Teenage Rosalia and her twin brother, Noah, have lived on the Princess Andromeda as long as they can remember. They were told that their parents abandoned them on the ship's doorstep because they didn't want them. But when Rose overhears an astounding conversation, her life changes forever - and not for the better. Soon, Rose and Noah have uncovered some dark secrets that just may have been better off hidden. --Sparrowsong 18:23, January 9, 2010 (UTC)
Chapter One[]
It was Sunday afternoon, and everyone on the Princess Andromeda was mostly minding their own business. Some of them were talking to their friends, or practicing with swords. It seemed like an ordinary day.
Rose sat in a corner, listening to her iPod. She was sucking on a strand of her hair; it was her bad habit, like how some girls bit their nails or popped their zits.
"Hey, Rosie," her brother greeted.
She turned the music off and took her headphones out.
"Oh, hi, Noah," she said. "What's up?"
"Not much," Noah replied. "I kinda wish you would have a social life, though, sis."
"It's not my fault I'm so shy," she scoffed.
In return, he smirked and his eyes twinkled.
The twins looked quite a bit alike. Noah had very pale skin (almost pale enough to pass for an albino), black hair, and electric blue eyes with hints of green. Rose had dark hair, too, but her eyes were more of an ice-blue. She was frequently told how penetrating they were. And of course, her skin was also pale, though not quite as much as Noah's. They were even paler then most of the ship's inhabitants; nobody really got a lot of sunshine. Rose sort of liked the dark, though. It was creepy and mysterious.
"Thanks for stealing this for me, by the way." She was referring to her iPod. Noah was a kleptomaniac, as was she, but he stole more often.
"No problem, Rose."
Later that night, Rose couldn't sleep. She had the uneasy feeling that something terrible was about to happen, and it didn't feel like it was just her ADHD. She decided to look around, even though she knew the ship was infested with monsters.
She did a double take when she heard her name coming from a door she just walked by. She crouched down and listened.
It was Luke Castellan's voice, and he sounded deep in thought. Rose always thought that he looked a bit like herself and her brother, as well as sharing their last name, so when she was younger she'd always ask about that. He said it was because they were second-cousins; their father was his cousin.
"I sometimes feel a bit guilty, taking them from their mother like that," Luke said. "But, what does it matter? Better to have them raised here then be pawns of the gods like all those other half-bloods."
Rose heard a woman giggle.
"If those kids haven't figured out you're their father by now, I don't think they ever will."
The teen gasped, quite loudly.
"What was that?!" Luke shouted.
"I don't know!" the woman exclaimed. "We'd better go check, it could be an intruder!"
Rose felt the door start to open, and she quickly bolted. But Luke and the woman already saw her.
"Rosalia May Castellan!" he yelled. "Get back here this instant!"
Nobody ever called her by her full name, unless she was in deep trouble. She still ran, though.
She shook her brother awake.
"Noah, Noah, you have to get up!"
Groggily, he opened an eye.
"What are you so worked up about at three in the morning?"
She panted, then explained to him what she'd heard. He gasped and his blue-green eyes got huge.
"We have to run away," he stated.
She nodded in agreement.
Luke started pounding on the door, yelling at Rose and telling her to come out.
"F**k off!" she screamed while barricading the door.
Noah stuffed their suitcases and bags full of everything that they needed. Then they climbed out the window just as Luke managed to open the door.
"They're getting out through the window!" Luke hollered.
After briefly raiding the refridgerator, the twins prayed to the gods and jumped off the ship. They swam to shore as quickly as possible, avoiding the many sharks and fish they saw. Even Rose, who was always the daredevil, trembled a bit.
They spent the night in a graveyard. Rose fell asleep thinking I can't believe Luke lied to us! And kidnapped us from our mother!
Chapter Two[]
The next morning, the twins woke up and headed downtown, to get further away from the ship.
"I still can't believe it," Noah sighed.
"Me neither. They say the grass is always greener on the other side, and that's definitely right. On the ship, we were spoiled rotten. We got what we wanted, when we wanted it, and we were never disciplined. We had nice green grass and now we have dead weeds. No house, no food, no money, nothing. I somehow doubt anyone'll rent an apartment to two fourteen-year-old runaways."
Noah nodded, agreeing with his twin.
Rose saw her reflection in the window of a shop. Her hair was disheveled, her clothes were torn, her face was dirty, and she had dark shadows under her bloodshot blue eyes. She looked like a homeless girl.
Eventually, they came to a store that nobody else seemed to see. It looked a bit like a supermarket and an abandoned warehouse at the same time. It had a sign on it that read "WELCOME TO GOD-MART."
Rose thought that sounded familiar, but she shook it off. At least it looked safer than the Princess Andromeda.
They noticed a lot of strange-looking people there. Rose spotted an astoundingly beautiful blonde woman holding hands with a tough-looking man, an important-looking woman with long black hair and unnaturally grey eyes, and many others.
"Hey, Noah," she whispered to her twin. "Why does that one guy have a snake on his shoulder?"
Noah briefly glanced at the man. He looked a lot like Luke.
"I dunno," he shrugged.
After swiping some groceries (strangely, the alarm didn't go off), the twins went outside and begged for money.
While Rose took a piece of cardboard and wrote "DO YOU HAVE ANY MONEY TO SPARE FOR TWO STARVING, HOMELESS 14-YEAR-OLDS?" and drew a dollar sign, Noah took out a cup and begged passerbys for money.
"Hey, excuse me!" Noah called. "Any spare change?"
Most of them ignored him, though one boy did drop a penny in.
"Noah!" exclaimed Rose. "That's not how you beg for money! Here, you take the sign. I'll show you how it's done."
She was an expert mooch. Her ability to cry on command definitely helped.
She took the cup and started bawling like a baby while Noah waved the sign around.
Shoppers quickly came over and dropped money in.
Suddenly, the man who looked like Luke came over looking very worried.
He dropped seventy dollars in.
"Oh, thank you so much!" Rose cried.
She couldn't help but notice that he had ice-blue eyes, exactly like hers...
"What's your name?" the man asked, looking concerned.
Before the twins escaped, they almost never left the Princess Andromeda. But when they did get out, they were brainwashed to not do anything that could give them away. And if anyone asked their names, the story was that they were two poor, sweet innocent orphans named Nathaniel and Rosemary Smith and their "uncle," Luke Castellan, was taking care of them because their parents died in a fire. The twins actually had to fight an urge to say that.
Oh, well. What did it matter now?
"I'm...I'm Rosalia," the teenage girl replied, briefly hesitating. "Rosalia Castellan. And this is my brother Noah."
The man looked quite surprised when she told him what her last name was.
"I'm Hermes. Here, take these extra ten-thousand dollars."
Rose's eyes went huge when he actually handed them ten-thousand dollars. She'd never seen that much money in her life.
"Thanks."
"No need to thank me. Oh, and take this."
He handed her a piece of paper with "9-1-1" written on it.
"If there's ever an emergency - like someone's sick, or hurt, or there's a fire or an accident, or there's a burglar - call this number. Do you know how to use a phone?"
Rose nodded. Then she spotted none other than the man who she just found out was her father.
"Thank you so much!" she yelled while running away. "But we have to go now, we're being followed!"
Hermes stared after them. He still looked incredibly concerned for the teenagers.
The car Luke was driving chased after Rose and Noah as fast as possible. The twins ran until they could hardly breathe.
They couldn't take it anymore. They stopped to catch their breath. Unfortunately, that was just enough time for their pursuer.
Luke came up to them and flung Rose over his shoulder. She kicked, hit, yelled, and protested like never before.
"Help, help!" she screamed. "This man is trying to kidnap me!"
"Rosie!" Noah cried, lunging at Luke. But Luke managed to catch him, too.
Rose and Noah were thrown into the back of the car and quickly felt it speeding away. Once they were alone in a deserted alley, Luke pulled over, turned around and glared at them.
"You're in hot water," he hissed.
Chapter Three[]
Rose nervously giggled.
"S-sorry..." she stammered. "We were just p-playing hobos, and we got a little carried away. It was totally innocent, just a kid game."
"Playing hobos?" Luke repeated, scoffing. "I have a hard time believing that, Rosalia. You're fourteen. You haven't played games like that since you were eight."
She was suddenly very interested in her shoes.
"I...I..."
"Don't lie to me, Rosalia May," he said. "I thought I taught you that a long time ago."
Rose shook that memory away. She didn't feel like reminiscing about the simple life she had as a small child.
"Why did you run away?" Luke asked. Rose saw something in his eyes that looked like sadness. "Didn't you like the ship?"
"NO, you liar!" Noah shouted.
"Calm down, sweetheart," answered Luke. "I just want to know. Were you mad at me?"
"Yes, duh!" snapped Rose. "You lied to us. You stole us from our mom!"
Her father looked hurt.
"Rosalia, I did that out of love. She was a bad mother. She wasn't treating you well. She would have raised you to be another pathetic pawn of the gods, just like her."
Rose narrowed her eyes.
"What's her name?" she growled.
Luke looked down. For a second, Rose thought he was about to cry.
"Thalia Grace," he answered in a shaky voice. "Her name is Thalia Grace. Rosalia, Noah, you both remind me of her every day. You look so very like her. She has your black hair. Noah, you have her eyes. Exactly her eyes."
The twins fell into the trap just long enough. He started the car again, speeding incredibly fast.
Rose and Noah panicked, opened the door, and jumped out.
"Hey, come back!" Luke cried.
He stopped the car, got out, and ran after his son and daughter. He was stronger and faster than them, and they knew it.
Rose gulped.
He managed to catch up to the twins, grabbing both of them by the backs of their shirts.
"Help!" Noah yelled.
They squirmed away. Noah escaped, but Rose didn't.
Luke took a needle full of anesthesia and injected it into his daughter's neck. She screamed and tried to fight him, but it was no hope.
Her limbs got weak, and her eyelids suddenly weighed a thousand pounds. She finally gave up and let the drug do its job.
Luke gently carried her to his car. The last thing she heard before passing out was her brother's voice, screaming "ROSIE, NO!"
Rose woke up in her old room, on the ship. She could feel it slowly rocking.
She groaned and placed her hand on her forehead, still dopey from the anesthesia. Then she realized and loudly gasped, shooting up like a rocket.
"Shh," a man's voice said, pulling her back down onto her bed. She shut her eyes, preparing to be stabbed, but she felt no pain.
She looked up. Luke sat by her, stroking her hair.
She would have fought, but she was still weak from the drugs.
"Rosalia, Rosalia, Rosalia," he murmured lovingly, shaking his head. "This is one big misunderstanding. I never wanted to hurt you. I took you to save you from life as one of the gods' pawns."
"Like my mom."
He nodded.
"Haven't I told you? They hate you, child. They don't care at all what happens to you, no matter what they might say. It's all because of Hermes, my father, that I have my scar."
She narrowed her eyes, having a tough time believing her father.
She started to squirm, but he just kept holding her down.
"Darling, there's no sense in running away. You know I'll find you. Why would you want to leave, anyway? You have two choices - this, or a pawn of the gods. Which one do you want?" (A/N: This is almost word-for-word taken from the lyrics to Surrender by Evanescence.)
She finally gave up and just stared into his eyes.
"That's a good girl."
Rose avoided Luke's ice-blue eyes. They were so piercing, they bore into her soul.
"Don't you remember, honey? You were happy here. We loved each other."
She gasped, her eyes widening.
She remembered Luke playing with her, teaching her to read, giving her baths. She remembered him potty training her. She remembered him getting other children in trouble when they picked on her. She remembered him tucking her into bed, reading to her. She remembered him being there for every nightmare and "boo-boo."
"Daddy," she whimpered, tears rolling down her face.