//------------------------------//
// Chapter 25: Ryan 
// Story: Forbidden Places 
// by Starscribe 
//------------------------------//

Dear Journal,

Going under the sea for the portal home tomorrow. Will be with Kaelynn the whole time. See if I can find one of the locals to copy, looking like her would waste the chance. Friendzone? Nozone. 

Predictions not good for this crossing. Just like the one in that old city, some locals went through and haven't come back. Though at least this one was a few years ago, so maybe they just got unlucky. I'll pretend to sleep and hide from nightmares of waking up on Everest tomorrow. God that would suck—what if that were the only way back?

What if we spend the next five years going from portal to portal, and every one of them is somewhere unreachable or horribly unsafe? Maybe we make a gun and go back through Paris. Whatever the monster mash was, we can put an end to the graveyard smash.

-Ryan

When they left together the next morning, Ryan found no sign of the guards who had been waiting during most of the day before. There was only someone Kaelynn introduced as Rotala, apparently sent to help them by the royal family. Without any better idea, he just copied the young officer from the day before. He was about their age, anyway, instead of being grizzled and worn from long tours of duty. He caught Kaelynn blush at least once, which was probably enough. 

Maybe some parts of being stuck here wouldn't be so bad. I just need to refocus my mindset. I'm not a hideous monster, I'm whatever my partner wants me to be. Most science fiction shows have episodes about people like me.

But now wasn't the time to explore that possibility. Ryan still couldn't be sure that Kaelynn was even interested in him. The sensible plan was probably just to wait until they made it back to Earth. At least that way things wouldn't get awkward until after they had survived the ordeal of a lifetime. 

Then they reached one of several passages down beneath the water, and he was left with only one of the locals to copy. There was either the utterly boring castle servant, or Kaelynn herself. He chose the latter, if only thanks to his familiarity. 

To his relief, their minder didn't freak the hell out when he transformed in front of her. As soon as she was in the water after them, she only squeaked briefly in surprise, giving him a little distance. "Oh! You have a changeling. I don't recall... I guess the officers never learned that part. Because you were changed." 

Ryan nodded. "I hope that won't be a problem. Just like Kaelynn isn't a real seapony, I'm not a real changeling."

"Yes, well..." Though she'd changed into a fish, Rotala sounded almost unchanged from before. She was still about the same size too, just a little bigger than felt comfortable. But in the water the difference in size mattered far less.

"We should visit the city after we've investigated the portal," Kaelynn said. It wasn't the first time Ryan had heard the musical way she spoke under the water—but it was the first time he'd heard it not confined to tiny holes in the ground or little tanks. With the whole ocean around them, it was as though she'd stepped onto a sound-stage, and was doing warmups for a performance. "It's amazing, Ryan, you have to tell the others when we get back."

What he had to do was adjust the waterlogged saddlebags he had brought, and the heavy plastic case. The basic supplies they'd be carrying across, about fifty percent clothing by volume. If the crossing was safe, they weren't going to spoil any chance of getting help by making their rescuers think they were nudists.

"Whatever the young seapony wishes," Rotala said absently. "I cannot lead you away from Mount Aris, but if there is anywhere in either city you wish to see, I will take you there."

"Just the Worldgate first," Ryan said. Maybe he could copy more of what Kaelynn did with her voice? He needed to talk a little more. "However safe that is, the trip should be quick. Or eternal, if we don't come back. but I don't like planning for my own death."

That was probably the wrong thing to say—or sing. Kaelynn fell silent, and they spoke little as they crossed the reef, then through a stone tunnel cut into the rock of the island. Their guide seemed to know where she was going, though the next hour or so left Ryan almost completely lost. He used the silence to try and memorize the way out, or the way in—but the further they went, the clearer it became that Rotala was trying to get them lost. They passed the same tunnels more than once, they opened canvas doorways that were still partially unzipped from previous passages. They went up and down confusing ramps to nowhere. 

I guess the queen doesn't trust us quite as much as we thought. 

"It's a good thing we can breathe down here," Kaelynn muttered. "This is worse than any cave I've ever dived—worse than any wreck. If I got lost down here, I'd starve before I found the way out."

"That was why we dug them," Rotala said placidly. "Not to harm you, of course, or any other welcome guest of the queen. But the Storm King was determined to find us, and he knew where we'd gone. Only when the path was impossible could we finally feel safe."

But then she stopped, and the passage beyond looked different. It went up, rather than down, and was covered with familiar carvings along the walls. It was bigger too, wide enough that a dozen fish could've swam abreast. "Here is the Worldgate," Rotala said. "I will wait here as long as I can. If I am forced to leave, I will leave a note with instructions for you."

"It won't be long," Kaelynn said, hesitating near the vertical tunnel. "But given the maze, some directions would be good, if you have to leave us." Then she turned to Ryan. "You ready?"

He followed. By now, he'd just about figured out how swimming worked with the seapony tail. Maybe not as good as she could do it, but he was learning fast. Another hour of watching her, and he'd have it mastered.

"Fingers crossed," Kaelynn said, as they swam upward now. The walls were densely covered in unreadable markings—most pictographic, with sun and moon patterns. Others words, though Ryan couldn't read any of them. "Let's bring back some good news."

Just ahead was a patch of swirling gold, and a powerful current. If Ryan wanted out, he'd have to swim sideways as fast as he could. He let the current take him into another world. Home.

He passed through the timeless blur between worlds, and just like that... he was somewhere else. Naked and soggy, weighed down by the straps to a duffel bag wrapped awkwardly around his arms. But there was light above, and a set of bare legs he could swim towards. He followed, and broke the surface of the water.

They were in a cave, with blinding light streaming in towards them from one side. Enough that he could see Kaelynn beside him, clutching on to the edge of the pool. This time looked far less like a bath, and far more like a natural hot-spring, the kind he'd seen on National Geographic in Japan or China. All it was missing were those weird monkeys lounging in the water around them.

Steam rose from the water's surface in a constant trickle, enough to illustrate just how frighteningly cold it must be. Where Ryan's face touched open air, he felt frost forming, and their breath puffed up from around them in a steady stream.

"Outside," Kaelynn panted, pointing with one bare arm. "Clear path to the sky, nothing for gasses to catch on. Moss around the spring, lichen on the walls. Guess we can rule out poison this time."

Unless it was in the water, though that would probably mean it was pouring back across the world into Seaquestria. Ryan nodded absently, finding it very hard to concentrate. Kaelynn finally noticed him staring, and shoved him in the shoulder. "Oh sure, now it's embarrassing. Just give me the swimsuits."

He looked away, face flushing. "Sorry, here." He offered her the whole duffel bag. Fate couldn't possibly have given him a better opportunity than right now—naked together in a remote hot-spring, with the swirling portal to another world at their ankles. What would someone as confident as Blake say?

He didn't say anything, not until Kaelynn turned her back on him. "Tie me. Don't wanna drop our shit."

Not even she said it like she believed it. Ryan took the straps, fingers suddenly slow and clumsy against her back. "I know it probably isn't the time..." he said. "But lasting through that whole desert trip—you're one of the strongest people I know. And the hottest."

She laughed, spinning around in the water fast enough that he lost his grip on the straps completely. She touched his chest with one hand, grinning. "That one was okay. A little more confidence wouldn't be a bad thing, though. Something like 'You look better without the bikini.’ Say it like you mean it."

Ryan might not have any of the otherworldly magic right now, but it sure felt like his face could chameleon to cherry red. "But you just said—"

"Yeah?" She tilted her head to the side. "So what? You're the one who reads emotions. Since when do people ever say what they mean?"

He didn't look away from her this time. "I do think you look better without it," he said lamely. It was true, so at least he had that going for him. "But it looks cold as shit out there."

"But?" She tilted slightly to the side, dislodging the straps from around her neck. She was doing it intentionally. "I'm not gonna make it easy on you. Go on."

"You kept me sane over there," Ryan finally said. "It would be pretty cool if we went out together?"

Kaelynn groaned, wrapping one arm around his neck. "You're lucky I don't mind awkward, Ryan. But you're probably right about the cold. Let's pin this until we get back. Once we do..." She let go, then went back to pulling on the swimsuit. She did it herself in a matter of seconds now, without dropping their duffel. "Is it gross that I'm curious? I can't really explain it anymore, but... I remember. Over there, everything makes sense."

"Sure," he agreed. "I think it's part of the same process that transforms us. We need lower brain function to control new bodies. Pretty sure that lizard brain stuff is where sex-drive lives."

He took the satchel, and dressed before braving the edge of the water. It was every bit as cold as it looked, far worse than hot tubs felt in winter back home. He could practically feel the water freezing against his skin.

"I'm not just saying yes over there," Kaelynn said, staying down to her neck in water. Not like he could blame her, with the way he started shivering the instant he was out of the spring. "I'm still hoping we can cross here. God help us if the others end up like merpeople or something."

A thin layer of ice covered the rough cavern at his feet. He braced one arm against the spring, and managed to keep from falling over as he took his first steps.

"No corpses waiting just outside the water either," he said, keeping his voice neutral. "Toss me the shoes." They hadn't exactly brought mountaineering gear while they visited a secret city under Paris—but he'd take what he could get. Even soggy shoes would be better than nothing, for the short walk to the cavern exit.

Kaelynn flung the duffel over the edge, where it landed just in front of him. While she started climbing, Ryan pulled his shoes on. If he waited much longer, his feet would be too stiff, and he might hurt himself.

The cave wasn't terribly large, all things considered. It stretched past the spring for only a few dozen meters before ending in a rocky wall. The exit was about that distance ahead of them, with plenty of headroom and a ceiling that dripped with water from the spring.

"Can hot springs form naturally this high up?"

"Volcanoes," she answered. "We could be on a volcano. But it's probably not natural." She got her shoes on quicker than he did, before hefting the waterproof box in both hands and opening its clasps one by one. Wallets and IDs were inside, but also a single phone. "That map was hundreds of years old," she said. "Here's hoping the world caught up with this mountain since then."

"And no bone-monsters."