James reflects on what he knows about cockatrices. He knows they look like giant chickens and, in theory, shouldn't be too hard to spot. They are yellow, with a bright red comb on their head, plus long blue legs and a long blue tail. These should all be relatively easy to see given the verdant green background of swaying grass.
He also remembers that they usually hunt in groups and, most importantly, that their tails can paralyze a full-grown metahuman. Once their prey is immobilized, they go to work with their talons and their sharp beaks. Ares occasionally used them to guard sensitive areas, but James is reasonably sure he wasn't on guard duty much. He feels more like a seek-and-destroy operative, which aligns nicely with his current task.
Illeana looks up from what she's doing and cracks up at James' load out. It's clear that she thinks it's overkill. He can practically hear her thinking,
A chameleon suit and a ballistics mask? An assault rifle?! Whatever. Illeana's healing factor could probably outpace any damage the cockatrices could do, so of course she wouldn't worry about them. James didn't have the same luxury and needed to take reasonable precautions.
Illeana shakes her head and returns to her work. James sets off on his circular route, reflecting over the last few months.
They had just been in Denver a few days ago, reuniting with Team Blue at the appointed time and place three months after their original separation. True to their word, Team Blue had gone to Fun City in the CAS, then to the Caribbean League so that Doc could research their shared condition. Doc hadn't found much that he didn't already know, other than their condition had been given a name by the scientific community: CFD. In the meantime the effects of CFD continued to develop. Doc and Ohanzee seemed relatively stable, but Chino had continued his regression into a childlike state. Privately, Doc guessed that Chino's emotional age was no more than 5 or 6 years old at this point. A child in a man's body, truly, and not just any man's body but one that could kick down doors like a locomotive. There had been private conferences of what to do about Chino but few obvious answers. Doc swore to keep working on a cure, while reluctantly conceding that he didn't know if a "cure" would wipe out what little was left of Chino's maturity. After all, there is no guarantee that the nanites would be replaced by adult thinking; it is entirely possible that Chino would have a blank slate again, and would be starting over from infancy.
James reflected on his own personality changes. Of course he still
felt like himself, but there had been developments. How much was he recovering his previous self and how much was he blazing new terrain, he didn't know. He did feel a renewed dedication to his augmentations. They comforted him, and he felt the need to get the most out of them as possible. With Doc's assistance, James had disabled the safety limits and overclocked the performance of his arms and legs. That felt good; that felt powerful, comfortable. James had a sense that he was approaching some sort of nirvana, of stretching out to reach a singularity where man and machine were blended to perfection. Hadn't his Ares files said that he showed remarkable compatibility with cyberware? He had the strength and grace of a god, and it was hard not to feel like he might be some sort of evolutionary step forward for mankind.
Part of this thinking might have been a natural reaction to the amount of time Illeana and Sam have been spending together. The three months between visits to Denver were filled with a
4,000km road trip - Sioux Nation, Salish-Shidhe Council, skirting Tir Tairngire and PCC on the way back to Denver - mostly spent in rural areas where Sam wouldn't be unduly tempted by the local populace until he learned to control his hunger. Illeana, helpful as ever, was exceedingly patient in guiding Sam through the first steps of his newly Awakened, Infected life. But that also meant that James was the third wheel more often than not. He had no real concerns about any funny business between Illeana and Sam - Sam, after all, was not only hideous but also acidic - but he couldn't help but feel like he was unable to contribute to Sam's apprenticeship in any meaningful way.
James wanted to do some sightseeing on his own but the Sioux Nation was hostile to Anglos. Illeana could make him look like a native, but James didn't have the SIN nor any of the language skills to complete the deception. Illeana picked up languages easily - part of her magic, she explained - and even got James to teach her some Japanese and Spanish during a couple of the afternoons they had to themselves while Sam was off sulking somewhere. Salish-Shidhe had been much more welcoming, and very pretty too. The lakes in the mountains dredged up hazy memories of James' childhood that may or may not have been real. Maybe they were dreams, or scenes from a trid. Chances are he would never know for certain, but he still felt a certain affinity for the terrain. He had spent weeks hunting and fishing while Illeana was off with her pupil.
A flash of blue and red returns James to the present, where he recalls that he should be trying not to get eaten. Up ahead, a hundred yards or more, he spies a handful of red combs and blue tails that suggest that Illeana's nose was onto something. The cockatrices' heads are small though, and hitting them at this distance would require a bullseye. James sneaks forward, hoping that being downwind will preserve his stealth. His chameleon suit can't stop him from crunching through the grass though, and suddenly the cockatrices are spooked and disappear.
He can't help but be impressed that they're nimble enough to hunch down and run underneath the cover of the grass. Mechanically, he's not even sure how that works, since their legs must be as long as his, and it's not like they can flatten themselves on their bellies like a metahuman. James reaches the point where the small brood had been hiding and sees tracks leading off to the east. He does his best to follow.