Chapter Sixteen

I'm…I'm a fish.

Mer-person.

Mermaid.

Whatever variation I tried to say in my head did nothing to help the reality of the situation. The tail was glorious, unlike any fish I'd seen. The truncate fluke was the width of my shoulders and flowed through the water with small crowns protuberances like the tail of a betta fish. Additional dorsal fins sprouted from my hips and calves, designed to blend in with swaying kelp and deep-sea shadows, but also to propel me through the water. I'd studied predator fish before, silent, deadly hunters who stalked their prey for hours until the opportune moment presented itself to go in for the kill. And this tail was designed for just that, the swirling black patterns doubling as camouflage, but when caught in the sunlight, they shone with the morbid vibrancy of an oil slick. I tentatively moved what used to be my legs, finding that the muscles were similar, just fused into one, larger limb. It responded instantly, and I yelped as I shot back faster than I'd expected, my back colliding with the stone wall of the pool.

"Maren!"Kai's voice shouted down our bond. He was beside me in a blink. "Are you alright?"

A hysterical laugh bubbled out of me, as actual bubbles traveled up to the surface, "Am I alright?!" I cried shrilly.

I pushed away from him, the momentum forcing us apart, though I didn"t hit anything this time. My head burst from the water, but unlike Ariel, whose hair didn't obey the laws of physics, mine plastered to my face in inky rivers. I pushed the strands aside, and they slipped through the webbing between my fingers.

"This is not happening, this can't be happening." I examined my fingers, the scales smattering my arms and the curves of my breasts. I gently touched a gill on the side of my neck and flinched when it fluttered close, like a reflex I didn't know I had.

Kai surfaced beside me, enough space between us so my tail could keep me above water without bumping into his. My shock was subsiding into cold fury, and I turned it onto him.

My glare was enough to make him wince, "I can explain."

"You fucking better."

He began floating back and forth across the width of the pool, the merman version of pacing. "Even from our initial introduction, I knew you weren't like the others when my glamour didn't work on you."

"You tried to use it on me?" It made sense, there was a certain allure that made it hard to look away, but I'd equated it to shock.

"I was desperate to get out of there. I would've done anything."

"I know." I said, my mind racing to connect the dots and ignore my present situation. An ‘out of body feeling' would have been a gross understatement. "Is that what you meant when you told me I shouldn't have understood what you said to Dennis?"

"Yes. I don't know what sparked the recognition in your subconscious, or what's since suppressed it, but you heard the language of the merfolk. I'm speaking it now."

"You are?" I listened closely, but all that came through was English.

"Do you recall the night you jumped into the tank?"

That wasn't a night I would ever forget. If I closed my eyes, I could still picture that first, intoxicating kiss. "Of course."

"I couldn't believe you came after me. I thought humans were selfish creatures, but you jumped in without a second thought, even after I told you to go. Then the hatch closed, and you started to drown. I knew there was no other way to get you out, so I…" He sighed, running a hand over his damp locks, they fell into his eyes as he looked back at me, whatever memory he had of that night haunting him. "I thought you were human, but I still couldn't…"

"What did you do, Kai?"

"My people call it a soul exchange. It transfers a singular piece of one soul and fuses it to the other, linking the two on an unbreakable level. With it, we share not only strength, but certain abilities..."

I thought there was something supernaturally intense about that kiss, not to mention the brief moments after when I could breathe underwater. A part of me thought I'd hallucinated that bit from lack of oxygen.

"You didn't leave that night," I remembered.

He nodded. "I had to make sure you would survive. I didn't know what or how it would manifest," He bit the side of his lip, shaking his head. "I thought Cee was going to bite my head off when she saw the state I returned you in."

My eyebrows shot up, "Made sure I would survive?" I repeated, my tail flicking in indignation. "For a merman who knows several languages, you're really fucking up this explanation."

"Little star," he sighed, like I was missing the most obvious point in the world.

"Don't call me that!"

His eyes flashed, "You can't honestly tell me that you, of all people, haven't thought about the possibility yourself. You understood me in that tank, you felt the pain ravaging my body, you speak to my mind, and most telling, you survived. A soul exchange is nearly fatal to humans. It strips them of their faculties, drives them to madness. You saw but a fraction of it in those scientists, but a direct exchange does much more damage. The human loses pieces of themselves that are rarely recovered. Only someone with our blood can survive it."

I tensed, my synapses firing at lightning speed. It made sense, why I'd been drawn to the sea on more than just an intellectual level. Why I understood the needs of its creatures better than even modern science could comprehend, and the many times they understood me. My ritualistic need for morning swims, the need to lose myself beneath the waves, only quelled by my desire to help Kai. Even my relentless urge to get into the lab, one that went beyond research and sticking it to Dennis, an instinct that went against every logical reason of why I shouldn't set him free.

It made sense, terribly cruel sense.

"I told you once there were merfolk who would return with stories from their time on land?" he asked gently, but the tone of his voice did nothing to stop the bombshell from dropping.

"It's not possible," I whispered, despite the fact that my tail swaying through the man-made current was all the proof I needed. I swallowed hard. "Where is she?"

"I don't know," he said. "Merfolk tribes are nomadic, and we don't always travel together. I only met your mother briefly in these waters, several years ago."

That timeline stuck in my mind. Dad's accident…

"You said this soul exchange is fatal to humans?" I asked slowly. "Or it drives them mad?"

"Usually," Kai said, picking up on my thoughts as he always did. "I don't know if she truly meant to use it on him…"

"You're seriously telling me that she's responsible?!" As if I couldn"t hate the bitch more. "What on earth, in the goddamn seven seas, would possess her to do that to someone she supposedly loved?!"

"I don't know," Kai whispered. "I did my best to reverse the damage."

"What did you do to him?" I snapped.

"Built a block to the glamour in his mind. It will keep the memories from overtaking him, though they may occasionally rise to the surface. He will have to remain strong to fight them off."

I shook my head in disgust. "How could she do that to him?"

"Perhaps she didn't have a choice. You said his boat sank, maybe she was trying to protect him."

I glared at Kai, "And you? What were you protecting? You said you weren't sure I was more than human until recently. You just wanted to get out of that damned tank!"

"You were drowning Maren!" he shouted. "I told you to leave me."

"That's your excuse?!" I screeched. "I'm a fish, Kai!"

"Mermaid," Kai said slowly, "and you always have been. The exchange sped up the process, as did our…physical joining. You can change back as I can."

"Why?" I asked. But I kept going, spilling out all the things on my mind, I couldn't stop it. "You didn't know what your powers would do to me. How do you know your glamour, your siren song, whatever the hell you call it, didn't lure me into helping you?" I recognized that I sounded more like a crazy conspiracy theorist than a scientist. I didn't care, "How do I know this wasn't all part of some revenge you concocted against humans? Or to satisfy your own curiosity and see if someone like me could even make the change?"

"Our powers don't work on other merfolk." he argued.

"I'm not a mermaid!" I screamed, even as my tail swished in protest. "I've swam in the ocean my whole life, with two legs! I was normal until I met you!"

"You were never normal, Maren." Each of his words punctuated my mounting anger. I wanted to slap him.

"This whole time, you were using me. How can you claim that any of this was for my benefit when you never felt the same!"

I was falling, I could feel it, and there was nothing to hold onto. Not until Kai grabbed my shoulders, forcing me to look at him. The anxiety fizzled like sparklers. I tried to squirm away, but he held firm. His eyes burned into me, the hard set of his jaw like a stoic mercenary.

"Every waking moment you consume me, every night you sing in my dreams, and when I wake without you beside me, it is to aching loneliness and maddening pain that is worse than any torture I have endured. Lungs or gills, I cannot breathe without you beside me. If anyone has lured me in, it's you. You've utterly ensnared me, I cannot exist without you. I would rip my own damned heart from my chest if you asked because it belongs only to you," He cupped my face, stroking my cheek with his thumb. "I love you, Maren."

He kissed me then, his lips demanding against mine, trying to convey the words into physical action. I was still spinning from his confession. It was circling around me like a whirlpool ready to swallow me whole.

But it wasn't real.

"Mmf- wait," I said around his mouth, pushing back until there was a comfortable amount of space between us, though I didn't know what that was. Just being on the same planet as him felt too close, especially when I felt my tail stirring, trying to wrap itself around his waist of its own accord.

"Maren—"

"Stop," I cut him off. "Just…I- I can't do this right now. It's too much." I breathed. Swimming over to the edge of the pool, I hoisted myself out of the water, rolling onto the sunnier portion of the patio. In his urgency to trigger my shift, Kai hadn't grabbed towels.

The awkward waiting period of Kai studying me while I stared at the cloudless sky didn't last long. There was a tingling sensation where my fluke was, like it had fallen asleep and now blood was beginning to flow back in. There was an uncomfortable hitch in my breathing as the gill flaps closed and melded into my skin, then the tingling intensified to the pain I'd felt in the ballroom. Only this time, I didn't lose control of my mind, which made the experience about a thousand times worse.

How the hell did Kai do this so often?It was worse than when I broke my ankle in middle school, or when I'd dislocated my shoulder in a surfing wipeout. Hell, it was more painful than period cramps!

I bit into my bottom lip hard enough to draw blood. It was pain on top of pain, but it kept me from crying out and alerting neighbors to call the cops on what probably would sound like a murder.

I could see Kai hovering near the edge of the pool, ready to pull himself out and help me. But the glare I gave him- one that would've definitely killed him if I had powers- had him staying put.

Oh, fuck. Did I have powers?

The thought came and went as my tail split with the sound of tearing velcro, and the dark scales began to pop off, some sinking into my skin. The color was different from Kai's, but if anything he'd ever told me was true, color was genetic as opposed to transferred, meaning I got it from her.

Once my bones ground into their usual shape, I struggled to my feet, panting hard. I braced my hands on my knees, trying to keep my center of gravity lest I tumbled back into the pool and had to start over.

"It will get easier," Kai assured me. He was at the edge of the pool, watching my every move like I was a predator about to strike. "Especially when you're in the ocean."

I shook my head, unsure of what else to say. Can I trust anything he's told me? I found my clothes at the threshold of the balcony doors to the ballroom, and hurried to change, noting with a grimace that my shirt was now a shredded crop top. I saw him lifting himself up when I came back.

"Don't," I said sharply, holding a hand towards him. He lowered an inch.

"Maren, we aren't finished talking. You need to—"

"Stay away from me." I seethed, watching as he flinched. Good. I hoped the words stung, it was far less than what he deserved, "I need time to think without you messing with my head."

"Maren—"

"Kai, I swear to whatever Gods you pray to that I will castrate you and chuck your severed parts into the ocean if you even think about following me right now."

The threat was enough to keep him safely in the water, and I made my escape before he realized I would never follow through on it.

I slammed the gate shut, heading towards the beach. Tears flowed down my eyes as I ran, a hysterical giggle bubbling from my mouth when I thought about my own tears triggering a transformation. They dried on my cheeks without incident.

Halfway down to the water, my toe knocked into a piece of driftwood, sending me tumbling. I spit out a mouthful of sand, wiping the grain away with the back of my hand. I reached out to the water to clean myself off, then recoiled. I didn't know how much water it would take to trigger a shift, but I didn't want to take any chances. I couldn't stop shaking, but I didn't know what to do other than to keep moving. Falling back on old methods, I was running away again.

The sun was overhead, shining its ethereal light on the rippling surface of the sea. The waves rolled over the shore like a serene blanket. Any other time I would swim to calm my nerves, but the ocean could do nothing to soothe me now. Sadness, anger, confusion; I couldn"t pinpoint any one particular reaction to lean on, so I just stood there, close enough to feel the tiniest spray of salt as the tide approached and receded, which came with the urge to dive in. But not just to swim, to disappear, far below to the depths, to leave the surface and never return.

I cried out, picking up the closest thing near my feet, a stone, and chucked it into the ocean. It wasn't nearly enough to satisfy the despair blooming in the pit of my chest. There wasn't anything that could. I was angry at my mother, betrayed by Kai, in shock from my transformation, and unsure of what to make of everything he had told me.

If any of what he claimed about this soul exchange nonsense was true, it had to be that bond influencing his feelings. His declaration of love was nothing more than a side effect of whatever he'd done the night I'd rescued him. He wasn't staying, not with the ocean pulling him back by his tailfin. I could feel it now, and it may not even be a fraction of what he felt since I was half- human. But I had felt him. The strange dreams, the bloodlust, the words and emotions that pierced my mind whenever I'd been near the aquarium, the night I'd taken his pain in as my own. The other side of my nature had been sensing him like a homing beacon long before we ever met.

I picked up a stick poking out of a small dune and hurled it out to sea. The resounding splash satisfied me for a nanosecond, then I bent down to hunt for something heavier. I shouted again, my voice raw, and I flung the stone as far as I could. When I crouched again I heard footsteps approaching from behind me. If it was Kai, I'd chuck the next rock at his head.

I swerved, rock at my side just in case it wasn't him I knew Cee was probably pissed at me for ditching her, and worried about my sanity. It would do nothing to ease her fears if she saw a rock-slinging banshee in place of her best friend. But the stone slipped from and fell back to the sand with a soft plop when I saw who was standing there.

"Dad, what are you doing out here?" I said. And how much of that did you see?

"I was on a rather pleasant stroll when I saw this brazen hellion flinging rocks into the water," he chuckled. He was dressed in his usual attire post-breakdown, loose pants and a button-down shirt. His feet were bare, the sand shifted around the soles as he wiggled his toes. "Mind your aim, you might rile up the merfolk."

"Too late," I said without thinking, then winced, watching his reaction.

His face fell, assessing me in a different light. "Oh, Starfish," He held his arms out for me, and I went into them, letting him rock me back and forth. He pulled back after a few minutes, then jerked his head. "C'mon, let's get you home." I took the arm he offered, and we started the trek back to the house.

"Did you know?" I asked when I couldn't bear the silence anymore. "What he was?"

He nodded solemnly, a shadow falling across his face. "The eyes…they are unmistakable. Eyes of the sea."

I'd never noticed how similar my eyes were to Kai's. To me, they'd always reminded me of my mother, the main reason I hated looking in the mirror. "And me? How could you not tell me?" And cue the waterworks. I think I"d cried more in the past few weeks than I in my entire life. My emotional stability wouldn't win me any awards.

"You were safer this way. You only have one foot in that world, which Marianna told me wasn't enough for you to develop powers anyways."

I started to tell him just how wrong his theory on that was, when he said softly. "Your mother named you, you know."

"My mom named me Starfish?" I said deadpan.

He smiled, "No, that was my nickname, and she'd get that same look on her face when I called you that. Your given name, Maren, in both worlds it means the star of the sea."

Little star.

No, don't think about him.If I thought about Kai, then I would miss him, and I was supposed to be mad at him.

"If you think the stars are far now, consider how you may feel living leagues under the water. But they represent hope and light for merfolk and the humans who use them as guides, and like us, they make wishes upon the ones that fall from the heavens. One such star fell the moment you were born, and that was that. She promised to tell you everything one day, about her people, your heritage. You are a bridge between worlds, raised as a human, but no one could pull you from the water. You won't remember, but our move from Florida was hardest on you, especially when we drove through the desert. It was like you feared you'd never see the ocean again." he chuckled. "I'd like to think that obsession came from me."

"I think I got my stubbornness from you."

"Touché, but your mother was more stubborn than a bull shark. There wasn't anything she wouldn't do once her mind was made up."

I swallowed, my feet slowly dredging through the soft sand. "Why did she leave? If she really loved you, loved…me. Why did she go?"

He paused at the base of the back steps, turning us around. I always thought the water looked particularly endless from this angle, stretching out into a wide, blue infinity. "The sea is a powerful force," he said softly. "The only thing that can match it in its intensity is love. She loved you so much Maren, and I'd like to think she was happy here, that I made her happy."

"I know you did,"

"But first and foremost, she is a part of the sea," His expression darkened. "And humans have proven just how cruel they can be towards what they don"t understand. I truly believe that everything she did was to protect us."

"You found her, didn't you? The night of the accident…"

He smiled wryly. "You cannot blame yourself for my mistake, Maren. I ran off in the middle of the night, half-cocked on a flimsy theory. It was my own choices that landed me here."

"But it wasn't flimsy."

His eyes clouded, and I held my breath, waiting for the madness to kick in, but he was lucid when he spoke, "I had her back for a moment. One glorious moment. Then something hit the boat, and it capsized. I was stuck, drowning…Ironheart was there, there was something…" he shook his head. "Sorry, lost my train of thought again."

My heart ached for him. There was so much more I wanted to ask him, but I didn"t want to push whatever mental bandage Kai had put on his psyche. I shivered and he then noticed my ripped shirt. He shrugged out of his button down and wrapped it around my shoulders. It went down to my knees, but it was much warmer, and I nodded gratefully.

We looked towards the horizon, and I searched like I was expecting to see my mother pop out of the water and wave to us. Had she ever seen me while I was swimming, watching me from afar?

Was she proud of me?

I didn't know why I cared. I'd spent most of my life hating the woman for leaving us, but the thought of being as disappointment to mermaid-kind for being a scientist that had studied a captured one, it was unsettling. Dad grasped my shoulders, imploring me with his stern, studious gaze. "My brave girl, I know that look." He pulled me in close, smoothing my hair back. "Your mother and I are so proud of you. You've grown into a courageous, radiant young woman, one who has had to make too many impossible decisions, but always made them work. Whatever you choose, whatever parts of you that you embrace or turn from, you will always be my little girl."

I hugged him tightly, wondering why it felt like we were saying hello and goodbye all at once. I guessed in a way, we actually were. After all that time without him, here he was again, the dad who took me on boating expeditions, showed me the jellyfish at the aquarium, and whose endless stories about the sea inspired me to pursue it as a career. I wouldn't have met Kai if I hadn't chosen marine biology.

I did my best to reverse the damage.

Kai had recognized the madness in Dad, the madness he could and had caused in other mortals, and he still helped him. He had only been on land for a day then, he was still distrustful of Cee and Allie. He could've easily left Dad to fend off the demons himself, but he tried to save him. He did save him.

I squeezed Dad harder, crying into his shoulder and he held me firmly, telling me without words that he'd hold on as long as I needed. And I held on, all of the emotions I'd been shoving aside finally pouring out, all the rage, and fear and guilt. I put it all on my dad's shoulders, and he carried it, a sturdy foundation once more.

We moved to sit on the porch steps, and I leaned my head against his shoulder. My eyes were heavy, and my breath hitched every so often, but I was more relaxed than I'd been in a long time.

"Alright David, I've torn the place apart!" Becca called from somewhere in the house, I heard her footsteps as she looked for him, spotting us on the back porch. "I don't know where that blasted box of yours went, but it's not here and I've got to get ready. Sam will be here any minute! Are you sure you didn't give it to your partner, or whatever he was, before the move?"

Soft creases formed on dad's face as he turned to look at her. "There's no way…"

"Did you say Sam?" I asked Becca with a raised brow, "As in, Sam Juno?"

There was no hiding the blush on her cheeks, though she tried to with the palms of her hands. "We've been…talking."

My brow rose higher, as did the shit-eating grin on my face as I remembered the flustered look on Juno's face at graduation. "Is that what the kids should be calling it these days?"

She ignored me, addressing dad again, "I'll check upstairs again, but you should call him."

He shook his head vehemently. "No matter what state of mind I was in, I never would have given that research to him. It's too valuable and too dangerous in the wrong hands, especially his."

"What research?" I wondered, the scientist"s interest piqued.

"Years ago, I was working on a device that could track marine species with the DNA of a single sample." He lowered his voice so only I could hear him. "It was how I found your mother. An extremely rare bit of DNA that turned out to be one of her scales."

Her scales? "But I thought…" I trailed off, hoping he'd fill in the blanks.

He only shrugged, "I'm not sure, but once we were married, I destroyed the sample and set the research aside. I wouldn't risk anyone tracking the mermaids, your mother, or even you, if someone happened to make the same discovery I had."

My mouth dried, and the tentative good mood I'd recovered disappeared as a memory from my subconscious clicked firmly into place, of red dots on a beach. "Dad, what did this device look like?"

"It's silver, about the size of a tablet with protuberances around the edges for inserting DNA and switching between recorded species. It was part of a program I started called Odyssey, named after the voyage of the hero Odysseus to return to his homeland in Ithaca. I… I buried the name years ago, but I took my research with me here to ensure it was safe. Then I buried that as well."

"And I can't unearth it! I've looked everywhere," Becca repeated, throwing up her hands. "Maybe you moved it closer to you, like your bedroom?"

"Were the blueprints for working the device in the box?" I asked Dad.

"No, luckily those were in my room, beneath my mattress of all places. But the device itself is far more dangerous, and can be somewhat functional without them." Dad rose, brushing sand off his pant legs, "I'll take another look. It's in a metal box with a combination lock on the front Becca, two sizes down from a lunchbox. It has to be here," He leaned over, placing a gentle kiss on the top of my head, before rising to his feet. "Remember what I told you."

"Maren, are you alright?" Becca asked, finally noticing my disheveled appearance. "You look a bit peakish."

I nodded, even though I felt like I was going to be sick, "Yea, I just remembered I left something at Cee's. I'll see you two later."

Becca nodded, watching me worriedly as I started down the stairs, before disappearing back inside with dad. I wanted to tell him my suspicions, but I didn't want to worry him unnecessarily, not when he was doing so well. Plus, I had to confirm for myself if Reinhardt really had this tracker.

But he had to have it. Reinhardt had used the organization, continued the research, and now he had the tracker. Maybe dad was confused, and he had left everything with Reinhardt after we moved like Becca said. But if the tracker worked, if there was the slightest possibility he had Kai's DNA. Then Reinhardt knew where Kai had been this entire time. With me.

I took off from the back porch, following my footsteps back towards Cee's house. Kai couldn't leave, not until I knew if Reinhardt was still hunting him. If he went back now, if Reinhardt was waiting for Kai to lead him to the others, then his people were in danger. Dad had found a sample, somehow. He'd proved it was possible to collect one, at least if it came from the sea.

The sea…

It was so close now, two steps and I would be ankle deep. A pang of longing hit my chest so hard I stumbled. It was the ocean, calling me, inviting me closer, deeper. Is this what Kai feels, the pull he described?

I zoned out, my senses tuned to nothing else but the roar of the waves, and the sun nearly blinding in its late day intensity. I found myself taking one step, then another, my foot splashing in the approaching current. Tingles raced up my leg, encouraging me forward. It was something else entirely, something no scientist could ever calculate in their wildest dreams. Pure, limitless magic.

I dove into the glaucous water, the tingles spreading up my legs and fusing them together. The threading of my pants split down the center as scales began to bubble up from beneath my skin. They flowed around my hips like a skirt as my fluke spread out beneath me. I shimmied out of the ripped pants as I swam to the surface. Keeping dad's shirt, I threw the ruined pants towards the shore.

Back beneath the surface, I stayed close to the ocean floor, surprised by how clear everything was. These waters were never murky, but they were far from transparent. Now the view was like the after shot of a Claritin commercial.

The sandy seabed stretched out before me, peppered with crabs, starfish, and the occasional purple urchin that I soundly squished with my tail, the sharp spines no match for my tough skin. They were such a nuisance, eating their way through the kelp dad and I had painstakingly planted. It was coming into view now, our little garden, dotted between slates of staghorn coral, the jade strands swaying in the current. Garibaldi darted between the fronds for continual shelter, a fringe-head blenny poked its head out of a rocky outcropping before ducking back in as my shadow passed overhead. A bright orange anemone clinging to the side of the rock hosted a pair of tomato clownfish, and I even spotted the slim tail of an eel lurking in the corner. A long strand of kelp tickled the base of my tail as I brushed past.

Warmth bloomed in my chest at the life that had flourished here. What had started as a simple experiment to restore the local reef had rolled into an underwater Eden. All it took was giving nature the push she needed to restore the equilibrium. I felt a rush of deja vu reminiscent of my dreams, where I could sense the ocean around me like a living, breathing entity. Only this time, it was far from a dream. It was real, and indescribable.

I reached the buoy line leagues under my personal best, and that was after taking time to observe the reef. The holes in the underwater netting were wide enough to allow fish and crustaceans through, but small enough to discourage sharks and dolphins, as well as reckless boaters.

With my enhanced vision, I could still see far into the distance, and I used the ability to scout for the hulls of any nearby boats. This area was off-limits, but that didn't mean idiots on jet skis wouldn't try barreling through for laughs. Satisfied that the waters were calm, I swam to the surface. The wind and air were foreign compared to the underwater wonderland below me, and I wanted to dive down again. But something was missing, someone who I wanted to share this world with.

Kai.

The haze of the ocean's spell began to lighten as I floated above the current, and reality began to set back in as I took in the setting sun.

How long had I been underwater for? The sun was already touching the horizon. What had felt like mere minutes must've been hours. Becca and my dad would be worried, not to mention Cee, and Kai.

Kai, I had to talk to him.

But I had to see if Reinhardt had Dad's tracker first. And I knew where I'd most likely find him.

With my speed, I could be at the shores of the aquarium by sundown. I had to know, then I could tell Kai if it was really safe for him to leave.

The buoy height was no match for my tail. I glided over it in a single, smooth arc, splashing onto the other side with ease. Free Willy indeed.

With no real way to navigate, I hugged the coast, taking care to stay low and avoid the fishing boats setting up for their night catch and the areas monitored by the marine station. It meant I'd be taking the long way around, but I was okay with taking a swim.

Cee would make sure Kai was okay until I got back, and I would finally get the answers I'd been looking for.

I should've held onto my pants, I thought as I continued to tug at the crusty ends of Dad's button down. It reached my knees, but the looks I'd received while walking down the boardwalk ranged from perverted to utterly confused.

I'd dried off in a secluded cove about a mile from the aquarium, making sure I was well hidden until I shifted back. At twilight, with sea salt spraying up with every other wave, it took far longer than I liked. I was already grumpy, and on my walk over I remembered that I had no way of getting back into the aquarium. I could call Hughes, but I didn't have my phone, nor if he knew where Reinhardt was. My current plan was to knock on the back door, feign to be the victim of a mugging, and hope for the best.

I didn't try to avoid the cameras this time. I walked right past them, turning the corner to the back of the building, and the loading doors Kai and I escaped from. The camera he short-circuited had been ripped from the wall, leaving only a few broken wires behind. And the door was hanging open.

I knocked on it anyways, apprehension coiling in my gut, "Hello? Is anyone here?"

Silence.

Oh well. If they didn't want me snooping, they should've closed the door.

The place looked abandoned save for the tanks, which were also empty. I hurried up to the observation room, my bare feet slapping against the cool metal, and threw open the door. Empty. Not a single machine or manila folder, though the dirt and coffee stains on the desks remained. What was going on?

I wound my way back down the stairs, circling Kai's tank from the opposite side to see if they'd left a tool or even a scrap of paper. I was trailing my hand against the cool acrylic of the tank, contemplating where I should go next, when I stepped in a puddle no one had bothered to mop up. I flinched, jumping back and waiting for the shift to start. When nothing happened, I looked down.

It wasn't saltwater covering the soles of my feet. It was blood.

And lying face down, so close I would have tripped over him if I hadn't looked, was Hughes.

I slapped my hand over my mouth to muffle the scream that escaped. He was wearing his usual attire, the pristine white lab coat now stained with splotches of red. His skull had been cracked open with a blunt metal rod that lay discarded next to his body. It looked like he had been dragged, or crawled a few feet before dying, one hand outstretched, reaching for something that was no longer there.

I looked away from his unseeing eyes, breathing hard through my nose, trying to fight the urge to vomit. Who could have done this, and what possible motive did they have?

You still want those answers, Maren?

I didn't have the stomach to check if his body was warm, and there was no phone to call for help. I had to get out of here. I grabbed a discarded towel, wiping the blood from my feet before I sprinted from the lab, knocking into the open door. My first instinct was to head to the water, and I found myself on the beach before I could think about where I was going.

The wind blowing off of the ocean washed over me, stripping the scent of blood from my nose and sweeping in a good dose of clarity. I couldn't just dive in. Anyone could see me from the boardwalk. But I had to keep moving, I had to contact the authorities and tell Kai that he couldn't leave yet. Not if Reinhardt had—

"I was truly hoping it would be you."

His voice was like a snake slithering down my spine, and he sounded almost…happy. In the dark, with my new vision I could make him out, looking far too put together to be wandering the beach at twilight without a flashlight, or anything else for that matter.

"Stay back," I warned. My hands balled into fists, all of my senses on high alert, warning me of the predator that had just entered my waters. "I know what you've done." He'd killed Hughes, murdered him. But why?

He clucked his tongue in disapproval, "All I've done is push the very foundations of science, discovering things no one has dared to. And this is only the beginning."

"What are you talking about?" I swallowed thickly, particles of sand sticking to the leftover blood that clung to my feet.

There was an excited gleam in his eyes, the same sick curiosity that kept Kai in a tank for months, on the brink of death. He shrugged, "Why I'm following up on a new lead, of course. This specimen I'm procuring promises to be an even grander breakthrough than the last."

I took a slow step back, prepared to bolt. "And that would be?" My back hit something solid.

"You, Maren."

I sprinted sideways out of the arms grabbing for me. Guided by pure instinct, I ran straight for the water.

Two large hands clamped down on my shoulders. They grasped at me, just missing the ends of my hair, and I heard Dennis curse behind me, "She's fast!"

"Don't let her reach the water!" Reinhardt snapped.

I could sense them behind me, rapidly gaining. I pumped my arms and lowered my head, moving as fast as my legs would carry me and I briefly wished I had wings instead of fins to really get me out of their reach. I was five steps away, then two, then my feet were plunging beneath squishy sand and the undertow was dragging me out. I raised my arms above my head to dive.

Arms wound around my waist, hauling me back so hard that my ribs creaked in protest. I spluttered, trying to break out of the bear hold.

"Do it Marcus!" Dennis' voice strained as I thrashed in his arms.

"Let me go!" My body was jerked harshly to the side, and I cried out as something snapped.

"Are you sure we should..." I heard Marcus say.

"Now dammit!"

A sharp needle pierced the base of my spine, and my whole body went limp as scales began to form around my arms, down my legs.

"Holy shit," Marcus breathed, the blue glow of the transformation highlighting the shock on his face.

Reinhardt chuckled as the others dragged my limp weight to shore. My vision swam, but I was vaguely aware of my tail taking shape as the extra weight caused Dennis to lose his footing. Water swept over my shoulders, and I could feel its panicked caress, but my body had stopped responding.

"Marvelous," he clapped. "Simply extraordinary. I must commend you on going the extra mile for your research, Miss Saunders. Surely you can understand why we'd want to do the same. After all, it's human nature to be curious."

The last thing I remember before succumbing to the darkness was the roar of waves, and my own voice, deep in my mind, screaming out for Kai, even though I knew I was too far away for him to hear me.