Arachna

The sight of the chief punched Lance in the stomach. Caleb mirrored Rotoya’s smile, looking on from behind her police car. Her body was covered in burns, her face scorched, and her smile twisted.

“I thought you were—”

“Dead?” The chief laughed. “Well, I almost was. I’ll admit, you pulled a fast one on me. I’m impressed.” Her smile disappeared. “But I’m still not happy about this constant reminder.” She gestured at her face. “I thought the drug would’ve healed it by now, but… go figure.”

“Then maybe you should’ve left us alone,” Lance challenged. The beast circled his stomach with a low growl.

Rotoya emitted a pleased hum. “You’ve gotten brave since I last saw you.”

“Are you done?” Caleb interjected, rounding the police car. “Because I’m ready to get this over with.”

The chief closed her eyes and sighed. Annoyance sparked in her tone. “You’ve taken nearly all my men from me. The least you can do is give me this.”

“I did give you this,” Caleb spat back. His voice faded as he guided her far enough away to hiss in her ear.

Lance couldn’t make out the words, but Rotoya’s glare said it all.

The soldiers surrounding Lance kept their guns trained on him. If he ran, he’d be dead before he could round the corner.

An idea popped into his head, and he suppressed a grin.

The beast cocked its head to the side, as if wondering why Lance would want to smile.

Caleb would have taken control of me by now if he could… and if Caleb can’t control me… maybe my nanobots are the alpha ones. Which means…

The beast purred, and Lance closed his eyes, picturing the soldiers, all of them, guns pointed. The beast shifted within him, pacing back and forth.

Let me in.

Lance ignored it. He kept his eyes closed and chose a soldier standing next to Caleb. He focused on him—just him. He reached out and grabbed in the dark, clawing for a foothold. Then, in the darkness, Lance sensed them.

Dozens of energies, like fireworks, inhabiting the bodies of the soldiers and officers. He sensed them all, felt their breathing in his own chest. Their hearts pumped purple blood. They were all tense, all waiting for the kill order. Lance focused again on that single soldier next to Caleb.

The beast growled at the soldier, but Lance calmed it. It whined back.

Let me in.

With all the guns pointed at him, Lance resisted the urge to shake his head. At least two of the officers were itching to pull their triggers. Their anticipation was tangible. He homed in on that one soldier for the last time. He gritted his teeth and dug deep within him.

There it was. Not just the breathing of the soldier, calm and even, but the blood flow. The nanobots swam through his blood stream, reproducing by the hundreds.

Lance reached out into the dark again, and he could feel the soldier’s heart and the blood traveling through it. With that came his emotions.

Fear—the soldier felt fear. Had he seen what Lance could do? It didn’t matter. He held that heart within himself and focused on what he wanted to say.

Check the rounds in your gun.

Lance eased his head up, keeping his focus as he painted disinterest on his face.

The soldier looked down at his gun, and his hand reached for the magazine. Then he stopped, shook his head, and pointed the gun at Lance again.

Lance cursed himself, and the beast joined in.

He made to reach for the soldier again, but the chief stopped in the middle of her argument with Caleb. Her eyes shot to the soldier, then to Lance. A smile played on her lips, then Caleb looked at him.

“What?” he asked.

“We can’t kill him,” the chief responded, the smile still on her lips.

Caleb sent Lance a nasty glare. “Why?”

“Because he’s Eric’s son.”

Lance’s heart fell to his stomach, and in his shock, he dropped what little control he held over the soldier. The soldier shook his head for a moment, as if confused, then returned to normal.

Caleb stormed to Lance, and the veins in his arm flashed a bright purple. In seconds, his arm grew large and muscled, and with abnormal strength, he lifted Lance into the air, his cold hand around his neck.

“Does she speak the truth?”

Lance tried to speak, but Caleb’s grip was closing his airway. Caleb seemed to realize only when Lance’s vision darkened, then he slammed him down. The bench cracked under the force, and Lance gulped down air.

Lance took a few precious seconds to reclaim his breath. Caleb demanded he confirm what Rotoya said.

“Yes,” Lance said, coughing and rubbing his sore throat. “Yes, it’s true.”

Caleb whirled toward the chief. “Why didn’t you tell me this earlier?”

“To be honest? I’ve never really known for a fact. More suspected. And it seems my suspicions were correct.”

“You said it to me as if it were fact.”

“Thirty years on the force, I’m pretty sure I’ve picked up a thing or two about reading people.”

Caleb’s veins flashed again, and his arm returned to normal size.

Lance cleared his throat, dots spotting his vision. “What about our deal?” The world seemed to still around him. “You’re a businessman. Surely you know an opportunity when you see one.”

“I offered you a deal the last time we met,” Caleb hissed at him. “Negotiations are over.” He looked at the chief, a glare that said, You’d better be right about this, and leaned into Lance’s face. “I was going to kill you, but it appears you’re useful to me. Temporarily. Play along, and I may just spare you.”

Lance almost gagged from the sweet smell of his breath. His teeth were rotten. His eyes sent a chill up Lance’s spine, and as Caleb turned away, Lance realized just how unhinged the nanobots had rendered him. Will I become this way as well?

The beast was silent, which was all the response he needed.

“Fine,” Caleb said. “Take him back to Landreau Corp. I’m sick of seeing his face.”

“I actually have a good hiding spot toward the edge of town,” the chief countered. “We could use it, and you wouldn’t have to see his face at all.”

Caleb stopped halfway to getting in his car. “Not to be too honest here, Chief, but I don’t have faith in any of your hiding spots. Eric and his goons are too clever. They’ll find a way to get to him. Take him to Landreau Corp.” He muttered profanities as he shut the door and drove away. Most of the soldiers put their guns down and entered their vehicles. They drove behind Caleb, disappearing down the street within the minute.

When they were gone, only the chief, four soldiers, and one armored vehicle were left.

So that was what she meant by Caleb taking her men… He’d taken control of them. One of the soldiers remaining was the same one Lance had nearly manipulated. Fear and excitement swelled in his heart. If he could force the soldier to make a distraction, he could get away. The plan hadn’t worked as well as he’d hoped, but now he had a chance at fighting back.

Still, that he could even somewhat control one of these soldiers raised the hairs on the back of his neck.

Rotoya waved a hand, and her men crawled inside the armored vehicle. She sauntered over to Lance, and he waited with bated breath for her to punch him, kick him, even shoot him. She knew he could control her men now. The way she looked at him was the same way Caleb had looked at the sarcophagus he’d hidden in back at the church.

But the blows didn’t come. Instead, she leaned close and whispered in his ear.

“I can help you.” Her confident smile remained. She placed a hand on her hip, waiting for him to respond.

“What?”

“Get in the car. I’ll explain on the way.”

The beast purred and urged Lance toward the car. Was she telling the truth?

He followed her to the armored vehicle and slid into the passenger seat without a word, praying that the beast knew what it was doing.

It hadn’t led him wrong yet.

A mental count revealed six men in the back of the vehicle, completely still, as if they were statues without the chief’s orders. Yet somewhere deep down, their emotions remained. Even without control, Lance felt them—anger and fear and confusion. His head ached. Even just reaching for their emotions wore him out.

Rotoya waved her hand, and the officers’ heads fell. Asleep just like that.

“I wonder,” the chief began as she started the engine and eased down the street, “how it is you gained the ability to control my men.”

Lance remained silent even as the beast urged him to respond.

“Though, with Eric,” the chief continued, “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised you managed to get your hands on the drug.”

“How did you know?” Lance asked.

Rotoya smiled, but her eyes remained on the road. “I could feel it the moment you tried to control Officer Cortez.” Now she looked at him, a friendly gleam in her eyes.

Lance shifted in his seat. “Not that.”

Rotoya glanced at him with a proud smile. “I didn’t know, necessarily, but I strongly suspected. I thought you looked familiar when I saw you in my station. I’d recognize those piercing green eyes anywhere.”

“You’ve… You’ve never even seen me before.” Lance remembered what Eric had said back at the Rose. That Rotoya had been the one who told him about the fight back at the orphanage. “You investigated the case of my disappearance. You looked through the file they had of me. That’s how you knew what I looked like. Did Eric know about this?”

“I was an up-and-coming officer, of course I took the case. Eric didn’t have to know.” She winked at him, and nausea crashed into his stomach. “Of course, I never found you. You were too well hidden in those slums. When I first saw you at my precinct then found out Eric hired you, I could only imagine how important you were to him. The most logical explanation was that you were his son.”

“So you didn’t know for sure?”

Rotoya shook her head. “But I do now.”

“Why are you helping me?”

She was silent for a moment. “Like I said before, Caleb has taken control of most of my officers. Good men and women that shouldn’t have a psychopath like him controlling them. When I was caught in that explosion, I… think I died… but only for a few minutes. The nanobots took their sweet time bringing me back, but they managed. When I returned, I discovered that Caleb had taken the opportunity to gain control of them. Now, he holds them over my head. So far, he’s only given six of them back… He’s already killed a few. Like little stickers for doing good and punishments for doing bad.”

A spike of anger burrowed into Lance’s chest.

Rotoya sighed, and she stared forward with an ice-cold glare. “Oh, and I’m not taking you back to Landreau Corp. I’m taking you to Derek’s bar. That is where Eric and the rest are, right?”

Lance hid the frown that tugged on his lips, and as the beast growled lightly, he considered performing a repeat of their last encounter.

As if sensing his anger, Rotoya smirked. “I can’t imagine any other place you’d be hiding after losing your store and one of Kaela’s Roses. Notice how I kept that bit of information from Caleb?”

“But you don’t know which bar.”

“The one on Main Street, correct?” She laughed when Lance failed to hide the surprise on his face. “It’s the one closest to the Rose that burned down. I didn’t become the chief of police for nothing.”

The beast settled, and Lance did the same. At the smallest hint of betrayal, Rotoya would find herself headless before she could crack another smirk. The beast purred in agreement. “So you want us to kill Caleb so you can get your men back?”

The chief nodded. “And once this is all over, I plan on bringing things back to the way they were before. When I woke up after the explosion, it was like I could see for the first time. I lost all interest in helping Caleb in his endeavors. Until the blast, it felt like everything he said made sense, like he wasn’t wrong about anything. Then, after… it was the complete opposite.” She frowned. “I think he suspects me, too. If I keep working for him, I’ll likely find myself dead in a ditch. So if you have any reservations about trusting me, remember I’m doing this for myself and my officers.”

The headache she’d suffered from so suddenly at the station… had that been Caleb taking over her thoughts?

The chief sighed. “Or maybe… maybe I’m just in denial of what I did. Either way, I plan on getting my people back, so that conversation can be held another day.”

The remainder of the drive to the bar passed in silence.

Lance’s heart thumped harder and harder in his chest as the armored car approached the bar. Lance exited the car first in case Eric or any of the others were watching. No movement came from inside of the bar. No voices.

The chief slipped out of the vehicle next, and when she rounded the back to let her officers out, Lance held his hand up and shook his head.

“If you let them out, they’ll think we’re after them.”

“News flash, pal,” the chief fired back, “they probably already do.”

Lance rolled his eyes and stepped into the bar, the chief far behind. It was deathly silent, and when he peeked into the kitchen, nobody was there. I wonder why the door wasn’t locked?

“Eric,” Lance called. “Kaela, Derek.”

No response. If they’d gone somewhere else, Lance would never find them. At least Caleb wouldn’t either.

The chief entered the store, and when she opened her mouth to speak, a dagger plunged into the side of her knee. She yelled in pain. Eric flew over the counter and plunged his knife into her neck. The blade pierced through her and into the wall, pinning her. Derek dashed from around the corner of the counter and grabbed the pistol from her holster, pointing his own at her. Kaela appeared right behind him, ripping her knife from the chief’s leg and angling it at her.

Lance yelled for their attention as they kept their distance from the chief. But then Derek pointed the pistol at him, and Kaela did the same with her knife. Eric returned to the counter and watched.

“Why are you with her?” Derek asked. “And how is she alive?”

The beast snarled at all of them, and the killing calm settled within Lance. The urge to attack them nipped at his heels, encouraged by the beast. He swallowed it and forced the beast to wait.

Calm down.

No!

“Lance,” Kaela warned, “we kind of need an answer here.”

Derek kept the gun trained on Lance’s chest, his grip steady and stable. A professional, even when the fear behind his eyes revealed more than that.

“Please tell me you’re not with her,” Kaela said. “How is she even alive? Did you spare her, huh? Was this your plan from the beginning?”

“Listen,” Lance started as the chief choked on her own blood and writhed, “if she wanted to kill you, she could have easily summoned the six men in that armored vehicle to come out and shoot us all. But she hasn’t, even with that in her throat.”

Derek made no move to lower the gun, and Kaela kept her purple-soaked dagger pointed right at him.

“Please,” Lance said. “Just put the weapons down and give us a chance to explain… She saved me from Caleb.” As Eric stared into Lance’s eyes, he stared back, not flinching in the slightest under his dark gaze. You know I’m telling the truth.

Lance waited for a bullet to hit his chest. Behind the fear in Derek’s eyes lay anger and rage. That same look was on his face when Rob died. Lance recalled the sick smile Rotoya had worn when she shot Rob over and over. She continued to writhe with the knife in her throat, and suddenly, Lance didn’t feel so bad for her.

After a long moment, Eric pointed his eyes to the ground. “Lower your weapons… but Derek? Keep your distance. She tries anything, you shoot her.” He crossed his arms. “Alright, Lance… you have the floor.”

* * *

To their credit, they listened. Even with a gun pointed at him, his stuttered words came out over the haunting sounds the chief made as the nanobots scrambled to keep her body alive. Explaining took longer than Lance thought it would, but by the time he finished, the gun was no longer aimed at his chest, and Kaela had sheathed her blade.

“So now what?” Derek asked. “We’re just going to work with her?”

By now, the chief had gotten used to the knife in her throat, and despite the choking noises she still made, her head was down, and she picked calmly at her nails. At any moment, she could have removed it herself.

“That’s the plan,” Lance countered. “It’s not exactly ideal, I know, but it’s the best we’ve got.”

The room was silent for a long, long time. Derek stared at the chief with seething hatred, and Kaela mirrored it. Eric stared at her too, but differently—with disappointment rather than anger. How long had he worked with the chief? How long had she looked away from his illegal activities, to now be covered with purple veins and murderous tendencies?

Kaela moved first. She ripped the dagger from the chief’s throat and tossed it to Eric, who wiped the blood off and sheathed it within his cane.

Derek’s grip on the pistol tightened as the chief stood, rubbing her neck as her veins flashed. The wound closed rapidly.

“So,” the chief started, her voice scratchy and broken, “let’s discuss the plan.”

“What plan?” Derek muttered. His cold voice boomed, strong and unbreaking, though his eyes revealed the opposite.

The chief looked at Lance with a knowing smile.

Lance cleared his throat. “I managed to take control of one of her men.” He inclined his head toward the chief. “Well… kind of.”

Kaela closed her eyes and shook her head. “So… you didn’t just get injected with the drug…”

“You got injected with the alpha drug,” Eric finished.

Lance gulped. “I did… somehow.”

When Eric looked at the chief, she held up her hands. “Don’t look at me. Frankly, even with the alpha drug, he shouldn’t have been able to make any of my officers do anything, especially while I was in control of them. Even Caleb couldn’t take control of my officers until I almost died… He even had to convince Daniel to give him his soldiers. Never once did Caleb manage to rip them from that bond otherwise.” She nodded at Lance. “But this one’s different.”

Something stirred in Lance’s chest. Not the beast… something darker. A sadness and anger and fear slithered inside his body. The drug within him, however he’d gotten it, gave him a power that even Caleb didn’t have.

They had an advantage. So why did knowing that open a hole in his stomach?

“So Lance can take over Caleb’s men?” Derek asked.

The chief looked at Lance, and something like regret appeared on her face, an odd contrast to the smile she’d given when she shot Rob. “Not very well, but I suppose it’s possible.”

“I almost made a guard check his gun… That’s about it,” Lance said. “I’m not even fully sure how I did it.”

Rotoya hummed. “And I wouldn’t know how to teach you. I was able to control my officers from the beginning.”

“Lance doesn’t need to learn anything,” Eric interjected. “We can beat Caleb without it.”

The chief smirked at him, and Lance thought Eric would slide over the counter and pin her against the wall again.

“When we were fighting Daniel,” Lance said, the words weighing heavy on his tongue, “I let the bea—the nanobots… I gave them… I don’t know how to explain it. I gave them more access. When I did, that’s when my leg healed. Not long after that is when my veins glowed.” He swallowed the lump in his throat. The beast had urged him to give it even more room when he tried taking over the officer. “If I do that, I may be able to take some of Caleb’s soldiers away from him.”

Eric shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. We can still fight Caleb without you giving this drug… more access, whatever that means. If all else fails, we’ll use it as a backup plan.”

Rotoya scoffed. “If that’s what you call a backup plan, then surely you can come up with something better.”

Eric looked down in thought then turned his eyes toward Lance. “No…”

Lance met Eric’s eyes. “It’s not ideal… but you need to trust me.”

Eric’s face flickered with doubt, and he looked away. “Fine… So what do you need us to do?”

* * *

They talked and argued until a plan began to form. Lance had to admit, they couldn’t have done it without Rotoya’s inside knowledge of Landreau Corp.

“We need to go. If we spend any longer here, Caleb will track you again and know something’s up.” Rotoya stood. “If there’s anything else we need to discuss, do it now.”

She was met with silence at first, but then Derek spoke up.

“What did you do to Rob?”

The room filled with silence, and Kaela’s eyes filled with fire.

“When you shot him and dragged his body away,” he continued, “what did you do?”

Guilt crossed the chief’s face. “I gave it to my officers to incinerate.”

“When this is over, and all that’s left is us and you… I’m hunting you down and murdering you for what you did to him.”

The chief acted as if she was going to smile but stopped herself. “That’s fair. But I hope you realize it will not be an easy hunt.”

Derek balled his fists, his mouth set in a thin line. “Makes it all the more satisfying when I take you down.”

“If,” Rotoya corrected.

Eric raised his eyebrows and clapped his hands together. “As fun as that sounds, we should really focus on the plan.”

“Absolutely,” the chief purred.

Derek glared at Rotoya and stormed to the bathroom. Lance held his breath until he disappeared. Kaela rubbed the back of her neck and grabbed a bottle of wine from the cabinet behind the counter. She disappeared into the kitchen. Eric remained where he was, watching the chief with that same disappointed glare.

“I thought you said you wanted things to go back to normal after this?” Lance asked.

“Wishful thinking, I guess,” she said. “I’ll need to face the consequences for what I’ve done.” Sadness laced the words, but she smiled at Lance. “Let’s get going.”

Lance stole one last look at the backroom. He wanted to say goodbye to them, but when he turned to do so, the beast urged him away. Fine, whatever, he thought then followed Rotoya.

Eric grabbed his arm before he could exit, pausing long enough for the door to close behind Rotoya. She didn’t look back until she reached the armored vehicle. “Listen to me,” he said. “You need to be extra careful here.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it. I need to live so I can kill your not-so-secret admirer, now let go of my arm.”

“What are you mad about now?”

Lance ripped his arm free. “I’m not mad. I just don’t like you. And I definitely don’t like you grabbing me.” He sighed, his skin burning.

Eric lowered his voice when Kaela walked back into the room, wiping a hand on her cheek. The bottle was already half empty. “I’m trying, okay? Parenting is hard.”

Lance sighed. “I get it. I get that you’re trying, but I wish you’d just… I don’t know…”

“Maybe we could—”

“Maybe we could talk about it later, huh?” Lance didn’t wait for a response before he walked out the door, refusing to look at the smiling chief.

“Something wrong?” she asked.

“Yeah, we’re not headed to Landreau Corp yet.”

The chief nodded. “Eric used to get on my nerves all the time too. I can only imagine how infuriating it is when he’s your dad.”

Lance grunted in response as they climbed into the armored vehicle. Having to work with the chief was bad enough, but relating to her was a step too far. She didn’t stop there.

“What is it like, having him as a father?”

Lance bit his tongue, his nails digging into his fists. “Not much different from having him as a boss.” He opened his mouth to add something but shut it quickly. She wasn’t about to suck any more information out of him than necessary.

“Are you ready for this?”

“I’m ready to be done with this, if that’s what you mean.”

“What are you going to do when this is over?”

That was the question that silenced Lance. He hadn’t thought of it much. What he wanted and what would happen were likely going to be two different things.

Finally, he said, “If we get out of this alive, I don’t really care what I end up doing afterward, as long as Caleb’s dead and I can walk the streets without…”

Killing Caleb would stop the manhunt, but they were still wanted.

“I see that look,” the chief said. “Between Eric and I, we’ll make sure you’re not considered criminals anymore. Though you may have to keep your friend off me long enough to do that.”

Regardless of what they’d done, Lance was still considered a terrorist. Whether he cleared his name or not, that accusation would make anyone suspicious of him. The slums were hard enough, but if the residents found out a terrorist was in their territory, they would take it as a challenge.

He swallowed the anxiety that rose in his throat and chose not to think about it. Not now, of all times.

“Who’s going to take over the police station if not you?”

The chief smiled. “I have a candidate in mind. Once she’s not being mind controlled anymore, I’ll have her take over.”

Lance kept his mouth shut, wanting the rest of the drive to be in silence as he collected his thoughts and readied himself for the suicide mission ahead.

Still, a few more questions swirled around in his head like buzzing insects.

The beast purred in amusement at Lance’s exasperation, and he found himself opening his mouth to speak. “So what exactly has Eric done to annoy you in the past, anyway?”

* * *

“—and the rest is history,” the chief said.

Lance smiled. “Was he really covered in blood?”

“Covered in it. Looking back on it now, it’s actually pretty funny.”

Lance chuckled, not just at the story, but at the situation he found himself in: riding in an armored vehicle with someone who would have killed him mere days ago, laughing at her stories about his father, on the way to enact a plan that would likely result in one or both of their deaths.

Despite the coming dangers, he savored the calm before the storm. Streetlights hung over them, a flash of orange light before returning to darkness. The laughter eased the tension in his chest. If this plan did kill him, at least he was glad for these last few moments.

Even if they were with the woman who had tried to kill him only days ago.

Rotoya turned down a street, and the only thing between Landreau Corp and them was the road itself. The Landreau Corp building was a tower among them, a beacon to their doom.

Lance’s chest tightened again the closer they drove. Breathe in. Breathe out. Lance repeated it in his head, reminding himself that they had a plan. He ran through it over and over in his head, even the few details they’d managed to iron out before leaving.

The more Lance dreaded what lay ahead, the faster the car seemed to move. The chief lost her genuine smile and replaced it with one much more wicked. The entrance came into view, as did the soldiers waiting at the steps. They stood patiently, rifles in hand.

The chief stopped and handcuffed Lance in one quick motion. She awoke her officers, and they left the vehicle as if they hadn’t been unconscious for the past hour.

The six officers surrounded the vehicle, and the chief left her seat, rounding the car to Lance’s side. She opened the door and pulled him out.

Lance landed hard on the ground, groaning in pain at the impact of the cuffs on his wrists.

“Get up,” the chief said, pulling him to his feet. Her face was stoic and angry. The officers around them wore dark helmets.

Their eyes were invisible behind their visors, but Lance could still feel the stares on him, the urges they had to pull the trigger now and be done with it.

The beast growled at every one of them. Somehow, it was a comfort.

Rotoya shoved him inside the lobby and kicked his legs out from under him.

The same six soldiers from earlier now surrounded him. The chief’s stare burned into his back. A shudder traveled up his spine. He embraced it, allowing it to become as real as he could make it.

Elevator doors opened from down the hall around the corner, and Caleb stepped out, any hint of his smile gone. The beast hissed. Caleb approached Lance and raised his foot. Lance raised his arm in defense, but the kick met his chest anyway, and Lance fell back onto the tile. The beast snarled and snapped at its chains.

Lance didn’t think. The killing calm settled over him. Even with the pain gripping his wrists, he rolled back from the landing and was on his feet again. He pushed off the ground and lunged for Caleb. Rotoya’s hand scraped against his back in a vain attempt to grab him as he threw his body weight into Caleb.

But Caleb was too quick. He punched Lance down.

Lance slammed into the ground, his jaw screaming in pain. The beast didn’t quit snarling. Get up!

“Don’t shoot,” Caleb said, his voice calm.

Lance suppressed a yelp as Caleb grabbed him and hoisted him onto his feet. The beast urged him to attack again, but he resisted the angry growls inside of him and focused on the plan.

“Attack me again,” Caleb said, “I’ll kill you on the spot. You’re lucky I’m giving you this chance.”

“You attacked me first, asshole!” Lance retorted, breathless.

“I didn’t like the way you were looking at me.”

Lance’s veins hadn’t shown. Or if they had, Caleb hadn’t reacted. The beast gave an affirming purr.

Do it, Lance told the beast. Show him. He wasn’t sure if the beast could laugh, but the sound it made resembled a dark and wicked chuckle.

Lance stepped away. One second passed, then two, and he swallowed the lump in his throat as nothing happened.

Give me more room.

No, Lance hissed at it. No, you can do it without the extra room. This is not the time for this.

After a whine, the beast purred. Gently, lightly, his veins answered. Slowly, the color turned purple, traveling across his legs and body.

Caleb looked at Lance’s arms first, then his neck. His face twisted in anger.

“I’ll gladly attack you again,” Lance said. He made to lunge, but something hit him hard in the back of his head. He landed on the cold ground, and the beast went silent. His veins returned to normal.

Footsteps, then Caleb’s voice rose above the ringing in his ears. “How did you…” He paused then swore. “So you’re learning to control it. Hmm, that’s unexpected… but I think I have a way of fixing that.”

Lance rubbed the back of his head. The darkness surrounded him, and the voices became muffled. Hands grabbed him and dragged him across the floor. He was losing his grip, falling into the darkness. He fought against the heaviness in his head. He refused to go under, tried to follow which directions they took him. An elevator dinged, barely audible. His stomach surged as it dropped. He nearly vomited. More voices sounded.

The doors opened, then he was dragged across a cold concrete floor—left, then right, then forward, as if traveling down a long hall. Finally, after another right, he was dropped.

He almost gave in to the darkness, but a kick to the ribs woke him. He yelped in pain.

“I was just going to keep you down here, but now I have questions for you. I’ll give you a few minutes to collect your thoughts. When I come back, you and I are going to talk.”

Caleb’s words were cold and angry, and Lance, unable to fight it anymore, submitted to the darkness and went under.