Taming the Wild Beast of Alamina

Duncan made it another twenty meters before Hale decided that allowing him to continue pretending his ribs were a minor inconvenience was wasting time.

He caught Duncan beneath the uninjured arm and took some of his weight without asking, earning a brief look of irritation that Hale ignored. Nero remained on Duncan’s other side, less because the dominant alpha needed two men to keep him upright than because Nero had accepted his loyalty less than five minutes ago and apparently saw no contradiction between trust and supervision.

The residence appeared gradually through the wet forest as they descended, grey stone emerging between pine trunks and winter brush. From this angle it looked even less like a prison than it had in surveillance photographs. Two stories followed the slope of the mountain, broad windows facing the valley, while the oldest portion of the structure disappeared partly into the rock behind the newer wings.

Arion’s voice came through Hale’s receiver.

"We’re moving toward Hunter."

Duncan glanced at the device. "Tell him not to enter, even if he gets the exterior door open."

That stopped Nero.

"Why?"

Duncan shifted carefully away from Hale and pressed a hand against his ribs while he caught his breath. "The outer residence is ordinary. Staff rooms, kitchen, security office, and storage. Amaru is inside the central section."

Dean’s voice came across the channel. "The sealed part of the original building?"

"Yes."

Hunter joined from the northern entrance. "Two internal security doors according to the plans."

"Both biometrics. I can open them." Duncan looked toward the house. "The locks are not the problem."

Nero’s purple eyes narrowed. "What is?"

Duncan hesitated just long enough to make Hale look at him.

"Synthetic pheromones."

The channel went quiet.

"Explain," Arion said.

"The central section has its own ventilation system, filtration, and emergency power. The air supply carries a synthetic pheromonal output designed specifically for Amaru. It runs continuously."

Dean answered first. "Designed to do what?"

"Keep him manageable."

Nero’s expression lost the last trace of amusement.

Duncan continued before anyone asked what ’manageable’ meant. "I don’t know the exact formula or every response it is supposed to induce. We were told the system controls his dominant output and keeps him from becoming dangerous enough to break containment. Whatever they built was calibrated to him, not to the rest of us."

"And you have been breathing it?" Hunter asked.

"No."

Duncan’s answer was immediate.

Nero looked at him. "Never?"

"I have enough interest in surviving to follow instructions when someone tells me an enclosed section is saturated with synthetic pheromones made for a specific dominant alpha." Duncan’s mouth tightened when another breath pulled at his ribs. "The airlock isolates the central section. I have never crossed it while the system was active, and neither did the older guard. We were not paid to experiment on ourselves."

That removed one assumption and replaced it with a worse one.

Nobody knew what would happen to an unrelated dominant, an omega, a sigma, or whatever category Nero technically occupied once they entered the treated atmosphere.

Dean asked, "Do you at least know what it does to Amaru?"

"Enough to know it works."

"That was not the question."

Duncan glanced toward Hale’s receiver, hearing the sharpness in Dean’s voice without knowing the young omega behind it or the ability that had just helped kill his partner on the opposite side of the estate.

"He remains conscious. He can speak, read, make decisions, and follow what is happening around him. His dominant output is suppressed while the system is operating. Beyond that, most of what I know comes from the physician, and the physician tells security only what security needs."

Nero watched him for several seconds before asking the question he had apparently been holding since Duncan first mentioned containment.

"Who were you working for?"

Duncan met his gaze.

"Claudia."

Silence settled so completely that Hale could hear water dripping from the branches around them.

Dean spoke first. "Claudia is dead."

"The first one is."

Nero went very still.

Arion’s voice hardened. "The first one?"

Duncan gave a small nod even though they could not see him through the channel. "The woman who built the original organization died. The woman running from what she left behind is also Claudia."

For a moment nobody answered.

Then Dean asked, "Same name by coincidence?"

"No."

That single word made the entire thing feel considerably worse.

Duncan shifted his weight against Hale and continued. "She is a dominant omega. Young enough that she could not have been the original Claudia, but nobody inside the organization treats her as a replacement. She inherited the name, the network, the laboratories, the personnel, and whatever authority the first woman created. From what I understand, that was intentional."

Nero’s long white hair moved across the shoulder of his black coat when the wind changed. "She was raised for it."

"I don’t know."

"Chosen?"

"I don’t know that either. I know that when orders come from Claudia, nobody asks which Claudia is meant."

Dean was quiet for several seconds.

"That sounds exactly like something the original Claudia would arrange."

No one disagreed.

The woman they had spent months tracing through Andrea, Eva, and Sylvia and the infected beasts had apparently designed her legacy with enough care that even death had not removed her name from the organization. Somewhere after her came another dominant omega carrying the same identity, the same authority, and, if Duncan was correct, the same intentions.

Arion asked, "Does the current Claudia control this residence?"

"Yes."

"Directly?"

"As far as I know. The payments, medical schedules, and security instructions all come through her network. The older alpha and I answered to the same structure."

Nero looked toward the residence again. "And Amaru knows?"

Duncan’s expression shifted slightly. "I have no idea what Amaru knows about Claudia."

Hunter cut in before the conversation could expand further. "Can you shut down the pheromone system?"

"From the internal control room."

"Where?"

"Beyond the first secure door, before the sealed central corridor."

Dean answered immediately. "So someone has to get far enough inside to reach the controls."

"Yes."

"And you have no idea what the output will do to anyone except Amaru."

"Correct."

Nero looked almost entertained again, although Hale knew him well enough to recognize that particular expression as interest rather than humor.

"Useful."

Duncan looked at him. "That is not the word I would use."

"You already survived one bad decision this morning."

"I am attempting not to make another."

They reached the edge of the cleared grounds several minutes later. Hunter was already concealed near the northern wall, close enough to the main entrance to watch the cameras without crossing their field of view. Arion and Dean approached from the opposite side, Arion’s dark coat torn and blood visible along one sleeve beneath a hurried field dressing.

Duncan’s gaze moved over them for the first time.

Dean was smaller than he had probably expected, pale blond hair visible beneath the hood of his winter jacket, violet eyes fixed on Duncan with far more calculation than his age suggested. Arion stood beside him with blood beneath his nose and a knife wound in his arm, golden eyes offering Duncan absolutely nothing.

Nero stopped at the edge of the trees.

"You said you can give us access."

"I can."

"To Amaru?"

"To the central perimeter." Duncan looked toward the old stone core of the residence. "After that, you have to decide how you are dealing with the pheromones."

Dean’s attention shifted to the building.

Duncan followed his gaze.

"If you can get the system off, the last door opens from the control room."

Arion looked at him. "And Amaru is behind it."

"Yes."

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