by Wen Spencer
"Hmm." Ice pursed his lips together, thinking. "By now, probably. I had to use him as a distraction for the evil. We'd set up Loo-ae on a remote, so we'd have a chance to be clear of it when it started up. A running start. The demons—the Ontongard—caught us at the docks. Everyone else is dead, some with cleaner deaths than others. They knew we stole the Ae." He pressed fingertips to his forehead. "They started to rummage through my mind, trying to discover what we'd done with the Ae, so I gave them Daggit and Hu-ae to save Loo-ae." He laughed softly. "Hu-ae. Loo-ae. Listen to me. I'm using their real names."
Ice had made a small gesture to the shadows beside him. Ukiah looked and with a start recognized Loo-ae beside the huge bulk of a giant ventilation fan. A hole had been arc-welded into the metal sheeting of the ductwork, and the Loo-ae's exit chute was duct-taped into the air shaft.
"You can't use Loo-ae to stop them."
"I rekeyed it." He lifted his left hand and showed off the bloody stump of a pinkie, already trying to grow back. "I managed to slice off some of the evil and used Loo-ae to change it from your genetic key."
So they had taken one of his mice to program Loo-ae.
"Are you sure it was pure Ontongard? Even a few human cells, and you'd kill off everything on the planet."
"What do you want of me? Look!" Ice indicated a cut along his cheek. "I tried to kill myself, put a gun in my mouth and pull the trigger, but he's already too strong. He stopped me."
"I'm sorry. There's nothing I can do."
"Fine. Then I'll kill them all, even as I become one of them."
"This machine won't stop them."
"It might—that's all I care about."
"You can't do this. You'll kill millions of innocent humans."
Ice wavered. "The evil wants me to smash it. Is that enough of an answer?"
"No."
"They're finishing the transmitter today. They've had the detector done for years and found a source months ago. They'll be able to start sending messages out tomorrow. Sunday at the latest. What's a few million to the fate of the world?"
Ukiah edged sideways, hoping to get closer to the machine. "We still have time to stop them without Loo-ae."
"No!" Ice pulled out his pistol, aimed at Ukiah, and fired. At the last moment, though, his hand flicked to one side. Ice screamed surprise and anger as the bullets plowed through Loo-ae's casing to blast holes into the delicate circuitry inside. One of the bullets hit the power supply, and electricity arced in a miniature electrical storm.
They stood for a minute staring as the machine died, and with it all the hopes of the cult. Like all who had fallen to the Ontongard over the millennia, the cult had failed in the face of the sheer resilience of their enemy. Again and again, the invaders could recover from any blow, while the native-born either died or—infected—betrayed their own race.
Ice stared at his traitorous hand. "Oh, God." He dropped to his knees. "Wolf child, please, give me mercy. Kill me before they take me."
And take him they would. With Ice would go all the knowledge of Ukiah's world. Max. Indigo. His infant son. Nor was there time to consider long. While Atticus might physically survive the Ontongard's ambush at the cult's warehouse, if Ru was killed or worse—and more likely after years of close association with Atticus—made one of them, Atticus's fragile world would be crushed.
Ukiah couldn't let that happen.
Still, it was the hardest thing Ukiah had ever done, to pull out his newfound gun and point it at a person he knew. To keep it aimed between Ice's pale blue eyes. To pull the trigger. In the enclosed space, the gun thundered. The bullet smashed Ice to the ground. Gunsmoke and blood filled Ukiah's senses. All he could see was the sprawl of Ice's body. Still, the mostly Ontongard heart struggled to save the host. With a sob, Ukiah aimed at the pounding heart and fired again and again. The body jerked under the blows and went still. Life continued to exist, but could no longer steal Ice's form and memories.
***
Why, Atticus wondered, couldn't anything be simple anymore? There was a time—strangely just last week, but it seemed much longer now—when it was a straight and simple good guys versus bad guys. No werewolves, angels, demons, or aliens. Planning a raid seemed to offer the return to comforting routine.
The warehouse sat in a flat, treeless area; a desert of an industrial park. Dusk was running before heavy rain clouds, leaving behind a windy night full of the promise of rain. While the loading bays fronting Summer Street remained closed, one of the doors to the back alley had been wedged open. A black pickup truck blocked the narrow alley, as if the driver had tried to back it to the door, discovered it wouldn't fit, and left it at a drunken angle. Apparently someone was loading up with all haste.
"Looks like they're bolting." Ru took out the night-vision binoculars to scan the warehouse.
Atticus grunted. So much for an easily orchestrated raid. "Not surprising with the pod people breathing down their neck. Grab the cash cow and run." He checked his pistol, made sure it was fully loaded, and patted his pocket to check on the extra magazine.
"Speaking of pod people, you feel anything with your super spider senses?"
There were times when Ru took things a little too easy. Atticus grunted again in annoyance, but he closed his eyes and tried that weird "other" sense. "No."
"Hello? What's hedoing here?" Ru murmured.
Atticus opened his eyes and peered across the street. John Daggit came out of the warehouse carrying a cardboard box. Since his right hand was a painful collection of metal braces for his broken fingers, Daggit juggled the box awkwardly with his left hand.
"Call for backup?" Ru asked.
"Let me scout the area." Atticus dialed down the interior lights so they wouldn't turn on when the door opened. "See how many people we're dealing with."
Daggit dropped his load into the pickup's bed and hurried back inside. Faint thunder rolled around in the sky as Atticus eased out of the Jaguar and into the chilly wind. Instantly the omnipresent fish-and-salt smell of the ocean filled his senses. Keeping to the shadows, he crossed the street and crept to the pickup. Battered and muddy with steel toolboxes built in, the vehicle was obviously used for construction. A tarp and bindings lay ready to cover up the load.
Liquor boxes sat in the truck bed, perhaps a dozen in all, shoved as far as Daggit could easily reach, leaving a glittering trail of Invisible Red. Atticus slid on a plastic glove and gingerly tipped the nearest box to peer inside. Plastic bags of the alien drug filled the box. Based on what Daggit had sold his team, the boxes represented several million dollars' worth of drugs. What was Daggit doing with it? Where was the cult? But most important, where were Hu-ae and Loo-ae?
Atticus skinned off the gloves, dropped them into the already contaminated pickup, and stalked quietly to the back door to listen intently. The wind and the distant murmur of waves combined to make a deafening white noise. Taking out his pistol, he slipped inside.
The warehouse was silent. Its vast interior was stacked with great beams of hand-hewn wood. There was half of an old sign leaned against the wall near the door, painted with years after theMayflower took the Pilgrims to America, it was stranded and purchased by a farmer who towed it up the Thames and dismantled it to build this barn.The ghost scent of cows hung in the musty air.
There was something ironic in the fact that the cult had hidden an alien invader's tool in among the bones of their own ancestral invasion craft.
After several minutes of listening closely, Atticus was fairly certain that Daggit was working alone in the dim warehouse. He leaned back outside to signal to Ru. Thunder boomed, closer now. As the sound faded, there was an odd metallic noise within the building and the warehouse seemed to suddenly breathe out, the exhaled air warmer than the night around Atticus. Daggit had rolled up one of the great steel doors to the loading docks. Had he heard Atticus?
He waved to Ru to head Daggit off, and charged inside.
Daggit had run out of boxes. A small stack of plastic ba
gs were piled in front of the tall door meant for tractor-trailers. A cube matching Indigo's sketch of the alien machines sat by the loading dock—but only one was in sight. Daggit struggled one-handed with a Mayflowertimber, apparently planning to use it as a ramp to load the Ae once he pulled the pickup around .
The biker looked up as Atticus ran toward him, and swore. He fumbled out his pistol with his left hand. Atticus kicked it away. Compared to the Ontongard, Daggit moved ponderously slowly. Even as the big man started to react, Atticus whirled, caught Daggit's wrist, and took him down to his knees and then stomach while twisting Daggit's unbroken hand up behind his back.
Ru squealed the Jaguar around the corner and to a stop in front of the dock, flooding the area with light. He got out, hidden by the glare of headlights, and pulled his gun. "Solid?"
"We're solid." Atticus kneed Daggit in the back, keeping him pinned.
Daggit preempted the questioning with, "I don't know where the little bastards are! They called me. Sold me that damn machine, told me how it works, took the money, and ran. I don't have a clue where your brother is."
"My brother is back at my hotel." Atticus took out his handcuffs. "He swam ashore."
"So it was always about the fucking drugs?"
"Yes." Atticus cuffed the biker. "As far as we're concerned, it's always been about getting the drugs off the street and shutting the lab down. John Daggit, you're under arrest for drug trafficking, possession of controlled substances, and anything else we can tack on you."
"What? Are you kidding me? You're Pack."
"No." Atticus flipped out his ID and shoved it under Daggit's nose. "I'm DEA."
Daggit exploded into profanity as Atticus patted him down, ending with, "You're going to be so dead when the Pack finds out."
"They know." Atticus liberated a set of car keys, a switchblade, and a stash pistol. "They don't care. This hasn't been about the drugs for them."
Daggit grunted as if struck and then muttered darkly, "Those bastards, those fucking bastards," in an endless litany.
With a growing murmur, the storm front moved over them, bringing a downpour. Ru left the Jaguar's lights on, slammed the door, and scrambled up to the shelter of the loading dock. "Is that it?" Ru asked, indicating the alien device sitting next to Atticus. It was a waist-high cube of something that looked like brushed steel, with the "Hu-ae" symbol. Not totally what Atticus expected, but it matched Indigo's drawing. "Where's the other one?"
"I want a lawyer," Daggit said, assuming the question was aimed at him. "I know my rights."
"Look, you idiot." Atticus kicked Daggit harder than he intended. Daggit, he realized, had a trace amount of the drug on his hands, and it was affecting him. "The other machine is a bioweapon. It produces enough toxin to kill the entire city. If you're sitting in a holding pen when they turn it on, you're dead meat. Understand? Now where the fuck is the other one?"
Daggit considered in silence and then said quietly, "They took it away. They didn't tell me where they were taking it."
Atticus felt a tendril of fear uncoil inside him. Having seen Prime's world through his memories, Atticus now understood the scope of possible destruction that the Ontongard and their tools could create.
His fear awakened concern in Ru. "What do we do?"
"We contain this mess, get him into a holding tank, and find the cult." Atticus indicated Daggit. "There's drugs smeared everywhere. Just watch him—I'll handle things."
"I've got gloves on," Ru pointed out.
"Good."
Rain beat on the warehouse roof, a low, endless roar. Atticus just reached the truck when panic swept over him. He stood for a moment, panting from the sudden adrenaline rush. What was wrong? Why did he feel this way?
Then another person's will slammed into him. Get out! Go! Run!
Ukiah?
His brother was closing at a fast run, his fear racing out before him. Knowing his brother, there were only two things he'd be running from. Atticus focused on his new awareness of others like him and found the Ontongard nearly on top of him.
"Shit!" Atticus ducked back into the long warehouse. Silhouetted by the Jaguar's headlights, Ru stood over the prone Daggit. The falling rain formed a sheet of gray beyond the open doorway. "Ru! Get him out of here!"
Behind Atticus came the cough of a grenade launcher. In a burst of heat and sound, the truck exploded. He was smashed from his feet by the concussion.
Well, damn, the Ontongard were sick of losing, he thought. They'd come to the fight armed to the teeth. He scrambled to his feet, knowing that the stacks of ancient timber would go up like kindling.
In the far doorway, Ru turned toward the explosion. Daggit twisted as he stood up, snatched one of the plastic bags stacked by the door, and spun, swinging the bag of drugs at Ru.
"No!" Atticus cried, helpless, too far away to do anything but scream.
But somehow Ukiah was close enough to do more than that. He was suddenly between Ru and Daggit, shielding Ru with his own body. The bag struck Ukiah midchest and burst on impact. The transparent drug covered him instantly, setting his nerves on fire.
Atticus felt the drug blast through Ukiah's system as if his own body were washed with white fire. Ukiah had reflexively flung up his hands to protect his head. He screamed, arms flexing tight so muscles corded, and toppled—still screaming—into a fetal position, a fire victim wrapped in invisible flames. Atticus stood stunned, lost in another's pain, as the cloud of drug particles glittered in the light over his fallen brother. Ukiah's screams sucked the Blissfire into his lungs, and Atticus could feel the fire move through his brother's core.
Guns spat into the dim warehouse, bullets dancing Daggit backward, but all Atticus could hear was the deafening, endless bell-like chime of Bliss. The taste of red filled his mouth.
The Dog Warriors flowed into the warehouse even as another grenade exploded somewhere close by. Then the universe whited out and Atticus couldn't sense his body past the pain, although he knew he was moving his legs.
And then like a star going nova and dying to a dark cinder, the blaze of pain that had been Ukiah flared out.
Atticus stumbled at the sheer absence. Only Ru's support kept him from falling. Somehow they'd gotten outside, into the bitter-cold rain—a full block from the gunfight in the warehouse. The timer on the Jaguar's headlights had finally tripped, and they turned off. The fire shone through the open doorway like a baneful red eye, growing brighter.
He panted, trembling, feeling hollow, as if the experience had burned the core out of him.
"Atty?" There was fear in Ru's eyes.
"I'm fine. I'm fine."
Ru followed his gaze. "Ukiah?"
"He's dead." The words dropped into the hollow place like stones.
Rennie came out of the warehouse, Ukiah's body slung over his shoulder. At the corner of the neighboring building, a broken downspout showered rain past a spotlight, creating a glittering spray of water.
. . . a halo of dust. . . a million prickles of pain flashing into one flare of agony . . .
Shaw crouched in the shower, shifting Ukiah to the ground, letting the torrent wash the shimmering drug from the boy's body.
"You said this stuff is harmless!" Atticus shouted at Shaw. "That it only killed humans."
"Harmless to Pack." Shaw stripped the sodden clothes off of Ukiah as the water pounded unheeded on Shaw's shoulders and back. "Not to him. Not to you either. Not at that amount. His body shut down, rather than spread the poison completely through his system."
"He'll recover—won't he?"
"I don't know," Shaw snapped. "Poison is one way to kill us, as is fire."
. . . a blaze of pain like white fire and then nothing . . .
"Oh, fuck." Atticus couldn't bear looking at his brother; he stared instead at drops of rain sparkling in the spotlight. "What are you going to do with him?"
"He's our son; we'll do whatever needs to be done." Rennie stood, lifting Ukiah like a sleeping child.
. . . another's pain filling him— a complete union of a soul that once was one— and then nothing . . .
Ru walked beside him, one hand on Atticus's shoulder, a spot of warmth in the cold rain. "He'll be fine." Ru's voice betrayed what the rain hid—he was crying.
Atticus steeled himself with anger and kept walking. He just met Ukiah on Sunday. Five fucking days—just enough time to leave a wound that would never heal. Humans were the lucky ones. They forgot the pain and hurt, given enough time. In vivid slices, he could still remember parts of being a wolf—a moment here, a moment there—from what it was like to run on all four legs, to having a tail, to seeing the world in black and white. After he became human, every agony was locked into place. Despite being less than a year old at the time, he still could recall his adopted parents in exacting detail, had every moment he spent with them etched into his perfect memory.
. . . and then nothing . . .
They'd come to an enclosed bus stop. Ru pulled him inside, out of the rain. In that enclosed womb, Atticus took out his Swiss army knife and opened the blade.
"What are you doing?" Ru asked.
"If I live the rest of my life with the moment of his death locked into my memory . . . I'll go mad." He cocked his wrist, placed the blade on the blue line of his vein, and cut deep.
Ru groaned and sagged against the shelter's wall, looking away.
The blood ran hot over Atticus's rain-chilled wrist and gathered in his hand. He willed it to form a mouse while staring at the ceiling, trying to think of nothing but the slow drumming of the rain on the roof. They say if someone tells you not to think of a polar bear, it becomes impossible not to. If he thought about what he was trying to drain out of himself, it would embed itself back into his memory. So he thought about the sound of the rain, scanning through his perfect memory for music that matched the rhythm. He found one in the mournful ballad of "I Am A Rock" and filled his mind with its somber words. I won't disturb the slumber of feelings that have died . . .
