10 years had passed. Mikey had adapted to life in the lake. He had no choice. He still never understood why Gerard had done this to him. He had been betrayed by his own brother.
Mikey spent the first few years of his new life always wondering why. Why did he react like this? Why did he abandon him? Why was this his solution to this so called "problem"?
At some point he had realized that he had to move on. Being upset wasn't going to bring his old life back, so there wasn't a point.
So he did, he moved on.
He had made himself a new home in that lake. He used pieces of old wood and other materials he found to build himself a little underwater shelter. Not that he needed it, it just helped the water feel more like a home and less like what it was, a lake.
It was a day just like any other, Mikey had woken up in his "home" and went to search for food. It was kinda funny he thought, that he ate fish, seen as he basically was one. He had fins, and gils, and lived in the water 24/7.
Seen as it was still early and he had just woken up, he considered this meal to be breakfast. Usually breakfast for him was just small fish that hung out around the waters edge. He was always super careful not to be seen by anyone. He was terrified of what would happen if someone saw him. What would they say? What would they do? Would they kill him? Would they catch him and put him in some sort of aquarium? He didn't want to find out.
He slowly swam over to the shore line to find some minnows or something around that size to eat. For some reason, he couldn't find any today. He searched and searched and still nothing. As careful as he was, he was so focused on finding food for himself he didn't even notice when someone had walked right up to the area he was exploring.
"Mikey?" a voice suddenly called out.
Mikey froze. It had been so long since he had talked to anyone he was surprised that he even remembered his own name.
"Mikey is that you?" the voice said, louder this time.
Mikey somehow summoned up the courage to look for the origin of the mysterious voice that was speaking to him and somehow knew his name.
When he did, he almost threw up the nonexistent food he had found.
He recognized the person that had been speaking to him and saying his name.
It was Ray.