A/N: Wow I'm having fun with this.

RL stared at the man.

The man stared back.

"Hi." RL said dumbly.

RL's eyes raked down the bare torso of this man – his skin glistening with droplets of water, slowly falling onto his perfect stomach. RL could swear that his hair was perfect, even though it had been in the water – it kept its shape despite the water droplets.

"Hi." The man replied cautiously, in turn looking RL up and down.

RL bit his lower lip, tugging at his regrowth. The man's eyes followed the movement, one eyebrow going up. He bobbed closer to the edge, and RL instinctively took a step back.

"What's in your ear?"

First impressions can be tough. RL thought.

Of all the things this random, half-naked man could've said on their first meeting, and he goes with that.

Maybe he was drunk.

RL took another cautious step backwards, his hand going to his ear.

"It's an earring…"

"It shines."

Yep. Drunk.

"Why are you in the water?" RL asked gently. "Is there anyone here with you?"

The man gave RL a half smile. "Of course."

RL ignored him and tried again. "Why are you in the water?"

He scoffed. "You're a human, aren't you?"

What?

"What?"

The man sighed. "A human. Mammal. Lives on land, ventures into the water for brief amounts of time."

"You talk like it's a foreign concept." RL muttered, feeling a little uncomfortable round the stranger.

The man's eyes were alight. "Oh but it is."

"Pardon?"

The man just smiled a little, bobbing backwards.

"The world's a lot more than it appears. People hide away because they're not accepted for who they are. Species are long forgotten, because hiding becomes the only thing they can do to stay alive. In the end, we all look at the same moon, and in the end, we're all the same."

RL stared at him in wonder. For an outrageous drunk, his sentences were perfect – his eyes focused and relentlessly boring into RL's.

Maybe he was just a psycho.

"Who are you?" RL asked

"Don't you think the more precise question is: What am I?"

RL rolled his eyes, sick of these games. "You're a person, I want to know your name."

"RS." He replied, and RL nodded. "Yours?"

"RL."

RS nodded with a small smile. "It's destiny then…"

"Excuse me?"

"Our names. They both begin with R."

"Big whoop. I'm going to go now."

RL turned to leave.

"Hey!" RS cried out sharply, grabbing onto the ledge and hoisting himself up, resting on his arms.

Holy shit his arms. RL's eyes raked appreciatively over them, before his gaze when back to RS' blue eyes.

"What?"

"I wasn't lying." He said softly. "We all look at the same moon, and we're all the same, but it's our physical differences that divide us."

RL didn't want to listen anymore, but he couldn't seem to turn away. There was just something about this guy that was…simply beautiful.

"What do you want?"

"I want to show you that we're the same, but different."

"I can see you."

"Not all of me." RS whispered, and suddenly he swam over to a shallower part of the lagoon, and RL could've sworn he was seeing things.

His tanned torso dissolved into that weird flimsy dark grey stuff, before a magnificent blue tail with dark blue scales flicked out of the water, arching above RS' head and spraying water droplets everywhere.

RL couldn't.

He just couldn't.

He stumbled backwards, his heart in his throat, his eyes narrowed.

"No…" he hissed. "This is some kind of sick joke."

Behind his panic, RL knew that it wasn't. Besides the fact that the tail was too life-like to be a replica, there was no way any normal human could bend their legs backwards to look like that.

RS regarded him with serious, sad eyes. "Are you okay?"

RL sunk down the side of the cave wall. "No."

"I'd come and hug you if I could get up."

"I'd rather it if you didn't. Even if you could."

RS' eyes turned a stony grey/blue, cold now, instead of the warm, comforting and completely misleading blue they were before. His eyes narrowed, and he lowered his tail into the water again.

"My sister was right…" RS muttered. "For once."

"You have a sister?"

"And a family." RS confirmed. "But I wouldn't expect you to even fathom something like that." He spat.

RL was taken aback.

"Now hold on." He stood up, his eyes narrowed. "You can't show up here with a fucking tail and expect me to be okay. Jesus Christ…" RL ran a hand through his hair, tugging a little at his regrowth again.

"Why do you do that?" RS asked, clearly frustrated.

"Do what?"

"The hair thing. You grab it."

RL frowned, his eyes widening when he realised what he meant. "Oh. I don't know! Can we get back to the subject at hand? You seemed to be angry at me before."

RS shrugged. "It passed."

RL quirked an eyebrow. "Does that happen often?"

"No." RS scowled. "It's you."

RL blushed, looking away. "That's weird."

"I thought so too." RS breathed.

RL sat back down, breathing heavily. His brain was doing that weird, shutting down thing again.

"You're a mermaid."

"Man. Merman." RS corrected, and RL nodded with a dismissive flick of his hand.

"And…why?"

"Why what?"

"Why…why are you here? Like, why aren't you…" RL paused, recollecting his thoughts. "Why are you real?"

RS looked amused, lazily rolling onto his back and bending his tail towards his chest, gripping the ends of his fins.

"I mean…why has nobody ever realised that you guys are real?"

"I told you." RS said simply. "Hiding became the only thing we could do to stay alive."

"When did this happen?"

RS shrugged. "A few billion years ago. Merfolk were forced to disappear below the surface and never return."

"So why did you? Return, that is"

RS grinned. "Why does anyone do anything?"

"Excuse me?"

"Why are you here?"

"I was exploring."

"Exactly." He rolled onto his side, letting his tail straighten out. "It's the nature of free-will. I hate being confined to sand that's never seen sunlight. I hate the bitter coldness of the water after being near the surface. I love lying on the rocks and drying out, and finding bits of flora that I've never even imagined. It's exciting and new."

RL breathed in, pausing a little before talking again, letting out a breath. "Can I touch you?"

RS raised his eyebrows, his eyes glinting in a suggestive manner, his lips turning up in a smirk. "I know I'm good looking but…"

"Oh shut up." RL blushed. "I just…I need to see if you're real."

RS smirked and turned onto his stomach, holding himself up with one arm and extending the other.

"Come on then."

RL moved closer, step by step, breathing in sharply when he was about a metre or two from the merman's hands.

"I won't bite." RS said softly, cocking his head to the side.

RL nodded, sinking to his knees and leaning towards RS' outstretched hand. He seemed to hesitate, and RS closed the gap, sliding forward to grab RL's hand tightly.

"There." RS breathed as RL gasped. "Real."

His hand was cold, and almost slimy, but not in a weird way. His fingers weren't webbed, like the scary Peter Pan mermaids, which RL was secretly glad about. That would've been freakish.

"You want to touch my tail?" RS suggestively waggled his eyebrows, making RL laugh.

"Is that weird?"

RS shook his head. "Not at all."

He leaned onto his side, flicking his tail up and practically dangling his fins in front of RL's hand. RL reached out and gently grabbed the flimsy dark grey stuff that practically hung from the fins.

"What is this stuff?" he asked softly, his fingers dragging through the stuff as it slipped through his fingers.

RS had a small smile on his face, his tail sometimes twitching. "It's called 'familia.' Each merperson is born with their whole tail and familia white. It's only when we mature that our tails find a colour that represents us best. Our familia's are either clear or dark grey, like mine." RS explained softly. "Dark grey is the majority…it follows the commoners bloodline. Clear is the royals."

"Royals?" RL was mesmerized by the texture, the feel of it between his fingers, and the story that came with it.

RS shrugged. "These days it's not such a big thing, but those with clear familia's used to only be able to mate with others of the same familia. Same went for those with the dark grey. Our royals still have clear familia's…it's just not compulsory to mate with the same type."

RL nodded, not really understanding. His brain was in overdrive.

"What about the tail colours. Why is yours blue?" His hands trailed to the fin. It was just like a fish's tail.

"Nobody really knows. But it's unique. There is no living merperson with the same colour tail as me." RS said proudly. "There are different shades, but no tail is exactly alike."

RL chuckled in wonder, his hands moving from the fins to the actual tail. It was hard and scaled, almost like a snake, and RL could feel the muscle under the hard layer of skin. It was truly mind-blowing.

"So…do all merfolk live in a giant colony under the sea in Atlantica?"

RS blinked a little worriedly at him. "What?"

RL shook his head with a laugh.

"What the hell would make you think that…?"

RL grinned. "We have movies…mermaids aren't gone from our memories…they've just been dramatized."

"Movies…" RS raised an eyebrow.

"Moving pictures?"

"Pictures?" RL blanched. How was he ever going to explain all of it? RS let out a loud laugh. "Oh god, I'm not retarded. We make pictures." He was still laughing. "Your face though."

"I'm glad you found it amusing."

RS nodded with a grin, flicking his tail out of RL's reach. "We do live together, mostly. Of course, there are wanderers that branch out and live on their own, but we mostly stay together. It's easier to keep a secret when we're not so far spread. Wanderers only wander for specific reasons."

"What about you?"

"I sneak out. My sister covers for me."

RL nodded, worrying his lower lip between his teeth and giving his regrowth a solid tug.

"I like you." RS said softly, and RL looked at him with wide eyes.

"You what?"

"I like you." RS said simply, lying back in the water, stretching his arms over his head and leaning on them. Except for the hair on his head, he didn't seem to have body-hair.

"Oh."

RL bit his lip, not sure what to think. A thought suddenly struck him, stopping him from debating on the fact that 'liking' someone meant liking someone or not in merfolk-land.

"What did you mean before?"

"Hmm?" RS asked. He was on his back again, lazily splashing his tail in the inch deep water. "When?"

"When you said your sister was right..."

RS flipped onto his stomach, his eyes downcast. "RYS, my sister, always said that humans were…different to merfolk."

"Well…" RL looked down at his legs, laughing.

RS shook his head, more serious now. "Traditions, belief's…everything. We're two very different species, and everyone has always told us never to seek humans out…because they wouldn't understand. When you started panicking…I thought she was right…that you'd just run away and tell everyone and…" RS' eyes suddenly went very wide. "You don't tell anyone. Ever. You can't tell anyone about me and what I am, okay."

RL swallowed. "Yeah…okay. Maybe that's best."

Suddenly the sounds of Ewan McGregor's 'Your Song' floated through the air, vibrating loudly against the rocks where RL had dropped his phone earlier. RS practically flipped back into the deeper water, his eyes wide and panicked, dipping below the surface.

"Fuck!" RL scrambled to his phone. "RS, it's okay. It's a phone. It's fine."

RS didn't look convinced, hesitantly swimming to the edge and leaning on his elbows.

It was three past eight.

From; DPS

Where the hell are you?

"Fuck!" RL repeated, quickly texting back.

To: DPS

I lost track of time. Forgive me? I'll be there in a few minutes.

"What is that?" RS asked, peeking over the edge of the lagoon.

"It's what I use to talk to people who are far away. Look RS, I'm really sorry, but I have to go."

"What are you sorry for?" he was on his back again, playing with the wispy tendrils of his familia.

"Leaving you?"

RS chuckled. "I've been coming here since my familia was white. I'll be fine on my own."

"Can I come talk to you again?"

"Only if you don't tell anyone else about me. I'll be here if you're alone."

RL nodded. "I promise."

RS smiled to himself as his new friend scrambled from the lagoon.

A/N: Wheeee!

So this has a storyline and everything - the other characters will be featured. I've divied it up, and strangely enough, there's an equal number of mermaids as there are humans. #Weird.

And yes, I know that 'Your Song' is RS', but RL doesn't sing. I scrolled back as far as my TL would allow, and there were no lyrics. I was disappointed.