Renegade

Emily's POV

When I woke up, Griff looked like Hades. He had developed awful bags under his eyes. His shirt was dirty and covered in a mixture of blood and monster slime. Then I realized. He wasn’t bleeding. That blood was probably mine. Memories came back: Greek guy, HUGE, spiky, and then…ohh. He took off my shirt.

I had almost purred when I thought about that moment, and then I had acted all awkward. I mean, I was probably dying, and Griff had no other ideas when he took it off then to heal me, but still. A girl doesn’t get the chance to have a guy that hot take off her shirt all the time.

Griff was looking out of the hotel room’s one window, and when I tried to roll over and cried out in pain, he snapped his attention onto me, and helped me lie more comfortably.

“Whoa there, Emily,” He cautioned gently, “you’re still hurt.”

“Ah, I feel…just fine,” I said, grimacing from the pain. It was like my stomach was being constantly stabbed with white-hot needles.

When I looked down at my abs, it looked like I had been strafed by a monster-sized jellyfish. Pink and red welts lined my belly in a scary pattern, and I felt so lucky that I had been healed in time.

“Sure you do,” Griff smiled sarcastically. He gave me half of an ambrosia square and handed me the nectar canteen. After that, I felt much better. My stomach still felt like it was being stung by a swarm of bees twenty times a second, but the pain was subsiding.

“Where to now?” I asked, trying to change subject.

“London, actually,” Griff responded, “I got an IM from Nico last night, and I gave him a report of what happened at the Eiffel Tower. He told me that our final destination had been told to him by the real client, and that the client sent Periphetes to test us. He also told me that since Periphetes hasn’t reported to the client since we fought him, the client is assuming we’re ‘worth the trouble,’ so he’s meeting us in London. Apparently we’re supposed to be at a restaurant downtown called The Only Running Footman.”

“Never heard of it,” I remarked, “Let’s try not to wreck the Eye or something,” I said, and Griff laughed. Even in his supremely tired state, he looked really cute.

“Yeah,” He sighed, and then after a breath said, “Look, Emily, I’ve been up for the past 36 hours, mind if I—”

“Sleep,” I soothed, and Griff nodded his head appreciatively, crashing down on the bed opposite me. He was asleep within thirty seconds.

_______________________________________________________________________________

After he had woken up, the sun was starting to dip past its halfway point, dropping into the West.

West, I thought, London is West. No, it’s more North, isn’t it.

I looked out of the window towards the setting sun as I wrapped my dagger belt around my waist, hooking the clip carefully as to not pinch any of my stomach skin. My wound still felt like I was being given acupuncture and the needles were made of molten lead. But I decided to fight through it. I had been taught in my training how to overcome pain, and I tried some of the techniques my instructors had shown me as we loaded up another rental car, getting ready for another trip across Europe.

This time, only five hours. The trips this client had us going on were getting shorter and shorter. Maybe that was an omen. We chose to take a route that drove along the coast, and it paid off. On a sunny June day, the English Channel was absolutely beautiful. Griff had reverted to his old outfit of khaki shorts, skater shirt and ray-bans, which suited the sun-swept landscape. For the first time since that café in Gibraltar, I could relax.

By the time that we arrived in grey London, it was around nine. The clouds above the city seemed to be perpetually hanging, always there, ready to rain on whomever’s parade. But we didn’t come for that. We came to get rid of the black backpack that Nico had given us so, so many days ago. But it had only been four or five, hadn’t it?

Even though it was getting to the end of the main dinner rush, we found a table at the crowded pub Nico had specified. Not many people were there but some couples holding hands around candles, and an obviously American group sitting at a table for fifteen or so. The pub was dark, but the darkest corner stood out to the eye. Or rather, not the darkest corner. The darkest person, sitting in a corner of the restaurant, alone.

I couldn’t believe it. Dr. Thorn himself was sitting at the table in the corner, with two seats open next to him. Calmly, with a smug smile on his face, he beckoned us over. The main waiter started to ask us whether we had a reservation or not, but we just walked past him towards Thorn.

“That scum,” Griff growled under his breath, “I’m going to kill him.”

“Why so angry looking?” Thorn asked with French cheer from his table, “did you have any trouble getting to the restaurant?”

“Yeah,” Griff spat in his eye, “just Periphetes, Mormo, a Leukrokottas, and a Mr. Otto Field.”

Dr. Thorn wiped Griff's spit out of his eye, glared at Griff, and then regained his composure, saying,

“Oh, so you did meet my…associate,” Thorn mused, “interesting, that. You survived the encounter…huh.”

The monster seemed quite perplexed at the fact that we had met Mr. Otto Field and were still alive, and Griff responded,

“Shut up, Thorn. Let’s take this outside eh?”

“I agree, master Jackson. I know of a park quite near here that would be perfect.”

He mutilated the “J” in Griff’s last name with a sense of glee that unnerved me. If we were going to fight, I didn’t want to fight an enemy this happy.

Notes

THIS IS ONLY PT.1

Enjoy!
Grafon