<Episode 10>

“Call it in.” She did not just hear him say that.

“Jack?”

“I said call it in,” he told her. He pressed the button under the belt. Before she could say anything to stop him he started for the wolf. Jack grabbed the wolf by the shoulders and pulled him away from the tree. Then he turned around and kicked the tree. He backed up from the tree hoping on one foot before setting his right down. The tree cracked from the impact and started to fall. Suddenly the part he kicked exploded out. Rachel tried to shield herself as chunks of the tree flew in every direction. When it was clear she saw the wolf and the other young Drakan had done the same. Jack stood there not looking at any of them.

“Why…,” the wolf started.

“Get out of here,” was all Jack said.

“But I don’t understand.”

“I said get out of here!”, he yelled. “Now, before I change my mind. Git!” Unsure of what else to do the wolf nodded and reverted to his human form. The others did the same and the young wolf led them away. They stood there and watched them go. Finally Jack powered down the Fusion system and flexed his right leg a little.

“Jack…,” she began.

“Let’s go,” he cut her off. They walked back to the bike in total silence. His attention was on the path they were taking. Her attention was mostly on what just happened. Jack wasn’t kidding when he said they got some wrong Intel on this one. She was going to make sure heads were going to roll for this one. And Rachel wasn’t really caring whose head it meant at the moment. It wasn’t long before they reached the bike and Jack drove her back to her car. She put a hand on his shoulder when it looked like he was going to leave.

“Jack,” he still wouldn’t look at her, “what are we going to tell them?”

“Whatever the hell you want.” Underneath the helmet he looked really tired. “I got to draw a line some where.” Then he drove off and Rachel watched his taillight disappear. She looked at her cell phone then back into the woods, her decision already made. She had to draw a line too.

***

Things seemed to fall apart as soon as he heard they had sent Davidson after children. As he expected the Drakan under him were demanding answers. It took everything he had to keep them from revolting. The fact that damnable excuse for a male Allen disappeared right after helped persuade them. Mitchell had every team he had looking for him. Williams’ people were monitoring every camera stationed in the city trying to find a glimpse of him. Allen knew their set up just as well as he did, so he could avoid them for as long as he possibly could. But it would only be a matter of time before he had his hands around his throat, slowly choking the life out of him.

Then there was the other half of the problem to deal with. Haily had been seen sporadically in the building. Apparently doing her best to avoid him. The one time he was able to corner her he asked about Davidson. He apparently decided to lock himself in his apartment. Ignoring any attempts of contact by either Haily or Williams. What was going through his mind? Anderson wasn’t sure what he felt toward him. He killed a child, but they rebuilt him to be a weapon. He would sort all this out after he had dealt with Allen.

But there was one hope he was clinging to. The smell on Haily wasn’t any different. Usually the smell of death on her was a little stronger each time Davidson killed a rebel. She smelled the same as the last time he saw her. He knew it was entirely possible he was all in his head. A small seed of hope that Davidson hadn’t done it. That discovery was the only thing that kept him from ripping into her for not stopping Davidson if he did.

If he needed any more proof the fates were conspiring against him, he got it the moment he turned the corner to his office. He knew the balding grey haired man standing next to his secretary’s desk. Rodgers, the alpha of another pack. A powerful and influential one, this could not be even remotely good. Surprisingly the idea that he was here didn’t worry him at the moment. The fact that he was here in his territory, in his city, in his building, unannounced and uninvited. It was the height of rudeness and that irked him.

At least it was distracting him from his current problem.

Anderson locked down everything he was feeling as he approached. Rodgers looked very open as he came closer. A trap he would not fall for like others have. “Thomas,” he said while holding out a hand.

“Matthew,” the other took it. “I apologize for the suddenness of all of this. But I have been hearing some rather disturbing rumors lately. I wanted to discuss them with you.”

“Of course,” Anderson gestured toward the door. “Let’s go in my office and discuss this.” If things got rough he could always call for Mitchell if he had too. Rodgers took a seat in front of his desk. He was half way expecting him to take his. Sitting down he asked, “Can I offer you a drink?”

“No thanks, hopefully we can clear this up rather quickly. There have been rumors of a Drakan serial killer in you city.”

“Yes, I’ve heard them myself.” Right to the point, he was afraid of that. About that time something hit him, Rodgers was a wolf. Haily’s report said Davidson killed a green wolf cub. A cold knot formed in his stomach as he felt himself pale. “Probably concocted by the rebels. Anything to draw attention to my city. You know how they operate.” He said anything to try to prolong this as he slid his hand closer to the call button under his desk.

“The last one concerned my son.” His hand stopped momentarily.

Anderson hoped he sounded concerned as he asked, “Is he all right?”

“I’m not sure,” Rodgers said as he shifted in his seat. He looked for any sign of attack. “He was rather incoherent the last time I talked to him.”

“What do you mean?” He had heard stories of the seers being able to contact the dead. He never put any stock in it, he barely bought their ability to see your future. He would have never thought Rodgers put any stock in it.

“He told me he was guarding the pack of youths he was with against a Drakan insect. One made of metal if I understood him correctly. Then this Drakan somehow destroyed a tree and let them go.”

“Let them go? He’s alive?” Anderson felt a great weight lift off his shoulders. Davidson had more character than he was given him credit for. He covered for his outburst, “That’s different from the stories I heard about the Drakan Killer.”

“I know.”

“So where is your son now?”

“I do not know. He wasn’t sure if that thing was going to come after him again. He said he was going to seek out the rebels for immediate protection for some reason and to see if they could get him and the others out of the city without being noticed.”

“So he’s potentially still in my city? Don’t worry, I’ll put every connection I have to work on finding him and the source of this rumor. Like I said this sounds like something the rebels would come up with. Maybe as some sort of sick way to draw people to the cause.”

“Possibly. If I didn’t already lose a man in this city I would wonder less.”

“This man,” he said slowly, “wouldn’t happen to have been a frog?”

“A junior VP of mine. So he did die here.”

“A rumor my people heard. There was no frog in my territory so I had inquires sent out to other cities to see if they lost anybody recently.”

“I didn’t hear of any inquires. Although I don’t see why you didn’t ask your own VP about it. Allen, I believe that was his name.” Anderson arched an eyebrow. “I sent my man here to finalize the details of the deal between our two companies with him.”

For reason he didn’t yet understand pieces of the puzzle were suddenly falling into place, “Really?”

***

Jack stared out the window. The over cast day didn’t come close to matching his mood. He barely heard hard the knock at his door. He was a bit surprised, usually she would ring the doorbell a few times then quit. He just kept on ignoring it. “Come on Jack, open up,” Rachel voice was muffled. “We got to talk about this.”

“What’s there to talk about?”, he said mainly to himself. He let out a breath, might as well get this over with. Jack went over to open just enough so she could push it open. He went back to the window.

“Finally,” he heard her mumble as she came in. She closed the door and sat on the edge of his couch. “How are you feeling?”

“You sent me after a bunch of kids. How am I supposed to feel?”

“I didn’t know they were kids either. I was just as shocked as you were.”

“Right.”

“Look Jack…,” he cut her off.

“I don’t know if I can do this any more. If this is the price I have to pay, I can’t do this. The monkey isn’t worth it”

“I’m not going to talk you out of it,” she told him. “I’ve considered quitting myself. Not before I got some answers on how this happened first. I’m still looking into it in case you’re wondering.”

“What did Anderson say when he found out I let them go?”

“I… didn’t tell them you let them go.”

Jack looked at her in surprise. He didn’t think she would have done that. “So they think I went through with it?” She nodded. “That’s gonna be hell to live with.”

“They stopped looking for them at any rate. That was the idea when you told me to call it in.”

“Yeah. Guess something good came out of this whole situation.” He was quiet for a moment. “I had to be able to live with myself.”

“I know. What do you want to do now?” Jack thought about it for a few moments. Then he grabbed his jacket and headed for the door. He should have done this the moment he found out what the target really was. “Where are you going?”

“First, I’m going to find out exactly what the hell happened, then I’m giving your boss a piece of my mind.” She followed him out the door. “Trying to stop me?”

“I have a few things I want to say myself.”

“You were there all that time and you haven’t said anything yet?”

“You inspired me.”

For the first time since the incident he felt a smile start to form. “More like you want to see how I get answers.”

“That too.”

***

“We found him in a alley of all places,” Mitchell told him. A few moments prior he and his team dragged Allen into his office. Mitchell and his team apparently took a few liberties in apprehending him. Allen was sporting a black eye among other visual injuries. Not that he was disapproving of the treatment. “He was a little feisty when we caught up with him. But we calmed him down a bit before we brought him in.”

“Apparently. Now if you will excuse us Mitchell we have something to discuss.”

“One more thing,” Mitchell leaned in close. “We’re positive Jack is on his way here.” Anderson nodded slowly and looked at Allen. The man would not look in his direction.

“How soon?”

“Five, ten minutes tops.”

“When he arrives make sure nobody stops him on his way up here.”

Mitchell glanced over to Allen and grinned, “Understood.”

Anderson closed the door and silently went over to his desk. He sat in his chair, steepled his fingers and just stared at Allen. Like the worm he was he started to squirming under his gaze. There was nothing worse than a Drakan with no backbone. Neither said anything until Allen sputtered, “M… M… Mr. Anderson.”

“Be quiet,” Anderson snapped. Allen sunk back into his chair. “For the past few days I wondered how you could make such a blunder. Or should I say tried to make it look like a blunder. Especially when I warned you after your last major mistake.”

“I… I didn’t know they were children.”

“Yes you did.” Anderson got up and slowly circled the room. “Why else would you have disappeared all of the sudden. But for the life of me I couldn’t figure out why. Why did you have us send Davidson after children? Even if they were the offspring of the rebels we could have convinced them to come back into the fold.”

“I’m sorry.”

Anderson ignored him. “I could not figure it out. Then I had the most interesting visit from Thomas Rodgers.” Allen stiffened noticeably, he smiled behind his back. “Apparently his son was among the children we sent Davidson after. In fact he was the one Davidson fought,” he waited a couple of moments before adding, “to the death.” No kind of reaction from Allen what so ever. Good, that made this just that much easier. “But it wasn’t until he gave me an answer to another mystery that things started to come together. One you could not seem to solve, the mysterious frog.”

“H… He did, “Allen looked like he was starting to sweat.

“Imagine my surprise when he told me there was a pending deal between our two companies. He was rather taken aback that I knew nothing about it. A merger between our two companies I would have never agreed to. Between us we couldn’t figure out how you were planning to pull this off. Then I started looking through some of your personal business files.” Allen looked right at him, not sure to be shocked or angry. “Don’t look so surprised. I told you I was going to do as much when the humans heard the ceremony.

“And I was rather surprised myself at what I saw. I was expecting to see personal ventures, plans to carve out you own little empire, using funds skimmed from my company. I think I could have almost forgiven that. But what did I see instead? Everything you needed to take over a company. My company.”

“I can explain.”

“Then the deal with the children became rather clear. The other packs are already paying too much attention to my city because of the rebels. And I will admit the rumors of the Drakan Killer is not helping the situation. But if something happened to the son of a major alpha, then I would be put under a microscope. Eventually the Fusion project would have been discovered. More than likely leaked to the right people. I would have been removed and you would have been in position to buy the company right from under me. And you would have waited until I was removed too. You didn’t have the nerve to do it while I am still in control. If you wanted the company so badly you should have challenged me for it, like I did your father. As you should have challenged him in the beginning.”

“He wouldn’t hear of it,” he said through gritted teeth.

“Because he knew you were a sniveling coward. The very fact you planned all of this proved it. He knew it would not have been honorable combat, like tradition demanded.”

“You don’t know that!”, Allen shot out of his chair. “Neither of you knew that.”

“Then prove me wrong.” Anderson dropped his human form and became the green cheetah. “If you want control of this company so bad than fight me now.” Allen glanced at the door. “Mitchell has his orders not to enter the room, no matter what.”

“Fine,” Allen clenched his fist and reverted into a green shark. He fingered the scars on his chest, a low growl coming from somewhere deep inside him. Allen screamed at the revealing two sets of very sharp teeth. Anderson grinned, showing he had a dangerous bite as well and extended his claws. The circled each other, taking a swipe every so often to test the other defenses. But Anderson was biding his time. Waiting for the smell that was just now assaulting his nostrils. The smell of death, and it was getting closer. Allen was too caught up to notice. Anderson suddenly jumped to his left, making sure to hit the wall hard enough to leave a dent. He returned to his human form and slumped to the ground.

Allen turned his head obviously confused. Anderson put the appropriate amount of fear on his face as the door burst open. Davidson stood there suddenly dumbfounded at the sight, “Holy… !”

“That’s Allen!”, Anderson shouted. Allen confusion turned into rage as he looked at him. For a brief moment he thought Allen would actually do him harm in retaliation. He bolted for the door and knock Davidson out of the way. He held his shoulder as he got up and staggered toward the door. “Allen’s one of them. He’s the one that gave me the false information about the rebel leader.” He guessed right about the effect that would have on Davidson. There was a brief glint of anger as he got up and put his left arm across his chest. Anderson saw the belt materialized around his waist. He moved his arm across and raised his right.

“Henshin!”, he shouted and brought his right hand down on top of the belt. Davidson ran after Allen as the Fusion system activated. Haily took a step after him but stopped. Before she turned to check on him he allowed himself a small smile. Like that man deserved honorable combat.

***

Jack chased after Allen as a red tint took over his vision. The shark was fast but he was quickly gaining on him. It wasn’t long before he could grab the fin swinging in front of him. Allen turned to look back just as he reared a fist back. The punch knocked Allen down but Jack ended up falling over him. He beat the shark to his feet and kicked him under the chin. Allen’s head snapped back and he aimed another fist at it’s throat. The shark laid there on the floor holding his throat trying to breath. Jack stood over him and said, “You I’m not even going to think twice about.”

He reached down to pull Allen to his feet. The shark stopped gasping and shoved his fingers into his gut, right under the spot the blue chest armor didn’t cover. Jack doubled over in pain as he saw stars. He tried to keep from throwing up in his helmet as the shark grabbed him by the back of his neck. “Annoying little gnat,” then he slammed Jack face first through the wall. He threw his left elbow widely catching Allen in the shoulder. Allen let go and Jack kicked out his left foot. Allen stumbled back from the impact and he removed his head from the wall. He turned around to see Allen mouth come at him. Jack ducked the lunge and planted both his fist into the shark’s stomach. He grabbed it by the back of it’s head and slammed him repeatedly into the wall.

Jack took a few steps back and held his gut. He wasn’t sure but it felt like he busted something. The shark recovered faster than he thought and lunge again. Jack had just enough time to get his right arm up. Allen’s mouth clamped down on his forearm. He almost went down to his knees as the pressure increased, something was going to give. Then Allen spun to his right. There was a loud crack right before the momentum flipped him over as well. Jack screamed in pain and clutched at his right arm. Keeping his grip on the arm Allen got to his feet. Out of desperation he started punching wildly with his left hand. He nailed the shark in the nose before it let go. Jack held his arm close to his body, Allen grinned evilly and came in for the kill.

Jack saw the grin and yelled again. Not in pain, but from frustration. He launched a side kick when the shark came close enough. His right foot crashed through the two rows of the sharks front teeth. Allen grabbed his mouth and tried to get away again. Jack leaned against a wall, remembered the wolf and went after him. He grabbed a metal trash bin and when he was close enough swung it with all he could muster. The can bent into the shape of Allen’s head from the impact. It went down and he started stomping at it and pounding it with his left hand. Allen pushed him back the moment the meter started flashing. Not soon enough. He pressed the button to activate the mini turbines in the belt. Allen grabbed the can and threw it at him. Jack jumped to the wall and kicked off with his left foot. His right foot made contact with the side of it’s head. Allen bounced off the other wall and exploded.

***

Rachel raced down the hall after Mitchell showed up to keep an eye on Anderson. She caught the last part of the fight. Anderson and Mitchell showed up when Allen exploded. The sprinkler system went off as Jack cradled his right arm, fell to his knees and put his head to the ground. “Jack!”, she ran toward him. She knelt beside him, his every breath was mixed with a small shout of pain. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

“My… ,” he barely got out, ” my.. arm… can’t… feel… he broke… my arm.”

“Jack let me see.” He wouldn’t move it, he didn’t have to. His arm was bending in places that it shouldn’t be bending. Under the body suit it looked like a bone was sticking out. “Oh my God,” she muttered in French. “Jack listen to me, don’t power down. Do you hear me don’t power down.” She wasn’t sure how bad he was bleeding under the suit, it could be the only thing from keeping it from bleeding worse. “Get Friedman and Barry up here,” she ordered Mitchell.

“How bad…,” he didn’t get a chance to finish.

“Get them up here now!”, she shouted at him. “Don’t worry Jack, you’re going to be alright.”

“I’ll make sure he gets the finest care we can provide,” Mr. Anderson said while looking very concerned. “After all, I owe him my life.”