Ch2 - Suspicions and Capture

Delian Sutherland was furious as he knelt beside the shrivelled body of the young Marine, the body of a man under his own command.
The projectile which had seen his end was lying on a piece of cloth at his side, such a small piece of wood responsible for such a gruesome death.
Gruesome, yes, for the body was not merely prone as corpses tended to be, but paler than ever he had seen a corpse to be, and limp, without the grip of Rigor Mortis. His eyes were as they had been the moment at which he had passed, screwed up tight in an agony that Sutherland could not imagine.

The lad had been the first casualty of their mission, and all of a sudden he knew that he was not about to be the last.

Sutherland also knew that he was not dead for no good reason. The decision to send the lad and his patrol to the edge of the forest on the opposite side of the island; territory deemed out of bounds by the natives; had been a joint one between himself and Luke Castellan. They had been the ones infringing on the lands of the tribals, and this kid had paid the ultimate price.

They needed to take care as they continued with this mission of theirs, but gods damn it all they would not compromise.

Annabeth Chase left the confines of the walls slightly later than she normally might have done, aware of some kind of drama on the walls last night, and yet blissfully unaware of the horrific truth.
It was, of course, alongside the Grace siblings that she had set out, though Thalia's desire to explore the wilderness and Jason's impending conversation with one of the tribals meant that the girl from Cambridge was very quickly left alone.
This, in a daughter of a Goddess renowned for intelligence and curiosity, manifested itself in exploration.

Today, the river had caught her fancy, a fallen log which had seemingly long since straddled the merry little stream providing a place in which she could find a crossing.
The limits of their exploration had been reminded to them this morning, the lake which bordered the tribal village being set as the hardest of deadlines for all but the approved Jason, and the rest being set as free roaming space.
The blonde had already found some rather stunning pieces of potential evidence of an undersea civilisation linked to this one, though each suggestion had been cut down brutally by either Jason, Thalia or her own rationality. As such, her own mission, neither of the British Government nor the Royal Society but of the Gods of Olympus themselves, was shaping up to be a stunning failure.

Touching the mossy surface of the fallen log, Annabeth judged the level of moisture to be safe enough for her to attempt to cross, the depth and ferocity of the river not dangerous enough to truly threaten a swimmer as strong as herself. Leather, rubber-soled boots gripped the slippery moss, her arms stretched out wide to provide her with balance as she moved. She did not have far at all beyond the far bank in which to conduct her investigations and observations before she reached the patrol route of the research group's Royal Marine complement; the absolute limit of her bounds in which to operate.
The previous night's panic had only reached her as she had left Sentinel, with a hushed warning not to stray too far across the opposite bank of the river, lest she befall the same fate as the poor Marine had done last night.
She had not been told quite what had happened, but by the ashen faces of his partner on that particular guard shift, its unpleasantness had not been exaggerated.
Such thoughts, however, were cast away as she reached the opposite bank.
All of a sudden, the danger was all the more real.

However, she had a mission, and she would be damned if she didn't get it done as fast as was humanly possible. Her mother's legacy was far too great for her not to be the one to find the location of that long-hidden world for which they searched.
That being said, until she found something rather more concrete, there was absolutely nothing she could do regarding its discovery. Brilliant, the mighty Olympians had guided them to some wayward Son of Poseidon, if he even existed, but beyond that?
Nothing.
A rustle in the bushed put her on guard, machete knife in her hand and ready to be used should she be rushed.

Quite probably just an animal of some sort, she thought to herself, though her state of alertness was not reduced by any means, the British girl dropping to a crouch as she unslung the musket which had rested across her back, as long as a spear and fitted with a bayonet. Eyes fixed on the spot from which she had initially heard the disturbance, she quickly bit off the pig fat-bound seal on the back of the cartridge, tipping the powder into the pan, and then the barrel from the muzzle and sending the paper casing in before compacting it with the ramrod. She winced at the level of noise generated, though she knew, regardless of her assailant, that this was her greatest chance of survival.
Theseus, she was not, who could win a fight through skill at arms. She was a British girl, born and raised in Cambridgeshire, guided by strange hallucinations which had revealed themselves to be dreams sent by Gods.
She was a coward, who hid behind a metre or so of wood, and the distance at which it could cause death.
Another rustle, this time to her left.
She didn't dare hesitate, swinging her weapon round, bringing all 39 inches of barrel to bear on the flash of movement she had detected in the trees, finger pulling hard at the trigger in her panic to act.
The sound of her weapon's discharge rang out through the forest, indubitably drawing the attention of all patrols in the area, British or Native. She could only pray that it was the former who reached her first as she reslung the weapon once more, favouring the relative security of the melee weapon as she followed her line of fire.
It was an animalistic whimper that drew her attention, a high keening that was punctuated by the scrambling of dead branches as her victim hurried to escape.
No, this could never happen. If it was a human, she was dead meat; they would inform their chieftains that the British had initiated the hostility, and suddenly there would be no issue in horrific raids upon Fort Sentinel, the same horrific fate which had befallen that poor young soldier being inflicted upon each of her friends and colleagues in turn.

"BRITISH PATROL, DROP YOUR WEAPON!" screamed a voice from the opposite bank of the river.
She could only comply, the 200 yards that separated them being well within the range of a Royal Marine's effective range of fire.
"Annabeth Chase, Research Division!" she exclaimed, hands up in the air and hat in her hand to expose her long, blonde hair. "Someone tried to attack me from the trees, I think I've shot him."

They were on her position in a matter of moments, all eight of the Marines, their red coats bright against the foliage of the jungle, and quite evidently weighing them down in the sticky humidity. Word was that there would be supplies from Auckland coming in soon, and Annabeth hoped for their own sakes that it consisted of the khaki material favoured in British India, Africa and Australia. While the Red was traditional and exceedingly smart on a fighting man's body, even she, a non-combatant by the standards of present company, could appreciate that practicality was a far greater blessing than smartness upon the battlefield.
It was on shaking legs that she guided them to the last place at which she heard the sounds of movement, and it didn't take long at all for their combined efforts to lead them to the bleeding form of a young boy, quite probably her own age.

His arms and torso bore the tattoos which seemed omnipresent among his people, spiralling over his shoulders and chest, representing the waves of the ocean, and the teeth of sharks, the shells of turtles. She could see stylised arrowheads to one side, and then, upon the curve of the shoulder, the angry face of the Sun.
At least, it would have been rather clearer than she now saw it, if it weren't for the bullet hole and streaming blood in the middle of the ornate, spiralling tattoo, like a shot in the centre of a marksman's target.

Linking their red coats, four of the soldiers make a stretcher of sorts, carrying the boy's prone form back to Sentinel. Gods willing, CSM Sutherland would be able to heal him, and then the answers would flow. The Senior Non-Commissioned Officer seemed to have a knack for medicine, and his methods of interrogation were second to none. She had received no education on matters of the Greek Gods, but the name of Asclepius came to mind; perhaps he was some son of the God himself, whose winged baton and snake adorned so many of the medical establishments of the country.
Her speculation, however, was halted as the walls of the camp loomed back into view, the Grace siblings pacing worriedly atop the walls as they awaited her return.

It was a flustered Castellan and Sutherland who greeted them at the gates, one of the Lieutenants, an Australian by the name of Charles Beckendorf arriving to have a word with the Company's acting Officer Commanding in the absence of Major Parks, though their conversation ended as the Son of Hermes turned to face the his returning patrol.
There were no words spoken, however; there was a prisoner to heal and question.

It was with shaking hands that she cleaned the wound which she had inflicted on the tribal, limbs settling into a rhythm of damping a washcloth and cleansing the drying blood from his skin, a small part of her crying in sympathetic pain for the young man as her psyche tortured her in penance for her misdeeds.
On and on it went, that painstaking process, until there was no blood left.
Then came the more difficult of her tasks.
She could hardly leave him with a bullet in his shoulder, could she?
Fortunately for her, it had not ricocheted as bullets were wont to do, instead catching on the scapula and remaining very much where it had been.
Gripping well-muscled, tanned skin, she held his upper arm, pinning the limb to the bed on which he was laid out, the effects of the chloroform which she had administered to him not long left to last.
Fortunately, she was fast, and her mind was sharp.
The projectile was out with little work, and she set about wrapping the afflicted portion of his shoulder.

As the man slept, she couldn't help but examine him, her conscience only protesting by some small amount upon the processes of her mind. After all, when else might she get the chance to examine a tribal so closely?
He was tall, that much was obvious; taller even than some of the British, and his form was strong. Muscles bound his bones to his body, and his bronze skin was embellished with intricate artwork, like the sleeves of a gentleman's shirt, and along his torso and legs in a true exhibit of culture and colour.
If she were to compare him to someone that she had known of before, however, the closest resemblance would have to come to Sutherland.
The man shared the same build, tall and yet visibly strong, like a warrior of old. His face, too, with its sharp jawline and high cheekbones, could rather easily have belonged to one of the Elder Olympians, such was the elegance, the finesse in his physical form.
Like a flint striking rock, her mind came to a jarring realisation.
Taking off at a run, she didn't even so much as greet the guards who snapped to attention at the infirmary's door, only halting herself when she found Castellan, who, as it so happened, had been in conversation with Thalia.
Words were exchanged, and all of a sudden the trio were caught up in a flurry of movement.
In the jacketed protection of night, conversation would be made among the Royal Marine detachment of RRS Argo, regarding the sanity and safety of their stand-in commanding officer and the two researchers with whom he seemed to involve himself so often.

Delian Sutherland had emerged from a briefing with his Senior NCOs to a rather alarming piece of information.
The demigods of the quest had taken it upon themselves to administer potentially lethal medication, needless to mention its expense and rarity, on a pathetic foreigner, and a prisoner at that.
That being said, he knew of Castellan's typical rational capacity for thought, and the Daughter of Athena was hardly one to rush into an unfavourable scenario, regardless of her impulsive actions of the previous day.
Pulling on his heavy overcoat, therefore, he rushed out of his tent, towards the structure that had been designated the encampment's infirmary, and found himself face to face with a pensive-looking Annabeth Chase.

"Sergeant Major," She asked him, not even looking him in the eye, "We were briefed on the possibility of a Demigod being on this island?"
"Yes, Miss Chase, indeed we were," He responded, the gears of his mind spinning like clockwork to piece together the experimental move of the demigods who had assimilated themselves with the ship's complement, and using his own observation of the boy's body.
He had seen it all before; from the tone of the skin, to the structure of the face.
He had seen it on Theseus, and on Bellerophon, and saw it still in Triton.
Annabeth Chase, in all her genius, had shot the lost Son of Poseidon.
That night, however, he would wake up to the chilling sounds of the screams of his men, only to be met with their decaying corpses littered across the balustrade of his fort.
He didn't dare deploy troops to the forest, but even in the light of the fires atop the wall, nothing was to be seen.
The message was clear.
He was not perceived to be the superior party here.
He would be damned to Tartarus if that didn't change soon.

A/N
Still going with shorter chapters, and this is very much as I intend it to be. The plot is a fast one, and the real purpose of this project is honestly to give me something to write when I have an urge to put the proverbial pen to paper, but can't focus on my main project at this time; In the Light of a Waning Moon.
Really not much to say about this chapter, if you read it you know what's happened.
Until next time, then,
Sol
(I don't own PJO)