This still all seems unreal. Hell, I was taught that it wasn’t real for years. All these gods, myths, titans, and monsters…it’s hard to believe. But I’ve seen enough by now to know it’s true. And everything about it for me is just so complicated…finally learning who my Mother is after 23 years, that I was pretty much stolen from her by the guy who wanted to adopt me as his divine son. Hitting the bars like I did after that probably didn’t help me organize my thoughts. Then I had to report to MIST, then our assignment, it’s just…
Anyway, I figure if I just took a seat and wrote all this down it might help me get my thoughts straight. Not the reports I have to write for MIST. Just…writing, a journal.
So I guess I should start with MIST. It’s like…the divine version of the FBI or Interpol, I guess. And Njord, my divine father, apparently assigned me there as a trainee or something since I’m a brand new Scion. It still seems weird to be a part of MIST. CSI, NCIS, acronyms like that were shows I watched and nebulous law enforcement agencies I heard about. I never thought I’d actually be a part of anything like that, especially given my childhood.
But anyway, it stands for Mythological Investigation and Suppression Team. And it’s some joint effort between the pantheons where mortals, Scions, and creatures of legend can investigate all mythical craziness that goes on. It’s based on a “Touchstone.” Which is…a place that’s there, but not, or something like that. And you can get to and from the place via any ferry, or so they tell us. I know it’s how I’ve traveled between it and the real world so far. It’s about the size of Hawaii. Not the whole archipelago, Hawaii’s also the name of the largest island. MIST headquarters isn’t anywhere near as scenic as Hawaii though, of course. It’s all developed, kinda like the FBI headquarters at Quantico surrounded by the suburbs of a large city.
I was there for about a week. When I wasn’t going through orientation I was pretty much working out. It seemed to be the best way to blow off all the stress that the events of the past two weeks had caused to build up. Then they called six of us together for a meeting. I’d met four of the other scions, briefly, on the island.
Cindy’s a daughter of Poseidon; someone I knew a bit from workouts, the two of us both spent a lot of time at the pool. Stands to reason, I guess, since we’re both Scions of sea gods. She looks every bit as great in a swimsuit as you’d expect from a girl who grew up in Florida, by the way. Anyway, she’s a great athlete. Probably a little better than I am, which says something. I’m not a professional or anything, but there weren’t too many people I’ve met who can keep up with me. Very competitive too, and reminiscent of an Amazon with the big axe she uses to fight. Maybe a bit reckless, but she seems to be able to back it up.
I’d run into Kennedy every once and a while when working out too. Mainly while jogging. She’s Morrigan’s daughter, and a native of Ireland. I’ve heard she had military training over there; she certainly seems to be good with a sniper rifle. She must’ve seen some rough stuff, too. I’m not an expert on the conflict going on over there, but I’ve heard the fight against the IRA gets pretty nasty at times. Kennedy seems to be a bit on the quieter side, intense. Though there might be a softer side to her too, from what I saw later. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Oh, and she’s also very attractive. Maybe it comes with divine heritage; there seem to be a lot of pretty good-looking people with MIST.
Andrew’s a Scion of Thoth. I didn’t run into him much at MIST, but he’s certainly someone I knew about professionally before my visitation. Amazing reporter, always seems to be able to dig up an obscure story someone tried to keep hidden. He brought up the possibility of collaborating with me at some point, too, which would be great. And you can tell he’s smart; energetic too, and organized. Maybe not the best fighter, but we can’t all be.
Claire’s a daughter of Mannan Mac Lir, so we have two Scions of the Tuatha de Danaan. Seems to be something of a tech person, certainly likes sitting behind that relic laptop she has a lot. Very sarcastic too, I wonder if that’s just how she is or if it’s a defense mechanism for something. She also showed herself to be a pretty good shot with a pistol. I get the feeling there’s a lot to her we haven’t seen yet. Well, I have that feeling about all of them. But none to the same extent as Claire, except possibly Kennedy…maybe it’s a Tuatha thing.
The last member of our little group was someone I’d never met before; apparently she was brand new to MIST. Lexi’s a Scion of Aphrodite, as it turns out. Which explains… well, she’s absolutely drop dead gorgeous. She’s an amazing saxophone player, too. Her music is just…there’s nothing else like it. But she’s been pretty shy so far. Makes sense, we’re all new at one point.
But on to why they called us all together. MIST lost contact with a team of mortals they had up in Alaska. Obviously, they want to know what happened. But since it seems to be so dangerous they don’t want to send any more mortals up there. And we’re the only Scions they have available, so we’re up. Could be worse, at least there’s a lot of beautiful scenery up in Alaska.
The rest of the team requisitioned all the stuff they needed from MIST. I already had my own survival gear all packed up so I just had to grab that and round up my Einherjar. At least all the coats and stuff were loose enough that they didn’t need to be replaced. That Jotunblut-induced growth spurt has all my other clothes feeling a bit tight. But I digress.
The properties of the touchstone the island is let us arrive in an Alaskan ferry port. Cindy arrived dressed up in enough cold weather gear to keep her warm in sub-zero weather…which was amusing since it was in the mid to upper sixties. Ahh Floridians…they get paranoid about the cold.
So a couple of us talked a bit. Luke and Ryan started going over the map, John and James…went into bodyguard mode. It still feels a bit weird seeing them get right down to business like that. Though I suppose it makes sense, they’re former military after all. It’ll just take a little getting used to. Steve, he started talking up a cute cashier behind the counter. He tends to be a bit more relaxed than the other four. I guess that stone cold sniper motif all the shows and movies like to use isn’t as universal as they’d have you think.
Anyway, Claire and Andrew rented us a bunch of cars. Good, all-terrain type vehicles like I recommended. Then we drove an hour and a half to get to Whitter. It’s a little dot on the map, used to be bigger, but it got hit pretty hard by an earthquake back in ’84. Now it has a permanent population of 117, according to the sign, and a big old abandoned building that nature’s starting to reclaim. We all agreed that it was the likely spot for the research team to have disappeared and decided to investigate there first.
Andrew called in some owls which seemed to look around and search the area for him. That’s a pretty neat trick. We all prepped for trouble, then John and James breached the front door, which annoyed Claire. She seemed to think we should have been a bit sneakier. But hey, the Einherjar were elite soldiers back in WW II. They were even OSS. So I’m inclined to believe they know more than the rest of us about how to enter a building full of potential hostiles.
Anyway, a bunch of figures dropped down at the end of the first hallway. Cindy charged forward to meet them head on right off the bat, and battle was joined. It was fast and brutal. She cut one in half before I was even able to catch up to her, but then they started swarming around her. I slid in behind her and dropped one with an uppercut to the ribs, those brass knuckles Njord gave me really are pretty effective. Pretty much everyone else was opening up with firearms, and the things were dropping. Cindy cut another one down, I caved in the skull of one that was trying to sink its teeth into her arm. I ducked a pipe one swung at me, which two of my Einherjar promptly gunned down, and then it was over.
Cindy was the only one who’d even been wounded. One of the things had managed to bite through the armor she’s capable of growing from her ichor, pretty similar to what I can do except hers looks like silver. Mine looks more like granite, except the grain’s always flickering and flowing like liquid flames. Which I think looks pretty cool. Claire came up to help patch Cindy up, and Kennedy examined the bodies to see that it looked like people who…transformed, or stretched, or something. Thralls maybe? I was told that a giant’s Eitir did something like that.
But before I could worry about Cindy or the bodies that much the Einherjar told me there was something I should see (they’d gone ahead to clear all the rooms like you always see the law enforcement guys do on TV when entering some hostile environment). Anyway, they showed me to what was, at one point, an officer’s lounge. And judging from a discoloration in the water, it looked like one of them had thrown up. That’s when I knew whatever was in there must’ve been bad. I mean, the guys were OSS, they’d seen concentration camps. I couldn’t imagine what it would take to make them throw up like that.
And if it wasn’t for my newly-discovered divine fortitude I’d have probably thrown up as well. Even with it I could feel my stomach churning. They were…bodies; stacked, dismembered, stripped…it was like some horrible, macabre butcher shop. Man, I thought I’d seen a lot. A revenge killing or two growing up to set an example, even a bear attack once. I’d seen messes, and I’d seen savagery…but never anything this gruesome before. I won’t even try to say it didn’t shake me…I just hope I don’t have nightmares about it.
Kennedy came in to look around too, when Lexi asked I warned her that she wouldn’t want to see this. I found some MIST camo, and a passcard. So this is what happened to at least some of the people we were sent to find. I found a ghost, too, and pointed it out to Ken. Figured she might be able to see it being the daughter of a Goddess associated with death and all. Crap, not she might wonder why I could. I haven’t actually told them that Hel’s my birth mother…or about all the complications regarding my visitation. It’s just…not something I want to talk about yet.
And that was about when Lexi started playing her saxophone, which was a blessing. Incredibly soothing music, and we needed it. The scene in there, the callous way the dead were treated, was enough to fray anyone’s nerves.
Then Kennedy and I talked to the ghost. Before he died, he was…forced to eat the people stored here. And he’d been terrified, told he’d be killed if he didn’t, eaten. And it seemed to be transforming him into those things we’d fought earlier. I heard Ken sigh, I know I did too, and saw a hint of sadness show through her usually stoic expression. I could certainly understand it. It looked like the ghost was succumbing to babble mindlessly at that point. And that anyone alive, the dead, could be treated in such a manner…it was unnerving, depressing.
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