No Mere Zombie: Deathless Book 2 (6 page)

Shaping had to be the key. It was his one advantage. The Mother wouldn’t have left an entire gender defenseless, so there must be a way to compensate for a female's stealth. Hmm. He couldn’t pierce Bridget’s mind when he probed her, but he
could
feel resistance when he tried. How could he use that? Maybe he could somehow broadcast his will in all directions like a sonar burst. A sort of ping.

This is possible, Ka-Dun. Dispersing your will weakly in all directions. Ingenious.
The beast rumbled. It spoke rarely these days, now that they'd joined fully.

Disperse his will. He considered the problem for a moment, blurring to another tree trunk, then another so quickly that he hoped Bridget couldn’t follow. How could he do that? Visualization. That seemed to be how all their powers worked. Blair imagined his will as a giant balloon, slowly filling as he pushed harder. It grew larger and larger, bulging around him in a shimmering wave he suspected only he could see. He pushed harder, straining until it was as large as he could make it. Then still further. Finally it burst, spraying bits of his will in a blast around him. It washed harmlessly through the jungle in every spot. Except one.

He met resistance in a neighboring tree, just a few feet behind him to the left. Blair blurred, diving into a roll as Bridget’s claws raked the space he’d just occupied. He flipped to his feet, spinning to face her as Bridget melted back into the shadows.

“That’s the first time you’ve anticipated one of my attacks,” her disembodied voice came from the shadows. “What did you do differently?”

“Trade secret,” he replied, grinning as he repeated the trick.
There.

He lunged at the darkness, his swipe connecting ever so briefly with flesh. His claws came back tinged with blood, but there was no sign of Bridget.

“Clever, whatever it is. You can find me now. And here you didn’t want to spar,” she teased from the shadows.

Furry arms shot from the darkness behind him, wrapping around his midsection as Bridget’s much heavier body bore him to the ground. He struggled briefly, but now that she had a hold of him there was no escape. She was much, much stronger.

Then she began the worst form of torment, the kind she knew better than anyone how much he dreaded. She tickled him. He thrashed back and forth, struggling to free himself as he wheezed out laugh after laugh.
 

“A-all right,” he panted, going limp. “I yield.”

The jungle vanished, replaced by the obsidian ring with its bright border. Bridget’s form wavered, shifting back into a
very
naked woman. Her impossibly soft breasts pressed against his back, her face buried against the fur behind his neck.

Blair shifted too, rolling onto his back. Bridget snuggled up to him, draping an arm across his chest and nestling her head on his shoulder. It brought him back to countless mornings in bed, long conversations about interesting topics after hours of lovemaking. The longing warred with the pain of betrayal. Part of him recognized this as an invitation to more pain, but he stayed where he was. Her scent was overpowering.

“I’m sorry, Blair. For everything. I hope you understand that,” she murmured, burying her face against his shoulder. It actually sounded sincere. Maybe it even was. People could change, couldn’t they?
 

“It looks like the ring is already in use, though not for sparring,” Cyntia’s thickly accented voice came from the doorway.
 

“We’ll just have to wait our turn,” Liz replied, tone dry as the Sahara.

Blair scrambled to his feet, blushing in embarrassment and guilt, though he wasn’t sure why he should. It’s not as if he were dating Liz, though they’d certainly grown close during their mad flight from Peru. Bridget leapt to her feet, snatching her shirt from the ground and covering her chest with it. She refused to meet Liz’s gaze. He was a little ashamed of standing there naked, but he squared his shoulders anyway.

“We just finished,” Blair offered. Lamely.
 

“I’ll bet you did,” Liz muttered, expression unreadable.

“Blair learned a new trick,” Bridget said, obviously attempting to change the subject. She glanced down at her nakedness, blushing scarlet. “He can find us even when we’re hiding in the shadows.”

“Interesting,” Liz said, striding purposely towards the ring. She’d already regained her composure and if she were angry, she certainly didn’t show it. “How do you do it, Blair?”

“I send out a sort of 'ping.' Like radar,” he explained, exiting the ring and meeting Liz and Cyntia near the edge. He picked up his shirt, but didn't put it on yet. He’d be damned if he was going to act embarrassed, no matter how he felt. Bridget stood a few feet away, still avoiding Liz’s gaze. “I can’t easily invade your minds, but I feel the resistance when I try. If I send out a weak ping in all directions I can sense where you are.”

“Impressive,” Cyntia said, crossing her arms over a more than ample chest. The gesture seemed deliberate, so Blair studiously avoided looking. He was already in enough trouble, though he wasn’t sure why he should be. “Did you discover this technique, or did your beast reveal it?”

“It was my idea. The beast seemed rather surprised,” he replied, eyeing the safety of the door. “I’m going to go grab a shower. I’ll see you all at dinner.”

Bridget started to follow, but Liz touched her arm. “Would you stay, Bridget? I was hoping we could spar.”

Bridget’s creamy face paled. She shot Blair a worried look and then turned back to Liz. “Of course. There’s still a lot you can teach me.”

“Great. Cyntia, why don’t you help Blair get dinner started? We can spar later. Bridget and I need some time alone.”

Chapter 7- High School Bullshit

Liz stepped across the glowing line into the circle, dropping her sports bra onto the stone outside, along with the rest of her clothes. She rolled her neck, unlimbering for the fight. Then she shifted, marveling in the miracle of it.

The process still hurt. How could it not? Bones snapped and popped as her body re-arranged itself, limbs lengthening and muscles swelling. The worst part was definitely the muzzle splitting her face, and she teared up briefly in the same way she had when a girl had broken her nose back in the fifth grade.

When the process was complete she'd gained over three feet in height, and a thick auburn pelt covered her nakedness. That had been a mercy when she first started, but constant combat and the burdens of leadership had burned the embarrassment out of her.

She paused, turning to face the shorter woman. Bridget had dark wavy hair, beautiful eyes and a dazzling smile. There wasn’t a wasted ounce anywhere on that perfect body. She could see why Blair was interested, but it still stung. Liz felt frumpy beside her.
 

"I'll be the target," she said, walking to the middle of the ring. The lights began pulsing in time with her heartbeat.

Bridget shifted as well, becoming a majestic silver just a few inches shorter than Liz. She stepped into the ring, but the scenery didn't change. That was a first.

The ring senses purpose, Ka-Ken
. Liz's beast rumbled.
You seek a direct confrontation, a battle of strength. Trickery is not needed, and so the ring offers no distraction.

Was she really picking a fight over a man? Maybe. It seemed like exactly the sort of thing she'd have chastised her brother for doing, a fistfight over a girl. Her desire to do exactly the same thing was testament to how much the virus had changed her.

"So have you known Blair a long time?" she asked, turning to face Bridget as the smaller wolf wrapped the shadows about her. She was gone a heartbeat later, undetectable save for her disembodied voice.

“Yes, for a long time now. We went to Stanford together. Him, Steve, Sheila and I,” Bridget's voice explained. It circled slowly around Liz as Bridget moved. “We dated for three years, most of it spent at school or later at a dig site in China.”

There was a moment of silence and then a flash of silver as Bridget lunged from the right. Liz flowed into one of the combat forms the Mother had taught her, catching Bridget's neck with one hand and her right arm with the other. That left one of Bridget's arms free, and she raked Liz's chest in a spray of blood.

Liz responded by slamming Bridget's face into the obsidian, then rolling away and disappearing into the shadows. Now it was her turn to attack from the shadows. They'd alternate until they grew tired, the idea being that they could practice both attacking and defending. Liz had taken to the exercises with a surprising fervor. She really enjoyed losing herself in the activity, the primal joy of combat. Usually she did, anyway.

“But you broke up?” Liz asked, circling Bridget. Her opponent shifted slowly, ears twitching as she sought Liz.

“A long time ago, yes,” Bridget said, dropping her gaze to the stone. If werewolves could have blushed, Liz had the feeling that Bridget would be. “Steve was his best friend, and Sheila was mine. Blair took a job heading up a dig and it took all of his time. He didn’t come to bed. Didn’t eat with me anymore. I didn’t see him for months. Steve…”

A wellspring of rage bubbled up in Liz as she understood where Bridget was going with this. She lunged from the shadows behind Bridget, wrapping one arm around her to pin both arms while the other tore out Bridget's throat. Liz shoved Bridget to the stone and then rolled back into a crouch while she waited.

“You slept with his best friend?” Liz asked, more than a little satisfied by the amount of blood. What a mind fuck. That explained so much of the subtext, why Blair seemed interested in Bridget one moment and angry the next. “I’m amazed he still speaks to you.”

Bridget struggled to her feet, the terrible wounds healing almost instantly. Her ruined throat knitted itself back together as she slipped into the shadows.
 

“So am I,” Bridget agreed, sounding embarrassed as she circled Liz. “I don’t deserve it. I cheated on him. The worst part is that when he came to the dig…I abandoned Steve. We’d been on the rocks for a while, but that’s no excuse. He was dying from radiation sickness, and I ran to Blair for comfort. I didn’t deserve either of them. I still don’t.”

“But you’re pursuing him anyway?” Liz asked. She kept her tone even, but was willing to bet that Bridget sensed her disapproval.

“I shouldn’t, but Liz, I can’t help it. I love him. I always have. Even when I was with Steve I never stopped loving Blair. If he told me to leave him alone I would, but he hasn’t. You can’t blame me for trying,” she said, voice still moving as she continued to circle. Liz got the sense that she was looking for some sort of absolution, but she wasn’t the one who could offer that. “I know it’s wrong. I know I should just let him go, but I feel like I have a second chance. To be a better person. The woman he deserves. He’s an amazing man.”

"A man you don't deserve," Liz growled, flexing her claws. "If you hurt him again, there will be hell to pay. I promise you that."

Chapter 8- Mother's Return

“You are a very stupid man, Blair Smith,” Cyntia said, nose slightly upturned like some South American parody of a Valley girl. The statement was made while she filled a battered pot with water, then set it gently on top of the Coleman camp stove they’d liberated from the installation outside. The Mohn Corp soldiers who'd occupied it were all dead, slaughtered by the Mother in her seemingly infinite fury.

“You won’t get an argument from me,” he agreed, opening the dented cabinet that they’d used to store their dwindling supply of food. Well, processed food anyway. They could always go hunting, but that still felt incredibly odd despite the fact that Blair enjoyed it. “How about beef stroganoff tonight?”
 

Blair picked up a large packet and tore the seal. He set it on the marble next to the camp stove, marveling at the veins of gold that shot through the rock. Its value was incalculable and it could be found throughout the Ark.
 

The powdery substance inside the packet smelled like preservatives, but at least it was better than the smell of his own sweat. He would have made time for that shower, except that he had a feeling Cyntia would have insisted on joining him. She had an odd idea about what constituted boundaries.
 

“Do you know why you are a very stupid man?” Cyntia asked, unperturbed by his attempt to change the subject.

“I have a feeling you’re about to tell me,” Blair said, suppressing the sigh. It was like a bad anime show, one male character surrounded by women. There was Jordan of course, but somehow he managed to sidestep this crap. Blair missed Trevor.

“You are a fool because Liz desires you. She is a much better match than that little vixen with the shifty eyes. Liz is strong. You need a strong woman, Blair Smith,” Cyntia explained, lowering the temperature on the camp stove as the water came to a boil.

“I’d love to hear you call Bridget weak to her face,” Blair retorted, pulling the mouth of the packet wide so that Cyntia could pour in the water. Once it was full, he used the strip at the top to reseal it. It would cook for the next few minutes, but the others would arrive long before then. Their enhanced senses allowed them to smell cooking anywhere in the Ark.

“You dance about with words. Do not play such games. You know I am right,” she said, giving him a measured glance. She began setting bowls around the wide marble table. It was flanked by a pair of benches cut from some sort of foam. There was enough room to seat twenty, so they only took up a very small corner.