A/N: I've seen quite a few fics of Tula's death and the aftermath - and how it could have happened, but I've never seen then from Garth's point of view, or even much of Garth's reaction in them - and well, I'm under the impression that he and Tula were still together at the time (also I have this need to defy the usual)

~o~

It's so ironic – or maybe it's just the universe's sick, cruel twist – that for fish out of water, they've been placed so painfully close to the environment of their home, yet just far enough to not be able to touch it. The moisture is crying out to him, teasing just near the surface of his skin – so, so close, yet he can't move towards it.
His chest hurts. It's hard to breathe.

He stretches out his hand to the side, his fingers brush against the back of her hand. "Tu-…Tula," he coughs out – is there blood in his throat? "Tula, we'll be okay," he gasps, his fingers rubbing on her skin, "the other's will find us. They will."

He thinks he gets a response from her. It's hard to hear through the blood roaring in his ears; waves crashing against each other through his thoughts, oddly out of place among the dead silence of the dock shed.

Although he does hear the real crash that comes next. The door – something has crunched and boomed against it, blown it open. He hears a man's voice swear, and footsteps – friends? – running toward them. The black and red stealth costume of Kid Flash is the one that slides into his view while another pair of feet run past his head to the woman laying next to him. His hand grasps more fervently for Tula's now, pushing it away from him in the process as Kid Flash crouches down next to him. "Hang on, buddy," the other young man says to him, placing one hand on his shoulder and eyeing the piece of shrapnel that is sticking out of Garth's chest, snugly impaled into his ribcage. "We're going to get you guys out of here." Garth stops gripping for Tula's hand, and tries to focus as Wally is struggling to get him to sit up, slipping Garth's arm over his shoulders. "Do you think you'll be able to take Tula out on your own?" he asks the team member that he's arrived with.

Garth can't hear the reply from the other person. He's too busy trying to stop his head from spinning and falling off as Wally pulls him up onto his feet. Still, that doesn't stop him from noticing the way Wally freezes, and the long pause before he finally lets out a disbelieving whisper; "…what?"

Once again he can't catch what the other person is saying, but from the soft, husky murmur that speaks to Wally, he's guessing it's Artemis that came with him (which, would make sense, seeing as they were the ones that had been situated closest to him and Tula for the mission). The bare, sculpted arms that duck underneath Garth's other arm, helping Wally carry him out, confirm his suspicion.

He tries to turn his head towards Tula, where she was laying, but he can only loll it weakly to the side, and Artemis' face and mass of blonde hair is blocking his view. "Bu…but T-tula," he mumbles, metallic tasting blood rising up from his throat and slipping through his mouth as he speaks.

"She's gonna be fine," Artemis says quickly. "She told us to take you first. She said you need help faster than she did." The archer is glaring straight ahead, focusing on what is in front of her, rather than facing Garth, while Wally isn't saying anything.

Tula has always told him that Artemis is a horrible liar.

They only tell him after his fourth night in the medical bay, only after they are sure that he is "stable" and "strong enough to handle this". They speak slowly and softly, hesitant and reluctant to spit it out. Really, why do even bother?

He doesn't understand how anyone could ever be strong and stable enough to be told that the person they love is dead; how that blow could possibly be cushioned by soft voices and firm hands resting on your shoulder.

It still kills you all the same.

"There will be two separate services held for her. One for the hero community, and one back down in Atlantis." Facts, facts, boring facts. That's all Batman seems to be able to talk in. Even with a young hero dead, and many more shocked and traumatized, it's still always the facts.

"Of course," his king, the Aquaman, steps in, "there is no obligation for you to go to both of them, not if you don not want to. You only have to go if you are up to it."

He rolls over, ignoring the flash of pain in his chest; the pain you get for being the one to survive – the one to keep on living. "I will not be going," he sighs into his pillow.

"You will not be going to the one held by the Justice League? Or…"

He's not entirely sure they managed to get all of the shrapnel out. He can still feel it, twisting and jiggling between his ribs, sharp fingers clawing at the inside of his lung. The pressure is on his chest again. He can't breathe.

"Either."

He plummets the room into silence with his resolve. Finally. He shuts his eyes and embraces it, letting his head swim back into the waters of nothingness.

"What is that?" The water shrinks away and his eyes open. Why can't they just leave him?

"I will not be going to either of the services."

"Garth, son…"

"I'm tired." Aquaman pauses in his attempt to reach out to him, and stands up, turning, with Batman, to leave the room, and Garth resigns himself back to the stifling warmth and silence of the room; back to the dark depths of the ocean in his mind, swimming and searching, through the black, for her.

Four, pale skinned, freckled fingers and a thumb are interlaced with the same amount of phalanges of a darker, tanned skin colour. Even though the owners of these entwined hands are speaking to him currently, the only thing he can focus on it their hands, the way that the paler hand is clutching tightly onto the other, in fear of having to let go, fear of having it slip through his fingers. Their fingers are fixed together like a braid; strong, unable to be untangled or separated - at least, that's what they think.

Garth knows that you can separate a braid - very easily. All you have to do is cut right through it.

He had tried to hold Tula's hand that night, on the floor, so close to water, yet so far. He tried to hold it through the pain, through the nightmare that still hasn't ended for him. Whether he had tried to hold it for her, or for himself though – he isn't sure.

The point is moot though; because he was never able to grasp it.

He wonders if she was already dead by that time; and if the hand he was reaching out for was already cold and lifeless.

Lifeless or not, he'd give anything to be able to braid his hand with hers right now.

He keeps waiting for Kaldur to come; talk to him about it, reminisce with him about their early days in the conservatory of magic. They'll talk about the first lessons they had, where Tula immediately made it her personal goal to beat the both of them in the grading. They'll talk about the first exam, when she totally wiped the floor with Kaldur, and expected to do the same with Garth, sorely disappointed when he was discovered to be a highly talented sorcerer, beating her and topping that class from that year on. They'll talk about the time they both saved Aquaman from Ocean Master, and ended up getting a serious scolding from Tula, acting like a mother and telling to two of them to never be "that stupid" again.

They'll talk about everything, and maybe it'll all work itself out again. Maybe things will go back to a semblance of normality.

But Kaldur never visits. Garth never hears from him. The next, and last time he sees his longest and best friend, he's walking up the ramp into Black Manta's ship, glaring at them and announcing that he will never come back – he will never forgive them for the tragedy that has occurred within them.

Garth doesn't get it.

Nightwing doesn't even try to change his mind. He doesn't question it and doesn't try to coerce him giving it a second shot. Garth does feel bad, a little – Artemis and Kid Flash also announced that they were retiring for while only a few weeks ago, saying that they need to try and focus on college. There's more to it though, Garth knows that.

Still, towards his apologies and expressions that he just can't do this anymore, Nightwing shrugs and says it's fine. They have plenty on newer kids coming in, he says, and the rest of them can manage – for now.

"If you need me," Garth says to him, "I'll be available as soon as possible. I promise that."

Nightwing nods. "What are you going to do now?" he asks, and Garth is struck into thought, staring at the ground.

"I'm…I'm not sure yet."

"Well," Nightwing smiles, "whatever it ends up being, good luck." Garth nods and steps through the zeta tube, teleporting him straight to Poseidonis, into the smooth, comforting ocean – the water filling through his lungs, soaking into his skin, splashing over his psyche and mentality; tangible and close and able to be touched and embraced, and never just that far enough away from him again.

~o~

Reviews would be very welcome! :)