#wild earth shark tank

[wildearthpetfood]

Can Wild Earth Pet Food Improve Your Dog's Energy Levels?

Every pet owner dreams of seeing pet store usa and their furry friends full of energy and vitality. Whether chasing a ball in the park or wagging its tail at the door, a dog's energy level indicates its overall health. One major factor influencing this is their diet. Wild Earth pet food, a plant-based, high-protein option, has been gaining attention for its ability to improve dogs' energy levels. Let's explore how Wild Earth could be the perfect choice for your dog's nutrition.

Understanding Wild Earth's Approach to Dog Nutrition

Wild Earth is more than just a pet food company—it's a mission-driven brand. They aim to revolutionize pet food by focusing on sustainability, health, and ethical practices. Instead of relying on meat-based ingredients, Wild Earth offers a plant-based, high-protein formula designed to meet your dog's nutritional needs.

Why Choose Wild Earth?

Choosing Wild Earth means prioritizing your dog's health and the planet's well-being. Wild Earth products use clean ingredients, ensuring your pet receives optimal nutrition without unnecessary fillers or harmful chemicals.

Key benefits of Wild Earth Pet Food:

High-protein formula derived from plants.

Free from artificial additives, by-products, and fillers.

Supports sustainability and reduces environmental impact.

It is packed with vitamins, minerals, and omega fatty acids for overall health.

These features set Wild Earth apart from traditional pet foods, making it a forward-thinking choice for pet owners.

How Wild Earth Pet Food Enhances Energy Levels

Energy levels in dogs are directly linked to their diet. Dogs require a balanced protein, fats, and carbohydrate intake to fuel their daily activities. Wild Earth's formula ensures these requirements are met, improving stamina, activity levels, and overall well-being.

The Role of Protein in Energy

Protein is essential for maintaining and building muscle mass, repairing tissues, and producing energy. Wild Earth uses yeast protein, a high-quality source that contains all the essential amino acids dogs need. This innovative ingredient is sustainable and more digestible than traditional meat-based proteins.

Healthy Fats for Sustained Energy

Wild Earth includes omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids, crucial for maintaining a shiny coat, healthy skin, and vital cognitive function. These fats also provide a steady energy source, helping dogs stay active throughout the Day.

Essential Vitamins and Minerals

Wild Earth pet food is enriched with B vitamins, zinc, iron, and magnesium, all of which play vital roles in energy production and overall vitality. These nutrients help dogs maintain their metabolism and immune system, enabling them to lead more energetic and fulfilling lives.

Features of Wild Earth's Pet Food Products

Wild Earth's line of products is specifically designed to cater to your dog's nutritional needs while ensuring sustainability.

Wild Earth Dog Food:

Made with yeast protein and plant-based ingredients.

Contains prebiotics and probiotics for improved gut health.

Fortified with antioxidants to boost immunity.

Wild Earth Dog Treats:

High-protein snacks that complement daily meals.

Ideal for training and rewarding good behavior.

Available in flavors dogs love, like peanut butter.

Benefits of Switching to Wild Earth Pet Food

Transitioning to wild earth shark tank can improve your dog's energy levels, coat quality, and overall health. Here are some of the key benefits:

Increased vitality: Dogs fed with Wild Earth show higher energy levels due to balanced nutrition.

Healthier digestion: Your dog's gut health improves significantly with prebiotics and probiotics.

Better weight management: Plant-based proteins help maintain a healthy weight, reducing the risk of obesity-related issues.

Questions and Answers About Wild Earth Pet Food

How does Wild Earth pet food provide complete nutrition for dogs?

Wild Earth pet food is formulated with plant-based proteins, healthy fats, and essential nutrients to ensure dogs receive complete and balanced nutrition.

The primary ingredient is yeast protein, which contains all the essential amino acids that dogs require for muscle growth and repair. Additionally, Wild Earth incorporates omega fatty acids for skin and coat health and vitamins and minerals like zinc and magnesium for energy production and immune support.

Unlike many traditional pet foods that include fillers and by-products, Wild Earth's formula focuses on delivering high-quality, digestible ingredients. This approach ensures your dog gets the necessary nutrients without any unnecessary additives.

Is plant-based pet food suitable for all dog breeds?

Wild Earth's plant-based pet food is designed to meet the nutritional needs of dogs of all breeds and sizes.

Dogs are omnivores, which means they can thrive on Wikipedia a plant-based diet as long as it includes the necessary proteins, fats, and vitamins. Wild Earth ensures its formula is balanced, providing high-protein content derived from yeast and plants. Additionally, their products are veterinarian-approved, making them a safe and practical choice for your pet.

When transitioning to a new diet, following the feeding guidelines and monitoring your dog's energy levels and weight is essential.

How can Wild Earth pet food improve my dog's digestion?

Wild Earth pet food contains prebiotics and probiotics that benefit gut health.

Prebiotics, such as dietary fibers, nourish the good bacteria in your dog's gut, promoting a healthy microbiome. Probiotics, on the other hand, add beneficial bacteria to the digestive system, aiding in the breakdown and absorption of nutrients.

This combination helps prevent common digestive issues like bloating, constipation, and diarrhea. Over time, dogs on Wild Earth diets show improved digestion, impacting their energy levels and overall well-being.

Why should I choose Wild Earth over traditional dog food brands?

Wild Earth stands out because of its commitment to sustainability, innovation, and quality.

Traditional dog food brands often rely on meat by-products and fillers, which may lack essential nutrients and contribute to environmental harm. Wild Earth, however, uses plant-based ingredients rich in protein and free from harmful additives.

By choosing Wild Earth, you support a brand that prioritizes the planet's health while ensuring your dog gets optimal nutrition. Their ethical practices and focus on science-backed formulas make them a leading choice for conscious pet owners.

How to Transition to Wild Earth Pet Food

Switching your dog to Wild Earth should be done gradually over 7–10 days to avoid digestive upset. Here's a step-by-step guide:

Day 1–3: Mix 25% Wild Earth with 75% of your dog's food.

Day 4–6: Increase to 50% Wild Earth and 50% current food.

Day 7–9: Transition to 75% Wild Earth and 25% current food.

Day 10: Feed 100% Wild Earth.

Monitor your dog's energy levels, coat condition, and stool consistency during the transition. Most dogs adapt well and show improvements quickly.

The Wild Earth Difference

Choosing the right pet food is one of the most impactful decisions you can make for your dog's health. Wild Earth stands out as a brand that combines science, sustainability, and quality to deliver exceptional nutrition. By switching to Wild Earth, your dog can enjoy increased energy levels, better digestion, and improved health.

At Wild Earth, we're dedicated to providing as seen on tv pet food with innovative, ethical, and high-quality products. Whether our nutrient-packed dog food or protein-rich treats, every product is designed with your dog's well-being in mind.

If you're ready to enhance your dog's energy levels and support their long-term health, contact us today or visit our website to learn more about our offerings. Let Wild Earth fuel your pet's journey to a happier, healthier life.

[lonely-lighthouse-keeper]

JOURNAL OF THE LIGHTHOUSE STATION AT CACHALOT COVE

[[ log 45 ]]

~Partly Cloudy Conditions All Day~

~Wind Speeds Up to Wind Speeds Up to 15 km/h~

Time of writing this log is 2154

Duties done at the station:

𓇼 Polish Glass

𓇼 Mail Check

𓇼 Cleaning the Station

𓇼 Collect Seaweed Off Docks

mr. keely came by earlier this afternoon once i got back and turned my attention towards the kelp that has grown back on the docks. thankfully my little basket business has been working well, however i will use some of it to make a simple snack for the other townspeople!

Good evening logbook! I apologize for not writing one since the Monday, as I had to make an emergency leave to the sister light house, Moray Station. The keepers there were under much stress with the amount of tourists and fishermen coming back and forth through the port of Abalone, that they requested I come by and help with, well, anything I could get my hands on. I did get a lovely little bonus, with which I was able to get a little bit more clothes and also my first travel cup-like item, with which I shall bring with me on trips like this in case I need to hold some warm tea.

Also! I did end up having to go to the aquarium over in Cape Pearl, as there was an injured bird found on the beach of Moray Station. The keepers explained to me what an aquarium is, and that it is a rehabilitation center for injured sea animals, as well as a way for normal people to see creatures like sharks and jellyfiish behind the safety of a tank. This ofcourse shocked me because why on Earth wouldn't the people let those animals go?! I did get the chance to ask someone this question, to which they said that the animals wouldn't survive in the wild. I didn't belive them, but I do know that this person has a high respect for these creatures, so I felt slightly safer letting the poor bird go. Hopefully the bird is safe.

May the Seas and Stars Guide You~~

[sharktankinsights]

Wild Earth Shark Tank Update – Wild Earth Net Worth 2024 - In order to acquire 5% of his business Wild Earth Ryan Bethencourt applied for $550,000 on Shark Tank. Healthy pet food produced by Wild Earth is better for the environment and dogs. The company specializes in producing dog food with plant-based ingredients. According to Ryan a lot of dog food is bad. They include unhealthy fillers and too much fat. That was something Ryan wished to alter. He used koji to create a new kind of dog food.  A particular kind of fungus called koji is employed in soy sauce and miso. It is good for dogs and high in protein. Ryan wanted to create dog food that was environmentally friendly and beneficial to pets. But Ryan had a significant obstacle to overcome. His business had not yet begun to sell and had made no sales. Will the entrepreneur get a deal on Sha...

[market-spy]

Diving into the Depths: AUV Market in Offshore Oil and Gas IRM

Ahoy, fellow Earth-dwellers! Today, we embark on a deep-sea journey to unravel the mysteries of the Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) market in the realm of Offshore Oil and Gas Inspection, Repair, and Maintenance (IRM). Hold on to your hats, because it’s about to get wet and wild!

Making Waves in the Market: 

Picture this: a market valued at a whopping USD 0.61 billion in 2022, riding a CAGR wave of 21% that’s set to crash into the shores of USD 3.39 billion by 2031. Yes, you heard it right — AUVs are making waves, not just in the literal sense!

Why the AUV Hype? 

What’s the fuss about these underwater contraptions, you ask? Well, it turns out AUVs are the rockstars of the Offshore Oil and Gas IRM scene. With an industry clamoring for cost-friendliness, safety, and environmental compliance, AUVs have waltzed in as the heroes. Imagine a world where downtime is reduced, and the only danger is whether the AUVs prefer rock or classical music.

Going Deeper, Going Remote: 

Offshore projects are taking a plunge into deeper waters, venturing into remote areas that even your most adventurous friend wouldn’t dare explore. Enter AUVs, stage left. These aquatic wonders extend beyond the mundane Inspection, Repair, and Maintenance routine, embracing tasks like environmental monitoring and data collection. It’s like turning Batman into Batman with a PhD in marine biology.

Tech Evolution: 

ML, AI, and AUVs — Oh My! Hold on to your snorkels because technology is at the helm of this submarine extravaganza. AUVs are now infused with the wizardry of Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI). No longer just underwater drones, they’ve become underwater Einsteins, providing data analysis so accurate it’ll make your GPS blush.

Market Geographies: 

Europe, North America, APAC, and the Rising Stars Europe, North America, and the Asia Pacific (APAC) — the triumvirate of AUV supremacy. But wait, the underdogs are rising! Africa and South America are catching the AUV wave, as their oil and gas applications grow. The competitive landscape is a sea of big players like Kongsberg Maritime and Saab Group, all vying for the top spot.

Market Snapshot — 2024–2031:

Global Market Size: USD 0.61 billion

Largest Segment: Light Weight Vehicle (LWV)

Fastest Growth: Heavy Weight Vehicles (HWVs)

Growth Rate: 21% CAGR

Segmental Shenanigans: 

Dive into the nitty-gritty with segments like Man-portable, Light Weight Vehicle (LWV), and Heavy Weight Vehicles (HWVs). It’s like choosing between a compact car, a speedboat, and a full-blown submarine for your underwater adventures.

Water Depth Drama: 

Shallow, deep, or ultra-deep waters — the eternal struggle for supremacy. Shallow water AUVs are the popular kids on the block, versatile and compatible with every underwater shindig. Deepwater and ultra-deepwater AUVs, on the other hand, are like the niche artists, critical but overshadowed by the mainstream.

Market Dynamics: 

Driving and Slamming on the Brakes Drivers like increasing offshore activities, safety concerns, and cost efficiency are propelling AUVs forward. But watch out for the road bumps — high initial investment, limited payload capacity, and technical challenges might put a dent in the AUV parade.

Competitive Landscape: 

The Ocean’s Got Talent The AUV market is a fierce battleground, with heavyweights like Saab Group and Ocean Infinity flaunting their high-tech weaponry. But the real MVPs are the startups, bringing fresh ideas and innovation to the underwater arena. It’s like the tech version of Aquaman meets Shark Tank.

For More Information: https://www.skyquestt.com/report/auv-for-offshore-oil-and-gas-irm-market

Recent Developments: 

AUVs Making Headlines From Saab’s mysterious customer order to Fugro’s North Sea pipeline inspection, AUVs are hogging the headlines. Oceaneering International even went shopping, acquiring Seabotix to expand its AUV wardrobe. It’s like a Hollywood blockbuster, but underwater!

Key Market Trends: 

More Than Just Submarine Swag AI and ML integration, multi-mission AUVs, and hybrid AUV systems are the cool kids on the AUV block. It’s not just about inspection; it’s about data, efficiency, and versatility. AUVs are evolving faster than a school of fish chased by a hungry shark.

Conclusion: 

The Deep-Sea Disco Continues As we surface from the depths of the AUV market, one thing’s clear — AUVs are not just underwater drones; they’re the maestros of the Offshore Oil and Gas IRM orchestra. With technology, innovation, and a touch of underwater pizzazz, they’re set to rule the waves for years to come. So, buckle up, fellow explorers, because the deep-sea disco is far from over!

About Us-

SkyQuest Technology Group is a Global Market Intelligence, Innovation Management & Commercialization organization that connects innovation to new markets, networks & collaborators for achieving Sustainable Development Goals.

Contact Us-

SkyQuest Technology Consulting Pvt. Ltd.

1 Apache Way,

Westford,

Massachusetts 01886

USA (+1) 617–230–0741

Email- info@skyquestt.com

Website: https://www.skyquestt.com

[sqinsights]

Diving into the Depths: AUV Market in Offshore Oil and Gas IRM

Ahoy, fellow Earth-dwellers! Today, we embark on a deep-sea journey to unravel the mysteries of the Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) market in the realm of Offshore Oil and Gas Inspection, Repair, and Maintenance (IRM). Hold on to your hats, because it’s about to get wet and wild!

Making Waves in the Market: 

Picture this: a market valued at a whopping USD 0.61 billion in 2022, riding a CAGR wave of 21% that’s set to crash into the shores of USD 3.39 billion by 2031. Yes, you heard it right — AUVs are making waves, not just in the literal sense!

Why the AUV Hype? 

What’s the fuss about these underwater contraptions, you ask? Well, it turns out AUVs are the rockstars of the Offshore Oil and Gas IRM scene. With an industry clamoring for cost-friendliness, safety, and environmental compliance, AUVs have waltzed in as the heroes. Imagine a world where downtime is reduced, and the only danger is whether the AUVs prefer rock or classical music.

Going Deeper, Going Remote: 

Offshore projects are taking a plunge into deeper waters, venturing into remote areas that even your most adventurous friend wouldn’t dare explore. Enter AUVs, stage left. These aquatic wonders extend beyond the mundane Inspection, Repair, and Maintenance routine, embracing tasks like environmental monitoring and data collection. It’s like turning Batman into Batman with a PhD in marine biology.

Tech Evolution: 

ML, AI, and AUVs — Oh My! Hold on to your snorkels because technology is at the helm of this submarine extravaganza. AUVs are now infused with the wizardry of Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI). No longer just underwater drones, they’ve become underwater Einsteins, providing data analysis so accurate it’ll make your GPS blush.

Market Geographies: 

Europe, North America, APAC, and the Rising Stars Europe, North America, and the Asia Pacific (APAC) — the triumvirate of AUV supremacy. But wait, the underdogs are rising! Africa and South America are catching the AUV wave, as their oil and gas applications grow. The competitive landscape is a sea of big players like Kongsberg Maritime and Saab Group, all vying for the top spot.

Market Snapshot — 2024–2031:

Global Market Size: USD 0.61 billion

Largest Segment: Light Weight Vehicle (LWV)

Fastest Growth: Heavy Weight Vehicles (HWVs)

Growth Rate: 21% CAGR

Segmental Shenanigans: 

Dive into the nitty-gritty with segments like Man-portable, Light Weight Vehicle (LWV), and Heavy Weight Vehicles (HWVs). It’s like choosing between a compact car, a speedboat, and a full-blown submarine for your underwater adventures.

Water Depth Drama: 

Shallow, deep, or ultra-deep waters — the eternal struggle for supremacy. Shallow water AUVs are the popular kids on the block, versatile and compatible with every underwater shindig. Deepwater and ultra-deepwater AUVs, on the other hand, are like the niche artists, critical but overshadowed by the mainstream.

Market Dynamics: 

Driving and Slamming on the Brakes Drivers like increasing offshore activities, safety concerns, and cost efficiency are propelling AUVs forward. But watch out for the road bumps — high initial investment, limited payload capacity, and technical challenges might put a dent in the AUV parade.

Competitive Landscape: 

The Ocean’s Got Talent The AUV market is a fierce battleground, with heavyweights like Saab Group and Ocean Infinity flaunting their high-tech weaponry. But the real MVPs are the startups, bringing fresh ideas and innovation to the underwater arena. It’s like the tech version of Aquaman meets Shark Tank.

For More Information: https://www.skyquestt.com/report/auv-for-offshore-oil-and-gas-irm-market

Recent Developments: 

AUVs Making Headlines From Saab’s mysterious customer order to Fugro’s North Sea pipeline inspection, AUVs are hogging the headlines. Oceaneering International even went shopping, acquiring Seabotix to expand its AUV wardrobe. It’s like a Hollywood blockbuster, but underwater!

Key Market Trends: 

More Than Just Submarine Swag AI and ML integration, multi-mission AUVs, and hybrid AUV systems are the cool kids on the AUV block. It’s not just about inspection; it’s about data, efficiency, and versatility. AUVs are evolving faster than a school of fish chased by a hungry shark.

Conclusion: 

The Deep-Sea Disco Continues As we surface from the depths of the AUV market, one thing’s clear — AUVs are not just underwater drones; they’re the maestros of the Offshore Oil and Gas IRM orchestra. With technology, innovation, and a touch of underwater pizzazz, they’re set to rule the waves for years to come. So, buckle up, fellow explorers, because the deep-sea disco is far from over!

About Us-

SkyQuest Technology Group is a Global Market Intelligence, Innovation Management & Commercialization organization that connects innovation to new markets, networks & collaborators for achieving Sustainable Development Goals.

Contact Us-

SkyQuest Technology Consulting Pvt. Ltd.

1 Apache Way,

Westford,

Massachusetts 01886

USA (+1) 617–230–0741

Email- info@skyquestt.com

Website: https://www.skyquestt.com

[shoutoutwoofwoof]

How To Get People To Like Wild Dog Food | Wild Dog Food

How To Get People To Like Wild Dog Food | Wild Dog Food



Dog aliment labels recognize “all natural” and cat aliment labels recognize “grain unfastened,” however do you clearly apperceive what’s in your puppy’s meals? And is it surely secure?

” And Down the Walls of Maulin ” – Wild Dog Food | Wild Dog Food

A new take a look at by way of the Clean Label Project a civic non-earnings agency, checked out brought than 900 top-selling dog and cat aliment…

[s-brant]

The Hidden Spot (3/3)

(gif: @television) (PART TWO) (SERIES MASTERLIST)

Summary: In the aftermath the argument, JJ tries to no avail to find a chance to apologize for his actions. Y/N seeks comfort from the girls but ends up finding a new perspective she hadn’t yet considered.

Word Count: 7.7k

Warnings: Angst with a happy ending, implied sexual content/innuendos, implied parent/child abuse, and fluff.

A/N: Welcome to the final installment of Solar Power! Okay, I know I’ve been withholding this for a while (three months yikes) I was trying to continue writing it with the plans I made for it but I couldn’t and I didn’t have as much inspiration anymore, so I found a natural way to end it with what I already had. Thank you for your patience, and I hope you guys enjoy it. Have fun!

Laundry day is typically Y/N's least favorite.

The sand from sitting at the edge of the creek never fails to weasel its way underneath her clothes, her arms grow tired and achy from the constant movement of having to slap the wet garments over the boulder, and the fear of iguanas and snakes intruding is an ever-present anxiety she has to face each time. It's sweaty, exhausting work, but, today, it's her favorite option.

It's been days since she and JJ last spoke to one another, and it isn't like he hasn't tried. He tried on multiple occasions throughout the first day after he fucked up so massively to get a moment alone with her, but she refused.

First, he approached her as she was eating in the morning and sat down next to the tree she was seated against with the carefully thought words on the tip of his tongue. Before he could draw in a breath to say them, she tossed the cluster of ripe berries she was feasting on into his lap without a goodbye and stomped, actually stomped, away to help Pope fish for shellfish with their makeshift net. As long as she was with others, he couldn't give her the private, respectful conversation she deserved, so she made certain to have another person with her at all times.

The next time was later that day when she was reaching for a large leaf from one of the younger palm trees to add to their hut. Apparently, she missed a section while letting him seduce distract her the day they did it, so she huffed from inside of the decently sized structure and crawled out to find another leaf to thatch it over. One hand braced against the trunk of the tree for her to stretch up on her tippy toes to swipe a leaf off with the other when she felt someone come up behind her.

His voice was unmistakable, murmuring, "I got it."

Her breath trembled on the inhale, knowing exactly who it was she felt and saw reaching over her head to pluck the large leaf off of the tree for her with ease. If she focused hard enough, she could nearly feel his chest brushing a centimeter away from her back when he breathed, and that simple fact almost made her forget everything. It almost made her forget her anger to feel his fingers brushing hers when he handed her the leaf, but then she caught a glimpse of a hippeastrum flower in the distance and fled before he could say anything else.

It seems, however, that he has since stopped trying to talk to her since the third and final time she ignored him that day. Ever since, he might as well have dropped off the face of the earth to her, and though it's what she thought she wanted after his rude behavior, she is miserable because of it.

"I mean, what the fuck is his problem?" Y/N asks as she beats his only shirt against the rock to agitate dirt, sand, and ash from the cotton fabric, "First, he got shitty with me after I helped him save his best friend from becoming shark food, then he yells at me in front of everyone. For what? For having the audacity to care about him? I was worried about him for fuck's sake, and he"—smack—"fucking"—smack—"ruined"—smack—"everything!"

There's a pause in the air between the rest of the girls, then she feels someone coaxing the tank top from her hands like one would approach a wild animal prone to attacking people.

It's Sarah that she sees when she looks up from where she's half-submerged in the river with nothing but her underwear on as Kie dunks her shirt in the river to work on cleaning it.

None of them care much about nudity at this point in their friendships together. Without anyone else around or the structured expectations of society, there isn't a reason to care. It's not like any of the boys will come looking to hang out with them anyway. Not while they're busy dealing with JJ the same way the girls deal with Y/N.

Technically, they aren't all supposed to be here today. It's hers and JJ's laundry day, paired together in every job on their schedule thanks to Pope's initial suggestion of them partnering up to live together after they first got here, but she flat out told John B she wouldn't be doing it with him. Instead, the rest of the girls followed her into the forest with the entire group's laundry to make a day of it. A much needed day away where she wouldn't be subjected to her and JJ's mutual silent treatment.

"I think the shirt's clean enough," Sarah says with a kind smile.

She takes it away to drape over the clothing lines they hung between the trees.

The absence of string or twine made them get creative with their substitutes, so their clothing line is a vine they tied between low-hanging tree branches for them to hang their wet clothes on. It'd likely be smarter to tie them up on the beach as usual, but they know she doesn't want to be around him, or so she pretends, so they put some up out here for the time being.

Y/N sighs, reaching for the next shirt in the pile.

"I'm sorry," she says softly, "I'm literally going crazy."

The rest of them are perched around or in the flowing water with small piles of clothes that wouldn't even be enough to fill an average washing machine in the real world, but takes hours to wash and hang dry in their world.

And it may sound dramatic, but it truly is a different world than anything they're used to. They lived on an island before this, but it was bustling with civilization, technology, and every other aspect of modern society that they all took for granted before they were stranded. It's a slower, simpler world, and somehow, despite being at the mercy of nature, it's a kinder too. There are no divisions between them other than those they create themselves, no Ward or Rafe Cameron types looming overhead to ruin them at every turn like they did in Kildare.

Kie starts to slap her white shirt against the rock  to clean it, shaking her head.

"You aren't though, I think he's an ass for what he said to you. Sure, y'all hated each other for no good reason for years, but he didn't need to tell everyone you "threw yourself" at him. That was fucked up," she says.

Soon after, Sarah is murmuring her agreement.

"I think he's acting like an ass too."

Y/N takes a deep breath and leans forward to rest her chin on folded arms atop the boulder as she looks between the three other girls.

"I think he doesn't give a shit about me. The reality of the situation is, we're stuck in the middle of nowhere with no chance of getting back to our normal lives. Sarah is dating John B, he's already tried to hook up with you, Kie, and he knows Pope has a crush on Cleo, so he won't try that," she sighs deeply, "He's lonely, we all are, and it's probably been a while since he's had sex. I was just there. It was my fault to think it could've meant anything."

Forget what he said to her that night about waiting "so long" to be with her, or the clear evidence that was his genuine worry for her after they killed the shark. None of it matters to her at this point because she has already made up her mind and resigned herself to what she believes is the truth, which is that he always has and always will dislike her.

Her eyes are downcast with the thought that finally clangs through her.

It's the first time she's dared to consider it since their relationship began to improve over the course of the summer leading into autumn, and she can't deny that it hurts, it took her so long to admit to herself that she had feelings for him in the first place, so to be humiliated and rejected by him in front of everyone here...It hurts worse than anything.

She's about to crawl over to the shore to pick her shorts out of the sand to wash them when Cleo breaks her contemplative silence. They all look up from what they're doing at the sound of her voice.

"I think you're wrong."

The initial gut reaction she has in response to this is to laugh, but she doesn't. She is far too curious to hear her out for an explanation to laugh off her statement as nothing more than a misinterpretation. After all, sometimes an outsider perspective is more accurate than that of the two people involved in a friendship or relationship. Sometimes, you need to have distance from the issue to see it clearly without the biases of emotion.

Cleo walks over to the clothing line and throws the shirt she was washing over it to dry as she continues speaking as though pleading a case to court. In this instance, the deciding jury is composed of a heartbroken girl and her two friends who have every reason to hold JJ's behavior against him.

"His best friend was getting chased by a shark and he didn't jump in, but what did he do the second you got in the water?"

Y/N didn't see him diving in after her initially.

Bubbles dispersing around her from the impact of her body on the water roared in her ears, as well as the sound of John B yelling at her to go back once she resurfaced, so she didn't pick up on the splash of JJ jumping in too. She didn't turn around to see the absence of him standing atop the rocks with the same shell shocked look he had when they first realized the severity of the situation, she was too busy trying to keep her head above water as they fought back against the shark.

But she did notice when he reached them. His hands searched for her through the splashing water until they found her waist, and when she realized it was him, something strange happened. Even with life-threatening danger looking them in the eyes in the form of an aggressive, bloodthirsty animal, feeling his hands on her and knowing he was there calmed her instantly. It didn't matter that they were dancing with death, all she knew was that JJ was there, and if he was with her, everything would be okay.

Then, how could she ignore how he acted after? She doesn't mean his rude attitude either, she means the worry. The wide, melancholy puppy eyes she found staring down at her when he climbed out of the water and tugged her body onto his with no thought on his mind other than her safety. No matter how much she tries to convince herself of it, those aren't the actions of a man that "hates" someone. Not by a long shot.

She swallows thickly as she meets Cleo's gaze and sees the knowing smile growing there. Her hand rests on one hip, and she leans against the tree they tied the clothing line to with amusement toying at her beautiful features.

Clearly, their collective silence is the answer she needed to confirm her suspicions.

"I rest my case," she says, “You don't swim with sharks for a girl you hate. That, my friend, is love."

The four letter word is so plain and simple, yet it stirs her stomach with a fluttering sensation she often notices whenever he's around her or mentioned in conversation like this. For a second or so, it doesn't matter that he hurt her feelings as she lets herself consider the wild possibility of him loving her. It isn't long before her logical side kicks back into gear to remind her of their history, as well as the moment at the bonfire the other day when he humiliated her in front of their friends, but it's heavenly while it lasts.

How different would things have been if she accepted long ago, before their dislike for each other could snowball into a rivalry they upheld out of sheer stubbornness, that she has always had feelings for him?

She isn't sure if she can take the leap of faith needed to label her feelings as love yet, but it's the type of longstanding infatuation that promises to turn into love if they work things out and decide to explore a relationship. The thing is, even if they do mend fences, that doesn't mean he'll want to pursue anything with her. For all she knows, his intentions with her could very well be purely sexual.

It's all too fickle for her to trust it.

"I don't know, dude, figure it out," John B said as JJ trailed after him down the beach earlier today, shit outta luck with ideas on how to get Y/N alone to apologize, "Give her some flowers or some cute shit like that, and be honest. You clearly like her, so it shouldn't be that hard."

It is, in fact, that hard.

Speaking from the perspective of an outside looking in on his complicated relationship with her, John B doesn't know how it feels to live within the uncertainty of whatever it is they have together. He and Sarah are head over heels in love with one another, overcoming every obstacle, both self-inflicted and externally sourced, hurled at them over the course of their relationship. How could he understand what this feels like?

Even when he and Sarah weren't on good terms after Ward faked his death, there was no denying their love for each other, but with Y/N...He isn't too sure.

Sometimes, he thinks has it figured out. He'll catch a glimpse of fondness in her eyes for him and wonder if it means anything. He'll go a few days without arguing with her over the smallest, dumbest topics and wonder if it means she likes him more than she used to. But what truly made him question it was when she kissed him in the forest.

It makes him trip over his feet, lost in his memories, as he trails through the forest in the direction the other girls said they remembered her going in after they finished drying out the laundry.

Sarah's arm shot out to plant her hand flat against the trunk of a palm tree, hitting right against his neck when he aimed to walk straight through to the path. Stopping him right in his tracks, she looked him up and down with a glare that cut him to the bone. Even if she weren't physically blocking him from leaving, he likely would've stopped right there at the sight of that look—a look all girls, despite age or upbringing, have somehow honed to masterful extent.

"If you hurt her again, I will not hesitate to throw you to the sharks," she said, and he wasn't sure if it unnerved him less or more that she spoke the words so calmly. “Got it?”

It made her smile to see him swallow thickly at her promise. He deserved it for what he said to her best friend, so she played up her intimidating side far more than it naturally expresses itself. She didn't need to turn around to know that Cleo and Kie smiled with her, not only because of what she said, but because of what JJ following her into the forest again must have meant.

It meant that, whether she intended to forgive him or not, he was going to apologize to her. And, knowing them and their inability to be apart without finding their way back into each others lives one way or another, they knew where it'd lead.

Her reaction at the creek when Cleo said he loved her displayed everything she couldn't bring herself to say to them. They had no doubts that all it'd take was one more interaction between them after the time apart, which had pumped their hearts with an aching, swirling tension that promised an explosive resolution, for them to finally face the reality of their feelings.

He met Kie and Cleo's stares before coming back to Sarah's, nodding once. It was the only confirmation she needed to yank her arm back from the tree, her smile turning warm and friendly with his silent agreement in mind.

Sticks and fallen leaves crunched beneath his boots as he rushed off on the path they often take through the trees, and Kie called out after him in a shout, "She followed the water, so just stick to the creek and follow it up!"

So, he does exactly that—tramples through the bushes and weaves in and out between soaring trees on his way up the side of the creek that none of them have explored to its source up the incline of the island.

Most of the time, they don't have much free time to explore the island. They're often too preoccupied with doing what they need to in order to survive, then when nighttime comes and offers them time to do whatever they want, it's too dark to go exploring without anything to illuminate the way through the dark. The extent of her exploration often comes from the walks she takes when she's trying trying to find time to herself and ends up getting followed by JJ.

Y/N frowns to herself at the thought of him, tilting her head back into the water to wash away the buildup of sweat and sand clinging to strands of her hair.

Hiking up the creek until she reached its source proved to be her best idea since arriving here, because it has led her to something she regards as the most beautiful place she's ever seen. A waterfall flows freshwater into a swimming hole so blue, she hardly believed it was real when she climbed up the rocks separating the stream from the small body of water that feeds it. She decided immediately that it'd be her little secret for now until any of the others decided to explore and find it too, a place where she could visit when she wanted some time to herself.

But, for now, she uses it as a place to bathe without having to worry about being seen by any of the boys like she does when bathing by the creek.

There's no soap or shampoo, but the flowing freshwater feels better than anything compared to the salt and sand by the beach. The temperature is cool and refreshing, yet somehow comfortable at the same time. No goosebumps are raised on arms when she scrubs them beneath the surface, using the sand that already clung to them as an exfoliant until she's satisfied with her skin's softness.

No sign of dirt, sand, or the distinct scent of saltwater can be found on her now. Her bare body glistens under the sunlight coming down over the waterfall as she sits atop a rock, half-submerged in the water, and combs out the ends of her hair.

It's the happiest she's felt in days.

Since what happened with JJ, she hasn't been able to have a moment to think clearly without running into him or having one of their friends bring him up in conversation. The only person who didn't was Pope. He veered straight away from that sore subject the last time she spoke to him, which, if her memory serves her well, was last night when they ate dinner with Cleo.

But even then, the comfortable avoidance of her drama with JJ while she sat with Pope doesn't hold a candle to the peace she feels sitting here on her own. The rushing sound of water paired with chirping birds and the breeze fluttering the treetops mollifies her ill-tempered attitude the longer she spends here, and, with her work for the day behind her, she intends to stay until daylight runs out.

At least that way she won't have to see JJ again. Instead, she'll eat dinner with Sarah and head straight to bed for another day of finding innovative ways to dodge him.

It isn't like she hasn't thought of hearing him out. Somewhere deep down, all she really wants is to accept the apology he keeps attempting to give to her and tell him how she really feels. But it's not that simple, especially not after what he said to her the other day. How is she supposed to trust that he won't freak out again the next time she tries to act friendly with him? What happens if he rejects her and they're forced to spend the rest of their lives together here?

Perhaps if they were back in the Outer Banks, the risk wouldn't be as severe, but there's a very real possibility that they'll never be rescued, and she'd rather not make her future a living hell by confessing her feelings to a person who claims to hate her. It'd be too complicated, and the last thing they need in a place where they rely on one another for survival is to complicate things more than they already have.

Who needs JJ, anyway? She thinks to herself, I'm perfectly fine right here. I live in paradise with my best friends, and I'm staring at the most beautiful waterfall I've ever—

"Y/N?"

Her eyes shoot away from where they were trained on the waterfall to see someone hauling themselves up over the rocks she climbed over less than fifteen minutes ago, making her entire body jolt in surprise. At the sight of a blonde head peeking over the top, along with a set of hands grappling for purchase to help him climb up, she shrieks in surprise at the eye contact JJ makes with her from afar and does the only thing she can think of to hide herself from him.

She falls forward off of the ledge she sits atop and splashes face-first into the water.

Of course, this doesn't do much to hide her. He already caught a glimpse of her as soon as he was able to see over the edge of the ground, and he already saw her half naked in the moonlight not long ago, but she reacted as though he's never seen her undressed anyway. It made her stomach drop and her body lurch on instinct until she practically belly flopped on the surface in a huge splash that sprayed him with water.

She has to spit water out of her mouth and force it from where it flew up her nostrils when she comes back up with reddened cheeks that have nothing to do with her sunburn. Her hands frantically move to cover herself, one arm slung over her chest while her other hand moves down to cover herself below. It leaves her feet as her only way of keeping herself afloat, kicking desperately enough to keep her above water as she tries to find the words to speak to him.

"I—You—You're here, what the fuck are you doing here?" she asks.

Her voice is shrill with embarrassment. It makes him grimace from where he stands at the edge of the water with nothing to display his reaction to the situation. Though, on the inside, he can't ignore how vigorously his heart pounds in his chest.

On the inside, he can't ignore the swirling storm of the feelings that've built up over the course of the past week or so, all of them culminating into this interaction that he's played and replayed in his mind over and over while planning what to say. But now that he's standing here, he's speechless. It may have something to do with walking in on her being nude as in broad daylight, contrary to the other time he saw her without a shirt, that has him so bent out of shape, but it's more so his nerves.

His stomach is churning with anxiety and worry. Worry that she won't accept his apology, worry that his attraction to her isn't reciprocated, and the ever-present worry he's felt over her safety since they were stranded here. The minor detail of her being completely naked in front of him for the first time doesn't help though. If anything, it muddles his mind further and makes his attempt to response to her slow down as his eyes unconsciously roam over the expanse of exposed skin beneath the clear blue water.

JJ blurts out before he can think of anything else to say, "I'm sorry."

Her expression is a mystery he has no chance of solving at this point. It morphs somewhere between embarrassment, anger, confusion, and something else he can quite place as he continue to ramble on.

"I was a dick the other night. I know you've been avoiding me and, trust me, I was trying to give you space, but"—he stops to breathe for a second or two, running his hand through his hair to push it out of his face—"I didn't wanna leave things with us on a bad note 'cause, you were right, we've been friends lately, and I didn't know how to handle that. I still don't," he says, "So, I'm sorry."

The water bobs around her chin the entire time she floats there and stares up at him with wide eyes. There's a heavy pause between what he last said and when she opens her mouth to speak, leaving them with nothing to do but look at each other with the white noise of nature crescendoing in their impossibly loud silence.

She's about to say something, then snaps out of it and glances down at herself, as if suddenly remembering her current state of undress, and asks, "Can we at least not do this while I'm butt ass naked? I can't imagine you'll retain anything if you're staring at my tits the whole time."

The sound of her sardonic tone almost makes him crumble in relief. It's a good sign, a sign of the dynamic they used to have before he went and fucked everything up over his anger at her for risking her life.

In hindsight, he knows he should've thanked her for saving John B, not scolded and humiliated her in front of everyone they know, but he had a hard time controlling it. As soon as they made it back to land in one piece, he wanted to hold onto her and never let go while, at the same time, wanting to shout at her for being so stupid.

He scoffs.

"I would never—"

She cuts him off, "You're literally staring at them right now."

And her narrowed eyes have him spinning around in place instantly, squeaking out a quick, "Alright, yeah, fair enough. Turning around," as he does it.

His sudden compliance after getting caught staring so blatantly makes her stifle a traitorous giggle to herself. She hates that he's capable of making her laugh right now. After everything he said to make her never want to speak to or see him again, after what she said at the creek about knowing he doesn't want anything more than a sexual relationship with her, the fact that he still makes her laugh is infuriating.

She stares at the back of him on her swim over to the edge of the water to put on her folded up clothes. From the uncovered, muscular back facing her wandering gaze to the dirt-dusted boots planted firmly on the ground, she takes him in and thinks herself a hypocrite for telling him not to stare.

All she ever does is stare. It's the one thing she has ever allowed herself to do in regards to her feelings for him. She hasn't been able to say or do anything, so she looks. She steals glances and silently worships everything he has to offer visually while appreciating aspects of his personality to herself—where neither he or anyone else could find out.

By the time she's stood back up on the side of the water with her panties back on and her freshly cleaned white shirt now clinging to her soaking skin, her nerves have already began to get the better of her. Her voice is unsteady this time around.

"Okay," she says, "I'm decent."

When he turns around again, he wants to object because she sure as shit ain't decent, not at all, but he can't bring himself to do anything but gawk at her for a second or two before he catches himself. He isn't sure if he'd call her wet top, which is now see through, being "decent" but he doesn't comment on the pointlessness of her putting it back on. At least it makes her feel less embarrassed about being seen by him, even if he can still see pretty much everything he had before.

If it were a few days ago, perhaps she wouldn't have cared. He already saw her anyway. It may have been dark out, but he still saw and touched and kissed her. The only thing that makes this different for her is the terms their relationship is on and how much more vulnerable she feels in the wake of their fight.

Her arms are crossed over her chest protectively on his way over to her.

She sits back down at the drop off into the swimming hole with her legs dangling in the shallow decline into the deeper depths of the water. Neither of them says a word until he too is sitting there beside her. It's the closest they've been to each other since the day after their fight, when he helped her pick the palm leaf off the tree, and they're just about ready to burst out of their skin with the mutual desire to get closer.

A moment passes, then she shifts to face him a little.

"If you really mean this, we're gonna have to lay out some rules here. Okay?" she asks.

Usually, he'd make a joke right about now. He'd say something about how he should've expected her to ruin it with rules, or ask her if she's going to make him sign a legally binding contract over it. Except, he doesn't.

It's the most confusing turn of events to him that was set off in a chain reaction after she kissed him for the first time, but he doesn't want her to think he doesn't take her seriously. For once, he actually cares about what she thinks of him, and it's such a new revelation, he doesn't know how to act around it. It leaves him sitting here with nothing other than a nod given in her direction, looking over at her with his mouth clamped shut.

She gets lost in his eyes for an instant.

"You can't freak out on me like that again. I don't know why you were so pissed at me, but that isn't okay. If you have a problem with me, we can talk about it, but humiliating me and telling all of our friends that I threw myself at you isn't cool. Like, at all. You had no fucking right to do that to me."

He takes in a breath and opens his mouth to apologize again, but she stops him before he can get a word out.

"You can't act all buddy buddy with me in private and kiss me, then act like you hate me in front of your friends. I won't let you treat me like that, and I won't do that to you either. It's just not fair to either of us," she says it sternly, and the next sentence nearly makes him choke on his own spit, "If you wanna fuck me, you have to respect me first. I'm not one of those Touron girls that'll kiss the ground you walk on and never call you out on your bullshit."

That, he realizes, is precisely why he has always been enamored with her. It's easy to forget sometimes that what initially made him dislike her is also part of what attracts him to her. He likes that she's able to put him in his place this way without being too timid or too aggressive about it.

The way he treats girls is a topic he'll never hear the end of, both from the people around him and his own self critical thoughts.

Other kids growing up at the same time he did had a mom and dad. They had structure and genuine love in their households guiding them and showing them how they should shape their future love lives, but JJ didn't have that. His mom split when he was six after a tumultuous and violent relationship with his dad, who then siphoned his unprocessed hatred for his ex-wife into his child. It is needless to say, his life has been loveless from his conception itself.

All he knew was that sex made him feel better. It was a coping mechanism—a form of escapism that would never last but would keep everything at bay if only for a little while—and he started to gain a reputation in Kildare for sleeping around a little more than most people consider to be normal. It wasn't as if he tricked anyone into thinking he wanted anything serious though. He never fills anyone's head with the idea of being his girlfriend, but it does sting for them to essentially get used for sex and never get a call or text back.

Her voice speaking up again cuts through his faraway thoughts and brings him back the present, back to the stare cutting him to the bone.

"Cause if you don't want anything from me except sex, I don't want you. You know I have feelings for you, everyone does at this point, and I won't let you play with my heart like that."

This time, his response is immediate, as if he can't even help himself with the shock of the new information sinking into him for the first time.

He says softly, dead serious for the first time in a long time, "I didn't know that."

To have that be his first and only response to everything she's said so far scares her shitless. It makes her wonder if the risk of telling him the truth was for nothing because he doesn't give anything about himself away in the four letter phrase, except for the fact that he's been in the dark about her feelings for him. He doesn't say if they're reciprocated, or if he agrees to the rules she's setting down should their relationship progress past its previous hatred, and it terrifies her.

The vulnerability is written across her face as he looks over at her hugging her knees to her chest, pulling them from where her ankles dipped into the water to curl her body close to itself. It's an unconscious gesture that tells him everything about how she's feeling without her saying anything yet. It tells him that she doesn't know how he feels yet either, and his stomach runs rampant with butterflies at the idea of having to admit it.

"Well, now you know," she says it as casually as she can, then starts to stammer, "You don't need to feel obligated to like me back obviously, I just figured it'd be better to tell you before someone else did. Sarah was gonna slip up sooner or later anyway. Either her or Cleo. Cleo reads me real easily, it's honestly a little—"

His lips are slotted against hers mid-sentence.

She's too shocked to kiss him back for the better half of a second, her eyes wide open until it clicks with her what's happening. Then, after her delayed reaction, they flutter shut and her head dips forward to meet his in the midst of the kiss with an enthusiasm to match his.

It isn't a reincarnation of the first kiss they shared—charged with sexual tension, aggression, and years of hatred accumulated into one heated moment.

However, it's as ardent as one would expect an interrupting kiss to be. His hands are cupping her face how they had after they came out of the water from killing the shark, yet their feelings for each other in this moment couldn't be any more different. It's somewhat awkward and fumbling with her knees hugged to her chest between them, but it makes her heart soar just the same as it did when it happened the first time.

But, then, she remembers the important topic of conversation and forces herself to pull away from it, not wanting to get too distracted before they can fully resolve their issues. His kiss was an answer in and of itself, but she needs to hear him agree in order to accept the apology. She won't settle for anything less.

Their noses brush as she murmurs, "Does that mean you feel the same?"

His mouth curves into a trademarked JJ smirk that sets her heart aflame.

"Take a wild guess, Princess," he says.

The taunting nickname he uses has her shoving him with her arm so he wobbles on the edge of the water enough to get his heart pounding without pushing him in completely, but, as always since they arrived here, it's a playful shove. She had no clue of his troublesome home life before he broke down in front of them in the hot tub over the summer, and now that she does, she's careful to never be too rough with him during their meaningless "fights".

They're always taking playful shots at one another any chance they can, but she'd never want to trigger a foul memory through it. Their back and forth banter is ingrained in the love language of their relationship, so she never wants it to accidentally upset him.

In the span of time it takes for her to shove his shoulder and unintentionally create distance between them in the heated aftermath of the kiss, the tension starts to dissolve again into their typical dynamic. She smiles at him again for the first time since his mistake on the beach that night, and he lets himself appreciate it in a way he wasn't able to before they finally confessed their feelings.

Technically, he didn't say anything about his, but they both know he agreed with her. They don't need it to be said in explicit terms to know what this moment means for them. It's a turning point, that much they know, and neither of them wants to resist it, so they don't. They let it take control and drag them into the epicenter of its madness, tying their hands behind their backs to leave them helpless. It's clear to her now that there's nothing they can do to stop themselves now.

Y/N breaks his gaze and chances a mischievous glance at the waterfall, then sizes him up out of the corner of her eye. He can tell without any mythical power of mind reading or straight-up asking her what's going on in that head of hers that she's up to something. He knows her too well to miss that look on her face and mistake it as something other than her being the evil little shit she is.

"What?" he asks in dread, anticipating something far different, far more demon-eqse than what she has in mind.

Her smile grows as she stands up from the curled up position she was in and casts him another cheeky grin over her shoulders before it clicks with him what she's doing.

The wet fabric of her shirt is peeled away from her torso in one quick motion under the guidance of her hands, as if she had to build up the nerve to do it and get it over with before her nerves got the better of her. From the obscured view he's allotted from behind her, he can only see the shape of her breast from the side and watches in surprise of her actions.

Somehow, seeing her strip unprompted in the middle of the overwhelming daylight shining down at them over their secret swimming spot is more shocking to him than her jumping into shark infested waters to save John B. It takes her tossing her top aside, shimmying her panties off of her legs, and diving headfirst into the crystalline water for him to fully process the situation.

What fully wakes him up from it is her coming up from underneath water to beckon him in. She's already starting off in the direction of the waterfall, calling out to him in one last teasing invitation.

"Are you coming in or not?"

Hell yeah, I'm coming in, a voice in the back of his mind says with his body jolting into action quicker than the thought can finish itself.

She must press her lips together to stifle her laughter at the sound of him standing up and shuffling around on the ledge they sat on in a frantic effort to undress himself. The mental image she has of it is a mirror to reality: JJ almost slipping on the wet ground as he shoves his shorts and underwear off of his hips and kicks the offending material aside.

A clumsy splash reverberates through the area a second or two later, and, while he's underwater, she can't help but let out a quick burst of a giggle and peek around at the bubbling surface. The waves made by him jumping in after her bob up to her lower lip, making her spit some of it out on her leisurely swim to the other side of the natural pool.

JJ comes up looking a mess, his hair plastered to his face before he shakes it out of his eyes like a wet dog, but she has never found him more endearing than she does now. He paddles after her, fully engrossed in their little game of cat and mouse.

"Where are you going?"

She flips onto her back for a moment to see him. Her hand points to the waterfall now pouring close enough to her turned back that it sends stray droplets flying onto her shoulders and churns the water her hair floats in.

Contrary to his state of disheveled yet, as per usual, effortless beauty, she appears as native to their surroundings as the flowers growing in the woods around the water. For someone who was raised in the pristine conditions of the Kook kingdom, where the worst that can happen to a girl like her is a broken nail or unrequited frat boy crush, she fits in seamlessly with the island life they live. As it turns out, they were right to make it official through the silly ceremony they did by the fire. His girl is a Pogue through and through.

She says it loudly enough for him to hear over the rushing noise of the waterfall, "Take a wild guess," and promptly disappears within the sheet of splashing water.

The waterfall consumes her as though she was never there, her body backing up into it in swift kicks until she's hidden from him.

For a second, he's worried.

His pussy-whipped—without even getting any yet, he reminds himself—and love struck mind comes up with the possibility of her being dragged under or sucked into an underwater cave by the current with every powerful drag he makes through the water in pursuit of her. Logically, he knows it's merely a waterfall, a smaller one at that, that won't create enough of a current to do something like that.

His eyes are clamped shut under the spray of the falls on his way through, but as soon as he wipes his eyes and opens them to the awaiting natural beauty of nature, a space in the world carved specifically for them, he has to blink away his disbelief.

The waterfall acts as a divider between the outside world and the little secret she stumbled upon on her quick exploration of the area before JJ followed her here. On one side, the rest of the island sits in its bountiful glory for their friends to find them if they so please. On the other side sits an untouched cove. Leaves climb the moistened walls of the hidden paradise, leading down from the high veranda to the floor of smoothed rock that drops off into the depths of glowing blue water.

It's possibly the most beautiful thing he's ever laid eyes on. Well—his wonderstruck gaze flickers over her floating with her head dipped back in a peaceful submission to rest on the edge of the rock—almost the most beautiful thing.

She can sense him approaching in the gentle waves rippling from his movements, and her eyes peek open to see his face in the dimmed light at the same time she feels his hands taking hold of her waist.

"So, this is your new hiding spot?" he asks.

His head is tilted up to see the high "ceiling" of the small cove in quiet wonder, never having seen anything like it, even back home in Kildare. He follows the leaves climbing the walls up to the top where, he thinks, there's a small opening where a shaft of sunlight sneaks in. Following the light down to where it shines on the water next to them, his focus is taken up by the vibrant water bobbing in the tiny glimmer of light...that is until he feels her lips on his neck.

His mouth turns in a soft smirk, and she thinks his hands tighten their hold on her waist at the contact.

She shakes her head and lets herself smile against his warm, tanned skin.

"Our new hiding spot."

Tag List: @gabiatthedisco, @fangirlvoice, @black-syren, @apparrio, @particularcth, @planetdemon, @idk-ijustworkhere, @krisphann, @astrydis, @k-k0129, @zarahsloves, @sundownsdusk, @jessmaybank, and @stilesflannels.

[haveyouseenthisskeleton]

Could I please per chance (I'm running out of ways to say maybe but I have so many ideas and I love how you do the headcanons) get the main skelebros with an s/o who has a way with animals and can pet almost any animal they come across and they absolutely love it.

I answered something similar just right here, so I'll go with the guys I didn't pick last time.

Undertale Sans - Best life ! Now he can pet every dog and bird he wants without having Papyrus screaming it's unhealthy. No one can stop him. He's going to be your second in master petting cute pets. Also, please, give the guy a parrot, he wants one so badly for years now.

Underswap Papyrus - The problem with Honey is that he is allergic to mostly everything that has fur, including Toriel and Asgore. That's why he doesn't go as often than before see the old man. It was better when he was behind a big door. The other problem is that Honey is a child. He knows he's going to regret it, but he has to pet the animals. Every time. He just can't help it. He's both crying and sneezing, but he is the happiest skeleton on Earth. Though, it's not really healthy for him and you better tell him when to stop or else his brother is going to lecture you to death for putting his baby brother in danger.

Horrortale Papyrus - Well, Oak and Willow have a learning farm, so of course he loves animals. He's using you when one of the farm pets has a vet visit but doesn't like the vet. You're good for calming them. Willow is impressed with your gift and he's not against coming with you to pet one of these wild deers always roaming in the forest behind his home. Oak would love this too.

Horrorfell Sans and Papyrus - So. You found a dozen of stray cats and they followed you home. Now the brothers are arguing. Copper doesn't want to hear anything because the cats already hate him, but Chief has already adopted all of them and he is just screaming "BUT LOOK AT HIS LITTLE FACE. HE HAS A BLACK LITTLE MUSTACHE ON THE NOSE. WE CAN'T THROWING HIM BACK OUTSIDE." Though, as Chief's S/O, you're going to win. Copper will sulk the rest of the week.

Swapfell Papyrus - "No." "PLEASE. JUST ONCE. I PROMISE I WON'T ASK AGAIN." "Rus, no." "RUS YES." That's the last sentence he said before he jumps in the shark tank at the aquarium. Now you are forced to follow him so you can pet the shark and keeping him alive thirty more seconds. Behind the glass of the aquarium, Nox is looking at you in shock. He thinks you just pushed his brother in the tank and tried to murder him. You can feel your sins crawling on your back from where you stand. Rus is so happy though. Best day of his life.

Outertale Sans and Papyrus - So. Congratulations, you found a space whale. The space whale loves you. The space whale loves so much it decided to lay down on the skeletons' house. The house is dead. Moon and Sun are speechless. You try to explain them you don't have enough money to pay for the damage but they are not listening to you right now.

Dancetale Sans - One of Rambo's dream is to ride a horse and dancing on it, but he read that only nervous horses are used for these types of shows. With you calming the horse however, it's giving him the confident boost he needs to try it. The guy trusts you with his life. Like literally. He has only 1 HP, remember?

Dancetale Papyrus - Salsa is really scared of moths and bugs in general. So when you came back from the garden, so proud, covered in bees, he just high pitched screams to stay away from him. Salsa is locking himself in his room and won't come back before you makes sure to get rid of every last bee you brought in the house. He will be paranoid for weeks after that.

Dancefell Sans and Papyrus - Of course, Tango had to used this for his Instagram account. You're in a safari, circling with lions and Tango wants you to pet a lion for his damn video. You're doing it, and it's fine... Until they spotted poor little Rumba. Big cats are still cats. Cats still hates Rumba. And so they chased him suddenly. All of the thirty lions. After surviving this, Rumba refuses to get out of the hotel for the rest of the trip. He's not amused. It was worth it though. Everyone enjoyed the pet and the chase sessions.

Mafiatale Sans - He sits awkwardly next to you, then asks you if you can do like in that fairy tale and leads rats to attack people. You are not sure how to answer this. He realises his ask is weird and just teleports out of your way. You're still asking him why he wanted to do this.

Mafiatale Papyrus - He has only one rule : no animal inside the house. Welp. There not inside. There are lots of stray cats and dogs roaming in the garden. Creeper is not happy with you. You have two days to find a solution before he's calling someone. Then a small kitten meowed at him, and he stops, and now all the pets are in the house. You're teasing him for weeks.

Mafiafell Sans - He's so exciting. His dogs are battle dogs and he has trouble having actually a nice "doggy time" with them, since they are always trying to protect him. But with you around, they somehow transform into playful puppies. Fang is having the time of his life. You're even bringing the pack home sometimes just so the dogs can have a break too.

Mafiafell Papyrus - At first he was really not ok about that. But then he realised that means more kitties. Now the scary and strict Torpedo is begging you to foster kittens at home. He can't live without the kitties. That's an order. Go fetch kitties with your magic trick.

Ink - Is it working with every animal? He kidnapped several Burgerpants and dog guards of the Multiverse. Now P E T. No one likes that. You're begging Ink to give them back to their worlds. They have families too god dammit.

Error - He's watching you from a safe distant pet a big pig. Then you ask him if he wants to try. "hell no." "... ok, once." He gets close, then leans a finger towards the pig. The pig sniffes it, then absorb his entire hand. Error is : screaming in shock.

Disbelief Papyrus - He likes animals and all but... Isn't this too much? You argues about the fact the cow was roaming in the street because someone abandoned her and that she was sad. He's strangely fine with this. Tonight, you're sleeping with a 700 kg cow because she's lonely and Delta is sad that she's lonely because it's reminding him of Sans.

[yanderecandystore]

How ye are having a good day v3v, I feel like imma you a bunch of oc ideas but ummm you got any siren/shark mermen ocs with a s/o who is a deep sea diver?😳 - Cold Anon

Boo, I'm so sorry for taking this long ;-; shit has been going down at the speed of light, so I haven't been able to focus all that well.

I have written your request a couple of times, but it always felt so… Awful? Like- It didn't read as proper oneshot so I kept re doing it over and over again.

I have two posts about mermaids, yet not exactly an official character. I'm going to make this one without an official one for now as well because I can't really think straight- Sorry Cold.

Shout out to @aka-thethirstyone for giving me ideas and helping me build this up-

TW/Tags: depressed/suicidal reader // failed suicide attempt (drowning/hydrogen poisoning although not very accurate) // victim blaming mentality (coming from the reader) // angst sad boi hours with some softness in the end //

🍭꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍮꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍰꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍮꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖🍭

Deep blue sea [Yandere!Shark Merman x Reader - Short Fanfiction]:

You've put yourself in this situation, and even if the consequences may seem unfair, you should know better than to whine about it, you should know about now you don't have the right to complain about something you brought to yourself.

That's what you kept telling yourself, everyday, every hour of each day, and it seems to be a prominent thought even in a moment like this.

Every time you go underwater, you can't help but feel a deep connection with the submerged world around you. So much color and wild beauty that if makes you feel like you might as well not be on Earth anymore, it makes you feel like you're on a different planet.

Like you're in a different realm with wild creatures that hold both beauty and death in them, as marine creatures can be often quite unforgiving to each other, or unwanted visitors.

The alien-like ambience you feel while diving it's probably the most comforting thing in your job, if not the only comforting thing about your whole life.

Just like an old sailor, at sea you feel at home, and at home, you don't feel the same. But in your case, you feel like nothing whenever you come back to your house, and a "home" it's a place you have never really been in, so how can you describe the feeling you get when you're diving deep underwater, as something you never understood?

Who knows, maybe it was just a feeling you got, after all, all your team thinks you're too emotional over the ocean. Some would call you an insane person to be so attached to a body of water.

Yet it doesn't matter what the truth to your case may be, because it's whenever the embrace of said body of water fills your senses it's when you truly feel alive again.

That comforting embrace, as if the immense ocean was truly hugging you and relaxing your muscles.

That comforting, deadly embrace was what felt like home to you. And despite everyone else's warnings, you felt like it was your time to be one with the ocean.

It has been a long, unfortunate ride for you. And as I said before, it's not like you were planning on going back home today.

No, you refused to keep feeling empty at your empty house, going by every single day in your empty life-

It was time for a change. It was time for something different. Some peace for once, something that you wouldn't regret.

Or well, wouldn't be capable of regretting anyway.

Your plan was almost perfect, right? I mean, you were certain your diving team wouldn't notice you suddenly going numb, or even caring enough to help you out. So it was essentially perfect, right?

Yeah, it was unfortunate yet perfect. It brought you despair to think of how perfect your plan was.

But since when was your life easy, [Y/N]? Since when did your plans went your way, you don't really remember having luck-

Even at your final moments, you aren't giving peace that you waited for.

When you dived deep without the proper preparation and your oxygen tank having barely enough to half an hour, you let your body get numb by the water pressure and the narcosis that happened as soon as you dived too deep for your fragile body to handle.

Funny how something that can bring life can also take it away, water surely is probably the most powerful element on Earth. Yet, even if it was sentient, you couldn't be able to beg for the ocean water to fully take you away from this pain, from this emptiness you feel.

The ocean it's as beautiful as it is merciless, so it shouldn't have been a surprise that it would take back your hopes away from you.

While you were unconscious and awaiting your own end, you couldn't possibly be aware of the creature picking your numb floating body.

You couldn't possibly have seen the rest of your diving group looking for you, or the predator carefully observing them, making sure they couldn't see you or him.

When you wake up, you'll feel not only confused after finding out your plan has gone wrong but also finding the immense creature laying on top of you like a pillow.

You didn't feel like fighting, or understanding what the hell was going on, you just noticed that the man on top of you clearly wasn't human and really, really heavy.

Yet you weren't completely awake, you weren't completely fine passing through that whole event, hell, you didn't even realize you weren't inside the ocean anymore, or that you are laying on a completely unfamiliar beach with a creature who is essentially a myth on top of you.

He was sleeping. Dreaming.

Growling. Someone was having a bad dream.

Or maybe a good dream? Throughout your expeditions, you have never really interacted with sharks, only looked at them from afar, so you don't know how to read their behavior.

In a moment of high due to your sudden awakening, you pet his head, getting through his white and grey hair despite the fact that he shouldn't have any hair in his body.

But again, you didn't care, you didn't care for anything, you just wanted to look at the sky and drift once again into your dreamland.

Yet this gentle yet heavy and firm hold he got you on was starting to bother you, but not because you were not enjoying it, no, it was totally the opposite.

You... Missed this. You missed this now that you remember the last time you received any form of comfort from another living being. Even if this terrifying thing could possibly eat you, you felt somehow comfortable being hugged and used as a comfort pillow to someone so big and muscular.

You felt odd, like you were worth something for once.

As if this big predator of the vast seas needed some sort of comfort, and for some reason it chose you to help with his little self-conscious problem.

It felt great knowing that even the someone that is so menacing feels scared or sad from time to time. It makes you feel… Strong, in a sense.

If he can feel vulnerable and openly show it, then I can too, right?

Sigh…. Maybe you were overthinking it, like everything else you ever did. Maybe you should just sleep and see what happens when you wake up-

If. You wake up.

And while you were thinking the worst of yourself and of your captor, the man himself was trying his best to hold the joy, the sorrow, and the pain he felt when seeing you losing your strength while diving.

It doesn't matter if he says anything, what can he say? Nothing he could possibly think about telling you, you'll be able to understand back. The language barrier was just like that. Massive, towering, unbreakable.

It would take a long time to understand one another, considering how you both spoke in different ways. Generally speaking, even your minds seem to be in different places.

You thought about things that he would never be able to comprehend, your self hatred is something he'll never agree with.

Your pain, your sorrow, it doesn't make sense to him, cause up until this day, he only saw the [Y/N] that had fun swimming with the fish and playing with them. Not the one that lives unhappy up on the surface.

How can someone that brings him so much joy can think so little of themselves, is something he'll never understand.

He doesn't know exactly what your true plans are, since in his head, you do these things by accident.

You've been trying this for a couple of times now, and he has either not understood the meaning of it or tried to hide the fact from his own worrying heart.

You did something that would have been pretty stupid especially considering that you were all alone, what if he wasn't there observing you? Would you just- Stop moving completely?

The thought of seeing the cute diver he grown attached to going away from this plan of existence is cruel if not straight up torture.

He just found the one who is bound to be with him for all his life, how else would he feel after discovering something so terrible? The only thing that anyone would feel in his place is fear, is rage, is agony-

Clearly something was going wrong up there, something that made you just-

Decide to float through the ocean forever.

But- But this is oddly the perfect solution to his own problems, now he has a reason and a way to get you to be with him forever now, right?

You seemed to have given up on the human world you live in, and he really wants to be with you so you two can easily be together now. It's an unfortunate event yet also the only opportunity that he has seen as useful to his cause.

Of course, he doesn't understand you, and you surely don't understand him yet, but that is fine because as soon as he wakes up, he'll make sure to do everything in his power to make you feel like the happiest mate of all.

He only hopes you didn't see him sleeping on top of you as a lazy thing for a husband to do, don't worry about him being a bad dad though, he'll make sure to show off everything he has in store for you.

Even if it takes a while to get you accustomed to his mannerism and your now little private island, he knows you're going to love it here with him as your company.

🍭꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍮꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍰꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖♡🍮꒰⑅ᵕ༚ᵕ꒱˖🍭

[wildearthpetfood]

8 Places to Buy Discounted Wild Earth Pet Food Online

Do you want to give your pet the best pet store usa food without breaking the bank? Wild Earth pet food is a top choice for pet parents who care about their furry friend's health and the planet. But high-quality pet food can be pricey. Don't worry—there are ways to snag great deals online! Let's explore eight places to buy discounted Wild Earth pet food and keep your wallet and pet happy.

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Top 8 Online Stores for Discounted Wild Earth Pet Food

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F.A.Q.s

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Chewy, Amazon, and Thrive Market are great starting points for deals.

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Yes! Subscriptions often come with discounts and save you the hassle of reordering.

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Stick to trusted retailers like Chewy, Amazon, and Petco.

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Absolutely! Bulk purchases often come with better pricing.

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Wild Earth is designed to meet the nutritional needs of dogs of all breeds and sizes.

[smallblip]

Deep sea baby

Levihan | Rated for mild swearing and mild deed-doing | This is a secret santa gift for @hanji-zoe103  💕

It’s on Ao3! https://archiveofourown.org/works/28429827

Hanji is born of white foam, where the heavens collide with the sea, and Levi loves her with a fierceness that would make the tides jealous. Levi knows little of poetics, but Hanji promises to find him in the next life and the ones after.

And sure as the waves crashing into shore, she does.

 Hanji is the sea. Uncompromising, untamable, painfully beautiful. Levi thinks she’s poetry in motion, the way she dances, barefoot across sandy beaches, the way she walks down towards the place where the sea meets land, unafraid amidst white waters. 

  He sits, like the shores, and watches her. Watches her bend towards the ground, hands dipping beneath foam, searching for shells. She holds them up against the sun to inspect them when she finds them. Treasure, she calls them. 

  When she’s waist deep in salt water she turns back to look at him. 

  “Come on Levi! The water is warm!” 

  ≋

  Hanji is born of white foam, where the heavens collide with the sea.

  And Levi is the most beautiful boy to have walked the earth, so beautiful he puts the gods to shame. And Hanji fears whatever love they have will be short-lived, because he loves her with a fierceness that would make the tides jealous. 

  It’s a long way from heaven, but Hanji comes to see him every day. She sits with him in a clearing in the forest while he works and he’s sceptical at first. Nothing good comes from associating with the old gods. But the hem of her dress is caked in mud, there’s earth under her nails, and she swears exactly like a sailor would. He teaches her to climb trees and she names all the sheep in his flock. 

  “Maybe it would be nice to stay here forever...” she says to him one day, and Levi understands the gravity of what she’s suggesting. The heavens would not allow for it. They would cut her up piece by piece and she would be returned to the sea. 

  But there’s a conviction in Hanji’s eyes, a severity that justifies the cult of mortals at her feet. The same determination that Hanji has when she’s pulling splinters from her fingers, when she picks wildflowers for Levi, when she holds him against her chest and challenges the gods. She balls her fists and curses the greys of the skies, yet she dances in the rain, giggling, pulling Levi to join her. He surprises himself when he relents.

  So Levi tells her she has his heart. 

  Each night he holds her close, and each night she falls into a deep slumber and she dreams of running barefoot through a field of white roses to reach him. She pierces her foot on a thorn and the field is stained red. A field of red roses. Each one blooming and dying at Levi’s feet. 

  ≋

  In a kinder life, they are childhood friends in a sleepy seaside town. Levi has a popsicle in his mouth, the last of it melting on his tongue. Hanji has long finished hers, and her fingers are sticky from the syrup. But it doesn’t matter because Levi is burying her in the sand so she can keep her filth to herself. He contemplates covering her mouth with sand too, but they’re going to turn thirteen soon and he’s tired of pretending that her talking annoys him. 

  “When I’m older I’m going to sail all over the world!” Hanji grins. Levi thinks it’s funny that now she’s just a talking head in the sand.

  But his heart sinks a little. He doesn’t know if his future is on a vessel bound to nowhere. But they’re still young and their plans have little structure and bearing, so for now Levi pretends he’s going to be there with her, sailing across the ocean.

  “Did you know it’s a myth that lobsters mate for life?” Hanji says, absentminded, part of her trying to distract from the heat, and another part of her already thinking about that ice cream they have waiting for them in her freezer. “Sad huh... Who knew you can’t trust everything on TV...” she laughs. 

  “Seahorses mate for life...” Levi says. He tries to stay nonchalant, but he’s a little embarrassed he spends his free time googling facts he thinks Hanji would enjoy.

  And Hanji knows. Of course she does. She has known him her whole life. In this life and the next he is her Levi. Her Levi with an endless capacity for kindness. She smiles. 

  “Seahorses huh...”

  ≋

  They meet on a ship sailing through uncharted waters. Levi joins the Royal Navy when it feels like he’s exhausted all other options. There's a hunger for power that guides their ship to foreign lands.

  It’s the middle of the night when hears shouting. He jolts awake and already the rest of the crew are reaching for their weapons. There’s no time to change out of their night clothes. The ship spirals into a frenzy. He spots the warning of black sails and white crossbones from afar. The ship is gaining on them. It’s clear they have to stand their ground and fight. 

  The pirates board their ship, and there’s a wild clash of knives and swords and the smell of blood in the air mixing with the metallic taste of gold and bronze and silvers. Levi lunges but his sword is halted midair by a cutlass. 

  “Not so fast Officer...” the pirate says. Past the eyepatch and greasy hair he sees her- he feels her. There’s a white rush by his ears calling for him to come home. 

  I found you, she whispers in his ear as she brings him aboard her ship. 

  The sea promises gold and riches beyond imagination, and Levi promises to follow her to the ends of the earth. 

  ≋

  Levi works in his uncle's bakery a small town in the middle of godforsaken nowhere. It's a family business, and they've been getting good reviews from travel blogs online looking for spots off the beaten path. 

  Levi is on a date to the aquarium and Kenny yells a “don't come back tonight if you know what's good for you!” after him. There are still customers in the bakery and everyone is staring at him. The teenagers in the corner snigger. 

  His date doesn't show, but he's not surprised really. The first date had gone by in a way that could be considered painless. But beyond nice pleasantries, there’s nothing much to look forward to. So Levi completely understands. Then again she could’ve at least had the courtesy to drop him a text. In any case, Kenny will be disappointed. He enters the aquarium anyway. Might as well. He had already purchased the tickets, and he hasn’t been since he was a child in elementary school. He watches the sharks swim laps behind the thick glass. He wonders if they feel unfulfilled, living in a tank, watching as people from all around take family trips to visit the aquarium. 

  “That one’s Bean!” Levi switches his attention from a particularly small shark to the person beside him. 

  “What?” He replies.

  “That one!” She points to the shark making its way past them, “she’s Bean. We rescued her from a fishing net.” 

  Levi watches her grin with suspicion. Maybe he should introduce himself. He's not usually one to introduce himself to strangers with wild hair and gleaming eyes behind thick glasses, but there's a first for everything, and before he knows it, he's telling her his name.

  "Date stood you up?" she says, and Levi glares at her. "Oh... Wait... That really happened?" she apologises, and the stranger with the wild hair and gleaming eyes becomes Hanji. There’s something about the lights in the aquarium, the blues and violets that reflect off the auburn in her eyes in a way that’s almost ethereal. 

  The things that conspire after are tricks of the light then, surely. Hanji invites him back to her apartment, and they talk and they polish off a six pack of beers and a few bottles of cheap wine between the two of them. "This is fun! I haven't gotten shipfaced in a while!" Hanji chuckles. 

  “No.” Levi says, he has little tolerance for bad nautical puns. But it only encourages Hanji to tell him more. There's a mix of "where ya fin all my life" and "you're whaley cute", and finally, when she's absolutely smashed, a "nice boat, wanna fuck?" 

  At that, the dams break and Levi laughs. 

  Hanji wakes up the next morning, killer headache, she shoots up and the headache splits her skull open. Too quick. 

  “Ouch...” she says, eyes blinking through sleep and haze. She grabs at the bottle of water by her bedside and shuffles through her drawer for ibuprofen. 

  “You idiot...” 

  Hanji snaps her head up, looking for the owner of the voice and there Levi is, leaning against her door, hands folded across his chest. Hanji’s jaw slackens. 

  “In case you were wondering, no, nothing happened...” 

  “But... but you’re here... in... in my room...” 

  “Tch...” Levi rolls his eyes, “you passed out and I stayed just in case you choked on your own vomit and died in the middle of the night...” 

  Oh...

  “Wait did I?” 

  Levi raises a brow, she’s still not all there. “Still alive aren’t you?” 

  Hanji shrugs. This could be hell for all she knows. “Fast acting pain relief” proving to be the biggest scam of the century. 

  "What a fucking shipwreck of a person..." Levi says and it takes Hanji a minute before she's doubled over in laughter, tears pooling in the corners of her eyes. 

  Levi half expects to never see her ever again, but there she is the day after, as promised, finger pressed to the glass, ordering herself a Pain au Chocolat, an Americano, and his number on a piece of napkin. He sighs, but he's writing it down for her anyway.

  "You really followed me home that night huh... Didn't it cross your mind that I could be a serial killer?" She says, examining his handiwork. 

  Levi scoffs, "you invited a complete stranger you picked up at the aquarium into your house, and then proceeded to get very wasted... Didn't it cross your mind that I could have been the serial killer?"

  Hanji laughs, and it startles her when it echoes throughout the bakery, "touché..." she says, "guess I am a shipwreck of a person..." she winks.

  The corners of Levi's lips betray a smile as he watches her take a seat by the window to read. 

  "That's not Petra..." Kenny comments. 

  "Who said I went home with Petra?" Levi answers.

  Kenny's face pulls into a smirk and he lets loose a deep rumble of laughter, “Levi you absolute dog!”

  ≋

  The sea is a passage. To a new life that Hanji can only pray will be fulfilling. She is the princess of a port kingdom- a people favoured by the sun and raised by the sea. 

  Her ships carry her to a distant land of frigid waters and snowfall, where her betrothed is king. When she sets foot on land, she's greeted by faces paler than hers and a mannerism befitting the heartiness of Northern kingdoms. There are skins being made into pelt, fish hanging out to dry, wines made from preserved fruit. Already, Hanji misses the white sandy beaches and the heat of the midday sun, but she's to be queen now, and she remembers this when she walks past the heavy doors into the throne room. She comes bearing gifts of glass beads, fine porcelain, and dried fruit and nuts- a reminder of Summer. 

  She takes her place beside her husband, and she smiles at the people who have come to see her- the princess from the other side of the sea. They are her people now. 

  And that's when she sees him.

  His expression doesn't change even when he kneels in front of her and kisses the back of her hand. He vows to protect her. 

  She calls for him later, and he tells her to call him Levi- he has never been too keen on formalities. Besides, Sir Levi doesn’t suit him quite as much. And she's Hanji, just Hanji. 

  It's Winter when they take a ride through the forest. She's not used to the heavy furs and wools and Levi has to remind her that the sun doesn't shine the same here. But Hanji knows. Her golden skin now mellowing. She hikes her dress above her knees and toes through the snow. The ground caves beneath her feet like powdered sugar, and Hanji thinks maybe there's beauty in her new home. She thinks maybe there's warmth to be found, as Levi catches her before she slips. 

  He shows her the lake, now frozen over, and they slide over thick ice like children. She pulls him down with her when she falls and they laugh. There's something in his eyes that Hanji recognises as fear. She feels it in the beat of her own heart, warning her against falling. But they’ve been treading on thin ice around one another, and falling seems inevitable.

  So Levi presses back against her and kisses her. Hanji feels a warmth coursing through her- the same fire she's promised in the lullabies her mother used to sing her. 

  "We should come in Spring. The lake is beautiful then..." Levi says as they make their way back to the castle. And Hanji promises to show him her home. The crystal waters; gentle waters. She knows it's a promise that may never be fulfilled, but nevertheless, this is a moment in time, and promises offer a glimpse into possibility. 

  Come Spring, they make love by the lake, under the cover of the sea of trees. Everything is beautiful in the Spring. 

  ≋

  In another life, the sea promises protection. 

  There’s only one rule out at sea near the white rocks-

  Beware the Siren’s song.

  Levi lives in a little house by the sea. Everyday he sails out near the white rocks to catch fish. 

  Hanji circles his boat. Her iridescent tail catching the light and reflecting deep purples and green. She sings her best song for him- the beautiful fisherman with the grey eyes. 

  "Don’t swim into the nets," he scolds and Hanji is taken aback. She thinks about her beautiful fisherman when he sails for home. And there's a familiar tugging that she feels in her gut. But the weather has taken a turn for the worse and she doesn’t see him near the white rocks. Not the next day nor the days after. She seeks the council of the waters and the waves carry her to shore. 

  There’s a storm raging. The windows are rattling against their frames. Lightning illuminates the skeletons of his house and there’s a persistent knocking that weaves in and out of the thunder. Levi takes the screaming kettle off the hobs. 

  He opens the door to her. She’s standing in the rain, hands wrapping around herself to shield from the cold. Levi’s gaze skims from the tip of her nose down to her bare chest, down to her long legs. He swallows thickly. She’s leaning against the frame of the door, shifting her weight from one unstable leg to another. Like a fawn learning to walk. He frowns but nevertheless, he leaves the door ajar for her to enter.

  “You’re gonna get the floors all wet...” he mutters. Rainwater he can manage. But seawater makes the floorboards a little sticky, and that annoys him deeply.

  “I told you I’ll come for you.” She says. 

  Levi shoves a towel in her face, “Dry yourself.” He pauses for a moment, taking in the shock on her face. “Please.” 

  Surprisingly, she does as she’s told, and when she’s done, she hands the towel back to him. 

  Levi finds her dry clothes, and she pinches and pulls at them, inspecting after she puts them on. 

  “I’m here to eat your heart lover boy.” 

  He considers her. It’s colder this time of year and the sea is relentless. But her skin is gold like honey, sun-kissed in a way that reminds Levi of summers and homemade jam and the grass beneath his feet. 

  “Levi.” He replies.

  Levi. she says, smile spreading across her face like butter on warm toast. 

  He shares his stew with her and she tells him her name is Hanji when her hands are warming by the fire. She looks at Levi, gaze washing over him like a wave. And there’s familiarity in the way his eyes soften when he looks at her. He looks at her like he's trying to call forth a string of memories tying her to him; him to her. But all he has is an affection for her that ripples through his consciousness. It's accompanied by the sounds of laughter- her laughter- and the pale shimmer of moonlight.  

  So she returns to him the next day, and the day after, and the days after that. 

  Hanji brings him little pieces of treasure. A conch shell, a dead sand dollar, bits of sea glass. Her legs grow stronger each time. She dances around his house. She pulls him flush against her chest and rests her chin atop his head and sways to a tune she’s humming. 

  Beware the Siren’s song, they say. 

  But they’re far from the white rocks and she’s laughing exactly like a lover would. The floorboards are creaking under their toes.

  He looks for her when he’s out at sea, and listens as she tells him stories of the depths, about the men who hurt her, about dying at sea, and about the promise of protection and rebirth.  

  When she wakes again, there's water in her lungs and she learns to breathe. To call the sea her home. 

  But maybe it's not by accident that she falls asleep in his arms one night, cocooned in white sheets that remind her of sea foam. 

  She kisses his nose in the morning and he blinks an eye open to look at her. “I’m gonna eat your heart lover boy...” Hanji teases, hair tickling his skin, the sight of him crossing the boundary between sleep and daybreak takes her breath away. 

  Levi smiles, pulling her closer, "stop moving so much..." he groans. It’s still early, they can still afford a little shut eye. He cradles her in his arms- a promise of protection. “You already have my heart,” comes his reply, in a moment of tenderness, and Hanji doesn't return to the waters. 

  ≋

  In others, the sea forces distance between them. 

  They don't meet in this life.

  But sure as waves reaching towards the shore, they meet in the one after.

  ≋

  They're in their second year of college but nothing really changes. 

  Except when it does, it happens so fast that Levi doesn't have time to breathe. The next time he takes a breath he's lying beside Hanji. They’re both sated and sleepy and Levi stills his breathing, coming down from his high. And Hanji thinks this life is nice. It's effortless in a way that reminds her that they are meant to be.

  The Marine Biologists have gathered for a nights out- a pub crawl to be specific. The entire course is decked in ridiculous outfits. There’s a merman somewhere, and a manatee, there’s even a sea snake (moray eel, Hanji clarifies). And Hanji is dressed as a shark. 

  Levi is there because he gets dragged along to everything that Hanji is a part of and he gets asked one too many times what his outfit is supposed to be. Because he’s in his jeans and a black top and he just looks- normal? 

  “He’s my next meal!” Hanji says and Levi pulls a face, he chokes out a, “shitty four eyes...” and he’s blushing a little more than he should because does she even hear herself?

  Halfway through the night Levi wonders why he’s so tipsy. This is really unlike him. He remembers meeting Hanji’s friend Moblit, whose Aquaman sends Hanji over the edge with laughter. He remembers hearing a round of “oh hey Levi!” (They all know who he is, after all, he’s often hanging around Hanji). Then the beer bong challenge. Oh right. The beer bong challenge... that’s why. Hanji won, at least he remembers that. 

  And he also remembers dancing with Hanji at the back of one of the pubs. “This is a good song...” he murmurs in her ear and she visibly shivers. But everything is spinning and the music is delicious, touching is also delicious, and they do just that. And at some point Levi must have just gone for it, because Hanji’s mouth is hot and inviting and Levi thinks he’s delirious so he surrenders to the feeling. 

  They’re back in Hanji’s room, only because it’s only a flight of stairs up and Levi is unzipping her ridiculous costume that surprising does little to ease his raging hard on. And Hanji, god forbid, isn’t wearing anything underneath. 

  His top comes off once they make it past the main door to her flat. Levi doesn’t even notice the mess in Hanji’s room as they navigate the narrow space and soon they're on the bed, hands moving in what is best described as a frenzy. 

  It feels so good and Levi finally admits to himself that he has been thinking about this for a while. And he’s almost relieved when Hanji kisses him and lets her want slide down his throat. 

  Levi wonders if they can still be considered friends. Last he’s checked friends don’t scream each other’s names the way Hanji is saying his name right now as she bites down on his shoulder. Plus, the whole best friends to lovers trope is just one big cliché. And yet, Levi doesn’t hate it. He has to admit it’s actually really nice. 

  The next morning Hanji finds Levi rummaging through her sink cupboard. 

  “My extra toothbrushes are the drawer.” She gestures towards the bottom drawer with her toe. They brush their teeth and they're sitting on the bed again, it's the only place for two to sit, really. 

  “So... Was it good for you?” Hanji says, a little amused with how the entire situation unfolded.  

 Levi clears his throat, face going red. “Would’ve been better if you weren’t wearing that stupid outfit...” He wants to say he's never felt this way with anyone before, but he doesn't. 

  “But hammerheads are cool!” Hanji protests and she’s pouting. Levi wonders if now’s a good time to kiss that stupid look off her face or if that’s too much.

  “Fucking one isn’t...” Levi mutters. Hanji throws her head back and laughs. 

  “So... What do we do now?” Levi asks. And Hanji shrugs saying a "admit we love each other and carry on with our lives?" like it had been obvious. 

  "Sounds good..." he says, smiling, and he thinks they deserve this effortlessness. 

 ≋

  Hanji comes back to him like ship returning to port. She thinks about meeting him when he's six and building sandcastles on the beach. He had ignored her attempt at conversation and Hanji had been a little annoyed.

  "You don't remember me do you?" She huffed, pout on her face, arms crossed. 

  Levi was confused, that definitely caught his attention, "do we know each other?" he asked. 

  "No," Hanji confessed, "no but... I know I'm supposed to meet you." She said with all the confidence a five year old can muster. Levi bickered with her. How can a five year old be so smug? He was a whole year older and he was by no means as confident. He didn't even know whether to pick sushi or pizza for lunch. 

  And she thinks about the night before she left. 

  "I like you Levi..." she had said. She willed herself not to cry, so there's a moment in which she's just chuckling humourlessly to herself. And Levi's scowls at her. "Inconvenient huh..." she added. She had to cross the ocean the next day on a voyage bound somewhere far away and this makes it that much harder.  

  Fucking inconvenient indeed...

  They don't make promises, but Hanji wishes they had. She wishes they would have at least addressed her little confession, because it's been eight years. Eight years of it gnawing at her brain and now it's just a little awkward. 

  Hanji takes a deep breath as she disembarks at port, her feet a little unsteady on dry land- like a fawn learning to walk again. But she sees him. And the knot in her chest unravels. Eight years. It's been too long. She takes tentative steps towards him, but soon she's running and enveloping him in a sweaty embrace. 

  He's whispering something, muffled because he's pressed into Hanji's clavicle-

  “Did you know seahorses mate for life?” 

  She smiles. Sure as the sun, he’s in her arms again. 

  Seahorses huh...

  ≋

  Hanji knows whatever life they've led, this is her favourite. 

  The one in which her and Levi see the sea for the first time together. 

  The one in which she’s the Commander, and him, her Captain. And between them, a river of words left unsaid threatening to break the banks. 

  One day they must cross the ocean, but today they visit the shores again, without the kids this time. And Levi learns why when he watches her peel at her clothes. Her harness comes off first, then her blouse, then everything else, like a little dance for an audience of one. Levi tries not to stare, but he’s already seen her by candlelight in the dead of the night. And yet she never fails to take his breath away. 

  She makes her way to where the white foams dredge the past up the shores of the present. 

  "Come on Levi! The water is warm!" she says, and he hears it like a call to come home- where the heavens collide with the sea. 

  He takes off his clothes and folds them in a neat pile beside Hanji's mess. He swims out to join her.

  The moonlight caresses her skin and this scene- this moment- is opulent. Levi unties the patch over her eye and lets the waters carry it away. She chuckles. "I'm never going to get that back am I?" she says, holding his hand and guiding him to shallower waters. 

  And Levi knows there's some poetry to the way she's kissing him. She tastes like saltwater and Summer all at once, and Levi thinks that he has never felt this way with anyone else. Will never feel this way about anyone else. Instead he glowers at her-

  “Hanji don’t you dare fucking die... I’ll never forgive you if you do... I swear I’ll-“ 

  Before Levi can continue, Hanji is laughing, sputtering as her head bobs below the surface of the water. 

  “Even if I do, you don’t have to say goodbye. I promise I’ll look for you in the next life... And the ones after...” She says, brushing the pad of her finger against his nose. The heavens and the sea bear witness. And Levi promises to follow her to the ends of the earth. 

  Treasure, he calls her, when the sound of white water crashing provide refuge for words that have little place in this life. Levi knows little of the words lovers say to each other, and even less of poetics, yet here he is with Hanji, sitting on the shores now, and watching salt crystal in her hair. He falls asleep that night to the sound of her breathing. And amidst dreams of roses and white foam,

  Levi is home. 

[babylon-crashing]

shark shamans and magia del mar [i]

We are a species that invented mirrors in order to see the Divine and we rage like Caliban at any shadow that has the audacity to show us something different. We adore the gendered to the point of having male and female magic, male and female gods, male and female religions. We say it's hardwired in us. We say it's written in our DNA. We say there is no other way.

The sea, though, the source of all life on this earth, has no gender and whatever magic Homo sapiens might possess we've only been aware of it for the last 200,000 years. Tiburon, the Spanish word for shark, on the other hand, has been seafaring well since before the Jurassic age even began, more than 130 million years ago. There are over 1000 different species of sharks, though most people can only name four: the Great White, the Tiger, the Bull and the Hammerhead. What they know about Tiburon comes from horror movies. “It is as if God created the devil and gave him . . . jaws,” and thus a whole generation of Americans who'd otherwise scoff at superstitions developed an irrational fear of the ocean and everything in it.

The International Shark Attack File reported that in 2019 there were a total of 64 confirmed unprovoked shark attacks worldwide. Compare that to the estimated 100 million sharks that are killed each and every year, a number that far exceeds what any of their populations can handle in order to recover. What sportsmen don't catch the rest get sacrificed for a bowl of Chinese shark fin soup. When the last bowl of soup is drunk the oceans really will be filled with nothing but ghosts.

To fear Tiburon is to admit that you know nothing about Tiburon.

There is something odd, disingenuous in fact, about a Witch, a Bruja, who balks when Tiburon appears before them as a guide or familiar, but doesn't think twice when the spirit manifests in feline form, everyone loves a Lady Tituba or Princess Perfect Paws. Both species are predators, though; both possess their own weird magic, passing through realms we will never know. The only difference is that we've domesticated the cat. Tiburon will never be domesticated.

The longest any of the large pelagic sharks have been held in captivity was back in 2004 at the Monterey Bay Aquarium when a young female Great White was kept in an outdoor tank for 198 days before releasing her back into the wild.

Every shark is ancient and brings with it ancient gifts. When Tiburon sticks its snout out of the water and allows its human to rub its ampullae of Lorenzini that produces a trance-like state it is fair to say that particular Bruja has been bonded with their guide.

Whether in a dream or out on the sea, once Tiburon becomes interested in what you have to offer you have a astonishing possibility to expand your magia del mar repertoire and learn something that is truly antediluvian being kept alive down in the ancient dark depths that few of us will ever experience.

[the-faultofdaedalus]

Pls tell me more about deep sea and space because that's one of the reasons I love Stevetony... Steve was submerged and Tony fell from the sky. The poetry is exquisite

space horror is just sea horror but flipped around and EXPONENTIALLY bigger. like, ive never been in space and i have never been far enough from any shore to not be able to see land, but it’s that same kind of........... feeling, to me, at least.

both are just, so, so big, so big that we as humans are not built to understand that scale. if you’re lost in the middle, there is no way you can determine which way is safe and solid ground. for me the.... horror? i guess? comes mostly from the not knowing. not neccecarily the sense of monsters in the dark? but in the sense that there are things about BOTH of these places that we will never, ever know about. it’s that loss of knowledge. that’s what gets me.

also, just, the scale of both of these things that are both utterly inhospitable to humans. on the surface, just barely touching it... we’re fine. we can duck in for small amounts of time, hold our breath. any deeper and any further in and you need special equipment and metal tanks so that just being in it’s presence won’t kill you. because it will kill you. it’s not malicious, it doesn’t hate you. it’ll kill you regardless.

like, all the horror of the open sea: being stranded on a raft, or an island, nothing but ocean further and further out to the horizon, no food no water no shelter, the only life too far to reach, the idea that even if you DID try to swim or paddle to safety you would have absolutely no guarantee that you would ever hit land, ever see another craft. you don’t know which way has safety. there’s no way to know. you might get caught up by a current and be whisked even further away from rescue, you might float into a city or a boat and be rescued almost instantly. you might be able to infer which way is safe, but mostly.... no. no you can’t. that isolation and that lack of resources, including knowledge.

that is space, but take all that and make it much, much, much, bigger. you can sail across the pacific ocean. there is a finite amount of water on earth. there is NO end to space. in this case, your continents, your islands, your safe harbors, they’re planets. insignificant dots scattered throughout nothing. in space, a fraction of a fraction of a decimal off-course can be the difference between hitting solid ground and breathable air or sailing past into void forever, and ever, and ever.

it’s not about what horrors might lurk in the depth!!!! it’s not about sharks, or space-sharks, or whateverthefuck. the fear of the ocean isn’t... oh, something might brush your toes -- though there is that as well. it’s not about what’s out there. it’s about what’s not out there, and how little is out there. it’s about how much nothing is out there. how much absolutely fuck-all is out there.

one of my favorite quotes about space and space horror of all time is “you don’t have to look up to see space, you have to look away from safety” and that’s... that’s really it. (quote is from nerdcubed’s outer wilds game of the year 2019 monologue, which is fantastic, as is the game he’s taking about)

it’s also, mostly for space specifically though again this applies to the ocean but on a smaller scale, is time. is how long things have been around, and how long things will continue to be around, and how long the universe will be around without anything else in it, and how long humans and human memory will not be around.

it’s about how long it takes to get from any point a to point b. it takes about a week for a cargo ship to get from china to canada. it used to take a lot longer, but now we have better boats.

at our current level of technology, it takes seven months to get to mars, the closest planet to us that isn’t Actually Hell (sorry mercury and venus) and that’s at the best possible lineup. It takes light forty two minutes to get to Jupiter. that’s light. that’s a forty two minute lag-time if you want to just talk to someone, who is still WELL within our solar system. There’s years of lag between what we see and what is actually happening at even the closest stars to us, and even more when it comes to actually getting there. Can you imagine being an explorer, freshly touched down on this planet that you’re going to be studying, knowing that it’s taken you thirty years to get here and that you’ll most likely never have a conversation with any of the same people ever again because it takes years to send a single message one-way? can you imagine that isolation? any journey to any other star would take so long and it’s horrifying.

Every single thing in space is so much further apart than any media ever really shows. Asteroid belts aren’t these dense, terrifying-to-navigate bands of rock. The space between single asteroids can be hundreds of thousands of miles. the scary part isn’t what is there it’s what not! it’s that there’s nothing! ever! for millions of miles!

there’s a great side plot in a podcast called wolf 355 (skip this para if u care about spoilers) where one of the main characters gets launched, in a shuttle, away from the station and the star that is the main setting for the podcast. there’s only a limited amount of food, only a limited amount of water, and the main engines are dead. The only thing this character can do to try and save himself is turn very slightly to the right, every three days. The way he tries to save himself is by putting himself on an intercept course with another ship, which is still over a lightyear away from him. The only way he can do this without starving to death is by using the shuttle’s cryo pod, for three days at a time, firing the booster, and repeating that. again, and again, and again, and in the end it is still not enough because he’s getting destroyed from the repeated freeze/thaw and eventually he runs out of water because the cryo systems use water and even after all of that, which amounts to around 200 days, there is this: he is on course, but he is not on time. at his current speed, to intercept with the other ship, would take six thousand years. (he’s eventually rescued by another ship, but only by coincidence.)

it’s so big! space is just so big, and so empty, and there’s amazing things in that emptiness that humans will never know about because even though they’re happening right now they’ll be eroded before we ever get to see them.

and thats still without any of the horrifying incomprehensible monsters that could be out there waiting to munch us up like sour cream chips.

[alwayslateneedingtea]

Poseidon Kid Things:

Look, we all love Percy and his set of powers, because he's badass, right? But there are some other things I'd like to see:

Poseidon's kids that never get to go to the ocean. That live their whole life land-locked because their mortal parents want to keep them safe, so their heritage isn't known. Ranch-hand Poseidon kids who grow up fierce and wild and more than a little out of place.

So they have a connection with the ranch horses the neighbors own. The horses always find them at the fence, and allow themselves to be pet by a grubby-handed, hyperactive child. The adults freak because they see this enormous, hot tempered animal lipping at the kid's hair, but then the kid laughs.

Kids that always know where they're going, and where they are. They can tell East from West before they can speak, and they always sleep best with their bed facing North.

Everyone forgets that in some myths, Poseidon created cattle, too, trying to create the horse. So give me a kid who finds themselves in very close quarters with a bull, who happens to be notoriously unfriendly, that completely chills out when the kid explains why they're there. Bonus points for the cow doing the sniff-snuff-lick thing they do when they greet new herd members.

A kid who can find all the navigational stars with no issue. Who maps constellations by season, and seasons by the movements of the sun, earth, and animals.

A kid who can tell what type of flier a bird is just by the shape of it's wings, and how far they are from home.

A kid who has the whole map of Middle of Nowhere in their heads, and can get from Point A to Point B ten different ways without putting much thought into it.

Kids who are luminescent pale, like the pearls at the bottom of the sea. Who have eyes the color of flint, of churning waters. Who moves the way the tide does, not particularly graceful, but entrancing all the same.

They have a voice that rises and falls like waves, gentle and soft, without hurry. In everything they say, they take their time, and say it exactly as they mean it.

The first time their class goes to the zoo, they slip away from the group to get back to the salt-water touch tank. Not even to touch the animals, (though that's nice too) but to just feel the water. Because that lukewarm, salty, gently waving pool feels so good.

Coincidentally, all the touch-tank critters adore them, and the little old ladies there just coo over this tiny child that has like twenty lobsters and a couple small sharks fighting over who gets pet first.

Spoiler alert, it was actually the kite across the pool who zoomed in and shoved all the other ones down and pushed this kid's hand almost out of the water with how fast they wanted the attention.

And then they get mesmerized by the jellyfish tank, because they can feel-hear the calm-thoughtless-quiet-push-float that makes up the jellyfishes' whole life. Their teacher is just happy they found something quiet to watch.

Poseidon kids that are totally vegetarian, because they're totally against eating fish, and have raised almost every other kind of livestock.

Poseidon kids that take salt-baths to clear their skin, and that's the only thing that helps.

Poseidon kids who have no idea who they are, or who their bio-dad is, but are just trying to live their best lives with what they have, as far away from what should have been their home as one could be.

[jeveuxetreecrivain]

The Art of Story telling - Short Story

Choose a question from A Calendar of Tales. Answer it. Now write a story from this answer.

“If August could speak, what would it say?” That it’s so hot, it’s baking.

The air was too still.

Meria had come under the canopy to look for a brush of fresh air but even in the shade, there was no escaping the summer heat.

The grass was yellow and withered. From the window of her bedroom upstairs, it could appear beautiful, as if a great golden mantel covered the earth, but up close, she could see how her parents’ garden was suffering.

As far as she could tell, it hadn’t rained for three weeks and four days. The water tank ran low, the strawberries hung sadly from their branch, and the stream that used to sing in the woods had turned into a muddy snake.

There was nothing to do but wait. The weather was starting to affect the villagers. Kids didn’t come outside anymore, the plastic of the playground too hot for their fair skin. Her mother’s neighbors, an old couple still obnoxiously in love after decades spent together, were now having words all day long. They weren’t the only ones.

Meria’s man had left two days before, turned mad by the heat and humidity, and holding Meria and her parents responsible for the lack of amenities in the house. In a sense, it was true. Every bit of money her parents could spare was put into the family farm, growing vegetables for years. There had never been any need to install the AC or purchase a TV. The only concession had been the internet, but it was so slow it had eventually pushed her partner over the edge. He had left, saying he would never come back.

Meria wondered if it was true, what it meant to her relationship, if it was over between them.

She couldn’t even feel sad about it, she didn’t have that kind of energy. She felt dried up, like a cake left in the oven for too long, baked to the point of having lost taste and texture. At this point, she was just longing for rain.

If rain came, it would save the farm. Meria could battle against the banks, against the loan sharks, against the buyers, against the State even. But she couldn’t battle the sky. That victory was out of her reach.

Or maybe, the heat wave was a sign. That is was time to stop the fight, time to let go. The void that would surely follow terrified her. Better to hold on, under a thirsty tree, whose branches hung as low as her spirit.

Suddenly there was noise, a car on the road. Meria watched for it, followed it to a nearby house where it parked on the gravels. A woman came out, wearing a white summer dress, cool as a lily. She disappeared into the house and Meria lost interest.

Later, as she was resting her eyes, she heard the light steps on the pebbles, getting closer. The woman walked towards her, Meria watched her under her lids. She had changed into something more fitting to her surroundings, as though she wanted to go into the woods gather wild berries.

“Hello,” she said, and her tone was so nice, so familiar, as if she was talking to an old friend, Meria was taken aback.

“Do I know you?”

“Maybe not anymore,” the new comer admitted. “I’m Evelin, we used to play together. A long time ago.”

Meria closed her eyes to welcome the mental pictures. They hadn’t been friend exactly, but they had been part of the same group of kids, re-enacting battles for freedom all around the village. “You haven’t chosen the best time to come back.”

“My mom called me. She said it’s my fault and I have to fix it.”

Meria blinked. “I’m sorry?”

Evelin looked away. “A few weeks ago, I spent the night. It was raining heavily then and I sang something to call the sun. I meant it as a joke, but my mom assured me it hasn’t rained since. So, here I am.”

Meria laughed. “What are you gonna do? A rain dance?”

“Why not? Anything for my mom. You wanna come?”

“And do what?”

“I don’t know yet. I’ll see when I get there.”

“This is crazy,” Meria muttered. But she stood up. There was nothing else to do.

She followed Evelin into the woods, walked behind her on the planks that crossed the stream, desperately quiet. Even the microclimate of the forest seemed to have given in to the heat. It wasn’t as hot as in the garden but the humidity was worse. Mosquitoes were swarming. Evelin broke from the path, to hike between the trees. The ferns, usually vibrant and playful, had the renouncing bow of lifelong prisoners.

Meria lost her footing and fell, opening her palms on a nasty rock. Before Evelin could turn back and help, she was standing again, cleaning the wound with her mouth.

Evelin eventually led her to a giant boulder, as old as the land. Most likely the forest had expanded around it for centuries. A tree had found the strength to grow within a crack and now, it stood beautifully above the stone, its roots wrapping around like a crown, seemingly unaffected by the heat wave.

Meria had forgotten about the place, or rather, she had turned indifferent to it, somehow knowing it was there but without desire to see it again after years spent away. For the second time, memories flowed her, of games played on that boulder, of disagreement over who it belonged to, childish thoughts that led kids to believe they could own such a force.

If there was a god of rain, as Evelin’s mother seemed to be convinced, it wasn’t a bad idea to look for them here.

“Now what?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” Evelin sighed. “Maybe a sacrifice, but what?”

“I have blood,” Meria noted, extended her palm.

“Oh, okay…maybe smear it on the stone, say a few words?”

“What shall I say?”

Evelin shrugged. “I think you know more than me what is needed.”

For a moment, Meria pondered over the words. Then she put her hand on the boulder and dragged it, tracing a large circle around it. She prayed for a storm, with thunder and cracks that would make the air breathable again. The she asked for a gentle rain, soft enough as to not damage the crops. Finally she begged for morning dew and evening mist, the ultimate sign the earth would have cooled down.

As she did, her wound stung baldy but she never wavered, even finding beauty in the contrast of the scarlet blood against the grey stone. Once done, she came back to Evelin who smiled. “The rain will wash it,” she said as they walked back.

[encyclopika]

Animal Crossing Fish - Explained #56

Brought to you by a marine biologist with a small family...

CLICK HERE FOR THE AC FISH EXPLAINED MASTERPOST!

Most animals on Earth do not take care of their offspring. It’s just too much work, honestly. No, really, it is. Feeding and protecting tiny versions of yourself for weeks to years takes resources that are hard to come by, like food, shelter, and energy. Parental care is an evolutionary trade-off that will affect litter size and how well-developed the offspring are. Fish usually provide no parental care to their babies, as a rule of thumb. Today’s fish, the Angelfish, does, though!

It’s fun to catch these guy in Animal Crossing. They are pretty, unique, and honestly, I never get sick of seeing them while trying to get the rarer fish. Under a small shadow, just fish during its active hours and you’ll eventually get it. When you donate to the museum, they are put into that “aquarium” tank in the freshwater section with the other hobby-aquarium fish, like the Neon Tetra and Goldfish. And that’s accurate, because this species, the Freshwater Angelfish (Pterophyllum scalare) is popular with hobbyists the world over.

Native to the Amazon River basin and its tributaries, the Freshwater Angelfish lives in slow-moving streams and floodplains within its range. Those gorgeous stripes it has are actually its camouflage, allowing it to hide within the shadows and stems of submerged plants. 

Above I mentioned that the Freshwater Angelfish takes care of its young; in the wild and in the home aquarium, Angelfish will aggressively defend their babies against any other fish that gets too close for up to two months after the young hatch from their eggs, which the parents lay under plant roots and leaves. Although parental care is fairly rare in fish, it’s actually one of the hallmarks of the Family Cichlidae, the Cichlids, for which Angelfish belong. 

But besides that family, you really don’t see parental care in fish. As we’ve covered before, most bony fish (basically anything that isn’t a shark in ACNH, for reference) are either broadcast spawners, in which everyone comes together and spews out their eggs and sperm into the water to find each other and get taken by the current, or they lay their eggs somewhere and leave (or die, like salmon). The strategy is ultimately to make as many babies as possible, which overwhelms predators - they can’t possibly eat them all! Lots of species of fish will have MILLIONS of babies per spawning season, per female, which ensures that some will make it to adulthood. But that comes with a cost - to make that many babies, the babies themselves will be low-quality. Even after hatching, the babies are called “larvae” because they still have so much growing to do. Even for giants like Bluefin Tuna, their babies are just a few millimeters long.

^What fish larvae look like. 

And most fish have no concept of what fish larvae belong to them - adults will gladly eat baby fish, which means, in the aquatic environment, cannibalism is accidental, but not uncommon at all. It also means small filter feeders, like anchovy, are totally capable of eating their predators, and they do all the time. Stuff like this is what makes aquatic biology so different than terrestrial biology with similarly-sized animals. Saying an anchovy can eat a bluefin tuna, even as a larva, is nuts when you realize that’s analogous to saying “a zebra ate a lion cub”. It’s unheard of for us and other animals that put all their effort into parental care instead, giving birth or hatching just a few big, well-developed babies and then caring for them for a long time. That strategy ensures that all babies make it to adulthood, but at the cost of having more at a time. And that’s the trade-off - quantity or quality? 

And that’s what is really cool about the Angelfish. Their babies are still tiny larvae, but the adults protect them as best they can while the babies figure out how to get food on their own for two months. Even though that doesn’t sound like a lot, it’s enough to give Angelfish an edge.

And there you have it. Fascinating stuff, no?