Hope wanted to drown herself when she sat back down on the pier. She was internally yelling at herself for what she'd done. She'd yelled at strangers and called them an extremely rude name. Her father had taught her better.
She groaned and buried her face into her hands. A voice behind her called out, "Hey Hope!"
She turned it was Conner and Travis. She couldn't help but smile. Conner and Travis may have been idiots and annoying but they might as well have been her older brothers, the way they saw each other.
They patted her head like a puppy, sitting down on either side of her, handing her a plate of breakfast.
"Heard you yell," said Conner, trying not to laugh.
"The whole camp hear you yell," added Travis.
Hope blushed. "I really don't know where that came from," she muttered. "I just really didn't like the way they were looking at me, like a monster."
"You are a monster," said Travis.
"And you have a tail," added Conner.
Hope shook her head, smiling slightly. "Not helpful guys, really not helpful."
The boys laughed. "We're not here to help," They joked. "We're here to tease you."
Hope suddenly felt very nervous. "Please don't."
They looked at each other then grinned maliciously. "Not a chance!" She 'fell' into the lake. They ran.
Hope came up just in time to see them run to the end of the pier. "You are so going get it!" She shouted, pulling herself out of the water and running after them.
They dashed for the cabins laughing as a dripping wet girl followed them, unable to suppress her own laughs. That is, until she just collapsed.
At first, many believed she just tripped, but when she didn't get back up, the others started to worry. Something else was happening.

---

Hope blinked. Hadn't she just been chasing Conner and Travis? Where was she? She looked around but saw nothing. Only darkness.
"Hello?" she called, her voice echoing. "Where am I?"
Dark malicious laughter filled the room. It went from creepy evil laugh to completely insane in an instant, as the room suddenly brightened with bright blue flames.
A woman sat in a corner. She was the one laughing. She looked as if she might have once been beautiful with the perfect dark hair/light skin contrast, and beautiful green eyes.
But she'd been in that room for too long and she'd been chained up for far too long too. She was the definition of insane person. Her laughter was starting to scare Hope.
"Has the little baby dragon come to visit?" the woman asked.
Hope fought hard not to scream as she backed as far away from the crazy person.
The woman continued to laugh. "Even a dragon can be burned," she cackled. "I'd stay well away from those flames."
Hope kept backing up--right into the flames.
Pain seared up her back. She let loose a blood-curdling scream as the icy blue flames burned their way up her body.
Her vision blurred and she passed out, still in pain.

---

Pollux sat in the infirmary next to Hope, waiting for her to wake up. Chiron said she was just fine. She was just sleeping, that all Hope needed was more sleep. Did Chiron even know how much Hope slept to begin with? She would never collapse like that just because she hadn't slept enough.
Pollux knew something else was going on here and he would not leave Hope's side until he knew what. After about an hour next to her, Hope started to scream. Her screams echoed throughout the entire camp, as Pollux clamped his hands over his ears, unable to move. It was just too loud.
Blue flames started sprouting along her body as Chiron came riding in towards her, as her screams fell silent.
"Don't touch her," he called immediately. "Those flames are not normal, and they will die out in a bit."
True to his word, the flames dies out, leaving behind ugly red burns, that were still hot to touch.
Apollo campers followed Chiron's exact instructions to make a special burn salve as Hope slowly opened her eyes.
She whimpered slightly like a puppy. "It hurts," she said so softly, they almost didn't hear her. "It hurts."
Pollux held out his hand and she took it barely squeezing. This concerned him. He remembered her nearly breaking his hand when she scraped her knee. That pain couldn't nearly be as much as this one, and yet she could barely grip his hand.
Slowly Chiron and the others tended her burns and she was left to rest. "Pollux?" she whispered quietly.
"Yeah?"
"Thank you."
"For what?"
"For staying."

Notes

Yeah, I hope the banner makes a little sense now. I added some characters, but to be honest I probably going to find some new pictures soon--I don't like all of those. I am so freaking tired, I don't want to do anything but sleep, but I have to get this up before I forgot. So here you go. (Probably not gonna go to sleep though)

you know the drill,
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--Kim