Love Thy Enemy

Lucy looked down at the building from her vantage point on the building next to it. It all seemed quiet, not many guards. The humans must have thought that they were in the clear, that nobody knew what it was that they did inside of the facility. Lucy knew however, she could smell the others out there. The others like her, Supernatural. The Weres suspected a while now that humans were experimenting on their kind. The quality of medicine, weapons, and healthcare was advancing too fast for them not to be, and it pissed her off. “Lucy we are ready to infiltrate.” Jake said. Jake was her cousin and her brother’s beta. When it’d been confirmed that humans were experimenting on supes as Lucy called them, her brother and alpha, Brone, sent her and a small team in to free the test subjects. Supes and humans had been on opposing sides for some time. What the packs could not understand was how the humans were capturing their targets or who was funding them. The government was constantly telling them that there was no experimentation happening, but now the packs knew better, and they were going to put a stop to it. “Copy that Jake, I’m on my way. let's do this!” she replied excitedly as she made her way down from her perch. It didn’t take them long to scale the big wall surrounding the building. Nor did it take them long to get into the building itself. “Man, humans really are an arrogant bunch, aren’t they?” Jake remarked, and Lucy nodded at him. They’d gotten rather bold over the years. They knew they weren’t the top of the food chain yet still acted as though they were. Lucy and her team of four guys looked around in awe at the place. There was a maze of hallways, but they followed their noses. The team walked through a door and stopped in their tracks, growls escaping them before they could hold them in. Cells lined the length of the hallway, every cell filled with a different creature. There were Weres of all species, a witch, Fae, Elves, and even Vampires. The Vampires surprised Lucy as they were so much stronger than humans, and unlike popular belief, holy water didn’t hurt them. Once she inhaled their scent though she understood. The vampires were newly turned and were still relatively weak. Jake and the guys opened all the cells after taking out the guards and were getting ready to blow the place up. “Alright we are ready to go, Lucy.” Jake said, pulling on her arm, but something was telling Lucy they weren’t done yet. One of the Weres kept looking at the heavily locked door at the end of the corridor. “Hold on a sec, Jake.” Lucy mumbled. She took the keys from him and walked to that door. She tried every key, but none of them worked. Instead, she dropped the keys and tried pulling the door off its hinges. Before long, the whole team was pulling, but the door wouldn’t budge. Suddenly, one of the Weres they’d freed appeared beside them. He ushered them out of the way and took their place. Lucy frowned at him. She didn’t know how he would be stronger than the four of them, but then he looked at her, and she could see his reptilian eyes and surmised that he was a Were-dragon. He pulled with all his strength, his eyes glowing. At first, nothing happened, and then the metal started to whine until finally, he ripped the door right off. Lucy nodded her head in thanks, and the five of them went down a staircase. This part of the lab was far different from the rest. It was high tech and had more guards. Lucy, the were-dragon, and her team took the guards out with ease. Then they headed to the only cell down there. By the scent alone, Lucy could tell that the being inside of the cell was ancient. Far older even than the wolves oldest elder, who was nearing a thousand. Jake appeared beside her with a key card. He reached past and swiped it. The door opened with a hiss, but he would not go inside the cell. Fear wafted off him like perfume and stunk up the whole space. The were-dragon growled at him. “Leave! if she wakes up to that smell, she’ll attack.” He growled, and Jake growled back. “Guys we need to go. This place is about to blow.” Will, the packs gamma said. With a huff, the dragon walked in and picked the woman up into his arms. She looked so tiny, almost like a human adolescent. Once he had a good hold of her, the five of them rushed out of the building, getting far enough away just as the bombs exploded. “Come on, you can come with us for now.” Lucy told the were-dragon, and off they sped into the night, back to pack lands. “My brother is going to kill me.” Lucy whispered to herself as they ran. Brone paced his office as he waited for his sister to come back from her mission. He knew she would be okay because she was the best warrior their pack had. Not only that, but Jake, their cousin, and his beta were with her. Suddenly, there was a commotion outside as people cried out in fear. In a rush, Brone was outside and in a battle stance. His eyes widened in surprise though at what he saw. Lucy was walking up the driveway to the pack house. Behind her, Jake, Will, and another shifter following. As they grew closer, Brone scented that the male was one of the rarest shifters of their world; a were-dragon. He was easily close to seven feet and was twice the size of Brone himself; in his arms, he carried a small woman. Her hair was a deep red, almost the color of blood, and was so long that the ends grazed the ground. Her skin was pale and almost shimmered in the moonlight. Her clothes were a style he’d never seen before, but what surprised him the most was her scent. She smelled like the forest after the rain and orchids. The female’s scent made his wolf purr. “She is ours.” his Lycan Trey told him. Brone grimaced. He already had someone he’d picked as his mate and Luna. He hadn’t marked her yet but planned on it soon. “I don’t care if she is ours. I don’t want her. I already have Missy” Brone replied to his beast. “She is weak, I will not accept her.” Trey snarled at him. Brone was surprised by this. His beast had never been angry at him like this before, but he shrugged it off. Brone pulled Lucy into his arms once she was in reach. “Are you alright? Did everything go as planned?” he asked, and Lucy frowned. “Oh Brone. There were so many different species there. Fae, Elves. Rare shifters like a phoenix and him.” Lucy said, motioning to the were-dragon behind them. “What about her?” Brone asked, pointing to the unconscious woman. “She’s been there the longest. She was there long before I was.” Case, the were-dragon said in a deep, strong voice. “Alright. Take her to the pack hospital until she recovers, and then we can question her.” Brone sighed, running his fingers through his short curly hair. Lucy led Case to the pack hospital and watched as he placed the woman on a bed. She knew as soon as she saw him that he was her mate, but neither of them had pointed it out. When he straightened up and turned to her, she smiled at him. “Okay so what’s your name?” she asked softly as the pack doctor checked out his patient. Her mate pulled her out into the hall and buried his face in the crook of her neck, inhaling her scent. “My name is Case, Lucy. I am so glad you found me.” he replied, his voice a deep rumble. He looked into her eyes, Lucy smiled and wrapped her arms around him. Just then, the pack doctor came out, looking slightly pale. “What’s wrong, Rick?” Lucy asked. Rick took deep breaths to calm himself and then cleared his throat. “I’ve performed preliminary tests, and she is in perfect health.” He informed them. Lucy frowned. “Well, if she’s in perfect health, why are you so pale?” she asked, and Case caught on first. “He doesn’t know what she is.” Case said, causing Rick to nod. “He’s correct, I have never seen anything like her before.” he said with a shrug. Case and Lucy stared into the room at the unconscious woman lying on the bed. She was so still it was almost as though she were dead. “I don’t understand. How did the humans capture her?” Lucy asked in a whisper, and Rick shrugged his shoulders. Case rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he watched the steady rise and fall of the woman’s chest. “What if they didn’t capture her? What if they found her, just like this, and all the advancements they’ve made concerning illnesses is because of testing they’ve done on her?” he suggested. Lucy gasped, covering her mouth. “Are you telling me that she isn’t even aware that they’ve been cutting her open like a lab rat?” she asked softly, her eyes filling with tears. Case shook his head. “She was aware. I could smell her pain every time they descended those stairs. They did unimaginable things to her. But in all the time I was there, she never once cried out. Different species like vampires and dragons go into what we call slumber when we reach a certain age, when we are tired of our long lives or if we are too dangerous to be around others, even our own kind. However, even in slumber, we are still aware of our surroundings.” he explained. “She might be slumbering.” Case told them. Lucy ran her fingers through her hair. “Then the question we should be asking is. If she is a creature that we have never seen before, how long has she been slumbering?” she asked, and the room lapsed into silence.