OLYMPIA

The Day after the Night before

I woke up still reeling from the night before and the headache that followed didn't help with the situation either. I didn't know how I was going to break the news to Ares, he looked up to Zeus so much. I got changed and stumbled to the canteen desperate for food. The smell of Bacon immediately made my stomach rumble, I joined the queue and ordered my breakfast before seeking out Ares and making my way over to him. I sat down tiredly and Ares chuckled at the sight of me "Rough night?" he stifled out, I glared at him with a smile on my face before the thought of the serious chat happening dawned on me. 

"Ares I need to talk to you about something, and you're not going to like it.." I looked at him with a serious look. A stern face took over the smile that previously sat on his face. "Whats up?" he looked at me worriedly. I took a deep breath and decided it was now or never "Last night after the party, I was walking back to my room and I saw the office door opened slightly. I wasn't originally going to go in, but there was this big folder on his desk that caught my attention, I just went to have a peak and I found out some stuff" I blurted out, he nodded at me to carry on with the same solemn look on his face. "Zeus isn't who we thought he was, our parents never gave us over willingly, we were taken Ares. Someone must've kidnapped us when we were babies, then I found my birth certificate and - " I took a deep breath before saying the next part "They never died in a forest fire, they were exiled outside of the dome. Then Zeus came in and he was on the phone, he was talking about us, Ares we have something that no one else has." 

He looked at me seriously with an angry face on him " Whats different about us?" he growled out. "I don't know, but he said we have abilities and we could never find out about them. That was all I heard. Ares no matter what you do, you can't mention this to anyone, not Apollo, not Hermés, definitely not Zeus. No one can know that we know. You cant trust anyone right now" He nodded at me with a look of understanding. "I just don't understand why he never tol-" He looked over my shoulder and stopped speaking, I followed his gaze and saw that Apollo was making his way towards us with his breakfast.

"Hows everyone doing this fine morning" he said in a chipper tone. We nodded back at him, not in the mood for the positive energy he brung with him. He took the hint and didn't say much else, we just ate in silence. My mouth wasn't saying anything but there were a thousand thoughts going through my head right now, and I knew that the same was going on for Ares. "So does anyone want to do something today?" Apollo suggested to both of us. "Actually we can't today, We leave tomorrow to seek out LIVE , we have meetings with Zeus today so we aren't free, but maybe we can do something tonight if you'd like?" I countered his offer. With a small look of disappointment he nodded his head "Sure, text me when you're free" he said questioningly, "Of course" I nodded as I stood up and discarded of my tray. "We should get going, we have a meeting in ten minutes" Ares reminded me. "Bye Apollo, we'll see you later" I waved to him as we left. 

"Okay Ares, the meetings with Zeus, you need to make sure you don't bring up anything that I've told you this morning" I warned him with a serious tone in my voice.

"Of course I wont, come on Ath I'm not that stupid" he responded a bit annoyed that I'd even suggest that he would've blabbed. We walk up to Zeus' office and gave a hard knock on the solid oak door. We heard Zeus' signature grunt which meant enter, with a final glance at Ares we entered the Office. 

"Morning Athena, Morning Ares." Zeus boomed through the room. 

"Morning Zeus" we nodded in unison. He stared at us deeply for a second, almost as if he was trying to figure us out. The stare felt like it was intensifying every second making my heart thump, did he know? , did someone hear us talking this morning?, did he see me in here?, a million questions were going through my head but they were interrupted by Zeus' face breaking into a smile. I smiled back hesitantly before he began speaking "So.. I want you both to know that I'm very impressed with you both. I don't want you to go yet I still see you as two troublesome babies, it feels like only yesterday your parents gave you two to OLYMPIA." I glanced towards Ares to see his face turning red, Ares hated nothing more than being lied too, I could see he was holding back from unleashing his vicious words on Zeus. " You're both so grown up now. I know we haven't always had a great time together and there was of course the small matter of the -" Zeus stopped to clear his throat before carrying on with a tense voice "- incident"  he stated obviously referring to me running away from OLYMPIA. 

"But now that you're both 18, theres some things you should have. These are things that your parents gave us when they handed you over, souvenirs, if you will" he continued before grabbing a box from his safe and handing it to us. "Theres something in there for the both of you". I grabbed the shiny necklace that was clearly meant for me, It was beautiful. I put it on and wondered over to the mirror "Im never taking this off" I smiled to both of the men in the room. I glanced over at Ares and saw him holding a silver chain with a small blue and white eye charm, we both studied the charm "Its the 'evil eye'  it's meant to ward off evil spirits and bad luck. Keep both of these necklaces safe, these meant everything to your parents." Zeus clarified our confusion. 

"We don't have much longer together today so I need to give you these" he pulled out two big brown envelopes. "Mission Briefs, in these folders is every thing we know about LIVE, including possible locations, coordinates, and dome numbers" Zeus told us before sliding over the envelopes. I pulled out the paper eagerly awaiting to see everything we had been training for. 

"Ares, Athena. I need you both to leave now, Persephone is waiting for you both in the infirmary, we need one more dose of blood from you both before you leave, then you'll need to head to the lab. They've been focused on making some gadgets and tech for you both for when you leave. Once the appointments are over at the infirmary and the lab, then you're free for the rest of the day. Maybe you should go see Hermés, Im sure he'll want to see you both before you leave" Zeus said to us.

We both nodded at him before turning on our heel and leaving promptly. "I'll come and see you both tomorrow before you leave" he shouted quickly from behind us. I looked back to smile at him but Ares carried on stomping out the room.

We shut the door before both sharing a look between each other "Are you okay?" I asked him with a worried tone. He looked at me briefly before returning to stare at the wall "He's a liar, he lied to us our whole lives. All the shit about our parents giving us up to him, it was never true and he knew that. I just need to go cool off somewhere. I'll come and find you later okay?" he walked off before waiting for my response. 

 I just stood there staring at my brother storming down the corridor, with a hefty sigh I made my way to my room to sit and read through the brief that Zeus had given us.