The Hunters Volume One: The Beginning

Episode 6: Discovery

   "Everyone this is Daniel Whitestone. He is very familiar with what we're dealing with right now so I called him in for back up."
   Veronica looked amused and made no effort to hide it. "So even the Hunters have to ask for help sometimes."
   Dan's coal eyes landed on her with an intensity that wiped the smirk off her face. "It would be folly to face an enemy of whom you know little about without adequate preparation."
   "Sounds familiar, doesn't it princess?" Jade grinned at the vampire who simply huffed and ignored her.
   Mia raised a hand to draw the Amerindian man's attention. "Uh Dan right? Michael said you're quite knowledgeable on all of ... well this, right?"
    "Yes, that is true," the man replied. "I have a wealth of experience in these matters." His eyes hardened gradually as he leveled a piercing stare at Whitney who sat beside Mia on the couch. "So it is very easy for me to detect someone who has been afflicted with a curse. Especially when they are in the same room with me."
   The increase in the intensity of his tone of speaking and its hidden implications was not lost on the other people in the room. Every pair of eyes in the room fell on Whitney who to her credit, did not so much as flinch even a little.
   "What is he talking about?" Michael asked firmly.
   The fire witch sent him a scathing glare before turning to the medicine man with a less stern expression.
   "Sometime last week," she began. "We fought off a bunch of skinwalkers. After I killed one of them, this appeared on the back of my hand."
   Whitney then pulled back her jumper sleeve to show them the tattoo. The circle had all but disappeared already, only a tiny arc remaining alongside the black rope encirclement. The moment Dan laid eyes on the mark, a deep frown appeared on his face. In two long strides, he had arrived before Whitney and seized her hands to closely examine the mark.
   "Be grateful you have such a friend, girl. Your arrogant confidence in yourself will bring you more harm than you can imagine."
   Michael and the other Hunters moved closer to them to observe Whitney's hand. As soon as Dean got within a few feet of the witch, he notified them of a dangerous amount of malevolence wafting off the girl.
   Michael turned to Dan with a stern look in his face. "What's going on?"
   "Your friend was cursed by a skinwalker," the Amerindian man replied without stopping his observation.
   "So?" Lee spoke up from his position on the back of the couch. "Michael can just erase it–"
   "Not this one." Dan cut him off immediately. "You'd do well to avoid attempting to remove this curse. It's nothing like the others. Where most curses affect the life force of the victims, this one affects the victim's fate."
   "Fate?" Mia repeated confusedly.
   "Destiny, soul path, whatever you want to call it," Dan delineated. "It's very complex dark magic. Whoever cast it on you must really have a reason to hate you."
    Whitney thought back to how she had incinerated the skinwalker and the amount of pain it must have been in. "Yeah, I can think of one or two."
   "Not the time Whitney," Mia admonished. "So why can't it be erased?"
    "Michael's magic can erase just about anything," Dan admitted calmly as he released Whitney's hand. "However, this goes beyond the realm of normal dark magic. While there is a  possibility of him successfully erasing the curse, there's a far greater chance of him affecting the flow of your fate."
   "I'm guessing that's bad?" Mia surmised.
   "Very bad."
   The constant talk about her as if she was not present in the room had begun to grate on Whitney's nerves and she felt she had heard enough. "What does the stupid mark even mean?"
   Dan gave her a look as if to remind her that she was in no position to be giving orders. But he answered her nonetheless. "They are both Native American symbols. The rope signifies the binding effect of the curse. That keeps it in effect until the conditions for the curse have been met. The fading white mark symbolizes how much time you have until that happens."
  
   Michael unfolded his arms and paced about thoughtfully. "Is there any way of knowing what those conditions are?"
   The older man shook his head ruefully. "Unfortunately no. But until we do, I will have to do something to delay the curse."
   Mia's face lit up like a lightbulb. "You can do that?"
   "I have a way of increasing the duration of the curse." Dan turned to look at Michael pointedly. "But I can only do so up to one additional week. So you guys better make sure you resolve all of this by then. I'll try to assist you to the best of my ability."
   Michael nodded gratefully. "Thanks a lot Dan."
   "You can thank me by taking care of this as soon as possible," Dan replied as he took a seat beside Whitney. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a pen and taking a nearby notepad, he scribbled a list of items on a piece of paper.
   "I'm also going to be needing a few more materials to create protective talismans for the rest of you. I brought some of my own materials but it seems I greatly underestimated the level of this threat. What I have will not be enough."
   "Dean and Olivia will get you everything you need." Both of the named Hunters nodded in acceptance of their leader's orders. Michael then turned to Lee and Jade. "You two have something to do right?"
  "Yeah, come on pretty boy," Jade drawled as she dragged Lee out of the room.
   Michael faced the rest of the room's occupants, a serious look on his face. "There's no need to emphasize the importance of being careful out there. These guys are not afraid to fight dirty. You all should know that by now."
   Aiden and Caen shuffled slightly in their position behind Veronica. The memories of the last attack were still fresh in their minds and they felt uncomfortable hearing the Hunter remind them of it. Having been taken out so easily before the fight had even began and then forced to sit and watch while their charge fought for her life, it was easy to imagine the amount of indignation both men felt towards skinwalkers. If the latter hated their race so much, then they were more than willing to return the favor on full and more.
  
                          *********
   The hospital in Starlight Central Academy had been built to provide medical students to help prepare them for real life scenarios. The place operated like an actual hospital as the school management had gone all out by employing several genuine doctors to guide the students, as well as multiple miscellaneous staff. The medical students were simply required to serve as interns to the doctors as well as observe them in action to glean as much as experience as possible. Since it operated like the real thing, the hospital was never closed at any point in the day. Rather the employed staff rotated shifts to keep the place functioning day in and day out.
   The sun had already receded well into the horizon when the two Hunters arrived at the hospital. Having spent more than a few hours memorizing the layout of the building, both of them were already familiar with the placement of rooms in the hospital. After taking care to ensure they were not seen by anyone, they made their way to the back of the building quietly.
   Jade moved to place her hand on the wall of the building and frowned immediately.
   "What is it?" Lee asked.
   "There's good news and bad news," she responded. "Good news is that there is definitely something up with this place. It's covered with a lot of advanced magic runes."
   "And the bad news?"
   She turned to look at him with a bitter smile on her face. "Those runes are all primed for detecting incoming foreign magic energies."
   "Meaning?"
   "You go in there and every skinwalker in the building will know immediately."
   "Well shit," Lee sighed and turned his gaze upwards to stare at the wall before them. "Now what?"
  
   "I have a plan." Jade's words had Lee turning to face her expectantly. "There is a way I can get you inside without them knowing exactly where you would appear. But they will be aware that someone entered the place so you'll have a very small window of time to do whatever you have to do you'll have to get the hell out of there–"
   "Let's do it," Lee agreed nearly instantly.
   Jade slapped a hand to her forehead in exasperation at the Asian boy's jumpiness. "Lee, this is serious. I know you can fight your way out of there but we're trying to be stealthy here. You absolutely cannot get caught, you understand?"
   "Yeah yeah, just open it already," he waved her warnings off.
   "Why do I even bother?" Jade sighed and held out her hand. A swirl of purplish black shadows appeared out of thin air and expanded rapidly to a size big enough for a person to fit through.
   Once the portal was steady, she turned to deliver some final words of warning to her partner. "Remember I can only buy you about a minute at most. How much you can do depends on how fast you can work."
   The boy turned his head to give her a cocky grin. "How fast I can work ehh?"
    "Just go dummy," Jade pushed him into the portal, unable to stop the smile that bloomed in her own lips. "Try not to get caught too."