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danddandtea · 3 years

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Jellies

Summary: Modern Au. A trip to the aquarium with the Mighty Nein :) Spoilers to current.

Ships: Fjorester at the forefront, canon relationships

The tank was located on the farthest side of the room, but it was the first thing any of them saw as the entered the next section. Jester ran to it first, a flare of skirts as she whirled around to face them just before darting off, dancing back around again when she knew they were following. The tank overtook the entire wall, meeting the ceiling and floor with the sealed metallic edges thick enough to contain thousands of gallons of water, the glass made of towering, connected panes. It was like the ocean had been sliced in half and rested on the other side of the barrier, containing nothing but hundreds of orange topped jellyfish. They were angled at every possible orientation, clumped together or distanced apart, their bells splayed out like Jester's skirts on a perfect spin, or contracted to propel them in water direction they faced. It was a whole tangled world of delicate creatures, their trailing limbs like golden and pale strings through the water.

The rest of the Nein reached her as she splayed her hands across the glass and pressed in to stare upwards, watching the gathering of jellies at the top of the tank, unperturbed by the coiled lattice of their tentacles and flowing carelessly past one another.

"Oh wow..." Jester sighed, lips in a awe-limp smile. Her eyes glowed with the light of the tank, her skin cast a paler blue and dappled with watery light.

Fjord smiled faintly. Then covered it with his palm and paused by a different tank. More jellyfish, floor to ceiling, but it was rounded and isolated from the walls and within it was a whirlpool of ghostly pale bells. Each one had a rosette of four half crescents and their stinging arms were short and whispy below. He gave a shiver at the sight, the moon jellies spectre-like in any light, but especially beneath the contrasting lights of the tank. He was familiar with the display and didn't linger much longer before joining Jester.

Everyone was ahead of him now, already by her side. Veth was struggling to hold her son back from the glass, eyeing it distrustfully as her husband adjusted his glasses and stood stunned before the sight. Ultimately, she relented to Luke's begging to get closer to the "bubbly fishies" and released him to press up to the tank just like Jester. Beau and Yasha were a respectable distance from the panes, their arms crossed and shoulders touching in a steady lean against the other. Yasha was looking at the beautiful flourishes of each jelly, blooming orange. And Beau was looking at Yasha, their expressions the same. Sheepish wonder. Caduceus was smiling at everything all at once. Caleb was partially bent over a sign, detailing the creature before them.

"Pacific sea nettle jellyfish. Chrysaora fuscescens." Caleb recited, peeking up at the mountainous tank, slipping strands of hair back behind his ear.

Fjord kept his hand over his mouth as he took them all in. Caleb would have the whole plaque memorized already, knew almost as much as him on the subject now. Still, Caleb took a moment to read it aloud to the group, only a few of which listened to a single word.

Like the moon jelly display behind them, the words crested over Fjord with nostalgia, comfortable now as he found his place beside the Nein. Caduceus looked at him, all-knowing and calm and Fjord dropped his hand to let his smile show.

"I knew y'all would like it." He said, tone betraying his words as he knotted his fingers together. "Pretty, right?"

"Oh, Fjord." Jester turned and she was beaming now, a little sun beside the golden halos behind her. "It's beautiful, Fjord! It's just like it was out on the ocean but now we can like, really really see it, and it's so beautiful but also maybe a little sad y'know because these ones don't get to swim around as much as the others we saw y'know." Her brows pinched together as she continued, her lip jutting out as she considered the confinement of these tiny brainless creatures.

Fjord couldn't believe her mind sometimes. Her ability to care seemed ceaseless and all-encompassing.

He stepped up and placed a hand on her shoulder. "Ah Jester... don't be sad now. I don't really think they notice a difference. You heard what Caleb was reading, right? Right Caleb? They just float with the currents. As long as there's food and water around them, I'm sure they're happy."

Jester didn't look totally convinced, seeing the soul in anything, but sighed out, "I guess Fjord. This is a really big tank, after all."

Caleb had moved away from the group, reading other plaques on the walls and posted in front of the nearby tanks. He looked up as he was called. "This says the jellies do not have an organized brain. Most of their nervous system is used to move and digest. As Fjord suggested, it does not appear that they think much beyond basic needs."

Yasha sighed. "Oh to be a little jellyfish, floating around without a brain."

"No thoughts, head empty. Literally!" Beau added with a dorky grin thrown Fjord's way, glancing just in time to watch him roll his eyes.

It was Yasha's turn to give Beau a look of poorly restrained affection.

Caleb continued to move around the room, never content until he's everything there was to read, and knew the names of everything he saw. There were more tanks and tank dwelling creatures, and the Mighty Nein seeped out in small groups to view it all. Jester and Fjord were the last to move from the Pacific Sea Nettles, and it was by Jester hooking his arm and pulling him back towards the rounded tank Fjord had first stopped by.

She was quiet for a moment and didn't release his arms, the both of them soaking in the moment. This tank certainly looked pretty, with her standing beside it.

"These are very pretty too, Fjord." She cooed, her voice dropping to her usual sly tone. He glanced her way, warily as always when she was preparing to tease him. "You know what they look like? I think they look a little like—"

"Ghosts?"

"No!" She giggled. "I was going to say they look like sand dollars, Fjord!" She laughed and he sighed through a smile. Though after a moment she relented with a coy smile. "But they do kind of look like little ghosts, you're right."

The moon jellies could stretch their bells until they were practically frilly flat discs in the water, and flow through the tank gracefully, or flow around as lazy plates of gelatinous body. It was hard to be afraid if you looked to long and saw them contorted foolishly, or flying through the water only to beat uselessly at the bottom of the tank.

Snippets of conversation streamed about the room. Veth's family talking excitedly, Caleb explaining something scientific to Luke, who turned and parroted it to his parents two feet away. Yasha and Caduceus talking in calm tones, voices at that soothing timber that could lull the whole car to sleep when they were the last two staying up to drive. Beau complaining loudly beside.

Then, naturally as the tides changing, the groups shifted and collided and flowed. The combinations of voices formed into a new arrangement. Luke squealing as Yasha lifted him up to see a tank embedded high up the wall. Veth asking Caduceus if seaweed was considered a plant, or if it wasn't, but still counted as nature anyway, or what the Wildmother's whole deal with the ocean was anyway. Fjord almost tuned in, but Caleb and Beau's voices overlapped, raising in volume as they argued over nothing.

"I really like it here." Jester said gently, drawing Fjord's gaze back to her. She looked up and smiled, and it was a gentle thing between them. "Thank you for taking us Fjord. Did you spend a lot of time in this place? Growing up?"

Fjord flushed, the way he always did when he answered truthfully about his past. "Ah, well, yeah. I did, actually. I really liked it here, with all the creatures and the smell... It's... Nice."

"Did Vandran ever take you?"

"Well, um, well no. No he did not." He thought for a beat. "I don't know if he's ever been here, actually. Might not be as important if you can go out on the waters yourself."

Jester grinned. "Y'know, I bet he probably did come here. I bet he would take dates here all the time! And they would make kissy faces at the fish, or make out behind the penguin exhibit or something!"

Fjord laughed and peered at her, attempting to match her playfulness. "Really? You think this is a good place for a date?"

She squeezed his arm slightly. "Oh definitely! There's so many dark corners to sneak away to, and... and this is very romantic, actually." She stared back towards the jellyfish bloom in front of them and became soft and awed once more.

"I really do like it here Fjord. We all do. Very much."

Fjord was flushing again, he knew. He covered his mouth with his hand and looked to another tank, towards Beau crouched and looking into a small square of a containers. Caduceus towering beside her, looking at another small tank three rows up. Watched Luke run around chased by his parents. Caleb reading every sign in sight. Yasha never quite smiling like when she first saw the room, but quiet and radiating her own signs of happiness.

Fjord rubbed his tusks against his palm for a moment and let out a small, relieved sigh. "I'm really glad, Jester."

It was a small piece of himself. An old piece of himself. A small, old, yearning thing, that he stood here quietly uncovering with an aching history. And every piece of him that was laid out, he found to be indiscriminately loved.

He coughed, overwhelmed. "The next room over has seahorses."

And Jester gasped. Loudly.

The rest of the Nein laughed. And they followed Jester to the tangle of weeds and tiny seahorses. And Luke asked Fjord why they were called seahorses because they were very very small and horses are very very big. And Fjord didn't have the hands to cover his smile when he lifted a very excited Luke up to see their tiny equine faces. And Caleb read the sign on Hippocampus erectus, droning behind them. And Beau and Yezza talked about how many creatures they thought were in the tank. And Yasha watched them all. And Caduceus was still explaining to Veth why the Wildmother's influence was all encompassing to life, and that even things that aren't related through the same arbitrary rules, they can still all be brought together and protected under her guidance.

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