2. CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 2
Are you fucking kidding me?
Aban had been flying for three weeks straight when he spied a group of soldiers marching into a coastal town with tanks and plenty of guns. He could easily hear the citizens’ screaming on the wind that kept him aloft.
As much as it pissed him the fuck off, there was little he could do. He’d shifted at home, leaving his clothes and phone behind. If there had been time, he would have flown there to put a call into the Council, but he’d been flying for those three weeks. He wasn’t even close to the tiny home he kept on a remote island in Northern Canada.
He wasn’t like most Albatross. He preferred extremely colder temperatures. Sort of. Not so much when flying, but where he lived gave him the solitude he preferred, yet the ability to stay warm with a large fireplace.
Still, though he liked to live remotely, he’d kept up on what had been happening in the world, especially the shifter world. The constant attacks on various groups had him flying more often hoping to catch those responsible. It would have been better if he could stop them completely, but he was one shifter, a bird, at that. Admittedly, he was an enormous bird, but to keep his shifter status a secret, the last thing he needed was for the humans to see him carrying a backpack with him to stash clothes and weapons.
No. It was better to stay in the skies while watching and following. The only downfall was those who got killed in the attacks, but he doubted he would be much help to stop any of it, even if he could shift and fight back. He might be an Alpha, a very strong one at that, but there were still only so many bullets he could avoid before eventually being shot, and then where would that leave those that were being sold to the highest bidder?
Staying high in the clouds, he noticed something that had his heart dropping and terror threatening to cause him to do something really stupid. He’d been wrong about the town being attacked. It was multiple towns. The longer he flew, the more knots formed in his stomach at the sight. There were at least fifteen towns, and they all fell.
He watched in horror as the ‘soldiers’ ransacked the towns, locked the citizens they’d captured into cages, and loaded them onto a large shipping container ship. He stared down at the ship, stunned to see what had to have been two thousand cages, all filled. He needed to fly home as quickly as possible to call their Chief Council and warn him about it.
If only he could make it there and back without risking losing the ship. There had to be another way. His gaze fell to the northern edge of the town below him. Three women were hiding with at least a dozen children just outside of where the bad guys had stopped searching for more survivors. The group was obviously too afraid they might be seen if they moved, so instead, they hunkered down to wait them out.
If just one of them had a phone, he knew their chief’s number by heart. He’d memorized it long ago in case he’d come into a situation like the one he was witnessing. The question was, how does he get to the group without being noticed?
Flying even further north, he hoped he was far enough away the enemy wouldn’t see him. Not only didn’t he want to risk being captured, but he feared that if they came looking for him, they’d find the others hiding.
The moment he touched the ground, he shifted and crouched low behind an outcropping of rocks and foliage. Keeping all his senses open, he carefully, yet swiftly, made his way to the group in hiding. He’d done his best to make enough noise for them to hear him coming without being too loud that the bad guys would have noticed.
Two of the women gasped softly in fear as they stared at him like he was a snake about to bite them. “I swear, I’m not here to cause you harm. I was hoping one of you is carrying a phone so I can call this into the Council.”
The third woman just eyed him but didn’t seem afraid. “Are you with the Council?” she asked him.
Not about to lie, Aban shook his head. “Not officially, but I know the Chief and have often informed him when I see a group being attacked or an encampment where shifters are forced to work.”
One of the kids stepped up with his arm stretched toward him, holding a phone in his hand. “It was my father’s. The moment we heard screaming from west of us, he handed it to me and told me to run and hide. He told me the minute the enemy was gone to call a number he had already programmed into it.”
Aban felt some relief pour into his overly tense body. He needed to make this call, shift, and get back into the air quickly. He could already hear the humans making preparations to shove off. Admittedly, he would still have time as a ship that size wouldn’t move quickly, but he didn’t want to leave anything to chance. That was especially true with how many prisoners they had locked in cages.
“This better be important.” Saber may not have said who he was, but Aban had talked with him often enough to know that growly tone anywhere. The fact that he sounded seriously pissed off most likely meant he was spending alone time with his mate.
It was impossible to stop his wince at their Chief Council’s annoyance. Alpha Aban might have been, but he knew no one who hadn’t tilted their head in Saber’s presence. The Ape Shifter was intimidating as fuck.
“I swear, you keep acting like a brute, and people will stop coming to you for anything.” Chadwick’s voice grew louder, as if he’d yanked the phone out of his mate’s hands and was putting it up to his ear. Okay, so there might have been one person who had the balls to stand up to Saber. Then again, Chadwick wasn’t exactly sane. The man juggled sharp knives in his hands when he was bored.
He might have been deadly accurate each time, but that didn’t mean accidents couldn’t happen. Yet he blithely tossed them into the air and caught them as if they were nothing.
It didn’t hurt that Chadwick was Saber’s mate and their Chief would never hurt his mate. Hell, the big Alpha doted on his Omega mate.
“Sorry about Saber. He’s been a bit testy lately.” Considering shifters were being attacked, kidnapped, and sold to become basically slaves or even science experiments by some governments around the world, it wasn’t a surprise that Saber was grouchy. “What can I do for you?” Chadwick asked.
“Hey, Chadwick, it’s Aban. I don’t have time,” he rushed to say since Chadwick could talk someone’s ear off. “I was flying over North India, Bangladesh, and Myanmar, and all three coastlines were being attacked. Obviously, I couldn’t do an actual count, but it appeared there had to have been two thousand cages stacked on the decks, all filled.”
“Fucking hell,” Chadwick cursed. “Any idea where they’re going?”
Even though Chadwick couldn’t see him, Aban was shaking his head. “No. I’m going to follow. If I can, I’ll take this phone with me, but there are no guarantees. When I find out where they’re stopping, I’ll do my best to contact you again.”
“We’ll be flying out in thirty minutes,” Chadwick told him. “However long it takes, don’t lose that ship.”
“I won’t.” Aban clicked off with Chadwick and turned to the kid, who had to have been in his teens. “Take it.”
The woman who hadn’t seemed fearful of him when he’d first walked up to them said, “Please ask someone to pick us up and take us to safety.”
He really should have thought of that when talking to Chadwick. Calling up maps, he sent a pin of their location to Saber with a quick note about survivors needing help as soon as the Council’s fighters got there. Then he shifted, plucked the phone up in his talons, and flew high above the cloud cover.
Now, he just had to hope for enough luck that his grip on the phone wouldn’t break and that it wouldn’t fall into the sea.