Human Stuff:

For the first time in her ten-year life she could finally leave the main city of the underwater kingdom of Atlantica. Ariel was very excited to go exploring and couldn't wait until the day after her tenth birthday. Of course she knew her father would never let her go unless one of her sisters accompanied her.

As Ariel waited by the doors she wondered if Aquata even was coming. She knew that they all had other things to do, but this was important to her. She impatiently glanced down the hallway once more and smiled. Aquata hadn't changed her mind about coming.

"Sorry I'm late Ariel, dear." The brunette mermaid told her sister as they swam out the door. "Daddy wanted to talk to me about my responsibility over you."

Yes, King Triton wanted to make sure that Aquata knew what she was getting herself into when taking Ariel outside the city gates. Ever since she was younger Ariel had been a really curious mermaid; always exploring what she wasn't and getting into trouble because of it. The redhead, of course, never regretted those times.

As they swam to the gates of the kingdom Ariel picked up some speed. She wanted to hurry up and reach the gates so that she could leave for the first time. She didn't even realize that she had left Aquata behind until she heard, "Ariel, slow down."

The ten-year-old mermaid stopped swimming and waited for her sister. While she was waiting for Aquata to catch up with her she started to wish her father had let her go exploring on her own. Ariel knew that she was too young to go exploring on her own, but in three years, however, she could explore on her own.

"Ariel, now when we're outside these gates, you can't just go swimming off like you just did." Aquata informed her younger sister as they waited for the gates to open. "You have to be careful out here in the open sea. There's a lot of dangerous fish in the sea that'll take advantage of a young mermaid such as yourself."

Ariel huffed, blowing a loose strand of red hair out of her eyes. Her father had given her a lecture of all the dangers of the open sea before they had left and the last thing she needed was another one from her sister.

"I know, Aquata, I know." Ariel told her sister, as she swam a head, but not too far.

Aquata shook her head. She had a feeling that no matter who told Ariel that it wasn't safe in the open sea that she wasn't going to listen. Ariel didn't listen back at the palace, anyways, so why should the open sea be any different. She felt that it was a good thing that she went with her youngest sister to keep her out of trouble.

Ariel was amazed at all of the other sea animals that they passed. She had only seen some of them in the books that she was meant to study. The wild sea flowers had to be Ariel's favorite part of the open sea. Aquata had a hard time keeping up with her sister. Damn, that little mermaid could swim fast.

As Aquata swam to keep up with Ariel a huge, sunken, rotting ship came into view. She looked at her sister and instantly became worried. Ariel was right next to the hole in the ship and it looked like she was about to enter it. "Ariel, wait!" Aquata called to the mermaid as she swam as fast as she could over to Ariel.

A sunken ship was the most dangerous place underwater. If anything happened to Ariel, especially inside a sunken ship, her father would have her tail. However, Ariel didn't listen, as Aquata figured she would, and swam inside the hole.

Reluctantly Aquata followed her sister inside. "Ariel, we should leave."

Ariel hadn't heard a word Aquata said since she had seen the sunken ship. This had impressed her the most so far out of what she had seen. The wild sea flowers were nothing compared to this. The only thing she knew about ships was that humans used them whenever they wanted to go out on the water. She never quiet understood why they just didn't swim.

For some reason Ariel thought that the inside of the ship was absolutely intriguing. Every shred of human stuff, that was left, she went to immediately as soon as she spotted it. "Aquata, all this stuff belonged to humans, correct?" Ariel asked her sister as she looked up from some maps.

Aquata closed her eyes and nodded. "Yes, human used to use these things." The blue tailed mermaid told her sister. Aquata had never really liked human stuff and it was really starting to bother her more and more the longer they stayed in the sunken ship. "We should really head back to the palace."

Ariel just continued to ignore her sister's pleas to go home as she swam over to the table. On the table sat a metallic object. She picked it up and twirled it in her short fingers. At one end it was rounded and it had some sort of dip in it. One the handle it looked like vines had been carved into it.

"Ariel, let's go!" Aquata pleaded once more, this time in a stern voice.

The red haired mermaid nodded as she turned to face her sister. They should really start heading home. It was getting darker under the water and they were supposed to be back by nightfall. When they were leaving the sunken ship Ariel still had the metallic object clutched in her hand. Aquata had wanted to tell Ariel not to bring the object that she had found, but she wanted her sister to keep one treasure from the day, so she settled for not telling their father about exploring the sunken ship.

Once they reached the palace Ariel took her newfound treasure to her room. She avoided her father and his questions about if she liked it or not by getting Aquata to tell him that she was sleepy.

In her room she spent about an hour staring at the human object that she had found. It was very fascinating. She wished she knew what humans used it for. She couldn't ask anyone because no one in the kingdom ever talked about the human world.

"Ariel," Aquata's voice came from the door.

"Yes?" Ariel asked as she turned to face her sister.

"I hope you had fun today." Aquata said as a small smile graced her lips.

"Oh, I did!" Ariel exclaimed excitedly. "Thank you for taking me Aquata."

"You're welcome Ariel." Aquata said as she hugged her sister. "Now you better get some sleep."

The redhead nodded as she swam over to her bed. She turned around to say goodnight, but her sister was gone. Shrugging, Ariel put her treasure under her pillow and got into bed. As she began to fall asleep all she could think about was collecting more human stuff and finding out their uses. Her last thought before falling asleep was how she wished that she could explore the human world one day.

AN: Well, I wrote this one-shot because I had always wondered when Ariel started to take an interest in the human world. When I listened to the song 'Human Stuff' off the Broadway soundtrack this idea formed in my head. I was trying to keep Ariel in character as much as possible and if I went out of character I'm sorry.

Princess Cornelia