The Mer Meme!

[artfultanzer]

The Mer Meme


Art Credit Here

Mers. Be they maid or man, they are fish from the waist down. Many stories are told about these lovely creatures, and their songs of temptation. Or maybe they're less than lovely and can't carry a tune in a bucket.

This is the meme for playing out mer/mer or mer/human interactions. As long as at least one participant is half fish, it goes here! ... OK, I guess you could be a selkie.



Mer/Mer Prompts:

Help! Fins! - You've just become a mer, through magic or mad science. How will the older mers treat you? Or perhaps you're not alone in this crazy twist of fate.

Mine - This is YOUR territory and you'll be damned before you let some... goldfish swim on in.

Hunting - The prompt for collaborative hunting threads!

Hunted - There's always a bigger fish.

The Deep - The ocean is a deep, dark place, and down in the depths even the sun doesn't reach, strange things live.

Sunken Treasure - Go explore that sunken ship with your friends! Who knows what treasures you'll find?

Mating Season - Exactly what it says on the tin.

Wildcard/Random - Whatever you want or roll again!



Mer/Human Prompts:

Discovery - You never knew the stories were true, but this encounter cemented the idea.

FOR SCIENCE - Whether the human is a lab tech or a member of PETA, something's fishy with this lab's practices...

Savor your Savior - A human saved from drowning or a mer saved from dying under the sun's scorching rays. Or maybe you just helped them get blueberries. Either way, you owe them one.

Siren's Song - Not all mer are nice. Some want to drown and/or eat humans.

First Impressions - You don't make good ones by hitting someone with a boat.

Little Mermaid - You wished for legs, and you got them! Now you can see the surface world - but at what price? Or maybe the reverse - you wished for fins and now interactions with friends are a little strained.

Obligatory Interspecies Love Prompt - Again, exactly what it says on the tin

Wildcard/Random - Whatever you want or roll again!

Comments

Discovery (for Bun)

[destiny_key]

Growing up next to the ocean, one hears a lot of tall tales and wild fish stories. Some of these later turn out to be true, mainly the stories that the fishermen told, and some were legends passed down through the years, told for so long the lessons were lost to the ages, and were merely used to scare children around a campfire.

But no matter the story, no matter how old he got, the ocean always called to Sora. He'd lived in this seaside town his entire life, spending every moment he could on its shores, picking up shells, building castles, splashing in the water, and there was not a doubt in his mind that he'd spend the rest of his life here, too.

And always, always, he remembered his favorite childhood story, the one about the mermaids in their glittering kingdom, deep beneath the waves, far from any human eye. When he'd been very small, he'd believed with the absolute certainty that only a child could have that the stories were true, and used to sit on the docks for hours, hoping to catch a glimpse of a tail.

As he grew older, Sora found it more and more difficult to keep believing, but still, he found the time to sit on the dock most days, staring into the sea. Sometimes he brought ice cream, sometimes friends came with him, but many days he was alone. He had no idea why he kept the habit, but something about it was... comforting. Familiar.

Today, when Sora resumed his usual afternoon post on the dock, there was a storm wind on the horizon, though there were few clouds in the sky. He predicted the storm would probably roll in around sunset, which saddened him, as he'd have to cut his daily visit short, but for now he was content to stare into the sea with the wind blowing his hair softly away from his face.

[darkbreak]

Storms meant turbulence and trouble. Fish were displaced, some even beached themselves, and the currents sometimes turned every which way. Unless you were very very deep, navigating yourself under the surface could be harder than normal.

Which is how Riku ended up being so close to this island. The current he was using turned particularly nasty, already affected by the storm, tossing and twirling him into the more shallow shores of the island. He wasn't beached, thank goodness, but he was closer than he liked. Spotting some wooden posts in the ground that connected to some sort of structure (must be human. no other creature is quite so industrious or destructive or creative as them), he curses under his breath. This could be bad. Very bad.

But does it have to be bad? He was told too many stories of how destructive humans are. Of how many close calls his friends have had or those of fish that had been caught in their nets. And their machines and machinations that destroyed their delicate homes. Sure he couldn't ignore the evidence, but not all of them had to be bad, right?

He creeps closer to the dock, curious as to what it's purpose is and if there are any humans around. He drifts between the surface and the floor, his dark and silver tail nearly breeching the surface at times.

[destiny_key]

Sora wasn't sure how long he'd been sitting on the dock when he saw something new. He'd spent dozens, hundreds of hours on this dock. He'd seen fish, boats, debris, dolphins, and many other things over the years, but the shine that he'd seen in the water today was different from anything he'd ever seen before. He spent a long moment squinting at the spot, wondering if the setting sun was playing a trick on his eyes, when he saw it again. What was it?

The clouds were starting to roll in now, making it harder to see, and Sora leaned forward further, trying to get a better look. It looked like it was coming closer, but it was still hard to tell what it was. It looked like maybe the size of a small dolphin, but it had the shiny scales of a fish. His mind flashed back to his favorite childhood story, but he quickly dismissed it. That was impossible... right?

He moved forward again, but it seemed he misjudged the amount of dock he had left, because his hand met nothing when he attempted to put it down. Sora flailed a bit, caught off guard, and the movement caused him to slip the rest of the way off the dock and into the ocean.

Thankfully, this part of the shore was shallow, only a foot or two over his head, and it was easy to swim back up to the surface beneath the dock. What he wasn't so thankful for was the fact that he was now soaked, and he'd have to walk home in wet clothes with the cold storm wind blowing. As if that was the least of his worries, Sora suddenly remembered the shiny thing that had been making its way towards the dock, and he quickly turned in a circle in the water, wondering if he'd scared it off.

[darkbreak]

Riku wasn't scared off necessarily. But the tumbling human crashing into the water does startle him enough to keep to the sandy bottom, ready to swim away if necessary. But watching the boy flail in the water fascinates him.

Truth be told, he's never seen a real live human before. Riku's only ever heard stories about their tail-less bodies and lack of gills. How strange that such creatures that couldn't breathe in the water often spent time in it or around it.

Those limbs (he thinks they're limbs anyways) are kicking and flailing, but despite that Riku finds his curiousity growing. He pushes his fingers against the shore and very slowly creeps his way closer, careful not to breach the surface like before.

[destiny_key]

The flailing slowly subsides as Sora starts to tread more slowly, still looking around for the shiny thing. The waves are getting choppier out on the open water, but under the dock they're still relatively calm, sheltering him from the worst of it. He knows it won't last long. Looking out at the sky, the clouds are rolling in fast, and he reckons its maybe an hour until the storm hits full-force.

He should probably get out from under the dock, but he can't bring himself to leave until he finds the shiny thing. In the back of his head, maybe he is hoping it's a mermaid, but either way, he wants to know. He won't be able to settle until he knows, and he knows he'll regret it if he leaves now.

Sora spins around again, still scanning outwards, and he doesn't really notice the face in the water until it's nearly on top of him. He blinks at it for a split second, shocked, before he yelps and scrambles backwards as best he can in the water. No way this is real.

[darkbreak]

Oh crap. He got too close.

They really are noisy and disruptive, aren't they? Riku ducks down, letting himself sink to the bottom yet again, eyes carefully trained on Sora in case he decided to do something. As far as he could tell, the human was unarmed but the stories he's heard speaks of how cunning they can be...

The storm is coming in fast and he can feel it in the water. If he doesn't leave soon, he might not be able to get back at all. But making the first move could be disastrous too.

[destiny_key]

When Sora stops splashing and the water calms again, he watches, wide-eyed, as the person in the water watches him back. Mermaid. Merman? Either way, they're watching him just as intently.

Holy shit mermaids are real.

He can see the shiny silver tail flapping slightly in the water behind the merman, and unless his eyes are playing tricks, he definitely looks really real. He has no idea what could happen next, or which of the stories were true and which ones were fake. Were mermaids nice? Or was this guy gonna try to drag him into the depths of the ocean? Somehow, even as a little kid, he never thought about what he would do if he did meet a mermaid.

They stare each other down for a long moment, Sora still treading water slowly, before he manages to work up the courage to make the first move. What was the worst that could happen, really?

"Um..." he starts, then licks the salt from his dry lips to try again. "Um, hi?"

[darkbreak]

...He's not doing anything?

In fact, that sounded like a voice, right? Riku tilts his head and raises a brow in confusion. He can't make out the words, if they even are words, down here but as far as he can tell, the human isn't doing anything aggressive.

Hmm, curious. He propels himself upward, surfacing some feet away from Sora and looking him over. Humans are so weirdly shaped.

"...Is that how you swim? Kicking those things around?" He gestures with his head to Sora's legs.

[destiny_key]

Honestly, Sora is so shocked by this turn of events, that his first thought is only Oh thank god he speaks English instead of something perhaps more reasonable. As it is, his mouth is still going faster than his brain is.

"My-my legs? Yeah," he blurts. "I have to stay above water somehow, you know."

Well that was a dumb thing to say. The merman probably already knows that. Sora feels kind of like an idiot, but this is probably the strangest thing that's ever happened to him.

[darkbreak]

Riku tilts his head back, as if trying to size Sora up and look him over properly. It's so bizarre to see those leg things moving the way they do. He's so used to seeing tails below the waist.

Quietly he goes under again, swimming around Sora to try and see how they work but giving him a wide enough berth. He's curious but doesn't want to get too close.

When he surfaces again, it's just with a flat expression. "They're weird."

[destiny_key]

Sora watches the other boy as he swims around, examining his legs as he continues to tread water, and he turns his head to keep the merman in sight. He consciously slows his kicks so that Riku can see them in action, and honestly he supposes he'd be pretty curious too if their positions were reversed. He's pretty curious as it is right now anyway.

"Well maybe I think fins are weird," Sora says before he starts to curse his big mouth again. "I mean, we're just... different, you know?"

[darkbreak]

Hmph. Fins are not weird, and that's evident from the frown set on Riku's face.

He thinks they're weird, huh? Well, Riku twists himself to do a backward sommersault into the water, sending a huge splash Sora's way with his tail. Take that you weird tailless human!

"If that's true, you're just weirder." Could he be... teasing? It almost sounds like a teasing tone, and Riku's even got a hint of a smirk on his face too.

This is a humanHmph. Fins are not weird, and that's evident from the frown set on Riku's face.

He thinks they're weird, huh? Well, Riku twists himself to do a backward sommersault into the water, sending a huge splash Sora's way with his tail. Take that you weird tailless human!

"If that's true, you're just weirder." Could he be... teasing? It almost sounds like a teasing tone, and Riku's even got a hint of a smirk on his face too.

This is a human? The same creatures that his kind is so afraid of? He doesn't seem all that dangerous.

"Why are you in the water?"

With a storm approaching and no visible gills, it seems like a bad idea.? The same creatures that his kind is so afraid of? He doesn't seem all that dangerous.

"Why are you in the water?"

With a storm approaching and no visible gills, it seems like a bad idea.

[destiny_key]

Sora yelps at the splash, quickly trying to cover his face, but to no avail. If he wasn't soaked before, which he absolutely was, he would definitely be now. He spits out salty sea water out of his mouth, and shivers slightly. He knows he should probably get out of the water soon, go home before the storm hits, but he can't seem to bring himself to leave.

He sticks out his tongue at the teasing, and laughs before answering the question.

"Oh, I, uh, fell in," he says sheepishly. "I saw you in the water, and I guess I leaned over too far to see. How 'bout you? I've never seen a merman before. How come you're so close to shore?"

[espigeon]

[This is an AU and not a TF situation btw.

Julien's not completely helpless out of water. He has no legs or walking-fins, but he can breathe air and is very long and able to do a sort of awkward sidewind in flat soft places, or sort of slither, working that long tail and propping himself on his hands when the going gets rougher. But, quite a ways onto the land now, he's starting to dry out and all those rocks he hit on the way out here are hurting? A lot actually?

He makes it to the shade under some tall trees and has to rest, limp and breathing hard, looking half dead. He's past the halfway point now, the only way is forwards... if he can make it.]

what world is this, who knows, we'll MAKE IT UP

[hobbitstho]

[Boromir finds Julien because his horse shies. It's been long days on the road, long hours since he rose that morning, long weeks before he will return to the walled city from which he came; he is all but dozing in the saddle when the twitch of a long tail in the shadows startles the animal, and he almost fails to keep his seat.

He expects to see a snake on the path, or a deer among the trees. But his eyes follow that long tail up to the body attached to it, to the uncomfortably human head and arms, and he draws a soft, startled breath. Uncertain, he makes a halfhearted gesture against witchcraft, one from his home country, far from here. He's heard legends. He isn't a fisherman, nor from a family of fishermen, but he has cousins who live by the sea...

When the creatures of the deeps emerged from the water to complicate the lives of mortals, though, he tended to assume there... would be water somewhere nearby.

He dismounts and loosens his sword in its sheath, but does not draw. (His horse is happy to let him approach alone.) He does not know if it is a man or a beast - whether the serpent's tail is the greater part of its nature, or the head and mouth and hands.]

...Speak, if you can.

woo!

[espigeon]

[Julien feels the hoofbeats a little before he hears them, his very long body picking up on the vibration. In water his lateral line gives him a fantastic sense for what's moving where; on land it's less sharp, but still useful. He moves as if to hide himself, but that's useless. Maybe if he was fresh and not baking in dry day heat.

Horses are weird if you're used to living underwater. Hippocampi only bear vague resemblance, being more like elongated manatees. Legmen are only marginally less weird. Walking! How is he not falling over?

Julien props himself on his elbows. Here in the shade, a contrast from the bright sun out past here, it's a little hard to be sure of his coloring, but he's blue-tinged at the least.]

Uh. Ahoy. [That's how legmen greet each other, right?] I know this is sudden, but can you spare any water?

[hobbitstho]

[It does speak. It is a strange creature, sure enough - even the human part of it is not quite so, too sleek and flat, not made for the air and the earth.

A skin full of water, freshly filled, hangs among Boromir's saddlebags. He glances back at it; shifts from one foot to the other; runs a hand pensively over his beard.]

I have heard tales of your kind. You are far from the deeps that spawned you-- near a day's journey from any deeper stream than those from which the deer draw refreshment.

[He takes a cautious step closer, in under the shadow of the trees - he is wary, but also powerfully curious.]

I passed such a stream not an hour hence, and there filled my skins. I am not a man who would deny mercy to a fellow-traveler - but in all the old tales, the Deep-Men are bargainers, slippery as eels. Tell me first: Why have you put yourself in my path?

[Because of course, if he found the creature, it must have been because it meant to find him. Coincidences, in Boromir's experience, tend to resolve themselves in his favor.]

[espigeon]

[Julien stares at him for a moment. Up close the gills down his sides are visibly open and showing red. Some of his breath is exhaled through them, an attempt to cool a creature that can't sweat.]

Please... yes, yes, I came up the sweetwater channels. We can do that, we just don't like to let it on.

[A length of tail is in a patch of sunlight that makes it through the canopy. He moves it. ...Tail might not be the right word, much of his length expands and contracts with each gill-flaring breath.]

No tricks, okay? I'm here looking for my brother. He... I think he went and fell in love with a legman.

[hobbitstho]

[His expression changes. Maybe it's the strangeness of the story - how much it feels like something from one of the old tales. Maybe it's the word brother, and the number of impossible things Boromir knows he would do if his brother required it.

...It will cost him nothing, he thinks, to help. The stream is not far from here. He can refill what he has.

He brings the full skin and kneels beside the tree-- down on one knee only, and his sword still loose in its sheath. If the Deep-Man is armed, Boromir does not know where he could be concealing his weapon. And he believes he could overpower the slender creature, unless there is more strength in its arms than there appears.]

...You invite more questions than you answer, son of the Deep. My kin tell old stories of men seduced by the sweet-voiced women of your kind; but they end always in death at the bottom of the sea. I have not heard a tale of a Deep-man pursuing one of my kind over the earth.

[He hesitates. He proffers the water as he would to one who intended to drink it, but-- fish, so far as he knows, do not drink. But if he speaks, does he drink as well--?]

[espigeon]

Thank you.

[If Julien had been carrying... well, anything, it's gone now. It does look like he was wearing something algael and loosely-woven, now dried and shredded by progress across the ground. Mermen don't have much access to or need for fabric type things that hold up in dry air. He reaches eagerly for the water and he does drink, deeply, or pour it into his mouth anyway. Some of the water seeps from his gills and leaves him gleaming and less flattened out.]

Hey, hey. Why would we do that? I can't say there's never been any seduction, there's always merfolk who like legs and legmen who like... not legs. And sometimes that ends badly. But it's usually rendezvous on boats or the shore or something... even we can't really go to the bottom of the ocean, or even really into the dark.

...You sing better than we do, anyway. Way more range and clearer. [It's part of the appeal of humans, a lung/vocal chord system adapted to thin air alone instead of double duty air and water. Julien puts his hand down, pushes himself a little farther off the ground.]

I don't know how you live out here, though! There's nothing keeping you from being pulled down. Even plains of nice soft-looking landweed, there are stones and that hurts.

[He sounds offended. It had looked like it would be fun to move across a field of grass. He's not as enthralled with the land - or perhaps with a particular person on it - as his brother is, but he'd entertained fancies and lolled around on beaches and in swamps, and thought himself daring.]

[hobbitstho]

[Boromir has no way of knowing if the remains of the shirt are clothing, or if they were once attached to him - like a snake shedding its skin. His picture of the Deep-folk is colored by legend and rumor. Once the men of the sea traded with the men in the sea, they say; but that belonged to a time almost lost to memory.]

If our stones sank, we could not raise them into towers, nor build walls across our borders, nor mine them for their value. [He meets offense with offense - what would a sea-dweller understand of the might of the works of men?] They are a nuisance caught in a boot on a long march, I give you that; but what houses the Deep-folk build could never rival the majesty of the fortresses my people have built - even great cities of stone, gleaming white in the sun!

[He's a little homesick, maybe.]

--But why brave the stones? Is your mission to dissuade your brother from his pursuit? Does he travel on his belly over the stones as you do?

[A bizarre, slow-motion chase - two gasping men wriggling across the plans in a line. He does not know whether to call it grotesque or funny.]

[espigeon]

[Julien shakes his head. He's seen land architecture only from a distance, generally being wary of legmen. Walls seem completely pointless to him, why wouldn't people just swim over them? But he doesn't feel like arguing.]

He's better suited for this than me, and anyway I think... I hope... it was raining. But of course I have to stop him! It's hard enough living in sweetwater for a couple moons when it's a big river or a lake, some isolated pool will get him sick, and someone will find him!

[He thumps the end of his tail for emphasis.] If he's got to fall for a legmaid it's got to be one he can moon over without getting himself killed. He ought to know disappearing like this is cruel to everyone else, I don't care if he spends most of his time swimming alone.

[hobbitstho]

[It's jarring, how near that frustration strikes to Boromir's heart. The problem, of course, is bizarre to him-- but the fear, less so. It is difficult for Boromir to mistrust the intent of one seeking a brother.

Granted, he's never known Faramir to moon over anything. Nor has Faramir expressed any desire to chase the object of his affections, whoever she may eventually be, into the sea. But they have rarely been parted from each other for so long. If he sees connections where there are none, he can hardly be blamed. It was Faramir who wanted to start on this mad quest, and Boromir who could not bear to see him go.

Faramir would know more of the legends, were he here. He would know what questions to ask.]

...Your brother is willful, [he says ruefully.] Is he the elder of you? Or the younger?

[espigeon]

Too willful. [His tone is sour, but fond underneath.] Always in bays watching your docks and swimmers... he saved a girl from drowning and then she came back and found him.

He was from the spawning before mine, but he looks older. [They aren't related by blood. It's customary to call people you grew up around by familial terms though.] Possibly because he was trying to keep me and my spawning out of trouble.

Do you know this area at all? I must be near the hamlet by now.

[hobbitstho]

I am a stranger to this country, if less strange than you. ...But I passed through a hamlet earlier today, where I bought provisions. It is not more than ten miles behind me.

[He gives the tail a skeptical look.]

What will you do there, if it is the one you seek?