Everything You Are - Orm Marius/Ocean Master

Chapter Twelve - Not Legends Anymore

"Whoa! Ahhh!" Following her jump, Mera found herself sliding rapidly, down, down, down through a sandy tunnel. She was sliding so fast she wondered if the tunnel would ever end.

It soon did, and she shot off the edge of it, flying through the air and landing hard on a sandy ledge below. As she recovered, she scanned the area; Aurelia was nowhere in sight.

"Aurelia?" Mera called, her voice echoing through the myriad of tunnels. "Aurelia?!"

"Down here!" Mera jumped at the voice directly below her, seeing that the other woman must have flown right off the ledge, for she was clinging to the edge of it.

With a groan, she hauled herself onto the ledge beside Mera. "Look what I found."

Mera gawked. "What you found?"

"Yeah." Aurelia gave her best Aurelia Curry shit-eating grin.

"You mean what me and my 'stupid Atlantean GPS' found!" The redhead huffed and got to her feet, brushing herself off.

"Would you check out this place-" Aurelia gazed around, impressed. "It's bad-ass!" Her words echoed around them a few times before finally fading. "Well, the so-called 'Kingdom of the Deserters' certainly looks deserted."

"This architecture is ancient," agreed Mera, also gazing around in wonder.

Aurelia kicked down a rock in their path and they hopped down into a sprawling room.

"This is the Hall of Armour," Mera explained.

"Damn."

"Where the legends say Atlan's trident was forged."

"Uh, I don't think they're legends anymore," said Aurelia. "Look."

Mera joined her where she stood overlooking a cracked slab of stone, engraved with a trident.

"Oh my Poseidon!" cried Mera. She fell to her knees in awe. "It's real!" She gingerly reached out to touch the stone.

"Gotta admit, that's pretty cool," agreed Aurelia. "Well, at least now we know what the trident looks like."

Mera looked up at her with the biggest grin on her face, before jumping to her feet and giving an excited squeal, followed by an adorably excited dance. "I can't believe it! Vulko was right - it's real!" A hand fell to her mouth, and for a moment Aurelia thought she might burst into tears she was so happy.

"There's more." Both women walked to the front of the room where a round metal structure sat, covered in a thick layer of dust, and looked out of place. At the top, there was an engraving, one that matched the shape of the cylinder. The women exchanged a glance and nod. This was it.

"Huh, the ancients really could build some epic stuff," remarked Aurelia.

Mera brushed off the surface, put the cylinder in place, and...

Nothing.

"Huh." Mera sighed, confused.

"Well, that was anti-climactic."

"Nothing."

"Yeah, of course it's not working. It's been sitting here collecting dust since before the Sahara was a desert." All the excitement was gone.

"Since before the Sahara was a desert," Mera repeated.

"Yeah, thank you for repeating what I just said."

"It's completely dried out!" Aurelia shrugged. Mera sighed. "You do your best thinking when you're not thinking at all."

"Uh, thank you?"

"Hold still-" Mera held up her hand.

"Uh, hey, what are you doing?" Aurelia asked, going cross-eyed as Mera held her hand hovering in front of Aurelia's face.

"It needs water, and you're the closest source. Now hold still." Aurelia watched as Mera closed her eyes in concentration, her hand beginning to glow as she activated her hydrokinesis power. Moments later a single droplet of water levitated off Aurelia's forehead and into the air, Mera carefully dropping it on the ancient machine.

Turned out that one drop was all it needed, for it immediately began to glow with a turquoise light and the gears began to turn, up and running, remarkably well for something so ancient.

Aurelia chuckled. "Show off. You could have just peed on it." Mera shot her a disgusted look. "What? It's true. That's what I would have thought of first."

"Remind me to teach you how to use your hydrokinesis as soon as we return to Atlantis."

The cylinder descended into the machine as an image appeared of an elderly man with white hair and a beard in gold and green armour holding a lavish gold trident

"King Atlan!" cried Mera. "And the trident!"

"Huh, he's older than I pictured," remarked Aurelia.

"Shhh! It's his message-"

"In this trident resides the power of Atlantis.  In the wrong hands, it would bring destruction, but, in the hands of the true heir, it would untie all of our kingdoms, above and below. If you seek my power, you must prove your worth.  Journey beyond the end of the world to the Hidden Sea. Look inside the bottle for the charted path. Only in the hands of the true ruler can they truly see."

On that cryptic note, the image disappeared, and the machine shut down, the cylinder popping back out.

"Huh," said Aurelia.

"King Atlan's final message to his people," breathed Mera. She retrieved the cylinder again. "We can't let Orm or Orvax find this." Aurelia nodded in agreement.

Without another thought, Mera tossed the cylinder to the ground with an echoing smash!

"Ah, wait-" Aurelia watched as it was smashed into a million little pieces. Too late. "UGH!"

"What?"

"Shouldn't we have written it down first?"

"I memorized it."

"Oh." Show off.

"Didn't you?"

"Oh, yeah..."

"Okay. What did he say?" Mera challenged, arms crossed and eyebrows raised, a playful smirk on her lips.

"He said: something, something, trident."

"You're hilarious."

"Why, thank you."

Both jumped then when the floor beneath them split to reveal a bottle.

Aurelia scooped it up. "'Look inside the bottle for the charted path'," she quoted. "See, I did memorize some."

Mera rolled her eyes, but was smiling. "What is it?" She stepped closer to see the bottle.

"So, we've got the old 'message in a bottle' trick, huh? Classic. Hey, uh, is the machine leaking?" Aurelia asked, noticing a trickle of water accumulating at their feet.

"That's not coming from the machine -"

In a sudden burst, water sprayed into the hall, smashing down the rock columns. Both women were sucked into a rush of water, which mixed with the heavy sand, creating a thick, muddy mess.

Dazed and disoriented, and now caked with muck, they could just make out the towering figures of armed guards in high-tech Atlantean armour.

The Deserter Kingdom had been flooded once again.

(Was hoping to update sooner but had a busy weekend visiting family! But, here we are, with a suspenseful ending! ;)

Thanks so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed! :) See you for the last chapter!)