Siren Song of the Sea
#27 of Shattered Shards
Siren Song of the Sea
By Von Krieger
Cinna let out a sigh as he compared the two maps once more. There was no way he was reading them wrong, but he went over them as if he could will them to change and alter the unpleasant circumstances. It didn't work, however. Despite all his willpower and silent muttering of curses, the two pieces of parchment refused to offer more favorable conditions.
He'd been a SCUBA diving instructor by trade, but that had been before the world changed. Some incredible cosmic event had brought his world together with one filled with strangeness and sorcery. The resulting world was dubbed Terra Unita, or the Joined Earth. It had many wonders to explore, and new opportunities to take advantage of that had not existed in either of the two worlds before. Cinna had been using his expertise in underwater exploration and artifact recovery to make a new career for himself, one that he found a great deal more intellectually fulfilling than teaching diving to yet another crop of tourists.
The union of the technological Earth and the sorcerous Aerth had not resulted in a homogenous mix of science and sorcery; there were areas where one or the other dominated, and did so to a great degree. In the places where the concentration of magic was the highest the land clung to the way it was before the union of realities, and it had no tolerance for outsiders. Individuals from low or no magic areas would find themselves altered, their memories picked apart and put back together. If one lacked the will or mental discipline to keep their mind together they would find themselves quickly forgetting who they were, their old lives gone and replaced by someone, or something, that would be perfectly at home in the new environment. Strangely it didn't work the other way. People from higher magic areas could enter high technological areas and find themselves perfectly at home. Magical energy was still present, but the vast majority of it was used to essentially disguise the fact that anything had changed. Lizard-people could freely walk down the streets and the natives would just see rather large, broad shouldered humans. Well, most of them, anyway. There were always a few people who could pierce the veil, but they quickly learned not to say anything, less they be whisked away to an asylum. The larger creatures of Aerth tended to stay well away from such places. The laws of physics seemed to have been cast aside and broken within the magical world in some cases. Dragons would find themselves crashing down from the skies in areas of low magic, their wings and muscles not enough to support their heavy bodies. Gigantic insects would find themselves suffocating as they were hit with the effects of the square-cube law.
High intensity areas of either type were rare and most places tended to be perfectly hospitable to peoples and creatures of both worlds. There were also many places where things had become a blend of both worlds; people, architecture, animals, objects, all altering to become a mix.
The Joining had greatly altered some people, Earthers more than Aethers. The latter had an incredible number of technological, sentient races, while the former had precisely one. Cinna considered himself lucky that he'd been offshore and underwater when the merging occurred. Water tended to have a naturally high magical charge, and being submerged in it had protected Cinna from the degree of alteration that had struck most of the people in his home town.
The crossover hadn't been perfect, areas of land had been scooped up and tossed around, then stuck back together like mixed pieces from a million jigsaw puzzles. The Joined Earth was bigger than Earth and Aerth combined. There were bits that were duplicated from both worlds, some pieces that seemed to be from different timelines, and there were places that had been mashed together to form a single place and a single people without seemingly any sort of rhyme or reason to it. Cinna's home had been on one of the Florida Keys which now was connected to a mainland of some sort and fused with an Aerth trade city named Fort Blackscale. The layouts of the two towns had been identical; buildings were a perfect blend between the two, as were the population. Everyone had two sets of memories, one from a person on Earth one from a person on Aerth. Physical forms had blended into a hybrid of the two people.
Strangely enough, everyone had adapted to it with relative ease, though it still freaked Cinna out. He'd gotten a bit of the merge as well, but the only signs of it upon him were slightly pointed ears, a change in hair color, an uncomfortably large amount of women's clothing sized to fit him in his guest room closet, and a great deal of knowledge and experience about magic. His other half had been a sorceress of some sort, and Cinna was rather thankful for her skill with something he otherwise wouldn't understand. He also seemed to benefit from her superior intellect. He was rather sure he wouldn't have figured out his current money-making methods on his own. Nor would he have figured out how to use a few elementary spells to merge enchanted items and technology, which he used to make his maps.
One was a simple geographical map that showed the lay of the land and from which world and location that land had originally come from. He wasn't sure how exactly it worked, but he could move the view around on the parchment as if it were a computer's touch screen. There had been several things involved in the construction, a GPS unit, books on wildlife and plants from both worlds, high quality surveyor's maps, a microscope, and a dozen other items. Though what drove the main function of the map had been a CD-ROM with a copy of Google Earth burned onto it. Cinna used it to find old churches in more rural areas. Combined with the other map, which showed the magic/tech balance and blend he could find places where the overlap allowed a merger between an old, abandoned church and an Aerthen temple. The temples of the magical world were almost fortresses, large complexes to keep the devout safe from the wicked beasts and feral creatures of the wilderness; often with tunnels, catacombs, and cavern complexes beneath them.
Clergy from Aerth tended to have actual tangible powers that they were able to demonstrate. They could perform their own sorts of magic, create weapons enchanted to strike down the demonic, or to shield the pious. Combining magical and tech items was incredibly easy, but it still took quite an effort to manufacture the components. The shortage came from the magical items side, the most desired of which could never be automated or constructed in an assembly line type of manner. Collecting magical artifacts from the old temple-churches was how Cinna made himself a rather substantial living in the new world. Some were valuable only to collectors, while others went for big bucks on the open market. In the past two years he'd cleaned out all of the easy targets, the ones that had been marked on the maps as places of interest or mentioned in papers by local historians that got posted online. He'd reached the point where he had to physically go and look through old newspaper archives to find what he was looking for. With a few minor spells he could browse through them merely by touch, rather than sight. He could look through a hundred years worth of newspaper in a few hours, rather than a few weeks.
The new site he'd discovered had been perfect except for two details. One was that it was entirely offshore. There were bits of land that had existed upon one world that suddenly found themselves below sea level upon the merge. He'd visited a few places like that before. They were, thankfully, empty of corpses. The population having been dropped on dry land somewhere nearby was rather common. A few times he'd found the towns to be still functional, the people within having been altered to aquatic or amphibious races of Aerth.
Cinna sighed at the coloration that had been laid over the area on his second map. This one had been created to prevent Cinna from wandering into magic areas where he might find his mind scoured out by the powerful forces that suffused the land, making him into an unknowing permanent resident. It had also been upgraded to show other features of the area.
"Please let it be populated," Cinna muttered under his breath and made the small hand motion to swap the function of the second map from mana intensity to population density.
"Fuck," he grumbled. The area was almost completely empty. No permanent residents, meaning he was a perfect target.
He had a few protections that he'd used before in areas like this to keep himself from being altered, but they'd never been underwater before. It was a low tech-acceptance area, so using SCUBA gear was out. It was a prime location to acquire some artifacts from, but he'd have to purchase or rent out some underwater exploration gear that wouldn't be radically altered by the forces of magic.
He shuddered as he recalled the last time he'd crossed into a high magic zone. His dive gear had transformed itself into living creatures, shaped and sculpted via magic to serve a similar purpose. All those crustacean legs grabbing onto his skin, and the thing in his mouth... bleh!
Sure, the altered gear had worked, but it had been utterly alien and uncomfortable to him. Plus it didn't change back when you left. It had been a pain in the ass to replace the equipment, even though he'd actually made a profit by selling off his 'living' SCUBA gear.
He sighed once again, knowing where he'd have to go to get what he needed at a decent price. The same shop that he'd sold his transformed gear to. He wasn't particularly fond of the place, it always gave off an odd vibe, and the store owner was a bit... creepy. Perhaps it was the tiny spark of Elf inside him, but the half-Dark Elf proprietor always put him on edge for some reason.
With a sigh he rolled up his maps and headed for the store.
-o-
Cinna let out an annoyed growl at the sight before him. He had not wanted to spend a single second more than he had to in the shop and had just taken the first thing that the mage that ran the place said would be suitable for both underwater exploration and prevent the magical forces that acted upon his target to warp his mind.
The owner, half-dark elf and half something else, always made Cinna's skin crawl. She was not a native of either of the towns, arriving after the Joining. She kept a pair of creatures at her side almost always. They were some weird mix between lizard, cat, and looking quite adapted for the sea. They weren't her pets, and if you asked her that she would tilt her head to the side, grin and show off her strange teeth, and inform you in an amused tone of voice that she was in fact their pet. Thankfully he'd managed to get out of the shop before her petting and baby talk to them escalated to grotesque levels. The last time he'd been in the shop she'd kissed the large dog-sized creatures. There had been tongue involved.
The rolled up bundle had been an opaque plastic tube, Cinna had though it would be some kind of face mask and belt pouch or backpack or something. But instead he'd opened it to find white and black latex, and had unfurled the object to find a full-body suit that sported orca-like coloration. It wasn't merely your typical suit; there was padding in certain areas that Cinna found uncomfortable to contemplate, as well as an inflatable tail. It was in some uncanny valley between scuba suit, fetish gear, and inflatable pool toy.
Cinna was already on the beach, as close as he dared go into the magical zone without some sort of protection. He could feel it on the air, making the hair on his arms stand on end. There was already a strange tickle within his head, sounds of distant muffled conversation. He didn't want to wear the suit, especially not with its wide hips and padded chest, but he didn't want to waste the rest of the day driving back and picking out another item from that creepy shark-toothed store owner.
It was with great reluctance that Cinna began to strip off his clothes in preparation for donning the orca suit. It was obvious that the outfit was meant for a woman and to essentially enhance a womanly shape while under water. The tail also annoyed him, it would get in his way under the waves, and it seemed to be inflating all by itself without any effort from Cinna. In fact, he hadn't seen an air valve anywhere to inflate the tail.
He let out a sigh and gave the suit a dismissive wave of his hand. Magic, bleh. He didn't really trust it, despite the expertise given to him in the form of memories from his Aerthen counterpart. Every time he left the house he was thankful that he hadn't merged with the elven sorceress any further than he had. It made him shudder; walking around as some sort of half-male half-female freak. It made finding dates almost impossible, as mixed-gender fusions were, as mathematics predicted, about half of the population. Some of the merges were rather subtle. You couldn't tell if that cute, busty long haired girl across the room, be it one with pointy ears, green skin, fangs, or fur, was packing meat between her legs. There was only room for one penis in Cinna's relationships, and by golly it was going to be his.
He was thankful he worked alone as well, that there was no one to see him in the ridiculous orca suit. It was with great reluctance that he pulled it on. Immediately he found something else to grumble about; the suit was too damned big. It hung off his lanky frame like a child wearing his father's pajamas. He let out an annoyed sigh as he pulled the suit's hood up over his head. The thing was supposed to activate in water, but Cinna was beginning to suspect he'd been sold a bum deal. It was incredibly awkward walking the few feet down to the shore line with his feet in the suit's oversized boots. He felt like a clown.
But then an incoming wave washed over his feet, the cool water felt even through the suit. Cinna could feel something happening, but he wasn't sure what it was. He stepped out further into the water, and further still. The deeper he went into the water, the more he felt the coolness of the sea water, though not the wetness. As he reached chest height he drew a breath into his lungs and ducked under the water. Immediately he felt a warmth spreading across his body, the baggy suit growing tighter and tighter upon his frame until it covered him snugly, like a second skin.
Cinna opened his eyes beneath the waves and felt no discomfort. He remained beneath the water, waiting for the feeling of his breath to become tight in his chest. But it seemed to be a long time in coming. He spread his fingers and toes, feeling the webbing between them, and took a few strokes forward. He seemed to cut through the water effortlessly; his speed faster than it ought to be.
There was a new sensation of muscle and movement behind him. Cinna looked back to see the suit's inflated tail, no longer merely filled with air, but rather a part of him, swaying up and down to propel him through the water. It was so easy to move around underwater, far easier than the cumbersome diving equipment that he had used all his life. And he was so quick, too. He cut through the depths like a knife, though it rapidly made him feel tired and need to draw breath.
Cinna aimed himself towards the surface, slowing his pace. As his head broke free of the water he discovered several things. The first was that in the few minutes of rapid speed, he had left the land a ways behind. The second was that he hadn't put a shred of gear on, and thus was completely naked. The third was that the odd padding on the chest and hips of the suit seemed to have been... altered.
He floated on his back, looking down at his body. The padding upon the chest had seemingly grown outward upon exposure to the water, looking almost like the budding of breasts. Similarly the hips of the suit, as well as the proportions made him look... rather feminine. A bit heavy and broad, but rather feminine. Not that there was anything wrong with that, a familiar voice seemed to whisper in his mind.
Curious, Cinna brought a hand to his chest, cupping the potential breast. The sensations drew a gasp from his throat, the sensation felt quite real and quite pleasant. He ran a hand over his midsection, feeling slick, smooth skin slide over slick, smooth skin. He'd honestly expected something like this, but expectation did little to prepare him for physical alteration. He ran his fingers up his side and winced as he found that the zipper had vanished. But questing higher he found the tab at the side of his neck where it was supposed to be.
That was comforting, at least. The change would not be permanent. An unpleasant thought went through Cinna's head and he reached down between his legs. As he feared, he felt nothing down there, though his fingers traced over a slit. Unable to stop himself, his fingers slipped inside, caressing the sensitive flesh within, making his arousal spike. He couldn't resist fondling and caressing his altered form.
He could feel a familiar sensation from his loins and felt his member slipping out into the open air. Oh, right, whales and such had their man parts kept internally for the most part. He wrapped his hand around the length, which seemed to have been enlarged quite a bit from its human state. It had altered a bit in shape and composition as well. Cinna found that he could move it a bit.
The press of his hot flesh against his cool, wet, webbed hand was wonderful. All other thoughts left Cinna's mind save for exploring the strange, but pleasurable alterations that had come with the suit. Diving for treasure could wait until he became a bit more intimate with his new form.
He didn't really notice as he slipped beneath the waves, able to hold his breath for a time. Being underwater seemed to heighten his pleasure, as well as to allow the suit to further work its magic. Each small motion of the water against his skin made a ripple of pleasure spread from the spot, sinking in deeper and deeper. Cinna could feel his tail growing, thickening, becoming better suited for propulsion on an actual creature than as a decoration upon a simple suit. Before it felt like the suit was growing tighter to fit his body, but now it felt more like his body was growing to better fit the idea of what the suit was supposed to be.
He could almost hear a song, soft, comforting, lulling him into a strange state, not quite awake, not quite asleep. Everything that was happening to him seemed to be taking place in a dream; one that was familiar, one that told him there was nothing to worry about, even as his new breasts began to fill out, no longer mere nubs, but wonderfully large orbs that were more than a handful.
Cinna's mouth opened to utter a cry that at first he thought was muted by the water around him, but instead he heard something, a sound that was unlike any other that he had ever made before. A few moments later there seemed to be an answering cry from somewhere far away. It was at that moment that the transforming human climaxed, and then he slept.
In his place someone else awoke, someone who had been an observer in Cinna's body for quite some time. She couldn't quite remember who she was or what she had been. But the seas felt comfortable and familiar around her. Even if her form was somewhat foreign. Her body quivered with the delicious aftershocks of her masculine climax and she grinned as she coaxed every last drop of seed from her shaft.
She had explored the seas before, long ago, though the songs were different, broken upon into pieces. It was as if they had been shattered, swept up, and then placed haphazardly back together. Yes, that seemed about right. But there was a familiar sound upon the water, one beyond the hearing of most mortals. It called to her, caressed her, assured her that things were going to be okay.
She felt a gentle touch upon her shoulder, someone's hand brushing playfully over her smooth head. Dimly she felt like there ought to be something up there, hair perhaps. But she couldn't remember precisely what. Webbed hands gripped her gently, pulling her back into a kind embrace against an unseen figure. She could hear him in the song and knew he was here to help. His body was warm and slick, but not as smooth as her own. Her visitor nibbled playfully at her neck, making her giggle. She knew he could see the cloud of her seed in the water, and she could sense his playful amusement. He wondered why such a gorgeous creature would have to tend to her own pleasures when several such as himself were a mere song's call away.
He released his embrace, allowing the newly awakened girl to turn and look him over. Much like herself, he was a mix of human and orca, though more on the side of orca. No, that wasn't quite right. She wasn't a human, but something rather close. If she could only remember, if she could only find her harmony in the song once again.
His touch was electric, and she craved more. Even though the caress upon her forearms seemed to draw out small fins to the surface, matching adornments on her legs soon appearing. He had seen this before, and it could be helped along. He told her that there was always some confusion at first, but soon she would regain memory of who she had been, and who she would be. His master would be more than happy to take her in until she had regained her proper sense of self.
She thanked him for his kindness with a kiss, though it was rather clumsy. She seemed to have a bit more face than she thought she did. But the sensation of his tongue against her own told her that such was good enough. She could feel his arousal, present in the great song of the sea that nearly enveloped her. It took little effort to fan the flames of his lust, whispers that were not whispers thanking him for his kindness and wanting to repay him for his hospitality.
Her tongue felt oddly thick in her mouth, but as it trailed down the orca-man's body she found that it was just right. He was larger than she, sized both in body and in manhood. His was more of a tapering tendril, a masculinity belonging to a creature of the sea, while her own seemed more like something of the land seeking to imitate the wonderful manhood she saw before her. She caressed it hungrily with her tongue, coaxing it into her maw, sandwiching it between her plentiful breasts. The male found the act quite pleasing, though a bit baffling. He wondered what other strange, yet erotic ideas rested in the female's head. She teased him with a few, and he expressed his desire to participate if they all felt as good as this.
She felt a small, sleepy voice in her head crying out at what she was doing. But it was easily silenced, and easier still drowned out by the living song around her. That voice had kept her sleeping for quite some time, and now it was time for that voice to slumber for awhile and let another join the chorus in its place.
The voice was silenced as she coaxed the male to climax. She eagerly, almost hungrily, gulped down his plentiful seed. But still she craved more. She shivered as a strange sensation blossomed within her, restoring something that until that moment she hadn't realized was missing. The thought made her blush, for until that moment she had not been truly female, merely a feminine shape with a masculine member. Though her manhood still remained, nestled behind it was its opposite. For the moment she was both male and female in one, her flesh still not sure what it was supposed to be. She was not sure if she wished to keep it, or to see it go. It had felt rather nice, but it was somewhat alien to her in her mind. Even if it did feel somewhat familiar, as if it had been a part of her for long enough to get used to it. But she was female, this was something she knew for a fact. It was tied into her song, what parts she could hear of it.
It all confused her, and confused the male as well. Perhaps his master would be able to help her? An image came to mind of a great, majestic creature of the seas. A great orca whale with a gleaming hide like her own, though black and silver rather than black and white. She knew the sea lord of which the male served, sometime long ago he had taught her of the sea and of its songs.
Her tail was only too happy to accompany the male. She was awed by the speed it allowed her to surge through the waters. The deeper she went, the louder the familiar portions of the life song became, comforting her, welcoming her back. She could remember the awe she felt long ago, hearing it all for the first time. Nearly overwhelmed by what it told her. It was so much easier to understand than mere words, words could not be tied with true emotion, with feelings, with images, with the heart's deepest desires.
She raced ahead of the male, the way familiar. She had been here long ago. Darting into one of dozens of seemingly identical caverns felt like coming home. The twists and turns were ones she knew by heart. The light of the outside world faded and vanished, and she moved purely by the sweet sounds of the song around her. She swam through the caverns and tunnels at a speed that surprised her, her memories of traversing them being slow. Ahead of her she could see the soft, rainbow hued lights that she recalled from the undersea palace that she had once called home. She had studied magic here, when her studies on land had come to an impasse. She couldn't remember her name, but she could remember what she had been called when she had studied under the sea lord.
"I can never remember Elvish names," said a voice as she surfaced. The black and silver snout of the great creature nuzzled her belly gently as he spoke, "And you swam so slowly that you would have me either waiting all day, or I let you cling to my dorsal fin as we went places to give you your lessons."
And the sea lord had ferried her around so often, his followers and servants joked that the elven girl practically was his dorsal fin. Dorsal smiled, another piece of herself slipping into place. When she had left long ago she could easily hear the song, but she found it difficult to calm herself, to set her spirit adrift in the great sea. But now she found herself resonating with the song as if it were second nature. The seas pulsed with strange magics, some segments of the sea becoming like great oysters, sentient beings from outside the sea treated as irritating grains of sand, to be wrapped with many layers of magic and altered to be more comfortable to the realm. The magics seemed to be confused when encountering her, though. Dorsal immediately knew why.
She grinned as she gripped the zipper tab for the orca suit. She let out a soft sigh as began to pull it down, not daring to look. She could feel the undersea palace's cool air upon her bare skin, the sensation no longer heightened by the conflict of the realm's magic and the suit's. Dorsal kept her eyes closed tightly as she pulled the zipper down all the way, the suit that once clung to her so tightly now easily coming loose. She let out a sigh and opened her eyes, her grin widening.
Little had changed with the suit's removal; her skin was still black and white, sleek, shiny, and gleaming like latex. She still had her webbed fingers; she still had her tail behind her. The only alteration seemed to be a bit of a reduction in build and in bust. But she could feel the magics of the realm wrapping around her, comforting her, welcoming her home. Dorsal could feel her mind beginning to clear, memories of her life upon Aerth brimming to the surface, as well as memories that were not her own, but those of a male human who had been disgusted with the wonders of two worlds that had become one. It was his turn to sleep, and her turn to live her life.
The realm's magic tickled, coaxing her body into slow growth to become what it had been before. It would be some time before Dorsal was her proper self; how she ought to be...
Though there was a way that the process could be accelerated. And the easiest way to do so just so happened to coincide with one of the things she'd wanted to do before. She kicked the diving suit aside as several orca-men began to caress her, the entwining of their desires and hers helping to ground the magics that were altering her, pointing them in the right direction, making them accelerate. The males lifted her up and tossed her into the deeper water. Dorsal yelped in surprise at the action, though she quickly understood when she felt the huge presence rising up beneath her. The great sea lord was on his back just below her, the enchanted whale's massive member jutting up between her legs.
Dorsal thrust against her master's length, the whale's shaft well-lubed and drooling warm wetness onto her belly. It felt so good, it made the orca-girl crave more. And more was quickly provided as several of the sea lord's followers gathered around her. Her hands, her mouth, her feet, even her tail, she used all she had to please the many men around her. She could feel her transformation accelerating with each climax, her experienced touch too much for the over-excited males to stand for long. She could remember, faintly, being an elf. But that life had ended when the worlds merged, and she would start a new one. She couldn't picture her elven form in her mind's eye, all Dorsal's thoughts of herself were of her new form; the beautiful, busty, latex-skinned she-orca that she had become.
Every climax she caused brought her so much closer to completeness, so much nearer to truly becoming what she desired to be. It felt so good to serve the great sea lord, to service him and his servants. His seas had always been centers of travel, and he went out of his way to gather up those who had been changed by the forces that suffused his realm. The ranks of his followers had swelled these past two years, and many of them would be quite eager to help welcome one more into the fold.
She felt her lord climax, could feel the seed surge up through his might shaft before it met the air. The thick torrent splattered down upon her, hiding black latex in a downpour of pearlescent white, blotting out the smaller eruptions from much smaller males.
Dorsal cried out as every pleasurable nerve in her body seemed to fire at once, and even some that were not in her body. Her climax joined with that of those around her, adding a wondrous chorus of pleasure to the great song of life. Her own member was the last to erupt, adding a relatively tiny amount of seed to the mess atop her. With each set of cum that splattered upon her, the organ seemed to reduce in size by that amount. As it vanished the last of the man that had held Dorsal captive within him for so long had gone with it. Her body was complete now, and with a few more rounds of fun, her mind would soon follow.
"Insatiable," the sea lord rumbled, "Perhaps we should have named you after another piece of my anatomy," he teased.
-o-
A grey-blue skinned woman knelt on the beach, picking up the last few items of discarded clothing. Nearby a great scaled creature, looking rather like a mix of lizard, feline, and shark sat just below the waterline, watching the woman work.
"Yes, my lady, you are quite correct in stating that my motivations were not purely altruistic. Though we were as close to what one might tentatively refer to as friends as blood of the wood and blood of the depths can be, sending him to a place where he would become her also has provided for opportunities for financial and intellectual gain," she said with a smile, showing shark's teeth behind ebon lips.
"After all, I do not think dear Dorsal would mind if I browse her books. And," the dark elf chuckled as she took a few steps into the water, fishing out a white and black latex suit, "And I can always resell this particular piece of merchandise. The sea lord is paying quite well for loyal followers and concubines, ready to order."
Nearby a tendrilled head broke the surface, belonging to a creature much like the one that rested upon the beach, but larger and sporting a mane of small tentacles. The creature gently held a squirming eel in its jaws.
The elf let out a soft gasp and gave the beast a glare. "My lord! Surely you jest! Though the very idea makes my claspers harden at the image, that eel is most certainly not going where you imagine it!"
She chuckled, "After all, it is far too small. We can most certainly find better."