Rejected And Reborn As The Alpha King's Luna

Chapter 71: The Great Escape

POV: Theo

The explosion that disabled the locks felt like a gift from the gods. I slammed my shoulder into the cell door the moment I felt it give, bursting into the corridor to find complete chaos. Guards shouted orders that no one could hear over the alarms. Prisoners emerged from cells like ghosts rising from graves, some running, some fighting, some just standing there as if they'd forgotten what freedom looked like.

"Theo!" Xavier's voice cut through the noise.

I spun to see my brother-in-law leading a group of three other Alphas, all of them wearing collars but moving with purpose. Even weakened, Xavier radiated that True Alpha energy that made others want to follow.

"Where's Thelma?" I demanded.

"Above us. D-Block. I can feel her through the mate bond, it's faint but it's there." Xavier grabbed my arm. "And Luna?"

Pain lanced through my chest at her name. "I don't know. I can feel her through the bond, but it's wrong. Something's wrong with her."

The twin bond with Thelma pulsed, a compass pointing up and to the left. I could feel her moving fast, fighting, leading. Pride surged through me despite the circumstances.

"We need to get to them," I said. "Both of them."

A guard rounded the corner, raising some kind of weapon that hummed with energy. Xavier moved faster than should have been possible with the collar, tackling the guard and slamming his head into the concrete wall. The man crumpled.

"Let's move," Xavier said, grabbing the guard's weapon. "We go up. Together."

Our group pushed through corridors that all looked identical, white walls and fluorescent lights creating a maze. Other prisoners joined us, some I recognized from the trial, others complete strangers. A young vampire with scared eyes. An older witch with burn scars covering her arms. A massive werewolf who looked like he'd been fighting since the moment his cell opened.

The facility was enormous. Every corridor we cleared revealed three more branches. How many people were trapped down here?

"Gas incoming!" someone shouted.

I looked up to see vents opening in the ceiling. Green mist began pouring out, and immediately I felt drowsy. My steps slowed, my thoughts getting fuzzy.

"Cover your mouths!" Xavier ordered, ripping strips from his shirt to make crude masks. It helped, but not enough. Several prisoners collapsed, overwhelmed by the sedative gas. We couldn't stop to help them, not with guards closing in from behind.

We found a stairwell and climbed, my legs burning with effort. The collar around my neck felt heavier with each step, draining my strength. But the twin bond pulled me forward. Thelma was closed now, just two floors up.

We burst through a door into another corridor, and there she was. Thelma fought at the center of a group of prisoners, her hair wild, her eyes blazing with determination. Even without her Alpha power fully accessible, she moved like a warrior, leading her people with strategic precision. An older man fought beside her, coordinated and skilled despite his age. A teenage girl cowered behind them, clearly terrified.

"Thelma!" I shouted.

Her head whipped around, and relief flooded her face. "Theo!"

Our groups merged, prisoners flooding together in a mass of desperate bodies. Thelma pushed through to reach me, and we crashed together in a fierce embrace.

"You're okay," she breathed. "Thank god, you're okay."

"So are you. I knew you'd start a rebellion." I pulled back to look at her. "Very dramatic speech, by the way."

"Learned from the best." She squeezed my arm, then her eyes found Xavier.

The world seemed to stop for a moment. Xavier stared at her like she was the sun breaking through storm clouds. Thelma's breath caught, her hand lifting toward him unconsciously.

"Xavier," she whispered.

"At least forty that I know of." Marcus pulled the teenage girl forward. "This is Riley, my daughter. She's sixteen. She was captured as a baby. She's never known anything but this place."

Riley stared at all of us with wide, terrified eyes. "It's too loud out here. Too bright. I want to go back to my cell."

My heart broke for her. What kind of monsters did this to children?

"We're getting everyone out," Thelma said firmly. "All of us. No one gets left behind."

A witch with gray hair and knowing eyes touched Thelma's shoulder. "That's a beautiful sentiment, child. But some of us aren't making it out of here."

"Lillith, don't.."

"Hush." Lillith smiled sadly. "I've been here thirty-seven years. My magic is unstable, my body failing. But I can do one last good thing."

She walked toward a massive metal door at the end of the corridor. Red lights pulsed around its frame, and I could feel the magical energy radiating from it even through the collar.

"This door leads to the main prisoner blocks," Lillith explained. "It's sealed with blood magic. To break it, I need to give it what it wants. Life force. Freely given."

"No," Thelma said firmly. "We'll find another way."

"There is no other way. Not in time." Lillith placed her hands on the door, and her body began to glow. "Tell my daughter, if you ever find her, that I died free. Finally... free..."

The light intensified, blinding and beautiful. When it faded, Lillith was gone. Just ash drifting to the floor. And the massive door stood open, revealing corridors beyond filled with cells.

Prisoners emerged like a flood, hundreds of them, all wearing collars, all with that same desperate hope in their eyes.

"Everyone move!" Xavier shouted, his Alpha voice cutting through the chaos even weakened. "Up and out! Follow the lights!"

Dr. Vex's voice suddenly boomed through speakers: "Attention. Facility self-destruct sequence has been activated. All personnel evacuate immediately. Detonation in thirty minutes."

Thirty minutes. To get hundreds of people out of a massive underground complex with guards still trying to stop us.

"Spread out!" Thelma ordered. "Break into groups of twenty. Alphas lead each group. We move fast, we fight hard, we get everyone out."

I felt it then through the twin bond, a spike of urgency and direction. Luna. She was pulling me toward her, the mate bond screaming that something was wrong.

"I have to find Luna," I said.

"Go." Thelma grabbed my arm. "Xavier and I will lead the main group out. You get her."

I ran, following the bond like a lifeline. It led me down another corridor, through a door marked "Medical Wing," into a room that made my stomach turn.

Examination tables with restraints. Surgical equipment. Vials of blood labeled with names and dates. And in the center of it all, strapped to a table, was Luna.

"Luna!" I rushed to her side, working at her restraints with shaking hands.

She was barely conscious, her skin pale and covered in injection marks. Her eyes fluttered open when I touched her face.

"Theo?" Her voice was so weak. "Is this real?"

"It's real. I'm here. I'm getting you out." I freed her restraints and lifted her into my arms. She weighed almost nothing.

"They took my wolf," Luna whispered, her eyes filling with tears. "I can't feel her anymore. Theo, I'm broken."

The mate bond showed me what she meant. Where there should have been the warm presence of her wolf, there was just emptiness. Cold and hollow and wrong.

"You're not broken," I said fiercely. "You hear me? You're not broken. We'll fix this. I promise."

But even as I said it, I felt through the twin bond what Thelma was sensing. Luna was dying. Without her wolf, her body was shutting down. We had maybe hours, not days.

I carried Luna out of the medical wing, running as fast as I could while cradling her against my chest. The corridors were packed with fleeing prisoners. Guards tried to stop us, but the sheer numbers overwhelmed them.

I found Thelma and Xavier leading a massive group toward what looked like a cargo elevator. They were moving efficiently, protecting the weak, fighting off guards.

"Theo!" Thelma saw Luna in my arms, and her face went white. Through our bond, I felt her understanding the same thing I did. Luna was dying.

"We need to get her out now," I said.

The cargo elevator doors opened, and we started loading prisoners inside. Twenty, thirty, forty people crammed in. It would take a dozen trips to get everyone out.

We didn't have time for a dozen trips. The self-destruct counter showed twenty-three minutes remaining on screens throughout the facility.

"Next group!" Xavier ordered, staying behind to load more prisoners.

The elevator began to rise, carrying the first group toward freedom. The rest of us prepared for the next..

She dropped from above like a predator, landing in the center of our group with inhuman grace.

Dr. Cassandra Vex.

But she wasn't human anymore. Her eyes glowed with mixed vampire red and wolf gold. Her teeth had elongated into fangs. Claws extended from her fingernails. She moved with a fluidity that was neither wolf nor vampire but something in between.

"You're not leaving," she said, her voice layered with multiple tones. "If I can't study you alive, I'll study your corpses."

She'd been injecting herself with supernatural genetic material. Years of it. She'd become something neither fully human nor fully supernatural. A monster of her own creation.

"Move!" Thelma shoved Riley and Marcus behind her.

But Vex was faster. She grabbed a young vampire trying to run and snapped his neck with casual brutality. He crumpled to the floor.

"I've spent decades perfecting my work," Vex snarled. "I won't let you destroy it."

Xavier stepped forward, placing himself between Vex and the prisoners. "You're not stopping us."

"Oh, but I am." Vex smiled, revealing too many teeth. "Because while you're here fighting me, that timer keeps counting down. Twenty-two minutes now. How many people can you save in twenty-two minutes? How many will you leave behind?"

She lunged at Xavier with vampire speed. They collided, both supernatural creatures weakened by collars but still deadly. They crashed through a wall, disappearing into another room.

Thelma moved to follow, but I grabbed her arm. "You need to get the prisoners out. I'll help Xavier."

"Theo.."

"Luna's dying!" I shouted, the words tearing from my throat. "She needs to get out now, and you're the only one who can lead everyone else. Please."

Thelma looked at Luna in my arms, felt what I felt through our bond. She nodded, tears in her eyes.

"Don't die on me, brother."

"Never."

I handed Luna to Marcus. "Get her to the surface. Do whatever it takes."

Marcus nodded, already moving toward the elevator with Riley supporting Luna's other side.

Thelma began organizing the next group, her voice strong despite everything. "Everyone able to fight, stay with me. Everyone else, next elevator now!"

I ran toward where Xavier and Vex had disappeared, following the sounds of destruction.

Twenty-one minutes until detonation. Hundreds of prisoners are still trapped below. And somewhere in this facility, a monster wearing the face of a scientist was trying to kill my brother-in-law.

I burst through the broken wall into a laboratory filled with equipment and specimens in jars. Xavier and Vex circled each other like predators, both bleeding, both damaged.

"Need a hand?" I asked, moving to stand beside Xavier.

He grinned, blood on his teeth. "Thought you'd never ask."

Vex laughed, a sound that held no humanity. "Two against one? I've faced worse odds."

She charged, and we met her head-on.