Your human keeper that you kinda like.....?!

(Quick note: I know one of the tags is monsterfucker but that's not really right, not that I care about y'all kinky stuff, just the size difference makes ts a little difficult 💔) It was Zain's first night working at the aquarium.

The job itself wasn't particularly complicated. He was a night janitor, which mostly meant cleaning corridors, maintaining the exhibits, taking care of spills, and helping with the less glamorous parts of aquarium maintenance.

Unfortunately, his first shift came with one particularly unpleasant assignment.

The largest tank in the entire facility.

The aquarium had a massive underwater viewing tunnel running through the tank, one of the main attractions for visitors during the day. The tunnel was relatively narrow, with curved reinforced walls and a transparent ceiling that allowed visitors to walk directly beneath the enormous expanse of water.

At night, though, there was nobody around.

Except Zain.

The aquarium didn't shut the tank's lights off completely after closing. They were simply dimmed, leaving the water illuminated by a soft, muted glow. It was dark enough to give the tunnel an eerie, almost peaceful atmosphere, but still bright enough for the night staff to see clearly.

And, unfortunately, that meant the creature could see them too.

Zain was currently halfway through cleaning the tunnel.

He had a mop in one hand and a bucket beside him, quietly trying to convince himself that this was a completely normal job.

It wasn't.

Not when the aquarium's most dangerous resident lived in the enormous tank surrounding the tunnel.

His coworkers had already given him plenty of warnings.

"Don't worry," one had said. "It usually ignores the staff."

"Usually?" Zain had repeated.

Another coworker had laughed and told him that the creature liked watching new employees panic.

Someone else claimed it could recognize individual people.

Someone else claimed it had once attacked a cleaner.

Zain had eventually figured out that most of these stories were complete bullshit.

Probably.

He dragged the mop across the floor and glanced upward.

The dim tank lights cast soft patterns through the water above him, making the shadows move gently across the curved glass.

Nothing.

Just dark blue water and the faint glow of the tank lights.

He looked back down and continued cleaning.

A few seconds later, he glanced upward again.

Still nothing.

"...Okay."

He sighed.

"Stop being paranoid."

He kept working.

Then, without really thinking about it, Zain looked upward one more time.

His entire expression changed.

Something enormous was moving through the water above him.

Slowly.

Silently.

The dim lighting made its silhouette seem even larger as it passed through the illuminated water.

The sheer scale of it made Zain instinctively freeze.

He could see only parts of the creature at first as it passed over the transparent tunnel, but even those were enough to remind him just how ridiculously large it was.

One clawed hand drifted into view.

Zain stared.

Its fist alone was roughly a quarter of his height.

"...Holy shit."

He immediately looked around.

Nobody.

Good.

He looked back up.

The monster was still there.

And, despite every survival instinct telling him not to stare, Zain couldn't help himself.

He stood there with the mop still in his hand, quietly watching the creature move above him.

He was terrified.

But he was also fascinated.

He knew absolutely nothing about monsters. He didn't know what half of its anatomy was for, what it was thinking, or even what was considered normal behavior for its species.

And now he was standing inside its tank.

Or, technically, underneath it.

Zain slowly returned to cleaning, pretending he hadn't spent the last several minutes staring.

Every few seconds, though, his eyes wandered back toward the ceiling.

"...I'm definitely getting caught doing this eventually."