WILLIAM

Jeremy's ready to talk. Meeting in council room three in fifteen minutes. Eric's link directed.

I would not have Kara getting caught up any more in this mess, so I got her set up with a project at home and headed down to the council room.

Walking in the large grey-blue boardroom with one wall taken up by a white board, I sat at the long rectangular table to Eric's right, and placed my files down. I looked over the oak table and all the nail scratches from previous shifts, some even my own.

We were still waiting on John so I absentmindedly stared at the long bench behind Jeremy and Garrett. It was built-in to the wall, wide enough a wolf could prop there if they shifted. Jer and Garrett were chatting on about some tv show Jer watched last night, and Tarin was checking something on her phone. This would most likely be her last council meeting as she was just filling in for Blake as Head Tech.

Eric looked up from the head of the table. "Where's Kara?"

"She's busy at home."

He seemed disapproving. "Don't you think she should come to this meeting?"

"This isn't about her. This is about Jeremy. She doesn't need to be caught up in this."

Eric looked at Jeremy down the table for a flash. "She might already be."

"She's busy. I'll tell her anything she needs to know. She's still adjusting." Though that was a lie. Seemed like she was adjusting fine. I just couldn't have her hearing whatever Jeremy had to say and feeling like she needed to race out and kill herself trying to save all those creatures before she was ready.

I took a moment and started sliding mine and Kara's connection closed as best I could make it without feeling too sealed. Just enough that she couldn't watch what was happening. It tightened my chest, but hopefully she would be too busy with painting all day to notice.

Eric sat back in his chair and shrugged. "Your funeral dude."

I scowled. "And what's that supposed to mean?"

"Just that Andrea would skin me alive if she thought I was holding something out on her. I may be the formerly scarred alpha, but next to her I might as well be a poodle."

Garret and Jeremy laughed.

I did not. "Kara is fine."

"I know she's fine, but she needs to know..."

I caught Eric in my glare. "I will not have her being worried about this."

Tarin cut in her two cents. "Will, if this is about keeping her protected, she needs to know what's coming."

"I can keep her protected!" My fingers clenched around the arm rests of my swivel chair.

She sat back and rolled her eyes. "Alright."

Jeremy shot me a look from across the table. "Will. Bro. Stop acting like a raging teenager that needs to shield their mate. You're thirty. She can defend herself."

As if I needed reminding, Eric mentioned, "she jumped out of a four-story window and walked away ten seconds later."

Jeremy added enthusiastically, "and she even got shot!"

Eric grinned over to him, eager. "I haven't heard that story."

"This conversation is over," I stated finally.

"That punk vet...." Jer started.

"Gentlemen!" I scolded. "We are done with Kara!"

"Okay, okay," Jeremy conceded. "But don't come crying to me if she freaks out that you kept her in the dark."

"Why would I do that?" I spat.

He tossed his arms up. "Just saying Willyboy. She's not going to be happy." He smirked to Eric. "I'll tell you that story later. It's a good one."

John came in then and head darted around the table. "What'd I miss?"

Eric chuckled. "Just William acting like a freshly mated hormonal teenage wolf."

John pulled out the rolling office chair next to me and laughed, plopping down. "Aww, Princess Caroline get a splinter?"

"Can we get to business, please?" I scowled over Tarin's head.

Eric sat up professional. "Yes. Let's do that. Alright. I called you all here because Jeremy has information about the werecreatures. Hopefully, we can come up with a plan of how to get them out of that hole, and care for the rest." He turned to Tarin, John, and Garrett. "If you haven't heard, Kara is a healer. And yes, she can heal them. But we will talk about that later when we get to it." His eyes then focused on mine.

I knew his implication and reiterated annoyed. "She will not be coming."

He sighed and then went on. "Jeremy was stuck down in a cavern for eight years as one of those creatures. He..."

"Not all was in the cavern," he interjected.

We all turned to him and Eric motioned for him to take the floor. Jeremy swallowed and exhaled nosily as he tried to gain his courage. My own fingers rubbed small circles over my armrest in anxiousness of hearing the story.

He began. "It was eight years ago. I was out running and decided I wanted a drink, so I headed to the good bar a few towns over. I found a group of four from Boulder Terrain Pack and we started up some pool and heavy drinking. An older bald man who smelled a bit too sweet came over and started chatting us up. I don't remember what we talked about, but he ordered us all a round of shots. Next thing I know I wake up in some sterile white laboratory, caged like an animal with the Boulder four."

Jeremy closed his eyes and his hands clenched to fists as he relived those days. "We were kept as lab rats. We were poked and prodded, skin and blood stolen. Anything he could get his grubby little paws on."

Tarin asked horrified, already into the story. "He who?"

Jeremy leaned back in his chair, fingers absentmindedly sliding over the tabletop. "His name is Melvin Lawrence. His guards called him Sergeant Major, but I think the military title was fake. He worked for the Department of Supernatural Security in their defense section. He worked with making wolfsbane weapons. Well, wolfsbane is poisonous to humans too, though not as badly, and after years of working with it, it damaged his lungs up pretty bad. He ended up getting this horrible lung cancer and DOSS let him retire early with a generous settlement."

Eric's face set, trying to control his breathing. We all figured DOSS would have some way to fight against us, but this was the first time we had heard it for certain.

Jeremy continued. "His lung cancer was so bad that chemo and radiation, or whatever the humans do, wasn't working for him. But he knew something that might help."

Garrett cut in a growl with understanding. "Werewolves and their extreme healing."

Jer nodded. "He thought if he could extract the gene for extreme healing, he could replicate it in himself and cure his cancer. So he rented his own science lab somewhere, I'm not even sure where it was, and went to find himself some werewolves."

He took a breath and slowed. "And we were trying to get drunk and just what he wanted. He slipped us some wolfsbane-sleeping pill-who knows what-concoction and next thing we know we're lab rats. Well, whatever he was hoping for was not working. So as the months went by with no results, he started getting desperate and we found more and more wolves in cages beside us, kept like some stinkin' monkeys."

"That's horrible," John looked sickened.

"He injected one of them with his own cancer cells to watch how the cancer would heal and instead of healing, the wolf mutated into some deformed werewolf creature that couldn't do anything or act for himself. Lawrence figured that the cancer and the wolfsbane formed together into something that mucked up our healing. Soon we found out that it could spread because after one bite all the others in the cage with him were mutated too."

His fingers drummed on the table a minute, then he continued. "I only remember a few days more after that."

John leaned forward on his elbows. "Until Caroline?"

Jer's eyes went to him. "No. I only remember a few more days of the sterile room. I must have gotten infected with the mutation. I started to come around again about twenty-five shifts ago. My mind was still on the fritz, but it must have been that after five-ish years our wolf healing finally was clearing the cancer out enough? As the full moons began causing our half-healed bodies to shift, a few months in we started coming out of our fog. At that point it was sixteen of us. We were down in the cavern then. We started living as a pack again. We had water, a little room to run, and some delivery men would toss down deer or cow carcasses every week or two from that cave opening. At least Lawrence didn't leave us there to rot." He growled, then tried to center himself again. "We became more and more lucid as the months went by, and as we did, we tried everything to get up to that cave, but we couldn't get anywhere close with the slippery mud and steep walls. We eventually gave up and just tried to live."

"But there were over twenty of you? And some were still werecreatures?" I asked.

He nodded. "Come to find out somewhere in those years I can't remember anything, Lawrence heard of werewolf healers. Specifically, the healer line in Fremont pack. Heard stories of their healer curing anything quickly and easily with magic. So he created the cavern and cave system with a new lab close to Fremont to find their healer. There were stories that pain could even call the healer to the fight. So he must have tried to do that for a while."

I bit inside my cheek and my chest clenched with a need to keep Kara away from the monster.

Jer exhaled and fisted his hands together, knocking into his forehead as he relived. "He found the last in the healer line. A man. Dan Mason. Healers have never been men, but Lawrence wanted that cure. Messed the guy up bad. But didn't kill him." He paused a moment. "Kept him in cages up in that cave for six months trying to cut the healer out of him, or get the healer to come to him with his wails. The last healer was his grandmother, but she had been gone for ten years at that point and no new healer had been found. Well, eventually Lawrence's cancer went into remission and he had no use for the program. He tossed Dan to the wolves so to speak and with Dan's bite he became a creature too. He was the last of us to get lucid."

Jer stared at the back wall while the rest of us tried to take in the slew of information. Eric handed him a water bottle and he downed half of it, then rolled the cap between his fingers. "About five full moon shifts ago, Lawrence's cancer came back with a vengeance and so did he. It was in his brain now or something; he was talking about it with his guards up there once. So he was more desperate than ever to get his healer. New wolves were being brought in and injected with different serums trying to get the healing boosted. Nothing was working and he'd toss the new infecteds down to us. The newly mutateds couldn't communicate with the link as we could but I could sort of give them basic commands as the acting alpha. Mostly like 'don't eat us please' and 'share the dang waterhole you brutes.'"

He took another swig of water, finishing off the bottle. He growled to himself, glaring down to the table. "Then three shifts ago, we hear new screaming and figure it's just the newest test subject, but then Dan goes absolutely insane. I don't know how he knew, some fatherly bond I guess, but he realized that the new subject was his son. His now ten-year-old son he hadn't seen in six years. Lawrence was messing up kids now."

Eric and Garrett's eyes instantly shifted gold, both of them surely imagining the way this story was going and fearful for their own children.

Jer continued. "He heard his kid in trouble and just became Superman. I don't know. He climbed that wall like it was a staircase. We'd tried to get up that thing for months, months I tell you, before and since, but he did it in a blink. Suddenly there was all this commotion up top. It must have been Lawrence's new laboratory. Dan must have been busting through everything. There was crashing and clanging, howling, and screaming. But Dan was too late. Max was already mutated. Dan got him off some table and then linked his last goodbyes to a child that would never hear them. Then Dan's howls were cut off with a rapid gun firing." Jer took a clearing breath as he tried to stay strong for his friend. "Dan never came back to the cavern."

"He was killed," Tarin supplied and reached over to squeeze his hand.

Jer nodded. "Yeah. We're pretty sure."

"What happened to the child?" Eric asked, muscles still tight in protectiveness.

Jer released Tarin's hand and looked to Eric. "We never saw Max again either."

The others looked to the table in sorrow, but my mind flashed to Kara's time healing Former Gamma Walter in the dungeon. "Is it possible he got away?"

Jer's eyes pointed on me.

I sat forward against the table. "There is a small werecreature housed in our dungeons right now. Kara said it was a child."

His eyes filled with some strange hope. "Max could be here?" He stood. "We should go. Let's meet Kara there. She can heal him."

"No. Not yet," I insisted.

Jeremy scowled, surely ready to start shouting obscenities.

I added, "Kara will get to Max if it's him. He is safe at the moment. Let's figure out what to do with this information."

Jer shook his head out and slumped back in his chair. "Yeah. You're right. What would I do anyway? Say 'hey kid, surprise your dad is dead?'"

Eric cleared his throat. "We can contact Alpha David and see if the child has any other family if it turns out to be him. Dan was mated I presume?" He stalled, asking an open-ended question. "Was she also down..."

Jer bent his head. "He was mated. Elaina. He never freaked out over any of the other screaming, so I suppose she could still be around."

"Well then, we will do our best to be quick about this and give the poor woman some closure."

Jer gave a shallow smile. "That'd be good."

Eric scanned the faces of the room. "So. We know there is an opening at the top of the cavern. But if this boy did get out and food was being brought in, then there is a second entrance somewhere. And probably not on Fremont property or their patrol would have spotted them. We need to find it." His eyes landed on John. "Do you think your trackers are up for the job?"

John nodded enthusiastically. "Hells yeah."

Garrett cautiously cut in. "Trackers may not be necessary."

John turned to him, obviously hurt that his skills may not be needed.

Garrett's brow came down as he tried to think. "Walter and Denise said something strange when I went to talk to them. Said the last thing they remember was finding a cave entrance on a hike off pack property in March." He looked up to Eric and left the question open. "Maybe that cave was...."

A hand raked through my hair. "And the timeline. Three moons ago. March. That's about when we started finding werecreatures."

WILLIAM?! Kara's loud link broke through.

I startled in my chair with the abruptness of her thunderous link. Goodness, Love. What?

She asked cautiously and incredulously. Were you blocking me?

No Darling, of course not.

The link quieted, and then her inner voice was low and hurt. Please don't call me that again.

I shook my head slightly. Yes, right. Sorry Sweetheart. I meant no, of course I'm not blocking you. I'm just in council meetings and when I'm with the Alpha discussing business outside links are often shut. I forced myself not to say darling again, like it was some dickhead codeword for my lies.

Oh, she answered softly and slowly. I see.

Did you need something, ...sweetheart? I'm quite busy.

Oh, um. I just... Actually, no nevermind. It's not important. I'll just ...talk later.

She sounded upset, but I couldn't deal with that right now. I'll be home for dinner.

Yeah, okay. Bye I guess.

Bye dear.

Eric's eyes were on mine, most definitely noticing I was linking. "What?" I barked.

"She should be here."

"Mind your own damn business." I would not have Kara being part of this. She would heal the creatures after she learned to use her token, but she did not need to be part of getting them away from Lawrence.

Eric shook his head as if I were some petulant toddler and then looked around the room. "Garrett. Are the former Gammas available for questioning?"

Garrett rubbed over his chin. "I think they were being discharged yesterday, so probably."

"Okay, we'll talk to them and try to get some landmarks." He turned back to Jeremy. "But let's continue here first. What happened in the next three months you were down there?"

Jeremy made an uneasy face. "Not much changed for us. More wolves were being brought into his lab, but not that many were being thrown to us." He looked to the ceiling. "Lawrence was getting ruthless."

We were all quiet as the implications were made clear and we gave a moment of silence for those lost.

Jer then focused on me. "Then one day out of the blue, this girl literally jumps from the skies and rolls through the fall like some freaking ninja. She's closest to one of the mutated and pounces him, pressing him to the floor while it's chomping away trying to get its teeth around her. Suddenly her hands are flat on it and her eyes close. Me and the other halfsies are just staring on totally shocked to see anyone, let alone this pretty angel leaping from the skies."

He winked at me and I scowled, but I held back the 'mine' my wolf was threatening to growl.

"And then, the whole room almost silences as we watch the mutated form back into a man. Me and the other halfsies are thinking 'WTF man' and then she's on another mutated. Me and the rest are finally getting over our shock and it starts getting loud and the mutateds start making this really creepy chipmunk sound and one breaks to run at her. I commanded it and the rest to stay off the girl. They stepped back to around the cavern walls but I knew the order wasn't going to hold long."

He leaned forward on his arms at the table, his hand motions as if he were playing the scene. "So I bound over to her, and as soon as she steps off after healing that wolf, I grab her hand to stop her from running to the next and basically ask something like 'who the heck are ya' and then she stares me dead on with bright wolf eyes and says 'William is my mate. I'm here to help you.' And abruptly her hands are on my cheeks. Then there's this amazing heated pulsing blasting through my body. I fell to my knees and I feel myself transforming. I can no longer feel the pointed teeth at my lips and the hair at my torso. And I'm just feeling this magic radiate through me. It was so incredible. Felt like a warm jacuzzi on the iciest of days. And then I'm human again and I can't even say anything. I'm left staring at the mud on my totally human hands and she's off doing Jack. I'm in awe like I never saw hands before. Then I'm still on my knees, but I hear Jack gasp. My eyes go up and it's not that he's now healed, it's that a mutated is leaping forward."

Tarin then leaned forward, chest heaving with anticipation. My own wolf was pacing in my head, worried for his mate, but I tried to remind myself I already knew the ending to this story and she's just fine upstairs.

"I didn't even think. I'm just racing forward and slamming into the beast and shoving him into the mud. It's snapping and trying to claw at me, but I'm dodging the best I can. Then her hand is on me and she's pushing me off and holding it down herself. Her movements are slow though and her muscles aren't as tight as they were when we watched the first. She's failing, but I didn't know what to do. Me and Jack just looked at each other but then the wolf is human and she's slumping over into the mud. I pick her up and then ...I realize I can feel your presence through the link." He looked over to me almost reverently. "Something I hadn't been able to feel for years. It felt good bro."

A smile started to lift one side of my cheeks in wistfulness. "It was good to hear from you too."

I then started filling in my side of the story, but he broke in before I told them about climbing out myself.

"There's something else." He looked down and clasped his hands in his lap, then he looked at me and I braced myself for what was to come. "Melvin saw Kara. Will, I don't know how much he saw, but if he didn't see her heal, I'm sure he put two and two together. He was watching all of us in that cave opening with night vision goggles as we climbed out. He'll be after her as soon as he can figure out how to get to her."

The arm rests of my chair broke off in my hands and wolf hairs lifted on my arms.

Kara! I screamed throwing our connection completely open.

Whoa, yes? What? Hi, I'm here! I'm okay!

Are you safe? What are you doing?!

She cringed through her thoughts. Um, I'm just going to get paint? I'm so sorry!

I took a breath and leaned back against the chair back letting my panic subside. Good. Good. No, that's fine. Yes, get some paint.

I was thinking maybe of a light grey for the front room? She asked timidly.

That's fine love. Why don't you call my mother over and have her help put on the first coat? Then mom could keep an eye on her for me too.

Oh, yeah sure. Yeah, I can do that.

I rubbed my hands over my face in a final move of relief. After a moment pause, I linked her again. Listen I've got to go, I'm still in a meeting. I just needed to hear that you were okay.

Oh. ... Okay, bye then.

Love you.

You too.

I sat back up in my chair and tossed the arm rests to the garbage can. "Er, sorry about that." But I knew we had council chairs lined up for days in another room, as wolves often hear unfavorable news in these meetings.

Eric eyed me carefully. "Is Kara okay?"

I nodded and tried to relax my breathing, shaking the wolf hair back in. "Yeah, she's just going to the commissary to get paint."

"Good," he took a breath too.

"Sorry," Jeremy spoke regrettably, staring at my chair.

Scooting into the table, I shook my head. "It's okay Jer. I need to know what we're up against."

He eyed me with a knowing look, an eyebrow raising.

I pinched the bridge of my nose, knowing what he was implying. "Okay, look. I'd still rather Kara not know the extent of what Lawrence is doing to those wolves. If she hears, she's going to go running off there to save them all and I can't take that risk." My eyes then lifted to the faces around the room. "Let's plan on getting the werecreatures out ourselves and she can heal them when they are safely back in pack boundaries. I don't want her anywhere near that monster Lawrence."

Jer nodded. "I'm with you Willyboy. I don't want her getting hurt either, but I think she should know why. Dan said that his grandmother would get called to where she was needed. Kara's smart. Better to get her to know why she can't follow any intuition than her just disappearing."

It was sound advice, and I gave a relenting nod. "Yeah. You're right. I'll tell her as soon as we're done here."

Eric nodded approvingly. "Good. She needs to hear it. We all want her safe."

Tarin gave a compassionate smile, and then John clapped me on the back. "Aww, our 'wittle beta wolfie is growing up!"

I shot him a sour smile. "Ass."

He laughed.

Garrett was not amused and cleared his throat. "What else do we need to talk about? Should we get Walter down here?"

Eric nodded. "Call them down for a meeting in thirty. But as for right now... we're on lunchbreak." And like magic, there was a knock to the council room door and Eric opened it to a kitchen worker bringing in a cart.