Setting The Network, Chasing the Sword

Daquiri learned very early on that not holding on while riding Agamemnon could very well lead to the possibility of falling to her death below. Unfortunately, the only thing to hold onto that offered any amount of legitimate safety was Cat's waist in front of her. She really wasn't a fan of physical contact that didn't involve inducing pain on others, and she supposed the only thing she could be grateful for was that she hadn't ended up behind Jake. As it was, her hands were resting as lightly as possible on her friend's hips. It felt weird.
It must have been nearly a few hours that had passed since they'd left. There hadn't been a whole lot of conversation so far. Usually Jake making stupid comments, Cat either making wry replies or trying to be amiable, all things considering, and Daquiri complaining or insulting something. So far, she was in a decidedly perpetually bad mood.
And she was getting really tired of sitting on top of a bronze flying dragon.
"My ass is numb," she declared shortly. "Are we going to be landing this metalhutch any time soon?"

Jake rolled his eyes. He was allowed to do that, because he was in front and no one could see him doing so.
"We'll be landing by Chicago in a little bit," he answered. A few hours of awkward conversation and complaints. It was worse than the usual quest roadtrip. Though, he would admit, traveling on the back of a dragon was both awesomer and faster than by truck.
"You guys can grab food while I set up the node. Try not to wander too far on your own."
They had both only gotten there midsummer, so that was hardly six months of experience between the two. And big cities usually meant 'lots of places monsters can hide'.

Cat nodded, which was pointless, as Jake was in front and couldn't even see her. "Got it."
    A few minutes later, they touched down in a park in a suburban area, and Cat manoeuvered out of the saddle and slipped off of Agamemnon. She patted his bronze flank and stretched out her somewhat stiff limbs before fishing some mortal money out of her pocket and going over to a hot dog vendor a short ways away.
    The lady was frowning at something over her shoulder as she went up to the cart.
    "You rich people," she said accusingly, turning to Cat suddenly. "You can't just land that stupid private jet of yours wherever you want, you know."
    Cat looked back at the dragon. "Uh, right. Sorry about that. Can I have a hot dog with ketchup?" She glanced back at Jake as it occurred to her that he might want one, too. Did she have enough money? She checked the prices listed on a little whiteboard on the cart, and at the cash in her hand, and was relieved to find that she did. Her gaze shifted to her redheaded companion, but from what she knew about Daquiri so far, she knew she wouldn't want a hot dog anyway. She looked back at the hot dog vendor. "Make that two."
    The woman scowled, seemingly annoyed by Cat randomly tacking on another order. Cat pressed her lips together and started tapping her foot quietly. The vendor handed her the two hot dogs, and Cat dropped her coins into the woman's waiting palm. "Keep the change," she offered, hoping to appease her. It didn't. If anything, she seemed even more bad-tempered.
    "Rich kids," the vendor muttered under her breath as Cat turned away.
    Cat sighed through her nose, trekking back to the bronze dragon. Of course she had to tick off the very first person she met after leaving camp again. "People."
    She approached Jake and handed him the hot dog. "Here ya go." Then she trudged off to the empty playground nearby, in the opposite direction of the hot dog cart, and sat down on a swing.
    Maybe this whole thing wasn't a good idea. The girl with her sword was probably long gone by now. Who was to say that they'd catch up and find her? And how would they get Jake to go along with it when he realized they had only tagged along to go on a wild goose chase without permission? Because he was going to find out, one way or another. Cat kicked at the woodchips on the ground. Yup. Crappy idea. But it was too late to back out now.

((I would like to point out that I'm pretty sure that crappy idea was Ri's.))

Jake’s last comment spiked a bit of indignation in Daquiri. Was he implying they couldn’t handle themselves? Pfft. Like he knew anything.
    Daquiri was glad when they finally touched down to earth. Or at least, glad in comparison. She dismounted from the dragon as quickly as humanly possible. It was a good thing she was used to riding on a regular basis, else her legs probably would’ve turned to jell-o once they hit the ground. As it was, they were stiff in a different way than they were after a long ride when she hadn’t been on a horse in a while. For one, it had been an over three hour ride, and two, there weren’t supple muscles moving underneath her, but solid metal. Needless to say, she felt much more comfortable with equine.
    Without saying a word to Jake or Cat, Daquiri walked off a ways by herself, tired of being around people. She’d just started becoming familiar with what it was like to hang around Cat for a while, and even that was taxing. Being around multiple people—especially someone like Jake, who liked to talk one’s ear off—was starting to drive her over the edge. She wasn’t sure how she was supposed to survive the rest of this trip without exploding.
    Considering she hadn’t eaten since breakfast and it was now dinnertime, she was on the hungrier side. Looking around, though, she didn’t really see anything but vendor food, which all sounded disgusting to her. Food from the street? Why was that appealing to anyone? Needless to say, she would definitely be taking the time to go find something better.
    She noticed Cat walking over to a vacant swing set by herself, looking a tad dejected. Daquiri had never been the consoling type, and she still wasn’t in the mood to talk or interact in general, but she had a feeling she knew what was on Cat’s mind. And unfortunately, she’d already figured that part out, so that meant she had to go let the girl know.
    With a large sigh, she slowly made her way over to the swing set and sat down on the swing next to Cat. She pushed off the ground a bit, letting herself sway back and forth gently. Swinging was one of the things she’d tended to turn to when she’d still had recess in school. It was one of those mindless activities where she could do something while simultaneously just sitting with her own thoughts. She glanced over at Cat.
    “So, I was figuring,” she started abruptly. “Once dork-head over there sets up his glorified spy gear, he’ll need to give it a test run.” She gestured with one of her hands. “We should be able to take a look at it and see where that girl is. She has to be a demigod, since she was in the camp. We can see where she’s heading.”

Jake dismounted and started unloading the parts of the first node. He figured he'd just set it up here. Far enough from the main drags to be left alone, but near enough to get a good read on the city.
He accepted the hotdog from Cat with a nod, stuck it in his mouth to eat while he was working.
"Agamemnon, guard," he mumbled through the hot dog.
Agamemnon clicked and snorted, both acknowledging the order and pointing out that what he had said was only barely comprehensible.

It would take a little bit for him to get it all up and running. At least half an hour, possibly more.

Cat looked up when Daquiri came over and sat on the swing beside her. She raised an eyebrow slightly, and the corner of her mouth twitched slightly, in an almost-smile. "That's a pretty good idea," she admitted.
    At least Daquiri was looking forward, thinking about their next moves. She had been doing that the whole time, actually. Meanwhile, Cat herself was moping around on a swing. She had to be better than that.
    She straightened up, and as she did, became aware of the sword sheathed at her side. "Oh. Should we start with sword practice?" she suggested. That was good. She could be productive, then, and knowing that made her feel better.

Daquiri tried not to make a face at the suggestion of doing something that involved interacting with people. She already was expending the effort to just talk to Cat; trying to teach her something with sharp objects would probably result with the girl losing an arm. She definitely didn't have the patience.
    "If I'm doing anything right now, it's finding food that's actually edible," she replied. She stood up from the swing. "Come if you want, but don't expect me to make conversation." She paused. "Who knows, maybe we'll run into a monster you can practice on."

Cat was initially inclined to leave Daquiri to her search for food for mutual alone time, but at the mention of monsters, she realized it was probably better to stick together. In a big city like this, who knew what was lurking around the corner? Well, they were in a park at the moment, so there weren't really any corners for monsters to hide behind, but they'd probably walk off to somewhere that did have corners. And when they did, well, there was safety in numbers.
     She swallowed another bite of her hot dog and stood. "Alright then."
     She followed Daquiri as the girl strode off, one hand holding her lunch, and the other in her pocket. She glanced back quickly at Jake and Agamemnon. The set-up would take some time; Jake wouldn't notice if they were only gone for a short bit. Cat turned her attention back to the rest of their surroundings, keeping a wary eye out for any suspicious strangers.
     This was it. They were in the normal world now.
     Cat still remembered when that was supposed to be a good thing.

Daquiri and Cat walked along the sidewalks in silence for a while. Even if she had wanted to talk, there was so much hustle and bustle about, with the noises of people and the city added in, that it would've been hard to keep up a conversation anyway. All the better for her, at least.
    Jake had specifically told them not to go far, so she was doing her best to do the exact opposite. Whether or not Cat noticed, Daquiri strode on without a falter in her step or a hesitation in her demeanor. Jake thought they couldn't handle themselves in the mortal world? He was going to eat his words. A moronic Hephaestus kid that thought he was just sooo much better wasn't going to--
    Daquiri broke off of her train of thought when she collided into someone and nearly lost her balance. Luckily, Cat was there to steady her, else she could have been in serious danger of getting trampled. Spinning around, she sent a furious glare at whoever had bumped her, only to find the man had turned back to her as well. Or rather, the building. He must have been almost a full two feet taller than her, to the point where she felt much more ridiculously short than usual. With his long duster and mop of unkempt hair that made him look like some kind of hobo, he couldn't have stuck out more if he was a pillar of flame.
     "If you're gonna insist on being a skyscraper, maybe you should learn to start moving like one," she snapped.
     The man had begun to open his mouth with an apologetic look on his face, but at her retort, his eyebrows furrowed and a bit of a scowl replaced his look. "Sorry, jeez, take it easy, short stack," he said back, his voice gruff.
    Daquiri flipped the man off before doing a heel-turn back around, grumbling to Cat about the nerve of some people.
    Luckily not too long after that, though, she finally spotted a cafe that looked fitting for actual human beings to eat at and made her way inside.
    Thank the gods there were salads here.

Cat navigated through the streets of Chicago, keeping close beside Daquiri. They were getting farther away from the park where Jake was, who had told them not to stray too far... She pressed her lips together, taking a moment to look around at the other people walking around them, feeling extremely paranoid. She turned back to the direction in which they were walking, and before she could even open her mouth in warning, a tall man bumped into Daquiri's shoulder as he walked past. Cat managed to step aside quickly as Daquiri almost fell, and she reached out to help her keep her balance, but the redhead was still irritated. She turned around to snap at the man, who had also stopped and turned back to face them after knocking into her. With a rude hand gesture, she whirled around again and stalked away.
    Cat's eyebrows knit together anxiously. "I'm so sorry about that," she apologized to the man before hurrying after the other girl.
    She stayed behind Daquiri, who continued walking briskly to who-knew-where. She followed the other demigod into a cafe, where a waitress smiled at them and showed them to a table. Before sitting down, Cat suddenly remembered to check out the other customers, in case anyone was suspicious-looking. If anyone was going to attack them, she wanted to be prepared for it beforehand.
   Her eyes skimmed over the menu. She didn't actually intend to eat anything, since she had already eaten a hot dog. She set down the menu and took a sip of water, wondering if they could take anything to-go.

*****

The service at the cafe was quite efficient, getting Daquiri's salad and tea order and Cat's hot chocolate out in less than ten minutes.
    "Thank you, she told the waiter politely as he set down the food and drinks.
    "No problem," he said, glancing at Daquiri and winking at her. "Enjoy your salad, beautiful."
    Cat coughed. The waiter gave her an annoyed look. She frowned. What, was she getting in the way of his flirting? How unprofessional. She gave him a disapproving glare. They stared each other down for a moment. Then, the light coming from the windows suddenly disappeared, and the glass came crashing inwards.

((Yes I'm posting this a month and a half later, stop judging me.))

Daquiri was quick about ordering her food, and glad that it came out as soon as it did. Even though she hadn’t taken care to heed Jake’s words about distance from him, she still didn’t want to be gone too long. They were on some sort of schedule for this trip, and while she was very well aware that her and Cat’s private intentions for tagging along would probably make the trip longer than it would have been originally, she still wanted to get it over with as soon as possible. She was pretty sure there was only so much of Jake Arin that she could take.
Daquiri’s thankfulness towards the service was short-lived, however, as immediately after giving her her salad, their waiter blatantly hit on her. Her face darkening into a glare, she opened her mouth to spit some less-than-decent words at him, when Cat cut in first with a cough. Daquiri at first assumed the girl was trying to tell her to leave it alone for once, but when she looked over it was apparent that the signal had been for the waiter, who now seemed to be having a small stare-down with Cat. Daquiri couldn’t decide if she was more obliged or irritated at Cat for standing up for her, but she didn’t get to officially decide since the Universe decided to take that moment to try and screw them over.
She reflexively flinched and threw her arms up to guard her face and neck when shattered glass flew everywhere. Her brain only had about one-point-five seconds to comprehend what had happened before she had to dive out of her seat to keep from getting roasted alive. The next few seconds were a mixture of making sure Cat was okay, seeing whether or not magical fire worked on muggles, and getting the hell out of that café.
“Cat!” she yelled over the noise of panicked mortals. She coughed as smoke started to curl in the air from the burning chairs and tables. “We need to get this thing away from everyone!”
The other girl had probably already had the same thought, but whether she did or not, Daquiri couldn’t wait another second—she booked it out of there. She didn’t know what this monster thing was, aside from the fact that it apparently breathed fire, but keeping it in an enclosed space definitely seemed like a bad idea.
Out in the open, Daquiri had a clearer view of what had attacked them. Apparently Jake wasn’t the only one that liked building giant, magical metal traps of death, because if anything resembled Agamemnon, it was this giant bronze…bull? That was what they were, right? What were they called…automatons? Whatever the term, the real question was—how were they supposed to kill it? For that matter, how were they even supposed to get near it…
“Uh, Cat…” Daquiri brandished her dagger, standing against the bull warily as its ruby red eyes glared at her, like it was sizing up how easy it would be to run over someone so small. “How about that sword practice?”

As the window broke, Cat ducked under the table, banging her shoulder against the side of it as she did so.
    "Ow."
    The glass shards clinked on the floor and thudded dully onto the seat where she had been sitting only a second before. She scrambled out from her hiding place and immediately had to dive aside as searing flames blasted towards her.
    It subsided, and, heart thumping, Cat looked to the window and saw what they were up against.
    A huge bull, made of metal, and looking very, very evil.
    Yeah. Not good.
    "Uh, Cat... How about that sword practice?"
    "Yeah, sure," she replied weakly. "I've got some time."
    She processed something her companion said earlier about getting the monster away from the mortals. Slowly, she began to move sideways towards the door. Someone whimpered behind her, and she risked looking away from the bronze creature. The waiter who had served them was cowering under another table, looking at her with frightened eyes. She pressed her lips together. She wasn't particularly fond of his service, but... to think, a few seconds ago she thought she had time for petty squabbles with dumb flirty waiters.
    "It'll be okay," she told him, her voice as steady and quiet as possible, before slowly, carefully putting her attention back into leaving without provoking the beast.
    They were almost there when the thing got impatient. With a snort and a toss of its head, it pawed at the ground, lowering its head.
    "It's gonna charge!" Cat bolted for the door, and together the demigods ran for their lives.
    They raced down the street, fire alarms and panicked screams ringing in their wake. Cat gripped her sword with white knuckles as she sprinted towards the park, Daquiri only a few steps behind her.
    She heard a loud, furious roar, and pounding footsteps as the automaton bull began chasing them.
    There was no way they could outrun this thing.
    "We're going to have to fight it!" she yelled at the redheaded demigod, looking back towards her and the giant bronze thing who looked just as angry as she remembered. Oh joy.

"You're just now realizing that, are you?" Daquiri snapped back.
    They'd been back on the ground for like, a half hour. Why was something already attacking them. She really didn't want Chiron to end up being right about them not going on this quest--she hated when other people were right.
    And she really wished she was on a horse right now.
    "We should try splitting up," she said in harried breaths to Cat. "It can only go for one target--the other one attacks it from a different angle." They didn't have much time to decide anything else. "Now."
    Daquiri split off right, trying to head somewhere where collateral damage wouldn't be as much of a problem.
    She didn't have to turn around to figure out who the bull had followed.
    The sound of its angry bellow practically knocked her over in and of itself, it's mechanical body somehow managing to amplify the noise to a cacophonous volume.
     A large part of her was confirming that she was about to be dead, trampled meat five seconds from now.

As her companion veered right, Cat headed left. She felt a bit relieved to note that the bull hadn't followed her. Unfortunately, that meant it was still on Daquiri's tail. That wasn't good, especially since it was getting closer and closer to her. She grit her teeth, and sprinted towards her. She tackled her friend sideways, slamming her shoulder into the sidewalk. She let out a noise of pain, but managed not to swear.
    The bull was still running, working on slowing itself down as it noticed its mark had disappeared. Cat's eyes widened, noticing a very familiar bronze dragon coming their way from behind the bull. Aggie was coming to their rescue, and just in time.

*Then Aggie hears them and is all "ooh fighting whee" and goes and saves their butts and then Jake is attacked and kinda just fends big bad fiery bull off himself because BA and Ri and Cat are just like "whelp oops" and Jake is like "wtf guys" and Ri probably makes some kind of snark comment and then they all ride off into the sunset.*

*Next Scene*