Althaia

Chapter 17

"Here."

Adelfo handed me the fatigue uniform.

"I'm scared." I whispered.

He laughed,"You're the one who's scary, Persephone."

He was nervous being around me.

I slumped back in the seat and kept my thoughts busy.

The plan was for me, Atlhaia and Adelfo to infiltrate the UF's army base and use Adelfo's borrowed power on Hades. The one he used on Nikolai to suppress his powers, a manipulator type that turns off the switch of our powers. A very useful and dangerous type.

We have to incapacitate Hades before he could call back up, I don't know how much training Hades has done but I'm nervous on what the outcome would be.

We will leave him there afterwards and wait for the fight to ensue.

The others already left, Adelfo, Althaia and I are left inside the make shift bunker we improvised near President Makoto's mansion.

"I'm gonna start cutting your hair, Persephone."

I closed my eyes.

This is for my family, my friends, Magus and Hades.

A few minutes passed, I went to check in the mirror, "Look at you."

Atlhaia approached me and grasped my arm and tightened her grip.

Both of us were scared.

"I don't know if I did a good job but this should do the trick, you'd blend in quite well."

I couldn't respond.

Adelfo looked at Althaia, "Althaia, remember. If you see Magus, or anyone you know from the army, just act normal."

She nodded.

I looked at her and I didn't notice her hand holding mine.

This is reality, this is not some nightmare we can just wake up from anytime.

…

Surprise attacks are not allowed, stated in the warring rules, both sides should fight fair and once a rule has been broken, the other wins and will conquer that opposing side's land.

In a fair fight, if a side has 50% fatalities, the other wins.

A president can concede defeat but in this case, Hades has set his terms with no surrender and President Makoto has agreed.

He knows that Hades would still attack no matter what.

A few hours after Hades' army arrived, they'd settled in and made their base near the shores where the Bullet Express station is located.

Hades went to meet President Makoto at the Imperial Palace.

It's a formality within the warring rules as well.

We got inside the base, a few soldiers called Althaia out but it was nothing to panic about.

Althaia guided us to wear Hades is, as a soldier, they know where a certain area would be in a war base.

Soldiers scurried around the base, both the capitol police and the military mingled but there was a slight hint of hostility in the air.

As we were approaching the tent, a hand gripped my forearm and halted me to a stop.

"What are you three doing here?"

Magus.

"Don't intervene, Magus." Adelfo warned.

"I am a soldier of the United Front, and you are intruders. Tell me why I won't take you as prisoners of war?"

That hurt, but he was right.

Adelfo turned around to face Magus, I saw him reached out his hand and I couldn't see what happened next.

I looked at Magus and he was like a statue.

"What did you do?" Althaia asked.

"I borrowed Charles' power."

My heart raged as I heard his name, wait? What does he mean by Charles' power? Charles had a memory manipulation type power. What's this gotta to do with him?

Unless, he had two powers.

The way he killed my Dad!

"What happened to Magus?" I panicked.

"Calm down, he's okay. Charles can control certain processes of the brain, I paralyzed him but he can still hear us."

My eyes widened.

"So that's how he killed my Dad. He told controlled my Dad's brain to shutdown."

…

Charles wasn't a memory manipulation type power user, he was a different type of manipulator, the dangerous kind.

Like how Nikolai is a water type user, though he could control a lot of water or liquid related elements like snow, sweat and even blood.

Charles is like that.

Malvado is behind this again, Charles is an official low tier but his powers are high tier or even high to elite.

It was to hide the fact that he had someone like Charles in his sleeve.

Adelfo slowly dropped Magus' hand to his side, "Magus, your fault for butting in. You have to come with us now."

Althaia looked at her watch, "Its twelve noon, we have to move. War starts at one."

…

"Magus can sense life using the roots from the ground." I told Adelfo.

He looked at Magus, "Do what she said."

Magus' feet glowed, "He's alone."

"Wait, are you sure he's telling the truth?" I stared at Adelfo.

"I'm already controlling his entire being, I could make him strip here in front of us and he wont resist."

Instinct kicked in, my focus went straight to the entrance of the tent.

"You're underestimating me, Kore."

My skin crawled as the owner of the voice appeared.

"I am your twin brother, we shared the same womb. I could feel your presence from miles away."

"ALTHAIA! NOW!" Adelfo pushed Althaia towards Hades.

Hades caught Althaia, but Hades was caught off guard. Althaia dragged Hades down and forced her lips towards his, I noticed his eyes turned all white as soon he touched Althaia's lips.

Did they know Althaia would be one of Hades' weakness?

"Don't worry, Persie. I just knocked him out, I'm a poison type though all of my poisons are weak. He'll wake up in a few minutes."

We brought Hades inside the tent and had Magus guard the entrance.

Adelfo went to hide the tap somewhere on Hades' body, somewhere inconspicuous.

It's to monitor his location and the communication between he's allies.

"I already had his powers suppressed, though I'm not sure if he'd react in some violent way. He seemed so calm. Moreso when he saw you, he was expecting you too."

"I don't know him anymore, he's been unpredictable since we met again for the first time a few days ago"

Althaia was hovering around Hades' body.

"Are you worried for him?" I asked.

"Yeah, but honestly Persie, I feel guilty. I think it was something I said that made him surrender to the government."

"What do you mean?"

"We were talking the night before the capitol police and the guards from the Blue House came to the base. I'm a disgrace as a member of Epineo, I told Hades that it wasn't a bad idea that he'd be president. He could destroy the government from the inside, but I didn't put into consideration Harold Malvado."

It wasn't your fault. I thought.

I wanted to say it but I can't tell her about me being inside Hades' body.

"I don't think its because of that, Hades has always been a softie. He was probably sacrificing himself to let the heat off from the base. Since the government couldn't step inside, so they'd probably force their way in if he didn't surrender."

"I don't know but this guilt has been eating me from the inside, I wanted to tell you from the beginning but you seemed to so distant from the first time we met."

I wasn't distant, I was just wary because I saw you in one of my visions.

"He's gonna wake up, we have to leave." Adelfo reminded us.

Althaia went to stare at Hades' face one last time, "I hope we'd meet again." She whispered