Mutts Like Me (The Awakening Series Book 1)

by Keri Armstrong

  I skidded to a stop, my heart pounding as I looped around, sniffing the air. The coppery scent of blood filled my nose as I tentatively stepped closer to peer into the pit.

  Dead.

  All three of them. Although one appeared to have missed the spikes altogether, it looked as if his neck had been broken.

  I stared in disbelief for a long moment and then let loose a low, plaintive howl that came from the depths of my soul. I’d done it. And surely Toshi and the others had used the time well that it had taken me to get here. They were probably already in the facility wrecking shop.

  I hoped.

  I checked the wound on my back leg, elated to find it was already healing, and turned tail to spring back down the hill, eager to join the fight. When I got within sight of the compound, a thrill went through me when I noted the doors were swung wide open.

  They were in.

  I leapt from the ledge where I’d started the chase and loped toward the entrance, making sure to keep my senses on high alert. It only took a few steps into the compound to realize it was total pandemonium. Howls ricocheted off the metal walls, and the smell of fresh kill hung heavy in the air.

  I skulked down the hallway, pressing my nose to the floor, breathing in a hundred scents, but fixing in on only a few.

  Toshio, Alex and Gina had been down this very hall, and recently, along with others I didn’t recognize.

  My nose was on point. I jogged down the corridor, swiveling my head left and right in search of danger. What stopped me in my tracks though, was a drip of liquid splattering on my head. I looked up to see beads of water slowly forming another drop on the very edge of what looked to be some sort of hatch, and splashing at my feet.

  I considered just moving forward. The others had passed it by, so it was probably nothing.

  But what if it was something?

  I eyed the distance between the ground and the ceiling hatch dubiously. It would require a nine-foot vertical leap. One fierce enough to also propel me through a closed hatch that might be painted shut for all I knew.

  Drip.

  I hunkered down, and centered myself, taking a second to filter out the noise and the scents around me and focus on the task at hand.

  Then, I went for it, sailing up in the air. I let out a snarl as my broad, wolf paws connected with the metal. A resounding clang rang out, but damn it, I was through. Half of me, at any rate. I clawed at the floor, pulling the rest of my body in, and looked around in stunned confusion.

  The scent hit me like a brick to the side of the head. Wolves. So many wolves. Instantly, a chorus of howls went up, sending an electric shock through my whole body.

  Dozens of them, each in cages, locked up tight. I didn’t hesitate, allowing myself to easily slip back into my human form, reaching for the pack at my neck.

  The howls became yips, a frantic chorus of excitement as I riffled through my weapons and tools to find the lock cutters.

  Score.

  Not even bothering with the long t-shirt and shorts inside the pack, I dropped to my knees next to the nearest cage and met the golden gaze of the wolf before me. She looked hungry, her fur matted and sparse, but her eyes were fierce. She leaned forward and nuzzled my hand before bowing her head.

  A rush of affection flooded my senses and I couldn’t tell who the feeling belonged to, me or her. But then a spatter of gunfire shattered my thoughts and I quickly fixed the teeth of the cutters over the lock. It took all the strength I had, but I managed, and the padlock clattered to the ground.

  “Yes!” I shouted with glee as the first wolf padded out of the cage, nudging me gently and then staring at me expectantly. Instinctively, I knew she was waiting to follow my lead. I didn’t question it. We had to act fast.

  “If you shift into human form, you can help with the locks,” I instructed, rising to look through my bag again.

  She effortlessly changed forms, become a too-slim young woman with stringy blonde hair. She’d clearly known suffering, but again, I was stuck by the courage in her expression.

  “Anything you need.”

  I handed her the lock cutters and ran down the length of the room, counting cages as I went.

  Twenty-two.

  I reached into my bag and withdrew a pistol. There was more than one way to get through a lock.

  And once we got them all undone, we would have two dozen more troops to bring to the party that could help my team win this fight.

  Granted, we were all naked, but that was the least of our worries for the moment.

  I’m coming, Toshio.

  Chapter Ten

  The battered gang of wolves and I had all shifted back to animal form by the time we started tracking the rest of group. I focused my attention on the shadows as we crept down an eerie corridor, the shady quiet and instinct making my hackles rise, along with the wolves travelling soft-footed behind me. Our awareness converged as one—the sensation comforting and strange. Like hive mind.

  Since they felt my emotions as I felt theirs, I tried to keep calm. Otherwise, their recent terror would overwhelm all of us. I did my best to send out soothing vibes, to let them know they were going to be safe. Even though I was now starting to worry about Toshio and the rest.

  The scent I’d had earlier was fading and the facility was too quiet. We tracked around a corner where I could tell Gina had been, and nudged a slightly opened door the rest of the way open. The room was empty, save for a table in the middle with a large lamp hovering above it.

  A smell that I could only describe as putrid evil filled the air: fear, blood, feces, metal and rot.

  One of the wolves in the back began to whine and I turned to see. It was one of the smaller males, his legs shaking as he tried to back out of the room. One or two of the others rallied around him, while a few others growled at them. I let loose a sharp bark at those and they stood down. As I approached, the small wolf bowed his head, his bladder releasing.

  Jesus. What happened here?

  Images, not my own began filling my brain. A thin young man strapped to the table, the light blinding as his lids were stapled back his brow. Injection after injection of some paralyzing substance that didn’t allow for movement yet didn’t deaden pain. Skin being peeled off, muscle pulled from bone…

  Sickened, I shifted back to human form and knelt before the traumatized wolf. He hunkered down further as if trying to press into the floor.

  I wrapped my arms around him and held him close. “I promise you, we won’t let anything like that happen to you again. You’re free now,” I whispered.

  The others, still furred, moved in, surrounding us, nuzzling and offering licks of comfort.

  Even though I wanted to stay in the group huddle and offer more reassurance—to myself as much as to them—I knew we had to hurry and get out of there. I was starting to feel sick wondering where Toshio and the others were, why I couldn’t hear them.

  “Come on, let’s go,” I said, just before shifting back.

  We passed down one quiet corridor after another, my anxiety rising with each empty room. Where were the other mutts? Hell, where were the guards? No bodies, no sounds, nothing. Had they left us? Gone to look for me in the woods?

  I considered the last. It was a possibility. Maybe I should go out to see. I motioned for the others to follow me, sending them mental images of the woods. A general sense of relief and anticipation swept through the group and I felt better. Yeah, maybe this was the way.

  We’d made it to the front door before I realized just how wrong I’d been.

  Something electrified covered the doorway, as I’d discovered when the shock threw me back on my ass, causing me to involuntarily return to human form, twitching and momentarily incapacitated.

  The wolves behind me began to howl and gather around me as another door to the side of us slid open to reveal a hidden room. Inside were at least ten men and women in white lab coats whose smiles sent shivers through me that had nothing to do with the shock I’d just receive
d. As soon as some of the pack started to snarl, one of the women in the other room raised something to her mouth and blew. The piercing sound sent the entire pack, myself included, into devastating seizures of pain.

  It was a work of mere moments for the rest to come out and jab their needles into our necks.

  The young male wolf I’d comforted earlier caught my eye as he went down. The resignation I saw there hurt worse than the sense betrayal he also projected.

  I’d failed them all.

  ***

  I came to alone, upright in what felt like a glass coffin. I could see, but couldn’t hear or smell anything outside of my confines. I banged against the clear walls and realized it wasn’t glass. It didn’t exactly feel like plastic, either. I didn’t know what it was.

  Since I was no longer paralyzed, I was able to turn and look at my surroundings. Outside of my container was a room that looked too much like a doctor’s office for my comfort, except there was no exam table here. Only a counter with a sink, a desk and a couple of chairs.

  Inside the container, I was wearing what appeared to be a hospital gown and the implications of that nearly brought me to my knees as I still recalled the examination room from earlier.

  Above, vents pumped air through the tiny chamber that held me. They weren’t big enough for me to climb into, but maybe I could squeeze through as a wolf. I closed my eyes and tried to concentrate.

  Nothing.

  After several more attempts, I started to really panic. I reached out with my senses to see if I could find the pack, but they were cut off. I didn’t know if it was from the fact that I was in human form, or if they were…

  I stopped that train of thought in its tracks, recalling the Will Smith line about danger being real, but fear being a choice. Fear would do me no good right now. I needed to think.

  I could only figure that the ones who held us must be some of the Awakened. Who else would have the tech to take down a pack of shifters and a freakin’ dragon? And they must have taken them because otherwise they’d be here by now.

  I considered all that had happened. The sudden cut off of sound and scent, the secret door.

  They must have been watching. But we were still alive, so they also must be ancients from the caves – they wanted us alive for some reason. From all I’d learned from the mutts, if our captors had been affiliated with the ocean dwellers, we’d be dead.

  But I couldn’t understand why the experiments, if they were just re-gathering their tribes? It seems they’d want to be nice to us, if they wanted our help taking over the world.

  But didn’t it all start with experiments, another voice whispered in my head.

  I hated that voice. Even if it was my own.

  Think, Marti, think!

  I didn’t have any more time to think when another door slid open in a nearby wall and Toshio was pushed through it.

  He stumbled a little as the man behind him came through, still pushing at Toshi’s back.

  “There, you see, son. I told you she’s all right.”

  Son?

  Toshi grabbed hold of the counter to pull himself upright. He looked so weak and bruised that I could barely breathe around the pounding of my heart.

  His eyes met mine with a look of such sorrow and regret that my stomach cramped.

  No, Toshi, no. Don’t give up! I silently begged him.

  The man behind him came around and stood before me.

  Son, he’d said.

  As I looked into his face, I could see it was true. Toshio undoubtedly must look a lot like his mother, but the lips, the jaw, the dimpled smile – they were all straight off the face of this smug bastard who stood before me wearing a lab coat.

  I bared my teeth at him, snarling even without fangs, and he just laughed.

  Still grinning, he turned to Toshio. “Reminds me of her dad,” he said.

  I lurched forward and hit the clear wall, which just caused him to laugh more.

  Toshi rose up and snarled. “Leave her alone.”

  Rat Bastard just raised his brows. “If you want that, you know what you have to do.”

  What, what did he have to do?

  I had a bad feeling I wasn’t going to like the answer.

  Toshi looked at me again and mouthed, ‘I’m sorry’ just before he turned to his father and nodded.

  His dad clapped a hand on his back, smiling like a proud papa. “You’ve made the right choice, son.”

  Without another word, they turned and walked out of the room, ignoring me as I pounded against the glass. “What choice?”

  A few minutes later, the door reopened and another lab-coated asshole came in, carrying a clipboard and pen. A woman this time. I glared at her look of amusement.

  “So, you’re the famous Maritza,” she said.

  Famous? I’ll admit, I was curious what she meant by that but refused to be baited. I crossed my arms and continued to stare, hard. “Where’s Toshio?”

  She glanced down and made a note on her board then looked up again. “You’re a lot like your dad, you know. You even look like him, there in the stasis chamber. He glared at me just like that.”

  It took every bit of what little self-control I had left to stand still, praying I could keep my face from showing any reaction. I’d had years of practice getting the “I don’t give a damn” look down pat after going through the Chicago Public School system. But man, it was hard. Even if I could keep a straight face, my heart was pounding so heart she could probably hear it.

  My dad? Stasis chamber?

  I was momentarily glad for the tiny confines because it kept me upright; otherwise, I might have sunken to my knees a while ago.

  “However,” she continued cheerily, “all’s well that ends well. You’ll get chipped, and we’ll get to him eventually.”

  A wild shot of hope flashed through me. They’ll get him eventually. Maybe they didn’t have him! Maybe she was lying before, or maybe he’d escaped. Either way, he must be alive. And if he’d out-maneuvered them, so could we.

  She gave a small smile, snake-cold and thin. “Ah, I see you’re happy. That will change.”

  At this point I didn’t care what she said. I had hope again. Although that chipped comment….

  She smiled at me again as she reached behind my container and my blood chilled.

  I heard a click just before gas started pouring inside the chamber.

  My ears rang but I still heard her say, “Now, let’s see about that neck of yours.”

  ***

  Once more, I awoke in a place different from where I last remembered being. A strong smell of garbage assaulted my nose as I came to, gagging on the scent. It took a moment for my eyes to focus and for me to rise up, panicked, from where I lay in an alley. I stood on trembling legs and and…

  No. I couldn’t be.

  But it was. I recognized the alley and what was left of the building next to me. I was back in Chicago.

  Next to the burnt out rubble of my apartment complex.

  I bent over, dry heaving whatever little was left in my stomach. The building was gone and I didn’t even know if my gran was still in there when it happened.

  They had dumped me there, unconscious, but at least fully clothed. My stomach lurched again. Someone had dressed me in my own clothing, which made my skin crawl to think of it. I looked at the rubble across from me. They had been in there before it burned.

  Oh, Gran.

  I dry heaved some more, the spasms only getting worse as I realized that under my jacket, I was also wearing the hoodie from the training center…which I had last seen at Clara’s.

  That could only mean the gang was truly gone. I sank back down on my haunches, as spasms of grief wracked my body.

  Tears and snot ran down my face but I didn’t care. Everyone was gone. Everything was gone. My family, my friends, my home. I had nothing and no one to turn to.

  I don’t know how long I sat next to the rubble of my old home, sobbing and rocking back and forth before
the familiar sound of a contraband grocery cart being pushed over concrete brought me to my senses. One of our many homeless was making his way down the sidewalk toward the alley. I jumped up and ran, realizing that I had just their ranks.

  I continued running for a while before coming to a stop by one of the elevated train platforms, then slowly made my way up the stairs to sit on one of the narrow wooden benches. I looked down the track longingly, wishing I had somewhere to go. Out of habit, I patted my jacket pocket to check for my train pass. A rustle of paper greeted me by surprise. I reached in and pulled out a folded slip of paper. Curious anticipation and fear set my fingers trembling as I unfolded it.

  ‘We’ll be seeing you soon’ was all it said.

  I slumped over the bench, head in hands, as I tried to decipher the cryptic message. Were the Awakened toying with me? Tormenting me even more than they already had?

  My head came up as another thought occurred to me – a wild hope that maybe, just maybe, the message was from one of the Mutts? Smuggled in somehow to let me know they were all right and would be coming to get me? My heart picked up pace as I considered it. Then slowly, sadly, rejected the idea. How could they possibly have done so… unless one of them dressed me? Someone had to have told them or shown them how to get to Clara’s.

  Toshio?

  Was that what his dad meant, by ‘you know what you have to do’ in order to keep me safe?

  Oh, Toshi, what have you done?

  As other people began gathering on the platform, I knew I had to find another place to go. It wasn’t safe here. I stood, drawing in a deep breath to check the species of the waiting passengers. All human. Most of them cold, some of them unwashed. I coughed a little, my breath puffing like smoke in the chilled air.

  Think, think, think!

  How could I find Caleb and the others we’d left behind in Chicago? I couldn’t retrace the steps in my mind from our mad dash out of the city because Cass had been driving too fast. A wolf out of hell.

  What was Caleb’s last name?

  My shoulders slumped as I suddenly realized that I didn’t know any of their last names. My head shook in disbelief the more I thought of it. We’d been travelling together and fighting together—risking our lives together—for several days and I didn’t even know their friggin’ last names.