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Chapter 2. Getting prank-called by a god
The air tingled their skin, making it crawl under their cold breath, but instead of feeling fear, Frankie felt ecstatic; their hair danced with the wind's flow and they moved quickly.
Adrenaline was flooding their senses, running, was liberating. A sense of liberation made its way through them.
When they ran out of breath, Frankie stopped, but not before searching for a water source.
Luke had told them that Kronos managed all messages sent inside the army's headquarters. So he advised Frankie to go outside and call their mother there.
The sun shone brightly, slightly bothering their eyesight; Frankie approached a nearby lake with caution, maybe some guards were scouting the area.
They summoned their gauntlets and surveyed their surrounding. And they sighed with relief when no one was around. They put away their gauntlets.
Frankie took a long time to take out the drachma Luke had given them. And when they fished it out of their pocket, they traced the outlines of the coin; they thought about what they wanted to say to their mother, it had been so long since they'd seen her face.
They had managed to create some mist that turned into the image of a rainbow. Everything was ready, now the real question was if they were ready.
And with a mind full of words, Frankie tossed the coin into the lake.
"Oh Iris, goddess of the Rainbow, please accept my offering," They knelt beside the rainbow. "Please, show me, Helen Werner, please."
The rainbow stood still as if waiting for something, Frankie hoped they could still talk to their mother; maybe it was too late, maybe they shouldn't have come to Kronos's army, maybe...
Colors flashed in a whirlwind of misty clouds but after a while, Frankie could decipher their mother's face; she looked tired and older; she had cut her hair into a pixie cut and her eyes seemed clouded with thought. She was silently fighting with a plastic dummy.
"Mom..." They tried to reach for her but the mist parted slightly when their fingers tried to touch the image.
She turned around, her fists were prepared to fight. But she looked straight into Frankie's eyes, and she smiled with pure joy. "Frankie." It was like she hadn't said their name in so long.
They smiled widely, it felt so great to see her again. "Hi, mom"
Helen's figure approached her child's image. "Where are you? What have you been doing? I am so mad at you right now, you know that right?"
Their mother looked pissed but in a worried way, they noted how her eyebags had grown while they were away.
"I've been busy with some things, sorry for not going back home, it's just that I had to stay. I swear that I'll visit you when I can, but I'm so-"
