Rei had not been looking forward to his next meeting with Nagisa. Nope, not one bit. He had not stayed up all night researching merlore on the internet—and consequently woken up late and missed his morning run—because he wanted to know everything that he possibly could about the blonde merboy. Rei was just showing polite curiosity in the subject. He had also not spent nearly half an hour trying to pick out what to wear and end up settling on a new shirt and some shorts because he wanted to look particularly good. The blue haired boy just wanted to make sure he was dressed for the weather. Lastly, Rei had not stopped by the convenience store because he wanted to buy something for Nagisa. It was just a particularly hot day and he just happened to have enough money for two popsicles. Rei had absolutely not bought one specifically hoping that the merboy would like it. Not at all. Not one bit…

As Rei walked towards the end of the beach and tried to convince himself of the rationality of his actions, he pointedly ignored the butterflies fluttering in his stomach. He was not nervous; his stomach was probably just upset because he had eaten breakfast too quickly that morning.

By the time Rei sat on the rock where he had met Nagisa the day before, he almost believed himself. But as soon as he heard a familiar cry of "Rei-chan!" and felt a pair of wet and surprisingly strong arms wrap around his waist, all of his efforts sank to the bottom of the sea like a lead brick.

"N-Nagisa-kun! W-What—"

The merboy tightened his grip around the blue haired boy's waist. "I was worried you wouldn't come today."

Re turned away and fixed his glasses. "Of-of course I did. I said I would yesterday."

Nagisa mumbled into his shirt. "Not everyone is as honest as Rei-chan."

Before he could ask the blonde what he meant by that, Nagisa let go of him and sat down on the rock. "Oh no, I got your shirt all wet!"

Rei pulled on the places where the wet fabric had stuck to him. "It's fine."

"No, you should take it off" declared Nagisa, grabbing the hem and pulling up. "Humans are really delicate so you might catch a cold if you keep it on."

"It's nearly 100 degrees outside! I'm not going to catch a cold! And I am not delicate!" cried Rei, desperately trying to hold his shirt down.

"Better to be safe than sorry!" cried the merboy. With one final tug, Nagisa pulled off Rei's shirt and "accidentally" dropped it in the water.

"Oops."

"Nagisa-kun!"

The blonde fished it out of the water. "Oh no. Sorry Rei-chan. Well, you definitely can't wear it now."

Rei crossed his arms self-consciously. The enthusiasm with which Nagisa pursued something once the idea got in his head was starting to make the blue haired boy feel increasingly concerned on multiple levels. As he watched the merboy wring out the shirt and lay it out on a nearby rock to dry, Rei remembered the popsicles.

He pulled them out and handed one to Nagisa. "Here."

The merboy stared at the proffered plastic package, his eyes shining with curiosity. "What is it?"

Rei unwrapped the strawberry flavored one and handed it to Nagisa. "It's a popsicle."

"Pop…sicle?"

"It's flavored ice."

Nagisa took the popsicle and watched Rei unwrap his own and take a bite.

"It's going to melt if you don't eat it soon."

The merboy gathered his courage and took a bite. "Oh! It's good!"

Rei smiled as he watched him enthusiastically take large bites… "Wait, Nagisa-kun, you're eating it too f—"

"Oww, my head!"

"You got a brain freeze because you ate it too fast."

"Brain freeze?! It froze my brain?!" Nagisa frantically rubbed his head.

"Pfft, hahahahaha!"

"Rei-chan it's not funny! Do something!"

In between laughs, the blue haired boy explained to Nagisa that a "brain freeze" was just the colloquial name given to the headache caused by the dilating and swelling of blood vessels in the roof of the mouth when you ate something cold too quickly. After Rei assured him that it was not fatal, the merboy tentatively finished his popsicle.

"Thank you Rei-chan. It was really good, except for the freezing brain. That just hurt."

"You're welcome." Rei watched as Nagisa nibbled on the popsicle stick. "Nagisa-kun, do you like sweet things?"

The merboy nodded enthusiastically. "We don't have as many sweet things in the ocean as you humans do up on the surface, so they taste especially good to me."

Rei smiled. "It suits you."

"What does?"

"Liking sweet things."

"Why?"

"Because you're so cu—" Rei cut himself off as soon as he realized what he was saying.

"I'm what?"

"N-nothing" mumbled the blue haired boy, busying himself with picking up the garbage.

Nagisa cocked his head and watched closely as Rei set aside the plastic bag with the wrappers in it. "Rei-chan you have a hole in your stomach!"

"What?"

Rei gasped as Nagisa grabbed him by the waist and lowered his head to his navel. "Nagisa-kun, w-what are you-?!"

"There's a hole in your stomach!" cried the merboy, carefully trying to pinch Rei's bellybutton shut.

"It's not a hole, it's my bellybutton!" cried the blue haired boy, frantically trying to push Nagisa—who was getting uncomfortably close to delicate areas—off his lap.

"Bellybutton?"

As the merboy straightened up and placed his hand over his own completely smooth abdomen, Rei recalled one of the more confusing topics he had encountered in his "casual" research the night before. None of the articles and stories he had found agreed on how merpeople reproduced. Some likened them to dolphins or seahorses, while others claimed that their tails split into legs on the night of the full moon, and they mated like humans. Not that he had been especially interested in the topic or anything…

Rei was brought back from his musings by an inquisitive poke to his navel.

"What is it for?" asked Nagisa, once again engrossed in the odd indentation.

"It's a scar from where I was attached to my mother's umbilical cord."

"Un billing…cord?"

"Umbilical cord" repeated Rei, adjusting his glasses. "Just like any other mammal, humans are conceived and develop in the female's womb. All placental mammals have a navel, or bellybutton, it's just that it's especially noticeable in humans."

Nagisa absentmindedly pinched the skin on his abdomen. "Placental mammals…"

Rei held his glasses in place. "N-Nagisa-kun, if you don't have a bellybutton, then how does your kind…reproduce?"

"Hmm" the merboy leaned back and swayed his tail thoughtfully. "What's the word…plant…plat…plati…platypus! Like a platypus!"

"Platypus?"

"Yea, one of those funny looking animals with duck bills and beaver tails and fur. My friend Rin-chan says that the mommies lay eggs, but they feed their babies milk. We're kind of like that."

"Rin-chan?" For some reason, the name left an unpleasant taste in Rei's mouth.

"Yea, he lived in Australia for a few years, but he came back recently. He said that we weren't so weird because platypuses lay eggs even though they're technically mammals. We're technically mammals too."

"So, do you…m-mate like mammals, or like fish?"

Nagisa considered him for a moment, his eyes glittering with mischief. "Tell me how humans mate first."

"H-How…what?"

The merboy flicked his tail. "I'll tell you how merpeople mate, but only after you tell me how your kind does it."

Rei blushed up to his ears. He adjusted his glasses and tried to calm down. What the hell was he so embarrassed about? Nagisa was asking a perfectly justified question considering the topic they were discussing. A completely natural biological process. He'd learned plenty about it in his co-ed health class without batting an eyelash. This was no different at all.

"F-For humans, intercourse happens between a male and a female. The male inserts his penis into the females' vagina. When the male reaches orgasm, he ejaculates in the female. His sperm travels to the womb in order to try and fertilize the female's egg. If the egg is successfully fertilized, then the zygote embeds itself into the wall of the uterus. The zygote develops into an n embryo, then a fetus, and then, after 9 months, a baby is born."

Nagisa pouted and mumbled. "That wasn't sexy at all Rei-chan."

The blue haired boy's blush spread down to his neck. "W-What?!"

"Nothing" sing-songed the merboy with a coquettish grin.

Rei fought the urge to pull his legs up to his chest and hide his face in his knees. He had a growing suspicion that Nagisa enjoyed seeing him squirm, so he would say outrageous things on purpose.

"Well?" asked Nagisa impatiently.

Rei turned to him. "Well what?"

The merboy frowned and leaned toward him. "What about love?"

The blue haired boy blinked. "Love?"

"Yes. Love. You humans have it too don't you? Tell me about it."

Rei opened and closed his mouth, but no sound came out. For the first time in a very long time, he didn't have an answer. What was he supposed to say? Love was an unpredictable and messy emotion. There were no theorems, no equations, and no way to cleanly explain it.

After a moment, he cleared his throat. "Well, I've never experienced the emotion in a romantic context, so I'm probably not the best person to ask."

The merboy peered into his face. "Do you believe in true love Rei-chan?"

The blue haired boy felt his heartbeat quicken. Another question he didn't have an immediate answer to. He'd never really thought about love or romance. The idea of dating had never really crossed Rei's mind. Did he believe in true love?

"I…I'd like to."

Nagisa studied him for a moment before smiling and leaning back on his arms. Rei couldn't help but notice how lovely the merboy looked when he was genuinely smiling.

"I guess it's my turn now, isn't it?" asked Nagisa, tilting his head to the side.

Rei nodded and sat up a bit.

"Well, first off, we have 2 different types of mating: seasonal and enduring. Seasonal mating is when fertile people from all around travel to warmer waters for the purpose of preserving the species. It's quite animalistic of us, isn't it?"

The blue haired boy adjusted his glasses. "The desire to reproduce is instinctual."

Nagisa smiled. "Well, anyway, once my people reach a certain age, they are expected to go find a mate for the season and get to making babies. Sex is basically the same as you humans do it."

"The same?"

"Yep. Mating season happens during the period of the year when merpeople are most fertile, so changing from tail to legs is easier."

Rei sat up ramrod straight and looked at Nagisa incredulously. "L…Legs?"

The merboy nodded. "To mate, my people go on land and their tails split into legs because, as I'm sure you noticed, we don't exactly have dicks in this form."

Rei blushed.

"The mechanics of sex are the same as with humans. Anyway, after all the fun, you each go back home. If the female becomes pregnant, then she carries the baby for 6 months, lays the egg, sits on it for around 4 months, and then the baby hatches."

"Wait, so if the male and female part after mating, then does the child never know who its father is?"

"That's generally the case, but sometimes, mates are in the same pod so the daddy has a more active part in the kid's life. Merchildren are all raised communally, so parentage is really just a formality. You can always tell who you're related to though, even if you've never met before."

Rei sat back and absorbed the information. He was still stuck on the fact that Nagisa had the ability to change his tail into a pair of legs.

"It's all different if you have an enduring mate though."

"Enduring mate?"

The merboy nodded with a faraway smile. "A life partner. If you're lucky enough, you meet your destined one during the mating season. But most never meet at all."

The longing and loneliness in Nagisa's voice made Rei's chest tighten.

"When you find your enduring mate, you stop participating in the mating season. They are your one and only, so you can't bring yourself to change for someone else. Enduring mates can have sex whenever they feel like it without adhering to the mating season schedule because true love is stronger than primal instinct."

"It sounds nice" murmured Rei.

Nagisa ran his hand over his tail. "You know, even though seasonal mates are male and female, enduring mates don't have to be."

Fighting to control the mess of thoughts running through his head, Rei looked over at the merboy.

Nagisa held his gaze. "Enduring mates can be male and female, female and female, or male and male."

There was something there, and yet there wasn't. Was the blonde toying with him? Could he somehow sense Rei's inner turmoil and enjoyed making an even bigger mess of his thoughts than he already had?

The merboy slid off the rock and into the water, resurfacing a moment later. "Sorry, my scales were getting itchy."

"It's fine" said Rei, pushing up his glasses.

Nagisa swam up and held onto his legs. "Hey Rei-chan…do you want to learn how to swim?"

Two days ago, Rei would've said no and walked away. Two days ago, he would've scoffed at the sheer thought of himself splashing around in the ocean. Two days ago, he would've gone into a whole discourse on the absurdity of trying to move around in the water like a fish.

But two days ago, he hadn't met Nagisa.

"…ok."


hello again everyone and thank you for reading! i finally got around to writing the next chapter for this. sorry it took so long.
so as you can see, i bumped up the rating to m because of nagisa and rei's colorful conversation. it took me a while to decide how i was going to do the whole mechanics of mermaid sex. i decided to just take the lazy and uncreative man's route and have them grow legs. (yes, i know it's a cop out)
anyway, as you could probably tell, the whole purpose of this chapter was to get through technicalities so that i can concentrate on the smut in later chapters. (im probably going to have one more before the real fun begins)
as always, reviews are very much appreciated and encouraged!