A/N: I'm so sorry this is late! I was swamped with work(being self employed sucks, some days you have nothing to do and others there aren't enough hours in the day) and then I was nervous about writing the meeting because I was afraid I wouldn't meet anyone's expectations and more anxiety yada yada, writers block, blah blah blah, then finally I forced it out. Hopefully this won't be a regular thing and I wait so long to post the next chapter(fingers crossed!)

I'm also failing at keeping with my word count on Nano...

Anyway, here it is! Hope you guys enjoy!

Chapter 6: Chase

"What was that horrible screeching?" Complained Lance, holding his ears to keep potential blood from running out. "That sounded like a dying whale!"

"I don't know, but we can't worry about it, we need to go." Said the Jellyfish head, Plaxum, trying to hurry him along through the dense coral and rocks. The flat ocean floor had transitioned into a landscape of rock mazes and coral trees. Plaxum seemed to know where she was going, but he was still doubting his decision to follow her.

"It sounded like two dolphins having sex."

"Lance…"

"Or maybe a Mer with a broken vocal cord."

"Lance…"

"Or maybe they just couldn't sing. Yeah, I'm going with that."

"Lance!"

Lance smirked at her. He didn't know what kind of look she was giving him, but knowing he had aggravated her was entertaining enough. "Where exactly are we going?"

"We're meeting with two of my friends. They're going to help us find her."

"Yeah…" He should have trusted his instinct. A missing princess? A weird foreign Mer who liked wearing a jellyfish on her head? Was there something wrong with her face?

And then there was the fact he left in the middle of the trial. What was he thinking? Maybe he still had enough time to go back.

Then he remembered Nyma and that Mate of hers. He felt so…betrayed wasn't the word, but it fit the situation. She totally played him because he had a weakness for pretty faces. It was going to be his downfall someday, and it looked like it almost happened. She had tied a pretty good knot, not that he wouldn't eventually get out of it, but he would have missed the trial. Or, even worse, fallen prey to a shark. If Plaxum hadn't shown up, he didn't know how long he would have been stuck there.

But why him? He might have a really good nose, but his wasn't the best. Maybe it was because he was in the right place at the right time. He boasted about some of his skills, like archery or speed or sense of smell, but it was mostly to try to convince himself he was better than average. He grew up with five siblings, and even if he was the Guppy, he still had a hard time getting noticed. His dad always took him hunting with him, but he wasn't there anymore…

He smacked his cheeks to try to knock those thoughts out of his head. He needed to keep his mind from wandering away from his original point. "So why'd you want my help?" He started, following her further into the coral forest. She had been directly in front of him, almost like she didn't know he was behind her. It made him feel like less than an equal since she didn't even bother to know if he was following. She had a nice tail though…

She actually stopped to turn to him, almost making him run into her. Her hesitation was enough for him to know she was going to try to make this as painless as possible. "I saw that Nyma wanted to pair with you, even though this wasn't really a team trial. I know her pretty well so I knew what she was up to. I figured if I helped you, you could help me."

Lance felt used. That was conniving of her. Why didn't she just say that? Knowing you were in debt to someone wasn't as bad as being manipulated. "If you had said that I would have followed anyway."

"You followed without much persuasion. You wanted to leave."

What? No, he didn't! He had been working so hard to take this trial. He had done hunts with Hunk, practiced tracking, and built up his speed every day. Why would she think he would just leave the one chance he had to freedom for some stupid princess?

Why did he? He didn't know. Lance felt like his thoughts were traveling too fast to keep up. He didn't like the feeling of helplessness that came with self-ignorance.

Time to bury those feelings and think about them never. "Whatever, I just like helping damsels in distress." He smirked and winked.

He didn't need to see her face to know she rolled her eyes. "Let's go, my friends are waiting."

He briefly wondered what friends she meant, but then remembered seeing them at the Shoal. They were the other jellyfish heads. He was doubting his decision again.

He let his mind wander again. It always happened in the middle of a boring journey. Whenever he followed his dad, whenever he was following his siblings, and even when he was following Hunk. Hell, even when he was leading. He couldn't help it. He didn't know why his brain was like this and it frustrated him a lot. He would get into trouble for forgetting something small, or not pay attention to someone talking, or got super hyper and started disrupting class.

Like when he got distracted by that horrible screeching, and jellyfish head had to snap him back to attention. What was that shriek anyway?

His derailed thoughts came to a halt when he ran into Plaxum. "Watch where you're swimming." She said, pushing him away. "These are my friends Swirn and Blumfump." He couldn't stop staring at the octopus legs. There were…there were Mers like that?

"It's good to meet you." Said the octopus Mer, holding out one of his tentacles. Lance forced a grin and quickly touched tails before pulling back. "Here, now put this on." He was suddenly holding a jellyfish, trying to shove it on his head.

Lance quickly dodged. "Um, I'm good, I don't want to be stung."

"It only hurts for a couple of minutes. And the swelling will go down." Said the other normal looking Mer(besides the jellyfish on her head). Swirn, was it?

"Why are you wearing them anyway?"

"We must hide our identities." Said Plaxum. "If the Queen or any of the Guards from our Pod see us, they'll immediately detain us to your Shoal."

"Uh…But they don't know me, so they wouldn't care."

"True…"

"So you can put the jellyfish away, thanks." He batted Blumfump away who was still trying to force the jellyfish on his head. "What exactly are we doing?"

"We need you to smell this." Blumfump let the jellyfish swim away and immediately shoved a sash in his face. "You can track her, right?"

"What do I look like, a shark?" He shoved it away.

"I thought that's what you were."

What? Why would they think that? They look nothing like sharks. Yes, they have the sharpest and most rows of teeth, and their sense of smell was better, and hitting them on the nose disoriented them…But they weren't sharks. "The smell is probably faded. I wouldn't be able to find her if I tried."

"Please, we really need your help…" Plaxum sounded desperate. This princess was more important to her than just royalty.

He sighed. Well, I'll try." He couldn't guarantee anything, but he still took the sash and sniffed it. There was a faint scent, not enough to make out what it was, but he had an idea. He looked around to try and see if he could get anything, but he couldn't. It was too faint and it was probably gone. "I can't find it."

"We need to travel north." Said Plaxum. "That's where she last went when our Pod was migrating to your Shoal."

"Okay…" North? He had never gone that far. Hell, he had never even been this far.

The sudden urge to explore on an adventure took hold and smothered any common sense he had. "Okay." This was probably a bad idea.

But who cared, he was going on an adventure, something he only dreamed about.

—

The wall was intimidating. Heading straight up. It was a sudden steep landscape of more forest and caverns. It was both exciting and terrifying. He had the strongest urge to explore every hidden, dark corner and discover every algae and plankton he could. The terrifying part was how far up it stretched.

Lance had never seen anything like it. It looked like a rough terrain of jutted rocks and reefs of coral that didn't know which way was up. It went on forever; so far he couldn't see where it went. He didn't know things went so high, he had never been that far up.

He knew about Land Walkers and that they didn't live in the ocean and existed on some plane called Land, but he had never seen it. There were stories passed down through his ancestry of the dangers going above the "surface", whatever that was. It was like a wall between water and this "air" they spoke of. You could see through it, but you couldn't actually touch it. The stories never made sense. You would feel both light and heavy? What did that mean? Mers could breathe it, but it was harder and they couldn't use their gills. They would have to use their nose and mouth. That would make smelling difficult and overwhelming. He only liked using his nose ever so often, sometimes he was overcome so much he would get dizzy. "Breathing air" didn't sound pleasant.

But there was always that curiosity. It was why he would watch for Land Walkers and study them, and after a while, mess with them. They looked so weird too. Their two-tails only bent in the middle, and their webbed fins at the ends were very small, he couldn't understand how they were able to swim. They probably couldn't swim very fast. And they had black leathery bodies, sometimes with strange colored stripes. And those things on their heads? He never got close enough to see through the glass at their faces, but he was told they needed those things on their backs to breathe underwater. He was told they had the faces of Mers, and resembled the Two-colored like himself. Only they were still one colored without scales? Hard to picture. They probably looked ugly underneath that mask, which was why they covered it. And some of them grew hair on their faces! So gross.

The possibility of traveling further up and experiencing this "air" and touching this "surface" was intimidating, but it called to him. He wanted to touch it. Wanted to see it. He dreamed of exploring as far up as he could, but there was always a watchful eye on the younger Mers. This trial alone was the first time he was ever without someone watching them. Except for these weirdos.

He heard migratory Mers could travel anywhere, including the surface. It was highly frowned upon, but at least they had the option. Sometimes Lance wished he was one of them.

He paused, sniffing the waters. He knew was it was, but not anything recognizable. "Hey, wait." The three Mers he had been following stopped and looked back at him. He still cringed every time they faced him with those jellyfish heads. "I think I smell a Mer."

"You can distinguish that?" Asked Swirn.

"We need to avoid them. We can't get caught." Said Plaxum, her tail swishing nervously.

"What if it's one of the guards? Queen Luxia could be sending them after us!" No matter what came out of Blumfump's mouth, Lance couldn't bring himself to believe him. Why would the Queen care about these weirdos?

"We must swim on." Said Plaxum. "Can you tell where they are?"

"Well, I could track them." The Mer was pretty far, but the weird part was it was in the direction they were heading, not from where they were coming. Mers didn't travel out here, they avoided the wall. "But they're in the direction we're going."

"That's not good. Maybe they're a Wanderer." Plaxum started swimming in circles and mumbling to herself. "We've come so far, we can't get caught now. What if they're part of a thieving pod? We're not equipped to fight anyone. We need to avoid them…" She stopped spinning and faced Lance. "Would you be able to distract them?"

"What? Like bait? I thought you needed me for tracking your friend."

"Just till we get passed them. You can follow our scent too, right?"

"So I'm supposed to track this Mer and distract them while tracking your guy's scent while you sneak by?" They nodded like it was a reasonable request. He sighed. "Okay, whatever. I'll keep them distracted but I ain't putting myself in danger for you guys."

"Just till we pass, then you can catch up."

Lance wanted to blow bubbles in their faces. Why was he going along with this? They were expecting a lot. What if this Mer was a Guard from the Shoal? Or a thief person they talked about? He was supposed to distract them, then get away? He was a little flattered they had faith in him, but he knew it was just because he was expendable. They could have gotten any Mer to help, he was just convenient. "Fine." He grunted, then swam up towards this Mer that had their tails in a tangle.

It was a sweet smell, layered with a couple different kinds of seafood. Shark, shrimp, swordfish. Quite a variety, where'd this Mer hunt? They couldn't be with a Shoal like those jellyfish heads said. There were also unrecognizable smells, ones he definitely couldn't place. It was an interesting combination.

And weirdly enticing.

Lance shook his head. Now wasn't the time to be chasing some tail, he had a job to do. Luckily the smell was kind of strong, which meant they were close, so it wouldn't be hard to find them.

He couldn't see anything though. The coral was too thick, and rocks were making the terrain uneven. There were a couple of small valleys, caves, and tall sharp rocks anyone could hide behind. That's probably why he couldn't see them. They must be hiding, and they must know he was there. If this was going to be a case of shark and fish, he might be able to chase them away from the group. Well, if it was one thing he was good at(and what he had been practicing for), it was hunting.

His glowing eyes scanned around the shadowed reef and sharp rocks, searching for any movement that would catch his attention. The water was still and anything not attached to coral or algae had swum away. They knew there were predators around, long before he swam up.

He let his nose do the searching. He slowed to a float, letting the near still waters carry him through the weaves of every corner and curve. The Mer was close, he could smell it.

A swish of red caught the corner of his glowing blue eye, disappearing behind a tree of coral. He kept his lazy pace like he hadn't seen anything, and let the current drag him through a wall of rock to disappear. He dove deep into the small cove, peeking out through a hole to see if he could spot the red tail again. Red was an interesting color, pretty rare. This Mer must have been from another Shoal, or probably migrated from the Far East. The water flowed till it was new, a couple of doboshes ticking by. He kept as still as he could, unblinking, till he saw the tail of red again.

It was hard to see, but the Mer looked like him. In a way that it was only scaled on half his body. His red tail was as bright as the red cracks shining through charcoal magma at the bottom of the Deep. His unscaled skin was lighter than the Mers in his Shoal, not quite a color he had seen before. And black hair? Strange combination.

But also beautiful.

He didn't have as many fins as him. There were fewer scales even; his hands weren't completely covered, and he didn't have dorsal or arm fins. His ears were pointed but not webbed. He almost didn't look…complete.

When the Mer turned his head in search of company, his eyes glowed a brilliant violet. Purple was the rarest of colors. They were captivating even from afar.

He couldn't help but follow.

Lance kept to the shadows and rocks, keeping himself from out of sight as he followed the strange Mer. He was heading farther up the endless wall, backing out into the open ocean to avoid the obstructing plant life. He was heading in a singular direction, against the current. Did he not know how to swim? He was just making it harder for himself.

Lance wondered what his next move should be. Should he confront the Mer? Avoid him? Forget about him and leave? Lance was in a state of apathy at this point.

A second his mind was wandering into the depths of his lack of concentration, and the next he spotted the Mer swimming away. Crap, he must have seen him. "Wait!"

The Mer was fast and had a head start. But this Mer didn't know how to use the currents for speed, unlike Lance. He couldn't contain the smirk stretching across his lips as he sped up.

The red Mer looked back to see him gaining, and took a dive into the rocks. Lance almost had trouble stopping himself, but he used the swing of the current and propelled himself into the rocks and right in the path of the red Mer. "Ha! Gotcha!"

Smack!

"Ah! God, my head!" Lance could feel his forehead throbbing beneath his hands as he held his eyes tight to keep the stinging down. How fast had this guy been swimming? Faster than he thought apparently.

"Why don't you watch where you're going!" The other Mer's voice sounded as strained as his, only with a little more lace of frustration. It was a little hoarse for a Mer.

"Well if you knew how to swim I wouldn't have to!"

"I know how to swim!"

"Apparently you don't!" Lance's eyes connected with the brilliant glowing violet, and he was struck with awe and recognition like he had seen those eyes before. A sense of calm flowed into him, like the harsh currents from a storm slowing to a dull wave. It was strange, one minute he was furious this Mer hit him, and the next he couldn't stop staring into those eyes. He wanted to say something, like his name or ask where he was from. He wanted to know who this strange Mer was and why he was so captivated by the beauty of those eyes.

But his lips stilled and his heart started thumping as the soft glow of red sprinkled the other's face and his own blue scales started to shine.

Finally! So glad this part is over, it was a pain to write. I like stretched out writing the last couple paragraphs over 3 days, it was so painful... And I hope you guys aren't too mad at the cliffhanger XD Now, onto writing the next chapter!