He wakes up, to his baby sister.

Interlude 6 (continued)

“Jason, I need to talk to you.” Jason sat up in his bed, and almost knocked heads with Persephone who was leaning over him, shaking his shoulder.

“Percy!” He gasped, finally coming fully awake.

“I had a lucid dream.” She said simply.

“Okay, I’m up. Go wait for me in the living room.” He told her, and she nodded, padding quickly and quietly out of the room then closed the door behind her.

Jason sighed and scrubbed at his face. He checked the time on his phone, and saw that he’d only been asleep about an hour and a half. On a whim, he checked the MRE app.

Persephone Kelly

Relationship: Brother, Mentor

Prominent Attitudes (out of 100): Affection 82, Admiration 80, Playfulness 79, Trust 74, Loyalty 71, Love 70, Friendship 62, Submissiveness 55

Temporary Traits: Post-Divination Haze

“Oh, shit.” Jason tried to blink the blurriness out of his eyes. He glanced at Chloe, who was fast asleep, facing away from him. He considered waking her to share the new temporary trait, but decided against it. Instead, he got up, and padded into the bathroom to splash some water on his face, and then went downstairs to meet his sister, who was curled up mostly under one of the blankets they’d left on the couch earlier during the movie.

“Hey, you okay?” He asked as he sat down next to her and gently rubbed up and down her back.

She nodded, “It was a lot. Everything exploded.” She murmured.

“Like… a bomb explosion?” He asked.

“Something like that, but bigger, and slower. There was a black mare with five legs, and riding on her back was Johnny, a girl who kinda looked like a man, a goth doctor, and Jenny, and a big soldier girl, and an Indian girl…”

“Like Chloe?” He asked, and Percy shook her head.

“The ones with the dots.” She touched a finger to her forehead.

“Who else?”

“Twin girls, and a little Asian girl.”

“All of them were girls?”

She nodded, “Except for Johnny. A bunch of other girls I didn’t know. They were… twisted. Changed. Something was happening to them, like something out of a scary movie. And it was happening to me too!”

“That sounds like a lot of people for one horse.” Jason pulled her into his arms as she shuddered from the memories. After she’d mentioned having a panic attack the last time she’d tried this, he shouldn’t have suggested she do it again, he realized. But he needed to know if there was more. “Anything else you remember?”

She nodded, her nose pressed against his shirt. But then paused and pulled back, “There was a road with stars on it, and a woman standing there.”

He nodded, “A lot of women, it sounds like.”

But she shook her head, “This one wasn’t like the others. She was elegant, and sophisticated, and… so old, but she didn’t look old. And she was holding a leash that attached to sixteen collars, each on a dog of a different breed.”

“It wasn’t literal.” He told her. “Divinations don’t show you what will be, but give you insights into what might occur. Remember that, no one’s going to explode, or be twisted. Some of those people you saw may be metaphors for events. Keep that in mind. What’s more, it can’t hurt you, and obsessing about it will only make it more likely to occur. So, what do you think it means?”

She frowned, but shook her head again, and her eyes were becoming fully focused at last. “I don’t know. But that’s all I remember.”

“Well, now I’ll remember too. The five legs on the horse could refer to the five years you got from some of the other divinations. You also said there were sixteen dogs. That number might mean something too.”

She nodded, and looked up at him, “I think there were sixteen girls too in the explosion part, if you count me.”

“Do you think you were included or just observing them?”

“I think I was part of their group, I could sense I was being twisted like they were.”

“So the number sixteen is also probably important, though I’m not sure what it might mean.” She sighed, and looked down, so he continued, “Why don’t you go back to sleep, we’ll discuss it more in the morning, if you want.”

She nodded, and hugged him fiercely, then went to the kitchen for a glass of water, and made her way back up the stairs with Jason close behind. He watched her disappear into her room before slipping into his own room, and lay down on his bed.

Whatever it was Percy saw, it sounded very traumatic, but hopefully it was still pretty far off. At least 5 years.

Gradually, sleep took hold of him once again. And this time, he didn’t dream.