Progenitor

by Cassandra Chandler

  “Self-healing?” Brock said. “Really, Vaughn?”

  This wasn’t going to work. Brock had to try something else, and he only had one idea remaining.

  “I didn’t want to do this,” he said.

  He focused his thoughts. The buzzing grew louder as he brought it more into the center of his awareness, gathering energy just as he had with the link between his replicants.

  This had better work.

  The lighting in the room took on an odd blue cast. He didn’t let that distract him.

  Reaching out to the annoying buzz surrounding him, he imagined it as a tangible energy, then tore it open. He let his consciousness pour into the stream, filling it, overpowering it.

  First step, tell Roy to fuck off.

  Brock pushed against the current of energy that had been trying to break into his mind. He let his anger fuel his attack, like he’d done to the replicants after they put Meg in the pit. It amplified the mental energy he sent along the corridor.

  For a moment, he was out in the cave. Dexter swung a blade at him, but he ducked in plenty of time, then lashed out with claws, laughing as they parted Dexter’s flesh. Blood rained down on the stone beneath his feet.

  Another opponent crashed into him, lifting him off the ground. Furred, clawed, and with teeth that were sinking deep into his arm. He let out a howl of pain, then grabbed the smaller werewolf by her neck, twisting until it snapped. Her body went limp and she fell to the ground.

  “Oh shit,” Brock shouted in his mind. “Meg? Meg!”

  He lashed out at Roy, blasting him with every ounce of energy he could.

  “You fucking bastard,” he yelled.

  Roy screamed, grabbing his head and digging his claws into his own scalp. Brock felt a searing wave of agony spear through his gut as someone impaled him through his back. The tip of a blade burst through his belly.

  At first, Brock hoped it was infused with silver. But when Roy dropped to his knees, he grabbed Meg’s limp form and lifted her, pulling her toward the gleaming metal sticking out of him.

  “I won’t die alone.” Roy’s thought dripped with hate and malice.

  Brock had to stop him.

  Another pain—a closer pain—burned across Brock’s neck and torso. His awareness snapped back to the room where his actually body was.

  Tessa had recovered and was still obeying Roy’s command.

  Her teeth were embedded in Brock’s neck, her clawed hand shoved all the way through his abdomen. She shook him with her jaws, tearing more of the flesh on his throat.

  Brock blocked out the pain. Dying and splitting, enduring the pain of his replicants, dealing with his own body—he had years of practice. He had to get to Meg.

  “Tessa.” Brock could still feel the tether of energy connecting her to Roy. The shithead wasn’t dead yet.

  Brock sent energy along that mental corridor, letting his consciousness fully connect with Roy and Tessa’s.

  “Tessa, let me go,” Brock thought. “I’m your brother.”

  “My brother is dead. Everyone is.” Her thoughts were wild, almost incoherent. It was no wonder, with what Brock could pick up from Roy.

  He was sending her revolting images of Tessa killing Brock—and their dad. And…feeding on them. Brock’s own stomach churned from the visions.

  “This isn’t real,” Brock projected. “Roy is feeding you these images.”

  “Roy?”

  “The previous alpha.”

  “Alpha…” Her thoughts began to dull. “We have to obey the alpha.”

  “I am the alpha now.” Brock sent the words with force. He didn’t want to, but he felt her slipping away. Dammit, he didn’t have time for this.

  But that only left him with one option.

  “Brock is weak.” Roy’s voice whispered in Tessa’s mind. “He doesn’t deserve you. You’ve almost killed him. What kind of alpha is that?”

  “Tessa, please don’t make me do this,” Brock thought.

  She had been so messed up by being colonized by Edgar, and now Roy’s mental control. Puppetmasters getting into her head and under her skin. What would she think of Brock if he used his true power to stop her?

  Roy’s presence faded a bit. Either his body was dying or he was retreating. Either way, Brock could sense his fear.

  “Marcus is alpha,” Tessa thought. Her teeth tightened around Brock’s throat.

  If Brock didn’t do something soon, she really would kill him—and it would destroy her. He knew if she ever snapped out of Roy’s control, knowing she’d killed Brock would destroy any sanity she had left.

  Meg needed him. The Blades needed him.

  He had to act.

  “I am alpha.” Brock intensified the connection, shoving her consciousness to the side, like body-slamming her mind. He sent energy along her nerves, willing her limbs and jaws to obey him.

  “How… What are you doing?” Tessa thought.

  “I’m saving us both.”

  He carefully unlatched her teeth from his neck. The less damage he had to heal, the sooner he could get outside and help Meg and the others. Even waiting a few seconds felt like hours.

  When his throat was healed enough that he thought he wasn’t at risk of dying from that trauma, he slowly pulled her arm out of his stomach.

  Tessa’s biological hand rested on his chest. He could feel their bodies breathing in synch, sharing the pain. For Brock, it was nothing. For Tessa… She hadn’t experienced pain like this before.

  “I’m so sorry,” Brock thought. He tried to shield her from the worst of it, but knew his pain had to be passing on to her.

  He felt her fighting against his control. She wanted to jerk her arm back. Honestly, so did he. But his body would heal faster if she didn’t disembowel him.

  Damn, his eyes were freaky while he was doing this. He was used to the golden glow of his right eye from being around werewolves. The crackling, sparking blue light that kept flickering out of his left eye was new, though.

  He pulled her arm out slowly, giving his body a chance to seal itself and heal, keeping his insides in place as his body knitted back together.

  “I didn’t mean to.” Her thoughts were disjointed. He could sense her shying away from the reality of what she had done—and what had been done to her.

  The moment her arm was out, he released his control of her. She fell backwards, retching. Blue light pulsed over her body as her fur retracted and her muscles and bones shifted to her human form.

  Brock shoved himself to his feet, shaking off a wave of disorientation at being back in his own body—and only his own body. In a raspy growl, he said, “We have to go.”

  He ran toward the back hatch, following Meg’s scent as much as memory. The door was hanging open. The smell of blood hit him as he leapt out into the cave. Tessa landed next to him.

  Dexter was on the ground, cradling Meg in his lap. She’d reverted to her human form, but she hadn’t vaporized.

  Silver poisoning takes time to kill a werewolf.

  Brock pushed the thought away. She would be okay. She had to be.

  Dexter looked up at him, his expression somber.

  “Meg…” Brock took a step forward.

  “She’ll be okay,” Dexter said. “Nathan grabbed the blade and broke it off before it could touch her. If we’d been linked, he would have known that I could have pulled it out in time.”

  If Dexter believed that, why did he look like someone had just died?

  “Is Nathan okay?” Brock asked. “And Jon?”

  “Nathan lost some fingers, but they’re already growing back.” Dexter nodded his head to his right, glancing at something behind Brock and Tessa. “He’s keeping them busy. I didn’t think it was safe to try to stop them on my own.”

  The scent of blood thickened. Werewolf blood. Brock could hear flesh ripping, the sickening squelch of flesh hitting the stone ground. He was familiar with the sound.

  “Oh my God.” Tessa was staring over Brock’s shou
lder. She covered her mouth, stumbling toward Dexter and Meg.

  Brock didn’t bother to look. He knew what he’d see.

  The link was still active. Silver poisoning did take a while to kill a werewolf. So did being dismembered.

  Roy was still alive—barely. Brock could sense him. And Jon and Nathan…

  They hadn’t turned out right. But at the moment, Brock couldn’t let himself think about that. Meg needed him.

  He walked over to her, letting the energy of the change wash over him, returning him to his new not-quite-human form, and dropped to his knees beside his mate.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Meg’s neck hurt. Not like the pain she’d felt from her collar. This was new.

  Her bones ached and her muscles throbbed. She tilted her head to the side, wincing as her nerves twanged across her tendons.

  “Ow,” she said.

  “What’s the matter, never had your neck broken before?”

  That smooth voice and snark…

  “Dexter?” she asked, opening her eyes.

  He was smiling at her. Holding her in his arms. She was lying across his lap.

  She tried to sit up, fast, to move away. Instinct and conditioning were hard to fight. But other hands grabbed her and held her in place.

  “Easy.”

  She knew that voice, too. That scent.

  “Brock.” She looked up at him, her chest filling with relief and joy and so many other emotions, she couldn’t begin to name them all.

  He was smiling, too, and Tessa was staring down at Meg from over his shoulder. But Tessa wasn’t smiling. Her lips were pulled in a worried frown, her brow was furrowed, and her eyes were filled with tears that gleamed in the golden light cast from her eyes.

  “Tessa.” Meg smiled and sat up, more slowly this time. “Are you okay?”

  Tessa shook her head, but laughed. “I’m not the one who just had her neck broken.”

  Meg reached up and touched the front of her throat. That’s right, Roy had broken her neck during the fight.

  She looked over at Dexter. “Are you okay?”

  He laughed, lifting his shirt. The skin on his side had already healed. There weren’t even any scars.

  “We hydra are a hardy sort,” he said.

  Porter’s voice sounded from the area of the elevator shaft. “It’s good to know our regeneration is intact, though I’d rather have found out under more controlled circumstances.”

  Meg leaned forward, hoping to see him, but no one was there. It must be coming from a speaker.

  “Did Vaughn get the communications back up?” she asked.

  “Not inside the ship,” Brock said.

  He lifted her to her feet, not stopping till she was pressed against his chest. He wrapped his arms around her, holding her tight.

  For a moment, she let herself rest there. Feeling his strength, his warmth, his love. He kissed the top of her head.

  “I was so scared,” he said.

  Meg smiled. “I wasn’t.”

  He pulled away, looking down at her with a puzzled expression. She only laughed.

  “Alphas don’t get scared.” More quietly, she added, “I knew you’d come for me.”

  Brock laughed, then gave her another hug.

  Jon and Nathan approached. She wasn’t sure what they’d been doing until she noticed the dark red staining their arms up to their elbows. She swallowed hard.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  The blood started to glow. Both men lifted their arms in unison, twisting their hands from front to back and watching as the blue light vaporized every last trace that Roy had ever existed.

  “I can’t believe it,” Meg said. “He’s finally gone.”

  Dexter rose to his feet. “About fucking time.”

  “We’re free.” Meg smiled at Tessa, but Tessa didn’t smile back. In fact, if anything, she looked more upset than ever before. Saner, yes, but more troubled.

  “What’s wrong?” Meg asked.

  “I’ll explain later.” Brock hugged her closer. Tessa glared at him briefly, then quickly looked down at her feet, her shoulders hunched.

  “Porter, get down here with Dad,” Tessa said. “I want Marcus out of his stasis chamber.”

  “We’ll be there shortly,” Porter said.

  She turned and walked toward the ship. Brock followed, pulling Meg along with him.

  “I want to make sure Vaughn’s okay,” Brock said. “You three wait for Porter and Dad, just in case we missed any trolls.”

  Dexter let out an indignant snort. “We didn’t miss any trolls. But don’t worry, we’ll keep Eli safe.”

  Brock paused. He stared at Dexter for a few long moments. Finally, Dexter let out a sigh.

  “Fine.” Dexter smirked. “We’ll keep Dad safe.”

  “There you go.” Brock headed for the ship again.

  When they were inside, Meg said, “Did you get a chance to explain what was going on to Tessa? About the voice and how she can control herself now?”

  “If Brock lets me,” Tessa snapped.

  “You know I had no other choice,” Brock said.

  Tessa wheeled around, snarling at him. “That doesn’t make it any better.”

  “I feel like I’m missing something,” Meg said.

  “It turns out I still have at least some of my hydra abilities,” Brock said. “Only with the pack instead of my replicants.”

  “That’s amazing.” Meg didn’t understand why it was upsetting Tessa so much.

  “See if you still think so the first time he takes over your body and makes you do what he wants,” Tessa said.

  “Dammit,” he yelled. “That’s not fair and you know it.”

  Tessa flinched away from him.

  Meg could only imagine how awful that must have been for her, after everything she’d been through. To have her own brother take over control at that level.

  “How could you have done that?” Meg asked. “She’s your sister.”

  “Yeah, she is,” he said. “And you’re my mate. Roy was about to kill you, from what I saw, and Tessa was in the process of killing me. If I hadn’t stopped her, Roy might have survived. Tessa was barely hanging on to her sanity as it was. Forgive me if I was wrong in thinking that killing her brother would send her over the edge. I know if the circumstances were reversed, it sure as hell would have broken me.”

  “Just forget it,” Tessa said.

  Brock dropped Meg’s hand and took a menacing step forward. “No, I can’t forget it. I feel like absolute shit that I had to do that. I’d also do it again in a heartbeat and expect you to do the same and more to protect our pack. There are too many of us for me to look after myself.”

  “You can’t handle four wolves?” Tessa snorted.

  “Four wolves, ten replicants, and a shit-ton of human Blades, including our Dad,” Brock said.

  Meg needed a way to diffuse the situation. A non-violent way. She waited a beat, just for effect, then said, “And also Vaughn.”

  Both of them turned toward her and she shrugged. “He deserves his own category.”

  “Curator?” Brock said.

  “I was thinking ‘IT guy’.” Meg smiled at him.

  Tessa laughed. A moment later, so did Brock.

  “Who ever heard of a werewolf pack with an IT guy?” Tessa said.

  “Hey, it’s the new millennium.” Brock shrugged. “We need to adapt to changing times.”

  Tessa nodded, still smiling, though it was subdued. Meg would take what she could get.

  During their movie night, Vaughn talked about how effective humor was in helping Marcus in the field and for coping with their bizarre lives in general. Meg was so glad that had worked.

  “Speaking of which, we should go let him know he’s safe now,” Meg said. “I’m not as good at telling jokes.”

  “You did great.” Tessa reached for Meg’s hand and squeezed it. She held on as they walked to the stasis chamber room.

  Tessa went to Marcu
s’s pod while Brock led Meg to another one. It looked empty to her, but she could smell Vaughn’s scent leading toward it.

  “How do we let him know he can come out?” she asked.

  Brock slapped the glass a couple of times, then rested his hand on it. He pressed his face against the glass, peering inside.

  “I think I can see him,” he said. “He’s curled up at the bottom.”

  “Can he hear us?” Meg asked.

  “I don’t think— Uh-oh.”

  “What ‘uh-oh’?” Tessa said, joining them.

  “He saw me and I think he’s freaking out.” Brock pointed at his face. “It’s probably the eyes.”

  “They are really freaky,” Tessa said.

  Meg tried to pull herself up so she could see down through the window. “Give me a boost. I’ll talk to him.”

  Tessa gestured toward the stasis chamber. “He can’t hear you.”

  “He doesn’t have to.” Meg waited for Brock to kneel down in front of her, one leg bent so that she could stand on it and look inside the chamber.

  Vaughn’s arms were braced against the sides of the cylinder. She could see his chest heaving. His eyes were wide.

  She smiled at him. It felt incredibly lame, but she didn’t know what else to do. Then she waved.

  “Wow, why didn’t I think of that?” Tessa said. “Waving—the universal language of, ‘we’re no longer trying to kill you’.”

  “Shut up, Chicken,” Brock said.

  “Shut up yourself, Bock-Bock.”

  Meg laughed and they both glared at her.

  “Sorry,” Meg said. “Sibling rivalry isn’t something I’ve experienced in a pack before.” She glanced at Tessa. “But seriously, don’t poke the alpha.”

  Meg turned her attention back to Vaughn. She pressed her hand against the glass, this time making the Scifi “V”-shaped salute Vaughn had taught her. He did a little double-take.

  Now that she had his attention, she started trying to sign. The angle was awkward, as was trying to balance on Brock’s leg.

  “You’re safe,” she signed. “Everyone’s safe.”

  He didn’t look convinced. He signed back, “What the fuck with those eyes?”

  Meg laughed.

  “What’s funny?” Tessa asked. “Is he making jokes? Because if he’s making jokes, I’ll stop freaking out.”