The Dark M’attr Machine rose in the distance. They were almost there.
Charlie was going to miss this world. He’d have to visit Las Vegas when he got home. Home was going to be weird.
He stared at the streets as an explosion rang out around the corner. Two dark figures careened around it racing towards the garbage incinerators.
“Gunk!” Charlie yelled. “Stop!”
Zeke and Tallahassee, blackened and bleeding, were running towards them, three ProtectoBots on their tails.
The garbage incinerator slid to a halt as Gunk dropped the gangway and Charlie ran down to haul the injured rebels in. “Shut it!” he screamed at Gunk and the gangway came up, closing just fast enough to stop the bots from getting at them.
Gunk slammed the garbage vehicle into overdrive and they careened around a corner and away from the bots.
“You’re alive!” Charlie had never been so relieved in his life.
“No bot’s going to get us,” Zeke laughed.
“What’s going on?” Charlie asked as he dropped down next to Zeke.
“The honchos must have figured out we stopped their hybrid onslaught. They’ve turned the bots on everyone,” Zeke said.
Tallahassee groaned, holding his side in agony. “Gunk, you gotta get us out of the city.”
Charlie stared out at the DarkM’attr machine quadrant that was right in front of them. This was his moment. He was finally going home. To his sister, his nephew, to no crazy robots or confusing foods.
Gunk looked over his shoulder at Charlie.
“Get us out of here,” Charlie nodded. There was no way he was going to risk everyone’s lives just so he could get home. He’d rather everyone was alive here, than he was alive there and they were all dead.
Gunk nodded and spun the machine towards the nearest exit.
Then suddenly, a gut-wrenching blast rocked the earth, and before Charlie’s nearly blinded eyes, the warehouse that held the DarkM’attr machine exploded in a burst of fragmented white light. Charlie shielded his eyes as bits of the machine sailed through the air, littering the sky with all hope he had ever had of returning to his own time.
Monfils pulled the BSA up in Trenchtown. He’d followed the raging Deltas on the comm system and discovered too late that Jade had left the rebels and was back in Crowley. He’d watched the DarkM’attr Machine blow up in the distance as he’d landed outside the house that used to be hers.
Jade stood there, head bowed, staring at the blackened foundations.
“How could this happen?” she murmured.
Monfils placed his hands on her shoulders. They’d been lovers once and it was all he could to not embrace her and kiss away the tears he knew were buried deep within her. But she’d ended it before and never given him any indication she wanted to rekindle their romantic relationship. Monfils always missed her, but he didn’t pressure her.
It’s not like she ever dated anyone else. It was just a matter of time before she came back to him.
“I should have moved them when I saw what was happening,” Monfils murmured.
“Yes, you should have.” Jade yanked herself away from Monfils, even though she knew she was being unfair. It’s just, the rage driving inside her wasn’t the Delta coding anger she’d felt before. The blind turmoil that had clouded her judgement. Now her judgement was crystal clear and stone cold.
Without looking back at Monfils, she walked away down the darkened, deserted streets of Trenchtown.
Chapter 39
Charlie stepped out of the garbage incinerator in Holbrook. A crowd of Lowsmiths stood dark and dusty, watching them come out. Zeke helped Tallahassee, who was limping. They stood with Gunk at the top of the gangway, Angelo shadowing them from behind.
Applause started at the back of the crowd and slowly moved its way forward. The Delta hybrids had been stopped. They may not have turned into bright and shining Lowsmith lovers, and they might still like their elite lifestyle in the city, but at least they would never be controlled by Warren or Blake or anyone anymore. They would always have their own thoughts and feelings.
Charlie’s heart was dragging into his shoes. The DarkM’attr machine was destroyed. Jade was gone, back to her life in the city. He was never getting Jade. And he was never getting home. The thought wasn’t completely devastating, but it made him lonely and homesick and… wispy. Very, very wispy. Like a dry desert wind would blow right through him and carry him away.
Tallahassee, Zeke and Gunk raised their arms to the applause, but Charlie couldn’t do it. He didn’t want recognition for doing the right thing. He didn’t want any of it.
Apparently, neither did Zeke. “Hey, you want to go get a drink?” Zeke hissed at Charlie.
Charlie was surprised, not only by the invitation- where the hell did someone get a drink around here? But also, because he found he most certainly did want to do just that. “Uh, why yes I do,” he nodded to Zeke.
“Come on, there’s an Outliers’ village just over the ridge there.” Zeke motioned to a red dirt pile in the distance.
“Really? We can just go?” Charlie asked.
“Sure. Come on, I got a little four-seater we can take.” He nodded Gunk and Tallahassee away from the crowd and they slipped to the side, letting the crowd get lost in itself.
The four-seater looked a lot like a golf cart covered in dirt. It was only floating a little bit above the ground.
“Jump on,” Zeke launched himself into the driver’s seat.
“I can’t ride backwards.” Charlie shook his head.
Gunk and Tallahassee took the rear-facing seats. Angelo turned on his hover ops and took to the air next to them.
“Cool.” Zeke nodded, admiring the bot’s ability to fly. “Don’t let Maverick see you do that. He’ll dissect that out of you for sure.”
Before long, the four of them were zipping along in the evening. The sun was setting over the red horizon. The wind lifted Charlie’s hair and he thought it was really quite an amazing feeling. It was a miracle he was here and this was America, but it wasn’t America, it was such a different place. Something he never even dreamed of. And he was cruising along in this open vehicle, whatever it was, feeling a certain amount of camaraderie with his new friends.
Friends.
Charlie had friends. Sort of.
For all the nights he sat in the Lonely Tree Tavern, he’d never sat with anyone. He always sat alone. And now he was getting a ride with people he’d been through something with. They had survived and they had each other’s backs. These were good people and he was good people and they were hanging out together.
As the small floater slid over the crest, Charlie was amazed to see the ramshackle town in front of them. There was metal and a few other interesting things around, but in general the Outliers’ village didn’t look much different from the small villages dotting the 21st century American landscape. There was only one street here and everything was on it.
Zeke pulled the floater up in front of a dimly lit doorway. He jumped out and was in the building before Charlie had even gotten off the vehicle. He was too busy looking around at how much things had changed in some parts of the world and stayed the same in others. This was clearly a watering hole. He would have known that even if he hadn’t been taken there for a drink. Small, single-story brick building, small metal door… The building wouldn’t be out of place in the 21st century When he pushed open the door, he found himself grinning. Dirty corners, crooked frames. This place looked a hell of a lot like the Lonely Tree Tavern. He knew it wasn’t, but it looked and felt a lot like it. He realized he probably shouldn’t have been surprised. Buildings in England stuck around for five, six, seven hundred years. Just because three hundred have passed doesn’t mean everything is just wiped off the face of the earth.
His friends sat at a table in the corner, already waving the cute bartender over. Definitely not Dan the Man, this was a curvy, busty young woman. However, from the look in her eye and the blade on her hip
, Charlie thought she might give Jade a run for her money.
“I ordered you a beer,” Zeke said as Charlie sat down.
“You guys still drink beer?” he asked.
Tallahassee and Zeke exchanged a look. “What did you think we were drinking?” Tallahassee asked.
“I don’t know, freaking something distilled from something. But I guess beer’s been around six thousand years, no reason why it would disappear in three hundred. And I am damn happy about that.” He grinned as the woman came back and placed four beers on the table.
He took a sip of the beer. “Amstel Light!” he grinned, suddenly at ease. “Amazing.” Maybe things weren’t going to be so different here in the future.
The door to the tavern opened, shedding light inside the dim recesses. Tallahassee grinned as he lowered his glass, his eyes going over Charlie’s shoulder. “That’s one hell of a hybrid friend you got there,” he said.
“She’s pretty amazing.” Charlie stared down at his beer. “I hope she’s okay.”
“Well, she looks okay to me,” Zeke said.
“What?” Charlie asked, looking over his shoulder.
Through the light of the open door a silhouette walked straight towards them. The way her hips moved, the way her hair fell, and the shape of the DC15s pistol in its holster…the silhouette could only be one person.
“Jade!” Charlie sprang to his feet, grabbing her hands in a kind of awkward trembling greeting. He dropped her fingers like she was on fire and motioned to the table.
“Grab a beer, come over. I mean sit down, I’ll grab you a beer,” he corrected himself. He looked up at the red hulking bot. “Angelo, you want anything?” He asked, giddy with delight.
“No, I am quite all right, thank you.”
Angelo stared down at the flimsy chairs encircling the leaning wooden table. “I think I’ll just stand over here by the wall,” he decided.
“Your parents?” Charlie had to ask even though he wasn’t sure he wanted to know the answer.
Jade looked Charlie in the eye. “There was nothing I could do.”
Charlie nodded solemnly. It was exactly what he expected, but he knew it had to be tearing her apart. “I’m really sorry, Jade.”
The barmaid arrived with Jade’s beer.
“You know,” she said after taking a sip, “their whole lives, they told me they wanted to do one thing; die together.” Her voice choked a little bit at the words. “They got to do that. And they didn’t want me to feel obligated to keep them alive. And now…now I don’t have to do that. I’m truly free. Nobody can get in my head, nobody can control me, I have nothing I need to think about. Except what I want to do now.”
Charlie looked awkwardly at his hands. “How did you find us?”
“I asked around,” Jade said. “You know the DarkM’attr machine is destroyed?”
Charlie nodded. “Yeah, yeah, I saw that explosion right before we escaped. But somehow, the pain of the DarkM’attr machine being destroyed doesn’t feel quite so bad anymore. I don’t feel quite so hopeless.”
He looked around at his smiling friends, the bot fiddling with his knife, then he looked at Jade, and he raised a glass. “To the Allegiance,” he said, the corners of his mouth lifting just enough as he looked into Jade’s deep brown eye.
“To the Allegiance. To HOPE.” The others agreed, raising their glasses.
About the Authors
MELLE AMADE is a bestselling science fiction and fantasy author whose debut YA urban fantasy Shifter Chronicles series launched in 2016. Her books weave a tapestry of hidden worlds, ancient power, deep passions, international locations, and heroines who dare to risk their lives and sometimes… even their hearts. Melle lives with her family in Los Angeles, California where she can snowboard on the mountain and swim in the ocean all in one day.
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MICHAEL TROZZO is a feature film writer/director, and avid science fiction fan. His film, Falling Away, was shown internationally on major cable networks. His award-winning, end of the world romantic comedy screenplay, The Beautiful Things, has recently been adapted into a novel slated to be released in early 2018. He is drawn to stories that blend moments of humor with emotional connection, and likes to find that in life as well. When he's not writing, he can be found hanging with his wife, young daughter, or watching tennis in the hot desert.
Bound to the Alphas
Lily Thorn
Copyright © 2017 Lily Thorn
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All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without the expressed written consent of the author.
All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons (or shifters), living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Bound to the Alpha
No name. No memory. Nowhere left to run…
She awakes in a forest, dressed only in a traveling cloak and with no memory of who she is or why she’s run her feet bloody. Worse, she seems to have woken up in shifter territory, under the noses of two huge wolves. One shifter is fierce and cold, the other warm and comforting. But her enemy is after her, getting closer every day. And he has nothing to fear from shifters…
Chapter 1
There was nothing but the sound of her ragged breath in her ears, the pounding of her bare feet against the earth. Her lungs ached, her legs burned, but she couldn’t stop. Not now. Not ever.
The stitch in her side flared. Crying out, she stumbled and fell. Ignoring her scraped hands, she rose, gulping in deep, shuddering breaths of air.
She looked back over her shoulder, dread in the pit of her stomach. She couldn’t name what was behind her, but she knew one thing.
He is coming.
Far off in the inky night, a scream of rage split the air. Backing away, she began to run again. It felt like an icy hand had seized her heart. The words pulsed through her mind like a chant, her feet lending a frenzied beat.
He is coming. He is coming. He is coming.
She raced toward the mountains, wind clawing at her stolen cloak. Branches whipped her face, thorns tore at her legs, but she forced herself onward.
She just wished she knew what she was running from.
Chapter 2
“Maybe you could take a minute to calm down—”
“Calm down?” Jet whirled on his brother. “They’ve ruined everything!”
“Stop,” Jasper said, using that annoyingly serene tone of his. “Think for a while. I’m sure there’s still some way to salvage this.”
“I’ll salvage it, all right.” Jet strapped on his belt knife and strode out of his room. “I’ll salvage both of them until they beg me to let them honor their agreement.”
Jasper caught up, neatly stepping in front of him. “Brother…”
“Don’t try to slow me down.” Jet pushed past him. “And don’t ‘brother’ me. I have to do what’s best for the pack.”
“And what’s best for the pack?” Jasper was jogging beside him now. “Seeking revenge on our sister, and on our neighboring pack?”
Jet stopped, giving him a cold stare. “Which one of us is Alpha?”
“You are.” Jasper lowered his eyes.
“At least someone recognizes that.” Jet marched through the main cavern, making heads turn. Most of the pack was still eating breakfast, but some of them rose as he passed. No doubt they’d already heard.
“As you were,” Jet snapped.
Fable and Rowan remained standing. Jet bristled. They might be his sister’s best friends, but they did not get a say in her punishment.
Rowan opened her mouth to speak. Out of the corner of his eye, Jet saw Jasper raise his hand slightly in a quelling gesture. Still glaring, Rowan sat.
Stifling a snarl, Jet stalked toward the entrance. He wasn’t going to stay inside this den any longer if no one was going to listen to him.
He refused to look back at Jasper, or any of his pack. None of them understood the burden of his position, the responsibil
ity. None of them had sat through five and a half long months of negotiations, trying to forge an alliance with the pack to their south. None of them were kept up at night, wondering if their numbers were too thin or their borders strong enough.
Only Jet knew. And no one seemed to care what he thought.
He stepped through the gauntlet of hanging roots, batting them away from his face. Jet remembered looking up at them as a wide-eyed pup, his father telling him how the towering oak shielded them, connected them to the earth, and how he should remember that every time he passed beneath. But his father had never told him how to deal with a sister who scorned him, a neighboring Alpha who couldn’t keep his word, or a pack who didn’t respect him.
Jet marched through the canyon, not bothering to look back at the oak that grew at the far end, lending shelter to traitors who didn’t deserve it. He would demand respect, by force if necessary.
“Slow down, will you?”
Jasper was a few paces behind him, as relentless as a flea.
Jet would give him as much attention as a flea deserved.
“At least tell me where you’re going,” Jasper said.
He was Alpha. He answered to no one.
Jet left the canyon behind, continuing his straight, determined path. He would not be turned from his mission. Trees and boulders should move out of his way, lest they meet the same fate that awaited Ash.
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