The One-Hundred Part 1 - The Above

If you're wanting a happy fairytale, keep looking. This isn't he story for you. But if you're looking for a mythical story filled with dystopia and magic, both dark and light, keep reading. Every baby is killed beneath the waves--with one exception. The one-hundred thousandth lives. A long time ago, 1 in every 100,000 children born from a human was a mermaid. But now mermaids are the only ones that can survive in this flooded world. The human children, the one-hundreds, are placed on the "islands" poking up over the sea. The humans that live through Mother Nature's fury have created Tribes, created rules. One of these rules is to not go near the water, to not touch it. And then there's a girl who lives to be sixteen, who goes and touches the water. Who begins to show symptoms of something half-human. Symptoms of a mermaid. These symptoms have drawn something out from the depths of the woods, from the darkness of the sea... And it's out to get this girl that's growing scales. The One-Hundred in the midst of one-hundreds. Cressa-la. Gifted and spared. Will she be so lucky again?~ EXERPT FROM THE ONE-HUNDRED ~ Every cycle, this is where I hide. I say it as if I have a choice. I don't go out, I don't eat, I just try to fall asleep, and yet I still end up dreaming about the moon and all the trouble it could get me into. My feet find their way to my hammock and I lay down, my weight making it sway. My voice drifts past my lips as the ancient song I sing helps soothe my rigid heartbeat. Desperately, I attempt to ignore the voices outside my new home and block out the happy laughter of my tribe and the aching of my heart. I focus on sleeping, on dreaming. I yearn to think of anything else, something slightly normal, but the boy in the water keeps me awake with his wonder and my questions, and soon I see the sun poking through the cracks of my door.