Fascinated and at ease from the familiar smell he'd had with him all his life, he stepped closer and squinted. The world tilted, crossed over itself and made his brain spin in his skull, a fact he just had to deal with for the time being. None of it helped. If anything, it almost made him think for a split second that the shape on the water was someone's sheet that had fluttered off a line or something and had gotten ensnared by the water. That was stupid, however, and he tossed the idea to the side almost immediately. Even drunk as he was, Yamamoto knew how things moved on the water, and bed sheets didn't... pulse. Clearly he couldn't rely on seeing from this distance. A little bit excited and grateful, somehow, he made his way to the slight stone wall separating the beach portion of the dock from the rest of town. That he didn't slip and eat a face full of sand was half a miracle and half that, even completely hammered, he was still athletic as all hell. Even with a bottle in one hand.
Once he was close enough that the water was licking at his boots, it was considerably easier to discern the exact shape of the creature. Mostly, that it was translucent, a sort of thin film... And something a lot more solid right in the center of it. There were a lot of round things that could go floating in the ocean, like coconuts, but they didn't usually have a pair of eyes that focused directly on him with a film over that which reflected light right back as they stared.
Yamamoto didn't smile, because he'd come to learn that meant a very different thing with mer until they got to know you. He just grinned and waved with one hand. At some point when he wasn't paying attention, his legs had moved him a little further into the water. "Hey there," he said cheerfully. "Nice night, isn't it?"
There was no immediate response, only more silent staring. At the edges of the bell, something seemed to shift and tug at it. Belatedly, his brain finally pieced together what was so familiar about this scene. Still, Yamamoto didn't step back, or stop. Instead, he waited another beat. "I could try another language," he said, and then tried a few anyway. He only really knew a couple pretty well, counting his home tongue, but he'd managed to come across all sorts of different scraps of languages, enough to sort of introduce himself or show that he didn't mean any harm. Just because Haru was a lot better at it than the rest of them didn't mean he couldn't try.
Still nothing. His arms were still above the water, so he would be fine at initial contact, he just preferred they not get to that point. Fingers wringing around the bottle, he remembered its existence. Hey, what the hell, right? Still grinning, he stretched out his arm towards the shape. When they got so close, he had no idea. Being drunk was kind of a pain in the ass that way. "I don't think I'm going to finish this. I'm Yamamoto. Have you had a drink before?"
At first he thought that he'd continue to get silence, which was probably a pretty awkward thing at best, except then the head in the middle of the jellyfish bell finally moved. It wasn't a lot, objectively speaking, except that anything was really a lot when there'd been absolutely zero response before. In the moonlight, this close, it was easy to see the humanoid face that tilted back to look at him properly. Mer could be quite varied, almost more than humans could be... and Yamamoto had never seen any of them that were quite like this. As a general rule, although it only counted around half the time, mer had something like human skin on the 'top' half, or, at the very least, they looked a good bit more human than they didn't waist up. For this one? They weren't all the way translucent as their bell was, just... thin. Thin like holding paper up to the sun and seeing the sunlight turn map tan into something golden, moonlight turning ship sails aglow. Yamamoto had no idea where the light was coming from, how much of it was reflective and how much of it might have been something from within them, only that it was stunning. It somehow seemed to show even more in the mer's noticeably plump limps, and the eyelashes that curled up along their eyelids. Well. Where they would have eyelids. Mer could be weird in what they did and didn't have. Matching this radiant beauty, the mer asked, "You're intoxicated, aren't you?"
"Probably more than a little," Yamamoto answered honestly, because he might hide a lot of things about himself but he wasn't an actual liar. Besides, the bar smell was probably clinging to him. "Would it make you feel better if I told you that I probably would have done the same thing if I were completely sober? I'm just not sure if I would have gotten here sober, at this particular time of night."
"Not really." The edges of their bell twitched again; Yamamoto didn't feel anything pressing in against his clothing or slipping underneath it. He'd take that as a victory. "I could drown you right now."
"Ha ha, lots of people say that about me!"
"...I mean it."
"They also say that." They weren't usually creatures of the ocean, but they did also say that. Pulling his hand back, Yamamoto tilted his bottle to the side in... some sort of gesture. He wasn't really sure of the meaning himself. "Do you want to?" Exactly like before, there was no quick response, and Yamamoto was starting to wonder if perhaps that's just how this particular mer was instead of it being a legitimate threat. Of course, it might also have been a legitimate threat. Used to that sort of thing, Yamamoto determinedly carried on. "How should I refer to you, anyway? By, uh, sex, or gender. That sort of thing. A name would also be good but I don't mind if you don't want to tell me that!"
It was a good question to ask. A lot of people dismissed the mer as being 'weird', if occasionally helpful, but Yamamoto was pretty sure that was just the generalization problem coming up again. Gender was one of those 'weird' things about mer, although Yamamoto found it pretty simple. Some mer changed due to conditions. Others just changed because they could. Others never changeed, while also still changing. All anyone ever has to do was ask. Until that point, Yamamoto liked to claim no idea, being that it was true. Besides, with every mer he'd ever talked to, it seemed like it was appreciated.
Considering the careful way this mer looked him over, Yamamoto had to wonder if it was appreciated or if this one had never really dealt with humans much at all. Just because they lived near a human town didn't really mean anything. "Male," the mer finally said, and Yamamoto grinned widely. "Chikusa."
"Chikusa," Yamamoto repeated, rolling the name around in his cheeks. It was short and blunt against his teeth, an anchor impact into sand. He liked it. "Nice to meet you. I'm Yamamoto Takeshi. Or, ha ha, Takeshi Yamamoto depending on where you're from? I guess it doesn't really matter for you. So, Chikusa, what are you doing?"
Chikusa's lips thinned, which didn't really actually do anything for how full they were except that Yamamoto wasn't sure he could call it an outright frown. "...Tell me what you're doing first."
"Yeah, that's fair, isn't it? Ha." If he was the one asking all the questions, then it was sort of a one sided conversation, and it gave him an advantage besides. Taking a deep breath, he let his boots slide against the sand beneath his feet that he couldn't see until he was lulling backwards with water lapping at his jaw. "I guess I was getting away. People can be really tiring, you know? Ha. I mean, not my crew," he said, quickly correcting himself. "It would be pretty bad if I couldn't tolerate my crew! I mean, we're all kind of stuck together for days on end. I'm really glad I managed to find Tsuna when I did, because the rest of the crew is- I mean, they're not exactly like I hoped, because I wasn't hoping anything in particular? But nothing is boring. And we're all pretty honest! So that's always exciting."
Getting a whole chest of issues in only a few sentences was apparently not what Chikusa signed up for tonight, since, when Yamamoto turned his head to look at him, he was staring at him with those wide eyes. Turned away from the moon, and they looked much darker with the irises more defined. "So do you hate people or not...?"
"I don't hate people!" Yamamoto protested. "They're interesting. But most people just require... a lot of work, you know? Or I guess you might now."
"...I don't do anything... that I'm not interested in."
"Ha ha. I'm jelly." Almost immediately he laughed at his own joke, convulsing and curling in on himself until ocean water washed up into his mouth as a firm reminder of where the hell he was. Once he was done sputter, Yamamoto glanced over at where Chikusa was floating. Promptly, he revised his theory that Chikusa didn't talk to humans very much. The mer was giving him such a flat look that there was absolutely no doubt that he had heard the same joke perhaps dozens of times before. "But anyway, yeah. I guess I had enough! So I was coming back to the ship, except then I saw you, so I thought I would come say hi."
"...Even though I could kill you."
"You haven't yet!" Apparently there was nothing Chikusa could say to that, so Yamamoto turned the question right back around. "So what are you doing?"
For a moment, Chikusa only observed him where he was partially floating in the water with his feet only partially anchoring him and his bottle somehow still in his hand. Apparently, that was enough of a mental image for him to come to a conclusion that honesty would be an alright policy instead of leaving, or killing him. They'd only known each other for a few minutes, but that was enough for Yamamoto to have a decent gauge on the mer's personality. He didn't seem like the type to lie. That impression was only strengthened when Chikusa said, "I was going to poison a couple of ships."
This time, there wasn't any hesitation before the answer came. "The one with the man in armor figurehead... the military vessel... and the one with the clam decorated on its side..."
While it was probably more than a little cruel to say as much, Yamamoto didn't pay much mind to the first two ships that Chikusa listed. The military vessel had been there before they'd docked just the other day, and his crew had already been pretty hasty in getting everything done they needed to so that they could set sail again. As far as any of them had been able to tell, there were only rumors floating around about them, and they weren't yet as infamous as some of the other pirate crews sailing across the seas. Still, why tempt fate, right? Since they were natural enemies, Yamamoto wasn't exactly sure if he had it in him to exactly feel heartbroken over the idea of them being poisoned by some mer with an agenda. The same could be said for the other ship Chikusa had just described as well. Yamamoto hadn't gone on it or anything like that. He wasn't even particularly familiar with its crew, only that he had seen them at a distance. However, in some ways, he didn't really need to do so. On his own, he had picked up the secretive way the crew packed their luggage, their furtive glances, various little things that made them more untrustworthy for anyone who was actually paying attention. More than his own senses, however, he trusted how his crew had reacted: Tsuna's uneasy fidgeting whenever he saw the ship or its crew, the way Gokudera spat in its direction as if he saw something he didn't like, even Lambo's simple blunt complains of "Wow, what a bunch of creepy guys!" Whatever they were hiding in their shipment was something unsavory. Yamamoto had little doubt about that. Perhaps this mer had seen something even humans hadn't seen just yet.
So that was all, well... Yamamoto couldn't exactly say it was "fine and dandy". It was just, at the very worst, it would help him and his out more than it would harm them, he was pretty sure. One thing wasn't great, however, and he blinked over at Chikusa. "Hey, the clam ship is my ship. I mean. Tsuna's ship. I'm a part of his crew."
Chikusa didn't particularly react, besides blinking back. "So?" he asked plainly, which... Well. That was fair, wasn't it? Yamamoto couldn't exactly complain about the fairness here. After all, no one could trust the military or navy or anything else to do with the government, and the ship with the armored figurehead was clearly suspicious.... And then there was the Vongola, with its crew of actual pirates.
It was really a probably more fair assessment than Yamamoto was giving other people. "I mean, can I at least ask why you're trying to poison our ship?" he asked, fumbling to regain his footing. It was a little hard when he was still drunk and fighting against the tide.
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2
Once he was close enough that the water was licking at his boots, it was considerably easier to discern the exact shape of the creature. Mostly, that it was translucent, a sort of thin film... And something a lot more solid right in the center of it. There were a lot of round things that could go floating in the ocean, like coconuts, but they didn't usually have a pair of eyes that focused directly on him with a film over that which reflected light right back as they stared.
Yamamoto didn't smile, because he'd come to learn that meant a very different thing with mer until they got to know you. He just grinned and waved with one hand. At some point when he wasn't paying attention, his legs had moved him a little further into the water. "Hey there," he said cheerfully. "Nice night, isn't it?"
There was no immediate response, only more silent staring. At the edges of the bell, something seemed to shift and tug at it. Belatedly, his brain finally pieced together what was so familiar about this scene. Still, Yamamoto didn't step back, or stop. Instead, he waited another beat. "I could try another language," he said, and then tried a few anyway. He only really knew a couple pretty well, counting his home tongue, but he'd managed to come across all sorts of different scraps of languages, enough to sort of introduce himself or show that he didn't mean any harm. Just because Haru was a lot better at it than the rest of them didn't mean he couldn't try.
Still nothing. His arms were still above the water, so he would be fine at initial contact, he just preferred they not get to that point. Fingers wringing around the bottle, he remembered its existence. Hey, what the hell, right? Still grinning, he stretched out his arm towards the shape. When they got so close, he had no idea. Being drunk was kind of a pain in the ass that way. "I don't think I'm going to finish this. I'm Yamamoto. Have you had a drink before?"
At first he thought that he'd continue to get silence, which was probably a pretty awkward thing at best, except then the head in the middle of the jellyfish bell finally moved. It wasn't a lot, objectively speaking, except that anything was really a lot when there'd been absolutely zero response before. In the moonlight, this close, it was easy to see the humanoid face that tilted back to look at him properly. Mer could be quite varied, almost more than humans could be... and Yamamoto had never seen any of them that were quite like this. As a general rule, although it only counted around half the time, mer had something like human skin on the 'top' half, or, at the very least, they looked a good bit more human than they didn't waist up. For this one? They weren't all the way translucent as their bell was, just... thin. Thin like holding paper up to the sun and seeing the sunlight turn map tan into something golden, moonlight turning ship sails aglow. Yamamoto had no idea where the light was coming from, how much of it was reflective and how much of it might have been something from within them, only that it was stunning. It somehow seemed to show even more in the mer's noticeably plump limps, and the eyelashes that curled up along their eyelids. Well. Where they would have eyelids. Mer could be weird in what they did and didn't have. Matching this radiant beauty, the mer asked, "You're intoxicated, aren't you?"
"Probably more than a little," Yamamoto answered honestly, because he might hide a lot of things about himself but he wasn't an actual liar. Besides, the bar smell was probably clinging to him. "Would it make you feel better if I told you that I probably would have done the same thing if I were completely sober? I'm just not sure if I would have gotten here sober, at this particular time of night."
"Not really." The edges of their bell twitched again; Yamamoto didn't feel anything pressing in against his clothing or slipping underneath it. He'd take that as a victory. "I could drown you right now."
"Ha ha, lots of people say that about me!"
"...I mean it."
"They also say that." They weren't usually creatures of the ocean, but they did also say that. Pulling his hand back, Yamamoto tilted his bottle to the side in... some sort of gesture. He wasn't really sure of the meaning himself. "Do you want to?" Exactly like before, there was no quick response, and Yamamoto was starting to wonder if perhaps that's just how this particular mer was instead of it being a legitimate threat. Of course, it might also have been a legitimate threat. Used to that sort of thing, Yamamoto determinedly carried on. "How should I refer to you, anyway? By, uh, sex, or gender. That sort of thing. A name would also be good but I don't mind if you don't want to tell me that!"
It was a good question to ask. A lot of people dismissed the mer as being 'weird', if occasionally helpful, but Yamamoto was pretty sure that was just the generalization problem coming up again. Gender was one of those 'weird' things about mer, although Yamamoto found it pretty simple. Some mer changed due to conditions. Others just changed because they could. Others never changeed, while also still changing. All anyone ever has to do was ask. Until that point, Yamamoto liked to claim no idea, being that it was true. Besides, with every mer he'd ever talked to, it seemed like it was appreciated.
Considering the careful way this mer looked him over, Yamamoto had to wonder if it was appreciated or if this one had never really dealt with humans much at all. Just because they lived near a human town didn't really mean anything. "Male," the mer finally said, and Yamamoto grinned widely. "Chikusa."
"Chikusa," Yamamoto repeated, rolling the name around in his cheeks. It was short and blunt against his teeth, an anchor impact into sand. He liked it. "Nice to meet you. I'm Yamamoto Takeshi. Or, ha ha, Takeshi Yamamoto depending on where you're from? I guess it doesn't really matter for you. So, Chikusa, what are you doing?"
Chikusa's lips thinned, which didn't really actually do anything for how full they were except that Yamamoto wasn't sure he could call it an outright frown. "...Tell me what you're doing first."
"Yeah, that's fair, isn't it? Ha." If he was the one asking all the questions, then it was sort of a one sided conversation, and it gave him an advantage besides. Taking a deep breath, he let his boots slide against the sand beneath his feet that he couldn't see until he was lulling backwards with water lapping at his jaw. "I guess I was getting away. People can be really tiring, you know? Ha. I mean, not my crew," he said, quickly correcting himself. "It would be pretty bad if I couldn't tolerate my crew! I mean, we're all kind of stuck together for days on end. I'm really glad I managed to find Tsuna when I did, because the rest of the crew is- I mean, they're not exactly like I hoped, because I wasn't hoping anything in particular? But nothing is boring. And we're all pretty honest! So that's always exciting."
Getting a whole chest of issues in only a few sentences was apparently not what Chikusa signed up for tonight, since, when Yamamoto turned his head to look at him, he was staring at him with those wide eyes. Turned away from the moon, and they looked much darker with the irises more defined. "So do you hate people or not...?"
"I don't hate people!" Yamamoto protested. "They're interesting. But most people just require... a lot of work, you know? Or I guess you might now."
"...I don't do anything... that I'm not interested in."
"Ha ha. I'm jelly." Almost immediately he laughed at his own joke, convulsing and curling in on himself until ocean water washed up into his mouth as a firm reminder of where the hell he was. Once he was done sputter, Yamamoto glanced over at where Chikusa was floating. Promptly, he revised his theory that Chikusa didn't talk to humans very much. The mer was giving him such a flat look that there was absolutely no doubt that he had heard the same joke perhaps dozens of times before. "But anyway, yeah. I guess I had enough! So I was coming back to the ship, except then I saw you, so I thought I would come say hi."
"...Even though I could kill you."
"You haven't yet!" Apparently there was nothing Chikusa could say to that, so Yamamoto turned the question right back around. "So what are you doing?"
For a moment, Chikusa only observed him where he was partially floating in the water with his feet only partially anchoring him and his bottle somehow still in his hand. Apparently, that was enough of a mental image for him to come to a conclusion that honesty would be an alright policy instead of leaving, or killing him. They'd only known each other for a few minutes, but that was enough for Yamamoto to have a decent gauge on the mer's personality. He didn't seem like the type to lie. That impression was only strengthened when Chikusa said, "I was going to poison a couple of ships."
This time, there wasn't any hesitation before the answer came. "The one with the man in armor figurehead... the military vessel... and the one with the clam decorated on its side..."
While it was probably more than a little cruel to say as much, Yamamoto didn't pay much mind to the first two ships that Chikusa listed. The military vessel had been there before they'd docked just the other day, and his crew had already been pretty hasty in getting everything done they needed to so that they could set sail again. As far as any of them had been able to tell, there were only rumors floating around about them, and they weren't yet as infamous as some of the other pirate crews sailing across the seas. Still, why tempt fate, right? Since they were natural enemies, Yamamoto wasn't exactly sure if he had it in him to exactly feel heartbroken over the idea of them being poisoned by some mer with an agenda. The same could be said for the other ship Chikusa had just described as well. Yamamoto hadn't gone on it or anything like that. He wasn't even particularly familiar with its crew, only that he had seen them at a distance. However, in some ways, he didn't really need to do so. On his own, he had picked up the secretive way the crew packed their luggage, their furtive glances, various little things that made them more untrustworthy for anyone who was actually paying attention. More than his own senses, however, he trusted how his crew had reacted: Tsuna's uneasy fidgeting whenever he saw the ship or its crew, the way Gokudera spat in its direction as if he saw something he didn't like, even Lambo's simple blunt complains of "Wow, what a bunch of creepy guys!" Whatever they were hiding in their shipment was something unsavory. Yamamoto had little doubt about that. Perhaps this mer had seen something even humans hadn't seen just yet.
So that was all, well... Yamamoto couldn't exactly say it was "fine and dandy". It was just, at the very worst, it would help him and his out more than it would harm them, he was pretty sure. One thing wasn't great, however, and he blinked over at Chikusa. "Hey, the clam ship is my ship. I mean. Tsuna's ship. I'm a part of his crew."
Chikusa didn't particularly react, besides blinking back. "So?" he asked plainly, which... Well. That was fair, wasn't it? Yamamoto couldn't exactly complain about the fairness here. After all, no one could trust the military or navy or anything else to do with the government, and the ship with the armored figurehead was clearly suspicious.... And then there was the Vongola, with its crew of actual pirates.
It was really a probably more fair assessment than Yamamoto was giving other people. "I mean, can I at least ask why you're trying to poison our ship?" he asked, fumbling to regain his footing. It was a little hard when he was still drunk and fighting against the tide.