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[buywithme]

[Tap tap tap

Yes, that sound is coming from your window, barge denizen, it is the soft tapping of little fingers on irritatingly water resistant glass.

Tap tap tap

Usually, Prefect is pretty much the last person on the barge who would come tapping at someone's window, trying to lure their out of their room into a watery grave. He's a nice person, and more than that, a man who holds himself up to a high set of moral standards.

Unfortunately, he fell overboard and turned into a mermaid, and he does have a precedent for taking a keen interest in fucking with people when he's been turned into a mermaid. Still, it's probably okay to open your window and talk to him, right?

Tap tap tap

Tap tap tap

Tap tap tap...]

Comments

[with_my_teacup]

You have to cut them into pieces and eat fast or leave the rest. It's trouble. And they taste gamey, like a whalefall.

I've only had them dead, maybe they're better fresh.

[He frees the net and slings it around his waist, tying it up carefully out of the way of his fins.]

Why do you want to know all that? They seem pretty simple. Do like, air and light. Don't like, drowning, being eaten.

[buywithme]

You would have had to cut me into pieces... [Probably. Prefect swims a lazy little lap of Riddick, eyes now utterly attentive to the little light shining over him.]

They have all kinds of things though, and they wear all kinds of clothes... and I think perhaps they feel things that we do not feel...

[with_my_teacup]

That is not a toy. It is part of my spine. I'll hide it again and you won't be able to see.

[He flares his fins to look bigger, and lifts his dorsal spines, most of them much shorter than that long whip but much sharper looking.]

Like what do they feel?

Besides jellyfish, when you're around.

[buywithme]

I'm not playing with it! [Prefect insists, shrilly. He's not playing with it, just... well, drawn to it. It glows in the darkness, and Prefect is hungry...

He frowns, as the fins flare up, and positions himself to avoid them, while still not wanting to swim away, really.]

And I don't know what they Feel. Sometimes I see little glimpses of something strange in them, but then it goes, and I don't know what it is.

[with_my_teacup]

You make sense like nautiluses make sense.

[And they swim backwards and navigate by bumping their shells into things, Prefect. Examine your life, and your choices.]

[buywithme]

You're so rude.

[Sighhhh. But he still likes the tiny light on your spine, so there's that...]

[with_my_teacup]

My mother always told me that politeness is the only lure that you unbright people can use. I'm not biting. [Sniff.]

[buywithme]

If you did, you'd not eat people who you're on first name terms with. [Prefect critiques, before leaning down to bite a little bite on Riddick's shoulder.

A friend-bite. He's cleaning him.]

[with_my_teacup]

I was mostly angry.

And some hungry.

Mostly angry. Most things that go for my lure don't have hands.

[His shoulder flinches, and he gives the other mer a long, suspicious look. But he lets him get on with it. If blood happens, though, he's netting the little shit and locking him in a ship's hold until the new ship is gone just to teach him a lesson.]

[buywithme]

It's not my fault you have a beautiful, delicious looking lure. [Prefect says, sulkily, between nips at Riddick's shoulder.] In fact, it is clearly your fault, since you make it like that deliberately to lure people in...

[He bites again. Still not drawing blood, but maybe a little harder this time. An unhappy criticism of your attempt to eat him.]

[with_my_teacup]

To lure fish! Fish! Organisms with small brains and uncomplicated life outlooks!

The occasional large crustacean! Mostly fish!

[buywithme]

I'm just saying this is what happens when you make yourself look like food.

[with_my_teacup]

[Riddick drops his bottom jaw, extending his mouth wide, and then shuts it with a snap.]

Likewise, little merboy. Use your brain, not your eyes.

[buywithme]

[At the snapping of jaws, Prefect quickly skitters off away into the darkness.

Then he quickly realises that he can't see, and swims slowly back.]

Can we go up? Where it's shallower?

[with_my_teacup]

Not too far. It starts to hurt. But a little toward the light.

[Sigh]

For someone who thinks tools aren't fair you really could use a lantern.

[buywithme]

No. When you shine a light, things come for you from the dark. I'm not like you. I don't do well to attract things.

[with_my_teacup]

Hfff.

[But he'll swim someplace a little less incredibly dark, Prefect. It may even be an apology for trying to eat you.

It may not.]

[buywithme]

[Prefect feels more or less placated now that he's been led to lighter climes, so he sighs lightly.]

Sorry for trying to eat your lure...

[with_my_teacup]

[Grunt]

Well, I'm not going to eat you.

[Sorry, Prefect, that's as close to an apology as the angler gets.

He squints in the light-- dim though it is it takes a lot of getting used to. He's a dull red color, here where red light actually reaches. He thinks he looks just splendid. Do you have sensory papillae? No? Bet you're jealous.]