Prisoner (Werewolf Marines) (5 page)

A blast of heat hit him in the face,
staggering him. There was no green, no new leaves or cut grass,
only white sunlight glaring off pale sand.

Afghanistan?

DJ had no time to waste wondering. He could
run faster as a wolf, so he transformed and took off into the
desert.

To his confusion, the scent of green rose up
behind
him. But this time he was close enough to catch an
underlying tang of sweat. It wasn’t a landscape, but the scent of
the woman he’d fought.

That was strange. Normally people’s scents
were instantly recognizable as belonging to people, no matter how
closely they resembled other smells. He’d never mistaken his
grandmother’s scent of sun-warmed steel for actual metal, or his
brother’s spicy scent for real nutmeg.

Lechon wondered if the mystery woman’s odd
scent had to do with what she was. A
plant
shifter?

He’d never heard of such a thing, but it
could be possible. Grandma Steel said that there were hundreds,
maybe thousands, of different types of shifters in the world, most
much rarer than wolves. And like wolves, they kept to themselves.
Lechon had only met two in his entire life, a coyote and a
binturong.

He glanced backward. The secret lab was
cleverly disguised as a rock formation, and seemed to be mostly
underground. No one was chasing him— yet— but he probably didn’t
have much time before they did. Luckily, the air was so dry that
scents would be hard to track, and the ground was either rock-hard
clay or sand that fell in once his paws lifted, hiding his
footprints.

The desert was marked by shallow canyons, low
hills, and stark rock formations. He made for the canyons, where he
wouldn’t be visible from above. They intersected with each other,
forming a maze where he could lose his pursuers. Lechon scrambled
into the nearest one. It was narrow, lined with gravel and sand,
and had walls of streaky stone.

He saw and scented dry weeds as he raced
through the canyons, but never any water. The only animals were
beetles that smelled oily or acidic, and the occasional lizard
scuttling too high above his head to catch. The heat was intense.
He panted to cool himself off, his tongue lolling, but it wasn’t
enough to make up for the sun beating down on his thick fur. This
was no place for a wolf.

He became a man again. To his alarm, once he
was on two feet, he staggered, his vision blurring. DJ felt so
shaky and sick that he had to sit down and put his head between his
knees. Pain flashed through his head in rhythm with his heartbeat.
He was terribly thirsty.

“Heat exhaustion,” he muttered.
“Goddammit.”

He’d run long and fast enough to evade
pursuit, but he’d paid a price for it. All the fighting he’d done
at full strength probably hadn’t helped, either.

DJ had seen guys fall out from heat
exhaustion, though he’d never done so himself, and knew the drill:
get them out of the sun and have them rest, cool them off with wet
cloths and cold packs, and give them water or Gatorade in small
sips.

If he went back to the lab, they’d
undoubtedly be happy to do all that for him, probably complete with
interesting experimental drugs in the Gatorade.

He pressed himself into a scrap of shade. The
dry heat seemed to suck the moisture from his body, as if he was
sitting inside an oven. Lechon had burned his paws on the hot sand,
so DJ’s palms and soles were burned too. He examined them, then
checked his side. His scar had opened up and bled, but only a
little. He pulled his shirt down and put it out of his mind.

Without moving from the shade, DJ looked for
a twig. There were none to be seen, but he found a stiff bit of
weed that would work. He stuck it into sunlit sand and marked the
end of its shadow with a pebble, then sat back to figure out his
options while he waited for the shadow to move and tell him which
way was west.

The landscape looked more like the American
southwest than Afghanistan, with its thorny weeds, gnarled rock
formations, and orange-pink stone. If he was near the coast and he
headed west, he’d probably hit civilization, or at least a gas
station, before too long. Or he could drop dead before he hit
anything. It took three days to die of thirst, but heat stroke
could kill you in a matter of hours.

Still, he’d rather chance the desert than
turn around and go back. He’d never entirely believed in the
stories of secret government labs that performed sadistic
experiments on shifters, given that it was always a friend of a
cousin’s girlfriend’s sister who’d escaped to tell the tale, but
they’d scared the hell out him when he was a little kid. And now he
knew they were real.

On the other hand, people
had
escaped.
If he retraced his steps and let them re-capture him, maybe he’d
get a better chance later. At the very least, he’d know to bring
water and a hat. Shoes would be good, too.

While he waited, he tried to figure out what
would be best for Roy. DJ couldn’t help him if he was dead of heat
stroke. But he couldn’t help him if he was locked up, either. If he
made it out of this desert, he could come back with help:
werewolves, Marines, whistle-blowing journalists,
somebody.
This was way too big for him to handle on his own.

The shadow of the weed finally moved enough
for him to get a direction. He put a pebble on the new end of the
shadow. The first pebble marked west, and the second pebble marked
east.

The dizziness had faded slightly, so DJ
pulled out the stalk and brushed over the mark he’d made. He took
off his shirt, tied it around his head, and got up and went on,
heading west.

After a few more turns, he saw a huge rock
formation within walking distance. He decided to hike to that, find
a cave to sleep in for the rest of the day, then strike out again
in the cool of the night.

As he walked, he played music in his mind. He
didn’t try to stumble through his most recent, hottest, coolest
finds, but instead chose songs he knew so well that he didn’t have
to search for a single beat or rhyme. Tagalog or English, French or
Punjabi, it didn’t matter if he didn’t understand the words so long
as he felt the passion and the anger, the energy and wit.

DJ’s lips moved soundlessly as he challenged
himself to keep up with rappers who could fire out lyrics like
bullets from a SAW. The rhythms gave him strength, the beat kept
his feet moving, the music carried him forward, the voices urged
him to never give up.

***

DJ woke up coughing. There was sand in his
eyes— sand in his mouth and nose— sand halfway down his throat.

He rolled over, and white light nearly
blinded him. He was lying in the middle of the canyon, in direct
sunlight. Why would he have decided to take a nap there? His recent
memories were hazy: walking and walking in that blast-furnace heat,
his head throbbing, his feet sore...

DJ had never passed out in his life, but
there was obviously a first time for everything. He hadn’t even
lost consciousness when he’d gotten third-degree burns, though he’d
been in so much pain that he’d wished he would. Where the hell was
he, with heat extreme enough to knock him out? He hoped he wasn’t
trying to walk to the coast of Utah.

Even sitting up required a tremendous effort.
Every inch of him hurt. His head was splitting. His lips stung. His
throat felt like sandpaper. His muscles were cramping, and so was
his stomach. His soles were scraped raw. He was sunburned all over,
and so exhausted that he felt crushed under the weight of his own
weariness. DJ wanted nothing more than to curl up and go back to
sleep.

If he did, he’d probably never wake up
again.

He became a wolf and sniffed for water, mice,
lizards, cactus, anything to give him a little moisture. He scented
nothing but dust and weeds, minerals and dirt. A wolf could endure
more than a man, so he went on in that form. But soon even Lechon
was reeling, unable to bear the weight and heat of his fur.

When he became a man again, nausea hit him
like a fist to the stomach. He doubled over, dry-heaving. Nothing
came up. His mouth was too parched to even spit. When the spasms
stopped, he wiped his face with a shaking hand. His hand came away
dry, too. He’d stopped sweating. His body was shutting down.

That was the point where you didn’t sit guys
down in the shade with an ice pack and give them little sips of
water; you called for medevac and airlifted them to the hospital,
immediately. DJ could undoubtedly hold out for longer than the
average guy, but even his werewolf healing couldn’t magically
produce water.

I am so fucked,
DJ thought.
I’m
going to die here, and no one will ever know to go rescue Roy.
Everyone will think we were killed in the helo crash. My family
will be heartbroken. God knows what it’ll do to Alec and Marco if
they lose both of us. I was a fucking idiot to keep running once it
was obvious that there wasn’t any water.

But he couldn’t stop moving now. There was no
shade or water in the canyon. Maybe there’d be some in the rock
formation. It wasn’t like he had any better options. Even if he was
willing to go back, he was much too far— and too far gone— to make
it.

He forced himself to his feet, staggered, and
fetched up against the rough granite wall. At least that provided
some support. He made his way forward, leaning on the side of the
canyon as he went, his eyes half-closed.

The memories that drifted through his mind
felt more vivid and real than the sun that burned his skin and
stung his eyes.

His pack sleeping in a pile on the living
room floor after he’d returned from his first tour of duty, giving
him the traditional traveler’s welcome home. They might not approve
of his career, but he’d never doubted their love. He was surrounded
by fur and warmth and everyone’s scents. The pack sense held him
like he’d never left. His sister Five teased him that if he had a
nightmare and bit her, she’d bite him back. But he’d slept like a
pup.

The flash of the explosion. The impact of
landing. Searing agony in his side. Roy picking him up as bullets
hit the dirt all around them, his face dead white beneath the
smears of dirt and blood. The smell of chemicals and soot and
charred meat.

Staring at yet another incomprehensible set
of marks on paper until he managed to decipher “rifleman.” Crossing
his fingers that the question was asking him to write out the
Rifleman’s Creed rather than explain the place of the rifleman in a
fire team, DJ began to scrawl what he hoped would come out as,
This is my rifle. There are many like it, but this one is
mine…

The ice-blue eyes of the woman he’d fought,
the astonishing strength of her grip, the silken brush of her hair
against his cheek. Her scent of green.

When he fell again, the landing was
surprisingly gentle. He must have made it through the desert, and
collapsed on a bed of moss. He could smell cut grass and sticky new
leaves.

Chapter Four: Echo

117 Degrees

Echo opened her eyes to the disconcerting
sight of Mr. Dowling looming over her. She recoiled.

“You’re awake,” he informed her, as if he was
briefing her on her own level of consciousness. “Your ankle is
bruised and strained, but you can walk on it.”

She was in one of the hospital’s recovery
rooms, but still dressed, lying on top of the sheets, and not
hooked up to anything. Her ankle was wrapped in elastic bandages
and elevated on a pillow, with a cold pack draped over it.

“What the hell happened?” she asked, sitting
up. “Who was that guy?”

“That was Dale Torres, a Marine we
captured.”

“You
captured
a Marine? Couldn’t you
just have him transferred?”

Mr. Dowling gave her an irritated look. “It’s
not a simple matter to have a member of the armed forces
transferred to a base that doesn’t officially exist. Anyway, it was
an independent decision made by an operative in Afghanistan. Born
wolves rarely join the armed forces, so obtaining a born wolf
Marine must have seemed like an unparalleled opportunity.”

Echo read between the lines of Mr. Dowling’s
explanation:
Someone went way off-book in snatching a Marine,
and we’re all praying that this doesn’t turn into a giant,
career-ending clusterfuck.

In the interest of getting on with it, Echo
limited her inquiry. “How’d the operative spot him?”

“Torres was in a helicopter with Farrell,
another Marine from his fire team. Their helicopter was shot down,
and they were the only survivors. Farrell was severely wounded, and
briefly transformed into a wolf during medevac. Torres clearly knew
what was going on, and Farrell had bite wounds. We’re still looking
into their backgrounds, but we believe that Torres is a born wolf
and bit Farrell to save his life.”

“Where’s Farrell?” Echo asked. “Was Torres
trying to get to him?”

“Possibly. But Farrell’s not here. It’s
unclear at this time whether he’ll ever be fit for duty again.
Though if not, we can still use him as a research subject.” Mr.
Dowling seemed to like that idea.

Severely wounded, bitten by a werewolf,
and locked up for ‘research,’
Echo thought.
The poor guy
probably wishes he was still getting shot at in
Afghanistan.

Mr. Dowling went on, “Torres, on the other
hand, is an excellent candidate for recruitment.”

“Good luck with that. If you think
I’m
a handful…” As much as Torres had clearly been surprised by her
strength, she’d been surprised by his. She hadn’t had that much fun
fighting someone since Brava had died.

Mr. Dowling frowned. “Yes, I reviewed the
tapes of Dr. Semple’s session with him. Born wolves don’t normally
have such formidable powers. All the same, a ball was dropped.”