[Project Nemesis] Jungle Fever

by Celeste Anwar

  “Muñeca, that snake is, what we Colombians call a verrugoso, aka a Bushmaster. That thing will kill you quicker than Armando will smile. It will bite you twice, and within seconds--muerto,” he snapped his fingers, then chucked her under the chin again, “You should be grateful, it had its beady little eyes on you,” he teased her, not offended by her anger.

  He bent and slipped his ragged jeans up and over his semi-hard cock. He grinned at her when she noticed it. “This snake won’t bite you, mi amor. But it will hurt you.”

  She looked quickly away, encountering Armando’s dark eyes on her.

  “For a hunter, you´re mighty squeamish about dead animals,” Armando said suspiciously, he held her close to his left side and Remy held her right arm. Rafael drifted from behind and wandered up front, wherever he perceived there to be a threat, apparently he´d just done her a favor! Remy and Armando dragged her through the jungle since she couldn´t keep pace with them. For every step she took, they could take four--how the hell that was even possible, she didn´t know.

  She gritted her teeth, ducking her head against the brush they dragged her through. “I´ll have you know, I´m a Vegan,” she told them, her voice equal parts snooty and proud. She glared when all three of them, even Armando, the dour one, burst into laughter.

  “Cherie you´re joking! How do you hunt anything?” Remy asked her.

  She narrowed her eyes, disliking the way they made her feel ridiculous. “I trap and then release them. I never hurt them. You three were so busy condemning me for taking this job, and not wanting to go to prison, you never asked me my hunting method!”

  “I think it´s safe to say, muñeca, that we never expected that to be why!” Rafael joked and all three of them grinned at her, each shaking their heads in surprise.

  “How ... how is it that you can shift into cats?” Yvonne asked hesitantly. “If I hadn´t seen it for myself, I would never have believed it.” The jovial mood quickly disintegrated, all three of them looked evasive. Their body language positively screamed it. She knew that she wouldn´t get an honest answer.

  “Your Project leader knows why we can shift ... I wouldn´t say that we had a choice, would you Remy, Rafa?” Armando told her sarcastically.

  “If you knew the shit that goes on in that facility, chérie, you wouldn´t want to work for them. Bastards, the lot of them. Remember that, they´ll screw you before there is even the remotest possibility of you screwing them. Not only will they fuck with your life, they´ll fuck with your body too, nothing is going too far, they´re messing with nature, man. There´s no stopping them now,” Remy snarled.

  “Chill out, man. Don´t start with that freaky shit, you know how you get,” Rafael warned.

  “I´m not a kid, Rafa. I know when to stop. The lady asked a question, I was merely giving her a reply.”

  Silence reigned for a couple of seconds. Yvonne´s panting breaths were loud and broke the silence up. “Can we slow down, please?” she asked wearily, she was bruised, battered and had passed out once already.

  Sure, she´d woken up refreshed, but it was better not to push her luck. The faster she walked, the more energy she´d burn, and she didn´t have that high a reserve in her. What energy she´d had, had been spent on fighting that damned jaguar. Not only that, but she swore it was getting hotter, and she hadn´t had anything to drink for hours now. That couldn´t be good. Either way, she couldn´t handle the speed they wanted her to run.

  Armando looked down at her. “Why are you ill?”

  She breathed heavily, rubbing her forehead with her shoulder. “I’m not yet, but I will be soon if we don´t slow down,” she told him briskly. “Can I sit down for a second?”

  Armando looked at her warily for a second. “We can´t. Not yet. We need to get away from this section of the jungle. There are more cats around here. We need to get nearer to the facility. It´s easier to hide, and we don´t have to protect our territory. More cats have died over here from territorial squabbles than anything else--”

  As if summoned from the depths of hell, two cougars leapt from the underbrush, charging into their midst. The intelligence in their eyes startled her. All her suspicions about the cats she’d tried to capture were confirmed—every single cat unleashed onto the island had unnatural intelligence. They had to all be shape shifters. Why she wasn’t informed of this, she could understand, but it pissed her off that she hadn’t been given fair warning to defend herself. She was trapped on this island with monsters.

  The cats charged the group of men. Almost as one, Armando and Rafael seamlessly shifted into their cat form—two great, black panthers with fierce, golden eyes. Their grimaces of pain lasted only split seconds before fur enveloped their features in a sleek, feline mask. They were breathtaking, huge, muscular beasts that moved in sync with one another, stalking the intruders with the grace of cats, but the intelligence of humans.

  She held her breath, waiting to see what would happen. She couldn’t help but want Armando and Rafael to win. Without a word, Remy shoved her back against a tree, knocking the breath out of her as he shielded her with his big, hard body. She could feel the muscles of his back crushing her breasts. He grunted to feel her struggle against him, holding a hand behind him to keep her from escaping his fleshly cage.

  “Let me go. I ain’t no baby!” she yelled, trying to get away. Odd as it was, she didn’t feel endangered by their attackers, not with the three men seeming willing and able to protect her—or else keep anyone else from getting and using her before they could.

  Dimly, she heard the sounds of the cats warring with one another, though she could see little. Yvonne smacked at his shoulders and arms, trying to move him enough that she could breathe and see the fight.

  He wouldn’t move. She gnawed her lip, thinking. She tried another tactic, sliding her hands around his hips to cup the edges of his groin, rubbing herself against his tight buttocks. He jerked, his cock reacting to her touch.

  “Merde,” he grumbled, jerking her hands away from him. “You shoulda just said you wanted ta see the show.”

  “I thought it was obvious,” she said.

  He moved enough she could look over his shoulder, but by then, she could see the cougars were tired but not looking to retreat.

  They circled each other, testing limits, occasionally swiping and grabbing. Snarling viciously, the cougars tried to make themselves seem bigger and badder than they actually were.

  She felt herself preen when she realized that she had three strong males protecting her. Shaking her head at the thought, she muttered, “What the fuck?” under breath. But she couldn´t help it, their presence was messing with her mind. Most of the time she´d spent with them, she´d felt partially sickened at the thought of them--they were savages, but another part of her was secretly turned on by them.

  To be proud that these three guys who had captured her and were going to use her as ransom, were protecting her as well, was just too weird. Now she knew that they could turn into cats, she could understand why the men had been acting weirdly around her all the time, they were attracted to the pheromone that she was bathed in. All that chest rumbling and shudders had been freaking her out! It wasn´t very flattering to be desired solely because she was covered in chemicals, but it wasn´t important and it meant they were more interested in her scent rather than her body!

  Perhaps it would give her a better opportunity to seduce them or use her wiles to get away—if they were helplessly attracted to her because of the pheromones, she just might have a chance.

  The intensely female part of her didn´t like feeling that one bit, the hunter and soldier was relieved.

  One of the panthers saw an opening and jumped a cougar, ripping his throat out. The suddenness of it surprised her. She gasped, digging her nails into Remy’s shoulders.

  Blood spewed from the golden cat, bathing the greenery with red as it flailed in death throws. Yvonne shuddered in horror, closing her eyes against the scene in front of her, wishing she hadn’t fought so
hard to see what was going on, wishing she could plug her ears against the screams of the dying. Her nosiness had revealed the horror of just what she was up against, just who she was traveling with.

  She heard Rafael hiss at the cougar fighting him, and he must have bitten the smaller animal. A yowl of pain echoed through the jungle and she heard the other cat crash through the brush back to whatever bush it had run out from. She knew that the cougars had not been there to make friends--they´d all been fighting to kill or maim, maybe even take her, but it still made her feel sick when she replayed the scene in her mind.

  She hated violence. That this was a necessity for their lives wasn’t lost on her.

  Taking a steadying breath, she leaned back against the tree trunk, rested her head and tried to delete that gory picture from her mind, but she didn´t think she´d ever be able to manage that.

  Yvonne had always been sensitive where animals were concerned. Her mother had abandoned her as a baby and she´d spent the majority of her childhood in a variety of care and foster homes. She´d been unhappy her entire childhood—she’d been a wild child, but she´d had to be, just to cope. She´d lived with so many families that she hadn´t known whether she was coming or going. In nearly every home she´d lived in, she´d been beaten or mistreated. She was lucky nothing worse had happened to her. She´d met a girl at an orphanage—Louise—who’d been raped by one of her foster parent´s sons. The boy had been arrested and she had been sent back to an orphanage, but it had made Yvonne so angry to hear that poor girl´s tale, especially when a couple of weeks later, she´d tried to kill herself.

  She´d only been fifteen at the time, luckily her suicide attempt hadn´t succeeded, but it had not only scared Yvonne, who had been thirteen at the time, it had pissed her off to the point where her behavior had worsened. She was caught in a vicious circle. By the time she reached David, she´d been fourteen years old and a complete hellion. David and Moira, his wife, had lived on a farm. David had retired at fifty-five, and Moira was a teacher. She´d spent more time with David, since Moira was always working, and at first she hadn´t trusted him--she´d trusted no man since she´d heard Louise´s tale. But slowly, David had broken down her barriers, and they´d become firm friends. He taught her not only how to hunt and track, but how to care for animals too. She´d tended the farm with him, one Christmas they´d gifted her with a puppy, and that dog had been her best friend until the day she´d died ten years later.

  It had damned near broken her heart. It had hurt her much more than her divorce ever had. She´d always had an affinity to animals, had for a long time, and to see one being killed, hurt her, even if it was a monster, a shape-shifter. Worse yet, these weren’t just animals, they were humans trapped in beastly bodies.

  What had she done by coming here? Would they save a special place in hell for her for what she’d done?

  When she´d taken this assignment, she´d tried to put out of her mind what could be happening in the facility. Tried to ignore the fact that they were running tests on animals, but she´d been greedy, too eager to erase the enormous tax debt her ex-husband had saddled her with.

  Yvonne was ashamed of herself. She really was. Her greed and avarice had pushed her into this situation--it was her own fault. Now she’d be lucky if she could get off the island in one piece, unharmed. Hell, she’d settle for just getting out of here alive.

  She could worry about her eternal soul and penance later.

  She watched the two men prowl around the area, sniffing here and there, tracking or searching for more cats. When they were satisfied that they were alone, they shifted back into human form. The scars on Armando mostly covered his arms and legs. The rest of him was golden brown, male beauty. As if sensing her eyes on him, he looked up and caught her gaze. His brown eyes darkened to nearly black.

  She shuddered, relieved when Remy moved away but felt cold all of a sudden.

  Despite her aversion to their violence, she couldn´t help but appreciate the beauty of their

  bodies, but her distaste for the killing and fighting must have shown on her face. Armando stalked over to her, grabbed her by the arm, and pinched her chin between thumb and forefinger. “You think me a monster, chica?” he hissed at her.

  “Yes!” she snarled, unafraid. She leaned into the tree as his eyes narrowed angrily at her. He crowded her with his body, his fury and disgust evident.

  She knew that if she´d been a man, he would have attacked her. She couldn´t help but sigh in relief when he moved out of her personal space. His body was still tense from the fight, parts of him covered in blood, she shouldn´t have answered his question, but she was relieved that they hadn´t noted her attraction for them, and also, the act that she´d witnessed had horrified her.

  But then, that had been Armando in cat form. Sure, the cats had human qualities and vice versa, but that didn´t mean that the form they were in at that moment didn´t take control. A cat under attack would never allow a threat to escape from his grasp, he would kill it and know that he no longer had to fear for his life. Survival of the fittest, the most basic rule of nature, and she couldn´t forget that. Just because the genetically altered cats could use the human part of their brain to their advantage didn´t mean that the cat didn´t rule at all times.

  They were as much animal as they were human.

  The thought should have disgusted her. Instead, she felt pity for them and the monsters they’d become.

  “Chill, hermano,” Rafael warned his cousin, and quickly grabbed him on the shoulder and squeezed.

  “I´m chilled.” Armando shrugged Rafael´s hand from his shoulder, looked coldly at her, then told the group, “We need to get to the water. She´s attracting all the other cats. Let´s get a fucking move on. But know this, muñeca,” he snarled, “I´m no monster, you´re fucking boss is the monster. You think I wanted to be this,” he held out his arms, “well, I didn´t. I never asked for this shit. Remember, who your boss is--at least I´m not in cahoots with one.”

  Chapter Four

  Not a word was spoken as they set off again through the jungle. Armando´s words seemed to reverberate inside her head, condemning her, sentencing her without trial. But was it really without trial? She had told herself many a time to suck it up and get on with the assignment.

  She knew that she had talked herself into this job because of the money. She´d ignored all of her beliefs and principles and allowed herself to conveniently forget them, so how could she judge Armando? She couldn´t.

  He was right, she was working for a monster, a monster that wanted the experiments to go on, when they should have never even started. She had aligned herself to the bad side, and all for money. She was the baddy in all this, no matter her work. As she´d grown up, she stopped her wild child ways, and had always tried to remain on the right side of the law.

  Whatever was going on here had to be against the Geneva Convention. Experimentation on human beings without their consent—this was the stuff of nightmarish science fiction. She was in the wrong here. What really sickened her though was that she was actually working for the law—that’s what she’d been led to believe, and before now, she hadn’t had any reason to doubt the validity of what she’d been told.

  She’d had to believe that here in this jungle, she was acting on her government’s side of the law. The cats in this jungle were, for a better word, AWOL, and she had been hired to bring them back to the fold before the ecological system was destroyed or altered irreparably.

  Her mind was focused completely on her thoughts, so much so, that she didn´t realize that they´d apparently reached their destination. She only looked up when she heard Rafael splashing through a small pool.

  She smiled to herself as she remembered reading somewhere that jaguars love to swim or be in water--the cat in him must be purring in satisfaction. The small pool was fed by a waterfall trickling down jagged, moss-covered rocks. Ferns dimmed the sunlight and waved in a warm breeze, making light dapple across the pool’s surface. It was
extremely rocky, and through the clear water she could see that rocks extended into the pool itself. It was an odd shape, almost oblong, with four rocky quarters to it. Each looked like a rather uncomfortable bath. The waterfall, although small and not very strong, obviously kept the water fresh since there was no smell of stale water. She couldn´t see where the water actually ran on to, but the whole area looked wonderfully refreshing after having sweated, fought, and walked through the whole humid mess that was a jungle.

  Yvonne could practically taste the water, it smelled so fragrant. She looked forward to jumping in, could almost feel the cool freshness of the water. Her skin tingled in reaction, she couldn´t wait to feel that chill on her hot skin. She walked into the pool--she didn´t have to be asked or told!

  She knew that she was only here because of the musky pheromone. For the first time that day, she thanked God that she had been sprayed with the stuff, since it meant that she could cool herself down here in this lovely nook that she would probably never see again.

  She waded in fully clothed, not caring that her clothes would be dripping and soggy by the time she´d finished, she knew that it wouldn´t take long for them to dry in the heat of the jungle, and it was lovely to be able to wash the grime from her clothes as well as herself. The water was chilly but refreshing, a definite contrast to the intense heat outside of the pool.

  She didn´t relish walking back into it. Although the coolness of the water was slightly rejuvenating, she was dead on her feet. She needed to rest, she felt strange, not herself. She couldn´t pinpoint exactly why, but she just felt odd. On edge.

  But that was normal, she was trying to escape these men and return back to her own team. In truth, she just wanted to run home and face her debts some other way. Maybe she could scrounge up enough money to pay a lawyer to help her out. Something.

  She didn´t want to run back to her team, only to be faced with the prospect of having to trap Remy, Rafael, and Armando and return them back to what obviously had been hell for them, and all so that she could pay off her dues and not go to prison.