"I--I mostly spend time by myself, now," Xandria said quietly. "Away from, away from people. Far away. I needed a rest."

Jeffery looked Xandria up and down, studying the young girl. He reached for words to reply, but before he could find them the quadro was abruptly accosted by a massive wave. The force of which was more than enough to knock the three humans off their feet, covering them once again in salty water, if only momentarily. Once Jeff's ears cleared of water, he was greeted by the sound of Ainsley cursing like a sailor, her bum leg had torqued as she fell and she was now verbally expressing her immense pain in an r-rated manner.

Xandria found herself tumbling through the wave and into a feeling that she was all too familiar with. Sharp pains, like the growing pains of a child, but in an adult size serving, shot up through her body, and when the wave washed back out, she was left, stranded on the sand with a tail instead of legs.

"Dernit!" Xandria exclaimed. "I just got that pair of pants!"

"Well, that's a new one, even for me." Commented Jeff, sitting cross-legged in the newly-wet sand. "A mermaid huh? Anyone else got anything they're hiding? Ainsley, you'd better not grow wings and fly away. Jeeze, next thing you know we'll find out that I'm a dern robot and that the puppers is a friggen talking doggo, never a dull moment I tell y'ah."

Being lower to the ground, Mel was not knocked off her feet by the wave, but she was soaked again, and salt water getting in her nose made her sneeze.

"Ach-whoo cough is the best... baseball player... inhale in the world? cough Ruuuufff--Babe Ruuufff."

Remembering the last time, Mel moved several paces away before shaking herself vigorously. Her voice sounded much more normal when she finished.

"Just a little talking dog joke to make you comfortable."

Xandria hadn't really wanted to talk about being a mermaid, but looking at the state of the party now, the offer had to be made. "Should I fetch the others? See if they can come up with a sledge or something?"

Twig’s was in the water when she caught site of two people approaching camp. She grabbed a leg of a bar stool that was nearby and started for shore. In her haste, she tripped on a shell and ended up under the water. Grumbling to herself, she picked herself up and continued to the people. Twig’s was glad to see Dan return and even pleased to see Junior – until she got closer and saw how he seemed to be enjoying himself. She felt a snarky comment rising inside her, but she listened to all that Dan had to tell them. She was just about to say something about people having fun while others were working to Junior when she saw Mr. Waters’ small fire catch the larger pile of driftwood on fire. She let out a surprised exclamation and rushed up the beach to the fire, stopping at the pile of salvage to grab a large mixing bowl. She used the mahogany bar stool leg to disperse the wood across the beach. Being care not to get the little fire, she started trying to salvage as much of the wood as possible by filling the bowl with sand and pouring it on the burning wood.
~~
Pittersticks couldn’t help it. He started laughing uncontrollably at the disaster with the fire and Mr. Waters’ confusion at finding his bag moved and coconuts in its place. Pittersticks had a low voice for a squirrel and often had a deep maniacal laugh. However, when he was very excited he became more squirrelish so this laugh was quite high pitched.

Faye had already planned to agree to Molly's suggestion of going back, even before they noticed the smoke rising from the horizon. Then, any other plan was abandoned. They followed the stream back to the edge of the forest, before hurrying back as quickly as they could to the beach. Faye was glad that she'd kept in relative shape even while running the store, but even so, it was going to take a while for them to get back.

In fact, they got back just about in time to see Twig's pouring sand on some of the fire. Faye quickly realized the value of this idea, and quickly started kicking more sand onto the fire. Remembering that her shoes were still rather damp from her time the water, she didn't hesitate to stomp on some of the burning pieces as well, and hoping the ambient moisture would protect her shoes. (She didn't dare to hope that another pair in her size would wash up on shore.)

She couldn't help but add, "Never a dull moment on this relaxing voyage, huh?"

Dan didn't see the fire right away; he was facing toward the ocean, watching the incoming waves intently, perhaps looking for any stragglers or wreckage that might yet float in.

Grace was still in his lap, facing the other way. "Ooh, Daddy, look at that!"

He quickly twisted around and saw what had impressed his daughter. "Stay here, okay?" he said as he gently set her aside and rose to his feet. He glanced around but didn't see much that could help carry water, finally settling on a small hard-sided cosmetics case that had already been emptied out.

Not sure how much it might help, he dunked it into the waves and dashed back toward the fire, using its water to douse some driftwood that was just catching fire. It didn't work that well, so he decided to follow the example of Faye and Twig's and began using it to scoop sand onto the fire.

Xandria flushed at Mel's suggestion, which did not match her somewhat green skin well at all.

"No, I'm fine, I'll be fine, I just have to get un-wet," she grumbled. "Which doesn't take too long, unless we--"

Another wave interrupted her, dousing the humans again.

"Yeah," she sighed. "Tide's coming in. So, um, I think I'm just gonna go take a swim, cause I think I saw either a dock or an outcropping, and those are generally pretty good places to dry off. If any of you find any, uh, well, pants, mind setting them aside for me?"

Some time before, back on the Titan IC...

One minute Angela Baxter was up on the deck, walking with her family toward their quarters, and the next, she was floundering in cold, dark water.

She had no idea what had happened. Wasn't the ship unsinkable? But more importantly, she had to get to the surface and find safety. Then she could worry about details. She kicked toward the light above, hoping it was the right direction.

She surfaced and took a huge breath of fresh salty air as she looked around her. She'd been with her family, but through sheer bad luck (or this author's plot device) she had no idea where they were now.

One of the ornate wooden buffet tables floated nearby, upside down, its legs reaching toward the sky. It would do for now; she had to get out of the water before she got too tired or too cold to float.

She tried to swim to it, only now registering agony in her left arm. There wasn't blood, just a big bruise. She didn't remember how it got there in all the excitement of the sinking, but it had come from a pesky bulkhead hitting her.

Angie managed to get onto the table after several attempts - being small had occasional advantages - but she figured her arm was broken and she could only hope she'd be found before she went into shock.

Her last conscious thoughts were of her family, of little Emma safe at home, of Grace and Dan somewhere in this watery mess, and that all of them would always remember just how much she loved them.

The next wave washed in, picking Xandria up slightly before it went back out and put her down.

"You should go, get Ainsley back with the others," she said firmly. "I'll meet up with you later."

When another wave crashed into her, she plunged into the water, hugging the ground to get as far out as she could. A second wave insured she was free of the beach. She waved at her landed fellows, then dove back into the sea.

At first she headed toward the encampment, but realizing that meant she would be showing up without pants for no good reason yet again, she decided to circle out and see if she could find any more survivors. Hopefully they would be as pleasant about the surprise as the others were. She dove, looking for shapes isolated against the light of the sky, then surfaced to inspect the various pieces of wreckage. She remembered from her earlier, pre-accident days that victims were encouraged to cling and climb on to wreckage so they had a better chance of survival. Thus she popped from clump of debris to clump of debris, hunting for humans. She eventually crossed Angie's table, eventually deciding to push it to shore while Angie slept, since that meant she was less likely to startle. Xandria began making her way back toward the shore, abandoning Angie every now and then when she thought she might check some more wreckage, or if she felt the need to dive and look about again.

It was on one such dive that she came face to face with Maeve. Both women startled, and immediately surfaced. They both had a ways to go, however, so they spent an uncomfortable minute staring at each other before they burst through into the evening air.

"What were you doing down there?" Xandria demanded.

"Trying to look for signs of land," Maeve retorted. "What were YOU doing down there?"

"Looking for more people?"

"Oh."

"Land's this way. Wanna hitch a ride?"

"Need my sister first."

"...it's a pretty big ocean."

"Nah, she's close by," Maeve said, turning around, then pointing. "She's there."

"I've got an unconscious one over here. Go to your sister, and I'll join you in a bit."

"Name?"

"Xandria. You?"

"Maeve. That one's Kaelin."

"See you shortly, Maeve," Xandria said, slipping back under and heading back to Angie. She made good time with her powerful tail, and Maeve and Kaelin were also shortly in tow. She steered them toward a sandy patch, and despite Maeve's ability to manipulate the ocean as a whole, she did manage to ensure Angie was gently carried up to the edge of the tide. Here they split up: Xandria went off on her own toward her previous landing place, and the others stayed with Angie.

They were not far from the camp, and Xandria pointed the way. Kaelin seemed somewhat revived, especially once her sister dried her off, and thought a run would not hurt, so Maeve stayed with Angie while Kaelin took off in search of Mel, Grace, or Mr. Baxter, all three being ideal.

By the time Molly reached the beach, the fire was mainly under control, thanks to the quick actions of Twig's and the others. She looked around to find the source of the ongoing yelling she could hear. There was Mr Waters, groveling on the sand, beating his fists upon the ground.

"Now, now, what's the problem, Mr Walters?" she began, feeling just a mite impatient. Captain Knott hadn't been kidding when he said that this might be a challenging cruise. "Perhaps if you would help a little bit, instead of complaining, things would go better for you."

"I did--I was!" he retorted indignantly, "and look what happened. My bag--it's gone!"

"This one?" Molly marched over to a nearby tree and pulled out the missing bag from behind it.

"It-it-it wasn't there a minute ago; I'm sure of it," he stuttered, his eyes nearly popping out of his head, as he snatched the bag from her and hugged it close with ardent relief.

Molly shook her head disbelievingly. She could almost imagine that she heard the faintest echo of high-pitched laughter coming from the trees. "Nonsense!" she muttered, and headed back towards the fire and the people gathered around it.

More and more damp passengers were straggling in, it seemed. Molly sighed--the commisariat was going to be a bit strained with so many people to feed. Perhaps some of them would be good at fishing. If not, coconuts and seaweed would have to do.

Faye restrained a sigh. Even Molly was beginning to get frayed, she could see - this was going to end so well. Okay, it was time to get things organized. "Well... all right, so that... happened." She shook it off; not helpful. "We're all back, it looks like - we just need the others - any word from them?"

As she said as much, she glanced out across the beach to try to catch sight of the other search party. She was relieved to see a figure - until she realized that the figure was too short to be Xandria, and too humanoid to be Mel. The girl looked no older than 11 or 12, and was running towards them. She was soaking wet, looking almost like she had just stepped out of the ocean, though at first Faye wasn't convinced - her hair simply had too much volume to be that wet. Faye vaguely remembered seeing the girl around the deck of the ship, usually in the pool or otherwise letting off a lot of exuberant energy. Today, though, there was more urgency in her pace.

Faye waved at the girl - pointlessly, she realized, as there was no way she could have missed them. "Is everything all right?"

"Mrs. B is hurt," Kaelin said, skidding to a stop in the middle of the camp. "Hi. Maeve's with her. She's too tired to carry her."

Grace saw Kaelin run in before her father did, since he was still busy with some errant flames, and she was glad to run to greet her friend.

Dan, however, heard the magic words, "Mrs. B is hurt," and went over to where the two girls were standing. "Thanks for telling us," he said. "Which way?"

Kaelin pointed and Dan let Grace lead the way, knowing it was hardly fair to make her stay away when she'd been as worried about Angie as he had been. She was a good runner, and had the advantage of youth, but before long her shorter legs made keeping up hard. Fortunately, by now Dan could see someone on the ground and Maeve nearby.

He took in the situation at a glance. "Hi, you must be Maeve. I'm Dan, her husband. Thanks for rescuing her."

He knelt by her side, his (very) basic survival training kicking in. She was still lying on the overturned buffet table; she must have used it as a raft. Clever.

No obvious blood or injuries apart from a large, nasty bruise on her left arm. He wondered if it was broken. She seemed asleep but might be unconscious, but her breathing was strong.

"Maeve, have you had any medical training, or do you know anyone who has?"

Just then he felt a small, warm shape next to him and heard his daughter sniffling back tears. Grace needed reassurance right now, and he let himself give her a gentle hug.

He glanced up at the sky - when had the sun sunk so low? - and decided not to move her just yet. "This place is as safe as any. Gracie, can you run back to camp and let them know we're here? Ask for any blankets or clothes we can cover her with, and ask if anyone has medical training."

"I wanna stay with Mommy."

"I know, sweetheart, but I want to stay here in case she wakes up or needs something. And the camp isn't far away. See, there's the smoke from the fire." He pointed. "But you can rest here a couple minutes if you want to."