"Come on! Hurry!"
Niecalli swims up to the surface with a new friend she made. Pializtli (pee-yah-liz-way) is a well-known, albeit young, Talokanil warrior who is assigned to Niecalli as a guard. He is to watch over her when her main three trainers, caretakers, are unavailable.
"Nayeli! Talokanils are not allowed on the surface. You, especially, are prohibited." Pializtli exasperates, chasing after Niecalli.
"No one has to know." Niecalli stops swimming and turns to Pializtli, staring at him. "And I mean no one." She emphasizes and begins swimming again.
"Wait Naye – Argh!"
Pializtl follows suit, not entirely stopping Niecalli. The first time they meet, Pializtli is a well-mannered boy, serious in his task in watching her. But as more time passes, Niecalli's mischievous nature rubs on him, occasionally going along with her whims. Today is such a day. The curiosity and excitement overwhelms the fear from the punishment of the trouble they are getting into.
They break through the water slowly, only letting their eyes show to inspect the surroundings. On the surface, there are people dragging in boats to land while some hauls fish and others fix nets.
"What are they doing?" Niecalli whispers.
"It looks like they finished fishing. It is almost the end of the day."
As the people finish their day, they walk further inland and disappear completely from view, taking their fishes and nets along with them. Niecalli and Pializtli wait a few more minutes to ensure that the people are truly gone and not coming back.
"Alright, I think it's safe. Let's go." Niecalli withdraws underwater and swims to the surface as Pializtli follows suit.
They walk further on the sandy beach and Niecalli stares at her blue feet, wiggling her toes.
"Oh the sand sticks to your feet! This is very uncomfortable." She huffs while Pializtli gives a small laugh.
Neither of them has ever been on the surface before. The interest and wonder fuels their drive to examine every little thing they could find. Niecalli walks to the edge of the beach. She touches the little plants and feels the trees, stroking the textures and ridges in awe. She walks around a tree to go further in but she sees a child – a human girl around her age, holding a basket with an adult man crouching over something not far behind her. Both see each other, both stop in their tracks, both freeze in place. The little girl lets out a scream. The man behind her quickly stands up, alert, and faces them. He sees Niecalli's unusual appearance and runs towards them, shouting words Niecalli did not understand. Despite all her training in how to fight and defend herself, Niecalli has never actually been in a situation where she had to, making her back away, shaking in fear. She turns around and tries to run back to the water. It is her first time above ground, the gravity holding her firm to the surface of the soft sand causes her to stumble all over the place, and her constant shaking did not help. The man pulls the little girl behind him and chases after Niecalli. When he reaches her, he kicks Niecalli's back. She falls hard on the sand face first, her water-filled mask breaking in the process as she hyperventilates from lack of oxygen.
"NAYELI!" Pializtli hears the commotion and runs towards Niecalli, pulling his spear out and attacks the man. The disturbance alerts the rest of the people, running towards them with shovels and everyday items as makeshift weapons. This keeps Pializtli distracted.
As Pializtli is fighting, keeping the people away from her, Niecalli crawls towards the ocean, still hard of breathing, excruciatingly slow. Her hair is all over her face, preventing her from seeing where she is going. Her sight is getting blurrier and dark spots gradually cloud her vision. Niecalli tries to breathe deep, to no avail, and huffs, pushing her hair out of her face with her shaky hand and accidentally yanks off the respirator on her shoulder providing her gills with oxygen. Niecalli huffs again taking in as much air as she can and surprisingly, her breathing got – better. This realization stops Niecalli in her tracks and tries to breathe again, making sure it isn't a fluke. She is breathing better, albeit still struggling as she breathes in the air in loud wheezes. Rolling to her back, she drags her shaky hand to her other shoulder with as much strength she could muster and pulls the covering off her other gill. Air fills her lungs with ease as she gulps an abundance of it through her nose. She sits up and stares at her hands, still breathing heavily. The blue tint of her skin is slowly vanishing, making way for the tanned tone of her natural skin.
Pializtli stands over a pile of unconscious men and hurriedly runs to Niecalli.
"Niecalli! Nayeli! Are you oka-?" Niecalli's appearance halts him as he stares at her, still distractedly looking at her hands in wonder.
Niecalli draws her hands to her shoulders to find her gills gone. "I can breathe air." She whispers. She looks up excitedly at Pializtli, her eyes glows in mirth. She stands on her legs and hugs him tight. Pializtli starts laughing as Niecalli pulls him into merry jumping.
"Pializtli! I can breathe ai – wait." She abruptly stops jumping as she contemplates. Dread replaces her happiness as she lets go of Pializtli and runs towards the ocean as fast as she can.
"Where are you going?" Pializtli shouts. He watches her dunk herself head first into the water and observes the quietness as she stays there for a couple minutes. She emerges with an excited scream. She throws her fists in the air and woohoo-ed in excitement, jumping all over the place.
"I CAN BREATHE BOTH!"
Nayeli = Princess