Mermaids in Massachusetts

The Bet

Austin was starting to worry if they would find Mason at all. They kept travelling, going from place to seemingly unrelated place, finding nothing new. All they had to rely on now was Ian, who still occasionally messed up. He was only human. (Well, not really, but still.) Everywhere they went, it all had a sense of Déjà vu.

"I miss my mum," he muttered one day, when he, Ian, Tristan, and Tanner were seemingly in the middle of nowhere.

"Yeah?" Tanner said, sounding slightly out of breath.

"Yeah," Austin said.

"What was she like? Your mom, I mean," Tristan asked. Austin quirked an eyebrow. He was expecting that question from Ian maybe, but not Tristan. He hadn't seemed all that interested in their personal lives prior to this.

"She's very kind, sweet. She cares about me so much. I haven't spoken to her in such a long time... she probably thinks I'm dead," Austin said, the weight of his own words weighing down on him.

"Aw, Austin," Tanner said, sending him a look of sympathy. Austin felt a pang in his gut at knowing what Tanner had been through, and that he was even complaining at all.

"I have never met a woman before," Tristan said, very matter-of-factly.

"I have," said Ian, and all eyes turned to him.

"You have?" Tanner asked, tilting his head. "When?"

"I was younger, nine or ten. My dads were out hunting and my brothers and I climbed to see... it. To see the above," Ian said. "We did not really think about it. It was more of something to do to ease away the boredom, no biggie. But we messed up. A group of women, maybe twenty-two or twenty-three spotted us. My brother Tom pulled me under, and Ben found his way down on his own. It was crazy. That was only a day or two before the virus hit," Ian said, a small smile on his face. "But hey, I survived te whiu piwa, so there is something in that."

"You survived it?" Tristan asked. He seemed so startled by this revelation.

"Barely. Lost hearing in both ears," Ian said. "I mean, can read lips pretty well, but it is really cool to find someone who can actually speak sign language."

"I have never met someone who survived it before... that is so impressive," Tristan said.

"Wait. What's te whiu piwa?" Austin said. He was beyond confused.

"I think you call it the Barbaric Plague?" Tanner said.

"That's, no. That's definitely not a thing," Austin said.

"Okay, not Barbaric, but it sounds like it. Uh, Baboonic? Bootanic?"

"Bubonic? The Bubonic Plague?" Austin said.

"Yeah! That's it, yeah," Tanner said.

"Do you guys have medicine down here?" Austin said.

"No, not really," said Tristan.

"Right. So, Ian, how the hell does one survive the literal Black Plague without vaccines? That doesn't make any sense."

Ian paused before his answer. "Vac- what? I have no idea what that means," he said. Austin nodded, prepared to explain it, but Ian continued. "I think, from Tauruses I know, that we have a better immune system than you do."

"Without vacc- nevermind. It doesn't matter," Austin said, realizing that Ian can't really understand that word, anyways.

"Right. Anyways. I think it is time to take a rest. What say you, boys?" Tanner said, and they all started at him.