Enjoy!

The summer sun was high in the air, sending its warm waves down to the northern Barbados beach that hosted the Chipmunks and Chipettes. The ocean was an almost unreal blue, sparkling and lapping the shore hypnotically. It was a perfect day for relaxing, for playing, and for living life to the fullest.

Alvin was the first one in the water, wearing solid red swim trunks. He lugged his surfboard in as well, and paddled out a bit to meet the incoming waves. Eleanor and Theodore were a bit closer to the beach. They splashed around in the water, Theodore in dark green trunks and Ellie in a lime green one-piece. Simon and Jeanette walked hand in hand along the surf, the waves rolling just up to their ankles. Simon wore his navy blue checkered trunks, while Jeanette had on an indigo-and –purple tankini. Brittany was lying down on a towel away from the water. She wore a shimmery pink bikini; the bottom piece had a skirt attached.

As she walked with Simon, Jeanette couldn't stop looking down at the water. She couldn't help but wonder if there was something there, anything at all, that could possibly have any ties to the mermaid realm. But even if there was, how could it ever help her get back to Oceana? Her powers were gone. Besides, Oceana was off the coast of Shellfish Cove, which was back in California. The thought was silly.

Or was it?

Out the corner of her eye, Jeanette thought she saw something glittering in the sand. She blinked in disbelief, and it was gone. She turned her gaze to the ocean. It was calm and bright. She thought of how it had looked yesterday, when she'd pictured it all angry and violent. She shivered at how real it had seemed.

"Are you okay, Jeanette?" Simon asked. He had felt her shivering. Jeanette looked into his concerned gray eyes. She blushed a little.

"I'm fine. Just…thinking about how beautiful it is here." Simon smiled.

"It really is. I've never seen water so blue."

Jeanette smiled back at him. Her worries seemed to melt from her mind. For the rest of the afternoon she was content to just walk with him, the sun on their backs and the warm ocean water on their feet.

o0o

The sea floor was one of the most mysterious places one could ever visit. No sunlight reached the sandy bottom, and because of this, only the darkest, strangest of creatures usually lurked here. Predators, especially ones with sharp teeth, skulked within every shadowy nook, cranny, and crevice of this level of the sea. No mermaid or merman in their right mind would go down here of their own free will.

Perhaps I AM out of my right mind, thought Shay, a young mermaid. Her features were barely visible in the dark, but she was illuminated enough to show that she had dark purple locks that reached her waist, and a silver tail that occasionally shone when she flicked it. Her face showed anxiety and mild fear.

"But the comb told me to come here…surely it can't be that dangerous, right?" she said to herself. She looked down at the palm of her hand.

She was holding a tiny golden comb. It was full of cracks, as if some careless mermaid had thrown it toward a coral reef during a storm. Its once radiant pearls were dull and broken; some of them were missing. A couple of the comb's teeth were gone as well. Shay had done her best to fix it when she had found it out on the reef, but try as she might she hadn't been able to return it to its former glory.

However, when she had put the last piece together, the comb had begun to shine with some sort of inner light. It was beautiful, she'd thought at first. Then she'd heard a voice, nothing more than a whisper. Come down, it'd said. Please help me. Come down.

The mermaid shuddered as the cryptic message replayed in her head. She'd listened to the voice, and had come down to the deepest part of the ocean she could find. Well, not really…she had gone to the deepest part that WASN'T the abyss. No-one ever went into the abyss. It was suicide. The water pressure was too high, and there wasn't enough oxygen even for mer-people with the strongest of gills-or lungs, it depends.

Shay looked back at the comb. It was still glowing.

"What do you want me to do now?" she asked it.

"Come down," the whispery voice said again. "Come down and help me."

"Deeper?" the mermaid looked around fearfully. "But this is-

"The abyss is where I rest," said the voice patiently." "Come down to me."

"But I can't go there!" she shrieked. "It's-

"Keep me with you, and you will not be harmed."

The mermaid hesitated. Half of her wanted to throw the comb away, and go back home where it was safe. But another part of her was telling her: you can't back out now. You're too far gone. Keep going.

So after taking a deep breath, Shay flicked her shiny tail and started toward the abyss.

o0o

Afternoon was beginning to turn to evening back on the beach. Dave called the kids in to get ready to go out for dinner. He smiled slightly at their happy, summer-excited expressions. It seemed like they didn't have a care in the world. Dave sighed, thinking back to THAT summer.

David Seville had seen a lot of things in his life, from evil record producers to werewolves, but what happened two summers ago had taken the cake. The morning after Jeanette's disappearance, he'd discovered the other kids missing too. Of course, he'd gone into a miniature panic attack and called the police immediately. However, when he went out on the beach to search later that day, he'd seen all six of them: Brittany, Eleanor, Theodore, and Alvin sitting on the beach talking to a woman in the water. He had been about to run down to them, but froze when the woman lifted her tail out of the water. He'd stayed and watched slack-jawed as Simon emerged from the water carrying Jeanette bridal-style, followed by two more of the mermaid creatures. He'd watched as the blond mermaid waved her hands over Jeanette, and back away as she'd woken up. He'd also seen Jeanette hug all three mermaids before the fantastic creatures swam away into the sea. When the 'munks and 'ettes had started up the beach, he met them with a grim face and demanded an explanation.

So they'd sat with him, and explained everything from start to finish. How Jeanette had been kidnapped, how she'd discovered her powers, how she'd made friends with two of the mermaids, and how the blond one was their queen. He'd listened to how Simon and the others had been kidnapped by an evil mermaid, who wanted revenge on the Chipettes because of what their grandfather, who was a merman himself, did to her. He'd heard all about how Jeanette got them free, and how, with the help of Simon and the mermaid Annalise, had defeated this evil mermaid.

The whole thing was, quite understandably, very hard to swallow. Even two years after the incident, he was still quite wary of the sea after what he'd been told. However, he began to see no reason to keep the kids away from water. If Jeanette had really vanquished some evil mermaid, she could probably very well hold her own against whatever other evil there might be in the sea. Heck, his own son Theodore had defeated a werewolf! The Chipmunks and Chipettes could certainly hold their own.

So Dave could do nothing but smile with them, and help them enjoy their new teenage lives to the best of his ability.

o0o

Shay had reached the edge of the abyss. It was very dark here, and was black as pitch within the crevice beneath her. Not only that, certain types of fish lived here, types that did not mix well with mermaids at all. Gripping the comb, Shay thought about her options. Should she really be doing this? What if the comb was wrong? What if it COULDN'T protect her?

"Keep me with you, and you will not be harmed."

Shay looked down at the comb. It was beginning to glow brightly. Her courage somewhat renewed, she started downward.

The abyss really was the darkest part of the ocean. But with the brightly glowing comb, Shay could see every nook, cranny and creature within several yards' radius of her. Although, this didn't necessarily ease her fears. Not only did some of the deadliest predators live down here, so did the most bizarre creatures. Most of them Shay had never seen before in her life. There were fish with wide eyes and pointy spikes on their bodies, skulking eels with razor-sharp teeth ducking in and out of crevices in the rock walls, and transparent fish that were goodness knows how long. Shay glanced around uneasily before swimming forward.

"Gah!"

Every sea creature that had been in front of Shay darted quickly away, startling the mermaid. Confuse she moved forward again, and more creatures moved back.

"The light," she thought out loud. "They're afraid of the light."

Shay continued on, the light opening a sort of pathway when it cleared the creatures away. As she went deeper and deeper into the abyss, she realized that she felt no more water pressure than when she was above the abyss, and she could breathe just as well as usual. The comb really was protecting her; without it she'd probably be dead or dying by now.

After several minutes, Shay was able to see the sandy floor of the abyss. She wondered if this was the very bottom of the ocean. If someone were to dig down even deeper, what would happen to them? Would they reach the center of the Earth? Would the ocean's water drain down into the hole? Probably not, with all the water pressure. Shay's thoughts ended as her tail finally touched the bottom. The muffled a scream as she turned around.

There were gigantic bones everywhere.

Her eyes widened in shock and horror. She'd never seen so many remnants in her young life. Hesitantly, she took a closer look. The bones were obviously much too big to belong to any Shallow-dwelling creature. Something in her mind suddenly clicked.

"Whales."

"…I'm in a whale graveyard."

Turning away from the creepy bones, Shay returned her attention to the comb. The artifact was glowing profusely, its golden light bouncing off everything. Suddenly, the water grew warm, the sea began to rumble, and the whale bones began to clatter against one another.

"W-What's happening!" Shay screamed. Rocks were beginning to dislodge themselves from the walls surrounding her. Bottom-dwelling fish scurried away. Despite the warm water, a cold chill ran down Shay from her head to her tailfin. A cold, cruel cackle filled the abyss. Shay could only look on in horror as the comb yanked itself from her grip and began to spin in a miniature whirlpool. Eerie green light filled Shay's vision. When the shaking finally stopped, a large, hulking figure was towering over her in the center of the whirlpool.

"Ahh…" Sherri sighed with an evil grin. "It's good to be back!"

Uh-oh! Shay, what were you thinking! D:

How has Sherri returned? Wasn't she dead? The magic runs deeper than you thought…

Tune in next time to see what happens! :D