Seaweed (Story; F Humans -> F Mermaids)

[thunderwing]

Autumn and Nia were two '90s slackers just looking to get high. Now they've got until nightfall to get to the beach before they turn into mermaids. Bummer.

…

Friday, July 3, 1998
9:00 AM
Autumn and Nia’s apartment, Santa Marisa, California

“Okay, but you have – no. How about – okay. Do you – nothing? Okay, well, thanks for looking.”

Autumn put down the portable handset, and sighed. “Nobody has anything.”

Nia looked at her with desperation in her big brown eyes. “What? But it’s the long weekend!”

“Yeah, and Phish is in San Diego tomorrow. All the weed in southern Cali just flowed down there. There’s nothing left – no grass, no shrooms, no acid. Shit, you probably can’t even find a toad to lick.”

Nia shrugged. “I mean, we could go to the concert. Or hang around outside the concert.”

“Yeah, but if we did that we might have to listen to Phish.”

“I guess. Wait, why don’t we go see Captain Jackie? She’s always got something she wants us to try.”

“Hell no. That woman has done so many drugs she doesn’t understand normal people’s tolerances any more. Once she gave me something she said was a ‘real mellow high’, and I spent the next twelve hours trying to stop my skeleton from escaping out of my butthole.”

Nia sighed, and slumped back on the couch. “Ugh. This sucks. Our one weekend off, and we’ve just got to go through it…like, sober.”

They were a mismatched pair. Autumn had grown up in a trailer park on the outskirts of town, kind-of raised by her scatterbrained mother and not-at-all raised by an absent father. Her fashion sense tended towards cutoff jeans and metal-band-logo tank tops, and her face was perpetually shrouded by her shaggy mullet, her green eyes almost hidden by her bangs. What her fashion choices didn’t hide were her arms – she lifted weights, and she was proud of how buff she was. She also liked that it showed off the skull she had tattooed on her right bicep.

Nia came from a Black upper-middle-class family on the East Coast – as she described them, a family of Carlton Bankses, but without the charm. Always the black sheep of the family, she’d largely cut herself off from them after finding out they all voted for Bob Dole, and moved out west. She found the bohemian lifestyle more authentic – and she didn’t have to worry about her brothers turning narc on her when they found her weed. She was gorgeous and slim, with big dark eyes and fantastic natural shoulder-length curls, and wore only the finest thrift-store finds – currently, a peasant blouse and a long, patterned skirt.

They both worked, intermittently, at the local drive-in movie theatre, one of the few left in the state. They’d met there, and despite their differences, they soon found they shared a love of the demon weed and became fast friends – and, eventually, roommates.

And now, it was Friday morning. They’d planned a long weekend of getting high and taking it easy. They even had it off work – the drive-in had been rented out by a religious group, who’d taken one look at the ragtag group of stoners and slackers who usually worked there and insisted on bringing in their own staff for their rally.

Unfortunately, it now seemed the “getting high” portion of their plan was in serious jeopardy, which would make the “taking it easy” portion considerably less easy.

The phone rang. Nia immediately perked up.

Autumn waved her hand, dismissively. “Don’t get too excited. I bet it’s just my dumb cousin trying to sell me Amway again.”

There was an unfamiliarly husky woman’s voice at the other end of the line.

“Autumn. Nia. I heard you’re looking around. Meet me in the park, by the big ugly sculpture. Try to avoid the holy rollers.”

…

10:00 AM
Calvert DeForest Park

The park was full, unfortunately. Even more unfortunate was what it was full of.

“We cannot let this great nation fall to the feminist-homosexualist axis! The feminine void must only be filled by the male light – two women together create a larger void, the portal to sin and wickedness and Hell!”

A well-dressed, conservatively-styled white-haired woman was on stage, pounding her podium as a small throng of devotees with anti-gay placards hung on her every word. The rest of the crowd seemed more interested in the free hot dogs that were being handed out.

Autumn was already elbowing her way through the crowd with a casual disdain for the skulls of others. “God. Who knew there were so many Jesus freaks in town?”

Nia groaned, trying to travel in her friend’s wake. “C’mon, Autumn. I’m Christian, you know.”

Autumn scoffed. “I’ve never seen you go to church. You watch cartoons with me every Sunday morning.”

“You don’t have to go to church to believe in the Word. It’s all about…you know, love and forgiveness and being nice to people. Not about telling people what to do with their pussies and whatever.”

“Well, you’re one of the good ones, then, Nia. Not like these people.”

The woman was still ranting on stage. “Lesbians have infiltrated this country’s proudest institutions. Folk music. Auto repair. Sitcoms. In ten years, we could have a lesbian president, a lesbian Supreme Court, and a lesbian late-night talk show host! We must drive these short-haired, unshaven, Subaru-driving sorceresses into the sea, before it’s too late!”

Nia glanced up at her. “Who is this woman, anyway?”

Autumn groaned. “Ugh. Penelope Bergamot. She was hot shit in the ‘50s or something – she was in all these, like, big Hollywood synchronized swimming musicals. And then people stopped caring about those ‘cause they were dumb, so she got super into hating lesbians.”

A brass band began to take the stage, as Bergamot left one more message to her followers. “And remember – tonight, we’ll be at the Seashore Drive-In, with the Penelope Bergamot Mermaid Revue!”

The two girls finally pushed their way through the throngs and made for the far corner of the park, where an impressively-ugly abstract sculpture quietly rusted away. Autumn had somehow grabbed one of the free hot dogs.

Nia was vaguely horrified. “Blech, are you going to eat that? That’s, like, homophobia on a bun!”

Autumn already had her mouth full. “Yeah, but I’m gonna use the calories from eating it to commit the sins of, like, sloth and gluttony. And maybe lust too, if Mulder takes his shirt off in this week’s X-Files. So it’s a win for us.”

And there was that husky voice again. “Autumn? Nia?”

She stepped out from behind the artwork. She was tall and statuesque, with long, flowing purple hair; anything beyond that was disguised by a trenchcoat and fedora.

Nia scoffed. “Shouldn’t you be selling the letter V to Ernie in the back alley on Sesame Street?”

The woman ignored her wisecrack. “I understand this city has a shortage of certain…dry goods. I just happened to have something I’m trying out, so I thought I’d do some test marketing. An ounce, for starters.”

Autumn was dubious. “You knew our names.”

“Yes, because you’ve been calling every dealer in the tri-county area. Word gets out, you know.” She pulled a baggie out of her coat.

Autumn squinted at the small transparent sack, and the dried herb within. “It’s…blue.”

“It’s a new strain. I’m a horticulturalist.”

Nia took a closer look herself; the weed inside was glistening like no other weed she’d ever seen – like moonlight reflecting off the surface of the ocean. “This looks dank as hell, Autumn. But…it is really blue.”

She shrugged. “Fine. Let me show you.” Taking a sample from a larger bag, she rolled herself a joint, pulled a Zippo out of her coat pocket, and smoked it, right in front of them. She inhaled deeply, then exhaled an impressive amount of cerulean smoke.

Autumn and Nia glanced at each other, silently acknowledging that this was pretty badass.

She smiled – or at least, it looked like she was smiling, beneath the fedora. She had big teeth. “I’ve been trying this for a while, so I’ve built up some tolerance – but you haven’t, so look out. This stuff is going to blow your little minds. Don’t make any complicated plans for a while afterwards.”

They made their exchange – twenty of Autumn and Nia’s hard-earned dollars for the bag. The dealer started to walk off, but turned back, shooting them one final glance. “I do recommend you go to the beach, though. It’s going to be beautiful tonight.”

…

10:30 AM
Autumn and Nia’s apartment, again

They ran home.

Once they were safely inside, Autumn handed the bag over to Nia, who immediately got to work.

Nia had the delicate, nimble hands of a surgeon, and she rolled the most perfect joints Autumn had ever seen. She took extra care with this batch, and soon had two neat little spliffs. She handed one to Autumn, who had her lighter at the ready.

Autumn clicked the lighter open. “Happy motherfuckin’ Fourth of July. Time for some fireworks.”

She lit both, and they inhaled, deeply. They held it in their lungs for as long as possible, feeling it burn their alveoli like a pyroclastic cloud, before exhaling clouds of blue smoke when they could finally take no more.

The effect was immediate – the most intense high either of them had ever felt. But it wasn’t frightening – it was like being plunged into an endlessly deep blue ocean of mellow, as gentle waves of chill lapped against the rocks of consciousness.

Or something like that.

Nia came up for air, briefly, for another toke. “Ho. Lee. SHIT. She better still have our number, because I am adding this to my regular rotation.”

Time passed, punctuated only by another hit before they were submerged again. They could feel a tingle – a pins-and-needles electric charge that spread out from their lungs and soon suffused their entire bodies. Abd then…a wetness. Like their bodies had been gently lowered into a cool, refreshing pool.

That wasn’t the only wetness they were feeling. Between their legs was a hot, urgent arousal they hadn’t felt in each others’ presence since the sex scene in Titanic. But as their thoughts turned to that moment, they thought not only of the lean, hardscrabble-poverty-honed physique of Jack, but the opulent voluptuousness of Rose – something neither of them had thought about much at the time.

Of course, they didn’t have a Kate Winslet handy. But what they did have...was each other.

Autumn stared deeply into Nia’s eyes. “Nia…has anyone ever told you that you’re totally gorgeous?”

“I mean…probably. When they were trying to sleep with me.” Nia brushed aside Autumn’s bangs to return the gaze. “And you have really beautiful eyes. And…and soft lips…”

They kissed, both surprised that they’d never tried it before. Their lips locked together, tongues clumsily colliding, as their hands wandered to the back of the other’s head, running their fingers through their hair.

Nia’s hands felt something unfamiliar poking out of Autumn’s hair. Her gauge-bearing ears were…longer? And pointier? And…felt kinda rubbery, like a fish…

Autumn had found something similar on the sides of Nia’s head, her multiple piercings no longer in her shell-like ear, but something that looked like it had been transplanted from a tropical aquarium. “Nonono…something’s really wrong…”

Nia tugged on the new appendage. “There’s something…something stuck to you…”

Autumn swatted her away. “Ow. Ow! They’re my ears, Nia! Fuck!”

Autumn looked down at herself, and saw that crimson scales had started to push out of the flesh of her shorts-clad legs. She tried to pull at them, but they were firmly attached – and as she watched, horrified, more began to emerge.

Nia had pulled up her skirt, revealing that similar, albeit purple, scales were growing on her legs, as well. And as she took a closer look at her hand, she saw that thin, translucent webbing had started to form between her fingers.

Nia caught a glimpse of her reflection in their glass coffee table; sea-green streaks had started to form in her hair. Autumn followed suit, and saw that her own shaggy mullet had was becoming a vibrant orange at the roots.

Nia was trying to rationalize what was happening. “There…there’s something in that weed, after all. We’re just hallucinating.”

“No. We’ve tripped before, and this is NOT that. We are NOT having the exact same trip. This is REAL. We’re…we’re changing, something’s happening to us!”

Scales on their legs. Fin-ears. Finger webbing. Colorful hair.

Nia was the first to say it.

“Mermaids.”

They were silent for a while, their addled minds trying to process what was happening.

Autumn bit her lip. “And we’re really horny. And horny for each other, which is new.”

“And we’re still really high.”

“Yeah. We have to get to Jackie’s.”

…

12:00 PM
Captain Jackie’s bungalow

Captain Jackie was a local character.

She’d lived through the ‘60s, and if you met her on the right day, she might still believe that it was the ‘60s. If half of her stories could be believed, she was the Zelig of the counterculture; she was the eighth member of the Chicago Seven, she’d ridden the Merry Pranksters’ bus, and she had taken the brown acid at Woodstock.

She’d also done every mind-altering substance known to man, which made her a living encyclopedia of drugs – the perfect person to go to if you were having a bad trip. Nia and Autumn lived quite close to her, and had met her after buying what turned out to be a really bad bag of mushrooms. After she’d eased them through the puking and the hallucinatory snake-bats, they’d quickly bonded with the older woman, and often helped her out with chores around her cluttered, ramshackle house.

Right now, she was outside tanning. It was something she probably did too much, given that she looked like Joni Mitchell after being microwaved for half an hour.

Nia was the first to burst through her front gate. “Jackie! We bought some weird blue weed from this lady and it was probably a bad idea but nobody else had anything and we smoked it and it was really good shit but now we’re turning into mermaids and we kinda made out with each other a little!”

Jackie lowered her tanning mirror, and took a close look at them through her blue-lensed sunglasses. They both took off the bucket hats they’d donned to conceal their ears.

She clicked her tongue. “Ah, shit. Seen it before. Someone sold you girls seaweed.”

Autumn arched an eyebrow. “Seaweed? Like on sushi?”

Jackie waved her hand, dismissively. “It’s like that seaweed in the same way that regular weed is like the dandelions I pull out of my morning glory.”

She sat back in her lawn chair, clearly preparing to tell another one of her outlandish stories.

“Picture it – Palo Alto, summer of ’68 – the Sunshine Supernalia Music Festival and Be-In. I was in the chillout tent getting my vibes back together after taking some sketchy peyote. In comes this girl – hippie chick out of Vermont – and she’s real thirsty, and itchy, and desperate to get laid. I spent most of the Johnson Administration in that state, so I wasn’t too bothered until she started growing scales on her arms. By that time, the peyote was wearing off, and I held her hand for a little bit – and then she started making out with me, and I didn’t stop her. When her tongue wasn’t in my mouth, she told me she bought some blue weed off this tall dude with green hair. Some biker came by, and he’d seen it before, down in Florida. That shit is bad juju – it makes you super-high, then it turns you into a mermaid.”

Autumn stared her down, still unwilling to believe all this. “Mermaids aren’t real.”

“I don’t know if all that Disney shit about underwater castles and seashell bras is true, but I saw her legs melting together with my own eyes. The peyote wasn’t THAT bad.”

“But the biker, he knew what to do, right? How to reverse it?” Nia looked hopeful.

“Oh, there’s no reversing it. All you can do is get the poor bastard into the nearest body of water. We loaded her onto his bike and got her to the creek, even though it meant we missed Country Joe and the Fish. Just got her there in time – the gills are the last thing to come in, and once they do, you gotta get them wet immediately. She thanked us and swam off. Never saw her again. Hooked up with the biker, though. What was his name – I wanna say Dwayne?”

She snapped out of her reverie. “So I’m sorry, girls. It’s adios to your legs and life on land. The good news is we’re not far from the ocean here. By the looks of it, you’ve got until nightfall.”

She looked wistful for a moment, and patted both girls on the shoulder. “I guess this is goodbye – you won’t have much time for this old town once you hit the ocean. It’s been a real trip knowing you gals – you remind me of me, and I don’t have any better compliment to give than that. Vaya con dios.”

She hugged them both, and waved as they headed out.

It was all starting to sink in for them. Captain Jackie might have been a bit of a flake, but if there was one thing she was never wrong about, it was drugs. Their human lives, then, were over – and who knows how much of them would be left by the time they were fully transformed? It had already altered their sexual orientation, after all. Would their old selves be lost to a tsunami of new instincts?

But there was no time to dwell on that. They had to get to the ocean, or else.

…

1:00 PM
Santa Marisa Galleria

The hot afternoon sun hung over them, making them feel like tuna steaks on a grill. They could see the wavy, superheated air coming off the sidewalks, practically searing their newly-sensitive flesh.

Autumn wiped the sweat off her brow. “God, it’s hot out. And…dry.”

Nia checked her watch, and pointed to the nearby mall. “We’ve got lots of time. Why don’t we get a drink. And lunch.” Her stomach was rumbling, her transformation burning calories by the minute.

They headed inside, the air conditioning making them both breathe a sigh of relief. The food court was buzzing, alive with chatter and laughter – and any number of delectable food odors.

Autumn surveyed the court. “So what do you feel like? Might be the last time we have pizza, or burgers, or…”

Nia’s eyes had alighted on Stop, Drop, and Roll Sushi. She pointed to it, wordlessly.

Autumn blanched. “Sushi? Nia, we’re going probably going to spend the rest of our lives eating raw fish. That’s what you want for your last human meal?”

“It…it wasn’t, but then I saw it, and I smelled it…”

And now Autumn had, too. And the lure of the glistening raw fish was…undeniable.

“Fuck. Stupid fucking mermaid curse.”

They loaded up on sashimi, grabbed a mineral water, and found a table.

Something struck Autumn. The mineral water was fine, but it was missing something. Absent-mindedly, she grabbed a salt packet, tore it open, and poured it into her beverage. She took a sip, and found the mixture surprisingly refreshing.

Nia took out a napkin, and started drawing their best route to the beach. It would be long, and circuitous, but it would keep them hidden – there was a good chance they were going to get less and less human-looking as the day went on.

Already, their changes had proceeded since they left Jackie’s. Scales were now forming on their forearms and the backs of their hands, even as they covered more and more of their legs. Their ears were growing dramatically larger, now matching the coloration of their respective scales, and could no longer be fully concealed under their hats. But perhaps most noticeable, and uncomfortable, was how tight both of their bras had become – they’d each gained at least a cup size, and it was clear they weren’t done yet.

Nia poked hers, disapprovingly, as she felt her bra clasp dig into her back. “Guh. What is up with the Baywatch boobs? These can’t be easy to swim with.”

Autumn had decided to grope hers instead. “Mm. They feel good, though.”

Their ears twitched. Someone was approaching them – and the distinct jingling of a wallet chain told them exactly who it was.

Triple-T. Taylor Tyler Thomas. The living avatar of the 1990s, from the frosted tips of his hair to the Nike Foamposites on his feet.

They’d both dated him at various times. He was an okay hookup, really – easy on the eyes, always had weed, preposterously well-hung – but he had one fatal flaw. He was really, really stupid. Worse, he was stupid enough that he thought he was smart.

He took a seat without an invitation. “Ladies. You know I’ve always admired your aesthetic. But this new look…ooh, it’s doing it for me. You look like you’re right out of those Japanese porno cartoons. Is there a comics convention in town?”

He noticed they were holding hands – which even Autumn and Nia hadn’t noticed they were doing. “And I see you’ve begun to explore your…bisexuality. I always got those vibes from you two, you know. I read a fascinating article about it in Newsweek. Why don’t we discuss it this evening, at my apartment, over a stuffed-crust pizza? I have a case of Zima chilling as we speak. After all, what better way to celebrate bisexuality than to have a man and a woman at the same time?”

‘Bisexuality’. He pronounced it like it was some foreign phrase he was trying to make as sensual as possible. Unfortunately, it was working.

Autumn stifled a groan, while Nia tried to avert her eyes. They were horny enough from the transformation that it almost sounded like a good idea – Zima and all. But if they spent the evening with the guy, they’d definitely end up fully transforming at his place, and then who knows what would happen. Would he call the cops? Sell pictures of them to the Weekly World News? Build a giant aquarium so they could be his live-in sex pets?

Nia gently shooed him away. “That’s a…tempting offer, T. Why don’t you go hang out by the Orange Julius while we talk about this, girl-on-girl.”

With a lascivious smirk and a little bow, he departed.

Autumn was seriously considering the offer. “We do have all afternoon. And he lives right by here. And I guess we’re not turning all-the-way-lesbian, because I can’t stop thinking about his gigantic cock now.”

Nia tented her fingers. “I don’t know. I…god, I’m desperate to get laid. But I still feel kinda weird…like, a threesome? With you?”

“This might be our last chance to have sex as humans – or sex, period! I watch Animal Planet, you know. You know how fish have sex? We might spend the rest of our life splooging fish eggs out of our vaginas and waiting for some merman to come along and jerk off on them. And…you know, we can just have him in between us. We don’t have to do anything to each other, if you don’t wanna.”

Nia bit her lip, letting her eyes wander over to Taylor, knowing full well what he was packing under those cargo shorts. “Ugh, you’re right. God, I wish that dick was attached to a smarter guy.”

Autumn paused. “Wait. He has a car. We can have sex with him, then have him drive us to the beach!”

“Perfect.” Nia waved him back over. “I’m gonna have him buy us some California rolls to go.”

…

4:30 PM
Taylor Tyler Thomas’ house

The air was rich with the aromas of sweat and sexual fluids – with the slightest hint of seawater. The waterbed lurched back and forth, the three people atop it rocking like ships in a white squall. Two of them found the experience strangely natural. The third…did not.

Taylor was gasping at this point, his body on the verge of completely shutting down from fatigue and dehydration. “Oh…oh my GOD, what the fuck happened to you girls? You were both good in bed before, but…like, did you go to prostitute school or something? Did you read all the sex tips in Cosmo? Are you normal when you’re apart but when you touch you get like Wonder Twin powers?”

Hoping to silence him, Nia ground her mound in his face. “Shut…shut the fuck up, Taylor! I’m almost done!”

Autumn writhed under him, his massive tool buried to the hilt in her soaking slit. “Yeah! We’re not fucking you for your personality! Give me that fucking cum!”

Nia and Autumn’s transformations had continued. The entire lower halves of their bodies were now totally coated with scales, as were their arms up to the elbow. Their ears were now ostentatious fins poking out from their hair, which now only bore traces of its original coloration. Even their faces had changed a little, as their lips had slightly plumped up, and their eyes had changed colour – Nia’s were now an eerie pale blue, while Autumn’s were a molten gold.

Taylor had remained totally human, which was good. Nia had briefly been worried that they might be contagious.

He finally came, a final spurt of cum issuing from his much-abused member. His mouth was dry. His body ached. It felt like an iron gauntlet was squeezing his nutsack. But he just couldn’t stop – he didn’t particularly want to, of course, given the two foxy babes he was sharing a bed with, and for once his body was fully cooperating.

Autumn rolled over, basking in the afterglow. She liked sex a lot, but it had never felt this good. And Taylor…well, was a moron, but he was smart enough to let his body do most of the talking in bed.

It hadn’t quite been perfect, though. She and Nia had…avoided each other a little. It had been impossible to totally avoid contact, and they had done a little making out, but they hadn’t made good on the sapphic desire that had been building up in each other since this morning. They were friends, after all, and their sudden, burning lust for each other had made things a little uncomfortable.

Nia stroked Autumn’s face, gently – only to lose her shit once her eyes alit on the clock radio, which read 4:35. “Shit shit shit! How did we spend three and a half fucking hours having sex?”

She started counting on her webbed fingers, the blurry events of the past few hours coming into focus. “Wait…no. That’s…that’s impossible. He came…five times in me, five in you, once on your stomach, once on my tits, once on both of our faces…the last time I was with him he came twice, and that was with an episode of Letterman in between. That’s not human.”

“Yeah, I’ve been with Taylor before too, remember? He doesn’t last that long, unless he’s gotten into some of that tantric Sting shit.”

Nia placed her hands on her heaving bosom. “Autumn, it’s us – we’re not human. I can…I can feel it. It’s a mermaid thing. We’ve got that blood sugar sex magik going on – like, mermaids used to seduce sailors into the ocean, right? I guess they just didn’t mention the part where they fuck them until their balls turn into craisins.”

Autumn tore herself away from the bed. “That’s it. We’re done. We have to get the fuck to the beach, or we’re going to fuck Taylor until we’re mermaids and he’s a pile of dust with an erection.”

Nia looked longingly at the bathroom. “Okay, maybe if we…maybe if we have a shower first…”

Autumn pulled her up, forcefully. “No time – and we can’t risk getting wet making us go all Daryl Hannah, either.” She tossed a towel at her. “Dry as much Taylor off yourself as you can, then get dressed.”

Autumn called out to the inert form of their host as she pulled on her shirt and discarded her now far-too-small bra. “Taylor, can you drive us to the beach?”

“Sure…sure,” he croaked, weakly. He tried to pull himself out of bed, and promptly fell off it. He moaned, softly, on the floor. “I’m okay. I’ll be okay. Maybe if I have another Zima…”

Autumn sighed. “God dammit. He couldn’t drive a Power Wheels Jeep right now, much less a real one.”

Nia shrugged, as she buttoned up her blouse. “It figures. He barely had a working brain as it was, and now there’s probably, like, no blood left in it.”

Autumn scooped the keys off the hall table. “Taylor, we’re taking your Jeep! You can pick it up on the beach later!”

He groaned.

Nia tried to get her sandals on, but found, much to her distress, that her foot had widened and flattened, her webbed toes now spindly – like the rays of a fish’s fin. Loud cursing over her shoulder told her that Autumn’s army boots were out of the question, too.

They ran out to the Jeep barefoot, their webbed feet slapping against the hot pavement of Taylor’s driveway. Autumn took the driver’s seat. “Okay. We still have…like, time. We can make it. We just can’t take the back route.”

Nia consulted her napkin map, tracing their path with her webbed finger. “So our fastest route is…through the drive-in.”

“Right through the Jesus fr – the anti-gay rally. Shit.”

They set off. Nia gazed longingly out the window, wondering if this would be the last time she ever saw these familiar things – houses, trees, cars. Meanwhile, Autumn focused solely on the road.

They were making good time. They were going to make it.

Unless.

Autumn felt a tugging sensation on her thighs. She looked down in horror, seeing that her scaly legs had begun to move inexorably together, starting to merge together into a single appendage – and that her feet were further lengthening and fanning out, into a tailfin.

Neither of these things were particularly conducive to driving a car.

“Nia…Nia, my fucking legs!”

“I know, it’s happening to me, too!” Nia wailed, her tail flapping helplessly.

Autumn gestured at the pedals. “You have to…get down there. Work the pedals with your hands.”

Nia did as she was told. Autumn reduced her speed, shakily giving out commands to brake or accelerate as she tried not to look down at her former legs – even as she could feel flesh and bone and muscle merging together to form a single, undifferentiated appendage, and hear it tearing her shorts and panties apart to make way.

Nia’s glittering purple tail started to flop, nervously, as she worked the pedals.

“Autumn.” Her voice was shaky, her breaths deep and heavy.

Autumn patted her head, reassuringly. “You’re doing really good down there, Nia. We’re almost at the drive-in.”

Nia bit her lip. “Autumn, I…I can’t stay down here.”

Autumn stroked her hair. “It’s okay, I know it’s uncomfortable, but we’re – “

“No, I can’t be this close to your pussy! I can hear it, I can smell it, I can taste it…fuck, I want to eat you out, right now! I can barely control my body – it’s like I’m in mermaid heat or something!”

Autumn’s grip on the wheel tightened as her mind immediately went into overdrive – it was now undeniable how much she wanted Nia to do all those things…

She managed to stammer out a single word. “Please.”

It could have meant “please don’t”. It could have meant “please let me pay attention to the road so we don’t die”. It could have meant “please let me park the car before you give me the tongue-fucking of a lifetime”.

But Nia knew her friend. It wasn’t a please – it was a plea. The same fire burned in both of them, and it needed to be quenched before it reduced them both to ashes.

Also, Autumn’s hand was not-so-subtly pushing her head towards her womanhood. That was a good hint, too.

Autumn gasped, softly, as Nia’s tongue parted the scales concealing her pussy and began to stimulate her outer lips. She had to fight from squeezing her eyes shut as Nia found her clit, and started teasing it with the tip of her tongue.

Cars were swerving around them now as they hurtled down the street. They were close to the drive-in – mere blocks away. But Autumn was having trouble paying attention to anything. It was almost like the rest of the world was fading away…

Her senses were all so potent now. She could smell the tang of their combined arousal – practically taste it on her tongue, and how she longed to plunge that tongue into Nia. Her finlike ears could hear everything – even the wet sounds of Nia plunging her fingers into her own womanhood. And her sense of touch…god, she could feel every inch of Nia, her erect nipples poking through her blouse and into Autumn’s tail, her webbed hand on her hip, and that fucking tongue exploring every part of her…oh god, oh GOD.

She came with a cry, and her vision went white…which was not particularly conducive to operating a motor vehicle. Neither was her wildly flapping tail, which pressed down hard on the accelerator as she contorted in orgasm.

She lost control of the car, which went skidding towards a streetlight. With her last iota of willpower, Autumn yanked Nia back up into the passenger seat. The airbags immediately deployed, knocking both girls unconscious…

…

6:00 PM
Seashore Drive-In Theater

“Unhhh…”

Autumn’s eyes fluttered open. Unbuckling her seat belt, she slid out of the car door, falling to the pavement below.

“Ow. Nia are you – ooooofff!”

As if on cue, Nia toppled out of the car as well, falling right on Autumn.

They were all but full mermaids now. Their muscular, scaly tails showed no sign of ever having been human legs, and bore a number of new fins along their length; they would presumably help them swim, but for now they were useless, fluttering distractions. Nia had left her skirt in the car, while the ragged remains of Autumn’s shorts were still on the driver’s seat. Their arms, up to the elbows, were coated in the same scales; their fingers were webbed, with short claws replacing their nails. Autumn’s mullet was fully orange, while Nia’s curls were sea-green; they had faint patches of scales on their eyelids and cheeks, and their soft lips had changed colour to match their scales.

They were almost mermaids, but they were missing one thing; gills. And a slight itch in Autumn’s neck told her they weren’t far off from arriving.

Nia groaned, and rolled over to Autumn’s side. “Ugh. I’m sorry.”

“Glad I could cushion your fall, Nia.” She laid her hands on her chest. “Good thing we come with built-in airbags now, too.”

“Not just about that. I’m sorry about – “

“No, don’t be. Fuck that. We don’t know how to control these fucking…nympho fish bodies yet, and we sure didn’t fucking ask for them, or to be in this fucked-up situation. And…to be honest, I – “

Before she could finish, a man in the distance spotted them, and started running in their direction. He had a significant entourage with him.

Autumn winced. “Ah, fuck. It was nice knowing you, Nia.”

The guy was about fifty, and dressed like a Mormon missionary – white shirt, neat slacks, and an American-flag-patterned tie, topped up with a military-precise crew cut. “Hey, what are you two doing over here, goofing off? We gotta get you to the tank!”

Nia was confused. “The tank?”

“Yeah, for the show! You girls are the mermaids, aren’t you? Let me guess – you were running late, and those tails must take forever to get into, so you put them on at home and tried to drive here. I’ll call a tow truck for that thing.” He barked at a harried-looking assistant hovering by him. “Go get the scooters!”

Autumn cursed under her breath. The Penelope Bergamot Mermaid Revue, live tonight at the Seashore Drive-In Theater. This dude thought they were the costumed mermaid dancers who were supposed to perform tonight.

He knelt down, taking a closer look at the two of them – especially their tails. “We haven’t met. Howard Bergamot – you know my mother, I’m sure. You know, I saw pictures of the costumes, but they didn’t do them justice. They really look real. Did you make these yourselves?”

Nia shrugged. “Yes?” It was kind of true.

Shortly, the assistant returned momentarily with a pair of Rapscallion personal mobility scooters. A pair of burly security guys lifted Autumn and Nia up, placing them with surprising gentility on the battery-powered vehicles. They were meant for someone with legs, naturally, but they could wedge their new tails in there without too much of a hassle.

Nia glanced at Autumn. The best course of action would be to book it to the beach as fast as possible, but it was clear the people surrounding them had other plans. Even if they decided to make a break for it, it’s not like the scooters would be able to outpace an able-bodied adult. So for now, they followed, as he led them to a large wheeled water tank, the size of an above-ground swimming pool, close to the stage that had been set up in front of the drive-in’s screen.

“You aren’t going to wear those shirts, are you?” He glanced at Autumn’s arms, clucking with disapproval. “Mm. If you’d gotten here earlier, we could have covered that tattoo up with makeup – we’ll just have to hope Miss Bergamot doesn’t see it. She wouldn’t approve, as you can imagine. She wouldn’t care for those muscles, either – very unladylike – but I imagine they help you swim, right?”

He rolled over a rack of clothing, and handed them each a stars-and-stripes bikini top.

He turned around, giving them some privacy; his entourage followed suit. “Of course, she doesn’t approve of a lot of things.” He let his guard drop for a second. “I’m lucky that she’s so hyperfocused on lesbians that she hasn’t figured out why her only son ‘hasn’t met the right girl yet’.”

Nia turned to Autumn and shrugged. She doffed her peasant blouse – like Autumn, she’d left her ill-fitting bra back at Taylor’s – and slipped on the bikini top. It was a little tight, but it was reasonably well-suited to containing her new assets.

She looked over at Autumn, who was completely frozen in slack-jawed lust. Nia snapped her fingers, snapping Autumn out of it. She, too, reluctantly tossed her tank top aside and put on the bikini top. It looked a little incongruous, with her flame-orange mullet, jacked arms, and skull tattoo – enough to make Nia smile – but it was pretty hot.

Howard’s attendants helped them up to the tank, opened the hatch, and eased them into it. It was a large, circular tank; it was covered with red-white-and-blue bunting, concealing the interior from the outside. Soft lights built into the sides illuminated the water from below, compensating for the darkness. There was a metal dock hanging off the side; Autumn and Nia planted themselves there, their tails dangling in the water.

Howard peered in, to see that they were in safely. “Okay, you know what to do from here – we’ll start up the music as soon as we pull the bunting off, and you’ll go into your routine. Once you’re done, we’ll roll the tank back here, get you changed, and I’ll handle your checks – feel free to stick around for the afterparty, although mother doesn’t approve of alcohol, so it’s Diet Pepsi and ice tea.” He patted them both on the shoulders. “Break a…fin?”

He closed the hatch, leaving them in the blue-lit gloom of the tank.

“Pfeh.” Autumn spat. The chlorinated water felt gross on her fin.

From within the tank, they could hear muffled shouting – it sounded like the actual mermaids had shown up, late, but Howard was convinced they were imposters, because their costumes looked terrible compared to “the girls in the tank”. He had security take them away. Autumn and Nia both winced, knowing that was probably their last chance to escape.

Soon, the tank shuddered. They could feel the water shift as it was rolled, slowly, towards the stage.

Nia groaned. “Great. It’s showtime. Now everybody’s gonna see us, and they’ll find out that these aren’t costumes pretty fast.” She looked glum. “Plus we don’t know the choreography, either.”

Autumn sighed. “I guess we just wait here, then. I hope Mulder and Scully know to keep our gills wet when they black-bag us.”

Nia laid her hand on Autumn’s. “Autumn…I just want you to know that if I had to get turned into a mermaid and sent to a secret government lab with anyone, I’m glad it was you.”

Autumn turned to look at her – and was taken by her otherworldly beauty. This was still her best friend – but there wasn’t anything that said she couldn’t be her lover, too. “You’re so beautiful. You’ve ALWAYS been beautiful, but I’ve never realized it.”

They embraced, their bodies pressing against each other. Nia shuddered in Autumn’s grip. “Oh god. Just…just hold me in those Linda Hamilton arms…”

They kissed, their soft lips locking together. This felt right. It felt like they’d been waiting their whole lives for this – as if their human existence had been mere prelude to this union of hot, still-kinda-stoned mermaids.

Nia’s webbed hand wandered under Autumn’s bikini. “I didn’t get a chance to finish what I started back in the car…you only came once, and I know I can do better than that.”

Autumn was already inching towards Nia’s needy womanhood. “And I didn’t get a chance to even things up. I can’t have you holding that over me, can I?”

The bikini tops came off, and they were naked, basking in each other’s presence. It was cramped on the metal dock, and the metal grating was digging into their sensitive flesh, and the chlorine in the air tasted bad, but they didn’t care. They were together. Tomorrow they might be exhibits in a freak show or test subjects at Area 51, but right now, they were here.

Tongues explored stiffened nipples. Tails entwined. Hands caressed achingly sensitive clits. Neither of them had ever been with a woman before, sexually, but they were both women, and they knew what they liked. In their present state, of course, it might not have mattered if they were both blindfolded and wearing oven mitts; the mere presence of each other and their burning desires were enough.

They were so wrapped up in each other they didn’t notice the bunting on the tank had been pulled up, fully revealing them to Penelope Bergamot and everyone at her rally as a brass band struck up “The Stars and Stripes Forever”. They writhed on the dock, nearly wrist-deep in each other.

“Oh god…fuck my mermaid pussy, Autumn!”

“Only if you suck my big fucking fish titties!”

The crowd was silent, briefly, then went absolutely wild. The men were transfixed – and the women were, too, even if they would never admit it. Suddenly, the anti-gay rally had become the gayest thing to hit this drive-in since Bound/Showgirls Double-Bill Night.

Penelope Bergamot was not transfixed, exactly. Her eyes rolled back in her head, and she toppled to the stage like a fallen oak.

The crowd went wilder.

People rushed the stage. Someone, mercifully, dropped the bunting back on the tank.

The hatch opened.

It was Howard. He extended an arm to them.

“You girls need to get out of here?”

Autumn sighed in relief. “Fuck yes. The beach. It’s just over there.”

He gestured to the crowd, concealed but audible. “I don’t think I can drive you out of here with everything going on, but we’ve still got the Rapscallions. I’ll hold them off until you can get away.”

Nia whispered a hushed prayer as Howard helped her on to the machine.

He was staring at them, differently than he had before. “You’re real mermaids, aren’t you. I should have seen it, but…”

Nia crossed her arms over her breasts, out of habit – although she didn’t feel particularly self-conscious about her nudity. “We weren’t real mermaids until…like, today. We’ve got to get to the beach before we finish transforming.”

“Okay then.” With Nia on her scooter, he turned to Autumn, grunting with effort as he pulled the densely muscular mermaid out of the tank.

She looked at him, a little dumbfounded, as he eased her onto the scooter. “Why are you helping us?”

“Well, I guess what I saw what you were doing in that tank…it didn’t appeal to me on the same level as most of the crowd, but it was just so beautiful. And it made me realize that there are beautiful things in this world, and I don’t have to help my mother destroy them.”

He gestured to the beach, off in the distance. “Good luck.”

They gunned the engines to their top speed of eight miles an hour, and “sped” away into the night.

…

8 PM
Santa Marisa Beach

It was a glorious sunset, a gorgeous tableau of reds and oranges and purples as the swollen solar orb sank below the horizon. Autumn and Nia would have appreciated it more if it didn’t merely herald the end of a day, but of their human lives.

But there was no time to ponder that, because there, laid out in front of them, were the twilight sands of Santa Marisa Beach – and beyond it, the vast, mysterious ocean that would be their new home.

“Oh god. Fucking finally.”

Autumn’s Rapscallion whined as it tried to push its way across the sand. Finally, it sputtered and died, as wisps of smoke emerged from its overtaxed little motor. Nia’s keeled over moments later, its battery sparking.

Autumn looked to the water in the distance. “Okay. It’s fine. We’ll crawl the rest of the way. I’ve seen baby sea turtles do it a million times on TV, I’m sure we can do it.”

Nia scratched her neck, feeling the gill slits beginning to form. “Don’t most of those baby sea turtles get eaten by crabs and birds and stuff?”

“We have arms. We’ll be way better at it.”

And so, they began to crawl.

But there, between them and the sea, was the dealer. Her trenchcoat was gone, revealing her statuesque body, which was clad in little more than a few strategically-placed strands of kelp. They could see her pointed ears, her webbed hands, her shark-like teeth, and the arcane, iridescent runes tattooed on her pale flesh – she wasn’t a mermaid, like them, but she wasn’t human, either.

Nia groaned. “Damn it.”

The woman smiled, beatifically. “Autumn. Nia. You’ve turned out beautifully.”

Autumn clenched her webbed fist. “You did this to us on purpose.”

“Of course I did it on purpose. I’m a sea witch. I love mermaids. I need mermaids. You will come with me to my realm beneath the seas, where you will tend my underwater gardens, growing more of the seaweed that transformed you. And I will go forth with it to the surface world, bringing you more sisters to work alongside you.”

Nia cocked an eyebrow. “So you’re making more mermaids so you can make…more mermaids.”

The witch seemed shocked to hear it out loud. “I…I guess, basically…”

Autumn snapped her fingers as she had a eureka moment. “…that’s Amway.”

The sea witch looked offended. “What?”

Autumn punched the witch’s ankle, making her stumble backwards. “That’s fucking Amway, dude. My cousin is always trying to sell me shitty vitamins and stuff, and it’s exactly like this. It’s a mermaid pyramid scheme! I didn’t lose my humanity just so I could get another shitty job!”

Nia chimed in. “Yeah, get fucked, lady!”

Her features were angry now. “Hey. HEY. You aimless mortals were barely-employed, always high, and you both dressed TERRIBLY. You were LOSERS! I saved you from a lifetime of toil and entropy to join me beneath the waves for centuries of blissful purpose. You have nothing else. You WILL join me.”

Autumn gave her the stink-eye, as hard as she could. “Well, what if we don’t want to? You gonna fuckin’ make us?”

The witch was clearly not prepared for this. “Er…people usually just do it. What else are you going to do? You’re mermaids!”

Nia folded her arms. “So you don’t have any magic spells or potions or amulets to make us obey you or anything.”

“…no. If I did I really wouldn’t have to go through all this trouble. But – “

“Well then get the fuck out of our way, sea-bitch. My gills are getting drier than your sandy cooze.” Autumn started commando-crawling, elbows-first. She roughly shoved past the sea-witch, making sure she got a rough swipe from her scales. Nia followed suit, knocking the witch off-balance and depositing her, ass-first, into the sand.

The sea witch sputtered in disbelief, watching them crawl away from her. With a jolt of Atlantean invective, she disappeared in a puff of blue mist.

They didn’t even notice her leave as they continued to crawl. They were mere feet away from the sea, now. The waves lapped at their elbows.

Nia paused, staying just out of the sea spray. “Wait. I have to…I just have to think about this. It’s just…it’s so heavy, man. Like six hours ago, we were humans, with human lives and jobs and legs. And then we had that stolen away from us, and we just turned down…whatever that was, too. What are we gonna do, Autumn? There’s no undersea kingdom waiting for us down there – just sharks and eels and multi-level mermaid marketing schemes.”

Autumn blew her hair out of eyes, and sighed. “The summer’s gonna end. The ‘90s are gonna end. Our twenties are gonna end. The future’s gonna suck for humans, probably. But…but it doesn’t have to, not for us. We’re mermaids, we don’t need jobs, and we don’t need to be straight – we can just be young and dumb and horny and high every day. We’re gonna make it, Nia, because we’ve got each other. You and me, forever, or however long mermaids live.”

She held out her hand. Nia took it. “You’re my best friend, Autumn. You’re strong, and you’re brave, and you’re just…I don’t know, good at things. And you’re…like, an amazing lover. There’s nobody else I’d want to get turned into a bisexual mermaid with.”

“Nia, you are smart and funny and you eat pussy like a fuckin’ pro. If I get to be with you, it was worth turning into a fucked-up sex fish. Let’s go.”

The waves crashed over them, and they were swept out to sea.

In their short lives, they’d been high a lot. They were still kinda high right now. They’d had good highs, bad highs, disappointing highs. Highs that burned themselves out in a matter of minutes, highs that lingered for hours.

None of them compared to the feeling of seawater rushing through their gills for the very first time. They held each other, laughing, as they tumbled through the waves, their tails kicking to propel themselves through the water.

It was all going to be okay.

…

Saturday, May 22, 1999
8:00 PM
Santa Marisa Beach

Waves crashed against the rocks, as seabirds cried out into the ocean breeze. Atop a rock sat Autumn and Nia, in intense negotiations with a lanky, shaggy-haired dude. Autumn was taking the lead, while Nia de-scaled a fish with a pocket knife.

Autumn held out a coin in her webbed hand. “It’s a gold doubloon, moron. Gollllld. It’s worth way more than two hundred bucks.”

He narrowed his eyes. “Where am I gonna spend a gold doubloon?”

“Pawn shops. Jewelers. eBay. Anyone, it’s fucking gold! Come on. Bite it, it’s real.”

“I’m not biting it. It was in the ocean.”

“All right, fine.” She tossed the coin back in the water, then unfastened the bikini top she’d stolen from a sunbather. “Here, then. Mermaid boobs. You bring us more tomorrow, you can touch them.”

Nia lay on the rocks, as sexily as she could muster. “And if you bring us more than we asked for, you can touch mine, too.”

His jaw literally dropped, like a cartoon. He stammered out a reply, handed her the baggie, then scuttled off.

Autumn yelled after him. “But if you try to pass some fucking ditch weed off on us, I’m going to feed your dick to a shark!”

She re-fastened her top, laid back on the rock, and sighed.

Nia clicked her tongue. “You’d think the people of this town would be more appreciative. We got rid of Miss Bergamot for them.”

“Sure, except it made all the tabloids and they had reporters crawling all over here for a month. Remember, MERMAIDS USE MIND POWERS TO KILL GOLDEN AGE SCREEN STAR?” She scoffed. “Mind-powers, my scaly ass. That dusty bitch’s dried-up mummy body couldn’t handle hot lesbian sex. Of course, I think it was Howard coming out a day later that finished her off. Good for him, though.”

Nia started carving up her fish into filets. She did eat it raw, but she liked to eat in a somewhat civilized manner – unlike Autumn, who ate hers bones, scales, and all. Nia wasn’t sure if Autumn actually liked it that way, or if she just liked how much it annoyed Nia. “Does it bother you that we basically have to whore ourselves out to get weed? It feels a little…degrading.”

“Eh. To be honest, I like having them touched. Not that you don’t provide me enough stimulation, Nia-doll, but I like having a guy’s hands on me, sometimes. I know you do, too. Remember that surfer you ‘rescued’ last week?”

Nia crossed her arms, indignantly. “I was giving him mouth to mouth!”

“With tongue?”

Nia ran her hands through her sea-green hair and laughed, a little embarrassed. “Okay, fine. He was into it, though.”

Autumn pulled out a waterproof radio, looking to the distance where the screen of the Seashore Drive-In was clearly visible.

Nia sidled up to her, and handed her a fish. “What’s showing tonight?”

Autumn took a bite out of it with relish. “New Star Wars. It’s probably gonna be good, right?” she muttered, her mouth still full.

Nia rolled her eyes, as she took a ladylike bite out of her filet. “Of course it is. How could it not? They haven’t made one in twenty years. Civilization would crumble if it wasn’t.”

Autumn waved the baggie. “Well, hey, back-up plan, we get high and laugh about how dumb it is, and then make out.”

Nia smiled, and brushed Autumn’s shaggy bangs out of her eyes. “In that case, who cares if it’s any good?”