by Kym Dillon
Marcus swore quietly, looking around and scanning the underbrush.
"All right," he said, his voice deadly calm. "This is one of those situations where you need to listen to me without question, you understand?"
"Yes," she whispered, her voice coming out more level than she had thought it would. "Yes, I understand."
"Good girl. All right, we're going to start back towards that big rock behind you and to the right. You know the one I'm talking about?"
"Yes."
It was a tall outcropping of rock jutting up into the trees. Covered with moss and vines, it looked as if it had been there for a thousand years. Jessica guessed that it wasn't its age that Marcus cared about so much about as the fact that it was tall and wide. No one could come up behind them if they kept it at their backs.
"All right, let's go. Be careful, but speed is good. Speed is very good right now."
Jessica took a tighter grip on the satchel that held her sampling kit and walked in the direction that he had indicated. It wasn't that far away, just a dozen yards or so, but it felt like a few football fields.
Please, I don't want to die here, she thought. I don't want Marcus to die here either.
They had just made it to the stone when there was an explosion of motion in the jungle ahead of them, and a few large animals, stone gray and cackling like fiends emerged.
"Hyenas..." she choked out, but then there was a roar to her right.
She had thought that Marcus as a man was fast and strong. It was nothing compared to what he was capable of as a panther. He shifted so quickly that she didn't even see the moment in between. One second he was a man, the next he was a panther, and the moment after that, he was launching himself at his foes.
Frantic to do something, anything, to help, Jessica slid her kit next to the rock and picked up a large tree branch. The moment she turned back to the flurry of violence in front of her, however, she knew that she would be of absolutely no use.
There were at least four hyenas circling Marcus, tall and broad animals that were skilled pack hunters. They lunged at him, taking snaps that they pulled back from. They were testing his range, she realized with dread, seeing how far he would stretch out before leaving himself vulnerable to another hunter.
The hyenas would draw things out until their prey was exhausted and making mistakes. Marcus, however, refused to allow them to do so. He let them test him for a moment, and she realized that it was only so he could put a little more distance between the vicious predators and the rock where Jessica was sheltering.
Then, Marcus lashed out like a hurricane, and with a single, powerful blow, he crushed one hyena's head and just as quickly lunged around to swipe long, sharp claws across another's face. They tried to draw back, trying to regroup and strike at him, but Marcus didn’t let them.
As Jessica watched in complete awe of his powers, he refused to back down. Marcus flung himself at his foes over and over again. He dispatched another with a powerful bite to the spine, but as he did so, one of the mangy beasts had circled to his side and bitten down hard on his foreleg.
Marcus's roar of pain filled the forest, and he spun around, clubbing the offender down with sheer force, but the damage had been done. His leg dripped red with blood, and he faced his final opponent, the biggest and smartest, on three legs.
This one, alone now, played a different game. It danced just outside of Marcus's reach, forcing him to extend himself farther and farther over that injured leg. It circled him over and over, and from where she stood clutching her branch tightly, she could see he was wearing out. All it would take was the panther being just a little too slow, just a little too sluggish, and it would be over.
Unless the hyena is distracted...
Jessica knew how hopelessly outclassed she was when it came to animals that were at the top of the food chain. She knew that even the weakest hyenas could likely tear her limb from limb. It didn't matter. If she didn't do something soon, Marcus might..
She couldn't think about it. Instead, she acted.
Jessica strode forward just as the hyena stood between her position and Marcus. Realistically, it was the most dangerous place that she could be standing right then. If the hyena made a lunge for her, there would be absolutely nothing that Marcus could do about it.
Taking a deep breath, she brought the end of the branch sweeping across the hyena's rear legs. The thing was too heavy to be knocked off its feet, but it buckled for a moment before turning on her with a snarl. She could see its enormous dog-like teeth, the anger and fury in its eyes, and then with a roar, Marcus was on top of it. His final killing lunge had none of the elegance or grace that he had had before. This was a desperate animal's last ditch fight for survival, but fortunately, it worked.
The hyena went down with a final shriek, and then silence returned to the clearing. The branch fell from Jessica's numb fingers, and she slid to her knees in exhaustion.
"Marcus?"
The name fell out of her mouth, and the panther looked at her. Marcus's words echoed in her ears, and she wondered who was in control now, man or beast. She wondered if the beast had any compassion for her, if the man had enough strength to protect her if it did not.
Then with a blurring that was hard for her mind to understand, the panther disappeared and there was only a naked man in front of her, crouched on the ground, looking exhausted with a bloody arm.
To Jessica's surprise, he grinned at her, and there was something savagely proud in that grin.
"I told you to stay put," he said, but he couldn't keep the laughter from his voice.
"I decided I knew better," she retorted, and the sound of his laughter bellowed through the clearing.
6
Neither of them could stomach staying in that clearing, next to the dead hyenas, but their mutual exhaustion wouldn't take them that far either. Before Jessica would agree to take another step, however, she insisted on tending to Marcus's arm.
"It's going to be fine," he said. "My kind heal very quickly. In a week or so, it's just going to be an ugly scar that doesn't bother me at all."
"Okay, but right now, it's an open wound that is going to attract all sorts of nastiness. Here, stop being such a hero, and let me tend to it."
For a few minutes, she was so busy washing out the wound and disinfecting it with their decades old first aid kit that she wasn't aware of anything else, until suddenly she realized that she was tending to a patient who was not only sexy as all get out, but very naked. She couldn't stop a blush from rising to her cheeks. She guessed that Marcus could tell what she was thinking, because despite flinching from her touch, he chuckled a little.
"What have you got on your mind?" he asked innocently. "Whatever it is, it looks entertaining."
"Um, it's about the fact that you're naked," she muttered. "Does... does that happen every time?"
"I'm afraid so. Some of the other shifters have forms smaller than their human bodies, and they get off a little better."
"You probably shouldn't be naked going through the jungle," she said, and he nodded.
"I don't have any more tactical gear, more's the shame, but I have an extra pair of pants in my pack. Might even have a shirt, though that's a little less likely."
As it turned out, after she had patched him up as best she could, he dug out a T-shirt, a pair of running shoes, and a pair of ancient jeans. He made a face after he put them on, and she laughed.
"You look like some guy from Brooklyn on your way to get some artisan yogurt or something," she teased, and he sighed.
"Honestly, I’m not exactly sure what artisan yogurt is, but I might try it. Let's get out of here. I'm ready to be away from this mess."
They walked for an hour or so, but after just a few minutes, Jessica could see that Marcus’s injuries were getting the best of him. He appeared to be fading fast. He stumbled more, and his gait had slowed. Before, she had guessed that he was deferring to her, but now she could tell that he was just exhausted.
"All right, executive decision time," she said. "We're stopping here for the night."
He glanced at her with a frown.
"There's still plenty of daylight," he said, and with a feeling of dismay, she could tell he was going to argue with her. If he got his way, he would be marching with an injury, possibly losing more blood and getting weaker all the while, and she refused to think about what that might mean, quick healing or no.
"Well, yes, but there's a stream here," she said pointing. "And some shelter among those rocks. And honestly, I'm really sorry, Marcus, but I'm exhausted. I'm not sure how much farther I can go."
She had a feeling that if he were a little more alert and aware, she never would have gotten away with that tiny fib. Instead, the moment she mentioned that she was tired, Marcus couldn't begin to set up camp soon enough. He wouldn't allow her to prepare the lean-to or set up the mosquito netting, but he at least let her rove the immediate area looking for firewood for the night.
She thought that they would simply prepare their rationed MRE’s. She was startled when she saw Marcus select a long straight branch from a nearby tree. He snapped it off with a casual strength that should have been terrifying, and with a few strokes of an enormous knife, he put a sharp point on it.
"What are you doing?" she asked, and he grinned.
"I thought I would catch us some dinner," he said, and Jessica decided that she had had enough.
"No, you are not," she said, loudly enough that he looked at her in surprise. "You are not doing one more thing tonight that is going to aggravate your arm or prompt more blood loss. You are not going to go throwing a spear into the water and trying to... to wrestle with whatever you pull out of it."
"I'm not?"
"You are not," Jessica said sternly. "Give me the spear."
"Okay, but whoever carries the spear is in charge of getting us dinner," he said, amusement lurking in his bright eyes. At that point, she was well past caring, and she held out her hand for the spear.
The moment he put it in her hands, she could feel how heavy it was, and she started to wonder if she had made a bad decision.
He settled on the bank to watch her, and refusing to be daunted, she marched out to the water where the bright afternoon light would make it easier to see the fish she was supposedly trying to spear. She tucked the ends of her long skirt into her waistband and kicked off her shoes. There were no open cuts on her feet, so she probably wouldn't have to worry about parasites, and taking a deep breath, Jessica stepped into the water.
"Augh!"
The jungle was sweltering, but the stream, likely fed from the meltwater in the mountains to the north, was frigid. She waited, teeth clenched for her skin to get acclimated to the temperature, and the whole time, she could feel Marcus's amused glance at her back.
"Want me to take over?" he called, and she could have snarled at him.
"I don't give up so easily," she retorted.
"Stand with your feet planted, and balance the spear in your hand," he said. "Remember that you are stabbing, not throwing, and that you want to adjust for the fact that the water bends your vision. The fish isn't where it looks like it is."
It was good advice at least, even if her first half-dozen thrusts netted her nothing but splashing water and a glimpse of a frightened fish lunging away.
Her seventh attempt, Jessica overbalanced and ended up in the water herself, and the only thing that made it even marginally acceptable was Marcus's roaring laughter from the bank. He had lost the drawn and stern look he had worn while they were marching through the woods, and she had to assume that his wound was healing after all.
"Yeah, laugh it up," she called, and he shrugged.
"Any time you want me to take over, I will," he said, and she turned back to the water.
Her tenth try netted nothing. Her fifteenth was similar. However, sometime after she lost count, when her body was aching with the strain of holding still and when she was wondering if she could just try to net the fish with her shirt instead, her spear made contact, and suddenly there was a wiggling fish the size of her forearm on the end of her spear.
"Oh my god!" she yelped, because she had honestly not thought this far ahead. It had seemed an unlikely enough procedure that she would land a fish in the first place, and now that it happened, she had no idea how to proceed.
"Scooping motion!" shouted Marcus, standing up from his seat. "Down to get the spear in, and up to toss it on the bank!"
Gulping, she did as he said, half-expecting to see the fish squirm away no matter what she did. Somehow, miraculously, the fish went flying through the air to land half in the water and half on the bank. It might have fallen back into the water, but Marcus was there in a flash, scooping it out with powerful hands.
"Is it good?" she asked anxiously, coming in from the water. "Is it dinner?"
At some point, her stomach had started crying to be fed, and she could feel the pangs claw at her when she wasn't distracted.
"Unfortunately, no," he said with a frown. "This one's toxic to humans."
Jessica could feel her eyes well with tears that she struggled to hold back. For god's sake she would not be a baby about this, there were MREs, and Marcus probably could fish if he had to, and...
"Oh, sweetheart, don't look like that, I was joking! It's fine! It's perfectly fine, I promise!"
For a moment, Jessica could not understand the words that Marcus was saying. Then the meaning set in, and she dropped the spear, launching herself straight for him.
"You bastard! I was doing that to make sure you didn't hurt your damn arm! I was so worried you were going to hurt yourself, and I'm soaking wet, and I'm exhausted and you tell me that it's poisonous?!"
Marcus’s laugh was deep and sonorous, rolling over her like the tone of a golden bell. In the fading light, she could see his eyes glow with pleasure and amusement, and she stepped back. She had to, otherwise she might lean in too far towards that preternatural warmth. Who knew what might happen after that?
“Can... can we get this cooked?”
“We can,” he said softly. To her relief, he didn't question her brief pause.
He was able to scale the fish and gut it while directing her to get the fire started, and soon enough it was spitted over the crackling flames. As the fish cooked over the fire, Jessica flopped down on the ground. It was hard underneath her and if she lay still too long, it would start to bruise her, but right then she was too tired to care.
'It really will be okay,” Marcus said. “I promise you, I'll make sure that you're okay.”
Jessica was too tired to do much more than smile at him, barely turning her head.
“That's not even what I was thinking about. I mean, I am going to be very grateful if you get me out of this, but if for some reason, you can't, you need to get this gear to the village I was going to. They need these samples back in the city. The WHO needs them. If you have to make the call, that's the one to make.”
Marcus frowned at her.
“There is no way that I'm going to value some medical gear over-”
She propped herself up on one elbow, looking at him narrowly.
“That's what's going to have to happen,” she said. “Marcus, promise me. These are important. I am too, but when it comes to furthering the understanding of the disease and how it's working on people... that's the call you need to make. I need to know that's the call that you are going to make.”
“Jessica, please, don't...” To her surprise, Marcus's expression looked disturbed, and he reached out a hand to fold over hers. His touch sent those indescribable tingles through her again. Though it was hard, she drew her hand away. She looked into his eyes, trying to convey how important this was to her, how essential this was to the fate of the people in the region. She needed him to be absolutely clear on what her needs were. Their eyes locked, and he was t
he one who looked away first.
“All right,” he said, his voice barely more than a whisper. “All right.”
He shook his head, turning towards the fish to give it an unnecessary poke with his knife.
“You are one hell of a woman, Jessica,” was all he was willing to say.
When the fish was cooked to Marcus's satisfaction, he deftly pulled it off the spit and cut it in two. There were no plates, but he found two large waxy green leaves to serve them on. Jessica was very nearly brought to tears again when she took her first bite of the fish. The meat was thin and scanty, and she had to carefully eat her way around the pale needle-like bones, but she thought it was perhaps the best fish she had ever eaten.
It wasn't until she had finished her portion that Jessica looked at Marcus guiltily.
“You... need more food than I do, and we split this down the middle...”
Marcus chuckled.
“After that joke about the toxic fish, I've lost all right to make any demands like that. And as I said, my kind heal fast. By tomorrow night, I'll be back in fighting condition. I might not be very elegant about it, but I can get us fed. Not to worry.
Jessica was surprised to feel her eyelids droop as the sun fell below the horizon.
“I don't know why I'm so tired,” she complained, and Marcus laughed again as he banked the fire to last through the night.
“It's being in the bush,” he said. “I have a friend that says that the wilds turn us all into birds, we rise early, we sleep early. You'll probably wake at dawn and feel drowsy again at midday. This is what people did at the dawn of their history.”
“Their history? Do you not think of it as your history?” she asked, and he thought for a moment.
“That's... complicated,” he said. “and not something that I really should talk about.”
“Oh, I'm sorry,” she said, “I didn't...”
“It's all right.”
Marcus felt strong enough to make them a bed, weaving together thin branches to offer them some padding from the increasingly cold ground. He found a way to drape the mosquito netting so it hung around the bower. From her place close to the fire, Jessica thought that there was something lovely about it. It was something that a knight might build for his lady fair, and she smiled a little at that thought.
