Karen: I'm back! Thank you to anyone who's reviewed, faved, followed and all that stuff so far. And another big thank you to PaperGirlInAPaperTown for the lovely review and amazing talks in PM. She really is lovely :3
Tanya: Glad to see you found someone to talk with about everything
Isis: And as nice as it is, we should really get along with Chapter 2, so here it is
Karen: That's my line!
Chapter 2: Tanya and Isis
"We're looking for Zac Blakely, anyone know who he is?" One of the women asked, in a slight Russian accent.
Zac shyly raised his hand up, catching their attention.
"Aha, just the man we're looking for," the other woman said excitedly, her voice being more British.
Zac looked over the two women. The first woman was almost as tall as he was, wearing a red vest top with gold/ brown armbands and brown fingerless gloves, along with a pair of red jeans that had swirly patterns in gold down the sides of them. On her feet, were a pair of brown sandals, and most importantly, an triangular scar over her right eye, almost like the shape on an icicle. Her eyes were two different colours, one being red, the other being white like ice and her hair was a very light bleach blonde colour, very short with bangs coming across from the right, almost covering her left eye.
The other woman was a bit shorter than the first, adorning an electric blue vest top with black/ white armbands but had no fingerless gloves. Her lower half was a skirt a shade darker than her top, and fell midway down to her knees. She hand nothing else on her legs and also wore a pair of sandals, but they were black. She had two different coloured eyes as well, one was a light blue whilst the other was gold, and her hair was surprisingly pitch black with streaks of blue appearing throughout it, the length of it being about down to her butt. As for her right eye, there was a scar in the shape of a lightning bolt running down it.
He suddenly realised who these two were. "Let me guess, Tanya and Isis, right?"
Isis smiled at him. "Clever boy aren't you?"
"Not really, Seiger just told me that you two were easily recognisable by your scars is all," Zac admitted.
"Zac? Who are these two?" David asked confused.
"Sorry. This is Isis," he said gesturing towards the black haired female with the lightning bolt scar. "And this is Tanya." Gesturing towards the other woman.
"Nice to meet you David," Isis greeted with a smile.
"Nice to meet you too," David replied slowly. "And the scars? Any story behind them?"
"We can't talk here," Zac said quietly. "I need to take these guys on a tour around land and the HMC, but if you come to the Moon Pool tonight, everything will be explained," he promised.
"Tour? Did Seiger really ask you to show us around here?" Isis asked.
"Just a few basic things like this place, which is the Ocean Cafe, If we ever come on land, we usually meet up here," Zac explained.
"The other places then?" Tanya prompted.
"Uh yeah, let's go," Zac replied, leading the two females out the door, waving to Sirena and David on the way out.
"Looks like he's got his hands full hasn't he?" Sirena noticed.
"Looks like he has indeed. And we do as well, two Watermelon and Lime Frappé's for table 6," David ordered
"And one for me," Sirena added, winking. She just couldn't resist it any longer.
- On the path to Rita's house -
Zac had shown Tanya and Isis Suncoast High, his house and introduced the pair to his parents, just as a note. Currently, they were headed towards Rita's place.
"So, where are we going to now then?" Tanya asked.
"To a good friends house. Principal of Suncoast High, Rita Santos," Zac replied.
"Is this Rita a me-" Isis began to say before Zac quickly silenced her. The reason being that a male was passing them.
"Shhh. There are people around here you know. We don't need anyone knowing about her or us," Zac explained in a whisper.
"Oh right, sorry!" Isis apologised in the same whispering tone.
Carrying on up the path, the male who passed them stopped to look back them.
"Looks like the IMH will be happy today," he said to himself. He then turned around and carried on down the path.
Rita had given Zac a key to her house, just in case he might of needed it in some strange instance. He opened the door and let the two mermaids in.
"Woah, this place is beautiful," Tanya admired as she looked around. "It could use some more red and yellow but each to their own opinion."
Zac smiled and began heading off towards Rita's bookcase, the two girls following him.
"And we're by a bookcase because?" Isis asked impatiently.
"This is important. You see that book there?" He replied, pointing towards the book with the word mermaid on it.
"Humans have books about us?" Tanya asked as she went to pull the book out to read it, only to find that the book didn't come out of the shelf, but made the whole bookcase slide to the side, revealing the stone wall.
"After you," Zac insisted. Tanya lead the way whilst Isis followed behind her, Zac staying behind to make sure that the bookcase closed. The girls were in marvel at the lovely stone stairs and the lights that lit their way. Tanya stopped once she noticed that part of the wall was missing, an opening as it were. She curiously walked inside of it, speechless when she saw all the treasures within the Grotto. She stepped to the side so that Zac and Isis could get in as well.
"Welcome, to Rita's Grotto," Zac introduced as he walked down the steps to greet Poseidon.
"Hey Poseidon," Zac said in a friendly voice as he let the cat jump onto his shoulder, the cat giving him a friendly head rub and brief meow in return.
"A Cat?" Isis asked curiously, wondering why it hadn't hurt Zac yet.
"This is Poseidon, Rita's cat, he won't bite," Zac replied. He slowly walked over to Tanya and Isis with him, neither of the two mermaids flinching.
"Pretty much every other mermaid I've met except Rita, were all scared of Poseidon, but you two seem to be fine around him," Zac noticed.
"We've been on land a lot in our respective countries, we're used to them, and this one is so cute," Isis cooed as she fussed him, Poseidon purring away.
He eventually hopped down and went back to sleeping on top of Rita's chest where she kept her Moon Ring.
"This is where Rita used to train us whilst we were on land, but you can come here whenever want, especially if you need a rare mermaid item, Rita most likely has it," Zac explained.
He began walking back out of the entrance and carried on down the rest of the stairs, the girls following.
"I smell sea water," Isis said.
"Here's why," Zac replied as he stood along of the edge of the exit to the Ocean. "This tunnel leads directly out into the Ocean, and if we head strait, we'll hit Mako Islands shore."
Tanya immediately dived into the water, followed by Isis, and then Zac.
"Lead the way," Tanya said plainly, watching as Zac dove under the water and began heading out of the tunnel.
"It's been a long time since we've seen a merman isn't it?" Isis said as he watched him swim out.
"And a cute one at that," Tanya replied blushing.
"You like him?" Isis asked surprised.
"Oh come on, he's cute and you know it," Tanya replied, diving down and following Zac out.
"Honestly," Isis said to herself as she began following them.
Their tails weren't the same colour as most other mermaids. Tanya's tail was predominantly red with flecks of gold scattered around it whilst Isis's tail was more of a storm blue colour with flecks of black scattered on it. Elemental mermaids usually had tails to represent their elements but Isis and Tanya's were more or so suited towards themselves.
The three of them were all very silent on the way to Mako Island. Once they could see a shore line, Zac suddenly turned left and began heading around the back of the Island, Isis and Tanya following. They soon reached the opening to the Moon Pool and swam up into it, the two girls gazing around, looking up at the volcano's peak.
"This Moon Pool is situated in a Volcano?" Tanya asked in shock.
"It's been dormant for so many years, and there's no lava or anything so it's 100% safe. The only other thing I have to do is teach you the code for our sleeping quarters," Zac replied, ducking below the water.
"He swam down to the bottom of the Moon Pool and found the silver mark. "You'll just need to hold a hand out." Isis held out her right whilst Tanya held out her left.
Zac began chanting in a strange language that neither of the two mermaid recognised, and noticed that his body had naturally entered Overdrive state, the strange fin like ears returning along with the golden glow and gold eyes. Silver light engulfed his hands as he placed them on top of the girls hands, the silver light transferring into them. He chanted three final words. "Eldura Heischia Lantura," as the Overdrive state then wore off, Zac returning to normal.
"Great, so all you have to do is place the hand I transferred the light to on the seal, and the door will open. There will be time to test it out later though, we have a Seiger to go talk to," Zac explained as he created a white portal for the three of them to head through.
Once they were on the other side, Seiger took his hood down, the group of three doing the same.
"Ah, Tanya and Isis, nice to meet you at long last," Seiger greeted with a bow.
"Nice to meet you too," Isis replied happily.
"Likewise," Tanya replied as she did a little bow as well.
"Well done Zac, I'd say that was a job well done. But before you leave, there is something important that we could use you to for," Seiger said, motioning towards Tanya and Isis.
"Something interesting happened during Evie's first mermaid school lesson. I presume you two remember your friend Lacrima? Elicia and Marina?"
- Meanwhile, in a unknown location -
"Guys, I've got some good news for you!" A man shouted as he headed down a short staircase.
"What is it now Lucas?" Another man asked.
"You'll never believe who I just saw today," Lucas teased. Remember the man who stopped down the path on the way to Rita's, that was Lucas. He was a short blonde haired male, surely no older than 25, with dark brown eyes, and a hell of a lot of scars on his body, and one tattoo on his back which wasn't visible, but it was the letters IMH in a very bold sharp font, with two harpoons either side of it.
"Just spill it already!" A woman shouted.
"Jeez, sorry. Well, I won't tell you flat out, but there were two women, one of whom nearly said the M word," Lucas explained breifly.
"Are you sure they nearly said mermaid?" Richard asked in shock.
"No doubt about it. Besides, they were headed towards Santos's place and they had two rather unusual scars on their face," Lucas replied.
"Elemental mermaids," the female voice said plainly.
"It's been weeks since we've had any interesting news on mermaids, looks like our Sea Demon didn't do us much good after all," Richard said with a sour tone. "But it looks like our luck is about to change."
"Not just that, but they were with a guy as well, who told the girl who nearly said mermaid to be quiet. I'd take bets any day that he was a merman," Lucas added.
"Think it's the same one?" The female voice asked.
"Most likely, there aren't that many out there any more," Richard wondered. "Even so, you should be happy. Looks like you'll need to go back to the HMC for a while, Felicity."
Karen: Sorry if it seemed kinda short, there was just a lot more to establish this chapter.
Isis: The next chapter should explain pretty much everything that happened in this chapter, including me, Tanya, and that brief section at the end.
Karen: It shouldn't take too long for me to get it out so you're all in luck for once. See ya soon! xxx