PDARPG Boss Fight Entries: Laguna 15: How to be a Merfolk (Prompt 7)

“Welcome to Merfolk Flipper Camp!”

 

“Shouldn’t it be ‘boot camp’?”

 

“You try putting boots on fish tails.”

 

Dee looked out across the coral plain at his new students: A few faces he recognised, but most were completely new. The number of portal-hoppers trying out a day in the life of a merfolk had really gone up lately, it seemed, following the stabilisation of the main Lost Songs portal.

 

“Now, getting your tail is one thing; using it effectively is another. By the end of this camp, you should know the difference between pitch, roll, and yaw, how to tell up from down, and which fin to raise when.”

 

Eltanin raised his finned hand.

 

“Yes, captain?”

 

“Yeah, ahh… why are you, a surface-dweller, teaching us how to be merfolk?”

 

“I have a very particular set of skills. No other questions?” Dee’s eyes skimmed right over Eltanin waving his arm about for what was no doubt a second inane query. “Good. Let’s start.”

 

The students split off into smaller groups, practising swimming through the miniature obstacle course Dee had marked out between the corals with kelp flags. Once Eltanin had gotten the hang of moving his tail to build momentum, his fin-wings made short work of the short stretches and generous turning angles. He swept through the course while some of the others were still rotating in circles, then doubled back to check on the two others in his group.

 

“I think I’m starting to get it.” This was some sort of dapper-dressed bird humanoid in a beaked mask. His tail was vaguely truncate– or wedge-shaped, as it’d be called up on the surface– a good, general-use variant. “Why do you need a merfolk tail anyway, Bodhi? Can’t you already swim?”

 

“Sure, bro, but it’s always good to try new things, y’know? See life from the other side of a fish tail.” To emphasise this, the sea otter did a quick backflip on his short, broad carp tail. Now that was a shape built for maneuverability and short bursts of speed. On spotting Eltanin, he added, “Got any tips for us, pro-bro?”

 

“Think of the water as your ally, not something to fight against; it supports your weight from below, so you can expend all your energy moving forward instead.”

 

Admittedly, it was hard to explain three-dimensional space to non-flying folks. They so often thought of movement as left, right, forward and back, while in the air or water you had the additional cardinals of up, down, and even upside-down to mix things up.

 

“Instead of moving your fins to stay in place, relax your posture, like this.” He curled his tail back in a sort of inverted question mark, holding his wings out perpendicular to his body in a sort of underwater variant of a hover. “And let the water do the work for you.”

 

The next few minutes consisted of Bertrand unlearning the concept of gravity and Bodhi learning to use his caudal fins instead of doggy-paddling with his arms.

 

“Ah, so the tail goes… I see. And to stay in place… right!”

 

“Duuude,” Bodhi said. “This is so much easier than treading water.”

 

“Merfolk!” Dee’s voice boomed out, whale-like in volume and timbre, across the coral field. “Five more minutes, and then we’ll move on to the timed course. There’s prizes for the first three to cross the line! Except you, Eltanin. You clearly skipped a few grades. You sure you haven’t done this before?”

 

“Swimming’s just underwater flying, sir. Once you get used to the weight of the water, the basic theory’s the same.”

“Well, Laguna chose your merfolk form well, then. Still disqualified.”

 

“Aww."