Heracles' house was located outside of the capital city, in a part of the kingdom mainly dedicated to fishing. Small stone houses dotted the vast area, scattered about with half a kilometer of open water between each one. It was a huge difference from the stacked and crammed-together buildings that Gilbert was so accustomed to in his densely populated city. As a result, he would frequently get lost trying to find his friend's home. With each visit, he got better at locating the place. Or so he told himself. He didn't know how the locals did it.

Today, his goal was to go see the surface with his friend, but they weren't heading to the island this time. He had his sights set on something more ambitious. The fireworks from last night had left a spark in his soul, and his curiosity for land was only growing stronger.

"Herrrrracleeeeees!" Gilbert hovered outside the younger merman's house, tempted to throw a rock at it to get his attention. But a few moments later, a brown mop of hair stuck itself out from the small window, under which was Heracles. "Come on! It's time for an adventure!"

"I can't," The younger merman responded, placing his hands on the sill. "My mother told me to clean the house…."

"Well your mother's not here right now, is she?"

"…No," he hesitantly replied.

"Then come on! You can do it when we get back."

"Get back from where?"

Gilbert fanned his hands out in front of him, proclaiming it proudly. "The peninsula!"

Silence passed in the open space between them, after which Heracles ducked back into the house.

"Goodbye."

"Wait, no, Hera—!" Gilbert started, rushing forward and shoving himself into the narrow opening of the window. "We have to—ugh, you gotta come and—ow ow ow, hang on." With his hips tightly wedged into the window, he found himself stuck.

Heracles smiled at him, completely unwilling to help.

"Ow, my fucking dorsal," Gilbert whined, scooting himself back out of the house. He gave Heracles a pleading, pathetic look as he rubbed the scraped fin on his back. "Come on Hera, come with me? I snuck out and came all this way to come get you. It'll only be for a little while, promise!"

Heracles rested his hands on his hips. "We already see enough of the surface…while we're not supposed to."

Gilbert snorted. "That dinky little lump of sand? That's child's play! There's a whole landmass on the edge of the kingdom and you're not even a little curious about it?"

"No. Because I don't like dying."

"We're not gonna die," Gilbert reassured him, dismissing it when it actually probably should have been taken seriously. "None of those humans from before killed us, remember? And we'll stay hidden this time. Heracles, there's a whole different world out there. And hell, I know it's risky, but think of all the awesome things we'll see! Plus I don't want to go up there alone." He smiled pleadingly, a row of sharp teeth enticing the younger merman. "Please?"

There was a long pause, Heracles silently pondering his life choices. Gilbert knew then that he had to add in a little bribery.

"I'll uh…I'll get you that one food you like so much."

That piqued Heracles' interest. "Bone coral polyps?..."

"I'll even get the blue ones," Gilbert added in sing-song.

Heracles did love his blue polyps.

At the very edge of the sea, where the undulating surface was only a few meters above their heads, the two mermen found a twisting maze of rocks that crept out of the water and onto land. Under the water were multiple hidden passageways carved into the rocks. Gilbert decided it was a perfect place to hide out. There were plenty of nooks and crannies to duck into if anyone saw them, and it was close enough to see everything on land. Best of all, no other merfolk were around. Not that anyone would be crazy enough to live out there.

"Whoa, look at all the plants…." Gilbert had selected a spot behind a large slab of rock, his palms leaning against the grey surface as small waves gently rolled against his back. He had to squint at first, against the bright sun, but his eyes slowly adjusted. "They're so big! Are they all trees?"

"I think so," Heracles mumbled, eyes barely peeking above the rocks.

Past the shore was a small cliff, and tightly nestled against the side of it was a house made of wood planks. Besides for the single dwelling, there were no other signs of human life on the beach, but the nearby town was just barely visible at a distance. A few seagulls hurried along the sand, occasionally squawking at each other, while a warm breeze continuously rustled the grass not too far from the shore, so that the green mass undulated like the familiar world below.

Gilbert's eyes darted over the scenery, trying to absorb anything and everything. He couldn't look away. Heracles' eyes, on the other hand, were intently focused on a butterfly floating nearby.

"Wait wait wait, did you see that?" Gilbert suddenly said.

"Yeah, it's yellow," Heracles responded, still watching the butterfly.

"What—no, not that. Over there, next to the building, I thought I saw somethi—"

And that was when a human emerged from the dwelling, and Gilbert's head was shoved underneath the water as Heracles forced the both of them to hide.

A moment later, the two slowly peeked over the rocks again, their hearts beating hard against their chests. But the human seemed too far away to notice them, so they remained frozen in place, watching the man as he started walking down towards the shore. The human wasn't as close as the ones from the previous day, but seeing one in broad daylight was still exciting. At least to Gilbert. He never could figure out what Heracles was thinking at any moment.

The human kept treading along the sand, towards where the rocks met the shore. He stopped in front of the mass of stones and stared for a few moments, the breeze tousling his chestnut hair. He was still a good distance away from the two mermen, but it almost looked as though he was contemplating climbing onto the rocks. Gilbert hoped that wasn't the case, as that would lead him directly over to their hiding spot, and the prince didn't want to leave yet. He had just gotten there. But luckily, the human turned away and stared out at the ocean instead.

The breeze gently fluttered his brown hair again, along with one stray curl that stood out from all the other strands.

Gilbert gasped.

"That's the one—!" He cut himself off, covering his mouth to quiet down. He continued with a lowered voice. "The one from the ship."

"…There were lots of humans on the ship," Heracles replied, the fascinating butterfly from before catching his eye again as it floated within arm's length of the two.

"No, I mean…." Gilbert trailed off, remembering that Heracles hadn't seen what he had seen. He'd missed the fast paced dance and the swift, fluid movements of the human whose laughter caused the universe to burst into multicoloured sunbeams.

But that was just the fireworks.

"Well I recognize this one," Gilbert muttered shortly. "His name's...Rombo or something." The man sat down on the sand with his knees drawn up, water lapping at his legs every so often. From this distance, Gilbert could make out just enough details to be satisfied, because like hell was he going to try and get closer. This was already risky enough, even for him. "…The ears."

"Hmm?" Heracles glanced at the human again.

"The ears. They're so…" Gilbert moved his hands around, trying to think of a word to explain the oddly shaped skin. "Gummy!"

Heracles raised an eyebrow.

"Look at them. They're gummy. Why are they so gummy? I want to touch them."

"Don't."

Gilbert ducked down further behind the rocks, having felt himself edging up too high. "Gummy," he whispered. He really wanted to touch them.

As Heracles' gaze wandered from the butterfly to the nearby town and the landscape between, Gilbert stayed focused on the human. He once again noted the monochromatic skin, how it didn't have any speckles or stripes or anything that merfolk had, how it was all a uniform sandy colour. He stared at the bare feet, half sunk in the tide, connected to a pair of legs that were covered in cloth above the shins. Legs were different under the sea—most things had tails instead, but if an animal did have legs, it had way more than two. Gilbert wondered what it must be like to put all of a person's weight on only two feet, especially since everything was much heavier on land. And it was a little unfair, in a way. Humans could easily walk out into the water and float around, but merfolk couldn't scoot their bodies onto land very far without running into problems. Then again, humans didn't breathe in water. So he had the upper hand there.

Still, it was something to daydream about as he stared at the man relaxing on the beach, the sun climbing higher in the sky and threatening to dry out his cheeks before long. He didn't even realize how much time had passed before he idly wiped his face with a damp arm. Heracles had already refreshed himself in the water, his hand dripping as he waved it in front of Gilbert's face.

"Are you still on Earth?..."

Gilbert pushed the hand away with a smirk. "Yeah, yeah, still here."

Then the man stood up, his chest heaving a sigh, and he wiped the sand off his legs as the sea breeze flapped at his loose breeches. He turned around and walked up the beach, towards his dwelling. For some unknown reason, Gilbert felt genuinely sad to see him leave. But really, what could he do? Call out to him?

"Hey, wait!" he called out to him, before a hand again pushed his head underwater, almost snapping his neck at the sudden force.

"Are you cra-?!" Heracles' voice was garbled as it came out in a gush of air bubbles, but he coughed and took in a breath of seawater. "Are you crazy?"

"Probably!" Gilbert snapped back, too embarrassed to say anything else.

Heracles shook his head, as if trying to accept his now-insane friend. They both floated in silence for a moment, surrounded by walls of rock as the surface waves tousled their hair. Gilbert decided to act first, slowly surfacing and peeking at the shore.

The human was staring out at the ocean, a puzzled look on his face. He had probably heard.

"So, uh," Heracles started, as Gilbert sank under the waves again. "…What was that about?"

Gilbert wondered that, too.

"We should go," he responded instead. "I promised you wouldn't get killed, right? And that was dangerous. So let's head back."

That was the end of their conversation, as Heracles was more than happy to leave.

By the time the two arrived back at Heracles' house, it was the middle of the day. Distant sunbeams filtered in, glinting off the scales of huge schools of fish that swam overhead. Gilbert realized that, besides for making a living catching fish, merfolk lived out here because it was beautiful, too. He hung outside Heracles' house a while as the younger merman mentally prepared himself for some fast-paced cleaning before his mother came home.

"Don't you have lessons today?..." Heracles finally said after a long stretch of silence, mostly filled with him staring at the outside of his house, as if willing it to be clean.

"Nah, not today, thank God." Gilbert waved a hand in dismissal, smiling in relief. "My day is mostly free, except…" His smile faded away only to be replaced with dread. "Shit!"

"What—"

"Shit shit shit! Dammit! What time is it?"

"It's—"

"I was supposed to talk with Papa today! I missed it!" He quickly tugged a hand through his hair. "No, no, I'm really the worst, I've done it now, that was my chance to…."

"Gil..." Heracles came a little closer, trying to calm the panicking prince. "Gil, your father won't murder you for this…."

"You don't understand." Gilbert turned to his friend, clenching his teeth with worry. "You've never seen him when he's mad. It's not often, but holy shit, he can get mad. I'm so dead."

"What were you gonna talk to him about?"

"Just…everything!" Gilbert gestured wildly with his arms, whipping up small currents that tousled their clothing. "About the whole marriage thing, and me being a fuck-up and-! Dammit, I was going to try and get him to change his mind about stuff…." Gilbert groaned and sunk to the ground, miserably lying in the sand. "Now I've gone and fucked up again, and he'll be so mad he'll force me into a marriage right away, just to get rid of me."

Heracles hovered next to him, worried for his friend. "If you arrive now…will he be less mad?"

Gilbert looked up. "It takes at least 40 minutes to get back to the capital, even if I hurry. The tunnels take forever, too." He buried his face in his arms. "Ugh, I need to get away, I'm gonna run away. And then when he actually misses me, I'll come back and he'll apologize." He was just ranting about a dumb idea, but then he slowly lifted his head. "Yeah…yeah that could work, right?"

"Um…"

"I'll disappear for a while, lay low somewhere." Gilbert got off the dirty ground and put a hand to his chin. "Once my father realizes I'm gone, he'll panic and regret everything, and then I'll miraculously return again! He'll be so relieved he'll forgive me of everything and I'll be off the hook!" He was grinning by now, all of his problems having a solution in sight.

Heracles tried to cut in again, but Gilbert quickly continued.

"And a vacation from him would be awesome. But where should I go? Out of the territory?" He frowned again. "No, someone might still recognize me. I need to go somewhere far away…" And then his eyes lit up. "Like the land."

Heracles couldn't keep up anymore. "Wait, how?"

"I-I don't know, but they'll never find me up there, right? I can find a cave or something to hide in." An added benefit to that, he failed to mention, was the chance to watch more humans up close. Especially the brunet one.

"Gilbert. Do you remember that time you wanted to see how fast you could stop yourself at top speed, and ended up breaking your nose?"

Gilbert grinned a bit sheepishly at that memory, having collided with a rock wall after gloating so much about his swimming prowess. "Yeah."

"I think…this might end up a lot worse. You tend not to think things through."

"The only thing I need to think through is a plan of action, Hera." His idea was perfect, and there was no going back now. It was perfectly perfect.

"You'll get all dried up on land." Except for that detail.

"Not if I…stay in a puddle?" Gilbert pondered some more as he heard Heracles sigh. He needed to get to a place where no one would find him, especially the royal guard, and land seemed like the ideal place. But it would take magic to keep him there. At that thought, he gasped. "Heracles!" He grinned in triumph. "What about that octo!"

"That…octo?"

"The one that was banished. Well, you might be too young to remember that. He was an illegal magic user. I can go see him, and then he can get me on land somehow. And I've got plenty of money to pay him for anything! They say he was really powerful…."

"What if he hurts you instead?" Heracles managed to ask, eyes wide with shock.

"I'm the prince!" Gilbert shrugged. "He'll bow to my authority, no questions asked. He's the one who's banished."

Heracles was silent, looking worried as he thought over everything Gilbert was saying.

"Come on, Hera, it'll be fine. I've never done anything that killed me."

"Yet."

"It'll be fine," he repeated.

Silence filled the water between them. Gilbert was set on the idea, but Heracles' hesitation on agreeing with him was starting to get irritating. It was a brilliant plan, why couldn't he see that? And Gilbert knew he had done dangerous things before, but this was not dangerous.

"Well…either way, that's what I'm gonna do. You can come with me, if you want?"

"No way," Heracles immediately said, shaking his head.

"Okay then! If it all works out, I'll meet you at the beach we were at earlier!" He turned to leave, and instantly Heracles grabbed his caudal fin. "Ow."

"Just…" The younger merman was staring downward when Gilbert turned around. Worry was written all over his face. "…Be careful."

Gilbert smiled back. "Don't worry. Meet me at the rocky beach tomorrow; then you'll see I'm fine."

As Gilbert swam northward to darker waters, he tried to convince himself that the pounding in his chest was from excitement, not from fear.