Yara Aicaya

### Monster Parent

I was originally human, but was transformed into an Aicaya…which is a type of mermaid? Who transforms exiled people into mermaids?..I still don’t get it.”

### Killer Style

”My killer style…well it would be taking clothes that boys usually wear and making it something more feminine.”

### Monster Quirk

”My freaky flaw is that…I’m a fish out of water literally in today's age and with more traditional monsters. I’m afraid that they might not accept me for who I am, due to who I was.”

### Pet

”I would love to have a pet like me! Either a clownfish or a cuttlefish.”

### Favorite Activity

“My favorite activity would be walking along the beach. Enjoying the sunset and swimming across the reef at night.”

### Biggest Pet Peeve

“My biggest pet peeve is being asked whether I’m using the boy or girl bathrooms…there are unisex bathrooms.”

### Fav School Subject

“I've always founds Freakynomics to be a clawsome subject.”

### Least Fav Subject

“My least favorite subject would be physical deaducation...the change room make me uncomfortable”

### Favorite Color

“My favorite colors would have to be white, pink and blue. Of multiple different shades.”

### BFFs

“My best ghoul… is that right? My best ghoulfriend would be Nitocris. She’s such a cool ghoul for looking after me.”

Yara Aicaya is a 2023-introduced and all-around character for the Third generation of Monster High. A ghoul who has changed her life and seeks to make it even more special. She was once a human male who had been transformed into an Aicaya mermaid. She has come to Monster High to learn more about her new lifestyle and to live the life she's always wanted. She is a Freshman.

## Character

### Background

Yara's origins are murky; she was not always a female mermaid; she was previously a human male. Her mother met her father on the Carribean shore, he was a marine researcher form Floria and she a fisherwoman. They married and she moved back to Florida with him; where Yara was later born. Her parents were killed in a horrific accident when she was three, leaving her an orphan; she was then placed in the foster system. She suffered in the system since she never felt like a man and frequently played with feminine toys or put on feminine clothing in secret. She also enjoyed playing with mermaids as a youngster and wished to be one, which she was teased for because it was not manly. She was regularly found by others, and she was subsequently subjected to mockery and abuse from both her peers and foster parents. She ultimately fled when she was 16, hiding in a beachside cave nearby.
The mermaid thanked her and vanished back into the sea, unknown to Yara the mermaid and her pod continued to watch from the sea and occasionally upon land. They wanted to repay her back for her kindness and to give her the support, as that was their nature. On Yara’s final night as a human she ran away from her last foster care and had no choice but to live on the street. The mermaid approached her again, and offered her a chance to join their pod; allowing her the chance to receive the life she had wanted. She accepted and was brought into the pod, being transformed into a unique mermaid such as then an Aicaya. She was brought to Monster High in order to learn more about becoming a monster and to finally live the life she's always desired.

### Personality

Others have described Yara as quiet, restrained, and passive; those who know her understand why she behaves this way. She has spent years being abandoned and mocked by numerous individuals she thought she trusted until they betrayed her. She is aloof and quiet, trying hard not to form relationships for fear of being mistreated and abandoned again. Others, though, have formed friendships despite this. They describe her as a sweet, understanding, and resilient young lady. Even if she doesn't recognise such qualities in herself, she is as lovely and valuable as a blue pearl.

### Appearance

Not much is known about her former appearance, she keeps that part of her life private and doesn’t want to go very further on it.
As she is now a female mermaid, she looks radically different. Yara’s skin tone is a beautiful bronze skin with pale scales along her arms and legs with fins attached. She has high cheekbones and a more oval face with brown eyes, yet her pupil is blue in colouration. Her brown hair is kept loose and it hangs in curls, with pink and blue streaks. She is 5 foot 7 and she has a thin ectomorphic body type. As a mermaid she has some piscine features, such as a pair of gills upon her neck, pink and blue webbed hands and along her arms she has white fins with the same pink and blue gradient colouration. When she is in her true mermaid form, she is able to manifest a long mermaid tail. Her tail is a white and silver, with sharp fins upon the side of her tail and her large fanned fin being pink to blue.

## Monster Type, Abilities & Skills

### Monster Type

Yara is a mermaid, a water-based creature traditionally imagined as having a top half indistinguishable from humans and a fish-like lower half, usually in the form of one tail with a caudal fin at the end. There are many variations, though, which are largely of recent nature, and there is an overlap with other aquatic creatures, such as water monsters and sirens. Mermaids are predominantly thought of as female, and male ones tend to be given the designation of “mermen”, or the creatures are degendered with terms like “merfolk” or “merperson”. The nature attributed to mermaids ranges from murderous, for either entertainment or food, to saviorhood of children and sailors. They do not always drown humans on purpose; however, they just forget that humans can’t breathe underwater. Mermaids are sometimes associated with perilous events such as floods, storms, shipwrecks, and drownings. In other folk traditions (or sometimes within the same traditions), they can be benevolent or beneficent, bestowing boons or falling in love with humans. Some mermaids were originally humans but were transformed often as a result of them attempting to drown themselves such as Thessalonike of Macedon, whose legend has her becoming a mermaid and Iara a brazilian mermaid who was transformed into a divine mermaid to punish her family.
Yara has specifically become a special type of mermaid found in the Carribean, she has become an Aicaya. The origin of the earliest Aicaya is unknown, but they are young people who have left their ancestral towns and moved to the coast. These people won't have to experience rejection or loneliness again because Aicaya will find them and turn them in to one of their own. The astounding and singular quality of the Aicaya is that they are all distinct but accepted, thus they aren't all exactly alike.

## Abilities & Skills

* Monster Abilities
* Personal Skillset

Yara is a former human transformed into a special type of mermaid, as such she possesses the powers of common mermaids. Along with the additional powers of the Aicaya mermaid.

* **Amphibian/Aquatic Adaptation**: Yara possesses the ability to breathe both on land and within the water, capable of spending a long amount of time within either area.
	+ **Aquatic Breathing**: Being a mermaid Yara is able to survive and adapt to underwater environments, being able to breathe water in lieu of, or along with, a gaseous breathing medium,
	+ **Cold Resistance**: Yara is resistant to the cold temperatures of the depths and isn’t affected by them as much as other mammals.
	+ **Pressure Immunity**: Yara is immune to water pressure, meaning she are immune to damage from being crushed, smashed, or flattened as a result of the pressure.
	+ **Underwater Senses**: Yara has extremely accurate senses while underwater, allowing her to see, hear, taste, feel and smell underwater with the utmost of clarity without having to lose any clearness in any of her own senses.
* **Shapeshifting**: A power belonging to the Ceasg as they are legendary for taking on a humanoid appearance to marry men upon the land. Yara uses it so that she can walk upon the ground and attend classes. When she does use this power she is surrounded by bubbles and reforms her body when needed.
	+ **Swimming Tail**: When Yara shapeshifts back into her true mermaid form her legs fuse into that of a long mermaid tail. This is in order to swim faster through the water. Her leg bones transform into tail bones for such transformation. Despite the concept she doesn’t automatically transform when she enters water and it's instead deliberate.
* **Speed Swimming**: Yara can swim at incredible speeds, unrestricted by water resistance. Though she admits she is not as fast as Lagoona but is faster than the average human and other aquatic animals.
* **Water Manipulation**: Like other sea monsters and mermaids, yara is capable of manipulating water. Allowing her to shape, and manipulate water with additionally being able to manipulate inorganic compounds with liquid, gas (steam, water vapor), and solid (ice) states, including changing them from one state to others. She is able to create water from drawing from water vapor from the air.

Yara possesses many skills she has developed from her own hard work when in comparison to her granted powers.

* **Fashion Designing**: Yara has always had great skills in fashion design and tailoring. Being able to modify many male clothes she once had a boy to change it into clothing that she herself would wear. She has also been seen designing clothes for her friends and helping tailoring for monsters with their own clothes.
* **Spellcasting**: Lara is able to utilize magic, using certain actions such as gestures, rituals and thoughts as well as symbols, language and formulae to utilize mysterious and/or supernatural forces that don't abide by conventional science or laws of reality to achieve any effect or phenomenon imaginable. Lara was transformed through magical means as such she was taught magic by them. She specialises in spiritualism and the use of herbs to invoke mystical properties as well as certain items.

## Relationship

* Family & Pet
* Friends & Enemies
* Romance

Yara has formed a strong bond with the members of her Aicaya pod, and she will be eternally thankful to them for taking her in. She is exceedingly close to the original mermaid she saved, Syrena; they have such a tight bond that they are regarded as sisters to each other. They are all quite calm and kind towards her because the Aicaya are widely renowned for taking in exiles.

Yara was originally very hesitant in making friends with other Monsters, fearing them but she has gained a very tight knit group of friends. Yara‘s relationship with Cato is really good as Cato willingly teaches Yara information regarding Monster Culture and helps her understand some of the greater concepts she is expected to have as a Senior of Monster High. Nito and Yara have a deeply personal relationship, Nito supported Yara when they both came to Monster High. Allowing Yara to fully experience life as a Monster fully and educating her. Nito was the first one Yara revealed her transgender status too. Yara and Peitro didn’t start off on the best of settings, Peitro was a part of a group relentlessly mocked her for originally being a human; but when the school found out she was transgender he finally stepped back and re-evaluated what he was doing. He stood up for her and earned her forgiveness over many years, eventually becoming tight friends.

Yara has a decently good relationship with the Juniors, hoping to be enough of a role model for them. Yara and Zuri have a really good relationship with each other, she admires Zuri’s confidence and her amazing eye for detail and people. Zuri in response admires Yara for her courage to be herself and admires her kindness. Yara thinks of Deno as a little brother, she admires his over eagerness to please and his silly antics on the friend. While Deno thinks of Yara like a big sister he needs to look after and defend her from those who would criticize her. Kamihime and Yara did not start off on the right track. Kamihime originally being the ring leader in a group of Monsters who harassed others that were different. While Yara does appreciate that Kamihime has turned her life around and is on better standing, there is too much mistrust. Kamihime also feels that there is too much damage she has caused and feels like it’s best to leave Yara alone. Yara and Kingsley see kindred spirit in each other. Yara knows about Kingsley’s pain in being treated as something that he’s not and King admires Yara’s desire to change and be her true self.
Lara is more focused on her life as a Monster rather than looking for romance.

## Doll Lines

***Doll Lines from Current Generation of Monster High***

## Trivia

* Yara was originally an Aicaya, but I cannot find a reference of it anywhere on the web. So I've remade her as a human transformed into a ceasg via a wish.
* Her name Yara is a different version of Iara, a brazilian myth of a human who was transformed into a mermaid.