06.

Lyla sped through the water when she suddenly stopped and twisted her hand making herself invisible then continued swimming, but this time much slower. She reached the moon pool and swam up to the surface, still invisible.

As she expected, she found the brunette girl from the cafe and the two boys there. Keeping herself invisible she pulled off her moon ring and when the three people weren't looking she carefully threw it at a place they hadn't searched yet. She was just about to swim off when she felt the water moving and someone crabbing the surface, so the only thing she could do was carefully move to the other corner of the moon pool, where she could hide.

Nothing could describe her shock when she saw who the newcomer in the pool was.

"There you are." A voice echoed and Cleo, Zane and Lewis spun around in a heartbeat.

"Rikki!" Zane quickly ran to the side of the pool where Rikki rested her elbows. Cleo and Lewis immediately followed him. "Are you ok? How-" But he couldn't finish the question.

"How did I wake up?" Rikki raised her eyebrows. "Well..everything's still a bit blurry, but as you can see I'm here."

"It's ok." Cleo said. "The most important thing now is that you're awake and ok."

"But what happened?" Lewis asked Rikki. "I came here and found you on the ground unconscious.."

"Someone was following me so I sneaked out to the beach and swam here." Rikki began. "When I came here I found some weird stone. I bent over to take a better look at it and take it in my hand and it made some strange connection with my necklace. That's the last thing I remember before I woke up on the couch at the office." With that she finished her story.

"That's really weird." Lewis broke the silence that had followed Rikki's words. "According to the research Zane and I made in the Internet the only thing that could've woken you up is a moon ring. It's the only thing that can reverse the effects of the stone you found that is a stone of a trident."

"Say that again?!" Rikki said her eyes wide open.

Lewis only rolled his eyes in response.

"But Rikki's awake." Cleo slowly said. "That means something somehow must've helped her."

"The question is what?" Lewis said again.

"Interesting." Rikki said deep in thoughts.

"Wait, someone was following you?" Zane interrupted them. "Who?"

Rikki only shrugged her shoulders.

"I have no idea."

Suddenly something clicked in Lewis' mind; someone's following Rikki, than he hears voices in the moon pool cave..

"Guys, we need to talk." He stated. "But not here. Let's get back to "Rikki's". We'll talk in your office."

Zane and Rikki along with Cleo shared confused looks, but nodded and Cleo jumped in the water to join Rikki. When she resurfaced however, something caught her attention.

"What is that? Over there, under that rock that's about to fall..?"

Lewis turned around and hurried at that direction, to bent over and look under the rock. He then took the thing in his hand.

"That's..that's a ring!" He exclaimed, turning around and lifting it up for everyone to see.

"Maybe that's the moon ring we've been looking for!" Cleo gasped. "Let me see!"

Lewis walked back to where the girls were floating gracefully in the water and kneeled down stretching his hand to Cleo. Then the weirdest thing happened; at the exact moment when Cleo reached to take the ring, it literally moved to slip away out of her reach.

"What the..?!"

Everyone were starting at the ring with their eyes wide open. Even the still invisible Lyla on the other end of the pool.

"Did you do that?" Lewis asked Cleo shocked.

She shook her head.

"I can move only water, Lewis."

"Rikki, you try to take the ring." Lewis said and stretched her hand to her.

He had a theory and if it was right..

"Me?" Rikki raised her eyebrows.

"Come on, just do it."

She only rolled her eyes, but got her hand out of the water and reached for the ring. Her fingers curled around it and when she took it, she opened her hand to take a better look at the jewel; it felt small and strangely powerful in the palm of her hand.

"Wow." She breathed.

The ring was also really beautiful.

"It feels so..powerful." The curly blond's lips were pulled into a mischievous smile.

"Interesting." Lewis murmured to himself.

Cleo felt a bit jealous; the ring had slipped away from her fingers, but not from Rikki's.

Did Rikki had something she didn't? Had the ring in some strange way preferred Rikki instead of Cleo?

"I don't understand. How is it Rikki can touch the ring, but I can't?" The brunette asked Lewis confused.

She was longing for some explanation and hoped Lewis could give her some answer, whatever it was.

"I don't know." He said honestly. "But we should test it with Bella and Emma too before we start making conclusions."

Cleo nodded silently. Inside she felt a bit disappointed by her boyfriend's answer.

"Why don't you try and put it on?" Cleo asked Rikki.

She only raised her eyebrows at her but still did what she had suggested and put the ring on her finger. Suddenly the curly blond felt so much power and energy rushing through her veins.

"I can feel so much..power and energy, rushing through me." She said, her voice filled with excitement. "It feels good, really good."

She stretched her hand against the still ruined wall of the cave and curled her fingers. Suddenly the whole wall turned into flames.

"Stop!" Lewis shouted and quickly grabbed her wrist moving it away.

"Wow, that's so cool." Rikki commented, and relaxed her hand, letting the flames disappear.

"No it's not, you almost set that place on fire." Cleo shook her head, a trace of fear audible in her voice.

"Take off the ring." Lewis said seriously.

Reluctantly Rikki obeyed. But the minute it slid off her finger she felt all the strength leaving her and almost sank under the water, but Cleo helped her stay up the surface. Rikki quickly stabilized herself and gave the ring back to Lewis, while Cleo reluctantly pulled her hands away from Rikki.

"Are you ok?" The brunette asked her friend concerned.

"Yeah, I'm fine." Rikki nodded. "It's just..when I took that ring off..I felt like all my strength was taken out and I lost balance for a moment. That ring's really powerful."

"Maybe you shouldn't put it on anymore. It's not safe." Zane said. "You shouldn't have ever put that thing on."

"I'm not a baby, Zane." Rikki quickly got back her annoyance from him. "I can take care for me by myself very well, thank you. The ring is absolutely awesome and I WILL put it on again if I want to."

"Fine!" Zane waved his hands annoyed. "You can do whatever you want. But don't expect me to just sit down and watch."

"Guys, stop it. Now's not the time for arguing. Let's go back to the cafe and talk to the others, ok?!" Lewis interrupted them.

"Let's go." Rikki nodded and she and Cleo dove in.

Lewis and Zane wordlessly hurried to the land entrance of the cave.

Making sure everyone are gone, Lyla relaxed her hand and reappeared as if out of nowhere.

She couldn't believe she had thrown out her moon ring all in vain. Still, there was something good in the whole situation amd it was that now the curly blond girl was fine Zac wouldn't have an excuse not to help Lyla and the girls to figure out what had happened to them at the night of the lunar eclipse..

Lewis, Cleo, Rikki and Zane rushed inside Rikki's cafe and into the office where they found Emma, Will, Bella and Ash waiting for them.

"Oh, good, you're all here." Lewis commented approvingly. "We need to tell you something."

And he told the other four everything that had happened at the moon pool. When he finished talking he looked at Emma and Bella.

"We have to test what will happen if you two try to take it." He added. "Who'll be the first to try?"

"Me." Bella was the first to answer.

"Ok, get ready." Lewis said and took it out of his pocket.

Bella reached to take it and almost succeeded when it slipped away out of her fingers.

Cleo would never admit it, but that actually made her feel a bit better, because she was not the only one who couldn't touch the ring.

"Ok, Emma, your turn now." Lewis stretched her hand to her.

She took a deep breath and reached with her hand. The ring slipped away again.

"What does that mean?" Ash raised his eyebrows.

"It means out of the girls Rikki's the only one who can touch this ring. Like it had chosen her."

"Chosen me?" Rikki raised her eyebrows.

"For it's owner."

"Oh."

"But why her?" Zane asked concerned.

He was worried of what would happen if Rikki started to wear that ring.

"I have no idea." Lewis shrugged.

"We wanted to tell you something as well." Ash said and showed them what that had found in Will's book.

The others quickly read through the page and Cleo who finished first lifted her eyes to look at the other.

"The consequences might be dreadful, what the hell does that mean?"

"We don't know." Will said. "We just thought it might be important."

Rikki was playing with her necklace deep in her thoughts, when something came up to her mind.

"My necklace!" She exclaimed. "When I felt I was being followed my necklace started glowing! It was glowing the same way as it did when it made a connection with that stone that you say is from a trident."

"Hmm." Was the only thing Lewis could say.

Will and Ash shared worried looks with Emma and Bella, Cleo was looking concerned at Rikki and Zane wrapped his hand protectively around his girlfriend's shoulders.

"Look, we don't know what's happening, but from the little we know it sounds like we're not safe. Until we find out what's going on whatever we do we must stick together and never leave the others alone. When the girls go swimming, they should go together, and we the boys should do everything not to leave any of them alone. We don't know what we're dealing with, so we must be really careful."

The others had to admit Zane was right.

"You and I are working here along with Emma, Rikki and Bella." Ash said. "And Cleo's working at the Marine park with Lewis. It'll be easy for us to stick together and watch our backs."

The others nodded.

"I'm going to take the trident's stone and the moon ring with me so I could run some tests." Lewis said.

"And I'm going to help you." Cleo added quickly.

"Ok, after we settled that, we should go home." Emma said. "It's getting late."

"I can't believe I'm going say this, but I agree with you." Rikki stated, letting out a chuckle. "It is late and I feel tired. I can really use a good nice sleep when I get home."

"I'll drive you with my motorbike." Zane suggested quickly shooting her a smile.

"And I'm going to walk Emma home." Ash said.

Will also said he'll walk Bella to her house and Cleo and Lewis said that they were going to go to Lewis' place to do some experimenting.

After that they said their "bye"s and got on their different ways.

{ * }

Meanwhile Lyla got back on the beach to look for Nixie and Serena but she found Zac there instead.

"Zac, you won't believe what happened-" Lyla began, but he interrupted her.

"I'm sorry for my outburst at the cafe." He said. "I shouldn't have said those things."

Lyla couldn't help the smile that rose up on her face.

"It's ok. Really. I understand."

"Thanks." Zac said. "You have no idea how bad I've been feeling.."

Lyla only grinned at him and did something even she was surprised she did; she gave him a peck on the cheek. Zac's eyes found hers.

"What was that for?"

"No reason." She shrugged. "I'm just happy you're not angry anymore."

Zac nodded guiltily the suddenly remembered she was going to tell him something when they met on the beach.

"You were going to tell me something, but I interrupted you. What was it?"

Lyla's smile disappeared.

"Yes. You won't believe what happened." And she told him the whole story.

Zac couldn't believe Lyla's story.

"But why did you let this happen? Why did you throw your moon ring like that for them to find it? They don't have even the slightest idea how dangerous the moon ring can be."

"I just thought I'd help them wake up their friend so you could calm down and help us figure out what happened to us." Lyla shrugged.

Zac put his hand on her shoulder.

"Ok, now we've got to figure out a way to get your moon ring back." He said to her. "But first we must find Nixie and Serena. Do you have any idea where they can be?"

"No." Lyla shook her head. "Actually I thought they were going to be here, because that's where I left them when I headed to the moon pool."

"Well, we're going to have to look around for them." Zac said. "Come on, I don't think they had gone far."

And the two of them left the beach.

{ * }

"I told you we shouldn't get so far from that beach we were at. We're lost now."

"Relax, Serena." Nixie said impatiently. "We'll be ok."

They were wandering around for a good half an hour now and had reached a trailer park. They looked around but could see nothing but trailers everywhere around them.

"Great, now what?!" Serena murmured.

Just then they heard a strange noise.

"What is that?" Nixie asked.

The noise was getting closer.

"You're asking me?!" Serena gave her a look. "How should I know?"

Not responding, Nixie dragged herself and Serena behind the nearest tree, seconds before a motorcycle appeared in front of them. The bikers were two - a boy and girl and were wearing helmets on their heads. When the boy finally stopped the girl jumped off the bike taking off her helmet and grinned.

"Thanks for the ride."

Nixie and Serena suddenly were staring wide-eyed at her; it was the unconscious girl Zac wanted to help to.

The boy pulled off his helmet too.

"Anytime." He grinned back at her and leaned to kiss her.

The two girls exchanged looks.

"Bye, Zane!" The curly blond waved and walked inside her trailer.

Zane was grinning like crazy.

"I don't know if you realized how happy I am that we're back together. I was an idiot to hurt you like I did." He whispered to himself. "But I won't make the same mistake ever again." He looked at the direction of her window and mischievous smile showed up on his lips. "I love you, Rikki Chadwick."

With that he jumped back on his bike and drove off.

Nixie and Serena quietly snuck out from behind the tree.

"I don't understand." Serena said. "That girl was supposed to be unconscious."

"Well apparently she isn't." Nixie said impatiently.

"We have to find Lyla and Zac and tell them!" Serena said.

"That is if they don't already know." Nixie commented. "But come on then, let's go."

And the two started looking for they way back. They almost got lost again a couple of times, but eventually managed to get back. It was already night, so they decided to go to the moon pool and get some rest there, before trying to find Lyla and Zac.

Serena let her head rest on her arms while her tail was gently floating next to Nixie's.

"I miss Aquata and the pod." The blond sighed. "And I miss Rita."

"I know." Nixie said. "But everything's going to be fine, you'll see."

Serena took her hand.

"I don't know what I'd do without you and Lyla. You're like my sisters, my soul-sisters!"

Nixie pulled her in for a hug.

"I'm sorry for getting you and the others into this mess. But I promise I'll find a way to get you out of it. We just need to find Zac and Lyla and we'll figure a way to get back home."

Sirena tried to smile, but it was just a faint twitch of the lips. She then began to sing a beautiful song. She sang about the sea, about her friends, her family and above all - about the adventures that they were going through.

Because no matter what happens, that's the only thing that mattered after all.