"Hydra..." I muttered in my sleep. "Fire..." I half woke up. What? Where am I? I thought. I tried to lift my head. "Huh?" I heard footsteps rushing towards me.

"She's awake! She's awake! Embeth, she's awake!" a familiar voice shouted.

"I can see that." a sarcastic but joyful voice remarked. "Persephone," Embeth gently said, touching my forehead. I groggily sat up and opened my eyes.

"Where am I?" my voice asked. Hades replied quickly.

"You're in the hospital, Persephone."

"What?" then I noticed the slight itching in my left cheek. I reached out to touch it.

"Persephone," Embeth quickly said. "Don't touch it." But not before I already had. Instantly, burning pain spread throughout my face. I dropped my hand.

"Ow! Ow!" I yelled. Then it all came back to me. The path. The bones. The hydra. All of it. Every single second. Well, not really, but the point is that I remembered everything. I remembered the fire. The flame.

"How badly was I burned?" I whispered.

"What was that?" Embeth asked.

"How badly was I burned?" I repeated, this time much louder. Embeth and Hades shared a glance.

"Uh, well, Persephone..." Hades began. I lost my temper.

"How badly was I burned?!" I shouted. Hades looked slightly taken aback.

"Persephone, you might not want to hear it," Embeth said.

"Just answer my question!"

"Alright! Alright!" Hades said. "The left half of your face was scalded terribly. We were able to heal only a little bit of it; quite a lot of bone is showing."

My mouth dropped open. I then winced at the pain.

"Careful there," Embeth soothed.

"Get me a mirror," I ordered.

"Persephone..." Hades trailed off.

"Just get me a mirror! I need to see what I look like." Hades still looked reluctant to go get one.

"Just do as she says, Hades," Embeth said gently. "She'll need to get used to her appearance anyway," Embeth added, still softly, but with a note of authority. Hades ran off. Embeth quickly walked over to the door and shut it soundly.

"Persephone, you won't be the same," she started. I cut her off before she could speak again.

"You aren't talking about physically, correct?" I asked. She shook her head.

"No," she said quietly. "I'm not. I'm talking about the emotions you will endure." She leaned a bit closer to me. "Persephone, you just got half of your face burned off. It's understandable if you don't want to go within ten feet of fire, or any hydras for that matter." I cut her off one more time.

"I'm going to 'wear' it with pride, Embeth. I'm not ashamed of it. In fact, I think it'll look cool." She shook her head again.

"But others might not. Bullies will take notice of you. They will ridicule you. They will do anything in their power to make you feel embarrassed, no matter how proud of it you are." I smiled.

"I'm used to it. I'm used to the teasing. I've had plenty of it back home. Even though Mom tried to keep me from the outside world, it was in vain. I've sneaked out plenty of times. Trust me, Embeth, I'll be fine. But I'll be careful and try not to let their words affect me. All you have to do is not worry."

She looked slightly incredulous, but agreed.

"I won't worry if you promise not to land yourself in trouble."

I opened my mouth to reply 'yes' when the door burst open, Hades rushing in.

"Here..." puff of breath. "You..." puff of breath. "Go..." puff of breath. He held out the mirror to me.

"Hades," I said, taking the mirror. "How about you sit down?"

He nodded and ran/walked to the chair. Closing my eyes, I brought the mirror up to my face.

"Here goes nothing," I muttered. I opened my eyes. A girl-definitely in need of a shower-stared back at me. The majority of the left side of her face was complete bone. The flesh side of her face looked gaunt. Her skin-already charred looking-was covered in blisters, and scars, the most prominent scar reaching from the middle of her forehead to the end of her right eye. Her golden, silky hair was a frizzy mess and matted in several places. Her eyes-which were once apple green-looked yellow and grey, as well as bloodshot.

"That's me," I whispered, unbelieving. "That's really me,"

"Yes, Persephone. I'm sorry," Embeth said, worry in her eyes. Hades was still wheezing in the chair.

"I look..." I paused for a moment, looking for the right word.

"Completely gross, but the skeleton part is awesome!"

Both Hades and Embeth looked very surprised. "What? I think it's cool! Wait till I tell Amaryllis! She's going to be so jealous!" I grinned.

"That wasn't expected," Hades muttered. I kept grinning.

"If that's what you really think," Embeth said, "Then go on and show the world." Hades looked curious as to what she was talking about.

"Nothing, nothing," she said as she brushed his inquiring looks away. "Come on, let's let Persephone rest." She dragged Hades out of the room, shutting the door behind her.

I sighed and did as told. Falling back onto my pillow, I closed my eyes.

"I can't find her anywhere!" Demeter wailed. They were in a vast wasteland, surrounded by nothing but desert scrub.

"Calm down," Hecate said. "We will find her."

Demeter sighed and said, "But we have looked everywhere! Where else can we go?" Hecate thought for a moment.

"We could always go to Helios. Being the sun god and all, he pretty much sees everything that happens."

Demeter brightened.

"You're right!" she said. Hecate bowed. "Let us go!" Demeter cried and disappeared. Hecate facepalmed. Honestly, her friend could be way too overdramatic, she thought, and followed after Demeter.

~

Later, Demeter could be seen arguing with Helios.

"Please, Helios, tell me where my daughter is!"

"Thou wilt be searching for thine daughter. Thou might want to stop. Thy daughter is having fun at the place she was now. She wilt resent you a lot."

"Please, Helios. Cut out your thee, thine nonsense stuff. Just please tell me where my daughter is!"

"I did not. Thine has already scarred."

"JESUS CHRIST JUST TELL ME WHERE SHE IS!" Demeter yelled. Helios looked startled. Demeter glared.

Paeonia popped up out of nowhere.

Demeter shrieked and almost fell over.

"You're talking about Persephone? Hmmm. I think the last time I saw here was when she was pulled into the Earth. I mean, it was all really fuzzy, but I'm pretty sure that some dude just like popped up, snatched her, and went back down. And I'm not sure how I know this, but somehow Zeus was involved." She disappeared as fast as she had appeared. Helios looked like he was not happy. Demeter looked like she was still processing what Paeonia had said. And Hecate, well, Hecate was just standing off in the corner, smiling.

I woke up to alarms blaring.

I could hear people rushing around outside of my room. There was shouting and screaming. Wanting to know what was going on, I attempted to get out of bed.

"Ow, ow, ow!" I yelled. As soon as I had tried to stand up on my own two feet, I had fallen to the ground.

Hades ran in, panicking.

"What's happening?" I asked.

"Oh no. Let me help you up." he said, trying to lift me up.

"I can get up just fine," I snapped. "What's going on?" Embeth chose that very moment to rush in.

"Dearie, are you feeling alright? These alarms are not very good and everything's so hectic and..."

I hauled myself up.

"What's going on?" I asked again. Hades and Embeth continued to blabber on about random things.

"OH FOR GOODNESS SAKE WHAT THE HECK IS HAPPENING?" I yelled, frustrated. Embeth and Hades stopped talking and looked at me.

"I'm sorry, dearie," Embeth apologized.

"I as well," Hades said. "Apparently the alarms are blaring because demons are attacking."

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