I Have No Excuse

Untitled Part 16

I was in the middle of talking to Prowl or rather at Prowl since he still refused to forgive me. He acknowledged my presence when I came in, but he had retreated to the further end of the tank. At least he hadn't hidden himself away in his little nest. Barricade however was glaring at me and I had chosen to ignore him and keep talking. That had appeared to annoy him more than me glaring at him so I had made a habit out of it. However while I was talking about a movie Blaster and I had seen the other day I was called out to the beach. Apparently some fishing boat was attacked and well one thing led to another and now there was a situation.

I was greeted with the sight of six wounded mers. Arcee was already bitching them out for whatever they had done to get themselves into this mess. Well the ones who were left. A couple were being driven to the hospital for broken bones and scratches. Something about how some areas were restricted for a reason and what not and how someone could have died while Blurr, Cliff, Mirage, and I tended to the mers. They hissed and growled and snapped, but with a quick shot from a dart gun and they were done. One however was so hurt and weak it couldn't do much but whimper. It appeared to have been shot multiple times and its cries of pain were heart wrenching. Cliff had it drugged out of pity and things were silent the rest of the way back.

One had so many hooks buried in its flesh it took hours to remove them. Another appeared to have been slashed across its back by the rudder of the boat. Just stemming the bleeding had been a job of its own on the way back. Another had several slashes and scrapes, but wasn't too bad off. This one had broken a few bones from what the idiots had been howling about. Kept screaming that mers were dangerous and needed to be driven out and killed anyway. The last two were in the best condition and hardly sported any damage at all. One had been tangled in a fishing net and the other had been fighting the net with him.

The first two were deposited in a tank nearly right off the bat as they just had a scratch or two. Next came out the one who had really fought back in the matter of breaking bones. Next was the one with the slashed back and dorsal fin. Finally was the one who had gotten so many hooks stuck in its belly and arms it nearly ripped itself open. The other didn't come out that night. Nor the next. Prowl had taken to watching the new mers in the tank behind them. Barricade didn't bother even though Prowl seemed to be uneasy with something new coming in. Barricade only moved when they stared back with growls and hisses. At which point Barricade glared back and once again put himself between Prowl and the newcomers.

In their defense half of them nearly died and one of them still hadn't come back from medbay. They'd howl at night much like Prowl had done when he was alone. No doubt hoping their missing member would answer. They just wanted to know if he was ok, but unfortunately he wasn't doing well. He was only taken to the tank when he seemed stable enough and it was only for a limited time to keep them from attacking the tank any further. The state of their pod member was not pretty. He was pale and his scales had lost their shine. A great many of the scales had fallen off around the area of the bullet wounds leaving it bare and painfully red and tender. The most worrying was the fact that it only gave soft whimpers and even those sounds were scarce. It was becoming apparent that he wasn't going to make it.

Four twenty two am and he was gone. No dying cry. He just stopped breathing and that was it. He didn't have the strength to put up a fight and he was just gone. One second he was there and the next he was gone. There was no warning. Nothing that could have told them that he was going to disappear like that. They couldn't bring him back. The corpse was briefly brought to the pod to let them know. They didn't deserve to go on hoping to their dying day that their pod mate was going to come back. There was no wails nor howls. Just silence. Just more silence. Ever so slowly they drew closer and encircled their lost member. There they stayed until the corpse was taken to be returned to the sea. They didn't move. They didn't fight them for the corpse. Just let them take him without so much as a glance. They just stared at the sand with empty gazes. They stayed there and refused food for several days. Then ever so slowly they moved away. One by one.

They seemed at a loss for what to do now. They ate. They swam. They healed slowly. They growled at the staff. They glared at their neighbors. But they always returned to the spot their pod member had been before they took him away. They didn't try to make a nest. Just settled around the spot to rest and sleep. It was like a part of them was gone.

It was things like this that really made me think. How could people intentionally go out and do this? Sure there were accidents and there were times when people didn't know. Then there were situations like Prowls. Where their nests were intentionally destroyed and the mers were driven out just because someone wanted to build something there. There were hunters that wanted their scales to sell. They purposely found them and killed them for profit with no thought of the family they were splitting up. Of what they were destroying. Even if some of them were assholes like Barricade they didn't deserve this. They were broken and no one cared.