Chapter 5 - Theta
Edited: 11/12/2017
Posted: 4/2016
They were drug from sleep by a firm tug of instinct. Again.
They blinked as the world swam around them from exhaustion.
They shouldn't be awake.
The last thing they remembered was falling asleep with Beta in their boat; they should have slept for another week at least after everything the Other had done and the fight.
They shifted restlessly on bony but oddly squishy shoulders.
Their instinct was clanging. Something was wrong and it had dragged them from what was a near coma.
It took them a minute more to realize they were wrapped around Alpha's shoulders and then Alpha was crouching down by another human on the ground as the world swirled.
Their surroundings slowly stopped whirling now that Alpha was still. Then the salty tang of blood and tears reached their nose.
They finally realized who the human was.
Loud woman.
She dug the knife in her hand deeper into her own shoulder.
The pain made them instinctively recoil. Not physical; nothing physical could make an aura scream like that.
Loud Woman...Broken Woman. So, so broken. Pieces shattered and taped and glued together again and again and again; now they were too small to fix and they knew what that felt like, to know how broken you were.
They watched a rivulet of blood drip off her elbow and onto the ground.
They were awake now.
Angry and awake.
Alpha held the hand and stopped the knife. The blade glittered in the sun as it dropped to her side.
Then they saw the lines of the tattoo beneath the blood.
They understood what that mark was.
They understood the need to carve it out of your skin.
Subjugation. Servitude. Suppression.
Slave. Property. Tool.
Cage.
Cage.
Cage.
Memories surged and the pain. The pain, the cries. They couldn't help them; they couldn't stop them.
{Never!} the feral snarled in their mind.
They dug paws into Luffy's chest, squeezed tighter with their tail. They wanted to sink teeth into their tail but they stopped for Loud Woman's sake.
"Help me, Luffy."
The words were ripped from Loud Woman's heart to swirl into the voices in their head, all of the voices they couldn't save.
Lost in the voices and thoughts, they didn't notice Alpha moving right away.
He gave Hat to Loud Woman. Alpha gave his treasure.
[Never again,] they agreed with the feral.
Nami. Their Navigator. Their Theta. Pit. Theirs.
They could save Theta, here and in the present. They would not let Theta be alone-alone and enslaved for all that they could not see the chains.
Theta was their rock. Alpha was good in his own way when it mattered, and Beta was their physical strength. But Theta...Theta helped in all the ways that mattered in the heart and in the mind every day.
Emotional and mental pain broke you from the inside in a way physical pain could never touch. Bruises healed, but they knew too well how the mind twisted in and around and up and down.
Theta understood. They would fix this for Theta and Theta would help fix them and human and Other.
They did not remember blacking out again.
They woke to Alpha punching a shark fishman into a wall.
They threw out their power. They were surrounded by fishmen. Angry, arrogant fishman who had hurt their Theta.
Shocked fishman who stared at their Alpha's audacity.
Good. Theta was theirs.
They did not care the fishmen were ocean brothers and distant cousins. They hurt and caged their Theta. They did not know how, but Theta's pain had bled into the foundation of this place.
They raised their head slowly from Alpha's shoulder.
Murmurs broke out around them as the fishmen saw what they were.
Alpha did not take his attention from the shark fishman. Alpha and they knew the shark was the Alpha here.
They also knew he was a fool if he got up again.
"My peace and protection to you, queen."
They turned their head to look at the voice. An octopus fishman. He was bowed respectfully to them; the only one who had. He was also the only one to offer the traditional words.
"Polite." The murmurs grew louder at her words. Few sea queens chose to speak in their true form. Too much cost for too little reward.
They narrowed their eyes on the octopus. "And ignorant. Leave," they growled.
They pushed out a focused wave of intent. The intent to exact revenge. The intent to hunt, rend, tear, destroy, devour, and obliterate those who touched their Theta.
The octopus was stupid and young. He could do much better with his life if he still held such manners. He was misguided and foolish, but not cruel.
The octopus fell to his knees, his arms barely holding his face from planting in the concrete.
"Leave, and we may one day forgive you," they hissed.
They lifted the intent and he did crumple to the ground. He was still conscious, if frozen in fear and exhaustion. Impressive.
The shark moved in the rubble. Their attention shifted to watch the fishman Alpha from the corner of their vision.
Then the fishman Alpha spoke.
It was the stupidest thing he could have done.
"You! Human." He spit the word at Alpha like a curse. "You humans think you can keep us as pets?"
The shark stood from the crater Alpha had made of his body.
"Do you think we're animals you can control? Do you even know what she is?" Arlong gestured angrily at them.
"She's our nakama," Alpha answered. Alpha's voice was hard and unforgiving, so unlike his normal self, and yet as much like Alpha as his laughter. "She's Ryuko. And you hurt Nami our navigator. That's all I need to know."
"We need," they corrected.
Alpha nodded. "All we need to know to kick your ass."
And that was a statement of fact from Alpha to Alpha. A threat to their pit. They couldn't help the approving thrumming.
{Mine,} the feral snarled at them, jealous of their approval for Alpha.
"And Theta is mine," they snapped back.
Everyone stopped to look at them. Except Alpha. Alpha was too pissed off by the shark Alpha.
Their pit would have to get used to their words. They all slipped sometimes between their head and outside it.
"Octopus. Stay or leave?" they asked suddenly.
"Hachi. Hachi, queen," the octopus grunted as he pushed himself into a kneeling position. He pressed his forehead to the ground in a formal bow. "I will return home and pursue my dream of owning a takoyaki stand! One day I hope to have earned the forgiveness for what has happened here."
"Hachi," the shark snarled.
Hachi and they ignored him. And they knew Alpha was serious as well when he didn't even blink at the mention of food.
As simple as that the octopus stood and dove into the nearby pool that fed into the sea. They made sure he swam in the right direction for Fishman Island before they were satisfied.
"Kuroobi! Bring him back!" the shark snapped.
The shark had their attention. They turned to watch the ray fishman.
"Move and die," they countered.
The ray looked confused. He took a shuffling step and then stopped as Beta drew a blade to level it at him. The ray glanced at Beta's bandaged chest in disbelief. Beta smirked.
"Kuroobi! Move now or I'll feed you to Mohmoo! This queen accepts humans into her pit. Are you going to listen to me or a hatchling who doesn't know our history?"
They froze. All of the fishmen did. Even Alpha tensed at the sudden atmosphere, although he and Beta and Peacock and Chew Toy were confused as to the cause.
"Hatchling?" Alpha asked.
They did not say anything as they uncoiled themselves from Alpha's body.
They slid to the ground silently.
They walked until they were only a few feet from the shark.
"Alpha found us. They chose their pit as they have always chosen. Their human Alpha. Their human Beta. Their human Theta. Their pit is better in every way than the fishmen left here. And you hurt their Theta. Cage their Theta. Insult the feral's Alpha and Beta."
They sat up on their hind legs to look at the shark closer. The feral pushed forward and they let it, let the rage bleed into their aura as teeth and claws slid out.
"We are many, shark." Their voice deepened and layered with the feral as they spoke. "We are unforgiving. We are patient and fell and savage and hardened with age." Their aura pressed harder and harder on the shark Alpha until one knee buckled under the weight of it and he was left half-kneeling before them. "And we," they hissed, "do not suffer hubris."
They gathered all of their energy and shaved behind the shark.
They wrapped their tail around him.
"For your insult to we and the pit we will not forgive you."
Anyone that threatened their pit would pay. Fishmen, merfolk, human, giant, sea king, mink, and whatever else claimed the seas home. It did not matter what it was or how big it thought it was.
Immediately, eventually, some day, one day, but always inevitably, anyone that harmed their pit would pay.
Because they were always going to be bigger, smarter, and meaner.
The world had forgotten sea queens. They would remind them why they should fear their name.
They squeezed tighter and tighter. The shark clawed at their tail but the attacks slid off their scales harmlessly. They squeezed until they heard the shark's ribs crack. Then they squeezed more.
Finally satisfied, they spun and whipped his body over their head and back into the crater Alpha had already made along the wall.
They shaved once more, using the movement to swipe their tail with a whistle across the shark's chest before he could move.
The crack as his skin split diagonally was nearly lost by his yowl of pain.
"Alpha, kick his ass," the muttered tiredly. Sleep. They needed rest.
"Right," Luffy grunted.
They turned to walk back to the gate in the wall. They could see Theta there.
They were so tired. But they had to be strong.
{Eat him,} the feral snarled.
"Human made them promise not to eat people anymore," they grumbled.
"What is with you and eating people?" Chew Toy yelled.
From where he hid at the top of the wall.
The feral snorted in amusement.
"Once I kick his ass then the Other can maybe eat him if it wants to," Luffy threw back at them. The shark was still dragging himself out of the crater. "We'll leave it up to Nami."
The ray fish that had been standing nearby looked green at Alpha's words-mostly because Alpha was being sincere.
They grinned at Alpha, and it was the Other's too-wide smirk even without the teeth. "Theta's choice. Good."
They walked through the gate as they heard the shark finally shifting out of the rubble. Alpha was ready for the shark.
The crowd of humans outside the walls all backed up at their approach-all but Theta. Theta seemed to be frozen staring at them and nervously clutched Alpha's hat on her head.
They did not even pause as they shoved up against Theta, crawling up her like growing seaweed. Theta wasn't expecting the hug and they ended up in a tangled heap on the ground.
They curled their whole body around Theta there, keeping her safe. They began crooning to their Theta, soothing and low.
A nest would be better to hoard Theta while they healed. Theta and Beta who was stupidly fighting with his guts barely held in. They could defend and protect a nest much better, but this would have to do.
They shouldn't have pushed so much. They were going to need to sleep almost as deep as human.
But it had been worth it.
They thrummed happily as they held Theta close and drifted deep into the sleep again.
Nami watched Luffy throw her worst memories out the top window of Arlong Tower. It felt like the years of being forced to write his maps were fading into a horrible, hazy dream as the tools shattered on the ground.
The time was not forgotten, but it was in the past and no longer a waking nightmare.
Then the tower cracked and shuddered.
Nami sat in the dirt and hugged Ryuko's warm, smooth body around her shoulders and in her lap like a favored stuffed toy as the tears streamed down her face.
She watched Arlong Tower fall to rubble with Luffy's hat in her hands and Ryuko's...everything...wrapped tight around her like a scaly, breathing blanket.
Ryuko wrapped her tail around her stomach tighter, as if she could sense the bittersweet emotion. It was tight enough Nami could feel each breath she took against the coiled muscle.
The weight grounded her. It reminded Nami that she was protected by the fiercest being in the seas.
Ryuko was a myth-a creature of legend lost to time.
Sea queens were the boogieman of the fishmen. Nami was clutching the nightmare of her nightmares; a nightmare that could fling the worst of the fishmen around while still healing from her deathbed.
Ryuko should have terrified Nami.
Ryuko puffed out a warm breath through her nose that heated Nami's shoulder as her purring deepened.
Nami hadn't ever felt safer.