Okay guys, it took me a while but, like I promised I have updated the next week :-D

I really hope that you enjoy this chapter!

Chapter 13

"Is she alive?"

Alex's voice pierced through the foggy darkness in my mind like a spear, light shining wherever it went. I just wanted it to go away.

"She has a pulse, Alex," Anna's very familiar voice snapped, "However, she is the least of our problems."

"She's my twin sister! She is my top priority."

"Oh, so you don't care that four of us are unconscious, one is getting take-out in China, two have turned themselves into puddles and the other three are in solitary confinement."

Silence. "Well, when you put it like that..."

A sigh. "I'm going to check on Phe. She's still muttering about someone called Psyche."

I groaned. My head felt as if it was in overload. Images flashed through my mind of a beautiful red headed girl and a blonde haired boy. They were laughing, the boy winding his hands around the girl's waist, hugging her closer to him. The girl, Psyche, giggled, batting his arms playfully as he trapped her against his body, his Greek Sea blue eyes sparkling. The boy was entirely too familiar, every golden curl and each dimple sending a flash of recognition through me. However, as soon as I felt the name on the tip of my tongue, it disappeared.

Another image filled my mind, a familiar pain working its way through its skull.

I was running.

The world was blanketed in a cloud of darkness, the quickly fading moon giving off no light. Every time the moon faded a little bit more, I felt myself fade as well. Apollo had already faded with the sun, his eyes full of tears as he looked at me for the last time.

I choked back a sob as blood red thunder flashed across the sky. I would not cry.

I would mourn for my lost Huntresses and my dear brother but I would never let a tear fall down my cheek. It was beneath me.

My eyes unwillingly focused on a column of smoke some distance off. It was almost as if every single storm cloud and shadow in the world had combined to create this one massive swirling column coming from the sky. Just barely I could see two tiny figures standing beneath it struggling to hold up the unbearable weight.

A slight tug on my hand halted me in my steps, tearing my gaze away to look at the man holding my hand, snatching it away from him and stringing an arrow quickly.

"What is it Hermes?" I hissed.

His eyes were glued on something in the distance, looking in the general direction of Ares and Athena attempting to hold the world on their shoulders. "We should help them," he whispered.

I shook my head. "We can't, Hermes, and you know that. If we attempted to aid them we would perish alongside them. Only Atlas can hold the world upon his shoulders and he is under their protection. There is absolutely nothing we can do."

He gestured wildly behind, pointing to a blond haired God and an auburn haired mortal with exasperation. "Then why not help them! Eros and Psyche are dying."

I barely glanced their way. "It's too late for them," I said just as a loud chilling laugh echoed through the world. "And it shall be for us as well if we don't find Hades."

I sat up with a gasp, causing someone quite close to me to jump. My world was spinning. I almost expected to see the end of the world right in front of me as I snapped my eyes open. Unbearable sadness enveloped me. While I knew Aaron, Anna and Alex were completely and utterly fine, I still felt as if I had watched them die. Maybe I had.

I looked up to see Alex staring at me in shock, his mouth hanging wide open. Relief flooded through me like a wave and, before I knew what I was doing, I pounced on him, squeezing him tightly while I buried my head in his shoulders. His arms reluctantly wound their way around my waist as if they didn't know what they were doing.

"Thank the Gods you're not dead," I whispered.

He patted my back awkwardly. "Me too?"

I leaned back to grin at him, the first words coming to my mind charging out of my mouth. "When the sun faded, I was so devastated that you died. Has Ares and Athena survived as well?"

As soon as the words came out of my mouth, I froze. Had I really just said that?

Alex looked just a tiny bit shocked at my choice of words as well, eyeing me warily as he gently pushed me back onto the metal table.

That's when I realised where we were. When I had fainted, they must have taken me into the Greek Room. However, it seemed I wasn't the only one who had a random burst of otherworldly powers. Deanna, Helena and Harry were lying on the steel tables beside mine, barely moving.

In fact, if it wasn't for the steady rise and fall of their chests I would've thought they were dead. Pain shot through me.

Dead.

They had been dead once. I just couldn't remember how.

"Anna?" Alex called, keeping his eyes on me, "Are you dead?'

"What?" I heard her snap somewhere from my left, "Do I sound dead to you, Alex?"

"Well, Mia says that you and Aaron nearly died or something like that."

She appeared in front of me like magic, her midnight curls carelessly thrown into a messy bun. She looked like she had just woken up to find that she had something extremely important to do and she was unfortunately late for it.

She studied me intensely before running a hand through her bangs. "Great, instead of four unconscious, we now have three unconscious and one mentally insane."

"Hey," I said indignantly, "I am not insane. I just had a strange flash back."

"Really?" she asked curiously, "What about?"

I frowned. I felt as if what I had just experienced was something I wasn't meant to see. Something that should be kept a secret until the time was right. "The battle of Troy."

Anna frowned. "Oh."

I cast my eyes around the room, skimming over the two rather large water puddles on the floor to land on Zach and Aaron, who were both facing the walls, muttering to themselves.

"What happened to them?" I asked, shrugging off Alex's hand as he tried to feel my forehead.

"Our powers are coming in." Anna answered.

I slapped Alex's attempts away again, standing up. "But our powers have already come in. We've been practicing."

"Those were our individual powers. We also, apparently, have every other single power you can think of." She winked at me, "Including teleportation."

I followed her as she walked towards the end of the room, leaving Alex to continually feel the pulse of those still unconscious. "So what's the problem?"

I stopped to stand beside her as she gazed at the two puddles on the floor. "We don't know how to use our powers as well as the fact that we also don't know what our powers are untilthey show up. For example," she gestured to each of the puddles in turn, "Puddle One and Puddle Two are actually Haden and Po. Po accidentally turned them into puddles. Problem is we don't know how to turn them back," she turned to me, "Get my drift?"

"Clearly." I said dryly. I glanced towards Phe who was glaring daggers at a picture of a beautiful red headed girl. With a shock, I recognised her as Psyche from my flashback.

"Who's that?" I asked Anna, pointing to the picture.

Anna didn't even glance Phe's way. "Phe went searching on the internet and came across the Face book page of a girl called Phillipa Turner. She almost immediately printed out the girl's photo and started an extremely colourful rant on how much she hated a girl she had never met."

"Huh."

Truthfully, I wouldn't put it past Phe. However, I did struggle to remember the connection between Aphrodite and Psyche. I had a strange feeling it had something to do with her son (ugh, Phe with a son) Eros marrying someone prettier than her.

I nodded in satisfaction. It made sense.

Phe had always harboured an incredible jealousy fuelled hate for girls who just barely threatened her beauty. I could only imagine how Phe would act if she came across a girl who was not only more pretty compared to her, but also made Phe look like some wannabe hooker.

I would personally find it hilarious, however, I doubt Phe would find the humour in it.

A sudden jolt of dizziness, the pain familiar as it wound its way through my head. I dropped to the ground with a gasp, my hands gripping my head. I squeezed my eyes shut, barely aware of Anna dropping to the ground next to me, her hands shaking my shoulders.

She was yelling things incoherently into my ear but, slowly, a sense of weightlessness was enveloping me.

I knew what would happen soon. I would visit what I called the Wasteland and then reappear in a place I had never seen before in my life. A very exasperated voice in the back of my mind whispered, Pathetic.

This did not help.

My eyes flew open, scrambling to look at something solid, something that didn't suddenly disappear and reappear in random places but all I saw was Anna drawing back a fist, a look of regret in her eyes. Her words were barely piercing the fog in my mind. "We have to knock her out before she gets herself stuck in China."

Then, for the second time that day, everything went black.

"Has she woken up yet?"

"No, Henri, generally when you're knocked out, you stay knocked out. At least for a while."

"Have you tried the water?"

"I sprinkled some on her face but it didn't work."

"Sprinkled! That won't work! You have to do this!"

I jerked up suddenly; gasping for breath as what felt like an entire bucket of water was splashed onto me. I rubbed my eyes, flicking a strand of water soaked hair out of my face to see a very shocked looking Alex and a very cheerful looking Henri.

"You look like you've been thrown into Hoover Dam," he said happily, "At least it did the trick."

"I'd like to throw you into Hoover Dam," I muttered darkly. Once again, for the second time that day, I had woken up on one of the steel, blood stained tables that lined the walls of the Greek Room. Helena, Deanna and Harry lay where they were last time I saw them, totally undisturbed. The two puddles that were once Haden and Po had fortunately disappeared though, along with the picture of Phillipa Turner and her silent hater.

I glanced to where Zach and Aaron were once muttering at a wall but all I saw was a few cracks in the plaster and what looked like blood splattered across the wall.

He grinned an impish smile, his hair ruffled when, suddenly, he wasn't. A wind swept through the room and Henri just disappeared. I glanced at Alex, shocked, but he looked slightly bored as he stared at the wall of monitors above my head.

Suddenly, I could feel hot breath at my neck, a voice whispering, "Now, where would the fun be in that?"

I twisted my body so that I was facing Henri who had somehow moved quickly enough behind me, his eyes alight. I knitted my eyebrows together in confusion. "How did you do that?"

Another burst of wind swept through the room, a blur of colour speeding past my right. I pivoted, once again, on the table to see Henri standing where he had been only a few moments ago, grinning. "Super-speed," he boasted, "Face it. I am now officially awesome."

I raised an eyebrow, opening my mouth to speak when a scream pierced through the air.

I snapped my mouth shut with a thunk!, Alex jumping slightly and turning to peer through the door leading into Uncle Carl's study.

Henri, however, just grinned. "That happened sooner than expected."

I looked at him strangely. I hadn't seen Henri this happy since he dumped a bucket of sewerage water on our Principal's head. "What exactly did you do, Henri?" I asked cautiously.

He inspected the wall intensely. "I put four weasels in Anna's room."

I blinked. "Weasels?"

"From Russia!" he said cheerfully.

I truthfully did not know how to respond to that. Alex threw back his head and laughed. "You better run, Henri. Anna isn't going to rest until she gets you back."

"Actually, my dear friend," Henri smirked, "I left your calling card."

"What?"

"You better run, Beach Boy."

A loud scream echoed down the hall. It sounded suspiciously like the word, "Alex!"

Alex let out a colourful string of swear words, wasting no time in sprinting to the wrought iron staircase, disappearing into the maze of catwalks above our heads.

I allowed myself a small smile, expecting Henri to look overjoyed that his prank had worked. However, when I looked up, it was to realise that his smile had slipped off his face, his emerald eyes giving me a once over.

I frowned, urging Henri's eyes to meet mine. "You did that so that Alex could leave, didn't you?"

He ignored that question, instead answering it with his own. "Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, Henri."

He shook his head. With a shock, I realised that Henri actually looked hurt. "You didn't have a pulse, Mia. When you passed out in front of me and Zach, you didn't have a pulse. I thought you died."

"I'm not dead, Henri," I said softly. I didn't know why I was putting his feelings into consideration. For some unknown reason I, Amelia Lewis, felt guilty about scaring Henri.

"I know that now, it's just," he sighed, "When you passed out, Mia, I had a flashback."

I froze, barely daring to breathe. I had a sneaking suspicion of what this memory was about.

"It showed what I could imagine as the apocalypse," he continued, not knowing that every word was like a dagger to the heart, "And, well, Hermes watched you die, Mia. Artemis, actually, but she looked like you so much that I felt as if you were the one dying."

I didn't dare to speak as he aimlessly picked up one of my arrows, fiddling with it. The silence was weighing down upon me heavily, restricting my ability to speak.

Finally, Henri spoke up again. "It makes me wonder," he said, running his finger along the arrow head before looking up to meet my eyes, "Why are we here? What caused the Greek Gods to allow themselves to die in the hope that they would be reincarnated? Were they running from something and, if so, what was it? Is it still after us?"

"I don't know," I whispered then, my voice stronger, I said, "But if it is, then it will be no match for us. We'll look down on its dead body and laugh, Henri, I promise."

Henri, however, didn't look very reassured. If anything, he looked even more depressed, the previous laughter in his eyes gone. He dropped the arrow onto the table, stuffing his hands in his pockets, suddenly smiling.

I didn't truthfully know how to deal with this sudden mood change, narrowing my eyes as he winked playfully at me.

"I guess you're right," he agreed, shrugging, "Now, I should probably leave before Aaron discovers what I put in his bed."

I frowned. "What did you put in his bed?"

He didn't need to answer, however. As soon as the words left my mouth, I could hear the distant yells of, "What the bloody hell is this!"

Henri winked again. "See you later, Archer."

And with a burst of wind, he was gone.

"Are you sure you have it under control?"

"Yes Anna," I said impatiently, "I am completely fine."

I was sitting in the lounge room, taking my usual spot in the circle besides a very disgruntled looking Alex. Every now and then, Anna would shoot murderous glares in his direction, muttering something about "filthy vermin." Alex had the grace to ignore this, instead choosing to stare at the window, watching the dark, star filled sky.

The fire was roaring merrily, an explosion of red, yellows and oranges. At the beginning of the meeting, Haden had reached into a fireplace and, when he had withdrawn his hand, it was to reveal a ball of glittering fire cupped in the palm of his hand.

Surprisingly enough, as I gazed around the room, there was barely a time that one of us didn't use our powers. At the moment, I could see a string of water repeatedly curl around Po's fingers, Deanna, who was staring at a potted plant, was making the petals of the flower reopen and close while Zach had amused himself during Anna's rant by turning the ceiling into a complete replica of the night sky above us, twinkling stars shining down on us.

If someone had told me a few weeks ago that my family would be able to do all this, I would have given them instructions on how to get to the nearest Loony Bin. However, now, to us, having powers was normal. Any previous doubts about our apparent reincarnated powers were gone, replaced with talent, skill and self belief that we could handle it.

Though I would hate to admit it, we actually acted like the Gods sometimes.

The thought scared me.

We had spent the last hour and a half crowded in the lounge room, discussing the discovery of our very recent individual powers. Anna had argued passionately that they were dangerous and could lead to our exposure, however, Zach was more relaxed then her, trusting us to take care of ourselves. Then Anna decided to use me as an example. I wasn't incredibly happy about this but I couldn't voice it. Zach wouldn't be impressed and he was, technically, King of the Gods.

"Mia, are you even listening to me?"

I raised my eyebrows at Anna. "My teleportation problem is under control and even if it wasn't, we're going back to school in a few days time. We don't have the time to study and take notes on our every individual problem. We just need to go along with it and hope that, like our past self, we will, one day, be able to control it."

"She has a point," Zach said, oblivious to the glare he was receiving from Anna, "We can control the vast majority of our powers and those that we can't control, we've been taught how to hide until a time where we can control them."

"But how do we know that we can control and hide our powers?" Anna interrupted, "For all we know, we might just think we have complete control. We should at least conduct a few more tests. Just in case."

A loud groan emitted throughout the room. No one wanted to be another victim of one of Anna's tests.

Zach seemed to be thinking along the same lines. "You're right. We do need to figure out if what we think is correct but perhaps through another way then being lab rats all day. Maybe a training exercise?"

This seemed to go well with everyone else. Our heads snapped up, holding our breaths just in case it was too good to be true.

Anna sighed, defeated. "Fine. I'll have to watch the exercise in order to take accurate notes, though. That means I'm not going to participate."

Zach grinned before turning to address all of us. "Meet me at the top of the left hill tomorrow morning at eight. We're going to be having one final showdown before school."

This was met with loud cheers from most of us.

"Now, I suggest you all get some rest. Tomorrow is going to be a long day."

Finally, after 12 chapters, I had finally reached the climax of the story! :P

How did you like this chapter? Please review and tell me what you think! I might just change something just for you :-D