Up Above
A Mermaid's Tale..
Kawatopa is here! Tristan Tidewater has dreamt of this day ever since she was a little mergirl! She could not be more excited! And she wants to do EVERYTHING!!! She wants to dance, wear clothes, go for a walk, eat human food, learn their customs and their culture, she wants a truly human experience. However, this is not her only goal. As she grew older she noticed more and more human garbage and liquids in the water surrounding her home. In some area's the water has gone from a sparkly clear blue to a slightly murky green. Growing up this concerned her. She was continuously investigating anything that had anything to do with this issue. She found that in some area's there are fewer and fewer fish over time. Not only did the fish suffer but anything that had any life in it seemed to suffer as well. Plants and other sea-dwelling creatures in the area began to die off. Everyone seemed to notice but no one seemed to care. They all believed that what they were experiencing was a "dry spell" and that in time everything would come back and be plentiful again. Tristan had a hard time believing this. She felt that they needed to take some form of action before all the life surrounding them died off, which would force the tribe to move. Although everyone assured her they would be fine, Tristan couldn't stop this nagging feeling that she was right. So she promised herself that not only would she enjoy her Kawatopa but she would also use her time to investigate this problem from land convinced that she would find answers there. Also, all of her attempts to solve this problem from under the water failed she hopes to have a better chance of solving the issue from land even if she has to clean it all herself.
Respectively Tristan spent most of her childhood and adolescence investigating this problem while also dreaming of everything else she would do once she got up there. One thing she learned from many of the merpeople she talked to that had returned from Kawatopa was about the value humans placed on objects. This inspired her to gather many things that she thought humans would value from around the seafloor.
Every merperson was taught growing up all about Kawatopa. Kawatopa is a journey a merperson takes upon their 18th birthday, in which they journey to land for the first time and stay upon land for a year as a human. They are not to return to their tribe for a year. After a year's time, upon the merperson's 19th birthday they will make a decision to either live out their life on land or return to their tribe below water. This meant everyone had to learn how to live up there. And it was much more complicated than how they lived under the water. In addition, they also learned about their currency and how to use it in detail. Now every merperson has the same allotted amount of simoleons set aside for them for their Kawatopa enough to get them started. After learning this and the value that humans place on objects Tristan decided to collect and keep collecting until it was time for her Kawatopa. She planned to sell what she had collected once she got to land wanting to give herself the best start possible therefore giving her chances of solving the problem of their tribe's waters the best possible chance as well.
Tristan could not believe the amount of simoleons she made from the items she had retrieved from the sea! After completing the tedious task of getting those items sold Tristan started to look around.. everything was just.. so.. beautiful!!! She loved all the different colors and the sky! She was just so overwhelmed by it all once she took the chance to take it all in. Looking up she adored the majestic pinks and purples of the sun.. so that's the sun she wondered.. the sun setting in the.. The sun SETTING?! Tristan had almost forgotten the first rule! Find a dwelling before the sunsets!!! Running back into the shop where she had sold her collection she asked the man there if he knew where she could find a dwelling to buy. It took the man a minute to realize she meant a house then he thought that odd seeing how he didn't pay her enough money for the things she sold to buy a house and judging by the state of her torn, tattered clothing, messy hair, and generally unkempt appearance she seemed very poor otherwise. Still, he wasn't going to say or imply this in any way. After all, the girl may be odd but she still seemed kind and hadn't wronged him in any way. The man proceeded to tell her about a little house that had just gone up for sale a few weeks ago.
Within these islands saying "it's a small world" would be a severe understatement. Everybody seems to know everything about everybody else.. or at least a good bit. If anything even slightly "big" happens like a house going up for sale, someone got a promotion, someone's having a BBQ, for instance, you can bet all the inhabitants of the islands of Sulani will know about it! So of course this man knew about any houses that would be available if there were any. He proceeded to tell Tristan how to find the house then found the number to the owner of the house and gave them a call to inform them of Tristan's arrival. They all agreed to meet at the house.
Tristan elated with joy hurried along her way following the kind man's directions. She felt truly lucky this day. Although seeing the sun sink lower and lower into the sky urged her to move a little faster. Truth be told she was going as fast as she could in her brand new legs that she was still adjusting to. Worries set aside, she was literally exhilarated to be on land and just have the ability to STAND, let alone walk! And to breathe air! Everything just seemed so magical! Tristan couldn't help being giddy with glee.
By the time Tristan got to the house not only had the sun completely set but her lungs.. was that right? Yeah, her.. lungs felt a stinging like nothing she had ever felt before. It was as if tiny jellyfish has somehow got inside her and started stinging her from the inside. On top of that, she couldn't stop with these large heaving breaths that kept coming out of her preventing her from taking any breaths in which she desperately needed. She became scared they may not stop. But then slowly they started to get less intense and then gradually her breathing returned to normal. She had been in a crouched position her hands placed on her thighs to hold her up. Slowly she was able to stand up. Then she could see a woman standing before her, thin-framed, somewhat aged with bluish grayish hair, blue eyes, dressed in a blue robe. She had a kind smile on her face and her eyes showed ages of understanding. Tristan, expecting to meet the owner of the house was a little confused at her demeanor at first. Then the woman stepped forth raised her right arm in front of her bent at the elbow palms faced outwards towards Tristan then with one smooth slow fluid motion she moved her arm from the elbow up in a smooth arc to the right with it ending with her forearm and palm both facing up towards the sky and fingers pointed towards Tristan while saying "Sata Sawa" (this meaning "welcome" in mermadic language.) "My name is Orkaya, I am here to help you get adjusted." Then it all clicked in Tristan's head. "That's right!" They had learned about a group of the elder mermaids who had chosen to live on land and who had volunteered to help merpeople get started with their Kawatopa. Every merperson gets a list of names of the elder volunteers a week before their Kawatopa starts. Each elder is assigned an area and they all have completely different ways of helping a merperson get started. Which made Tristan realize she felt like kicking herself right at that moment. Tristan was supposed to find the elder first thing when she came to land, but it took so long to run (or rather walk very carefully) all the objects she amassed over the years that the time slipped away from her and she was fearful to be caught outside at night on her first night, not being used to her legs and all. They were told some pretty scary stories about what can happen should one not be careful and obey this rule. Now Tristan just wanted to hurry up and buy this house and run inside and hide. She could feel her cheeks get a little warm. Tristan opened her mouth to speak but then just started to stutter incoherently, Orkaya interrupted.. "It's ok, it's ok." She gave a small laugh. "I've actually been doing this for quite some time now and I found that having a house for sell helps me to find the merperson of my area a little faster.. although" Orkaya gently looked up at the sky as she shrugged her shoulders and then relaxed her body and settled into a smile looking at Tristan while saying "I did expect you A LOT sooner" and with that, she laughed again. Tristan joined her this time in laughing albeit nervously with her cheeks feeling much warmer and started to start to try to explain why she was so late but once again Orkaya stopped her. "It's ok we have plenty of time, and you must be exhausted. Let's take care of the payment and we'll get you inside and get you settled in for the night. Up here nighttime is a time for rest." she encouraged with a gentle smile on her face.
Tristan was feeling very tired she suddenly realized that what Orkaya said sounded nice, so Tristan nodded and allowed the older woman to lead her inside where they settled the payment of the house. Then Orkaya walked her around the cute small little house, that Tristan immediately fell in love with. However, she did wish for more big windows but she still felt truly lucky to have found such a nice dwelling.. house.. Orkaya said this is a house and apparently there's more like this and not like this.. it's very confusing.. they're all called something different. Anyways Orkaya said she would explain more tomorrow and that Tristan should expect her neighbors to come over to invite her to the neighborhood. That sounded so nice to Tristan she couldn't remember learning about something like that. But it sounded simply wonderful. Then again there wasn't too much about this world that didn't sound simply wonderful to Tristan. Orkaya gently took Tristan over to the kitchen and explained a bit about the appliances there. Mainly focusing on the fridge Tristan was sure she could retain sustenance from there. Orkaya brewed a pot of tea and poured Tristan a cup. Then Orkaya disappeared into the bedroom and came out with an outfit and handed it to Tristan and informed her that there were more clothes in the dresser she could have in case she didn't want to buy any right away. Promising to inform and teach her more tomorrow Orkaya gave Tristan a hug wished her good luck and advised against her using the stove or microwave until after tomorrow. Then she headed out the door and on home leaving Tristan in a new strange house all alone.
