Be there in two hours. Can't wait
Miss you
Hello?
What are you doing???
Be there in five.
Where the fuck are you?!
To say that Jason had a meltdown, would have been a massive understatement. By his fourth text going without response and his update from Chase stating that she had been lingering in the same store for about an hour, he sent the tracker in to go get her. True panic began to set in when he hadn't heard back from Chase immediately, who upon seeing her discarded clothes rapidly called to action the rest of others in the unit, notifying them that they were on red alert and needed to find her instantly. Jason knew there was a fucking problem when Marks phone began to ring, and it was Chase who was calling the beta as opposed to calling him.
By the time he descended upon the mall, the fire alarm system was already pulled. It being done by one of the members after it was determined she was not in the building and to reduce possible casualties when Jason arrived. All in total eleven people lost their lives, an amalgamation of mall administrators, unfortunate still fleeing employees, and rent a cop mall guards who Jason ripped through like a steak knife through butter. Chase had been critically injured and was found with low vital signs, but would pull through after a week laid up in the pack hospital. He would be immediately dispersed once again after his recovery to aid in the search efforts.
The news would later report it as an act of terrorism and sensationalize the unclear story with no information and no video footage. This narrative being guided by Jacobs gentle tone to network administrators. All communication lines from the building had been cut, all video had been taken and all hard drives were either taken or destroyed.
Jason would spend the next several sleepless days scouring the footage with the analyst team. He had burned into his memory the exact moment and time she was escorted out of the shop. The path she took leading her out of the mall. The car she was placed into. All the way up until the car pulled out of the parking lot. And then she was gone. Nowhere to be found. Disappearing into thin air. Almost as if she had been a figment of his imagination.
Jacob utilized high up connections with local authorities with heavy bribing to act in quick response and step in and diffuse the crowd of shoppers and mall employees, citing that the building was not safe and they all needed to disperse. A bulletin was sent out amongst all packs citing her disappearance, the description of the woman she was with at the time of the disappearance whose identity was unknown, as the real Stacie Decanteur had turned up dead in a river, and a heavy reward for those with details that would lead to her being found. Five hundred warriors and trackers dispersed from Shaded Mountain in search of her despite there being no evidence which way she went.
Cane requested and was granted the further militarization of Shaded Mountain packs force and that of their allies surrounding Pinecrest territory who rapidly descended on the territories border as a glaring very present show of force despite the Alpha and Master Beta saying they had nothing to do with it. The Alphas son, Alex, would later be confirmed to have been inundated with an allied pack in an ambassadorial peacekeeping mission, and having not once ever left its territory.
It had been a week and a half from the event that caused the domino effect that impacted the entire lycan populous in the North American continent, word was even spread globally among foreign packs in hopes that she would be spotted. Jason and Jacob stayed within their own territorial limits monitoring the credit card for any activity, and organizing the influx of tips by likelihood of them proving fruitful as they managed a task force designed for her return. The alpha solely focused on her return at present and keeping his own sanity with that drive, knowing she was still alive out there somewhere. Also, knowing she had not left on her own volition and quickly shutting down that notion brutally with violence by those who attempted to suggest it.
Meanwhile, Elizabeth was growing weaker as she was led by foot through unknown sets of woods. Her hair had been dyed black and she was forced to wear contacts in the color blue, her eyes never getting reprieve from them. She vomited profusely every morning, which was mostly her own burning stomach bile as food was scarce and there was such a fierce presence of all packs looking for her, making its attainability that much harder. Shaded mountain was motivated to bring her home, all other packs motivated in reaping the reward whether it was monetary, gaining the large packs favor or having them in their debt. The group of individuals who had taken her, a middle aged blue eyed man, the blonde, the brunette, and the red head were not at all prepared for the task they had undertaken.
The violent storms started about two days into their journey with the young blonde, it was the first sign of her that initially went unnoticed. However, they increased in intensity with each day that passed, and were being hailed by news stations as a sporadic indescribable phenomenon. Jacob was the first one to put it together and on day five began to pinpoint a trail, the storms resulting in a linear path in the direction of southwest. Mark's field unit was the closest and he was in constant contact with the master beta while analyzing weather reports himself for signs of abnormality. His team was getting closer, noticing the prevalence of fallen trees and their scattered limbs, charred cratered ground from lightning strikes and scorched sections of wood from rapidly spreading wildfires.
On the seventh day he found the group, everyone except for her. They had run out of those little heart shaped gummies, the purple gummies they had been forcing her to eat every six hours for the last week. Her scent no longer being masked in their absence and her powerful lavender smell now intermingling with the pungent coppery scent of blood in the air as his team descended on their poorly kept campsite.
The blonde and brunette female had been savagely ripped apart, with limbs missing and faces slashed so fiercely that they would be deemed as only
identifiable through dental records. The older man with sharp blue eyes was slowly bleeding out, gurgling on his own blood which bubbled from a deep cavity in his neck, the attacker obviously acted with pointed malice against him. His slow death was by design as measured strokes were taken to induce severe pain, and prolonged bleeding at the avoidance of major arteries, just enough to induce a shock to his system which would not allow his rapid healing to kick in. His grainy dying voice repeating over and over through the spittle of blood filling his throat as if in surprise and disbelief. "Supposed... noshif... she.... noshif... supposed... to.. noshif...be..."
Mark's blue eyes landed on the redhead who was in an obvious state of shock, sitting against the base of a tree a few yards away, covered in blood that was not her own as she rocked back and forth with her arms tensely holding onto her knees tucked tightly against her chest. All sound stopped the moment he saw her and he only heard her frantically beating heart, all smells faded as he smelled the overwhelming fragrance of Jasmine assault his senses now that her scent was no longer masked. His eyes faded to black as he rapidly descended upon her ripping her up callously from her huddled position by the arm resulting in a shriek and smacking her savagely across the face with every bit of strength he had, blood spraying out of her mouth and nose from the impact.
"You stupid fucking cunt!" He seethed at her behind gritted teeth. Gripping her chin with such malice that her gums cut into her own teeth as she profusely began to cry. "Do you fucking have any clue, what kind of fucked up situation you have put me in?" His words deep and threatening as his eyes bore into hers. "Where the fuck is she?!" He shook her by his grip on her jaw where she whimpered and cried more frantically. Her lack of answer resulted in him slamming the back of her head against the tree, causing her scalp to bleed and her vision to blur. "You dumb fucking rogue bitch. If she's hurt, I'll kill you myself." He said as he threw her to the ground and proceeded to stare down upon her with swirling black pools of intense anger.
"I.."she whimpered out as she was sprawled in the ground trying to get a singular frame of vision in her eyes "d-didn't know." Her body shuddering.
"Are there anymore of you?" He spat out pulling out his pack of cigarettes with a shaky hand, trembling fingers bringing one up to his mouth as he lit it. Her head shaking now as she cowered beneath him. "Then shut the fuck up." He seethed out at her as smoke billowed out of his flared nostrils and where it could from behind his clenched teeth. His head turning to the confused men in his unit where he stared at them with a hardened look. "This goes no where." It being obvious he was speaking about the redhead beneath him. "Tie this stupid slut up." He said pushing her over with his foot firmly, knocking her off her hands and knees where she curled up into the fetal position and just crumpled in despair. "Now." His tone sharp and curt as he walked away from her and the men, who rapidly began to bind her hands and legs together.
He quickly finished his cigarette subsequently lighting another before he even stubbed out fully his first. Taking deep breaths through his nose as he began an attempt to compose at least his voice for the phone call he had to make.
"Mark, did you find her?" Jacob immediately questioned as he answered the phone.
"We arrived about an hour behind her leaving. The group she was with are all dead. When we arrived, the one who seemed to be in charge was bleeding out. Older male, blue eyes." He said taking another heavy draw of his cigarette. "Three female casualties. A blonde, a brunette and the redhead she was seen with last. All rogues."
"Did you get any information?" Jacob followed up quickly, his tone seeming hopeful with the news.
"She's on her own now, so we'll begin tracking her scent... Jacob..." Mark began to hesitate as he took another puff of his cigarette and exhaled the smoke deeply. "I believe she's shifted, and I believe she did this to the group."
"You need to go immediately and find her if that's the case. She's in even more imminent danger if she has in fact shifted." Jacob said his tone low and holding a warning.
"I'll let you know when we find her. We have to set fire to the corpses first. It's too much carnage. They can't be found like this." Mark said with a head shake, as he puffed again on the soothing nicotine stick.
"Leave a couple of men behind to take care of the casualties. Have them find you when done. I'll update the alpha and let him know we're closer. If you speak with him, do not mention the shifting." Jacob said hanging up the phone without waiting for a response.
Mark walked back to the blood stained encampment, his eyes diverting to the redhead who was now tightly bound with the rope, shedding silent tears with a hazy look in her eyes staring off in the distance. "Ajax, Tucker." He said quickly calling two of the men over from the community effort of piling up the bodies. "You will stay and burn the bodies. Tucker you will find the unit upon completion. Ajax.. you will take this one to a motel and wait for further orders. You're relieved from the search efforts. Your new task is to babysit this dumb bitch until I direct you otherwise. And don't fucking think about touching her."
"Yes beta." They said in unison before returning to help the other men gather the rest of the body parts, scouring the area to ensure nothing was missed.
Mark looked down at the red head for another minute his eyes filling with disgust as he dropped his cigarette only inches from her bleeding nose and proceeded to smother it with the toe of his boot. Shaking his head before pulling his eyes away from her and beckoning the rest of the unit to follow him as they were to move forward and begin looking for promising tracks.
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It would be four more days before there was any presence of her. There were no more storms to follow. There was no scent trail to sniff. There were no recognizable tracks to give guidance in direction.
There was only a collect call made to a cell phone in the middle of the night to shed light on the fact that she was still alive.
"Hello?" A groggy male voice answered the phone call made at 2am in the morning.
A computer voice followed its generated script 'You're receiving a collect call from' the recording cut out to the sniffles and weak cries of a woman 'press one to accept the charges. Press two to decline the call.'
He was immediately woken up out of his fogged daze at the sound of the recording, tapping furiously at the one button on the key pad.
'Your call is now being connected.'
The recording stopped and the phone line connected where he again heard the continued weak cries of the woman who made the collect call.
"Liz... is that you?" Alex said sitting up in his bed as he reached to turn on the light on the night stand.
"I think I killed them..." she whispered back still behind tears.
"Liz. Don't say anymore stuff like that through the phone line."he whispered back to her, in case the call could be monitored due to it being a patched through collect. "Where are you?"
"I don't know." She whispered erupting in more tears. "But I'm covered in bloo-"
"Stop Liz. Look around you. What do you see?" He said more urgently trying to get her to focus and not potentially incriminate herself.
"There's... a diner... down the road. H-Hanks place." She faltered in her voice as she spoke.
"Anything else?" He asked putting her on speaker phone and beginning to search for diners named Hanks place.
"A gas's station... I passed it. Jerry's jig... and a sign I passed said 40 miles to Crystal River city. Ten minutes probably down the road." She said gaining
clarity as she used her memory recall.
He was doing rapid searches of everything she said, all being located in singularity to one place. "What.. how did you get to Colorado?" He asked, ripping off his blankets and immediately beginning to throw on clothes.
"I.. I don't know." She began to cry even more fervently.
"Okay Liz. Calm down. I'm in Colorado. I'm staying as a guest at the Sand Stone pack. I'm two hours away. Can you wait for me? Can you do that for me?" He said grabbing his keys and wallet.
"I d-don't have any clothes." She whimpered into the phone. "I'm really cold."
"Is the diner open?" Alex questioned quickly as he began to gather his blankets and some spare clothes before he switched her off speaker and began to dart out of his guest housing down to his Jeep.
"No. But even if it was I don't have clothes." She stressed again.
"Liz, you're in the middle of no where. Break in. They won't have an alarm. Find a rock and smash the glass at the door." His voice calm and firm. "Once your inside, look for something to put on and try to find something to eat. I'll try to get there sooner... but do not leave."
"I'm scared." She whispered back lowly.
"I know." He said softly. "But I'm coming to get you and we'll figure this out. Alpha Brent will take care of you until we figure it all out. Have you contacted your Uncle?"
"I tried. He didn't pick up." She said softly.
"What about Alpha.. what about Alpha Jason?" His voice almost didn't even want to form the question as he asked her.
"I d-don't know his number." She whispered out.
"Of course you fucking don't." His tone dripping in clear annoyance. "I'll be there soon." He said as his car was already heading off pack territory. "Don't call your uncle again. Just wait for me. Can you do that?"
"Y-yes... can you bring me some clothes?" Her voice faltering again.
"I already have them. Get inside the diner. The temperatures going to drop even more. I'll see you soon."
"T-thank you Alex." She whispered in appreciation.
"Anytime. Now go." He said back hearing the click disconnecting the phone call. His foot on the gas depressed all the way down to the metal of the floor. He'd be there within an hour. He'd guarantee it.