apologising in advance for some weird and confusing ass shit happening in this chapter
» NIALL »
They reach the end of the long corridor, coming to a stop right outside a cell, a rather big one. Niall looks inside the cell, rows of wooden planks nailed to the rocks, lined with rows of glass bottles which are filled with colourful liquid ranging from a neon blue, to hot pink, yellow, lime green and even black.
Niall's eyes widen when he realises whose cell this is. The sea enchantress'.
Bobby nods at the guards guarding her cell, signalling for them to leave them be. They do as instructed.
"My, my, Mr Horan, fancy seeing you down here." Niall hears a female voice, surprisingly calm and soothing and not... 'evil-like'.
From the shadows, out comes a slim mermaid, about middle aged, long, royal blue hair which reaches the middle of her back, swaying gracefully in the water. Her skin is porcelain-like, her tail a light baby blue which matches perfectly with her icy blue eyes.
"Althea." Bobby nods stiffly in greeting.
"Well, to what do I owe this pleasure?" She asks, swimming and making her way closer to the gates, hands holding the bars as she looks at Bobby. Her icy eyes then land on Niall's ocean blue ones. Unconsciously, Niall moves back and away from her.
She raises a perfectly shaped brow up at the younger merman, and Niall flushes slightly under her intense and rather intimidating scrutiny.
"Is this him?" She asks, glancing over to Bobby, before her eyes land back on Niall's just a second later.
"Yeah..." Bobby answers softly, his hardened and guarded features softening slightly.
"A work of art, ain't he?" She smiles smugly. "How long has it been? 15? 20 years?" She asks, her eyes still not leaving Niall's, whose, unlike hers, daren't meet hers.
Bobby simply nods stiffly. "20."
"Well, what do you need then? I'm a busy woman, locked up in here, you know?" She states, and Niall can't tell if she's joking or not.
"Show him everything." His father simply says, nodding his head towards his son. He then surprises Niall by unlocking the gates, and it lifts.
The sea enchantress, or Althea, gestures for Niall to come closer. He doesn't.
She chuckles softly. "I won't bite." She says. Niall gulps, and eventually does, moving closer till he's inside his cell, with his dad just behind.
Althea goes over to the shelves, her eyes roaming the endless supply of potion bottles. She finally picks one, a turquoise coloured one, popping the cork off before taking a sniff. How the gallows does the liquid stay in the bottle instead of flowing out, since... you know, they're underwater?
She turns to face Niall once more, bringing the bottle up to his face, who immediately backs away.
"Woah.. w-what's that?" He asks warily.
"Something to help you see everything." She says, as though it's the most obvious thing in the world.
"And what the hell is that supposed to mean? Dad?" Niall turns to his father with worried eyes.
"Don't worry, son. It's perfectly safe. I just wanna let you see a memory of mine. About your mum and I." His father reassures.
Niall nods hesitantly, and the sea enchantress smiles lightly, before bringing the bottle closer to his nose.
"Take a sniff." Hesitantly, Niall does as he's told, the surprisingly sweet but musky scent fills his nose. It actually smells exactly like his dad's natural scent.
Almost immediately, it draws out a sharp gasp from the merman when his vision suddenly goes black, and his body go limp.
But that darkness doesn't last for long because he soon sees a blurred outline of two figures.
A merfolk and a human.
The vision clears up, revealing a merman and a lady... a human lady, and on closer inspection, Niall immediately takes notice of the familiar turquoise tail and dirty blonde hair.
It's his father. A much younger version of him, that is.
He looks at the lady, she's beautiful, Niall thinks. She's wearing a deep purple summer dress, has shoulder length brown hair and bright blue eyes which seem to be shining. Is that... his mother?
The plain white background shifts to the beach, golden sand, clear blue sky and bright sun. His father is in the water, with the lady sitting on a wooden pier, legs dipped into the water. The couple is smiling brightly, laughing whole heartedly, with nothing but love and joy shining in their eyes. Niall can't help but to smile softly at the sight. Is this how he stares at Harry? He probably looks like a love-sick idiot, but it doesn't matter because he's so bloody happy whenever he's with Harry.
They kiss, and Niall can literally feel all the love radiating off of them.
The figures go blurry once again, the scene completely disappearing into a cloud of white smoke. Niall was about to question what was happening, but he stops himself when another image appears. This time, the couple seem to be in an isolated cave, up on land with his father seated on the rocky ground and the lady right next to him.
"We want a boy." He hears the familiar voice of his father say, this time, the couple looking slightly older than they were before.
"A boy, eh?" Niall's eyes widen when he hears the voice of the sea enchantress. And soon, her figure appears too, opposite the couple, with a big black bowl in between them.
"How do you want him to look like? Muscular? Tall? Tan? Sharp features?" She asks.
The couple exchange glances with a soft smile. "However he turns out is perfectly fine with us."
The sea enchantress shrugs nonchalantly. "Alright... but don't blame me if he comes out looking like an anglerfish." She says, causing the couple to roll their eyes.
"Pass me your hands." She says, then reaches out for the couple's hands, the lady's first.
She then grabs what looks like a shark's tooth, before pricking her finger, causing her to hiss in pain. Very quickly, she grabs a glass tube, letting the blood drip into the tube.
She does the same to Niall's father, repeating the same procedure of collecting his blood into the test tube. She swirls it slightly, the thick red blood mixing together.
Into the black bowl that sits between them, she pours the drops of blood in there, before going over to the shelves of potions sitting behind her. She grabs one that's in a deep, royal blue colour, together with one that's pure white.
Her thumb flicks the cork off each bottle, before she's pouring just one drop of the blue coloured liquid into the black bowl that already holds the mixed blood.
Immediately, bright, sparkling dust swirls in the air above like a glorious cloud. Unlike confetti or glitter, gravity had no way to make it fall. Althea, closes her icy blue eyes, lips parting as short chants leave her lips.
Her porcelain skin glows as the magic from the dust enters the blood mixture. The sparkling dust swirls abstractly above the black bowl. It's hypnotising, really.
Then, Althea takes the white liquid, and pours one drop in. Immediately, the bowl shakes, startling the couple back slightly, the concoction starting to glow into a bright ocean blue.
His father's arms are wrapped protectively around the lady's waist, both their eyes blown wide with awe as they watch more iridescent dust fall gracefully into the bowl.
Althea catches a handful of the magic dust in the air in her palms, then, she blows it into bowl, and suddenly, there's a soft poof, followed by loud crying. From a baby.
The couple gasps, tears in their eyes as they stare lovingly at the small baby that's sitting in the bowl. The baby has bright lilac hair, smooth, fair skin and bright blue eyes.
Niall gasps at the scene unfolding before him! That's him! Oh.. so that's how he was... made. Hey, he was actually a really cute baby.
The family huddles around in a loving hug, with bright, joyous smiles on their faces.
He smiles at the sight, and his heart tugs a little at the scene. He really wishes he got to knew his mother.
The scene shifts, fast forwarding to show the family of three on the beach, newborn Niall in the mother's arms. They smile, before they're gently lowering him down into the water.
The baby giggles, splashing about in the water, and the parents are watching with amazement as his tiny, plump legs are shifting into a little tail. Turquoise cum purple. (Don't get your dirty minds in a twist, cum here means 'combined with' I see you dirty little thangs ;))
Once again, the sight blurs out, before disappearing into a cloud of thick white smoke.
This time, it's night. Total darkness prevails as clouds thicken and the sky is striking with lighting, blotting out the starlight. Wind is rising, temperature dropping and the waves are high.
There's distant yelling and shouting as a sailor boat struggles to ride the high waves. The ship is occupied by at least five burly men. They climb up the waves, and then crashes down in a cascade of wood and water.
"There!" A gruff voice yells over the loud palpitating of rain. He points out at sea, gesturing to the familiar turquoise tail that's visible under the dark water. His father.
"Stop it! You can't do this!!" A distressed female's voice yells out in a heart-wrenching sob.
"Shut up, bitch!"
Then a loud, sharp gunshot rings through the air. Then another, and another.
There's a shrill scream, and all too suddenly, the man that's holding onto the gun, directs it from the fleeing merman to the lady instead. Niall's mother.
"No.." Bobby mutters with fear in his eyes, glancing over his shoulder at the scene.
With determination, he flaps his strong tail down onto the water, causing the waves to go even higher, the large wave towering over the small boat. He sends it crashing down on them. He can catch her if she ever falls into the water.
But it was too late. A gunshot has already been fired.
His heart stops as he watches with horrified eyes how his love falls over the boat.
She falls into the water, and Bobby is sprinting as fast as he can towards his wife.
"Maura!" He helplessly calls out, his eyes darting around the dark, murky water to look for his fallen wife.
But he sees nothing but broken debris from the ship. He swims deeper southwards, and that's when he sees it. His wife's unmoving and bleeding body, sinking deeper and deeper down under. Fast.
Bobby swims as fast as he can down towards his wife. A feeble attempt, because soon, her body is consumed by darkness.
With a burst of anger and heart wrenching pain surging through him, he's using all his energy to shift the tides out of anger. Anger at the humans, and most importantly, anger at himself for putting his wife through death.
The waves plummet down, breaking through the deck of the ship. The rest of the men fall into the sea, black waves folding over them, and they never resurfaced.
The entire scene disappears, and Niall sees nothing but darkness again.
He feels some pressure on his temples, before it's gone.
His blue eyes flutter back open, and the world around him spins, causing him to fall onto the cold, rocky floor.
"Niall? You okay son?" He feels the comforting arm of his father around his shoulder before he's gently helped up.
"Yeah." Niall breathes out, rubbing the bridge of his nose to rid of the aching pain in his head. The pain is throbbing so violently in his skull that he's wondering why it didn't just crack open.
"How're you feeling?" He hears his dad ask carefully.
"Like a shark's chewing on my skull." He groans. He glances over to Althea, and something's bugging him at the back of his mind. He just doesn't know what.
"Do you mind if I have a word with Althea please? Alone?" Niall asks.
Both merman and mermaid get taken aback at his request, but eventually, his father nods, a little hesitantly.
"I'll be outside then." His dad says.
"Wait." The sea enchantress stops him.
She then swims past Niall and over to the older merman instead. She leans in closer to his ear, whispering something to him that caused his entire body to tense up and for his features to harden.
"It's none of your business." His father practically growls, backing away slightly from the sea enchantress.
"Don't take too long, Niall." His father says, his blue eyes now icy as he stares Althea down coldly.
Without another word, Bobby is swimming off, the gush of water from the power of his tail could practically blow Niall away.
"So, what do you need?" She asks.
"Two things actually..." Niall says sheepishly.
"Shoot."
"A bubble helmet. Fit for two... please?"
To Niall's surprise, she starts chuckling. The lilac haired lad raises a brow at her in confusion.
"Sorry.. I didn't mean to laugh.. I just had a.. deja vu feeling. But, sure. Anyway," she waves her hand dismissively, "Continue, what's the second thing you need?"
"Right.. why do I have a feeling that you actually know what happened to my mother?" Niall asks carefully.
"What do you mean? You saw what happened, didn't you?" She asks, an indifferent look on her face. A little too indifferent.
"I did.. but I feel like you know something about her death that wasn't shown.." Niall gasps, staring wide eyed at the seat enchantress. "You know who shot her."
"Please," she rolls her eyes. "How am I supposed to know? I wasn't even there at the scene, and I definitely don't interact with humans." She states. "Whatever you saw of your father's memory, that was it."
"If that was just my dad's memory, does that mean it may not be the full truth of what happened?"
She nods. "What you saw earlier, it was fully extracted from your father's history. It's all based on everything that he remembered, whether it's the full truth, that's another question. And all the bottles here," She gestures to the bottles lined up on the shelves. "They're all memories of the people of Aquacia. Past and new, all automatically stored in here. Those who want to store their memories, that is."
"Why would someone actually want to do that?" He asks.
She shrugs. "In case someone loses their memory, I reckon..." She trails off, her icy blue eyes piercing into Niall's as though she's trying to silently communicate a message across to him.
"What?" Niall asks, head tilted to the side slightly. "Why're you staring at me like that?" He asks, a little creeped out at the moment.
She chuckles, shaking her head. "Nothing." She says. "You'll know soon enough." She whispers under her breath.
"What was that?" Niall asks, not hearing what she just said.
She simply shakes her head. "Anyway, is that all you needed? A bubble helmet and asking me if I knew anything about your mother's death."
Niall nods, still a little confused at her behaviour. "Oh, wait." He pipes in.
"My mother's memories wouldn't happen to be in one of these bottles, would it? I want to see her side of the story just before she.. you know..." He asks softly.
"You're lucky she wanted to keep her memories stored... even though she isn't part of Aquacia." She states. "Any reason why you wanna see them?" She asks, genuinely curious.
Niall shrugs. "Not really.. it's just... something isn't sitting right in me."
"Maybe it was an old crab cake you ate?" She jokes with a small smirk, but goes over to the shelf once either way.
Niall can't help but to release a soft giggle. Maybe Zayn was right. She isn't as bad as others make her out to be.
Speaking of Zayn... "Why'd you cut Zayn's lifespan by 5 years?" He suddenly asks. "He went through a lot... with that Maya girl and all. Couldn't you have cut him some slack?"
She breathes out a short laugh. "I did." She shrugs lightly, picking up a bottle with lavender coloured liquid in it. "I didn't cut his lifespan. I gave him additional 5 years, in fact."
Niall raises a brow. "Then why'd you tell him you cut it?" He asks in confusion.
She simply shrugs with a light smile. "Now, are you gonna continue asking lame questions or do you actually wanna see your mum's memories?"
"Right, sorry." Niall mumbles.
Althea does the same as before, popping open the top of the bottle and bringing it up to Niall's nose. This time, without him flinching back.
He breathes in deep, this time, a sweet, almost florally scent fills his nose.
Niall's vision goes black and his mind empties out, much like earlier.
Unlike the first time, the memory this time starts right on the stormy night, on the sailor ship with the bad humans trying to catch his father. It's exactly the same scene as before.
Loud shoutings, gun fire, thunder and lightning. It's like Niall is reliving a nightmare over and over again.
Like before, he watches helplessly as the man who was holding Niall's mother captive before, aims the gun at her instead of dad who's swimming underwater.
The gunshot cracks into the air as loud as thunder, the noise reverberating in ears.
But it didn't shoot her.
The wave which dad made, caused the ship to tip, resulting the shooter to lose his balance, completely missing the shot.
But that rock in the boat did cause his mother to topple over the edge, splashing into the water.
But she didn't seem worried. Almost as if she knew Bobby would be coming any second to bring her back to surface.
"Maura!" His father shouts.
But it's then that she starts to sink. Her legs tired and struggling to bring her back towards the surface. With overpowering effort, she manages to breaks the surface, gasping for air.
But with barely a splash, she is under again. This time she starts sinking. Way too fast for a normal human to sink under water.
That's when Niall sees it. She isn't drowning.
It's like there's an anchor tied to her ankle to sink her.
But it's not an anchor.
She's getting dragged down.
Not by some shark or some sea creature... no.
It was a merfolk.
The dark blue, almost black, tail that's glistening in the dark gave it away.
But before he could see who it is, everything goes black, and there's a loud ringing in his ears as he gets ripped back into reality.
Niall gasps sharply as he comes to his senses once again.
He inhales deeply, a palm pressed over his chest.
What in the flipping gallows did I just see?
Mum wasn't shot. She didn't get killed because of a human. She was getting dragged down. She was murdered... by one of us.
That rumoured merman who killed a human, it's true! And unfortunately, that human happens to be Niall's mother.
"You okay?" Althea asks softly, concerned.
"I..." Niall gasps. "I need to go. I.. I need to talk to my dad.." He rushes out, rubbing his hands over his face anxiously.
"Hold on." She stops Niall.
She quickly goes over to her shelf once more, pulling out another bottle, slightly smaller than the rest, a light blue liquid with little hints of purple. She then grabs a small piece of a peach coloured coral.
"Take these." She places the items in Niall's hands. "This," she raises the coral. "Is the bubble helmet. Blow into the this hole, and the bubble will form." She explains.
"So, what's the human's name?" She asks with a soft smile.
"H-Human?" Niall stutters out, silenlty cursing to himself when his cheeks flame up. Why is he so whipped over that boy? Dammit Harry.
Althea chuckles, nodding. "You can't possibly want me to believe that the bubble helmet is for you alone, can you?"
"Oh.. right..." Niall mutters with florid cheeks.
"So? What's his name?" She asks again, seeming to be genuinely interested.
"Harry Styles." Niall says shyly, his heart skipping a beat.
"Harry..." She repeats softly, her eyes distant as she goes deep in thought, but there's a small smile on her face nonetheless.
"Anyway, what's this for?" Niall asks, raising the bottle of liquid, only because he wanted to stop blushing at the topic of Harry.
"Your memories. In case you want to... see them." She briefly says.
"My memories? But I don't remember storing my memories... why would I need-"
"Niall." A stern voice suddenly interrupts them. "What's taking so long?"
"Nothing." Niall says, before quickly hiding the things behind his back.
"Let's go then." His father says, grasping on Niall's elbow and bringing him out.
Niall glances over his shoulder, seeing Althea shoot him a last wink, before the shutters for her cell closes back shut.
»
"Dad, can I talk to you?" Niall asks, coming back out from his room after he has placed the items Althea has given him.
"Sure." He hums after hanging up the shell line on someone from work.
"Why'd you want to show me your memory?" He asks.
His father sighs, before gesturing for Niall to take a seat next to him.
"I just wanted to show you how the human world is really like. You may be in love... and I don't doubt it when you say the lad is a good man. He must be, if he took care of you for the past few days with no ill intentions. But everyone else... the second someone finds out, you're literally dead meat, son."
"I know all that, dad." Niall sighs, then purses his lips at his words, thinking of how he should explain things to his father.
"But humans aren't all bad, and maybe things may not actually be what they seem to be? And sometimes the ones with ill intentions are actually right under our noses?" Niall says, trailing off into a question rather than a statement.
"Where are you going with this, son?" Bobby asks, his eyes slightly narrowed.
Niall puffs out a breath of air. "I don't know how to say this..." He mutters. "But.. earlier when I was alone with Althea and I was seeing into your memory, something didn't sit right in me... so I asked to see into mum's."
He raises a brow at his words, but doesn't comment anything about it.
"Go on." He nods.
"And I was looking at the time right before she... you know."
His body tenses up, but he nods nonetheless.
"She actually didn't get shot... by the human."
His brows furrow together deeply. "What do you mean? I clearly saw him firing and she fell over the ship."
Niall shakes his head. "The gunshot missed because the ship tipped over. Because of your wave."
Bobby's body freezes, his face draining of colour.
"Oh my- fuck... I.. I caused her death? I knew she would topple over. I knew all of them would. But I was so sure I would be able to reach to her in time, I-"
"Dad," Niall cuts off his father's rambling, and his heart literally aches to see how distress his father is.
His usual stoic expression now completely gone and replaced with hurt and guilt, tears brimming up in his eyes. Niall tries to speak, but he's afraid his voice would break down. And right now, he can't afford to sound weak. He has to be his strength now.
"It wasn't your fault. None of this is." Niall says carefully, his voice a little shaky.
"I saw what happened. Mum wasn't drowning. She was getting... dragged down."
His brows raise, and a glint of anger flashes through his dark blue eyes. "Dragged down?" He asks, his voice now clear and strong, a huge contrast from his previous tone.
"What do you mean dragged down? Dragged down by what? A shark? A giant octopus?"
Niall glumly shakes his head. "No... a merman." He mumbles.
His father laughs nervously. "You're kidding right? There's no way... no one knew about us."
"I'm not kidding." Niall speaks quietly. "I saw his tail. It was a dark blue colour, glistening and all. Which, I found strange, because I've never really seen someone with such a dark tail before."
Bobby's blue eyes widen in surprise and... fear? "Like... a blue-black kinda colour?"
Niall quickly nods. "Exactly like that."
Bobby groans in frustration.
"I think I know who it is." He murmurs.
"What? You do? Then go arrest him, dad! You can throw him into the gallows!"
His father sighs, then shakes his head.
"No.. it's not that simple." His father sighs again. "Come, I need to show you something." His father says, then swims over into his room, with Niall following behind him in confusion.
Inside his father's room, is a whole rock wall that's filled with carvings of the wanted merpeople down in the gallows. He calls it the 'Criminology Rock'. It's what he uses to solve his crime cases. The entire wall is almost filled, which is a scary thought, except for the bottom quarter of the rock.
"Remember when you asked if anyone has escaped from the gallows?" His father asks carefully.
Niall nods, his gut coiling tightly... he's got a bad feeling.
"He's the only merman in the whole of Aquacia whom I've seen has a dark blue tail." He explains, before pointing to a face, right at the bottom of the whole list. "I actually don't know why he was thrown in the gallows. He has always just been... there."
And when Niall realises who he's pointing to, his entire face pales and his blood runs cold.
What the bloody...
How can it be?
That merman is... Alex.
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ok ok, I know, i'm incredibly sorry there's no narry action in here, but I promise, they will come soon, just bear with me xx
anywho, so yes, did you guys expect that any of that? Any future guesses? :)