[A cool hand touches his leg, and Sampo watches Gepard move away from him with an almost feverish rapture, like how penitent pilgrims gaze at relics of saints-- like he could burn his face into memory. Gepard even smiles at him like the statues of saints, his face beautiful and his smile a distant benediction. No pious man ever wanted to take an exalted saint's face in their hands and kiss them, probably, but Sampo never would've claimed to be one.]
[He'll find him again. If he can remember his face and that there are merfolk cities under the sea, he'll be able to find him.]
We will. You can count on it! [He tries to keep up the enthusiasm, but, well. It's hard when his lips are starting to get as blue as his hair.]
[The voices are getting closer now, close enough that Sampo can start to make out conversation, and Gepard's long, sleek body disappears into the surf. In the dim light, he vanishes into the dark water with ease, and Sampo wouldn't have been able to find him again even if he hadn't been freezing. It feels very lonely with him gone, with nothing else for Sampo to focus on but the unrelenting sound of the surf and the approaching voices and the way the cold keeps getting deeper into his bones.]
[A few minutes later, there's a shout from the boardwalk-- someone's spotted him, and soon there are a few people walking down onto the beach to have a better look at him. Someone touches his cheek-- a woman with grey-blue hair-- and recoils at how cold he is. She gives a few orders to the others, and they start to move him; someone wraps him in their coat, to try to warm him up a little. They don't try to make him walk, but carry him off the beach, and he tries to look out at the water for as long as he can for just one last glimpse of a lovely savior.]
[As he's carried-- and my, someone's massive to be able to carry him like a child-- the woman keeps talking about hypothermia, something about possible concussions, he stopped trying to stay awake once the ocean was no longer in sight.]
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2024-09-25 02:40 am (UTC)[He'll find him again. If he can remember his face and that there are merfolk cities under the sea, he'll be able to find him.]
We will. You can count on it! [He tries to keep up the enthusiasm, but, well. It's hard when his lips are starting to get as blue as his hair.]
[The voices are getting closer now, close enough that Sampo can start to make out conversation, and Gepard's long, sleek body disappears into the surf. In the dim light, he vanishes into the dark water with ease, and Sampo wouldn't have been able to find him again even if he hadn't been freezing. It feels very lonely with him gone, with nothing else for Sampo to focus on but the unrelenting sound of the surf and the approaching voices and the way the cold keeps getting deeper into his bones.]
[A few minutes later, there's a shout from the boardwalk-- someone's spotted him, and soon there are a few people walking down onto the beach to have a better look at him. Someone touches his cheek-- a woman with grey-blue hair-- and recoils at how cold he is. She gives a few orders to the others, and they start to move him; someone wraps him in their coat, to try to warm him up a little. They don't try to make him walk, but carry him off the beach, and he tries to look out at the water for as long as he can for just one last glimpse of a lovely savior.]
[As he's carried-- and my, someone's massive to be able to carry him like a child-- the woman keeps talking about hypothermia, something about possible concussions, he stopped trying to stay awake once the ocean was no longer in sight.]