Mermando had forgotten all about the concert because he had discovered a new shipwreck recently and was too excited to wait to explore it. Same with his best friend Wendy.

"So, where's this new shipwreck you discovered?" Wendy asked as she appeared behind Mermando.

"Straight ahead." Mermando smiled and pointed to a ship in front of them. "Isn't it fantástico?"

"Yeah it's great." Wendy grinned.

Wendy and Mermando became friends years ago due to their shared interest in the human world and in exploring. Once they were old enough to swim out on their own they immediately started exploring sunken ships in search of interesting objects to collect.

"Oh wait...isn't this shark territory?" Wendy looked around warily.

"You're not getting cold fins now are you?" Mermando frowned as he swam towards the ship.

"Who me? No way." Wendy scoffed as she followed him. "I just don't want you to end up in the belly of a shark. Your dad would blow me to pieces if that happened."

"Oh, so you think you can out swim a shark?" Mermando smirked.

"Well I was the fastest swimmer in school..." Wendy shrugged teasingly.

"Hey I improved." Mermando retorted.

"Only because I coached you." Wendy reminded him.

"Sí sí..." Mermando muttered.

They swam inside and started looking around.

"Oo this is great." Wendy grinned. "A lot of cool things in this ship. Let's see..."

She and Mermando went their separate ways to search for items.

"Ah excitement, adventure..." Wendy smiled...before seeing a skeleton of a human. "DANGER! YIKE!" She swam towards Mermando and hid behind him.

Mermando chuckled.

"Still scared of humans?" He teased. "Come on Wendy that one can't harm us, don't be a scaredy-catfish."

"I'm not a scaredy-catfish, and considering what they do to fish you can't blame me for being scared of them." Wendy retorted. "I'm fine with collecting their trinkets but I'd rather not meet one face to face. Even the ones that don't have much of a face left."

"Yeah, I guess the dead ones can be kinda creepy..." Mermando winced as he took another look at the skeleton. "Come on, let's check the top floor."

They swam up and Mermando instantly saw something.

"Oh dios mío!" He beamed, seeing a fork. "Oh dios mío! Have you ever seen anything so marvilloso in all your life?"

"Wow, way cool!" Wendy grinned before frowning with confusion. "But, uh, what is it?"

"I don't know...but I bet Stan will..." Mermando put the fork in his bag.

Wendy heard a strange rumble.

"What was that?" She looked around but didn't see anything. "Did you hear anything?"

"Hm, I wonder what this is?" Mermando found a pipe and looked at it curiously.

"Mermando!" Wendy said, trying to get his attention.

"Wendy will you relax, nothing can harm us in here." Mermando rolled his eyes.

Wendy saw a shadow appear in front of her. She turned around...

"Shark!" She screamed. "It's a shark we gotta get out of here!"

This time Mermando took her seriously - but who wouldn't at that point? - and followed her out of the room. The shark crashed through the window and chased after them, repeatedly snapping its jaws. The shark chased them all over the ship, but Mermando and Wendy fortunately were able to stay just out of range. Unfortunately Mermando's bag got caught on a jagged part of the broken floor so he swam back to grab it. He then swam upward where he met Wendy, who had taken the long way up. The continued swimming away as the shark continued chasing them, finally swimming out a porthole and into open water.

They then swam around the mast until they reached the top. Just then Wendy saw one of the anchors on the ground. She swam towards it with the shark following.

"Wendy, what are you doing?" Mermando called.

"Trust me, I got an idea!" Wendy called back.

She then stayed near the top of the anchor...and at the right time swam through the hole that normally was attached to the chain. The shark followed and got stuck.

"Yes!" Wendy pumped a fist.

"Nice move Wendy." Mermando grinned. "Come on, let's go see Stan now." He started to swim away.

"You have soup for brains!" Wendy gave the shark a raspberry...who snapped at her.

Startled, she zoomed to Mermando.

"Wendy you really are a scaredy-catfish." Mermando chuckled.

"I am not..." Wendy muttered. "Come on would a scaredy-catfish trick a shark into getting stuck?"

"Of course not, I was just teasing." Mermando grinned.

"Mermando, you're the reason why I'm glad I don't have any brothers."

A.N. For this parody I decided to not include Wendy's brothers. They wouldn't have shown up anyway so there was no point in adding them.

The character Mermando mentioned previously, Stan, was a seagull who studied humans and sold their items to other creatures (though as other objects and for high prices...he was a bit of a con bird). Mermando and Wendy were the only ones he never conned because they always got their own items and preferred keeping them for themselves. Instead Stan decided to be friends with them, and told them what each item they collected was for free. He often got the items mixed up though...he sometimes mistook one item for another. Not that he was senile or anything - actually his mind was really sharp for an old bird - it's just that he spent most of his time either on his rock selling his items or going around collecting discarded items. He didn't study humans often enough to learn the difference between a lot of similar objects.

At this moment he was sitting on the top of his rock having fun with a telescope, one of his favorite human items.

"Stan!" Mermando called.

"Ah Mermando, and Wendy too, glad to see ya!" Stan grinned as he flapped down to the lower part of his rock.

"Stan, look what we found!" Mermando grinned, handing over his bag.

"Yeah, we were in this sunken ship when all of a sudden a shark attacked!" Wendy bared her teeth. "But I tricked him into getting stuck!" She then smiled proudly.

"Way to go Wendy." Stan smiled back. "So you got human stuff huh? Let me see..."

He looked through the bag.

"Oo, nice find there." Stan pulled out the fork. "A comb, don't see these often. Interesting shape too, must be a rare version."

"A comb?" Wendy said.

"Yeah, human's use them to straighten their hair out." Stan explained. "Unlike you merpeople human hair gets all tangled up in the wind so they need devices like a comb to get rid of the tangles."

He gave the fork back to Mermando.

"Wow, a comb." Mermando smiled.

"What about this one?" Wendy pointed to the pipe.

"Oh this I haven't seen in years, this is wonderful!" Stan grinned as he picked it up. "A miniature tuba! Man this is a rare find...you think maybe you could..."

Mermando and Wendy frowned at him.

"Never mind..." Stan muttered before clearing his throat. "Anyway, humans use these to make fine music. Allow me."

He blew on it, but all that came up was seaweed and bubbles.

"Music?" Mermando said with horror.

"Should've cleaned this first..." Stan muttered as he examined the pipe.

"Oh the concert, my father's gonna kill me!" Mermando put the fork back in his bag.

"The concert was today?" Wendy groaned.

"Maybe if I-" Stan was still examining the pipe.

"No time Stan, we gotta go!" Mermando grabbed the pipe. "Thanks anyway!"

He and Wendy swam away.

"No problem kid, and anytime!" Stan waved after them.

Mermando and Wendy continued swimming rapidly back home, not knowing that two mermen were spying on them. Their names were Robbie and Bud, and they worked for the sea sorcerer Gideon. Robbie and Bud were holding a crystal ball, which worked like a camera. On the receiving end was another crystal ball that worked like a TV minus the multiple channels. There were only two channels and that only happened when Robbie and Bud split up (they each had their own crystal ball).

Watching the crystal ball TV was of course Gideon himself.

"Yes, hurry home prince." Gideon sneered from a dark hole as he snacked on some shrimp. "We wouldn't want to miss daddy's celebration now would we? Ha! Celebration indeed, oh bah! In my day we had fantastical feasts when I lived at the palace. And now look at me, wasted away to practically nothing."

He came into full view, revealing that he wasn't a merman at all. Instead he was half-human and half-octopus.

"Banished and exiled, and practically starving." Gideon almost growled. "While he and his flimsy fish folk celebrate! Well I'll give him something to celebrate soon enough! Robbie! Bud!"

Startled, Robbie and Bud nearly dropped their crystal ball but they managed to catch it in time.

"I want you to keep an extra close watch on that charming little son of his." Gideon ordered. "He may be the key to Nereido's undoing."