DARWIN

Saturday, March 24, 2018

"Darwin," Grandpa Jon said heavily, "can you please go look in the hallway closet? There's some rope there we can use to...secure Nero."

I ran, but not for the hallway. After stumbling around blindly for a moment, I crashed into the bathroom and stumbled over to the toilet, where I hurled my guts up. Even after I was empty, I felt sick — something about the pain and sh*t still happening too fast, but especially the pain. My... I don't know what throbbed. My brain? My brain stem? Something inside still hurt like fury, like a pulsing wound, the sensation needling my stomach. Another ache swelled and ebbed inside my skull, and I retched, sending bile and blood dripping into the toilet.

Footsteps — I looked up to see Grandpa moving to one of the white cabinets, pulling out a drawer. He came over and handed me a tiny packet of white powder labeled BC. "Take it with a swallow of water," he said, handing me a cup. "Should do something for the pain."

He flushed the toilet, and I ran water in the sink and knocked it back with the painkiller. I chanced a look into the mirror, and barely smothered the urge to run back to the toilet — Nero and his goddamn elbow had beaten me black and blue. Thank Arceus he'd missed anything essential, but dry blood painted streaks down from my eyes, and my nose was still dripping. I reached up to touch it, but Grandpa's hand got there first, probing gently.

"Bruised," he determined, "but nothing broken. You'll walk it off."

I stared at him unabashed, feeling like I was trying to assemble a puzzle that had no complementary pieces. Nero, he was called, and Grandpa had called him that. How did he know him? More importantly, did he know who...what Nero was? The question was at the tip of my tongue, but got stuck there.

"Grandpa," I said, opting for the easier route, "who is that kid, and how do you know him?"

He was back at the cabinet, fishing out stuff: Band-Aids, rubbing alcohol, gauze, and a cold-pack. "I met him just today," he told me. "He came by asking for help."

"What kind of help?"

"Directions."

"Where?"

He gazed up at me, eyes glassy. "To Rustboro Trainer High School."

I felt a fresh stream of blood leak out of my nose, down to my upper lip — I pinched my nostrils shut, trying to staunch the flow. "He was looking for me," I said.

"Yes, he was looking for someone who'd supposedly caught his Sharpedo out at sea. Though I didn't know he was talking about you at the time, son. I had no idea."

"Why did he think you would know where to find me?"

"Not you, the high school. I can give people directions to that place easily enough."

Then I guess a better question was how Nero had known that I went to RTHS. But I almost didn't care about that. "Grandpa," I said tonelessly.

He looked up again, from where he'd been loading the medical supplies in the bin. Something about my voice had spooked him — his eyes had gone wide, his pupils expanding. "Yes, son?"

Ask, I thought, but no, how could I? Nero was there, I had visual proof that he existed... But today he had legs, and to suggest he'd ever had anything but would still, to anyone, be lunacy. Ask. But I chickened out at the last second.

"That thing with his voice..."

"What do you mean?"

"Didn't you see how Thomas fell to the floor when Nero said, 'Sit?'"

"I saw it. What are you saying?"

I stared at him. "You didn't feel it when Nero was talking?"

"Feel what, son?" He looked edgy, his eyes straining to the door. Thinking about Thomas? Was he still with Nero? I'd nearly forgotten. "Never mind," I muttered, still confused and addled with pain.

Together, we returned to my new bedroom. Thomas was still there, and Nero was still unconscious. The former had lifted the latter and dropped him on the bed, where he lay motionless, all but dead to the world. Grandpa Jon handed Thomas a pack of BC. "For the pain," he said.

"F*ck the pain, Grandpa," Thomas growled. He was in a seriously bad mood, his face bleeding and his voice still rasping from his blow to the throat. "The only thing I wanna know is who the f*ck this punk is, and why he's flipping his sh*t in your house."

Grandpa Jon dropped the BC and offered Thomas a clean cloth instead. "His name is Nero," he said tiredly. "He came to me for directions to your school."

"The Sharpedo I caught was his," I said to Thomas's arched brow. "He wants her back."

"Seriously?" He stared at me a look moment in incredulity, almost as though he thought I was pulling his leg. When I nodded sullenly, he cast a scowl over at Nero. "Well f*ck, couldn't he have just called and asked? Why's he punching things?"

Do mermaids know how to use phones? I couldn't see how they would be of much use underwater. Probably he'd had no choice but to track down his Sharpedo the old-fashioned way, which had to have been a pain in the ass. He probably would've still been out there pounding the pavement if I, miracles of miracles, hadn't been moving into the same place he stopped and asked for directions.

But Thomas was right: I wanted to get rid of Sharpedo — er, Magdalene — about as badly as Nero wanted her back. If he'd just f*cking asked...

"Well, what do we do now?" Thomas asked. He'd wiped most of the blood off of his face, but a gash beneath his cheek was still leaking. "Do we call the cops? Please say we call the cops. I'd like to see this pisser behind bars."

"I'll take care of Nero," Grandpa Jon said firmly. "You boys head back into the kitchen and clean yourselves up."

"Whoa, wait, what about that rope?" Thomas asked. "And a gag too — this guy's got some kinda weird banshee sh*t goin' on, and I don't need anymore bleeding on the brain."

I glanced at Grandpa, waiting for him to acknowledge that Nero's painfully high-pitched voice was indeed something that had happened, but he was keeping his face rigidly neutral. "Again, I'll take care of Nero. I know how to tie knots, Thomas — I was in the Navy, so don't you worry about securing him." Thomas frowned, looking unconvinced, and Grandpa Jon waved at us, trying to herd us towards the door. "Go on! Darwin, take these medical supplies. I'll join you in the kitchen in a moment."

Having no other choice, we headed down the hall, and as soon as we were out of earshot, Thomas's uncharacteristic scowl was back. "What the actual f*ck," he hissed. "It's the weekend. I should be on a couch somewhere, covered in chip crumbs, not getting into fistfights."

I said nothing, still reeling — I put the medical supplies on the table and handed Thomas a Band-Aid. He stuck it impatiently on his face, the wrong way. I motioned for him to tear it off and gave him another, and when he bungled that one, I said, "Pay attention! You keep putting it on wrong."

"You put it on, then," he growled. "One of us needs to be pissed off."

I stuck it on his face and then turned to the rubbing alcohol, upending the container atop of a cotton ball. "I-I'm...pissed off too."

"You're in shock. I'm pissed off. Probably because my head hurts 'cause of that douchebag. What the hell was that screaming, by the way?"

I spoke cautiously. "I don't know... But that definitely happened, right?"

"Of course it f*cking happened! Unless you were deaf to begin with. Your grandpa obviously is, and is probably desensitized by whatever the hell war he was in, because he didn't seem to mind much when that bastard was beating you and me bloody."

"What did you expect him to do? Fight?"

"Yeah, maybe. I also expected some honesty, but I guess I can't have that either."

"What?"

Thomas glared at me, and thumped my temple. "Wake up, Snowman! Your Grandpa's hidin' something, and it ain't porn. A five-year-old can see that. Don't deny it."

I rubbed my skull, annoyed. "I don't deny it... But what is it?" Yes, it was true, Grandpa Jon had had the look of a cornered Pokémon in the bathroom, like he'd been trying to edge his way out of a trap. Does he know? That question again. I stared at Thomas, suddenly feeling trapped myself. He noticed.

"What?" he demanded. "You know somethin'?"

Do I tell him? Would he believe me? Most likely, no, and I could see it now — he'd thump me on the temple again and ask if I was alright, and then he'd probably ask if I was trying to pull one over on him.

But God! Nero was here, but instead of the sky clearing, there were more clouds, more confusion, more questions than answers, and I still felt like I was more insane than sane, and I needed someone else, someone simple and unassuming like Thomas, to confirm that I was not.

I opened my mouth, but was interrupted by a sound from the parlor: the crash of boxes against the floor. A call: "Darwin! Are you in here?" Quincy appeared around the corner, and then hissed: Found him!

Sh*t! Thomas and I both dove for cloth to wipe at our faces at the same time, but it was too late: Mom appeared, and shock, then horror spread across her face like a TNT detonation.

"What happened here?" she screeched, making a beeline for me.

I cast Thomas an anxious look, and then Mom grabbed my face, turning it this way and that as she detailed my injuries. "Arceus," she hissed. She cast her eyes over at Thomas, and they widened in disbelief. "Did you two get into a fight?"

"No—" Thomas started.

"Yes," I said quickly. She glowered at me.

"What about?"

"It was stupid," I said before Thomas could open his mouth. "Just a disagreement, nothing to worry ab—" I stopped — Mom wasn't looking at me anymore, but at Grandpa Jon, who emerged from the hallway behind us, wiping his hands on his pants. He paused when he saw Mom standing in front of me, and I'd never experienced a silence more awkward than the one that came after that. I began sweating bullets, and Thomas looked like he wanted nothing more than to bolt for the door and get the f*ck out of there. I sympathized — the patio door was so close, yet so far away, and Mom's hand was a weight on my shoulder, holding me in place.

After a moment, Mom spoke, her voice so gritty that I had to wonder how many cigarettes she'd smoked between now and last I'd spoken to her: "What happened? They said there was a fight."

"More like a home invasion," Thomas said. "Darwin and I got bloody putting the sucker down—"

I slammed my foot on his, and Mom spluttered. "A home invasion?"

Grandpa Jon's face became drawn. "Yes... A misunderstanding. I had a guest earlier asking for directions and..." He trailed off, and I felt agonized for him, trying to find a way to spin this sh*t. "Again, a misunderstanding. He thought Darwin was..." He couldn't seem to come up with the rest.

"He thought I was threatening him or something," I said quickly. "I had some of the silverware and was wondering where to put it, and there was a knife, and the guy thought I was gonna stick him with it."

"So he attacked," Grandpa Jon continued, shooting me a grateful look. "Thomas came in, and he and Darwin were able to subdue him."

Mom's eyes ranged around the kitchen. "Where is he now?"

"The back room," Grandpa Jon said. "It's safe, we've restrained him."

"Did you call the cops?"

Pause. "Yes."

He's lying. I tried not to betray my shock, and I saw Thomas's hands tearing at a piece of gauze I'd had out earlier. He knows. Did Mom? I couldn't tell — her face was an unflinching mask of dislike, aimed at Grandpa. Was she even hearing what he was saying?

Well, I had, and my mind raced. Why was he lying? If he hadn't called the cops, had he contacted anyone? Nero's parents maybe. Wait, he's a mermaid — that would be impossible. So then what was the plan? Leave Nero there and... What?

But more importantly... Why was he lying?

More silence, and instead of awkward, it was stormy, busy with unspoken thoughts and fraught with tension. Eventually, Mom reached for a cotton ball and soaked it in rubbing alcohol.

"Stay still," she said to me. "You're still bleeding."

I hissed as she pressed it to a welt on my face, and Thomas said, "You want me to get the rest of the stuff from the car, Ms. Blakesley?"

"I want you to hold tight," she said as she placed a bandage over the welt. "After I'm done with him, I'll take care of you."

"I'll start clearing some space for you, Heather," Grandpa Jon said quickly.

She didn't answer, and when Grandpa left, I felt the heat in the air finally begin to diffuse. But not entirely — I still felt highly on edge, and Thomas, sitting at the edge of his seat and tapping his foot rapidly, did too.

What happens next? I thought glumly.

***

A lot of unpacking, turned out.

It was a little surreal, how we just got on with the work of moving in after Mom finished fixing us up. No more questions, no more wafer-thin explanations. Just loading and unloading, cutting through strips of tape with keys or knives, piling stuff on the parlor floor and looking for a place for it.

Most of the stuff went into a shed Grandpa Jon had in the side yard, fifty yards from the house. The essentials, like clothes and shoes, school books and paperwork, was put in the rooms, two different rooms from the ones that Grandpa Jon had shown me earlier, on the whole other end of the house. It was clear that he didn't want us to think any more about Nero or the questions surrounding him.

But I couldn't help it — knowing that he was in that sunny bedroom with the patio door and the four-poster bed nearly drove me mad with curiosity. So sometime near two o'clock, when I was sure that Grandpa Jon was in the parlor helping Thomas sort through stuff to store or put up, I abandoned my box, one marked "Living Room", and stole through the kitchen and down the hall. The door to Nero's bedroom was firmly shut, and I wondered if it was locked. I tried the knob. It wasn't.

Inside, Nero was still there, and still unconscious. Holy crap, mermaids are delicate. Unconscious but restless — he twitched as I stood there staring at him, and the movement was so sudden that I nearly fled back into the hall. But it was just a muscle twitch so, uneasily, I crept closer.

His hands had been tied to the headboard with that rope Grandpa Jon had told me to fetch earlier, and he'd taken Thomas up on his suggestion to gag him. Thank Arceus. That meant that if he suddenly woke up and tried a banshee scream, I might be able to make it to the door without falling.

I looked at his face, one so greatly pale that you almost couldn't tell where the skin ended and the hair began. It was so freakishly weird to see this guy in the flesh — too many times over the past week I'd thought that the face I'd seen in the Water Safari had been a hallucination, and to be looking at the face of a dream brought to life, I felt my stomach itch as I tried to square it all with sensibility and reality.

"Mermaid," I said, testing it out — the word left my mouth sounding unconvinced, and, in a weird way that was hard to describe, fake. "Mermaid," I said again, struggling to believe it. "You're a mermaid... A mer—"

"What did you say?"

Oh God! I spun around to see Grandpa Jon standing in the doorway of the room, mouth agape. I slapped a hand over mine like I'd been caught cursing in church.

"What did you say?" Grandpa Jon demanded. I stammered, and Grandpa Jon snapped, "Darwin. How did you know he was a merman?"

The anxiety reversed course, slingshotting back through my body in a strike of abject amazement. "H-how... You know he's a mermaid, Grandpa?"

Something flashed through Grandpa's eyes: intense dread, awful regret. His mouth worked a moment, then pressed into a harsh line. "Yes," he said.

The bottom of my stomach fell away, but I felt no nausea, just a surge of deep-reaching relief so intense that it nearly liquefied me; as it was, I grabbed the edge of the bed, gasping. And crying? Yes — two tears slid down my face, and I let out something between a laugh and a choke.

"Oh thank God!" I moaned, feeling physically weak. "Thank God! Grandpa, I thought I was crazy, crazy—"

"Darwin," he said harshly. He crossed the room, grabbed my shoulders, stared into my eyes. "Answer: how did you know that he was a merman?" A furrowed brow. "Are you with the Seawatchers?"

Seawatchers? "No," I said, wiping the tears from my face.

"Then how?"

Why was he angry? This was a good thing — I wasn't insane. And mermaids... Holy sh*t. Mermaids existed. There were others out there like Nero, others with the tails of Milotics, swimming beneath the waves. How many? And how could they change from tails to legs, like Nero obviously had? Where did they live? What did they do? How was it that the human race knew little to nothing about them? So many questions, and they just kept coming, and coming—

"Darwin!" Grandpa Jon said.

"The... Water Safari," I stammered, struggling to snap out of a strengthening daze. "After I caught his Sharpedo, he came after me, tried to drown me, and I saw that he had a tailfin."

For some reason, Grandpa was still not happy, like I was — in fact, I saw fear in his eyes. Why? "What is it?" I asked, the burst of euphoria beginning to fade. He released me, stepped back, and I cried, "Grandpa? What's wrong?"

He shook his head, looking torn. He reached for his back pocket, then paused. "Darwin," he said, "leave me a moment."

I didn't understand. "Why? What is it? What's happening?"

"Darwin, please!" he said.

I cast Nero a last look, then left the room, more confused than ever before. But happy too. I'm not crazy. I swung like a pendulum between the two extremes, and my stomach lurched. When I reached the end of the hall, I heard Grandpa talking. Phone? Who was he calling? A sudden chill raced down my back, and I hurried back into the parlor. Thomas and Mom were still there, sorting through stuff.

"Where've you been hiding, Snowman?" Thomas demanded. "If you keep leaving me to do all the work, I'm gonna start charging by the half hour."

Mom shoved aside a stack of binders and frowned at me. "What's wrong with you?" she asked.

I was...grinning?...like a loon. Except I couldn't exactly call it a grin. It was more like my face was confused, and didn't know whether to grimace or smile. Did you guys know that mermaids are real? the impulsive part of me wanted to shout. But I swallowed the words, remembering Grandpa Jon's eyes: Fear. Dread. Why? I couldn't stand not knowing. Why did me knowing that Nero was a mermaid induce such a reaction?

"Sorry," I said, squatting. "What do you want me to do next, Mom?"

She gave me a weirded-out look, but pointed over to the four boxes left unopened. "Start with those."

I got to work, trying to immerse myself in the task and not think about Grandpa Jon, his eyes, or who he was talking to in that back room where Nero was tied up. I didn't succeed: I kept pausing, staring into the distance, lost in thought, the bad feeling crouched at the base of my skull growing stronger and stronger. Something's wrong. But what? Who are you calling, Grandpa?

Half an hour later, he was there, standing behind us and wearing a smile about as fake as the color in Thomas's hair. "Looks like we're all making some headway," he said.

Mom said nothing; Thomas shrugged. "Little by little," he said. "You here to help, gramps?"

"Actually, I'm here to offer a reprieve. After working so hard, I wager you boys would like some fuel for the rest of the day."

Mom rose. "I'll be fixing lunch at three."

"Don't trouble yourself, sweetheart: there are some good restaurants downtown that I want to show Darwin, and I want to stop by the bank as well. Thomas deserves a generous tip for his labor, wouldn't you agree?"

Mom's face contorted into a severe scowl, and, wordlessly, Thomas looked over at me, a brow lifted. Grandpa Jon also looked at me, pleadingly, and I felt a mental twinge, a surge of instinct, the same that had told me that Grandpa Jon had been lying earlier. He wants to get me out of the house alone for a little while, and not just to get familiar with Petalburg City. My heart pounded. Does he want to talk? About what he knows about mermaids? But if that was the case, why was Thomas coming?

I almost didn't care: this man knew something about mermaids, and I wanted to know what — at that moment, I wanted almost nothing more. "Maybe he can show me the bus station," I suggested to Mom, "and some of the things to do around here."

Mom stormed in the kitchen without another word. I watched her, feeling guilty for some reason. "What about Nero?" I asked.

Grandpa Jon put a hand on my shoulder. "You saw him. He's not going anywhere."

Thomas stood up. "I'll follow," he said.

"Don't waste your gas, son," Grandpa Jon said. "We'll only be gone a little while, and you can head home with food in your belly and green in your pocket."

Thomas shrugged. "Whatever."

With that, we dropped our things and headed outside. At the bottom of the hill, Grandpa Jon unlocked the big truck, and we piled inside; Thomas and I both climbed into the backseat and Grandpa Jon slid behind the wheel without comment. He started the engine, and we were off.

After climbing out of the trees and rolling onto the road, we drove out past the huge lake, which was nearly blinding in the glowering sunlight. Before long, the downtown shopping district opened up around us, and as I stared absently out the window, I found that, indeed, there were a lot of good-looking eateries down here, in particular an old-fashioned pizza parlor and a gourmet sandwich shop.

But I wasn't particularly hungry, for food, at least — what I craved were answers, and an explanation for this bizarre absurdity that had now become my life. I glanced at Thomas, who was thumbing through his phone, probably checking social media. He still looked grumpy — was he going to tell his followers everything that had happened today? I glanced up at Grandpa Jon, just in time for him to look away from the rearview mirror — he'd been watching me. The seesaw inside me tipped a little further away from happy and relieved, deeper into perturbed.

I blinked, and downtown Petalburg City disappeared behind us. Now we were back out in rural Hoenn, passing through a seemingly infinite stretch of cropland.

Wait, weren't we supposed to be going to eat downtown? He had mentioned going by the bank, though... Maybe that was further out, and he intended to loop around.

Fifteen minutes later, and we began to slow. I had no idea of where we were, but I didn't see any banks, or bank signs. We'd turned down a lonely country road, walled in by trees on either side that fell away a couple of miles later. Now I saw tall stands of barley and fields of cotton... And the ocean, very suddenly. Ocean? Yes, it was not a lake — Grandpa Jon had the windows rolled down, and I could taste salt in the air. Huh, if memory served, the ocean did brush borders with this side of the Hoenn Region... But still, this was quite a ways from Grandpa Jon's house, and I still didn't see any banks. My fingers wrung, and I noticed that they were damp with sweat, and not from the heat.

Grandpa Jon, where are we going?

A dirt road suddenly appeared in the trees, and Grandpa Jon slowed, and turned. Down we trundled, bumping over ruts and bruises in the path, until it suddenly turned to smooth asphalt again. The trees cleared a ways ahead, and I saw a rolling fence, standing open. A gate? Beyond was a parking lot, and a very blunt, nondescript building sitting in the sand not four hundred yards from the surf. The lot was empty, and the building looked closed, but Grandpa Jon pulled into an empty space in front of the door. I squinted, looking for a sign — "Navy Federal Credit Union", for example — but there was none. The building was made of concrete, but it might as well have been a shed on private property.

We got out, and Thomas slammed his door a little too hard. "Where the hell are we?" he demanded.

Grandpa Jon raised a hand for calm. "I'm sorry to drag you two all the way out here like this. This is work: I searched the house earlier, and realized that I'd left my wallet here when I left on Friday."

Thomas gazed at the building, and I could practically see his suspicion intensifying like the neck of a thermostat. "What kind of work are you doing all the way out here in the middle of nowhere, gramps?"

"Telecommunications with local fishermen, mainly," Grandpa explained. "I had a similar job in the Navy. This is a prime location to set up shop for such tasks, as the airwaves here don't get tangled much with those emanating from the city. So, clearer broadcasts." He gestured. "Come inside. It might take a moment for me to go through my workspace."

He went, and Thomas shot me an angry look, like I was responsible for...this. Whatever this was. I didn't know yet. But like him, I was beginning to get a little nervous. This is fine, right? He's your grandfather. Yeah, it's fine.

We headed to the building, and Grandpa Jon unlocked the door, which shut with a heavy slam behind us. The inside was a lot more orderly and sterile than I expected: in fact, going in, I had the strange feeling that I was in something like a rec center, or a hospital. A single hall with linoleum tile and bands of overhead lights that switched on with a flick stretched before us. A security booth stood to one side, unmanned; we went down and passed several doors. One at the end of the corridor had a window, and beyond I could see some kind of meeting space, with chairs and a big table.

Grandpa Jon stopped before one of the doors and unlocked it with a key from his ring. Pushing it open, he said, "Could you boys wait here a moment? My office is down the hall, and I should be back in a bit."

I stepped inside the room and blinked. I'd expected a waiting room or just a side closet or something, only to find myself in some kind of miniature apartment. The entryway divided it in half: to the left there was a living space, complete with a couch, easy chairs, a coffee table, and an entertainment center packed with movies and a CD collection. To the right was a kitchenette with a short bar, cabinets, a microwave, and a fridge. A platter of Oreos and two cans of soda sat on the counter, with something else laying beside them. A note?

Slam.

Click.

Horror slid down my spine, and I was almost afraid to turn around. But when I did, I saw Thomas standing beside me, in front of a closed door. He, too, was staring at it, like it was some sort of cosmic anomaly, something that shouldn't have been possible.

He looked at me, face slack with shock, and grabbed the knob.

It wouldn't open.

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