When fate and worlds collide

12 | No Excuse for Stupid

We watched them scan the area before slipping back onto the rooftop. I turned a burning glare on Glen, tempted to knock some sense into him—physically, and repeatedly.

“Did they just set an… ambush?” Jax asked quietly.

“I have so many f*****g questions about how such a big group, led by such a big stupid i***t, survived this long. Especially in the city. Either your luck is tapped out to the max, or some new deity is watching over you.” My voice was ice and laced with disbelief. I stepped back and wiped my hand on my pants like touching him had contaminated me. “They’re pack hunters. Their alpha is one Feral you never want to meet. Smarter than the rest. Controls everything they do. And yes.” I met Jax’s eyes. “That includes traps and ambushes.”

Glen’s eyes were wide, full of dawning terror.

“We go round,” I instructed, not waiting for a discussion.

I slipped into the narrow alley between the buildings, longing for the rooftops—where I could actually see threats before they hit us. But Jax wouldn’t last long up there. Not with the speed and movement required. So alleys it was. For now. After a few hours of walking—and narrowly avoiding more scout patrols than I cared to count—we finally reached the building Glen insisted held his group. I asked how he knew they were still there after three whole days. He claimed they wouldn’t leave without the two of them.

I scoffed internally. Waiting around in a city like this for missing people was less loyalty and more a slow, willing march toward death.

Glen took point with Jax behind him, and I brought up the rear, my attention fixed on every patch of shadow. My senses buzzed on high alert. Buildings like this—dark, stale and rotting—were where Nightmares thrived. Even during daylight, this place felt like a creature waiting to inhale. We descended a flight of stairs to a metal door, faintly feeling aura powers brush against mine. Interesting. Glen pressed his hand to it and pushed, the metal groaned, but didn’t move. He whispered a name—too loudly for my comfort—and a faint voice answered from the other side. Metal scraped, and the door cracked open. An old man peered out, eyes flicking to Glen, then Jax… and then landing on me. The fear coming off him was so strong it tasted rancid in the air.

“Glen? Jax? We thought you were dead,” he squeaked.

“We will be soon if you don’t open the door, John,” Glen hissed. After a heartbeat of hesitation, the old man vanished, and the door swung open, allowing us to slip inside. I turned and shoved the door shut, sliding the massive makeshift bolt into place. It was laughable that anyone thought that thing could hold back a determined Feral.

One glance around the room made my stomach drop. No windows. No extra exits. Just this one door between thirty-something people and teeth in the dark. Once the Ferals traced our scent here, this basement would become a tomb. Pairs of eyes blinked at me from all corners—people peeling themselves from makeshift beds, craning to see the stranger their men brought back.

“Glen?” John asked again, staring at me with a mix of fear and morbid curiosity.

“This is… actually, I didn’t get your name?” Glen glanced back at me.

“That’s because I didn’t give it,” I snapped. “And if I’d known you crammed everyone into a death trap, I wouldn’t have come.”

“Please—there’s still time,” Jax cut in, stepping forward before jerking, face twisting in pain. He grabbed his arm and crumpled to the floor. The hairs on my arms rose as the poison inside him clashed with the Aura blood I’d given him.

“Graham! We need an antidote!” Glen yelled, dropping beside him. An elderly man shuffled forward, carrying a case with trembling hands. He was so exhausted and terrified I was amazed he was still upright. Again the thought crossed my mind: How the f**k did this group survive this long? Luck? Divine intervention? Chronic stupidity?

I knelt beside him and gently pried the vial and syringe from his shaking fingers. His wide grey eyes met mine, and I gave a brief nod before drawing more than the standard dose into the syringe. With the mix of Feral venom and my blood fighting inside him, Jax needed every advantage he could get. Roughly shoving Glen aside, I knelt by Jax, his chest heaved, sweat dripping off him in rivulets. I rolled up his sleeve and slid the needle into the vein at the crook of his elbow. The whole thing was crude, unsanitary, and definitely not medical protocol—but the world was dead, and protocol died with it, leaving me no other choice.

Survival was all that mattered now.

Moments crawled by, each one stretching thin like a thread ready to snap, until Jax’s breathing finally steadied. His deep blue eyes fluttered open, hazy at first, then locking on me with startling clarity. I felt the venom recede, my Aura blood settling like a storm reluctantly pulling back from the shore. Jax gave me a faint, grateful smile—and unfortunately, I felt my mouth twitch back. Good thing half my face was covered.

“Thank you, stranger,” he whispered. Small feet slapped against the floor behind me. I spun automatically—already halfway through a defensive strike—when Jax’s hand clamped around my arm, stopping me before instinct took over. I came face to face with a little girl. Bright, fiery blue eyes that cut straight through me. Matted, dirty-blonde hair tied back in a lopsided ponytail. A surge of Aura power hit me, not a ripple, not some harmless spark, but a wave that washed over me and made my senses sharpen to a painful edge. My power stirred, curling in my chest like it had just remembered something important.

“Did you save my daddy?” she asked, voice barely more than a breath. She clutched the mangled remains of what used to be a doll to her chest. I blinked, stepped back, but said nothing. Silence tends to say more than words anyway. She slipped past me to Jax’s side while I scanned the room, tension coiled tight beneath my skin.

There were stares—so many of them, as I stepped forward cautiously. Some hopeful, some fearful, while other looked…hollow. A quick head count confirmed around thirty people, maybe a little more. One of the biggest clusters I’d seen since the fall, though that wasn’t necessarily impressive. Big groups tended to go extinct faster. Now that Jax wasn’t dying anymore, Glen shoved past me, wild-eyed, searching desperately for someone.

My eyes landed on her silhouette cut through the crowd, and my blood iced over, my heartbeat spiking hard enough to hurt while my stomach twisted itself into knots. Rage, hatred, disbelief—each emotion slamming into me like a fist. Glen crashed into her in an embrace and I blinked, thrown for just a second by the sheer size of her—still large, still imposing, still unmistakably her. Wherever this group crawled out from, she’d been eating better than most.

But then a little girl darted to Glen—and the word she shouted knocked the air straight out of my chest. My fists clenched so tightly I felt the bones strain. I bit my tongue hard enough to taste blood. And still the anger swelled, jagged and merciless.

“Daddy!”