Alexa huffed and puffed. Her shirt was soaked with blood and sweat, turning the sand and grit under her shirt into clumps of burning, stinging muck. She'd have to change her shirt before going back to the hotel, but she was not about to leave now. This was the longest she'd been out here at a stretch, and she'd made more progress today than she ever had before. She wiped the blood from a cut on her arm, and winced slightly. She took a bandage and wrapped it around the cut on her left forearm, now quite tan thanks to the long days spent out here in the desert.
"Definitely going to leave a scar." She muttered to Luna, returning the bandage to her pack. Luna let out a little whine and gave Alexa's arm a meaningful nudge. The metal canine was none the worse for wear, she hadn't even been scratched by those glass and metal quills. That didn't stop her from whirring with concern for her master, though. Alexa smiled and gave her a pat on the head.
"You're such a good girl." Alexa muttered. Luna whirled lightly in agreement. After a few more seconds the ache had finally left her arms, the twitching had left her muscles. She took a deep breath and winced slightly. Ribs were bruised, well on their way to being broken, but they'd have to do.
Over the past few weeks she had discovered quite a bit about the cerastes, enough, in fact, that she fully intended to send her findings to Uncle Chuck when she was done here. The cerastes are quite the eaters. To say that the horned stakes were omnivores didn't really do it justice, they ate everything; animals, plants, trash from the side of the road, even the sand they swam through. She had witnessed the big one snack on the rubber of a blown out tire and a few rocks more than once. As best as she could figure out they used the non-organic stuff they ate to make their quills somehow, maybe even their horns, but Alexa had no way to verify that yet. They either weren't venomous or the bite from one of the smaller ones had put her into a very detailed and mundane hallucination, so that seemed to mean that they used their incredibly flexible bodies to constrict their prey long enough to either bash their heads in or gore them with their horns. As the only one she had found that was big enough to hunt her was the bus sized one she herself was hunting, that was only theory on her part.
The biggest discovery, and the thing that might just save her bacon on this quest, she discovered entirely by accident. Five days ago she was out during one of the Mojave's rare thunderstorms. The frustration of such a large quarry evading her had caused a bit of recklessness on her part, but it also resulted in the big discovery. A lightning bolt had struck a patch of sand, not exactly uncommon during a thunderstorm in the desert, but what had been a huge surprise was the mass of roiling coins swarming the spot a few moments later.
She watched with fascination as the younger, smaller cerastes, the smallest ones the size of cobras, the biggest twice the size of an anaconda dipped and dove through the sand. The things were at it for several minutes before they suddenly darted away, diving away into the sandy surf. Then the big one surfaced and swallowed the patch of sand whole before disappearing once again.
After a thorough look at the sand back at the hotel she had discovered that the biggest oddity was zinc oxide. Things filled in pretty quick after that; zinc in the soil, lightning caused the chemical reaction and oxidation. More importantly, it meant she had bait!
She had tested her theory a few days later using some baby powder and after confirming it in spectacular fashion, she had started a proper hunt.
A hunt that was about to have its fifth, and hopefully, last confrontation of the day.
Alexa spat a wet glob of phlegm into the dirt and replaced her handkerchief over her mouth and nose.
"Ready?" She asked Luna. The metal canine gave a quick woof of affirmation. Alexa nodded and gave her one more pat before the winged dog took flight again. She gave her a few seconds before she pulled out the bait; a canister about the size of a soda can. She shook it lightly and pulled the pin. She lobbed it as hard as she could from the rocky outcrop she stood on, towards the sand. Midway through its arc the end popped off, spilling a stream of white powder in a thick white cloud.
Almost immediately the first thick triangular head shot from the sand, sniffing at the smokey trail, beelining straight for the treasure trove left in the can. Alexa pulled the lightning bolt charm from her wrist, the sword sparking and spitting as it grew to its full length. She held it loosely in her grip and silently waited.
The change occurred in a second; one second the little snakes swarmed the can, the next they shot away like roaches caught in the light. The moment the massive bulk of her prey broke through the dune she let him have it! A desert's payload of pilfered heat lightning struck the horned snake directly between the two curly horns. The snake's body seized up as the lightning crashed through it, but Zeus she was not. Her bolt didn't have the stopping power to take down a creature like this on its own, and she knew it. The point was just to make it angry, and she succeeded.
The snake reared up with the hiss of thousands of fire hoses, showing off the battle scars from their last four encounters; long scars all over its belly, a deep cut just under one eye, most of the quills on its left side cut off in a ragged line.
She smirked up at it.
"You look like hell!" She called. The snake let out an angry hiss and dove at her. That was when Luna dove into action; a glittering net of celestial bronze seemed to materialize out of nowhere, dropped from the jaws of the mechanical canine. It wrapped around the lower jaw of the serpent and the enchanted weights snapped to the rock.
Seeing her chance, Alexa rushed the beast, slashing into its hide with her sparking sword. The Cerastes hissed and writhed, two of the weights popping free even as Luna continued her work, securing the overgrown worm to the rock. Alexa ran down the creature's body, slashing and stabbing furiously every time it tried to push one of its loose folds towards her. Each cut, minor though it was, earned her an angry, vengeful hiss from the Cerastes.
She finally reached her estimated strike point and skidded to a stop. She licked her lips and readied her sword, staring into the glistening red wound she had made the last time they had had this exchange. She threw her full weight forward, putting everything she had behind the point of her sword.
Pure pain and adrenaline did what concentrated effort couldn't; the snake surged upwards, breaking the restraints and carrying Alexa along for the ride. She gritted her teeth and held onto the hilt of the sword. She had to complete the final step.
It was pretty hard to determine where the organs were in a creature with no skeleton to act as a guide, but she hoped the rhythmic pulsing she felt from the sword was the heart and not the abdominal muscles attempting to dislodge her. Only one way to find out; with a soft cry she sent another jolt of electrify into the Cerastes, deep into the muscles of its chest cavity. Just as before the whole creature seized, but it was more than that this time! The blood in front of her hardened and rapidly began to turn to sand.
"Yes!" Alex's cheered just as her blade slipped free of the dying beast. She fell with a heavy thud onto the waiting back of Luna. The two circled their way down to the ground, which had become littered with an innumerable number of quills and two massive horns. The moment Alexa's fingers touched one it shrank down to the size of a large water bottle.
"One Cerastes horn, this aught to please Hera." Alexa happily chirped. She took a moment to change clothes before once again climbing back onto Luna's back.
The strip during daylight was a far cry from its evening splendor. Tourists kept their heads down, avoiding the torturous light of the sun as the trudged towards their next disaster. It was easy for a flying dog and her rider to pass as a particularly buzzard.
The pair had something of a usual landing point, about 20 minutes from Paris's, part way down the strip. She had just gotten off Luna, with her faithful mutt preparing to take off again, when a commotion on the street caught her attention.
A truck with the words Kindness International stenciled on it had stopped at a station. The doors at the back of the truck had been flung open wide, and everyone (except for two men Alexa assumed were the owners of the truck) were clapping and cheering as three animals ran down the street towards the desert, an antelope, a zebra, and an albino lion. Even that Alexa might've ignored had she not noticed two figures running away from the truck, one with pale with curly brown hair, the other with a darker complexion, black hair, and a bright yellow backpack bouncing on his back. The brown haired one in particular caught her attention, he had the distinctive stride of a satyr, which could only mean one thing; the boy had to be a demigod. A demigod currently running straight towards an alley Alexa knew was not a good way to go.
"We gotta stop them!" She yelped, flinging her leg back over Luna's back and kicking her into high gear. They flew across the street, Luna nearly crashing into the wall of the blind alley immediately behind it. Alexa spilled off the back of the metal hound and sprang to her feet, palms up. The black haired boy had already drawn a sword, Celestial Bronze, no doubt, and the brown haired boy held a can of what looked to be green beans like a pitcher ready to deliver a fastball. Before anyone could move or speak a voice, not one belonging to any of them, came from the air at the boys' right.
"Alexa?" The air shimmered slightly, and all at once Annabeth Chase appeared out of nowhere, slipping her enchanted Yankees cap into her pocket.
"You know her, Annabeth?" The sword boy asked, the tip of the sword lowering slightly.
"Ah, you must be new." Alexa chuckled.
"Percy, this is Alexa, the first person in the last decade to try to complete the trials of Heracles. She's a legend at Camp. Someone had to have mentioned her at some point." Annabeth scoffed.
"I was a little busy with the whole finding out I'm a demigod thing!" Percy defended with a slight blush. He pulled out a pen cap and placed it on the tip of his sword, causing the whole thing to shrink into a ballpoint pen.
"That's fair, plus I haven't been to camp in over a year, I doubt I'm still gossip worthy anymore." She glanced up, the Lotus hotel's entrance sparkling invitingly.
"Come on, there're better places to talk and you three look like you need a shower and a good meal." Alexa said with a motion of her arm.
"And a nap!" The satyr added, earning him a chuckle from Alexa.
"Yeah, you all can crash at my place. Come on." Alexa cast one more dirty look at the fancy little trap at the end of the alley and led the three back down the strip to Paris.