Darkness can't drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate can't drive out hate; only love can do that.

-Martin Luther King Jr.

His blood was red. Bright, thick blood that ran through his veins, under his skin since the day he was born into the world, and it bled and colored the sand just as red, just as fast as her's might.

That was the thought that made Anandi stop and stare toward the shoreline while the rest of the villagers nearly trampled over each other trying to get back to their homes.

Pirates were enough of a fearful threat to send anyone running; the village she called home had only been attacked a handful of times by them, each encounter ending with Chief Gopalrao handing over supplies, food, and offering lodging until they left. There were never any casualties; this town was made up of civilians with no combat experience and no real hope of fighting back. Anandi herself was a common practice doctor, more used to wrapping bandages and raising scalpels than raising her fists.

Just giving them what they wanted was the smarter choice and at any rate, most of the pirates only seemed interested in taking what they needed and being on their way. No fuss, no hassle, nothing worth getting overzealous about in such a small place with no real valuables to speak of.

But those petty thieves and extortionist were nothing compared to this pirate, who has washed up like a beached whale on the hot sand. Since the early morning there were sounds of cannons and yelling and guns from the far east side of the island; Anandi and small group of people had volunteered to go through the forest to the edge of the beach and see what the commotion was.

Even that was routine; pirates sailed the ocean after all, and it wasn't uncommon that different ships would cross each other's paths at some point and start a fight. Occasionally the marine forces on the next island over would step in and involve themselves in the fray; but the town was mostly under their radar, not worth much notice if a few pirates came around every few years or so to start trouble. They had enough problems with bigger cities and bigger fish to catch.

Anandi and at least twenty other able bodied men and women had gone forward to know what was happening, to have an idea of what to expect at the outbreak of violence and noise that was happening just a few miles away. One ship was down, sunk and smoking like a wildfire as it went under the waves; people she assumed were pirates by the ships tattered flag were struggling to get their heads over the surface of the crashing waves. A few were still on the boat crying out for help, but the growing waves would soon silence their cries.

Then there was a smaller ship, similar to a dhow, just a size bigger; it was closer to the island, and while it was not in ruins as the other, more sturdy vessel, it was half sunken in the water. There was no one else on board; Anandi had watched the one lone figure who swam his way to land, arms cutting through the waves that may have crushed another man to death. When he was finally able to drag himself to shore, a large stick jutting out from his back and blood spilling over onto the ground, it was then that she and the others saw him for what he really was and fled.

A visit from a pirate was bad enough. A fishman was a death sentence; Anandi too had turned, ready to run for her life, run back home and board up the windows and doors, maybe even take some food with her and hide in the brush until he left or perished of starvation and the elements. The high tide would take him if the blood loss didn't first.

But even as the other's screamed and made a ruckus from their fleeing, the fishman didn't stir from where he lay. A low, throaty cough escaped him and more blood ran from his mouth; Anandi had paused and waited, but he made no other movements. From where she stood, his back was rising up and down just barely; he was positioned shakily on his side, hand gripping onto the other end of the staff lodged in his body and coming out his stomach. She realized that without a doubt, they had nothing to fear; he was dying where he lay.

"There's so much."

His blood was red, bright and splattered and oozing in a slow pace from his wound and his mouth; his torn shirt was also stained. Most likely not his own, which would explain the red spots on the water's surface by the larger, sinking ship.

"He probably tried to attack them and steal their ship; a fishman could over power a group of humans easily enough. He tried to kill them, rob them, and now he's paying the price."

The fishman groaned and his haggard, weak curse made Anandi jump; he was trying to pull out the staff, but it broke off on one end. The other half was still lodged in his back.

"He was probably going to steal from us too and kill us. He's a fishman. They hate humans, they don't care if they haven't done anything to deserve it!"

Anandi couldn't move; he let out another cough, a wheeze and his hand slowly loosened around his grip on the broken half of the stick. Then he slumped over on his stomach with a heavy thud as the blood spread.

"I have to leave. I should go tell the others he's dying, they must be scared to death right now. I have to go, I have to run!"

"G-get out of my sight…"

The fishman's fierce glare was punctuated with the utter disdain he spoke to Anandi with; she might have felt more intimidated if his stare wasn't half glazed over from the pain.

"I…"

"Get out!" another painful, choking sound as he spasmed. "I don't want the last thing I see in this life to be an ugly human."

"I just…" Anandi stood over him, hands glued to her sides; she couldn't tear her eyes away from the blood. "You're bleeding…"

"Come to watch the monster die? Or maybe take a crack at the spear in my back?" his faint chuckle was malicious; was he holding on to life out of spite, so a human wouldn't get the satisfaction of seeing him suffer? "Go on if you dare. I'll break your puny arms and take you to the next world with me."

Anandi knelt down slowly and took the skirt of her dress in both hands; she found the seam and tore it with her teeth. The fishman's eyes narrowed as he watched the cloth rip away, until only some of it remained to cover herself.

"What the hell-?"

"I have to pull it out." Anandi gestured to the staff. "I have to do it quick and stop the bleeding."

The fishman let out a howl of anger. "You little brat!"

Anandi jumped back as his arms twitched, but it was unnecessary.

"Dammit-dammit all! Don't come near me, not you, not a stinking, inferior, pathetic-GET AWAY!"

No matter how hard he kicked or tried to raise his limbs, they barely budged. He had lost too much blood; the dim, hateful glint in his eyes was fading.

"I'm sorry! Brace yourself!"

Anandi stood up and stepped over to him, digging her feet in the sand and taking the staff in both hands; he cursed and raged despite his condition, desperately trying to buck her off as she tugged and pulled with all her strength.

"NO!"

The stick finally slid out in Anandi's grasp, the blood now coming out even faster and soaking the white sand red; she cried out and quickly pressed the cloth over his wound.

"I need something to keep the pressure...I need…"

Rope. Debris was all around, floating in from the wreckage. Anandi looked around wildly, deaf to the fishman's cursing. There was bits of rope and crates just a few feet away; she ran over and back, nearly tripping over nothing as she returned to his side and tied the rope all around his middle to secure the cloth.

"I'm so scared...if he could, he would kill me right here, right now."

Anandi felt relieved tears come to her eyes as he fell limp; she waited and began gathering other things from the shore. There were crates of supplies, floating in the shallows; she took them to land, wading through the seaweed, a bundle of anxiety in her stomach turning and knotting up as she checked the fishman. He was breathing, probably just passed out from the loss of blood and the pain of the spear being yanked out. Anandi touched his shoulder lightly, the skin hard but somewhat slippery; it reminded her of when she caught a fish barehanded it had slipped from her grip in an instant.

With a trembling sigh, Anandi attempted to hoist him up on one of her shoulders, but he was too heavy. Instead she had to drag him upward to the small shack, long ago abandoned when fishing and selling the catch was replaced with farming exports. It was just too dangerous with all the sea creatures that showed their ugly heads on the shorelines.

"And here I am helping one...what's wrong with me? If I was in his place, he'd feed me to the sharks. Or even eat me himself…"

She was not stupid. Deep down in her heart, Anandi knew not all fishmen were like the one she was struggling to bring to safety as she ran back to her own little cabin to grab supplies for a blood transfusion. She knew because she most definitely knew they assumed the same about as the humans, specifically the ones who looked at them as animals, inferior creatures incapable of anything but savagery. But just as not all humans were so hateful, surely, Anandi couldn't help believe that under all the fear and uncertainty and suspicion that not all of these beings must be like the one she was busy hooking up to a small IV.

"But this one clearly hates me as blindly as I feared him." Anandi found a vein in the crook of her elbow and with one last look to make sure the fishman was unconscious, she stuck the needle into it. "No. I am still scared. I'm scared he'll kill me. I'm scared of what he'll do when he wakes up. But it can't be helped; I'm still a doctor."

Anandi watched carefully as the bag of blood strung up onto a makeshift hook dripped and filled as her blood began flowing through the tube to his own. The truth was, part of her was ashamed; she knew it was wrong to feel the way she did; it was irrational, plain foolish to be afraid about something she knew nothing about. It was part of the reason Anandi had studied medicine and diseases, to understand, to know why and how she could help alleviate the pain and fear that came partially from the unknown. An illness that may or may not mean the end of someone's life or a cure that could save it.

"Maybe…"

Anandi chanced a longer look at the fishman's face as she slowly sterilized and covered the place where the needle had been in his arm.

"Just maybe there's a chance this can help. Maybe he'll go back to the fishman after this and tell them, tell them that even a human as fearful of them as me could see reason."

At any rate, her conscience would not suffer for neglecting to treat an ailing man on his deathbed.

"A man." Anandi smiled and shook her head at the term; she supposed it was half accurate. "Well, I guess I better get this guy some food for when he wakes up; maybe if he eats that he won't think of eating me out of spite."

The shack's abandoned and meager fishing supplies weren't much, but she didn't really need them in the first place. Along the beaches border were tide pools of sea life; during high tide, they were covered by a few feet of water, but as the sea calmed down and the ocean receded from the sand, the little pools revealed sea life such as clams, mussels, small crabs, and craw fish, along with some smaller fish like anchovies or bluegills that would occasionally get washed up in the pools. These could be scrapped of scales and cracked open to reveal the meat inside.

"I hope this pot is big enough." Anandi sighed lightly as she stirred the stew that was just about to overflow; she almost second guessed keeping the guts of the fish, but without them, there really wasn't that much meat and the less wanted parts of the fish were the most nutritious.

"The fishman's going to need all the nutrients he can get once he wakes up." Anandi let the stew simmer in the fireplace, hoping the old thing wouldn't crumble from getting some use as she scrubbed dirt off the oranges and bananas she had found in the forest.

Maybe it was the light sound of the scrubbing or the noise the stew made as it sizzled and bubbled as Anandi took it off the fire; maybe it was even the smell or maybe it was just bad luck.

Whatever the reason, she looked up from finishing the cooking to see two icy blue eyes staring at her almost unseeingly.

Anandi didn't know what to do aside from completely stopping everything to stare back; the fishman seemed to be in a similar state, not so much due to shock or apprehension like her, but more because he was still shaking the fog from his mind, trying to comprehend what he was looking at.

"You...you…."

The stew was filling the shack with a wonderful hearty aroma and the fire provided a source of warmth on an otherwise chilly evening; the sun's rays were barely visible and Anandi only just realized she must have spent all day down at the beach. It almost surprised her, as the expectation was that he would need at least another day or so before he had the strength to tear the bandage from his arm. His eyes darted from his arm to the cleaned and disinfected needles, IV, and blood bag.

"You! How dare you!? Do you have any, any idea in that hollow, feeble skull what you've done?!"

Anandi scooted back as he grabbed his arm hard enough to cause the small hole where the needle had been inserted to reopen itself and leak blood.

"Wait, stop, you shouldn't do that!" she rose and held up her hands, not daring to come closer but barely containing her panic as he squeezed tighter and bled faster.

"Get it out! Get it out this instant!"

He clenched his fist and eyes shut against the pain of the spear injury as he stood to his full height. "You trash, get your blood out of me!"

"I-I'm sorry, but that's impossible." Anandi said with all the strength she could muster. "My blood is O negative, it's fine to give to anyone for a transfusion; please try to calm down-"

"Do you even understand human? Do you even realize what you've done!? I would have rather died and rotted in the ocean and got eaten by sea kings than have your disgusting blood run through me."

The fishman's tone was deathly quiet, but no less viciously disdainful; Anandi took a step back, almost tripping as he took one forward; he had stopped trying to force blood from his elbow, his eyes glued to her shaking form.

"I...I just…"

"You just what? Can't you even speak in the presences of a fishman? Are you so terrified? Did you think I would feel indebted to you?"

The malicious grin revealed rows of teeth that Anandi immediately found herself imagining sinking into her jugular.

"You presumptuous piece of trash. I rejected you. I would have rather died; I owe you nothing but the back of my hand!"

The fishman took a mighty swing that most likely would have knocked Anandi head from her neck, but the pain in his body was still too much; on some miracle, he stumbled and fell sideways into the wall, shaking the whole structure as he groaned from the pain. It left her an opening to dash out of the room. She breathed harshly and didn't look back as he roared and cursed her, only continued forward with the pounding of her footsteps ringing in her ears as Anandi made her escape. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she ran through the village to what was hopefully safety; most of the others were already in their own homes, getting done with dinner and ready for a peaceful night's sleep.

"I put everyone in danger." Anandi thought in a flurry of panicked thoughts as she found herself running not into her home, but to the Chief's building.

Once Anandi burst in past the guards and explained through her anxious sobs what had transpired, a mob of fifty people plus herself and Chief Gopalrao were matching down the beach with whatever weapons they could find as well as brightly lit torches, burning both for visibility in the near pitch darkness and to burn down the little shack.

It was just a few feet from the shack when Anandi and everyone else realized something was not right.

"Doctor, what are you playing at? Is this your idea of some joke?" The Chief's gaze went to her sharply as Anandi made her way closer to the door that was open and swinging in the breeze. The fire was out, the food was gone. Even her medical supplies was nowhere to be seen.

"Sir, I'm not joking!" Anandi scanned the area; the mob of people were now lowering their weapons, but their confused and angry faces were all turned towards her accusingly. "There was a fishman, he tried to attack me once he woke up, and then-!"

"Look!"

One of the men shouted excitedly; in the light of the torches, a set of large footprints could be seen leading from the beach to the ocean. But they stopped where the water slowly ebbed and flowed over the dark, wet sand.

"It seems our unexpected visitor took his leave." Chief Gopalrao said lowly before casting her a hard look. "It was injured, yes?"

Anandi fought the impulse to frown at the term. "Yes sir, he was having a hard time keeping his balance. He lost a copious amount of blood, by all accounts, a person should have died."

"Yeah, a person not a monster." someone grumbled. "We must have scared it off."

Chief Gopalrao stared off into the ocean. "Perhaps. If he was in such a state, he must have realized we had the advantage of catching him at his weakest. Doctor, were there no other surviving fishmen?"

"No sir. He was the only one who washed ashore."

The Chief closed his eyes and exhaled with a deep frown, the lines in his face much more pronounced; as stern as he was, it was evident relief was sinking in.

"I understand that as a medical practitioner you have been sworn to treat any persons that need it."

Anandi looked down at her bare feet as his stare bored a hole into her head, as well as every other person that was present.

"That's all well and good, but surely you must have thought of what a dangerous force your actions could have unleashed on this town?"

"I-"

"Doctor, your foolish disregard for common sense could have cost us any security we have in a place already barely in contact with the world at large. Can you comprehend the chaos of a human hating fishman on this island?"

She couldn't feel any lower if he had said she was to be banished; her effort to do the right thing ended in her almost personally being decapitated and now, mostly likely disdain from her peers.

"I do sir. I will be more careful in the future of who I provide my services to…"

"There will be no penalty. We were lucky this time. Hopefully, there will be no need to count on luck again."

Chief Gopalrao sighed and put a hand on Anandi's shoulder briefly before walking past her and up the slope to the forest borders. The rest of the mob was following suit, casting her strange and disapproving glares as she stood there, toes sinking into the wet sand as she held back tears of shame.

The moment Anandi was certain she was completely alone, she collapsed to the ground and let the waves lick at her legs as while she covered her damp face; all the adrenaline had left her feeling exhausted, but not more so than the fact that in one day, she had managed to do nothing right when all she wanted to do was make the world a little less wrong.

Anandi failed to even sense the cold glare that never wavered even as the night wore on and she had long ago picked herself up to drag her feet in the direction of the village for a wink of sleep.