The ocean's Vessel: Trapped in a Small Puddle

Featured Aqrions:

                            Vessel                                                                Nibble

Location: Ego’s research and rehabilitation facility 

Age: Teenager

Activity: general literature

Wordcount: 1.258

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      Vessel felt the cold sensation of the night seep into his skin as his gaze wandered towards the moon, the night air cold on his skin, the smell of the ocean nearby causing his heart to clench with homesickness. He was trapped, utterly trapped without any way to escape, cramped in this small orca tank with 3 bottle-nosed dolphins, always chattering about, chirping, and singing their stupid little songs. It was once more one of those nights where he would decent towards the bottom of the shallow tank, rolling himself into a ball to chip and clip away on his Tail fluke, there was nothing else to distract his mind, and if he were to attack the dolphins, oh no, the aliens would transfer him into an even smaller space. 

 

His eyes shifted towards the dolphins, silently smiling to himself as a memory came back into his mind. One of his fellow pod mates once said that dolphins are one of the most intelligent beings in the ocean, right after Aqrions, and yet, he found himself smirking at their stupidity. Just the thought of them dancing, singing, and twirling around for the entertainment of those aliens caused him to chuckle arrogantly. Yet, here he was, disobeying the orders of the humans, resulting in an undernourished body, while the dolphins were well-fed and happy. Perhaps, he was the stupid one?

 

Eventually, exhaustion claimed his body as he unconsciously rose up to the surface, his blowhole peeking out to nourish his brain with air. As Vessel opened up his eyes again he saw several aliens muttering around him, their little gross, coral-sized nubs touching and pulling on him.

 

In the tank nearby the dolphins were swimming around, performing their tricks for a whole pod of aliens, their chirps of excitement and greed seeping into Vessel's bones, agitating him even more. He felt the aliens tugging on him, covering the last stump on his left side with an icy cold device, its material sending unpleasant shivers down Vessel's spine, causing his body to tens up. He couldn’t even hear his own thoughts over the loud music of the dolphin's performance, all he knew was, that whenever one of those fragile little alien nubs came too close, he would try and bite them, chopping off their little sea pickle-sized stumps, or fingers, whatever they called it. He hated it, he hated every second of it. He never wanted to get captured by those freaks, and yet here he was, trapped in this cramped tank with those other creatures.

 

After a few agonizing minutes, they finally slipped on the device on Vessel’s nub, fastening the straps on his neck, back, and tail. But they weren’t done, oh no. One of them, someone Vessel was very upset with, was a young woman with black hair and a black swimming suit. She would visit him often, daily even, trying to make friends. Ugh, how much he hated humans. She always would come to him, call him over, and try to bribe him with those horrible-tasting sardines that the dolphins were so over the moon for. Vessel bit in the air, his body recoiling away from her as she approached him. The dragon's attention was fully on her, well, until a sneering, heart-shattering pain crushed over his body like a tsunami. 

 

A loud noise came from behind his body. It felt like taking the long pointy needles of those sea ​​urchins and ramming them into his tail. He squirmed in pain, trying to lash out, but the restraints on his body kept him from breaking free, from getting away, from fleeing, and from hiding. Eventually, the pain subsided as the woman injected something into his body, she really could have done that sooner. 

After a while, the aliens let go of his body. letting it glide back into the deeper region of the tank. Even though the pain wasn’t there anymore, it still lingered vividly in his mind, he could still feel the vibration of those things on the back of his tail. His body floated in the water, unable to move as his mind became hazy. his gaze locked onto the window, which would reflect his image back at him on this type of day, his eyes narrowed as he tried to move closer to it, trying to see his mirror image. He gasped out in disbelief as his gaze lingered on his reflection. It looked different than normal. 

 

He had something weird on his flipper now, a device with a green and red light that would sometimes blink, and that wasn’t all, he could see the the straps that strained against his body. If it wasn’t for the painkiller clouding his mind, he would think that the straps held the device in place. his eyes fluttered down towards the reflection of the tail, his tail-tip wasn’t chipped away anymore, and it looked even weirder now. There was something black attached to it, it nearly looked like a dolphin's tail fluke. Eventually, after a while, he slowly regained control over his body. He tried to use his muscles to swim, but his whole body ached resulting in strained groans. But eventually, he regained control over his body, and strangely enough, even considering all the pain he had just gone through, his swimming gradually improved, and he hated it.
Now he felt like he had to be grateful and nice towards those aliens just because they gave him a bit of quality of life.

 

After a few hours they introduced something new to the tank, Vessel didn’t know why they wouldn’t leave him in peace. As if the bottle-nosed dolphins weren’t annoying enough, they added a little weird Blue Tang into the tank. It swam around without any orientation, peaking Vessel’s interest as his hunting instincts kicked in, watching it with an intensity in his gaze that would have frightened any other living creature, and yet, the Blue Tang approached him, the most dangerous creature in this whole tank. Vessel’s eyes gleamed over towards the dolphins, for some reason they kept their distance this time, something about this small fish was weird, and not the ‘haha funny weird’, but the ‘I wouldn’t even eat that’ type of weird.

 

As days passed Vessel grew more and more agitated as the small Tang would follow him around, but just him, as if it was obsessed with him. Eventually, the aqrion thought it might be a cool idea to play with it, but not in a friendly kind of way. He would swoop up the small being and toss it over onto the rough dry surface of the marble stones that adorned the edge of the tank. Vessel peaked out of the water, watching it as it squirmed about, making weird buzzing sounds similar to his metallic flipper back when it would easily break upon Vessel slamming his body against the walls of the tank. He tilted his head upon the small fish, but yet, it seemed to be oddly resilient. Perhaps it wasn’t even alive in the first place? He quietly thought to himself.

 

At this point, Vessel found himself absolutely and utterly confused. Each time he tried to see something fun in his situation, stuff just became weirder and weirder.

 

>>I just wanna get back home…<< He eventually sighed as he turned around, his gaze lingering towards the seagulls hunting over the sea shores, listening to the wild orcas calling for their families in the distance. These were the only sounds that reminded him of his home.