Hello all! As per usual, typical apology for posting zip over winter break. I've had a pretty stressful break, long story short I had some medical issues. But instead of using the recovery time to write, I just shiny hunted on Pokémon. Forgive me! Anyways, I did manage to get this chapter written, although it went through some serious editing and revising. I hope you enjoy it, and it tides (ha, ocean puns) you over until the next one comes out. Although being that I'm back at my college for the time being that might be hard. Remember, review!

Shirayuki was highly aware of her reputation around the pod, and it made her incredibly uncomfortable.

She was the mer who disappeared for days after being sick, who then came back with a paralyzed tail, a huge manta ray as her service beast, and an unknown merman who had one too many colors in his tail. Every time she left her home with Lioj, she got stray looks and whispers tickling her ears through the pressure.

Business was slower at her shop. Zen helped the best he could, but there wasn't much he needed to do with almost no customers. He helped her harvest the herbs she needed, occasionally ground up mixtures for her, and then would hand them off. Lioj was a little too big to sit comfortably in the shop, so he waited at the backdoor or at the window. He had tried to stay near the front, but no mer felt comfortable enough around him to swim by.

"Shirayuki?" Zen asked, his arms wrapped around the basket full of weeds and kelp of all kinds. He swam alongside Lioj's undulating motion easily. "Are you alright?"

Shirayuki nodded. "Yeah, sorry. My head's lost in the waves."

Zen's white hair had dimmed from its time away from the sun, very light dustings of yellow mixing with the white to give it an almost golden shimmer. He smiled, then adjusted the basket in his hands.

Shirayuki studied him. In ways, he had adjusted to life under the sea well. He moved his tail with no hesitation. His muscles had tightened around his core, although his new collection of shirts kept them hidden for once. He had learned to fight like a mer, with stabs instead of slashes thanks to one of the few mers in Shirayuki's village who didn't seem to care where he came from. He had better endurance and was even faster. However, there were other ways he hadn't adjusted. He occasionally would try to breathe through his nose and end up coughing like he had choked. He was getting sick of seafood, which didn't make sense to Shirayuki but he explained he had animals on land that tasted different. When he had free time, he would stare longingly at the surface. He sometimes spoke English in response to something said to him in Mermish. He didn't sleep well, although Shirayuki had done her best in helping him set up a mattress of the strongest and softest kelp she could find. Therefore his eyes had bags under them and the blue seemed darker and less alive a million miles Below Surface.

At least they fought less.

Shirayuki's tail was aching slightly. She knew this was a good sign, it meant that slowly but surely feeling was returning to her. After feeling came movements. Zen had told her once she was healed the sea planned to make him human again…at the cost of her becoming one as well. A very scared part of Shirayuki hoped she never healed, because she would rather have a broken tail than no tail at all.

Lioj stopped suddenly.

Zen spun around, halting himself while he tilted his head. "Something wrong?"

Lioj was unmoving. Shirayuki rolled over on his back and put her hand on top of his head. "Are you alright?"

Then she sensed it. She looked to the left.

Zen followed her eyes and his tail fluttered rapidly, sending him upwards and then back down. "Oh my God."

Down towards the edge of the kelp forest, a long snout was emerging. Shirayuki watched, horrified, as the creature nosed its way free and slowly into open water. It was enormous. Its head was the size of a whale shark, with a mouth big enough to swallow a mer whole. Thousands of teeth showed, giving it an appearance of a maniac grin. Its skin was black and white, spotted. This creature had no need to camouflage itself, it was obviously an apex predator that would rather fight than flee. It had a short neck, and two massive flippers broke through the kelp to propel it forward. The flippers scooped water out of it's way, instead of moving with the water, the beast manipulated it. It's body was the length of a blue whale, with two slightly smaller fins towards it's backside. It had a stumpy but pointed tail. It swung itself in a tight circle to shake the clinging kelp strands on it.

Lioj trembled under Shirayuki's fingers.

"Shirayuki." Zen breathed, his gins flaring wide open in a poor concealment of panic. "What is that thing?"

Shirayuki had never seen anything like it. "A monster." She murmured. "I…I don't know."

The creature tired of circling itself and swam upwards at alarming speed. Shirayuki watched it swim thousands of feet in a mere few seconds, then slowly circle below the croppy surface. Shirayuki winced when he launched itself through the surface, and then landed with a boom loud enough to make her feel as if the world had just shaken on itself.

"We need to get out of here. Warn the village." Zen spoke fast, his tail was lashing at the water so hard it looked as if he couldn't control it.

"The pod." Shirayuki corrected numbly.

"Sure. Lioj, can you-" Zen stopped with a wince, as the creature had just exploded through the surface again. The landing vibrated the water and Zen covered his ears, letting the basket fall from his hands.

Lioj barely moved, but propelled himself forward still. He offered Zen his flipper. Zen grabbed it, and Lioj wiggled slightly to lunge through the water silently. Lioj was fast, but Shirayuki kept her eyes on the monster playing in the waves. It was so huge, she felt as if she was trying to swim past the moon. But Lioj was a strong and sturdy swimmer. It took them a few minutes to get far enough away from the monster for it to just be a shadow lunging at the surface. Even at a distance, Shirayuki could feel the impacts it had on the surface.

She had seen whales breaching. But this was not just breaching. It felt as if the creature was trying to attack the sea, viciously. Ramming itself against the sea like it was trying to beat it down. It became impossible to watch, so Shirayuki rolled over and looked forward. Still, she heard the booms. Whales sometimes did something like this during mating season. To warn off other males or possibly stun them with noise, they would reach their back fins into the air only to slam them down on the surface. But never had Shirayuki seen a whale breach its whole body for that practice. This was something else.

The next few minutes felt as if they took an eternity. The lights of the pod's home shone. The pod's home was a natural dip in the bedrock, and filled with natural rock formations that were easily shaped into homes. Shirayuki used to always love coming home after a long journey to see all the different lights of the Vidre shimmering. They were a beacon against the cold sea.

But right now, they were a flare to that monster.

As they got closer, Shirayuki could already see some mers had come out and were slowly and cautiously lifting into open ocean to see what the booming sounds were. Shirayuki glanced back with a hard roll – she hated how limited her motions were. She could just see the monster's shadow as it thrashed around, but it was so far. She would have to hope that the other members of her pod would see it to.

Two mers swam up to them. A merman with a mossy green tail named Kai and a merman with a glassy purple tail named Shiira. "Shirayuki." Kai greeted. "Do you know what that sound is?"

Shirayuki had always liked Kai and Shiira. They were good friends of hers and helped her out when they were younger. Now they were a little more grown up and more interested in protecting the pod, but they were some of the few mers who could overlook her strange circumstances. "Kind of?" She responded.

Zen swam forward. "There's a horrifying creature not far from here. We need to get everyone to hide."

Shiira gave Zen a startled glance. "What do you mean horrifying creature?"

"It's the truth!" Shirayuki struggled to lift her arm to point. Lioj moaned sympathetically at her when she winced and found she couldn't do it.

Zen pursed his lips at her, then turned and pointed at the shadowy figure far in the distance. "Look there."

Kai and Shiira followed his finger, narrowing their eyes. "That could be anything from this distance."

"The booms are in sync with it if you need more proof." Shirayuki said. She looked around nervously, as more and more mers were starting to lift into the open ocean to see. "We need to get everyone to shelter."

"We don't want to lock down the entire pod if it's not an actual emergency." Shiira said hesitantly.

"What if it is?" Zen demanded. "Please, I know I'm not from here and you don't have a reason to trust me. But I spoke…I mean, if that monster is what I think it is we all need to take shelter immediately."

Kai looked thoughtful. He looked around at the surrounding muttering mers. Then he sighed and shook his head. "Even if it is something to fear, we don't have a code or anything. To get everyone inside would take hours, and to make sure the entire pod stayed hidden is another thing entirely."

"We have to try." Shirayuki pressed. She pushed herself further up on Lioj's back. "I promise you Kai if this is what we think it may be the entire pod is in grave danger."

Kai and Shiira looked at each other. Then they sighed in sinc. "Alright, we'll see what we can do." Kai said.

Zen and Shirayuki sighed in relief and looked at each other. "Thank you."

The two mermen nodded at Shirayuki, then swam upwards. Their next actions made Shirayuki's eyes go wide and Zen gasped.

Kai cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted loudly into the water. "Pod! This booming you here is a predator! Everyone is to stay inside their homes until the threat has passed!"

Zen ran his fingers through his hair. "What are the odds that the water won't carry that?" He hissed in English.

A chatter of confused mers responding arose around them.

"What do you mean?!"

"What are we hiding from?!"

"We haven't done a pod lockdown in years!"

Kai and Shiira spared a glance at Shirayuki, then Shiira swam forward. "At ease, mers! It's just a precaution, and shouldn't last long."

There was a few more minutes of chatter as Kai and Shiira convinced everyone to take shelter. During which Zen and Shirayuki stared at the surrounding ocean. They listened for the booms, which were still happening…but slower.

Kai and Shiira swam back up to Shirayuki and Zen as the mers began to swim back into their homes. "We did what we could. I hope you're right about all this."

"I hope you're not." Kai looked aghast at Shiira. "If that thing is so dangerous that we can hear it hitting the surface from leagues away and Shirayuki thinks that all of us need to hide away then it's something I never want to meet."

Shirayuki smiled a little hopelessly at Kai. She almost said something about how his shouting might have alerted the monster, but she didn't think it was worth it. "Thank you, both." She said instead.

"Well, come on then. We should lock down with the rest of them." Shiira nudged Kai with his tail and dove downwards to help make sure the other mers got home safe.

Kai followed.

"Come on, we need to hide Lioj somewhere." Shirayuki said to Zen, who was still looking around. He didn't respond, so she tried it in English. "We need to hide Lioj."

Zen frowned, then looked at Shirayuki. "Let's hurry. The booming has stopped."

Shirayuki felt her blood chill.

Zen grabbed Lioj's fin and they dove downwards. Lioj glided straight to Shirayuki's home, landing with a small spiral in her back garden on the seafloor. Zen dropped the basket of kelp next to the entrance, then swam over and held his arms out to Shirayuki.

Shirayuki bit back her resentment at having to be carried into her own home, but she tried to push herself up to make it easier for Zen to scoop her up. He lifted her no issues, then swam into the house. He looked around with a frown. "Where can Lioj hide?"

"Upstairs. The issue is how we get him through the doorways." Shirayuki responded in Mermish out of habit.

Zen nodded and swam up to the second floor. He set Shirayuki down on her mattress, swimming over his make shift one on the floor near the window. "There. What should I do about the kelp?"

Shirayuki shrugged. "If it's a lockdown, we can still swim around our homes. You shouldn't have taken me all the way up here. We can go back down once Lioj is settled up here."

Zen nodded. He looked around. "I think maybe he can fit through the back door if he curls in on himself and spins in." Zen put arm across his chest and one across his back and twirled through the air to demonstrate, his fin curling into a tight spiral before opening again.

Shirayuki nodded. "Give it a try."

Zen swam downstairs again and Shirayuki sighed. She was tempted to lie down, but she knew she probably wouldn't be able to right herself again without help. While she had the quiet, she closed her eyes and tried to listen for any booms, or any stray currents. She couldn't feel for them without her arms, which she couldn't lift. So instead she listened.

There were no booms, but the monster must have been close. She thought she could hear some rhythmic swishing noises, which wasn't too unusual. Every creature with a tail in the sea had a meter to which they swam, so it could have been anything. And sound was distorted in the water, it might have only happened to sound like it was something huge approaching because of the amplification. Surely it wasn't actually the monster...so she told herself.

She opened her eyes with a frown. She couldn't lie to herself, she knew it was the monster. Fear bubbled up in her like a tide pool, frothing at her heart. "Zen!" She called out into the ocean.

His response was a little garbled but he called back. "We're almost through! I'm coming."

Lioj came first, twirling so tightly he looked like he was in pain. Then he leveled and straightened his wings, just barely brushing the sides of her home. Shirayuki had to giggle at his bewildered expression. Zen darted like a minnow underneath the great manta ray and to Shirayuki's side as Lioj lowered himself with a small grunt onto the floor.

"What's wrong?"

Shirayuki opened her gills a few times, pursing her lips. Then she swallowed the lump in her throat and looked out the window. "I can hear it. The monster's coming."

Zen followed her gaze and shivered. "I can't provide much comfort right now. I'm just as scared as you." He took a shaky breath and hugged himself. At his request, Shirayuki had tried to find him the tightest shirt possible. But it was an odd request. Nothing in the ocean stayed tight, it was just not the way of things. All the mers clothing was made of a soft moss, woven to hold on to itself. Even if they started out pressed to the mer's skin, eventually the moss would thicken and spread thanks to the salt. It was the weaving that kept it from falling apart all together. Zen didn't like it. He said it made him feel as if he was wearing a "skirt", though Shirayuki wasn't sure what those were.

When Zen continued to talk, Shirayuki snapped her gaze back to his face and tried to hide her blush. "Sorry, what?"

Zen blinked at her. "I said what if it sees the light to the Vidre and comes down to the village?"

Shirayuki wanted to vomit at the thought. She shook her head. "We have to hope it's a creature that runs on smell, not sight. The village isn't without it's magic protection. Worst comes to worst we send a few brave men out to throw some red pearls into the air."

Zen swam over to his bed and sat down, leaning his arms on the window and scanning the ocean. His blue eyes were dark and his forehead creased. "How many red pearls do you have?"

Shirayuki wanted to shift but she felt too sore to do more than gently stretch her neck. "Hopefully enough. Zen, can you carry me downstairs so we can put away the herbs?"

"Oh, right. Sure." Zen got up again and swam over to Shirayuki. He scooped her up gently and swam over Lioj. Lioj spun around to face them with a worried sound.

"Stay here, Lioj." Shirayuki ordered.

Lioj whined but didn't move as Zen lowered them down into her shop. He set her on the countertop, and then went towards the kelp basket.

Shirayuki probably didn't even need to be sitting here to oversee Zen's packing. He had practically mastered the art of twirling the kelp strands around themselves and slipping them into the water-proof tubes Shirayuki used. He could recognize most herbs on sight, occasionally he would ask Shirayuki to make sure he was correct and Shirayuki would say he was. Shirayuki thought he might only ask her so she felt useful.

"Can I ask you about the pearls?" Zen spoke while he worked.

"Yeah. Of course."

Zen twirled a strand of kelp around his finger before proper spiraling it. "You used one on me the first time we met, didn't you? It made that chain move."

Shirayuki winced. "Yes. That's a simple magic. Most mers know how to use it. It's a simple pearl, it will make any inanimate object move for a short while."

"Really? Does it have like…like a size limit or something?" Zen shoved the first three tubes filled with herbs into the pockets on the wall. He pulled out several empty ones in their stead.

"Yeah, only so much as the pearl bits can touch can really move." Shirayuki shifted when she thought she heard the swoosh of a large fish coming close. "Zen, it's almost here."

Zen pursed his lips. "Why don't we go up with Lioj? Just…just until it passes."

Shirayuki nodded. Zen darted over to her and once again lifted her into his arms. She listened as Zen swam up. Lioj was staring out the window the best he could, lying on the side of the wall. Zen and Shirayuki moved towards Zen's mattress, leaning together against the wall so they could look outside.

And Shirayuki wished they hadn't.

In the way the ocean was clear today, She was also clouded. And so, when the monster moved slowly out of the gloom, Shirayuki didn't see it coming.

Zen muttered something in English she was pretty sure he could have picked up from the pirates. Her heart jumped like a dead fish stranded on the beaches. She was so scared, her fin actually unraveled for a second before it curled in on itself in pain.

The slight whisper of mers that had been bouncing through the water completely silenced as the monster appeared in front of the pod. Its maw looked even bigger up close, and with horror Shirayuki saw how it had its mouth slightly open. Meaning it was tasting the water: trying to find them. Its whole body bent up to the sky as it looked down at the little crater.

Shirayuki felt her arm be grabbed and jumped. Zen had her bicep in a vice grip, without taking his eyes off the monster. The monster made some horrible rasping noise; it was like the sound of a bunch of bodies rolling down a rock. It snarled at the pod.

Shirayuki covered her mouth with one hand, wanting to move away but finding herself unable to.

The monster snarled once more, then suddenly tossed itself forward. It swam over Shirayuki's home in barely a second. Then there was one more second before a blast of water rushed over the village like its own wave. Shirayuki and Zen ducked, but poor Lioj was sent flying straight backwards into the opposite wall. All around the pod, she heard shouts of shock and dismay as unprepared mers were swept backwards or away.

When the current passed, Lioj let himself sink to the floor, looking up pitifully at Shirayuki and Zen.

"Are you alright, Lioj?" Zen asked.

Lioj dipped its head.

Both Shirayuki and Zen sighed in relief. Then Shirayuki realized uncomfortably that Zen had his arm around her. She glanced at him, and he looked back at her in confusion. Then he noticed where his arm was and ripped it away with a wince. "Sorry." He hissed.

Shirayuki shook her head and poked her head out the window. "Is the monster gone?"

"I don't know." Zen sighed, leaning his head against the stone of his wall. "Hopefully."

Shirayuki wanted to believe it, but she wasn't sure.