–Love doesn’t knock on doors.-
Back in the Ocean, a deep sigh heaved through the whole undersea castle.
“Majesty, what’s wrong? You seem troubled” the little crab spoke.
“Ah~ Ohno-san~” the king sighed with his curly hair swinging softly in the streaming.
King Matsumoto felt that there was definitely something wrong with his daughter. He was used to her grumbling about how much the life undersea sucks and how awesome it must be to be able to walk and to live on land. As much as he loved to see his daughter smiling, it was unusual for her to be that dreamy all day long and to grin to herself in the manner she recently does. She didn’t even play her famous pranks on him, which was actually most suspicious.
“You know, Ohno-san, I think she’s in love.”
“EEEEEEH?!” Ohno had a queasy feeling about this.
“I wonder who he might be.” King Matsumoto said. The fact that his little, lovely daughter was grown up with all of a sudden, overwhelmed him with lots of bad feelings. Did he fail as a father? He remembered when she had been little and had that small coughing fit. Oh, how he had worried she was deadly sick and brought her straight to the emergency room, but fortunately, it had turned out to be just a small cold. He had watched after her when she had met up with boys of her class (no, he wasn’t ‘stalking’, he was ‘caring’) and had ended up hitting them up when they talked bad about his daughter.
Ohno didn’t want to know at all. Instead he thought of preparing the symphony for his own funeral if the king would really find out.
“I don’t think it is love.” Matsuken smirked (as much as a fish can smirk),”They say that girls become prettier when they really fall for someone. You’re still as plain as ever.”
“Uhun.” Was Nino’s only reply, not even turning at him and continuing to look out, fumbling dreamily with the anemones on the window sill.
“Matsuken, what do you think he might be doing right now?”
“Probably he rescues little tortoises in his pants.” Matsuken joked.
“Maybe he’s thinking about the sexy, mysterious lady who saved him. Hehehe”
“Which lady are you talking about? There was just you. C’mon, he doesn’t care as long as he’s alive.”
“I wonder which color his eyes might have.”
“Piercing green.”
“Ah, stop fooling around, fishy. His face was too pretty for having ugly eyes like that. I wonder if his injured leg is okay by now.”
“LEEGG??!!!”
Suddenly the door sprang open and the King fall headlong right into Nino’s room. Ohno behind him tried desperately to hide.
“DAD?!” Nino was furious and scared “Did you eavesdrop?”
Matsumoto hastily hid the spy snail under his brown hat he was wearing for (rather ineffective) disguise.
“No, I didn’t.” Her father said straight out.
“Of course you did or else you wouldn’t have barked in. Why do you always sneak around behind my back? Ever heard of the word ‘privacy’?”
“Nino-chan~ There’s no need to get mad of me. I do accept your privacy, you know, I even stopped reading your diary. You’re daddy’s only girl and I’m just worried about you!”
“You don’t need to! I can care about myself very well.”
The king was heavily hurt by the rejection of his beloved daughter. Deeply disappointed he started to poke Ohno. But then he seemed to remember something.
“Ah! Revisiting the topic again, what were you actually saying about ‘legs’?” Matsumoto stared at her, and oh, how he could stare! Those dark, sparkling eyes under the neatly plucked eyebrows were seriously no joke.
“Did I say ‘legs’? I, uhm, mean ‘hag’! Yes, hag! Those hags are pinching my cheeks too much! But it could also have been bags. I actually thought of getting a new one for Matsuken. What do you think about getting a new bag, Matsuken?” Nino tried to escape.
“No, you surely said ‘I wonder if his injured leg is okay by now.’” The king glanced at her furiously.
“So you DID eavesdrop! YOU’RE A LIAR, DADDY!”
“That’s not the point of our conversation! You went to the surface again, didn’t you?” He raised his voice in anger.
Nino didn’t see a chance to come out of this or redirect the talk on her father’s stalking.
“If I weren’t there, he would be dead by now!”
“Great! More food for my sharks and less die-offs of fish!”
That was just too cruel!
“How can you be so evil! I love him and I won’t give up on him, no matter what you say! I’ll go up and see him as much as I want to! I hate you, daddy! Being a princess sucks!” Nino snapped.
She grabbed the fish on his fins and stormed out of the room (“Hey, you- OUCH!”).
“NINORIELLE!!” Her father yelled in rage, but he only saw how his little, rebellious daughter went off without looking back. When his anger slowly sunk down he sighed tiredly “Oh, Ohno, what did I do wrong for her to grow up like this. She doesn’t know how dangerous the world up there really is. I’m worrie- Ohno?”
But the crab was gone.
Nino came up to the surface. She was at her favorite place from which she watched that handsome man sinking. The sun was shining. Normally Nino liked to be in the sun, enjoying the lights running into her body. It made her feel alive. But by now, she felt exhausted by the fight with her father, totally pissed and sad.
“Are you crazy, you stupid girl? You totally kinked my awesomely styled fins! That was hurting… Huh? What’s up with you? There’s water coming out of your eyes!“
Matsuken stopped his complaining when he saw that Nino was actually crying.
“I… stupid dad! I know that I will never meet him like that, but he doesn’t need to get that angry and keep on saying such vicious stuff! Ah, fishy~ I wish I were born as a human then I could walk on land and meet him.” She squeezed the fish to her chest.
Matsuken stopped complaining about his lack of breath, feeling pity for his best friend. Even though he knew he should better not tell her of the idea he had, he felt too miserable for her.
“I … I knew someone who might… be able to turn you into a human.” He said cautiously.
“Eeh?” Nino loosed the embrace and stared at him.
“He… She…. It’s a witch. Transsexual Johnny.”
“Transsexual? What was it before and what is it now?” She asked curiously.
“He’s female now. And you rather should react to that ‘witch’ part, not the ‘transsexual’ one.” Matsuken answered dryly. “However, I don’t think it would be a good idea to take you there. He.. she’s dangerous. Who knows what she will ask for her price. You should ask your father-“
“Nah, don’t talk, let’s go there! GO GO GO!” Nino pushed the little fish and despite his worries (and the regret that he started talking) he lead Nino to the witch’s cave.
The cave looked scary; the entrance was painted in a flashy pink and sparkling lamps in purple, rose and pink were put around it. The alley to the inside was embroidered with pink and pinker lights, throwing the purple wall in terrifying Hello Kitty-like formed shadows. On the side walls, there hung jardinières with even pinker anemones in them, and a smell of incense sticks mixed with aromatic candle crept to the outside.
Nino was indeed scared, but with the thought of being able to meet Sho, she swallowed her fear and swam into the transsexual cave, ignoring the protests of the little fish.
Nino went until the way ended in a huge hall. Its walls were covered by tall cupboards, each filled to the brim with bottles and boxes in various sizes and colors. In the middle of the hall, there was a table with an unusual ugly mermaid sitting behind it.
Johnny was scribbling something on some papers, when he looked up.
“Oh~ Welcome my Darling! I already expected you.”
Matsuken hid out of fear behind Nino’s back, who got rather suspicious at that, but maybe this person could really help him.
“You want to become human? Guess what! I’m able to make one of you. All you have to do is a small Audition.”
“Audition?”
“Yes. All you need to do for Johnny is to sing a little song and to do a back-flip.”
Nino beamed. If there was something she had confidence in, it were those two things. As soon Nino begun to sing, Johnny smirked and started to scribble again on a paper.
“You have a good singing voice” he remarked, “and you hit the notes perfectly. Johnny likes what he’s heard.”
The little mermaid knew that she was (awesomely) good at it but still took the praise smiling proudly.
“Here is my deal, Honey. I will make you a human. But you will only stay human if you get a kiss of true love before the sun sets at the evening of the 3rd day. Should you not be able to get the kiss, you’ll be transformed back into a mermaid. You’ll have to sing, dance and act for Johnny for…let’s say… the rest of your life. You’ll also probably be thrown into iced water from time to time. Johnny is a little masochist; I like torture people from time to time for my personal amusement.”
Nino narrowed his eyes, looking at the mermaid/man warily.
“Mh~ I don’t know. Risking my whole life for only 3 days being human... C’mon, Johnny-boy! You know that my voice is far more worth than that. Isn’t there something…”
Matsuken couldn’t believe that she actually tried bargain about it. She always has been stingy, but he thought there was a limit.
“Hun Hun. You try to go for it Sweetie-pie, huh?” the witch smirked.
“Of course, I have to take out all I can get.” Nino smirked back.
“Haha, Johnny likes your power. But hypnosis act is all I can give you extra.”
“I call it a deal.”
Johnny started again to scribble on the paper and shoved it with the pen to Nino.
“Just sign and you’ll become a human.”
Even though Nino seemed rather confident, she was scared. She wondered, if it was right to trust the witch. The little mermaid took the pen with slightly shaking hands, gulped once and holding her breath, she wrote her name in scrawly fonts under the contract.
As soon as she finished the last stroke, the contact flashed in a horrible pink and divided into two. “One copy for me and one copy for you. That you don’t forget.”
Nino took the magically self-folding contract into her hands. Johnny reached her a little bright pink bottle, a heart formed on the cork of it.
“Swim to land and drink this.” He instructed, “You will become a human then. But hurry, the first day dawned already.”
The little mermaid pressed the bottle in her hand and swam out of the cave as fast as she could. Her thoughts were all about her becoming finally human, that she didn’t hear Johnny’s evil laughter echoing from the Hello-Kitty decorated walls of the cave.
Arriving at the beach where she brought her beloved one to, she stared at the little bottle and gathered all her courage to drink the content.
“Nino, I’m begging you: Don’t do it! You don’t know what will happen! What if the witch tricked you?” Matsuken warned her.
“I have no choice, fish! I already signed the contract and if I don’t do it I’ll probably be a mermaid for the rest of my life!” Nino opened the bottle. She closed her eyes and gulped the drink down.
“Buah~ Tastes awful!” she complained.
Suddenly, she felt her throat burning, a fire running down into her stomach. A felling of vomit came over her, when she started feeling dizzy. Nino started to cry in ache when a pain spread in all her limbs and it felt as if her body was about to be ripped into pieces. It went white in front of her shut squeezed eyes before she lost her conscience.
Nino felt her conscience coming back slowly to Matsuken’s desperate call of her name. So she was not dead, but her conscience still refused to come back fully until she heard a familiar voice that she allocated to be Ohno’s.
“So here you are, I sear- OH MY- !”
