Twin Eagles

Somewhere around Yosemite National Park, California — June 15, 2022; 23:03

Although only a few years into existence, the New Rome University Monster Hunting Society [MHS] had begun to establish itself in the colorful world of NRU clubs. While some student orgs. had ancient traditions dating back to the very founding of the university, the MHS focused on distancing itself from the city as a whole.

Case in point, the now “iconic” MHS Yosemite trip. While most hunts were a weekend of tracking hellhounds through Wine Country vineyards or sniping more humanoid abominations in the suburbs, the first week after finals gave club members a chance to go crazy in the California wilderness. Despite the heavy mortal and unaware demigod presence, enough monsters flocked around the general Yosemite National Park area to justify spending the NRU Special Activities Funding Board’s money on young adults day drinking while running around with spears and swords.

Of course, not everyone was as apathetic about the trip.

Aikaterinē of Sestos, club treasurer and NRU sophomore, had a more comprehensive plan. There was talk of a drakon roaming the Sierra Nevadas that made the Yosemite area a frequent rest stop. While a drakon was a bit much for one person — even if it was the (essentially) 20 year old daughter of Zeus — she was not looking to slay it tonight. The goal was simply to find if it was here.

Regardless, Kat was not going to act as though she would not attract trouble. Over her chiton and boots was her celestial bronze [CB] armor, recently reforged to account for growth. At her hip was the xiphos Danny forged a few years back for her, copper wires snaking across the CB blade. Her back carried the weight of her CB shield and CB tipped spear.

Aria was sprinting through the undergrowth, her feet a vague blur. Four. Four! Of her sisters, dead. Siobhian, Cytheris, Rosemary, Laothoe. The images flashed through her brain as she ran, tears of anger and frustration coating her face. It could not be possible. It just couldn't. They were not dead.
She had hunted monsters for the past five centuries, but this drakon was one of the worst she had met. Impenetrable scales, a breath of acid gas, poison spit. And if that wasn't enough, its oily body could camouflage itself against the trees at will. He'd got her a fair few times already: her left arm, now a gruesome red colour, was covered in blisters from an acid burn. She'd been whacked into a tree and her leg had cracked. She was pretty sure some of her ribs were broken as well. Her head throbbed and blood filled her mouth, she had to spit it out every few seconds.

"AH!"

A sudden burst of pain and her leg gave out. The Hunter rolled to the ground, breaking her fall with her good arm. Di immortales. The drakon must have heard that. She stayed motionless in the grass for a long second, listening for any telltale slithering, the rasping of scales against bark, or the flicking of a barbed tongue. The hand clenching her dagger was white.

Silence.

She stayed just one second longer before slowly getting up into a crouch and disappearing behind a tree. A quick go-through her pockets confirmed what she was fearing: she was all out of ambrosia. There were a last few crumbs, which she pressed tagainst her lips, but they did nothing except briefly clearing her blurring vision. Her leg still killed her. As for her blisters, they had started oozing a yellowish pus-like substance which, apart from being obviously gross and painful, also stank like a week-old latrine.
Aria leaned back against the tree trunk, holding her ribs. Her silvery clothes were caked with blood and mud. Her backpack was in tatters. This was not looking good.

And just at that moment, something hit her shoulder. Something warm, viscous; it rolled down the shreds of her jacket, filtering through her clothes. Saliva. Aria slowly lifted her eyes. Emerging from the tree's crown, a double row of teeth materialized out of thin air right above her head. It was like a scene from Jurassic Park. Bloody camouflage. How long had the drakon been there? Had it just arrived, or had it waited for the perfect opportunity, when the prey was it its lowest?
No matter, Aria thought. This was it.

The fangs snapped, but she had already rolled out of the way, using the slanted terrain to plummet down as fast as possible. Leaves crunched, dirt flew. A hidden rock sent her flying and she landed hard. Planting the side of her boots into the earth, she skidded to a painful halt and glanced upwards. The goal of the game was to gain distance, both to avoid the poison and the acid breath, but also to get the drakon in range of her arrows. If it was not gonna show, she was going to make it show itself. A quick glance at the sky told her the clouds she had summoned earlier were still there, hanging low and dark above the canopy. They had started to pale, but Aria could still work with them. She may be too weak to fly right now, but she could still call on a storm.

"Kαταιγί," she grunted, and almost doubled over as her energy faded. The world switched to red, then to black. She fell to her knees.
No! Get up. Get the hell back up, you idiot. Her entire body trembled as she forced herself to stand, gritting her teeth so hard she thought they were going to pop out.
But it had paid off: the faint sound of rain softly reached her ears, dripping off the leaves above, intensifying by the second. It took a moment to really kick off, but when it did, it was like fireworks. In the span of a few moments, the forest was inundated by the roar of wind and heavy downpour, branches whining, the undergrowth whipped open by violent gusts. Aria closed her eyes, tilting her head back. If these were her last moments, she wanted to feel the rain on her face. Dying during a storm seemed a pretty fitting way of leaving this world. The cold water slid into her ruined clothes, cleansing her of mud and poison, pooling at her feet. It was a small solace, but sweet nonetheless.
Somewhere above, leaves rustled. A hiss cut through the air like a whip, bringing her back to the present. Aria could spot the drakon clearly now: it may have camouflage but the water rolling down its scales clearly gave it away to her trained eyes. Summoning her bow, she took cover and shot two arrows, three arrows, four arrows. Until her quiver was empty. But even the most vicious ones did nothing more than slow him down. She might as well be stabbing him with splinters.
Grunting in frustration, she tossed the silver bow aside. What was it worth now? Clearly, this drakon needed more than arrows to be obliterated back to Tartarus. Her dagger and sword were both short-range, and engaging in close combat right now would be suicide. No, she needed something else. Something she hadn't done in a long time.
Slowly, she lifted her arms. No more mistakes, no more playing safe. The daughter of Zeus had rarely been this close to death, and she was down to her last cards.

"Aστραπή. Nῦν!"

Lightning flashed.... but it did not strike the drakon. It hit Aria.
With a guttural scream, she lifted off the ground, shaking with spasms. Purple-white tendrils crackled up and down her body. Her hair spiked up almost comically, her face distorted by the prolonged shout. This was the highest voltage she had experienced in her life. Nothing had ever felt so intense. She was burning with electricity, toeing the line between heaven and the underworld.
Somewhere above, thunder was building up, coming together like a crescendo. And, just as it rolled in with a sky-splitting crack, she slammed her fist into the ground, sending an electromagnetic shockwave through the forest. The earth rippled. Thunder echoed. Sparks flew. Branches dropped. Carbonated roots broke the earth. The drakon flew back with a shriek, shaking its massive barbed head. And Aria fell to the ground, unable to move. The daughter of Zeus was like paralyzed. Little bits of electricity fizzled here and there on her body, like the last hiccups of a dying battery. This might be her last fight, but at least the drakon was taken care of.

Haha, so she thought.

A soft slithering made her ears perk up.
How is he not dead? she thought, incredulous. She had seen it fly, hitting a tree, electricity bouncing from scale to scale. Was he immune to shockwaves? Or lightning? She tried lifting a finger, summoning the tiniest spark of electricity. But to no avail. Her fingers gave a little electroshock then went numb. And the drakon approached, clearly pissed off. It wasn't even bothering with camouflage anymore, its blue scales standing out clearly against the undergrowth. Bushes cracked underneath him. Aria didn't move - what for? She had no energy left. No ambrosia. No healing potion. She'd just played her last trick, and her bow's string had sizzled with the lightning bolt.

If there ever was a time for last resorts, it was now.

"Father, if you hear me," she prayed in Ancient Greek, "if you hear this, please, send assistance. Anyone."

It was not like her to pray for help. But her four sisters were dead, and she may well be next. She did not intend to end her life in a drakon stomach.

While Kat felt as though she was hot on the drakon’s trail there was still a lack of any substantial evidence pointing to it being in Yosemite. Fallen trees here and large chunks of earth moved there, but that only served to say it had been there. Nothing saying it was in California right now.

The Ancient Greek stopped for a moment, leaning against a fallen Oak tree, running her hands along the vicious cuts in the toppled trunk. She looked up at the night sky, the stars and moon hidden by an overcast veil.

Well that is odd, Aikaterinē thought. The report said it would be clear tonight. Liar. Could she blame the meteorologist though? The gods were fickle creatures — whatever radar tricks he used could not even come close to predicting their collective will.

Aikaterinē pressed on, shrugging off the inaccurate reporting. Except that it became even more inaccurate.

As rain picked up and Kat cursed her poor foresight for choosing to go with a chiton rather than pants and a shirt, a commotion a ways ahead grabbed her attention. Raising the temperature around her by about ten degrees — it was cold for a summer storm — the daughter of Zeus became even more intrigued as lightning stuck in the distance.

Sudden rain, impromptu lightning... Aikaterinē had seen such phenomena before. She had seen it when Amara demonstrated her powers before the adoring Sestos. She had seen it when she encouraged Nakamura to go all out. And she had seen it every time she ended up in battle.

There was a child of Zeus out there, and even as she got tripped by a shockwave she kept on through the forest until the ground ran out above a clearing. And at the bottom of the small cliff, her worst thoughts were confirmed.

The Drakon of Yosemite — blue, barred and battered — was here. And across the clearing in the sights of the beast, a small girl laying in peril.

Taking in the scene, Aikaterinē was faced with a dilemma. A quick check showed she had only half a flask of nectar left and she only came to track a beast, not kill it. But out there, in that patch of open undergrowth, a sibling lay there helpless just outside of Hades’ grasp.

Aikaterinē did not know who this girl was. She could be a Legionnaire cut off from her allies or a camper lost in the forest, or maybe even a stray demigod on the run facing the wrath of Hera or some other petty divine being. She could have the best intentions in the world or she could believe she is the one to overthrow Olympus.

But she was a demigod from this new, strange world — the new, strange world that accepted her even after Amara had done so much to destroy them. For the forgiveness they showed her, for the chances they had given her, for the person they allowed her to become, Aikaterinē sworn to defend them to her final breath.

This girl was not going to die tonight.

With an open hand, Aikaterinē summoned a lengthy bolt into existence. Pulsating with unrestricted energy, she lifted the heavy sliver of light above her and stepped back to throw. No time to confirm a hit, she ran back about 50 paces and turned. She summoned static to surround her, enhancing the speed of her every movement.

With drawn spear and enhanced movement Aikaterinē took off through the forest, leaping blade-first from the earth’s end and impaling the drakon with a primal roar.

The drakon drew closer. Through the rain drops, Aria counted the fangs protruding from its mouth. Some were still red with the blood of her sisters. As she realized that, a shot of anger ran through her body, igniting the last spark of her energy, the faintest bit of strength she had left. Clenching her dagger behind her back, she was getting ready to give it her very last shot, her most desperate attempt at staying alive. Her breath caught and she coughed up some blood, but her eyes stayed on the drakon. Come closer you fucker, she thought. Don't be shy.
Just as the drakon reared its head, about to strike - Yeah that's it, come on - something odd happened. An eagle flew through the sweeping rain, right between the monster and herself. Then, out of nowhere, lightning struck the drakon from above, falling straight from the sky in a dazzling flash.

.... With a roar?

Aria know what kind of sound lightning made, and it was not that.

The drakon didn't even have the time to shriek. Unraveling like a ribbon, the long snake fell to the earth, its head a pool of smoldering ashes. In a matter of moments, it had dissolved in the rain, its essence absorbed back to Tartarus. Evaporating out of existence. Aria did not relax her guard though - her vision wasn't 100%, but she could've sworn there was someone standing over there. Someone with dark hair like hers, albeit much longer.

"H- hey," she croaked, coughing up blood. It ran down her chin in thick dark clots. "Aaaah..." With a raspy breath, she clutched her ribs with her free hand. Even she could feel her limbs laying at an odd angle.

The moment her spear sunk into the drakon’s scales Aikaterinē could feel the beast beginning to fall apart. She drew her xiphos and stabbed above her, holding on as the reptilian beast fell to earth.

With a flinch and a ”Skatá!” on impact, the nipping of electricity around her body reminded Kat that yes, she was still alive and yes, she had just killed the Drakon of Yosemite with a spear and a lighting bolt. She stepped back from the disintegrating snake and looked on in awe. ”Agapitoí theoí...” she thought out loud; was she really this powerful? No, she could not be, she had faced lesser beasts before and they took much more than that to bring down. Something was up with this drakon...

As she collected her weapons from the dusty mud Aikaterinē caught a look at the girl. She heard her say something faint and a pained cry in tow. Wincing instinctively, she sheathed the xiphos and headed over.

Kat kneeled and pulled out her hip flask of nectar, holding it out to the downed girl. “Drink this,” she insisted.

Aria gulped the drink down gratefully, drips flowing over her chin down her neck. Nectar. The taste of pheasant stew filled her mouth, full of spice. Nobody did pheasant stew like that anymore; it brought her right back to her childhood, to the parties and the elegant dinners. She felt like a toddler. Vulnerable, but strangely comforted. Like she could allow herself to be weak yet without being hurt. Slowly, she felt herself laying down her guard - if this strange girl wanted to kill her, she wouldn't have given her this drink. Whatever motives she may have, right now, they did not involve harming her.

"What's your name?" she whispered, wiping her mouth. Heat filled her muscles; she started to feel her bones mending again, flesh knitting itself back together, cuts closing into scars. Her ribs snapped back into place and her gross blisters stopped oozing.

“Aikaterinē.”

Aikaterinē of Sestos, daughter of Zeus and Queen Iantha, sister of Amara, lover of Aelia, friend of Danny and Megapenthes, Treasurer of the New Rome University Monster Hunting Society, student of urban planning and The Rainbow of Sestos. But she asked for a name and not a resumé, so ‘Aikaterine’ would do.

“And what about you?” Kat asked as she collected the flask. A quick shake revealed the steel bottle to be dry.

Aikaterinē looked the downed girl (and maybe sister!) over. Despite the nectar beginning to mend her wounds she still looked as though kicking hornets’ nests was her pastime. Her clothes were tattered and the only weapon Kat could see was a dagger, though she swore she saw a bow around here somewhere. But if they shared a father like Kat thought, she did not particularly need weapons.