Creaking across the old wood, Venus looked around the deck for any sign of life before swinging open a nearby door. She came face to face with a grandeur painting of a father, mother and young son. The boy looked eerily familiar to her but she didn’t care to think about it for another second after she spotted a shelf full of different and odd objects. Some were rusting down to their roots while others shined as if they reflected with the sea.

Digging deeper, she found luxurious necklaces, rings, and bracelets. She tilted her head then whispered, “I remember seeing mother wear things like this around her tail!” She giggled to herself and went to slip a diamond-encrusted necklace onto her own tail but realized she was playing human.

Unclipping the necklace, she walked over the mirror hanging on the wall and held it above her head thinking, ‘maybe it’s some type of crown?’ She clipped it again and tried draping it over her honey-blonde locks only for it to slip straight down to around her neck. The jewels dazzled in the sunlight making her smile radiantly as the necklace. Looking at the other jewelry in the room, she picked it up and realized it looked familiar.

Venus skipped over to the painting that hung in the dimly lit corner of the room and saw the same jewelry she held in her hands draped delicately on the mother in the painting.

Slipping on the rings and bracelets as the painting depicted, Venus twirled back to the mirror and gaped at the wonderful treasures she’d discovered. “I never knew the dry land would have such dazzling trinkets. I wonder why they’ve been collecting dust with the other rusty pieces.” She looked back in the mirror and bowed deeply and jeered with a smile, “you most certainly may not have this dance, my captain! I’m a proper lady, while you just yell at your crewmates all day for no reason at all!” She laughed at the thought of what Captain Caysien would really say if he heard her speak that way.

Turning and prancing around the room, Venus danced with the sunlight being the free fish she was. With the wind and dance knocked out of her, she finally calmed down enough to think it wise to put everything back to where she found it. Her salty sweat dripped from her forehead to her nose. Stepping over the small window, the creaked it open to smell the sea she longed for and to be refreshed from acting like something she wasn’t for longer than she anticipated.

With the sun and salt filtering through the room, Venus stepped over toward the shelf and began carefully taking off the jewelry she was dancing around with until she spotted some more peculiar objects upon the shelf. As the dust twinkled around her gaze, she picked up a small anchor-shaped stamp and pressed it hard against her hand, “curious...I wonder who would want to mark themselves with that?” She put it back and scoffed thinking it weird to have a rusty old thing like that. Blowing on the shelf, dust flew up into the air reminding her of the fresh salty breeze she felt when she first rose to the surface in her early years. With the reminiscence dangling next to her ear, she tilted her head at the sight of a small silver cufflink that was broken and weathered.

Picking it up, a spark blew up in her head making a memory flash by of a young boy floating in the water. His golden hair floated in the moonlit sea and the fire above the water raged on. It was only for a moment but it was enough to make her drop the trinket making a small ‘tink.’ It rolled across the floor until it was stopped by a coal boot.

Bending down, Scotty picked up the cufflink and looked around the room to see nothing out of place but the dust floating through the sunlight. He crept across the wood checking every corner for anything was askew in his captain’s room. The squeak with every step made him less intimidating and more foolish, he himself had the same thought as he blushed thinking of an intruder watching him walk across the floor sounding a duckling.

He hid his face in the palm of his hands and grunted while his face was ablaze. He crouched on the floor embarrassed and mumbled, “pray to tell me no one is watching me as of now!”

From behind the thin folding doors, Venus held her mouth to keep from laughing at the boy- ahem I mean man in front of her dying of embarrassment over some squeaky boots. She thought to herself, ‘if I really were to reveal myself now I know he’d be too upset to confront me!’ She reached her hand out to open the door when the entrance to the captain’s quarters swung open.

“What the hell are you doing here, Scotty? You’re supposed to be out there searching with the rest of the crew.” Stepping into the room completely with his white baggy shirt drifting with the wind, Captain Caysien cocked his head at his flushed crewmate, Scotty. He walked over to his desk and plopped his heavy boots onto his desk to lean back languidly.

Scotty skimpered over to him and stuttered, “w-well I thought I saw someone walking across the deck, s-so I came up to check and then heard someone talking in here! But I knew it wasn’t you because I just saw you on the docks Captain, so I wanted to make sure it wasn’t a Murili-”

“Stop right there! You know you can’t say things like that while we’re here.”

“I just,” Scotty twiddled his fingers embarrassed and mumbled, “I just wanted to make sure no one was here to steal your trophies.” He glanced at the dusty shelf with every piece of jewelry and knick-knack still ominously sitting in the same place as always.

Caspien slammed his boots on the floor and scoffed, “are you kidding me right now, Scott?” He stood up and brushed his fingers through his hair, “I thought you’ve known me long enough to know that these aren’t trophies, I’m not a lunatic!” He gave the boy a hearty laugh while ruffling his dark hair and told him, “I know you think I’m crazy when I tell you about my dreams and childhood but these are proof that it all happened.”

Scotty sat down on the stool in front of Caspien’s desk and patiently waited to hear a story from his one and only captain. His ears pricked up as the clanking of two glasses echoed throughout the room as Caspien poured two cups of rum for himself and his oldest friend.

Placing one cup in the hands of his mate while taking the other back to his desk, Caspien sat down and sighed, “lord knows how old I was when I first saw her. I couldn’t even tell you the first time we met” he lied through his teeth. “But I just remember her enchanting lavender eyes and the soft touch of her porcelain fingertips against my cheek as she told me, ‘there’s nothing for you to fear. I’ll always be right here with you, my child.’ She was the light of my life while my parents talked about when they would get back to Arla next.” He swirled the boos around in his cup and chuckled, “my mother didn’t notice I was gone until her jewelry started disappearing with me as well.”

Scotty laughed along with him and begged, “oh! Tell me about how the duchess scolded you after she found out. That’s always my favorite part of these stories!”

“She didn’t always scold me!”

Scotty tilted his head, “so she didn’t?”

“No, she most certainly did.” He scratched the scruff poking out of his chin and jeered, “at least she’s never yelled at me for crying during the welcoming ball!” He slapped his knee and burst out laughing remembering when he was first introduced to Scotty. They’d met at a ball welcoming home the country’s men from their 7-year long war against Murilia. They’d been friends for the last 2 decades while keeping their relationship under wraps from the rest of the crew.

Scotty pouted in his chair and mumbled, “at least I don’t dream about a mermaid I’ll never see again.” After saying what he did, Scotty covered his mouth and realized what he made his captain seem like.

‘A child…’ Venus thought to herself as she peered through the cracks in the door. The two men kept bickering as she longed to leave the dark closet she holed herself up in to escape being caught. She backed up to sit against the wall but felt something brittle behind her.

Turning around, she came face to face with a shriveled tail beaming in the sun that blazed through the cracks in the door. Vomit came up her throat but was stopped by her hand as she gazed around her to see dozens of hanging, severed tails all around the room she thought to be a closet. The ‘trophies’ hung from the ceiling and swayed from her touch making her dizzily petrified. Only to realize that the man she’s encountered before is searching for,

“--Her tail. You can’t tell me that if you saw a glamorous blue and gold tail flopping around in the water, you wouldn’t want to capture forever! What a sight to see. I need to find her Scotty, whether that makes me a fool caught in the past or a child looking for our future; I don’t care.”

Venus clamored about the room trying to find another door or hidden window to escape but came up ended handed. Curling up in the corner, Venus hid from the light and avoided the shriveled siren tails swinging with the afternoon tides.