Mysteries of the Deep

Abby Ebon

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

Disclaimer: I do not own "The Thirteenth Year" (Disney, 1999) or "H2O: Just Add Water" (Nickelodeon, 2008).

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

Turn Of The Tide

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

"You're turning into quite the little blackmailer, aren't you?" There was something almost fond in Miriam's voice. Kim didn't quite know what to make of it, so said nothing at all, and only stared stubbornly ahead, meeting Miriam's eyes by way of the rearview mirror. Miriam was driving them back to Kim's house, but

"Alright, do you know who to call about this?" Miriam asked, soft and worried in her own way. Miriam didn't dislike Lewis, and didn't like him. He was a former friend of Zane; at most he should be a curiosity.

He preferred Cleo, Emma, and Rikki to Zane, who was charming and wealthy – when Nate wasn't around to ruin him. Miriam had heard about it from the gossips, that Nate had come into Zane's life – and as quiet and quick as that, Lewis had left it. Good riddance, so far as some had been concerned… but Zane didn't forget his friends so swiftly as that.

Miriam could tell from those questions Sean Marshall had asked, he wouldn't let that Dr. Jess Wheatley go without confronting him. Lewis was his assistant, and might become something like collateral damage or cannon fodder if he got in Sean's way. Lewis was the type to do something like that – because it was the right thing to do.

Miriam wouldn't see him lose his job or get hurt because he hadn't been warned; she was a lot of things, but not outright cruel. So he had to be warned, but Miriam didn't know how to go about it without getting involved. It rested with Kim, who was Cleo's sister, Cleo who was Lewis's friend, or…or something, the way Cleo was sometimes with Lewis, she acted like a girlfriend, or a big sister.

"We might catch Emma, she probably hasn't gone yet." Miriam didn't ask gone to where, she kept her mouth shut and raised her eyebrows.

"Emma works at the Juice Net." Kim bit her lip worriedly, and Miriam looked to the car's digital clock.

"We just might make it before closing time." Miriam told her, and smiled as she sped up.

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

"I know that look." Emma's tone was teasing even as she had been worriedly watching Ash all this while. He had not noticed her looking at him looking to the sea as he cleaned up for closing. It was how she knew that what would happen out there on Mako Island under the New Moon tonight disturbed him more than he would say.

He didn't like it. Yet there was not a thing that Emma could think of to help him understand and accept it. Her words were all she had to offer, and at them, he finally looked to her rather then to the sea.

"You do, do you?" Ash answered, looking to her fondly. His words were rueful, his smile half hearted.

"Do you want to go out there with us?" Emma nodded her head to where Cleo and Rikki sat.

"Go out where…?" That oh-so-familiar young voice had come from behind her. If Emma needed further proof that she was distracted by Ash to the point of not noticing him, this was where that line had to be drawn.

"Elliot, what are you doing here?" Usually her little brother could be trusted to go home after school and stay there. Not today, apparently.

"You never came and picked me up from soccer. I told Nate I'd walk here to where you worked." Emma closed her eyes, silently counting until she got control of her temper. What Nate had done was irresponsible, but what she had done was…was worse.

"I'm so sorry…Elliot…I." Her little brother shrugged her apology off, glancing to Rikki and Cleo, and then to Ash. He frowned then, and bit his lip.

"No biggy, but…are you going somewhere?" Elliot pushed, gently but instantly, he wasn't going to be distracted from what he had heard by Emma's guilt. Elliot knew she had friends of her own, and a life to live, that her friends were not supposed to be his. That didn't mean they didn't care about each other, but Elliot understood it – he didn't have to like it, but he did understand and sympathize.

"A camp out, on Mako Island, it was supposed to be an all-girl sleep over thing, but I suppose we could make room for you too." Cleo teased with a grin, expecting Elliot to back out. Emma closed her eyes so that no one saw her roll them. Elliot wasn't quite at the point where he thought girls were icky, as Cleo likely thought from Kim.

"Cool." Elliot couldn't have looked more pleased to be included. Cleo looked wide eyed to Emma, mouthing the word "oops". This time, Emma made no attempt to hide her rolled eyes.

Ash laughed, Emma delighted in hearing it, smiling softly at him.

"You're coming too, right?" Elliot asked of Ash, who nodded and ruffled Elliot's hair as he went back to work. This time he didn't look to the sea as they finished cleaning up for closing.

"Alright everybody, time to clear out for closing…" Ash made shooing motions as he followed them out of the Juice Net, locking the door up behind him. It was how they missed Miriam's car pulling up in the driveway behind them. Miriam and Kim had to be the last people they expected to see, and the least liked.

"What are you doing here?" Cleo demanded of Miriam, for it had been made clear to her that Kim when babysat would be staying at home, safe.

"Blame your baby sister, not the baby sitter, she's a baby blackmailer." Miriam snarled back, with a smirk.

"Good thing too, we went to the Marine Park… there was this guy at the Info booth, a Sean Marshall, he was looking for Lewis's Dr. Jess Wheatley! We…didn't like the look of him." Kim finished weakly, seeing the looks her sister was exchanging with her friends. She thought Cleo looked exasperated and …and not at all worried, as if she was embarrassed. Kim felt her cheeks flush as they burned, and Elliot stared at her as if she'd been wrong from start to finish.

"Where are you all going to?" Kim asked, biting her lips and looking to Elliot, who answered loudly and unafraid.

"Mako Island!" His excitement couldn't be hid.

"It's probably nothing to worry about, Lewis just introduced us to Jess today, they didn't mention anything about Sean Marshall…" Cleo rambled, but Miriam interrupted.

"As if they'd tell you about someone like him…? Look, Cleo, I got a good look at this guy, I heard him talking about this Jess Wheatley as if he owned him. It was the worst sort of bad-ex-boyfriend break up vibes, okay? Will you just call Lewis - have him call this Jess Wheatley, first before you jump to conclusions of what we are telling you? I don't want them getting hurt on my conscious." Cleo was red faced, but took out her phone and pointedly put in the number for Lewis's cell phone.

"Lewis, look, it's Cleo; Miriam just drove up with Kim in the backseat. They say they came from the Marine Park. There was someone named Sean Marshall there, looking for you and Jess. Do you know anything about him, about why?" Cleo paused, breathing in deeply.

"Oh, hello Jess…yes, Sean Marshall, that's right…right…okay…thanks." Cleo was very pale as she ended the call.

"He's bad news, Jess says – an old high school rival, I think. Says to stay clear….thanks, Miriam…Kim…" Cleo looked to Rikki, who clenched and unclenched her fists – and to Emma, whose lips were pressed in a thin line. Yet it was Ash, who stared across the street, and didn't blink who spoke and by his words let them know something was wrong.

"Miriam, did you get a good look at this guy?" Ash asked softly, his gaze flinching away from the street and what he saw, aiming a false smile to her.

"Yes, I wouldn't forget his face – wasn't bad looking, but very intense." Miriam tapped her fingers on the steering wheel, uncomfortable now that she had delivered the message she had meant to.

"Look in your rearview and let me know if that's him." Miriam did just that, as if checking her make-up. No amount of blush would hide her face pale with fright.

"He must have followed me." Miriam's voice was very faint, almost apologetic. Kim shared a nervous look with her sister, and Elliot looked to Emma and Ash, but both were very careful not to look back across the street. Rikki was the only one to see the car of one Sean Marshall drive away, as if a prowling hunting predator had found another trail to follow.

"Get Kim home, now." Kim had never heard Cleo sound so angry, Miriam only nodded at her big sister's order; she started the car and drove. If she took to the roads as if they were to be made into a maze, Kim said nothing, for Miriam got her home safely and there, she knew without it being told that there they would stay.

"How much do you think he could have heard...?" Rikki wondered, Cleo locked eyes with Emma, and Elliot was cold with realization – Sean Marshall, whoever he was, had been right there when Elliot had blurted it out, that they were going to Mako Island. He felt like an idiot. And then…Cleo had called Lewis, spoken with Jess...Rikki's question could have the worst kind of answers.

"Anything…everything…" Cleo sounded pained; looking down at the cell phone in her hand as if had betrayed her.

"What do we do?" Emma asked softly, resting a hand reassuringly on Elliot's shoulder as if she knew how bad he had messed up and how bad it felt. For better or worse, Ash answered her.

"You can't go to Mako Island now." Ash sounded final on it, frowning. They knew the truth when they heard it – it was too dangerous. Just as there was no way of knowing how much Sean Marshall had heard, there was also no way of knowing how much he had already, always known.

Their identities, their very lives were in danger if they stayed or went. Either way, Sean Marshall represented that unknown. He could keep whatever he knew to himself, or worse by far…tell. They had to be here to guard the secret. They couldn't go or be in two places at once; separated they were weaker, more vulnerable.

"I'll go, keep an eye out." Emma, after sharing a glance with the other two girls, nodded in agreement to Ash's words. If worse came to worse… there was always another New Moon after a month's wait. Neither Cody nor Julia would like it, but for safety's sake they would abide by it.

If Sean Marshall had still been watching, he would have seen three girls driving home, one with her little brother.

Ash stayed behind in the parking lot, in his car - and only after he was sure no one was watching him, that no one could overhear him on his cell, he made a call.

"Sean, its Ash…yeah, it worked – they're out of the way, staying home for the New Moon. I'll meet you on Mako tonight." Just as Ash Dove was supposed to, he drove to the docks, and was met by Sean Marshall: who had been trialing his aunt Julia Dove and her son Cody Griffin for almost ten years.

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

A single phone call had ruined Lewis's night. It echoed in his ears, with the rush of his pounding pulse.

"Lewis, look, it's Cleo; Miriam just drove up with Kim in the backseat. They say they came from the Marine Park. There was someone named Sean Marshall there, looking for you and Jess. Do you know anything about him, about why?" They'd thrown together something to eat, salad and salsa and chips and dip with chicken.

"Sean Marshall?" Lewis had parroted it, and Cody had inhaled as if it wasn't a name, but a scent, he'd turned a look on Lewis like he was prey. Lewis had gone pale with fight, freezing in its grip, his instincts screaming danger and predator.

That look wasn't for Lewis, he realized, as Jess motioned for the cell phone, without a word, slowly he passed it over. Cody watched that phone as if it was a mouse, he was a cat prepared to pounce.

Pounce was such a silly word, Lewis thought, it didn't suit that look.

Rending, tearing, bleating, bleeding…Lewis swallowed, feeling as if his mouth was dry and it would never be normal.

"Cleo? This is Jess." Jess didn't look at Cody as he spoke, and that was the key to overcoming that stare, Lewis realized distantly. Jess breezed by that look as if it was normal…maybe it was. It didn't stop it from being terrifying.

Lewis heard Cleo's voice, replying, and realized that Jess had put her on speaker phone.

"Oh, hello Jess…" Cleo sounded a little surprised at the urgency of Jess's tone, or that Lewis had passed her over to him without warning.

"Did you say Sean Marshall?" Cody snarled the words, but Jess wove at him for silence.

"…yes, Sean Marshall, that's right…" Cleo confirmed it, and Lewis looked to Zane, who sat still – staring at Cody as if he didn't know what to do about him. Lewis was only glad he was not the only one so spooked.

"Cody and I knew him in high school – he was Cody's rival in swimming…this is bad news." Lewis was surprised that Jess sounded so calm, organized. Like he knew what it meant, what this Sean was doing.

"…right…" Cleo sounded hushed, surprised at how calm and serious Jess was taking this.

"Stay clear of him, Cleo. Tell the girls that, there is no telling how much he's guessed over the years – how much he really does know and have proof of. You must be careful, ok?" Jess finished, looking to Cody, who shook himself out of that staring look of a predator with Jess's eyes upon him. It was clear that Cody didn't want Jess to think of him as that dangerous.

"Okay…thanks." Cleo hung up, and Jess stood up.

"We've got to move, now – if we're going to Mako Island, we go now, clear?" Jess demanded of Lewis, of Zane. Each nodded in turn when Jess looked at him. It was in the silence of his announcement, of that one phone call that had turned their sleep over celebration into something else with far more solemnity and somberness that Lewis realized – their lives were changed, forever. They could never go back – never risk being less, or more then what they were at the end of the New Moon tonight.

Cody was already headed to the ship tied to the private docks that were in Zane's backyard; the rest could do nothing but follow in the footsteps he left in the sand.

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

"Jess, you might want to come up here and take a look at this – I think he's already here." Zane called, not sounding surprised. Jess looked – but it was Lewis who recognized who stood beside a stranger he'd never met, but remembered seeing once or twice in what he'd thought to be coincidence.

"I don't believe it - that's Ash!" Lewis was hurt, and it showed in his tone of voice. Zane grit his teeth and wished he could have spared Lewis this betrayal of his trust.

"Let's go see what they want." Jess suggested, putting a hand on Lewis's shoulder in comfort. Zane knew it would be a cold comfort to Lewis: that he stood surrounded by friends, those who he could trust, and who trusted him in turn – yet faced one who had broken that faith. Lewis would have to tell Emma and the rest of the girls of this, whatever happened here.

They came ashore, and not alone for Julia straddled sand and sea, staring at Ash as if she knew him.

"Mother…?" Cody asked of her, soft but insisting an answer to his inquiry. The power was there, like a current beneath the waves. She simply stared and shook her head.

"Well, well, fancy meeting you out here. What, if you mind my asking do you think your doing, besides breaking Emma's heart?" Lewis demanded of Ash, having eyes only for him. Zane had kept at his side, determined that Lewis would not meet him alone. In making this friendship, in trusting Ash, they had both failed.

"You could call it that." Sean Marshall mused, with a smirk.

"Or you could call it what it is, a reunion of sorts." Ash interrupted, with a glare at Sean.

"Oh?" Jess asked, keeping to Cody's side. Cody's eyes flicked between his mother and Sean, frowning.

"Oh, yes. Do you have any idea how hard it's been to keep track of you? Let alone to find you..?" Sean asked of Jess, stepping forward. He stopped abruptly at the look Cody gave him. He put his empty palms forward, swallowing.

"I don't know what you think I'm doing here, Cody – but I haven't done anything to earn that look." Sean sounded hurt, and stepped forward again, slowly coming closer to Jess step by step. Jess looked to Cody but stood his ground.

"Stalking us isn't a crime where you come from?" Zane asked, with a sarcastic sneer.

"Stalking implies following, we got here first, didn't we?" Sean spoke up, throwing the comment over his shoulder at Ash.

"Only because you followed my friends, you knew by stalking them." Lewis insisted, looking to Jess who frowned at Sean's slow approach.

"It was perfectly legal, looking up where Dr. Jess Wheatley worked, going there – pure coincidence that I saw Cleo's little look alike. If I followed, it was partly to be sure she got home safely." Sean spoke so smoothly there was no telling if it was truth, lies or excuses he used: or if he believed what he told.

"How do you know what Kim looks like?" Lewis asked, soft, Zane knew that when Lewis spoke softly he was truly upset, when he whispered his control was spent.

"I showed him pictures. He had to know who was who." Ash spoke up, as if in Sean's defense. Sean grimaced at the obviousness of it.

"Why?" Cody demanded of Sean, staring at him as if he wanted to know how he looked inside out.

"Simply put, Cody, I'm looking out for a friend. I knew you before you knew Jess, and you're…not yourself now. You're a danger to him, to them." Sean clearly didn't like saying it, but he also wouldn't lie to Cody. He would be able to smell it on Sean. Cody stepped forward, blocking Sean from the sight of Jess, putting himself between the two.

"Why, Ash?" Lewis inquired, his piercing gaze looking to both Sean and Ash, settling on neither of them.

"I didn't want them hurt. Julia's my aunt; Cody's my cousin – this is a reunion of sorts, like I said. My father entrusted to me what Julia was …he had kept her secret to the grave, to keep them safe. But they…aren't safe." Ash struggled to put what he'd seen into words that would warn them that this was right: that his breaking of their trust was worth it.

"Emma isn't safe, the girls aren't safe, is that what you're trying to say?" Lewis hissed, and Zane looked to his features, pale and pinched with pain. Lewis and he would have to tell Emma about this, Zane realized, and it would hurt her – hurt a friend Lewis held dear, who he had protected the longest.

"No, that isn't it Lewis – don't you see? The girls, they have us to help them protect themselves, to protect those around them – but Julia…and Cody…they don't. They're wild; they're something else now; something beyond human." Ash's fingers opened and closed, as if he was reaching for something to hold onto, to support himself with. It wasn't easy for him to face Lewis and Zane like this – they saw it, and that it didn't make it easy should have told him it didn't make it right either.

"You're wrong you know. They've had me." Jess spoke out from behind Cody's body. He would defend them, Julia and Cody… even when it was obvious that he was being defended from Sean's approach.

"They are putting us all in danger: in danger of losing our humanity, in danger of our lives!" Sean crunched his teeth, knowing from the cold look in Cody's eyes and Jess's silence that he'd gone too far.

"Is it so bad, not being…human?" Julia spoke, her voice dry as the sand she sat her tail fin upon. She was both beautiful and frightening.

The silence after her words was full of waves washing upon the shore.

"We all have to face changes." Lewis said softly, looking to Jess.

"You don't!" Ash gestured to Julia, frowning. "Do you think she's happy? I won't let you do this to your life Lewis! Just because of one of them wanting it…"

"What have you done?" Julia asked, soft as the night that had approached as they spoke.

"We've made sure you can't make this mistake. I was too late once before, I won't be again." Sean's voice was full of sorrow, his eyes upon Cody.

"Sean…" Cody shifted uneasily on his feet. It was clear to him that Sean and Ash would not let them pass, they were rather prepared to spend the night standing here.

"It's our choice, Ash. Isn't that our freedom too? To choose to be human or not…we've made that choice, for better or worse. That's apart of being human, too, isn't it?" Zane asked knowing that their time for talking was running to an end.

"Your choice or not, you can't go into the moon pool. You can't get in it." Cody sneered, eyes flashing.

"If the surface way is closed – there is another way, if that is their will." Julia spoke, smiling. She offered her hands to Lewis and Zane.

"If you would choose the sea beneath the waves, come away with me." Lewis sent Zane an almost reckless smile, and they took her hands as she slipped beneath the surface of the waves, sliding her tail along the sand as a serpent might, moving swift and sure.

Cody looked over his shoulder to watch them go, keeping Sean and Ash from following until it was too late to stop them. Jess smiled and put a hand on Cody's back, tilting his head toward the sea.

"Let's go." Jess urged, needing no asking. Cody took the hand Jess had offered in his touch and went with him into the waves. His legs slipping away with the wet, it was Cody who looked back – not Jess – at the two left standing on the shore, looking lost and lonely.

O.o.O.o.O.o.O

Wherefore three maids the moon pool had shined and bubbled with the full moon's light, for the three youths that swam to the surface – it was still and eerily silent. Much is said of mermaids and the moon; that the moon is the god or goddess of mermaids, or that mermaids are the daughters of the moon…but it is shone in truth what ties tritons to the turn of the moon's dark face.

The shallow sea pool became a whirlpool, swallowing them down to the depths of the sea pool where darkness and death could have taken them. What would have been death became the cradle of a new life, for when they swam to the surface, gasping, it became laughter, for they too had tails and fins.

They swam all that night, splashing in the sea – but morning's light found them returned to the shores of Mako Island.

Ash and Sean had waited at that cove, watching over the ships.

Where the waves lapped at the sand, Jess slept in Cody's protective embrace, the tide was low and soon sand and sun would dry them and leave them with legs. Cody did not sleep, but watched over Jess and Zane and Lewis who laid not too far away, tails twined together.

Sean stood nearby, but Cody pretended not to see him.

"I thought he was lost, you know? Years ago you took him away…and now he's found, and isn't…it isn't the same." Sean was careful to come not too near, well aware of what Cody could do if he chose. He remembered how fast Cody had swam, how fierce his once friend had become – it had been frightening, and the only one who hadn't been afraid now slept at Cody's side.

"None of us will ever be the same, Sean – we grew up, with growing comes change, but it…it isn't always bad." This Cody had learned at a hard cost, for it was a lesson Jess had had to teach him. Something he had not really believed, until this morning.

"I was always jealous of how good you had it, Cody…with Sam, and…Jess, well he is a better friend then I ever was. You took them all away, and left me…." Sean didn't say it, it was a old hurt that still ached and he was stubborn. Cody had missed him, had feared him, but Sean had once been his friend.

Maybe they could be again, and all that had changed between them, what they were now and had been then – hadn't changed that.

"Will you stand beside us?" A slow, almost thoughtful, nod was all the answer Cody had need of.