Happy last day of MerMay, all!! To end out this month, I wanna share my H2O: Just Add Water reboot/spinoff idea with yall!!!!
Meet Angie, Mel, and Scarlett :3 :3
Your totally average teenage losers that get turned into mermaids :D
Will it be the best thing to ever happen to them or will it ruin their life?? Who’s to say!!
Right now I’m still in the writing/outlining phase of this silly story. If there’s enough interest I might make it my next comic project hehe.
Rehydrated features themes of environmentalism and being true to yourself! Especially if you’re outside the norm in some way :3
Here’s a couple of doodle pages to properly showcase personalities and ideas and so on~
I have more to say about the Rehydrated twists and turns but I’ll keep that to myself for neow. But feel free to ask me stuff about them! I loooove rambling about characters~
I hope you all had a merry MerMay!!! Fish long and prosper!!!!!
I'm back from my travels through Vietnam. Being back I have reopened my online store on Etsy. Feel free to browse through and discover some mermaid prints and keychains.
my idea was that Hannah, as a means of protecting Alois, turned him into a half-fish half-boy mer-monster, so no demons or humans inhabiting the living world could ever hurt him again!
After getting a letter from Victoria Wolfgang herself, Steph naturally rushes over to her office with a bajilion questions while she tries to keep it together. They have a long and eye-opening talk. Steph is losing her mind.
There was no question about it, the first thing Steph did after reading the letter was heading to Victoria Wolfgang's office. By the time she arrived there, the sides of the paper the letter was written on was crumpled in her hands and she read it three more times on the way, and she marched in without invitation or even asking if she was allowed.
After a letter like that, if Vicky wasn't expecting her, that was her problem.
She burst into the office and closed it behind her in one fell swoop, leaning against the door with her back and just staring at Victoria in silence, watching her, almost expecting the woman to laugh into her face. "Is this real?" she asked, her voice actually shaking, her entire body brimming with... something overwhelming. She wasn't even sure what."Or is this your way of getting revenge on Renzie for that costume? I hope-- I don't think the latter would be a great strategy, but I have to know. I have to hear it from you."
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It came as no surprise to the city council president that Steph was there in her office bright and early. Victoria had been indeed expecting her, busy typing away on her keyboard as she blew through the morning email list, and hardly glanced up from the screen when her door was unceremoniously burst open and the brunette appeared.
Thankfully, Xander was still taking some time off after the wedding fiasco, so aside from the stray city staff member, too dedicated to call in when the Big Boss wasn't around to write them up, it was just Victoria and Steph that early. After finishing her typed sentence, Victoria slowly dragged her eyes from the computer to above it, and at her unannounced guest standing there appearing quite shell-shocked. If the circumstances were different, Victoria may have laughed; but this was no laughing matter.
"Good morning, Miss Anand," She greeted curtly, her politeness always having an echo of something snobby, buried within the professionalism. The mention of Renzie made Victoria bristle, lips flattening into a thin line and an eyebrow quirking up in a sharp angle; as if to say, don't. That was a topic for a different day, and a different person. "I certainly hope I don't give off the impression I would joke about those matters? I was very serious."
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One look was enough to know that Renzie and his costume would result in some kind of follow up, not that Steph didn't imagine it would, but this wasn't that conversation. And it was between him and Victoria, she had a lot more important things to discuss.
She just nodded as Victoria reassured her that no, she wasn't joking, she was in fact very serious and suddenly she just felt overwhelmed, she wanted to screaming and jump up and down and maybe do some victory laps, she wanted to jump on Victoria with all her questions, she wanted to cry a little bit, if she was being honest, because finally somebody believed her. Somebody who didn't turn out to most likely, possibly be a mermaid. Not that she could still process everything that happened with Mellora.
Steph actually ended up sheding a tear, but she quickly wiped it away - she was trying to be professional. She nodded again and finally walked up to Victoria's deska nd sat down across from her, the letter still in her hands. "Okay, yes you wouldn't joke about these kind of things." If anyone were to find out about this... "Why now?" she asked, quiet, her voice just a little bit shaking. Maybe there were more important things to discuss, but this was important for her, personally. "Why didn't you just tell me before? You knew... you know how it has been for me, you have to know, and yet you kept quiet and now... why now?"
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The tear did not go unnoticed by Victoria, who noticed everything; she glanced back to her computer, hand still poised on her mouse, and simply began her work once more as she hit send on an email, waiting for whatever emotions Steph was feeling to pass. They did quicker than Victoria anticipated, and to her delight, the mermaid historian was back on track - though her questions were not exactly ones that Vicky felt important in the moment.
If Steph was seeking a sign of remorse or sympathy, it wouldn't be discovered in Victoria's face. Instead, she took her time before answering, expression thoughtful as if she were carefully plucking out the right words in her head, forming them together, and then, finally then, speaking. "Because I have concerns about our mayor's choice of life partner, and until now, I didn't feel there was a threat to the town."
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What Victoria said was both surprising and not at the same time. Steph felt such glee to hear that Victoria suspected Siobhan to have secret, possibly power-hungry intentions, and she really wished certain people were here to hear this. To hear all of this, because even if she said anything about the letter or this conversation, nobody would actually believe her.
"So we can agree that Siobhan is a siren, right? I'm assuming you came to the same conclusion?" Her voice shifted now - professional and strong, that momentary emotion gone and buried deep. For now. She'd talk more about it with her later, but they had more important business to diccuss. "Not that she is any good, she couldn't even keep her hold on Xander for long enough for that wedding. But it is concerning that she could do that in the first place."
She paused for a moment before she asked, "Do you have anything on her? I know you said you don't have concrete evidence, but you have to have something so that you felt confident enough to come to me."
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Victoria blinked, finally betraying for just a moment the woman behind the mask; surprise, concern, confusion - they melded into one, and then it was gone, and her cool smile took it's place. More of a security blanket than anything else, in this moment. "A siren?" She simply asked, a little hmm following her words, as if the idea were new to her.
"I know she is hiding something. That much, she told me herself. But I got other things out of her... she told me that mermaids were real, and if they weren't, she wouldn't be here. I think she was sent here, I don't..." Another falter as Victoria cleared her throat. "I don't think she knows what she is doing, and she won't help me help her." Her tone indicated a strong message - if you're not with me, you're against me. But then she removed her hand from the mouse, and came around the edge of the desk to sit in the chair beside Steph. "I need to know I can trust you. My options are limited, I'm sure you've gathered, because if they weren't, you wouldn't be here right now."
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Victoria asked back almost as if she didn't come to the same conclusion. She had to. She couldn't have just looked at Siobhan and that announcement and think that it was all normal and she was nothing but a human. Steph was sure of it. But then she continued, and Steph was hanging onto every word Vicky was telling her. "She... told you? She came to you and told you all of this?" She wouldn't be here if mermaids weren't real. Was she saved by one of them? That was what she assumed was happening. "Did she tell you why she was confiding in you instead of her so called fiance?"
She watched the woman come around the desk and sit down right next to her and she tilted her head and gave Victoria a look as she turned towards the woman. "Victoria, all of this a lot right now, and I am sure you must know that. But you probably know that I don't really have a reason to talk about this to anyone. Most people in town already think I'm crazy with all the mermaid talk, if I suddenly announce that I think you believe in them too and you have information about them, I think that might just tip people over and lock me up somewhere because she think I lost my mind. So no, I'm not going to tell people about this, as much as I want to. Desperately."
Steph let out a sigh. "But I also know that you know I tend to talk a lot and it was a risk for you to come to me. You're desperate and you want something from me. So I want you to be completely honest with me. No games, no hiding things because you don't think I need to know something, no holding back. That is the only way whatever this is is going to work."
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Confiding in Victoria wasn’t exactly the best explanation for what had gone down between the city council president and the bride - it was much closer to the lines of Vicky cornering and intimidating Siobhan into spilling the truth. Or some version of it. Despite her thinly veiled threats, Siobhan had kept true to whatever secrets she was holding hostage, and that was what had prompted Victoria to turn to Steph. “We had a conversation,” Victoria repeated, unsure how many details to divulge about her methods for extracting answers. “She was very hesitant to say anything, but I’m not someone who takes ‘no’ as an answer very easily.”
There wasn't much reassurance gained from Steph's promises, but it was too late too turn back now. Maybe she wouldn't give full honesty just yet - but more than she felt comfortable giving, certainly. "I confronted Siobhan, shortly after her arrival. I had a bad feeling... and she was confused, kept doubling back at first, but there was something she said I just couldn't let go. 'The mermaids need our help' - did she mean us, in town, or her and whoever she is working for? I asked if she was military, and she said no, and I'm inclined to believe her, but..." Now she sighed, shoulders losing their rigidity. It could have been easy to explain Siobhan off as another crazy, but something stuck out to Victoria....
"Siobhan told me that Port Vale was the only safe place for them now." She spoke slowly, quietly, hardly above a whisper, eyes trained intently on Steph. Them - mermaids, she assumed. "I think they have already arrived and are among us right now. I've been investigating the new surge in population, and it's been a struggle to find out any information at all, and the P.I. I hired-" She hesitated. Was that going too far? She had indeed enlisted professional help to try and find out about Siobhan, but the woman was a ghost. "He can't find anything, Stephanie. Not a single clue to Siobhan's life before coming here. I believe what the woman says."
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Steph almost let out a snort when Vicky said that she wasn't one who took a no as an answer, but she held herself back. She didn't want to anger the woman, not when she was in the middle of revealing so much new information to her. And she was, Victoria was sharing so much, and Steph didn't even realize, but she leaned forward, eager, excited, hanging on every word Vicky said.
"The mermaids..." she echoed Victoria's words. "This is the second time that is how you used it- or how you said she used the words. Not us, them. The mermaids. So she isn't one of them." Even more proof in Steph's eyes in that moment that Siobhan was a siren, really. "If she is military, she's hiding it exceptionally well, she just doesn't carry herself in that way."
Victoria kept going, and Steph for a moment she felt like they needed to slow down so she could keep up, while she also just wanted Victoria to tell her everything she knew right away, as fast as possible. Victoria was in a lucky situation - she knew Steph knew, she did her own thing, but so much of this has been news to Steph, starting with the very person she was having a conversation with. And the fact that Victoria mentioned P.I.s didn't help, all she could suddenly think was one hanging on Mellora, following her... Vicky already believed mermaids were here in town.
"I believe her too, but I can't understand why she would tell you such cryptic things but not the full truth. If she was going to talk, she might as well tell you all she knew." She bit her lips, unsure if she should say it, but there was no way she could ignore this part of the conversation, that would be even more obvious. "And she was one of the new peoples who have arrived since the tourism season ended. Did you notice that despite the quiet time, so many of them decided to stay?" Mellora arrived mid summer, she would hopefully wouldn't fall into Victoria's suspicions.
"As for what she said about Port Vale being safe... I think I might have some idea on what she was talking about. I believe the storm was-- this is going to sound insane, but it wasn't just any normal storm. It was insane, nothing like I've seen before, and I think it's all connected to the storm." She pulled up her phone and looked up the picture she took of the document she found in the mayor's box she was given. "Xander gave a bunch of things to me - most of it was pointless, but I found this among them. I think... I think our lighthouse is somehow protecting us from whatever is out there. Once the light went out, the storm showed its head, and then once it was back on, it was done and gone. It cannot be a coincidence, Victoria."
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"Apparently not," Victoria nodded at Steph's speculation, surprised to be on the same page completely. Perhaps she'd been quick to write the woman off as unimportant, all this time - though, she really found no fault of her own in that decision. Steph had never seemed exactly credible, especially with the way she chose to speak out on what she knew. It was that very thing that had ended up working in her favor now, though.
A smile, secretive and small, crossed Victoria's face. "She wasn't exactly... eager to tell me anything. That's why I think she is working for someone. Why else keep your hand so close to your chest? Someone else is pulling the strings, maybe the same person who sent the mermaids here. Though I didn't get the impression that Siobhan was working with them, exactly."
There was something about Steph's reaction just then, and the woman noticed, head tilting as she tried to narrow down exactly what had shifted. The lip bite said there was something unsaid. "Of course I noticed. All women. All from 'far away', what I've gathered, and more than a few of them are strange, though given this town..." Victoria scoffed, but lovingly. No one could ever fault her for not caring about Port Vale. Everything she did betrayed that deep love for the town. Her concerns about whatever Steph was hiding faded immediately when the storm was mentioned. "Yes! Exactly. And the pendant, the timing of it... did you find anything out? I was hoping you would update Xander, but if you ever bothered to do that, he never told me." Her annoyance was palpable.
She looked at the clues Steph had found, eyebrows wrinkling up together. "The lighthouse?" She asked, and her tone showed she didn't hold much belief in the theory. "Hmm. I doubt that. Just because we practically worship the things, doesn't mean they have anything to do with our actual town. The Lighthouse has been there forever. It's impossible to be connected."
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Now that was another question that Victoria was at a loss for, and she threw her hands up in defeated frustration. "I would love to assume I scared her off, but I have this suspicion she will be back. Blackmore, anyway, is expecting her to return, so, we shall see," She frowned, a tight, thin line that showed her age more than usual; the fine lines around her mouth pulling taunt, tired. At the next question, Victoria scoffed. "They're 'in love'. Whatever that means to her."
"I think that whatever they are, it's dangerous for us to not know about them. They are hiding, but why? What do they want?" Victoria prodded, pleased to get the conversation back on track; back to the topic of what she wanted from Stephanie. This was her contribution, as far as the city council woman was concerned. The librarian was to investigate, to get these answers, to assess the level of threat. "I want you to find out. What they are, who they are, why they are here, what they intend to do, and why they hide."
Her heart dropped (yet, oddly, quickened in pace with anticipation) at Steph's confession of seeing the pendant before. So had Victoria, long ago, when she was young - or a drawing of it, anyway. Some old journal, passed down through the family linage. Gone, now. Her parents would have nothing of it, and neither would she, now. "Yes. It's some sort of mermaid heirloom. It's important to them, somehow, and they would kill to get it back in the past. My grandfather told a lot of stories. I didn't believe him," She lied. "Until I saw it here. Lighthouse or not, it doesn't matter. It won't answer the important questions, Stephanie. Stay focused. Please."
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Siobhan would be back. That was interesting. Steph would have assumed that Xander would be heartbroken, but maybe he really just wanted to postpone the thing. Maybe have some conversations with Moray about it, since apparently he forgot that in a lot of this... "Maybe she's just... grateful to be taken in or something and mixes things up with love. Maybe she doesn't necessarily know what it is." A pause. "Or maybe she just wants to use Xander and this is the easiest way because he is a man and she is beautiful."
Steph couldn't help but raise her eyebrows. "Look, I don't know their reasons, but I am guessing one of it would be to not be turned into a lab rat once everyone realizes that mermaids and sirens were not just myths and legends. If they tell the wrong person, they might think they are bringing some carnage onto themselves." Or maybe they just wanted information, she wasn't sure. She didn't know and currently she didn't want to think about it. It only reminded her of Mellora and her pendant and everything she didn't know. "But okay, I will do my best to find out more information. I've been doing that my entire life, it's not going to be any different now."
They had similar opinions about the pendant, that it was something important, but Steph didn't really like the way Victoria swept her lighthouse theory to the side. Just because it wasn't something she knew or felt plausible, she didn't feel like they should rule anything out. They knew too little for that. But she didn't want to start an argument, not about this. She wanted to find out more, see what else Victoria knew. "Okay, fine, staying focused. Tell me what kind of stories your grandfather told you."
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"If she just wanted love," The way Victoria worded it implied that she thought the concept of love in general was less believable than mermaids. "There are plenty of more eligible bachelors in town. Picking the mayor is a move with dedicated intent. Don't underestimate her, Stephanie." Now, she was frowning; Victoria knew that Steph was a positive force of a nature, but come on. Surely she could see the risk from behind her rose-colored glasses. But she nodded to Steph's next words, agreeing - if the majority of humans found out about mermaids, there would be a scientific revolution, and the quality of life for those in captivity for tests would surely not be up to human standards. It was also something that Victoria wanted to avoid. The town came first, but contrary to popular belief, she was not heartless.
Giving a decisive nod, Victoria returned her hand to the mouse as if to signal their meeting was nearing an end. She had no interest to share her personal stories, or speak of her late grandfather - it opened the door to emotion, and that was not the goal of this conversation. "They are private, and not important. I'll let you know if I think of anything that could be useful, but for now, you should just focus on your investigation. I'll do my part, on my end... I'll keep working Xander, and that little fiancé of his. You've been.... helpful. Thank you."
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"Yes, yes, I know, she probably had ulterior motives, I just sometimes like considering different options. But I know this is as shifty and suspicious as it gets." Even if Emilia and Renzie insisted that they thought it was love. Or at least lust. Steph did not agree with them and after Vicky mentioned other eligible bachelors, she was just glad it wasn't Renzie Siobhan decided to target.
She hoped for more. She had so many questions and really, if it was up to Steph, she would have stayed there in that chair and picked Victoria's brain for hours. Figure out every single detail of what she did and didn't know. She felt like the woman still probably knew more than she was telling her and when Victoria turned away from her, clearly showing that their conversation was over, Steph felt such disappointment. And she just wanted to push for more, get Victoria to tell her more.
But she was also very painfully aware that if she stepped over a line, Victoria would not have a conversation like this with her again. And she wanted to be able to come back, talk to her, figure out what she knew. So she just nodded. "Fine, okay, yeah. If you figure anything out, please let me know." And even though she was trying to be good, even though she probably shouldn't have pushed her luck, as she stood up, she still said, "For the record, if you told me about this sooner, I could have been helpful sooner," because it didn't sit well with her, the way Victoria had that pause before the word helpful. The way she said that entire sentence. "Have a nice day," she said her goodbye and then she was off, rushing to any kind of place where she was hidden and alone so she could let out the screen that she's been holding in all through the conversation.
Hello everyone out there. I'm JuneChristina, a young fantasy and silhouette artist. New shop items dropped. Get yourself original silhouette stickers from my ko-fi shop
@ http://Ko-fi.com/junechristina/shop
You can eceive 15% off on all shop purchases for the month by becoming a tier member.
Lastly, if you see this post can you please share it. Any form of support is helpful. Thank you.
Rules: post the last line or paragraph you wrote (from any WIP or finished piece) and tag the same number of people as there are words if you like. If not, cool.
Tagged by the lovely @mordinette Thank you! <3
This is from my original story:
Celeste was still floating close enough to hear Fugan exhale in relief. She wondered what would have happened if the captain hadn’t relented. She was beginning to get the impression that Fugan and his dad weren’t as close as she was with her own father.
I’ll tag: @autodiscothings @squigglysquidd @savbakk @rpgwrites and anyone else who’d like to join in!
