By the time I am escorted back to my room, the rain has dried up and the sun casts slithers of light across the night enclosure pool.

I pace the lengths of my confines in a frenzy, unable to piece together what exactly I'd just seen. Marine World is mutilating girls, removing their legs, replacing them with real tails. But how? Why? Where had that girl even come from, and what exactly does this mean for the rest of us?

Nausea begins to creep through my body, until eventually, I run to the bathroom and vomit up the contents of my breakfast. It seems impossible to get those images out of my mind; all I can picture are her cold blue eyes as she lay lifeless across the bed.

I wipe my mouth before getting to my feet, my legs shaking beneath me. One thing is certain, at least. Whatever Marine World had been doing in that lab, it wasn't successful.

I decide I'm not going to tell the others. At least, not yet. Telling them what I've just witnessed might send one of them off the rails, and right now we can't afford to have another situation on our hands.

I pull on my tail in preparation for entering the enclosure, running my fingers along the smooth, pale scales. Perhaps the girl in the lab was born with the same defects as the rest of us, and this is what Marine World had meant when they said they'd find a cure.

The thought makes me sick. A permanent tail isn't the cure I'd been envisioning–it is just another prison.

The guests arrive as soon as I'm put back into the enclosure. They push themselves against the window, pressing their noses to the glass. I turn to them feeling somewhat deflated, giving a lackluster wave. I'd hoped the rain would last right up until the evening, but it seems hope never has any bearing on reality.

"We're playing if I were a guest," Jewel says at one point. "Want to play?"

I swallow hard. Playing a game is the last thing I want to do, but I don't want to have the girls worrying.

Without waiting for a response, Asia turns to look at the guests, waving her hand at the woman closest. "If I were a guest, I'd be wearing a bright orange T-shirt with my name written on the back."

I scan the guests, giving them a little twirl before studying the pair of sunglasses dangling from a young man's shirt. "If I were a guest, I'd be wearing a bright orange T-shirt with my name written on the back, and thick, black sunglasses," I say.

Jewel turns and scans the guests. "If I were a guest, I'd be wearing a bright orange T-shirt, thick–"

"With your name on the back," I say.

Jewel narrows her eyes impatiently. If there is one thing she hates, it is losing. "Orange t-shirt with my name on the back, black sunglasses and a large, straw hat."

I find myself smiling. "I guess we know who's not excelling at the memory experiments."

"I think you'll find I got a perfect score last time," she says.

"Unlucky for you, then."

We all turn slightly to find Muriel hovering behind us, her usual smile missing.

"And why's that?" Jewel asks, her voice unpleasant.

Muriel's eyes darken. "Because once you pass your experiments, Marine World gets rid of you for good."

We all freeze. My mind flips back to the last experiment I'd had. I'd thought I'd failed, but Rob told me I'd passed, which means I've passed every experiment.

Before I can question Muriel Two further, she disappears under the surface of the water without a trace. We turn back to the guests, no longer in the mood to play games.

"You believe her?" Jewel asks through her smile.

I don't respond. I can't. I am too busy thinking about Muriel–the real Muriel, and the day she disappeared. I'd always thought her dissent into madness was the reason Marine World got rid of her, but what if that wasn't the reason, after all?

"The whole point of those tests are to improve our performances," Asia says. "Why would they get rid of us for being good at them?"

I gnaw at the side of my thumb. If what Muriel Two says is true, I won't have much time left now that I've passed my final experiment, and any moment I could be taken out of this enclosure and chopped up like that girl I'd seen.

Muriel Two suddenly shoots up from beneath the surface, flashing us a smile before swimming up to the glass to wave at the guests.

"And are we really going to believe anything Miss split-personality has to say?" Jewel asks. "She seems a few buttons short of a sweater, if you know what I mean."

I smile slightly. That was always Alison's go-to phrase whenever she talked about somebody she didn't like. Hearing it again makes my chest start to ache.

"What do we do, Aura?" Asia asks.

I turn to look at her. Since Muriel disappeared, I have become the one they look to in a crisis, the one who is supposed to make everything better again; I am not doing a very good job.

"We're to take it seriously until we can talk to her properly," I say. "Don't start failing the experiments or else it will draw more attention to us, but don't get everything right, either."

I don't bother to mention it is too late for me.

"What do you think this means?" Asia asks, her voice filled with worry. "I mean, what's Marine World's goal here?"

My expression darkens, and I continue to watch Muriel from the corner of my eye, desperate to know what is lurking beneath her smile. "I don't know," I say, "but I have a feeling we're going to find out soon enough."

I spend the night tossing and turning, plagued by nightmares of butchered mermaids and doctors in surgical masks. Eventually, I push the covers off me, sick of the way they keep clinging to my legs.

Through the night enclosure window, I see the sky has turned a strange kind of turqioise, streaked with the tiniest hint of pink just along the horizon. I sit up in bed, too restless to fall back to sleep.

The alarm clock on the bedside table reads seven. I grab a book from the table and begin to flick through it, but my mind is too preoccupied to follow the storyline, and thoughts of Crystal start to break through the words.

If only I'd done something sooner, then perhaps she wouldn't have resorted to killing Alison. Now she is either going to end up like Muriel, or like one of those mutilated girls in the labs.

"Reece?" The word comes out panicked, frantic, and almost immediately, the door creaks open and Reece towers in the doorway, his concerned expression half hidden by the darkness of the room.

"What's wrong?" he asks.

"Nothing," I say, pulling my knees to my chest. "I just wanted to know how Crystal is doing."

He falters for a moment, as though hesitant to tell me. "She's okay. She just–" he stops again. I find myself gripping the edge of my bed.

"She just what?" I ask.

"She's just complaining of pain in her legs," he says. "I'm sure it's nothing."

I swallow hard, my chest feeling heavy and compressed. "It's not nothing," I whisper, causing Reece to look at me. "It's the defect."

Reece looks confused. "What defect?"

I run a hand through my hair, wondering if this means the girls and I will be experiencing symptoms soon, too. If so, escaping will soon be impossible.

"We were born with a defect in our legs," I say quietly, refusing to look at him. "A result of being altered as an embryo." I let out a bitter laugh at the irony. We were designed to be the best, and yet those same alterations will one day leave us defective. "One day, our legs will stop working," I say, studying my legs. Despite having years to get used to the notion, there is never a moment when the thought doesn't scare me to death. "Marine World has been trying to find a cure for years, but no such luck."

Reece is silent as he studies me, his eyebrows drawn in the middle. "A cure for what?" he asks. "What exactly is wrong with you?"

I resist the urge to narrow my eyes. Hasn't he been paying attention? "My legs will stop working," I say slowly. "From the defect."

Reece doesn't resist the urge to narrow his eyes, because he lives in a world where he is free to react however he pleases; I do not share that luxury.

"What defect?" he asks impatiently. "What's the illness called?"

I open my mouth, but nothing comes out. I wrack my brain, trying to recall the times Marine World has spoken about it, but all I can hear in my head is defect, defect, defect.

"I'm not quite sure," I say. "I just know something went wrong when they engineered us. Our legs aren't as strong as they should be, and every so often, we'll get this intense pain in our legs to the point we can't move. One day, they'll stop working completely."

"And you've felt this pain before?" Reece asks.

I nod. "If Crystal's in pain, it means her symptoms are worsening. Does she have any books to read in confinement? Things to distract her?" I reach across to the bedside table. "She can have some of mine. I can–"

"She's got things to keep her preoccupied," Reece assures me. "You don't have to worry."

I put down the book I'd picked up and pull the covers to my chin. "Well, can you give her a message for me then?"

Reece crosses the room and kneels before me, studying my face with a troubled expression. "What do you want me to say?"

I take a deep breath. "Tell her I love her," I say. "Tell her–I don't know. Just tell her I understand. That I'm not mad."

Reece searches my eyes for a moment, as though he wants to say something else. "All right," he says, getting to his feet.

"Thank you," I say.

He pauses at the doorway, his back still turned to me. "You're welcome," he replies, shutting the door behind him.

Hi guys,

Tell me what you think of Reece–goodie or baddie?

🧜🏽‍♀️🧜🏽‍♀️🧜🏽‍♀️