Making Waves (Miracle: Salvation Isle #6)
1. CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 1
Hopeless. It wasn’t a word Glyn Webb would have ever imagined using, much less feeling, but that was exactly the situation he was in, with zero chance of ever getting free. Then again, he’d also never once imagined being forced to work on weapons that had the potential to kill thousands of people. Hell, if his captors had anything to say about it, millions would die at their hands.
He had no clue how any of this had happened. Humans weren’t even supposed to know shifters existed. But they clearly did or he wouldn’t be there.
As surreal as it was, one minute he’d been at the town council meeting protesting their law that allowed over fishing for the two companies their colony owned and the next he was caged. Okay, so technically the town hadn’t ‘owned’ either company, but it often felt that the companies ran the town since the two families who did own the companies basically ran their colony.
After three years of making his point with no acknowledgement of his arguments, Glyn knew despite his well-planned case nothing would sway them. That said he wasn’t about to stay silent on the matter either. Humans were already doing enough damage to the environment, did they really need to contribute? They were shifters, after all. They, more than most, knew the impacts of harming the ecosystem.
Yet, their colony only seemed to care about one thing…The almighty peso. Money was the only thing their leadership seemed to care about. Though, not any longer.
He looked over at their ‘former’ mayor and nearly barked out a laugh. Not really. For laughter was not only forbidden with severe punishment, but not warranted considering they were all being forced to make weapons for a third world country with a dictator that was even more self-centered than those who’d run Glyn’s colony.
A feat he’d never imagined possible.
Sure, he’d heard of North Korea. Had seen the news coverage of them trying to become… Not bigger, but maybe ‘more’ than what they were. Why? Who the fuck knew. Glyn would have thought they would be better off staying in the shadows, trading with others and not making waves.
That thought actually did make him laugh, which caused two guards to point their guns in his direction. Fuck. Forcing himself to be silent again, Glyn kept transferring uranium – which was completely bare of shielding – to where his former leaders were placing the rocks infused with uranium onto a conveyor that passed through a laser in order to separate the Uranium from everything else.
How they had all gotten taken and exploited into working to destroy the world, Glyn didn’t know. One minute he’d been listening to their mayor, Hugh Goldman, drone on and on about funding another ship to bring in even more fish that would both destroy their ecosystem – not that Hugh would have admitted that – as well as bring in money to their colony and the next minute they’d heard loud booming, which he’d later learned were cannons.
It hadn’t taken more than fifteen minutes for their colony to be completely overrun. The citizens were either dead or captured and driven into cages. None of them had once thought they’d be placed into cargo containers and forced into working for a country who wanted to take down the world.
No. It was more than that. His parents and sister weren’t there. Was it possible they’d died during the attack? Yes. But his brother, Jarvis, who had been with them when they’d been taken, claimed they’d survived, which meant they had been taken somewhere else.
“We need to find a way out of here,” Jasiri, one of the colony’s councilmen, hissed out which was just fucking stupid. Not only had they tried, but they all damn well knew their capturers were listening to every word they said.
Talk about stating the obvious. It had been something they’d all said over the past three months that they’d been confined. Yet, none of them had come up with one possible escape plan that didn’t end up with someone dying.
“Then come up with a way we can all leave safely.” Glyn was fucking tired of them acting like it was all on the rest of the colony to set them free. Especially when every one of them knew any attempt to escape didn’t mean death to the one who tried to flee. It meant death to someone he or she loved.
His brother, Jarvis, might be the only one there with him, but Glyn wasn’t about to get him killed. If only their leaders had cared about their own loved ones. In the past three months twenty of their friends and family had died because of their resolve to free themselves of being confined.
Admittedly, in the beginning, he couldn’t actually blame them. They had been warned, but as a shifter, stronger and more resilient to injury, they hadn’t believed the humans holding them. But once they’d slit the throats of their mates? Fuck, there was no way Glyn would have ever put anyone he’d loved at risk.
Their leaders? Not only had their mates died, but then their children. With no other family left, their captors just killed them. “But unless you can, shut the fuck up.” There was no way he was going to die just because their colony’s leaders refused to accept their fate.
That was especially true when he’d witnessed four others brought in and forced to work, despite appearing strong and more than capable of taking care of themselves. If those big Alpha types could be captured and forced to work right alongside him, what hope would he have to fight the humans?
“Move it,” one of the humans watching them yelled as he pushed the gun he was holding into Glyn’s back.
It took every bit of his control not to fucking punch the asshole, but Glyn did as he was told. He wasn’t one to conform to doing what he knew was wrong, but he also wasn’t willing for his brother or anyone else he loved to die because of his convictions.
“Do what he said,” one of the newcomers, a tiger shifter if he wasn’t mistaken, told him in what was more of a growl than words. “I get it is despicable but at least we’re alive.”
That didn’t mean he was just going to take what they were doing to him and his people. Okay, so yes, technically he was – for now. But he was determined to find a way out. Not just for him, but for all of them. If only he could figure out a way to accomplish that goal without getting someone else hurt.
“Don’t worry. They’re looking for us,” the tiger shifter kept his voice low so the humans couldn’t hear him.
His heart sped up at that glimmer of hope this man offered. “Who?”
“My boss, Saber Thorsen.”
And just like that, that sensation of hopelessness disappeared. If the Council Leader knew where they were, they might have a chance of being saved after all.