capture. Raw looking criss-cross marks from the fishing nets littered the skin on her tail and ribs, and she felt a surge of satisfaction over the fact that she’d landed a few fishermen in the hospital.
Dylan knelt down on top of the tank's edge and got to work, dabbing at the mermaid’s wounds with cotton swabs and a light antiseptic spray. She kept her half submerged as she worked, splashing water across the expanse of her body every now and then to keep her skin wet.
She noticed the mermaid had already started to look a little better from the transfer over, watching as her skin had started to look less peaky. Her hair now swirled softly through the water, no longer tangled and brittle from the dry air, and the gills at her neck and ribs seemed to open and close at a normal breathing rate, no longer weakened by the lack of water.
She took her time to really get a good look of the creature, starting from the bottom up. Her hand reached out to gently touch her tail, allowing her fingers to smooth across the mermaid’s rubbery skin. The skin jumped under her touch, and Dylan glanced up to her face to find her lips slightly parted with a frown, and a mouth lined with vicious looking teeth. Her chest was large but smooth, with the grey skin blending into slithers of white. Strong, muscular arms rested at her sides, with sharp, claw-like hands and translucent webbing between each finger.
The mermaid was incredibly beautiful, she’d be a fool not to agree. Full, blood red lips pouted as she remained unconscious, plump and soft. Long black lashes that swept over her high cheekbones, and a strong jawline that could cut through diamond.
Even while gaunt, she was pretty.
Dylan pulled back with a clear of her throat, not realising that she’d leaned in closer to inspect.
She dropped back down into her office, leaving the mermaid to rest inside the rubber pulley as she dimmed the lights in her room. She was slightly torn, wanting to go home, but not wanting to leave the mermaid alone in her current state.
With a quick rummage around in the cupboards, she managed to find an old lumpy pillow and a crumpled blanket.
“This’ll have to do,” she muttered with a sigh, chucking them both towards her desk as she made her makeshift bed for the night.
She set an alarm for earlier than usual, just for extra time to check on the mermaid’s wounds, before falling into an uncomfortable slumber at her desk.