Chapter 17
SEBASTIAN
Without our wolf link, Gunnar's frequent punishments would have horrified me. I knew what he was doing and why, but it was hard to watch, especially when I felt sympathy pains through our bond.
No human could take that amount of abuse, but my mate reveled in it. They shocked us if we stood too close to the door when they entered, and again if we acted out of line during their visits. For Gunnar, that was all the fucking time.
"I'm fine," he reassured me after each blast. "Babies are fine."
After the first week, even Dr. Bunting sounded concerned when he asked the lab tech, "Are you certain you're not endangering our assets?"
"No, sir. The shock level might burn his skin, but no internal damage."
Already, our children were property of Paskal Enterprises. It shouldn't have surprised me, but surely my father realized the pups growing inside Gunnar were his grandchildren. How could he be so callous?
I growled at the lab tech, and he shocked me. "We could turn up this one's dose," he said.
"No." Dr. Bunting's gaze flashed to the camera in the corner of the room.
The lab tech's eyes widened, and he became enamored with his tablet screen. A moment later, he walked to the corner I used for a restroom. After taking some samples, he switched the dirty pad for a clean one.
Here I was, trapped in a cell for daily evaluations, unable to switch from my wolf form, peeing and shitting on the corner floor mat in an otherwise sterile environment. If only my haters could see me now.
Instead, the man who was supposed to love me unconditionally watched on video feed while Dr. Bunting and his assistants took their morning, afternoon, and evening test samples. Who needed haters when my father treated me like a lab animal?
"It could be worse," Gunnar said one night while I squirmed uncomfortably on the hard mattress pad they'd given us for beds. The stand-up cot on the space station had been more comfortable.
"How could anything be worse?" I buried my nose under my tail, careful to keep away from the not-so-pleasant smells.
"They could be milking you for alpha sperm."
I raised my head to glare at him through the thick glass wall. "Why—"
"They're already talking about hooking me up to some kind of milking machine when the babies arrive."
I refused to ponder the possibilities if Gunnar didn't produce enough milk. Could our children eat human formula, or would they starve?
The questions plagued me at night. Then, morning came, and we did it all again.
Blood draw. Saliva swab. Urine and fecal samples when available.
Once a week, they hosed us down with soapy water and doused us with anti-microbial powder.
They laughed when I shook my ass at them, trying to wash away the stench I wasn't willing to lick away with my tongue.
I doubted my microbiome was ready to test how similar my digestive and immune systems were to a wolf's.
One thing I knew for certain: I was coming to love my mate as much as my wolf did.
Gunnar kept me sane when my thoughts veered toward despair.
He was always there with a joke, or to pass along any movement of the pups inside him, or to debate a philosophical question when the inevitable certainty that he would give birth in this facility filled us both with dread.
The days turned into weeks, and soon, months. Gunnar's belly distended, his ribs spread, and his wolf body stretched to contain the growing lives inside him.
One morning, I woke to find him strapped to a table while the lab tech ran an ultrasound wand over his abdomen. Gunnar radiated discomfort throughout the procedure, and they knocked him out with a tranquilizer dart before releasing the restraints.
"What does Dr. Bunting say about the pregnancy?" I asked when his fury burned through the residual brain fog a half-hour later.
"Twins," Gunnar said. "Due in a week."
"A week?" It was too fast for a human pregnancy, but we hadn't been allowed to shift back to our human forms since we'd arrived. Perhaps keeping us in wolf form, with our wolf metabolism, sped up the pregnancy, as well.
"What did they look like?" The ultrasound screen had been angled away from my cell.
"Like fetuses. Two of them. They still look too small to survive, but Dr. Bunting was pleased with their progress."
From what I remembered from my biology classes, the last trimester of pregnancy was vital for rapid weight gain and lung and brain development. I didn't know where that fit with wolf gestation, but with a week to go, that would surely put Gunnar near the end.
If there was any consolation for being kidnapped by my father and brought to a research facility to be lab rats, it was the constant monitoring.
So far, the pregnancy was going as well as it could.
No matter how much he disobeyed Dr. Bunting, the lab techs maintained Gunnar's well-balanced diet and provided plenty of fresh water. For that, I was grateful.
Meanwhile, I got scraps and one bowl of water per day. They wanted me weak, thinking it would make me more docile. I hid my animosity beneath a shroud of feigned exhaustion. Together, Gunnar and I bided our time.
Our mate bond soothed me on the days when I wanted to bash my head against the wall.
Six days later, after a particularly frustrating morning session of tapping buttons to "speak" like a trained dog, I couldn't resist. I wanted out of my cell, and the fastest way was through the glass wall beside the metal door.
Once the lab emptied for their morning staff meeting, I rushed the wall, throwing my shoulder against it with all my might.
Gunnar talked me out of it after the first few blows, but then I noticed the tiny spiderweb of cracks beside the opening where the metal deadbolt slid into the glass wall.
"That's our way out," Gunnar said when I showed him the fracture. "Conserve your energy and wait for my signal."
His thoughts soured. "I learned something else during my morning exam.
As soon as our pups are born, they plan to test them for their designations.
Bettina's grandfather said the wolves of old had to wait until alpha and omega tendencies manifested during puberty, but Dr. Bunting seems to think a blood test at birth will work.
If one's an alpha, they'll kill you. And if there's an omega, they'll kill me.
" Wolfish laughter shook our bond. "They would have kept me as their brood mare, but I've proven to be a hostile test subject. "
The thought of our children becoming orphans at the mercy of Paskal Enterprises sickened me. "We won't let that happen."
Gunnar's mental state hadn't improved by the time Dr. Bunting returned for our noon prodding. When they directed him into the larger room to run their tests, he jumped at the doctor and both lab techs, the first time in desperation, but then with purpose.
"It's getting weaker. I can feel it."
He reacted the same as always, falling to the ground, his shoulders shaking. His laughter filled our link, and hope ballooned in my chest. After months of despair, I almost didn't recognize it.
I sat on my haunches, watching the show. When his collar's power went dead, his human form rushed to the surface. I reached out to him, my wolf doing his best to hold back Gunnar's humanity. "Not yet. Wait for an opportunity to strike, and then you can shift."
The lab techs continued their tests, oblivious of the danger. They took their samples, jotted their notes, and then left Dr. Bunting alone to review their work on the oversized monitors.
Gunnar and I watched the burly techs leave their workstations and exit through the metal door that resembled the ones on the space shuttle. The lock spun and clanked back into place with finality.
I expected Gunnar to leap at the man who had caused us both so much heartache over the past two months, but he chose to shift first, his neck shrinking and lightening to pink skin, somewhat scorched where the collar's prods had touched him.
He eased it up and over his partially shifted head and pointy wolf ears, his arms still covered with thick hair and his fingers still tipped with sharp claws.
Then, he returned to full wolf form with the collar hooked over his front paw.
He tossed the collar across the room, in the corner closest to Dr. Bunting. It clanked against the glass before clattering to the floor, drawing the doctor's attention. I'd followed it, too. When I looked back to where Gunnar had been, I found only sterile white space.
A surprised, "Oof," drew my attention back to the doctor, right before his forehead crashed into the corner of the monitor, smearing it with blood.
Gunnar leaped onto his back, knocking him forward, his giant paws pressing the doctor's shoulders to the desk, his jaws clamped around the back of his scrawny neck.
Gunnar shook his head viciously, and the doctor's neck snapped.
I should have been horrified by my mate's brazen display of violence, but all I felt was numb satisfaction.
Dr. Bunting would never shock Gunnar again, and he wouldn't touch a single hair on our babies' heads.
The fucker had it coming. For all his pride in being a doctor, he had certainly disregarded the objective to do no harm.
First, he'd injected us both with high doses of radiation.
Then, he'd sent us into space to force our shifts.
After kidnapping us, he'd kept us in wolf form with the shock collars around our necks.
Mine still thrummed with power where the prongs nestled against my skin.
Gunnar shifted, and his body contorted with pain. I called to him through our wolf bond, telling him to shift back, but he didn't seem to hear me. He picked up a discarded tablet, but it had fallen to the floor during the skirmish. Giant cracks marred the surface.
Gunnar turned back to the desktop computer, his fingers flying on the keys. Just as I heard the wheel turning on the metal door into the lab area, the lock on my collar snapped open, and it fell to the floor.
I didn't have time to shift, nor could I wait for the door to open. With renewed vigor, I threw myself at the wall beside the cell door. The glass splintered along the frame, but it wasn't enough. I hit it repeatedly. Each time, my strength diminished. I'd gone too long without proper nutrition.
I whimpered as I retreated, my right front leg aching from the beating I'd given it.
Whoever was trying to come through the door would restrain us and put the collars back on, thwarting our escape.
We would live out the rest of our short, miserable lives as lab rats until we were no longer needed.
Then, our children would take our places in this forced captivity.
My father and I rarely talked business, but I didn't need a board meeting to explain what he wanted from our pups. The companies still in his name were all shell corporations with huge defense contracts. He wanted super soldiers, and he planned to use shifter DNA to build them in his lab.
I couldn't let that happen. I wouldn't.
The door lock clanked into the open position.
It was now or never. I limped to the back wall of my cell, using the full length to pick up speed.
Lunging forward, my claws scrabbled against the smooth tile, and I almost fell.
Then they caught on the corner, propelling me forward.
I rushed headlong toward the glass, ramming it with my shoulder.
When I hit, it shattered outward, the largest projectiles skidding across the floor before me while shards crashed into the opening door with enough force to shove it closed again.
The next time someone pushed it open, I fell upon the unsuspecting lab tech, ripping out his throat with a single slash of my fangs through his neck.
The next person through the door kicked me hard. I flew backward, landing on something sharp right between my shoulder blades. It hurt like hell, but what I saw come through the door next filled me with rage. Armed guards fixed their rifle sights on Gunnar.
"Sebastian!" Gunnar cried through our link.
"I'm fine." I rolled onto my stomach, but when I tried to gather my paws under me, they went skidding in all four directions.
"Stay down, son." My father pushed between two guards and loomed over me with one Oxford loafer on my damaged shoulder. "If you move, they'll kill the omega."
"Don't move," Gunnar said. "I'm coming for you."
That was the last thing I remembered before my father jabbed the butt of a rifle into my temple. Then, the world went dark.