Authors: Eve Langlais
no good bears, Viktor managed to slide into the back seat, his passenger not loosening her grip at all until the door slammed shut. Tentatively, she lifted her head and peeked around.
“Is this a car?” she asked.
“A truck.”
“And it is going to transport us?”
“We’re going to take you to processing,” Jessie
announced, starting the engine and putting it into gear. At the first lurch, his lady tucked back into him, and holding in a sigh, Viktor hugged her loosely.
Damn FUC, and damn Gregory.
The latter, a loyal hyena henchman for more than a few years, obviously betrayed their plans to the former – stupid agency and the bane of the mastermind’s existence – and now everything was ruined. The shifter’s special ops team overran the Moreau installation with guns blazing. The staff and guards put up a valiant, if useless, fight. Thousands of dollars in research was destroyed or taken into evidence. Scientists died or threw themselves at the mercy of the invading force, the traitors.
With nowhere to escape and the enemy closing in, the mastermind did the only thing it could.
When the cage in the lab was opened, it turned big eyes, brimming with tears toward the FUC agent. The mastermind murmured, “Oh thank you. Thank you for saving me from these horrible people.”
The fools bought it.
As they led the diminutive figure out to the waiting chopper along with those who could still walk, the plotting began anew, the devious cogs in the mind whirling, until a suspicious guard stared a moment too long.
Muah-ha-boo-hoo-boo-hoo.
Wiping false tears, a grin threatened to burst free behind a tiny hand. So long as there was a breath to take, all was not yet lost.
The idiots didn’t know who they had in their midst, which suited the plan just fine. So what if they’d taken over Moreau Island Industries and rescued all the beautifully monstrous projects hidden there? The clueless animals still didn’t know who the mastermind was, who hid under their very noses. Why, they even promised to provide food, clothing and shelter. The irony was giggle worthy.
But the laughter, the evil chuckle of someone not yet defeated, needed containing.
I mustn’t let them know they’ve caught me. In their midst, I will find a way to infiltrate their network. Discover where they’ve sent my lovely creations and hidden my files.
And if lucky, get a hold of a particular bunny and her baby. Oh, and toss a bit of revenge at two bears and a swan who screwed up the brilliant plan in the first place.
I haven’t given up, world. I will become the greatest predator the shifter community has ever known. All shall tremble before me. Muahahaha.
“Is something wrong?” the FUC agent asked coming alongside.
Coughing into a diminutive hand, the mastermind smiled up at the oblivious shifter. “Nothing wrong. Just something caught in my throat.” The taste of near success, that was.
Project eventually sat on the seat beside the one called Viktor. He pronounced it funny, with a hard emphasis on the K and T, a result of his slight accent perhaps? She liked the cadence, whatever it was, although she couldn’t figure out why when he spoke, shivers tickled down her spine, nice ones. She also quite enjoyed the smell of him, spicy with an overtone of something she couldn’t decipher. Whatever it was, inhaling it calmed her, but at the same time, created a strange heat.
Concentrating on him, she took stock of her situation. Despite her wishes, Viktor rescued her, taking her from the only home she knew, thrusting her into a world that frightened. And it got more intimidating the farther they travelled.
Perched beside Viktor, she kept a death grip on his arm and a claim on his body. Legs draped over his lap, her fingers digging into his forearm, she tried to take in the scenery whipping by. Dizzying green at times, square with buildings at others, signs with letters and colors! Dozens of bright and bold colors. So much had happened, so many things overwhelmed her senses, her mind threatened to shut down.
Never in her wildest imaginings could she have guessed at the big world outside the laboratory. Used to confined spaces, and ceilings which boxed her in, the glimpses of the sky, soaring so high, made her feel small and insignificant. And yet, it didn’t seem to bother Viktor or the woman behind the wheel of the vehicle. Did they not fear that endless space over their heads? Apparently not. If they could handle it, so could she. She hoped.
“Nope. But they’re still sweeping the place. The guards that are alive are being sent to a secure facility for processing, while those that didn’t survive the raid are getting DNA swabbed and fingerprinted. None seem to be the mastermind though. Actually, none of the ones questioned so far can even provide a description. It’s like their minds have a blank spot where he’s concerned.”
Project held her tongue as she listened. Despite Viktor’s assurance and claim he took her to safety, she knew from experience how devious the mastermind could be. Rumors abounded, tossed around amongst the guards who didn’t temper their conversations around the projects, of the retaliation meted when one of their ranks let loose their tongue in the wrong company. The mastermind didn’t like those who told tales, even if none had much to say. The brains behind the operation seldom left anything to chance, even their identity. Project suspected the daily pills they were forced to swallow had a lot to do with the memory lapses of her cellmates. Everyone except for her. Project knew well the mastermind’s face.
Exactly how did she recall when no one else seemed to? She theorized the ‘incident’ made her less susceptible, not that she ever admitted it. She played dumb like all the rest, lest the mastermind decide to terminate the lab’s longest running experiment. Even now, in supposed safety, Project kept quiet about what she knew. Habit was a hard thing to break.
“So what’s your name?”
A nudge from Viktor startled her.
“She’s talking to you,” he said.
Project glanced at Viktor, his hard gaze making her shiver. “Me? I am Project X081. But the doctors call me Project for short.”
He frowned, but she didn’t recoil. She’d already noticed he grimaced a lot, but it didn’t mean he followed up with violence. Actually, she found him quite attractive even when he wore his grim, forbidding look.
“You’re not a prisoner anymore, so you can tell us your real name. The name you had before you went to that place.”
“I have no other name.” Or none she remembered. Unlike the others brought in their teens and adult years, Project’s memories began in a cell. Not the one they eventually found her in, but similar in almost all respects. She’d moved around a few times in her life, the voyages a fearful thing comprised of restraints and blindfolds.
“Did you have your memories erased?” Viktor asked.
She shook her head. Then nodded it. “No. Yes. Maybe. I don’t know. I wouldn’t exactly know would if someone did. Or didn’t. It’s possible.”
Viktor’s eyes almost crossed as he attempted to follow her logic.
“How old were you when they captured you?” asked the woman driving.
“I don’t know. I can’t even be sure I was captured. I think I might have been born in the laboratories. I’ve only ever known the labs and the dungeons they kept us locked in.”
The vehicle swerved, and panicked, Project flung herself on Viktor and clung for dear life.
“Shit, Jessie. Take it easy, would you?” he grumbled.
“Sorry. I’m just a little shocked by your friend’s announcement. I didn’t realize the mastermind had been taking prisoners and experimenting for so long.”
“You and me both,” he muttered. “You don’t remember going to that place, so let’s try a different angle to see if we can jog your memory. How many years did you spend in their custody?”
Project shrugged. “I don’t know. We don’t have calendars or ways to mark time. A long time though.”
“How old are you?” Viktor asked. “Eighteen? Nineteen?”
Project giggled. “Oh no. Not that young. According to Doctor Keljoy, I turned twenty six this year.”
“Still so young,” he remarked.
“How old are you?” she asked.
“Old enough to know better.”
Not an answer, but it seemed the woman called Jessie understood the cryptic response because she laughed. “You’re never too old, Viktor.”
He grunted in reply. Conversation done for the moment, Project snuggled closer, and he didn’t push her away. Why she found his presence comforting, she couldn’t have explained. He smelled nice, that played a part. He appealed to her visually. But more inexplicably, she felt safe with him. He projected an aura of confidence and menace that should have made her flee – or wet her pants – but instead, attracted her.
Until she felt secure, or able to face the new world he’d thrust her in with some measure of competence, she’d stick close to him. Real close. She nuzzled her nose against the skin of his neck, a low rumble of pleasure rattling from her. He stiffened, and not just his upper body. A part of him under her buttocks, got harder too, it went from a firm nudge, to a thick one. Innocent in many ways, Project still knew what it meant. He found her attractive. For some reason, this elated her.
In the dungeon, most of the guards and doctor’s ignored her. Mastermind’s orders. Project was too valuable for them to accidentally damage. Not that she understood what made her so special. Other than her ability to resist most drugs, she was a failure in every other way.
While tall, she wasn’t big and strong like some of the others held captive. She couldn’t change into her animal shape, heck, she didn’t even know her animal shape. She didn’t possess super speed or strength, nothing. And yet, Mastermind prized her, keeping her alive even as so many others were killed after the doctors deemed them useless.
But Viktor didn’t know about her special status. He’d never gotten the warning to stay away. He found her attractive regardless of her less than pristine exterior.
Despite the boring start to her day, things were looking up. She rubbed her bottom against the bulge, and snuggled closer.
Way up.
Viktor suffered the strangest agony during the car ride, one of a rock hard cock and tight balls. It annoyed him. Since when did rescued waifs turn him on? It wasn’t even as if his mystery lady did anything overtly sexual, other than cling to him like a leech in the Amazon. But still, something about her nearness, the heat of her, roused his sluggish, cold blood.
Sick croc. Dirty, and a victim of experimentation, he should have set her aside the moment she latched onto him. Found someone else for her to cling to as fear kept sending her for the safety of his arms. However, for some strange reason, the idea of her in someone else’s grasp didn’t sit well with him at all.
He blamed it on his sense of responsibility. She’d chosen him to trust and he owed it to her to get her to a place where she felt safe enough to let him go. But really, was there anywhere safer than with him? Skilled, in more ways than he could count, in methods to subdue an opponent and defend himself, she’d inadvertently chosen well when she decided to use him as her personal protector. If only she’d stop nuzzling him and making those rumbly sounds. Not one to cuddle, it appalled him to realize how much he enjoyed it.
Instead of focusing on how her warm breath tickled his skin, or her frame fit so comfortably in his arms, he thought of other things, like how she’d gotten captured at a young age. Young enough she didn’t recall who she was, because he refused to contemplate the possibility she’d been born and created in a lab. Some things were just too farfetched to believe, even for
identity and gave them a file number. It angered him. Here was a beautiful young woman –
too young for an old croc like me
– who’d lost years of her life because of some perverse quest for power.
I will help her get revenge.
And if it involved killing, well, he was good with that. He’d not invested in all those boxes of ammunition for nothing.
The ride passed uneventfully, and Jessie parked the truck at the back of the building that housed FUC headquarters. Viktor opened the door and slid toward the opening while sexy enigma clung to him.
“We’re going outside for a minute,” he told her. “You might want to close your eyes for a second.”
His redheaded neck-scarf clamped them tight while Jessie stifled a snort. He flicked his middle index at her mirth, but the swan, with a honk in reply, only shook harder. Eyes scanning the alley, which was clear, Viktor entered the service door and took the stairs two at a time up the several flights to the office. A man his age needed to keep in shape, so he eschewed elevators when possible for any chance at exercise. Carrying his redheaded lady provided an extra element of exertion he needed. He lied to himself instead of admitting that perhaps his decision stemmed from the fact her bare feet would find the concrete steps uncomfortable.
Once he reached the last landing, though, he halted before going through the door where everyone would see him and his new fashion accessory. Bare feet or not, if he carried her in, he’d have to kill a lot of his coworkers if they dared laugh. Besides, there was carpet just past the door, industrial low pile stuff, but still soft enough to keep her feet from harm.
“You need to let go now.” Yeah, he said it, but he didn’t loosen his grip right away.
Golden eyes opened and peered at him. “Is it safe?”
He snorted. “Depends on your definition. Most people would say getting this close to me is tantamount to a death wish.”
“You wouldn’t hurt me.”
Spoken with such conviction. It warmed him. And made him scowl. “You shouldn’t trust so easily. You don’t know me. I could have nefarious intentions.”
“Ooh, that sounds like fun.”
He almost choked. “I could snap your neck before you could blink if I chose.”
“But you won’t.” She beamed at him.
He sighed. “Just get down, would you? I don’t need the entire office making fun of me.”
“Sorry.” She loosened her grip and slid down his body.
He enjoyed it way too much. Or a certain part of his physique did, at any rate. When she took a step away, he immediately noticed the ebbing heat.
“I’m going to take you in now to meet my boss. I don’t want you to freak out, but keep in mind there’s going to be some other shifters in there as well. All good guys, of course. Nobody here will hurt you.”
“You wouldn’t let them.”
No he wouldn’t. In that, she was absolutely right.
Stalking into headquarters, glaring at anyone who might dare to say a word about the woman who clung to his arm, he garnered some looks, but not as many as he feared. The woman at his side, who really needed a name, peeked around, not so much fearful as curious and cautious.
“What is this place?” she asked, returning the frank stares of the handful of other FUC agents who looked her way.
“This is FUC headquarters.”
“A sex place?” She said it on a squeak.
“No,” he hastened to correct. “FUC as in the Furry United Coalition. We are a group of shifters working to aid our kind against crime as well as discovery by the humans.”
“Everyone here can shift?” she asked, glancing up at him with round eyes.
“Every single one.”
“But there’s so many.” She took a sniff. “And the flavors… I never knew so many kinds existed. How marvelous you all work together.”
“This is just a fraction of our population. There are shifter communities all around the world, as well as FUC offices. We’ve integrated so well with society, we even work and live among the humans.”
“They don’t know our secret?”
“The humans? No. Although, some do suspect. Most though, treat the possibility of our existence as a joke.”
“And if they were to find out?”
“Discovery would mean war, or hiding. The humans don’t like anything they perceive as different, and people who can turn into animals would definitely fall under that category.” He flashed her some pointed teeth, a mouthful that he knew for a fact was more copious and deadly than most people owned.
“What’s your animal?” she asked.
“What does your nose tell you?”
She wrinkled it and looked so cute as she concentrated, he bit the inside of his cheek lest he do something stupid, such as kiss those soft lips. “I don’t know. You kind of smell like Bob. He was an amphibian, and yet at the same time, you’re nothing alike.”
“You’re comparing me to a frog?” He said it with disdain. “Not even close. I’m a crocodile.”
“I’ve never seen one of those. Are you fearsome?”
His chest puffed out and the pupils of his eyes turned into vertical slits. “Very.”
A smile brightened her face and her eyes shone. “I would love to see your crocodile sometime.”
“Maybe, if the opportunity arises.” Not likely. The chances of him encountering her after today hovered in the low to not likely range. But, he didn’t tell her that. More disturbing, the thought of not seeing her again didn’t sit well with him. That or he suffered indigestion. “What about you? What’s your animal?” As a reptile, his sense of smell sucked, even in human