The Clandestine Saga

Cloud Nine

Watching the hunt had been extremely valuable to Cadence. She was able to observe how the other Hunters and Guardians talked to each other, how they accessed each other's visuals to determine where they needed to go and to coordinate their plan of attack. Aaron had allowed her full access to his communication screen, and she was actually able to see him firing off directives to his team members like a rapid-fire machine gun. He was sending out orders faster than she could read them. Of course, no one was actually reading most of the messages; they were sent directly into the receivers' brains, including her own, but it was still incredibly impressive to see how fast they came.

Even though Aaron was working with a team he was not as familiar with, he was still able to pinpoint their strengths quickly, and they worked together to hem in the Rogue Vampire. Out of fear, the rebel charged one of the Hunters who grabbed him by the throat and squeezed, sending his head flying several feet into the air. What Cadence certainly would have found quite disgusting not too long ago actually had her cheering, and she couldn't wait to have the opportunity to prove herself on the battlefield.

The next morning, she met Shane and Meagan at the gun range. Cadence had been disappointed when Aaron had let her know he was going to be a little bit late. Most of her night was spent thinking about him, and she couldn't wait to see him. However, she understood that he had work to do, and Shane went ahead and got started as soon as both ladies were ready.

"All right, girls," he said in his booming voice. Shane had the appearance of a bodybuilder, though he had the peppy attitude of a personal trainer. Cadence didn't know him very well, and she wasn't sure what to think of him. He had a fun personality, but there was just something she couldn't put her finger on that made her not quite count him as a friend--not yet anyway. "Meagan, this is not your first time at the shooting range. I'm going to go ahead and let you get started on the targets over there while I run through weaponry with Cadence."

Meagan found her way to the target practice station and Shane continued. "I'm going to introduce you to the two primary weapons you will be using to kill Vampires." He reached over to the table next to him and picked up the first weapon, the larger of the two. "This," he said, "is a modified Beretta 93R. It packs the same punch as the regular Beretta but we're not shooting bullets here. That would be too dangerous to humans and wouldn't do nearly as much good. We are shooting liquefied silver ions, or LSI. Now, this is a compound created right here at LIGHTS, and it will essentially take out any Vampire with just one accurate shot to the heart. Since it is a continuous stream weapon, we have to be very careful to make sure the stream ends before we swivel the weapon to engage our next target. Usually this isn't a problem. Basically, the stream ends as soon as we take our finger off of the trigger but it is something to be aware of. LIS is not deadly to humans, or to Hunters, unless a Vampire is shooting it. It does sting when one of these two entities is hit by it. Please keep in mind, however, that since you are a Hunter, you can kill Guardians if you shoot them with LIS. You will be required to spend an extensive amount of time in our training modules learning the difference between Vampires and Guardians before we even consider allowing you to take the Beretta outside of this learning environment. Understood?"

"I have a quick question," Cadence said, hoping for some clarity. "Why do most of the movies and books out there on monsters say that silver bullets kill werewolves but not Vampires, if silver really is lethal to Vampires?

"I have some theories on that," Shane admitted, "But basically, the answer is they just don't get it. Confusion, maybe. I tend to think it's a conspiracy on the part of the Vampires. You ask Aaron that and mention a conspiracy; he'll laugh right in your face. Bottom line is this, best way to kill a Vampire, rip his MFin' head off. Second best way, silver to the heart? Got it?"

Cadence nodded, so he moved on to the next weapon. "Now this is a modified Glock. Because of the size of the Glock, it does not shoot LIS. We load these suckers with the real deal, silver bullets. Naturally, you can imagine these weapons are highly dangerous because they carry actual bullets, which can also kill humans. So, with this weapon, you can basically kill any entity. Which means, if a Vampire gets his grimy hands on one of these and fires it at a Hunter, they will most certainly drop dead just as quickly as any other being. I'm sure you know by now that Vampires cannot kill Guardians, but they can kill Hunters with any weapon at their disposal. Though they usually prefer not to use guns, they can, and sometimes they do. You may or may not be aware that the original Glock does not come with a safety feature. However, ours are thoroughly modified with a top-of-the-line safety mechanism, which you engage and disengage here," he said, demonstrating the safety to her.

After Shane took her through the steps of making sure the safety was on, how to take it off, and how to tell the difference, he showed her how to load the weapons and the best way to use the viewfinder for both of the weapons, especially since she was right eye dominant because the IAC could potentially interfere with the right eye's ability to focus correctly. It took a little while for Cadence to become accustomed to holding her eyes the way he instructed her to, and she found it much easier to aim if she had all of her visuals off, so she practiced turning them on and off quickly as she shot at the targets in the gun range.

Once she had gotten used to the weapons and done some target practice, the next step was to use the practice module LIGHTS had available. This was a simulated walk through, utilizing holograms to represent all three Passels of the Ternion. So, as she listened to Shane's instructions, Cadence realized, she would have to determine quickly who was and who was not a Vampire. If she accidentally shot a Hunter in the simulation, she would receive a two-point deduction. If she accidentally shot a Guardian, she would be put on probation, sent back through the initial training, and mandated to spend at least one week solely on target practice with no module practice. They took shooting Guardians very seriously around here, and she understood why.

The goal was to score at least thirty points on three consecutive turns through the simulation. Each Vampire kill was worth five points, and there were twenty Vampires within the five minutes of the module. The module changed each time, so it was not possible to rely on one's memory to pinpoint where to find the bad guys without risking taking out one of the good guys.

Once they reached their goal of three consecutive scores of thirty points, they would be allowed to participate in an observation. This was Meagan's fourth attempt at completing the modules. She had actually scored above thirty points twice before but not consecutively. She had shot a few Hunters but never a Guardian. Shane said he thought, perhaps, she was so worried about shooting a Guardian she wasn't firing fast enough and hitting the Vampires. Cadence listened to everything he had to say to her because she wanted to make sure she did the best she could.

Meagan entered the simulator first. Cadence was able to access her visuals to observe how she preceded. From the very beginning, Cadence could see some things that she was clearly doing wrong. She stood next to Shane, and they both reacted similarly each time Meagan missed a Vampire or almost took out a Hunter or Guardian. At the end of the simulator, she had scored twenty-five points. Good, not great, and not good enough to count for one of her three runs.

Then, it was Cadence's turn. She had her choice of weapons, and she chose the Glock. She felt it was small enough that she could raise and aim it with one hand if she needed to, which would make it easier if she ever decided to carry two. For this simulator purpose, however, she was only allowed one, and she couldn't wait to get started.