An Eye Opener

Sarah opened her eyes only to find herself surrounded by books. All around her were books, so many that they formed the walls, the floors and even the ceiling of the room she was in. She sat up, slightly panicking and tried to remember what had happened to her.

She remembered that she met a strange old man who had informed her she had died. Yet she had also supposedly met Hades and Persephone in the middle of a domestic situation. The last thing she could clearly remember was the excruciating pain she felt and then a soothing voice asking her whether she wanted to be a 'champion' or something.

Now she woke up in an unfamiliar environment for the second consecutive time. Sarah looked around apprehensively and spotted a door behind her, the room had nothing else that interested her. She picked up a book only to find it written in some incomprehensible script which she had never seen before. It reminded her a little of the cuneiform writing she had seen in a history textbook from her high school days.

Sarah got up and approached the door, just to put her ear up against it, as she tried to determine what was behind it. She could hear an indistinguishable murmur. Since her gut was not giving any alarms over, she decided she might as well open the door, if she had truly died once already, what more did she have to lose.

Sarah opened the door only to find a beautiful Caucasian woman seated on a comfortable looking arm chair. In one hand she held a book and in the other was a mug where a warm aroma of coffee emanated from. The woman noticed Sarah almost immediately, placed down her cup of coffee before she adjusted her glasses and put down her book. Sarah felt the woman give her a once-over before she nodded in approval and got up from her seat.

"Sarah, a pleasure to meet you. You heard me earlier, my name is Athena. I am sure you have many questions, I will try my best to answer as many as I can in the time that we have."

Sarah was surprised to hear that familiar gentle and soothing voice come out from the gorgeous woman. She could clearly remember this feeling before she fell unconscious and now, she knew that the person before her was the same one as the one in her head earlier. She was glad that she had not gone crazy despite all that she had experienced in the last day or so.

"Uhm, Athena what are you? Also, what happened to me and where am I?"

"Currently we are in the depths of your mind. I am sure you remember meeting my uncle Hades, so you know you were dead. However, my uncle's impatience, lack of thought and idiotic actions led to your soul being sent back to your severely damaged body. Currently your mind is still processing the fact that you were dead and it is essentially trying to resynchronise with your body after I had it healed. Had I not intervened, you would have died a true death, your soul scattered forever and all traces of what makes you, distinctly you, would be gone. Perhaps you would have preferred that end, but remember you made the decision to accept my conditions."

"Conditions? Uhm, you mean the part about being your champion? What is that? Wait, you skipped my first question."

"Oh, did I? I didn't mean to. I am what you would call a 'god'. You have already met my uncle Hades, so I am sure you can piece together the rest. There isn't much to being a champion of a god, other than there might be an occasional task I require your help with, or another god may also request your aid. Of course, your time and efforts would not be without reward and you can choose to accept or decline of your own volition. No pressure. Think of it as more of a casual job, to supplement your current career."

Sarah felt the conditions were too good, after all there appeared to be no downsides to being the champion of Athena, in fact, Sarah had been revived and given a new lease on life. Whereas Athena appeared to be getting nothing out of it. So, Sarah still a little suspicious asked.

"So, what do you get out of this? And why did you ask me to be your champion? I am just a journalist."

"As our fates are now entwined, I will be straightforward with you, what I get out of this arrangement is simply this, acknowledgement. We gods, exist and continue to exist only because of the acknowledgement of your kind. We are empowered and are able to do more the stronger our following is. My father Zeus was once able to freely control the skies at the peak of his power, yet now we are all merely shadows of our pasts. I have been conserving my strength for the past thousand or so years and was only just able to restore your body. As for why I chose you, because you are more than just a journalist Sarah. You have that spark of adventure that I saw in the likes of Perseus and Herakles."

"However, it is mainly because you have realised the truth of this world. The existence of what would otherwise be known as the mythological cannot be freely disclosed to the public. So, I was tasked with ensuring that you were properly guided and looked after. The best way to do so was to ask you to be my champion. It is a win-win situation. You get your life back and I am able to gain a new friend."

"Wait, Athena, Goddess of War and Wisdom. So, you're saying that all of those stories about the gods, the mythologies, the heroes and the religions are all true? Satan? Baba Yaga? Santa Claus?"

"Not quite, a lot of the things you know as stories were made up by my siblings and I as well as the folks from the other religions in order to remain relevant, so to speak. Satan and Santa don't exist. But the Christian Heaven and Hell do, albeit they are run in rather questionable ways and by some, in my opinion shady beings, some would say it is working as designed but not intended. But, I digress, Perseus did exist, however he has passed on for many years now. Herakles however, the dumb idiot is still around, albeit he has remained petrified for the last two thousand or so years."

Sarah was still stunned by the continuous revelations by Athena and had barely processed the fact that a lot more gods than just Hades and Athena existed before she was pelted with information about heroic figures such as Perseus and Herakles.

"Herakles is still alive?"

"Yes, he foolishly tried to challenge Perseus once as he thought that he was so blessed by the gods that he could take a gaze from Medusa's head and remain unaffected. And the rest is history. None of my siblings and I bothered to save him, he is very much an obnoxious buffoon. He once claimed that any woman that failed to be charmed by him was in fact not a woman. That sort of idiocy deserves to be encased in stone for a few thousand years. Hopefully he has spent all this time reflecting on himself. Oh, we don't have too much time. Sarah, there are a few other things you should know. One, your death was not an accident. Two, I will contact you sometime in the future when you wake up, there is something I need you do for me, it will also help with your story. Three, we gods are no longer able to affect the Earth, we cannot interfere in the lives of mortals as immortals, I was only able to help you because of a loophole. Now that you know of our existence my siblings and the other forces at large will begin to notice your new status, some may ask for your help and others may choose to antagonise you. How you respond to their overtures are up to you. I will support whatever decisions you choose to make. However, you must remember I cannot save you another time, to do so would risk the fracturing of your mind and neither do I have the strength to try. Oh, my grandfather appears to be quite generous today, there is time for one more question. Feel free to ask anything."

Sarah had thought she would be overwhelmed by the influx of new information from Athena, however she felt her mind had become more clearer than ever. Her memory and processing power appeared to be greater than before, she was sure that it had come from Athena. Sarah had a lot of things she wanted to ask Athena but the only burning question she had was

"Athena, this is not the first time this has happened has it?"

"Ahh, a good question. But no, this is not the first time this has happened. Albeit, this is my first time. My father picked up a champion a hundred or so years ago, Nikola Tesla was his name, he died at a young age doing an experiment with lightning and my father intervened before he met my uncle Hades and so he was returned to life. A more recent time would be when my aunt Aphrodite once took in a young champion, Marilyn Monroe was her name, a shame she died so young, my aunt has never been the same since. But yes, we gods take in champions every now and then, when we find someone we can connect with, otherwise the fates between the two parties can become very ugly and the consequences disastrous. My brother Ares once thought it would be fun to pick a young Serbian man to be his champion but the incompatibility between the two caused the young man to become incredibly egotistic and delusional, as he believed he had been chosen by the gods, which in a sense was true. But his delusions soon overtook him and my brother was unable to stop him, as their fates had been bound, meaning they could not harm each other. This young Serbian man would then be the spark that set the world aflame. However, we are two very different beings, my brother and I. So, Sarah do not fear, the fact that we were able to converse like this within your mind is proof that we are compatible. Hmm, it would appear our time is up. See you on the other side."

Before Sarah could reply, for the nth time she felt herself once again falling.