Chapter Nine- Sorry

Look I know i said this would be out days ago but you know things happen and then other things have to wait. Anyway, here it is chapter nine of Hero's Core. 
Side note: I won't be saying when the next thing will be coming out because I have a bad habit of breaking those dates. You could ask pretty much any of my friends, or family member nothing I do is pre planned or generally on time when i do plan things out. So from now on just check the blog daily and hopefully something new will be up.
So for now enjoy this chapter!
P.S. It's a long chapter!

Chapter 9

Changing Wings

Raven

I didn’t like the idea that I was vulnerable to the deception of Toxin again. Omega had taught me about a year ago how to block out any attempts to get into my mind. It was annoying to think that he had come up with a new way to get into my mind alone. None of the others were affected by it, which made me a little uneasy. And the way that Toxin was talking to Apollo and Eos had given me this feeling like something was off about that. They seemed to all know each other quite well. I didn’t know whether that was a good or a bad thing but I was going to find out later anyway.

Later after I woke up I had been crying with Chelsea. It felt so nice to know that she was safe again and that she was alive and home with me. The team has agreed to let her stay at the cave with us for a while until we can work something more definite out for her.

“ I’m so glad your okay!” I remember saying to her. She had bandages wrapped around one of her arms and stitches above her right eyebrow. It must have gotten split at some point when I was unconscious. Probably during the fight with David. According to Scar she had held her own during the fight. This didn’t really surprise me thought because once I was taken into protective custody so was she. We had both been taught by Omega how to defend ourselves if needed. It wasn’t until later that I had showed Frostfire my powers and became her apprentice.

“ Me too little cousin. I missed you so much. I thought you had given up on trying to find me!” She confessed to me as she lay next to me on the bed in the infirmary. I was still remembering the conversation.

I needed to go and get some air.  It was doing my head in being locked up.  A few of the Heart heroes came by to see how I was doing and had all agreed that staying inside and resting was going to fix me right up. I seemed to be the only one who liked the idea of going outside during this weather anyway.  I looked out the window in the lounging area and saw that it was raining a bit. I grabbed a coat and went to walk out side to go and find a tree to sit in.

“ Going somewhere?” Tahlia called out from behind me. Busted, I had to laugh as I turned around to see she was also wearing a coat and looked like she was about to go outside too.

“ Just to go outside and get some air, nothing to life threatening,” Clockwire laughed at that one and came to stand beside me.

“ I was just heading out as well. Mind if I join you? I always like to go and sit in a tree when it’s raining. Weird I know but something about just feels…” Clockwire glanced off as though in thought for a minute.

“ Calming? Yeah I do it too. I’ve been doing since before I was five. You know what they say, old habits die hard,” I laughed with Tahlia at that point. “ I’d love it if you’d come. You know just in case I drop out of the tree like a shot bird,” I laughed as a shocked look came onto Clockwire’s face.

“ Not funny! Especially after everything you’ve been through the last few days!” She said as she opened the door to go outside into the rain. I saw the perfect tree to sit in about four meters away from the door. It was a tall old oak tree with sturdy branches and loads of leaves.

I ran towards it and started to climb, following behind me was Tahlia who was keeping up quite well considering the she wasn’t known to be the fastest climber.

“So what’s going on with you and Lachlan hmmm?” Clockwire asked innocently. Somehow Apollo’s name had been leaked while I was unconscious. I laughed outright as she said it the smirk on her face showing through in the little light coming through the branches.

“Nothing’s going on. It’s complicated,” I leant back on my hands behind me. My legs were wrapped around the thick branch and my hand resting near the trunk of the tree where the branch was wider. Tahlia was on the branch next to me in the same sort of position except she was leaning forward.

“ So there is something going on between you two?” Her eyes were hopeful. I shook my head and smiled a little. It was as though she was a younger girl trying to see if her big sister had a boyfriend yet. It was funny because I had once been like that with Becca. Sometimes I still am, but I needed to be serious a lot more these days.

“ Not really, I mean we’re friends and everything’s cool. And I’m happy with that,” I didn’t look at her face as I spoke in fear the she might see right through my bluff and call me out.

“ But you want it to be more don’t you?” too late, I thought. She knew exactly what I was thinking. I heard rustling from below and put my hand over her mouth until I could see the red and blonde hair pop through the branches.

“ oh please don’t stop talking on my account, I would love to join in on this conversation. I spent an hour a few nights ago trying to explain to Cassie here just how much Lachlan likes her,” Tahlia started to giggle at this and Becca came and sat on the branch on the other side of me.

“ Please not this again. I am happy just being friends with him and from what he’s been acting like I’m guessing he’s fine with it too. I mean he practically admitted that he had seen part of the allusion of which I was making out with him in.” I got a few stares at that point. “ and he still didn’t seem to care about it. He just doesn’t like me like that okay. I even said to him that that was a part of the allusion that I had created and he was still all nonchalant about things. I mean what kind of guy does that?” so what? I was ranting to my friends again. There was nothing wrong with that.

Becca wrapped an arm around me and laughed. “ oh sweetie you got it bad don’t you?” Tahlia apparently can’t help but laugh at stuff like this cause she was about to fall out of the tree in fits of laughter.

“ Yes,” I whined at her. Tahlia brought herself together and apologised for laughing so much at me.  “ Look I get it okay, this is probably the most entertaining thing your gonna see for a while so get all the laughter out now,” I told her.

“ It’s not that, it’s just that I know that generally when guys are like that it means they’re into you. Maybe you just need to be more casual around him,” Clockwire suggested to me. I had never thought of that until now but then I realised he had only been acting weird since the team started. We had been so casual, as Clockwire put it, back then. I mean it was only a week ago but still it felt so far away to me.

“ Nah, he’s just not into me. And what’s the deal between him and Eos anyway, they seemed really close. Or at least they used to be,” I asked trying to change the subject a little, but failing miserably.

“ Nice try, those two are probably just old enemies who used to have a thing for each other but it was a forbidden love. Then as the star crossed lovers they were Apollo put Eos in jail. Or it could just be you imagining things again,” Becca laughed as she finished talking.  I thought about what she said, and realising how stupid I sounded even asking about it. So I joined in on her laughter followed by Clockwire.

“ You should honestly consider becoming an author Becca,” Clockwire told her while still laughing. I nodded in agreement. My phone started to play out my friends ringtone.

‘cause I’m fire starter, make your blood run faster, with hearts like water’ I hit the answer button and pressed the phone to my ear rolling my eyes at the two girls sitting infront of me lip singing the words of the song and over dramatizing it all.

“ You got Brooke,” I answered casually using my other name knowing Aria was on the other side of the call.

“ Hey, guess what? Jayden finally asked me out. So I was wondering if you would want to come out on a double date with us? You could bring Tyler or Jayden can get one of his mates to come with?” Aria was excited about this because she had been wanting to go out with Jayden all year. I was glad the guy had finally asked her out, but felt kind of sorry for him knowing what would happen if they managed to stay together longer than a week, beating the record for Aria’s longest relationship.

“ Um, sure but I might bring someone different,” I replied as she took a breath.

“ Oh goodie! Do I know said guy?” her voice was a little quieter now she had gotten all her excitement out.

“ No, you don’t but I’ve told you about him a few times,” Aria obviously picking up on who I meant just laughed.

“ So you and Lachlan huh? Never would of picked it. I thought you two were just mates?” I could practically hear her smirking on the other side of the phone call.

“ We are just friends so it will just be a friend thing. Look I got to go ok? Text me the deets and we’ll meet you there later,” I hung up before she could go on a full blown session of questions. The girl was the schools top journalism student after all.

“ Aria? I could hear her screaming down the phone again. So this double date of your that your going to ask Lachlan to go with you on…” Becca was cut short as Omega’s voice boomed out to the tree we were sitting in.

“ Everyone, we have a world wide problem, all heroes report to the HH in two minutes!”

“ It can wait,” I finished off for Becca jumping down from the tree and landing in a crouch on the ground. “ Guys, you heard him world wide problem!” The others jumped down a second later and we ran into the base to get changed into our gear and leave.

I got into my room and changed into my gear grabbing my half moon clip that folded out into a bow and put it in my hair. My quiver was slung over my back and I was out the door.

Apollo

The team was all standing in Heart Hall with all of the heroes from the HHC. I was standing in between Lumos and Raven who had now unclipped her bow and had it in its full form in her hand.

“ This is the group who have declared war against the heroes due to the fact we locked away Eos after getting Raven out of the coma she was in. The call themselves the Gods. All of them except Toxin are named after Greek gods or goddess and generally their powers are similar to that of which the name of the god they took,” Omega was briefing us all on the foes we were about to fight against. I however already knew all this because these people were my family. This was my fault and I didn’t want this to be happening.

“ But Eos was the Greek goddess of dawn. Her powers were over sun, so why was Eos the con using that name?” Scar asked, it showed that he was a quick study. He had been flipping through a thick book on Greek gods and goddesses while we were in the briefing. Obviously this was going to be useful for them all.

“ I can answer that,” I spoke up and raised a hand to show I was the one speaking. “ Her name is Ebony, so she thought because her name was similar she would just use that name. Besides she liked how the goddess’s roman form was named Aurora,” I finished looking down.

“ How do you know that?” Knight said from the side of the room standing beside his dad.

“ She was an old friend before she went bad, that how I knew where to find her when we needed her to fix Raven. I don’t trust her though, she tried to kill me eight times last month alone. She has a grudge against me for not being on her side with the Gods,” I explained, the lie easily falling from my tongue. One thing I had learnt quickly when becoming a hero is that you need to be a good liar. My family had a gift for never getting caught out on a lie, a gift of which I was grateful for.  That and the increased strength.

“ We will be going up against them in groups. Mentors and Apprentices will work together along side another couple of pairs. The groups are shown above, find your group and head to the location stated below your group,” Omega ordered and walked towards Raven and Frostfire. Soon follow were Whitenoise and her mentor Treble who joined the two pairs. They left straight away for the Zeta plates and left to go get the douches whom I am related to.

Lumos grabbed my arm and pulled me towards Knight and his dad. We were followed by Phoenix and Flameshore.

“ We’re heading out to Crystost. There’s a stronger group there and they’re calling for all of our blood. Especially yours Apollo. Someone named Helius keeps calling you brother and a girl named Selene saying she’s your sister,” Phoenix said to me. I snagged a quick glance at Lumos. He was the only one who knew the complete truth about my family. Sure, the HHC knew that there were cons in my family, they just didn’t know my family was some of the worst criminals around.

“ Probably because my name is from the Greek legends too. Helius was Apollo’s honorary brother because they were both gods of the sun. Apollo took over running the chariot from Helius. Selene was Helius’s sister, she was the goddess of the moon, before Artemis, Apollo’s twin sister, took over,” I explain the legend to them before they could ask any more questions. I was so close to telling the team about my past the other day back in the kitchen but when I chickened out I thought I was going to be okay. But now, with my family going on a rampage, today was definitely going to push me, and my lie telling skills to the limit.

“ Well, that makes sense. We should go before anyone one gets seriously hurt,” Flameshore said as she headed over to the zeta plate and set it to the location we were heading to. The rest of us followed and hopped up onto the plates and waited for it to shoot us all half way around the country.

Within the next minute we were standing on an identical plate in a deserted building. I could hear in the distance the sounds of cars being thrown around the streets and their alarms going off. People were screaming and running around like crazy. It was fair though they were being attacked by what could be argued as maniacs. Though no one could say I hold a grudge against my family. I mean its not as though any of them have hurt me. Much anyway.

“ Come on you lot, we have some serious damage control to do. Apollo and Lumos, you two take down any of the guys on the east side of the city. Knight and Samurai, you two are taking the west side of the city, that leaves the north and the south to us. Are all of you guys clear?” Flameshore turned to us taking control once again. Even though she was in the apprentice position in the partnership, she was willing to take complete control of the situation. She had been accepted into the HHC a few months ago, before the idea of the team was even brought up. That and she is also turning twenty in a few weeks. She was seen as too old for our team now anyway.

“ Who put you in control? Last I checked you’re just a newbie on the core anyway,” Knight was running his mouth again. Who could blame him though if anyone was going to be in charge here you would think that maybe Phoenix or Lumos would be the ones to take control seeing as they were founding members of the core. It was understandable. But I had no problem being told what to do as long as it let me kick my family’s butts.

“ No, she’s right we discussed a plan on the way to the Heart Hall. That was exactly the plan we had chosen, if there is any problems I suggest you leave them alone because we really need to get these guys before the rip this place apart,” Phoenix turned to knight and glared up at him. He was at least a full foot taller than her which was remarkable seeing as he was still growing.

Knight for once didn’t have a snarky remark to  yell back at her and instead pulled his dad out the door to go and fight my family.

“ Okay, well we better go,” Lumos said exiting the building and heading to the east with me hot on his heels. This is going to be one hell of a day, I thought to myself. I was going to have to face down my brother and sister.

We were half way down through the city when I felt this tingling on the back of my neck. This meant that either my sister was watching me or that there was a telepath in the area.

“ Selene, I know your up there!” I yell out to the building to the right of me. Sure enough, a girl in a half toga top and dark grey leggings jumped down landing infront of me on the ground.

“ Always had a gift for knowing where I was didn’t you,” She looked up at me smiling sweetly. Another old trick she used to use on me when we were younger. She would use it to try and get me to do something for her. Back then I would generally give in, but these days I knew better than to fall for it.

“ Lumos go ahead, I’ll catch up,” I turned my head slightly as I spoke. Mainly so my sister could tell that I wasn’t going to give into her this time.

“ Make sure you do, don’t entertain your sister too long. Remember what happened last time,” Lumos gave me a look that told me he really didn’t want to go in case something was going to happen, lets say an ambush. It’s happened in the past, my family just doesn’t seem all too keen on me being a hero.

“  I know Lumos, I’ll be careful,” I reply as he leaves. “ Just you and me sis, now why are you all doing this. I know the deal with our family’s little outings, they don’t happen like this unless there is an important prize,” I kept talking knowing that if I stopped she would pounce.

“ Brother dearest, can’t the family just come together to torment some innocent people with no reason?” She jumped behind me about to strike when I flipped away kicking her in the face as I did so.

“ No, never have, never will. What’s the deal?” I needed to keep her distracted a little. I knew if we stopped talking she would focus, and when Selene was focused she was deadly.

“ It’s funny that you think you know so much about the family when the fact is that you left it to go and join the ones we were born to be fighting against. But no matter, you will come home eventually,” Selene came up to take another shot at me. This time she managed to get the shot to hit me on the elbow as I blocked it.

She was strong, but not as strong as me.

“ Whatever you say little sister, or is it Bethany? Do you even use that name any more? Does it mean anything to you?” I continued to block her hits knowing she would wear herself out soon enough.

“ Of course I do, but you have no right to use it,” She said the same thing Ebony had. Eos, Selene, Helius, my family had a bad habit of changing their names to become something worse then what they already were.

“ Back to my previous question then, what’s the plan? What are you all going to gain from this little attack on the world?” I hit her in the stomach just below her belly button.

“ You,” getting up from the blow to her stomach she got up and swung into a kick the connected with my face. It matched the bruise that was forming on her face from where I had hit her earlier. “ We fight because we know that you will have to give in and come join us. There are too many of us, even if the core and your team are fighting together. You know as well as the rest of us, our family is huge, and we all fight on the same side,” that was it. I smacked her to the ground knocking her on conscious. I tied her to a pole with her feet and hands bound so she wouldn’t be able to escape . At least not without a struggle.

I headed towards the centre of the city, knowing that's where my family would want to strike the hardest. They were always all about a show. And where better to put on a show then in the centre of the city?

“ Brother, how nice of you to join us!” the deep voice came from the left. I knew then and there who it was, Aaron, my older brother.

“ Aaron, always a pleasure. Care to spar?” I asked turning to see the smirk left on my brothers scarred face. From our last fight, didn’t realise I had got him that badly, I thought to myself blocking a punch from him and returning it.

“I see you admiring your handy work. Never thought you had it in you to be honest,” He was smirking again at the fact I could see the scar. It was a deep gashing sort of scar that went from the right side of his nose the edge of his top lip on the left side. I had given it to him when I was fighting him sword on sword a few months ago. Hadn’t seen him since then though.

“Well, when your brother is threatening your life a person tends to defend themselves,” I try not to gag at the fact that he seemed so pleased by the fact I had given him such a horrid thing. I probably shouldn’t be saying things like horrid because it doesn’t sound manly but in my place its what it seemed. There was no other way to describe that scar.

For the next half an hour we fought in silence. Constant dodging and striking. Like an old routine that our grandfather would have us do whenever we visited them. But I got lucky, I hit him in the hip near an old injury and sent him to the ground.

“ Still got a bad hip I see,” I smirked and said it in such a way anyone who was watching would have thought I was the bad person in this fight.

“ You got lucky, you weren’t aiming for my hip at all,” he replied trying to move but found that he couldn’t. As he went down, I had hit a few of his pressure points paralysing him for a while. I had won this round.

“Call off the attack and I will make sure that they let Ebony out of the prison early,” a complete bluff, lie, whatever you wanted to call it but this had to stop. From the corner of my eye I could see that Samurai and Phoenix were cornered by five of my cousins and a couple of my uncles. Lumos and Knight weren’t doing much better either, both hurt and bleeding. Flameshore seemed like the only one in our group that was still able to fight at a strong force.

“ No, your lying. You know I’ve always been able to see through those little lies of yours,” He’s right, there is no way to stop this unless you join them. I thought to myself. I knew that if our group was doing bad, nobody else could be doing much better No, there is always a way out of these situations, there is always a way to make them comply to the needs of others. The logical side of my brain was working in overtime trying to find a way to make my family give up.

“What do you want?” I had asked my sister but she could have easily been lying. You never know what goes through the mind of a villain in this world. Especially if there last name is Theos.

“ We want you back with the family,” Helius smirked at me as he started to move. The paralysation was starting to wear off.

“ Family? So what if you guys have names that come from Greek mythology? You guys aren’t really a family,” Flameshore shouted out as she was taking down the last of my cousins that had cornered her. She was throwing punch after punch and connecting her fist with their faces with each one she threw.

“ They don’t know, well that is a surprise. I wonder what would happen if I told them,” Helius seemed to be getting rather cocky at the fact that the HHC and core didn’t know that we were actually a family.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Knight spat towards my brother. I smiled to myself at the fact that they still believed this was all just another ploy Helius was using.

“ Go on then, tell them. See what will happen, because I am nothing like you!” I shout at him pulling my arm back ready to punch him out like I did with Selene. I was practically begging him to do it because it would just give me another reason to beat him black and blue.

“ Tell us what?” Phoenix spoke out towards us as she shot a flame out and flew forward to come and help me.

“ We’re related,” I felt all the heads turn towards myself and my brother who just sat there smirking like a maniac. So, I punched him as hard as possible in the nose. Satisfied by the loud crunching sound I watched him fall back to the ground again.

“ Wait I thought you said that that was just them using the Greek god things as an excuse to call you their brother?” Samurai piped up while knocking out the last of my family members in the city.

“ I lied okay? I was going to tell the team first before I told you guys. But its not like nobody knew, I mean Lumos knows and Omega which probably means that Scar knows too,” I tried to find another excuse for why I kept it a secret but I just couldn’t find any.

“ Why did you do it?” Flameshore asked tying up a few of my cousins. I had to laugh because I honestly didn’t have an answer.

“ I don’t know, I guess I was scarred that one day I would end up like them or that you wouldn’t trust me as much knowing that my whole family tree is a con,” I felt her put a hand on my shoulder. I didn’t know it was a way to keep me calm or herself.  Whatever it was for it also meant that if I for some reason started, or tried to, attack them, then Flameshore could keep me in place.

“ You should have told the rest of us. I understand that you were scared by the fact we might reject you,” Phoenix started. But Knight just had to butt in because he wouldn’t be himself if he didn’t.

“ Or lock you up,” he smirked at himself thinking that it was a smart comment. Phoenix thought not.

“ No we wouldn’t have,” she glared daggers at the younger man standing beside her. “ But honestly did we seem so confronting or biased that we wouldn’t let you prove yourself to us?” finally getting to finish what she was originally trying to say.

“ No it’s just that I didn’t want to end up like the rest of my family,” I was hoping I wouldn’t have to explain anything more. But I knew that that was probably never going to happen.

“ Look can we just talk about this when everyone can hear it, right now I don’t feel like explaining my actions twice. So, can we just go back to the hall to meet up with the others?” I was hoping now that they could hear the desperation in my voice.

“ Of course we can,” Phoenix took my arm and started pulling me towards some of my cousins and uncles to take them to the hall so we could send them off to the John Gordan Penitentiary. Hopefully where they would all rot. But I doubted that they would be there long. Somehow the cons that got sent there always got out early on ‘good behaviour’.

“ Thank you,” I tried to bring a small smile to my face. But to no avail.

Within the next couple of hour everyone had brought back their groups of cons from the raid against

“ That's the last of them Omega,” Scar reported back to him and then came to join the rest of our little team. As I looked around to see what everyone was doing I noticed that all of the HHC members who had been in our group were huddling together and seemed deep in conversation. I had to look away to stop all the unreasonable thoughts from overloading my brain.  I looked to what the rest of the team was doing. Whitenoise and Scar were playing some sort of half wrestling half tickling game, while Knight looked like he was trying out some pick up lines on Clockwire. And sitting in the corner was Raven who was on her phone and looked to be texting someone.  Wonder who? I smirked to myself feeling someone’s eyes on the back of my head. I turned around to see White giving me this look that said, Check yourself before you wreck yourself.

That's when Whitenoise and Scar came over to sit with me.

“ You know she wants to invite you out to a thing with her friend and her friends boyfriend right?” Scar whispered in my ear. I laughed a little because only he would be able to get away with telling someone something like that without getting into major trouble.

 I turned and spoke to him in my regular tone,“ Shouldn’t she be the one to tell me that?”

“ Shouldn’t who be telling you what?” Raven came and sat on White’s lap. Which made Scar laugh a little.

“ Don’t worry Cee, we were just mucking around a little,” Becca gave a smirk and winked at Scar. They couldn’t have been more obvious about the fact we talking about her. Just what I needed to top things off today. I had to force myself to think straight again because random thoughts were filling my mind about whether Raven would ask me to this thing or whether Scar and White had some kind of crazy prank/plot thing going on again.

“ Everyone, we need your attention. I believe that Apollo has something he needs to share with the rest of us,” Omegas voice boomed through the hall in a single tone which demanded attention

Showtime.

 I told you it was a long one. This chapter is just under nine pages long.  Please comment so I can make things even better because i don't know what to improve on if you don't! You can also email me at roseinthorns16@gmail.com so please please please comment and tell me what you think should happen in Hero's core!

Bye For Now!