Was this guy being legit? And rounds? What was this, some kind of boxing match?
“Seriously?” I said finally.
“Of course,” he answered with his hands out. “I’ve no wish to destroy you unless you are at your best, for you are correct in that it would prove nothing.”
“Well, okay then.”
Then he stopped and gave me a hard stare.
“I expect your best, Mr. Dex,” he pointed out. “Anything less will make the death of your friends very unpleasant indeed.”
“Fine,” I said, recognizing that I probably wasn’t going to survive. The least I could do was give a quick death to the others with me.
“Good,” he answered with a nod. “Now, if you look straight up, you will find your lovely Rachel Cress as well.”
There she was, in a cage that was hanging over the arena.
She was staring down at me with angry eyes.
“Rachel,” I stammered.
“Idiot,” she replied.
Chapter 19
Well, that was gratitude for you. Here I was coming all the way to London, leaving my Vegas crew behind so I could help my former partner get free from the binds of a bunch of werewolves, and she was calling me an idiot.
“What the hell?” I said.
“You’re a moron,” she declared. “This entire thing has been a trap to get you here.”
“Obviously.”
“And yet you did it anyway?”
“You’re my partner, Rachel.”
“Ex-partner,” Leland started loudly, but he significantly quieted as all the wolves turned to look at him. “Sorry.”
“And what good is that going to do me when this guy comes at you?” She spat as she pointed at Rex. “I’ve seen his speed, Ian. You can’t match his speed.”
She was clearly homing in on that word.
“He’s fast, eh?” I sought to clarify.
“Very,” she answered. “You’ll have to move with Haste to even have a chance at him.”
“I got it, I got it,” I said through the connector, thinking that it would make more sense to speak with her in private.
It was dead, though.
“Rachel, you there?”
Nothing.
Great, they’d somehow made it impossible for me to talk with her. I knew my connector was fine because I’d been speaking with Harvey, but I couldn’t get through to Rachel.
Maybe I could use Harvey as a relay.
“Hey,” I connected to him, “can you reach Rachel from where you are?”
“Sure.” He then called out, “Hey, Rachel, it’s me, Harvey!”
“Uh…hi,” she said in response.
“I’m talking about through your connector, Harvey,” I groaned.
“Oh, sorry.” A moment later he added, “Nah, it’s dead. I got an idea, though. One second.”
I began stretching as Rex did the same.
“Just checked with Leland and Lydia, Chief. Nobody can get to her.”
“Damn it,” I replied. “All right. Well, while I’m fighting this guy, do your best to come up with something to get you guys out of here.”
“Like what?”
I glared at him. “How the hell do I know? Just think, will you?”
“Right, right. Sorry, Chief.”
Here I was about to have my body torn in two by the biggest werewolf known to man, and Harvey was asking me to brainstorm with him regarding ideas on how to get out of this mess.
“You have one minute to prepare, Mr. Dex,” Rex stated as he walked back to his side of the ring. “Do choose your skill carefully. I would truly hate for this to be too simple of a fight.”
I didn’t reply.
There was no point.
Rachel had given me a hint. I would go with what she’d suggested. She’d been around him a lot more than I had, after all.
I calmed my mind as best as I could and slowed my breathing.
Rachel had suggested I employ Haste, so that’s what I was going to do.
If I made it out of this round, I’d have to choose something else next. I couldn’t use any skill in succession, not without quite a delay between them anyway, so I’d have to pick wisely.
Time, my mind said.
That was probably going to be one I’d have to use. Flashes, too, no doubt.
But I had to be careful because I only had one Time left. Of course, using it was better than dying.
The one good thing about those particular spells, or skills—or whatever the hell they were, was that they didn’t take anything but a stated thought to launch them. They made me a little wobbly, of course, except for Sniff, but I really saw no need to employ that one at the moment.
I focused again until Haste took over.
It was time to fight.
Chapter 20
Haste was engaged and I was ready to fight, but I learned real quick that Rachel was correct in her assessment regarding Rex the uberwolf.
This dude made Haste nothing but an even playing field.
He smiled in his wolfish way.
“I know about your various skills, Mr. Dex,” he gloated, “and I fully expected that your first selection would be Haste.”
Fighting to get the upper hand, I replied, “Well, Rachel did just suggest it pretty heavily.”
“Ah,” he said, inclining his head, “I was wondering why she was speaking certain words with so much emphasis.”
I glanced up at Rachel to see a slow smirk forming on her face. I thought the word “idiot” for her.
“Okay, so we’re the same speed now and I have no weapons.”
“Very astute observation, Mr. Dex.”
“Still not much of a fair fight then, is it?” I said, seeking to make him question the validity of this battle.
He moved in closer and we began to circle around each other. I was seeking out weak points on his person, but I couldn’t spot anything obvious. The dude was just a brick wall of muscle and fangs.
“I’ll let you in on a little secret,” he whispered menacingly. “You have no chance of beating me even if all things were even. I’m merely leveling the playing field as best as I can so that my flock will be pleased.”
“Kind of cowardly for a wolf, no?”
His eye twitched. “What would you have me do, Mr. Dex, tie one arm behind my back?”
“It’s a start.”
“And you’d still be no match for me.” He gripped and released his hands a few times. “The fact is that nobody can match my ability.”
“Sure are confident in yourself.”
“Supremely,” he affirmed. “Now, what say we get on with this charade?”
My adrenaline was on the rise, Haste was engaged, and my pants were preparing to be filled with shit. This made the nine levels feel like a trip to Disney World.
“Okidoki,” I said casually, “but one last thing?”
He rolled his eyes. “Go on.”
“Your second in command,” I said, pointing behind him, “is she supposed to be pointing a gun at you?”
“What?”
The moment he spun, I leaped onto his back and got him in a rear naked choke, wrapping my legs around his chest and locking my ankles.
He grabbed at my arms to try and free himself, but it was abundantly obvious that he wasn’t prepared for the level of strength I had as an amalgamite.
I squeezed as hard as I could.
Using a line from a poem I’d recently heard, I hollered, “Die, fucker, die!”
Unfortunately, Rex had other plans.
He must have recognized that there was no easy way out of this and so he grabbed my ankles instead of my arms, dislodging their connection to each other. I tried to swing them back together, but by now he had yanked one of my free legs so hard that I thought certain it was going to pull right out of my hip joint.
I grunted and released my kung-fu grip.
“Fuck,” I said as I landed on the ground and rolled away, jumping back to my feet with
a wobble.
My right leg was tingling, but it’d heal soon enough.
Rex, on the other hand, was grabbing at his throat and choking.
There was no time to waste.
I took a page out of a Jean-Claude Van Damme movie and jumped up with a spinning kick. My leg was still tingling, but I didn’t need it to be one hundred percent to do its job.
My foot tagged Rex right on the cheek and he stumbled backward.
It felt like I had just kicked granite.
He stopped, shook his head for a moment, and then spit out a fang.
Even if I died right here, at least I’d go knowing that he’d be dealing with some major dental work due to fighting me.
I backed away.
Far away.
He glared at me angrily for a few moments as rage welled up in his red eyes.
Then, with a massive roar, Rex flexed every muscle in his body and charged.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” was all I could say before he launched himself at me.
If I hadn’t had Haste engaged, I would have ended up being torn in half by the speed at which he was flying. His mass alone would have ended me. As it was, I was able to fall straight down and let him sail directly overhead.
Mostly.
His massive paw, hand, or whatever the hell it was, reached out just in time to knock the living shit out of me.
I’ve never been hit so hard in my life.
Seriously, I was even hearing the chirping of little birds.
But this was no time for pain or concussions—assuming I wanted to live, anyway. The way I was feeling, that would have taken a little contemplation, so I just went with wanting to live and moved on with things.
I got back to my feet and spun back to see two Rexes standing there.
It took me a second to realize that this was just because my vision was seriously messed up from that hit.
“Wait, wait, wait,” I said, holding up my hands. All four of them. “You have something in your fur.”
“I’m not falling for that again, Mr. Dex,” he replied as he pulled back his hand and swiped at me.
I ducked.
He swung again.
I ducked again.
He faked a swing.
I ducked.
He finished his swing, clipping my shoulder this time.
I flew.
He laughed heartily and then stalked over to where I’d landed.
My head was ringing, my leg was tingling, my vision was fighting to right itself, and now my shoulder throbbed like hell. And this was only the first round!
As he hovered over me and drooled his vileness on my suit, I had the feeling there wasn’t going to be a second round.
“And now I will literally bite your head off,” he said with a sinisterness that should have been reserved for demons, and maybe dragons. “Any last words?”
“Could you brush your teeth first?” I requested flatly. “Or at least use some mouthwash?”
His eyes narrowed and in a flash he pulled back, cracked opened his wide jaw, and lunged.
I closed my eyes and waited to feel the embrace of darkness.
Ding ding ding!
He stopped.
“Shit,” he groaned, his teeth touching the sides of my skull.
I opened one eye as he pulled away.
“What?” I asked, barely able to talk.
He pushed himself back to full height. “Round’s over, Mr. Dex. But in the next round, you die.”
“Oh, that’s good.”
Chapter 21
True to his word, Rex waited for me to fully recover, which included some kind of elixir that brought me back to full health and power.
My body was no longer aching and my vision was clear. I still had a bit of a headache, but something told me that was going to be there for a while. Rex had quite a wallop, after all.
“Any ideas?” I called up to Rachel in as quiet a voice as I could manage.
“Why are you trying to keep quiet?”
“Because I don’t want him to hear us,” I answered. “Duh.”
“Seeing as how you told him that I was coaching you before,” she chided, “it’s not like he’ll be surprised by anything I say.”
“True.” I then played back the words Rex had said to me while we were facing each other before the last round got underway. “He apparently knows everything about me anyway.”
“Why don’t you just get the hell out of here?” she suggested. “You know I hate playing the part of damsel in distress. It’s such a misogynistic view of women.” She crossed her arms in standard Rachel fashion. “I don’t need some damn man to fight my battles.”
I knew how she felt about such things, and she was right to feel the way she did. But this situation was different than she was playing it out to be. The wolves didn’t kidnap her because they were trying to do the old “prince saving the princess” bit. They wanted to get to me no matter what. If Rachel’s name had been Irving, and she’d been a six-foot-four vampire who was covered in tattoos and body piercings, they still would have stuck his ass in that cage to use as bait.
But Rachel wouldn’t see it that way, no matter how I tried to position it.
“Would you rather be down here fighting him while I was up there in the cage?” I asked pointedly.
“Yes.”
I should have expected that.
“Well, me too,” I concurred, though that wasn’t really true, “but that’s not how it is, so deal with it.”
“Then just let me die.”
Knowing Rachel, she meant it. Her pride was worth quite a bit more to her than her life. I didn’t know if that stubbornness was a Cress family trait or not, but I found it less than beneficial at times.
“And Harvey and Leland, too?” I said with accusing eyes. “You’re all right with that, also?”
She cursed under her breath. “Nobody asked you to bring them here.”
That was true, and frankly I would have been much happier during this entire mission if I’d not brought them along. So far they’d done little but get in my way, test my every last nerve, and pal around like a couple of long-lost friends.
“Look,” I said firmly, “I’m not going to leave, so you either help me out or all four of us die.”
The angst on her face was monumental.
I missed seeing that look.
“Use Time,” she mouthed, keeping her face taut.
“But I only have one more use of that.”
“So?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” I said, blinking. “What if we need it at some point in the future?”
In response, Rachel pointed across the ring at Rex the uberwolf. Then she raised her eyebrows in an “are you fucking kidding me?” fashion.
She was right, of course, but…
“Do you have any other suggestions?” I pleaded.
“Suicide?”
“Wait,” I said as a smile grew on my face. “You said you’d rather be down here fighting than me doing it, right?”
She squinted. “Yes.”
“Then let’s go with that.”
“Slight problem with that plan, Einstein,” she said in a rather pedantic tone. “I’m not sure if you’ve noticed or not, but I’m kind of stuck in a cage hanging over the arena.”
It was my turn to point out her stupidity. Thoese moments were rare, so I quite relished them.
“Not if I Channel you.”
Her look changed from sour to impressed. So you know, that, too, was a rarity.
I hadn't used Channel in a long time. It was one of the first skills I'd discovered. The problem with it was that not many people liked having themselves channeled through me. But in this instance, there wasn't much choice.
“It’s a solid idea,” she stated with a nod, “but the only way you can do that is if we touch or if you can get through to my connector.”
“Damn it,” I said. “Forgot about that.”
“But it gives me an idea,” she sa
id as she tapped on the metal bar of her cage. “You could use Harvey’s strength, if he’ll let you.”
A slow smile crept upon my face as I began to nod.
It wouldn’t be nearly as effective as using Rachel’s magical capabilities, but it’d make me easily double as strong as I was normally. There was still the problem of dealing with Rex’s speed, since Haste was out of the picture now.
Still, it was better than nothing.
“Harvey,” I said through the connector as I closed my eyes, “I’m going to need to channel your strength in order to fight in round two. Are you cool with that?”
“Do whatever you gotta do, Chief,” he answered. “We all die if you lose anyway, right?”
“Yes.”
“One question, though,” he asked with a voice that seemed to quiver, “is it gonna hurt?”
“Only if he hits me or bites me or whatever.”
“Huh?”
“I’m not just channeling your strength, Harvey,” I said, “it’ll be like we’ve merged.”
“That sounds creepy.”
“It’s not a sexual thing, you weirdo.”
“I never said it was, Chief,” he commented. “I just meant that it was creepy because we’d be occupying the same head.”
“Ah, sorry.” I coughed. “Anyway, you’ll be in my head as a bystander. You won’t have any control, but you’ll feel what I feel and I’ll have access to all of your strength in addition to my own.”
I glanced over at him and he nodded, but he didn’t look like he was all that interested in playing. To his point, though, it was either this or certain death. At least this would give us all a chance at round three.
“And you have to keep silent, no matter how bad it hurts.”
“Why?”
“Because we can’t let him know that I’m using your strength or he’ll just destroy me with speed.”
“Got it, Chief,” Harvey agreed stoically. “I’m ready.”
I closed my eyes and reached out.
The Ian Dex Supernatural Thriller Series: Books 1 - 4 (Las Vegas Paranormal Police Department Box Sets) Page 55