#thomasocuilinn

Honestly, Ronan wasn’t sure how the argument started exactly. He was enjoying a night at the Houseboat, when either he bumped into a drunk or a drunk bumped into him. Whatever it was, drinks were spilled, curses were shouted, one thing led to another and now they were both out on the docks in the dead of night, ready to exchange blows. Usually, Ronan wouldn’t be very eager for a fight against normal drunken human sailors, fragile as they could be, but this one had a couple of friends and this made the fight almost fair enough as to be entertaining.

location: Port Vale Mermaid Museum time: just before closing time

To say that Gemma disliked her job at the mermaid museum’s gift shop would be an understatement. She’d intentionally selected the job with the thought that it would have enough mental downtime to allow her to think of other things, but it turned out that didn’t mean she’d been prepared for how tedious it would be. Restock this, wipe down that. Ring up the customers, who attempted to engage her in banal conversation far more often than she’d like. Of course, the position did come with some advantages over other human jobs. Being in close working proximity to Mellora and Thomas meant that she was able to keep an eye on both, and she had inroads to influencing both mermaid and hippocampus viewpoints, if she ‘played her cards right’ as the humans said. And of course, the fact that none of her coworkers were human meant that  she could actually ask any questions she had without fear of giving away that she knew less on a subject than a human ought to. 

As it happened, she had one of those questions now - so when she caught sight of Thomas walking by the gift shop, she gestured for him to come over. She could have come to him, she supposed, but she knew that there was no one currently in the gift shop besides her - who knew if that was the case for the rest of the museum? And besides, she wasn’t supposed to leave the gift shop while she was working anyways, and there were still a few minutes left before the museum closed. “Hey, quick question,” she began, waiting for him to come closer before continuing. “What’s our stance on haggling? Someone who was in here earlier kept trying to tell me she’d give me $10 for a $14 mug. That’s... weird, right?” She still didn’t have a perfect handle on how human money worked. From what she could tell though, establishments tended to expect humans to pay the listed price for what they were offering.

If Elistra was going to ingratiate herself with Mellora- or even begin to trust her beyond her appealing, pretty words, she should also acquaint herself with the people that ran in Mellora’s circle. The man who called himself Mellora’s cousin and guided tour groups in the museum where she worked was named Thomas, which wasn’t particularly a suspicious name. However, everything else about his situation was. If Elistra was one for gambling, she’d bet a considerable amount on him being a hippocampi, one allied strongly with the mermaids. As she had learned with Jo though, sometimes she could be very, very wrong.

It was early enough in the morning on a weekday that there wasn’t much of a crowd to speak of in the museum. If Elistra wanted a private tour alone with one of the tour guides, this seemed the time to get one. She wandered around, trying to act as casually as possible until, finally, she spotted Thomas near a display.

“What’s that one about?” she asked, approaching him from behind. When he turned to look at her, she smiled and gave a small wave. “Hi. I’m Elistra. Your name’s Thomas, right? Mellora’s cousin?”

Coming ashore for the first time in a land visit was always tricky. At least with Port Vale though, Mike had an advantage - he’d been here before, so he knew where to go to get his hands on the basics. Once he looked the part in some totally not suspicious human clothes, he made his way through town and on over toward Isidore’s place. As he walked, his thoughts drifted to the dreams that had led him here. Mike had a tendency to go where his dreams seemed to guide him, even if he didn’t fully get why they were pointing in any particular direction. Port Vale made enough sense - more sense than a lot of his decisions seemed to on the face, if he was being honest. With the mermaid and siren leaders gathering there, he’d figured it would only be a matter of time before he’d wind up joining the crowd. And while parts of what he’d dreamt made just as much sense - Gaya being there, for instance - there were other parts he was still trying to puzzle out. There were important pieces missing, he was sure of it. Didn’t have the faintest idea of what those pieces might be, but that was alright. 

No sooner than he had that thought, he caught sight of a familiar face in the crowd and stopped short. No way. Was that...? It couldn’t be. He squinted - either the world was playing a super freaky, messed up trick on him, or it was. “Thomas? Is that really you, bud?” Not waiting for an answer, he wrapped the man in a tight hug. “It’s so good to see you, man. I thought you were --” he cut off, eyes watering with emotion. “Where - where’ve ya been?”