The Trials of Gregg (6 page)

“What kind of shifter are you?” John asked.

“Me? I’m a Jaguar. Which is kind of cool since Mitchell is one, too. I may not be related to him, but at least I’m the same breed as him. So it makes me feel like I have some sort of bond with him.”

John could understand that. He would feel the same way if he were Bowie. As for John, he had only met a few Lions outside of Skye, so he had yet to make a real connection with any of them. While Skye was nice enough, they had yet to get past the point where they were just casual acquaintances.

“Have you shifted yet?” John asked.

“I did once. Mitchell’s brother, Jacyn, talked me through it, so it wasn’t that bad. How about you?”

“I have a few times. The first time, I didn’t know what in the hell was going on, and it hurt like a bitch. I was terrified afterward. I had never heard of shifters yet, so I didn’t know what was going on with me.”

Bowie’s mouth parted, and his eyes grew so wide John was afraid they were going to come rolling out of his head. “Dude, that’s just fucked up. I’ve heard of people going insane from that.”

“I almost did,” John admitted. “For a while, I thought I had. I mean what sane person believes that they can change into a full-grown Lion? Or at least, that’s what I thought until the Ravens started making public appearances, and I realized shifters were a real thing.”

“Why didn’t you come to us right away?” Bowie asked in a
duh
voice.

John gave a shrug. “I didn’t know how I would be received. For all I knew, I would be seen as an enemy or a stray that would have been killed on the spot. I didn’t know anything about shifter politics. So I thought the best thing to do would be to lay low, continue living as a human, and hope nobody ever figured out who I was. I now realize that was pretty naïve of me.”

“Just a bit,” Bowie shot back sarcastically. “Any shifter that gets within ten feet of you can smell your Lion stench.”

John lifted his own arm and inhaled. “Do I really smell that bad?”

“No, it’s not unpleasant, but it’s strong. You’re all Alpha, dude. Once they get you out in the battlefield, there is going to be no stopping you.”

John had to admit to himself that Bowie had a point. Whenever he’d gone out on missions with his human unit, there had been no holding him back. John had almost felt like some wild beast. Now he knew that was because, in a sense, he was.

“Do you have any family here?” John asked.

Bowie shook his head. “My parents were killed in the mass attack. I have a twin who they think may still be alive out there somewhere, but so far, they haven’t had any luck in finding him. How about you? Do you have any family here?”

“No, they did some blood work on me and found out that all my family members died in the attack. I did have one sister who made it through, but she died a couple of years ago in a battle with some Hyenas, so it’s just me.”

Bowie gave a sympathetic smile. “Sorry about that. It must really suck to have no real family.”

“I do have a foster brother I’m really close to. Mitchell let me call and tell him where I’m at and stuff, so I’m not totally alone.”

“Is he human?” Bowie asked with a slight tilt of his head.

“Yeah.” John really hoped that Bowie wasn’t one of those shifters that looked down on humans because he was beginning to like the rookie. It would be a shame if he had to punch Bowie for saying something derogatory toward Ramon.

“He didn’t have any problem with you being a shifter?” Bowie said.

John let out a sigh of relief. It looked as if Bowie wasn’t one of those human haters. Most likely because he was raised among them like John had been. It was kind of hard to hate the very people who had raised and cared for you your entire life.

“No, he was just angry I didn’t trust him enough to tell him sooner,” John admitted.

Bowie started to say something else, but they were interrupted when Alden came by. “Everybody suit up and get ready. We just got a call for a mission.”

John stayed put with all the other newbies. There was no way they would be sending him out on a mission already. But Alden turned to him. “That includes you, John. You’re more than ready to handle this assignment.”

Adrenaline began to spike through John’s body as he followed the others to the armory to get their weapons.

Gregg rushed to his side. “You’re going out?”

John gave a shrug. “Alden seems to think that I’m ready.”

Gregg nipped at his bottom lip before he gave a nod. “Okay, just make sure to stay by my side. You may see some pretty freaky stuff out there. Don’t let it get into your head and mess with your game. Keep your focus on the battle and staying alive.”

John started to say that he knew how to handle himself in a battle, thank you very much, but then realized Gregg had a point. John was about to see people shift into animal forms, and he would be in a kind of battle that he’d never dreamed he’d be in before. All kinds of freaky shit was about to go down, and John’s ass was going to be square in the middle of it.

“Do you know what kind of mission it’s going to be?” John asked.

“We’re going to be liberating some slaves from another compound. Shane and Tatum are already there, securing the interior. That way, the slavers won’t kill off all the slaves when they see us coming. Our job will be to take care of the assholes on the outside.”

“What kind of shifters will they be?”

Gregg gave a half-shrug. “Your guess is as good as mine. It could be Hyenas, Snakes, Ravens, or even Spiders. They all have their dirty feet in the slave market pool.”

John held back a shiver at the mention of Spiders. He’d heard from the grapevine that Spider shifters were much, much larger than their animal counterparts. Some of them reaching a towering ten-feet tall. That was something John did not want to tangle with.

They were given their guns and body armor. At first, John was soothed by the thought of the armor. But then he looked behind the guy handing out the stuff and saw a pile of torn, bent and bloodied armor that had obviously been in previous battles. John’s confidence in the protection took a drastic nosedive.

“Shit, does this stuff even work?” John asked as he poked at the armor. It seemed hard enough, but if so, why was there such a big pile of defects?

“Yeah, it’s saved my hide many times. But there’s only so much even the best armor can do when you’re trapped under a Raven and he’s going at you with his talons and beak. Those motherfuckers are dangerous and damn strong,” Gregg said.

“If you’re trying to give me a pep talk here, you’re failing miserably.”

Gregg gave him a grim stare. “No, I just want you prepared for what we’re going to be facing out there. It would be wrong of me to send you out blind. I would never do that to you.”

No, Gregg wouldn’t. Because, unlike so many others, Gregg was truthful. Even if the truth was tough to face. It was one of the many things that John liked about the Hawk. Well, that and the fact that he had a fantastic ass, a great sense of humor, and the most amazing set of lips ever.

There was so much that John wanted to say to Gregg at that moment. But there wasn’t time. They had to rush out to the van waiting to take them to the mission. But John made a silent vow to himself. Once the mission was over, he was going to finally tell Gregg how he really felt about him. John was sick of dancing around the issue.

They piled into the back of a van, and John ended being wedged between Ash and Gregg. It was a tight fit, and the ride was bumpy as hell, but John had been through worse during his career with the military. So he didn’t have any complaints.

“Do we know what kind of shifters we’re going up against?” Ash asked.

“Don’t take my word as proof positive, but I heard that it was Snakes,” a soldier across from them said.

“Aw, man, I hate those things. You usually have to shoot them to hell before they go down,” Ash whined.

John’s stomach did a slight lurch. “Let me guess, shifter Snakes are much bigger than normal, everyday ones.”

“Yes, and they’re a hundred times more venomous, too,” Ash rattled on. “Plus you have to add on that they have human intelligence, and that makes for one hell of a fight we’re in for. The last time we had a fight with a group of them, I saw a Snake swallow one of our guys whole. Can you imagine dying that way? Being slowly digested?” Ash shivered.

Gregg let out a moan.

“Why don’t you tell a few more horror stories so the newbies can get even more nervous?”

Ash had the good grace to blush. “Sorry about that, guys.”

“Don’t be,” John said. “We need to know what we’re going to be facing. The more we know about the enemy ahead of time, the better off we’ll be.”

The van came to a skidding halt in front of what he guessed used to be an old big-box store. Now it was abandoned. Or at least it was supposed to be. It would seem that the slavers had taken over and made it the main headquarters of their operations.

Even before they opened the door, John could hear the pinging sound of bullets hitting the sides of the van. He still surged forward, all the while shooting. At first, he didn’t have a good visual on the enemy, and once he did, he wished he’d never looked.

Half of them were in their human forms and using guns to shoot at John’s team. The other half were in the Snake form. John had expected them to be big, but not that big. They were frigging huge. They had to be at least sixty feet long. They were as wide as a truck, too. Their fangs alone were bigger than his hand, and don’t even get him started about their eyes…they were a bright red that glowed in the dim evening light.

The sane part of John wanted to break rank and run in the opposite direction. Luckily for him, his insane part was much stronger and in charge, so he stayed put and started to shoot the hell out of the Snake that was close to him.

Gregg had been right about one thing, John was indeed seeing some freaky shit. He knew this was just the beginning of the battle, and there was still a lot more to come.

John continued to shoot at the Snake, but it kept coming for him. Gregg joined him, spraying some bullets of his own. Finally, between the two of them, they managed to take the Snake down.

But it was only one, and there were so many others to go. John wiped his face as he took in the scene before him. It looked like something straight out of hell. Half of the felines and Hawks had shifted and were fighting in their animal forms. They were using their claws, talons and fangs against the Snakes, while those in human form were using various weapons, such as flame throwers. Smoke, ash, and flames filled the air, along with the scent of burning flesh.

John’s eyes began to sting from the polluted air, but he fought on. He considered shifting, too. He might have better luck fighting in his Lion form. He was stronger and faster when he was his animal. Shane came over and joined them. He had a flamethrower strapped to his back and a wicked grin pasted on his face.

“Let’s have some real fun,” Shane said.

“I thought you were inside, securing the perimeter.” Gregg said.

“It’s all clear and locked up tight so none of these creepy crawlies can get inside,” Shane assured him. “I was a good assassin, don’t worry. I just wanted to come out and play.”

John decided right then that Shane had been right. He wasn’t just cray-cray, he was full-out crazy. But for some reason, John couldn’t help but like the guy. It wasn’t just because he happened to have a flamethrower on his back either.

Another Snake spotted them and began to lurch forward. It moved fast despite the fact that it was so huge. Both John and Gregg took a step back, but Shane did the opposite, he took a couple of steps forward and flipped the thing off.

“Do you have any idea how ugly you are? You should be killed for that alone. But no, you had to go and add dealing with slaves on to it. I was inside there and saw what you guys were up to. There’s frigging children in there, you sick fuck!” Shane yelled.

Shane then let loose with the flamethrower. He wasn’t nice about it, either. He aimed right for the Snake’s face. The Snake let out a shrieking sound as the flames hit its head. John let out a wince of sympathy even though he didn’t like the thing and wanted to see it dead, it had to hurt like hell.

The Snake thrashed around wildly, like it was making a desperate attempt to put out the flames. It gave a final surge forward, making even Shane take several steps back to avoid getting squashed before the Snake hit the ground and died.

John watched in horror as the thing continued to burn, its flesh turning black and the flames spreading downward along its long, green body. He looked up and saw several other Snakes in various stages of burning. His stomach did a slow roll. While he’d seen some pretty gross things in his life, this one had to be the worst.

He noted that the fighting had died down. There were no more Snakes alive. John let out a deep breath. Not only had he survived his first official fight as a shifter, but they had been victorious. What more could he ask for?

They began to make their way to the building that housed the slaves. Gregg grabbed John’s arm and pulled him to the side. “You’re going to see some really terrible things in there. I just wanted to prepare you.”

“How bad is it going to be?” John asked, his gut clenching in dread. He’d already thought he’d seen the worse, and now he found out it was just the beginning.

“The slavers treat their captives worse than animals. So it’s going to be terrible. I’m not going to lie to you.”

John let out a deep sigh. “Okay, then. Let’s do this and get it over with.”

As soon as John entered the building, the stench hit him. It was so rancid that it almost knocked him off his feet. It reeked of urine, blood, puss, decay, unwashed bodies, just to name a few. Then he saw them—row upon row of cages. Many of which were stacked on top of each other. All of which were no bigger than a large dog crate. They sure as hell weren’t big enough to fit a human, but that’s what each one of them held.

The captives were filthy and dressed in rags that were equally dirty. Their hair was so matted and greasy that, in most cases, John couldn’t even tell what color it was. When he saw Shane had been right and that the captives were of all ages, John felt a surge of rage go through him.