Fiery Scales

Ch.8-Ideas (Part 2)

The mer's eyes had suddenly lit up and he yelled "KING!" while making grabby hands at the coral from his sitting place on his cushion.

Ah yes, they had gotten him some fantasy stories to help with reading and the king, or prince, is always an important figure in all of them, plus in all the pictures he's the shiniest, the mer likes shiny things.

While in thought, Marco gave the mer a coral. He was instantly inspecting it with big eyes from all directing, making very impressed sounds as if what he was holding was a big treasure... there wasn't even anything special to see, but well it had come from a king, so it must be special!

Chuckling behind his hand Marco quickly grabbed the other coral and kneeled before Ace.

"Ace-yoi"

Without even being looked at, he got a hum as a reply.

Marco released a sigh, maybe they should say his check-ups in the infirmary is also something a king does if it makes him this interested. Shaking his head, he tapped Ace his cushion "Look at me, please."

A moment later the merman placed the coral down and looked up with a smile "Okay Mahko!"

-Cute!!!- With a cough Marco focused on his instructions. "Yoi, notice how one side of the coral is hollow with a cavity at one end and fully closed at the other. The cavity side is the bottom, there a bubble will come out when you-"

"BUBBLE COME!"

"...." The merman was looking into the cavity, switching with which eye he was looking before trying to shake something out of it. Ace had also started some kind of chant of 'Bubble, bubbly bubbel, come come, no be af(r)aid!'. Aaah Marco's heart couldn't take this, how can one be this adorable, he could look at this all day, all paperwork and pranks on him forgotten in an instant!

"Oi Marco."

"..."

"Earth to bird."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"PINEAPPLE- PINEAPPLE- PINEAPPLE-HEAD-PINEAPPLE-BIRD-HYBRID-FLAMI-!"

Reluctantly and with a sigh Marco stood up and turned away from the sight before him to answer the annoying voice close to him "What do you want Thatch?"

"What do I want? Maybe that we try and continue this test?"

"We're working on it-yoi."

"... If the test was 'who can stare the longest at the freckled merman', then we had already gathered enough data for that 10 minutes ago. Right now you're just looking like pervert,... actually you always look like this when Ace is involved, but we're reaching new limits of just staring even for you."

"..." Marco turned away to once more look at Ace, considering Thatch his words. He didn't stare that much... did he? Yes, he knows he got distracted some times, but it wasn't that long that he was distracted... right? And it's not his fault, how can they not see the mer's charm! He's j-

"If you're not going to give the rest of the explanation, I'll help Ace instead." The chef said and stepped forward, ready to take the coral out of the first division commander's hand. Marco barely even noticed it, still entranced by the beautiful sight in front of him. However, the moment he felt the coral leave his hand, he was quick to grab it again and kick whoever tried to steal his quality time with the mer.

"-OOF"

"Hands off-yoi."

"Damnit, that hurt you stupid birdbrain."