Not many of Chloe's friends understood why she enjoyed the races as much as she did. Even when she tried to explain it to them.

"It's not even that exciting after watching the first couple of races."

"They're not all the same races though! There are so many different categories!"

Chloe, even though she knows it doesn't matter at all, still tries to make her point every single time anyone says anything in that regard.

And it's usually at this time during the conversation that her friends roll their eyes and swim away, their tails moving swiftly as they cut through the water quickly, tittering at Chloe's predictable response.

When Chloe was but the tender age of three, just getting the hand of navigating the ocean floor, swimming through upwelling and downwelling and submarine rivers, she had first caught sight of long shadows drifting overhead, speeding across the surface of the ocean.

It was Chloe's mother who had been the one to tell her of this other world outside of theirs. The human world; the world of the land dwellers. And it was Chloe's mother who told her of the journey that sailors would sometimes undertake for the simple love of adventure and the ocean, racing against other likeminded adventurers, in the form of bedtime stories ever since.

"And these sailors swim across the world all alone in their boats," she pauses and looks down at a barely awake four-year-old Chloe, "they can't swim very fast or as well as us you know."

Chloe sleepily giggles, "They don't have fins."

Smiling softly her mother replies, "That's right my sweet."

"I wanna see them momma."

Speaking even softer, Chloe drifting off to sleep faster and faster now, "What do you want to see my sleepy Chloe?"

As Chloe's big blue eyes finally completely disappear behind heavy eyelids she murmurs out, "Mm everything," and Chloe's mother smiles lovingly down at her as she kisses her forehead.

Due to her fascination, as Chloe grew older and her understanding expanded, Chloe's mother continued to teach her more and more things about the humans, which only served to make her even more fascinated by these races.

Once Chloe was about fifteen, her mother took her up to the surface to get a better look at these boats and humans which helped her get a better sense and understanding of them, as they sailed by.

"It's so long!" Chloe exclaims as she swims below the length of the boat, never having realized they'd be so big from so far below.

Her mother laughs beautifully, "It's certainly not the longest in this race, look over there." Her mother points and Chloe swims out from under the boat to look in the direction her mother was pointing and sure enough, a little ways away was an even longer yacht making its way faster through the water.

Chloe's eyes widen and she quickly swims over to it.

She cant wait for nightfall now, when it will be safer for them to breach the surface and really get close. She had been excited about it before but now she was even more so.

Chloe wasn't the only young mermaid to be fascinated by these races and the humans, and luckily for her, Aubrey was also her best friend so it made things quite easy.

After every race, neither one of them could wait for the next one to begin, and they could get a little bit much right before and right after these races, a time when all they could really talk about is the race.

This year though, rather than simply wait for the boats to come by their part of the ocean and swim alongside the boats for a day or two in the middle of the race, both Chloe and Aubrey decide they're going to actually swim the entire course from start to finish.

"The entire race?" Chloe's mother asks, tilting her head slightly and looking at her husband, who raises an eyebrow and shrugs as if to say 'hey, it wasn't my idea.'

Chloe nods enthusiastically, "Aubrey and I want to watch from the very beginning, and make the circuit with one of the boats. I think we might even be able to pick out a winner! I mean we've watched so many of these."

"Chloe…you know these races are very long, right?" Chloe's mother asks, wanting to make absolutely certain she's aware of how long these can be, "I mean their boats, no matter how fast they are, aren't as fast as us."

Chloe grins and rolls her eyes good-naturedly, "I know mom, but that's all part of the adventure!" Chloe scrunches her nose and teases lightly, "You did this yourself when you were 17. At least I've waited a little longer, I'm 23 you see, before I told you I want to go swimming across the oceans."

Her father laughs and her mother throws her head back and chuckles.

Chloe's enthusiasm shows through and really there was never a question as to whether she'd be doing this.

Her mother and father share a smile, and her mother turns to her and says, "Well I guess your father and I will see you when you pass by this way during the race."

Chloe's grin could not be matched.

"You know you're going down Conrad, so I don't even get why you're still entering the race."

"I may be going down in your dreams maybe, but this race is mine."

Beca laughs heartily as her longtime friend and fellow competitor says this.

"Well damn Stacie. That went from zero to a hundred quick."

Stacie grins at her and shrugs, "I saw an opportunity and I took it."

At 24, Beca is officially the youngest ever competitor to enter the Vendee Globe. Stacie, who will be turning 25 during the race, is a close second. A fact that Beca constantly brings up.

Stacie and Beca met at age 6 because of their fathers who are both avid sailors themselves, and it seemed like destiny for them to meet again ten years later when assigned to the same crew, after having convinced their fathers to sign up to enter into the Clipper Round The World Yacht Race, the first real competitive sailing experience for either gentlemen as well as their daughters. The involvement in that race alone was enough to facilitate a long-lasting bond between them.

That first race, made it clear to both girls that racing was something they really had a passion for. They almost won that race, and it was then that the want to actually win began to grow within them.

Together they must have sailed at least five thousand miles, and even completed a number of single-handed trans-oceanic races to qualify for the Vendee Globe separately.

Being so young, neither of the two was taken too seriously until it was obvious that they were running serious campaigns and each had very serious plans of winning this race.

"I can't believe we're finally going to do this!" Stacie exclaims suddenly, grabbing onto Beca's upper arm and squeezing excitedly, "It's like this day couldn't get here fast enough, and now that it's here I can't seem to wrap my head around it."

Beca grins up at her and nods in total agreement, "Absolutely, I get that. It's going to be-"

"Well lookie here, what did that guy on Eurosport say? If only this was a modeling competition for best looking sailors, Beca Mitchell and Stacie Conrad would surely win by a landslide." The man stops in front of them and makes a show of looking them up and down, supposedly appreciatively, "I have to admit he's not wrong. But too bad this isn't a modeling competition, which means you're going to lose big time."

Bumper Allen. A 35-year-old man, and one time Globe veteran. Also, an all-time ass.

Beca and Stacie share disgusted looks and walk around him to continue making their way down to the dock.

They hear him try to get their attention but they've heard variations of the same for a long time now, and neither one of them is about to let a man like Bumper ruin their day.

It's early in the morning so there isn't really much press or any crowds to see any of the racers off, but that will soon change once they start to arrive a little later.

The calm morning, one buzzing with quiet undercurrents of excited energy from the sailors, is going to change into a roaring day in less than a couple of hours.

"I hope he ends up forgetting everything he's ever learned about sailing and yachts in general." Beca grumbles.

Stacie laughs lightly, "Oh come on now Beca, we don't need that kind of negativity. Positive vibes Mitchell. We don't need you forgetting everything."

Beca rolls her eyes but manages a little grin, "Yeah yeah alright Conrad, you can stop with the Yogi talk. So…what say you we meet up in thirty? Then we can head off and pick a spot for the fam so they won't get pushed around by knuckleheads."

Stacie chuckles as she hops into her yacht, "Sounds good. See you in thirty."

Beca walks a little further down the dock until she's in front of her own yacht.

Trebled Waters

She takes in a deep breath and lets it out slowly before smiling to herself and climbing on board and doing her last-minute check of the boat and the contents on said boat, not wanting to forget anything crucial.

"Beca! Beca over here! Stace! Stacie!"

Beca and Stacie can't help but laugh at Mrs. Conrad's enthusiastic waving, her homemade 'kick some ass!' sign made in support of the both of them waving wilding in front of her.

"Dude, your mom? Is the fucking best." Beca says as they get to her, wrapping their arms around her.

"Your fathers are down further; they know some of the other contestants and are saying their hellos. I thought I'd stay up here to wait for the two of you. How excited are the both of you?"

Stacie laughs lightly, "Really excited. Beca and I barely got any sleep."

Beca rolls her eyes, "I don't know what she's talking about, I slept like a baby last night. Best sleep I've had in months!"

Which was true, once she managed to actually fall asleep.

"Will we be able to have breakfast this morning before you have to be off?" Mrs. Conrad asks, looking from Stacie to Beca and back again.

Stacie looks to Beca and lifts a shoulder, "I don't know mom. I mean maybe coffee, but an actual breakfast…"

Beca grins slightly, "If we can manage to tear our dads away from the old skippers long enough we could. We have time."

Suffice it to say, Mrs. Conrad did manage to get the men away to share breakfast together.

The two families say their goodbyes at the docks, Beca hugging her father tightly, Stacie engulfed in her parents' arms, before switching and saying goodbye to each other's families.

"We're going to be watching and cheering for you, the both of you." Mr. Mitchell says, his eyes a little misty as he does so.

Beca smiles up at him and the five of them stand together for a couple of beats just taking each other in before Beca clears her throat and nods her head in the direction of their boats, "We've…we're gonna go kick some ass now."

Mrs. Conrad laughs lightly, "Yes you are! You two are going to show these scoundrels a thing or two about sailing!"

Beca and Stacie watch as their parents walk back up the docks to the view area, before turning and walking back the way they had come before. And once again they stop at Stacie's yacht first.

"So…you take care out there Mitchell."

Beca grins up at her and nods, "Likewise Conrad."

Stacie surprises Beca by lifting her up into a tight hug, "We're so winning this."

Beca laughs as she's set back down, "We so are."

Stacie quickly knocks on wood, and it's to that sound that Beca is walking towards her ship to, with head held high and a determined grin on her face.

"Have they started?!" Chloe asks, swimming even faster now for fear of having missed it.

Aubrey, who's close behind her, gently nudges her and laughs lightly, "No they haven't started yet, none of their boats are even at the starting position, look."

Chloe laughs at herself, "See, I knew that, but I'm so excited I just can't stop myself from thinking we're sure to miss something."

They swim all the way to the docks and see all of these beautiful racing yachts all aligned and Chloe is over the moon with anticipation, "Do you think the humans have arrived yet?"

Aubrey tilts her head as they both looks up towards the sun, shimmering as it does but still not up fully, "I think it's probably too early, but we might see a few though."

Chloe perks up, "And those would be the ones we choose our winner from."

Aubrey chuckles and raises an eyebrow, her tail swishing slightly, "And why would it be any of them that's a likely winner?"

Chloe twirls to lay on her back, looking up at the bottom of the yachts, "Because only the most serious sailors would be out so early to see their vessel."

"That doesn't necessarily mean they're going to win." Aubrey argues gently, watching as Chloe slowly summersaults in perfect circles, only to pause once her sentence is finished.

Chloe giggles lightly, "Perhaps not all of the ones we see, but surely one of them will be the winner."

Aubrey laughs, "Let's just hold off on deciding until we get a look at them out on the water."

It's then that they hear the sound of footsteps coming from above them on the dock, and both Chloe and Aubrey lock gazes with each other, their eyes widening excitedly as they whisper in unison, "humans!"

They're swimming up under the dock, right under the humans, faster than a flying fish, and simultaneously their heads pop out from under the water, taking advantage of the cover the wooden dock allows them.

"-and now that it's here I can't seem to wrap my head around it."

Chloe and Aubrey are mesmerized as they peer through a gap in the boards at the humans talking above them.

Chloe's eyes are wide with wonder as she watches a rather short human talking to a taller one. She murmurs, not taking her eyes off of the two women, "They're not like any sailors that have ever come across our oceans."

Aubrey nods, her own eyes wide, "They're certainly not."

"Absolutely, I get that. It's going to be-"

Chloe's eyes finally see the shorter woman's face and hears her voice and Chloe's face breaks into a smile. A smile that is short lived upon the entrance of one Bumper Allen, who steps right in front of their line of vision.

Aubrey and Chloe grumble, sharing looks of disgust.

Aubrey rolls her eyes and murmurs, "I can't believe this fool is back again."

Chloe swims around the immediate area quickly, trying to look for another decent gap in the boards before coming back, and murmuring, "that's because he's a man who thinks he's the best. There's no fool greater than an arrogant fool."

Chloe and Aubrey perk up as they hear the women start walking away, and they exchange excited glances before swimming down the dock with them, hoping for another chance to see them, rather than simply see their shadows passing over them through the thinnest of gaps.

As Chloe goes to follow the smaller one, the one referred to as both Beca and Mitchell, she quickly notices Aubrey moving out from under the dock and under the yacht of the one named Conrad.

"You go ahead, I want to see more of this one." Aubrey says with a grin, her tail brilliantly catching the light as she floats even closer to the boat.

Chloe grins and shakes her head slightly before quickly finding her human.

She sees her climb aboard and then she decides she's going to be daring. She'll be careful of course, but she is going to get a closer look of this human.

Chloe slowly swims up from under the water, just off the starboard side of the yacht and carefully peaks up over the edge, only to quickly duck down as Beca starts to walk over to check some of the rigging.

Chloe hears Beca walk farther away from her humming to herself and Chloe once again peaks over the starboard side, watching silently as Beca moves around with a grace she couldn't imagine she ever would have achieved even if she was the one born with two legs. Chloe's eyes never stray, her excitement doubling as she realizes that she's really actually seeing a lady human that's going to race singlehanded around the earth.

The moment that truly seals the deal for Chloe? It's the moment that Chloe hears Beca start to lowly sing to herself as she works. And Chloe's face breaks out in a large smile, her mind made up now even more assuredly.

This is her human.