Fish out of water ; killugon mermaid AU

Lesson: Do Not Look For Fish At Midnight (re-written)

A Great amount of Fear seemed to settle itself on the horizon, thick and heavy in the late air and warmly stifling. Killua could feel it crawl up his lungs. The Warm Air caused his breath to become high and shallow, almost a gasp. This wasn't right, nor natural or even usual. Greed island was a tourist trap at its core, plastic and carefully formulated - ideally there should be no Great Fear nor stifling air nor anything of such beginnings. It was bad for business, you see. The Warm Air was swarming mosquitos and uncomfortable humanity and uneasy non-humanity. He hated it.

Sweat soaked Killua's hair - white and usually relatively fluffy - until it was plastered to his head. He had sprinted down the hill to the beach, stumbling painfully, arms pumping, sharply dragging air into his lungs. Choked by sobs, his breath now came in short pants - the Great Fear and Warm Air had an adverse effect on his endeavour to regain oxygen. His hands gripped the sand encrusted wood of the pier. He was at the edge. The end of the pier. The edge of the world. His world, at least. Killua stared down into the roiling sea until he saw dancing white lights and then he stared at those until it hurt and then he squeezed his eyes closed and painfully dug his heels into his eye sockets to scrub the pain away. He opened his tear-stained eyes again and stared back into the black waves and the glimmering white reflection of the moon and his glimmering white reflection. Then up at the real moon. He looked down again and that's when he saw it; a flicker, a glinting of green or white or silver or-something-else in the bright moonlight. Some creature in the water. A shark. He thought, heart beating faster. A shark a shark a shark a shark his mind beat out in tandem with the beating of his heart.

The moon shone down, unusually bright. Everything was so vivid. Killua could smell the salt in the air, feel the gritty sand against his palms, see everything around him. The lighthouse swung its light around from the top of the hill. Round and round. The sea was light, then dark, light, then dark again. The light hit the sea again. He kneeled closer still to the dark and light waves. The sea was clearer now, as if to aid him. A shark a shark a shark a shark he thought a shark a shark a shark a shark. No. Sharks weren't native to these waters. Killua strained his eyes. The Lighthouse swung round again. The Great Fear encased his mind. The Warm Air suffocated his lungs. His eyes burned with effort.

The sea became clearer once again and it was here that he could make out a rock formation, and there that he could see the large shape again and a glint of light. He so terribly wanted to see it. The creature he thought, suddenly giddy with excitement. The creature the creature the creature the creature- and a sudden strange and wonderful manic need to see The Creature overtook him, and he leaned closer to the sea so close until his nose almost became wet with seawater and closer still that it seemed the water might engulf his head completely and even closer still until. Until.

The water was in his nose, and in his mouth as he had not had the good sense to close it. He knew he must have overreached and tilted over completely into the water but yet, all he knew was that he had been on the wet pier one moment and the wetter still sea the next. He could not move. Not even to flail about in the water like some kind of beached fish as he knew he would have done had he been able to move. This is because here is a certain numbness one feels when shocked by cold water. A terrible thing that freezes you to the marrow of your bones and renders you quite immobile. This numbness could disable the most able-bodied of swimmers and Killua was certainly on the lower end of this particular spectrum, due entirely to his inability to swim. When paired with the numbness of sudden cold saltwater, inability to swim and lack of air, Killua had no plausible way to drag himself out of the predicament, nor save himself from inevitable death by drowning. Unfortunately for him of course.

Salt water stung Killua's wide eyes as he stared around helplessly, continuing his slow descent into the depths. Like a slow falling dance. A death waltz with the sea, if you would. Black fuzz danced and rippled at the corner of his eyes, yet Killua felt a strange sense of calm. Even stranger still was the thought of the creature. Drowning hadn't dampened his mania nor fascination with it. He hoped it would eat him after he drowned. That would be kind of cool, he thought. Killua had always had a peculiar sort of pessimism when it came to death. Every day was just another step to the end. Grim mentality, he knew, but strangely comforting. Although, he had not realised he had taken his final step this morning. It was almost humorous.