Dragon Warrior

by Shéa MacLeod

  She removed her feet from his bed and let the front chair legs drop back to the floor with a thunk. Her movements were relaxed, unhurried as she stood to her feet. Her cool fingers trailed lightly across his forehead. The contact sent unexpected shivers through his body.

  “No fever. Good.” She smiled and he watched in fascination as a dimple appeared at the side of her mouth.

  She had a lovely face with strong, high cheekbones and a gently sloping jaw line. He couldn’t quite tell, but he was pretty sure her eyes were blue. Blue like cornflowers in summer.

  Damn. Where had that thought come from? He was a Warrior. He didn’t think about women, let alone compare their eyes to flowers. And what was a cornflower, anyway?

  “Hungry?” Her voice was silk, sliding across his senses.

  He felt a stirring below his waist. Shit! What was happening to him? The Marines might indulge their sexual desires from time to time, but Warriors had no such desires. They were not aroused by the skim of soft fingers over their skin, or the huskiness of a voice in their ear.

  He cleared his throat and his voice was a little hoarse when he spoke. “I could eat.” The thought struck him that he was hungry for more than food. He shoved it aside quickly. That was not the thought of a Warrior. He needed to pay Barnes a visit. Something was seriously wrong with his conditioning.

  “Good.” The dimple flashed again, wreaking havoc with his self-control. “I’ll bring something. I’m afraid it won’t be very interesting. Clara insists on a liquid diet for the next day or two. Don’t want you puking all over the place.”

  He had no answer to that so instead he watched as she strode out of the room. Even in the dim light he could tell she had an amazing ass.

  “What the fuck is wrong with you?” He muttered to himself. He tried to remember the last time he’d even noticed a member of the opposite sex, let alone been interested in one. He tried to pull up a memory, but his mind skittered away. It had been before he’d become a Warrior. Some of his conditioning was holding then. Barnes would be pleased about that. He wouldn’t have to start from scratch.

  Another woman entered the room. This one was middle aged and a little on the plump side, which was unusual in the wastelands. She wore glasses perched on her nose and a sour expression on her face. “So you’re awake. Fine by me. Sooner I get you out of here, the better.”

  If this was their doctor, she needed to work on her bedside manner. Still, he was used to Barnes and his cronies. He was fairly certain they were all half-crazy. He could handle one snippy medic.

  She went about the business of checking his wounds and shining a light in his eyes and he went about the business of ignoring her. At least until she started asking questions.

  “What year is it?”

  “25 ADW.” That’s what they called it. Twenty-five years After the Dragon Wars.

  “Know where you are?”

  “Not specifically. Last time I knew I was in the desert fighting a dragon.”

  “Huh.” She pulled his eyelid up and peered at his eyeball like he might suddenly sprout tentacles or something. “Rank?”

  “Dragon Warrior.”

  She snorted at that. “Name?”

  He said nothing. She looked concerned for the first time. “You don’t remember?”

  He shrugged. “Might have had one. Before I became a Warrior.”

  “Might have had one?”

  “There isn’t enough room in the human mind for both memory and enhancement,” he parroted Dr. Barnes and hated every minute of it. The man was an ass. “Therefore, the unimportant must go.”

  “In other words, they chopped out your memory,” she said dryly.

  “Something like that, yes.”

  “They don’t give you names?” She didn’t seem particularly interested. More like she was killing time, so he didn’t bother answering. The truth was, no. They didn’t give Dragon Warriors names. They were built to fight and die. They were human machines. They didn’t need names. He didn’t need a name.

  “You’re progressing nicely. Should be out of my ward in a day or two. Soon as we get you on solid food. Rain should be back soon with something for you to eat.” She turned on her heel and stomped back toward the other room.

  Rain. So the young woman’s name was Rain. He wanted to say it, to see how it felt on his tongue. The expression on her face when he spoke it. Another strange thought for a Warrior.

  Scenes flashed through his mind. Odd disjointed snippets that made no sense. A headache throbbed behind his eyes. Memories. He was experiencing memories. Memories he shouldn’t have. He started at the ceiling, willing his mind back under control.

  Unfortunately, it didn’t stay under control very long. Rain returned, swinging into his room, a thermos in one hand and a mug in the other. He watched her, the gentle sway of her hips as she walked, the movement of her hair, which he realized was a rich, dark blond. Like pulled taffy.

  A memory tugged. The tang of salt air, the cry of gulls, his small hand wrapped inside a warmer, bigger one ... His mind skittered away again.

  The memories were trying to seep through. The memories of Before. Barnes had warned him of this. That the minute such a thing happened he should seek help immediately. Returning memories were the first sign of catastrophic mental meltdown.

  But there was no Barnes. Barnes was who knew how many miles away. He tried not to panic. Maybe he could still get back to the base in time.

  “Brought you some soup.” She plopped into the chair next to him and leaned forward, a tiny hint of creamy white cleavage visible above the V-neck of her top.

  Again, he noticed her scent. Not as a predator scents its prey, but as a man scents a woman. That tease against the senses, so faint yet so strong. He struggled to keep his arousal under control.

  “Here.” She splashed some soup from the thermos into the mug. “It isn’t much, but it should taste okay, and it’s got plenty of good stuff in it. Vitamins and whatever. They used some of the fresh tomatoes from Padre Pedro’s garden. I figured the mug would be easier for you than a spoon and bowl.” She handed him the warm mug, her delicate fingers brushing lightly against his, sending another shiver down his spine.

  He wrapped both hands around the mug, desperate for her not to notice they were trembling. Definitely meltdown. He was sure of it. He had to get out of here and back to base so Barnes could fix him. Before it was too late.

  Chapter 13

  THERE WAS SOMETHING odd about Micah Caine. Rain hadn’t missed the faint tremor in his hands as he took the mug from her. She couldn’t blame him. If what Clara said was true, he didn’t remember much of anything.

  Rain was quiet for a while, letting him drink his soup in peace. Letting him get used to her presence. She wondered if he was as aware of her as she was of him. The scent of him, that slight musk of man, teased her nose. It wasn’t at all unpleasant.

  “So, you don’t remember who you are.”

  “I’m a Warrior.” He said it with finality as if that were the only thing worth knowing. “One of a handful of those chosen.” There was pride in his voice.

  So, there were definitely more Warriors out there. Good to know.

  “Yeah, you’re a Dragon Warrior all right. But you’re more than that.” She took a photograph out of her pocket. The same photo she’d spent countless nights mooning over. The photo of a man who should be dead.

  She laid the photo in front of him. “You are Lieutenant Micah Caine. United States Army. You’re a hero.”

  She watched his eyes flick over the photo, not an ounce of recognition in his face. “Not possible. This picture is decades old. If I were Caine, I’d be an old man now. Or dead. Obviously, I’m neither.”

  “True,” she agreed. She handed him a small mirror and watched as his eyes widened, darting from the photo to the mirror and back.

  He swallowed hard. “Perhaps...” He cleared his throat. “Perhaps he is a relative. My father or uncle.” His earliest memories were of training t
o be a Warrior. He had no memory of family, so anything was possible.

  Rain nodded. “That could be, yes. Except for one thing.”

  His eyes flew to her face. “What’s that?”

  She took the mirror from him. Then she tugged the sheet away from his body, exposing one long length of leg. Using the mirror, she showed him the scar on his hip.

  “Do you know when you got it? Where?”

  “Of course I do. I...” He stuttered to a halt.

  “You don’t remember, do you? You can’t hold on to the memory. Every time you try to grab it, it slips away.”

  “How do you know?”

  She smiled at that. “It’s written all over your face.”

  She had him there. “It must have happened before...”

  “Before you became a Dragon Warrior,” she finished for him.

  He nodded. “Why is it important?”

  “Because Micah Caine had a scar in the same place. And not just any scar. An identical scar. He got it in Afghanistan when a bomb exploded.”

  THE BOMB EXPLODED INCHES from the front of the Humvee, sending the vehicle tumbling end-over-end. Fire. Heat. The cries of the wounded.

  Caine stumbled from the wreckage, his vision obscured by smoke. Jamison lay sprawled half under the burning ruin of the truck. Caine couldn’t tell if he was breathing, but he grabbed the man by his bulletproof vest and pulled anyway, hauling him from the fire to safety.

  “Caine, you’re bleeding man.”

  Caine glanced up to see Rayner’s fuzzy outline. “What?”

  “We’ve got to stop it before you bleed out.” The medic knelt beside him, oblivious to his own injuries.

  Caine glanced down. His leg was covered in blood from the hip down. Damn, that was a lot of blood. He tried to tell Rayner to forget him and do something about Jamison, but his voice didn’t seem to work.

  He watched in a daze as Rayner slit Caine’s pant leg with a knife. Beneath the fabric, the cut was so deep he could see white bone shining beneath, blood pouring down his leg in a river.

  Rayner said something but Caine didn’t hear. Instead he slid into welcome darkness.

  “MICAH! MICAH!” TERRIFIED, Rain gave his face another slap, trying to rouse him from whatever fugue state he’d slipped into.

  “What is it?” Clara stormed into the room, fury written in every line of her body. “What have you done to him?”

  “Nothing. We were talking and then he just ... passed out.”

  There was more to it than that. They’d been talking about his past. His identity. She’d mentioned Afghanistan and she could tell he’d been on the verge of remembering. And then it was like someone or something shut him down.

  Clara sighed, rolled her eyes, and grabbed a small bottle from a nearby shelf. She uncorked it and waved it under Caine’s nose. His eyes fluttered open.

  Rain ignored Clara’s mutterings as the woman stomped back to her office. “Hey, you all right?” she asked Caine.

  “What happened?”

  “You, uh, well, you sort of passed out.”

  “Passed out? As in fainted?” His voice was filled with outrage.

  “More like something shut you down.”

  “I was remembering.”

  “Yeah.” She barely resisted the urge to smooth her hand through his closely shaved blue-black hair. Damn, what was wrong with her?

  He nodded as if it made sense. “It’s supposed to be a safeguard to prevent memories from Before.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “There’s a scientist named Barnes back at the base.”

  “We’ve met,” she said dryly.

  “He claims that the alterations to create a Warrior don’t leave room for memories. The memories are ... removed. And safeguards put in place in case they attempt to resurface.”

  “Safeguards that make you pass out?”

  He nodded. “Yes. We are told that to remember is to risk catastrophic meltdown and death.”

  Rain studied the man on the bed. There was definitely something different about him now. Something that had been missing in the Warrior was suddenly alive. “It didn’t work, did it?”

  “No. It did not.” His jaw worked, fury tightening his features. “They lied.”

  “What do you remember? Do you remember who you are?”

  “I remember a great many things. And yes, I remember who I am. I am Lieutenant Micah Caine of the US Army. And I’m supposed to be dead.”

  MICAH WASN’T THRILLED about spending more time in bed, but Rain had gone off to talk to the leader of the compound and Clara had insisted he rest. Especially after that embarrassing episode when he blacked out. Lieutenants in the United States Army did not faint.

  Neither did Dragon Warriors.

  He ground his teeth together, barely leashing the fury that threatened to engulf him. He’d told Rain he remembered Before. Which was true. Sort of. Things were coming back, but they were still in fragments.

  He winced as the scene from Afghanistan flashed through his mind again. Definitely something he wouldn’t have minded forgetting permanently. Just like he’d love to forget his own death scene.

  He remembered hustling a small group of survivors to the derelict Army bunker. He remembered the drag attack like it was yesterday. He remembered everyone dying. Everyone except Audrey and Foster. The three of them kept going. Kept shooting.

  He remembered the grenade going down the dragon’s throat. An explosion. Then nothing.

  He sighed and rubbed a hand over his hair. He shifted and winced as his cracked ribs protested. At least the headaches that accompanied the memories had stopped.

  He closed his eyes as another memory surfaced.

  Darkness.

  Blinding light.

  A wizened face swam into view. A halo of gray hair, thick glasses, lab coat. Was he in a hospital? It sure felt like he should be. The pain was overwhelming.

  “Hello, Lieutenant Caine. Welcome to my laboratory. I’m Dr. Barnes.”

  Micah tried to speak, but nothing happened. He frowned.

  “Oh, I’m sorry, but you’ve been badly damaged. Don’t worry. I’m going to fix you right up. Good as new. Better than new, actually.” Barnes cackled. “And don’t worry about the psychological trauma. You won’t remember a thing.”

  And he hadn’t. Until now.

  “YOU’RE TELLING ME WE’VE got Micah Caine in our medical ward?” Elan’s voice sounded steady enough, but Rain could smell the reek of alcohol on him.

  “That’s exactly what I’m saying,” Rain said. “They did something to him. Something to make him forget the time before he became a Dragon Warrior. But he remembers now. He remembers the time before the Dragon Wars. He remembers the day the Wars started. He even remembers dying.”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake.” El propped his head in his hands as though it ached too much to stay up on its own. Probably it did.

  “El, we should ask him to stay. Now he remembers who he was, who he is, he’s our best chance of keeping the compound safe from the drags.” Not to mention the Marines.

  Elan squinted at Padre Pedro. “You agree with this harebrained scheme of hers?”

  “Yes, Elan, it just so happens I do. Not only is Micah Caine a trained soldier, but he’s a formidable Warrior enhanced by whatever the scientists did to him. He would be a great asset.”

  El’s bloodshot eyes swung back to Rain. “Thought you said they were all brainwashed, those Marines.”

  She shrugged. “They are. But the concussion must have damaged the conditioning. He can remember now and he is pissed as hell at what the Marines have become. At what Barnes did to him and others like him. I think we can persuade him to join us. In fact, I don’t think it will take much convincing.”

  “And if the Marines come for him?” Elan heaved himself off his chair and headed over to the side cupboard to grab another bottle of home brew.

  “Why would they? They think he’s dead. Killed with the rest of his platoon figh
ting the drags.” Rain exchanged a glance with Padre Pedro as El took a deep pull at the bottle. She saw the saw the sadness in the Padre’s eyes and knew it echoed her own. El was on a downhill spiral she was afraid none of them could stop.

  “Fine. Whatever. Do what you want, just leave me in peace.”

  In the hallway outside Elan’s room, Padre Pedro let out a deep sigh. “So troubled, that one. I am at a loss. Nothing I say or do seems to matter anymore.”

  “He’ll straighten out when he’s good and ready. Not before. Nothing we can do about that.” But her heart hurt. Elan was all she had left of Sutter. They were so much alike. Had been so much alike. “I’m going to talk to Micah. The lieutenant.”

  Padre Pedro gave her a look that told her he knew exactly how she felt about Micah Caine. “Be careful, Rain. You don’t know what was done to him. He is not the man you’ve read about. Not anymore.”

  “You don’t know that.” She was convinced that man still lived inside the Dragon Warrior. He was alive and he had his memories back. There was hope.

  Rain strode down the hall to the ward. She arrived in time to see Micah attempting to get dressed, which was amusing to watch since he had one arm in a sling and a thick swath of bandages around his ribs.

  “Need help?”

  He glanced up. She couldn’t quite tell in the dim light, but it looked like he was blushing.

  “Yeah, thanks.”

  She helped him get his shirt over his head and his arms into the arm holes without jostling his injured arm too much. It was her turn to try not to blush as every motion brought her into contact with his warm, bare skin. Every touch sent a little electric zing through her body, until she felt flushed and breathless.

  “So, um, we were wondering. That is, Padre Pedro and I were wondering ... You can’t return to the Marines. God knows what they’d do to you and now that you remember the way things were and you know what they’re like...” She trailed off, nervous. “Well, we were wondering if you’d like to, you know, join us. The compound, I mean.” Rain wanted to smack herself in the head. She sounded like an idiot.