Chapter Text
Jotaro had just swiped in when the screaming started.
It wasn’t unusual to hear raised voices in the Facility; Dr. Brando often lost his temper at the less experienced staff, workers yelled to each other over the noise of machinery, scientists voiced their frustrations about missing data or uncooperative subjects.
But this was something else entirely. No one ever screamed --not where it could be heard, anyway--and certainly not in antiquated Japanese.
“Unhand me!” The voice cried full of fear and fury, punctuated with an electrical crackle and the sounds of a scuffle. “I’m warning you...!”
“Steady, gentlemen,” Dr. Brando’s even, English-accented voice answered, clear even over the grunts and snarls that indicated a struggle. “You, hold tight here--don’t let it wrap around your forearm or it’ll break it like a twig.”
Jotaro picked up his pace to a jog. Why was the noise coming from the Observation and Testing Suite? That was his territory.
More importantly, who the hell was speaking such old-fashioned Japanese in Miami, Florida?
“I said, don’t touch me!” Jotaro rounded the corner just in time for the Creature to lash out with its tail, striking one of its captors in the jaw. The force of it took the meat clean off the man’s face, soaking Jotaro’s shoes in blood.
The Creature panted, eyes wide as if shocked by what it had done before the edge of danger entered their gaze again, focusing on Jotaro. It was humanoid, as far as Jotaro could tell--or mammalian, at the very least--from the torso up, pale, decorated with emerald scales, a head of curly red hair, and bright, intelligent lavender eyes. But the similarities to anything Jotaro recognized ended there: from its hips began a long, green, serpentine body lit up with bright markings and ended in a wide caudal fin. As it squirmed in several men’s hold, Jotaro could see pectoral fins, dorsal fins, a heterocercal caudal fin--but this was no shark or dolphin.
And certainly not a mermaid, because those didn’t exist .
“Get that man to the infirmary,” Dr. Brando sighed, sounding as if someone had jammed their toe rather than had their jaw sliced off, “And send in for...oh, he’s here already. Good evening, Dr. Kujo.” His lips twisted upward briefly, making his pale blue eyes crinkle in a way that might have been handsome if he didn’t know what a bastard the doctor was. “I’ve got a new project for you. A live one.”
Jotaro was too shaken to even begin signing his reply.
“Let me go!” The Creature writhed again, making its captors lose their grip. It twisted its long body to lunge at Dr. Brando but before it could so much as bare its teeth, the man seized it by the neck. The Creature choked, immobilized by the way Dr. Brando dug his nails into its sensitive gills.
“Enough of that,” Dr. Brando chided, hooking his fingers under the Creature’s gills, “Get hold of it again, gentlemen. What did I tell you about keeping pressure on the neck?” He turned to Jotaro again, heedless of how the Creature began gasping for air. “You have a degree in marine biology, no? Well, this should be a fun passion project for you.”
The Creature struggled weakly, eyes flickering desperately to Jotaro’s.
“Where did you find them?” Jotaro signed.
The Creature’s eyes widened a little, as if in confused recognition.
“Oh, for christ’s sake,” Dr. Brando huffed, then looked to his assistants. “What did he say?”
One of the men, an intern that Jotaro recognized for being related to Daniel from Accounting, spoke up; “I think he was asking where we got it from, sir.”
“Just put it in the saltwater tank,” Dr. Brando said with a wave of his hand, making the Creature whine with the movement, “It’ll be fine.”
Jotaro’s lips thinned. This...being was unmistakably sentient, and seeing them wrangled like a common animal made him feel sick--but he would be lying if he said he wasn’t incredibly curious about what they were.
They spoke Japanese: antiquated, even ancient Japanese, but with enough common words for Jotaro to understand. They could communicate.
He needed to know more, and they would be safe in his lab.
He turned and waved over his shoulder, beckoning Dr. Brando and his assistants to follow him. It would be easier than waiting for the intern to translate.
They dropped the Creature unceremoniously into the tank, heedless of the delicate ecosystem within that Jotaro had been cultivating for years. He winced, but was relieved when the Creature gave a deep, grateful inhalation of water that poured bubbles from their abused gills.
Then their eyes flashed and they surged for the surface, fangs bared, only to hit the heavy metal cover that Dr. Brando’s men hastily pulled over it. The Creature hissed, a sound so fearsome and low that it shook the glass of the tank, and shoved at the cover again. The hiss may have been frightening, but the Creature looked far more frightened by the prospect of being captured.
Their expression made Jotaro’s chest ache.
“That should do it for now,” Dr. Brando said with a smile, wiping his hands on his slacks, “Once it falls asleep, we can sedate it and contain it properly.” He leaned down to tap the reinforced glass, making the Creature’s markings light up threateningly as they retreated to the back of the tank. “As for you, Dr. Kujo...just keep it alive until then. Treat it as a Key Specimen, SB class. What a catch, eh? I bet you’ve never had anything more interesting than an octopus in here!”
Jotaro didn’t bother telling him that he’d been preserving an extremely rare species of mantis shrimp that had just been crushed under the Creature’s tail. He grit his teeth and shoved his hands in his pockets, watching the Creature thrash and snarl in the tank.
“As talkative as ever, I see. Do let me know what your findings are. Now, I believe you have a meeting with Dr. Forever; the man goes ape-shit when he’s kept waiting, so do hurry along.” Dr. Brando turned his back just as the Creature locked eyes with Jotaro.
Help me, they signed.
Jotaro’s hands moved of their own accord: I’ll try .
He couldn’t bring himself to glance over his shoulder when he shut off the lights in the lab and walked out the door.
It was late afternoon by the time Jotaro was able to stop by his lab. His stomach ached with hunger; as usual, he hadn’t been given a moment to sit down and eat his lunch in peace. Something always needed his attention at the base: radio tuning, submarine repair approval, an interdisciplinary squabble, meetings… Some days he wished he’d never accepted his grandfather’s offer, even if the job paid well. It funded his research, and in the end that was all he cared about.
That, and the Creature currently occupying his tank.
He swiped himself in, flipped on the lights, and locked the heavy automated door behind him.
The Creature was just as he’d left them, pressed into the bottom corner of the tank with a defiant expression. Their eyes tracked Jotaro’s every movement as he crossed the lab to set up his equipment. Their pupils were blown wide and their tail twitched subtly, like a cat ready to pounce on its prey. This being was no doubt a fearsome predator in the wild, judging by...well, everything about them.
If he wasn’t certain the Creature would immediately maul him, he would’ve loved to study their dental structure up close. As it was, he lowered himself to their eye level, set his clipboard on his lap, and raised his hands: “Hey there.”
The Creature tensed, their rather froggish lips thinning before slowly and uncertainly raising their webbed hands in return: “Hello.”
“How do you know how to sign?”
“How do you know how to sign, human? I hadn’t thought your species capable of intelligent communication.”
“I can’t talk, so I had to learn how to communicate another way,” Jotaro explained, pulling down his turtleneck to reveal three deep, jagged scars running along his throat. Sometimes, they still stung. “But most humans don’t know it. Sign language.”
“That’s not what it’s called,” The Creature argued with narrowed eyes, “This is deep-speak. We created it for underwater communication more than several thousand years ago. Humans could never grasp the complexity of our language, spoken or signed.”
Jotaro withheld a snort of amusement at the Creature’s arrogance. It was charming, in a way. “Well, humans call it sign language,” He replied evenly, though his curiosity soon got the better of him: “Who’s ‘we’?”
The Creature blew bubbles at him as a human would huff in annoyance. “Like I’m going to tell you that.” They drew their coils closer, defensive. “You’d just hunt us to extinction, like you humans are doing to everything else.”
“Fair enough,” Jotaro nodded with a slight frown. They weren’t wrong. “Do you have a name?”
The Creature paused, then gave a wry smirk. “Of course I do.”
“But you’re not going to tell me.”
“Humans can’t pronounce my name.”
“Can you sign it?”
“Names cannot be signed,” The Creature remarked flippantly.
“Yes they can,” Jotaro replied, and signed his name.
The Creature stared at him for a long moment in confusion, then pursed their lips. “What does that mean?”
“It’s my name.” Jotaro spelled it out again.
The Creature’s thin brows furrowed in concentration as they tried to repeat the gestures, and their coils began unfurling bit by bit. It seemed their curiosity was powerful enough to bring them out of their shell at least a little.
“No. Uh, what about in ASL...” He tried again. “J-O-T-A-R-O.”
The Creature followed his hand movements slowly with dexterous, webbed fingers, and looked to him questioningly to see if they’d gotten it right.
“You got it.” Jotaro couldn’t help but feel pleased for the Creature’s triumph.
“Jotaro.” The Creature returned his smile for a split second before correcting it into their usual haughty frown and edged back into the corner. “Where am I?”
“The Facility. It’s a Naval training and testing base.” Jotaro answered as honestly as he could. “It’s...in Florida.” A thought occurred to him, and he frowned in concern. “Were you beached by the hurricane? Is that how they found you?”
The Creature glared at the sandy bottom of the tank, using their tail to swipe irritably at a floating piece of seaweed. “Yes. I was headed for the Desert River and tried to take a shortcut around the warmer coasts, but the currents knocked me off course. Next thing I know, I’m stranded a mile up on a beach I'd never been on, and those humans were carrying me away from the water…” They trailed off into a mumble, their brow easing as the hopelessness of their situation sank in.
Jotaro’s heart sank with theirs. Though every bone in his body was screaming at him to carry the Creature back to the ocean, the consequences were too great: Dr. Brando had made people in more important positions disappear for smaller transgressions than releasing a key specimen. Jotaro had a sneaking suspicion they’d all ended up in the high-security basement floor that only Dr. Brando and a handful of others had access to.
As sympathetic as he was to the Creature’s plight, nothing could be worth suffering the full force of Dr. Brando’s wrath. He wasn’t ranked General of Covert Services for his exceptional manners, after all.
“I’m sorry,” Jotaro offered, shrugging his shoulders, “If it’s any consolation, I’ll try my best to make your stay here...not terrible.”
The Creature blew bubbles at him again, with the added threat of bared teeth. “That’s hardly a consolation. Consolation would be giving me a date for release. What do you even want with me, anyway?”
Jotaro could only shrug. “I’ll let you know when I find out. They don’t tell me much around here.”
“How reassuring,” The Creature signed with sarcasm practically dripping from their claws before they turned to circle the bottom of the tank. Finally, they settled again, resting their chin in their palm. “Why are you the one they assigned to look after me?”
“I’m a marine biologist.” Jotaro explained, then frowned, correcting himself; “I have a degree in marine biology. But at the Facility, I mainly design submarines, among other things. Whatever else goes on in the Facility isn’t my business.”
The Creature tilted their head, curious. “Submarines. I see. I’ve seen those before, once or twice. And if I’m correct in assuming a ‘marine biologist’ specializes in observing sea life, like myself...” They drifted a little closer. “I assume they want you to run tests on me?”
Jotaro shrugged again. “Probably. Dr. Brando told me to treat you as a Key Specimen. We don’t get many of those--or if we do, I’ve never seen one. But the protocol is pretty simple. I’ll just take notes on your behavior, physiology...nothing painful. I promise.”
The Creature’s lips moved around Dr. Brando’s name with a sneer, though they seemed distracted by something else. “What was that last word? I don’t recognize the meaning.”
“Promise?” Jotaro raised an eyebrow.
“Yes, that. What does that mean?”
Jotaro touched the bill of his cap, thinking. “It’s like an assurance, but staking your reliability on it. So if I promise I won’t hurt you, it means...well. I won’t.”
The Creature watched him for a long moment before their eyes crinkled slightly with a smile. They had drifted closer now, close enough for Jotaro to see the flicker of nictitating membranes over their eyes. Their eyes…they were lavender in some lighting, and violet in others.
He was startled out of his reverie when the Creature began to sign to him again. “Alright, Jotaro. For the lack of other options, I will accept your promise. I would prefer an oath of blood, but this will have to do for now.” Their markings faded till their lower half was a deep, uniform green. “Now, I’m quite exhausted. You’ll have to study me later. Good night.”
With a little wag of their tail, they darted back into the darker recesses of the tank, drew in their coils, and curled up like a snake.
Jotaro very much doubted that the Creature was actually going to sleep in such uncertain conditions, but far be it from him to question them. With the day they’d had, Jotaro wouldn’t begrudge them some well-deserved alone time.
“Good night,” Jotaro signed at their back, heedless if they saw him or not. He dimmed the lights in the lab, went to his desk, and began preparing a folder for SB-2002, The Creature.