"Perhaps he’ll be more interested once he’s unstrapped. Maybe he just doesn’t like to eat lying on his side."
"So... you don’t think that having been torn out of his own environment, shredded by a motor boat, having major surgery, and being stuffed into a tank that won’t let him move could be part of it?"
"Don’t get sarcastic with me, Mulder, I sign your pay cheques."
"Sorry, sir," he grinned and winked at her, flirting his way out of trouble.
She pursed her lips in mock-annoyance. "Keep working on it. Whatever you need, the centre’s resources are at your disposal." She turned away, dismissing Mulder. The animal was making her nervous, he could tell. So close to human, yet so... different. It was bound to have that kind of effect on a lot of people.
Mulder took another fingerfull of the fish pulp he’d made up and smeared it over the animal’s lips. There was not the slightest bit of interest. Swirls of water took away the food, cleaning the environment, and the animal didn’t even flicker an eyelid in acknowledgement.
"Come on, what else? You don’t like seaweed, you don’t like fish? What else are you going to eat down there? You don’t have plankton eater’s teeth. Those are predator’s teeth. Eyes in the front, that’s a predator’s trait. So what else are you eating? What will tempt you, hmm? How about a shrimp?" Mulder stood up, cracking his spine. "I’m going downstairs to see what else we have in store. I’ll be back in a few minutes." He was sure he could imprint on the animal if he kept talking to it, especially if he started to feed it. The eyes followed him now, slowly and with disinterest, but it was a start.
Mulder skipped the feed store area. Nothing in there raised the slightest flicker of interest. Okay, fish-guy, you’re apparently half human, let’s try that angle. Mulder let himself into the restaurant that brought in more revenue for the aquarium, and started to raid their seafood tanks.
He grabbed a few shrimp, oysters, a lobster, a couple of crabs. Dropping the live produce into a large saucepan, and picking up a meat cleaver. He had to be out of there before the chef caught him – he had yet to be forgiven for making up fish paste in the chef’s expensive juicer.
Sitting beside the tank, he chatted to the merman again, "Twelve dollars a pound. You had better like this!" Mulder sliced up the lobster tail, making thin strips of the clear gelatinous insides. "Come on, just try a little bit..." he held the strip against the merman’s lips, making it wiggle like a small fish. The lips were parted, but again no interest was shown.
"Oh, come on. You’ve got to be hungry. Warm blooded mammal your size, you’d have to eat a huge amount to maintain body temperature in cold water. Just a little bit, go on. Just taste it. Come on, lobsters mate for life you know, we’ve left a widow lobster in that tank just so you can have the best."
Mulder felt something warm flick against his finger tips... was it a tongue? He pushed it in a little further, knowing he was risking a finger, but willing to hazard it as he felt the movement of tongue exploring the titbit. "Go on, that’s right. Just a little bite." The sharp pressure of teeth was fleeting, and Mulder withdrew his fingers as the jaws worked briefly, the tiny offering accepted and swallowed.
"Good boy," Mulder petted him, trying to keep his voice to a soothing level, "Here, you want a bit more? Mmmm, that’s right. Nummy nummy! Of course, nothing but the best for you! You want lobster tail? You get it!" He pushed another tiny morsel into the creature’s mouth, feeling the sharp teeth nibbling his own fingers, very gently, before the lobster flesh was sucked away.
Mulder eagerly sliced up more hapless crustacean, "So, you’ve made the decision to live then, hmm? I guess, if you’re going to stay with us, we’ll have to find a name for you, won’t we?" He pushed a little more food between its lips. The response was lacklustre, but it was there. There were no infections, the wounds were slowly healing, and now the animal was eating. Wonderful. Perfect. He kept talking to his patient. "The first man who ever proved you existed, who brought back proof positive of homo-aquarius, his name was Krycek. I know it’s not an attractive name, but it would be appropriate. What do you think? A fitting tribute? Better than Wang Wang or Bobo or Ethel. Be glad you’re not a panda! So, Krycek, want another little morsel? That’s a very good boy!"
It took nearly four hours, including a forty five minute fish-nap, but eventually Mulder helped Krycek polish off a lobster, four large restaurant special shrimp, and most of a swimmer crab. Mulder finished off the meal with a back and stomach rub to make sure the food settled, then used a soft rubber-noduled brush to remove a filmy build up from Krycek’s scales. He guessed that the sea and sand removed that naturally, and took a few samples for testing later. He completed the ritual by massaging Krycek’s arms and shoulders, making sure they were not cramping too badly in the restraints. Finally he pulled the covers back over the tank, feeling as satisfied as if he’d eaten the meal himself.
-oo0oo-
"How is it today?"
"Good. We’re going to move him into the pump tank today."
"Pump tank? But we’ve spent nearly a million dollars preparing a display tank for it."
"He needs to exercise, and I need to know he’ll be able to swim properly before I drop him into a large tank. Look, Skinhead, you can wait until I know he’s going to be all right before you start exploiting him, okay?"
Skinner scowled at Mulder. He hated the nick name Skinhead as much as he hated his budget not balancing. "When will it be ready?"
"No fish before its time." Mulder turned to the rest of the team. "Come on, get him on the stretcher."
The pump tank, normally used to exercise injured sharks, kept up a steady stream of water, against which the tank’s occupants would have to swim. Its smooth sides presented no opportunity for injury, and the water pressure and temperature could be easily controlled for any type of animal.
Mulder very cautiously freed Krycek’s hands from the restraints, and the group of humans lifted the merman into the tank. Mulder kept hold of its hands as they took the stretcher away, and braced himself against the water as it started up. It was slow at first, until Krycek was used to it. The water pummelled him gently. He held the merman’s fingers lightly in his own, feeling as proud as a parent when, cautiously at first, the merman started to swim a little – an odd side-to-side motion that didn’t fit with the horizontal shape of the tail fins.
"Hey, aren’t you worried about those claws?"
"Not really, Frohike. He’s still too weak to make much of an attack, and I can get out of this tank before he could do a lot of damage. And besides, he’s got to be intelligent enough to know I’m his meal ticket."
"I hope you’re right. No way I’d get in there with those teeth. How long are you going to have to do this anyway?"
"Until he’s strong enough to go into a big tank. That swimming motion isn’t right, not for his body shape, so he’s probably still uncomfortable. There was a lot of deep muscle damage, and I don’t think he’s confident yet. Give him time."
"Don’t get too fond of it, Mulder. There are so many things that could go wrong, so many diseases, unknown parasites, the wrong water temperature, the wrong food... We don’t know enough about these things. Don’t set yourself up for a fall here."
"He’s a strong healthy male, he’s getting the best care we can provide. We have ichthyologists, marine veterinarians, and marine microbiologists on hand. We have a whole team of specialists - the best in the world to call on. I’m betting on his pulling through this. The only thing I’m really worried about is our ignorance of his behaviour. Is he going to pine for his own kind? How long can we keep him here before he wants to leave, can we provide the right kind of care appropriate to his intelligence level?"
"How smart do you think it is?"
"No idea. Not yet. No language recognition, less than the dolphins show. He hasn’t attacked us, so maybe he knows we are helping him, but then a dumb fish probably wouldn’t attack either. It’s too soon to say."
"It’s stopped moving."
"Probably tired. Turn off the pumps. I’m going to get some stuff to put in the tank."
"I already filled it with salt and a broad spectrum anti-bacterial agent."
"I mean rocks, shells, colourful things."
"To gauge its reaction to them? You think you can guess its intelligence that way?"
"No. Just because anything’s going to be better than looking at the tank walls all the time. I might drop a couple of small live fish in there. Nothing that will worry at his wounds, nothing valuable. Just to see if he interacts with them, or if he tries to eat them. That will give him something to think about."
Mulder stared down into the tank, mentally measuring the small movements the merman made to maintain his position. He could feel a tiny, not quite suppressed, bubble of affection for his new pet burst at the back of his rib cage, even though it was ignoring him totally in favour of the tank floor. "Keep your eye on him, I’ll be back in a few minutes."
"Mulder?"
"Yeah?"
"When was the last time you were home?"
Mulder just grinned, he knew they were going to tease him even more from now on, they knew his obsessions.
"I really think you should go home, get some stuff. I won’t waste my breath telling you to sleep there, but if you are going to move in here with the fish you should at least be comfortable. You could dump your stuff in the office, Scully won’t mind."
Mulder pondered the offer, "Do you think I’m weird, wanting to sleep here?"
"Yup."
"Well, as long as I’m being consistent."
-oo0oo-
Like bower-birds, the merpeople had decorated their spawning area with shiny objects. The marine biologists who had been trying to find them had only found their spore on that occasion, but they had brought back the objects the merpeople left behind. Mulder had been on that expedition and had kept some of the objects. Now he collected bits of polished coral, colourful stones, and even sea-damaged man-made objects. Although there was no evidence of tool making, the objects had been formed into crude tear-drop shapes, and made up a rainbow of patterns. These would definitely be more interesting for the merman than plain blue tank walls.
Mulder yawned and rubbed his eyes. Perhaps one night of sleeping in a real bed wouldn’t be so bad... it would prove Frohike wrong at least. He fed his gold fish; they had been starving while he was away. Mulder made a mental note to come by and feed them more often. He could spare the 10 minute drive here and back a few times a week.
He started filling up an old gym bag with any and all paraphernalia he could find on the merpeople. Old text books; both scientific and those that were little more than faerie stories. Anything that could provide an insight into the new acquisition. He knew a lot about the internal physiology of these animals, although never before had he seen them alive, seen a working system. He even had an old skeleton hanging in the living room, the remains of a mermaid, or merman – he couldn’t tell which – killed by a shark. Almost identical to a human from the waist up, and so very similar from the waist down. Femur, tibia, fibia, all the major leg bones, right down to the metatarsals were still present, although more like cartilage than bone, and fitting close together, creating a support structure for the long, heavy tail. The cartilage would be soft and flexible and moved almost like the spines of a shark.
Mulder ran his hands over the cold bones as he often had before, imagining warm flesh and scales covering the elegant structure. He’d spent countless hours staring at those bones, transposing what he knew and what he’d seen on taped recordings over the dead structure, imaging the way the animal had moved when alive, pictured it vibrant with life and colour.
He grabbed his old video tapes and started to stuff those into the bag as well. Fuzzy old tapes taken by would-be bounty hunters and lucky fishermen. Fleeting shots of the animals on sand bars or beaches, the occasional underwater shot. His treasure was one narrated by David Attenborough. The wild life photographers had not been able to track the animals – they tolerated no human presence, unlike dolphins. But they had been able to leave hidden cameras near suspected migration paths. It had cost a fortune, but the film was a wonderful treasure for people like Mulder, who dedicated their life and education to solving these types of mysteries.
Mulder dropped his bag and slipped the tape into the VCR. David Attenborough’s whispering voice shared intimate secrets with him as he dropped onto the couch to visit with old friends, two pods of merpeople travelling and meeting over the course of a northern migration.
The researchers have nick-named this magnificent specimen Gentle Ben, due to his quiet nature with the younger members of the pod and non-aggressive behaviour. He has mated with two of the female leaders of the pod, but does not at this time have his own mate. Not for want of attempts from the unattached males in the group.
Mulder unbuttoned his fly, let the zipper slide down as the merman called Ben ignored the displays of other unattached males. He liked to think he masturbated ‘while’ this video was on, not ‘because’ this video was on. Ben was the only red merperson ever videoed, and he was, as Attenborough said, magnificent. Translucent skin over a sturdy, muscular frame. Huge red dorsals, strong, shimmering scales on his tail. It was little surprise he was being courted by all of the younger males in the group.
Ben appears to show a preference for being alone most of the time, travelling outside of the pod, apparently acting as a lookout for danger. The only member of the pod whose company he actively seeks out is the one we have called Ray – because of his habit of hiding on the sea bottom to catch smaller prey – in the same manner as a sting ray. Ray is not as popular within the pod as Ben, due to his aggressiveness, and probably also due to his dull brown colouring, but as a pair of loners they enjoy each other’s company. We assume that Ray is an unattached male due to the death of a partner, as he is of the age to have been paired for many years. He shows the scars of many battles - he could be what the researchers have called a shark-widower. Why Ben has remained single we can only guess. As he has not appeared as part of this pod at any other time, he may have been from a more isolated group...
