Shifters

Chapter 18

The vampire had just sat there with his hand in her fur. He looked so weak but he wasn’t taking any chances. Jared was having them both brought in under heavy guard.

“Don’t hurt her and don’t touch the collar,” he had whispered before any of Jared’s men came rushing through the gate.

He looked at the shifter then the vampire. Then it hit him, this was the bastard at Lydia’s house. Petro, that was his name. The god damn vampire trying to hurt Lydia. 

Petro didn’t care anymore. As long as they didn’t hurt the shifter that had fought so hard to save his life. The Mistress would be taken down. As long as this one was protected and The Mistress was destroyed all would be ok.

“Don’t hurt her and don’t touch the collars” he whispered again before he fell into unconsciousness.

The two were escorted into the labs. The mess outside was cleaned up. They had taken the shifter he knocked unconscious and the vampire that hadn’t been killed.

Petro had said not to touch the collars. Both shifters had them on as well as the vampire. Why should he listen to a vampire and what the hell was going on here? He wanted answers god damn it all.

He knew something was wrong earlier in the day. Lydia had become restless. She was pacing inside the control room and she kept trying to convey some message to him. It was killing him to keep her shifted but she had to wait the phasing period out. He had gone in that morning. Like he always did, teaching her. Talking to her, giving her news of her kids, things to smell so she could use it to add to her arsenal of control. It was amazing how fast she learned.

He had gone in and she was pacing. Agitated. He didn’t know what was wrong. She had walked up to him and sat. She had made a sound he hadn’t recognized. She had pushed her nose against his hand. He stood there not sure about what to do.. She dug her nose into his hand again. Pushing her head along his hand until it rested on her head between her ears. He dug into the soft fur for the first time in almost four weeks. It felt just as good as he had remembered it had. But something else was there now, something he just couldn’t pick up on.

He looked down at her and she stalked off. He shook his head and had no idea what it meant. But not five seconds later he had gotten the call that there was a shifter running for the base along with the vampires and other shifters following close behind.

He headed towards where they had Petro locked down. He entered the room and the vampire was strapped down with the special bonds they had made after examining the others they held. But he was still unconscious.

“Kind of like a vampire coma it seems,” Carnope told him. “I’m not sure what’s wrong. He’s cool to the touch but our sensors show he’s raging with some fever. If he wasn’t dead already that would have killed him.”

He had walked out still as confused as he was before. Following Carnope he went into the shifters room where she was being held. It was large and reinforced with the same material that the Control Room was made of. Just smaller. She was pacing in there. Snapping and snarling at anything that came near. And that collar was still on.

“We can’t seem to get close enough to finish examining it. When we had first brought her in, we hooked her up to an IV to feed her. She was dangerously close to death. Not more than an hour later she was up and being surly. We haven’t been able to do anything since then,” Carnope chuckled.

“We put in some more food, which she ate very quickly. She seems to eat like Lydia does. Ravenous. And like Lydia she is refusing to cooperate,” Carnope continued. “From what we gathered, the collar, if removed without the proper key or whatever it needs, will detonate.”