Werewolf Apocalypse: Rise of the Lycans

The capture

Before the boots could reach our landing, the stairwell door above shattered off its hinges with a dull, pneumatic thud, and three figures dropped down the stairwell shaft in total silence. They didn't bounce off the walls; they hovered and landed on the concrete landing with the weightless precision of dropping autumn leaves.

"Target secured," a voice echoed through a tactical helmet visor. It was flat, monotonous, and entirely devoid of human cadence. "Two lifeforms. One infected, and one clean witness."

I scrambled down the remaining steps, throwing my body over Clara’s shivering frame. My right palm was still burning and blistered red where it had touched her shoulder, but I raised the iron tire iron with my left hand and pointed the bloodied metal tip up at the three shadow figures.

"Touch her," I snarled, my voice cracking, "and I swear to God I’ll tear your throats out."

The lead operative didn't even flinch. He raised a slender, silver-plated launcher and shot twice in quick succession. And two tiny, cold needles struck me; one in the neck, one in the shoulder. I felt the ice cold liquid flood my bloodstream instantly before my knees gave in and the tire iron clattered uselessly against the concrete. The last thing I remember as my vision blurred into a sea of swimming dark spots and absolute blackness gradually took over me, was the sensation of heavy, cold hands dragging us both into the dark.

I woke up with a dull and throbbing headache, to the smell of bleach and fresh rain. but the paralytic had worn off enough for my fingers to twitch. I was sitting upright in a heavy steel chair with my arms and legs bound tightly with thick, reinforced nylon straps.

"He's awake," a voice said.

I blinked against the stark, bright fluorescent lighting and tried to focus on where the voice was coming from, but it was useless at first. I looked around the room as much as the strap could let me. I noticed we were in a high-rise executive boardroom, high above the city. Its floor-to-ceiling glass windows offered a magnificent view of the skyline. Through the glass, the nightmare was fully visible: fires dotted the metropolis like fallen stars, black smoke billowed into the night, and searchlights swept across burning street corners.

To my left, Clara was strapped into a matching chair. Her head was slumped forward from unconsciousness, but her breathing was steady. The terrifying golden glow in her eyes was gone, though the skin around her neck remained pale and shiny with cold sweat.

Standing by the window, sipping dark red liquid from a crystal tumbler, was a man in an immaculate, tailor-made charcoal suit. He looked to be in his late thirties, with slicked-back raven hair, high cheekbones, and skin so pale it looked carved from white marble.

He turned around and looked straight at me with eyes that were a startling, unnatural violet.

"Leo Vance," he said softly, his voice like velvet dragged over glass. "Twenty-six. Digital strategist. Born in San Francisco, residing in the central district. You have no criminal records and no military background."

"Where... where are we?" I croaked with a raw throat. "Who are you?"

"You are in the penthouse suites of Synod Global Financial," he replied, walking slowly toward my chair. His footsteps made no sound against the marble floor. "My name is Lord Cassian. And to answer the question that is currently burning through your panicked mind—no, we are not government. We are the stewards of this world."

"You're monsters," I spat. "I saw your squad on the roof. You killed innocent people. You let those... those things slaughter the street."

Cassian sighed softly, as if disappointed by a child's crude logic. He took a small sip from his glass.

"Humanity is a fragile, chaotic herd, Leo," Cassian said, gazing out at the burning city. "For six hundred years, my kind has maintained the delicate illusion you call 'civilization.' We built your banks. We fund your media, we write your history books, we gave you the internet, comfortable lives, and the comforting lie that you are the apex species of this planet."

He leaned down, bringing his chalk-pale face inches from mine. His breath smelled faintly of copper and mint.

"The subterranean beasts you saw tonight are barbaric relic beasts. Primitive, driven by ancient blood-magic and filth. Centuries ago, during the First Apocalypse, they nearly wiped humanity out. My order, the Crimson Synod, put them in the ground. We locked them beneath the earth and made humanity forget they ever existed."

"Why?" I demanded, straining against the nylon straps. "Why keep it a secret? If people knew, they could defend themselves!"

"If people knew," Cassian chuckled coldly, "they would panic. Economy would collapse. Governments would drop nuclear ordnance on their own cities. Society functions because humans believe they are safe. A herd that knows it is prey cannot be managed."

He stood up straight, smoothing his silk tie.

"That is why our cleaners sanitize every witness. If a single video of a wolf transformation goes viral, if a single survivor tells the press what really happened, the secret shatters. The world ends not from the wolves, but from human panic."

"So you execute everyone," I said, a wave of disgust washing over me. "To keep your precious shadow empire intact."

"Precisely," Cassian said smoothly. He raised a silver-barreled pistol from his belt and aimed it casually at Clara's head. "Which brings us to your fiancé. She is bitten. The pathogen is in her blood. By dawn, the full moon will lock the curse into her DNA, and she will become a wild, uncontrollable beast. Protocol dictates she dies now."

"NO!" I roared, throwing my body forward so hard the heavy steel chair rattled against the floor. "Don't touch her! Shoot me instead!"

Cassian stopped and rested his thumb on the hammer of the gun. He looked at me, then slowly lowered his gaze to my right hand.

The skin on my right palm was heavily blistered, raw, and marked with a strange, faint symbol—a pale, glowing crest that looked like an ancient sun sigil.

Cassian’s violet eyes widened slightly. For the first time, his calm, aristocratic mask slipped, replaced by a flash of genuine shock.

"Where did you get that mark?" he whispered, stepping closer.

"I don't know what you're talking about," I gasped, breathing heavily. "I touched her wound... to stop her from biting me. That's all."

Cassian reached out and grabbed my wrist with his ice-cold fingers, then he lifted my right hand into the light. He stared at the glowing mark on my palm as if looking at a ghost.

"The Sun-Crest," he murmured, his voice dropping into a tense whisper. "The Priestly Lineage of House Silas. The blood that burns the wolf..."

He snapped his head up and stared at me with a cold and terrifying intensity.

"You don't know what you are, do you, boy? You think you're just an ordinary human." Cassian lowered the gun, a dark, calculating smile spreading across his pale lips. "Your blood doesn't just suppress the curse, Leo. It purges it. You carry the only force on this planet that can kill an Alpha without silver."

Outside, a violent explosion rocked the base of the skyscraper and the glass windows rattled violently in response, as a deep, guttural roar echoed up from the street below. The force of the roar shattered the upper glass panes!

Cassian turned back to the window, his smile had completely vanished.

"They're here," he said coldly. "The subterranean horde has reached the tower. They want their captured prince, and now, it seems, they will tear this city apart to get him."

He turned back to his tactical guards. "Prepare the transport. We take the boy and the infected girl to the vault."

"What about her?" I yelled, nodding at Clara as she began to stir, her eyelids fluttering open to reveal a dangerous, faint amber glint. "Are you going to cure her?!"

Cassian looked at me with cold, ruthless eyes. "That depends on how useful your blood is to us, Leo. Because if you fail to cooperate... I will let her turn, and I will force you to put her down yourself."