by Riley Storm
“Why are we stopping?” she asked, looking up from her reverie. “The hospital is over there, across the street.” She pointed off to the left, where the high fence and huge sprawling green space eventually gave way to the brightly-lit building that had been her second home.
“Because now that we have someone with access codes, we can use them to bypass the main entrance,” Lucien said.
“Bypass the main entrance…” Alison was confused. “There’s another entrance?”
“To our facility, yes.” Lucien pointed at a nearby green electric box set on a patch of grass in the middle of the parking lot. “That’s one of them.”
“One of them? How many are there? And I don’t have access to any of these. I never knew they even existed. How did you ever expect me to be of any help?”
They got out of the truck and went around to the rear, opening it up so the others could exit, Chief and Lorik dragging Lede between them. The shifter stared daggers at Lucien as he passed, eyes shriveling up to mere specks as they filled with hatred.
“You’re the head civilian administrator of the entire wing that hides our facility,” Lucien explained patiently. “Your codes have to give you access. Otherwise, it would raise too many questions if you came to a door you couldn’t open.”
That made sense. Sort of. “But how do you prevent me from then going in and realizing that where I am isn’t any part of the hospital itself?”
Lucien grinned. “First of all, the door is nondescript and well out of the way. No reason to ever go to it. Secondly, our personnel would intercept you, find a reason to send you back out of it before you saw anything out of the normal. After all, it’s designed to match the rest of the hospital. You don’t suddenly go through doors into some dark ominous cave where a pack of wolves might have a den,” he teased.
Alison blushed as she realized she’d been imagining exactly that sort of thing. Tunnels hewn directly from rock on the other side of the secret door, etc., not a mere continuation of the muted white walls and florescent lighting of the mental health ward.
“Well that’s boring. What kind of lair is that?”
Lucien smiled, but she realized it was a sad look. “One day, I’ll take you home to Moonshadow Manor,” he said wistfully. “Then you’ll see the beauty of our “lair”. Hopefully.”
She clasped him on the shoulder in a comradely gesture. “I know you will. I believe in you. All of you,” she said, her gaze taking in the rest of them. “You can do this. You will do this.”
They all grinned at her pep talk. Alison matched their looks. This was crazy. If it was found out, she could lose her life. Even if that was spared, she could lose her job, her career.
Yet none of that mattered to her. Well it did, she thought hastily. All of it mattered to her a lot. She liked living, and enjoyed her job immensely.
But the truth was, she’d found something bigger than that. Something she was willing to lay her life down for if it called for it.
She’d found her home.
37
There was a soft click, and with a hiss of compressed air, the entire side of the big green box with warnings about high voltage and electrical current on it lifted into the air, revealing a set of steep stairs that descended down into near darkness.
Lucien’s eyes picked out the bottom perhaps fifteen feet below, the iris pulling in all the light available to generate a grayed-out picture of what awaited them. It was empty. No swarm of shifters came up at them or appeared from nearby to spring the trap. No alarms clanged out.
So far, it seemed, Lede was going to provide what they needed, though Lucien wouldn’t go so far as to classify him as helpful.
“Be careful,” Alison said from down at his side, reaching up to pull him in and kiss him briefly on the cheek. “All of you,” she added to the others. “I’ll keep the truck ready. You just come back out with all your friends and I’ll get you out of here.”
Lucien knew she was happy to have a job, on standby to come down the tunnel if needed, otherwise she would be waiting in the truck, their getaway driver just like she’d been at the transfer station. She was a part of the pack now for real, and Lucien was grateful the others had accepted her as smoothly as they had. It didn’t always go like that with human mates.
“Back soon,” he promised, and then dropped into the hole, using his hands to support and guide his weight as he skipped the steep stairs entirely and slid into a crouch on the smooth concrete below, immediately spinning and looking around for any sort of danger.
It was clear, and he motioned upward to the others to follow him in. Lucien was taking no chances. There hadn’t been any booby-traps during his time as overseer, but there also hadn’t been infra-red sensors in the forest either. Who knew what other changes had been made?
Lana came next, coming to stand at his left while they waited for Chief and Lorik to carefully bring Lede down the stairs. It had taken minimal prodding to get the code for the outer door from him, though that didn’t mean much. Alison had been right there to confirm it was the access code for external doors on the facility.
Once the five of them were all on the tunnel floor, Alison pushed the door closed, and they were plunged into near darkness. The only light he had to guide them as they pressed forward was the dull red of a single ceiling light every twenty feet or so. With their vision it was enough to go by, but a human such as Alison would be hard pressed to find her way without any sort of flashlight.
They moved with cautious haste. Lucien had no idea how much time they had, and he couldn’t use any signals to communicate with Alison either. The concrete was too thick down here to punch through. But Lyken would have returned to the ruined safehouse by now and would have finished his thorough sweep.
He also, hopefully, would have found the thick saferoom in the tiny basement. Lucien had rigged a phone up to play heartbeats, which he hoped would fool his old friend for long enough to keep him away from the hospital while they ducked in, grabbed Logan and the others and made their escape.
If all went to plan, they could be in and out with minimal amounts of fighting.
If.
Neither Lucien nor any of his pack mates actually believed that of course. But if they could reach Logan and the others and free them, then the odds of their escaping would increase exponentially.
About five minutes in, they came to the first door to which they needed access. The smooth metal surface was unmarred, set perfectly into the concrete on either side. To the right was a nine digit keypad, and next to that a black pad sticking out from the wall at an angle Lucien knew was a fingerprint scanner.
Pausing, Lucien glanced over at Chief, who in turn pulled the gag from Lede’s mouth.
“What’s the code?” Chief asked, thrusting his chin in the direction of the door.
“Go to hell,” Lede spat. “I ain’t giving you shit.”
Lucien frowned. He’d more than half expected that sort of bullshit, but it was irritating nonetheless. They were so close to their objective, and all they needed now were the right codes to get them into the facility. There were only three possibilities, and he’d gotten them all from Alison before they left, but if they entered the wrong one, it would trigger an alarm in the command center and lock the door, preventing them from proceeding.
“Well, one thing you are giving us is your fingerprints,” Lucien said with a roll of his eyes. “That’ll at least tell us if they’ve changed your access. In which case this will be the quickest raid in the history of raids.”
With a gesture at Chief and Lorik, the two of them unshackled Lede and forcefully put his palm against the scanner. The pad lit up at the pressure on it and a green bar ran from the top to bottom, paused, and then reversed its course. A moment later, the pad blinked off, and the keypad lit up.
Everyone breathed a sigh of relief at confirmation that Lede was still in the system. It meant they had the drop on Lyken, though they had to move fast to ensure it stayed that way. Which meant
no delays in getting past the various security measures, like this one.
“The code,” Lucien said, stepping forward until he was nice and close to Lede.
“Absolutely not. Go get your bitch and have her enter it.”
Lucien’s balled-up fist broke Lede’s nose for the second time in less than three hours. “Do I need to ask again?”
Lede just spat blood in his direction in answer.
“This is the only fingerprint scanner we need, right?” Chief asked.
Lucien thought about it, then nodded. “Yes. They’re all keyed to the right hand as well,” he added, picking up on what his second in command was thinking.
Chief nodded thoughtfully. “Shall I remove his left hand then? Perhaps that will get him to talking.”
Lede’s eyes went so wide, it was visible even in the darkness. It was understandable. To a shifter, losing a limb was, in some ways, tantamount to a death sentence. A wolf that couldn’t keep up with the pack was no longer a hunter, it was prey.
In the human world that they lived in the reality was different, but the fear remained. It was considered the most horrific of punishments a wolf could suffer, to lose one of their paws. Lucien didn’t want to resort to it, but he would, if it came down to that, or Alison’s safety. He wasn’t about to bring his mate into the midst of the shitstorm that he knew would happen almost as soon as the door was opened.
“You wouldn’t,” Lede said, looking back and forth between the two of them as Lucien appeared to consider the option seriously.
“Give us the code,” Lucien said with a shrug. “Is it really worth it to you?”
Lede hesitated. Then he sneered, his confidence returning as he judged Lucien to be bluffing. “Nice try. Almost had me, I’ll admit, but I know you. You don’t have the stomach for—” Lede’s scream filled the tunnel, bouncing down the walls back the way they’d come as Chief snapped his wrist.
“Code please,” Lucien said calmly, as if he’d planned for that to happen all along. “Or he’ll use your own bone to saw through the skin until he rips your hand from your body.”
“Six-three-five-nine-nine-two,” Lede hissed through clenched teeth, holding his mangled wrist with his other hand.
By now, the pad had gone dark. Chief took Lede’s right hand, and Lucien did his best not to flinch as the left wrist flopped down at an impossible angle without the support, dangling and twisting. Lede whimpered, but he didn’t scream out this time.
The scanner did its job a second time, Lucien punched in the code, and the door opened with a clang of deadbolts retreating into the wall. A pushed of his hand, and it swung open inward, bright white light spilling out into the tunnel as they were welcomed into the facility proper. They were in.
Now the real fun began. Lucien had briefed the trio on the layout of the facility. Everyone knew their job. Lorik and Lana split off at the first hallway they came to, heading down to the right toward the main entry. Once there, they would engage the manual locks, preventing outside access. After that, the only way out would be back the way they had come.
Lucien, Chief and the white-faced Lede continued ahead, the injured shifter holding his wrist to his chest, the pain more than enough to keep him preoccupied so he wouldn’t be running away. They passed offices and sleeping quarters, the vast majority of which went unused. Lucien had never understood why it was built so large, when there generally were no more than half a dozen members of house Canis stationed there at once. The place could easily hold thirty or forty in comfort.
Right now, however, it was empty.
“I don’t like this,” Chief muttered as they moved hurriedly. “It’s too empty.”
Lucien was almost forced to agree. “This is what we wanted,” he reminded the others. “Lyken has taken them all with him. He must have.”
“He wouldn’t leave it completely unstaffed,” Chief countered stubbornly.
“Maybe. We’ll be careful on the way out.”
They reached the banks of holding cells, the one area that saw a lot of use. Often, shifters who caused a little too much trouble in Plymouth Falls were brought here, the shifter version of a drunk tank.
“Up and at ‘em,” Lucien barked as they waltzed in without a fuss.
Around him, the cells came to life as shifters roused themselves from sleep.
“Lucien?” The familiar voice came from one of the cells at the very back.
Jogging over to it, he found himself staring into the eyes of Logan, former Knight of House Canis. They had split him off, putting him in his own cell, without any of the others. Not full isolation, but bad enough. Wolves required a pack, and Lyken had separated Logan from his.
“You’ve overstayed your welcome, my friend,” he joked as Chief worked on Lede for the codes to the cell gates. “So they’re tossing you out. Called me to ensure you left without trashing the place.”
Logan chuckled. They both looked back down the hallway at the sound of a scream. Lede was on the ground, writhing in pain, mumbling something to Chief. The shifter looked up, saw Lucien and shrugged apologetically. Then he typed something into the keypad on the wall, and all the gates swung open at once.
Before Lucien could say anything more, a clatter of footsteps drew his attention. They had company. Moving to put himself between everyone else and the oncomers, Lucien prepared himself for whatever might happen. Were these guards that Lyken had left behind? Or was he finally about to spring a trap?
Moments later, Lorik and Lana appeared around the corner. Lucien breathed a sigh of relief, about to turn back when he caught the look of worry on Lana’s face. Stoic, unflappable Lana.
“What is it?” he snapped.
“Trouble,” Lana said, coming to a halt. “The locking mechanisms were already engaged.”
Lucien’s spine straightened in alarm. “Already engaged? Before you got there?”
They both nodded. “No guards either. This place is empty.”
“Shit.” Lucien spun on one foot and began barking commands.
“Chief, throw him in a cell and lock it. Logan, get your people up, there’s no time to waste, we need to move. Lana, scout ahead, but turn your ass around the second you see, smell or hear anything. Lorik, you’re with me.”
Together, they got the band of shifters up and moving, but it was slow going. Most of them were hurt, malnourished and many were without clothing. Lyken clearly hadn’t given a damn about their health. Where Lucien had hoped to find seven or so healthy shifters to add to his cause, he had perhaps two. Logan, and, to his surprise, Linden.
Lucien hadn’t expected much out of the former guard, given his newly-formed feelings toward the King and his rule, not after being imprisoned for a week and treated like this. But the man’s conviction seemed stronger than ever, and he was in great shape, courtesy of his former post as a guard at Moonshadow Manor.
The quartet led the way, following in Lana’s wake as they ran back down the hallway. There was no need to fear an attack from the side, because with the main door locked from within, the only other way in or out was the side passage they’d come in. So the tip of the spear was pointed that way.
Back in the middle of the huddle of other shifters in various states of readiness, was Chief. He was their ace. If something unexpected happened, he could spring free and hopefully thwart whatever it was before it was too late. It wasn’t much of a plan, but it was all Lucien had.
“This is too easy,” Logan commented as they reached the thick metal door that separated the facility from the tunnel.
Lana was waiting for them there, and she nodded. “I agree. There is no way we managed to surprise Lyken this badly. He’s not an idiot.”
“If he doesn’t realize that Chief knew who Lede was, then he has no reason to believe we would strike at the facility. Lyken knows I would never risk Alison. So we’d have no choice but to come through the main facility. Which is why he shut it behind him and went out this way. I think we caught a break. Now let’s move it.”
>
Lana nodded, looking over the group. “Where is Lede? Do we need to worry about him sounding an alarm?”
Lucien shook his head. “No. The cells were already so warm and cozy-looking, we didn’t want to let it go to waste.”
Chuckling, Lana turned and loped off ahead of the rest of the pack, her head swinging back and forth as she tested the air ahead of her.
Thirty seconds later, Lucien motioned and the rest of them moved forward as well, his spearhead once more leading the way.
They were perhaps halfway up the tunnel when they heard the noises. Even Lucien’s hearing wasn’t good enough to identify what it was.
A second later, there was a tremendous bang and the entire tunnel shook, concrete dust drifting down from the ceiling.
“Lana!” Lorik roared, taking off ahead of the rest of them.
Lucien was right beside him, his own worries unspoken.
Alison!
38
After the group had disappeared into the hidden tunnel and the door closed behind them, Alison had returned to the truck. For the first few minutes, she’d waited, watching the box, impatiently waiting for them to return.
Once her brain reassumed control from her impatience, logic dictated her next steps. Firing up the truck, she moved it farther away from the box, but to a point where she would still have a good view of it and the parking lot around it. There was no point in being right next to it anyway, because it was near the back of the lot. Here, she had the truck aimed almost right at the street exit, and yet through the passenger window she had a perfect view of where Lucien and the others would reemerge.
Lucien.
She was extremely fearful that he was walking into a trap. They all knew it was possible, and yet they were still going to try. It was a wondrous thing, the risks people would take for those they cared about. It was displayed in movies, books, and countless examples in real life. Until a few short days ago though, Alison had never truly understood why.
Now she did.
It was simple, really. There was strength in numbers of course, but it was more than that. A sense of belonging, of community. Having one’s back because they had yours. A bond brought about this way was like that of blood.