Morgan’s character is an amalgam of biological and behavioral features that allow her to thrive in the ocean. Unlike the rest of Drowned Mermaid’s characters, her ocean species was created for the story.
Her transformations were borrowed from the way marine animals have evolved to meet physical properties of the ocean. Water is denser than air, so their bodies must be shaped to move through drag and withstand pressure. Water contains less oxygen than air does, so animals extract oxygen from water or from the surface air, in the case of marine mammals. Water conducts heat faster than any other liquid, so marine bodies have insulation to prevent heat loss. Light degrades with depth in the ocean, but sound travels farther in water than in air. Marine animal eyes have adapted to low light, and their other senses have compensated in a variety of ways. Lastly, the ocean is not static. It is always moving and changing seasonally and across years.
Morgan’s hybrid role in the ocean ecosystem is a new one, driven by the ocean’s need to reverse human-made change. She is the ocean’s first apex adapter. While she lacks evolutionary advantages like speed, size, or venom, she has unique knowledge and physical abilities across animal and human worlds.
She breathes water and communicates across species. Her hands and mind understand the mechanics of plastic and nets. Where the garbage accumulates, she does not fear it. Her beauty and power are not in spite of her unusual situation but because of it.
Morgan appears only as a silhouette in the illustration, because readers are invited to decide what Morgan looks like for themselves.
