Okay, I know I know-I said I was going to write in first person, but now that I'm doing it I don't think that it's the best choice for me...so I'm switching back to third person.

*cue booing and hissing*

Yes, yes, curse my inconsistency, but I think I finally settled on what I want to do. Okay? Good.

Turtle

"But your majesty," Crab began, looking up at the queen in disbelief. Queen Starfish looked down at Crab condescendingly, arching a single eyebrow. "You-you can't possibly expect me to find the stone of Eclipso with-with him." Crab shot a sideways glance at Gannet, who was casually fiddling with his hair in the corner and pretending not to care. "Who, me?" Gannet cooed, blinking as innocently as he could. Just the sight made Crab want to fling the arrogant little dick off the gorge. As he gritted his teeth, Queen Starfish looked down at Crab, twining her claws together. "Crab, Gannet is perfectly-"

"Ooh, what's this?" Anemone asked eagerly, reaching over the armrest that separated her and Turtle's seat, and eagerly grabbing the laptop he held in his hands. As soon as the laptop left his lap, and Crab and Gannet's world disappeared before his eyes, Turtle's rapidly typing fingers were left grasping empty air. "Hey! Give that back!" Turtle cried, his blue-green bangs falling in his face as he reached over his seat to make a wild grab for his laptop.

"CGSE3." Anemone read from the name of the document, and her eyebrows furrowed together in confusion. "CGSE3? What's that supposed to mean?" In her confusion, Turtle was able to snatch his laptop back, using his wrist to wipe the fingerprints off the screen. "N-Nothing. Nothing at all!" He insisted, feeling the skin beneath the lights on his cheeks flush red.

Anemone huffed, slumping down in her seat. "You're no fun," she muttered, and from her carseat, Auklet giggled. "Yeah! You're no fun!" She declared, trying to imitate Anemone's motion of crossing her arms and slumping down in her seat. The only different, Turtle noticed, was that when Anemone did it it came off as upsetting, whereas when Auklet did it with her chubby arms and green hair tied up in ponytails, it looked totally adorable and Turtle had to smile a little, even if Aukelt wouldn't admit she was 'cute'.

CGSE3. Crab and Gannet and the Stone of Eclipso Chapter 3. The next chapter of his story. Which of course, no human being other than himself would ever read, certainly not judgy little Anemone. It wasn't that she tried to be judgy; it just came off that way, and Turtle was 98% she got it from her mother. Peering from his seat in the limo, Turtle watched Queen Coral fix her makeup in her hand mirror, applying a layer of bright red lipstick.

"Mommy, can I go to college too?" Auklet asked, putting on her sweetest smile, and Turtle had to admit, Auklet knew how to work her mother. Usually when she tilted her head to one side, clasped her hands together and blinked with her large, dark green eyes, Queen Coral's heart would melt and she would get whatever she wanted. Today, however, Queen Coral was forced to shake her head.

"Oh, I'm sorry sweetie-but you can say good-bye to Anemone!" She said, planting a kiss on Anemone's head, and causing the princess to go into a fit. "Ack, mom-stop it!" Anemone cried, trying to shove her mother away as Queen Coral enwrapped her in a large hug. "Well...I guess this is good-bye," Queen Coral said and the limousine pulled up to Jade University's dorms, tears coming to her eyes. Anemone mimed a gagging motion to Auklet, which caused the little girl to giggle.

With a sigh, Turtle stuffed his laptop into his brown backpack, which contained the few belongings that Turtle had brought to Jade University. It wasn't like he didn't have a lot; he just didn't have as big of a desire for material items as some of his siblings. His laptop, along with the few other things he had brought, could fit snugly into his bag and sling over his back.

Swinging open the car door, Turtle landed on the pavement, and held up his hand to shield his eyes from the bright sun, rubbing his arms a little bit. It was a little warm, but nowhere near as hot at the tropical temperature of the Sea Kingdom he was used to. Looking around, Turtle realized he had never seen so many different races. The dark complexions of Nights mixed with the pale skin of Ices roamed around the courtyard, colorful outbursts of Rains mingling with the olive and dull complexion of Muds.

Everywhere he looked, there were people, some with tattoos, some hugging their friends and texting, some sitting in the corners smoking and flipping off anyone who gave them a sideways glance. He noticed that a lot of people were walking by, talking into their phones, some were sitting on benches and reading. Everyone looked so...grown, doing their own thing.

Just watching was giving Turtle anxiety. For a moment, he just stood there, watching the whirlwinds of people, his lips slightly parted as he watched. Why are there so many people? He thought, shifting nervously from foot to foot. From what he had read online, Jade University was a fairly new school; hardly what he expected to be 'busy and bustling' right now. In fact, that was just one of the reasons he had picked this school above all the others.

Shifting from foot to foot as his stomach churned inside of him, Turtle let out a grunt as Anemone shoved past him, holding her pale pink suitcase in her hand, gazing up in amazement at the building. "Wow," she marveled. "This is amazing!" From the car, a Sea boy with pale gray-blue hair and an angry expression climbed out, three large bags and a suitcase clasped in his arms. "Yeah-pretty amazing princess," Gill grunted from behind Anemone's luggage.

Turtle barely heard him; he was too busy gazing at the campus. "Look at all the people," he and Anemone said in unison, only when he said it he sounded much, much less eager than Anemone. "I bet this campus had a whole cafe and a library and restaurant not that far from here, like they do in movies! This school is probably so perfect, they probably don't even have weed on campus! Ew, except for that guy, maybe not. Who do you think my dorm mate is? Do you think it's one of you? Oh, three moons, I hope it's not one of you," Anemone rambled on, continuing to talk as Gill grunted under the weight of her bags.

Sighing, Turtle shook his head. It was easy for Anemone to be so excited about college; having lived as a princess in the Kingdom of the Sea her whole life, she always got everything she wanted, and probably expected to instantly be one of those popular, sexy girls that she always saw in those college movies she watched. In fact, Turtle could actually see Anemone becoming instantly popular, though whether that was because people actually chose to be her friend or because she bought their friendship, he wasn't sure yet.

As Anemone led him and Gill into the building, Turtle kept his head down, trying not to be noticed, though he knew noticing him would be next to impossibly while he was standing next to Anemone. To be honest, the Sea princess was almost the definition of shiny. While Anemone often took her gifts for granted, the constant things she got from Queen Coral made her stand out tremendously from the other students.

As Anemone walked down the hallway, large strings of pearls draped around her neck reflected the light from the windows, and her pale pinkish-blue hair tumbled down her head in pretty curls. While she had a lot of dresses that most people would expect princesses to wear, today she had insisted on wearing one of her many, many designer outfits; a mini-skirt, blouse and headband, even in early fall.

Walking beside the shiny princess made it easy for Turtle to slip away unseen, making his way to the stairs while Anemone and Gill walked to the elevator. It wasn't that he didn't like them; he just needed some time to think, and walking helped clear his head.

Climbing up the several flights of stairs to his dorm, Turtle tried repeatedly to calm his jittery nerves. So there were a lot of students. Big deal. They were all so busy with their own lives, hardly anyone would have the bandwidth to pay any attention to a jittery Sea, even if he was a prince. With his luck, his dorm mate would probably be some big brute who did wrestling and hung out with girls and spent every night drinking and smoking weed. And that would leave Turtle to himself, with nothing better to do than read, write, and take classes on reading and writing.

Just the thought made Turtle smile a little. Yes, that was exactly what he had to do. He came to this school to major in English so he would spend the next four years doing nothing but reading and writing, not worry about what other students thought of him; he could do that all he wanted at home. With a little more bounce in his step, Turtle scaled the rest of the stairs leading to his dorm, which according to the e-mail he got, was on floor three.

Pound 225, Turtle read from the door as he walked down the hallway. If he remembered correctly, this was the dorm that his e-mail had directed him to. With shaky hands, the young Sea prince reached out for the doorknob, clasping the golden surface in his hands, and twisted the knob...

Instantly to be met with a knife being thrown towards an Ice boy.

"Nope," Turtle said, shutting the door and turning around to lean against it. No, no, no. This was not what he signed up for. He expected civilized conversation and writing, not attempted murder. Should he get the dean? Damn it, who even was the dean? He wanted to say it was Tsunami, whom he had heard about many times from Anemone and the oldest of Queen Coral's three daughters, but he didn't even know where her office was, or if she even had an office.

Trying to calm his rapidly beating heart, he debated calling the police, but decided it probably wouldn't be worth it if there wasn't an actual body. Muttering a quick prayer that he didn't get stabbed in the head, Turtle carefully pried open the door his dark green eyes carefully peering into the room. To his relief, there wasn't any blood, just a very upset looking Night girl, a Sand boy who looked like he had just seen the funniest thing in the world, and a Rain girl who was casually eating a mango and looked completely blissed out in doing so.

Turtle arched an eyebrow, wondering how they could be so calm in the face of an attempted homicide. Maybe there wasn't really a knife. Maybe he was just seeing things. Reluctantly, Turtle pried back the door, and carefully placed one foot in front of the other, slowly making his way into the dorm. It was bigger than he expected, for one, with much more people. Maybe his dorm mate had already made some friends and invited some people over?

Quietly edging his way around the counter, Turtle caught sight of two doors, one marked Boys and the other Girls. Instantly his heart sank. What was this, some kind of community home? Obviously there were enough people living here for them to have to label which gender went in which dorm. Turtle, in all honesty, wasn't great when it came to large groups of people. He was better when it was one-on-one; as Anemone described it, Turtle didn't like it when a room was too "people-y".

Still, the Boy's room was probably better than this whole commons area, and chances are he would have at least a little bit of privacy, and he would keep quiet. If he kept quiet, no one would notice him, and if no one noticed him, no one would realize his secret-

"Oooh, look, a new dorm mate!" A voice squealed, and startled, Turtle whipped around, silently cursing himself for being so noticeable. The blissed out Rain girl who was eating a mango had stood up from her seat on the couch to race over and greet him, a bright smile crossing over her face. Her hair and sundress swirled with various shades of pink and yellow, her dark green eyes bright and wide.

Her dark olive skin was just slightly lighter from the Night girl, as Rain skin was darkened from the heat of the rain forest, but this girl's had a certain glow to it like ever her skin was happy, and her face seemed to be locked in a state of perpetual excitement and joy, something Turtle had never expected from what he heard of the 'lazy Rains'. As she stood before, Turtle, she bounced on her heels, smiling as wide as she could. In fact, Turtle even had to admit she was kind of pretty.

"Hi! I'm Kinkajou," the Rain girl greeted, sticking out a single hand. After a moment of registering, Turtle reached out his own hand, which he realized was painfully clammy as he took Kinkajou's warm hand in his own. Kinkajou didn't seem to notice however, as she gave his hand a hearty shake, then looked at him expectantly. What? Did I do something already? Turtle wondered, worried she could feel the power tingling in his fingertips, but realized with relief that she was just expecting his name.

"T-Turtle," he stuttered, feeling like the most idiotic flounder in the ocean-er, school. Kinkajou, however, didn't seem to notice, and regarded him with a single beam. "Well, Turtle, that's Qibil and Moon, and in there is Carnelian, and in there is Winter," Kinkajou said, pointing to the Night, the Sand, the girl's room and the boy's room in turn. As she said the name Winter, he noticed she said it kind of dreamily, and Turtle found that for some reason that hand his fingers itch in an unpleasant way.

"Hey," The Sand said, walking over to Turtle and giving him a fist bump, which startled him a little bit. "I'm Qibli, but you probably already knew that," he said, shooting a quick glance at Kinkajou who smiled and shrugged her shoulders. Turtle gulped, giving a small nod. "Yeah, I'm-"

"Wait, hang on!" Kinkajou suddenly cried, racing forward and holding out one of Turtle's arms. "You have all these weird whirling patterns on your arms...Queen Glory told me that her friend Tsunami had that, and only Sea royalty have that! Are you king of the Seas?" At the accusation, Turtle almost laughed. Almost. If he answered truthfully, that would get him unwanted attention, but if he lied in the first five minutes, that may not make the best impression. "Um...prince," he corrected quietly, yanking his arm back and rubbing it self-consciously.

Kinkajou's green eyes widened so that they resembled saucers. "Woah, cool! Do you have like, a bunch of crowns and servants and gemstones! Oh, I bet this thing on your arm is worth like, a bajillion-gazillion-quadramillion dollars!" Kinkajou cried, tripping over her own words as she pointed to the golden armband on Turtle's arm that twined around three black rocks. Turtle felt his face flush red; Kinkajou, Qibli, and that Night girl, (Moon was it?) we all watching him with interested looks, like he was the most special thing on the planet.

This was not what he wanted at all. After years of staying successfully hidden from the prying eyes of his family, now was when he got the most attention? His stomach began to churn with nervous energy as he felt everyone's eyes on him, and for some reason he felt there were ears behind closed doors listening in as well. "Um, e-excuse me," Turtle said as quickly as he could, ducking under Qibli's outstretched arm and rushing to the nearest bathroom. As soon as the door was locked, he realized the oddity of what he had done, and placed his face into his hands.

Great. Randomly rushing off to the bathroom in the middle of a conversation was a great first impression, wasn't it Turtle, the Sea berated to himself. Well, no point in coming out now. He might as well wait until they were all in different rooms before coming out. Digging in his bag, Turtle pulled out his laptop and opened up CGSE3, picking up right where he left off.

As he gritted his teeth, Queen Starfish looked down at Crab, twining her claws together. "Crab, Gannet is perfectly capable of doing something as tremendous as this. As my top knights, you two seemed like the most likely candidates to fetch the stone of Eclipso."

As he wrote, Turtle stopped. For some reason, he couldn't figure out where to make the story move from there.

Sighing, Turtle slumped against the bathroom door.

So far college was off to a great start.