Chapter Eleven: Empty Hearts
"Hello, Slayers," said Morgan, her violet eyes gleaming with malice, "How convenient that I find you here."
Nicole and Luna, frightened by the reappearance of the Morgan, froze in their places and watched nervously at Morgan as she walked away from the rooftop structure and positioned herself between the two of them and faced Nicole.
"So, how are things?" Morgan said to Nicole.
Nicole glared at her while growling, "Stop gloating, Sue. I know you just killed Matt."
"Obviously," said Morgan in a bored manner, "If it makes you feel any better, I would like to say that he almost beat me single-handily."
Nicole's temper raised as she took in Morgan's taunting words. However, she fought to keep her temper in check and tried to focus on the Warrior Sue instead of the picture of Matt's death.
Meanwhile, behind Morgan, Luna had her bow out and was notching an arrow. The daughter of Artemis then pointed her bow and arrow at the back of Morgan's head. Nicole immediately noticed what Luna was doing and held up her hand to signal the Sue not to shoot yet.
Fortunately Morgan didn't recognize the signal and continued to speak, "Ready to join your friend in Hades, Slayer?"
Nicole didn't bother to answer Morgan and instead gave Luna the "OK" hand sign before quickly rolling behind the roof structure. That was when Luna released her arrow.
Morgan casually cocked her head to the left and Luna's arrow flew past, barely missing the Warrior's neck. Amused by her opponents' tactic, the Warrior then turned around to face Luna.
"I saw that coming, my fellow Sue," said Morgan, "You see, I have the ability to predict what stupid tricks you and that Slayer are going to try."
"OH YEAH?" yelled back Luna, "PREDICT THIS!"
Luna activated her 'daughter of Artemis' powers and started to fire her arrows rapidly at Morgan. The arrows glowed gold as they rushed towards the Sue; thanks to Luna's powers, the arrows were now faster than ever.
Despite the arrows' increased speed, the Morgan was dodging the projectiles with ease, no matter where the arrows flew. This was problematic for Luna, who only had a limited amount of arrows.
Matt never told me they could move this fast, the Sue thought as she desperately continued firing arrows at Morgan.
It was not long before Luna ran out of ammo. When that happened, the Warrior Sue ended her evasive movement and began to walk slowly towards Luna. The daughter of Artemis, a bit scared at this point, quickly backed up near the edge of the building roof.
Morgan, sensing victory, stopped seven yards away from Luna and took a Desert Eagle pistol out from her suit.
When Luna saw Morgan's weapon, she began to panic and screamed, "NICOLE! HELP!"
Too late, Morgan had already started to fire at Luna.
The moment the first bullet exited Morgan's gun, Luna's ADHD activated. The daughter of Artemis saw the bronze bullet come at her in slow motion and promptly sidestepped it. Morgan, unimpressed by Luna's reflexes, continued to shoot at Luna, who was then forced to bob and weave in order to avoid Morgan's next four bullets. Unfortunately, Luna didn't dodge the last one, which was shot at a low angle to her right leg.
Luna felt pain as the the bullet sunk itself into the side of her shin. She immediately collapsed and fell on her bottom, instinctively reaching for the bullet that was lodged inside her leg. But before she could do so, a shadow loomed over her, and Luna instantly knew whom it belonged to.
Morgan was very close to Luna and had her gun pointed at Luna's neck.
"How disappointing," Morgan said quietly while she readied to pull the trigger.
Morgan's Common Sense tingled. She turned her head a bit to the left and saw Nicole, who had her handgun a few inches away from the Sue's left temple.
"Dodge this," quoted Nicole in a cool voice. She pulled the trigger and was immediately greeted with the thunderous ring of gunfire.
Unfortunately for her, Morgan merely took a lazy step backwards to avoid the Celestial Bronze bullet. Morgan then spun and threw her arm out, catching Nicole by the throat.
"I saw that coming, Slayer," said Morgan as she watched Nicole drop her Glock in order to stop the Warrior Sue's left hand from choking her to death, "Personally, I thought it was rather idiotic of you to come that close. Gah!"
The Warrior Sue cried out in pain as Luna stabbed her in the leg with her Celestial Bronze knife. Morgan released Nicole, who took advantage of Luna's distraction by picking up her dropped Glock.
Another ring of gunfire echoed across the rooftops. This time, Nicole's aim was true. The Sue clutched her bleeding chest as she fell off the roof, slowly disintegrating during the fall.
The threat finally gone, Luna put her knife away and painfully began to dig the Celestial Bronze bullet out of her lower leg.
After she was finished, the Sue looked at Nicole happily and said, "You did it, Nicole. We killed the Warrior Sue!"
Luna's voice faltered when she saw that the Slayer's face was grim and was on the verge of tears. The Slayer still had her Glock in her right hand, and for a moment, the Sue wondered if Nicole was going to shoot her next. But that thought was immediately cast away as Nicole pulled off her backpack and started to take out the first-aid kit, along with some ambrosia and nectar.
Later...
"Where are we going?"
"We are finding shelter."
"Mmmm, okay."
Luna was following the Slayer down one of Manhattan's dusty streets. It was a bit creepy to the Sue at first that they had wander around in a city that was completely devoid of life, but Luna got used to it quickly. After all, demigods like her were used to being down on their luck.
There was still one question bugging Luna, so she decided to ask Nicole.
"How come Morgan didn't sense my attack?"
"What?"
Luna swallowed a bit before rephrasing her question. "How come Morgan didn't sense that I was going to stab her in the foot back on the rooftop?"
"I don't know," growled Nicole as they continued to walk, "It's probably because she ignored her Common Sense while she was strangling me."
"Is that what her precognition ability is called?" asked Luna, "Common Sense?"
Nicole ignored this question, so Luna took it as a "yes".
As they continued to walk, Nicole started to think about Matt, Coin, and Conway. Their faces began to swim front of her vision.
"I can take her," Matt with a cocky grin on his face. Then, he was gunned down by Coin, who said to Nicole in a deep voice, "Join us" before Coin vanished and was replaced by President Conway. The former daughter of Zeus looked at Nicole with confidence while saying, "Slayers, in our fight against the Sues, be determined and persevere!"
"Be determined and persevere," repeated Nicole to herself as she continued walking down the sidewalk.
But what was the use in being determined and persevering if the Sues had completely obliterated most of the Slayers and their base as well? What use was it in continuing the fight if there was hardly anyone left to stop the Sue menace? Nicole thought all of this as she depressingly lowered her head and started looking at the floor.
"Nicole, stop for a moment," said Luna, interrupting Nicole from her grim thoughts, "I think I see a hotel."
The Slayer raised her head and looked towards the distance. The Sue was right; there was a hotel in front of them. In fact, it was the Plaza Hotel. For some reason, the sight of the historical monument gave Nicole some new hope.
"Come on," she said to the Sue.
"Do you recognize this place?" asked Luna as they continued to walk towards the Plaza.
"Of course," said Nicole quietly, "They taught us at the Organization that this Hotel had a lot of historical significance."
"Like what?" asked Luna again.
"Like the fact that twenty years ago, a group of demigods, led by Percy Jackson, used the Plaza Hotel as a base during the Second Titan War," replied Nicole impatiently.
"Percy Jackson?" said Luna slowly. For some reason, this demigod's name sounded familiar to her.
"Yeah, what about him?" said Nicole.
Luna mused for a while before replying. "My memory's kind of fuzzy, but I think he and I used to go to some summer camp."
Nicole stared at her for a moment. "It seems that you're older than you look."
Luna did her best to look insulted. "What do you mean?"
Nicole sighed. "The advanced scanner back at the Organization said that you were physically sixteen years old, but from what you claimed, it sounded as if you lived through the Golden Age like Rachel did, and she is thirty-six years old."
This explanation made sense to Luna, but something else was bothering her aside from the mention of Rachel.
"Is Percy still alive?"
Nicole looked uncomfortable for a moment. "At the end of the Golden Age, the Sues made their first attack on Camp Half-Blood, and a lot of Slayers, myself included, believe he and many other canon characters most likely didn't survive it. Otherwise, they would have joined the Organization like Rachel and Leo did."
The two of them became silent when they finally reached the front of the Plaza. There was an empty pedestal beside the entrance; it was as if the statue the pedestal used to hold had decided to take a noon jog.
"I will go first," said Nicole.
Luna held the door open for the Slayer and followed her into the Plaza Hotel.
The duo entered the hotel and found themselves in the slightly dark lobby room. It was apparent that the hotel had not stood well against the power of time, for the lobby was dirty and filled with cobwebs. Although some of the fluorescent lights in the lobby were on, there were some that were flickering and others that were dead.
"This is not good," said Nicole.
"Why?" asked the Sue.
"The lights are on, genius," replied Nicole in a tired voice, "That means we are not the only ones in this hotel."
"Oh," said Luna, "So where do you want to go check out first?"
In the end, both of them agreed to first investigate the second floor of the hotel. The two of them took the stairs because Nicole didn't trust the reliability of the elevators.
When they finally got to the first floor, both girls had their respective weapons out. Nicole had her sword, but for backup, she had her Glock on her belt.
"I will scout," said Luna.
Before Nicole could argue with her, the Sue began to creep stealthily into the second-floor hall, looking out for suspicious objects and such. When she was satisfied to see that there were no traps up to her position in the hall, Luna signaled for Nicole to follow her.
"Let's not do the scout thing, okay?" said Nicole when she finally reached the Sue.
"Why not?" challenged Luna, "When I was with the Huntresses of Artemis, I was the scout. My job is to see if there are traps ahead of us."
"Yes, I understand that but—"
"The point is, if there is a trap that I fall into, at least you didn't die, correct?"
Nicole couldn't find a counter to Luna's argument and got a bit pissed off that a Sue managed to beat her in a logical debate. Nonetheless, she just let Luna do her "scout thing" and followed the Sue every time she signaled that the coast was clear.
It didn't take long before they went through the entire hall and not see anything suspicious. The two of them were back to where they started on the second floor.
"Guess there was nothing on this floor," said Luna while she wiped some sweat off her head.
Nicole was about to reluctantly agree with the Sue when she noticed that the hotel door behind Luna had a glow underneath its crack. She silently pointed this out to Luna.
Luna understood her and walked furtively to the door, making no noise on the carpet floor. Meanwhile, Nicole stood off to the side of the doorway, waiting for an ambush in case the room's inhabitants came out.
Nicole nodded to her, and Luna opened the door. Before Luna could do anything, a hand came out the room and pulled her inside.
"HELP!" she screamed as she was tugged into the room.
Nicole quickly ran inside the hotel room and put away her blade. She took out her Glock and pointed it at Luna's captor, who was tall and brawny.
"Let go of her, you Gary Stu," she said.
To her surprise, Luna's captor raised an eyebrow at her and growled, "I am certainly not a Gary Stu, girl. I am a damn Slayer and an Elite one at that."
Nicole lowered her gun but continued to eye the captor suspiciously. On the other hand, the captor let go of Luna and let her crawl back to Nicole.
The two of them stared at each other before two more teens joined the first. One of them was a white girl with long, blond hair and the other was a black boy with coiled, dark hair. The blond's eyes widened as she looked at Nicole and gave the Slayer a look of recognition.
"Nicole, is that you?" the blond said.
"Yeah, it's me, Amanda," said Nicole, who immediately put away her gun.
Amanda was about to go over to Nicole, but the tall boy stopped her with his arm. He glared at Nicole and said, "You are a Slayer, correct?"
"Of course I am," replied Nicole.
"Then why," said the boy, who then looked at Luna, "Do you have a Sue with you?"
"Long story," answered Nicole briskly.
The first boy's face grew more suspicious as he said, "How do we know you aren't infected with the Sue's OOC Curse?"
"Luna doesn't have the Curse," said Nicole anxiously (the first boy raised his eyebrows at this), "Besides, if I did have the Curse, I think Amanda would have tipped you off by now."
The tall boy turned to Amanda and asked, "Is this girl, Nicole, acting in character to you?"
Amanda turned towards Nicole, then towards the tall boy and shook her head.
The tall boy turned back to Nicole and said, "Sorry, but I'm afraid we need to get rid of you and the Sue."
At this Nicole's temper broke, she was tired of being let down by the people she knew and loved. First Coin, then Matt, and now Amanda. She was definitely not in a mood to patiently explain to the Slayers in front of her her situation.
"You know what, screw you!" she ranted in an angry voice at the tall boy, "You think I'm out of character? Well, look at yourself! You and your companions are cowards who hid in this shed when the Slayer Organization was attacked! How dare you say that I'm out of character when you lot didn't bother to do shit!"
She glared at the three of them after saying this. The other boy looked ashamed, but the leader wasn't. His facial expression hadn't changed in any way, but one of his hands had clenched into a fist. However, Amanda was gently smiling at Nicole.
Nicole was about to give her a piece of her mind when Amanda said, "Sorry about that, Nicole. I had to make sure you were clean."
"Are you saying that you pissed me off on purpose?" she growled at her friend.
"Yes," answered Amanda a bit too innocently. The blond then proceeded to hug Nicole, who now looked quite red in the face.
Much later...
"Mmmm, cup noodles," murmured Amanda with satisfaction as she ate, "You need to try some, Neville."
"I don't know, Amanda," said Neville, "Don't they have preservatives."
"Who cares," said Luna, "It's food. Might as well eat some."
It was night, about seven-thirty. In the Plaza Hotel's dining hall, Luna and Nicole were sharing some of their food with the other Slayers, who had didn't have the luxuries of cup noodle in their packs. Although they all knew that they were now fugitives in an unbalanced world, they didn't care about that because for the moment, the outside world didn't exist.
Nicole was talking to Jonah, the boy who had questioned her earlier. They were recounting their own stories to one another.
"Yeah, so that's how we got here," finished Nicole, "What about you guys? I knew Amanda was with you, of course."
"You mean Blondie?" replied Jonah gruffly, "Yeah, I was grateful that she was in my team. She has lots of patience, that girl. Helped answer most of Neville's questions so I didn't have to."
"Well, she's pretty smart," said Nicole, "I particularly remembered that she was the best in our Sue Identification class. I think she would have became an Elite earlier if she didn't frequently ditch class to play with the pet dragons."
"Speaking of Elites," said Jonah, "What's your ranking."
"I'm an Elite," replied Nicole, "Well, recently promoted, of course."
"Good, because I don't want to carry the entire weight of this team, especially when we have a klutz and a Sue," said Jonah.
Nicole raised her eyebrows. "The Sue has been a thorn in my side for two days now, but even I have to admit that she's far from useless. "
"Even so, I doubt her trustworthiness," said Jonah as he looked at Luna, who was chatting merrily with Amanda, "I hope you were right when you said that she didn't have the Curse."
"So about your story..." interjected Nicole slowly.
"Oh yeah, almost forgot about that," said Jonah, "Well, it all started when we were going to attack the SYOD meeting."
Jonah told Nicole how he and his group attacked the Sues after their creators materialized them into the meeting, only to fall in an ambush by Serenity Altruist Faith Joy Grace Charity.
"She was too strong for all of us to handle," said Jonah, "Most of my squad died by her hand because they actually thought they had a chance against her."
"Just like Matt," muttered Nicole grimly. She could vividly remember her last image of Matt in the forest, who was about to fight his last battle.
"I couldn't believe how powerful Serenity was," continued the Slayer, "I mean, she was many times more powerful than all the Big Three gods combined in their prime."
"You got to be kidding," said Nicole, "If she's that powerful, why the Hades did President Conway think we had an actual chance against her?"
Jonah shook his head in disgust."I don't know what our President was thinking, but now, I'm pretty sure our Organization didn't have a chance against the Mary Sues from the start."
"So only you, Amanda, and Neville survived Serenity's attack, right?" said Nicole.
"Yeah," answered Jonah in an off-hand voice, "Personally, I was surprised that Neville was still on his feet."
The two didn't talk for a while and instead watched the others interact with one another. It was only when the others quit the dining hall to go to bed, did the two began talking again.
"So what are we going to do?" asked Nicole.
"I don't know," said Jonah, "But I know what we aren't going to go off fighting the Sues anymore."
"Jonah, we can't give up now," said Nicole, who put one arm on his shoulder, "The balance of the world rests on our shoulders now."
To Nicole's disappointment, Jonah just sighed at her words and said in a tired voice, "Look, I'm a son of Ares; I know a losing battle when I see one. Besides, do you really think that four Slayers and one Sue can actually overthrow Serenity and her army?"
He stood up and left the dining hall, leaving Nicole all alone.