I'm home… It's been like what, three years?
Well, it's no Destiny Academy, but I've always wanted to go to Australia…
I just hope Bella and the others don't cause any trouble back at Astralis Caelum…
Terra and I already have enough to deal with and now this?
Great, just great.
"Oh. My. God. I swear, I will never take another one of those exams ever again," Rikki groaned as she walked along a beach with Cleo and Bella, her two best friends and in secret, fellow mermaids. They were all carrying their schoolbags and were on their way back home The sky was a bright blue and without a cloud in sight. In short, it was a perfect day for a swim. Unfortunately…
"Well, you're out of luck there," Bella smiled at the short-tempered blonde, "We've still got two days of them." Rikki never liked school and was the kind of person who would just skip a day just to go to Mako island, but she wouldn't without Bella and Cleo coming with her.
"Just two more days?" Cleo repeated. She sighed. "Feels like its going to take another two years til we get done… If only Lewis was here…" Lewis, her boyfriend and researcher, had left for America a few weeks before, but Cleo was always thinking of him. "You know what? Come over to my house. We'll study there."
Rikki groaned even louder. "I don't want to study anymore…" She gazed at the pristine, blue water with longing. It was practically calling out to her to go for a swim.
"I know, I know…" Cleo said sympathetically, "But if we want to graduate, we're gonna have to."
"I'm with Rikki on this one," Bella replied, "We've been studying our butts off for a week and-"
"He-ey…." A tall, brown haired guy, a surfer, approached the trio. "Would you ladies like to join me and my buds for a swim?" He pointed to where his friends were, who were all grinning and laughing at him. All of them were buff and pretty hot, but…
"Sorry," Cleo smiled sweetly at the guy, who looked extremely disappointed, "We have to go and study…" She tried to walk around him, but he quickly blocked her path.
"C'mon… There's no need to be shy. Forget studying and-"
"Sorry, I can't," Cleo said again, this time a little forcefully. She turned around and motioned Rikki and Bella to walk back towards where they came from, but just as they started to walk off, the guy grabbed Cleo's shoulder and roughly spun her around. "Don't you dare turn your back to me!" he snarled, his face melting from the smiling face to a mask of anger.
"Ow!" Cleo tried to shake off his grip. "Let go!"
"Hey!" Rikki whirled around, "Get your hands off her!" she said angrily. The guy just laughed. "Like I'm really gonna-"
"Is there a problem here?" A new, wolfish-sounding voice asked from right behind him.
The guy let go of Cleo's shoulder and turned around. "None of your-" He stopped and his jaw dropped, while the girls behind him stared at the speaker.
Two girls stood before them. Two incredibly beautiful girls. One of them, the speaker, was as tall as he was and had shoulder length black hair and wore a plain blue T-shirt and tan cargo pants, complete with a silver wolf chain necklace dangling from her neck. For a girl, she was quite muscular and looked like she had been through some sort of war, but the most unsettling thing about her was her eyes: unlike most Asians, who had dark brown eyes, she had bright blue eyes that seemed like they could see right through a person's soul. There was also something else in them though… Sadness. Rage. But there's something else about her… Cleo thought. I can tell she's been through a lot though. The girl looked like she didn't smile often, as there was a small frown on her lightly tanned face.
In contrast, the other girl next to her had long somewhat wavy blonde hair and had emerald green eyes, but they were just as piercing as the other girl's. Unlike the blue-eyed girl, she wore a white tank-top with dark green shorts. She tilted her head slightly as she surveyed the surfer without much interest, allowing Cleo to see that the girl was also wearing white rose earring studs. Like her friend, she was lightly tanned, but her face was showed no emotion.
Cleo shivered. Something wasn't right about the pair, After all, they seemed to have just popped out of nowhere… The black-haired girl was already intimidating enough, but the blonde was downright scary.
"I said," the wolfish voice belonged to the blue-eyed girl, "is there a problem here?"
The surfer shook his head as if coming out of a reverie. "N-No…" He hastily took a step backwards, stepping on Rikki's foot.
"Ow!" Rikki hissed, "Je-"
"Shh!" Bella whispered warningly. The blue-eyed girl took a step forward.
"I really do hate liars…" she whispered in a deadly tone, "I'm going to give you three seconds to run. O-"
Without another word, the surfer sprinted off to where his friends were, who roared with laughter at the sight of their friend running away from the girls.
The blue-eyed girl grinned at the sight, "Wow. That didn't take long. I didn't even get to one!" She turned back around to the Cleo. "You okay?"
"W-What? Oh, yeah, I'm fine…" she replied in a small voice.
"Ahh… Sorry if I scared you," The girl said apologetically, "I just saw that jerk bothering you, so I decided to step in."
"Oh, we weren't scared," Rikki butted in.
The girl raised an eyebrow. "Really? 'Cause it looked like to me that you guys wanted to run."
"… Okay, we were a little," she admitted, looking slightly embarrassed.
Bella stepped forward. "Who are you guys anyway?"
"Ah! Should have told you guys earlier…" The girl stuck out her hand, "Call me Tifa."
Bella stifled a gasp. A thin, but long scar extended from Tifa's elbow to her wrist. It stood out like a danger sign.
Tifa saw her staring at it. "Yeah… I got that a few years ago. It's nothing really." She quickly withdrew her arm, however.
Nothing? Cleo couldn't believe that. A scar that big isn't "nothing".
"She got that in an ice skating accident," The blonde girl finally spoke up, her green eyes now surveying the three. Her voice was somber, unlike Tifa's.
"Yeah, but it really isn't that bad," Tifa tried to reassure Bella. She didn't look convinced.
"If you say so…" She turned her attention Tifa's friend. "What's your name?"
The girl took a step forward, her green eyes now focused on Bella. "… My name is Terra."