Chapter 1

Damien finished cleaning up the downed log, it had taken him a while to take every branch off and cut it in pieces, but the work was finally done: now he had enough materials to fix the deck behind his cabin.

He cracked his knuckles and lifted it in a swift motion, his muscles tensing hard as he put the fifteen foot long trunk on his left shoulder. It was easily half a ton, heavy, but nothing he couldn’t deal with. He still had to carry it a few hundred yards before being able to strip it down and transform it into usable timber.

The walk back home was not an easy hike, but he liked it. The hot summer day, now that noon was approaching; the sweat on his back dripping off his torso, the quiet land. He was born for the wilderness, only duty was his one superior priority.

His heavy boots sank deep in the soft soil as he approached his cabin. He smiled, there was plenty of work ahead.

Then he picked up a familiar scent. Maverick, he thought. One of his crew.

“Hey boss!” Maverick said as soon as he saw him. “You busy? Gonna build something?”

He was standing on the back porch of the cabin, waiting for him.

Damien dropped the log just beside the cabin’s back garden.

He definitely never planned on having a yard up here in the mountain, the idea of it seemed ridiculous, but as soon as the place was built and the crew was ready to rest, Raiden, the weirdest one of the bunch, said they should dig it.

Now, after all that work, Damien wasn’t going to drop a massive trunk on it and destroy it. It would break Raiden’s heart, he thought, grinning. As if that could happen.

“I’m not building anything, just doing some repairs,” he replied, walking over to Maverick, cleaning his woodchip-filled hands, “what brings you here, Mav?”

Maverick got serious for a second, “The suits want to talk to you, they say it’s urgent.”

“What happened? Did they say anything?”

“No, boss, they said they needed to deliver the message straight to you, to make sure there was no miscommunication, and if there were any questions you could ask them right then and there.”

“Well, then. Let me go get my stuff, are the guys already there?”

“Yeah, I told them on my way up here.”

Damien opened the sliding glass door and entered his cabin, “make yourself comfortable, Mav, I’ll be right back.”

“Thanks, boss.”

Damien climbed the stairs to the second floor, passed two rooms and entered his own; put a t-shirt, washed his face and grabbed his tool belt.

When he came down, Mav was sitting on the back deck, playing on his phone.

“Aren’t you too old to play games?” he said.

Mav turned to him.

“I hope not, Boss,” he smiled, “but I wasn’t playing, check this out.”

He turned his phone to Damien and showed him a picture of the backyard. It was a good picture, actually: the bright grass, contrasted by the darker pines in the background, the blue sky just barely visible in the square photo. He was almost embarrassed to have flowers back there, but they looked great, so he wasn’t apologizing.

“Last time I posted a photo of your garden I got a few dozen new followers, and more than two hundred likes... people just love this kind of stuff.”

All that “likes” and “followers” and phone apps kind of thing was Chinese to Damien, but he understood enough to let out a chuckle.

“That’s good, I guess, do you get paid for that?”

“What?”

“The picture, followers, all that.”

“Nah, it’s just for fun.”

“Just make sure you don’t bring unwarranted attention, work is easier when humans are not around.”

“Don’t worry, it doesn’t say where it was taken, and I don’t explain a lot.”

Damien smiled and patted Mav on the shoulder.

“All right. I’m glad you like tech, we can’t depend on Franklin to be the only one to operate the equipment around here,” he said, and started walking the trail down to the tower.

***

The communications tower was a joke name for a large container sized room with radio equipment. It had a military grade antenna, though. The government made sure it was capable of transmitting through the mountains without much interference, along with being a cell satellite repeater, which was godsend up here in the woods.

It was mostly used for a high speed Internet connection and emergency broadcasts through special channels available to shifters, but from time to time the government suits wanted to contact them and instead of coming out here they used radio comm.

The White Paws were the first line of defense on the mountain. They had a ranger’s job, all right, that was the easy part, but their main duty was to help keep the Shadowlands at bay and report any incident to the other clans... and the suits in Washington.

The bears managed to keep their autonomy. It was hard work for humans up here, risky work. Especially since the Shadowlands made its cancerous puncture in this part of the country a few years ago, and he and his crew had to bend it to its knees and banish it. No human could do that, no fully charged automatic weapon could. Only them and their strength, but if Armageddon was around the corner, you could always count on politicians wanting to be the first to know, so they could run and hide before anyone else.

The day had indeed become the hottest of the year so far. He’d planned to shift and refresh at the Hidden Lake after his rounds, but that would have to wait.

The comms tower was in sight now, just one building on a set of four: Comms Tower, Supply Room, Lab, and Workshop.

Damien saw Mav’s truck beside the lab, its bed full of plastic boxes.

“I was planning on going to town later today, we need some supplies,” Mav said.

“You know you gotta stay until after the suits have said their piece, right?”

“Yeah, no prob.”

In the distance, Enzo saw them and waved, they did the same.

“Franklin says everything’s ready,” Enzo shouted, “He wants to try the new equipment.”

Damien smiled. Everyone was curious about this, but they wouldn’t admit it.

***

“White Tower to Blue Eagle, Big Bear speaking, you wanted to talk to me, over?” Damien said.

After a moment of static silence, a voice came through.

“Blue Eagle here, we copy Big Bear, is the whole crew there listening, over?”

“Negative, Raiden went out, everyone else in here... Thomas, just tell us what’s up, we don’t have all day, over.”

“Sorry, Damien,” said the man over the radio, a waver in his voice betrayed his fake confidence. Thomas was a good guy but humans never wanted to piss shifters off... especially bear shifters. “I just needed to confirm you all hear this.”

“The Gold Skin crew, north of your position have been having problems with wild animals, apparently they’re coming up to people and attacking them. Wolves, cougars, even birds.”

“Birds?” Mav asked, surprised.

“Quiet,” Franklin told him,

“Now, we both know,” Thomas continued, “Wild animals don’t attack people unless they’re frightened, hungry or protecting their young... and even then, that’s a rare occurrence. Unless there were traces of the rot around.”

“Some other crews have reported similar attacks and we’re asking everyone to be on the lookout for any punctures out there, just to make sure we’re good, over.”

Everyone was looking at Damien, Thomas was right, attacks were rare, rarer still in bear shifter territory.

“We haven’t had any trouble,” Damien replied, “but we’ll keep our eyes open, over.”

“Thank you guys, sorry for the inconvenience, we just thought it was safest to confirm, over.”

“We’ll report back if anything happens, over and out.”

Mav was the first to speak, “The Rot? You think it’s back, boss?”

“Don’t jump to conclusions so easily, boy,” Franklin said, “it’s a preventive measure.”

Damien nodded, “and if it’s not, we’re ready for war.”

He turned to Enzo, who was standing at the door, looking in. “Have you sensed anything unusual Enzo? You’d be the first one to notice with all those experiments you do.”

“Nothing, it’s probably just a false alarm.”

“All right, false alarm or not, we make the rounds... usual areas. Franklin, you stay here, try to communicate with Raiden, see if he’s seen anything weird. All of you, I trust you to do your job. You’re well capable of dealing with any issue. But remember, we’re here to back you up in case you need it, got it?”

“Got it,” they all said in unison.

“Let’s get to it, then,” he ordered, and everyone jumped to action.