Maddy says I’m being “sold” today, although I’m still not sure what that means. From what I’ve gathered, it means Niku and I are leaving Oceanica, but that we’re not going home. Maybe there’ll be fewer bubbles in “China.”
The long tank they put us into the first day sits between the holding tanks, as well as the net. I stare at the limp rope as I pop bubbles.
“Thank god, we’re almost rid of you,” Maddy says. I agree. China has to be better than this.
“Madison,” Delmara’s angry voice comes through the box Maddy holds. “Foam her.”
“Gladly.” The grin that crawls across Maddy’s face is as suffocating as an octopus tentacle. She clomps up the stairs to my platform and unhooks the shocker. This is exactly what I’ve been waiting for. I’m ready to die, and I’m taking her with me.
I surface in front of the platform, smiling because she’ll have to come close enough for me to grab if she wants to stick the shocker in the water. She hesitates. “Back up.”
I stay where I am.
“I said back up, Iodine.”
“Fuck that.” The words come unbidden from a broken memory.
Maddy’s eyes widen at my response, then slit into an angry glare as she finds the courage to step forward. She plunges the loop into the water, and I grab the pole, yanking hard. She teeters on those stupid human legs for a moment before falling. The water buzzes with electricity, and pain seers my hands, rips through my body as the shocker does its work. It cuts off with Maddy’s giant splash.
Her gasp ripples through the water around me, and I turn to find her clawing toward the surface through the mass of bubbles she’s formed. I reach her with one good kick, grab her brown hair, and yank her down. She screams, bubbles rushing from her mouth with the terrible sound, but I like these bubbles. These bubbles empty her. I sink my nails into her throat and rip. The air-scream stops abruptly.
Through the ribbons of blood spreading from her open neck, I see Niku. He smiles, too.
I swim to him, pressing my hands on the glass before I wince and pull them away. Foam fizzes from my palms and fingers where I gripped the shocker. Wisps of the webbing between my fingers floats free.
“Erie!” someone yells in the hallway, and I swim to the back of the tank, peering around Maddy’s body as a man rushes into the room and stops abruptly. He has skin like everyone who works here, and cropped blue hair with a fin that sticks out of his forehead.
“Oh my god,” he says. “What did you do?” His voice sounds familiar—echoing from one of my crushed memories—but I don’t think I’ve seen a landfolk with blue hair, or an extra fin sticking out of their forehead.
He takes a step forward. “Erie? It’s okay, sweetness. I won’t hurt you.”
Erie . . . that—that’s my name. How does he know my name? I swim closer as he puts his hands on the tank, but I don’t recognize him. His eyes are bloodshot, with dark circles around them, and worry lines cover his face, pinching it into a grimace. This can’t be my landfolk boy; he always had a ready smile and bright eyes. This man is broken.
“Are you from China?” I whisper.
Something deep inside his eyes shatters, and when he speaks, his voice breaks. “Erie, love, it’s me. It’s Finn.”
“Finn.” The name feels like a fish in my mouth. I know I’ve felt that before.
Without warning, he dashes up the steps, and I flinch at the shockwave as he jumps in the water. A curtain of bubbles envelops him, and his extra fin falls off, bobbing on the surface. When the bubbles dissolve, black hair floats in place of the blue, and I remember. His skin was black the first time he did this. This is my landfolk boy.
“Finn?”
He reaches a hand out to me, and I take it, wincing at my destroyed palm. I wrap my tail around him and he puts his lips over mine, blowing warm air into my mouth and through my gills. It’s been so long since I was warm. These are the bubbles I’ve been missing—the ones from my landfolk boy. My Finn. I close my eyes and breathe him in.
When he tries to pull away, I squeeze tighter before I remember that Finn can’t breathe underwater. I shove him to the surface, where he coughs, sucking in deep breaths of air.
“Maddy said you weren’t coming. I’m supposed to go to China.”
“No.” He puts his warm hands on either side of my face and leans his forehead against mine. “Maddy lied—I was always coming. I’m sorry it took so long.”
I want to stay like this forever—his warms hands on my face, my tail wrapped around his legs. “Are you taking me to China?”
“I’m taking you home, sweet. Back to the ocean.”
The ocean? Home? I can barely picture the Seadom now, barely remember the face of my grandmother and sisters. My sister—Clair. What about Clair? Before I can ask, Delmara runs into the room, Sergio behind her, and they freeze as they take in the scene. Finn holding me. Maddy’s body floating face down on the other side of the tank, tinting the water pink.
“Finnegan Jarvis,” Delmara barks, and I cringe away from him. “What have you done?”
His face pales as she walks across the room and up the steps, but his voice sounds strong when he replies. “This is what happens when you torture the Mer, Aunt D. They attack people.”
“So now you plan to take this Mer—who has learned to attack people—and put her back in the ocean with Mer who are already attacking people? What about the people in the ocean? What about the kids at Fort Zach?”
“Erie wouldn’t attack children. She drowned Maddy in self-defense because you told Maddy to foam her.”
Delmara grabs the cord that’s still attached to the loop and pulls it to her, dragging Maddy along with it. Her limp, lifeless hand is caught in the grip. With a good yank, Delmara gets the body halfway onto the platform. Maddy’s open neck is exposed, the ragged edges white and puckering, the blood gone from them. Both Finn and Sergio gasp.
“Self-defense?” Delmara says.
Finn looks at me, and fear darkens his eyes. Fear of me.
Delmara doesn’t give me time to explain—not that I could. “I wonder if Carbon was acting out of self-defense, too. Have you swallowed every lie that bitch girlfriend of yours spoon-fed to you? No wonder you never came back to me. You’re just like your father.”
She pulls Maddy’s hand from the handle and shoves her back in the water. Finn moves away from the body—and me.
“Get out of the tank, Finnegan.” Delmara sticks the loop back in the water, finger hovering over the button.
“So you can shock Erie ’til she foams? I don’t think so.”
“APHIS rules, not mine. She attacked someone—she has to be put down.”
“She’s not a fucking dog.” Finn’s fist pounds the surface.
“No, she’s a fish.” Delmara takes a step closer to the edge. “Get out of the tank.”
Finn’s eyes slit in determination. “No.”
She raises an eyebrow in disbelief. “I thought you knew how painful the electroshocker is.”
Finn’s face pales again. “I do. That’s why I won’t let you use it on her.”
Before Delmara can speak, Sergio steps forward. “Aunt D, you can’t use the shocker with Finn in the tank.”
She’s about to shock Finn—my Finn. I watched her shock Niku to get to me, and now, she’ll shock Finn. I don’t know what to do. I can’t attack Delmara. I sink to the bottom of the tank, wrapping in my tail.
Finn’s voice travels, distorted, through the water. “You won’t get the insurance money if you foam her.”
“I don’t need it. You just gave me a check for two and a half million.”
“I didn’t pay for foam!” He punches the surface again, and I cover my ears, but my hands hurt too much to press them against my head.
“It’s a shame you fell in the tank when Maddy shocked her,” Delmara says.
Sergio runs to the stairs. “Aunt D, no. You can’t.”
She clutches the shocker. “It really is too bad, but accidents happen all the time. You wouldn’t be the first.”
“Aunt D!” Sergio yells. “Stop it!”
I swim panicked circles around the bottom of the tank, waiting for the shock. Finn struggles to face Delmara against the whirlpool I create, but I can’t stop. I can’t do anything. She wants to hurt my landfolk boy, and I can’t stop her.
“You should have listened to me, Finnegan,” Delmara yells. “No one ever listens to me. Your father didn’t listen, and look what happened to him. Lost at sea, looking for the fucking Mer.”
“Aunt D—” Finn’s voice pleads.
“He should have taken you with him and saved me this grief. You were all I had left. All I had of him, and you betrayed me for some other woman, just like your stupid father!”
I kick hard with my healing tail and take a deep breath before the top of my head crests the surface. All three of them scream.