THE FINAL CHAPTER
Caliban shook himself out of his stupor. It had been more frequent now; the higher the dose, the more he was unable to concentrate. Sometimes, he wondered if he was going mad. He didn’t tell this to anyone else, though, but it seemed he wasn’t the only one. It had been a painful few days, and he was glad to be back on active service.
Lt. Stephen Caledon had made sure of it, and for that, he was grateful. His kind would have normally been executed for numerous failures, or worse, he would have been sent away to a new Sector and fade away into obscurity.
The mission was old, but it felt new to him. Even his body parts felt new, but the old feeling would come back, as Dr. Bartholomew explained. He was sure it would, the moment he got Ryker’s head in his hand. If Ryker resisted, orders were to kill him but bring his body back for further research. Alexia was the only one who needed to completely stay alive with minimal injuries, if that. It would be like transporting porcelain back to the base.
Would she welcome him with open arms like she had when they were still children? Whatever her reaction would be, she would have no choice but to comply with their orders. He saw the regiment looking serious, as if apprehensive of Alexia’s presence. He couldn’t remember much but was glad he didn’t. Embarrassment still burned through him, the mere fact that her touch could do that much damage. And here he thought he had full control over his shifting.
I’m coming for you, Alexia.
*
“We’re close by,” Ryker said to her as he saw a faint mountain range across the horizon. It would be another good two hours to get into Alaska itself. Dr. Barrett would have been proud of his car, as it had survived the weather conditions. Ryker knew its end was going to come soon. He hadn’t spotted military anywhere, and there were no signs of their presence.
He had avoided once major thoroughfares, keeping on backroads that were slick with ice. He knew the car wouldn’t last long, and they would have to trek through the barren wilderness and find whatever shelter they could. This would be the harshest yet, and even he could feel how cold it was, what more for Alexia?
The sun was at its highest, but the day still seemed gloomy. Ryker had hoped abandoned settlements would still be around. Maybe they were buried under a ton of snow… all of a sudden, the car gave an awful sputtering sound, and he pushed harder on the accelerator, the tires screeching with the pressure. He sighed, slamming his hands against the steering wheel.
Alexia looked at him with worry. She knew what was coming next. They had to walk, and it would take days or weeks to get to where the supposed settlement was. She didn’t ask Ryker to elaborate; he always said someone had to be there, someone who wasn’t part of Caledon’s regime.
She had never seen the president’s face until she’d left the lab. He was imposing, he looked harsh. He looked like someone she didn’t want to talk to. Would his power reach as far as this empty state? Her book had said that Alaska once had a thriving community, a cold frontier of possibilities-until the war had begun there.
She was hoping against hope that there were people there, werebeings or not, who empathized with their cause, whatever cause there was left for them. She was not a werebeing, but she wasn’t a normal human either. She was the more dispensable one with little to no use in the real world or in a resistance. The only thing she knew she could do was to wait for operations and tests… Alexia shook her head. She was being negative, something she hadn’t allowed herself to feel much inside Sector 12.
There was a foreboding feeling in her that wouldn’t go away. Perhaps she hadn’t gotten over Ryker’s initial rejection. Perhaps she was too cold to manage a trek through wilderness or perhaps she needed more rest. Whatever it was, Alexia felt a dark cloud weigh over her.
Ryker held out his hand, seeing her slow down paces away from him. “Come on,” he told her, “you can do it.”
You can do it. Alexia nodded, took another step and held his hand. She liked holding his hand, but it was something she wouldn’t tell him. She didn’t need to, right? It just came naturally between them, and it was comforting in such conditions. Ryker was afraid they would be spotted easily from above.
They wore black against the expanse of white landscape. Forests were nearly dead, he noticed. They had been petrified from the last war, and they stood like silent sentinels, their barks as dark as night, burned to a crisp. They could stay within the confines of the dead forest…
Ryker checked the map he held in his hands as Alexia looked around, closing her eyes once in a while and keeping her hands in her pockets. “We’re on the right track,” he said. The map was a battered one with towns listed on it, towns that were once filled with Native Americans who celebrated shifters, just like his parents.
The town he was aiming for was Kermode, a long-dead town that had been a haven for werebeings nearly three hundred years ago. They were a good twenty-four hours away by foot if it didn’t snow heavily.
The snow reached up to their knees, making the walk more arduous. A mountain loomed overhead, casting shadows on them. It looked ominous to Ryker, but he ignored it. All of a sudden, he heard the faintest whirring in the wind, and he looked around. He couldn’t sense humans or werebeings anywhere. Where was it coming from? Then, Ryker looked up and saw a moving black dot in the sky.
A helicopter? Ryker’s heart raced, and he grabbed Alexia’s hand. “Move,” he whispered to her. He stuck close to the dark trees, keeping his head down, instructing Alexia to do the same. Her grip on his hand tightened, and he could hear her heart beat. The chopper moved in closer and closer with its rotors destroying the silence. Ryker inched against tree trunks, as the chopper began its descent to ground. As soon as it dipped below the trees, Ryker looked at Alexia and whispered: Run.
They began to run through snow, her legs still nearly half-buried under it, and she heard the chopper’s blades quiet down. Ryker heard them talking in hushed tones; he knew their cover was blown and that they had been traced. It would take a miracle to get to anywhere safe, and Ryker knew he would be forced to shift.
He saw the fear in Alexia’s eyes. “Listen to me,” he began in a rushed manner, “you have to escape, alright? You have to run, run as far away as your legs can take you. Don’t look back-"
“I can’t leave you-"
“You can do this. Just follow the mountain range; it dips down to the coast, where you can find that village-"
“I can’t,” she replied, panicking and near tears.
“Don’t cry,” he snapped at her, and he was filled with worry. He took a deep breath and kissed her hard on the lips, and he held her face with both hands the moment he let go. “Run!”
Alexia blinked and adrenalin began to rush through her. She turned her back and began to run away from him, and she could feel tears streaming down her face. She heard him hastily take off his jacket and layers, and then she heard bones crunch.
Alexia stumbled twice, and she looked back to see that he was gone, and the only remainder were his clothes. Get to the end, she told herself, forcing her legs to cooperate. Faster, faster! She held onto fallen trees for support as she made her way to a thicker set of petrified trees dotting the edge of the mountain.
All of a sudden, she heard a roar, and the hairs on her nape stood. It was unmistakably a tiger’s roar, and she heard Ryker’s come next. She stopped, looking back at the path, her footprints slowly covered by the falling snow. Without another thought, she ran back. She couldn’t leave him alone, not with Caliban around. She felt her palms; they were cold, but it didn’t matter. What was important was that he would revert back to his human form, and she would do that to every werebeing soldier she came across.
“Halt!” someone shouted at her. Alexia took another step forward, and she heard the gun’s chamber cock. Then, she slowly looked up and saw men, all pointing their guns at her. Everyone wore masks, but one man removed his. He was a young, handsome man, but his features were distorted by a permanent glare that unnerved her.
The soldier walked toward her, his gun still pointed. “I’d prefer you come with us without resistance,” he told her. She looked at his uniform and saw Lt. S. Caledon on it.
Alexia didn’t say a word. All of a sudden, Ryker came charging at them, barreling the soldiers in his full werebear form, knocking them off of their feet. Alexia heard gunshots, and smoke from the weapons filled the air. She screamed, seeing a few hit Ryker.
She ran for him as he fell to the ground. Werebeings limped for the clearing, and now Alexia and Ryker were surrounded. She held onto his back as he struggled to get up.
“Ryker,” Caliban began, walking up to him in his weretiger form. “Surrender the girl.”
“Caliban, please don’t!” Alexia cried out to him.
Caliban hesitated at first, and then he saw the look on Lt. Caledon’s face. Ryker then stood up with a grunt and roared at Caliban, swiping the weretiger with its large paws, tossing the smaller werebeing onto a few soldiers.
“It doesn’t have to be this way,” Stephen Caledon told Ryker. He aimed his handgun at Ryker’s head and shot him but missed. Alexia was shaking as she stood behind Ryker, who attacked anyone who approached them.
A werefox rushed for Ryker, leaping high into the air, his teeth bared out. Alexia jumped after the werefox, brushing her hand against its tail, and the werefox shuddered, falling to the ground, becoming human once more.
Stephen shook his head, unable to believe what he had seen. This had to end now, he told himself, raising his gun and steadying it with one hand. Ryker was relentless, finishing off one werebeing after another, and finally, only Caliban was left standing. His remaining conscious human soldiers stood by, waiting for his next orders.
“Shoot him,” Stephen ordered as Caliban stepped back, with a hail of bullets directed for X014. Alexia screamed as Ryker covered her with his body, and he slumped to the ground, blood seeping onto the snow. Alexia shook as she stopped herself from holding onto Ryker’s fur.
“Wake up,” she cried. Caliban yanked her up with a heavily gloved hand.
“Please, please,” she begged. “Don’t leave him like this-"
“We’re chopping his body up when we take you back,” Caliban harshly told her. Alexia struggled against Caliban’s grasp as he dragged her away from Ryker.
“Ryker!” she cried out. “No! Ryker!”
Ryker could hear her screams, but he could no longer open his eyes. He felt colder than he had ever been, and he felt whatever strength he had ebb away. Come on, get up, he told himself. The werebeing soldiers were being pulled away by their fellow soldiers, and Caliban felt someone come up to him. A boot pressed onto his chest. His eyes flew open, and he swiped his paw at Stephen. Blood gushed out of his leg. Stephen screamed from pain, and the remaining soldiers shot Ryker, riddling his body with more bullets.
“Get me out of here!” Stephen ordered, his eyes closed and his face contorted with pain.
A rumbling came from the mountains, and Caliban saw snow falling from the peak. With a paw, he knocked Alexia unconscious, and she collapsed limply in his arms. Ryker had shifted back to his human form, and he stood up, bleeding heavily, his arm outstretched for her. “Alexia!” he cried out before his legs gave way.
“Avalanche!” another soldier yelled as they hurriedly transported their superior onto their waiting helicopter.
Ryker shook his head over and over again, willing himself to move. You were supposed to protect her, someone in him screamed. Alexia! Her unconscious figure was the last thing on his mind before he faded into darkness.
To Be Concluded.....
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Dear Reader,
I want to personally thank you for taking your time to read “The WereGames” I really hope you enjoyed it and you are hungry for the next part in the story.
This is the second book of the TRILOGY and you can get the FINAL book at the links below. Discover how it all ends!
See you in the next book :)
Jade x x