“You do realize that they’re military personnel, right? We’re basically declaring war on our own military.”
“Negative, Mr. Ingram. We’re destroying monsters. Monsters that live and breathe and kill and destroy on United States soil.” Jameson poked the top of his desk for emphasis.
“It’s still outside our purview. We have no Constitutional authority to—”
“Don’t you start preaching the Constitution to me, sir!” He was on his feet now, his face turning red. “The framers had no idea of the types of monsters we have to face today. And when I say monsters, I mean actual, honest to God monsters.”
“I know what you mean, Director.” Ingram’s voice dropped to a quiet whisper. “Preaching to the choir, remember? I’m just saying that it’s going to look, to an outsider, like we have declared war on our own military.”
Jameson shook his head. “To traitors. That’s all, Ingram. Any man that could allow himself to be turned into…” He shook his head as he paced behind his desk. “They’re traitors to the human race.”
“And what are we?” Ingram stood, his eyes imploring. “We’ve taken good men and turned them into automatons.”
“They’re soldiers!” Jameson pounded his desk. “They still eat and drink and piss and fuck and think!”
“Do they?” Ingram sat back down, a slow smile crossing his face. “Do they really? When they’re not training or in the field, where are they? Plugged into the neural net. Software updates, training protocols, tweaks to their hardware.”
“All necessary to create the best soldier possible.” Jameson crossed his arms and glared at the smaller man. “Don’t tell me you’re having second thoughts about this now?”
“No, of course not. The Gladiator Project is a necessary evil.”
“Evil?” Jameson sat down, his eyes glaring at Ingram. “Evil, you say?”
“Well, yeah. I mean, what we’ve done to those men…”
“They volunteered for this program.”
“They had no idea what they were volunteering for.”
Jameson leaned back again and shook his head. “No? To be made faster, stronger, smarter, more adept at killing the enemy? To be made better. Isn’t that what we’ve done?”
“We ripped out their soul!”
“Soldiers don’t have that luxury!” Jameson pounded his desk again. “Besides, they can have that back when they’re dead!”
“We deserve worse than jail, Jameson. We’re going to burn in Hell. You know that, right?”
Jameson smiled and it didn’t reach his eyes, sending a cold chill up Ingram’s spine. “That’s fine with me, old boy. As long as we can rid the world of monsters before we do it.”
7
“Immortal my ass!” Mitchell stormed to his door and quickly turned the lock, barring any further interruption. “When did all this nonsense start?”
Mark stared at him with wide eyes. “When do you think? Shortly after I was infected by both the vampire and the wolf viruses.” He shrugged as if it should make perfect sense. “Hey, I didn’t exactly see it coming, but it’s here. It is what it is and there’s no sense in getting bent about it.”
“No sense in getting bent about it?” Matt crossed his arms and glared at the man. “You can’t feel pain and you heal faster than a vampire on a blood binge, and you don’t find that the slightest bit out of sorts?”
“Oh, hell yeah.” Mark was on his feet, his hands moving as he spoke. “I find it all kinds of out of sorts, but there isn’t much that can be done about it, now is there?”
“We can do some testing and see if—”
“And see what?” Mark interrupted. “Matt, even Doc isn’t weirded out by this. There simply isn’t anything to go by, nothing to compare it to. We have no idea what should or shouldn’t be happening right now because it’s never happened before in history.” He fell back into his chair and sighed heavily. “At least, not that we know of.”
“What does that mean? Are you saying it could have happened before?” Mitchell worked his way slowly back behind his desk and eyed his friend carefully.
Mark shrugged. “I have no idea. I can only give you the canned answers that everybody else has been telling me. When those canned answers all proved to be wrong…hell, I don’t know. It just seems to me that history covers a pretty long time. For someone to tell me that it ain’t never happened before? I have trouble swallowing it.”
Mitchell leaned back in his chair and studied him. “Who would know?”
Mark shrugged again. “Beats me. I doubt that even the Sicarii would know. I’m sure if he got wind of something like me, he’d call it an abomination and have it destroyed.”
Mitchell snapped his fingers. “The griffin might. He’s been around for a long time. He’s supposed to be a bookworm geek or some such.”
Mark gave him a cautious stare. “I guess it couldn’t hurt to go talk to the bird brain.”
“I’d be a bit nicer if you do.”
“Hey, tact is my middle name.” Mark was on his feet and headed to the door. “Any idea where lion butt is calling home?”
Mitchell shook his head. “He and Doc set up a staging area for Jack’s team. Doc can show you.”
Mark scratched at his chin. “I wonder if I’d do better to bring bird seed or kitty chow?” He slipped through the door and pulled it shut before Mitchell could yell at him again.
*****
Jack pulled the trolley cart out of the staging area with the two crates of suicide vests firmly strapped to it. Doc had ensured that each vest was made safe before they were repackaged into the crates and samples of the two part explosives were taken for analysis. Doc swore that they could be incinerated as they sat since the explosives hadn’t been combined yet, but he truly doubted that any of the techs would want to volunteer to toss them into the incinerator. He’d have to make a call to the EOD unit and have them take care of it when they could.
As the doors to the freight elevator opened, Jack was nearly run over by Major Tufo. “Major, you seem to be in a bit of a hurry.”
“Where’s your team, Chief?”
“Pretty much scattered right now. We’re taking a break and I’m hauling off…”
“Where’s the griffin?” Mark interrupted.
Jack gave him a questioning look. “Allister? He’s still down below last I saw. He was going over everything we had collected at Lilith’s hideout.”
“I need to speak with him.” Mark pushed past him and squeezed past the crates. “It’s sort of important.”
“Is something wrong?” Jack held the door to the elevator as Mark reached for the button.
“What? No, I’m just hoping he can help me with a…a personal issue.” Mark pressed the button again and watched as the doors shut.
When the freight elevator stopped, Mark was facing the wrong direction. He turned and stepped into what appeared to be an oversized conference room. The lights were dim, but he could easily make out every detail. As Jack had stated, the griffin was seated next to the table going over a stack of crumpled and burnt papers.
The large creature shifted one of its dark eyes toward him as he slowly entered the room then turned his feathered face to meet his gaze. “You smell…different. What are you?”
Mark paused and gave him a curious smile. “I’m Major Tufo. I’m the Executive Officer here.”
“Very well. But what are you?” Allister cocked his head as he stared at the man.
Mark sighed and his shoulders slumped. “I was actually hoping you might be able to help me with that.”
Allister stepped away from the table and slowly approached him. His head cocked side to side as he assessed the man before him. “You smell of both wolf and vampire, yet you are neither.”
“Or I’m both.” Mark shrugged. “That’s what we’re trying to decide.”
“Curious.” Allister sat directly in front of Mark and for the first time, the sheer mass of the griffin struck him.
“You’re huge.” Tufo hadn�
�t realized he had spoken aloud as he stared at the large lion body before him.
“Yes, my mass increased considerably once I was transformed.” Allister raised a front leg and carefully took Tufo’s arm. “You are warm and your heart beats, yet, your eyes betray your vampire roots.”
“My eyes?”
“I see in spectrums that you cannot. You can see in the dark, can’t you?”
Mark nodded. “But wolves can see well in the dark, too.”
“Not as well as vampires. They are truly creatures of the night.” Allister pulled his arm closer and held out one of his claws. “This may hurt.” He punctured Mark’s arm, but he didn’t wince.
“Yeah…no. Not really. Doc says unless it’s really life threatening, I won’t feel pain.” He watched as the puncture healed, leaving a small point of blood.
Allister held the blood covered claw to his nose and inhaled deeply. “Smells of wolf,” he snorted and wiped the claw clean. “And vampire.”
“So, I guess you’ve never heard of anybody being infected by both before, huh?” Mark leaned against the table and squeezed his eyes shut.
“Heard of? Yes. Met? No.” Allister walked slowly back to where he was sitting when Mark first came in. “There was a reference to a man attacked by a wolf and a vampire on the same night. He reportedly became as you are now.”
Mark’s head snapped up. “Who? When? What happened to him?”
Allister shook his beaked head. “It was a story written many centuries ago. A young Romanian man…I don’t recall his name ever being mentioned. Reportedly, he recovered from his attacks very quickly and the people of his village feared him. They banished him.”
“What happened to him?” Mark stared at the griffin as he waited for an answer.
“He was attacked by a vampire and left for dead. A wolf supposedly interrupted the kill and came in to finish him off—”
“No! I mean after he was banished.”
Allister stared at him with wide eyes. “There is no record. This was all part of the verbal history of the village that was written down centuries later once writing became available to them. I’m afraid the rest is lost to history.”
Mark sighed and leaned against the table again. “I was just hoping for some kind of answers.”
“Be happy that you were infected by both and still live. Had it been simply a vampire, you would have died first and…” he trailed off.
“And what?”
“And living without a soul is not truly living.”
*****
Derek broke through the edge of the woods and began marching back towards the house. Laura saw him from the kitchen and slipped out the back door while Crystal was laying down, doing her best to rest from the lack of sleep the night before. She rushed to meet her brother and could tell from the look on his face that his hunt was unsuccessful. “Nothing?”
“Not even a hint of a trail. Are you sure he went this way?”
“Yes, I watched him. He went right through there and just…” Laura’s shoulders slumped as she realized that, if her father didn’t want to be found, he wouldn’t be.
“Look, Punk, I was thinking. If Dad doesn’t want to take that other shot, there’s only one thing we can do.”
“Don’t say to let him skip it.” She squared her shoulders and glared at him.
“No, of course not.” Derek rubbed at the back of his neck as he tried to think of a nice way to say what he had in mind. “I’m thinking a tranq gun. We could borrow one from the vet. It should hold 250CCs. We load it up, and we hunt him down. Bring in dogs if we need to. Track him down, shoot him up, let nature take its course.”
Laura felt her breath catch in her throat as she considered his idea. “If you miss, there’s no second chance. There’s only 250CCs in the bottle.”
“You think I don’t know that? It’s a one-and-done type of thing, right?” Derek sighed heavily and glanced back at the woods. “But as it stands, Dad’s not going to come back and say, ‘hey, I’ve had a chance to think about it. Go ahead and give me the shot’ now is he?”
Laura shook her head. “No. Not in this mindset he isn’t.” She pulled Derek to her and hugged him tightly. “Be quick, though, we don’t have much time.”
Derek took off toward the house then turned to her, “If I’m not back by dark, call Jimmy and have him bring his Redbone hounds.”
“You just be back by dark.” She watched him jog toward the house and, moments later, heard her father’s truck start and pull out of the garage. She turned toward the woods and stared into the darkening shadows. “Daddy…where are you?”
*****
Doctor Peters turned at the light knocking and froze in place. His eyes narrowed on Rufus standing on the steps leading up to the acrylic walled laboratory. “I didn’t realize you were back.”
“Apologies, Doctor. I didn’t mean to startle you.”
Evan hurriedly stacked his notebooks and placed them in a far corner. “You’ll forgive me if I don’t exactly trust you again, Monsieur Thorn.”
Rufus exhaled hard and nodded. “I understand completely, and it is exactly why I wished to speak with you in hopes of explaining my actions. I could never expect forgiveness for such a betrayal, but if you could be made to understand why I did such a thing…”
Evan held his hands up, cutting him off. “No need to explain megalomania to me. I work with souped-up commandos on a daily basis.”
Rufus allowed the jab and gave him a curt nod. “It may appear as a form of megalomania to the uninformed, but I assure you, it was necessary. In my day-to-day to life I encounter many who would just as soon kill or destroy not just myself, but any who get in their way.”
“And you think that gives you the right to create a Doomsday Weapon?” Evan nearly screamed as he stepped toward the other vampire. “You have no idea the totality of that kind of destruction.”
“Which is why I had it re-engineered by some of the best.”
“You what?!” Evan’s eyes widened with shock. “You allowed others to study that weapon?” He began to hyperventilate and stumbled to a chair.
“I assure you, doctor, they are most trustworthy.” Rufus stepped forward, and Evan held his hand out, holding him back.
“No. You have no idea.” He gulped air and turned his ashen face toward him. “If that technology ever gets out, there could be no stopping someone hell-bent on destroying any natural born creature. Be it elf, wolf, vampire…any of them!”
“Doctor, it will not happen.” Rufus paused and leaned against the doorway. “Besides, the miniaturized version was nothing more than a bomb. It nearly killed me when I tried to use it.”
Evan turned hate filled eyes toward him and shook his head. “The very fact that you would even attempt such a thing…knowing the possibilities.” He felt his fangs descend despite the fact that he knew he was no match for Thorn. “Get out! If I ever see you again…I’ll…I’ll…I still have the Holy relics and I will use them!”
Rufus stared after him for a moment longer then gave him a curt nod. “As you wish.” He turned to leave and then paused. He barely turned his head as he spoke to Evan. “It was never my intent to use the weapon against a natural born creature. I wished only to use it upon the demon witch Lilith. Had I not been backed into a cor—”
“Get out!” Evan threw a stapler at his general direction, watching it break against the door frame.
Rufus stepped down from the lab, his shoulders slumped. Evan watched as the vampire disappeared into the shadows and wished that he actually had the nerve to stand against the monster that had just darkened his door. He knew that, if he tried, one wave of his power could knock him to his feet. He shook with rage as the feeling of being powerless overtook him.
*****
Kalen paused outside of Brooke’s room and raised his hand to knock lightly on her door. A reflection caught his eye and he quickly lowered his arm, his hand covering the bracelet on his wrist. He felt his face flush with embarrassment
as he raised his hand and saw the stone glowing. The Wyldwood beckoned.
Kalen slipped into his room and lowered the lights. He gazed into the stone and Loren’s face came into view. “You called, Wyldwood?”
“Have you found signs of the demon queen?”
Kalen shook his head. “No, she has disappeared. There is the possibility that she was injured greatly in the explosion and may not be able to continue her…”
“No.” Loren interrupted. “The elders have seen her attempts to finish what she has started. She will also attempt to attack the capitol building of the United States. You need to warn Chief Jack so that he can prepare for her.”
“It shall be done.” He turned to rise then looked back to the stone. “Is there more, Wyldwood?”
He watched her glance both directions before lowering her voice. “Yes. Be careful, Kalen. A wound in battle may heal, but a broken heart sometimes never mends.”
Kalen felt a lump in his throat as he stared at her image. “I-I’m afraid I do not understand, Wyldwood.”
Her face softened slightly, and she gave him a smile. “I believe that you do. It is one thing to trust your heart. It is another to give in completely. Just, be careful, young one. Some loves simply cannot be.”
Kalen knew then that his secret was known. “You have been watching me?”
She chuckled slightly and shook her head. “No, my sweet one, I have seen it in my visions.” She sighed, and he could see the sadness in her eyes. “Just know that the one you give your heart to can never be a part of our world. She can never enter the Anywhere. As long as the two of you are together, you cannot return home.”
Kalen felt a knot grow in his stomach and he felt his head shaking in protest. “But I do not understand, Wyldwood. If she becomes my mate, then surely—”
“She is of the undead, Kalen. She can never enter our world. Vampires cannot be allowed to exist here. They are forbidden.” Her face hardened slightly and she squared her shoulders. “Remember your history, my child.”
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