《Tartaros》Chapter 19 - Edan
Advertisement
Of course my happiness didn't last long. Right after me and dad walked out of the shooting range, my bracelet started sparkling. It only meant one thing. Sonia was going to get me. Why now?
I turned to dad, hiding my bracelet behind my back. "Dad, I just remembered that I have to do something, but I don't want to cut this short-"
"Oh don't worry. I need to get back to work anyways." Dad straightened his coat. "If you are out late, come straight to my place. You can sleep in the guest house."
"I can sleep in your place?" My voice was shaky. My voice was never shaky.
"Of course. My son should have a room to be in in his dad's place." My dad shaked my hair and walked away, leaving me stunned in place.
I felt a bit guilty. I wanted to live with my dad, my mom's number one enemy. My mind spinned with ideas and scenarios. Maybe I could stop the war and bring both of the cities to peace.
When I was in the edge of the mountain where Ashphodea ends, I saw mom ship coming toawrds us. My heart dropped. I started running towards it, hoping that it wasn't the worst case scenario. I let out a sigh when I saw Sonia on the driver's seat and my cousin haning into the ship with the edge of her life.
Sonia steered the ship right in front of me. "What's up, dork? How brainwashed are you already?"
"Why did you ordered me here?"
"Oh, this one found something interesting. She wanted to get you." Sonia pointed at Andi, who had her eyes tightly closed. When I tapped her on the shoulder, she jumped in panic.
"Edan! We are already next to Edan... God that was fast." Andi was still holding on the seat like she was going to die if she let go.
"What was the important thing you wanted us to hear?" I leaned closer to Andi.
"Oh... Oh! I might know where your- our aunt is!" Andi looked so hapoy with the information. Smile in my face was gone. I stood up straight, trying to understand her words.
"What are you talking about? She's dead." When I thought about my words, I have never felt less certain of my words. I guess I didn't know what my mom had hidden from me in these years. I thought Andi and her mom was dead. What dicatates that my aubt wasn't alive as well?
"I saw... I saw a memory where your mom was pregnant and... she was there... and I know where they took her." I jumped into the back seat and gave Sonia the sign to go. This could be huge, like a final reason to actually move with my dad.
"Where is she? What building is she in?" I asked while we were traveling back to Tartaros.
"Well... I mean... they talked about a hospital and they were next to a grey looking building. So I guess there."
I had a hunch of what she was talking about. Tartaros had a hospital, this gray old building that I have never been to. Mom loves to visit there. She goes almost once a week there. I always thought she did it to boost the morale there bedore she vitisted the graveyard, but I guess she did something sinister too. I knocked Sonia's shoulder and sighned: "gray building next to the old playground."
Our travel there went fast. I was just inside my head, getting prepeared to see yet another family member my mother didn't allow me to meet. As we arrive just in front of the building,
Advertisement
I walked in with way too much confidence, girls right behind me. My confidence dropped immiditely when I saw who was inside. I dragged girls somewhere to hide.
Mom was standing in the front desk, talking to a boy that's younger than him. She looked... dirty. Her clothes were messy and her hair didn't look shiny. I have never seen mom look that untidy. The boy she was talking to, who looked like his head was covered in freckles, looked at mom like he wanted to hug her.
"You're really sure you don't want to see her? I think it would be good. She just gets confused that you-", boy tried to talk to mom but she didn't listen.
"Evan, just tell me if she's alright." Boy whose name was Evan, put his arms behind him.
"She's okay. We went to a walk yesterday outside. You know, you really should meet with her. She would really like if you just-"
"Please spare me with that today. I just want to know that she is okay and bring the gift I gave you. "
"You hired me to take care of her and I think her seeing her sister is a best thing to her right now. She's really lonely." Couple of workers who were dressed same as Evan, in pink shirt and pants, ran past us. I used them as cover so I could drag all three of us to the hallway next to mom and Elias.
"If it wasn't for Afrodite, I wouldn't have never hired you." That was the last thing I heard from mom. We stood in a hallway, just listening to their talk. We didn't know where to go. There were signs and people everywhere but nothing to clue us where to go.
"Oh, the parkour girl. Did you want that therapy lesson?" When I looked forward, the kid mom was talking to stood in front of us, looking at Andi.
"No... I... we..." Andi looked at me and Sonia in panic. I stepped in front of them.
"We are the company for... Kelsie. I'm Edan." Evan's eyes widened.
"Oh my name twin! Well, almost. Your mom didn't tell you were coming. I guess she finally told you everything. Times really are changing." I wish that was the case. I wish mom had changed but she still hides the truth. I need to see it myself to finally know it.
I smiled at Evan. "Yeah, mom is sometimes full of suprises."
"Demeter will love you. Come on." Evan started to walk towards stairs. Sonia tried to grab my shoulder but I pished her away. I wanted to focus on this. To figure out who the damm Demeter is. To figure what made mom just lock her sister up. Was she some murderous maniac? Was she danger to herself?
We finally reached two floor up. When Evan opened the door, one big giant space opened before me. It was filled with fake flowers that looked real. Gentle music was playing from spots I couldn't see. All the walls were painted to depict places I didn't regonize.
On the middle of that room was a short and slender woman who was smelling the flowers. Her head was completly shaved. In the place of hair was tattoos of flowers. She was wearing a floor lenght gown that made her look like she was floating.
"Evan! I didn't wait you back till night. I made you a flower crown." Woman tipped over us and put a small flower crown on Evan's head. After she looked at Evan in a dazed look on her face, she turned to us. "Who are you, my new friend?"
Advertisement
Andy started to speak with a shaky voice. "I'm Andy, this is Sonia and this is Edan. We are-"
"-interns." Andy looked at me weirdly. I... I didn't have the heart to tell the truth yet. She looked like she didn't know where she was. She stared out into the darkness and not even to me.
All of a sudden, her expression changed. She became more smile-y but she took a step away from us. "I'm sorry, who are you?"
"We just said-"
"Demeter didn't tell me who you were. She just said interns... wouldn't interns know this?" Kelsie looked at Evan, who looked at us.
"They haven't heard a lot of things yet."
Kelsie talked to Evan in just stares, arguing about something. After a while she looked back at us. "I don't know how to talk to teenagers, but basically... I have friends inside my head. Thanks to Evan, I know how to talk to them."
"I have read so many old medical books to learn about, and of course I talked to all of them. Apollo, Artemis, Demeter... and the others." Evan walked towards Kelsie, and more inside the giant room. "Demeter didn't do much. Just something with flowers."
I carefully walked behind Evan. Andy had some weird doe look on her face when she followed me, looking around. Sonia walked beside me, staring into my deep soul.
"Can I ask... Why are you here?" Andy asked.
Kelsie sat on the ground that looked like fresh cut grass that was greener I have never seen in any other place. After Evan sat down, I sat next to him. "My sister... she thinks we are safer here. I think... this is for the best. I do miss having more people around. Thankfully I still have Evan."
"And I'm stuck here." Evan laughed and he and Kelsie shared a warm look. "That remined me, I have to give you this."
Evan took a box from his back pocket and gave it to Kelsie. As Kelsie opened the box, Andy had started walking toward an unfinished wall depicting a woman looking at a waterfall.
"Don't touch that!" As Kelsie looked at a necklace that she found on the box, something shifted in her. She became more rigid. Smile left from her face.
"I'm- I'm sorry. It's just... It's pretty. You are talented." Kelsie, or someone else from her head, stood up and walked next to Andy. "It's this what you do all day?"
"Artemis, be nice to her. She's young." Evan tried calming Kelsie down. "Don't worry. She doesn't bite."
Artemis looked Andy up and down. "I don't know who you are but something doesn't feel right about you. Have they really been background checked? Or did you just waltzed right in to look at the crazy girl."
"Artemis-" Evan stood up and walked closer to Artemis, but with every step, Artemis walked away from him.
"No, none of that calming shit. These teens are some fucking ruse from the snakes. Or like she still thinks we are a teenager and not in our fucking twenties." Artemis hit Evan on his chest.
"We didn't want-" Artemis stopped when Andy opened her stupid mouth. "We just wanted to meet our aunt. My name is Andy Ruiz. That's Edan Roseblood."
"What are you talking? You're... You're his kid." Artemis looked out of focus. She just stared at Andy with a dazed look. Two nervous laughs came out of her mouth. "Brother, please help her."
Artemis leaned forward and slowly her face looked more and more scared. She was clearly a new person now. She looked around, scared of where she was. "Even if you run away from your family, you can't run away from your destiny. Father's blood, mother's blood, all solid gray. Mistakes come, mistakes go. Woman who destroyed her family. If you believe wrongly, only the ashes remain and the figure of darkness remains, triumphant. Don't let them win. Don't let a someone whose brain is blinded by their false dreams win.” I tried to take my eyes off the woman, but I couldn't. “He's already almost broken one mind. Don't let it happen. I-"
Evan rushed next to the girl. He didn't touch her but took something out of his pocket. It was a small bottle that let out a nice smell when the man took the cap off the bottle. "Cassandra. IT's fine. They aren't here to hurt you. You are safe."
“What… did she just say?” I didn't know where to look or what to do. Kelsie's words, or Cassandra's, or whoever she was at the moment, kept running through my head. She was… her words sounded absurd and reasonable at the same time. I just needed to hear more.
Her panic was cut short though, when Cassandra became a bit relaxed and dazed again. She just whispered: "Don't worry, I get her." Soon, Kelsie smirked. She straightened her stance and look straightly at me. "Sorry about that. Cassandra holds... some trauma that you are too young to know about."
"What was she talking about?"
"Like I said, don't worry about it." Kelsie tapped Evan's shoulder and walked towards the door. "I think this family meeting should end now. It was nice meeting you. I'd say it was nice to meet you, but honestly... Evan, can you get them out?"
Evan walked towards the door and opened it. "Let's go kids." I wanted to protest but I couldn't do anything else but walk behind Evan away from the room. Only after we were on the hallway, Evan opened her mouth. "I'm sorry. *I could have guessed that Artemis would throw a fit. She doesn't really like Tartaros in general."
"What exactly was Kelsie-Cassandra talking about?" Andy asked cautiously. Good thing he said that. I was somehow afraid to ask about it again.
“You'll have to ask Evalyn about that. I- I have my obligations that keep me from saying anything about it, but… Kelsie was the youngest of the Roseblood children, and like all of her siblings, experienced a lot of horrors. Our bodies process such horrors differently. This is his way of processing it.”
"I just know it's because of mom." My voice was like a mumble, but my mind was loud as you can be. My mother had locked her sister up just because she hated her. I wanted to throw up.
"Trust me. You don't know nothing." That was the last thing Evan said to me when we were back downstairs. He was wrong. I knew very well what she was talking about. Evalyn has done a lot of bad things during her reign. Destroying her siblings was one thing. That's what Kelsie was talking about. I had to choose the right side, and I know what to choose. I will not destroy my own destiny.
Advertisement
The Chronicles of Kevin's Mistakes
Since the times of old, the Six Towers of Valdir have stood tall in their respective kingdoms. Always, it is has been six. Six Managers, six Cores, six hoards of treasure. But times are changing. The fearsome Managers that history has come to know, hate, and respect, all the same, are about to get a new Manager in their ranks. They await to see who governs the seventh Tower on the banks of the Yearning sea, just as the adventurers, kings, and peasants alike are trembling with dreadful anticipation. Some want a newbie who's worth the extra space, while others want someone who'll keep with the status quo. Instead, they got Kevin. ~Expect an update on a Friday~
8 72Spatial storage of all things ( Dropped )
The Fourth Best Ability Of The Universe is in the hands of a peculiar assassin This will include a sort of system and some half assed comedythe MC will be a jerk and I will try to make him true to his characterAh and no harem Dropped
8 255The Granddaughter of Time
Teresa Hargrove was okay with giving up. She knew the Earth was doomed and there was nothing to be done about it. What she was not okay with was the Future, an enigmatic woman nearly fanatical in her devotion to making a difference, dragging her along — seemingly, to prove her wrong. It turns out though that the Future is very hard to understand. This story contains heavy themes, including mental illness, existential crisis and death. However, I still tried to eventually convey a message of hope. Several mythical and metaphorical beings in the shape of humans will appear in most chapters. However, they are not meant to be of a specific ethnicity or social background and are instead perceived differently by people around them. For your reading pleasure, feel free to imagine them any way you’d like, even if your imagination contradicts descriptions from the story. Enjoy!~
8 121TantaMount
Premise:Leo Renaud is a twenty-nothing year old living out his best years in questionable fashion. An average student with a small group of tight knit friends, he is obsessed with a relatively outdated MMO called TantaMount, relegated to obscurity due to its high level of difficulty. One morning he gets knocked down by a head turning ninja chick riding a motorcycle, who he swears he has seen as an NPC in TantaMount, and for obvious reasons, can't get her out of his head. And lately, players in TantaMount have been leaving the game (major players) and never heard from again. His best friends are skeptically behind him, but three large virtual mountains and many more obstacles block their path to understand what is going on, and the implications it might have in their world and the virtual one. Game on.
8 139(De)Forchunae | Progression Fantasy.
Tyler was taught his whole life to fear the demons who wear men's flesh known as Deforchunae. What happens when he is accused of being one? His beliefs and worldview thrown into disarray. He will have to confront his fears head on and find out what it means to be one of "The Fortunate".Chapters are around 2000+ words on average. No matter what 1 chapter a month. Possibly more
8 195Alter [ENG]
Ten years ago, Dawn of Darkness shook the world, sending bloodthirsty creatures from another world through portals to Earth. Newly awakened hunters opposed them, thanks to gaining the power to control magic and abilities beyond the boundaries of the average human. In present day Akally, a red-haired young man, is one of the awakened endowed with the ability to heal injuries, strengthen allies and... resurrect the dead. [The story is a translation of my original work done by me. English is my second language, therefore I will appreciate if you tell me about any mistakes you spot so I can learn from it and fix it. Thank you for understanding.]
8 73