It was late at night, and as Jupiter lay awake a thousand and one thoughts bounced around in their mind. She had been trying to sleep, and she was quite tired at that, but the noise in their mind kept them wide awake. With a defeated sigh, she rolled over and out of bed.
They sleepily drifted through the series of tunnels and underwater caves she and their parents called home. Jupiter was searching for one of her dads in particular, Outer, and they had a feeling they knew where he’d be.
Much as they had anticipated, Outer was in one of the caves open to the night sky. She felt their was a proper word for it, but was to tired to try and remember. Outer’s tail flicked as her father worked on something above water that Jupiter couldn’t make out.
Jupiter lightly bumped her skull against their dad’s ribs as she nosed her way under his arm and broke the surface of the water. Outer met his daughter’s eyelights with a sympathetic smile. “Couldn’t sleep?”
She gave a small nod before nuzzling into his side and closing their eyes. After a few minutes they spoke, “Dad ‘s a leviathan right?”
Outer gave a nod and a hum of affirmation, with which Jupiter continued on. “And they’re like, really big, right? So why isn’t he, like, a giant?”
“He doesn’t want to hurt you,” A squawk of indignation from Jupiter and a soft laugh from Outer, “Perhaps not exactly that, but there is a reason he is called the Destroyer of Worlds.”
“Mmmmmm alright, but have you ever seen him as a giant?” They ask, giving a small wiggle in excitement. What she didn’t expect was the solemn, thoughtful look that crossed their dad’s face.
“I…yes, I have, but it was a long time ago.”
The water was churning mass of dark water and oil. Outer could barely breath, let alone see. He tried to swim away from the foul water, but it only seemed to become thicker as he floundered. He couldn’t breath, he couldn’t see. Was he going to die? He was going to die.
He could feel something else moving through the water near him. He whipped his head around, his panic pitching into an impossibly higher gear. But, slowly, the water around him seemed to clear.
The first thing to greet him when Outer could finally see again was… a giant skull? It was, and the giant mer seemed to be the cause of all his recent troubles: The oil tainting the water seemed to pool out and away from the leviathan’s skull and the hands (hands?!) that were cupped beneath him.
The giant mer grinned, and Outer gulped. This could only end well.