Shoreline

9

They drove back to her house where Ava jumped into the shower, Arthur could still feel the tension and decided to leave but on the way out his eye caught the shimmering gold shard it was laying in her diving bag, he took a deep breath resisted the urge and left. Ava turned the shower off for a second when she heard his truck start, she just mumbled to herself and returned to her shower. "So much for taking care of me!"

After several minutes she got out and wrapped her dolphin towel blanket around her waist and walked into her bedroom pulling her shark onesie on, she skipped down the stairs and took the shard from her bag and the research began. As Arthur was driving home Mera was stood in the middle of the road, he slammed on the breaks and squealed to a stop. She didn't say a word and climbed into the cab with him.

"Your brother sent me to see if your human has made a decision yet, and he knows you stole back the shard, he will punish you even harder for that." She said, she was upset more than angry. "You are letting the one thing you love be in danger."'she said, Arthur didn't say anything he put his foot on the gas and carried on driving he knew she was right.

"She's stubborn! She won't listen!" He said keeping his gaze on the road ahead.

"Persuade her," she said.

"How?" He inquired.

"Show her how much you care, I don't know take her out for dinner." She suggested.

"How will that take her out of danger?" He said.

"It won't but it may soften her up a bit, and the more she trusts you she will hand the shard over. . ." He cut her off.

"Then what?" He said.

"We find the rest of the trident and we show your brother who is the ruler of the seas." She explained. The truck came to a stop as they were at the light house. "It will work I promise you. I just don't want you to lose another person you love." She said walking out of the truck and to the waters edge and then disappeared into the sea.

Ava had fallen asleep with her laptop on her lap, ocean related mugs littered the table and a half eaten bowl of cheetos sat next to them, but the shard sat safely in the pocket of her onesie, even when she slept she could feel its weight against her. In her dreams she could see the rest of the shards that were littered around the ocean floor, she saw herself collecting them all up before reshaping them all into the golden trident, she then presented it to Arthur.

It was a strange dream but the shard was using the warmth of her body to project the location of the rest of it to her and her alone. Arthur had ended up falling asleep in his truck but he awoke with a jolt feeling the shard being active it was calling to him once again but he knew if he could feel it so could his brother.