Chapter 5 in Oh, For the Love of Coffee![]
“Kassi. Kassi.”
“What?” I said sleepily.
“C’mon,” Natalie said, “It’s eleven o’clock.”
“Ugg. ‘Kay.” I got out of bed and looked around. Emma was still sleeping. I walked over to her and gently shook her shoulder. “Emma! Get up. Let’s go.”
“But what about my beauty sleep!?” she replied, aghast.
“Later,” I said. We all got up, equipped ourselves with weapons and other demigod necessities, and headed out to Starbucks. We went to the back door and pulled.
“Shoot,” I said. “It’s locked.”
“I’ve got it.” Natalie took a bobby pin from her hair and inserted it into the lock. After about five minutes, we heard a click. She took it out, inserted it back into her ponytail to secure a loose strand of hair, and pulled the door. It swung right open.
“Since when could you do that?” I asked her.
“I thought it would be useful so I learned it over the summer.” I shrugged. I’d seen stranger feats from this girl.
“Alright then, let’s go.” We stepped into the store and walked along the halls. The lights were off and it was deathly quiet. Shadows seemed menacing and dark.
“What exactly are we looking for?” asked Rebecca.
“Anything that would tell us why there are monsters in Starbucks,” Natalie replied. “Like an ‘evil agenda’ or something.”
“Let’s split up,” I suggested, “We can cover more ground that way.” We all went our separate ways. I walked down a hall way into an office. It was cluttered with papers, mostly unimportant mortal tax forms and what not. But something caught my eye, a little note with a symbol on it. It looked a bit like a lion and a vulture with words underneath that I couldn’t make out. Before I could look at it properly, I heard a crash.
I ran to where I heard the sound and saw Emma standing in a sea of glitter. It looked as if she had knocked over a snow globe that had a Gucci shoe in it. Rebecca and Natalie were already there.
“Oops,” said Emma. “I’m sorry, I knocked into the shelf. I got excited.”
“Shhhh!” I chided her. “We don’t want anyone,” Or anything, I added mentally, “to know we’re here!” All of a sudden I heard a grating sound coming from the other room. I motioned to the others and they got their weapons ready. Emma was still looking at the shoe. I reached up to my necklace and touched the charm. “Hesperus,” I whispered quietly. The sun and moon expanded into a bow with a notched arrow as I drew back into the firing position. A quiver appeared on my back.
We slowly walked toward the doorway. I went first, then Natalie, then Rebecca. Inside, I saw three hellhounds. Arrroofff! Shoot, I thought, they saw us. They went to the back of the room, forcing us to enter. Natalie went towards them, Scarlet flashing. Rebecca and I hung towards the back, shooting arrows. The hellhounds evaded us instead of attacking, which I thought was strange. Normally, they don’t act that way.
I shot one in the eye and it disintegrated before my eyes. Natalie stabbed the other one. Rebecca shot the other one. I turned towards her, “Nice shot,” I started to say. Behind her I saw a dracaena, holding a knife, ready to kill. “Rebecca!” I called, even though I knew it would be too late. She turned around and was about to get stabbed when, POOF! The dracaena disintegrated. In its place, was Seth Alder.
Next Chapter ~ Chapter 6: Caramel Apple Spice
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