AOG7

"Wake up, kid.... Wake up."

I groaned. Did I go unconscious again?

Reality check. Yes, I did.

"Well, that's good," a voice from above me said, chuckling slightly. "At least she can make some noises.... What was she thinking, summoning all of those ghosts?"

"No clue," responded another. It sounded like a girl's, hard and bitter. "If the kid does that again any time soon, she could kill herself. Not that I'd care, anyway...."

"You don't have to care about Terra, Leah. I bet you seven drachmas that she'll wake up and yell at you for not caring about her death."

The girl chuckled. "No bet. She's moving her arm."

I opened both eyes slowly. Two kids (a boy and a girl) stood above me; they both wore black like they were goths, but they had, like, really blond hair, almost like some of the Apollo kids. Both kids were at least seventeen years old, and they looked like identical twins. Their eyes were deep black voids, with a sort of insane twinkle in both eyes.

The girl smiled at me. "Welcome back to earth, Terra. It was nice watching you for three days."

"That means you've spent only two days conscious at camp!" Bob said cheerfully.

I scowled. "I guess summoning those ghosts drained me, huh?"

"Drained you?" The boy chuckled. "Not really. More like sent you into the deep depths of your mind, then you got kicked out three days later. What were you thinking, sending all of those ghosts at the Blue Team?"

I stared at him. "I.... I couldn't control how many ghosts I summoned."

"I can vouch for Terra, Warren. Although, it was epic, watching the Ares campers squirm and scream like pigs."

The boy grinned. "I agree, Bob. I think the Ares cabin will stay out of the Melinoe cabin for a while."

I stared at him. "The Melinoe cabin?"

"You got claimed by Melinoe, didn't you?" The girl frowned at me. "You know, transparent figure, pale eyes, arms outstretched like the thing wants a hug? Yeah, that's the sign of Melinoe."

"And.... She's the goddess of what?"

"Ghosts, duh!" The boy grinned and raised his arms over his head, beginning to make stereotypical ghost noises. "Ooh, I am the ghost of the Melinoe cabin! Fear me, or else I shall turn you living beings into ghosts!" He threw his head back and cackled.

The girl rolled her eyes. "Shut up, Warren." She turned her head to look at me. "I'm Leah. The annoying one is Warren."

"And I'm Lindsey!" said a really high, annoying five year old's voice.

I looked around. "Who?"

Leah scowled. "She's our younger sister. Died from cancer last year, and since Warren and I were on bad terms with her, Melinoe gave her to us as a, like, guardian."

"Like Bob!" Lindsey said in a sing-song voice.

"Er, kid. You really need to tone it down." Bob sighed. "And now I know how you two feel, having to listen to your younger mortal sister everyday. That reminds me; I used to have an annoying little brother just like Lindsey! I think his name was Liam....."

"Then what was your name?" I asked automatically.

Bob laughed. "You're a real riot, Terra. Not going to get my name from me so easily."

Warren chuckled, fingering a necklace around his neck. "Always the smart one, Bob. Anyway, welcome to the Melinoe cabin, and all of that nice crap. Leah's the senior cabin counselor and the older twin, so you can always go to her if you need something...."

Leah rolled her eyes. "Only because you're too lazy, Warren."

"I'm not!"

She rolled her eyes again. "Anyway, you're the youngest member of the Melinoe cabin here: me, you, and Warren, if we don't count the ghosts."

"But we're every bit as mortal as you!" Bob whined. "We can talk!"

I rolled my eyes and sat up. "But you don't wear clothes. You don't need to eat. We can't slap you."

"Good point," Bob sighed.

Leah looked at her watch. "Well, it's about five in the morning."

"You guys get up at five?" My eyes nearly jumped out of their sockets as they scanned the dark room. "Seriously? Everybody wakes up at, like, eight or something in this camp."

Warren chuckled. "Anyway, you'll be following our schedule now. Chiron mashed it up so that we won't be meeting the Ares or Hades cabins; they'll kill you for making them look like frightened kittens."

"It was awesome!" Lindsey added.

"By the way," Leah muttered, picking something up off the floor, "this is for you. It was dropped off during Hermes's mail run. Probably a Stygian iron sword; Hermes was delivering them to the Hades cabin too."

"It is!" Bob hissed. "It burns my soul! It burns!"

Leah rolled her eyes and shoved the sword into my hands. "Take it. It's for you, for one thing, and Warren and I already have ours."

I examined the sword; the sheath was black, and so was the hilt. I grasped the sheath and pulled it down slightly; the blade was black, too. The sword felt just right; it wasn't too light, or too heavy.

"I feel dangerous holding this," I murmured.

"Don't swing it at us," Warren warned. "If you can manage to kill us with it, it will suck our essence away, whatever that means.... Just don't do it."

I grinned and pulled the sheath back over the blade. "I'll probably end up using it on an Ares camper."

"'Atta girl!" Bob chuckled.

I looked around the dark room again. Nothing out of the ordinary, except for a strange feeling; I felt like I was being watched. I put the sword down next to me on the bunk.

"You know," Leah muttered quietly, "you haven't been cleared yet, Terra."

I looked at her and frowned. "Cleared for what?"

Warren bit his bottom lip and looked at his sister. "Er.... You know what happened to that poor Hermes camper, right? Victim thirteen?"

I nodded slowly. "Trust me, I had nothing to do with that."

Leah shut her eyes and took a deep breath. "They found him in the cabin like that. You left to go to the bathroom during dinner, remember?"

"I didn't do anything!" I insisted.

"With the ghost episode during Capture the Flag, everybody thinks you did." Leah opened her eyes. "Only a child of Melinoe or Hades could have done that. Warren and I always are at the sword-fighting arena at the time of the happenings with the Aphrodite kids, so we couldn't have done it, and all of the Hades kids were at their cabin during the events; they had just finished a head count when the first victims were discovered. And you were in the mortal world around the time the mortals were struck, and you lived near half the mortal victims...."

"But I really went to the bathroom! And I was at my parents' house when these probably happened in the mortal world!"

Leah sighed. "We can't ask your parents, for one thing, and sometimes you'd disappear out of the house with Nina and Harold during the afternoon; that's when most of the, er, living-to-ghost transitions happened, and Nina and Harold aren't talking."

I waved my hands around madly, groaning. "Why won't anybody believe me?"

"We'll help you clear your name!" Warren popped up behind Leah, wearing a Sherlock Holmes hat. "Detective Warren is on the case!"

Leah flung out her hand, knocking the hat off her brother's head. "Warren, shut up for once. Let's give Terra some space before you try going all Sherlock Holmes on her."

"Too late," Bob murmured.

I tried getting out of bed, using the sword as a cane to support myself, but I nearly fell off the bed. "I hate always being unconscious," I grumbled, attempting to pull on my shoes.

Warren chuckled, picking up his hat. "Well, Leah and I can't really summon an army of ghosts, and we're usually half-conscious after summoning five. You summoned how many? Sixty? And Chiron identified them as some campers that died in the Battle of the Labyrinth and kids who died in the forest before the border was put up around camp. I'm surprised you even woke up today."

"What? Should I be dead?"

"Yeah." Leah picked up a black cap from a bunk and plopped it on her head. "Either you're a freak daughter of Melinoe, or you're just really powerful."

"That's basically the same thing," Warren added, pulling out a sword from under another bunk.

I stared at them for a moment. "So.... I'm the living dead?"

"You can say that!" Lindsey said.

"Shut up, Lindsey," Leah snapped. "You're a mortal, and a dead one for that matter."

"I'm telling Mom!"

Leah scoffed, kicking an old piece of paper under her bunk. "You can't talk to her, you idiot. Do you want her to go to the mental asylum? Even I still love her, old insane shrew that she is."

Warren walked over to me and smacked the side of my head. "Come on, Terra. We're going to practice sword-fighting in the sword-arena."

I twitched. "At this time of hour?"

"We always do," Leah muttered, staring blankly at something on her pillow. She turned and stalked out of the cabin, and with her went the fading voice of Lindsey.

"Mommy is going to have your head when you come back home in September, Leah! She's not gonna...."

"Aye, that kid never shuts up!" Bob complained. "I now understand why Melinoe gave the twins Lindsey; the kid annoyed her to death."

"Isn't Melinoe a goddess?" I asked, frowning as I stood up. I took a hesitant step forward; my knee shook, but I kept walking towards the door with Warren close behind me.

"Yes. She's like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde in one; or is it the other way? Huh, I could never get those names right...."

"I agree," Warren muttered, grabbing my arm. "Let's go, old lady."

"Hey!" I protested as he pulled me along. I couldn't really have fought back; he was probably six feet tall, which was about two inches taller than his sister and about five for me.

The courtyard was entirely empty, and weirdly quiet. The Athena cabin door was half open, and I caught a glimpse of Nina and her friends talking quietly as they pointed at something on a desk. I looked at Warren, who shrugged.

"They always do that," he whispered, and hurried along to follow his sister, who basically faded in to our dark surroundings (her blond hair gave her away, though).

I swallowed and looked around. Distantly, I could hear whispering from all of the cabins, over the snores of campers and the restless rustling of the trees.

"My kind of place!" Bob commented. "I could get used to this."

"I can't," I muttered, staring at the ground.

"We're here!" Warren sang, and I looked up.

The sword-fighting arena looked the same (as usual), but it was dark now. The sword rack was neatly put near the shields, although a few swords were missing. I guess the Ares kids stole some for their weapon collection.

Leah stood in the middle of the sword arena, staring blankly at some dummies. As Warren and I entered, she looked up and managed a faint smile. "Welcome to the sword arena at five a.m."

"Looks nice," I commented sarcastically.

"It's pretty!" Lindsey said.

Warren rolled his eyes and let go of my arm. "Fail, Lindsey. Now, shut up and go away."

"She can't," Bob muttered bitterly. "She's like your consciousness; she'll never leave you alone, just like I can't leave Terra alone."

"It'll be wonderful when you stop talking," I muttered, rubbing my arm where Warren had gripped it. Damn, he was strong.

"Fine. Be that way!"

Leah looked at the dummies in front of her, and drew her Stygian iron sword. "Let's see.... I'll imagine this one is the Ares cabin's senior counselor...." She pointed her sword at the poor dummy. "This one can be that stupid Apollo kid who keeps flirting with me.... And then this one can be Warren."

"Hey!" he protested. "I'm right here, you know!"

Leah smiled crookedly. "Oh, I know, all right."

"Sadistic much?" Bob muttered.

Leah raised her sword, and smashed off the Apollo kid dummy's head with one blow. "This is for flirting with me yesterday...."

I flinched and took a step back. "Does she always do this?"

Warren nodded silently.

Great. So I had a really violent chick for a cabin counselor and an older half-sister. Wonderful.

Leah stabbed the Ares cabin counselor's dummy in the chest and tore upward with the sword, muttering things to herself as the straw flew everywhere. She blinked for a few moments, and stabbed the Warren dummy in the eye slit of its helmet. She withdrew her sword and turned to us, smiling. "You guys want a round?"

"Of what?" Warren frowned, tilting his head to the side. "A round of beer pong? A round of basketball? A round o--"

"A round of fighting," Leah interrupted, raising an eyebrow. "You're really stupid, Warren."

"Well, excuse me for being the video game geek!"

The two siblings began to argue back and forth, so I tiptoed out of the sword-fighting arena as they argued, listening to them argue before running back to the Melinoe cabin.

I really wanted to get some sleep, even though I'd been unconscious for three days.

I reached the Melinoe cabin door in record time, but one glance inside and I began to hesitate. It was really dark, and as soon as I opened the door and poked my head in, the feeling of misery and dread filled my mind. It was like a ghost was here; probably a ghost that was miserable in life, and it wanted others to feel its pain.

Then again, it was the goddess of ghosts' cabin.

I swallowed, and walked in, shutting the door behind me with my foot. My sword still was on my bunk, but otherwise the place looked deserted. I swallowed and walked towards my bunk, holding out my hand to grasp the sword.

"Hello."

I jumped, and turned towards the doorway. A girl in a pale dress, with funny glowing green eyes, stood in the doorway. I instantly recognized her as the girl from a week or so ago, when Nina, Harold, and I broke into the old abandoned house.

"You again?" I snarled angrily, and grabbed the sword off my bunk. "What are you, stalking me?"

The little girl chuckled. "No. I honestly don't know where you got that idea. Do you know who I am, Terra?"

"Obviously not her father," Bob muttered.

I blinked, all anger fading from my mind like dust on a windy day. "Er, your name is Emily, right?"

The girl smiled. "Bingo, but do you know who I really am?"

"Not like I want to."

Her eye twitched, and the smile faded from her transparent face. "You remember that little girl that used to live next door to you, and that suddenly she went poof?"

I tilted my head to the side. "Poof? Like, disappeared poof?"

"Yes."

"Er, yeah. Why?"

"I was that girl," she hissed at me. "You never were nice to me! When I wanted to play hide and seek with you and those other two kids, you always said no!"

I stifled a chuckle. "So is that why you're here? To lecture me about letting other kids play hide and seek?"

"No." Emily smiled, and her glowing green eyes glowed even brighter. "Melinoe says that all ghosts who haven't made peace with a certain someone can return to the earth to make their peace with them. So, here I am."

I waved my hand. "Yeah, yeah. Whatever. I make my peace with you, O spirit from the world beyond ours, blah blah blah. And sorry for not letting you play hide and seek with me. I was an idiot back then." I rolled my eyes.

Emily smiled faintly again. "I knew you would say that. Ah well. I'll make my peace with you by warning you about something happening right now...."

That really caught my attention. My wandering eyes looked back at Emily intently. "About what?"

"There are many cabins around here," Emily began, "and everybody is asleep."

"Well, duh. It's about five-thirty in the morning."

She rolled her eyes. "Yes, but there is one place.... One place where two kids are not asleep. They are arguing.... And then a mysterious figure with a golden shawl has approached them."

I eyed the ghost cautiously. "Are you trying to tell me a story?"

"This is happening right now," Emily muttered. "The figure is not female like it should be, and the two kids look at the figure. The figure tells them that the camp will slowly be reduced in number thanks to the shawl, and grins evilly. One of the two kids in the place immediately recognizes who this is, and tries to get an explanation. The other one – the smarter and older one of the two-- runs off to warn somebody.... And the other one falls to the ground."

I froze. "That sounds like...."

"Leah and Warren," Bob completed. "You'd better go and check up on those two."

"I'm not done!" Emily snarled. "The figure then approaches the running one. She trips over a misplaced shield, and tries to crawl away. Then, she stops and is limp. The figure picks her up and places her next to the other fallen one, and is gone."

"That's it!" I growled, and ran past Emily and towards the sword arena. Those kids sounded like Leah and Warren to me.

"Leah! Warren! Lindsey!" I called as I ran through the courtyard. I could see the sword-fighting arena in the distance, and ran faster. "Leah! Warren! Somebody answer me!"

I ran through the entrance of the sword-fighting arena.

Leah and Warren were on the ground. Their eyes were still wide, and Leah looked stunned.

"Leah? Warren?" I asked in a small voice, approaching them slowly.

They didn't move.

Both of their right hands were palm-up.

Warren had a "14" cut into his hand, and Leah had a "15".

Victims fourteen and fifteen were the cabin mates I had known for only a few minutes.