All Hell Breaks Loose (38 page)

By the time all the attendees were finally seated, the tension was thick in the room.  Charlie, his Stetson not on his head for once, moved to stand guard at the door.  The Pack leaders were speaking amongst themselves in urgent
undertone
s until Byron called the meeting to order.  He was flanked by Athena and Irene on one side and Alistair and Margaret on the other.  The remaining Hunters took one side of the table, the Pack leaders took the other, while Gabi, Julius and his retinue took up the side facing the door.  A few other
Werewolves
and Magi that Gabi didn’t know filled the handful of other seats.

“Gentlemen, ladies,” Byron began, coming to his feet.  “First, we’d like to convey our gratitude to the Master of the City for the use of his facilities tonight.”

Julius inclined his head in acknowledgement of the thanks, but his expression didn’t lighten.

“I believe you all have an idea of why we are here, but not everyone has been filled in on the most recent developments, so please bear with me.”  His eyes flicked briefly to Gabi, in an apology of sorts.  “I’ll be as brief as I can.”

While he certainly did summarise very efficiently, it was still over half an hour before they could continue with the meeting.  Gabi was getting seriously
ansty
.  When she’d begun tapping her fingernails impatiently on the table, Julius had surreptitiously captured the offending hand and trapped it against his thigh.  At least tracing his hard muscles through his dark chinos gave her something to do while the rest of them waffled on.

The
Werewolf
Pack leaders were disturbed by the news that some of their Pack members had been approached by Jason.  They were asking endless questions, trying to get details so they could question their own.  Finally, Julius took the lead.

“I believe these questions can be answered another time.  We need to prioritise the situation right now.”  His scowl silenced even the most animated of the
Werewolves
.  “And I think the most important matter to be dealt with now is retrieving Kyle.  First, for his own safety, but second, because I don’t think it would be a good thing for the facts of his birth to be known by someone such as Jason King and his pet bio-geneticist.  We need to put an end to his plans as well as ensure that no one else gets the idea that they can go around infecting pregnant women with lycanthropy in the hopes of creating another Kyle.”

Gabi could tell by the looks on the faces around the table that no one else had even considered that possibility.  She wondered if it had occurred to Julius because of her own precarious heritage and what revealing it might bring down on the human race.

“Yes, yes,” Byron agreed quickly.  “That is something we must consider.  Irene, we’ll need to have the use of a Mind-bender for this, a strong one.  Do you know of one who would be prepared to help us?”

Irene paused thoughtfully and began to nod.

“What do we need a Mind-bender for?” Gabi demanded.  “We know what we need to know.  Who are we going to be interrogating?”

“It’s not for interrogation purposes, Gabrielle,” Athena corrected with feigned patience.  “Once you’ve captured this man and his entourage, we’ll need to erase their memories and implant new
ones.  That takes a great deal of skill, but we can’t have him running around with this knowledge.” She looked to the other Council members.  “If you don’t know someone, I do.”

“Wait,” Gabi
said,
standing and putting her hands on the table.  “What do you mean when you say
capture
this man and his entourage?”

Chapter
20

“Exactly what I said,” Athena enunciated slowly.  “You and the other Hunters will be required to carry out a capture and containment of this group. The
Werewolf
Pack will decide the fate of the Lycanthropes, and the humans will have their memories altered.”  She spoke as though she was giving orders to a slightly slow five-year-old.

Anger seethed through Gabi, and when she next spoke, it was from between clenched teeth.  “Jason King has committed the kinds of atrocities that demand nothing less than a kill order.  Others have been executed for far less than what this man has done,” she ground out.

“Gabi,” Byron said, as Irene put a cautioning hand on Athena’s arm, “this man is human.”

Gabi’s eyes narrowed as they zeroed in on the man who was father and uncle to her.  “You’re in agreement with them on this?” she demanded of him.

“We have no jurisdiction over humans,” Byron told her.  “You know that, Gabrielle.  The manifesto of the Society has always been to stay out of the affairs of humans except to protect ourselves.”

“We will be protecting ourselves, as well as protecting the humans this idiot is about to unleash lycanthropy hell on,” she almost yelled.  “How could you condone allowing this man to get away with what he has done with a mind wipe and being allowed to go on with his merry life?  Do you think the loss of a few memories will change this sociopath’s core character, that he won’t try something like this in the future?”

“Gabrielle,” Margaret’s calm voice tried to soothe her, “you know we won’t allow that to happen.  We’ll put measures in place so that we’ll be able to keep a close eye on him.”

But as she spoke, a couple of the Pack leaders began to mutter amongst themselves.

One was louder than the others.  “Ms Bradford has a good point,” he thundered, bringing his fist down on the table to punctuate his statement.  The table groaned.  “If one of my
Pack
had committed these crimes, there would be no hesitation by the Council to issue a kill order.  Why should this man get leniency?”

Agreement rumbled through the rest of them, and they joined Gabi in glaring demandingly at the group of five.

“It has been clear from the initial formation of the Council,” Alistair said, speaking loudly to be heard over the melee.  “We do not punish humans.  If they commit crimes against us, our mandate is to erase all knowledge of other races’ existence.  If they’ve committed crimes against other humans, we find a way to bring those crimes to the attention of the human authorities.  We have a manifesto for a reason, and we can’t break our own rules just because a human has done something unprecedented.”

“This is ridiculous,” Gabi snarled.  She kept expecting Julius to caution her, to encourage her to back down a step, but he sat unmoving, his attention fixed on the Council members.  She stood up straighter, looking into the eyes of each of the Council members, stopping at Byron’s.  “My father stood against evil, cruelty and brutality.  I find it hard to believe he would be in agreement with you tonight.”  She tried to keep the deep pain from her voice, but speaking of her father never got any easier.

The other Hunters stirred uneasily.

“Yes, he did stand against all of that, honey,” Byron
acknowledged,
sadness in his eyes too, “but he also vowed to protect human life at all costs.  How can we pass judgement on a human when they are not even represented on the Council anymore?”

“You passed judgement against Vampires without us having representation on your Council,” Julius said without inflection, merely making an observation, but chagrin passed across the faces of all the Council members, except for Athena, Gabi noted.

“Yes, we did.”  Byron nodded.  “It was not the way we like to do things, but we didn’t feel that we had any choice.  We didn’t understand the hierarchy of your society and didn’t have too many
choices in dealing with
rogues
of your kind.  If we’d known of the existence of a Master of the City, we would’ve approached you a long time ago.”  He passed a hand across his forehead, weariness apparent.  “Perhaps this is a matter we need to rethink, but it isn’t a decision we can make without careful thought and consideration.  We can’t do that now with Kyle being in this man’s hands.”  He looked unhappily at Gabi.  “I promise you this man will not go unpunished, he will just not be punished by us.”

Gabi narrowed her eyes, but sat down again without another word.  She had been in conflict with the Council several times since she’d become a Hunter, but this was the first time she felt completely and utterly at odds with them.  In her heart she knew that her father would’ve stood with her on this one, but if she wanted to operate within the SMV, she had to accept what they decreed.  The meeting moved on to what Trish had uncovered about Jason’s holdings and the property that was assumed to be the laboratory and barracks for Jason’s base of operations.  As the meeting went on around her, Gabi considered her options.  She could simply walk away from the SMV now, take the Vampires and whatever Pack leaders wanted to join them and take down Jason King without the support of the SMV.

She knew that Julius would support her; she’d felt his anger with the Council’s decision.  For a few moments she allowed herself the liberty of imagining it, but then reality intruded to veto the idea.  If they went vigilante, she and Julius would find themselves in opposition with the Council.  If neither side backed down, there was the possibility of a war between the two sides, and that wasn’t an option for Gabi.  That would dishonour her father’s memory in the worst way possible.  So she would put aside her anger and do her part in the upcoming attack on the human’s compound, and she would deliver the kingpin and his accomplices into the hands of the Council.  She sighed as she came to the realisation, and Julius unexpectedly put his hand over hers where it lay on her leg and gave it a reassuring squeeze.  He was aware of her decision, he supported her, and he possibly even understood why.  It gave her a measure of comfort, when she felt in conflict with Byron, usually her closest connection to her father.  She forced her attention back to the meeting.

They were discussing the location.  It was an old military airfield to the south of the City.  It had been abandoned several years ago when the southern slums began to spill out of their original containment zone and spread to surround the base.  The military had by then outgrown the facility and moved to a newly-built airfield on the eastern side of the City.  A company purchased the land and buildings for a quarter of its market value, on the agreement that it would develop the land and build low-cost housing to try to shift some of the human slum populace into habitable accommodation.  Of course, the development hadn’t yet made it past the planning stage.  Jason King had been careful to tie the development up in red tape through his influence on the City Council.  What no one on the City Council knew was that Jason King was the controlling partner in the holding company of the subsidiary that had purchased the property.

The airbase was exactly what Kimberley had described.  It had military barracks, several large hangars as well as a large, military grade, underground bunker.  In another underhanded piece of trickery, Jason had ensured that the no-fly zone, which had been in place during the military’s occupation of the airfield, was still in place.  This was problematic.  With no recent aerial photos of the place, it was extremely difficult to plan a precision attack.  It was Lance who finally spoke up with what most were already thinking.

“I know you’re not going to like this, Hellcat,” he said, glancing her way, “but we can’t mount this attack tonight.  It is simply too risky.  There just isn’t enough
intel
for us to go on.  We need at least a day to recon the area, try to get some idea of what we’ll be up against.”

Gabi’s expression grew stormy.  “So? What?” she demanded.  “We just leave Wolf in the hands of a crazy human who might just dissect him to find out what makes him tick?”

“Gabi, you know Wolf means as much to us as he does to you,” Matt said.  “He’s like a brother to us, too.  The suffering of a Hunter is pain to us all.  You know that.”  His words brought home again the loss of her father and the other senior Hunter who’d been killed on duty shortly after she joined the Society.  The deaths had truly been felt through the entire organisation and the Community as well.  “But if we go at this half-cocked, we could lose not only Wolf but many others.  Wolf wouldn’t want that on his conscience.  He will hold out until we get there.”

It was the longest speech she’d ever heard Matt make, and the most sincere.  He wasn’t one given to verboseness or seriousness.  Before she could reply, Alexander surprised her by speaking as well.

“The Hunter is right, Hellcat,” he said, his usual teasing and cynicism markedly absent.  “If what the Doppelganger said is true, then it’s unlikely this human will do anything fatal to Wolf yet.  He may use him as a guinea pig, but he won’t kill him.  Not tonight.”

The Council kept quiet but watched with interest; they weren’t inclined to get involved in the details of an operation of this scale. 
That, they entrusted to their experts.

“What do the rest of you think?” Gabi finally asked, looking around at the Pack leaders and the other Vampires.

One by one the Pack leaders nodded, and after a brief glance at their Sire, Nathan and Liam murmured their agreement as well.  Her gaze then met Julius’s.  His expression was
schooled,
neither agreeing nor disagreeing, and Gabi knew he was leaving the decision to her.  She could now back down gracefully or continue to argue her point.  After a moment of careful thought she knew she needed to follow her head on this one, even though her heart was screaming for immediate action.  The room seemed to sense her capitulation.  The tight air of tension eased slightly, and frowns disappeared from a few foreheads.