Val lay across Tavras’s chest as he swam with her. In truth, this felt quite romantic especially given the way that he had helped her play with the dolphins just before. “That was really nice,” she had whispered to him, one corner of her lips moving against his chest like this.

“Was it?” he whispered back to her. His head lifted up to meet her eyes.

The hope still fluttered around in her heart that he would take the leap and initiate their first kiss.

All at once, Tavras dumped her to the side, causing her whole body to submerge beneath the water.

Val came back up, dripping wet and sputtering from shock. “What was that for?” Of course, she did not expect an answer, but she got one anyway.

Tavras laughed hard enough to make himself tear up. Did he really have to find that funny? He had ruined a perfectly good moment, turning it into the butt of a joke instead.

While he laughed, Val blinked partially unamused, but mostly peeved. Her eyes stung with every blink from the salt water that had gotten into her eyes.

Frankly, Tavras deserved to get wet too. Of all things, she called upon Divine Judgement for this purpose. Sure, she could just splash him with the strength of her enhanced body or use Mind Blast, but why settle for that when she could invoke her strongest power?

When her arm hit the ocean, water exploded outward to splatter Tavras in its full force. An onlooker might have thought a geyser had launched out of the ocean. Once the roar of this wave had quieted down, Tavras’s laughter could still be heard harder than ever.

“Oh, Val, trust me. You do not want to start a water fight with me, a god of water. I am the Sea Itself!”

A wall of water rose up behind Tavras, large enough to be classified as some kind of tsunami. The column blocked out the sun from view and casted a shadow over Val as its target.

“Crap.” She had nothing else to say for herself.

Her only hope: Tavras who had raised this wave still remained between it and Val. While he had battered himself with his own waves in the past, surely he would not do so a second time.

In the blink of an eye, Tavras merely ducked beneath the water and disappeared. This wave began its onslaught, heading straight for her. There went her only hope.

“Tavras!” she cried. “I give. I give!” Her words fell upon no other ears aside from Foofy’s back on the beach.

The wave crashed over her, throttling her and thrashing her across the sandbar closer to shore. She could not push herself to the surface despite her attempt to struggle against the pounding water. After a few moments of exhaustion, she submitted to the battering beneath this wave.

The dull sound of flowing water filled her ears. Somewhere on land, a yelp came from Foofy as he ran farther inland.

When she floated to the surface, Val coughed a few times and looked around. She needed to get sights on her target in order to get him back. If not for herself, Tavras needed to pay for having sent any water in Foofy’s direction.

There, she caught sight of him halfway to shore already. Tavras sloshed through the water, looking back to her and pointing. “I really got you,” he jeered.

Again, Val needed to hit him back with an equal punishment, so the power of Divine Judgement swelled within her once more. Admittedly though, she needed to deescalate the situation unless she wanted to turn this into a full-on fight. Therefore, she would satisfy herself with simply tackling him.

Her heels dug into the packed sand beneath her, and Val took off into a run. While her sprint may not have been as elegant as Tavras running on top of the water, she moved about as fast as that. It only took a second for her to tackle him and send them both toppling over into the surf.

Tavras fell back onto his butt, hands thrown back to catch himself. His shoulders and knees stuck up out of the water from where he sat.

Her hands landed next to his wrists, shoulders even with his. Her knees planted against the sand between his spread legs. Val found herself hovering immediately over top of Tavras. Her face had an inch of space away from his. Their eyes lined up perfectly, staring into each other’s and blinking.

“Why hello there, Val.”

“Hi,” she stammered back.

Likewise, the most miniscule amount of space also held between their bodies. If Val would let her legs and arms relax to the slightest degree, she could lay her body over his in this position. Before she could gather enough courage to even debate whether she should follow through with that fleeting thought, Tavras spoke up.

“Would you mind getting off of me now?”

“Oh, yes, of course.” Val sprang up, thereby sending some more water into Tavras’s face.

“And here I thought that we were done now.” Still sitting in the surf, he lunged forward and latched onto her wrist. By his hand, Tavras tugged her down to stare into his eyes. “Do you really want to continue?” The glint in his eyes told her that she would not want to continue by any means—or maybe she would.

An uneasy laugh prattled past her lips. “No, no. I’m sorry, Tavras. That one was an accident.”

“You’re lucky that I like water. That’s the only reason why I’m willing to forgive you.” Tavras made his voice sound overly strict, comically so to emphasize the way that he teased her.

Together, they made their way back to the beach. As soon as she had dry sand beneath her feet, Val collapsed back to lie down once more. “Ah, that was fun. A little tiring but refreshing. Thanks, Tavras.”

“Sure thing. I will leave you to yourself for a bit. Catch you later!” Without further ceremony, Tavras ran out to sea and disappeared once he reached water deep enough to swim.

Val continued to lay there on the beach. While things had not gone as well as they possibly could have between herself and Tavras, she felt very satisfied from the good fun that they had shared together. He certainly was a wildcard, she had to give him that.

Her head turned out to Foofy, who would now have her undivided attention on her day off.