Chapter 5

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The night slowly crept in, the tension in the air was thick. The woman and children were huddled in the pack house, nervously. Some of the smaller ones, lucky ones had slept. The others were torn between worry and terror. they had all been asked to assemble in the pack house for safety, safety in numbers. The men were guarding it like a fortress.

So the pack house was overflowing with pack members huddled in small groups everywhere. The bedrooms were use for the old and children and everyone else made themselves comfortable where ever they found place.

"I haven't even found my mate" Ria lamented, she was the romantic of the lot, always dreaming of her mate carrying her of in to the sunset. Naturally all female teen wolves formed a group, all of them huddled in a cozy corner.

"If I make it out of this alive I am going to forgive Ian and take him back, the fight we had was stupid anyway" Sarah one more pack girl moaned.

"I am done" Evelyn said, the others looked at her confused "If I make it out of this alive, I am leaving" The other girls looked at her horrified at the very prospect. Evelyn did not even know what made her say it out loud. She had always been careful with her thoughts, but life with fear of death hanging around her head every single minute got to her.

"I will go to a city, away from all this madness" she said and added more firmly "I am done" reinforcing her thoughts. She felt relived voicing out her thoughts, but looking around the shocked faces and wide eyes she regretted her outburst. They would not understand, how could they? none of them ever had been in her position before.

"But where will you go? What will you do? Without your pack you are vulnerable.... No other pack will take you, just like that" Ria spoke. Voicing out her concern, what Evelyn was saying was close to sacrilege. Would she go rogue? despite what all those rogues did to her? That very thought mare her shudder.

"I am not joining another pack, I will very much be a part of this pack" Evelyn said "I will go to a City" she stressed "away from wolves, I will stay in human cities away from all this killing and madness!" Yes, sometimes wolves did leave their pack temporally, for education, travel and other things but a wolf would always gravitate to its pack, it was the very nature of the beast within them.

"You think human cities are safe? Don't you watch TV?" Sarah added trying to make Evelyn realize her naive outlook.

"I know it's not perfect, but at least I have better chances of surviving a mugging attempt then a rogue attack" and it was true, she would be relatively safe in the human world, she was stronger, faster, had better senses then humans, she would heal incredibly fast. Normal bullets would not harm her, due to her being an Werewolf her bone structure was super strong and so was her muscle, she had very little to be scared of in the human world.

"But what will you do? What if you turn? Your wolf cannot stand the city!"

"I have not tuned till now, it is unlikely I will turn in the future" Which basically meant that she would probably not turn till she found her mate and finding her mate in the city was next to nil, as a male wolf would turn regardless he found a mate or not and because of that no male wolf would stay in a city, he would suffocate, his wolf will drive him mad.

"As to what I will do...I want to be a doctor, a human doctor, work in their hospitals...I will..." she suddenly was interrupted.

"Enough of that Evelyn!" her mother snapped, Evelyn snapped around to see her standing behind her. She had been busy with all the other woman organizing stuff around the pack house. Evelyn did not even notice when she came over but apparently she had heard enough.

"We will talk about this once this is over, but no more of this nonsense now!" She reprimanded firmly looking at Evelyn and to the group of girls around her, she wanted the discussion stopped.

Evelyn kept quiet and the other girls looked at her uncertainly. No one willingly left their pack, it would be crazy. You just din't do it.

This had been a sour point between Evelyn and her mother. When she first told her mother, she thought Evelyn was crazy and was convinced that this was just a phase, something like a teenage rebellion and nothing convinced her otherwise. Jeff had been concerned too, but he had seen the steely determination in her eyes and tried to reason with her.

But the last few months has just sealed the deal for her, not that she hated her pack or they treated her bad. To be honest they were as close to a family she would ever have, they were nothing but kind and warm. Since the time her mother and she were presented to the Alpha for permission to start over in his pack they have always been welcomed.

But over time she was tired of the rigid structure, the conformity of Lycan law's and the backward outlook towards woman. She realized most woman were content and happy with their life she was always told she would understand once her wolf came out. Which it did not, which meant her wolf would only come out once she would find her mate and that scared her more than anything.

Not that she had anything against the woman who found the pack life happy or people who believed in mates. But for her the idea of being permanently tethered unhinged her.

The permanent bond that mates formed scared her out of her wits being beholden to someone, someone having so much control over her. It did not sit right with her, people always told her once she found her mate she would understand, but finding mates was becoming a rarity day by day. It was becoming common for wolves to fall in love and marry and start families like humans did.

But there was one more driving factor inside her. She and her mother had been depended on others most of their lives. Like the Alpha of the current pack. Yes her mother eventually set up the diner and they did have a good income but still they owed most of that success to the Alpha to help them get started and on top of that they were dependent on the pack for many things for example to provide them security and that would never change.

This dependency on others all her life in turn had developed a fierce need inside her to become independent and she realized she could do that in the human world and over period of time this thought reinforced itself firmly in her head.

Now it was her driving force and nothing would change her from that course. She would prove herself out there, become someone Independent, achieve things on her own and may be once she did achieve what she wanted...that is become a doctor and spent some time in hospitals, maybe then she would go back to her pack and eventually she could settle down with them. Serve the pack as a doctor and get a chance to contribute something of value to her pack, the pack that helped her and her mother.

***

Alex was in his fourth cup of coffee, so far the night was silent, they weren't sure if the rogues would attack but he hoped, otherwise the wait would kill him. He knew their pattern, they gave a couple of days reprieve in between attacks.

They were not worried about the pack regrouping, they had numbers on their side and regrouping meant the best of the remaining were on the front line and were ripe for picking. This way they would slowly but surely pick the top warriors of a pack leaving the runt behind for easy picking and they had almost done this to this pack...boy were they in for a surprise. He took one more sip of the coffee and then put it on the table and flexed his neck and hands...the wait was a killer.

Nick and Jeff were also huddled in the corner of the command center away from all the activity.

"Do you think this will work?" Jeff whispered to his Alpha.

"I don't know" Nick replied honestly "But I hope it does, I do think they know what they are doing."

"But guns and bombs Nick? Really?" Jeff asked with doubt he was not truly convinced. It was just not done this way.

Nick just shrugged "only time will tell..."

Nick was about to add something but one of the operators shouted "We got bogies in east!" and everyone suddenly became focused

Alex literally flew to him and peered in to the monitor over him.

Nick and Jeff stood up "I think time is here" Nick said finishing his earlier statement.

"On projector" Alex Barked.

The image on came up on the projector I was showing a map with blips...the blips were slowly increasing, flashing on and off the screen.

"How many?" Alex asked.

"Not sure yet, but the way the sensors are going wild, it's a truckload" The operator responded while busily collecting readings from his computer screen.

"More bogies! Off west!" another operator shouted.

"On screen" Alex ordered.

The projected screen split in to two equal half's labeled east and west, now the west half of the screen was also showing blinking dots.

"I estimate close to 40 bogies on the east flank, coming in fast, ETA is 10 min" the operator responded.

"Estimating 50 hostiles from west ETA is 15 min" the other operator responded.

Alex tapped his earpiece activating it "we have incoming."

"Finally! If I had to sit on this rock for some more time my ass would have frozen and fallen off" Adrian responded.

Alex simply rolled his eyes "We got approximate 40 bogies from the east and 50 from the west. ETA is 10 and 15 min respectively. You take the east flank and the west, leave it to me."

"Kaboom?" Adrian asked.

Alex slowly smiled and responded "Kaboom baby!"

"All right, over and out" Adrian respond and cut transmission, he had work to do and wolves to kill.

"KZ's this is mother wolf" Alex again tapped his earpiece.

"Mother wolf!" came the bored response "your cubs are hungry! They need milk."

"Milk truck on the way, my darlings, get your cubs ready ETA 15 min, you can have the ones my potholes don't swallow" Alex responded.

"Awwww! Mother wolf, it's no fun! Not fair! No one wants to drink spilled milk, we like to rip open the cartons."

"Now, now my babies, you will get your turn" Alex's tone now turned serious "Now scope up and, pan out, happy hunting, over and out."

The minutes passed by agonizingly slow as the enemy approached.

"Visual on the east flank!" the operator informed and the east part of the projection on the screen changed, now it showed blobs of red surrounded by blue.

"Visual count" Alex barked.

"43" someone responded back.

"Adrian, your lucky number is 43, need at least half of them tagged and alive, so show restraint." Alex ordered.

"Copy that" was the crisp reply.

***

The silence in the forest was broken by feet running on the ground, birds and other smaller animals quickly got out of way sensing predators. The rogue army had crossed in to the pack land, today they planned to fatally cripple this pack and then go for the kill a couple of days later this would bring the last of the major packs of Colorado under their control.

They increased speed and rushed towards their target, victory was in their jaws. Just ahead in the clearing they would meet resistance. This Alpha was predictable if not anything. However what they did not expect was the size of resistance and some newer wolf's, scents they could not identify...they were surprised and they did not like surprises, it enraged them and without further ado, they pounced.

The unexpected resistance was relayed by the east flank attack of the rogues to the west flank, and they sped up to help their brothers.

***

"Here they come, ETA 2 min to the KZ" The operator shouted "switching to IR cams"

Alex was on his laptop typing away and a Rectangular box appeared on the screen and they could see the IR signatures of the Wolfs slowly moving towards it. On the bottom of the screen text displayed

"Online: unarmed."

***

Adrian and his teams were in the thick of the fight they were matched wolf to wolf, but what the rogues did not have was the skill and coordination Adrian and his wolves possessed, the rogues always depended on numbers and now that the numbers were even, the rogues were losing badly.

The snipers on the tree top began their action, with their scopes on... they could clearly distinguish their own from the rogues and friendlies were glowing under the IR scopes. There specially modified super silent guns started firing with barely any noise. In fact the only way the snipers knew the gun fired was the recoil from the shot. With wolfs busily ripping each other with their fangs and claws they hardly notice the pinpricks.

These specially designed bullet capsules on hitting the wolf body would break the skin open and the payload inside would get delivered in to the wolf body. The wolf would later see a small piece of metal sticking out of its body and would pull it out but the payload would be safely inside the skin. It would stay there for at least 24 hours before the wolf's strong immunity system would eject it out.

***

"Bogies entering KZ on west" Operator exclaimed.

They could clearly see the wolfs entering the rectangular box, the IR cameras gave a clear picture.

"Come to papa" Alex muttered, his hand was on the enter key on the keyboard, his system ready to execute the command once he pressed enter.

He waited till most of the wolves were in the rectangular box and hit enter.

"Kaa-boom!" He muttered. As his system emitted a beep in response.

Hell, had been unleashed...