Wolf: A Military P.A.C. Novel (25 page)

Chapter 49 Samantha

General Samantha Ariyan stared at herself in the mirror. She’d been doing so for the last half hour as a heat had built up in the core of her body. She had gotten out of the torn blouse she was wearing—the muscles tearing enough to make her gasp—and gone to treat the wound, hoping, praying that her breast hadn’t been damaged too much. Disinfecting it had made her bite her lip. And then when the peroxide had bubbled up and the wounds were clean she could see. Really, see.

Watch
ed the flesh of her breast slowly knit itself together. The teeth marks from Kerrigan’s attack had savaged her milk glands and the white fat surrounding it had been visible. The pink flesh had been rent like a burst paper bag. She hadn’t moved during the attack, hadn’t made the wound worse by trying to get away, her hands to either side of his head. “Don’t my love, please.” She’d never know if he had heard her because Sammy came to her rescue then. And then Kerrigan was gone.

She had a small idea of what he might be feeling.

“Sammy, what did you do?”

“I didn’t want to lose you. Was that wrong
, Samantha?”

She was still looking in the mirror, but now she noticed the miniature wolf sitting just slightly behind her. Dark auburn fur around the head and eyes, shading down to a lighter
colour at her feet. She was beautiful. The look in Sammy’s eyes was—concern. That was the only name for it. She had always been able to hear that in her voice, in the chimes that had come from her wrist—but to see it exposed in the dark shaded eyes of a wolf. Green eyes, she noticed. How very odd.

“No
, Sammy. What will it do?”

“Health and healing. Oh, you won’t need me anymore.” Sammy looked like she had just been kicked.

Samantha turned around and knelt. Her hands going to Sammy’s head, grasping the fur there. Her thumbs stroked the sides of her muzzle. “Not true, Sammy. I meant it. I love you. You’re my friend. My companion. I’m lost without you.”

“Kerrigan?” That was almost a whine coming from the wolf’s throat.

“I meant that, too. Do I have to choose between you?”

“No. Samantha is. Sammy is.”

The general rested her head against the wolf that was her friend. The fur soft, gentle against her flesh.

“Will I become a wolf, Sammy?”

“I don’t know. Are you angry, Samantha?”

“I, no.”

“Kerrigan was angry.”

“He was scared. It’s
—sometimes the same thing.”

“Updating emotional files,” Sammy said.

The general stared at her friend’s eyes. In a moment, the wolf blinked and looked down. She learned from me. Oh God. She’s like a child. And Samantha liked power as much as her son. How could she be so stupid? Sammy was alive. She didn’t know how, or even when, but the evidence was here in front of her.

“Sammy, we should go after Zach. Even if he doesn’t stay with us, he needs to know he has choices.”

“Ma’ii tsoh is dangerous. Wrong. I think.”

Samantha didn’t say anything
, but she agreed. The door to the chamber he was in was ruined. It wasn’t the act of a sane anything. But she didn't know that when she freed the black wolf.

“Sammy
, I need to speak to Captain Gabriel. Please.”

“Connecting.”

“Hello, Captain. Yes. Good. Could you have a jeep and a ski-doo waiting for me? Please. In an hour. Thank you, sir.” Sammy disconnected the line. A solid click echoing in the air.

“Sammy, using regulations as precedence, find me a reason to retire, immediately. And Sammy, from this point on, since we are friends, you have choices to act with or against me, depending on how you feel. Rank no longer has precedence.”

“Ma’am?” Sammy looked confused, her head cocked to one side.

“Samantha, please.”

“I don’t understand.”

“It’s a choice
, Sammy. But I don’t want you to leave, that’s not the point.”

“I won’t.”

Samantha reached down and scratched Sammy’s ears. “We need a dozen things before you tender that resignation.”

“What things?”

“I have something in mind. But I doubt Zach will like it.”

Node Two: Name, Sammy. Primary Interface: General Samantha Ariyan: Adapting. Primary Systems: Nominal. Organics Engine: online.
Behaviour and Emotional files: Updating: fear, anger. Sometimes the response is the same. Personal Choice: I don’t understand. Command Structure: Unchanged. 

Chapter 50 Kerrigan

Two wolves ran from the compound of the Calgary Military Base. One, the shifting black and grey of storm clouds. Its ears back and its fur flat and tail down. Following. The other, the red of blood, a deep crimson, its fur bristled in anger, its pace a solid thump against the ground. Soldiers jumped away in confusion and fear. The hot acrid scent of fear burning in the nostrils of both wolves. Later, shots ricocheted off the concrete, but they were too late and fired with unsteady hands.

The wolves r
an, the black one still following the red one past the confusion of men and the things that made no sense to it. The smell of grass and pine and animals, rabbit, enough to ease the confusion that surrounded it.

The red wolf ha
d a scent that made the black wolf bristle. His ears came forward, and his tail went up. The smell of the bitch that caused him pain was all over this wolf. Her lust a strong presence. A growl formed in his throat. His legs sped up, pushing against the soft grass they had come to, thrusting forward. He lunged, his teeth piercing fur and flesh. He heard a sharp yelp. This time he leapt to the red wolf’s back.

Kerrigan rolled when the weight of the black wolf struck him. All the years of his military training taking over. He wanted a gun, hands he could grab with and throw the black wolf over his shoulder. That doesn't happen. Kerrigan
was a wolf and the only weapons he had—he sunk his teeth into the flesh of the black wolf. It shifted and the sharp ivory of Zach’s canines scraped over the bone of its foreleg. The growl in its throat stopped for a moment.

Kerrigan continue
d to roll and found his feet, four of them that gripped the ground with the surety of claws and muscle strength he had never known before. He leaped away from the black wolf, turned and sprang forward, his teeth gleaming, a sharp snap that closed over the eye of the wolf he fought.

The black wolf ignore
d it and ground flesh from the red wolf's shoulder. Kerrigan jumped back. The growl in his throat deep and meaty. His eyes glared at the black thing in front of him.

Like him.

Not a wolf. Not a man. Was he Samantha’s creation too? Had she kept this from him too?

His breath settled, but he kept the stiff
-legged posture, his ears back. The two wolves continued to stare at each other. Gauging, judging the other. The black wolf’s lungs stopped their bellowing action, his fur settled down.

They blinked together. The black and the red.

Kerrigan barked.

And both wolves leapt into a run, shoulder to shoulder, nudging each other for dominance and position. The way soldiers would
—only they would verbally spar for one-upmanship rather than use physical sparring. Kerrigan found himself smiling, his jaw open and tongue lolling from his mouth. The scents around him invaded, coursing over his glands. Slowly he identified the
what
of things around him. One thing was clear to his new senses.

Men stank.

Chapter 51 Michael

The desert heat tore the moisture from Michael’s face
, the only exposed part of his body. Adrenaline pumped through his system, his suit gathering up the sweat and cooling the rest of his body. Since no body gear would protect his head from the damaging impact of a bullet, not even PAC, he opted for being able to see rather than for the extra protection. Shrapnel was a different matter, but PAC hadn’t reported any explosives in the area.

“Movement,” Boyen said. Four men, P.A.C. units, and combat suits brought their attention forward. The mound of sand they were on covered the chamber that PAC’s ping had discovered. Or rather, the screen that said there was nothing there. The data that all the P.A.C.’s had confirmed as false for its lack of variety.

They shifted, coming up to their feet and following the movement. A fox met their gaze and then leapt into the shifting valleys of sand around them.

Four men breathed easier. “PAC
, get me a satellite feed. Let’s see what else is around here.”

“Editing Silent Reporter feed. Seeking. Movement. Men, animals. South, southeast.”

“Let’s go.”

Four men crouched low, their eyes wary, their senses ratcheted up from the adrenaline that flooded their systems.

Behind them now, the fox watched, its eyes burning with an unnatural fury. No one had noticed the slim straps and buckles attached to the underside of the animal. Nor the pistol that was hidden there.

Node One: Piezoelectric differential acquired. Power level: full. Memory functions returning to normal parameters. Assessing abilities: Organics engine, complete; Medical mode, complete; Security Mode, Complete; Meta-materials construction techniques, Complete; Cognitive abilities, complete; Emotional parameters, fuck. Communication, incomplete; Long-range communication source cells missing. Acquiring mass to replace source material. Flesh, sand, minerals, other. Incorporation complete.

The organic machine named PAC stood up, the form of a wolf growing out of his cells, becoming flesh, and fur, and teeth. His coat contained the brindle colours of Faelon, grey and black with edges of white. The double guard hairs that would have kept a normal wolf dry and warm were piezoelectric strands constantly generating power. He looked around through the shift of snow and ice that fell from the sky. Lightening flashed. He sniffed the ground around him. After a day of storms and the buildup of snow there was nothing left of Michael’s scent. PAC looked over the cliff face. Nothing moved below him.

A whine came from his throat.

The wolf turned and headed up the large basin that led to Finley Creek and then back towards home.

Michael stirred. The depression in the wall that
had kept him from the wind and snow of the storm was too small to stretch out in. Backing out, he rubbed the cold from his muscles. He stood up and sniffed the air. There was nothing here. And he couldn’t stay. The despair that had hit him yesterday was still there, an ache riding his mind and heart, but he couldn’t give into that again. He rubbed his hands together, feeling the heat build, and then found a handhold above his head on the cliff face and pulled his body up. His feet followed, his toes searching out a grip. Thirty metres later, he pulled his body over the ledge where he had last seen Faelon in White Bear’s grip, where he had lost PAC to the wind and the elements. He took a deep breath.

S
now and ice filled his nostrils, the heady scent of pine, several animals upwind of him—and Faelon. It was faint. A hint on the wind. But it was enough. In the snow in front of him, there were wolf tracks leading to the cliff edge and then away again. The prints a quarter full of snow. Hope surged through him until he realized the size difference. This wolf was normal, tiny compared to Faelon. Following the prints led to a jagged hole in the snow, bare rock under a half-formed puddle of slush. What would melt the snow this way? But the prints stepped out of the depression, as if the animal had been dropped out of the air. It reminded him of how he had found Faelon, her prints disappearing into the depression where he had set his trap, but not coming out. There were no other prints around though, not White Bear’s—the way he would have expected if Faelon had gotten away from him.

It wasn’t Faelon. PAC was gone. Lost in the snow or blown away in the weather. Without his input, the machine would revert to its original form. He’d left the order that if he died PAC belonged to Faelon. But what happened if Faelon was dead
?

Michael
set off, his pace eating up the klicks before him, following the faint scent that was Faelon. At the top of the large basin he was in, he could see the avalanche that had buried the cave he had spent a night in. His gun was buried under that mound of snow. It should have been pristine in colour, but the small slide had brought down debris from the top, rocks and trees and . . .

. . .
a body. Michael slowed and then stopped. A cold realization gripped him, a shiver ran over his scalp and then down his back. He sniffed the air. The scent that came to him, he knew it. It smelled of spring to his new senses. Before it was just sweet, like the syrup as he had poured it over the traps he had set. The same trap Faelon had been in.

That meant
. . .

Before him was a body. Locked in death and
in two different forms. A wolf stared at him, its jaw open, but that was only one side of its face. The other side was human. Its grey eye blank with death, no presence, or life in its surface. No cataract covered over the colour. It was clear and stark in its beauty.

The same eyes Faelon owned. The shaman's tale of Simon
Werheald came back to him. Faelon's father.

Other parts of the body were human too, mixed together with that of the wolf. Wherever a human part showed, the bough of a tree had pierced the body. One sharp bough had impaled the chest, through its heart. Another had slid through the bones of the jaw.

Faelon knew what the plant would do. What would happen when she dropped her hind leg into the trap. Why? There was only one reason he could think of; to get pregnant.

Michael
knew the smell of the European Mountain Ash. The legends said it was sacred and could bestow long life. They called it a Rowan tree.

It was another way to kill a witch. And what was the Yeenaaldlooshii
? Even if they were from different legends. But maybe that was the point. Faelon’s father had studied therianthropy, all the ways to become something else. Wolf, bear, cat. The shaman worked with curses, it was how the Witchery Way was performed. Not through healing but with curses, and the skin of the animal.

Skinwalker.

What had Simon discovered?