Chapter ninety six

        Barry eventually stopped asking what the 'thing' Delilah and I were talking about was so we went to the basement to fetch the crew of the fallen plane. 

         We entered the dark and damp basement through the doorway which was one of the few surviving structures in the ruined mansion. The room was filled with cardboard boxes which we navigated through with some difficulty until we found the people we were looking for. The two pilots and the two hostesses were sitting on upturned boxes around what looked like an old rusted table with a candle on it , playing cards just like Delilah said they were.

          As soon as we entered the circle of light illuminated by the candle they noticed us but all of them except for Kim didn't seem to care that much about our presence one way or the other but Kim jumped up and run towards me like I was a long lost sibling,

         "Raven, you made it back! And you stopped the apocalypse! You are so awesome. OMG is that a new fan? I have never seen you holding a golden fan before. Is that what you used to defeat the angels and demons? Was it hard to defeat all those enemies? Can you tell me what exactly happened?"

          I swear to God if she had a tail it would have been wagging as she stared up at me with a worshipful gaze. Although the others were ignoring us at first , they were now staring at us suspiciously. It seems that all the work that Delilah had done to hypnotize them into thinking that Sophia and Raven were two different people had just gone down the drain. Delilah sighed and dragged the three of them to the corner to redo the hypnosis while I took Kim aside to talk to her,

        "Hey Kim, do you mind if I ask you for a favor?"

       She smiled beatifically at me as if I had just told her she just won a million dollars, "Of course you can, I will do anything for you."

       A pretty young Asian girl just told me she would do anything for me, my mind automatically went into the gutter and for a second I had trouble dragging it back out but eventually I managed to get my mind back on the topic at hand and continue the conversation, "I need you to promise me to never mention the fact that I am the raven or Persephone. Do you remember the monster I fought in Oslo? Well there are more evil creatures like him who would hurt my friends and family if they found out. They could be anywhere so I need you to keep this a secret from everyone, you cannot even tell your friends or family or you will be putting me and my family in grave danger. Can I count on you to be my friend and keep my secret identity hidden?"

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      She turned serious as she heard the contents and the tone of what I just said, "Alright Raven, I mean Alright Sophia. I promise to never divulge your secret."

       I leaned over and gave her a quick peck on the cheek, "Thank you Kim, you shall forever have my gratitude. If you ever need any help feel free to call me at any time, I will be happy to help a friend."

        I might have hammed it up a bit but it was obviously the right thing to do. The way her eyes were sparkling with tears in them and her breathing had become short and quick I knew that my little speech had a deep impact on her and she would probably never reveal my secret even if she was tortured.

        I left the hyperventilating woman behind and went back outside to see what was going on. The clouds had cleared up and the sun was shining , apparently this made the military feel safe enough to send helicopters to rescue survivors because I saw several helicopters canvassing the city area. They looked military and had the blue flag of the EU  and the insignia of NATO on them. Once in a while a helicopter would find someone and it would hover above that area while soldiers would zip line down ropes to help people up rope ladders or in some cases attach gurneys to pulley up those too injured to use the ladders.

         They were swift and efficient in the way only highly trained people could be and were doing a good job from what I was seeing. I really didn't want to tangle with the military right now but it seemed that I had little choice in the matter because one of the nearby choppers seemed to have noticed  me and was flying in my direction.