Siren

"*What's her name? The girl you love, who is she? And don't lie to me, Lewis. I can make any man, woman, god or beast do my bidding unless their heart belongs to another.*"
— Pandora Thorn to Lewis Finnigan

The **Siren** is a sapient, aquatic beast affiliated to the water, native to the regions of Greece within the Aegean Sea. They are infamously known for their relation to the Mermaid species and their hypnotic singing abilities.

## History

In Greek mythology, the Sirens (Greek: Σειρῆνες) are dangerous predatory creatures who lured nearby sailors using their enchanted singing voices to shipwreck on rocks, leading them to their ultimate doom.

## Description

### Powers and abilities

**Sasha**: "*It always has different meanings. Great love to some, and for others it can be dangerous.*"
**Lily**: "*Dangerous, how?*"
**Sasha**: "*Mythologists called it a euphemism for obsession.*"
— Sasha and Lily discussing the Siren song

* **Amphibious transformation**: Sirens are capable of taking on an ordinary human appearance through a quick metamorphosis that allows them to visit land for varying amounts of time. During this process, the siren will shed the membrane of her tail and will decrease in length. A siren will undergo this metamorphosis again when returning to waters of a natural geographical origin.
* **Aquatic habitation**: Sirens are able to survive and adapt to any underwater environment they encounter due to their complex internal structures, including high water pressures and extreme water temperatures. Sirens are known to habituate in some of the deepest zones of the ocean, between the mesopelagic and bathypelagic zones which range between depths of 200 and 4,000 metres below the surface.
	+ **Terrestrial habitation**: Sirens are also capable of surviving and adapting to terrestrial environments on land. The length of time spent on land varies from pure-breed to pure-breed, though it is known that by each time the siren returns to land, the longer and more suited to the environment they become. Sirens of a half-breed nature are able to remain at land or sea for as long as they desire, due to their natural biology and physiology being catered to suit both habitats.

* **Enhanced strength**: Sirens are noticeably physically much stronger than humans, and many other creatures. They are considered one of, if not the most physically powerful aquatic humanoid inhabitant, which is in part due to the bones and tissues of a siren being incredibly dense, though, like any living species, the levels of strength may vary from each siren to siren. As a teenager, Sasha was capable of lifting a wooden log in the forest that was three times her body weight.
* **Enhanced speed**: In water, a siren's powerful and streamlined tail allows them to propel through the roughest waters with incredible speed, grace, and agility with minimal restrictions to water resistance. They are noted as being five times faster than a sailfish, the fastest animal in the water. Their speed is also comparable in their human forms on land, as some half-breed sirens proved to show the immense speed that varied according to their physical structure and ability.
* **Enhanced agility**: Sirens are naturally agile creatures, due to their long tails that allow them great moves of flexibility and speed within the water.
* **Enhanced senses**: Similar to other aquatic mammals such as sea lions, whales and dolphins, sirens have superior enhanced senses to that of average beings, such as their ability to hear sounds far off the ultrasonic frequency. Sirens also have enhanced sensory systems comparable to sharks, including smell, hearing and sight. Below the water, sirens can hear sounds with frequencies ranging from 10 hertz to 150,000 hertz, frequencies that exceed audibility for humans on both ends of the scale. Sirens are also able to see clearly in the darkest of waters, due to the tapetum lucidum that is located behind the retina. This allows sirens to see far more clearly in dim light than that of a human.
* **Underwater protection**: An ability popular in nautical folklore, a siren can also grant a gift of temporary underwater protection onto a human by kissing them. For the duration they remain under the water, they can breathe as they do on land, though they are not immune to the dangers of the sea, such as water pressure and temperatures. When they return to the surface, the enchantment breaks.
* **Siren song**: Sirens are able to emit a captivating singing voice that allows them to manipulate another's feelings and actions, seducing and controlling their opponents. The power is rooted in their unique voice box; a hybrid of a larynx and a syrinx at the base of the trachea. It is noted as being a melodious, haunting song of vocals. The song cannot affect an individual who loves another, as told by Pandora Thorn. On humans, the song typically creates a negative effect, creating a type of lesion on the brain beginning in the frontal lobe (the region that controls impulses and inhibitions), which can lead to various side effects such as hallucinations, delusions, lowered inhibitions, amongst many more, though the exact nature of all symptoms is unclear. Based on historic findings, the song is known to cause obsession within individuals, hearing the song wherever they go, where they are eventually driven into the water to find the siren and eventually drown.
* **Fear inducement**: Similarly to the hypnotic singing of the siren song, sirens can also emit a sheer force of doubt onto their opponents. Causing lasting neurological side effects like the latter, the affected quickly begin to doubt their own self and show extreme levels of fear and timidity. This ability, however, is not cast by song; the siren will display a change in facial appearance, their eyes darkening to black, appearing hollow, their face resembling similar to a gaunt skull-like image.

### Weaknesses

* **Dehydration**: Pure-breed sirens are unable to survive on land for extended periods of time. After prolonged deprivation of water, they will begin to asphyxiate, and their skin will become extremely dry and irritated. After an extensive period of dehydration, their body will begin to shut down. Although this does not apply to sirens of a half-breed nature due to their biological abilities catered to survive both at land and sea, contact with fire or powerful sources of heat can provoke similar results of asphyxiation and broken, irritated skin.
* **Mortality**: Since the siren species are living, mortal creatures, despite having high levels of endurance and longevity, they are still capable of death by conventional means, such as starvation, blood loss, dehydration, etc.
* **Water pollution**: Sirens are prone to various infections and illnesses that come from pollutants within the ocean, that has even been seen to cause infertility in some cases.

## Known sirens

Catarina MoltravinosPandora ThornSasha ThornMarcia Thorn

## Etymology

The word **siren** by connection derives from the Ancient Greek word 'Σειρήν'. In Greek Mythology, a siren was a dangerous female who was considered to be alluring or fascinating but also dangerous in some way, that lured sailors with their enchanted singing voices to their doom.