Hey SF901 here~ This is the first chapter of Sol Invictus. Sorry it's late I have to do my research so I can accurately ingratiate the gods in the twilight world and I have other responsibilities outside of writing. I apologize beforehand for any mistakes this is an unbeta-ed story. The explanation of the Greek terms is at the bottom, and you can always pm me any questions you might have.

Other than that there's nothing much to say except read and enjoy^^


First Chapter~

"Alright I want to know what she did. What damage was done and how can we unravel it?"

Helios sat up in his chair as their patriarch addressed the gods. To the right and left of him his blood relatives all adopted similar positions of concern. All the high born gods had gathered for a communal of the divine. It was a historical gathering that only took place once every thousand years. Such a meeting only occurred in the most devastating of circumstances-Apparently his daughter, lovely little Isabella had unveiled something horrific: something that had even the most volatile of gods scared.

Zeus stood poised at the head of the table, more beautiful than any other deity, and also more unpredictable. His intentions in calling this meeting to order were hard to guess but it was clear something had terrified the thunder god into summoning them. Even Hera, Zeus' evil vindictive wife looked pensive. It was a rare thing indeed to see both rulers apprehensive. It was virtually unheard of for both of them to be scared of the same thing at the same time.

Their rulers' anxious mood was affecting everyone else at the table too. Helios included. To the right of Zeus his temperamental brother Poseidon frowned his perfect features seeming to darken in anger. To the left of Hera, the great god of war-Ares simply sat back with an amused gleam in his eyes, thoroughly enjoying the tension in the air.

Next to him the god of volcanoes and weaponry-Hephaestus clapped Ares companionably on the back with a loud guffaw shattering the delicate silence in the room. The rest of the gods down the length of the table had similar reactions to Zeus' words.

Athena had a condescending smirk gracing her lips. Helios knew her sense of duty had been tickled. As a goddess of heroes, wisdom and warfare-Athena always, no matter the consequences supported the underdog. It was that way in the Golden Era of Troy. It was still that way in 2012.

Further down the length of the table Aphrodite sat her hands clasped thoughtfully under her chin. She appeared concerned in a way that was foreign to her violent counterparts. Ares and Athena didn't waste energy worrying like the rest of the gods. They simply destroyed whatever was threatening them. The goddess of love did not have any such inclination so it wasn't surprising to see her concerned.

Dionysius, Helios' least favorite god sat back in his chair, letting out a loud fruity giggle. Unlike any other divine being that heralded over something useful-Dionysius was a god of pleasure. He thrived on wine, and exotic entertainment. Things pertaining to the future, or important issues that could dictate fate didn't interest him. There was a very good chance he was just here for the feast taking place after the meeting.

Hovering next to Dionysius was one of the biggest contributers to nature. Demeter-goddess of the harvest sat at the table trying to mask her worry and failing miserably. She had a tendency to obsess and dote over every obscene little detail so Zeus' ominous words had no doubt scared her. In any other situation her worry might be amusing. Not today.

Idly Helio's noted the gods that were absent.

Hades and his creepy wife Persephone had not shown up for the meeting and neither had Selene the goddess of the moon. Even with their seats empty, and these three gods missing something was being decided today. Everyone could feel it. The culpable tension in the room had every divine being paranoid, wired-waiting for some hellstorm to break loose.

Helios threaded his fingers absentmindedly through his hair, a human gesture.

What had his little firebrand unleashed?

"I spoke to the Oracle of Delphi." Hera hesitantly broke the quiet again, her eyes flickering nervously to her husband. Clearly she did not want to be the bearer of bad news, but the Oracle was her creature. No one else could commune with an underworld seer from Olympus. Despite the numerous rumors circulating Earth the gods were not all powerful-they could not interfere in Hade's realm on a whim. Every eye at the table regarded her with interest waiting for her to continue.

"And?" Zeus thundered impatiently his hands slamming into the table. The action made the table legs creak in protest. Several deities jumped in surprise, startled at being so close to the object of Zeus' wrath. Used to Zeus' temper after being married to him for several millennia Hera did not even bat an eyelash at his tantrum. Ignoring the thunder god- She calmly surged on with her explanation.

"Isabella did not just change some nameless human's fate. The Oracle* said our Fate had been changed." Hera spat out each word like it was poison. "She spoke of a new generation taking the reigns, and dismantling everything we took thousands of years to build…She spoke of war" Her eyes darted over the assembled gods' faces and lingered on Helios. "With your child at the center…Because of you our days are numbered." She hissed her eyes flashing in rage.

"That has nothing to do with me. Her punishment was your choice. My daughter would not be the key to Armageddon if she was still here. Her banishment was your decision."

Helios replied coldly, leveling Hera with infuriated glare.

"Maybe we should have killed her instead. Execution is always more entertaining anyways. In fact perhaps the entire Heliades line should be eliminated. They're more trouble than they are worth."

Incensed, Helios stood up trying and failing to reign in his temper. Hera had overstepped herself this time. No one was going to touch his children. Not Hera. Not Zeus. No deity had that right. His children were his and his alone. He would annihilate anyone that threatened them. Rules be damned. A cruel smile stretched across his lips and in an even tone he replied. "Hera I don't care what your status in Olympus is. You hurt even one of my children and I will end you."

Zeus stepped forward at the threat his whole posture rigid, coiled with so much anger he was like an aggravated cobra ready to strike.

Hera opened her mouth but a low wolf whistle interrupted the soon-to-be violent proceedings. "Aren't we all rather touchy today…" Athena had also risen from her seat when Hera's ugly side began to show. Gracefully she glided to the other end of the table where Helios stood, defiantly. The goddess of wisdom sent him a look filled with undisguised mirth. "Helios relax…you know she would not hurt your bloodline and you can't exactly argue that your children are angels. They do have a tendency to get in trouble." She smirked, but the amusement quickly faded when she got to the crux of the matter.

Her eyes dulled a bit as she adopted an air of solemnity. "You especially can't fault Hera for being upset. Consulting the Oracle of Delphi always ends in tragedy for someone and she's predicted a dark future us."

Despite the false benevolence marring her words he could not deny the truth in them. They all knew the Oracle of Delphi never gave inaccurate predictions. She predicted the trials of Heracles*, and his inevitable death. She predicted the fall of Python, the son of Gaia. She even predicted the coming of Jason of the Argonauts and the complete crap storm that followed. The Oracle was different than any other seer. Her prophecies always came to pass-they were inevitable, inescapable, and forever looming like a bad dream. Now she predicted the end of Olympus.

Helios deflated, his face crumpling in defeat.

What were they going to do?

"So what's the plan?" Ares voiced the question on everybody's mind that no one dared to ask.

Zeus stood up at his full height, filling the room with his anger, and his presence. "We're going to defy fate. I determine the outcome of the gods. My destiny-our destiny is not to be determined by some child."

The words were meant to be inspiring, and to rouse the gods' sense of pride, and superiority. To Helios they simply sounded hollow.

Running from fate never worked. Even gods' are held accountable to that rule.

Next to Zeus Poseidon, master of the ocean and every sea snorted, sending his brother an irritated glance. "You are a fool. Forget the child your stupidity will be the end of us." He sneered, voicing his opinion for the first time since the meeting had started.

"The hothead has a point. Running from fate only ends in sorrow. Look at Oedipus." Athena murmured softly, her words only intelligible to Helios because she was standing so close to him. The sun god suppressed a shudder. *Oedipus' fate had been divined at birth-he was supposed to kill his father and marry his mother. His parents in a desperate act to avoid that sent him away, and in doing so sealed their fate.

Bloody depressing tale.

"Let's hope we fair better than that mortal." He whispered back sending Athena a sidelong glance. The goddess of wisdom and hero's simply grinned, a small breathtaking smile gracing her lips.

"I wouldn't bet on it."

"hehe." The table fell silent as Dionysius' drunken burp disturbed the serious discussion taking place. The inebriated god giggled again and with an authoritative bang slammed his drinking flask on the table. "Just out of curiosity, has anyone seen Hephaestus?" He whined, taking another swig out of the flask.

Everyone froze.

Slowly, with almost painful reluctance every eye trailed to the empty seat next to Ares.

"Shit." Hera cursed startling several people.

"That idiot." Athena muttered with a fond grin.

"There he goes again." Ares commented wryily, sitting back in his chair.

"I'm going to kill him." Zeus sighed, cradling his head in his hands.

"Let's party!" Dionysius crowed tossing his flask up in the air and showering the gods with droplets of wine. Helios chuckled while everyone else glared murderously at the pleasure god. At the rate this was going Isabella, his little firebrand was going to have plenty of time to get acclimated to the human world. She could blend in and perhaps go into hiding…With Hephaestus' help.

It went without saying that Hephaestus had disappeared while everyone else was preoccupied-it didn't take a genius to figure out where he had gone either. The meddling game had begun. Isabella was now a very important human so most of the gods were going to start making little trips to earth.

Defying fate-Zeus' rallying cry to action was just another way of saying. "We're going to destroy the person endangering my rule." As of right now Isabella was not simply a fallen goddess she was a viable threat. No one wanted her to usher in the new age yet.

That being said-His daughter's life was very much in danger.

Helios could not protect her. It pained him to admit it but he had other responsibilities. He could only risk going to the mortal world at night when he was not dragging the sun across the sky. Unfortunately that meant for a majority of the day Isabella was vulnerable. Humans were so…fragile.

Someone could kill her. Graphically. Horribly.

Helios frowned, disconcerted at the thought.

Imagining his little firebrand gone was…unpleasant.

For now she was safe. For now Hephaestus would keep her alive.

"Let the games begin." Athena smirked next to him, and the assembled deities straightened each feeling as if an imaginary gauntlet had been thrown.

Let the games begin indeed.

aut viam inveniam aut faciam

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxX

"I didn't know what to do! I thought I was hallucinating!" Isabella winced doing her best to block out the panicked voice that was rousing her from sleep. Even half awake she could identify the voice as female.

"Ma'am." A much calmer voice tried to interrupt the whiny tirade unsuccessfully.

"What sane woman runs out in the middle of the road completely naked?!" The dramatic woman continued screaming, her voice rising exponentially with each word.

"Ma'am." The soothing masculine voice tried to interrupt again, but was rudely silenced by the woman's theatrics.

"I didn't mean to hit her!" The woman whined, her voice cracking with the effort not to dissolve into angry sobs.

"Ma'am! This patient needs rest, if you cannot calm down I'm going to have to ask you to leave." The level headed male raised his voice for the first time, forcing the woman to cease her sniffling. At his frustrated tone Isabella reluctantly peeled one eye open drinking in the scene laid out before her with some annoyance. At the very edge of her bed, a tall man adorned in white robes, carrying a metal instrument stood addressing a woman on the verge of tears. Isabella opened her mouth to say something to the pair and paused her eyes glazing over in pain. Her mortal body felt like it had been crushed by a boulder. Every sinew, nerve, and bone was screaming in abuse.

Biting back a whimper Isabella managed to croak a short sentence. "Where am I?"

As soon as the words left her lips, she found she had both humans undivided attention. The prestigious male grinned reassuringly. "You're in a hospital. My name is Dr. Connor." He grasped the female's shoulder companionably and Isabella's gaze shifted to her, studying the now relieved looking woman with some interest. "And this is Layla-she was the woman driving the car that hit you." He surmised with a solemn nod.

Isabella blinked at the foreign terms. Her comprehension of English was practically perfect but this man was speaking an entirely different language. What was a hospital? And at what point in time did she get hit by a car? What was a car? Her brows furrowed in confusion as she mulled over the alien words. "I do not…understand." She admitted finally, unable to mask her ignorance.

The obnoxious woman-Layla, let out a small pained groan. "Oh my god. She has amnesia I hit a naked woman with my car and gave her brain damage…I'm going to hell." She muttered pitifully cradling her head in her hands. The good "doctor" gave her a reassuring pat on the back and fixed the fallen goddess with a concerned look, which Isabella pointedly ignored.

"Miss I'd be happy to explain anything that confuses you." Dr. Connor offered politely speaking to her like one would a naïve child. She resisted the urge to roll her eyes at his tone. She was positive she was several thousands of years older than him, if she was a child he was an unborn fetus.

"What is this..,place?" She grunted, eyeing her surroundings suspiciously. She was in an all white room, with white walls, white sheets and a white bed. She was propped up by white pillows, and wrapped in white bandages. Surrounding her bed were large beeping machines she didn't recognize. She couldn't fathom what they were for.

Uncomfortably the doctor cleared his throat. "Well ma'am you're in a hospital like I already mentioned a second ago." Her brow shot up, clearly- That explanation did nothing for her. At her blank expression, he elaborated further, his face coloring slightly. "Hospitals are places people go when they are hurt, or when they're sick. We give them medicine or expert medical help so they can get well again."

Satisfied with the explanation, she let her features soften a bit. Apparently she was in a place for healing. This man was probably a healer. As if to confirm that thought Dr. Connor began asking her about her wounds.

"Miss I'd like to ask you a series of questions to determine if you really do have amnesia, and I'd like to run some tests if that's alright?"

Amnesia? Tests?

Isabella, frustrated with her lack of knowledge by this point simply nodded.

"Okay." He said serenely, while reaching out to grasp the clip board on the nearby table. He paged through the first few papers. "To start off with, what's your name?" He asked curiously preparing to write down her answers.

"Isabella Marie Heliades."

He paused, pen hovering uncertainly in the air. "Come again?"

Even the obnoxious woman was looking at her strangely.

Isabella hesitantly repeated herself. She had the sinking suspicion that perhaps she should have lied about her name. Last time she checked people were not naming their children ancient Greek names-that trend had died out thousands of years ago.

"Isabella Marie Heliades…" The Doctor echoed derisively. "Okay, and how old are you?"

This time she knew she was going to have to lie. Explaining she was several thousands year old was an asinine idea that had no appeal. The sweet deception streamed through her lips with almost no effort. "I'm nineteen." She supplied helpfully, keeping mind that she looked like a typical adolescent.

"Nineteen-beautiful, and do you have any living relatives? Parents? Siblings?"

This question was marginally harder to answer. She had no desire to think about her parents. Her recent banishment was still too recent-too raw for words. She had been cruelly ripped from her father, from her sisters. They were dead to her. Buried grief surged through her drowning her, choking her. Unable to think of a convincing backstory and loathe to sit there mute with grief-she fought back the traitorous tears that were threatening to spill forth.

"No family." She whispered hoarsely.

At her stricken expression the doctor set down his clipboard. "Are you sure?" He asked deploringly, questioning her as if she was something less than a millennia year old goddess of the sun. He was treating her delicately, like she was fragile-like she was mortal.

It was pissing her off.

"I'm positive." She replied shortly.

"Alright then." He hesitantly changed the tide of the conversation and picked up the clipboard again. "And how do you feel? Layla fell asleep at the wheel, and woke up in time to change direction so the car only grazed you. You were lucky it wasn't a head on collision so most of your wounds are superficial."

She tilted her head to the side feeling completely lost. "I feel…sore." She admitted after dissecting his words, and discerning their meaning. Why couldn't this healer ask questions like a normal person? Talking to him was exhausting.

"That's good very good." He stated chipperly.

"Doctor Connor." A woman in a uniform similar to the doctor's lingered indecisively in the doorway, a perturbed expression dominating her face.

He ripped his gaze away from Isabella's prone form and focused on the new arrival. "Yes Nurse Gonzalez?"

"There's a man here that says he knows our patient. He says he's a relative."

"A relative?" Both eyebrows shot up, and he hummed thoughtfully. "Isabella says she has no relatives. Did he give a name?" Incredulity ruled his normally vibrant expression. Something was suspect. Even this overly enthusiastic healer could feel the wrongness in the air.

"He said he's her Uncle Henry."

Isabella frowned. Uncle Henry? No god or mortal kin of hers had such a bland depressingly ordinary name, but it had to be someone from the divine community. She had only been human for a handful of hours, not nearly enough time to make friends-Especially not friends that masqueraded as some random surrogate uncle that no one's ever heard of.

Who could it be?

Not her father Helios. Hermes perhaps? He was well known for his tricks and was famous for his meddling in the human world.

Dr. Connor sent her a cautious glance. "Ms. Heliades what would you like to do? Do you want to see your uncle?"

Isabella sighed. She wasn't in a sociable mood. She didn't want too see anyone-let alone deal with this farce of a family reunion. However, she was not in a position to refuse. With her wounds still healing and her body incapacitated she was vulnerable. Any god with an ounce of power could sneak into her room, and she would not be able to protect herself.

Her helplessness as a human was staggering.

Resigned to her mortal failings, Isabella nodded grimly. "Sure. Maybe I can salvage what little family I have left. I would love to meet my uncle." She trailed off pathetically with a wince.

Dr. Connor still not completely sure of the safest course of action, nodded his assent. "Okay...Bring him in." The nurse ducked out into the hallway and Isabella lapsed into a comfortable silence with the doctor. At some point Layla had snuck out of the room-content to know her actions hadn't killed anyone. Still examining her paperwork, Doctor Connor proceeded to ignore her was left alone with her thoughts, and she had enough plenty to think about.

She was no longer a Heliades. No longer a goddess.

She barely even qualified as a human.

She had no purpose in life anymore. None. Nothing mattered.

What was she going to do?

"Ah if it isn't my lovely niece." The nurse had returned with a large intimidating man in tow. He stood several inches taller than the prestigious doctor, and had twice Dr. Connor's bulk. His grizzly appearance was offset by his stunning azure eyes, and long silky hair. Her Uncle Henry was clearly a god even though she was struggling to match a name with his face.

"Hello." She dipped her head and examined her ethereal relative more closely. At her blatant staring, he seemed to swell up with almost childish pride, and suddenly, as if struck by one of Zeus' lightning bolts she had an epiphany.

"Oh my god." She groaned, falling back into English slang when no curses in Latin were forthcoming.

Hephaestus the unequivocal god of volcano's, fire, and weaponry stood at the foot of her bed-mirthful and thoroughly enjoying her exasperation.

"Hello little firebrand."

He mocked, using her father's nickname for her. Refusing to acknowledge that with a response, Isabella grunted and fell back dramatically into her pillows. She covered her face with a hand and prayed the Earth would swallow her whole. She knew what her "uncle's" arrival meant.

Banishment was no longer her only punishment.

Something on a much grander scale was happing.

Fan-freaking-tastic.

beneficium accipere libertatem est vendere


-Okay that's the end of the first official chapter of this story. What do you all think? XD Stay tuned for the next chapter, it's coming soon.

-The Oracle of Delphi was hard to incorporate in the story. She's actually one of Apollo's seers that everyone went to for prophecies, but Hera occasionally convinced her to tailor her messages so she can ruin someone else's life. In order to help with the plot, I made her Hera's seer that she could contact from anywhere on a whim.

-Heracles was the original name for Hercules. For anyone that doesn't know what happened to him Hera meddled in his life because she's very jealous and dangerous. She made him go crazy and kill his wife and children than to redeem himself he went to the Oracle of Delphi who told him to work for some foreign king. The foreign king wanted him to complete 12 trials.

-I don't know much about Jason of the Argonauts, or Python-Gaia's son. All I know about them is written in the Heracles section and I didn't feel like researching them.

-Oedipus is fun lil story in Greek mythology of a boy that killed his father and married his mother. It ends with him blinding himself and his mother committing suicide all because they tried to escape fate. It's also a psychology term known as the Oedipus complex which is a major Freudian..thing.

-Aut viam inveniam aut faciam means "I will either find a way or make one."

-Beneficium accipere libertatem est vendere means "To accept a favor is to sell one's freedom."