Welp, here's a Halloween special for all you frantic fans of fiction! (Don't worry; it has nothing to do with Halloween and it will continue for a nice full-length story. And, contrary to some other fics I've created, *cough*most of them*cough* this will be finished. I swear it on the River Styx.
Damnit.
Well, anyway. Here ya go!
The son of Poseidon jumped over an overturned trash can as he ran down the deserted streets of New York. The uneven ground threatened to trip him if he wasn't careful, but he had no time to watch his steps. He would have prayed to Tyche if there was any use.
Up ahead, he saw a light. Though the day was hardly half over, the sun was down and clouds covered the night sky. Not that it would have mattered to have a clear sky; the moon was gone. It had been for several months.
Of course, this messed up the tides. Which meant the water was farther away from him at the moment. Which meant that he was even weaker than he normally was.
And for the last few days, that was pretty weak.
The light got closer. To dim to be a headlight (not that there would be any cars this early in the day) and to bright to be a lightbulb. Hmm.
He uncapped His sword. The light was a flashlight. He could see that. But who was holding it was a different question.
He doubted the bearer of the light had seen him. He ducked to the side, and into an alley. Normally this was a stupid idea; now it was safer than the streets.
The person holding the flashlight walked past him. He sighed. Just a zombie. A harmless one. Much safer than a living person.
He jumped out of the alley and kept running.
The next encounter with an animate object was much more dangerous. He was halfway to his destination, when the front of a building burst in front of him. He glanced around for cover. By the time he jumped behind a dumpster, it was too late.
It had seen him.
He grabbed the lowest rung of a fire escape ladder and started climbing. But the thing came running after him.
The demigods had started calling them Sentinels, after a similar creature in a popular sci-fi movie. But these were much more real. And just as dangerous.
The Sentinel glared at Kade for a moment, its robotic expression unreadable. Then, with a force that cracked the cement beneath it, it leaped into the air, landing on the ladder only four rungs beneath the half-blood.
"Damnit," Kade growled. He was in danger now. Serious danger.
He let go of the rung.
He dropped to the Sentinel, his shoes landing directly on the Sentinel's upturned face. It made no sound, but the weight of the demigod knocked it back to the ground.
Kade glanced up. The apartment building he was scaling was abandoned, and the lowest window he could get to was open, but the Sentinel would kill him before he made it. He sensed no water in the nearest apartments.
This wasn't good.
"Come on, come on," he muttered as he glanced around, looking for a way out of this. Then he happened to see a vent. A steam vent in the ground. Perfect.
He jumped straight onto it, cracking the grating. His sword cut a hole for him, and he jumped down into the hot, moist vent.
He started to gather the steam in a ball of water behind him as he ran. The water mass got bigger and bigger, until he had to let it meld to the shape of the tunnel he was running through. When he had enough, he jumped out through the next vent.
It was in the middle of the street. He had no worries about cars. His problem was the two Sentinels standing almost right next to him.
"Ha!" he shouted, pointing at them. The gush of water flowed from the vent in the asphalt and spearheaded the two robots. The force of the water knocked them off their feet, but they got up immediately. Kade collected the water again, and kept running.
The drain on his powers was minimal, seeing as how he reenergized himself with a touch of the element. The real problem right now was how to avoid three Sentinels all the way to Camp.
He ran down the street, making sure he was in the open. He wanted to live, yes, but there was a bigger plan going on in the world, and his part was important: Gather the Sentinels.
The Sentinels followed, their internal computers calculating his every move before he thought of it himself. They followed him perfectly, alerting three more to his presence.
Six. Pretty good.
He kept running.
He made it to Camp. Intact. On a Vespa. A red one, which made him think the gods might be on his side.
The other demigods were there already. The Sentinels were just three minutes behind him, which gave them plenty of time, really.
"Guys, guys, I'm here. Hurry." He said, as he jumped off the bike.
"'Kay," Kate, a daughter of Bellona said. The other demigods there were Corey Lewis, a son of Hades, Michael McCadless, a son of Zeus, and Sheera Kahn, a daughter of Hecate.
"Is the scythe ready?" Kade asked.
Kate showed it to him. She was wearing Celestial Bronze gauntlets, to protect her from the malicious powers of the weapon. "One king Titan's deadly weapon, right here," she said.
"Great," Corey said. "Let's get on with it. How many Sentinels do we have right now?"
"Three," "Three," "Four," "Five," "Three," came the answers.
"They think we're important, then," Corey said. "Good. Sheera, would you do the honors?"
Sheera took the weapon carefully. "It won't be but a moment," she declared in her best British accent.
"It won't be any time at all," Kate replied. "Alright, guys, you know what to do."
"Of course," Corey said, rolling his eyes.
"Then take your positions," the daughter of Athena commanded. The four demigods spread out, leaving Sheera by herself in the dining pavilion.
"Hey, idiots," Kate yelled to the four Sentinels. They were grouped together, in perfect formation, but when they saw the demigod their computers calculated the best attack strategy. They synchronized, and attacked.
Kate dodged a swipe. A second one's arm morphed into a sword, which it then swung at her. She blocked the strike with a spear haft, rolled back into a crouch, and ducked a punch from a third one.
The last one went behind her. She knew it was there, but she had to block two simultaneous blows from two Sentinels.
As she spun, the one behind her brought its mechanical fist down on her head. She stumbled, stunned. Then, as she was blinking, it stabbed her through the chest.
She fell soundlessly, her heart bleeding out into the dirt. In seconds she was dead.
The four Sentinels scanned the Camp. They sensed four more life forms. Only one was free of Sentinels. They started running towards it.
Kade took position next to the lake, hoping the water would give him an edge. The five Sentinels were walking toward him, around the lake. He waved his hand. A fist of water, hard as rock, knocked one of them flying, but it took no damage.
The Sentinels uploaded this scenario to their computer minds. They scanned the energy Kade used, replicated it in their servos, and experimentally created a tidal wave.
"Oh, shit," Kade mumbled. "Why can't I do that."
The Sentinels started walking across the water.
"Oh, you wanna show off, huh?" Kade asked. "Well, I'm a freaking son of Poseidon, and that's better than any fake stuff you can come up with."
The Sentinels scanned for the best battle strategy, synchronized, and attacked. One of them occupied Kade with a water fist, and the other four came at him, sword/arms ready.
He blocked an attack, but there were too many of them. He lasted just as long as Kate had, before one of them chopped him in half.
The pieces sank beneath the water, leaving only a stain of red as a marker of his death.
The Sentinels scanned the Camp. Only one life form was unoccupied. They started running toward it.
Michael and Corey were fighting together. Michael struck the Sentinels with lightning, which they scanned, uploaded, and replicated. Corey would shadowtravel them both away before the Sentinels could kill them. The lightning strikes were fairly random, though, and he had to resort to fighting with shadows.
The tentacles of darkness rose from the ground and entangled the Sentinels. For a bit. Just until they replicated the powers, and started choking the son of Hades with his own domain.
Michael ran to help him. The shadows grabbed him, too, and flung him to Tartarus.
He didn't have water powers to cushion his fall.
Corey gasped for three more precious seconds, then the darkness overrode his system and he faded into nothing.
The sentinels turned and started running towards the last demigod.
Sheera concentrated on the scythe, but in the back of her mind she saw the explosions where the Sentinels were destroying cabins in their search for her. She smiled faintly. Her Mist worked, even on robots.
But the Mist wouldn't occupy them for long. She got twenty seconds, in fact, more than she expected. Then the Sentinels—eighteen of them—burst into the pavilion.
But she was done.
"Too late, assholes," she yelled. Then she disappeared.
The Sentinels were gone. The buildings were intact. The blood in the water was gone, so were the mutilated bodies of the demigods. The son of Zeus was not in Tartarus. The red Vespa was back in New York City.
Nothing had changed.
That's it for the first chapter of this very vigilant venture! Tune in next time for the next chappie! Farewell, my good people! Survive! (Oh, and put the second R in R&R.)
