3. Chapter 3 #3
And a commander whose body wanted to submit to the alpha even while her brain fought for independence. He could still smell her arousal in the air. Still see the way her thighs had pressed together, the flush on her skin, the dilation of her pupils.
She'd come to him eventually. They all did.
Enhanced females recognized the apex. Their biology demanded it. Suzuki could fight with military discipline and Air Force control, but her body knew what it needed.
Protection. Strength. Breeding.
Isabella shifted. "You're thinking about fucking her."
"I'm thinking about everything." Gunner turned toward the command center. "Including that."
"Good." Isabella's smile was predatory. "I want to watch."
Tasha laughed softly. "Give her time to settle in first. She just lost everything."
"She'll heal faster with pack." Isabella's voice went serious. "We all do."
The settlement population had just jumped to twelve hundred.
The clock was ticking.
"Get everyone to the command center," Gunner said. "We've got two weeks. Maybe less."
"And then?" Isabella asked.
"Then we find out if Cerberus bleeds."
1312 HOURS — COMMAND CENTER
The room was packed. Gunner's core pack, Tucker's volunteers, Suzuki and her senior staff, Rivera with tactical displays, engineers, medics, supply coordinators.
Twelve hundred people needed feeding. Housing. Integration.
And they had maybe fourteen days before Voss arrived.
Suzuki stood at the tactical table, projecting maps onto the digital display. Her movements were precise, economical. Air Force pilot efficiency.
"Voss consolidated after Gao and Bertram fell," she began. "She absorbed their territories, integrated their survivors, executed anyone who resisted. Eight hundred stable-enhanced soldiers. Original Cerberus protocols—slow modifications, permanent integration, no degradation."
Rivera pulled up satellite imagery. "How does she supply them?"
"Stockpiles from pre-collapse military bases. She's been planning this for years. Full logistics chain—fuel, ammunition, food, medical. She can sustain siege operations for months."
"Weaknesses?" Gunner asked.
Suzuki's jaw tightened. "She's conventional military. By-the-book tactics. Doctrine over innovation. If you can predict her moves, you can counter them."
"But she's patient," Tasha said. "She doesn't need to rush."
"No. She can wait. Siege us. Starve us out."
Isabella leaned forward. "Then we don't let her siege us. We hit her first."
"With what force?" Suzuki's eyes met Isabella's. "She has eight hundred soldiers. We have maybe two hundred combat-effective personnel if we combine our forces. The math doesn't work."
"The math never works." Isabella's voice went cold. "We make it work anyway."
Gunner raised one hand. Silence fell immediately.
"Suzuki's right. We can't win a conventional engagement." He looked at the tactical displays. "But we can make it too expensive for her to commit. Force projection. Asymmetric response. Hit her supply lines. Ambush her scouts. Make every meter cost blood."
"Guerrilla warfare," Suzuki said.
"Yes."
"That buys time. Not victory."
"Time is victory." Gunner met her eyes. "Because while we're bleeding her forces, Tasha cracks the degradation cure. We stabilize the defectors. We turn dying soldiers into an army that won't break down."
Tasha shifted in her chair. "That's... optimistic."
"Can you do it?"
"Maybe. Gao's research has the framework. But testing takes time. Resources. Subjects willing to risk the treatment."
"You'll have all three." Gunner turned back to the map. "Suzuki, your people have fought Voss before. What's her pattern?"
Suzuki pulled up engagement reports. "Recon in force. Multiple probes to identify weak points. Then overwhelming assault on the weakest sector. She doesn't waste resources on frontal attacks. She finds the gap and exploits it."
"Then we give her a gap," Isabella said. "Bait. Controlled weakness. Draw her in and close the trap."
"That requires perfect timing," Suzuki said. "And assumes she falls for it."
"She will." Gunner studied the defensive perimeter. "Because she thinks we're desperate. Scattered. Barely holding together."
"We are desperate."
"But we're not scattered." Gunner looked around the room. "We're pack. Enhanced and baseline. Military and civilian. Survivors who've already killed two warlords and lived to build something better."
He let that sink in.
"Voss is coming to destroy us. To collar us. To take our children and turn them into weapons." His voice dropped. Went cold. "She can try. But she's never fought someone like us. Never faced an apex who'll burn the world before he lets anyone touch his family."
Storm chose that moment to scream. Furious. Demanding attention.
The room broke into nervous laughter.
Isabella patted Storm's back. "She agrees."
Suzuki watched Gunner. Her eyes tracked over him—tactical assessment mixing with something deeper. Her body's response warring with her brain's control.
Then she straightened. Professional. Controlled.
"What are your orders?" she asked.
Gunner met her eyes.
"Prepare for war."