There was no hiding in a tub. As big as it was - and it was big he supposed, for a tub that would fit a few dozen good fish for pickling at the docks or a hundred pounds of salted meat for provisions, but not a full grown merman - it was still four, rounded corners of bare wood. The sun beat down through the shallow water, making it easy to see him, and also the pair that were looking down at him with round eyes and raised brows. Both had been silent since his splashing had broken them out of their personal discussion, though the shared looks they traded and their twisting mouths, though they stayed shut, did the rest of their talking for them. Body language was universal, and there was no denying the content of their conversation this time. No one had any idea what to do with him. He certainly wasn't going to make it any easier for them to find any answers.

Anders braced his hands on either side of the tub to support what half of him was submerged as he stuck his chest out to make himself larger. Fighting is the only other option at hand, and it was as unlikely as hiding within the minimal shade cast by the side of the tub. There wasn't enough room to thrash a good wallop of his tail, at least not without tipping himself over, and he wasn't sure just how many attempts he could make after his already adventurous morning. Every angry flare of his gills is a battle of its own as burned tissue stretched, and exhaustion made his arms tremble even as they held him upright. A headache pounded it was across his forehead and the pair was still only looking at him. As if he was nothing more than a tuna they felt bad about eating. Anders bared his teeth and the burst of bubbles that formed his hiss made the male counterpart's arm twitch towards the female. She slapped it out of the way, apparently not needing or enjoying the show of protection, only to lean ever forward over him.

Fight or flight had always been his go-to plan. A plan C was needed, then.

Anders flicked his tail and the sudden, sharp movement drew both pairs of eyes. Distracted, he dropped his arms in favor for reaching the rim of the tub and hauled himself upright. He swallowed, pushing what water was still in his mouth out through his gills before clapping his hands over them and spoke.

"If you're not going to stick me back into the water, you think you can find something, I don't know, bigger?"

That finally changed their expressions. The bemused lines etching out around curiously bright eyes and lips parted just enough for deep, awestruck gasps stretched to almost laughable proportions. Jaws dropped to reveal dry mouths and the confusion that lit up brown irises brightened further into shock. Anders was sure he'd laugh if he knew it wouldn't hurt so much. He'd wanted the pair to back up, give him space, and all it took were a few words out of his mouth.

"You can..." The man gestured, hand flung uselessly out to his side to emphasis his lack of words.

Anders pressed his hands tighter against his neck before his gills could flare. "Talk? Obviously. Say angry words? Definitely. Any other questions before I can get my own answer?"

He hadn't actually expected any verbal reply - not when the only noise coming out of them now were some sort of high wheeze, like a puffer fish that had been poked one too many times. There was, however, a series of jerky head shakes, and though they worked their mouths up and down, no words fell from thick tongues, until the female managed to swallow down whatever it was that was so difficult to accept about a talking sea creature. Color returned to her face as a wide grin slowly spread across her face. The man's arm twitched out towards her, but he had a more difficult time reigning his world back in around himself to hold her back.

"How much did you hear, sweet thing?"

He crossed his arms over the rim of the tub and rested his head on them, upper half just low enough to keep his neck at the surface, and took a breathe before encasing his gills with his hands again. "I think you defined 'stealing'?"

Her grin widened. "I like him, Hawke."

"He's not a pet!" the man finally blurted.

Anders nodded. "He's right you know - I'm a wild animal. I bite. It'll most likely get infected, raw fish diet and all."

The female's grin only widened and she crossed her arms, turning her eyes to her mate. He raised his hands at her, but it was a feeble shield against her enjoyment. No shield at all, really, Anders scoffed. "Fish! He eats fish. One question down."

The rocking of the seas had always calmed him. The gentle push and pull as the waves rolled up the coast and the deep tides call to encourage them back to the ocean's bosom was like a heartbeat. It pulsed in a comfortable, dull roar in his ears - a constant in the ever changing life that was underwater. Anders was always wrapped in something to keep him in place, folding a kelp blanket around his torso to hold him close to the sound or snug in place by the shelter of a ship wreck, he drifted back and forth as he slept.

The current rise and dipping of his stomach was doing nothing but making him nauseous. There was nothing to keep him steady except for a hard surface under his cheek that rubbed splinters into his face with every motion, and as it shifted with the waves, he rolled to and fro with it. Tired muscles proclaimed their protests at the sudden shifts with deep pain and Anders curled in on himself to make himself smaller and centering his weight in one place, hoping to make himself heavier. A large wave crawled beneath the floor, lifting him up and up before dropping him back down, hard, and he slammed into the floor. He groaned at the impact, and another slap hit him from the other side. Water, this time. The thought came slowly, surfacing only after his gills had flared to catch what droplets found their way to the filaments. Anders felt the slow build of the drop come again and he bother braced himself for the fall and reached for the brief splash that would follow. The spikes of pain that blossomed throughout his face when he fell were worth it, he thought, as he caught another breath.

Another thought followed, even slower, nudging its way to the front of his mind between the instinct to find the next closest air source and the natural impulse to escape the discomfort of being tossed around like the seaweeds in a storm.

Where exactly was he now? The texture beneath him was solid and smooth unlike the uneven, coarse sand of the beach. It shifted constantly beneath him as well, but sand was never known to throw. The tides along the shore weren't ever this fierce, either, unless he'd been shoved further up the strand when the waves rolled in rather than pulled back out to deeper waters.

Except, there'd been something moving towards him before the weight of the exposed world caught up to him, and beyond the scorching sun on his back and the drying muck between his scales he'd felt something clamp tight around his arms and take a hold of him. Much like now, he thought, as the next dip of the floor never ended in another hard impact to the face. Instead, he was continued to be lifted up, half of him chilling as a blast of cold sea breeze hit his bare torso while the other half was dragged across the floor. Whatever had taken him - and wherever he was going, was at their mercy. There was little chance it thought about returning him to the bay...but the unexpected dip in water was a promising sign.

Blessedly cold water. Anders revealed in the deep breath he drew in for the first time since the hole had ripped open in the bay. He took another one, slower, just to feel the slight swirl of water cross his gills, clean and fresh. He blinked his eyes open and pressed his hands out in front of him, fingers splayed, when his vision remained dark. They hit a solid wall and he glanced up at the surface to find a small ring of the sky above, his tail hanging over him to block out the sun.

A bucket - they'd put him in a bucket.

He wriggled himself around until he was right-side up to let his scales soak, and grasped the edge of the tub to pull himself up - before quickly sinking back down again. The quick glance provided him enough information for the moment, like the great billowing sails suggested he was on a boat, and the pair of dark shapes marching towards him were his captors. Footsteps ended right before the tub and another noise took up the silence before it could follow. Words exchanged - the language of those with two legs. It was always difficult to understand when listening from the bay - they all spoke so differently - but there were words that stayed the same no matter who was coming or going. Those, he could pick up, and Anders let his head bob just above the surface to catch them.

"It was just laying there," one of them said. Long hair was tossed about a rounded face, and one hand rose from its placement on a curved hip to slap it out of brown eyes. A girl.

The other was taller, thicker, her mate maybe, Anders thought. Both looked angry, with the woman standing up straight despite the obvious height difference and the man's arms crossed over a broad chest. He only shook his head. "So you thought it was a good idea to take it? Like it was a lost puppy?"

"No, like a fish out of water!" The man rolled his eyes and she pouted. "Was I supposed to let the poor thing sit in the sun for who knows how long? Someone should have done something."

"Any other someone would have just pushed it back."

The woman threw her head back, exposing an impressive chest as she sighed heavily. "That would have just been another slow death, Hawke, you know that. The bay's not good for nothing anymore. Not fishing, not hunting..." She trailed off and cupped his jaw with her free hand. His jaw worked beneath her fingers as he thought through her argument.

"You still picked it up. This isn't like one of the dock cats that gets caught in the rain. At least I know how to feed them."

She shrugged. "It's got teeth. Maybe it'll like meat."

"That's not what I - Maker, 'Bela."

The man huffed out a breath as she gave him a soft pat on the cheek, and Anders sank back under the water. Saved, not captured, was what the pair said, but that was from their side. He folded his arms and a stream of bubbles left his neck as he grumbled under his breath. They had legs and could go where they pleased while he was stuck in a tub barely tall enough to fit the entirety of his tail for as long as it took to get where they were taking him. Unless he could escape. His arms weren't cramped or as sore as they had been the first time he'd woken. A little push here, a little push there, and he could shift the tub... somewhere. He twisted, shoving his shoulders against one corner of the tub, his tail at the other, and stretched. The bucket shuttered around him and he arched his back.

Anders hissed as he slipped and the edge of the tub caught on a scale. The splash drew a startled gasp from one of the two legged, and soon the shadow of his tail was joined by a shadow of the woman leaning over the side. He blinked up at her before baring his teeth.