Everything's Prettier Underwater

Chapter 13: I am NOT (a liar)

When Seungmin woke up that morning, it was with a sick feeling in his stomach. Today was the day he was supposed to start testing on the boys, as ordered by Director Park. Just that notion made him shiver with disgust. However, he had no other choice; if he didn't obey the director's orders, either the boys or his family would be the ones suffering the consequences. All he wished was that the tests wouldn't be anything painful for the boys, and that it bought him some time to come up with an escape plan.

He barely touched his breakfast when the guard came to give it to him, playing with the food. He took his time to get dressed in some red pants, white shirt and his trusty lab coat, trying to delay the start of his day as much as possible. However, the guard assigned to him quickly came to hurry him up, almost dragging him out of the room and all the way back to the basement, where the tanks were still ominously standing. The pink-haired scientist frowned at the thought that the mers had to sleep all night in this cold and desolated environment. As he'd had the chance to see before, they were used to soft, fluffy and comfortable places to sleep, made out of moss and algae. The pitifully thin sand layer at the bottom of the aquarium could definitely not compare to that.

On top of that, they were constantly being watched by guards and workers of the facility. Even the cleaning team seemed to always find an excuse to be in the aquarium room and gaze at the mers in awe.

As soon as he stepped closer to the tanks, the little team of "scientists" that the director had managed to assemble swarmed around Seungmin. A girl with short black hair and a clipboard in her arms stepped forward.

"Good morning Kim-shi. Here's the list of things that Director Park want you to do this week. You have to make sure that all your test results are transcribed in the computer system, but you can keep your own personal notes to work after hours if you want."

She handed him the clipboard, which had a pen, a bunch of draft papers and a list on the top. Height, weight, scale extraction, tooth extraction, nail extraction, full body x-ray, DNA swab, understanding of the reproductive system, language analysis, questioning session, assessment of vitality/dangerousness level, assessment of risks of self-harming for selling purposes...

Reading the list made Seungmin gag. The atrocities committed by Director Park knew no bounds, and the acts he wanted him to perform just to get to his goal of selling the mers were monstruous. The director kept calling the boys monsters simply because they didn't have legs, but there was no doubt in Seungmin's heart who the real monster was.

"My name is Choi Ae Ri. I'll be your first assistant. Now, please hurry along, we need to get started on those tests. I would hate to inconvenience Director Park because of our tardiness."

The short haired girl fixed Seungmin with an authoritative gaze, and the biologist could see in her eyes that she didn't like being his subordinate. However, it was the case, so Seungmin decided to take advantage of it, just to spite her.

"Well, if you're in such a hurry to start, why don't you transfer one of the mers into the small aquarium? I'm sure you should be able to handle that task, right?" 

He lifted an eyebrow and looked meanly at the girl. Surely the girl was all talk and no bite, and she would never dare to approach any of the mers from that close up. It was petty, yes, but it was his only safe way of exteriorizing his anger. He felt like an emo teenager acting rebelliously in front of his parents, but he didn't care, as long as it got his point across. He was not a willing participant in their little games, and he wanted to make it clear to everyone; especially to Jisung, Changbin and Jeongin. Hopefully, it would show them that he was on their side and that he didn't want to hurt them.

Unfortunately, Choi Ae Ri seemed to be a very stubborn and confident girl. She strode straight to the main tank, to the dismay of all of her colleagues, and reached the control panel that stood in front of the exhibit. She pushed some buttons, allowing a stretcher made out of a net and some steel beams to mechanically slide down from the ceiling, right inside the opening of the lid. Once it was a few inches under the water, she loudly tapped on the glass: "One of you get in the stretcher, now" she ordered.