A continuation of chapter 10 (water).

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Shapeshift

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Danny was frightened. That much was obvious. Sam had heard that the first transformation could be traumatic. She supposed that drowning was pretty traumatic, too. She wouldn't know. She couldn't drown.

His eyes were huge, pupils fully dilated, and luminous. Tiny, bright, silver and green stripes were appearing on his body, and strands of his hair were going bright. Bioluminescence. That was unusual. Not unheard of, Ember and Kitty both had it, but rare (Sam squashed the passing thought that it was also kinda hot). He wasn't forming a tail. The manacle on his ankle was probably preventing that. Or was it his clothes.

He tried to cringe away from Sam, but she held him close. He was soft, and sort of squishy in places. He didn't have much fat, but he didn't have much muscle, either. That would go away soon enough. Life in the sea was an active, vicious, one. He would almost certainly have to fight to survive.

Speaking of...

"Back off," hissed Sam.

Paulina circled closer. "Why? You didn't even want him, and he looks tasty." She brushed her frilled maroon tail against Danny's shoulder.

Danny stopped trying to (ineffectively) pull away from Sam, and shuddered closer. He was blinking rapidly. His senses likely hadn't adapted to being underwater yet. Even Sam took a couple of minutes to fully adapt when going between the water and the open air. Water refracted both light and sound differently.

"I said back off. He's one of us now."

"Please. He started life human. He'll never be anything but meat to play with."

Danny made an odd, strangled noise. Heck. Was not making the full shift screwing him up somehow? Sam didn't know enough about the transformation to tell.

"Where's the key?" Sam demanded. "Valerie, where's the key? I did what you wanted, right? Give me the key."

Valerie rolled her eyes. "Whatever. I need my anchor back, anyway." She swam over, key in hand.

Danny, predictably, tried to swim up as soon as the manacle came off. Sam dragged him back. She caught him whimper something that sounded a lot like, "I'm hallucinating."

She didn't blame him. Most people didn't believe in mermaids. She'd probably be pretty freaked out, if, like, ghosts wound up existing, or something. Sam shot a last glare at the other girls and pulled Danny away with her. She knew a nice little underwater cave not too far off. She could keep Danny underwater more easily there.

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Danny was convinced that he was having some kind of dying hallucination. He had fallen in to the water, was drowning, and now his brain was making up mermaids. Cannibal mermaids, no less. He would spend the last minutes (seconds?) of his life finding out that he was as nutty as his parents.

At least he got to hallucinate being kissed, before he died. He'd never kissed anyone before. That was nice, though it didn't make up for the pain of having his lungs fill with water, or whatever was happening to the rest of his body. It felt like it was being gone over with pins and needles, especially his legs, the sides of his ribs, and the sides of his neck.

It hurt.

The one who had kissed him was dragging him somewhere. They (She? He?) were little more than a dark blur on his vision. It had been hard to see above water. The water blocked even more light- or it should have. It actually seemed... lighter. That was wrong, wasn't it? If he was dying, shouldn't it be getting darker?

Maybe he wasn't dying. Maybe he was just having a psychotic break. That was... better? Yeah. He didn't want to be dying.

"Danny."

Danny jerked. He knew that voice. "Sam?" What the heck? How was he speaking? He was underwater. He shouldn't be speaking.

"Look at me," the mer... person (Sam?) commanded. Two hands guided his face up, through the water. He met an indistinct set of vaguely purple eyes. "I know you're scared. But, uh, that's normal."

"What?" He blinked, the face in front of him becoming a little clearer. "Sam?" His voice sounded really weird. How come Sam's sound normal?

"Yeah, it's me. Look, um. I'm a... sort of a... shapeshifter. And, uh. So are you, now."

"What?" repeated Danny. The prickling sensation in his legs redoubled. They itched.

"Just, please don't freak out."

"What? What's going on?"

"You're a shapeshifter, now. We, uh. We can change people by... kissing them. At least, girls can. Guys can't."

Danny stared. "Oh my god, Sam, you kissed me."

"That's what you focus on?"

"Oh my god, you're a girl."

"... Yeah?"

"Oh my god. Sam. You're a- You have a tail. You're a mermaid."

"I'm aware," said Sam, tone very flat.

"And you said that I-" He looked down, and his voice choked off as he saw that he no longer had any legs. He looked back up at Sam. "Why?" His eyes felt like they should be crying, but he wasn't, probably because he was underwater. This was so weird.

Sam shrugged uncomfortably. "It wasn't my idea. There's a rule about not getting close to normal people without changing them, and Paulina and her goons thought we were getting too close."

"So they tried to kill me?" said Danny, aggrieved. "They tried to- Oh my god. My parents are going to kill me. They're going to-"

"Wait, what? What are you talking about? Why would your parents want to kill you?"

"They hunt cryptids! Shapeshifters fall under that category! Merpeople certainly do. That's that's why they're here. To look for mermaids." He tried to curl up, but wan't used to the tail yet, so that didn't work. He settled for knotting his fingers through his hair. "I can't ever see them again. They'll think I ran away, or was kidnapped or something."

"That's not strictly true," said Sam, clearly trying to adopt a comforting tone. "Just, uh, look. When we get out of the water, we can change so we look human again. That's the shapeshifter part. Your parents don't have to ever know. But you're really going to have to tell me more about the 'hunting cryptids' part."

"We can change?" asked Danny, hopefully. "Just by going up?"

"Yeah. But you can't yet!" Sam said quickly, grabbing Danny's his arm and dragging him back. She was really strong, and moved much better in the water. "This is your first time. You have to stay in, at least for a few hours, otherwise you'll hurt yourself. If you don't spend a few hours underwater every day, you'll get sick. And it's more important to do that early on. That's what I've heard, anyway."

"What you've heard?" echoed Danny.

"Well, I haven't exactly done this before."

Danny cast around, trying not to be mad, because that was stupid. His vision was clearing. He could see the boundaries of cave they were in, Sam's outline, the faint cave opening. But where was the light coming from? He looked down.

"I'm glowing," he half-said, half-moaned.

"Yeah. It's a thing for some people. So, uh, the 'hunting cryptids' thing."