Chapter 110

As Ryan scrambled for the controls, the trio moved towards him, easily getting past the locked door.

"Come on, come on!" he muttered. The circuits were fried. The boat was not moving any time soon. Ryan breathed in deeply and turned to face the doorway, his hand protectively on the necklace.

"Hand it over, Ryan," Rikki commanded.

Ryan shook his head stubbornly. The three moved ominously closer.

"Stop!" Ryan shouted.

There it was again – that feeling of powerlessness from the necklace. The trio faltered slightly. Ryan began to smirk. The mermaids forced it down and out of their minds. It couldn't influence them anymore. Just like they had conquered the moonlight all those years ago, a silly mer artefact wasn't going to get in their way now.

As they regained their pace, Ryan's hopeful expression dropped of his face.

"We'll be taking that," Rikki said to Ryan as Cleo unfastened the necklace.

"Thieves," Ryan accused with a sneer.

"We're just returning it to the rightful owner," Emma replied.

The three moved out to the main room, Khasha and Jessie were just starting to come around.

"Wait," Ryan called out, "If you don't give that back, I'll tell everyone about you – all about what you are!"

"Would you really stoop so low?" Cleo asked, ignoring the thought that said 'well, he did just order your own friends to attack you,'

"All I wanted was proof," he pleaded.

"No one will believe you," Rikki said, "People are quite happy believing that magic and the dangerous mythical creatures are just stories – I doubt they'd want to find out the truth. People have tried before. No one believes them. Why would anyone believe you?" she finished harshly.

Jessie came to consciousness with a gasp. What had happened? She groaned and rubbed the back of her head. Emma offered her a hand and helped her to her feet.

"Easy, easy," Emma coaxed. "You're okay,"

They helped Jessie and Khasha outside. Both were in a daze. Ryan watched as the group moved to the deck, and dived into the water, Rikki carrying the necklace.

Cleo was sad at what Ryan had done, but did not want to leave him with more reasons to be angry.

"Goodbye Ryan. Take care of yourself," Cleo said.

Ryan nodded, a stumped expression on his face. With that, she too dived into the water.

Ryan moved to lean on the railing.

What on earth had just happened.

Ryan felt incredibly drained. As the necklace moved further away from him, he felt his body relax, and his emotions unjumble. A sudden realisation hit him: While he felt like he had been in control of himself and his actions while having the necklace, the necklace had actually been heightening his emotions and influencing his actions to become much more hot-headed and violent that he would have been. In some ways, it was probably a good thing that it was no longer with him. Who knew what he would have done to the two mermaids under his control.

Wait.

He had two mermaids under his control.

Cleo and Rikki were mermaids.

He had met five mermaids in one evening. FIVE.

He had found out that there were not only 'traditional' mermaids, but there were mermaids who lived on land – pretending to be humans – just like Cleo and Rikki. How many mermaids were there? He had seen their powers in action. What would happen if mermaids one day wanted to get rid of the humans?

'No,' Ryan's rational mind said, 'You have been watching way too many movies,'

'But what if?'

Ryan thought about what was going to happen when he got back to Australia. His colleagues and friends were still going to harass him about his belief in mermaids. The scientific community would still be ignorant to the magical going on around them. What would happen if the magical was revealed?

He sighed and walked back inside the cabin, taking in the wreckage that he, and the mermaids, had caused.

He was left with one main question – What was he going to do with his new knowledge?

OoOoO

Jessie was holding onto Rikki's shoulders as they swam away from the boat, and Khasha on Emma's. It didn't take Cleo long to catch up with them once she was in the water.

They made their way to the beach where Bella was with Anna. Anna and Bella had sent relief over mindspeak when Emma updated them as they were swimming.

"Thank God," Bella said, embracing Jessie, and then the others. It was a relieved reunion with a lot of hugging. Rikki definitely had some choice words for the Queen when they got back to retrieve their children.

"We need to head off," Emma said. "That necklace must be some sort of merman artefact – it appears that only non-mermaids can use it for control. If anyone else gets their hands on it, there could be big trouble. We need to return it quickly and get back home. We're already a few days delayed as it is."

"Agreed," Anna said. She went to stand up, and promptly turned white and sat back down.

"She's not in the best state," Bella said. "She lost quite a bit of blood,"

"Are you feeling better Jess? Khasha?" Emma asked them.

"Much," Jessie replied. "Bit of a headache, but nothing I can't handle,"

"Me too," Khasha said.

"Bella, do you think that we can go now if we carry Anna and move slowly?" Cleo asked.

"Yeah I think so," she replied.

With that, they helped Anna to the water's edge, and set off.

OoOoO

"Our Mums have been gone for ages," Charlie said. "Maybe we should do something,"

"I don't know," Jennifer replied, shifting Fi to her other shoulder, "The last time you said that here, you and the boys botched the plan, and now we're separated out of mindspeak range. The boys are who knows where – we can't risk anything by doing something silly!"

"Jenn, come on," Leila said, backing her twin up, "What if something has happened to them? We're waiting for them to come back so we can leave, but what if they never do!"

"Our Mums are much too cool to not come back for us. They will." Andy said firmly.

"I hope so," Ariana said in a small voice.

"Me too, Ari," Charlie replied.

OoOoO

After the botched attempt, which may or may not have involved freezing/gelling guards, the boys were taken from the isolation area to another area deeper in the settlement. The area was so deep no sunlight reached it through the water. The passageway was lit up by blue and purple glowing lights. The way the tunnel shifted made it feel like they were swimming down a spiral staircase.

"Where are we going?" Jake asked the mermaid guards that were escorting them.

"A room where you can't make any mischief," one of them replied.

"What does that mean?" Daniel asked.

"It means that we're taking you to a room where you can't use your powers," another replied coldly.

"We can't have you mermen attacking mermaids again – if anyone affiliated with the mermen sees you here, and thinks that you are our prisoner, it could spark reason for war," the first guard responded more kindly.

After a few more minutes, they arrived at a corridor of dimly lit rooms- the walls for these rooms were made out of mer gel, but it glowed a strange purple colour.

"Kina here will attend to your needs," the second guard gestured to the first. "We will take you back up to the main area when your family returns from their mission,"

Alex, Jay, Daniel, Eric, and Jacob reluctantly went into the room, and the door shut behind them. As soon as it closed, they realised they could not use mindspeak or their powers.

"What are we supposed to play with?" Alex asked Kina.

In front of them, Kina crafted toys out of water and gelled them solid – dolphins, whales, turtles. She smiled at them and returned to her post.

OoOoO

Finally, the mermaids arrived back.

'Varine, we have returned,' Emma projected. 'We have what you sent us to get. Honour our deal,'

A/N: MysteriousMarch/May - Hi! I just wanted to thank you for all the lovely comments you have been leaving on the chapters as you read through. I look forward to reading them. I thought I would leave this here on a chapter you are yet to read, so you see it :) Thank you again! - Krystalslazz

A/N: Hey everyone! I hope you've had a good few months :) I have had a busy time lol I can't believe I'm two months off finishing my first year of my masters degree. One more year to go! I'm sorry it keeps taking me so long to update. Thank you for sticking with this story.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter :) I have an awesome story arc planned, hopefully it won't take me too long to write, but I can't promise anything unfortunately. I hope you continue to tune in :)

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Thanks so much to the following people for reviewing the last chapter - I love you guys :D

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(ps GodoftheSea, I play ESO on PC North American server when I have time)