by Amelia Jade
Yet.
The longer he held the partial change, the more riled up it would get.
But he had to do this if they had any hope in succeeding.
Backing over the edge of the dam, he dug his claws deep. They were far stronger than anything a natural bear might possess, and they gave him enough purchase to start climbing down until his hands could do the same thing.
Slowly but surely he climbed down to the first hole and grabbed the sack of charges. A check showed him one of the Pegasi angling in on him. With a grunt he hurled the sack of explosives out over the dam.
The flier shrieked and dove, snatching it from mid-air in its mouth before angling up and away.
One down. Nine to go.
In this column.
He tried not to think about it, moving down the smooth face of the wall as fast as he could.
Another bag went soaring out into air, only to be snatched by the waiting mouth of an RAF flier.
And another. Then one more.
Then, just like that, he was done with the first column. Instead of moving back to the top, both Jarvis and Luther simply shuffled to the right to work their way up the remaining bombs. Climbing up was infinitely faster than going down, so they would be able to make their way through this column even faster.
Hopefully.
***
They were halfway up the dam when disaster happened.
There was rumble, and then suddenly the entire dam shook.
“What was that?” Luther said from across the dam.
Jarvis knew what it was.
They were too late.
“Trouble! We need to get clear.”
The dam rippled underneath them as something hit it again, and the two shifters were almost thrown free from their perch.
“We need to jump!” he hollered. There was no time for anything else.
A high-pitched whinnying came from above him and he craned his neck.
A RAF flier was swooping out of the air, shaking and tossing its head at him even as he came.
Jarvis knew what they were going for.
“JUMP!” he shouted at Luther, seeing a second flier dive for him.
“You and your fucking ideas!” Luther roared back at him, but the shifter didn’t hesitate.
Together they pushed away from the wall and soared out over the dam in free flight, ten stories above the ground.
Jarvis slammed the door shut on his bear as he fell. The impact would already be hard enough on the Pegasus, and the last thing it needed were his claws ripping it open as he struggled for a grip.
If it ever got there.
Jarvis was falling now, nothing but empty air beneath him. He didn’t dare turn around to look though, else he risked moving himself out of position. All he could do was trust the enigmatic fliers to save his ass.
Above him there was a huge bang, followed by a rumble.
Eight stories.
He almost risked looking behind him.
Seven.
Then suddenly the Pegasus was under him, matching his descent. Jarvis slammed onto its back, and immediately the shifter spread its wings, trying to slow the fall. For his part, Jarvis spread his legs and arms wide too, trying not to fall off.
Five.
“Come on. Come on. COME ON!” he shouted.
Three.
The winged unicorn shrieked loudly as the air bit into its wings, but their rate of descent slowed rapidly.
Two.
Their downward plunge became an upward curve and they soared back up into the air, both of them making their own versions of an ecstatic cry. From the left of them came a similar cry of success.
But the sound died in his throat as Jarvis finally remembered to look behind him.
Just as he did, the first cracks appeared in the dam.
Then the bombs on the outside of the dam went off.
Huge chunks of concrete spewed out through the air, arcing down to splash in the river below.
Cracks appeared in the upper eastern half of the dam.
Then, like ice, it cracked.
“Oh my God,” Jarvis whispered as water began to pour through.
They had failed.
***
The shifters assembled on the western side of the dam.
Behind them were the several hundred workers who had been freed from their makeshift office prisons by Gabriel and Ethan. There had been a brief battle with two more Fenris shifters who had been guarding them, but otherwise they had succeeded in their quest.
The others, however, had not been so lucky.
The divers had done as much as they could, but some of the bombs were just planted too low for them to reach without proper equipment.
By removing the explosive charges on the outside of the dam however, they had managed to prevent the entire thing from caving in.
But a huge chunk of the eastern side, the part where Jarvis and Luther hadn’t been able to reach in time, had given way as it was weakened from both sides.
Even now they watched as water poured through the gap, tens of thousands of gallons of it every minute, forming a torrent as it washed through the countryside, overflowing the little riverbed.
Downstream, Jarvis knew it would be directed south by the hill noted on Angelo’s map, and even now had probably washed out a huge section of the road between Cadia and Cloud Lake.
The town itself had been spared, and nobody was going to die as long as the dam held until it could be repaired, but the consequences for Cadia were going to be dire.
There was a lone positive within it all. Because the Fenris team had been caught and killed before they could flee, it no longer became a human act of terrorism.
All Jarvis and the leaders of Cadia would have to do now was convince the human leaders that not all shifters thought the same, that some of them actually were on the side of the good guys.
But for the moment, all Jarvis could do was watch as the water drained from the dam.
His entire team stood around him, sharing his dejection and sense of failure. It was tough for him to be positive, but he knew he had to. They had been faced with an impossible task, and if the truth were told, had succeeded beyond his wildest expectations.
He’d hoped they would succeed completely of course. But hopes and reality were very rarely intertwined with each other.
“We saved Cloud Lake,” he said, ensuring his voice was devoid of any raspyness or hesitation. “Nobody is going to die today because of what we did here.”
His throat hurt as he spoke, the slices in it still not completely healed, though they were no longer bleeding.
“We may not have succeeded completely, but I think—if we’re all honest with ourselves—we know that it simply looks worse than it is. We’ve lost the road between us and human civilization, true. But roads can be rebuilt. Structures can be repaired. But lives cannot be replaced.”
He turned as he spoke, making eye contact with both his Green Bearets and the RAF team.
“Thanks to your efforts, none will need to be. That is the most important thing to take away from this.”
His eyes narrowed. “That, and that Fenris will stop at nothing to win this war it seems.”
Jarvis shook his head. “I just wish I knew what was driving them to such lengths. This is extreme, even for them. They don’t seem to understand the idea of surrender.”
The others looked just as confused as he felt. There was no need for them to go to such lengths. This had backfired on Fenris, and now the humans would likely begin to crack down on them.
The war hadn’t been won outright, but it seemed likely that the end was now on the horizon. If the humans mobilized their forces against Fenris, the campaign would be swift and brutal, but there would be no doubt as to its conclusion.
Jarvis only hoped that Cadia could stay out of their sights if such a thing did happen. Humans were unpredictable like that, and he was already worrying for the safety of those he knew.
With
a sigh he turned away from the sight. It would take a long time for the dam to drain down enough that water stopped spilling over. There was precious little he could do by looking at it.
He needed to get back, to find Carrie, and tell her everything was okay.
“Gabriel, you and one of Ava’s team will stay here to liaise with the humans. Give them any assistance we can, and don’t be afraid to call if you need help.”
The big, grave-faced shifter nodded.
“The rest of us, let’s get back to Cloud Lake. I’m sure there’s more to be done.”
Chapter Fifteen
Jarvis
They were in the air when one of the Pegasi slid closer to where Jarvis sat on Ava’s back and shrieked at them, tossing her head and pointing downward.
Ava tilted slightly in the air and looked down, affording Jarvis a clear view off her right side.
Down below, thick black smoke curled up from the side of a large hill. He peered at it a little longer, until he discerned that the smoke wasn’t coming from anything natural. Sunlight glinted off of metal.
“Take us down,” he shouted. “Let’s have a look!”
Ava neighed her agreement and the pair began to descend. Jarvis waved the rest of them onward, and the others continued to head on back toward Cloud Lake, quickly outpacing them.
The object in question resolved itself into the crumpled remains of a car that looked like it had fallen off the side of the road.
“Set us down,” he told Ava, but she was already coming in for a landing.
Something flashed out of a nearby bush and struck Ava in the left flank when they were still ten feet up. Her majestic descent began to wobble, and then she collapsed mid-air. Jarvis flung himself free, landing heavily on the hard ground below as he rolled to his feet, keeping Ava’s body between him and whoever was out here.
He saw her flank rising and falling steadily. So she wasn’t dead, which was a huge relief.
Tranquilizer.
Whoever was out here knew what they were doing. Had they set this trap, somehow knowing he would walk into it? That seemed far too preposterous to be true. It was impossible for them to have known he would be coming this way, let alone that he would come investigate and not send one of his men.
Which meant that whoever it was had seen the flight approaching and readied a tranq gun just in case one of them came to take a look. It just so happened to be Jarvis and Ava.
“Show yourself!” he shouted.
In response another dart shot out from behind a patch of rocks. Jarvis ducked, barely avoiding getting nicked himself.
Keeping Ava’s body between himself and where the dart had come from, he picked up a rock the size of his head, hefting it in his hand several times.
Crouching low, he tossed it far to his right.
Whoever was over there was quick, because no sooner had the rock hit the ground than a dart was flying at it.
But Jarvis was quicker. He had already hurtled clear over Ava’s sleeping body and was bearing down on the gunman.
There was a curse and he saw the unknown man’s arm spin, but it was too late. Jarvis batted the gun away, easily breaking the grip the human had on it.
Jarvis stared. “Who the hell are you, and why are you shooting at us?” he snarled, getting close to the other man.
Immediately he began to smell gasoline. The man was covered in it.
And something else.
His eyes went wide.
“Carrie,” he breathed.
Spinning, not worried about the dark-haired human, he darted over to the car.
There was no one in it, but he once again caught her scent.
Following it, he located her body behind another set of rocks.
“Carrie!” he shouted, ripping the blindfold from her face before snapping the zip ties that were holding her wrists behind her back.
She made a noise, and he sighed in relief. She was alive.
But there was no response from her and her eyes stayed closed.
“Carrie?” he asked.
“Get away from her! She’s mine!”
The human was approaching him.
Jarvis turned, rage filling him at the human’s claim.
“Yours?” he asked dangerously, taking one step closer.
“Yes. She was with me first, you thieving, honorless pig!”
“Ah,” Jarvis said, a smile as cold as ice spreading across his face as recognition clued in. “You must be Angelo.”
“In the flesh,” the human said, giving a little bow. His clothing stuck to him, drenched as it was in gasoline. It was no small miracle that he hadn’t gone up in flames along with the car itself. “Now back away from my woman.”
Jarvis’s bear shook with anger.
“Let’s get one thing clear,” he said, taking a step closer to the human. “Carrie is no one’s ‘woman.’ She is her own woman, and makes her own decisions who she is with.”
He wanted so badly to snap the puny human’s neck, to watch the life flee his pathetic body.
But he couldn’t. Killing a human was a big breach of the rules. With what had just happened at the dam, Jarvis needed to keep everything under control.
“We’ll see about that,” Angelo said, and to Jarvis’s surprise, he advanced.
“You’re joking, right?” he said with a laugh. “I could break you like a twig.”
“Maybe,” Angelo agreed. “But that wouldn’t look very good to the human authorities, would it?”
He was within five feet of Jarvis now.
Jarvis’s eyes narrowed. There was something about the way he’d said that…
Something about the way he’d pronounced the word human.
Angelo put on a burst of inhuman speed and his fist hit Jarvis square in the chest before he could react.
The bigger man flew backward, pinwheeling up and over the car before he bounced and rolled across the rocky ground.
Oh. So he’s not human.
Jarvis cursed himself as he picked himself up off the ground, just in time to hear metal creak.
Angelo pushed off the car and slammed into Jarvis, bearing the two of them to the ground.
The surprise was beginning to wear off though, and Jarvis was able to block most of this blow. He frowned as he grabbed Angelo and physically tossed the smaller man clear of him.
“You’re a Turned shifter,” he said as the realization sunk in.
Angelo’s physical form was far too small to have been a natural shifter. Somehow, at some point, someone had decided to Turn him. That worried him to his core. Turning a human was no small feat. It was incredibly risky, and it often killed as many as it worked for.
If Fenris was resorting to trying to create their own army now, Cadia could be in big, big trouble.
Angelo came on with yet another blurring burst of speed, and Jarvis was barely able to avoid the blow.
Damn he’s fast! His smaller body must allow his strength to be able to move him faster.
But he can’t hit as hard…Not from a standstill at least.
Jarvis could use that. Somehow.
He ducked away from another punch, taking the blow on the shoulder instead of to his face. Rolling with the impact, he spun, delivering a surprise snap-kick that caught Angelo unawares. The tan-skinned human-turned-shifter went tumbling away.
“You can’t win this,” Jarvis stated as he advanced. “You’re fast, I’ll give you that. But you don’t have anything but rudimentary combat training. Nor do you have the strength to match me. What are you hoping to get out of this?”
Angelo snarled.
Jarvis rolled his eyes, then dodged as the smaller man hurled a rock he’d grabbed from the ground at him.
Using the distraction, Angelo charged.
“Seriously?” the Green Bearet asked, stepping aside.
To his surprise, Angelo didn’t slow down, but kept going as he dove for something on the ground.
“Oh shit,” Jarvis said and threw himself
behind the car moments before a trio of tranquilizer darts clunked into the far side of it.
He yanked himself back as the hot metal blistered his skin.
Right, it’s still on fire. Could explode. I should probably get away from it.
An idea suddenly entered his head.
Noting the locations of Carrie and Ava, his lips twisted upward in a smile. It was going to work perfectly.
Quickly digging in the dirt, Jarvis gathered half a dozen fist-sized rocks. Holding them clutched to his side with his left hand, he rose and smoothly began firing them at Angelo. The shifter ducked out of the way, taking cover behind a rocky protrusion in the ground.
Jarvis sent the last of his makeshift missiles hurtling at the Turned shifter’s hiding spot, and then bent down. Summoning his bear, he let its strength flow through him. His muscles screamed and protested, fibers ripping, but eventually they obeyed him.
And he simply picked the car up and tossed it at Angelo.
The other shifter was just standing up to return fire when the mass of burning metal landed on top of him in a brief explosion of fire as the gas tank finally ruptured.
Jarvis winced as he heard screams from under the car as it shook, where most of the flames were now centered. He’d forgotten that Angelo had been covered in gasoline. The screams became shrieks that eventually died away, as did the struggling.
The smell of burnt hair wafted over him, and Jarvis almost lost his lunch as the reality of Angelo’s sudden death sunk in.
The shifter had literally burned to death under the car.
Beside him, Ava stirred once, and then came to her feet in a flash.
The Pegasus whinnied and whirled, her horn lowered as she looked for an attacker.
“It’s okay, Ava,” he said, reaching a hand out to calm her. “It’s over. You were hit with a tranq dart. Are you okay?”
The razor-sharp horn bobbed up and down several times as Ava relaxed. She looked at Jarvis, the car, and then beyond him.
Carrie!
In the commotion he’d completely forgot that she wasn’t okay. Sliding to his knees beside her, he cradled her head.
“Carrie, c’mon. Time to wake up!” he said, feeling once more for a pulse.