This chapter contains spoilers for Night Broken, the 8th book in the Mercy Thompson series. If you like the series, but haven't read it yet, don't read this story, go buy the book. My writing can't compare to Patricia Briggs or Rick Riordan's.
Note, I'm skipping a lot of flavor text and background info, I figure if you're reading a fan fiction about a book, then chances are you've read the book and know, at least in part, that information.
Also, I own none of the characters, not even the OC I made as she is part of the PJaO books and anyone is free to duplicate her for their own stories. Writing a story using characters from published books, I certainly can't complain if someone likes my idea enough to run it in a different direction, but please, no slash.
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I also found the story I got the idea for the Shadow Travel mistake from; s/9380435/1/Shadow-Worlds by Musafreen.
A really good story, to bad he's pretty much dropped it. I figure since we're all playing around with other people's ideas anyway, as long as I didn't copy exactly, it wouldn't be a big deal. But still, check his story out; it's well worth the read. Maybe we can convince him to restart it?
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I tried to make it appear on my page, but I couldn't, so I made it the cover photo for the story. It's a picture of the gun I based Terry's on. It's a real weapon that fires real shells, shotgun in the case of the gun in the picture. Terry's has more decoration, including an engraving of the Drakkon she killed on the handle (made of Drakkon Ivory) and Greek lettering spelling out "End of Infinity" along the barrel. It's also a lot more powerful, but then, most of the weapons used by demi-gods are.
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A Story
Mercy
"I've already introduced myself, but for the new people, I'm Rachel Dare. And considering what happened last time, I'll forgo the offer of a hand shake. And yay; today is my 16th birthday." Her magic smells weird. Ancient, yet futuristic (and I never realized that the future had its own smell). I get the impression of sand, copper, snakes, more sand, crocodiles (?), dates, olives and caves, plus, a little bit of a similar power to Terry's undefined power (ok, more than a little, quite a bit more), yet subtly different.
I also notice her eyes are the same color as the apparition that took her over, and I'm pretty sure that wasn't the color when she first held out her hand to shake. In werewolves, eye color changes mean something, so I'm going to assume it means something for her as well.
On hearing that it's her birthday, the 2 boys jerk, evidently, they didn't know, and Annabeth and Terry aren't going to let them off the hook for it either, being ADHD, it's even worse than is normal for teasing. During the exchange, we learn that Rachel's parents are loaded. Loaded in a way that people would have thought of the Carnegies' a century before. When her mother asked what she wanted for her birthday, Rachel replied 'A million dollar donation to the Ronald McDonald House.' No, as rich as they are, Rachel knew that they didn't have that kind of cash lying around, evidently, her relationship with her parents is somewhat strained and she was being sarcastic. Her mother surprised her though, she decided to hold a charity ball to raise money for the foundation. That's how come she was actually dressed up and looking nice, evidently, she takes after Jesse, and why the boys just thought they were going to a charity ball.
Adam starts to give Tony, Molly, Sam and Warren a highly edited version of what happened this morning. He trusts everyone but Molly to some extent, and I also notice that Sam is now holding Adams phone with Bran on the other end. He's still on the line, just not saying anything. I can hear over the line what sounds suspiciously like a crowd and I wonder just how many people are listening in.
Adam gives a surprisingly detailed account of the episodes in the kitchen, it's the events outside that he edits the most, especially the bit about Percy CREATING a living thing. Something tells me, that wouldn't go over well at all. For that, he tells them that he is watching the pegasus for a friend, and that he is not at liberty to discuss either it, or the friend. As for naked water lady, he explains that it was a remaining creature from the River-devil episode on our honeymoon, something that is partially truthful, and something that the police and federal agencies are already familiar with.
Up till this point, everything is going pretty good. All of us with enhanced smell, and Rachel as noticed that Detective Ringwall doesn't seem to like us in any way, but she's remaining silent up until in a fit of ADHD inspired boredom, Terry takes out (summons actually, were does she keep that thing) her massive pistol and starts to clean it on the table.
Det. Ringwall grabs her gun and yells; "Hands Up! Don't Move!"
We're all sitting there looking at her when Percy asks; "What is your Problem?!" Quicker then I've seen anyone move before, he's out of his chair and standing in front of her, between her and Terry. "You already knew she had the gun, she'd already had the gun laying on the table and partial disassembled when you drew your gun. So I'll ask again, what in the name of Hades is your Problem?!" By this point, he's leaning over her, forcing her to bend over backwards, with her gun to his chest. "You've sat there this entire discussion, making faces of disgust and dislike. You've clearly got an ax to grind here, so what is it?!" Tony's got his hand on his gun (undrawn at this point) and Adam, Daryl and warren are standing up, ready to pounce. The other kids are watching with amused disinterest, Terry just reassembles her gun, but leaves it out. "If you want us gone so bad, why don't you shoot? Go on, do it, I dare you." With that, he grabs her hand and places the barrel in his mouth, "Do it" (it actually sounds like 'Eww Iee'".
When she doesn't move, he slaps her hand and the gun discharges in his mouth with a loud bang. Tony pulls his gun out and aims at her yelling for her to drop her weapon with Percy standing there with smoke coming out his mouth.
It's at that point that we all realize that Percy is still standing there, with a grin on his face. As soon as everyone is looking at him, he calmly spits the bullet out. "You can't hurt me." He says, and I'm not the only one to take note that he's actually lying about that. "There are only two things that can hurt me, that wasn't one of them. And no, I'm not going to tell you what they are either." He sits back down, spitting out the rest of whatever comes out the end of a barrel when a gun is fired, "The chances that any of us," waving his hands to include all the kids except Rachel, "will live to see our twentieth birthday are less than one and five hundred. So we're not inclined to play by your rules, abide by your taboos, or worry about your desire to control things. If you've got a problem with that, if you've really got that much of a problem with people that are supernatural, I'd suggest transferring to a different department, such as, I don't know, Meter Maid."
Molly is, by this point, shaken up pretty bad, and Tony is still pointing his weapon at her, though the tension has drained from him to be replaced with resignation. She fired her weapon at an unarmed civilian. Specifically, she fired it into his mouth. Even though he lived, even though he caused it really, there's a good chance she's not going to be employed with the police soon.
Terry decides to enter the conversation at this point; "Do you really want this gun so much? I'll tell you what, using this gun, and a single bullet." She removes all the shells except one, and I notice that one of the places to hold a bullet is covered over, "We'll play a game of Russian Roulette. You win, you can keep the gun, I win," shrug, "well, let's just say your partner going to be coming up with a story for your superior." With that, she spins the cylinder, waits for it to stop, points it at her head, and then fires.
The sound of the hammer striking home is, at that moment, almost as loud as Molly's shot had been. We're all staring at her aghast when she calmly puts the gun on the table. "Your Turn! Just pick it up, give it a spin, and take your chances!"
Surprisingly, Molly edges over to the table looking at the gun. It's actually a very beautiful piece of artwork, but it's also clearly a functional piece of art as well. As big as it is, it's clearly not big enough to hold the rounds sitting on the table next to it, three 50 caliber shells, each looks like artwork as well, and I can smell magic on them. I guess she left the tungsten core one in the chamber.
As she starts to pick it up, Tony starts to warn her not to, but Terry pipes up; "Be careful, it's heavier than it looks, and I put a hair trigger on it without putting a safety on."
Molly looks at Terry; "You don't have a safety?"
Terry points at her eye; "This is My Safety! It's called target identification! Something you've shown a noticeable lack of ability at! It'd be unfortunate if you shot your partner there by mistake."
Now Tony is looking at Terry coldly, but Molly just collapses back into her chair and seems on the verge of tears. "How can you do that? How can you have so little regard for your own life and the lives of others? Why play these games?" she seems ready to continue, but is overcome by a fit.
Terry replies; "We play games, because we're bored. It's a release of energy. For the most part, we work out, practice weapons drill and make stuff. But games are important form of stress release. What Percy said is correct, only one in five hundred of us survive to twenty. My father was one of the few, he was a member of the cabin that adopted me when I went to camp, and he married my mother at 16 who was the daughter of people from two other cabins. Only dad survived past twenty, making it to twenty two, my mom died right after giving birth to me at seventeen. She'd been held by a cyclops so he could eat me after I was born the way some rich people like veal. A friend of my Dad was able to overcome it, and rescue me and my Dad, but my Mom died. My grandparents on my mother's side died at seventeen and nineteen. We're not really given to worrying about long term plans, or were our lives will lead us, we already know. We Die!"
"The first time I killed anything," she says, "was about a year ago, before the battle of New York." Battle of New York? I notice that I'm not the only one who perks up at that.
"I got a quest. At the time, all the more experienced people had more important things going on getting ready for the war. I was to go back to the orphanage that I stayed in before coming full time to camp. The three of us, Jacob eleven, Megan also eleven and me, I was ten at the time were to rescue another half-blood that had wound up there and stop whatever monster was threatening her. Turned out it was a minotaur and some other things that looked like anthropomorphic otters." I shuddered, I've developed a dislike for otters since my honeymoon.
"We, meaning I, decided to go ahead, after all, Percy managed to kill a minotaur when he was eleven without any training or weapons and on his own. I figured how hard could it be? I grossly underestimated them. It turns out that they'd charm spoken all the kids. Jacob was cut down by the knife wielding kids. He didn't even have a weapon that would harm a mortal, only a celestial bronze sword, passed right through the kids, and they tore him apart. Some of them even began to consume his flesh. Megan does better, she's using a whiffle ball bat and bean bags from a game to knock the kids unconscious, and I'm concentrating on the otters and the minotaur." I'm completely engrossed by her story at this point, this girl has never been a child, and shall never manage to live that scene down. That fight had become her defining life experience, and she'd been ten years old.
"How much do you know about minotaurs? They're creatures of lust. Born through a rape and bestiality, they are consumed with lust and violence and must rape and murder to retain their existence. What it was doing in the orphanage was nearly beyond my ability to comprehend. But it was also gathering funds for its side in the war. Up until then, I'd actually been kind of ambivalent about the Titans, couldn't be any worse then what we had right? I learned right there, I had been wrong about that. They were taping things, even their murders and selling them for funding." My blood is cold at this point, I can see the looks of shock on everyone else's faces, even the kids, so she'd never shared this particular story with anyone before.
"When Megan gets killed by one of the otters, I know I'm about doomed. The only thing I can think of is to trick it into playing Russian Roulette. I'm pretty sure I'm about to lose, but it's thinking along the same lines, so I'm able to get it to parley. I manage to convince him to settle this with a game, and to swear on the river Styx for it and the otters to abide by the terms of the game. Luckily, the half-blood we came to rescue isn't included in any promises I make, and she gets a hold of Megan's bow, and being a child of the sun like her, starts to pick off the otters from behind while I'm setting up the game. She does it smoothly too, like that movie about the Russian sniper in WW2, 'Enemy at the Gates' she targets the ones in the rear, were none of the others can see what's going on. I get the minotaur to the table, remove one of the bullets from the gun I was using at the time, I only had two left, leaving the celestial bronze one in the chamber. We go several rounds before he starts to realize he's pushing his luck, and that's when he loses. As his head disintegrates, his body quickly becomes dust, and the two remaining otters turn to flee, but Meredith takes them out. The charm on the mortals fades at that point and the kids forget what happened in the mist. We call the cops, give them a bullshit story and they quickly discover the recordings and close the place down, sending everyone to different orphanages throughout the area. I manage to get Meredith out in the confusion, and everyone lives happily ever after. Yip, Yip yahoo." Something tells me, there's no such thing as happily ever after for her here.
"So, Every gun I make now, has some features built in from lessons that I learned that day. One; endless ammo; one of the chambers is sealed off, it's called the duplication chamber. It duplicates the other ammo over and over again, endlessly, though shells duplicated only last about a minute, so I can't supply a force with it, but it makes forensics a hassle as there's never bullets afterwards." Maybe she shouldn't have told the police that bit.
"Two; fully automatic, even though it's a revolver." With that, she walks over to the railing, points the gun slightly down so it hits about two hundred feet away, and lets loose with a long sustained burst, making it clear that it's fully automatic, and has the endless supply of bullets she mentioned. Oh yeh, she really shouldn't have told the cops about this gun. Of course, it also makes it clear how strong she is as her hand doesn't jump around at all, but remains stable and steady as she fires, one handed. Clearly supernatural levels of strength is on open display.
"Three; it can not only be hidden by the mist," it fades from her hand at that point, "but it always comes back to me, like Percy's sword." Ok, she's telling the cops this as a threat. Or a warning. She's saying leave us the hell alone, or I'll kill you. And she's not really being all that subtle about it either. The question is, did they get the message she intended, or something else, like maybe she's just a little off because of her trauma.
"Fourth; the duplication chamber is ALWAYS the chamber that is set to the barrel to fire, that way, all I need to do is think about which chamber I want duplicated, and it'll have that one ready to go." That's way better than the computer controlled guns from movies.
"And fifth and finally, I ALWAYS leave one chamber open. That way, all I have to do is think of the empty chamber when I fire, and nothing is duplicated. So unless you know that trick, eventually, whoever I'm playing against will think about the chamber that has a bullet." DAMN!
We're all looking at her in silence when suddenly my cell phone starts to play 'Sting Little Cobra', Tad's calling.
"Hey Mercy, I just spoke to Jesse and Ariana, they said you wanted me to open the garage today. It's Sunday, we're never open Sunday, did I miss something?"
CRAP!