Orion felt like he had to leap out of the water like a dolphin so he searched for an area that wasn’t under sea level. It felt like the realm went on forever, but he found two things to be very disturbing as he swam around. For one, the realm was very empty. There were only five homes in each of the five communities. It was probably due to Dragoonas’ terror, which caused the rest of them to die off. Not only that, but he couldn’t find a place to leap out of the water. He thought it’d be okay to use his entrance for a place to leap.
He went past the door and scriptures to the place he last remembered as he was drowning. He went out until he saw the light on the surface. He looked up and gasped when he saw Maria. “Orion, is that you?”
He ducked back down. He spoke from underwater. “Maria, what’re you doing here?”
“What do you think, Orion? What happened, I thought you died.”
“Almost, Maria, twice, but I’ve changed; I can’t come back with you.”
“Why ever not?”
“I’m not human anymore.”
He swam away. “Orion, wait!” She went after him and saw his tail. She followed, “You’re a mermaid?”
“Merman actually...”
“How?”
“I can’t explain it, but you must leave. You can’t follow or you’ll drown like I almost did.”
“Penelope’s been calling, asking for you. The trip was only supposed to last three days, it’s already been five. What should I tell her when she calls again?”
He sighed, “Tell her the truth; that I somehow became a merman. Don’t worry about me; I have some things to take care of in the magical realm I’m living at.” He paused, “And Maria… tell Penelope that I love her.”
As Orion tried to swim back to the palace, he had gotten lost on his way back. He was a little distracted by the fact people are searching for him, not to mention Penelope would soon discover that he nearly got himself killed to find his destiny. ‘I’ll come back, Penelope, I promise I will,’ he thought to himself.
He swam along, but knew he was in the wrong place because it was so dark, probably because it was a deeper part of the ruins. He saw an old, dark sunken ship, which seemed to have been there for thousands of years. He has read about such things and they were usually dangerous with occasional sharks patrolling them.
Despite that and his fear of the unknown, he pressed on as his inner light had some sort of attraction that drew him inside. It was dark, but his light lit it up. He looked around, seeing that there was another source of light that attracted him. He inched closer to it, looking at it curiously. It was a crystallized sphere that was carelessly lying on the floor with a few shards lying around it, like it broke when someone had dropped, or even damaged it on purpose.
He touched it and the shards magically came back into place. He held the silver crystal of light in his hands, feeling a mystical energy surround him like the light from within. In the midst of that tingling sensation, he saw a vision of the past, where he was falling in exhaustion at Penelope’s centaur hooves. He could also hear Adam laughing in victory as he destroyed the Centaur Forest. He woke up from that shock and decided that it was time to leave, since he sensed trouble coming his way.
He saw a dozen sharks coming in his direction and he quickly swam to the territory he knew. He recovered his sense of direction and headed to Oceana’s cave. He saw a place to put his silver crystal and it slid perfectly into place by her private seashell. He said to himself, “So, this is Oceana’s source of power? Maybe the light inside of me is made by a silver crystal too.” Oceana nudged him in affection for returning it, but he headed back to the palace to see what the update with Gemini was.
On his way there, he met up with Marina at the entrance, “Orion, where’ve you been?”
He was out of breath, “It was amazing, Marina. I realized that I was in love with Penelope so I felt I had leap out of the water like a dolphin.
Unfortunately, I got another perspective of your realm. I had no idea it was in such bad shape. I’m really sorry.”
“It’s all right. Besides, most of the merpeople migrated to waters in the Florida Keys so only a few were taken by Dragoonas.”
“How’d they escape his wrath?” Orion wondered as they swam slowly inside.
“Our protector helped us escape about three years ago. The truth is that your friend, Oceana, is a mystical being made out of the power of light and purity. She was always legendary, no one had ever seen her until Dragoonas came to our realm. He’d been causing all kinds of trouble, but Oceana was able to prevent it most of the time. However, one day, her power somehow weakened and she was unable to defeat Dragoonas. All her light was able to do was scare him away, but it wasn’t enough to destroy him. That’s why she could only escort the merpeople out of their homes and not destroy Dragoonas. After she got them away from him, she swam back to her home.”
“How’d you uncover all of this?” Orion wondered, “if you hadn’t seen her before.”
“Correction, I said no one had seen her before, but I have seen her before. The first time I saw her was during the migration to the Florida Keys. I waited for her out of the sight of Dragoonas. When she headed back, he took her by surprise and injured her badly before she could activate her internal light. She was swimming really slowly and started bleeding from the mouth. Ignoring the dangers to my life, I swam to get between her and Dragoonas. I said, ‘You’ll have to come through me before you harm my friend, Oceana.’ My determination made him angry and he was ready to strike when Oceana let loose her light. He was nearly blinded by it and swam back to his cave; a little crooked I might add.”
At this point, they were at the throne room and Marina had sunk down into her seat next to the throne. “What’s wrong?” Orion approached her.
She wiped her eyes, “Oceana took a major toll that day. It just scares me to death every time I think about it. I had to help Oceana back to her cave and she nearly died there. I quickly rushed to the Palace so Melanie could make a serum to heal her wounds. She came with me to bring it to her. When she gave it to Oceana, there was apparently a side effect to it, which caused her to lose control. She was confused and terrified, striking her tail against
Melanie, kicking her out of the cave. I tried to calm her down, but I had to get Marissa to help with that. She stroked Oceana’s scales, but she couldn’t stand to be touched and cried. Marissa got so nervous that she had to return home. I stayed with her throughout the night and she hadn’t been the same since. The next day, she didn’t even want me near her. She cried whenever I tried to approach her, almost like she was afraid that I’d bring someone else that could possibly hurt her again. That’s why she’s always so wary of us, the mermaids. I think she blames us for losing her power. I suppose that’s what she thought the serum was for.” She cried, and Orion couldn’t help but embrace her. “We were friends for a few short hours and then she doesn’t trust me anymore. I haven’t been able to see her as much until you came here.”
Orion had to sit down too. “I don’t know what to say. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. I regret my past, but I hope I’m making up for it now that I’m helping you with her problem.”
Orion got an idea, “Marina, how did her power weaken in the first place?”
“I don’t know. I read up on her and her source of power was a large silver crystal. I haven’t gotten to look inside her cave to see if it’s still there.”
Orion spat out, “Wait a minute.” She looked at him in a weird way. “A silver crystal?” She nodded. “I was heading back when I found this sunken ship. I found that crystal and brought it back to her cave. There were a few shards on the ground, but they magically reattached to the crystal.”
She gasped, “Orion, do you know what this means? Oceana’s power will be coming back and she’ll be able to destroy Dragoonas.”
“I’ll stick around just in case. I have a feeling that we’re going to need more fire power than that.” On the way to Gemini’s chambers, Marina hugged him, “What’s this for?”
“For coming here and getting me near my old friend again, as well as returning her source of power.”
As for Gemini, she had yet to stir from her deep sleep. Orion got a little bit more worried, knowing that the sooner she woke up, the sooner Dragoonas would return to destroy him. He knew that he could strike at any time and his life and others would be at risk. It didn’t help when he had continuous nightmares and plain dreams, seeing himself falling, being defeated or even killed by Dragoonas, as he slept in his shell of solitude. Because of that, he was always very edgy.
The sisters saw that he was getting more and more depressed and disturbed every day and they tried to warn him that his feelings of sadness could attract Dragoonas to him.
Orion returned to Oceana’s cave to see how she was doing. She greeted him with a purr and wrapped her tail around him. “Oceana, Marina told me the story of how you two met. I’m really sorry, but she didn’t do anything to hurt you. She tried everything she could to save you and she at least kept you alive. You can understand that, right?” She nodded, smiling as her light shined brighter than it ever had. “I’m glad you have your full power back, but I’m going to help you when the time comes. We’ll get through this alive, I promise.” He hugged her back and she purred. Marina had followed and went inside.
Oceana approached cautiously, but quickly wrapped her tail around her in affection. She turned around, but saw Orion slip away with his tail hanging low.
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