by Rose Francis
Everyone went quiet and still. All eyes were on Cassie, who was crying. Her guns were still trained on the cougar leader and his lady.
“Cassie,” said Selina. “I had no idea.”
Cassie used one hand to wipe her eye but pointed the gun right back at the cougar. “Pretty fucked up, huh?”
The cougar leader raised his hands to his chest level with his palms out. His eyes betrayed his inner feelings. Everyone was just as shocked.
“All right,” he said, stepping back. “We will let you through this time. But don’t come back here. Next time we won’t take it so easy on you.”
The pride shifted and ran up an embankment and into the forest.
Cassie finally lowered her Glocks and doubled over, resting the butt of the guns on her knees as she sucked air into her lungs in long, shuttering breaths.
“Selina, help her back into the car,” said Rafe. The entire pack’s clothing had been torn to shreds. Everyone pulled a change of clothes out of their personal bags and slipped into them on the side of the highway.
Chapter Sixteen
The convoy continued its trek through cougar country. No one spoke. Cassie used her shirtsleeve to dry the still-flowing tears from her eyes. Damn emotions. The sooner she could get them under control the better. She’d always been sensitive before the war, but this was ridiculous. She felt as if her emotions were erupting from deep within her like an overheated volcano.
Cassie watched out the front window as the deep green conifer forests and pale green groves of aspens flew by. The blur of the road lulled her into a restfulness she hadn’t felt since leaving the dome. Every once in a while, Rafe had to slow down to avoid a massive pothole in the road, and everyone hung on while he maneuvered through it.
The sun tipped toward the west, and they parked at a pre-war rest stop in one of the national parks. There were putrid restrooms, but everyone chose instead to use the woods. A river ran along the edge of what was once a manicured lawn that had become overgrown with tall native grasses and wildflowers.
Meredith and the other cook, Steven, prepared a meal on the tailgate of one of the SUVs while Selina shifted into wolf form to fish in the river. Rafe and Neil went off in private to talk, leaving Cassie to wander around the park alone.
Clark sat on a weather-beaten picnic table, surrounded by tall grass, shooing away flying gnats that landed on his glossy black hair. Cassie crossed her arms when she noticed she was walking right toward him and then decided to go in another direction. Why was he such a jerk anyway? What did she ever do to him?
“Hey!” he called out behind her. Cassie turned, pursing her lips and stared wide-eyed at him. She cocked her head to the side.
“What?”
“I’m sorry about the other day. It sounds like it sucked in the dome.”
“It did.”
“Did you get…? You know?”
“No. I ran away before it happened.”
“That’s good.”
“My friends are still in there.” Cassie’s hands twitched thinking of the cool steel of her guns. She wanted to take down the Pyramid Corporation and those sick vampire freaks more than anything she’d ever wanted in her life.
“Do you think… they’ll get, like, pregnant?”
Clark’s stupid question made Cassie’s stomach churn. The smell of the cook fire wafted over. They were cooking the murdered calf from this morning. Vomit rose in her throat and spilled over on the ground. These goddamned werewolves were so freaking insensitive.
Apparently, emotion-induced vomiting came along with the uncontrollable crying and childish behavior. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and glared at Clark. “Yes. They probably will.” Her own admission made her want to retch again, but she didn’t have anything left in her stomach. Not even water. She was done with this conversation.
She marched away in search of something to wash out her mouth, water or some hundred-proof vodka. She had to pass the roasting calf on the makeshift spit on her way back to her car where she knew she’d find a canteen. She wanted to cry again, but she held it back.
The sting of bile in her throat and the grit and the salt from sweat and tears mixed with the dust of the road made her want to go run into the river with Selina. She wished she could turn into an animal and frolic or hunt with such abandoned focus.
She swung open the door to the SUV and dug her canteen out from under her backpack to take a big mouthful to swish around before spitting it into the gravel parking lot. She took another long drink, soothing the sting in her throat.
Cassie climbed into her chair and waited. She didn’t want to talk to anyone or watch them cooking that innocent calf. She saw Rafe and Neil walking out of the woods and toward the car. Neil split off and went to check on the cooking while Rafe continued to their car.
He opened the driver’s side door and took a swig from his canteen, giving her a wary look.
“You did well back there, at the border of the cougars’ territory. Even Neil thinks so.”
“Thanks. I guess.”
“Everything all right? You look green.”
“Nothing. Just something Clark said.”
“Is he calling you out again? Because if he is, he’ll be disciplined.”
“No, no. Nothing like that. He just asked me about the dome.”
“Oh.”
“I swear. I want to kill them all. How did I become like this? You know, before the war, I spent most of my spare time dancing around in front of my closet mirror singing into my hairbrush, or reading, or drawing. Now look at me. I don’t even recognize myself.”
Rafe smirked and stifled a laugh.
“What?” she asked indignantly.
“Nothing. It’s just. Before the war. I was a human being, not a werewolf. I’d watch what you complain about around here.” He closed his canteen and shut the door without another word.
Great. Now she felt like crap. What was being a bloodthirsty murderer compared to turning into a freak mutant who shifted into an animal? She almost wished she’d been mutated like everyone else. Being able to shift seemed cool, although the whole shifting process looked as though it probably kind of hurt.
Selina came back to the car, dripping wet and naked. She grabbed a towel from her backpack and proceeded to dry herself, standing next to the car.
“Don’t you get embarrassed?” Cassie asked, looking forward. She knew she felt embarrassed hanging out with people who walked around naked all the time.
“Nah. Not really. You get used to it.”
Selina got dressed and sat in the backseat, lacing up her boots. “You all right?” she asked Cassie. Cassie frowned. After Rafe’s admonishment, she didn’t feel as though she had the right to be upset about anything. Selina had just lost her boyfriend and her best friend in the course of a few days. And now look at her, hunting for the pack with a smile on her face.
“Come and get it,” shouted Meredith.
Cassie grudgingly slipped from the front seat of the SUV and trudged toward where the others were helping themselves to slices of murdered calf off a tailgate. Cassie frowned; her stomach felt raw.
She glanced around and found roasted fish and crusty bread. She took a metal plate and grabbed a serving of both before she wandered over to a picnic table alone. She could hear the wolf pack laughing and eating behind her as they stood near the car.
Cassie felt the solid presence of a large man behind her. She turned her head to see Rafe, his face framed by the shimmering leaves of aspen trees. She stuck out her bottom lip and turned back to her food.
“Here,” he said, sliding a container of fresh strawberries in front of her. She stared at the bright red fruit, determined not to let it make her cry again. She plucked one from the container and popped it in her mouth. Sweet juice poured over her tongue.
“It might be a while before we have fresh produce again. Where we’re going isn’t exactly hospitable.”
“This is my fault.”
“Shh. Don’t talk like that. All of us know that survival means being ready to adapt. We all want answers. It isn’t like before the war where you just got a job at some company and worked for the next forty years. No one is comfortable. No one is complacent. Life is about being ready to face your challenges and meet them head on.”
“I want to face my challenges,” she whispered through clenched teeth.
“How so?” He popped a berry in his mouth.
“I’m going to destroy them. Their domes, their ships. Everything.”
“That sounds like a good goal. But it might take a little planning first. I don’t think you can take out the vampires and their human army with your two little guns.”
“Maybe not,” she said, eating another strawberry.
“But if any twenty-year-old human who breaks into tears at a moment’s notice could do it, it would be you.”
“Shut up,” she said, a smile creeping over her face as she nudged his arm. He gave her a gentle nudge back that turned into a clumsy half hug. She rested her head on his shoulder just before Neil stepped in front of them and Rafe pulled away.
“We’ve packed up the food and are ready to go.”
Rafe stood from the table, taking his plate and the container of strawberries with him, leaving an empty, cold hole where he had been. Cassie sighed. Would he ever stop pulling away? She yelled at herself not to cry, which was about eighty-seven percent successful. These PMS-style emotions couldn’t be over soon enough.
She headed back to the car with the empty plate in her hand. When she reached the food car, Meredith sent her back to the river to clean her plate off. Cassie grumbled to herself as she strode toward the water.
She bent down on the rocky shore and dipped her plate into the swift stream. When she looked up, she couldn’t believe her eyes.
Chapter Seventeen
She blinked several times, trying to force the image to make sense. Nothing made sense anymore. The old rules were gone. But this was just too much. It couldn’t be real. She must have eaten some bad fish, or maybe she was dreaming.
The creature on the opposite riverbank noticed her moving and raised its long neck to gaze directly at her. It was what it looked like, all right. A bona fide dragon. It was the size of a large car with a neck that stretched to the height of a one-story building. Its long, sleek body was covered in red scales over ropes of taut muscles. Sunlight glistened on the creatures back, glinting into Cassie’s eyes. It was almost mesmerizing.
She realized she’d been so awestruck by the creature that she’d stood silent in that spot for far too long, and the creature was on the move.
She didn’t have her guns or a sword. Her reflexes finally responded, and she dropped the plate to run back to the convoy in the parking lot.
“Where’s the plate?” asked Meredith as Cassie ran past.
“Rafe!” Cassie screamed as she reached the car where her guns were stored. He was sitting in the front seat with the motor already running, listening to the Beastie Boys again. “What’s wrong? Why are you getting your guns out?”
“There’s… a… It’s a dragon!”
“Oh shit.” Rafe twisted around out the driver’s side door and screamed at the convoy behind him. “Haul ass. Now!” Selina and Clark were already in the car. Meredith jumped into the car with most of the food inside it. All five SUVs rumbled to life and Rafe peeled out of the parking lot just as the dragon broke through the trees.
Its lumbering body bashed a picnic table, sending it flying against a tree to break into splinters. Cassie gasped. The beast was just feet behind the last car, which housed half their food supplies. It sprinted after the speeding SUV, snapping its jaws at the back bumper.
Rafe stepped on the gas, charging down the narrow mountain highway at seventy miles an hour. The rest of the cars zoomed after him. They took a turn at full speed. Cassie clutched the door handle, and her throat clenched closed as they barely kept from tipping over a hundred-foot drop into nothing.
The dragon hefted its body aloft, beating its muscular wings. It overtook the last car in their convoy from the air. Opening its mouth, it let out a hot stream of fire, roasting the roof of the SUV.
Cassie screamed as she watched, cupping her hand over her mouth. The smell of sulfur and burning meat reached even to the front of the convoy. She pulled her guns out of her bag and rolled down the window.
“What are you doing?” Rafe yelled.
“I’m going to take this fucker out.”
“You can’t. Their scales are like steel. Bullets don’t penetrate. They’re almost invulnerable,” said Clark blankly.
“They must have a weakness,” Cassie pleaded. She could hear gunshots behind her and see bullets bouncing off the dragon’s hide.
“Just under the jaw. The skin is softer and thinner there. If you can hit that, you might have a chance.”
Cassie leaned out the window and propped herself on the window frame, gripping the top of the SUV with one hand. With the other hand, she gripped her Glock, aiming at the giant monster.
It let another spurt of flames loose on the SUV at the end of the convoy. Cassie swore, trying to aim at the moving target inside the moving vehicle with wind whipping at her as she clung to the side of the car.
The dragon pulled back, as if readying itself for another attack. She saw her opening, letting bullets fly. Her first shot hit just shy of her target, only making the dragon angrier. It beat its wings trying to get to her. It opened its massive jaws to let fire bloom from within. Cassie regrouped and shot into the beast’s mouth.
It reared back, sputtering and wheezing. It flapped its wings hard, trying to stay aloft, but it soon plummeted from the sky. The convoy sped onward as fast as it could, but the car at the back of the line couldn’t get out of the way fast enough. The dragon’s heavy body smashed through the roof.
The car veered hard to the left, crashing into the stone mountain wall. All the other cars stopped. Neil ran toward the crashed vehicle to check if anyone was still alive. Meredith stumbled out of the passenger seat, limping toward Neil who caught her in his arms.
Rafe ran to the crashed car with Cassie not far behind. The dying dragon let out a warning puff of fire. Before anyone could do anything, the flame ignited a gas leak, and the SUV exploded into a burning inferno.
Cassie stopped in her tracks, watching the scene before her with stunned shock. She still gripped her Glocks in her hands.
“There were two good wolves in there,” Neil said through clenched teeth. “Warriors. Friends.”
“And the majority of our food supplies,” said Rafe.
The smell of roasting meat and burning oil hung on the hot air. What was left of the pack stumbled back to their cars. Only thirteen remained. They had been twenty just days ago.
They drove down the mountain in total silence. No one said what was on all of their minds. They blamed Cassie for this. They blamed her for bringing the Pyramid Corporation soldiers down on them. They blamed her for having to leave their comfortable home. She knew it. She could feel their rage and growing hatred. It made her want to cry and vomit and run away.
She gripped her guns in her lap. She would never let her weapons out of her sight again.
Chapter Eighteen
As night fell, they found a place to camp in an abandoned house near a small town at the base of the mountain. The house had been raided long ago, but it was shelter from the elements.
Meredith and Steven made a fire in the backyard and boiled water to make a big pot of pasta. Selina and Neil went off to find game but came back with only a squirrel and a rabbit. For a party of thirteen, it wasn’t much.
They gathered around the cook fire and ate their meal in silence. Cassie could feel the growing panic of the pack. They’d lost a good portion of their number, people who had been family since the war. They’d lost their home, and now they had only half of their food provisions.
Cassie sat alone and didn’t bother trying to be close to Rafe. S
he didn’t want to be close to anyone right now. She sat on the cold ground with her guns right beside her as she ate.
Night fell, and a few oil lamps were lit. The pack filtered inside the house and laid out their blankets on the large carpeted living room floor. Cassie crawled inside her own blanket with her guns tucked under the edge and fell into a deep dreamless sleep.
In the morning, she woke with a start to the sound of silence. Something was wrong. Terribly wrong. She gripped her guns and tiptoed past the sleeping pack to the backyard. She’d slept fully dressed in her boots and all, so when she stepped out onto the dewy lawn, her body was prepared for the cold.
Her mind was not prepared for the sight overhead. No matter how many times she saw it, her brain just couldn’t accept it as real. The disk-shaped, domed spacecraft hovered over the town. A low hum, almost below the range of human hearing, vibrated through her body.
They were following her. She knew it. They wanted her back. They wanted her womb for their disgusting breeding program. She would die before she let them take her back.
For an instant, she gripped her gun and considered putting a bullet in her own brain. That would end this, and they would stop following the pack. She raised the gun to chest level and gazed at it. She couldn’t do it. She wanted revenge. She wanted to make them pay. Her anger burned brighter than her sadness or fear. This wasn’t over. Not by a long shot.
She marched into the house to rouse the pack.
“Hey, everyone. Wake up. There is an alien spacecraft hovering over the town. We need to either get out of here or get deep underground. Being underground worked for me before. I don’t think they can sense us through the dirt or something.”
The pack sat up on their elbows and rubbed their eyes, trying to understand what she was talking about. Rafe was the first to stand and begin searching the house for a basement. Neil was not far behind, and they found a door downstairs within a minute.