Forgotten Curse

by Owens, C. M.

  Fuck my life.

  She walks away, taking the devil’s breath with her, and I breathe out a sigh of relief as my whole body visibly relaxes. I look to see Hale almost combusting from his repressed laughter, and I roll my eyes while scowling at him.

  “That’s not funny at all,” I admonish, and his laughter escapes lightly as he ushers me in the direction of the examiner’s office.

  “Actually, it’s pretty damn hilarious. You have the ability to move matter with your mind, go invincible, and occasionally blow shit all to hell, but you’re shivering in fear at the mere sight of Brazen’s parents. I’ve seen you face down monsters without waver, but you hide from two old full bloods. What gives?” he mocks, and I sigh out as we turn the corner together.

  “I believe we use the word invincible far too loosely. I’m only shielded from physical harm, and hell not even all the physical,” I grouse.

  He tilts his head, his concentration somewhere other than my explanation, and then I feel his touch as my shirt lifts up.

  “What the hell are you doing?” I growl, but he completely ignores me as he squats down to examine my bruised side.

  “How did this happen?” he urges.

  I pull him back up when I notice all the curious eyes on us. I sure as fuck don’t need Brazen hearing about this.

  “It’s from the other night. The hybrid freak hit me a little harder than I realized. I must have let my shield down for a minute when he caught me off guard and used my body to smash the wall.”

  “And you didn’t get any blood?” he gripes.

  “It’s healing, Hale. I don’t always have to use blood. I actually prefer not to unless there’s uranium involved.”

  “You should have said something earlier,” he grumbles.

  “Why would I? I already told you I’m not your responsibility, and I never was. I’m perfectly capable of caring for myself.”

  “Did he break through your invincibility?” he worries, his eyes carrying such a genuine concern.

  I want to scream at him right now. Why does he keep doing this to me? Why do those eyes act like they want me when I’m dismissing him, but yet if I want him, those eyes go cold? Stop confusing me, you asshole!

  “I don’t think so because he beat the hell out of my face, but there’s no mark to show where he was. I think I just got jarred out of my concentration. I wasn’t expecting his speed.”

  He exhales loudly, and then his hand grazes my back while leading me into the main hallway that holds the lab. His touch feels so natural, so desired, and so needed. I really need him to stop touching me at all.

  “You didn’t really have to come with me, but thanks for helping me shake the she-devil.”

  He laughs again, but his eyes still bear the burden of concern. He’s so fucking complicated.

  I love Brazen. I love Brazen.

  Maybe if I repeat that over and over in mantra, I’ll lose my love for Hale.

  “I wanted to come down here to check things out myself. I was finished logging hybrids since our people are a little more prompt than the full bloods and humans.”

  “That’s because we were drilled about being on time and beaten when we weren’t. The rest of them just do whatever in the hell they want to with lazy schedules to tag along. I’m only ever late to irritate Clay.”

  His eyes soften as he turns to face me, and he halts my steps when he pulls me to his body.

  “It’s hard to believe you ever wanted to be with a full blood when you clearly still view their kind as the enemy.”

  I tense up all over as I stare into those eyes refusing to love me. I purse my lips, and then I shake my head while looking away.

  “Brazen isn’t like the old ones who were at Cheyenne. If he was, my savage would have killed him the first time it emerged in his presence, especially when he tried to keep me from getting to you.”

  He seems to wince under that statement which confuses me all the more. He tells me to be with Brazen, and now it feels like he’s trying to drive the wedge of uncertainty between us.

  “After you, Ms. Crush,” he murmurs, though his tone is a little chillier now.

  “Thank you, Captain Banner,” I grumble while trying to sift through his array of personality shifts.

  “Dr. Campbell. I hope you have a report ready for us,” Hale says to the empty room.

  “Where is he?” I huff. “He said he’d stay here until I came to collect the report.”

  Hale’s eyes scour the room, and he takes my hand in his while leaning over into my ear.

  “Go invincible,” he whispers, and a chill sends the prickles all over my body as the thought of something watching us feels certain.

  The air feels colder in here, but sweat begins to form on my body that instant despite the chill. Hale pulls his gun free from his holster, and then he tucks me behind his back as he takes lead. I’m invincible, I should be lead.

  I hear a gnawing sound, almost like an animal chewing on a carcass from a small distance. It’s disturbingly eerie. The smell of blood and flesh warn me of what Hale has already sensed. My hand tightens on his side as I try to peek around him.

  I swallow hard as Hale rips the door open to the lab office, and I scream as something lunges at us. I fling my hands out, and the bloody creature is thrown across the room. It cowers in the corner like a terrified animal, and Hale flips on the light to cast a better view. I gasp when it covers it eyes and screams out in pain… but it’s not an it. It’s a him… the hybrid Hale killed.

  He’s hunched up like a wounded hyena. The stench of the blood layering his body forces me to hold back my urge to vomit. I cover my nose to block out my sensitive smell, but it’s no use. I’ve never encountered such a foul, disgusting scent in all my very long life.

  Oh, I’m going to be sick. Gross.

  His ears have melded into his head, and his eyes are almost white as they try to escape the blare of the light. He ducks behind a cabinet, and we see the doctor lying on the floor with his throat completely jerked free from its place while surrounded by his own pool of blood.

  What the fuck?

  Hale pulls out his second gun, and he climbs over to the corner to be across from the hybrid who has devolved to an animal-like state.

  “Don’t get a drop of that blood on you,” Hale cautions as my hand almost grazes the bloody side of the table in front of me.

  I hear the gun firing loudly in the hollow room, and the sparks fly from the barrel as the bullets whiz toward the savage creature. I’ll never complain about my savage again. At least I don’t become a snarling cannibal with a desperate craving for flesh. That’s fucked up.

  I hear the slapping of the bullets penetrating the skin, and then the creature screams out before plopping against the floor. Hale walks back over while carefully evading all the blood sprays.

  “He was eating the doctor?” I strain out through my held breath as he grips my arm at the elbow to start pulling me out.

  “No. He was eating his own self. It’s panic mechanism some animals exhibit when caught in a trap. I know we call our savages devolution, but that really was devolution. That fucking… thing had better stay dead this time,” he growls.

  He jerks me into the emergency decontamination room, and he jerks my shirt over my head while flipping on the radiation sprayer.

  “What the hell are you doing?”

  “That blood could be contaminated by who the fuck knows what. We’ll take a radiation shower, and then we’ll burn these damn clothes along with anything else we’re wearing until we know for sure what’s going on. I’m not going to risk you turning into something like that,” he asserts, and then he starts jerking off his own shirt.

  “Hale, we’re not human. We can’t be infected,” I grumble while throwing my boots into a burn basket.

  “We don’t know what that thing was, and the doctor’s pulse was starting to pick back up. I sealed the room on the way out.”

  My scalp prickles at the mere thought of this inf
ecting us. Dr. Campbell is… or was… a hybrid. What the hell can infect hybrids?

  Hale grabs the emergency switch, and he tosses his phone along with mine into the burn pile. The intercom picks up immediately with Clay’s voice on the other end.

  “Dr. Campbell, what’s wrong?” Clay frets.

  “It’s Hale. Campbell is dead… for now. Get someone down here to test us. This is a new outbreak,” Hale murmurs, and more chills slide up and down me as I follow his gaze.

  Dr. Campbell is pressed against the glass that surrounds the lab as he pounds uselessly against the unbreakable layers. It takes all my strength not to say something as cliché as it’s alive.

  “Us? Who is us?” Clay urges, knocking me out of my trance, terror slowly stealing my mind with one crazy thing at a time.

  “Araya is with me,” Hale exhales, and then he rips my pants from my body before jerking me to him. “We’re taking a radiation shower now.”

  “Good. That should kill anything you’ve come into contact with in the last twenty to thirty minutes.”

  “I’d like to be safe about this. Find someone to test us.”

  “I’ll test you myself,” Clay interjects.

  “You’re the commander. It wouldn’t be wise for you to risk your life. Just find someone else.”

  “No one else here is better with science than I am. I’ll be there in a damn minute. Stay under the radiation for at least ten minutes. I’ll be in the airlock. Have you sealed the premises?”

  “Yes I have, and Dr. Campbell is back with us. It’s official. It affects hybrids.”

  There’s silence on the other end of the intercom, and Hale flips the emergency lever back down to end the communication while separating my hair under the stream of water laced with heavy radioactivity. He carefully massages it into my scalp, and my trembling body leans against his as I stand there with only my bra and panties. His underwear is all that covers his masterpiece of a body, then I feel him turning me around so my back can face the showering flow.

  “I’m sorry, Araya. I should have secured this place before letting you in,” he murmurs guiltily.

  “It’s not your damn place to care for me. Besides, how would you have known the damn thing would come back to life? I would have went in there alone if you hadn’t come with me,” I grumble, and I feel his body shiver at the thought.

  “I-”

  “Here,” I murmur to interrupt his guilty monologue while turning him into the shower head. “You need to get this shit off you too.”

  He smirks as my body presses against his so we can both stay under the radioactive shower. I roll my eyes at his grinning face, and then he hands me a bottle of a lotion-like liquid.

  “What’s that?” I muse as he squirts a large amount in my hand.

  “It’s a compound designed to lightly infiltrate our skin so the radiation can seep past the top layer. You’re going to have to remove your underwear now and the ring as well.”

  I shiver slightly, and I start rubbing my body down with the new substance. I feel a dull burning, almost tingling sensation. Then I remove my bra and panties to toss them to the burn pile. I place my ring in the radiation chamber meant for keepsakes in case the virus is found not to be airborne.

  Hale’s eyes widen as my breasts reveal themselves to him, and he cracks his neck to the side before rubbing the substance over his chest. He removes his boxers, and they get tossed into the burn pile as well. Now I’m forced to look at his erection that swears he’s still turned on by me.

  Great.

  I force myself to look away, and he smiles when he catches my stray eyes.

  “Turn around,” he murmurs assertively.

  I do as he says, and I cringe lightly when his hands begin massaging the compound into my back and shoulders. The burning in my skin grows, and I’m not sure if it’s this substance doing it or his touch.

  His hands linger momentarily just above my rear, and then I hear his breath release as his hands move from my body. I turn around and take the bottle from his hands, and his eyes seem to become lost in mine momentarily.

  “Your turn,” I mumble, and he turns around to give me access to his back.

  I shiver lightly as my hands touch his skin, and then they glide up his strong, smooth, and perfectly delectable back. My breath goes rasp as I draw out the finish, and he turns back so our bodies are forced to be face to face and barely touching. My breasts press against his firm body, and his erection presses against my stomach.

  Grrr. Skin on skin is fucking killing me. I may love Brazen, but I’m still just a hybrid.

  His hand grazes my cheek before he tilts my face up to force me to stare at him, and then I begin shivering almost violently, my body involuntarily shaking like a human suffering severe withdrawal symptoms.

  “What the hell?” I slur out through my chattering teeth, my lips going numb and drawing down just slightly, like I’ve had a mild stroke.

  “It’s the radiation. Now that it has entered your system, it’s causing the radioactive shivers. It’ll subside once you can drink some blood, but you have to let it work for a while. You’ll feel cold, weak, and dizzy. We’ve been under here long enough. Let’s go sit down,” he murmurs gently while cutting the water off.

  “Why aren’t… you… shaking?” I chatter out.

  He pulls a blanket down from the emergency overhead compartment, and he wraps it around me before pulling one down for himself.

  “Because I’ve been in the lab and in the field more than you. It’s mandatory to scrub down if there’s ever even a suspicion of an outbreak of any sort. I’ve built up a tolerance to the side effects.”

  Well aren’t you the lucky one.

  “Come here. It’s going to get worse before it gets better,” he warns while motioning for me to join him on the small bench built against the wall.

  He presses his back to the wall, and I go to curl up in his lap so he can help steady my almost convulsing body. He wraps his arms around me, and I’m thankful my blanket is separating our bare bodies.

  The sealed door opens to several men walking in with their masks and biohazard suits. Clay walks over to us, and he tosses down a couple packs of blood as I snuggle in deeper to Hale’s chest. His hand tangles in my hair as he tightens his grip on me, forcing my head against him even tighter. My teeth continue making their clattering music, and he rocks me slightly as he tries to keep me from seizing.

  “I’ll draw your blood after you heal. The radiation will tamper with the tests. We’re going to put down Campbell, and then we’ll figure out what the fuck is going on. Are you okay to look after her?” Clay asks Hale.

  “You know I am. I’ve had plenty of radiation showers.”

  “Can I have blood now?” I stumble out.

  “You should be in the clear,” Clay answers with his muffled tone caused by his mask.

  I try to open the pack of blood as he joins the cleanup crew in the other room. I hear the gunshots firing to bring down the man who was once our breed of hybrid. I cringe as I hear the body collapse and splash against its own pool of blood.

  My trembling hands can’t open the pack of blood, and my weakened state keeps me from using my gift to aide me in my endeavor.

  “Let me,” Hale smoothly releases while pulling me closer to him and ripping the pack open with his teeth.

  I reach over my shoulder to take it back, but my trembling hand causes a few drips to slosh out to my shoulder before reaching my mouth. I begin guzzling as I feel the stray bits trickling down my back.

  The blanket around me moves as I feel the incredibly soft lips pressing against my back while Hale works the trail of blood in reverse. My breath hitches from the feel that has always ignited every bit of energy within me, and I feel his smile against my shoulder as he finishes removing the rest of the escaped blood.

  “Sorry,” he breathes. “It’s easy to forget we’re not together when I’m holding you like this.”

  I exhale loudly, and then I contin
ue gulping down the blood. He rips open his pack, and I finally summon up enough composure to speak.

  “Apparently I’m not the only one who made you feel that way while we were together.”

  I hear him wheeze in a painful breath as if I’ve just stabbed him with something, and then his arm tightens around my waist before pulling me in closer to him.

  “Araya, I need to tell you something,” he strains out, and I can hear his hesitance and reluctance staining his tone.

  “What? Alex wasn’t the only one?” I snark, and then I stand up now that my trembles have become more tolerable.

  “That’s not what I was going to say. Araya, I never-”

  “I’m ready to take your blood now. We’ll check for contamination, but everything should check out,” Clay chirps in interruption, and Hale sighs out when he loses his chance to tell me whatever in the hell he was planning to divulge, leaving my curiosity piqued.

  He never what?

  “I’ll go first,” I mumble while pulling my wrist to my mouth.

  I bite through the flesh, and then I take a beaker to let the blood fall into it. I wipe the spatters of blood from my mouth, and then my arm drips lightly on Hale’s arm when he wraps it around my waist.

  “I’m okay now,” I murmur. “You don’t have to hold onto me anymore.”

  “I’m just trying to see over Clay’s shoulder,” he lies, but why is he lying?

  “You’ll need to wash my blood off,” I grouse.

  “I suppose it would be bad if it got into my mouth, huh?” he flirts, and now I’m beyond confused.

  Mm… Bad in a good way and bad in a bad way.

  “Yes. It would be very bad. That would be a lot harder to explain to Brazen than the savage fuck we shared,” I grumble.

  “You’re still together?” he asks with a baffled and surprised tone.

  I turn to face him, and his bare chest is so close to my lips as my breath heats his skin. I accidentally let my lower lip graze over his perfect chest taunting me, and he closes his eyes as though he’s relishing my touch for the very brief second it’s there.

  “Yes. Why?” I ask while drawing back ever so slightly, my lip throbbing the second it loses contact with his skin.