#twst!flounder

When Oliver is acting fearful and careful, Rielle remembers his friend, describing characteristics that pertain to a possible Twst!Flounder (whom we don’t know if he’s a merman like the Tweels, based on Ursula’s pet eels, or a normal fish).

Twst!Flounder is “a scaredy-cat but really kind guy”. He’s been Rielle’s absolute best friend since they were little. Whenever Rielle got into fights with his father, the king, Twst!Flounder was always there with him. While Rielle was looking forward to come to land, leaving his friend was the one thing that truly made him lonely and he hoped T!F is watching the match.

But in another moment, when Oliver suggests calling Minajael to talk if they should go inside the room or not because it could be dangerous, Rielle immediately sours up and recalls his other friend Horatio, who is a musical conductor (“his profession is musician”) and always tale-tells to his father about Rielle’s antics. “A friend who worries way too much and is always fussing over [him]”.

Oliver assumes that Horatio was Rielle’s caretaker, much to the other’s dismay. Rielle hates that people treat him like a kid. 

I can’t stress enough how important was this tidbit because it was foreshadowed here how Mina would play a form of “King Triton” in the argument with Rielle, similar to Triton and Ariel’s scenes when he scolds her for missing the performance and more on the aftermath/fallout post Triton destroying her grotto, in how she was left crying and he swam away, knowing he went too far but thinking it was best to leave her have some space… 

I’ll talk more about this point in another moment!

Back to Horatio, it’s a curious name because it’s not the first time it is mentioned in Twst. Back in Book 3, episode 27, when the group enters the Atlantica Memorial Museum, Jack comments: “Here's a photo commemorating the visit of Horatio XII, court musician... Here's one of a fourth princess…”

No image of Horatio XII is shown to us. We can see King Triton’s statue in the background but when Jack comments on it in their visit post-overblot, you can clearly see who he’s talking about.

So I wonder if Horatio XII is this Horatio that Rielle is talking about (because he talks about him as if he’s much older than him and his profession is being a conductor, so he should be an adult of sorts) or someone of his family, all Horatios related back to Sebastian. 

Edit: I forgot about it but commenter @/pk2-2006 reminded me of the interesting fact that Sebastian's full name is "Horatio Thelonious Ignacious Crustaceous Sebastian Crab". This is where the "Horatio" name comes from!

Similarly, a fourth princess is mentioned in that b3ch27 but we don’t know if it’s referring to Ariel’s original other 6 sisters (if this and Horatio XII are older photos from another time) or if it’s Rielle’s sister. I noticed it bc in one of his wikias, his family section has “six other unnamed siblings”, not brothers.