The Battle for Sanctuary: The Titan's Legacy: Vol: 2 (Volume 2) (26 page)

Dominic's slow explanation was starting to wear on
Justin's patience. “And? Spit it out, Dominic.”

“
Okay.
So, it turns out that this place has um, inhabitants.” Dominic
seemed to be waiting to judge Justin's reaction.

“
Really?”
Justin felt a thrill of excitement mingle with a rush of fear. “Who
are they? Are they friendly? Do you think they can help us?”

When Dominic hesitated, Maria poked him. “Tell him
the rest, Dom,” she said firmly.

Taking a deep breath, Dominic said “I don't think
so, Justin. From your description of that teacher of yours, the snake
lady, I think these are her relatives.”

“
So
what's the problem? Ghelena was very friendly. I'm sure her
relatives, I assume you mean other gorgons, would be glad to help
us.”

“
No
Justin, I don't think they will,” Maria cut in. Dominic seemed
unable to speak at this point. “You see, when Dom was sneaking
around, he followed one of these snake-women and she led him to, what
was it, a communal kitchen, Dom?” He nodded mutely. “And
they were,...well, he saw the remains of a person.”

Justin stared at her in shock. “A person?”
He looked at Dominic, who just looked away.

“
I'm
sorry, Justin but considering that the only likely place to find
people in Sanctuary is from the top level, I thought, well I thought
that she might have been someone you knew.”

The very idea that some monster had actually taken
someone he knew and... Justin didn't want to finish that thought.
Something else occurred to him.

“
Wait.
You said she, Dominic?'

Dominic nodded miserably. “It was an older lady,
gray hair.”

Justin looked in horror at Aaron, who stared back with
the same expression.

“
Now
hang on, Justin! Don't assume it was her just because of that. There
are a lot of older ladies up there. We saw them when we first
arrived, remember?”

“
Her?
Her who?” Julia asked in a small voice.

“
Mrs.
Mallon,” Justin answered. He swallowed the lump in his throat.
And then another thought occurred to him. “But how would these
gorgons even get hold of someone from the top level? It's locked off.
No one in or out. Or so we were told.”

“
Justin,
what if Ghelena's involved.” Aaron raised his hand to stop
Justin's outburst. “I'm not saying she is or that she's part of
this, but you know what kind of control she has over people. Well,
except for you of course. And the way she comes and goes. Is it
possible that she has her own way in and out of the top level?”

He didn't want to think that Ghelena was involved in
something so horrible, but a tiny voice inside him reminded Justin
that she was part snake. And Aaron was right. She came and went in
Sanctuary with no one ever seeing her movements. Could she be
involved?

“
Okay,
this is getting us nowhere,” he said abruptly. “We are
just guessing and that always makes things worse, not better.”
He looked at Dominic. “I know you took a risk today, scouting
around like that, and maybe next time you could tell someone, like
Maria, when you're leaving the group.”

With a shrug, Dominic nodded and glanced at Maria.
“Sure, Justin. I honestly didn't expect to actually find
anything or anyone.”

“
I
know, Dominic and I'm not mad. I'm grateful.” The teen looked
surprised at Justin's statement. “No, I mean it. We might have
blundered right into those things if not for you. But now, if
everyone agrees, I'd like you to go out and do some more spying. Find
out all you can about these things. How many there are, their routine
if you can and, most importantly, where the exit is to the next level
up.” Justin looked at the others. “Does anyone object?
I'm not the boss here.”

No one spoke up against the idea and Justin looked back
at Dominic. “This is your choice. You don't have to go back out
there. Obviously those...things are dangerous.”

Dominic shook his head. “No, I want to go, Justin.
You're right. We have to know more about them. If they have a
routine, maybe we can time it so that we can get around them without
being spotted. And after seeing what I saw, I really, really want to
find a way out of here.”

Justin nodded grimly. “Okay, whenever you're
ready, you can head out.” He looked at Maria and the others.
“We need to make some plans,” he said.

She agreed. Once Dominic had eaten and rested a bit, he
headed out along with many good wishes and warnings to be careful.
Justin watched as he entered the shadow in the doorway and vanished.
Wow. It would be a while until he got used to that. Then the group
sat together and started to talk.

“
We're
in a bad situation here, guys,” Justin said in a hushed voice.
He pointed at the hole in the middle of the floor opening on to
nothing. “We have no retreat, nowhere to run if things go bad
here. So we have to be ultra-careful.
^”

“
You
are so right, Justin,” Maria said with a glance at the door.
“We need ideas here on how to stay safe and survive. And if I
might start with a basic one, I think we need to keep someone on
lookout at the door at all times.”

While some of the group looked surprised, others nodded
in agreement. Jason volunteered to be on watch first and walked over
to the doorway. He stood in the opening and rested against the arch
so that he could listen to the group and see out into the hallway at
the same time.

“
Great.
Thanks Jase,” Maria said with a smile at Jason. He grinned
back. “Right. Next, we have to think about ways to defend
ourselves, in case things go wrong.” She looked at the others
with a tight smile. “And lately, things always seem to go
wrong, don't they?”

When they'd all agreed, Yolanda spoke up. “What do
you mean, defend ourselves? I don't know about the rest of you guys,
but I've never hit someone or been hit by someone. I wouldn't have a
clue on what to do in a situation like that.”

“
I
understand, Yolanda. I really do.” Maria sat back and looked at
the other girl intently. “But we aren't the same kids we were a
few months ago. You know that. And we do have a bit of an advantage
over our opponents after all.” Yolanda and some of the others
looked puzzled and Maria rolled her eyes. “Guys, we're Titans!
Okay sure, we aren't adult Titans, but you saw what Justin and Aaron
can do. You know what Dominic is doing right now. We can shake off
attacks that would kill regular humans. You,” she pointed at
Jason across the room, “can call lightning. You two,” now
she glared at Julia and Yolanda, “can control water. I've got
these absurd reflexes.” She sat back again and took a breath.
“My point is, we aren't victims here. And if we have to fight,
we had all better be thinking like Titans, not defenseless
teenagers.”

Justin chimed in as Maria stopped talking. “And if
these gorgons are as nasty as Dominic says, they won't care about our
age or take pity on us if we're helpless. They will kill us.”

He spaced out his words and saw Yolanda and Julia's eyes
widen. He nodded to emphasize his words. “This is real, you
guys. So let's focus and see what we can come up with in the way of
strategy.”

“
Why
not ask Richard?” Jason called over. They all looked at Richard
who reddened under the group's scrutiny. “He's not just a great
climber,” Jason continued. “He's studied snakes for a
long time.” He chuckled. “Rich likes reptiles. Don't ask
me why.”

“
Do
you, Richard?” Maria asked him.

“
Well,
yeah. But I don't know how any of that would help us. I mean, these
are snake-people, right? Totally different animal, if you see what I
mean.”

“
Let
us worry about that. Just tell us what you know about snakes in
general,” Maria said encouragingly.

“
Okay,
if you think it would help.” Richard sat for a moment and
gathered his thoughts. He pulled his pack on to his lap and picked at
the fabric nervously. “Well, snakes do have a lot of things in
common with each other. They are all cold blooded, which means that
abrupt changes to the temperature around them affects them pretty
quickly. Um, they're all meat eaters.” He glanced at Justin and
grimaced. “Sorry,” he said in a small voice.

“
It's
okay, Rich. Keep going,” Justin replied calmly, even though
Richard's comment made his stomach clench.

“
Right.
Well, they don't see colors but they can see shapes. Oh and they
can't taste. They use their tongues to smell the air around them.”

“
Hmm,”
Maria mused. She looked at Justin then back at Richard. “Anything
else?”

“
Not
really,” he said. “I mean, they all shed their skins
occasionally. And the jaw expands. It can, um, swallow an animal
bigger than itself.” He looked a bit nauseous. “That's
about it.”

“
Thanks,
Rich.” Justin thought for a moment. “Okay, what can we
use from what Richard just told us?”

Julia's hand shot up, as though she was in class. Hiding
his amusement, Justin nodded at her.

“
What
about the cold blooded thing?” She glanced at Yolanda. “If
we were some place where there was water, I think Yolanda and me
could use it to drop their body temperatures pretty quickly.”

Yolanda looked perplexed. “We could? How?”

Julia gave an exaggerated eye roll. “Ice, Yolanda.
Honestly.” Her friend blushed and then frowned.

“
But
Julia, we don't know how to do that.” She paused a moment. “Do
we?”

“
Of
course we do. You heard the way Justin explained working with the
earth. That's what we did when we made the waves on the pool,
remember? We just thought of what we wanted and the water did it. How
it did it, I have no idea. But I don't think we need to know how. We
just need to know what.”

Yolanda looked thoughtful and nodded slowly. “You
know, that could actually work.” She looked at Justin. “If
we could catch them near some water.”

Justin was impressed. “Well done!” he
exclaimed. Both of the girls grinned at his praise. “I'm sure
that would work. We'll ask Dominic about any water he's seen when he
gets back.” He looked at the rest of the teens. “Any
other ideas?”

No one spoke for a moment and then Richard raised his
hand the way Julia had.

“
Richard?”

“
I
have a question. I heard Aaron mention that this snake-woman,
Ghelena, had some sort of control over people?”

“
Yeah,
I did, Rich,” Aaron spoke up. “Why?” he asked.

“
Well,
it has nothing to do with what I know about snakes, but weren't the
gorgons able to turn their enemies to stone in the old myths?”

“
That's
true,” Aaron answered, “I think Justin and I talked about
it back when we first met Ghelena. What we didn't tell you guys is
that she always wore a veil. We never did see her face.”

Richard looked off into space. “Now that
is...interesting,” he murmured.

Aaron and Justin exchanged glances. “Why?”
they both asked at the same time.

“
Because,
well, maybe her looks counteract her voice.” Everyone appeared
to be baffled by Richard's statement.

“
Um,
Richard? Could you elaborate a bit?” Maria asked in confusion.

“
Yeah,
of course. It's just that from what you told me, something in her
voice is hypnotic, or at least, I don't know, numbing to the senses,
right?”

Both Justin and Aaron agreed. “Okay,”
Richard continued. “What if she keeps her face covered because,
underneath that veil she actually does look more like a snake than a
human? With a veil on, she could be a beautiful, mysterious woman
under there, tragically half-human, half-snake. But take off the veil
and...horror show.” He looked at Justin expectantly.

“
Now
that's a possibility,” Justin said thoughtfully. “Her
voice never did work on me, but I think it was more related to my
being a descendant of Cronus than anything else. But with that long,
beautiful blonde hair and that sweet voice, even I grew to really
like her. Hmm.”

Aaron drank some water and wiped off his mouth. “You
know, we didn't ask Dominic what those snake-women looked like. That
would answer our questions pretty quickly.”