Eleanor woke up.

She woke up remembering how she fell asleep if she could call it something so sweet and simple. The last image she held onto was the giant yellow moon, looking so small and far away and surrounded by nothing but blackness. Her eyes had closed out the rest of the world as she had faded, succumbing to the cold water and the creature's strange screams.

If she opened her eyes, she would be forced to look around her and see whatever it was that made up her world now.

She’d been sure at the start that she was facing death. What else would the creature want with her? What else would cause a thing to wreak havoc and spread fear the way Isabelle had done? She had been a dinner to be played with, yet here she was.

'If only,' Eleanor began to think before she was cut off.

She could feel a faint rush of water around her. Not in as if she stood in a stream. But more the way she could feel wind whip around her while standing on the deck of her ship. She reasoned that it must mean she was being moved. There was a chance it was some sort of underwater current, but she thought it would be less likely for her to be floating around underwater and somehow alive.

Although, alive may not be the best term for what she currently was. She couldn't tolerate the darkness and unknowing any longer. She steeled herself against her worst nightmares and began to open her eyes.

Eleanor was expecting certain things as she forced herself to wake up more fully and open up her eyes. She was expecting it to be dark. The moon was high up in the sky before she lost sight of it, and they would be deep by now, even if it had only been a few moments she was out. She didn't think she was actually going to be able to see much if anything at all. Her eyes would not be accustomed to pure darkness after all.

She was expecting her eyes to sting when she opened them. They were in saltwater, after all. Her eyes often stung just from the backsplash while steering her ship. Much less deep down where the water was murkier and likely dirtier.

When her eyes opened, all of her expectations were squashed, leaving her to feel even more vulnerable than she did before. In the moment of confusion, Eleanor remembered a piece of what Sam had told her, his voice echoing around in her mind.

"Mermaids are not what they’ve been made out to be. Their beauty hides their true nature. It does not boast it. Humans are not companions, but not all are food."

Isabelle had spoken of wanting time when she had pinned down the young crew member. Time to eat, Eleanor supposed. They did not likely bring their prey home, then. Panic resumed as her mind failed to bring forth any more of the conversation. Her knowledge seemed spent.

Eleanor's sight began to focus on her surroundings. The light around her was brighter than her experiences had told her it would. It was the first thing that registered as she scanned the new horizon. It did not look like the utter darkness that the deep ocean should have looked like. Almost like she was approaching a harbor of a city, torches lighting the way from below. She could make out features up ahead.

The second astonishment that went through her thoughts, well before she attempted to move any of her other body parts, was that she could see clearly and without any sting of salt. These two things came together as a realization that shook Eleanor. It should have been obvious, considering she already knew what she had seen and heard. There was a way to be safe down here — a way of life beyond fish and rocks. As she put her thoughts together about the city and the Merfolk down below the surface, she became aware that she must have something in common with them.

She was alive. Not only that, but she could see, breathe, think. She took a deep breath in and held it for a moment. Her lungs were working, even though she was well beneath the surface of the water. Far away from the precious air above that provided her lungs with the oxygen they craved. It should not be possible, yet she could think of a hundred other things at the exact moment that should also not be possible. As she let that breath back out, she noticed tiny bubbles floating around her. She had no idea what it meant but filed it away under things that would need to be explained if she continued to survive this ordeal.

Eleanor went through her checklist again. She could see, and she could breathe. The next task was to see if she could move her external body. It wasn't enough that her brain was functioning. If she could not move her limbs, then she may as well not be alive after all. Despite having this to focus on, her brain was not letting her forget the situation that brought her here. She knew that she would need to remain alert, strong, and play any upcoming situations carefully if she wanted to keep her status as alive. She started small, her left hand.

Now a bit more aware of that single part, she was certain that it wasn't touching anything solid. It seemed safe to start her test there. She was testing more than just her motor skills at this point. Eleanor felt sure of that. She thought of her fingertips and wiggled them. All five of her fingers wiggled up and down slightly. They didn't touch anything other than water.

She didn't feel the need to wiggle her other fingers or her toes. Honestly, one hand was enough. It let her know that her body was functioning on all the levels she wanted it to. She moved her thoughts from her left hand to her head and her neck. She took a deep breath and turned her head, keeping her eyes wide open. She moved it to the left first, seeing the upper half of the ocean. It had similar lighting to the straight-up view she had a moment before, but the angle let her better understand what was happening. The lights that she had seen had been beams and reflections. She could tell even from here that the light sources were coming from the other direction, and it was darker the further away from her she looked.

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