by Kym Dillon
Marnie wavered for a moment, but then she gave in. She fell into his arms as if she had never lived anywhere else, and the first kiss that they shared under the broad Tanzania sky felt like a bright comet flying through the night sky.
Marnie had never felt so free in her life. She had always been a city girl, born and raised in Chicago, and then working for the CDC in Atlanta, the steel and concrete locking her safely away from the primal beat of the earth. Here, in the arms of the most exciting man that she had ever known, she could feel herself discovering the real Earth, the one that she had longed for without ever knowing of it.
Memories made that night would stay with her forever, she knew it.
She would always remember straddling Jax's naked hips, his cock buried deep inside her as he urged her to lean back, taking in the night sky embroidered with stars.
She would always remember how it felt when Jax bent her over, burying his teeth in her shoulder and marking her with a tender bruise as nothing but his.
She would always remember him crying her name as if it was a prayer or a plea, a look of desperate longing in his eyes. If he was a part of her, she was a part of him, and her heart swelled with pride to be joined with this fascinating, powerful man.
When they drifted off to sleep, Marnie wasn't certain whether she lay in the arms of a beautiful man or whether she slumbered against the furnace-like warmth of an enormous tiger. All she could hear as she fell into a deep and satisfying sleep was the sound of her name, half-spoken, half purred...
The tiger knew that there was danger coming. It was in the water. It was in the wind.
Danger had never troubled the tiger before. He would kill or be killed, and that was right. Everything was as the world should be. He would run and eat while he could, and eventually, there would be something that bore him down.
However...
Things had changed, and the woman with the sunlight hair was here now. She had a spider web strength, delicate but spun to hold worlds together. She was vulnerable in a way that he would never be, and it made something ache inside the tiger. He could feel her heartbeat close to him, and it felt like a frail thing, so fragile. It could be snuffed out with a single half-hearted blow of his giant paw. It could be bitten clean from the fabric of life by the jaws of a hyena.
Somewhere, somewhere close by, the tiger could heal the cackle of the hyena clans. They were ruthless in battle and powerful. A shiver of fear ran up his back, and he knew that there was no such thing as perfect surety. There was no way to keep his sunlight woman utterly safe, and a fear arose in him.
The tiger had never known fear during his adult life. He knew that now. He had been anxious, and he had been irritated before. This fear, however, went down deep into his marrow. It was not anger, which was hot, but instead it was cold, something that could freeze him down to his fiery soul.
If he had to be without this woman, he would die. He knew he could not protect her.
In the dark jungle where he was born, the dark jungle that would never completely leave his heart, the tiger roared.
Marnie awoke in stages. At first there was only the knowledge that despite having slept on the ground, she was not sure that she had ever been better rested in her life. The second thing she noticed was that she was sleeping in a pair of powerful arms. She was not breathing alone. There was someone whose breathing matched hers, rising and falling with her. It was a primal comfort, and Marnie almost drifted off to sleep again.
Then she became aware of a low and distant moaning, something that tugged at the edge of her consciousness. It was a sound of great pain, and to her eternal shame, for a moment, she wanted nothing more than to run away from it. Let someone else deal with the death that came with such a sound.
She sat up suddenly, realizing that the sound was no dream. It was a drone of misery, and it came from the village.
Next to her, Jax stirred with a frown. If he had been in his tiger form, his ears would have lain straight back against his head.
"What the hell is that?" he growled.
"I don't know," Marnie said, struggling into her clothes. "We have to get back, it came from the village!"
Before she could do much beyond stagger out from the lean-to, there was a thunder of hooves, and Marcus appeared on horseback. There was a look of stress and fear on the werepanther's face, and when he saw Marnie, he let out a breath of relief.
"Marnie, get on," he growled. "You’re needed."
Marnie only hesitated a moment before scrambling onto the back of the horse behind Marcus. Jax emerged from the lean-to as well, scowling at Marcus.
"Where the hell are you taking her?" he snarled. There was anger on his face, but there was also a fear that allowed Marnie to forgive him his possessiveness.
"Back to the village, there's trouble. Get yourself together and follow. I'm not sure what we can do.”
On the frantic short ride back to the village, Marcus told her tersely that the disease they had been studying had broken out among the villagers in camp. There were already three dead, and new infections were being discovered. The toll was catastrophic on a small village, and Marnie could feel a desperate panic overtake her. She pulled it back, barely, and by the time Marcus rode into the middle of camp, she was composed, if pale.
The first person she saw was Dr. Carter, pale faced and directing the medical workers and villagers in Chaga. She looked calm, but there was a terrible fear on her face. When she saw the two of them, she nodded tightly.
"Jessica is tending people on the west side of the village, closest to the jungle. She needs your help, Marnie."
Marcus couldn't ride through the center of camp. Instead he dismounted, and after tethering his horse, escorted her through a scene of barely controlled chaos. Everywhere, it seemed, there were people weeping or rushing about, trying to do what they could to minister to the dead and the dying. There was one small child sitting next to a covered body, weeping loudly. It took everything Marnie had not to go to him and offer comfort.
I need to keep moving, she thought grimly. If I can't help Jessica, that child might be joining that body on the ground...
She found Jessica in one of the examination trailers, ministering to a young teenager. The teenager was nearly covered in boils, and with a chill of horror, Marnie realized that this must have all started to happen in the last eight hours or so.
My god, what kind of disease moves this fast, this ruthlessly? The incubation period must be...
Jessica worked over the teenager desperately, but they could all see it when the teen took his last breath. Jessica froze, and Marnie could see the moment of realization and defeat that went over every medical professional when they realized they had lost their patient. For a moment, Jessica shook, and then she reached for the containment bags.
"Come help me," she said to Marcus, and Marcus obediently came to her aid. Together, they covered the teen, moving as respectfully as they could when there was such a terror waiting outside. It struck Marne that though Jessica's tone was sharp, she wasn't as angry as she had been before. She wasn't furious with Marcus, and he wasn't as short with her. Desperate times had brought them together, and Marnie felt a strange pang of relief.
When the teenager had been respectfully covered, Jessica looked up at Marnie. She seemed barely aware of the hand that Marcus placed on her shoulder.
"I am glad you’re here," she said, and Marnie could hear every moment of exhaustion in her friends voice. "We've been working for three hours, and there's... there's nothing we can do. Nothing we've tried works. People are simply dying."
"What can I do?" Marnie asked, and Jessica's laugh was a sharp and ugly crack.
"Whatever you can. Whatever you think might help. Dr. Carter's only orders right now are to keep everyone as contained as possible. Something this fast, this nasty? It could wipe out the region. Once in, no one out, is going to be the rule of the day, and that goes for us too."
There was something bleak and implacable about Jessica's tone
, and Marnie fought down the panic that was growing deep inside her. She knew that those were the conditions necessary in an epidemic situation, and that might be exactly what they were facing now. Her skin crawled at the idea of being in a situation like this, one where she might just as easily become one of the causalities as one of the medical workers. She pushed all that fear to the back of her mind. It would not help anyone right now, least of all her.
Jessica hesitated for a moment. There seemed to be a sort of silent communion that ran between her and Marcus. She nuzzled his hand without thinking about it, a gesture that struck Marnie as strange catlike.
"I'm sorry for what happened yesterday," she said. "I was wrong. That was cruel of me. I know that it's petty in the extreme in the face of what's happening right now... but I wanted to apologize, and I hope you can forgive me."
Marnie instinctively reached for her friend, and their embrace was one of forgiveness and love. There was a desperation to it as well, but Marnie knew that it was a real hug, nothing hidden or held back.
"Of course I forgive you. After this is all over, you and I are going to have a great girls’ night out on the town and forget all about it."
It brought a slight smile to Jessica's weary face, and she nodded.
"Sounds fantastic. Now, we should get back to work."
8
The day wore on. The sun climbed higher in the sky, and during one frantic five-minute break, Marnie thought that it should be ashamed to gaze down on such suffering without so much as blinking. The village contained seventy-six people, and by noon, they had lost ten of them. Another twenty were afflicted, and all the medical personnel thought that there were perhaps more that were suffering without yet coming forward about it.
The word had gone out that no one was permitted to leave, but the village surprised Marnie. She was used to reading about people fleeing epidemics and unknowingly making things worse. It was common for people who were not infected to flee even their loved ones in terror. It was an innate response, if not a particularly flattering one.
Here, however, no one fled. They wanted to stay close to their family and friends, and when Marnie remarked on it, Dr. Carter shrugged tiredly.
"It's love," she said bluntly. "It's the love a community has for each of its members, what a mother feels for her child, what a man feels for his woman."
There was a strange and distant look to her that made Marnie look twice. Stephanie Carter was a mystery to just about everyone in camp, but there was no time to tease her story out of her now. As soon as she had her breath back, it was back to work, trying to help people with few resources at her disposal and hope that dwindled with each passing moment.
She could work for two hours on someone only to have them die. She attended to one young girl who died four minutes into an examination. Marnie had never felt so helpless in all her life, and all around her were the wails of the bereaved. The sound rose and fell throughout the day, but it never stopped entirely, and Marnie knew that there was nothing she could do to fight it. She was torn between breaking down into tears whenever it rose again, knowing what it signaled, or simply joining the wail with her own broken voice.
She worked over the sick and dying until she thought she would shake herself to pieces, and she only looked up from her work when Jax dragged her away to stuff some food and water into her. The sight of food made her nauseated, but under his command, she choked some of it down. The food sat like a lump of concrete in her belly, and she shook her head, blind with grief.
"I don't know what to do," she said dully, and he could do was take her into his arms.
Then it was back to the desperate whirl of the dead and the dying until finally night fell. It seemed as if there was an ebb in the tide of new discoveries of those afflicted, and Dr. Carter ordered Jessica and Marnie to their tents for some rest.
"You're going to be in a world of hurt if you don't rest up," she said. "There are others that can take your place for a while. Get some sleep."
Marnie leaned against Jessica as they staggered back to their tents. Marnie tilted her head up to look at the dimming sky.
"It's so beautiful," she said, her voice hoarse. "I can't believe it's so beautiful up there when everything down here's so... so ugly."
Jessica wrapped her into a tight hug.
"I'm so sorry I brought you here," she said. "If it wasn't for me, you'd be safely back in the States ensconced in your sterile lab."
Marnie fought back the urge to shout at Jessica, to say that she was damned right, because this was unfair and cruel.
"I think I'm doing some good here," she said instead. "That's important to me."
Jessica opened her mouth to respond, but then a black panther stalked out of the darkness. It said something about how exhausted Marnie was that she didn't even bat an eye.
In a moment, he rose up in the form of a man, and Marcus stood naked in front of them. Apparently, Marnie still had enough energy to be embarrassed; she turned her eyes away, blushing a little, but Jessica had no such reservations.
"What is it?" she asked, and Marcus took her by the arm.
"You and Marnie and everyone else that you can find, you need to get to some kind of cover. Move everyone who can be moved to a central location and get whatever weapons you have to protect yourselves."
Marnie's brain felt overloaded. She could not handle any more information.
"What's going on?" asked Jessica, an edge of wildness to her voice. It sounded as though she might lash out at any moment if she did not get more information, and at least Marnie felt a little less alone.
"Hyenas," Marcus said grimly. "They're close and getting closer. They are going to attack, and they are going to leave no one alive if they're not defeated. Run. Hide."
Jax appeared out of the shadows, still human, but Marnie could sense a bristling strength radiating from him. It was hard to believe that he had been on death's door such a short time ago. She reached out to touch him, and her vision spun.
"No," she heard herself saying as if from a great distance. "No, not you... you can't fight, you were wounded..."
"Sunshine, I must," he said, as if it were the simplest thing in the world. "If any of us are to make it out of this, to protect all these people... I have to fight."
He hesitated.
"I must protect you..." he said more softly, and then it was as if something inside Marnie broke.
She flew at him, beating at his broad chest with her ineffectual fists.
"No!" she cried piteously. "You can't... I don't want to lose you, Jax, I can't...!"
She knew that Jax had grabbed hold of her wrists, that he was holding her still and trying to soothe her, but her vision went dark around the edges. It felt suddenly as if she were seeing and hearing everything from a great distance, and then with a whoosh, everything was gone.
Marnie awakened to the feeling of something blessedly cool against her brow, and the murmur of male voices.
"-can't stay much longer, Jax..."
"I understand. Another minute, and I'll be close on your tail, I promise."
There was an answer that was more a growl than an assent, and when Marnie opened her eyes, she was alone with Jax.
They were in one of the medical tents, and she was stretched out on one of the cots where she had so recently tended others. She felt a moment of relief when she figured out where she was, but then panic surged back up. This was where she had tended people who were dying, who were now covered with blankets and placed reverently in a covered area until arrangements could be made for their burial. She couldn't be lying there, she couldn't...
Marnie froze as she sat up. Her entire body felt warm, far warmer than it should have, and her vision swam for a moment before she could see clearly. She remembered all too clearly what the translator had said when she spoke with an old woman, desperately trying to get some information out of her, something, anything that might help her figure out how this plague could be averted.
She says she's burning up. She says something is sitting on her chest...
Marnie's scientific mind knew that the woman was feverish because her body was trying to destroy the infection and that her inability to breathe was because her lungs were having to work harder and harder. For a single moment, however, the interpreter's words made her hallucinate a demon sitting on the woman's chest, lumpy and misshapen.
Marnie could feel a throbbing on her arm, and when she looked down, her worst fears were confirmed. There was a large boil there, just above her elbow. It was the size of a quarter, round and weirdly beautiful in a way. She reached a trembling finger to touch it before she remembered herself and drew back.
So this is what it feels like, she had a moment to think. The thought was very calm, almost numb, and then her heart began to beat faster
She was on the verge of panic when Jax appeared next to her. He started to say something, and then his eyes widened, looking at the boil on her arm.
"My god... Marnie, is that..."
"Yes," she whispered, and tears filled her eyes.
She knew that she was supposed to be strong. She had come here to help people, and now she was the one who was afflicted. It felt tremendously unfair. She was going to die. She had, maybe, less than a day left.
Jax hesitated for only a moment, and then he gathered her in his arms. Frantically, she pushed him away, but he held on to her firmly. Pushing against him was as pointless as fighting a brick wall, and Marnie could feel her strength drain from her even as she tried.
"You need to let me go," she whimpered, her voice little more than a pained husk. "You can't be here, God only knows how this illness is transmitted. We still don't know..."
Jax snorted.
"Please. You saw how quickly I healed, didn't you? Shifter blood, it makes us immune to the nastiest of diseases. Things that kill humans. Hush, you need your strength."
Marnie found his words oddly hilarious. She laughed, or at least she tried to. Her throat had started to throb abominably, and trying to make her voice work was painful.