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Ocean of Destiny
by Brittney D. Thomas
Posted: May 22, 2001

CHAPTER 1

The ocean waters began to rise and fall, rise and fall. A figure covered in shadow stared at the waters, violet eyes glowing softly. It raised both hands into the air, supposedly summoning something, or someone. The waters rapidly began to rise toward the moonlight, forming a tsunami. The tidal wave rushed toward the figure at the beach, then completely engulfed it.

A young girl opened her violet eyes and yawned. She stared up at her ceiling for awhile until she heard a faint knocking on her door. "Time t'rise and shine, love." An older English voice called from behind the door. "Yes, Grandfather." She said sleepily. She climbed out of bed and went to her vanity. She stared at the mirror and sighed. There was no doubt she was different. But there's a fine line between different and just plain freaky. She thought to herself as she saw her strange reflection. Before her sat a blonde teenage English girl. Her face, along with the rest of her skin, was covered in shimmering green fish scales. Starting from her wrists, she had two large fins extending to her elbows. On her back was a set of green butterfly wings that looked a little too big for her. Light blue designs were decorated all over her wings. Her feet were somewhat larger than a normal girl's would be and her toes were webbed, resembling diver's flippers. Sprouting from her ankles were bluish wing-like fins. And last, but not least, was her tail. It stretched out about five feet and resembled a mermaid's fin. She sighed and looked at a ring in a black velvet box. It was golden with a blue-green emerald in the shape of a heart in the center. She slid the ring on her finger. "Ready t'go to work?" She asked it and smiled. With another sigh she cleared her throat and looked into the mirror. She sang softly. The ring began to glow and so did the mirror. A bright light circled around her until she looked like a normal teenager. She stood up and went downstairs to where her grandfather was reading the morning paper. She smiled and hugged him and kissed his cheek. "Morning, Grandfather."

"Good morning, Love. Did you 'ave a nice rest?"

"Yes, Grandfather."

"Jolly good. Now, go get some breakfast and hurry off to school."

"Yes, sir." She nodded, quickly ate, and headed off to school.

~*~Shandon High~*~

The first bell rang and she was racing to get to the pool. She rushed into the locker room just as the second and final bell rang.

"You were almost late again, Emerald." Mrs. Layka, the swimming team coach, said with slight irritation.

"Quite sorry, mam. It won't happen again. I'll try harder next time." She said quietly. A few of the girls snickered.

"Quite. Just hurry up and get dressed and get to th'pool."

"Yes, mam." She hurried to her locker. Meredith McAnders, one of the more popular girls, snickered at Emerald. "So teacher's pet...what's your excuse for being late this time?"

"Car trouble." She said quietly.

"What? Speak up, no one can hear you." A few other girls giggled. Emerald just sighed and headed off to the pool area.

"Alright, O'Shahana. I want to see some laps. In the pool, now." Coach Layka folded her arms. Emerald nodded.

"Yes mam." She dove into the pool and started swimming, faster and faster. The other girls finally came out of the locker rooms and they all watched Emerald closely. They were all waiting for her to mess up. Instead she swam ten full laps, then stopped and looked up at Coach Layka. "How was that, mam?"

Coach Layka blinked at her stopwatch, then shook it. "Well well, Emerald, you seem to be the fastest swimmer in the world according to this."

"Really? Cool!" She smiled. Meredith growled, then stared at Emerald and smirked wickedly. Emerald caught the look and then looked at herself. She almost shrieked. "Coach, I don't feel so well." She jumped out of the pool and ran into the locker rooms before anyone could see her. Meredith grinned, then turned to the Coach. "Here, I'll go check and see if she's alright." She said sweetly.

Coach Layka nodded. "Good idea. The rest of you, into the pool, pronto!"

Meredith sneaked into the locker room and got a good sight of Emerald. "Well...well...well. What have we got here? And I do mean, what..."

Emerald gasped and looked around. No escape. "Meredith, please. I'm begging you, you can't tell anyone."

"Don't tell me what I can and can't do, teacher's pet. I finally found a flaw in the quiet beautiful blonde girl. And I'm going to enjoy having this new power over you. Unless you transfer schools. And then I can have you out of my hair for good." She grinned.

~*~Bayville High (A few weeks later)~*~

Kitty and Jean were talking at their lunch table when they noticed a blonde girl sitting at a table, surrounded by almost half the guys in school, including Lance and Toad. She looked miserable, like she just wanted to be left alone, but she was trying her hardest to smile and be polite. Toad sat next to her and grinned, flashing yellow teeth. "So, what did they do up in heaven when they realized they dropped one of their angels down here, huh sugar?" He put one of his arms around her shoulders and she tried not to gag. Gross; please oh please leave me alone. Somebody get me out of here. I wish I were invisible. She looked around, and once again, found no escape. Kitty and Jean came to the rescue. "Alright, alright. Break it up, give her room to breathe. Especially you, Tolansky. Let her breathe for Pete's sake." Toad grumbled as Kitty shoved him away from the girl but leaned over quickly and whispered. "Catch ya later, sweetie." He winked and hopped off. She groaned silently and buried her face in one hand. "'Ere we go again." She muttered, then she looked at Jean and cringed. Jean smiled politely. "Mind if we sit with you?" She asked.

"You actually wont t'sit with me?" She sounded surprised.

"Why shouldn't we want to?" Kitty asked.

"I dunno. No one eva does." She said in her whisper-voice.

"Well, like, we do. Hi, My name's Kitty Pryde." She reached out her hand to shake, but the girl lowered her head. Kitty and Jean exchanged glances and Kitty lowered her hand.

"I'm Jean Grey."

"It's a pleasure. I'm Emerald. Emerald O'Shahana." She said, with her head still down. She didn't like making eye contact. It made her nervous. After lunch, they talked at Kitty's locker. "She's like, really shy, isn't she?" Kitty said.

"Yeah, but she seems really sweet. Maybe she'll let us be her friends." Kitty nodded in agreement.

Emerald was standing at her locker, lost in thought, as the fourth period bell rang. She snapped out of it and shook her head, then looked around. No one was in the hall. Great. She thought. She sighed and decided to put her math book away. She turned the combination lock, but the locker refused to open. She yanked it a couple times, but it still wouldn't budge. "Zut!" (French for darn) "Nothing ever seems to go right." She said as she punched it. She sighed. Now she was late for biology, didn't have a clue where her classroom was, and now her locker was stuck. She buried her face in her palm again and softly groaned.

"Locker trouble?" A boy asked behind her. She didn't bother to turn around, she just nodded and quietly said. "Uh huh."

"Here then. Let me help you with eet." He said with a smile. He studied the locker for a minute. "Those cruel teachers gave you ze most annoying locker in ze school and didn't even tell you how to open it. Well C'mere, let me show you." She removed her hand and looked at him for the first time. It was none other than Kurt Wagner. He pointed to the locker with two of his (human) fingers. "See right here? If you hit it right here..." He punches the locker right in the corner where he pointed and it opened."...it vill give every time." He grinned. She lowered her head and blushed slightly. "Anyvay, vat class do you have next?"

"Biology." She said. She refused to raise her head. If she made eye contact, she'd probably forget what she was talking about. She seemed to do that every time someone made eye contact with her. It probably had something to do with her violet eyes. Before she could use a mirror spell, everyone was afraid of her eyes because of their strange color. She sighed.

"Emerald?" Kurt said for the third time. She shook her head.

"Dreadfully sorry. Would you please repeat what you just said?" She blushed again. I'm such an idiot. Zoning out while someone here is actually being friendly towards me.

"Sure thing. I often have to repeat myself after awhile when Scott gets tired of listening to me." She giggled. "Anyvay, I said 'Great ve have ze same class. Vould you like me to valk you down there'?"

"Yes, thank you. I don't really know where the classes are. I'm new here...wait. How did you know my name?" She asked. "I never properly introduced myself."

"Oh, dat's easy. Every guy in school, well all the single ones anyvay, are talking about the pretty new girl. By the vay, I'm Kurt. If some guy named Scott asks for me and he looks grumpy, don't tell him vere I vent, K?" He grinned as the quickly walked to the biology lab. She smiled. Things seem to be looking better already. They both slowly opened the door to the lab where the teacher was writing notes on the blackboard. He turned to look at them. "Care to explain why you were tardy again, Mr. Wagner?" Before Kurt had to explain, the teacher looked over at Emerald and smiled. "Never mind, Kurt. I see why you're tardy. So..." He said turning to Emerald. "You are Emerald O'Shahana? Are you Irish?"

"No sir." She said quietly. "I'm English." Well, that's not really true, but it was good enough.

"Very well, Emerald. You may take a seat behind Kurt. Class has already begun."

"Yes sir." She nodded and walked over to her desk and took a seat

~*~After School~*~

Emerald walked out of the building, once again lost in deep thought, as she walked over to her car. It was a light blue jeep. She sighed and pulled out her pigtails, letting her blonde hair fall down her back. She climbed in and started the ignition just as the X-men gang got into their own car, which was parked directly across from hers.

"Hey Emerald, nice wheels." Kitty called.

"Thank you, you all have a nice set yourselves."

"Now wait just one minute. Emerald O'Shahana, is that really you?" Rogue climbed out of the car and walked over to hers. "Where's your...ya know..."

"They're not gone, just hidden. And can we please not talk about this in public?" She glanced nervously at the others.

"Follow us, Emerald." She said and then jumped back in the car without waiting for an explanation.

"Alright, if you say so." She sighed. What is my old friend doing?

"What's going on, Rogue?" Scott asked.

"Ah know what Ah'm doin. She followin us back to Xaviers."

"Vhy?"

"Because I said so. Now let's get going." Scott started the engine and they began to drive off, Emerald following. They stopped outside the gates. "Pull ova here, Scott." Everyone was confused, but they pulled over out into the open lawn and jumped out.

"What's this all about Rogue?" Jean asked.

"We got anotha one of us." She said as she looked at Emerald.

"Like, really? How do you know?"

"Because we knew each other when we were little girls. I recognized the ring."

"So, ees eet true? Are you really vun of us?" Kurt asked Emerald. She was really confused now.

"I don't know. What are you all? Some kind of army?" She asked nervously.

"No, don't worry, Emerald." Rogue turned to Kurt. "Turn off yer watch, fuzz-boy."

Kurt looked surprised. "Vhy? Do you vant me to frighten her away right vhen she just got here?" Rogue folded her arms. "Just do it!" Kurt shrugged, then nodded. He turned off his holo-watch and Emerald gasped. Rogue turned to Emerald. "Yer turn, fish-fairy."

"Please don't call me fish-fairy." Emerald said as she walked over to her car and looked into the rear view mirror. She sang softly and the mirror took back the conjured image. She turned to face everyone, and blushed. Kurt grinned. "Awesome vings." He said.

"Thanks." She looked around and caught sight of a limousine in the driveway. Professor X. came out with an older Englishman. Emerald blinked. "What's my Grandfather doing here?"

"Ah, Emerald, love. What a pleasant surprise. This is Charles Xavier. I've agreed to let him help you harness your powers."

"You mean I'm staying here?"

"If you would like to, Emerald." Professor X. said calmly.

"I guess it would be nice to have some friends here. Especially Rogue." She smiled at her friend.

"Ya know, if ya ever need to talk about, yah know...the war and stuff...Ah'll be here."

"Oh, that's quite alright." She smiled. "I'll just sort it all out later."

"Well, I'd better be on my way. Quite a pleasure to meet you, Professor."

"The pleasure was all mine, mister O'Shahana. Emerald, your things are already upstairs in your room. Ororo will show you the way. As for the rest of you, start on your homework." They groaned.

"Thank you kindly, sir." Ororo led her upstairs. "This is your room." She said, opening the door to a room right down the hall from Kurt's. "Your grandfather mentioned that you like the water and we thought you might like the view of the lake." Emerald walked out to the balcony and sighed. "This is quite lovely, thank you."

"You're welcome, Emerald. If you're up to it, perhaps we can have a demonstration of your powers later tonight?"

"Of course, mam. Whatever you say. I'll start unpacking right away."

~*~Outside by the lake~*~

It was getting dark and the X-men had gathered around the side of the lake, waiting for Emerald. She shyly walked out, her green scales glittering in the moonlight. An owl (Mystique in disguise) watched the girl with interest. She took in a deep breath and looked at the water. She raised her hands into the air and formed a tidal wave, right in the middle of the lake. The water swirled until it looked like a tornado made up of water. She jumped in the water and swam out into the middle of the lake. She used her butterfly wings to fly up into the eye of the swirling water and her tail wrapped around her legs and it began to glow. She became a mermaid, but she still had her large butterfly wings. The trees and flowers around her began to bloom rapidly. The tornado died down and she swam back to shore, transforming back to her original form.

"Welcome to the X-men, Harmony." Professor X. smiled, along with the rest of the gang. She blushed and smiled back.

~~~To Be Continued in Chapter 2~~~

Chapter: 1 / 2 / 3
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