by Anya Nowlan
“Shit,” he growled as he came face to face with two guards, a man and a woman, neither one of them looking particularly surprised to see him.
They’d set up a quick perimeter around a room, seeming to be the central area of the floor, with glass walls around a high-tech lab. Two of them were outside while the other two were inside and Thor could bet that the glass was bulletproof.
“I think we fuckin’ found it,” Thor murmured as he checked his gun for good measure, two shots gnawing into the ground inches from his feet. “They’re protectin’ a room. That’s where they’ve been,” he explained quickly, Price nodding.
“We don’t have much time. If there’s only four of them, I bet Prowler managed to cut the lifts’ power supply and reinforcements are taking the stairs.”
Thor exhaled, producing a small canister from his hip. It was the same kind of smoke bomb that he’d let Nia use in the jungles of Borneo and dammit if it didn’t make him think about her immediately.
Focus, he reminded himself, biting down on his lip.
“Now,” he said simply, pulling the pin from it and tossing it around the corner.
Immediately, he heard chatter from The Arctics. It could have just as well been a grenade and the thuds of bodies hitting the floor told Thor that they were expecting as much. He ran into the hallway, rifle up, looking for any movement. Price was right by his side, his rifle up as well. They shot at the same target, the man closest to them, and both hit him in the neck or shoulder.
In any case, the wolf wasn’t going to be getting up.
That mistake would cost them, though. The next shot that went off was not one of theirs and Thor could sense Price stumbling next to him while Thor got a lock on the shooter. He squeezed down on the trigger with the deft accuracy of a trained sniper and his shot was true, hitting the woman right in the middle of the eyes even despite the smoke.
“You alright?” he asked, looking over his shoulder at Price, who was bleeding out of the shoulder.
“Just fucking fine,” the man growled, changing his shooting arm and pushing forward. “There, one of them is getting away!”
Thor whipped around to see the remaining Arctics’ guards pile out of the glass room, one of them clutching a small black pouch to his chest while the other provided covering fire. Thor had to duck down and it was Price who got the guard this time, hitting him in the kneecap. While the man was howling with pain, falling down and still shooting, Thor managed to cap him in the neck, turning the guard into a gagging, sputtering mess.
“Go!” Price screamed, motioning for Thor to go after the last Arctics while Thor was already running full-speed through the corridors and the smoke.
“Lynx Four, in pursuit of target,” Thor growled into his headset, knowing full-well that Price was checking the room behind him in case there was a vial there they could use.
“Lynx One. Be advised, forces moving upstairs. We have to fall back. Count from five!”
Dice’s voice was strained. If he was saying that they had to fall back, that couldn’t mean anything good. But it also meant that Thor had to cover his ears as he counted down from five quickly.
Just when he reached zero, a huge explosion rocked the floor and Thor could see the guard before him stumble back and change direction as the stairwell he was heading for seemed to collapse into itself. Rio must have been busy, managing to arm the stairs before they’d gotten overrun.
Thor grinned to himself, a predatory, dark smirk that promised only the worst for the man he was chasing.
He got off a few shots but the distance was too great, the long, sprawling hallways working in the Arctics’ favor. He was tall and pristinely blond as all the lieutenants seemed to be, one of the ‘pure’ wolves The Arctics so loved to promote. They were also the deadliest fighters the terrorist organization had and Thor could not underestimate the man.
He saw when the man glanced over his shoulder for a moment, reaching a narrow area with four lifts, all of which had the shaft doors flung open and showing nothing but cables.
I’ve got you now, Thor thought, baring his teeth in a sneer.
But the werewolf seemed to realize the same, his eyes turning gold as he seemed to consider his options for a split second and then jumped into the nearest lift shaft.
“No!” Thor screamed, in time with Price’s voice coming over the comms.
“Lynx Six, target unfound. Falling back.”
Thor could sense the pain in his voice. The wound to his shoulder had to be worse than it had looked.
Thor got to the open doors of the shaft, looking down. For one insane moment, he’d expected The Arctics’ agent to have jumped to his death, but instead he had taken hold of the cables and was now skidding down to the bottom of the shaft.
“Fuckin’ hell,” Thor growled, unbuckling and then shrugging off the vest he had used to zipline into the building while grabbing gloves from his pockets and putting them on quickly.
Taking a breath, he jumped into the completely dark lift well, clinging to the steel cables that were already gnawing through his gloves as he almost freefell through twenty-seven floors.
It can only get worse from here.
Twenty-Two
Thor
“Fuckin’ hell,” Thor hissed under his breath as the floors whipped past him.
In at least four of them, he could count more than enough werewolf soldiers to wipe even the memory of his existence off the planet. It was his luck that the speed with which they were travelling down was too fast for the Arctics he was chasing down to stop without having Thor pummel right into him, and also that the elevator itself had been on a higher floor than where they’d started.
It was clean sailing until the bottom floor, right into the parking garage. A count of a second before Thor hit the ground, the Arctics was out, stumbling over his legs a few times.
“He’s here!” the man screamed, his voice echoing back at him in the parking garage, mostly empty as it were.
“Nowhere to fuckin’ run, wolfie!” Thor growled after him, barreling down the empty stretch of concrete as soon as he’d hopped out of the elevator shaft.
His knees hurt like hell from the landing and his hands were on fire from the long trip down, but he was damn sure that the wolf had to be feeling worse. There was a trail of blood dribbling after the Arctics, coming from his hands – he hadn’t had the same luck as Thor to have a pair of gloves handy.
“Lynx Four, chasing target in the parking garage,” Thor heaved into his comm, bringing his rifle up with the other hand and taking aim.
He took a shot but the werewolf managed a sharp left, disappearing between a couple of vehicles just in time. For a moment, Thor lost sight of him, having to skid to a halt. He knew that any second, the man’s companions might show up, and considering by the lack of response from Shifter Squad Nine, Thor didn’t have the same kind of luck.
Suddenly, he heard the sound of a car engine being fired up and his eyes went wide with the realization of what the Arctics was doing. He was trying to drive away and leave Thor in the lurch. When the sleek black Jaguar – no surprise that The Arctics would pick something as pretentious as a vehicle that cost as much as putting two kids through college – barreled out of a parking spot some fifty feet to Thor’s right, he couldn’t help but groan.
Keeping one eye on the Jaguar, Thor ran for the car Shifter Squad Nine had stashed away in the garage. It was a large, lumbering Jeep, but it would have to do. There was no point in trying to take any shots at the Jag, because if Thor knew The Arctics well enough, then he could be certain that the damn thing was armor-plated.
As Thor reached the car, which came to life immediately as he got close by thanks to some modifications Prowler had set up for it, several gunshots scraped against the hood and the driver’s door. He could hear shouts behind him and Thor threw himself into the car, gritting his teeth as a seemingly endless sea of footsteps came toward him.
So I guess they finally fuckin’ found m
e, he thought, switching the Jeep into reverse and then slamming the gas pedal when he was out of the parking spot.
He didn’t bother to put his head down even as the bullets peppered the car. The Firm came just as prepared. But when the Jeep was almost thrown on its side as an explosion went off just next to its front right wheel, moments before he could drive out of the open garage, Thor looked over his shoulder. He murmured choice expletives, seeing one of The Arctics’ agents holding a goddamn bazooka.
It was like they’d taken a class on destruction from Ryker’s and Rio’s textbook.
Putting that out of his mind, Thor burst onto the street, avoiding oncoming traffic by the skin of his teeth. He searched for the familiar cut of the Jaguar, spotting it far down the street, doing at least a hundred miles an hour between the nighttime traffic of Singapore.
“Lynx Four, still in pursuit. Moving away from Salem Pyre,” he said into the comm, going hard and fast after the Jag.
Thor would barely notice it, but behind him, the twenty-sixth floor of Salem Pyre would erupt into flames after a large explosion rocketed it, making it and the buildings around it shake ominously. Someone was unlucky enough to walk into one of Rio’s traps and one could be certain that there would be no one on Shifter Squad Nine who felt even the least bit bad about it.
Thor gained ground on the fleeing Arctic, praying that he caught up fast enough before the man could drive the both of them into an ambush somewhere else. The traffic, though lighter than during the day, was doing plenty to aid Thor in his pursuit, cars veering left and right as they reeled from the Jaguar blazing past them, at the same time accidentally blocking several exits for the car.
All Thor could think about, between trying real hard to not total the car and kill himself in the process as he clung to the steering wheel with white knuckles, was Nia. Her smile played on an endless loop in the back of his mind and the way she had looked when he’d left her in her room was imprinted on his mind.
He’d never really had a death wish – one that he would admit to, anyway – but now more than ever, he felt like he had to get this right. Not only were Nia’s and their unborn child’s lives depending on this, but his own fate as a shifter and a man.
If he failed, he could never look himself in the eye again. This much he was certain of.
Singapore was laid out in a grid that spoke of good planning and fine architecture, but it also hinged on carefully picked exits and entry points to get onto different roads. When The Arctics’ agent missed enough of them, Thor now right behind the Jag, he found himself in a situation where the only place to go was down the bridge leading to Sentosa island, the famed resort island of Singapore, with its one hundred and twenty foot replica of the Merlion, known as the symbol of Singapore.
It was lit up with endless lights, the cable cars leading in and out of Sentosa on several platforms moving quietly between the island and the mainland while getting caught in the shine of the lights of the statue and the hotels.
“I’ll get you now,” Thor growled under his breath, knowing that Sentosa ended up as mostly a dead end.
He was right. Just a second or two ahead of him, the Jaguar screeched to a halt near the Hard Rock Café and the driver jumped out. The man ran right behind the hotel, making a swooping circle around the hotel and on downward toward the entrance to Universal Studios Singapore and one of the closer cable car entry points.
“Shit,” Thor grunted, pushing in through the front doors of the hotel instead to gain some more ground on the man.
Screams erupted around him and Thor was more than certain that there would be a whole army of werewolves after him soon enough. Two men with rifles were damn hard to miss, especially when both of them were over six feet tall and towered over most of the locals.
Thor paid no heed to the screams and confusion he left in his wake, exploding out of the hotel on the other side and sprinting after The Arctics’ agent again. The man was breathing hard, Thor could hear that, but he wasn’t bleeding anymore. During the day, it would have been easy to disappear in the crowds on Sentosa Island, the place usually packed to the gills, but this late in the evening, the streets were mostly empty.
The Arctics ran up a flight of stairs that led up to a viewing platform, doubling as a cable car stop. The cable cars kept moving continuously, the last rides about to head out. Thor caught a glimpse of the man shoving his rifle into the chest of the ticket attendant, screaming at him to let him on one of the cars.
He was given entrance and by the time Thor made it up the stairs, the wolf had already jumped into a cable car and was two cars out, hanging over Sentosa and trailing slowly toward the mainland. When Thor jumped into another cable car, the attendant simply stared at him, clutching his chest, probably counting his lucky stars to still be alive.
With the door closing automatically, Thor found himself in an odd alternative dimension of sorts. He was panting hard, his hands dropped on his knees as he stood in the middle of the cramped car, which was slowing at near glacial speeds. The Singapore cable cars ran several kilometers between various watch points, to and from Sentosa, and the one that Thor and the Arctics were on would reach another hotel on the mainland in… oh, basically half of forever.
How the fuck did we end up here? Thor cursed under his breath, looking around himself.
Singapore was bathed in lights, twinkling in the distance, and slowly falling behind him was the ridiculous opulence of Sentosa. All the hotels were lit up, the island basically consisting of resorts and means of quick and easy amusement, and the giant Merlion statue was constantly changing as the projectors around it sprinkled it with sheaths of different colored light.
Thor took a deep breath, glancing ahead. He could see The Arctics’ agent grinning at him from two cars forward, holding up the bag that Thor was after. There was no doubt in his mind by now that the bag included a sample of LH89 and the man had been told to guard it with his life. Despite all the fumbling, the werewolf had done a damn fine job of it so far.
Shoulda just blown up the whole damn buildin’ when we had the chance, he mused darkly, testing the flimsy cable car’s construction by stalking back and forth once, making the whole thing sway.
Darkness and light consumed the cable car as Thor glared at the amused Arctic, cursing all the while under his breath. If he waited until the end of the long, slow trek, then the wolf would get a head start again and this time, Thor was pretty damn sure that the reinforcements would be far closer for the Arctics than for him.
But what other option did he have?
He leaned forward over the seats, looking at the cables that ran thickly along the route, going over the long stretch of water that separated Sentosa from the rest of the city. The doors were automatically locked, but that had never stopped a warrior before…
“Lynx One, calling for Lynx Four. Respond.”
The static was so heavy in Thor’s ear that he cringed, pawing at the volume knob to turn it down.
“Lynx Four. Where the fuck are you guys?” he growled into the earpiece, continuing his somewhat labored inspection of the cable car.
“Lynx One. That’s the least of your problems.”
Of course it is.
Twenty-Three
Thor
Thor felt like slamming his head against the wall of the cable car as the journey continued slowly towards the bright lights of Singapore. His jaw was clenched, listening to Dice’s explanation.
Apparently his guess that there would be plenty of Arctics waiting for him soon had been true enough. Shifter Squad Nine was tailing a large force that cruised out of Salem Pyre not long after Thor and the Arctics made their exit. Even if the rest of the squad had been in full fighting force, which they weren’t thanks to the plethora of injuries they’d gotten while trying to keep everyone off of Price’s and Thor’s tails, then they wouldn’t be a match for the overwhelming force The Arctics were putting forth.
That really didn’t leave Thor a lot of options.
Taking a deep breath, he flung himself out, grabbing the inside handrail above the door and swinging himself up on the roof of the car. The wind whipped at him, the warmth of the evening licking at his skin as he took a hold of the metal plating that connected the car to the cables.
His rational mind had given up on him at that point, it seemed. Not a word of objection came from the deep recesses of Thor’s mind as he dragged himself up and balanced on the cables, beginning to crawl quickly along them, trying to keep ahead of the smoothly moving cable car. It was the most precarious movement he’d ever made, with his large, thick form making the cables swing even harder than the breeze was.
Slowly, he saw the grin disappear from The Arctics agent’s lips, pure incredulity taking its place. Now Thor had to smirk, both at the fact that he was apparently trying to get himself killed by scaling cables hundreds of feet above the water, and also at the fact that for once, he’d managed to surprise the shifters that they figured had seen every form of insanity in the world.
Stupid is what this is, he thought as he scampered over the car that had been between his and the Arctics’, taking only a split second to rest his legs on the roof before continuing on. He built speed, moving faster. By the time the Arctics’ car was within reach, the werewolf had probably given up on the hope that Thor would simply fall to his death. The man pulled his sidearm and a low growl escaped Thor’s lips.
The first two shots pierced the Plexiglas windows of the car, blowing past Thor far too close. The third one dug into his ribs and made Thor wince and his grip falter. He almost fell, just feet from the car, hanging by one arm before he fixed his hold and moved forward like he was climbing the monkey bars.