Siren of the North

Chapter 1 - development

A/n. Just to be clear I don't own anything to do with XMen, this is just an idea based on most of the main characters from the XMen universe.  Melony and plot are my own creations and art is all original.  Enjoy!

Great Lakes, Canada - Northern Ontario

"There's something wrong with her."
'The coach told me about her transformation.  Is she human?'

"How could you say something like that."
'I know something happened, but maybe it wasn't as bad as they said.'

"Don't play dumb Susan.  She never goes to school anymore; she claims to have headaches all the time.  Last time she went to class the whole school had an episode of mass sleepiness!  You can't tell me that's Normal."
'School is important!  If she doesn't go to school her grades will drop and it'll make me look like a failure of a parent!'

"There's nothing Wrong with her."
'There must have been some misunderstanding.'

"Then explain why she can't touch water.  Hmm?  Go on."
'Proof me wrong.  She's a freak!'

"..." Silence.
'I don't understand.  I can't betray my own daughter!  I made her. We made her.  If there's something wrong it's our fault. Isn't it?'

"Exactly.  She's one of them Susan."
'She knows I'm right.  I need to help her see that.'

"She's OUR daughter!"
'You know she's of our blood!  What if that happens to us?'

"She was our daughter before she turned into one of them."
'She's no longer human!  What is she?'

"How can you say that!"
'She may be different, but she's still human, right? Maybe ...'

"I've had enough Susan, I'm dealing with this my way."
'I have to do something to help this family before She ruins it.'

"NO, Jim, Stop!  Don't you dare!  That's worse then trafficking!"
'We have to protect our baby! We have to fix her ourselves!'

"Susan, You need to face the facts.  Leave this to me."
'She doesn't get it.  She doesn't understand.  What if She hurts us?'

"Jim, JIM, No!"
'Please, no, I don't want anything bad to happen to her.  We need to ask someone for help, but not them.'

Melony cringed in pain, tears sliding down her face and soaking her pillow as she lay in her bedroom upstairs.  She couldn't stop her parents conversations from resounding in her head.  She wasn't even within ear shot and she could hear them. It was like leaving the subtitles on but the words not matching the voices.  It was tiresome and painful.  They used to come and go; voices and thoughts that weren't her own entered her mind and gave her headaches.  About 2 months ago It became a constant struggle to go to school because she could hear everything.  She had tried to stay home, but her father took her back after missing a week.

She was in math class, head down, holding her head to stop the voices when the teacher called on her.  She could hear the teacher before she called her name. 

'I'll ask Melony, She's never paying attention.  What's her problem.'  "Melony,". Ms Buckner called.  "Please answer questions 41.".

Then everyone's voices spiked her mind with their curiosity and criticism.  'What's her issue, she's such a loser.'  'Why would the teacher call on her, Shes never here.'  'Whys she here? She's sick.'  'Just go home already.'   'Isn't that the girl who had to quite the swim team?'  'I heard from a friend she had flippers!  Cheat!'

Melony just wanted everything to stop.  As soon as she'd thought that she'd stood up as if to call out and the entire class dropped to their desks, including the teacher - fast asleep.  She looked around her, frantically.  What had happened?  Was that her?  Did SHE do this?  She called their names  with no response.  She ran out of the classroom, trying to find someone to help her, but every door she looked in to, everyone was asleep!  She ran into the office.  Asleep. 

After this she stopped going to school.  It wasn't worth her time. 

Melony, curled herself into a ball under her covers, and continued to cry.  Her head hurt so much.   She missed the life she used to have.  She had been on the swim team too.  That was her favourite sport.  But that too had had a repercussion.  

It was the practice before the first meet of the season.  She was he fastest on the team.  Her best stroke, the butterfly.  She'd been working hard all semester on her strokes to make the time.  This was before she had started hearing voices.  Everything was normal. 

She dove in and began her sprint in butterfly.  She counted calmly in her head with each breath, trying to beat her time to the next well and back.  Usually she made it in about 15 counts.  8, 9, 10-   That's odd; she was already at the wall.  She did her flip turn and counted again.  5, 6, 7-  What?  She stopped.  Hands on the wall.  There was no way she had done that lap faster than the last.  She looked at her feet and shuddered.  There was little green scales crawling down her legs from her knees and her feet looked elongated and webbed, like a fish.  She looked around her wildly. Had anyone seen?  The coach looked at her with an odd look, the stopwatch hanging in his hand, forgotten as her time clicked on.  She wanted to just disappear.  Descend below the surface of the water.  But, what had caused her feet to change?

She looked down but nothing was going away.  In fact it looked like the scales were spreading up her legs.  She quickly hopped out of the water and pulled her feet away from the watchful eyes of her coach.  Slowly, the green scales faded back to skin.  She exhaled.  She had gone home early.  The coach approached her after class the next day.  He was a little awkward and it seemed like he didn't know how to say what he was trying to say.  But Melony got it.  He was cutting her from the team.  He didn't understand what had happened, but he didn't want to be called out of cheating.  She had ripped up her bathing suit that night and cried herself to sleep. 

After that she'd done some tests at home, hopping in the bath, having a shower, washing her feet.  Each time she touched the water, her skin changed, and the more she tried, the faster it happened, and the more change occurred.  Two weeks after the first incident at the school she had a complete transformation in the tub into a mono finned humanoid with green scales covering most of her body and tendrils coming off her hair, and rays off her arms.  She didn't mind it so much.  Some would call her a mermaid, but that meant she couldn't get in the water around her friends... Maybe she was a freak. 

Why was this happening to her?  She was just as confused as her parents!  She didn't understand it on bit, yet they were blaming her for these weird occurrences.  She detested them for this.  She felt betrayed by the people who were supposed to love you the most.  Was she alone out there?  Was she the only one?  No, wasn't the US having a problem with mutants?

Apparently her father had heard of others.  He had mentioned she was like THEM.  Who were they?  What were they like?  It didn't matter.  She just wanted the voices to stop. 

'Go away' She desperately thought, while trying to force the voices out of her head. 'Just be quiet.'  Suddenly there was a soft thud and silence.  She sat upright in her bed and listened.  When she heard nothing downstairs she crept to her bedroom door and peered out over the upstairs landing and down into the foyer.  She father lay haphazardly on the floor next to the phone, snoring, her mother was in the living room, hands wet with tears asleep in the chair by the TV.  She'd done it again!  Everyone was asleep!

She slammed her bedroom door and dived back under the covers and sobbed.  When would this stop!  When could she be normal again?