Night 49: Beginning A Hunt Through The Forest

--- Jon ---

“Me.” Audrey told him, earning a slight sigh of relief from Artemis.

(I really should try and figure out how to make her… not scared of me…) He frowned to himself before promptly realizing, (I have no idea how to do that! Ma only ever taught me how to scare people not make them… not scared!)

“Alright, in that case I’ll be taking the train yard and warehouse districts.” Valentina threw out. “With the Scarecrow I should be able to cover those and the neighborhoods around them.”

“I suppose I’ll take the suburbs then.” Artemis nodded. “With my Spell Sight I should be able to spot anything there if I can find high enough ground.”

“Alright, just remember to keep the property damage low at both.” Audrey warned the two.

“I’m not the one you have to remind.” Artemis pointed out with a roll of her eyes.

“And I’m not stupid enough to endanger my money.” Valentina scoffed before turning to leave as she muttered. “Pinche duende.”

“I’ll call if I find anything.” Artemis told Audrey before briefly glancing at him only for her eyes to dart back to the glasses wearing teen. “And you call me if you get in any trouble.”

“I can handle it.” Audrey assured her.

Artemis merely shook her head as she left. “I hope so.”

Once the other two members of her ‘magic club’ had left, Audrey turned towards him with a clap of her hands. “So, any ideas on where you want to go looking for Creeps?”

“Um, well I did have an idea.” He admitted rubbing at the back of his neck.

---

“So any particular reason you felt like traversing the forest at night?” Audrey asked him as they made their way through said forest by Pix’s light.

“I’m used to the forests from Blackwell.” He shrugged. “Figure it’s a terrain most people aren’t used to, so all of the Hunters in the city are probably ignoring it.”

“Mm, that’s fair.” Audrey nodded before telling him, “Though usually I cover the area around the forests on my patrols. Nature magic and all that.”

“Hmm, often run into trouble out here?” He asked, figuring that since she didn’t object then she probably ran into something out this way.

“One or two Creeps, but never anything like that nest you found.” Audrey answered before ducking under a stray branch. “Then again I usually stick closer to the trails and outskirts than this.”

“Why?” He frowned. “I mean, you’ve got the terrain advantage.”

“Because all I need is one of the werewolf Creeps getting the drop on me and I’m probably out.” Audrey pointed out. “It doesn’t matter if you can turn a forest against them if they can drop you in one quick hit. I’m hoping that with there being two of us and your fairy friend they won’t try anything or at the very least you’d be able to get them off of me before they can take me out.”

“I’ll do my best.” He promised. “And if worse comes to, Pix can patch you up easily enough.”

“Really? I know there’s a bunch of different elemental fairy types but I haven’t heard of any that focus on healing.” Audrey told him, eyeing the little fairy speculatively.

“It’s an offshoot of their Nature affinity so most should be capable of learning it.” He shrugged, not entirely sure why other fairies didn’t heal all that often. “Then again, it could just be that they don’t have much use for healing so they don’t bother learning how to heal.”

“A valid point, though I wouldn't be able to tell you one way or the other since Contracting and animals aren’t really my thing.” Audrey confessed. “Though a Nature based healing could be useful, since healing people has to be different than fixing damaged plants.”

“Maybe, but I doubt they’re as far apart as biology would tell you.” He argued, remembering a few of his lessons with DeSade and Miss Edna. “I mean, it’s magic so the concept of [Mending] is more important than whether you’re mending [Flora] or [Fauna]... Unless your affinity is distinctly plant based?”

“It’s not hard locked to plants.” The other teen admitted after a moment. “Though it does lean more towards them than animals.”

“Well you shouldn’t-” He froze his eyes snapping ahead of them as he darted closer to Audrey and turned off his flashlight. “Pix kill the light.”

“What is it?” Audrey asked as he felt Pix land on his shoulder.

“Do you hear that?” He frowned watching the space in front of them as he motioned for the other teen to follow him.

Audrey was silent for a moment. “Is that… buzzing?”

“Yeah, and the crickets went quiet, means they think a predator is nearby.” He told her as they moved to take cover near a tree, the buzzing sound growing ever louder.

With their backs to the tree they were able to hear the snapping of branches and the shifting of foliage becoming audible beneath the buzzing, signaling that whatever was making the noise was growing ever closer. Until eventually from just around the way they could see a large creature moving through the forest, its shape roughly that of the Insect Creep from the Sanctuary dossier.

Audrey raised her hand the faint glow of magic emanating from it and his hand shot out to grab hers by the wrist.

The other teen’s gaze snapped to him, her glasses glaring in the faint light of her magic.

He put a finger to his lips, tapped his eye, and pointed towards a second smaller creature leaping between the branches above the larger Creep.

Audrey adjusted her glasses as she tried to see what he did in the darkness before she eventually shook her head unable to see the other threat.

He gave the two Creeps a moment to get some distance from them before telling her, “There was one of the flying Creeps with it, if you went after the insect the bigger one would have hit us both with its flames.”

“Figured it was one of those, just couldn’t see it.” Audrey sighed before giving him a look. “So what, catch up to them and you deal with the flier while I take out the big guy?”

“Or we could follow them, see if they lead us to another nest or something similar.” He pointed out. “Think you could handle that while they’re still active?”

“Maybe, depends on how much time we have and how many there are.” Audrey admitted. “For now let’s follow them and see what we’re working against.”

He nodded before turning to Pix. “Dim glow, but don’t let it go too far.”

The little fairy gave him a nod back before projecting the dim light that would let him avoid accidentally stepping on anything that might alert the Creeps while also letting him spot said Creeps’ trail.

It didn’t take long to catch up to the Creeps, unfortunately rather than making things easier this just led to a greater tension as they tried to silently follow the pair as minutes turned to an hour, causing Audrey to slowly flag as the pace and tension slowly got to her.

“You okay?” He asked her after they’d let a bit of distance build between them and their targets.

“Yeah, just not used to sneaking around for this long.” Audrey grimaced as she pinched the bridge of her nose. “Usually only have to do it for a few minutes before the fight breaks out but this long distance shit is… it’s not really my thing. Artemis or Val would’ve been better for this kind of thing.”

“You want to go ahead and call it?” He frowned more in concern than anything else.

Audrey seemed to legitimately consider the offer before shaking her head. “No, that’d just make all of this a waste, and besides the pace they’re moving and how they’re moving away from the city… that’s not usual Creep behavior. We should see this through.”

“If you’re sure.” He nodded before once more moving to catch up to the Creeps.

After a couple of minutes he paused and moved to stop Audrey who gave him a curious look.

He raised a finger to his lips and shifted around the foliage as he caught sight of a rock formation of sorts surrounded by a number of large trees.

This by itself wasn’t all that alarming, what was alarming was that he’d lost sight of the Creeps they’d been following. (Maybe there’s a cave or something nearby and that’s where they’re nesting…)

He heard the cracking of wood.

(Move!)

Lunging for a nearby tree he grabbed a flying creep hanging from the tree trunk by its throat and dragged it down to the ground where he forced its mouth to remain shut and sat on its struggling body as he held the Creep in place before pulling out his knife and stabbing it into the chimera’s throat.

The Creep seemed to redouble its struggling for a few moments, before its strength seemed to slowly fade away, until finally it quit moving altogether.

He took an extra moment to make sure it wasn’t simply playing dead before letting out a sigh of relief as he withdrew his knife and stood back up.

“Good catch.” Audrey whispered.

“Yeah, I-” He froze, catching sight of an inhaling flier behind Audrey. “Cover your ears!” He told her as he covered one of his and both of Pix’s.

Before Audrey could even process what he said, a piercing shriek tore through the air causing the other teen to scream as she clamped her hands over her ears.

As the shriek died down, he staggered a step before forcing himself through a wave of dizziness as he stumbled towards flier.

The creep jumped out of the way of his slash before leaping into the tree branches above him leaving him in silence save the ringing of his ear and the whimpering of Audrey next to him.

At least until his other ear heard a buzzing coming from all around him.