Track, Hunt and Execute
There are some people who drink alcohol like fish and are able to walk straight on a centimetre wide line and then there are those like me who'll walk everywhere except that line.
For some weird reason liquor was not agreeable to my stomach and every time I had alcohol I'd be in for one hell of a night and today just happened to be one such night and that to on a cold one. I shouldn't have started on that second bottle of JD but then what were we to do for the cold; it wasn't that we weren't supplied with armour that kept us heated during the intense cold but alcohol had its own charm even though we ended up flat on our backs knocked out into oblivion.
From the half filled tumbler in my hand I took another long draught. Swirling the foul tasting, bitter amber liquid in my mouth I took my time swallowing it. I never drank alcohol I almost always gulped it down.
"You seriously don't like alcohol, don't you Aaron" Nick asked from beside me, his glass already empty and his hand reaching out for the bottle to pour himself another large while I still sat on my firs t peg.
I scrunched my eyebrows and nodded in defeat and with what I knew was an expression of disgust emptied the contents of my glass into his.
He laughed at me, not to make fun I'm sure but just on the situation. It so happened that Nick had a high tolerance for alcohol along with a keen taste for it. I wouldn't blame him for it, he hasn't had the best of childhood but then nor have I.
Maybe everyone leans on different things for support, maybe Alcohol provided Nick with the happy place he wanted to be.
My thoughts lingering on what he had told me about his past, I studied him carefully.
Nick wasn't your average Sentinel, for one he wasn't well built. He was thin and scrawny, looked malnourished in the standard armour thus the need for a custom well fitted armour which wasn't too heavy for him to fight in.
Less athletic and hyper active than other demigods, patience was his true virtue. Then the way he looked, unlike most of us who although in our late teens looked like mature men; Nick had managed to retain that boyish charm of his.
With his round face, dark hair with natural blonde highlights he looked like any other teenage guy in his senior year. The rigorous and inhumane demigod training had not taken away the innocence from him, innocence that was evident in his smile.
Never would one expect a kid like him to be from what I had guessed an Alcoholic.
It was true that Nick relied on alcohol to keep his memories under the threshold and maintain a level of peace in his mind. Many a times I had thought of helping him out of his habit and every time I had tried my efforts ended in vain, he was too far gone to be brought back.
"Come on, Nick. Make that your last. We have watch duty tonight." I said trying to sound reasonable because I knew there was no other way he'd listen and too my surprise it worked. He threw away rest of the contents of the glass and put the bottle in utility pack.
I turned to look at the forest ahead of me. We were stationed at the top of a cliff overlooking a vast forest of conifers in the extremely cold Canadian Northern Frontier.
The Hunters of Artemis had passed information to us on the growing numbers of Empousa in the northern territories. The information after much debate by the council had then been given to us. Our mission was to carry out an extermination of each and every Empousa that we came across but till now we hadn't come across any.
I took out my field-glasses, V-Bionics as they were called and slipped them on over my eyes. These bionics could see through the mist and were multipurpose in use, they could detect changes in aura, heat signatures, geographical changes, power aura and could also help in determine the power stats of the enemy namely strength, agility and speed by taking into accounts several physical and biological characteristics. A tool designed by Hephaestus himself, it had turned out to be more useful than anything else in recent times.
I changed the mode of my bionics to heat sensing and scanned the forest cover. No spike in the heat signature except that of the occasional moose or elk, nothing in the range of an Empousa's heat signature.
I sighed wearily, disappointed at the lack of action. "Here take my bionics and keep a lookout" I said getting up and holding out the bionics for Nick to take them off my hand.
He nodded and took them from me.
I picked up my sword from where it was leaning against the trunk of the tree where we had set up the lookout. It was a perfect spot providing shade from the sun in the day, cover from the rain, wind and snow, hidden from below and the surrounding cliffs by a thicket of bushes among which we had hid over the last few days.
"Nice hideout. Did you bring your girlfriends here?" came a sickly sweet voice from the tree top. I craned my head to see the familiar figure of Erida, Daughter of Discordia and a Sentinel Executioner.
The Sentinels was a prime organization within Fort Olympus. The members of the Sentinels were either given individual assignment and were rarely assigned in group unless there was a large mess or a powerful monster to be dealt with.
Unlike Cohorts there were no ranks in the Sentinels; however there were several fields each sentinel specialised in. An Executioner for example was sent out to kill, specifically to kill and nothing else. When the Council wanted something dead it sent out an executioner or in our case a group of executioners to destroy the band of Empousa.
"You actually think he's even dated anyone" said another merry voice, laughing in mirth.
Another snide remark and from none other than Alexander Bledsoe, Son of Eris the Greek form of Discordia, from behind the tree he walked out dressed in black armour with a golden apple on the left hand side of his breastplate.
His bracers and greaves were a steel gray in colour and he carried his helmet in hand, black like the Helm of darkness with a golden plume. On his waist instead of a sword or a dagger was a handgun snuggled in its leather holster.
Alex was a Tracker, it was his job to find a monster and track it down leaving it to the executioners and hunters to kill it but until now he had been unsuccessful in finding even a single Empousa.
"Gently Alex" said Erida, jumping of the branch on which she had been sitting till now landing in a crouch beside me. She then stood to her full height and looked straight into my eyes.
"Do tell me Alex. Did you bring your girlfriend here?" she purred.
"I don't kiss and tell." I said with a wry smile and headed off to patrol the area leaving behind a fuming Erida and guffawing Alex with a not to drunken Nick on the lookout for danger.
I climbed down the cliff, rather jumped off it. Not all the way down, even I can't survive a fifty feet drop. Correction, I can survive it but not without injury. I jumped from ledge to ledge and finally reached the snow covered forest floor.
The first snow had come earlier than expected in this region but then who was I to fight nature and its ways.
I put on the extra pair of V-Bionics and scanned the nearby area for any movement. With nothing on the monitor I decided to go for a little walk, probably might encounter something and so I aimlessly started walking through the forest.
Alert as much as I could be, I kept my guard up making sure that I wasn't sneaked upon because that's the worst that can happen to any demigod and it always ends badly. So I continued on my trek through the forest, sword in hand and dagger at the ready I made my way through the thickets occasionally coming across a herd of elk or a lonely moose, even a pack of wolves once but then again wolves were the last of my worry.
I must have walked for hours and it was close to dawn before I thought I should head back. With one last look around the lake, looking for evidence that assure the presence of Empousa in the area I started on my way back to camp empty handed.
As I traversed through the forest to the cliff top hide out I felt as I was followed. It was true that for quite a while the pack of wolves that I had come across last night had tailed me but now I felt as if I was being hunted rather than tracked.
I decided to move fast. The faster that I got to the others the better it'd be for me after all I didn't wish to end up as a pile of bones in an Empousa's nest and without wasting another moment I built up speed.
To anyone else I'd appear to be gliding across the forest floor but I knew that I was barely walking and I had still not been able to shake off my hunter. There was no other way, I had to run for it and within a flash I bolted.
Being a son of Hermes had their advantages; one was tremendous amount of speed and agility, the other being an excellent shot. When I felt I had put enough distance between me and my stalker, I whirled on the spot and sprang in the air.
Daggers in my hand I threw them towards the blurry black shadow that had been following me ever since but I didn't waste any time to see if I had hit a bulls eye with another burst of speed I sprinted to the cliff sending a flash of greek fire in the air, lighting the navy twilight sky with an emerald green luminescence.
Within seconds of the flash I heard the sound of a conch horn, I jumped on top of the tree,. Perched on its highest branch, sword in hand I scanned the tree tops.
I kept my guard up so as not to be caught unawares luckily I didn't have to for far too long as from a distance I saw two of my associates jump down from the cliff to my aid, no doubt blowing our cover in the process but it wasn't all their fault they had done so for me.
I descended from the large conifer and headed in their general direction. After searching for a few minutes I found the two of them.
In front was a boy no older than sixteen with dirty blonde hair and tanned skin, a grave expression on his face instead of the dumb smile that always played on his lips. Zac Jones, Son of Poseidon there were quite a few of them these days.
Not far behind him, struggling to keep up was Laura Lacour, Daughter of Athena, her chocolate brown hair tied in a long braid. She wore a slim fit Hunter's Armour. Dressed in black robes like that of my pursuer, she looked frazzled, not used to running in such terrain.
"What happened to you?" Zac asked stowing his sword in its sheath, his shield still on his arm.
"I have no fucking idea." I said, gasping for air. Whatever the dark shadow was, it was no doubt a great tracker and I knew that I hadn't quite injured it with my daggers.
"Did the Empousa pounce on you?" Laura asked. I shook my head, breathing deeply.
"Then what" She asked exasperated, looking for answers and not getting any.
"Do you mean to say that we blew our cover for nothing?" She said her face contorting with anger.
"LAURA!"
We looked behind us to find Erida, Alex and Nick. Nick and Alex, both were carrying knapsacks and utility bags. Erida on the other hand was now wearing her full battle armour. It was similar to Alex's, fitting black armour with Eris' crest on the breastplate except her armour had a molten gold flowing cloak with a hood attached to it.
Erida looked angry, with her sword drawn and a no nonsense taken look on her face she ordered us to get our own utility kits and then make way to Fort Olympus.
"But why" asked Zac from beside me.
"Because there are no Empousa here, they seem to have migrated somewhere else." She said clearly pissed off at the fact that someone had questioned her orders.
"I'm sure we'll find some proof that they were here. We need time." Cut in Laura only to be met with a deathly glare.
She glared at the three of us, "We have been here for over three days and during our patrols haven't found a single thing. We shouldn't waste anymore time. Moreover tonight is the Autumn Equinox and we have been reassigned to relieve the Sentinels at Londinium. From here on they'll be taking this case forward." And with that she turned her back towards us and took out a small golden orb from her utility belt.
She threw it on the ground and in a burst of blinding light, disappeared, no doubt to Fort Olympus.
Alex followed her actions and disappeared as well.
Nick looked apologetically at me and took out his orb as well.
"I'll see you there". I said. With one last nod he too disappeared leaving behind Zac, Laura and Me.
"What should we do?" asked Zac.
With a hard look on my face staring at the ground where Erida had stood moments before I said "We follow orders" and with that we headed to the cliff top to retrieve our belongings and then made our way to Fort Olympus, where we knew another mission and assignment waited for us...
In the shadows of the snow covered conifer forest stood a figure robed in black. From a far distance he saw the six warriors mutually opposed against each other.
Are these the prestigious warriors who he had heard so much about? Their reputation did precede them, maybe they learnt from their mistakes or maybe not all of them charged at the enemy head on.
There was still much to learn about these demigods and time was running out. He'd have to do with what he could learn from his new friends and it was time he paid them another visit.
With a smirk on the face the man in the shadows disappeared into a swirling cloud of darkness. It wouldn't be long now. Not long at all.