The Shadow Summoner | Book Three - PJO Universe

four

HEDGE

How hard could it be to find a satyr in an army-surplus store?

As it turned out, quite hard.

Macro's Military Madness stretched on forever-aisle after aisle of equipment no self-respecting army would want.

Near the entrance, a giant bin with a neon purple sign promised PITH HELMETS! BUY 3, GET 1 FREE! An endcap display featured a Christmas tree built of stacked propane tanks with garlands of blowtorch hoses, and a placard that read 'TIS ALWAYS THE SEASON!

Two aisles, each a quarter mile long, were entirely devoted to camouflage clothing in every possible color: desert brown, forest green, arctic gray, and hot pink, just in case your specops team needed to infiltrate a child's princess-themed birthday party.

Directory signs hung over each lane: HOCKEY HEAVEN, GRENADE PINS, SLEEPING BAGS, BODY BAGS, KEROSENE LAMPS, CAMPING TENTS, LARGE POINTY STICKS.

At the far end of the store, perhaps half a day's hike away, a massive yellow banner screamed FIREARMS!!!

Ariana glanced at Grover, whose face looked even paler under the harsh fluorescents.

"Should we start with the camping supplies?" Apollo asked.

The corners of his mouth drifted downward as he scanned a display of rainbow-colored impaling spikes. "Knowing Coach Hedge, he'll gravitate toward the guns."

"Yeah." Ariana agreed, remembering how his first response to everything was violence. "He's obsessed with anything violent."

So they started their trek toward the distant promised land of FIREARMS!!!

Ariana didn't like the store's too-bright lighting. She didn't like the too-cheerful canned music, or the too-cold air-conditioning that made the place feel like a morgue.

The handful of employees ignored them. One young man was label-gunning 50% OFF stickers on a row of Porta-PooM portable toilets.

Another employee stood unmoving and blank-faced at the express register, as if he had achieved boredom-induced nirvana.

Each worker wore a yellow vest with the Macro logo on the back: a smiling Roman centurion making the okay sign.

Ariana didn't like that logo, either.

At the front of the store stood a raised booth with a supervisor's desk behind a Plexiglas screen, like the warden's post in a prison.

An ox of a man sat there, his bald head gleaming, veins bulging on his neck. His dress shirt and yellow vest could barely contain his bulky arm muscles.

His bushy white eyebrows gave him a startled expression. As he watched them walk past, his grin made Ariana's skin crawl.

"I don't think we should be here." Apollo muttered to Grover.

He eyed the supervisor. "Pretty sure there are no monsters here or I'd smell them. That guy is human."

This did not reassure Ariana. Nevertheless, she and Apollo followed Grover deeper into the store.

As he predicted, Gleeson Hedge was in the firearms section, whistling as he stuffed his shopping cart with rifle scopes and barrel brushes.

Hedge wore bright blue double-weave polyester gym shorts that left his hairy goat legs exposed, a red baseball cap that perched between his small horns, a white polo shirt, and a whistle around his neck, as if he expected at any moment to be called in to referee a soccer game.