At midnight, Cetas stood in front of the wooden railings near the infirmary. The soft lunar rays basked Cetas' onyx scales, reflecting a slight radiance.
Even though he looked better than days prior, the doctor, Jones, still advised him to rest his body and take the medications that he prescribed.
It took a long time of understanding but in the end, Cetas got the message.
Now that I think about it, my stomach feels kind of weird. Cetas complained while massaging his stomach.
With a deep breath, he leaned forward and gazed far above the skies - admiring the stars from within.
It looked beautiful.
He did not know how much time he would spend on the surface but he felt like he needed to treasure every second of it. His skin was washed by the familiar feeling of cold nightly winds. Thinking back, he felt those very winds this morning when he was trying to climb up the door. Could it just be his unfamiliarity to the surface?
He did not know.
He knew nothing at all. Not of his identity. Not of his origin. Not of his memories.
Nothing.
In the tranquil sea of stars, it was a perfect time to reminisce. Yet, Cetas had no memories to reminisce from, he had but mere fractions of who he was but those were fragmented.
He could not see the bigger picture.
Even if he did, Cetas would be foreign to them - only sensing his instincts as his body and mind once experienced.
At least the stars are beautiful. Cetas sighed and remained in admiration.
Sensing a familiar scenery, a sudden gust of wind blew his dark-blue hair and brushed through his skin. Along with it, came the golden blonde-haired Skadi, wearing a white nightgown that stretched below her knees. With one glance, one could not tell that the woman was in her 40s.
"You really do admire the stars.."
Cetas could not understand her words so he remained perplexed and stared at her in confusion.
The two stood in silence, in awe, and in admiration of the blinking stars above.
The tranquil silence was only broken when Skadi let out her soft yet imposing voice, "Shall I teach you a word? You seem to have a knack for it. See this?"
She raised her left arm and curled his fist into a ball. Then, after doing so, she opened it up back again and pointed at it using her left hand.
"Haa...nnd.."
Skadi made sure to slow her words in order for the boy in front of her to understand. In her mind, he seemed like he could understand quickly - like he has potential for fast growth. It was not easy learning a language at all even for Skadi.
At a young age, she was forced to learn 5 common languages from each of the continents in the world.
Namely: Heliosian, Verdigin, Fantasia, Modern Sylis, and the hardest out of the five, Neron.
Of course, as she grew up, she learned more languages mostly from minor branches of the 5 continents. But, Skadi was interested in the languages of the other race. So, she spent almost her entire life learning about all of them. As she neared her 30s, she had already mastered Seafolk, Aetherian, (add.
Now, never in her life would she think that she would meet a depth-dweller! No one even knew their ancient name. The long-forgotten race was only told in fables, folklore, children stories, and a few other tales.
That being said, she was surprised by Cetas, who spoke words in perfect Northern Heliosian. It was easy to imitate words of course, but when you have been exposed to a singular tongue, then it would take a considerable amount of time until you can't master an accent or tone.
Unless he is a blank slate.. Skadi murmured to herself.
She repeatedly pointed at her hand and slowly spoke in order for Cetas to understand.
Within 34 seconds, Cetas began to understand and repeated the words coming out of Skadi's mouth.
"Ha..nnnd?"
Skadi nodded multiple times.
"Handd?"
Already?! Even I could not imitate a perfect accent like that when I was a child! I don't think I can do that even at my age right now! Skadi was immediately surprised. In his second pronunciation, Cetas had already nailed the word, its pronunciation, and her accent.
"Hand..", Cetas stared at his fingers and examined his hand.
So this is called hand in surface-dweller language? Cetas understood and then gestured to Skadi to give him more words.
Skadi, who took a few minutes to comprehend his body and sign language, pointed to the next word that she could think off - that being her fingers. She figured that they needed to start small before he could understand other complexities.
She figured that before Cetas met the Historian, she would prepare vocabulary so that he could formulate even the simplest of sentences. Of course, she had no doubts that the Historian probably knew how to speak in depth-dweller language but it was still better to learn from here and then. It was only through familiarisation that one could rapidly enhance their growth.
So, for an hour or two, Skadi would teach Cetas a few simple words that could be attributed to objects and body parts.
*
At 9 in the morning or as one would call it, 9 Sol, Cetas parted his eyelids and woke up peacefully. He remembered last night where he familiarized himself with various words. To his amazement, understanding surface language was easier than he thought it would be, especially since he comes from a different race altogether.
He opened his mouth and repeated a couple kf words that he remembered, "Hand, finger, leg, eye, wood, ship, hair, leg, clothes, night, monster..."
He continued naming a few words for a couple of moments. Although, there were probably some words that he had misinterpreted due to the lack of comprehension. For example, the word clothes, he had mistaken them for the nightgown. It was correct of course that the nightgown was a piece of clothing. But, it had a more specific term to it, that being the word "nightgown".
Cetas sat uptight and removed the white sheets from his body. It was only last night that he learned that this thin piece of cloth could protect his body from the cold!
After doing so, he placed his bare feet on the wooden floor, feeling its rough texture. As he walked past the multiple white sheet beds, he met the imposing door once more. It took him a couple of seconds to figure out where the door handle was but when he did, he instinctively twisted his wrist with the door making a satisfying click.
Upon exiting the infirmary, Cetas was quickly greeted by a warm ray of light. It was still unusual to him but Cetas decided to bask himself underneath the sunlight, walking quickly and heading towards the shade as he did not want his skin to get burned.
Down at the main deck, Cetas saw the all-familiar auburn-haired girl, who was busy slicing up a tentacle from the octopus yesterday.
She felt Cetas' gaze and stared back at him. Then, a wide grin formed on her face and she waved the sharp-bloodied knife on her right hand.
"There he is! You're awake!"
Cetas could not understand but he concluded that it was some sort of greeting. So, he waved his left hand in return.
The auburn-haired girl was delighted. If it were not for the blood covering her face and body, she would've looked pretty. But as of right now, she looked like a serial killer going crazy.
After that, Cetas descended down the stairs, and moved closer to the edge of the ship. He stared at the cascading waves, crashing towards the ship's side.
"Everyone!", suddenly Cetas heard a familiar soft yet imposing voice.
"We should be out of the Poseidon Depths in a few hours. From then on, it would take 5-7 days to reach Helios. Still, stay vigilant for any dangers. I'll keep looking out and extend my senses from above. If anyone sees or feels that something is wrong, tell me. I'll be up there.", Skadi pointed her fingers up, in the direction of the nest.
"Aye!"
With her declaration finished, everyone went back to their respective work.
Elishia kept cutting the tentacles of the large octopus. Reid was in the corner sharpening his blade. Jones was nowhere to be found as he's probably deeper in the ship and doing some alchemy. And lastly, Galkan was doing some blacksmithing.
Out of all of them, it seemed that Cetas was most interested with Galkan's smithing. Therefore, Cetas moved towards the direction of the bulky man in curiosity. However, before he could even fully arrive at his location, Cetas smelled something peculiar. It was the smell of something similar to wood, almost similar to surface dwellers but different.
Cetas turned his head east, his body tensing up due to the sudden shift in atmosphere. It seemed too quiet.. especially when they are located in the Poseidon Depths. His instincts told him to swim away!
Suddenly he saw a figure, not on the surface of the horizon.. but below! His eyes, already used to the consistency of sea water, could see much better when underneath. Although Cetas was not underwater right now, he could still fare his eyes well and could sometimes see creatures down below swimming and thriving.
Cetas looked up, hoping that Skadi noticed the figure but to his disbelief, the captain had not uttered a single word.
He stared back east, now noticing that the figure had gotten larger - it had become closer!
His eyes searched around the ship, looking for an individual closest to him. Determining that Galkan was the nearest, he quickly paced his steps and spoke in the language of depth-dwellers, "There is a figure in the distance! Warn everyone! Warn Skadi!"
Galkan only understood one word, that being the last in the sentence, Skadi.
"Skadi? What about her? She's up there", Galkan pointed upwards at the nest. Cetas repeated his words but the red-haired Galkan could not understand.
Taking a step back, Cetas reassessed his tongue and spoke in a different language. This time, he remembered the words that he had been familiarized with.
"Mon..s-"
"Hmm?"
"Mon..ster! Monster!", in perfect Northern Heliosian, Cetas pointed towards the east where nothing could be seen!
The other crew members stared at Cetas in bewilderment.
Galkan's eyes widened and his head turned towards the direction where Cetas' fingers were pointing at. Then, he squinted his eyes and looked dumbstruck, "There's nothing the-".
Before he could finish his words, Skadi, who was watching the commotion caused by Cetas, quickly yelled out:
"Galkan!"
As if something inside him was activated, Galkan stood up and ran towards the ship's helm.
Skadi floated down slowly and landed in front of Cetas, who was looking east with a fear-stricken face.
"Where?"
Hearing the familiar voice, Cetas shifted his head forward and stared up to match Skadi's face.
"Tell me."
Although he could not comprehend her words, he understood it. Cetas pointed east. First, his fingers were aimed at the empty horizon but then, he slowly moved his arm downward, pointing at the ocean.
Skadi could not see what was below due to the sunlight reflecting in the water. But, she trusted the boy's words, "Okay."