#gloop au

“Please, we don’t want to hurt you, only help!” She watches as the mer’s mouth closes in confusion. “You’re wounded," fae says, "we know how to help you, if you’ll let us.” 

The panicked, clouded eyes of the mer seem to lose their focus even more as they dart between the few crew members on the boat behind Rain. The mer says something Rain isn’t able to catch before the adrenaline wears off and the mer finally succumbs to exhaustion, their eyes closing and head falling onto the net.

When the mermaid finally wakes, they feel hands on their tail and odd, loose fabric clinging to their torso. They grab at it, trying to tug it off, before the hand moves from their tail to their arm.

“Don’t,” a voice says, gently pulling the mer’s hand off the fabric. “Keep the shirt on, please, until we can find you something else to wear.”

The tries to say something back, but their words come out tangled. The hand moves back to their tail, continuing to wrap around their wound with a slightly scratchier fabric than the "shirt" the voice was talking about.

“We removed the harpoon from your tail the best we could. I’m just here to rewrap your wounds. You’ll be able to meet the others shortly, but at the moment you’ll be lifted into the recovery pool to heal.”

The mer blinks, a look of confusion crossing their face.

Slowly, the mer begins to wake up more, pushing themself into a sitting position but keeping their tail still. A chill bleeds from the gray metal surface they are sitting on. They look around the room, confused; there was a circular tank filled with water in the center, desks, and strange devices. When they look at their tail, they see a human– the same one from the boat– wrapping a bandage around their tail to protect their wound. Vaguely, they get the sense they should be alarmed, but something about the human’s presence was comforting. Familiar, almost.

“There,” the human said suddenly, taking faer hands from the mer’s tail and pushing faerself away, seemingly cleaning up. “All done. I can move you to the tank, if you’ll let me?”

It takes a second before the mer processes what fae was saying.

“Where?” asks the mer, looking at their surroundings again, their spotted tail bending closer to themself. “And who?”

“You’re in an aquarium–” a look of alarm starts to spread across the mer’s face– “but it’s safe here! You won’t be put on display. As far as I know, they have no intention of showing you to the public.” The mer relaxes slightly, but their shoulders and tail stay tensed. “The recovery tank is just until you heal a little bit, and then we’re going to introduce you to the other mers, and if you get along, you’ll stay with them until you’re ready to leave.”

“...okay,” the mer says hesitantly.

“I’m Rain,” the human says, holding a hand out towards the mer. “I’m kind of… in charge of taking care of the mers here. It’s nice to meet you.” Fae smiles at the mer, waiting for a response.

“Clue,” the mer finally says in response, smiling kindly and showing their sharp teeth. “Thank you.”

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I love the idea of Rain finding mer!Clue and going “nope. No shirt no medical attention. Put it on.” And I can definitely imagine them ruining shirts on purpose to spite Rain lmao