A/N Hi everybody. I know I've got a few fans and I'm sorry for keeping you waiting on this chapter but I've had some serious writers block up until now but I think I'm over it so here's chapter 20! read and review and please enjoy.
Chapter 20
One week ago in San Francisco… Marina and her boyfriend Jason had just finished high school and were out camping in the woods near the beach just outside of town. The two were only a few days from moving to Australia to attend Gold Coast University and were enjoying their last few days in San Francisco by going camping. The pair was going to be starting school a few days after their arrival in The Gold Coast. Right now the pair were playfully chasing each other along the beach near their campsite. "Catch me if you can Jason!" Marina said "Oh believe me I can!" and he playfully tackled her to the ground and leaned in for a kiss and soon they were making out totally oblivious to the fact that the blue moon was overhead or the fact that they were next to the very same moon pool that Jake had transformed in a few years beforehand. That blue moon just happens to be the same one that caused all that mayhem for our favorite merpeople. So the loving couple in the heat of the moment rolled over and fell into the moon pool! "AHH!" Marina screamed as the pair fell underwater. "Whoa. This is so weird!" Jason said as the pair surfaced and saw the water bubbling and lights rising to the sky. So once the strange occurrence had finished the pair of new merpeople got out and back to their camp with the moon pool having completely ruined the mood and so they went to bed in their tent. The next day Marina put her bikini on and Jason put on his swim trunks and the pair of unknowing merpeople ran into the water hand in hand having no idea their lives had changed forever. "AAAHH! WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO US?!" the pair yelled simultaneously as they saw and stared at their newly formed tails. "It had to have been that crazy pool we fell into last night!" Jason said so they got out of the water to see if they might be able to get their tails back if they dried off. So ten minutes later they'd dragged themselves out of the water and had finally dried off and gotten their legs back. Soon they were at the moon pool. "Well? Who's gonna go in?" Marina asked but was surprised when her boyfriend jumped in causing water to splash all over the place and get Marina soaking wet which caused her to get a tail too and she fell face-first into the moon pool. The pair surfaced and Jason (being completely oblivious to the fact he'd splashed his girlfriend) asked why she jumped in after him. "I didn't jump in! I fell in when you jumped in and splashed me!" Marina yelled at her boyfriend. "Oh. Sorry Marina. I guess I wasn't thinking. I just felt so drawn to the pool. It was almost like a magnetic pull." Jason said "Well now that we're here let's look around." so the pair dived underwater and found an underwater sea cave full of blue jewels that were unlike anything they'd seen before. Jason pulled one of the unique crystals off and they surfaced and Marina said "Look! It's so beautiful! I can't believe nobody has found this pool before!" so then the pair got out of the water and dried off and got their legs back. "Well are you gonna say it or am I? Jason said "Say what?" Marina asked "What we are now." Jason answered and Marina looked at him and she knew what he was talking about but she didn't want to put it to words because it was just too weird. "I guess I will. It seems that even as impossible as this sounds, we're merpeople!" Jason said and marina let out a high pitched squeal of joy and said "Oh my god! I've wanted to be a mermaid ever since I was just a little girl!" "Well as thrilling as this is, what are we gonna do? Every time we touch water we sprout fish tails!" Jason said. And so over the next few days the couple packed their bags and went swimming every chance they got and Jason surprised his girlfriend by making that crystal he'd taken from the moon pool into a pendant on a gold chain and gave it to her. A few days later in Australia… "Well, tomorrow's our first day at the university." Jason said to Marina as they got their school schedules. The ironic part of this situation is that both new merpeople had already planned on becoming marine biologists before this unexpected change since they both loved the sea which made this quite a fun surprise. So now they were reading their school schedules and saw they had the same 11:00 to 5:00 schedule that Cleo and Lewis shared but they had no idea there were other merpeople in town let alone eight. "So now that we've gone through our schedules let's go for a swim!" Marina said and then they shared a wide grin and ran out of their apartment and straight for the beach but little do they know that they're going to meet more merpeople today. "Jake! Rikki! Wait up!" Cleo said using telepathy. "As usual. Those two are racing again." Lewis said. The entire group was enjoying the last swim of summer vacation before another year of college starts when Rikki and Jake started racing each other to mako. As Jake and Rikki were speeding along Jake stopped and swam behind a coral and called Rikki up. "What's up Jake?" Rikki asked "They're what's up." Jake responded as he pointed to the newcomers. "Wow new merpeople in town!" Rikki exclaimed and soon went out from behing the coral they were hiding in and used telepathy to yell "OI! You two! It's been a long time since I've seen any new merpeople in town!" "Rikki! Don't go surprising people like that! You definitely didn't need to yell!" Jake said and Jason and Marina were completely surprised to see the sudden appearance of Rikki and Jake and also even more surprised to hear their voices in their heads. All the pair could do was look astonished and point up signaling the pair to surface. "WOW! You two are merpeople too?!" Marina said astonishment clear in her voice. "Geeze you don't have to yell!" Jake said and Rikki burst out laughing. "What's so funny?" Jason said and once Rikki caught her breath she explained how she'd met Jake and how he'd said pretty much the same thing when they all screamed which is why she was laughing. Once their introductions were over Marina said "So there's more merpeople in town?" "Yup! Hey Jake go get the others and tell them to meet up at the café." Rikki said "Wait what café?" Jason said just as Jake swam off and Rikki explained how she owns the local café everybody goes to and how Jake helps her run it when he doesn't have school so then they were soon on the beach and Rikki steam dried her tail and the pair's eyes went wide and Jason said "Whoa! How did you do that?!" and Rikki simply said "My powers. Duh." and Marina said "Wait we get powers with our tails?!" "Yup! You two have got to be seriously new to this if you haven't found out your powers yet." Rikki said "Guilty as charged. We only got our tails a week ago in San Francisco. We just moved here for college." Jason said and then Rikki stopped in her tracks and said "San Francisco? That's where Jake became a merman." "WHAT?!" the pair said simultaneously. 15 minutes later at the café… "Are these them?" Emma asked. Jake had told the others that they'd met a pair of new merpeople and he'd also shut down the café so all the merpeople could talk without worrying about being overheard and now Rikki, Jake, Emma, Ash, Cleo, Lewis, Bella, Will, Marina, and Jason were in the café. "Yup. This is Marina and Jason. Apparently they changed in the same moon pool as you Jake." Rikki said "Really? That's a surprise. How long ago?" Jake said "Umm, about a week ago." Marina replied "Wow you two are seriously new at this! Have you found out your powers yet?" Cleo asked "What's all this about powers?" Jason asked "Well I guess not. Jason, have you noticed any unusual strength at all?" Lewis asked after observing the conversation for awhile. "Unusual strength? Like what?" Jason asked with a quizzical look on his face and Lewis who had apparently planned with Ash gave Ash the signal and Ash brought a weight over to Jason and said "Hold this" and handed Jason the heavy 100lb weight "Okay, why am I holding this?" Jason asked and Will said "Look at the weight and see how much it weighs." and Jason looked at the weight and saw it weighs 100lbs and realized he'd been holding it with one hand and said "WHAT THE HELL?! How am I holding this? With one hand no less!" and the other four mermen laughed at his comment and then once the boys finished laughing at their prank Will spoke up and said "In normal circumstances mermen are stronger than mermaids in and out of the water and faster than them on land but we all saw a very unique blue moon that gave the girls here all the strength and speed of mermen which is called the blue moon's gift. Also you said you changed during the full moon about a week ago? Well that's the blue moon that gave the girls their unusual strength and speed. Marina, I think that since you changed during that moon you might've gained the blue moon's gift too. Here try lifting this weight." and he took the weight from Jason and set it on the ground in front of Marina and Marina looked at the weight. "Well, here goes nothing." Marina said as she bent down to lift the weight and was surprised at how lightweight it felt and she said "Guys, are you sure this is 100lbs?" Marina asked "Have either of you been able to control your transformations?" Lewis asked "Well the first few times we didn't but then we realized we needed to get things sorted out and tried to hold back our transformations and it worked." Jason replied "Well that's part of the blue moon's gift too. When we first became merpeople we couldn't control our transformations either because it was impossible but after that blue moon we gained that ability." Cleo said "Okay but what about those powers we've been seeing you use? Like steam-drying yourself with a wave of your hands?" Marina asked "Actually the powers are a bit more varied than that. Each of us got our own powers when we became Merpeople and over time due to varying circumstances we gained additional powers on top of the ones we already had." Emma said "Okay so what powers do you all have?" Jason asked "Wanna see a demonstration?" Bella asked "Sure" both Marina and Jason replied at once. "Hang on a sec, maybe here isn't exactly the best place for a demonstration? Emma warned "She's right. This definitely isn't a good place." Lewis agreed "What about Mako?" Jake suggested "Okay buy not the moon pool. How about on the far shore facing out into the ocean? No boats ever go there so that'd be a safe place for the demonstration. Nobody will see us there." Rikki replied "Alright that seems like a good idea. Whaddaya say we get to Mako Through the moon pool then trek out to that side of the island?" Emma said "Sure." everybody agreed and went off. 10 minutes later on the far side of Mako island... "Alright we're here. Let's see your powers." Jason said "Who's gonna start us off?" Rikki asked. "I've got an idea. How about we show them our powers with the girls going first in order of least powerful to most powerful then boys from least powerful to most powerful?" "Uhm sure." Rikki said then everybody agreed. "So I guess that means I'm up first." Bella said then she used her powers to pick up a sphere of water from the ocean then she turned it to jelly and let Jason and Marina touch it then when they were done she solidified it and they were surprised that was even possible then she told them to stand back and she pushed her powers a bit further and the solidified sphere of water exploded. "Whoa!" both Marina and Jason fell backwards in astonishment. "And you're the least powerful of the bunch?!" Jason exclaimed with an even more astonished face than he'd had before. "I guess I'm up next. I have all the same powers as Bella with one more added on so I'll skip her powers and go straight to my powers." Emma said then she froze a puddle of water that was by the beach then aimed her abilities skyward and made it snow a few feet around them. "Whoa! It's snowing!" Marina said. It was her turn to be astonished this time. "Yup! And that's only the beginning. I have both Emma's and Bella's powers so like Emma I'll skip over their powers." Cleo said and since it was her turn she got started. So she got started and kicked up some wind and spun it a bit and since she wanted to be a bit flashy this time she turned it into a small tornado and threw a lightning bolt into it and had that spin too and held it up and turned it horizontal and had it follow her hand movements until she tossed it at a gigantic boulder which exploded from the combined force of both the lightning and the small tornado. That's when Marina and Jason were dumbfounded with astonishment and could barely speak until finally Marina piped up saying "And Rikki's more powerful than Emma, Cleo, and Bella combined?" "Yeah but her and Jason are kinda at a tie for who's most powerful. They both have the exact same powers and they've got the same level of skill with those powers." Will said. "Okay now I can see why the café wasn't a good place for a demonstration." Jason said and then they all started laughing and when the laughter died down Rikki told them all to stand back and she got started. Not wanting to be outshone by Cleo's flashy display she decided she go somewhere along the same lines so she started with a mini-tornado, threw a fireball at it then threw lightning at it to make a more advanced form of them spinning display Cleo made then added a mini-sandstorm around it that began to glow from the heat then she built a bigger boulder than the one Cleo busted by using her earth power to solidify the beach sand and lifted the spinning whirlwind of power and told everybody to get behind her so she can use her powers to shield them and the forest and she dropped it on the boulder causing a huge elemental explosion that would have killed them if Rikki hadn't used her powers to shield them like she'd said she would but then they saw that all the sand was glowing with heat so then Rikki flooded the beach to cool off thesand which turned it to glass so then she used her powers over earth and minerals to turn the glass back into sand so then it was the boys turns. Since Will is the weakest of the boys he stated off by making a water sculpture of a giant Dragon then told everybody to stand back and he used his lightning powers to strike it from above with broke it into a dozen big pieces then made those pieces explode. "Wow that was cool!" Jason said having finally gotten over the shock of how powerful his new friends were and was now enjoying the show. Marina was in a similar position but instead opted to keep quiet and enjoy the show. Now it was Ash's turn so he made it snow like his girlfriend did and then created a giant block of ice then expertly tossed small lightning bolts at it chipping off piece by piece of it until he had a remarkable sculpture of Emma in full mermaid form then at that Marina couldn't keep quiet and said "Nice going Ash! I can really see how much you love Emma. It looks great." "Thanks Marina!" He said. so then it was Lewis's turn and he created a ball of lightning in one hand and a fireball in his other hand then combined them and tossed them at a boulder where it exploded and shattered the boulder and even had a few spots of the boulder melted then he threw a lightning bolt at another boulder then threw a gust of wind at the pieces of the second shattered boulder which sent them flying out into the ocean. After that he created a slicxing wing burst that he threw at a third boulder which got sliced diagonally and the top half slid off and onto the sand. Then when it was Jakes turn he said "Well since my powers are the same as Rikki's powers I won't be doing a display so now it's time to find out what kindsa powers our new friends have." "What? But we haven't figured out our new powers yet. We didn't even know we have super strength!" Marina complained. "Then now's as good a time as any to try to find out!" Rikki replied. "Yeah you Don't wanna find out what your powers are in the middle of class. You'd wind up being exposed so it's better to try finding out now." Jake said "Okay… I guess it is better we try now afterall." Marina relented. So first up was Marina and Cleo suggested that the easiest way to try finding out your powers is by using hand signs. That's how they found out their powers. So with everybody watching she went through the entire book of american sign language which she was quite fluent in. Not one sign from sign language caused her to find out her powers. "Maybe you're being too structured? My heat power is activated by clenching my fist and that isn't any kinda sign language. You should try going through the signs we used for our powers at the start." Rikki said so then she went through each hand sign and fount that She has Cleo's water powers, Bella's Jelly powers, and Emma's freezing powers. After that it was Jake's turn and he found he has Rikki's heat, fire, lightning, and earth powers. So then they all practiced their powers for the rest of the day.