Chapter Text
I used to think the ocean loved me.
Not in some dramatic, poetic way, but in a real way — like how your mom knows when you’re sad before you even say anything. The waves always felt gentle around my ankles, like they were trying not to knock me over. Sometimes fish swam close to my feet, and I swore the water sparkled more when I was nearby. I thought that meant something.
I thought it meant I was safe.
My mom, Sofia, and I lived in a small house near the coast. It wasn’t fancy, but it was warm and bright and full of little things that made it feel alive — shells on the windowsill, driftwood hung on the walls, the smell of salt and lemon cleaner mixed together. The floor was always sandy no matter how much she swept, and the couch was always slightly damp from my wet hair after swimming.
I loved the ocean more than anything.
I swam almost every day, even when it was cold. I would dive under the waves and pretend I was a mermaid or some kind of sea spirit, holding my breath as long as I could, letting the water surround me like a blanket. I felt weightless there. Free. Like nothing bad could ever reach me.
Mom used to sit on the beach and watch me, laughing when I came up splashing water everywhere.
“You’re going to turn into a fish one day,” she’d say.
“Good,” I’d reply. “Fish don’t have homework.”
She’d roll her eyes, but she always smiled.
She never told me who my dad was.
Not when I was little, anyway. I used to ask sometimes, especially when kids at school talked about their fathers teaching them to ride bikes or fixing things around the house.
“He’s not around,” she would say softly. “But he loved the sea, just like you.”
That was enough for me for a long time.
I didn’t feel like I was missing anything. I had my mom. I had the ocean. I had my life.
Until the night everything broke.
I was thirteen.
It was stormy outside, but storms were normal where we lived. The rain lashed against the windows, and the wind howled through the cracks in the house, but I wasn’t scared. Storms always made me feel weirdly calm, like the world was loud but my head was quiet.
I was lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, listening to the rain, when I felt it.
Something… wrong.
Not a sound. Not a movement. Just a heavy feeling in my chest, like the air had suddenly thickened. Like the ocean inside me had gone still.
I sat up.
“Mama?” I called softly.
No answer.
Then the house shook.
Not from thunder.
From impact.
I froze.
Before I could even move, the front door exploded inward.
Wood splintered across the living room, shards flying like knives, the sound so loud it felt like it punched straight through my skull. The air filled with smoke and dust, and something huge moved through it.
I ran into the hallway, my heart slamming against my ribs, my feet barely touching the ground.
“Maya!” my mom screamed.
I saw her standing in the living room, barefoot, her hands shaking, her eyes wide with fear — and behind her, towering over the wreckage, was a monster.
It was massive, hunched, its skin gray and cracked like stone, its mouth full of jagged teeth too large for its face. Its eyes glowed a sick yellow, and when it breathed, it sounded like grinding rocks.
A Laistrygonian giant.
Even then, somehow, I knew what it was.
And I knew why it was here.
It wasn’t here for my mom.
It was here for me.
“Run!” she screamed.
But I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
The giant swung its arm.
Everything happened too fast.
The blow sent my mom flying across the room like she weighed nothing. She hit the wall with a sound I will never forget — dull, heavy, final — and slid down to the floor, unmoving.
Something inside me shattered.
“MAMA!” I screamed.
I ran to her, dropping to my knees beside her body, shaking her shoulders, begging her to wake up. Her skin was cold. Her breathing was shallow. Her eyes were closed.
I thought she was dead.
I didn’t even know I was crying until my vision blurred.
And then the giant moved again.
It took a step toward us.
That was the moment something in me snapped.
I didn’t think.
I didn’t plan.
I didn’t know what I was doing.
I just felt the ocean inside me rise.
The walls burst.
Water exploded from the pipes, from the walls, from the windows, from the floor itself. The air filled with crashing waves, roaring currents, pressure so strong it knocked me backward.
The house turned into a storm.
The water moved like it was alive, swirling around me, lifting me off the ground, wrapping around my arms and legs like extensions of my body. I screamed, and the water screamed with me.
The giant roared as the water slammed into it, lifting it off its feet, smashing it into the ceiling, the walls, the floor. Furniture shattered. Glass exploded. The house shook like it was being torn apart from the inside.
I didn’t stop. I couldn’t.
The more I cried, the more the water surged. The more I was scared, the harder the water hit the giant.
Finally, with a sound like cracking stone, the giant collapsed, dissolving into golden dust that sparkled in the air before fading away.
Silence fell.
Except for the dripping water.
And my own breathing.
I collapsed to the floor, shaking, soaked, my head spinning, my ears ringing.
“Mama,” I whispered.
I crawled back to her, pressing my hands against her chest, praying, begging, screaming internally for her to breathe.
Then her eyes fluttered open.
“Maya,” she whispered.
I sobbed.
She was alive.
Barely.
The ambulance came.
The police came.
Doctors, nurses, questions, flashing lights, white walls, machines, wires, bandages.
They said she was lucky.
Broken ribs. Concussion. Internal injuries. She would live — but barely.
And our house?
Gone.
Unlivable.
Destroyed.
And me?
I had no explanation.
No answers.
No gods.
No prophecy.
No magical explanation that made it all okay.
Just a house destroyed by water.
Just a monster no one else saw.
Just powers I couldn’t control.
Just a mom nearly dead because of me.
I didn’t know what I was.
I didn’t know why I was.
All I knew was that something inside me was wrong.
Dangerous.
Monstrous.
And I was terrified that whatever I was…
I was a freak.