Chapter 12: Stuck

"Any movement?" Kyma asked him as they waited.

Kai shook his head, remembered she couldn't see, then said, "No."

Beyond the sand dune, the submarine still sat docked at the lights as they had been for the last two hours.

Of the eight hours of life support available to the mini-sub, they only had two left before they had to begin the two hour journey back to the surface and the submarine showed no signs of returning to wherever it had come.

If they had to, Kai would begin surfacing despite it not moving, taking possible death over imminent death. If they had to, they could cut power to the sub's motors completely leaving just the life support functional giving them a few days in which a tow cable could be attached to them via one of the mini subs. But with the comm. system down the subs would have to physically search for them and the odds of them finding them were slim.

And Kyma would only last three days before she died of hypothermia, her special suit wasn't completely cold-proof.

However, Kai was sure they wouldn't have to worry about that.

An enormous submarine the size of a football field and three stories tall would be extremely noticeable to the mini-subs even with the cliff that dropped to the ocean floor. The submarine, to avoid detection, would have to return to whence it came sooner or later. That was when Kai could resurface.

"Do you want to turn the lights on?" Kai asked her.

She was trying to show how unconcerned she was, but he could tell. She was curling into his side as they sat in the middle of the pad, looking out into the darkness. Dark, hiding, surrounded by water; he understood how that would scare her.

"They'll see it." Kyma shook her head.

Kai kissed the top of her head, taking a quick breath of her scent. "I'll put the shutters on."

Before she could protest further, he left her to grab the specially fitted, light proof, plastic covers from the corner he had put them. She looked around, unseeing, as he slipped them over the windows.

Having the lights on wouldn't put much of a dent in their power, especially since they had done without them for as long as they had.

Because he knew it would burn, he warned her and covered his eyes before flipping the switch.

"Ow..." Kyma said quietly as the lights filled the tiny room.

Kai, to avoid blinding himself, let his eyes adjust, moved his hand, let them adjust again, and only then opened them.

"Better?" he asked, sitting next to her again.

Automatically, she curled back into his side and he put his arm around her shoulders.

"Yeah. Thanks." she smiled a bit. "We wont be able to see them leave."

"We'll feel it." he reminded her.

It had felt a bit like a storm passing right over their head, they wouldn't miss the return trip. If it made one before Kai decided to resurface.

Wanting to break the silence and keep her overactive mind off their worries, Kai asked, "Did you enjoy the book?"

"Yes." Kyma nodded. "I'm up to chapter 5."

There were only ten chapters in the book. Chapter 5, if he recalled correctly, covered merfolk traditions.

"I'm skipping the ones about humans." she admitted. "I'm kind of already well versed in those."

"I recommend going back and reading them." he told her. "It's interesting to read about your species. You may even discover something you didn't know."

"I discovered merfolk don't get married." she said nonchalantly.

"Not generally." he agreed. "We have mates but we don't tend to stick around for life. It's quite a long time to spend with one person. And we don't really have belongings to share with each other so a divorce wouldn't really do much. It's really just paperwork to us."

"Yeah." Kyma agreed. Did her voice sound a bit...disappointed?

Then he realized that he had put his foot in his mouth. Marriage, of course, wasn't just paperwork to her, a human.

"But, I suppose," he continued, "it's not such a bad thing. There are mates who remain together for all the rest of their lives. They're a bit rare, but it happens. I suppose throwing a big party and signing the paper wouldn't be all that bad."

"Oh, yeah?" she asked, smiling a bit convincing him he had corrected himself. "Is Greek the only other language you speak?"

"No." he said. "I'm a bit well versed in dolphin."

"Really?" she leaned back and looked up at him in surprise.

"Of course not." he said making her laugh.

"You made a joke." Kyma laughed, it was a delightful sound. It wasn't high pitched and delicate, it was rich and true.

"I grew up around the Greek Isles." he explained. "My mother and father liked the underwater ruins there. English is actually my second language."

"You don't have an accent." she said, leaning back against him.

"I moved here so long ago, it's just disappeared with time." he explained. "How about you? Any second languages?"

"No." she laughed. "English is pretty much it. My family is from Iowa. I never even saw the ocean until I joined MCRC. And the ocean I saw was never really worth looking at. The only times I got near the water was to look at underwater crimes scenes or help with oil spills or something like that."

"I'll take you to Greece one day." Kai promised. "We can go diving in the ruins. My parents still live there, actually."

"Really?" Kyma asked.

He nodded. "They're not together, not anymore. But they're friendly to each other. You can meet them."

Kyma beamed. "I'd love to meet your parents. I'd introduce you to mine, but I don't think you'd like Iowa. There's no major bodies of water there."

Kain was surprisingly happy that she would consider that. It meant she was thinking about him, considering him. "I don't think I would mind. At least not for a short period of time."

The CBI's weren't permanent. Kai had to take a weekly injection just as Kyma did or the affects wore off. But, as long as he had them, he could keep his tail split as long as he pleased. That didn't mean he enjoyed it. After about a week of not swimming, Kai began to feel restless, wanting to return to water. Homesick, one could say. He may be landed, but he was still a fish and the water was still the place he belonged.

Although, he could easily imagine spending a majority of his time landed on a beach house with Kyma by his side. Swimming with her on the reefs, watching her scuba dive, joining the world he came from the best she could. Then going to a house made right next to the water, building a home there. It was a nice image, one he was strangely attracted to.

He didn't have much in the way of possessions. He had a few things like that book, you couldn't be a human for a long length of time without gathering some kind of possession. Other humans thought it was odd if you didn't. Merfolk didn't really see the sense in hanging onto objects mostly because they really didn't have permanent homes. They swam where they willed, slept where it was comfortable, and repeated the same thing the next day. Possessions weren't really conducive to that kind of lifestyle.

However, imagining gathering those objects, those knick-knacks and memories, with Kyma beside, him; he enjoyed that thought emmensly.

Kyma made a sound in the back of her throat, recognizing his words but not really responding to them.

He reached down and put his hand under her chin and lifted her face.

Already comfortable with his kiss, she didn't resist or act surprised at all as he leaned down and began touching her lips with his own. He didn't really press them together, just sort of dusted them across, teasing her more than anything.

She growled a bit when he didn't actually make a real connection and, after a moment of that, she grabbed his head and leaned up into him.

Chuckling a bit, Kai let her do as she pleased.

Joe had never really taken charge in a relationship before. But Kai just teasing her, not giving her what she wanted, had annoyed her a bit. And if he wouldn't give it, she would just take it.

Not releasing her mouth from his, she maneuvered herself so that she was in his lap, forcing him to look up to kiss her.

He was being passive under her touch, letting her control how fast it went, offering no resistance at all to what she wanted.

But before Joe could get her fill, she felt a familiar rumbling start up again.

"Aw..." she pouted as she leaned back, making Kai chuckle again.

"Get back to your position." he said. "I'll turn the lights back off."

Grumbling about how other people had such horrible timing, Joe did so.

She heard him moving about behind her then they were plunged into darkness again. She heard him take down the shades after a moment of letting his eyes adjust as she felt the giant submarine begin moving.

"We're going to have to think of something else." she said. "What if that sub comes again while we're down here?"

Kai didn't answer her. She wouldn't have heard him anyway, she was thinking of what to do.

"Beginning surfacing." he said later after the vibrations of the submarine had long since past.

And so they began their two hour trip back up.