“What the hell…?” Nico muttered under his breath, running a shaky hand through his hair. He didn’t know whether to be scared, angry, or… amazed. A part of him wanted to understand, to grasp what was happening, but another part of him, the part that had always been desperate for the water’s embrace, felt something dark stir in him.

Why him? Why Emilio?

Emilio’s voice was weak, barely a whisper. “Nico… I just… I just wanted to know.”

The words were soft, laden with emotion, but Nico couldn’t understand. He still felt the rush of disbelief. He looked down at Emilio’s tail again, a mix of awe and something far more complicated settling in his chest.

“Know what?” Nico finally said, his tone strained. “You… you didn’t belong here. You never… I thought you’d drown, I—”

“I wanted to know why you loved it,” Emilio interrupted, his voice almost too faint to hear. “I wanted to see it the way you do. I wanted to understand.”

For a moment, the air between them hung heavy. Nico’s gaze softened, his jealousy momentarily forgotten in the weight of what his brother had said. The ache in his chest didn’t go away, but it was replaced by something else—an understanding, a shift. Emilio had always looked up to him, but this? This was something neither of them had ever imagined.

Nico inhaled deeply, staring at the tail, then back at his brother’s wide eyes—full of fear, vulnerability, and a new kind of strength.

Without thinking, Nico placed a hand on Emilio’s shoulder, his grip firm but gentle. “Don’t ever scare me like that again,” he said, his voice hoarse.

Emilio nodded weakly, still processing what had just happened, his heart racing with an overwhelming mix of emotions. But in that moment, with his brother’s steady hand on his shoulder and the cold ocean pressing against the sides of the boat, he finally felt the first thread of connection, not just to the water—but to his brother.

Emilio’s breathing grew shallow, his body limp against Nico’s chest. He was slipping—too weak, too exhausted to stay conscious. His mind spun in a haze, the cold of the water still clinging to his skin. The rush of emotions, the overwhelming mix of fear and awe, had drained him, and now his body was betraying him.

“Nico…” he whispered, his voice barely audible, the words slipping away as his eyelids fluttered.

Before Nico could respond, Emilio’s body sagged further, and he passed out, his weight heavy in Nico’s arms. For a moment, Nico could only stare at him, frozen, unsure of what to do. Emilio felt like nothing more than dead weight in his arms. But beneath the weight of his brother, Nico could sense the difference—the pressure of his brother’s body without the strange, unfamiliar sensation of the tail. The tail had disappeared completely, one moment it had been there, impossibly slick, and the next it was simply gone. It wasn’t like it had been pulled away, but as if it never existed to begin with, vanishing without a trace, like mist dissipating in the air. Nico didn’t know what caused it, or if it would come back, but something had shifted. It wasn’t just Emilio’s physical state, but the world around them had changed too.

The silence stretched on as Nico held his brother close, unsure of what to do next.

Then, from behind him, he heard soft footsteps—his mother, stepping out from the cabin with the same distant presence she always had. But today, there was a faint tightness to her expression, a quiet sense of worry that made Nico’s chest tighten. She didn’t need to ask; she already felt it, that something had changed.

Her eyes locked onto Emilio’s unconscious form in Nico’s arms. “What happened?” she asked, her voice carrying an undercurrent of knowing, though she didn’t yet have the full picture.

Nico’s heart slammed against his ribcage, the panic rising as he tried to keep his composure. “He fell in the water,” Nico said, voice rough but steady. “He couldn’t swim, so I helped him out.”

His mother didn’t ask for more details. She didn’t need to. She was distant, but that distance had always come with an intuition that couldn’t be ignored. She glanced at Emilio, worry evident in her eyes, but there was nothing in her gaze that suggested the depth of concern that a mother might typically feel. Still, Nico could see it—the sense that something, some invisible shift, had just happened.

“Is he okay?” she asked after a moment, her voice soft but steady.

Nico nodded, his gaze avoiding hers as he held Emilio tighter. “Yeah. He’s fine now.”

His mother hesitated, taking in the scene before her, and then nodded, accepting his words. “We’ll get him inside.”

Behind them, Nico could feel the presence of their father, standing just inside the cabin doorway, watching them in silence. The same detachment was in his posture as always, but there was something else—a subtle shift in his gaze when he looked at Emilio. No panic. No concern. Only the faintest trace of annoyance, as if Emilio’s fall had been nothing more than an inconvenience to him. The same man who had caused it, though Nico knew better than to confront him now. It wasn’t the time for that.

The father said nothing, merely glanced at Nico and then looked away, disinterested, his attention quickly drawn back to whatever was on his mind. Nico, still holding Emilio, didn’t wait for any more words from him.

“Alright,” Nico said, breaking the tension. “I’ll get him inside.”

His mother gave a single nod, turning away to prepare to help him, and Nico followed, careful not to meet his father’s eyes again.

With that, Nico carefully lifted Emilio, adjusting him in his arms, his body trembling from the weight of his brother’s unconscious form. Nico felt the ground shift beneath them both, as if they were both stepping onto uncertain, uncharted land, but there was no turning back now. The truth would reveal itself in time.

And for now, he could only move forward.