How to Catch a Fish (ManxMan)

Original Chapter Twenty-Four: Somewhere Beyond the Sea

[AN: Quick message - the first chapter of How to Deal with Demons has been posted and I highly recommend reading it before you read this chapter. If you don't want to, it's not a requirement, but it will give you a better understanding of certain parts.]

~Chapter Twenty-four: Somewhere Beyond the Sea~

It started out like a normal Saturday – if not better than normal with the unnerving presence of Leander still gone – and everyone was enjoying breakfast when Laelia brings up the topic of spending a day at one of the amusement parks on a beach not too far from here. Apparently, she and the twins have been planning on taking Cyra there for a little while and now that the trapping business is pretty much out of commission and has been for a couple days – a team of Mer are now stationed outside Taiji, ready to sabotage the humans once their nets have been fixed – they want to go through with it.

"Atasah-aum, how would you like to go topside with us for a day of fun?"

Nero looks at Laelia in wary surprise, "I don't think that's such a good-"

"Shut it," she snaps, and Nero immediately closes his mouth, which results in a clack as his teeth connect, "he's going with us."

"Don't I get a say in this?" I ask, setting my fork down to look at Laelia and her sisters. However, even as the words leave my mouth, I know that nothing I say will deter them from dragging me along.

As if to prove it, all four of them answer with a simultaneous, "No."

Which is how I end up on a sunny beach crowded with people of all ages while two casually-dressed guards - both a few inches shorter than me, one blond and one redhead – watch me like I might slip away if they so much as blink at the same time. Nero and Felix were not invited, so they sent a couple soldiers to accompany us. The girls put up a fight when they saw the selected guards, saying that it was a girls' day out – they ignored me when I took the opportunity to point out that I am, in fact, a guy – but Nero insisted. He says that he trusts me after Taiji – I had many opportunities to leave, before and after freeing Nero – and that they are only here for safety reasons, but I also know that they have orders to pull me back into the ocean at the first sign of danger, or of me trying to sneak off.

While Laelia buys tickets for the rides, the twins talk avidly about the rides with each other and their little sister a few feet away. Cyra does not appear as tense as she was during the engagement party, but it is clear that she still does not like crowds, as she looks far too tense for someone about to have many hours of 'fun'. However, she still argues loudly with her sisters about what ride to go on first, seemingly trying to ignore the other people in the area, confirming my suspicion that she does not enjoy crowds.

I am startled from my observations when Laelia pokes my arm. When I look over at her, she gestures at the cashier in the ticket booth. "Put out your hand place," the cashier requests, and I reluctantly do so, knowing that the burn marks on my hands, while mostly faded, still look unpleasant. However, the cashier barely glances at my hands as he secures the wristband over the silver cuff around my wrist.

Before I can ask the purpose of it, the twins push me out of the way to receive their own wristbands. Cyra goes next and even the escorts receive their own bands. Noticing my confusion at the band, Laelia explains as she pulls me away from the booth so we do not block the other customers in line behind us, "You can ride any ride so long as you are wearing this. It's like an infinity ticket."

Laelia leads me over to an unoccupied area and the others follow us. When we stop, everyone gathers into a circle to talk – or, rather, the siblings and I do, while the guards stand on either side of me and slightly behind me, making the circle bumpy. "What did you decide on?" Laelia asks, looking at her sisters.