WARNING: MC gets drugged against his will.
(80 days prior to present day)
My eyelids felt heavy as I tried to force them open. What I could see when I did, made me wonder if I was even still alive.
It was all shimmery.
Like silver.
Moonlight, or what I assumed was moonlight, illuminated that strange color of walls.
Where was I?
What…
What happened?
Everything seemed blank in my mind when I tried to recall anything.
Ugh.
I tried to move, to sit up, but the slightest movement had nausea rising high, bile practically in my throat.
Things hurt.
A whimper escaped me and I closed my eyes tight. As if that would help. As if shutting out whatever nightmare of a situation this was would help me feel better…
As if.
I heard a noise. Strange. Like someone walking. Closer, but from behind me.
Someone was here?
Who…
Who was…
I forced my eyes open and saw an unfamiliar figure squat down in front of me. They were wearing ordinary clothes, a small bag at their side. They flipped the top open and removed a syringe and vial. One with my name on it.
As if it wasn’t already a good sign that I couldn’t move painlessly.
Move.
Move…
I tried to force myself to move, but the moment I began to rise, I was slammed back down into the floor by their free hand.
I groaned, mostly in pain.
There was a pinch on my arm and I flinched.
What…
I wriggled away from them, best I could.
What did…
It was too late. It was far too late.
What did they do?
My mind floated. My limbs were weightless and all too heavy to lift.
Laughter.
It echoed in my ears as their shoes squeaked on the floor when they rose to their feet, standing over me.
Something…
Something felt weird.
Jane…
I tried to call out to her.
A warning.
Anything.
Jane.
Please…
Something’s wrong…
Maybe I was too tired.
Maybe I’d been hit in the head too hard.
I tried.
She didn’t respond.
The more I tried, putting all of my energy into it, the worse I felt. There was a burning feeling in my arm. My head was spinning more violently, the back of it with a sharp unending ache.
Had I actually been hit on the back of the head?
Everything was painful.
I groaned.
My muscles went limp as I watched the person go to a door through my blurred, tear-filled vision.
Was I alone in here?
My parents… where were they?
Jane… wasn’t responding…
Alone.
I was…
Alone…
For some reason, that made the tears fall faster.
When had I ever truly been alone?
I didn’t want it. I didn’t like it.
This feeling… I hated it.
The door opened, bright blinding lights from the other side making me squint. They turned to look at me, with a smile and a glint in their eyes.
They looked down at their wrist. A shiny watch of some kind was there. They were completely focused as it beeped following the buttons they pushed on it. Their mouth moved a bit as the door started to swing closed.
“48 hours…”
There was a click. The light was gone. There was nothing.
What did that… mean?
Was it… poison?
And I only had…
It was back to the darkness, to the sleep that called me, making my heart clench painfully in my chest. My eyelids closed without much effort.
This time, I didn’t force them back open. I let myself fall back into the numb nothingness…
It was cold there.
Uncomfortable.
Painful.
It covered my whole body… a painful sort of numbness. It was the feeling of sticking your hand into a bucket of freshly broken ice water while outside at temperatures below freezing. Putting your hand in to fish the ice chunks out, the cold wetness jarring you at first touch. Then, removing that first piece of ice. Your hand hit with the frozen air. Plunging back in… by the end, the ice is gone, and the only thing you can feel is the cold… and chunks of ice stabbing into your palms. There was nothing else but the redness of your skin and the aching of your fingers, but you can’t feel them move anymore.
That feeling… was everywhere.
But this, it was also something else.
That painful numbness wasn’t just cold.
It was…
I was on fire… it felt like…
I was… burning up.
It wasn’t long before I heard the click of the door again, drawing me back to the land of the living and conscious. The room was brighter than it had been before, the light streaming in through a barred window I hadn’t noticed before. I could barely see it out of the corner of my eye.
The room had a mystical feel while bathed in the moonlight. But this, now? This was just a sheet of silver. All of it. Literally… silver.
As daylight lit it up, I felt horror seep into me.
This room was completely covered in something I couldn’t touch.
No wolf shifter could touch it.
Not unless we wanted terrible burns. Burns that left scars.
Burns that, well, burned.
I’d seen a few before, on my dad. He’d been imprisoned because he was a twin. Those things were outlawed now. However, before I was born… there’d been nothing but encouragement for it. He’d been hurt, in more than one way.
Tortured.
Scarred.
A noise on the other side of the wall drew my weary gaze to the door itself.
Uhh…
Seriously?
You’ve got to be kidding me.
That too?
It was all silver. The door, the handle. Even the tops of the screws in the hinges were covered with silver.
I shivered.
This was specifically made for shifters. Wolf shifters. There was no escaping this kind of room.
Literally.
What had I gotten myself into? It was all fuzzy in my mind. I… I couldn’t bring the details to mind. I don’t remember what I was doing last. Where I was…
“…Blackstone. Yeah.”
The voice was faint, carrying through the door. My captor?
“Blackstone…” I whispered, my voice catching.
What was this about?
Jane’s last name was Blackstone…
She was one of only three living descendants of the original Blackstone Alpha.
There was a scraping noise and a small indent in the door moved aside. A window, I realized. A set of eyes peered in at me. They flicked off behind me, to a part of the room I couldn’t see.
I wasn’t alone?
Who…
Was it my parents?
We were somehow captured together?
For what?
Why?
Or, a thought hit me at lightning speed, was it Jane with me? No. No, she couldn't be.
“I have her mate right where we want him. His parents too.”
Every one of my muscles tensed at those words. They said…
Mate.
So, my parents were over there then. I ignored the slight disappointment filling me and refocused on his words.
This was about Jane, herself? What were they planning to do? Why?
How… how did they know?
We never told anyone.
We didn’t.
There was no way they’d know what we were.
“They’ve already marked each other, just like you said.”
Marked…
They knew…
They…
How?
I could hear the grin in their voice as they stared down at us – at myself… and my parents, who’d gotten drug into this because of me.
There was a pause. A nod, showing me a greater glimpse of that smile.
“Of course. If she shows up for him here, I’m ready. I have the drugs you gave me too. I’m already using them.”
Drugs…
Drugs?
What kind… what did they… do…
I vaguely remembered the pinch in my arm from before. A needle, wasn’t it? I’d thought it was poison… but, what if it was something worse?
My head ached, the pain almost blinding.
In an instant, I remembered the feeling of something hitting me…
It was before. Before we’d arrived here.
I remembered my parents shouting my name, their panicked expressions as they raced closer. They hadn’t seen the person behind them, aiming. I’d tried to tell them, but everything had gone black before I could.
My parents – they were with me.
This person… they were after me and Jane. They weren’t after them.
I brought them into this.
I needed to get them back out of it. Alive.
Jane…
I called out.
Jane…
You…
You’re in…
Danger…
It took the rest of my energy from me. I felt everything give way, the sensation of the floor swallowing me whole as I closed my eyes.
Sleep…
No.
I need…
I need to find Jane…
Tell her…
I…
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