Madison smiled at Kore. She was finally given permission by the water demon to swim around the Dark Ocean, as long as she didn't leave. Thankfully, Madison was perfectly okay with just swimming around the Dark Ocean. She needed to stretch her fin, and it gave her a chance to talk to some of the water demons about whether they'd seen Coco anywhere.
"Hi, can I talk to you for a minute?" Madison swam over to a female water demon who, as far as Madison knew, was swimming aimlessly.
The water demon turned, and gasped upon seeing her.
"Are you okay?" Madison asked her.
"You have to go-get out of here! You're Madison; the ruby warrior princess, right?" the water demon asked.
Madison nodded, slowly, "Why?"
"Gaito's here! Someone told him you were here. He's out looking for you. If it was one of the others you'd talked to, you'd probably be in the basement right now with Coco."
"Coco?!" Madison shouted, surprised, "You know where she is?!"
The water demon nodded, "Gaito's castle. Look, I can't explain now, you must leave! I'll try and get in contact with you later."
"Wait, what's your name?" Madison asked.
"Hannah. Please, just go! As far away as you can!" Hannah shoved Madison forward, and with a tentative glance back at Hannah and Kore's house, Madison swam out of the Dark Ocean as fast as her injured fin would allow her.
XXXX
"HOW LONG IS THIS DAMN WATER DEMON GOING TO SLEEP?!" Aryl shouted as she paced in the hotel room the next morning. Lexia sighed, ignoring her friend's outbursts, and Kiri just rolled her eyes, not looking up from her magazine. Moiyu, Jay, and Caren were out looking for food again. Rilene, as I'm sure you've guessed, hadn't woken up yet. And it was making Aryl crazy. Err… crazier.
"Just let her sleep. Lexia must have really hit her hard." Kiri finally answered, when Aryl's ranting got to her, "Look, can you run down to the lobby and get me some candy? I'm too lazy to wait for Caren, Moiyu and Jay to get back."
"Yeah, sure." Aryl said, "Gimme some money."
Kiri handed Aryl some American money, and Aryl exited the room. Once the two were sure she was gone, Lexia spoke up, "Where is she going to get candy in the lobby?"
"It's Aryl. She'll figure something out." Kiri answered, with a small smile, before going back to her magazine.
XXXX
"Did you find them?" Anayis asked Lycoris as she swam through the door.
"Sort of." Lycoris answered, "I found one of them. They weren't together. This girl was with three other mermaids and two water demons. The three other mermaids were using some interesting powers, but they weren't what you described. I wasn't sure if I should have given the message to this one and asked her where the others were, or had her pass the message on, or what, so I came back."
Anayis sighed. "Which color was she?"
Lycoris thought for a moment before answering, "Purple."
"And the other mermaids? What kingdoms were they from?"
Lycoris paused, "One was purple as well, so I'd say she was from the same as the princess, and the other two were versions of blue."
"Deliver the message to those four mermaids. See if you can figure out where the others are from them. It's the best we can do, and I need to meet with the seven."
Lycoris nodded and bowed to her princess, "I will, but do you mind if I rest first? I swam all night to get here."
"Of course!" Anayis said, her mood immediately lightening, "I didn't expect you to leave immediately."
"Thank you." Lycoris smiled.
XXXX
"I'm lost again!" Caren cried as she noticed that Moiyu and Jay were not behind her as she'd originally thought. She looked around the street looking for any sign of the two water demons and sighed, "Great." she muttered, walking in the opposite direction she'd been heading in, thinking maybe she'd left them behind or something. She had only walked a short distance when she noticed them at the beach that lined the road they were walking along. She ran over, stopping behind them.
"Hey, Caren." Jay said, calmly.
"Don't "Hey, Caren" me! You left without telling me!" Caren shouted.
"Sorry." Moiyu said, "But I thought I saw something."
Caren glanced out over the water, "I don't see anything."
"Neither do I, now." Moiyu sighed, "But I could have sworn…"
XXXX
Kiri watched the waves from the balcony of the hotel room. Lexia had gone down to the lobby to make sure Aryl hadn't somehow caused a catastrophe in the hour she'd been gone from the hotel room. The waves were calming, but Kiri's thoughts were interrupted by the sound of movement in the room. She turned around and looked in to see a confused Rilene waking up.
She ran in. "We're not going to hurt you." she told the water demon, "We just want some information."
Rilene squirmed in her restraints, "I'm not telling you anything!" she said.
At this point, Lexia walked in, "Oh, hey, she's awake. She said anything?"
"I haven't asked her anything yet." Kiri replied, "Did you find Aryl?"
Lexia shook her head, "Nope, but there was no trail of destruction to follow, so I think she's okay."
Kiri laughed, "Hope so. Okay, Rilene, right?"
Rilene was silent.
"Look, we just want to know what Gaito's message was." Lexia said, "The fires were put out, and now the message is gone."
"Message?" Rilene asked, "What message?"
"What? He didn't tell you anything?" Kiri asked, surprised.
"No, he tells all of us his plans, but he never mentioned a message." Rilene said, confused.
Kiri pulled the pictures of the Tokyo snowstorm out of her bag and showed them to Rilene.
"Then what about the snowstorm he caused?" Kiri asked.
"Gaito-sama didn't cause that snowstorm." Rilene said, "He thought you did, since it trapped three of us in Tokyo."
Kiri blinked.
"Then who--" she started, but was cut off by Lexia's cell phone ringing. Lexia flipped it open.
Before she could greet whoever was calling her, she got a frantic, "LEXIA! GET DOWN TO THE BEACH, HURRY!" It was Aryl. She hung up after delivering her message.
"What's wrong?" Kiri asked.
Lexia shook her head, "I'm not sure." she replied, "I'm going to the beach. You should come too. Bring Rilene."
"It'll be a little weird to walk around with a tied up water demon." Kiri said.
"Then untie her. Just hurry to the beach!" Lexia ran out of the room and Kiri glanced over at Rilene.
"You're loyal to Gaito, right?" Kiri asked.
Rilene nodded, "Of course I am."
"Damn it." Kiri muttered, "You have to promise not to leave."
"Why would I do that?" Rilene asked.
"Because there are four mermaid princesses here in California right now, and we will hurt you." Kiri said.
Rilene was silent as Kiri untied her.
"You have a human form, right?"
Rilene shook her head.
Kiri rolled her eyes, grabbed a baseball hat of Lexia's, pulled it on Rilene's head to cover her conspicuous horns and dragged the black haired water demon out of the room.
XXXX
Lexia ran over to Aryl who was standing at the beach with Caren, Moiyu and Jay. Hannah was in the water not too far away, and there was an unconscious mermaid lying on the beach.
"What happened?" Lexia asked her.
"Moiyu thought she saw something and came over here, and before the three of them knew it, Hannah helped this mermaid to shore."
"Her name is Madison. You have to get her to safety." Hannah told Moiyu.
Moiyu nodded, "We'll do our best. Is Myieli okay?"
"Myieli's fine." Hannah said, "Don't worry about her. I need to get back."
"Thanks, Hannah." Moiyu said. Hannah ducked underwater and disappeared.
"How do we get her back to the hotel room?" Lexia asked.
"I'm not sure. That's why I called you. Is Kiri coming?" Aryl asked.
Lexia nodded, "Oh, Rilene woke up. Apparently, Gaito thinks WE snowed Tokyo in. He's not behind it."
"But Hannah said--" Moiyu said.
"I know." Lexia said, "Which makes me wonder why Rilene thinks he didn't. Could Hannah have been mistaken?"
Moiyu shrugged, "I should have asked." she said.
"I'll try and catch up with her." Aryl dove in the water, swimming after Hannah as Kiri and Rilene ran over, the former holding the latter by her arm.
Rilene noticed Moiyu.
"Moiyu?" she asked, surprised.
"Hey, Rilene." Moiyu answered.
Suddenly, Madison stirred slightly, waking up immediately. "Ugh, my head." she muttered.
"Madison, are you okay?" Moiyu asked her.
"Oh, no. Not more water demons…" Madison muttered.
"Don't worry." Lexia said, "She's on our side. My name's Lexia. This is Moiyu, Jay, Kiri, and Caren. Oh, and that's Rilene, but you can ignore her, she's not technically supposed to be here."
"I guess you already know me."
"Can you switch to human form?" Caren asked. "We can go back to our hotel room and talk."
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
And that's that. Sorry it's shorter than normal, but I have to go eat dinner, and if I don't end it now, the chapter won't be out for longer. I've got a bunch of ideas, so I'll try and get the next chapter out soon too.
Next chapter: Rilene's beliefs are questioned, Lycoris's message is delivered, and Miriella and Rina find the source of the snowstorm.