Alarm prickled at his tail-scales and Naoto woke to the overwhelming sensation of danger pulling at his extrasensories.

Naoto had been fortunate enough to always have a roof over his head growing up. The closest he came to sleeping outdoors was occasionally falling asleep in old ruins, Lluvan and Keyes beside him, after late nights playing with other nereid kids in the old, sunken cities.

How Naoto wished he had a rocky, cold ruin to sleep in now.

Nestling himself between two surface-breaching boulders should have been his safest bet for shelter - especially after finding all of those shed teeth. Sharp stones and barnacles dug into his exposed skin, the water smelled strange and there was barely enough room to curl his tail inside along with the rest of him - it was far from comfortable.

The only comfort he did find was the knowledge that the young otter was sleeping on the exposed rock above him. For now it was safe and it would not leave that rock, not as long as Naoto did not stir or leave.

Between the nausea that bit at the back of his throat - from the few mussels and salt peas he’d managed to swallow - and the reality of his situation slowly sinking in, exhaustion eventually caught up to him shortly after the sun’s full set.

But now every scale, every nerve was buzzing with warning as something circled his shelter. Naoto curled as much of himself inside as he could.

Hunger, he felt in his gut and his teeth.

Cold, he felt in the center of his chest.

Sharks were generally curious creatures, and when they were hungry there was an intent to their movements; most of the ones bold enough to directly pass through nereidic settlements would happily take free food over actual hunting and calmed once they were fed. Some of them demanded nose pats and to have their fins stroked afterwards, but, ultimately, sharks could be reasoned with.

It was a foreign, almost ancient wildness, that Naoto had never sensed before, that gripped this new creature.

The creature cased the crag Naoto had hidden in for any weakness. As it swam between the horizon and Naoto, he noticed two things.

One, the creature’s long shadow blotted out the pale moon enough to make out its shape: the creature had a short yet sharp snout; a stubby torso that blended with its abdomen into an awkwardly sleek shape; four limbs ending in tiny webbed toes, each toe tipped with a black claw; and a long paddled tail. Just from seeing the dark shadow lurk above, the creature was much longer and wider than Naoto.

And two, the water level in the bay had dropped considerably. There was now less than two feet of water between Naoto and the surface. Had the water disappeared with the arrival of the creature...?

If he left the cover of his shelter, he could be eaten. If he stayed, he risked dry-drowning.

Naoto had survived two Lotan attacks and now he was going to die in a puddle with a monster.

His long fingers clenched his bag, kneading the fabric as he tried to keep his focus off of the imminent death he was facing. Idly, his hands made out the shape of the dagger in his bag, feeling the handle for a full minute before he realized what it was.

Naoto was a healer - an apprentice, at that - not some sort of master game hunter. The closest he ever saw to “combat” was the occasional fin-fight he found himself in with other young nereids that could not be persuaded nor ignored. But those had been mere scuffs, the painful end to chases that shot through the winding alleys and canals of Reshfen after the word “notareid” had been pointedly thrown at him. But this was different. There were no Keyes and Lluvan to have his back here, no Captain Falcata in the civil guard to hide behind, no father to heal over the cuts and bruises.

There was only this thing, the sleeping sea otter above, and Naoto.

Shakily, he withdrew the dagger from his bag, slowly unwrapping it from the purple sea silk that hid its pearl grip and tarnished irogane blade. Naoto knew enough about weapons to know that the pointy end would do damage even if the blade itself was dulled from years of neglect.

The next time the creature passed in front of him, Naoto pointed the dagger at it, held tightly by both his white-knuckled hands, as if channeling all his Will into an unspoken warning directed at the thing.

It paused, mid-stroke of its paddle tail, and hung in the water. Naoto couldn’t see its eyes, but he felt it staring at him. Considering him. Sizing up what threat this previously easy meal posed.

Nearby, a sea bird broke the tension as it dove under the water - aiming for a fishy prize. And in the blink of an eye, the creature was gone - off to hunt something more familiar to its palette.

🐚✯🐚✯🐚✯🐚

The Porte Store | June 14th

Dawn’s light trickled in through the dirty storefront window. It spilled over the empty shelves, eventually gracing the dusty countertop that hid Charles from view.

From Charles’s best guess, he had been floating in the sea and washed up on the island of Byss for one day. Which meant that today was, by all accounts, his seventeenth birthday.

Charles had always felt that the universe had a certain… agenda. An agenda that involved kicking him when he was down. And boy was the universe not going halfsies for his birthday this year. Last year, the universe had sent a freak storm to blow up his shelter and make him fail his family trials, trapping him in one more year of being a child. This year, not to be outdone, Charles had awoken to find that seeing a giant boney monster create a crazy storm and waking up on an abandoned island populated by sea crocs and fishpeople was, in fact, not a really trippy nightmare.

Pulling the scratchy old blanket over his head, Charles lay on the floor of the shop. He was so tired - sleeping was a difficult task, between his stupid brain reminding him that he was shipwrecked every five minutes and the horrible noises he heard outside.

The scratching at the siding of the old store he’d set up camp in, the muted bellowing hiss of a large, lizard-like creature, was all the warning he needed to stay away from any of the windows last night. Whatever it was could likely smell him. If it saw him, its efforts to break in would likely double.

And now, with day breaking on the anniversary of the day of his birth, he wanted nothing more than to lay there and stare blankly at the wall.

Survival training that had been drilled into his skull since he was a child was numbed by his situation. He was stranded and alone. He was so very tired and sore from sitting on a bare floor all night.

And it was his birthday - he could have a little mental breakdown if he wanted to! The universe could allow him that, at the very least!

Charles buried his face in the blanket, muffling his screams of terror-and-insomnia-fueled frustration.

“Okay, Charles, keep it together,” he muttered aloud to himself. “It’s only day two. You’ve done this before, the being alone on an island thing, remember? You did it last year. The only difference is that you’ve got a premade shelter this time.” He yanked the blanket tighter against his skull, part of his soft mohawk escaping the constriction and sticking out in the front. “And Mom and Daren aren’t here to save you this time, and there are sea crocs, and mermaids...”

Reluctantly, he folded the blanket and placed it on top of the water kegs after having his fill of existential dread for the day.

It was still morning. Sea crocs were nocturnal, so they wouldn’t be a prominent problem until late evening at the earliest. The mermaids and syren would be more of a challenge, he reasoned, since they would be out during the day. Though, as long as he stayed away from the water at high tide and close to cover, such as buildings and trees, even the inhumans would be manageable.

Pacing by the storefront window, boots crunching stray grains of sand on the wood, he put more thought into his situation.

He had shelter. The biggest challenge facing him soon would be finding food and additional fresh water. The mountain on the opposite side of the island would likely be his best bet - Charles recalled there being a waterfall that fed into the bay.

But Charles would need to plan before heading off to the mountain, it was too far. He had no way to transport the water, besides the heavy wooden kegs that would be too energy-costly to carry by hand, and he’d be dizzy with hunger long before getting there if he couldn’t secure food prior to going. (A person could survive for almost a week without food. That didn’t mean Charles wanted to.)

Besides, with the creatures on this island, who knew what wildlife was up there! He couldn’t very well defend himself with a shovel.

So… the mountain was too far. For now, anyways. With that out of mind, Charles’s thoughts cycled back on what his plans should be for the day.

For starters, he would need to take stock of anything left in the store and repurpose it to hold food and/or kegs of potable water. So far he had a shovel, blanket, and a wood box. The Porte Store had a small back storage room, where fresh daylight had revealed a single rear door that led out onto a flagstone terrace. The back door had a lock on the inside, though Charles would need to find a way to reinforce the front door he’d broken into.

Once that was done, he’d need to find food and more fresh water. The people that had originally inhabited Byss wouldn’t have been able to make the trip up the mountain every day for water. They had to have had a well in town. Even if they didn’t, Charles had a shovel and the knowledge of how to dig a beach well.