The washing of waves against a stony shore lulled Eliza into nostalgia. She remembered the beaches she would visit in her adolescence, staring out into the harbor, her fascination with ships and the sea running wild through imaginations. The size of these vessels were mighty impressive to her, even as she grew into an adult -- an engineer, no less, that could operate such complicated ships, while also surviving the trials of the ocean.
Eliza harked on that difference in perspective, that shift from seeing the ocean as majestic and wonderful, to seeing it for the wasteland of dangers that it truly is. When a spray of saltwater sprinkled over her, she felt a shock of fear, a jolt that brought her motionless body back to life. She coughed, realizing then that her throat was painfully dry and numb, and soon after did she learn just how fatigued her body was, battered and bruised all over. She slumped onto her side, her fingers digging into fabric -- a waterproof tarp, like the ones from the Generosity.
After a long squint to unblur her vision, Eliza looked to the ends of this tarp. It was spread out flat on a rock-solid ground, a perfect square that she had laid center of until she awoke. The questions that it begged, however, began to pale as her field of vision widened with increasing clarity. Far beyond the strangeness of the tarp was the mystery of the shipping containers that were scattered around her; mangled and damaged, these dull-colored steel boxes trapped her in a circle made by their haphazard placements.
These, too, were from the Generosity. She recognized the serial numbers, but not the condition they were in. Her curiosity inspired her to crawl up to her feet and investigate, but when she looked further past these initial few containers, she saw even more strewn past them -- many more, some piled atop one another, some twisted and broke open, some halfway into the seawater. Eliza’s throat became dryer as she comprehended the finality of her surroundings; in the middle of the ocean, she was stranded on an island of only stone, a spread of gray ground that went no wider than a soccer field.
Eliza’s face contorted into a pained grimace. She stumbled in her crawl forward, slipping off the wet stones that she used for support before finally finding the urgency to stand. The winds made her sway with imbalance, the cold touch reminding her that she was nude, stripped of her engineering outfit, but that was a weak concern. Upon hearing a rumble that was unlike anything the ocean could produce on its own, Eliza’s head turned to the overcast sky, gawking at what truly cast shade across her desolate location.
A massive figure lurked overhead. A body, a woman’s figure, unmistakably; high above where Eliza stood astonished were two globes of preposterous size, breasts that hung outward with some incomprehensible weight. This giant was topless, putting on display her unnatural skin tone of a teal color. A cascade of black hair ran over this immense bosom, the tips falling over her nipples for happenstance obscurity, but that was the farthest Eliza could see. Other than the creature’s navel, which was pushed onto the beach of one half of the isle, the engineer could view only this much of the giant; the distant picture was in her head, that this gigantic being was casually leaned onto the island with her elbows dug into the ground like utility towers.
And following those arms up to where they met, Eliza nearly fell backwards in surprise. She then heard a metal whining, followed by a powerful pop of steel; in the giant’s hands was a shipping container, turned about in her grasp like it was a palm-sized package. With a single finger from a webbed hand was this monster able to break open the locked doors, peeling them apart so that she could peer inside with one opened eye. Eliza blinked, baffled as the face craned forward into view, revealing to her a glacial-blue eye and ears that jetted aside like fins.
Then, a mighty splash, an explosion of water that no ordinary wave could create. The sound was a slap, followed by a flowing torrent; Eliza shuddered back as it whipped into view, some distance behind the woman. A black serpent-- a tail, of shimmering dark-navy scales, rising up from the water in a playful bout before submerging again with another powerful splash.
A mermaid, like something out of the legends. But while these mythical beings were already remarkable for their alleged size, this was nothing like Eliza had considered. This massiveness had only one comparison: the Generosity.
Upon thinking that, Eliza collapsed backwards, hard onto her rear. Her head was heavy, struck with flashbacks of a terrible, nightmarish sequence of events. Her ears rang as she remembered the crack and tear of metal, her skin crawled as she remembered the cold flood run over her body. The longer she stared at the mermaid, the more knotted her stomach became, but everything, all at once, faded in significance when she felt gravity beam onto her -- that eye locked onto her, and those lips curled with coy pleasure.
“Finally awake? I knew you’d come around eventually~” giggled out from the beast, an eruptive voice that pierced through the sighing of the sea. The shipping container, no longer of interest to her, was shifted into being precariously held between two fingers. Her attention fell squarely onto the lone, diminutive human, her eagerness teased like the sharpness of her teeth behind her smile. “I heard your heartbeat underwater. I was so relieved when I found you~ I was afraid I was too careless! I never intended for everyone to end up like that.”
Eliza stuttered on the verge of tears. She watched as the mermaid’s free hand gently drifted to her wall-like belly and stroked it with two fingers. Her stomach appeared so soft, but that unbreakable teal skin could only possibly bend to those equally massive digits. Eliza remembered as much, how futile it was to injure the mermaid in the Generosity’s desperate counterattack.
Before becoming lost in those memories, Eliza gasped with a pained voice as the mountain ahead began to collapse after her. She shivered up to her feet and dashed away, between two sideways shipping containers wedged in the rocks. Behind her, noticed in a lightning fast glance, Eliza saw the mermaid’s breasts crashing into the ground, their plushness meaning nothing to the island that they dwarfed; discarded containers were swallowed underneath the flesh, as was a fraction of the island, as the mermaid lounged forward in a pose that put her chin at rest into her hands. That smile persisted, now overbearingly close to Eliza with enough pressure to freeze her in place.
“Ah, swell! You’re actually quite lively!” she continued in a quiet yet daunting chuckle. “I suppose I can go ahead and introduce myself, if you’re so alert and all. I like to be called just Clo.”
Eliza mouthed the name after it had been rumbled from above. A short, quick name that seemed ill-fitting for a creature that stood well over 300 meters above sea level, with surely another 300 meters more in her tail. Even if her scale was disregarded, Clo was a stunning specimen to behold, her figure mythically attractive and adorned with ornaments that heightened her superior presence. Her black downpour of hair was brightened with coral additions, and similarly designed accessories decorated her fingers down to their webbing. Jewelry made from conventional materials also shined from her as fashionable features, including long hoop earrings of gold and a fan-shaped silver necklace that emphasized the broadness of her bare bosom.
Clo giggled again, a breath dispelled out her nostrils that briefly blew away the salt in the air. After that pause, she continued with her explanation, “I’ve got good news for you. I’ve decided to keep you!” As this announcement spurred despair within Eliza, it was noted with a delicate point of Clo’s finger down onto the little person. “I’ve wanted a pet human for a while now~ I expect you to be grateful and be on your best behavior. If you keep me entertained, I won’t have to eat you instead. Do you understand?”
Paralysis kept Eliza from speaking. She was stone solid, staring up at Clo in pure shock. She listened to her words and understood them well, but nothing could seemingly shake her out of her stunned state. Clo remained patient with her, continuing to grin like she had, her head shifting side to side as she waited for a reply. Eliza still did not respond; her head spun sickeningly, just like the vortexes that debuted this monstrous woman. Those vortexes, she remembered, was when it all began, and she gradually recalled what had occurred to lead her to being chosen as this mermaid’s pet.
The sky was overcast with a deep gray, but the navigator had promised that morning a day of smooth sailing. No storms were expected, and whatever winds that were riled up would surely pose no problem for the Generosity, a veteran shipping vessel that had endured many travels. Even if it did drizzle outside like the sea was known to do, Eliza knew she would be safe and dry in the depths of the engine room.
The droning and grinding of powerful machines was an unusual shelter for Eliza. She was accustomed to this environment, adapted to the heat and tight spaces. Following her routine job brought her comfort and content, especially in the wake of so many unfamiliar faces. Only a month ago had Eliza been enlisted in the crew of the Generosity, and not yet in that time had she socialized much with her shipmates. There was the customary camaraderie, that which came from working alongside anyone for days at a time deep at sea, but otherwise, Eliza was slow to form any relationships outside of rank and order.
Eliza was not one to make a strong impression, not unless it was related to her job. Engineering was her passion and absorbed most of her life. She felt comfortable underneath the weight of her gear, the water-resistant leathers that often ended up stained with oil and grease. She appreciated the heat and steam of engines, never concerned about how it frizzled her dark hair or flushed her freckled face. When at work, she was most alive; the moment her shift was over, there was little to remark about Eliza, other than her average appearance and passive personality. She managed to live a quiet life -- ironic, for a sailor aboard such a huge and busy shipping vessel.
A review of the numerous engines and their output had been conducted ordinarily when Eliza first heard the groan of the ship. Everyone inside heard the whine of metal, that of the ship’s course being forcefully redirected. Alerts blared for the crew to readjust their angle, orders trickling down the ladder of command until all were afoot. It was chaotic and loud, but there was a calm to it all, an understanding -- this was not particularly new, Eliza thought, for something in the sea to pull the ship aside. Like the other engineers, she assumed it was a change in the current, or perhaps a storm really had brewed into something worthwhile.
When the ship whined again, it ended its wailing with an abrupt quake. The entire vessel jostled, clapped by something heavy and unforgiving outside. The inner workings of the ship creaked in complaint against this pressure, sharing the stress with the diligent engineers within. Eliza was shaken enough to fall onto one knee, but she was one of the fastest to recover, responding swiftly to the barked commands. She applied herself to her job, but she could not ignore the unusual tension that something worse was upon them.
Eliza was realigning dislodged pumps when she first heard the mutterings of what was happening outside -- allegedly happening. She nodded along with the idea that it was an ambush of a storm, sweeping in against them with an onslaught of winds, but there were disagreements among the engineers. Someone must have heard wrong, or had hit their head and came up with a crazy concept: a sea serpent, supposedly, was attacking the Generosity. Camouflaged with the ocean, this beast was apparently lurking around them, spinning vortexes with its lengthy body that rocked the ship back and forth.
It was a tall-tale, whimsical enough to bring a smile to Eliza’s oil-speckled cheeks. Entirely untrue, she thought, but silently did she wish that fantasy world was real. It would be more magical, certainly, than the blunt labor it was to endure yet another storm.
In the midst of work, as steam spewed from pipes that were working under unreasonable pressure, gravity suddenly began to change. The crew noticed only when the tilt became too extreme, when unstable tools and equipment began tumbling in the same direction. Before long, they too were tripping over themselves in a stumble down that incline, which continued to rise steadily. Engineers barked at one another as they scuttled for safety, clinging to anything to maintain balance -- but Eliza, in an attempt to grab someone else that needed help, slipped into the tilt, suddenly in a swift slide towards the other end of the engine room.
Eliza slammed into the wall, collapsed there along with several other engineers that fell like she did. In trying to decipher gravity’s direction, she clumsily stood up, only to be thrown back down when the ship’s angle was put back to normal. Water crashed up loudly outside the Generosity as it rocked violently back into balance; the vessel had just endured an incredible wave that lifted and dropped it. Eliza was in disbelief, never before having experienced such a ride, but when sirens began to wail, she understood there was no time to make sense of it all.
The crack of steel echoed down the compact corridors, accompanied by the distinct gushing sound of water. Leaks were springing across the Generosity as the vessel was battered by the outside storm, tears widening into long gashes as seawater flooded in at incredible force. Eliza, staggering to her feet, first noticed just a puddle at her boots, dripping through the grates ineffectively -- before long, little waves were continuously pouring down the halls, threatening to swipe at her knees if she, and the rest of the crew, did not find highground.
But there were procedures to follow, and machines to halt. Without powering down the engines and the machinery that went along with them, there were untold amounts of trouble that could snowball into even larger problems. Eliza hesitated by a doorway while others rushed around her, stalled under the pressure of decision making, but the ability to choose was swiftly taken from her when a loud break of water suddenly jetted into the engine room.
Eliza screamed, feeling the ship tilt and teeter as torrents of water filled the lower chambers. It came with bull-like power, pinning engineers into walls or trapping them in the railings, more than a few being flooded out from corners they took refuge in. Eliza watched, but was helpless to their plights; with the water constantly rising to her, she stuttered an apology to the crew she was leaving behind, and closed the door in a rush away from the engines.
The lights flickered and faded as the vessel continued to rock without a steady rhythm, knocking Eliza into wall after wall as she raced through the halls. Water, it seemed, was seeping in from these areas as well, likely breaking in through portholes or filling in from above deck. Stretches of the halls were ankle-deep in water, but anything lower would be a swim -- Eliza thought only to continue up, feeling as though that breaking through the door to the outside would be the daybreak to this nightmare, fresh air that would relieve her of these dangers.
As soon as Eliza stepped outside, she stood still, only moving because the panicked crowds around her ushered her forward. A mist of saltwater sprayed all over the outside of the ship in clouds sparked up by sloshing waves crashing up against the hull. The large and numerous shipping containers whined and shifted with imbalance, demanding crews of sailors at a time tend to tightening their harnesses. Yet none of this is what put such a gawk in Eliza’s expression as the very source of this ordeal, the cause behind this unpredicted storm -- a sea creature, whose form conquered the horizon with an awe-inducing size.
Eliza was shoved aside to the railing in her motionless stare, her head locked into an angle that struggled to comprehend the impossible beast -- the thing she would come to know as Clo. Even beginning to understand the start and end of the monster was difficult as the tail swirled around their ship, ripping up waves in its circular motion that kept the ship destabilized and trapped. It was this realization, that this one sea creature had surrounded them completely, that was draining the hope from other sailors, a plague of doubt that brought many to an exhausted collapse.
But far up in the sky, bellowing with chime-like noises that could be heard over the crashing currents, was the shape of something human. The tail transformed part way up its length, the shimmering navy scales ending at the hips, where the body then became teal-colored skin. This human half rose like a skyscraper out in the middle of the ocean, the harshest waves bouncing off her waist and tail without repercussion, but any movement she made posed dire consequences to the Generosity. None of that seemingly weighed on her as a responsibility; though nearly out of view, eclipsed by a far-forward bust, her expression was unmistakably jolly and eager, a long smile nearly connecting her two fin-shaped ears.
“I thought I noticed something swimming in my waters~ I didn’t expect to find such a big ship for humans! Look at how cute you are~ There must be so many humans traveling inside you…”
Clo was giggling over what she had discovered -- hence the chiming that haunted the sailors. Their misery was her entertainment, though the sheer lack of malice in her tone could be interpreted as her interest being merely curious. Indeed, it was known by all beneath her that a creature her size could sink the ship with as little as a free hand. To her, the proud Generosity floated at the surface like a toy, small enough to be picked up in both hands with as much effort as it would take to lift a handbag. At any moment, that judgement could swamp the ship; the sailors desperately wondered what, then, she intended to do.
Eliza blinked back into the chaos around her, having nearly fallen deaf in a trance focused upon the giant -- A giant mermaid, she specified, wishing she had something to log this moment in. As fantastical of an encounter as it was, survival was more important than marveling at what could destroy the ship. She stumbled back into the flow of traffic, unsure of what to do other than to keep moving. There was plenty to help with, of course, as men and women were slammed around the deck anytime Clo cast a wave their way, or whenever the ship steered into a dip of a vortex.
The snapping of cords came with a pained chant from a crew of sailors. Any shipping sailor would recognize the pattern, that a container was breaking loose -- if not more. It was inevitable under such conditions, and it had been the priority of the crew to fortify the cargo before anything fell overboard. When the tilt of the ship became severe enough, top-loaded containers slipped off their perches and dove into the water, instilling a domino effect on all those beneath what fell -- a wall of containers was bound to collapse if they were not reeled back into position.
Eliza, needing a purpose to stay alive, rushed up the slick stairs to get to where others were pulling hard at broken chords and ropes knotted to a container. She approached a cluster of strong sailors, all putting their weight into retrieving the cargo, and joined them by grabbing at someone’s shoulders. She wanted to be more proactive, noticing others breaking protocol and standing atop other containers to push back what was about to tumble into the water.
Suddenly, the gathering of nearly twenty sailors was completely overwhelmed. Where it had before been a close contest between their strength and the container’s weight, an unexpected shift in power took them off guard. The container was not just pulled away, but plucked by two fingers and thumb, each digit thicker than several men put together. As simply as that, their efforts were defeated, and the container was removed from the ship not by nature, but a mermaid’s whim.
“Mm! So this just comes right off, does it?” Clo had ripped out the container into her grasp, casually rocketing it away into the sky without understanding how much weight was balanced between her fingertips. If she were to drop the relatively matchbox-sized rectangle, it could potentially blast into the Generosity’s deck.
Releasing it, however, was not Clo’s will. Her eyes narrowed on what she had taken, specifically the tails of ropes and those clinging to them. In front of her face, several sailors dangled helplessly, having been pulled along with cargo when it was spontaneously ripped away from the ship. They struggled to keep their grips, but the high-altitude winds were choppy, their bodies were heavy and wet with seawater, and of course, there was a ferocious smile ablaze beside them, taunting them with a glimpse of huge teeth curved into a smile.
When a rope broke, and a man went spiralling in a scream to the ocean far below, Clo’s reaction was delayed and lackluster, like watching dust be scuffed off an old object. Her attention beamed back onto the others; “Aha! Humans! Hmm? Was this something you were trying to keep?” Clo bobbed the container in her fingers, creating peril for those clinging to it. “Well, it won’t help you much now, whatever it is…”
Whether noticed in her long stare, or heard in the subtle shift in pitch, there resonated an air of suspense after Clo’s words trailed off. The shipping container, they began to understand, was not what interested her; it was the sailors clinging to the box, desperately trying to climb atop it. Their struggles were just amusement for the mermaid that held them, but when that entertainment ran dry, Clo lurked forward and extended her tongue outward from her grin.
The sailors were in an uproar, shuffling up the container with greater urgency, though it could provide them no defense against the serpentine tongue. It coiled around one side of the container, its adhesive touch abducting the toughened sailors like rice off of a fork. Their little bodies simply disappeared from the perspective of the Generosity, the crew of which had slowed under the horrorshow playing out above them. Five men, hardened by a history of the sea, were licked away to their demise; Clo’s eyes continued to sparkle above the five that remained, which she then licked off with even less concern.
Having witnessed fellow crewmates disappear behind those devilish lips, those aboard the Generosity rushed in a fluster, to anywhere but the sides of the ship. They sought refuge towards the center, but it was there where the shipping containers were most unsettled, forced loose out of their bindings and slamming around the deck. Eliza was among them taking that risk, ducking and lunging between faces she barely recognized.
There was a heavy splash beside the vessel, a geyser of water created where Clo’s shipping container had fallen. Since it had been licked clean of humans, the container itself was unimportant, and so she dropped it into the ocean like discarding trash. “I’ll just fetch that later~” she hummed to herself, her stare angling down at the ship. Her fingers curled excitedly, “What to take next…? What else are you humans shipping?”
Clo hovered above the ship with that earnest curiosity drilling into whatever flat color caught her eye. With just a push of her fingers, she was able to unload a large square of containers into the water, shoving overboard a duo of sailors with them. Their time in the water was dangerous, their struggles quickly consumed by the ravaging waves -- Eliza caught as much happening, when she glared out from the ship and at the mermaid’s powerful tail whipping out of the surface.
The tail was huge, of course. Its fan-like shape made its descents slower when it smacked the water, but it also expelled harsh winds and controlled the pattern of the waves. As Eliza raced with others to a higher deck, she kept an eye on that tail, watching as it sank underwater. It was not long until it rose again, heavy with water, on the opposite side of the ship. It cracked upwards like a bolt of lightning, before falling down over the Generosity.
A flood of water blasted through the main deck, sweeping sailors off their feet as the tail’s shadow darkened all they could see. Many were blind to the torrents that barreled down stairs and between shipping containers, blasting them into piles of people that the water would trample over. Eliza was nearly among them, lunging to grasp the railing of a stairway when the tail came careening over the ship. She was fortunate enough to grab hold and withstand a hard splash in the face, but it was a debt paid with the soreness of her arms, pulled to their limits as they were tangled around the bars.
When the water was finally relieved and washed off most of the desk, Eliza still struggled to breath, unsure if she was able to. She staggered up the stairs like she had been, enduring forward onto the next level of the Generosity, but along with all her bruises and aches, she was slowed by the beast’s wicked cackle; a giggle, truthfully, from Clo’s amusement. Though Eliza and the other victims were fighting for their lives against an impossible storm, Clo was playing around in the water, entertaining herself with their turmoil.
And now that her tail was coiled around the ship, everything and everyone on board truly belonged to her. They were now possessions to this mythical creature, and would be for as long as they stayed. There was no effort they could scrounge together to resist the mermaid’s whims, but there was the bleak possibility of escape -- a select few evacuating on row boats and praying for the best. If ever they had the chance, it was going to be as soon as possible.
Ahead of Eliza was a group of sailors clustered together, wrestling over each other in a complicated attempt to arrange the next emergency row boat. More people gathered over time, creating more chaos and confusion with their own shouts and additions; Eliza found herself helpless and pushed around in the crowd, drowning between burly men and women just as much as she would in the raging waters. Her heart raced like never before, wondering with uncertainty if she would even reach a lifeboat, or if they would all be taken up by then. But there was always a greater worry hovering above it all, the literal shadow that haunted this miserable effort of escape. Unlike her peers, Eliza always looked up, gawking at the amazing creature that had decided their vessel should be sunk.
Loud cracks and creaks of metal were heard behind the sailors. Another coil of Clo’s tail had formed around the hull, and within its twists was a tightening pressure. Her strength openly teased how she could cut open the huge vessel whenever she pleased, but that she chose to draw out the ship’s suffering was specifically for her own fulfillment. Unfortunately, where the sailors had hoped this would occupy her attention, they were gravely wrong, and when the first of the inflatable, bright-orange rafts were prepared, so too was Clo’s interest drawn to them.
More than a dozen men at a time crammed into the lifeboats, with several more jumping on top of them out of desperation before the rafts could be undocked. As they were being lowered, Clo’s face drew near, highlighting her utter massiveness with how every feature was fantastically big; no one could ignore the glimmer of interest in her pool-like eyes, how her lips curled with mischievous intent, or how her nostrils flared at the scent of human discord. Suddenly, as a result of her frightening presence, the tides of the crowd shifted, spreading out in all directions; Eliza was again carried by their movement, forced away in her paralyzed state.
But those on the lifeboats were committed to their getaway and could not change their course. As they were being lowered, a webbed finger pointed out towards them, driving itself effortlessly through the ropes the rafts were attached to. Instantly were the lives of many wound up in a tangle hanging by the mermaid’s finger; Clo rose them high into the air, swirling that digit once more so that it was tightly wrapped for her to appreciate.
“Trying to run away? Hah, I don’t think you can possibly get away from me, you know~” Clo laughed into the faces of horrified sailors, her serene calm in total contrast to the bloodied and beaten humans that grappled her finger. Some hung by the the torn ropes of the raft, kicking in the wind, while others clung to her skin, constantly searching for a place to hold themselves -- but many others were cast aside, dropping from the finger down into the sea. “There’s no reason for you to even try, so you won’t be needing the rest of these, will you?” And so the dread multiplied as another finger cut through the ropes and took claim of the rafts and its evacuees, gathering a pitiful handful of humans that she stared down upon.
“You’ve made it even easier for me,” Clo chuckled, smug with the lives she held in her palm. She was tickled by the humans scurrying along her skin, but they could not satiate her for long. They were raised closer to her eyes, level with the glare that beamed onto them, but despite rising, there was a sinister sinking feeling among them. “I can’t let you all run loose yet~ It’s not very fun if too many of you get to live.”
Without any further explanation, a tilt in Clo’s palm drove the sailors into the direction of her mouth. Her hand cupped into her lips as they spread apart, revealing a huge maw that approached closer to those falling into it. Horrified screams piped up as the sailors dug into the skin to resist the incline, but even those with the strength to do so were soundly defeated in that next moment, when the serpent-like tongue of the mermaid gushed into her palm and plucked away any stragglers. Nothing remained in her palm, not even the wreckage of lifeboats; everything belonged in her mouth like crumbs, and just as pathetically were they forgotten in favor of the Generosity’s plethora of playthings.
Eliza, as well as the rest of the crew within sight of the terror, awed at the violence they witnessed, but even that was a privilege to be stripped away. As they stared up at Clo and wondered what their odds of survival were, they were attacked from behind when the middle of the vessel collapsed. Steel and wood alike were shredded by the tail’s twist of excitement, and geysers of water blew in from every conceivable crack, furthering the ship’s deterioration. As floods overtook the inside of the Generosity, its bow and stern were propelled skyward into a v-shape. Within seconds, those two halves were broken apart entirely, and they slammed against the wild tides, rupturing the hull with forces it was never meant to handle.
Though she had been bound to fall backwards into the ocean while the bow was pushed up, Eliza was saved when a fellow crewmate grabbed her by the wrist and dragged her onto an inclined wall. A broken window made for an entrance into the sleeping quarters, and those nearby drained into the room desperately. Eliza dragged herself after them, wanting to follow and take shelter, but when the bow rocked forward at breakneck speeds, she was flung forward-- bam! A hard hit with her head, directly into the floor of the lopsided ship.
Water traced her form where she lay, motionless and pale in the freezing waters. Her vision fogged, and the cacophony of her crewmates continued until it was a vague concert blurred in her hearing. Still alive, she lifted a hand forward, but not to seek help -- to reach at Clo, an incredible distance away, in a wish to grab hold of her and make this madness stop.
Eliza collapsed to the rock-hard ground, her mind far too frantic to consider the damage to her knees. She buckled her head and hid in shadows, every blink opening wide and closing tight; with each cycle, she prayed her vision would return her somewhere else, on dry land with a bright sun. Somewhere far from the ocean, willing to give up the sailor’s life for good if it meant escaping this nightmare.
But there was no waking up from the real rain drizzling onto her, or the smack of waves against the rocky shore. Eliza understood her reality all too well, that she was currently cowering beneath a heap of shipping containers, hiding from that monster. The fullness of that creature could still not be comprehended, only limbs and sections that flashed in her memories, and that name clawed into her memory: Clo.
“I wonder where she went off to~” the mermaid sang, her huge voice whistling over the whipping winds. That chime-like tone inflicted stillness onto Eliza, but when light cracked into her crevice, her head jerked upward; the container above her was moving away, plucked by fingers longer and wider than they were. Like lifting a battery, it was effortless for Clo to take the container and set it aside, revealing above Eliza a haunting smile that drilled into that skyward expression of shock. “There you are~ You’re not very good at hiding. Or, maybe I’m just very good at finding? Hehe…”
Eliza did not stay to be taunted. Upon being exposed, she shrieked and made a dash forward, unconcerned with the direction so long as it meant getting away from Clo. She scrambled onto another shipping container which bridged onto a hill, her footfalls drumming against the hollow vessel. Before reaching its end, the container jittered with movement, forcing Eliza to jump for her destination. It was a tumbled landing, but she avoided being picked up by Clo, who was left with a container largely emptied of its contents.
What few boxes and scraps remained in the container were poured out alongside whatever water had seeped inside. Eliza did not look back at Clo as the mermaid reviewed what it held, just as Clo was seemingly not in any rush to try and stop her. She slid down a slick side of stone and tripped in her haste, slipping into a surprise pit -- another shipping container, its broken entrance pointing upwards in the way it had fallen there. Eliza squealed as she fell, landing among a floor of small boxes; a difficult place to find her footing, but a less dire surface to crash into than unforgiving steel.
Unfortunately, it mattered little how she fell into such a trap. It quickly drained Eliza’s heart of hope, that she was cornered in the container. It was only a moment later that her prison shivered with movement, followed by the sounds of metallic grinding and earth being shoveled loose. She was being lifted, acutely aware of where the giant fingers were pressed against the outside shell; Eliza feared that pressure and what it would mean to have it applied to her bare and beaten body.
Eliza’s window of vision swirled sickeningly as she was carried away, as if her container was picked up by the docking cranes she was familiar with. It took much less energy for Clo to handle the container, however, as evident by the curious smile that eventually eclipsed the outlook of the sea. Eliza trembled deeper into the mound of boxes, a scream of a gasp escaping her when she felt the monster’s breath flood her surroundings.
A cold, icy eye filled the window, peering within the capsule-like container. “You didn’t get very far,” Clo teased, her words riding up Eliza’s spine. “So maybe it’s better to stop trying. You’re going to hurt yourself, and I won’t be able to do much about it.” Though still tinted in that playful tone, Clo spoke sincerely with her words of caution. Eliza even realized the depths of her warning, that an injury sustained there on the rock island would spell death for her -- but, how tender and nurturing could a giant mermaid be?
Eliza vocalized her worries, stuttered aloud like an insane mantra: “Y-You’ll just eat me… You would… j-just swallow me… and that’d… th-that’d be the end of it…”
Clo chuckled. The one prying eye squinted with amusement. “I would have to, if you got hurt,” she admitted, “so let’s make sure that doesn’t happen. I’ve had plenty to eat at this point~ What I need you to be for me is a good pet. Hmhm, you didn’t forget about that, did you?”
In her fluster for survival, the thought of becoming a pet to this sea monster had indeed fallen from Eliza’s concerns, but now that it was reminded to her, it inflicted a hollowing sensation. Her humanity had been belittled this low, that she was scurrying away like a pitiful animal into a corner, desperately avoiding the inevitable reach of a far superior being. With her back against the far wall of the shipping container, all she could do was kick and push to keep herself from slipping down that slick incline. The boxes of items once intended for delivery were slipping down that slope, tumbling away into that encompassing image of Clo’s smile. A little shake, and a wave of crates and bags cascaded down that behemoth body.
Eliza whimpered as she pinned herself into a corner, her arms and legs pressed tight into the walls and floor. As exhausted as she was, she knew this struggle would not last forever -- she knew from experience, a feeling that she found frighteningly familiar. After a blink and a breath, Eliza remembered being in this position before, and the darkness that followed. The cavernous mouth of a mermaid, the intoxicating humidity of her breath, and the daunting depth of a throat...
The drift of water was calming as it moved around Eliza. Her fingers and toes curled while the rest of her body relaxed in a dormant state. She sighed, the corners of her lips kissed by splashes of water -- a taste that made her giggle weakly. The sloshing of water was accompanied by the busy movement of people, but she could tune them out like another layer of ambience. It was another refreshing day at the beach, a place in Eliza’s youth where she could dream about the open sea and imagine sailing alongside its plentiful waves.
A stomp shredded her delusion, a footfall that crashed too near to her ear. Eliza blinked awake, startled by the sparking lights overhead, the sudden clarity in voices booming and shouting all around her, the uncertain sense of gravity. There was a metallic whine, like a beast’s roar, that instinctively pumped her with adrenaline. Yet, before she could stir and make sense of the chaos, she was grabbed by the armpits, pulled upwards and aside until her legs could stand for themselves. A fellow engineer had helped her to her feet, one of several sailors that had packed into the cramped corridors, the minimal space tightened by the flood of water at their ankles.
Eliza shook her head. What she expected to be a wild nightmare was still very much her reality, and that slip into unconsciousness was an illusion of peace. She cursed under a cough, wishing that the very engineer that had aided her had simply left her to drown instead. Anything, she thought, to return to that mental paradise.
Another metallic wail scattered that defeatism. Eliza used pipes along the walls to steady herself; she was making the decision to live, at least for as much of a choice as she had. Though she accepted there was little chance of her making it out alive from this dire situation, she willed to press forward, if only towards that wistful idea of her being the one to report the sighting of a giant mermaid out at sea.
“Push!! Push!!” The most adrenaline-fueled of the sailors were stacked against a heavy door, grunting as they pushed themselves to force the way open. Behind that door was a torrent of water keeping it closed tight, gallons that had poured into the ship during Clo’s playfulness. It was the only way forward from where the dozen crewmates were stalled -- what they had assumed would be a shelter inside the Generosity was in fact a flooded maze of the interior they once recognized.
It appeared hopeless that the door would ever budge enough; the minuscule-sized gap they could force would immediately spit at them with the water on the other side, propelling them back like a counterattack. Eliza staggered up to join them, unsure if her ragged body would offer any help, but suddenly, the ship jolted downward, and so too did all the water inside shift with it. The crew was blasted off their feet -- though the shift in water was now enough for them to push forward into it, the inwards flow rammed into them relentlessly. Sailors that could not latch onto something were drained down the long hall, into the depths of the Generosity that had already been taken over.
Eliza was fortunate to still be braced into the set of pipes, her arms tangled between them as water kicked out her legs from under her. She was able to join the few that could continue forward, but she did so looking back at those who fell, those that sacrificed themselves. With no time to search for survivors, she carried forward, joining the crowd as they scaled through the drenched corridor.
As more and more water continued to claim the inside of the ship, it became a race to exit onto the deck. The route they chose to follow was determined for them by how the ship happened to be angled, the doorways which were accessible versus those that were already flooded. Loose cables and toppled items became obstacles to overcome, turning their territory against them. Legs were snagged by coils of rope and wire hidden under the water, but in the rush that they all were in, those that could not continue forward were trampled over, treated like just another hurdle. Even Eliza, who dreaded leaving her crewmates behind, was forced to push past a fellow engineer as the water behind them crept closer and closer.
When an exit outside was finally in reach, there was no delay from the leading sailors to bash into the door and fling it open. The howling winds poured inside the opening, but at least it was not more water that the ship was taking on. Finally able to escape the encroaching flood, Eliza and the others flushed themselves onto the deck. They were met with fellow survivors that raced towards the most forward point of the Generosity, but what fetched their attention most immediately was the teal-tinted wall directly across from them, a monolithic stretch of a stomach that arced over the vessel. Those expecting to gawk upwards to the peak of this mountain would instead only find the creature’s breasts dangling above them, their enormous outwardness hiding whatever expression she had.
Judging by her lullaby-like humming, all could assume that the mermaid was no more stressed than she was before. Clo was content with how the chaos unraveled in her grasp, quietly enjoying how the humans’ vessel broke apart under her contact. She allowed the consequences to happen as they were bound to, entertained at how much destruction can come about while she did nothing more to encourage it. It was according to her unreadable whims that the crew was permitted to live as long as they had, but with so much of the Generosity having been torn and sunk, what fraction of it was left earned the fullness of her malicious attention.
“Mmm, so this is all that’s left… I expected a boat this big to last a little longer~” Clo discussed with herself as she surveyed the bow segment of the Generosity. Beside her were the sinking remains of the other two fractions, plumes of smoke rising from the wreckage while dots of containers bobbed between them. Stragglers at sea swam to these little islands of debris for refuge, but the waves made by Clo’s movements swept away whatever safety there was to cling to. Idly, a whip of her tail crashed into the middle fragment of the vessel, striking it down along with the crew that had been abandoned there. “Perhaps I got carried away. I’ll have to savor what I have left~ We’ll have a lot of fun in these final few moments, huhu~”
A flicker of mischief flashed in her eyes, though no one beneath her could see that expression for themselves. If they had, they could have predicted the next wave of chaos she would create, but all the same were they helpless to prevent her. Deciding to test the bow’s durability, her hands gripped the opposite side of the ship, her fingers crunching through the steel exterior while sailors scattered from their sudden appearance. The ship bobbed hard into that direction as she leaned that way, causing the survivors within to stumble into the ship’s tilt. For many, with nothing to catch themselves on, they were thrown overboard, left to the mercy of the vicious waters as cargo from the deck fell in after them. Huge containers plummeted into the ocean as carelessly as snow brushed off a windowsill, and Clo urged it to happen, giggling as she watched the tiny boxes topple over the edge.
“Oh, it isn’t heavy at all anymore!” Clo remarked, maintaining that steep tilt the bow was forced into. “I suppose that’s what would happen to a ship that’s been cut down to size. In fact, I wonder if it’s possible for me to…”
Her comment trailed off, but the act was tried; leaning further forward in a hunch over the bow, Clo reasserted her grip lower into the hull, her webbed hands cupping effectively around the steel exterior. She was going to lift the final fraction of the Generosity, with the intent of keeping it intact -- as much as she could, at least. To do so, she needed core support, and so the ship was pressed in a hug tight against her abdomen. Her chest curved over and around the upper decks, that impressive bosom swallowing the bow’s bridge and ruthlessly ripping apart the utilities stemming from it. The remaining frontward shard of the once-great vessel existed under Clo’s arced pose, its grand weight about to be tested.
All the while, the final collection of survivors rioted in response to the many consequences of Clo’s fun. Her amusement was made ever evident by an insistent giggle echoing above as her shadow eclipsed them. With her abdomen bluntly colliding into the side, each bubble of laughter was fully noticeable as her gut spasmed fluidly for all to witness. They fled to the opposite half of the ship, but were flung back the other way as Clo’s arms pulled hard on the hull, a jolt-like tilt that the infrastructure suffered deeply from. Nearly all were unable to find balance as the ship rocked about randomly, and Eliza was among those being tossed and thrown across the drenched decks.
“Hup… Hmmm! It’s a bit awkward, but I definitely can~” Clo’s assessment was spoken joyfully, but it was a haunting and perhaps final warning of the imminent destruction. The sailors on board had already assumed the worst was unfolding, but as the bow’s movements suddenly steadied, it was clear that there was still more to endure. The crew sprawled out in the chaotic warzone that the Generosity had become, bracing themselves anywhere they could. Their time was short as Clo’s tail pushed her to another side of the ship, angling herself for a better way to lift the bow.
The cacophony of the crew’s groans and the ship’s collapse was muted to Eliza as she tread against a current of flooded water. All she heard was the crashing of the water and the winds whipping around her. She trudged up a flight of stairs to the upper deck, exhaustion weighing her down as much as the seawater soaked into her uniform, yet she pushed onward. Though it promised little salvation, the bridge appeared to be the final holdout through Clo’s curiosity, and so Eliza glared at her destination, driven to reach a door that had broken open earlier in the encounter.
Regardless of that determination, a force yet compelled Eliza to glance back behind her, if only once to witness the carnage. The deck’s angle was steepening against her, urging her to succumb to gravity and the storm of water, to descend into what was swallowing the remainder of her crewmates; the mermaid’s bust, two whales of flesh that hammered into the deck as Clo rose the vessel from the ocean. Her grasp around the halved-Generosity was like a hug with the topside of the ship pinned into her chest. It was there that Eliza’s peers fell, limp bodies bouncing atop the mammaries and slipping away to their fates -- some washed aside into the ocean, while others caved into her cleavage, vanishing away into its depths. It was impossible to hear their cries as they dwindled away, the sounds of the bow tearing apart too loud for even Eliza to imagine how they screamed.
But Clo’s voice reliably boomed above all of the metallic whining and snapping, soft and giggly as her tone was. “Ahah, it’s all cracking apart~” she teased. “Is this as strong as humans can make their ships? This one’s falling apart because I hugged it~” She huffed and shook the ship higher into her grasp, gradually straightening the curve in her back as more of the deck was smothered against her bosom.
Eliza was tripped by that shockwave that ripped up and down the ship, catching herself from a slippery fall by making a last-ditch scramble for the bridge’s door. Her own weight pulled down at her as she tried to climb up, but as Clo steadied the ship against her, Eliza had her opportunity to kick a leg over and roll into the inside.
Immediately, the engineer fell into a wall of the room, stumbling into a corner where every other loosened item had gathered over the course of the attack. Lights barely flickered with inconsistent life, casting haunting shadows that flashed for moments around Eliza. She made only enough sense of her surroundings to determine where she next had to reach in order to survive -- a foggy, faraway goal that she hoped would justify this turmoil.
The ship was still being tilted harsher in that angle, limiting the time Eliza had to work with. In a daze, Eliza trudged forward, clawing at whatever she could to scale the floor. Her goal glowed ahead of her with an overlay of emergency lights that still functioned: the complex control table, a wide array of buttons, dials, and meters that spanned around the captain’s seat, which was nailed into place. Eliza threw herself onto that chair, thinking she could use the chance to catch her breath, but a hard shudder in the ship’s structure took that prize away from her.
“Come in close, everyone~ You’ve got nowhere left to go now,” Clo chortled, staring straight down at her chest where clusters of diminutive humans piled up alongside debris and splashes of water. Unlatched freight struck her breasts with their full weight, yet all the same bounced off her skin and plummeted into the water, regardless of whoever was taken down with them. It was a rain of terror accented by her low laughter; “This is everyone’s last chance. All of you should come out now~ Hehe, this poor little ship doesn’t have much left to it…”
That grim warning bled into the bridge where Eliza struggled to hold her position in the captain’s swivel chair. The message was direct and clear, yet she was unsure what to do with it. Where was there to go outside the Generosity? Would she try to swim in the perilous sea, or would she try to climb that monster’s size until she’s found? Like the slope in the ship that still steepened against her, all options seemingly funneled into the same messy conclusion.
A terrible sound approached Eliza, earning her attention down to the back of the bridge. It was a thrashing noise that accompanied the rest of the chaos too fittingly, rhythmless and crude. It was more of the ship tearing apart, but the added sinking sensation drew a visual of what was happening. Eliza guessed correctly that Clo was dragging the Generosity down her body, surely swallowing the deck, cargo, and cabins into that cavernous cleavage. The monster had announced it before that she was merely hugging the vessel, and so was this her embrace, gradually smashing the deck apart with her tits while the fat spread smoothly around everything else.
Soon after, it was upon Eliza. As the noises of destruction crept closer, muffled through the steel walls of the bridge, a darkness eventually claimed the porthole windows. Eliza saw a glimpse of that teal-tinted skin rising up towards her from the outside, rising up like any flood of water would. It was those behemoth breasts responsible for carving up the deck as Clo held the ship near-upright against her torso, and they continued to do so, unphased by the utilities and railings that snapped against them.
Had Eliza held any hope of simply leaving the bridge, it would have been dissolved after the breasts pressed past all the doors and windows. After so much had been wrecked and ruined, there finally came a relative peace -- the whine of steel bending tragically against itself still droned on, but Eliza heard worse from the ringing in her ear, or those bubbles of giggles that bellowed high up where that creature was surely smiling.
Up, Eliza thought, staring through the cracked window that overlooked the bow’s point. She could see clearly up to the gray clouds, the one source of light that Clo’s chest had not conquered -- yet. It was the only salvation, for Eliza predicted well that the bridge would soon be destroyed. Putting together the last of her stamina, she balanced herself using the captain’s chair and the control panel around it, gaining precious height that allowed her to reach the window. She turned her head away from the glass as she rammed her elbow at a point that seemed weakest. One strike, then another -- the cracks of the window branched farther, so Eliza struck again and again, eventually getting shards to break apart and fall past her. A hole had been made, and after breaking more of its edges to widen it, she could make the painful climb up onto the outer wall, her grip straining against the sea-slicked surface.
On either side of Eliza, bulges of teal skin bobbed. They rose like rounded walls around the front of the bridge, their fat squished between the deck and Clo’s body. Eliza paled to these mammaries, cowering as their great weight slowly shook in place, like two waves patiently waiting to crash down. They were awe-inspiring by themselves, but Clo’s full size was even more striking, stealing Eliza’s breath when she turned and gawked at the giant’s shoulders, her neck, and that coy expression.
It enfeebled Eliza to realize that the sea monster’s eyes were not actually aimed at her, those pool-like pupils focused on the bow of the ship. She was not seen or noticed, her trials to have reached this peak of the Generosity unknown to this god-like being. For this moment in the whipping, open air, Eliza studied Clo with unprecedented quality. She observed the smallest nooks of details amplified in front of her, so close to the mermaid that she was compelled to reach out and touch the endless skin -- indeed, she hobbled towards one bulge of a breast and leaned into its plushness. It was real skin, smooth and slick to touch, chilled by the seawater yet too huge to be affected by the temperature. Even after collapsing onto her boob, Eliza still went undetected, a fact that shrunk her spirit.
It was, after all, her only option -- the only tangible option. Though this beast had devastated a crew of dozens and wrecked an entire shipping vessel, it was all by her design, communicated inarguably by her teasing announcement, her playful methods. Clo was not a mindless animal hunting some prey, but a willing actor choosing how to entertain herself. She spoke language fluently and picked apart the crew according to what enthused her, and so that was Eliza’s gamble: forfeit herself to the inevitable and pray to this divine serpent that she might shed some mercy.
The disadvantages stacked steep against Eliza, as Clo had no ping of interest towards any one human. She viewed them all as a collective, heartless to their individual ordeals, finding fun equally between the essentially faceless sailors. They were a resource, and with the vessel having been segmented and set to sunk, that resource had been depleted. Specks of limp bodies dotted her bosom in some places, but they weakly fell to the wayside as her body swayed; no longer did she feel tiny tickles where survivors made efforts to push away her bountiful body, or to squirm through its pressure. Where her interest and smile lingered was on the ship itself, the final fraction crumbling against her skin as the hull collapsed inward by her hug. Clo snickered, knowing soon that her fun here would end, and she would dive into the ocean to collect whatever trinkets spilled from the cargo.
“Is that everything? No more?” Clo asked tauntingly, her glare curving towards the people she spoke for -- the stragglers swimming in the aftermath, clinging to familiar pieces of debris against the rocking waters. The fins of Clo’s tail swept side to side to keep her balance, unintentionally terrorizing the sailors as it heartlessly rammed through them harder than any boat could. “In that case, I’ll finish off what’s left~ It was fun while it lasted!”
Clo huffed, her arms constricting tighter, her chest pumping outward. The constant whine of the hull broke into a screech as its metal crunched under her grip. At the tip of the bow, she saw the deck break apart and collapse into itself, never meant to endure such a pressure or angle. She felt the crumbled insides of the ship shift, almost enough to tickle her again, but that thrill had already passed. The cabin pressed between her boobs was one last point of interest for Clo, watching it intently as the building was submerged into her cleavage. To her, she saw a softness envelope the structure, but as the walls popped and the ceiling flattened, the sheer strength of her chest was unquestioned.
The bow was about to be halved by that embrace, until Clo exhaled and loosened her grip. Before fully committing to the ship’s destruction, she caught a glimpse of movement at her chest. Small and wiry, it scrambled up a pinch of her breast, clambering up it in flails. A human, she figured, but not a corpse like the others -- springing with life all by itself, it fascinated Clo, who could only guess at what adventure the human had gone through to survive so long.
Eliza had nearly avoided being flattened when the wall-like breasts suddenly swamped her from all sides. She had been pushing into the flesh, calling up at the mermaid in vain, when the flesh pushed back, threatening to consume her. There was no time to think: she leaped onto the breast in front of her and frantically clawed at the skin in a desperate climb, but her speed was not enough. She screamed as the two weights collided, slapping her between them, spared only by their inherent softness. Captured in a flood of flesh, Eliza swam towards the surface, fighting against the growing pressure until she had undug herself out into the open air again.
What greeted her was no light at the end of a tunnel, but what her vision instead cleared to lay on was a gigantic face angled down at her. Eliza shuddered up the round hill of Clo’s breast, kicking and slapping at the fat without remorse in order to push ahead. She crept forward fast, still afraid that the cleavage was closing in around her, but as she analyzed the expression hanging overhead, it dawned on her that she was being observed back -- she had been found, locked under the mermaid’s stare.
The winds swirled around Eliza in her dazed state, their howls discouraging her from trying -- broken down and desperate, she tried nonetheless. “Let me live!!” she screamed skyward. “I just want to live!! I can’t keep going-- please!! Please…!!”
Eliza pleaded with all of her diminished strength, heaving after every shout to refill her lungs. Atop the uneasy softness of Clo’s breasts, Eliza always fought to maintain her balance, lest she stumble and fall to the sea far below; after latching onto pinches of skin, she would swiftly raise her arms and yell again, a manic prayer that needed to be understood if she was going to live.
It did not go forgotten by Eliza just how tiny she was compared to Clo, however. It was a reality that anchored her hopefulness, that she was but a mite begging for mercy from something far grander than her. Her role in life had completely shifted; no longer was she a dedicated engineer working within a proud shipping vessel, but instead a mere speck that wished to be saved, a greedy endeavor when so many like her perished against the mermaid’s immenseness. Eliza prayed with the last of her humanity, offering it to Clo in exchange for living on without it.
Clo found herself stalled amidst the bodies flailing or floating around her. Fin-like ears flickered at the sides of her head, whisking away any water that would muddy her hearing. She heard it more clearly then, that squeaky piping from the human dotting her breast like a mole. With a keener look, Clo saw how this tiny woman waved at her, boldly begging for her attention. She grinned, thinking of how easy it would be to blow the lowly human away with just a breath, to send her spiralling back onto the bow before it was crushed, but other ideas played with her creativity behind that enraptured smile.
Utilizing any ounce of energy that regenerated within her, Eliza continued to claw up the hill-like breast, pushing through her exhaustion. Moving up and away from all the destruction was her only priority, even if it meant smacking her arms against the slicked skin to earn miserable amounts of progress up the gargantuan body. In mid-thrust upward, the slope she was ascending suddenly jostled; the entire terrain bounced with movement that threatened to swing Eliza away. In her fit of screams, she could not determine why the world shook the way it did, and whatever guess she would have made was assaulted by an explosive, metallic crunch behind her. That dense sound and the crumbling that followed signalled the end of the Generosity’s bow; with a squeeze of an embrace, Clo casually strangled that final fraction, the metal bending into itself before falling apart into the sea. If any thoughts lingered of somehow returning to the vessel, they were soundly dashed from Eliza’s options, stranding her where she was -- the mammary of this unstoppable, giggling creature.
Clo’s arms relaxed, unleashing the piles of debris that had piled against her down into the waves. “It’s gone~” she taunted in a husky hum. A twist around her revealed that no major part of the ship remained afloat; in its absence was a thick pool of oil marking the Generosity’s demise, a substance which Clo was splashed with like a hunter covered in blood. “Human ships are always so much fun~ but they never quite last long enough…” Her chest was boasted forward as she stretched her arms with pride, relishing her overwhelming victory over the desolate scene. When her glacial eyes next opened, their coldness was aimed at a specific splotch on her breast, a speck not unlike the flicks of oil on her great form. “Mhm~ Not like you, however. I wonder where something like you spilled out from…?”
Amidst her fading vision, Eliza’s waning life was brightened when Clo’s mention of her rang over her body. You, that exact word uncovered a glimmer of will in the engineer, while simultaneously hollowing her sense of self. Heavy with seawater, Eliza’s head flung upward, marveling at the dizzying image of a giant’s stare weighing down on her. She shuddered, but her grip refused to loosen.
A chuckle from Clo produced a tremor that shivered what she studied. “... Oh? Are you actually dead?” she pondered aloud, her amusement waning. “Was I mistaken? Mm, can you move still…?” Her grin itched back into place as she brushed a finger into her breast, her pad being wide enough to cover over the tiny body latched to her. The digit firmly pressed down, submerging Eliza into the fat before curling beneath her and forcing her to come with the tip as it delicately balanced her atop it.
Despite being bullied into a new location, Eliza’s adrenaline had been emptied out of her veins. Sputtering water and weakly lifting her limbs, she signalled as much life as she could towards the gigantic eye. The pupil, big as it was, twitched unabashedly with interest as it scanned the diminutive form, nearing so close that Eliza feared the eye would devour her -- it felt as much was happening, her entirety being absorbed into the mermaid’s focus. And as heavily as Clo’s stare beamed onto Eliza, so too did Eliza silently stare back.
Sloppily positioned on the fingerpad, Eliza soon felt her body slipping down the curve of wet skin. In a gasp, she flailed and kicked herself back into place, scurrying towards the fingernail and propping a leg against it for support. Her grip was naturally tighter than ever, reapplied with a new vigor -- but that tightness was questioned by an eruptive laugh bellowing from above.
“Hahaa! Oh, no! You’re so precious spasming like that~!” Clo explained through her giggles, attempting to do little to control her outburst. Her lips continued to quiver afterwards, finding humor in Eliza’s huff of vitality in response. “And the way you’re hugging my finger, hah~ You must be terrified. Do you even want to live after this? It might be better to just…”
Eliza began springing with movement to say otherwise, sensing the tentacle-like fingers of the hand bending into position. She sparked into an argument, flipping forward to yell at Clo, but she was smothered before she could speak, suddenly squished between the pads of fingers brought together. The fear of being crushed so pathetically was frighteningly real, but the pressure that was actually applied was instead forgiving -- strict enough to pin her completely, but very shy from outright popping her. Like this, Eliza could still push and punch at the fleshy surfaces consuming her, but there were no odds at all she could overpower the mermaid’s playful pinch.
“Should I do it? Should I do this quickly…?” Clo asked her, her fingers pulsating with small spikes of intensity. “Everyone you came with has already given up, you know. You should want to join them~ Being alone in the ocean isn’t much fun, believe me. Mm, why else do I come out to play with your little ships?” Her gaze softened, from a mild glare of superiority, to a blink of reflection. She was honest with her own perspective, that though she flaunted herself as a massive destroyer, she was ultimately picking fights with beings innately weaker than her, relishing a thrill that was relatively shameful.
None of these emotions dawned on Eliza, not while she struggled to keep the digits from completely crushing her. While Clo swirled with thoughts, her fingers slowly slid against one another, idly spinning the engineer between them. Then, when a decision was made, Clo’s grasp was released, exposing her captive laid limp on her fingertip.
“Little human… Mmm, don’t give up just yet,” Clo hummed, drifting aimlessly in the water as she remained above the shipwreck. “I can tell you’ve struggled a lot just to get here. Huhu, I imagine you must really adore me, to have strained yourself like this. I’ve decided that your resilience should be rewarded.” Her face, already so huge, grew larger still in a boost closer to Eliza -- so close her breathing whipped at the drenched body. “You want to live, don’t you? That’s why you’ve fought so hard. You can be left alive, if you come with me… Heh, you’d become something like a pet. You wouldn’t be harmed or tormented, no, no. Something I can watch over, return to…
“Of course, you’re free to turn down this offer,” Clo continued with a sly edge to her tone. “But it would be a waste, right? Everything you did to survive, only to die out here, like all those others. Would those other humans answer differently? If I gave them the chance to live, would they take it?”
Eliza shivered intensely, exactly as Clo had planned. The gravity of this choice drilled into the engineer as she waved through consciousness. Itching at her to decide were the ghosts of those that had perished, those that, unlike her, had been swept into the misfortune of destruction. The lives that grabbed her hand to pull her to safety, the lives that forced open pathways to flee a drowned fate -- gone, behind and beneath her. The crew of the Generosity had been nearly washed away by this mermaid’s whim, and it was yet another whim that promised her refuge.
Before the question had been posed, however, Eliza knew her mind had been settled, having committed to this pitiful destiny when she was just an unacknowledged speck stuck on the teal skin. It was no less despairing to accept this deal, a bargain for her life that would sentence her to the role of being a pet.
“Mmm? Have you thought it over?” Clo buzzed, eager to move along, if her grin was anything to judge. “Hoh, you seem convinced you deserve it… but I’m not so sure. Something so small, it’s also hard to trust… Can you be trusted, human? If you truly want to be my pet, then choose that life for yourself… and crawl into my mouth. Otherwise,” she giggled, “I wouldn’t be able to swim very well and still keep you safe...”
It was then exposed to Eliza, cutting her confusion short. Opened wide like a grand tunnel was a portal to a dark, living realm. An exhaust of a breath steamed from those parted lips, casting a warmth that hugged Eliza’s stunned shape and lifted her forward in a chill. Teeth sharp enough to pierce any hull dutifully lined the red cave, each fang glistening from the saliva that behemoth of a tongue was constantly releasing -- that very monster rolled out before her, practically pointing at her, presented as a bridge from Clo’s finger and into her maw. Whipping Eliza for hesitating was an outgoing gale of a breath, caused by the mermaid giggling at her captive’s skepticism.
Strands of spit clicked and a low hum resonated from the throat’s depth; in the paused moment, it was all Eliza could hear above the sloshing waves of the longspanning ocean. The fingertip was an island of isolation, a symbol of her hopelessness, while the fiendish tongue reached out to her, an opportunity -- the only opportunity -- to survive this emptiness.
Against a rage of instincts telling her otherwise, Eliza crawled forward, sliding her body to the end of Clo’s finger and finally onto the tip of her tongue. The reality shocked her as spit seeped between her fingers, the distinct sloppy texture of the tongue resonating through her arms as it responded to her weight. It took convincing herself to drag her legs behind her in order to continue; when she was too slow, the tongue surprised her with a curl inwards, launching her farther up its length as she squealed a dry gasp.
Barely any light made it through to this living cavern, and what little there was became shut off from Eliza as the gate-like teeth closed. Gravity seemingly shifted as Clo’s jaw closed and moved, pushing her captive into tumbles up and down her mouth. Tickled by that sensation, giggles rang like church bells over Eliza, and she was plunged into this play where Clo’s tongue battled her -- not unlike a smaller version of the serpent she was. To the rhythm of the mermaid’s amusement, the tongue swirled and curved in the mouth with dexterity despite its size, slathering the engineer in saliva that made her even easier to manipulate.
While Clo was entertained, it was a dive into hell for Eliza, regret immediately burning at her for having accepted this circumstance -- walking right into the beast’s mouth -- but there was a despairing acceptance in her heart, that she was in her place; an inferior being, so low on the scale of power, devoured rightfully by the better beast. A childhood had been invested dreaming of riding upon one of the massive ships that anchored at her home harbor, and while draped over a fence of teeth, she realized how little her life had meant, how fooled she was to believe her passion was of significance.
A deeper blackness consumed Eliza, laid dazed flat atop a tongue that had fallen still. The motions of outside could be felt, that incredible speed that matched the mermaid’s incredible size; certainly, Clo was swimming submerged into the ocean, carrying her pet elsewhere. Appropriately did a sinking feeling conquer Eliza on this mysterious voyage, as though her soul itself was being dragged to the mermaid’s destination to play out her given role.
A melody carried her away, both to her place, and into slumber. It was Clo’s hum that vibrated the mouth’s air, a tune difficult to decipher against the washing waters outside and the gurgling echoes of what was inside. But once Eliza’s ears took to the melody, it captured her, bleeding into her lowly, wondrous dreams…
Eliza was without a voice as she fell. Not a scream left her as the open air surrounded her, the shipping container’s slick ledge having vanished from beneath her. She was the last thing left inside to be dropped, caught in a trance that made her just as still as the crates of items that fell before her. The storm of memories had flooded back to her, those flashbacks of the Generosity’s demise leagues more terrifying than a singular fall.
The surface Eliza struck so soon within her plummet was a welcoming grasp; Clo’s hand was in position to catch her, as intended all along. Her body rolled into the pit of a teal-colored palm, skidding into a puddle of seawater that pooled in the wrinkles of the giant’s hand. Eliza began to lift herself, but a sudden motion of the arm slammed her back down as she was carried up into Clo’s gaze. Her head turned towards those piercing pupils, keen as to how they dilated with interest in her -- it should have spun fear in Eliza’s core, but there was nothing there to swirl inside her, a void in place of her self-interest.
Clo’s eyes neared closer, overtaking the image Eliza could comprehend of her face. “There you are~ my little human~” the mermaid sighed, her pleasant voice speaking above the crunching of earth that her mermaid tail drove through within the islet. Her head tilted with interest, stray ropes of hair swinging across her stare as they chased that motion. “Ahh, I almost can’t see you in my palm like this, hehe~ Mm, it’s so tempting to want to clench my fist for some reason…” The thought breezed through Eliza and broke her into a visible shiver. Clo chuckled, and she continued in a whisper, “Don’t worry… I shouldn’t scare you like that, now that you’re mine… I’m sure you’re scared enough as it is, mm?”
Eliza shuddered again, not because of a threat or pain, but because of her hushed volume. No longer was Clo’s voice bellowing like that of a god’s, instead carefully adjusted to her -- an impactful voice regardless, but brought to Eliza’s level, a consideration. A small, near-meaningless gesture, but it relaxed Eliza like a drug, an instant effect that effectively leashed her to Clo.
This slide in demeanor did not go unnoticed by Clo, who muffled a giggle of delight. She moved Eliza to be level with her chest, nearly clasping the woman against herself, as she maneuvered her huge body back onto the stoney beach. Her tail met the water with a natural-born touch, slithering beneath the waves until much of her tail was submerged. Clo was in position to dive towards the horizon’s cloudy sunrise, but as with before, her possession needed to be stowed safely away; her tongue was tickled by the suspense.
Eliza was caught staring out into that ocean vista when Clo’s speech shook her. “Human~ Oh, that doesn’t ring well at all…” the mermaid began. “I’ll think of a name for you -- something small, of course, hmm~ A new name to set off into a new life, right? Your boat is at the bottom of the sea, and your crew-- they’ve settled my appetite.” Clo giggled, stroking her satisfied stomach with a brush of fingers. “That life will be far, far behind you… My den is deeper still into the ocean, an island no human I’m aware of has ever reached. That will be your home~ And anything I salvage from those tiny containers, I can let you sort through that! Are you looking forward to this life? If you’re loyal and listen well, I promise you’ll be treated kindly!
“So then… shall we depart?” Clo continued where Eliza was too stiff to respond, only just then blinking with alertness. “If you are, then I’ll have you climb onto my tongue~ I’m sorry, but it’s the only way I can swim~” Her joyfulness betrayed any real sympathy, but Eliza was unphased. Having deeply accepted what she had agreed to, when the tongue was then upon her like a cliffside of red muscle, she took to climbing it as commanded. Once Clo could feel the pinch of a grasp on her tongue, it snaked back into her mouth, Eliza carried along with it.
All over again, Eliza was consumed by walls of pink and the atmosphere of fresh saliva. It was the same environment ripped from some hellish landscape, yet it was very different. The oppression was absent; the tongue did not wrestle her fatigued body, but cradled it, bent around her so that a dip in the muscle pocketed her. When she moved, the tongue did not fight back or react with whipping blows; it was always slow, perhaps sudden at times, but particular to how it flinched to Eliza’s touch. As welcoming as the mouth was on this second voyage under the water, Eliza kept still, quiet, and patient.
And as the vessel of a mermaid dove deeper and deeper, her humming began again. It was chilling and comforting, intimidating and loving. Above all, it was hypnotic. With legendary effect, it cleansed the thoughts of the weary and lost. The Generosity, its crew and its tragedy, were gone, and now forgotten -- diminished to a dream that drove the sole survivor into gratitude for being the mermaid’s pet.