Jennifer knew she should've been swimming back towards her pod, her family. She also knew that going this far into The Expanse alone was a sure way to get herself killed—her previous experience set aside.
But, Currents help her, the man on the boat interested her. "Crocker." She still remembered. There was something about him…it was in the eyes. What she remembered seeing of them, at least. They reminded her of the Dark Below that seemed to threaten to swallow her up when she would try to see how far she could dive before the Weight would become too great for her to stand.
And she found herself thinking they were a kind of Dark she wanted to get lost in.
So she stayed close to the shadow of the boat she'd been tossed over the edge of, careful to avoid the dangerous parts. She was certain that as far as her mother would be concerned, all the parts were dangerous parts. But she'd been following it for a couple of days now, managing to grab a couple of fish before the nets disappeared, and she knew it would be more dangerous to try to go back alone without the shadow. Curse her and her stubbornness; all she wanted was to see him again, and now she was miles away from home, from her kind, and she wasn't sure when she was going to get back and for what? The possibility of seeing him while he walked on shore?
Oh Currents what was happening to her?
It was night now, they were a little less than a day's swim from shore, and the boat had stopped, so she saw no harm in getting out from under it and rolling over so she could see the lights up in the Dark Above. But there was something…wrong with the currents around her, like there was a change coming. She looked up at the Dark Above, and realized that even that was wrong. It looked like it did right before a—
Before she could finish the thought, the waves became violent, there was a loud crashing sound and bright light.
"Storm!" one of the sailors yelled as the ship began to rock. Jennifer chose to dive a bit to stay clear of the dangerous parts of boat as it was tossed by the waves . She could just barely make out the various voices of the other sailors on the ship, shouting commands loudly at each other over the storm, which had only grown more violent. She kept her eyes on the Surface, wondering what would happen. Storms, while often unpleasant, were markedly less so the further you dove; Jennifer just didn't want to be any farther from the ship than she had to be. Storms also had a tendency to divide, and that was the last thing she needed this far from her pod.
Various crates and things she couldn't even begin to understand or give names to had started to fall into her world and she knew she probably shouldn't, but she began to grab a few things to look at them. It was another moment of different fascinating her—even if it was during a potentially dangerous storm.
Suddenly there was a crash of something large falling through the Surface, and she looked to see what new thing could've fallen now–why hadn't these creatures thought to secure any of this stuff if it was so important?—when she realized it wasn't a what so much as a who.
She swam quickly over to him to get a clearer look at him when she discovered that it was him—the one who'd cut her loose. She looked him over, looking for any sign that he was bleeding; she hadn't seen anything larger than the occasional dolphin pod as they'd traveled, but she knew enough to know that just because you couldn't see something, didn't mean it couldn't see you.
Thankfully, he wasn't bleeding, but he was strangely still for a creature of his kind that'd just fallen into the water—wasn't there usually a lot more flailing?—his eyes were closed as she reached to touch his face and he was—oh no he was sinking.
She wrapped her arms around his middle and pumped her tail until they had breached enough for him to start breathing—should he ever decide to.
Can't your kind control that? she thought as she headed towards the shore desperately, rain pelting them unforgivingly, Please please start breathing soon—I haven't even heard your name yet-your other name, come back please.
His head fell back against her shoulder as the shoreline began to come into view-the currents change made getting to the shore faster, but definitely not easier. The storm had begun to lessen as she found a small, rocked in tide pool. It was shallow enough for him to mostly be out of the water, but deep enough for her to be able to breathe and stay with him.
She set him so that his back was against one of the rocks surrounding the pool, and carefully leaned his head against it. She traced his face for a moment, studying him.
Please wake up, she thought as she gently rolled his head back towards her, I wasn't supposed to pay you back for saving my life so soon.
At that moment, he coughed up some water, jerking out of her hands, and his eyes snapped open, looking around wildly. She pulled back from him, giving him room to readjust and breathe, and watched him.
He ran his hands through his hair to get it out of his face as he climbed to his feet shakily, and finally calmed down enough to actually register the things around him. In particular, that he wasn't alone.
He looked down at her and seemed to put the pieces of what happened together as she watched him back. She wasn't sure what to do as he stared at her for a moment.
"You saved me." he said quietly to her.
She wanted to something to communicate that she there to help him, that she was a friend. She remembered another expression that she'd seen creatures like him do to placate others. She moved the corners of her mouth upwards and showed her teeth, trying to smile at him.
He crouched down to her level and she tried to straighten herself and sit up slightly so that she could be on his eye level. She wanted to show him that she trusted him, and the way her kind did that was by showing him her underbelly. It was the weakest part they had, the surest way to kill her kind, and she was trusting him with it. Though she couldn't be sure he completely understood what the gesture meant, but he understood it enough.
He returned the smile she was trying to give him and reached a hand out to her. She moved closer to him slightly, wondering what he was going to do, only to have him touch her face gently.
They looked at each other for a moment before he kissed her–just as she'd done only a few days before after he'd saved her–and said, "Thank you."
She studied his face for a moment, trying to memorize it, when she heard others of his kind calling out from further up shore. They must've noticed the rattled man standing in the tide pool and figured something was wrong. He heard them too, and turned to call back to them. She took the opportunity to turn back towards deeper water. She was gone by the time he looked back for her.