Disclosure

A Death’s Sanctuary Short Story

Copyright
©
2015 by Thais Lopes

Cover design by Thais Lopes

Model: Mirish
(http://mirish.deviantart.com/)

Wolf: Amber
(http://hotnstock.deviantart.com/)

All rights reserved. This book or any portion
of thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner without the
written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief
quotations in a book review.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters,
places and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination, and
any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses,
companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely
coincidental.

“
Did you
see
the news?” Luiz asked, from the
kitchen’s door.

With a resigned sound, I raised my hand,
asking him to wait while I finished eating my cheese bread.
Obviously agitated, he took a mug from the cabinet and headed for
the coffee pot.

“
Don’t even
think about it!” I almost screamed, with my mouth still full. “No
coffee for you! Once was enough!”

“
Hey, I
deserve it today! It’s going to be a long day.”

“
No way! I’ve
seen what happens when you drink anything with caffeine.”
I finished eating in a hurry, knowing there was
only one way to make him forget the coffee. “What was that about
the news?”

He immediately put the empty mug on the
table, getting a chair. His eyes were shining, and I knew for sure
he was going start talking science. Probably another crazy
idea.

“
I told you
about the living tissue samples that were being studied, remember?
The ones that had been frozen for ages?” He waited until I nodded,
smiling. “There are news about those studies. Unbelievable
news!”

I
froze.
That wasn’t what I expected. One
quick glance around was all I needed to make sure that Felipe was
listening. My other roommate had stopped just before the door, and
was completely still. Our eyes met, and he nodded lightly, a
worried expression on his face, before turning and going back to
his bedroom. I took a deep breath before facing Luiz, who had a
large smile on his face.

“What did they discover?” I asked, praying to
all the powers that it wasn’t what we feared.

“
There is an
anomaly on the DNA that would give a regeneration capacity to the
body that, until now, wasn’t even imagined.” He didn’t even try to
hide his excitement about it.

With effort,
I forced myself to appear curious. What I really wanted to do was
run to my parent’s home and wait for my next orders.
We weren’t ready for that… Not now. It was hard
to stay in the character I had created years ago, but somehow I
managed. “Right… And what does that mean?”

He sighed.
“Imagine you cut yourself, and in seconds it’s healed. Now, imagine
the same thing working not only on your skin, but on your whole
body. It’s the greatest discovery of the century!”

Yes, it was.
But he had no idea of what was really going on. I could hear the
faint noise that was Felipe typing on his computer, and the fact
that he hadn’t come back to the kitchen was the only confirmation I
needed. If they had found out about the regeneration capacity, it
wouldn’t be long before they figured out the rest.

“Yes, it seems to be.” I answered, going back
to my breakfast and pretending I had no idea of what he was talking
about.

Luiz made an
irritated sound before getting up. “I really don’t know why I still
try to talk about this stuff with you or with Felipe. You have no
idea at all.”

“
You’re
talking to two math students, Luiz.”
I
laughed.

Shaking his
head, he left the kitchen, and few minutes later I heard when he
closed the apartment’s door. He was probably going back to college,
where he would be able to discuss the news with his classmates. My
smile disappeared, and I let my worry be visible. Leaving my coffee
mug, I went to Felipe’s room.

“
So?” I
asked.

He didn’t
even take his eyes from the screen, his shoulder length blond hair
hiding part of his face. But I could see the worry lines that
marked his expression. Not a good sign.

“
Exactly what
Luiz said. They didn’t release anything besides the regeneration
capacity.”

“Yet.” I added.

“Yet.”

With sharp
movements, he closed the browser
’s window
before turning off the computer. Sighing, Felipe faced me. There
was no need to say anything, we both knew what was at
stake.

“
I’ll give
you a ride to the road.” I said, before going back to my
bedroom.

I dressed for
work in a hurry. The beginning of a headache seemed to tell me it
would be a long day, but there was nothing I could do. I needed to
hold tight to the life I had built. I couldn’t let anyone suspect
anything.

Felipe was
already waiting when I left the
bedroom.
Without a word, we went down to the garage. My car was a popular
model, dark gray, and with the darkest film allowed on the windows.
The less anyone could see inside, the better.

There were
two ways to get to my work by car. The shorter one, through the
city, was an everyday bet. I never knew if I would get lucky and
arrive in twenty minutes, or if I would get stuck in traffic and
need two hours. The longer way was through the road just out of the
city, a huge detour, but there was almost no traffic. And the long
way was also near one of our properties.

Felipe jumped to the back seat as soon as we
were out of the city traffic, and I heard when he started taking
off his clothes. A few seconds later the sounds of the
transformation started.

In less than
five minutes a huge white wolf jumped to the passenger seat beside
me, facing me with Felipe’s hazel eyes. His stillness was the best
indication of how worried he was. He usually asked me to open the
window right away, and stuck his face out like an overdeveloped
dog. But not today.

“I’ll leave half past five.” I told him.
“Call if you need a ride.”

I swallowed
the words on my mind. I didn’t need to tell him to call if there
were new orders for me.

The wolf gave
no sign of hearing me. I sighed while parking and stretched to open
the passenger door. Felipe jumped in the middle of the high bushes
by the road, and two seconds later I couldn’t see him anymore. I
closed the door and went to work.

The path
between the road and the farm was an old friend.
We’d been in the area for so long that the small animals
already avoided that spot. A pity. But I wasn’t going hunting
anytime soon, anyway, I was too worried and knew that there was a
lot of work ahead. When the scientists studying the anomaly in
those samples figured out what they had… We all would have more
problems than we could imagine.

Carefully, I
avoided all the traps – magical and mundane – that surrounded the
property, before running to the main house. In a couple of minutes
I could see the parked cars, and almost stopped when I recognized
the smells. What was the alpha of the cats doing there? And not
only him – it seemed that almost all the alphas were there, along
with a human servant of the Master of the vampires in the
city.
Even more worried, I approached the
door.

The door
opened just before I got there, and Dara came out.
The tall woman was a half-breed – her mother was
a werewolf, from the same clan she now leaded, but her father was a
demon. Without saying anything, she threw me a pair of gray
sweatpants and a simple shirt. I bit the clothes, being careful not
to make any holes on them, and went to one of the cars, using it to
hide my body while I changed. Five minutes later I went back, in
human form and dressed.

“
What’s going
on?” I asked, skipping the niceties.
Only
an emergency would have brought all the alphas together.

“
Inside.” Her
voice was cold, and her dark eyes seemed to shine
in different colors. “Ivan is already waiting
for you.”

Even more
worried, I nodded, going straight to the big meeting room.
With effort, I hid my surprise when I saw who
was there. I had expected the local alphas, and they were there,
but taking secondary positions standing by the walls. The alphas
from the Clans’ Council, the ones who had territorial authority,
were sitting at the big table. The vampires’ servant was there,
too, an older man who seemed harmless but could probably survive a
fight against any shapeshifter. And beside him was an unknown woman
with bright red hair. The hair was enough to tell me what she was,
but I made sure to catch her smell. A witch.

All the eyes turned to me, and I took a deep
breath, searching for my alpha. Ivan was standing by the table,
almost beside the wolf alpha from the Council.

“Got anything for me, Felipe?” He asked,
facing one of the men sitting on the table.

“Not much. I just wanted to make sure you
knew that the media already knows about the regeneration capacity,
and see if there are any new orders for me or for Camila.” I
answered, not sure about what to say or why Dara had told me to go
there. I had no place in a meeting like that.

“And your roommate?”

“
You know he
is fascinated by genetic therapy. He is following all the news and
by now is probably doing everything he can to get an internship in
one of the labs studying those samples. He was the one who told us
that it was already on the news.”

“
This means
they are really going ahead with that.
They’re not bluffing.” The witch said, sounding tired. “I
told you.”

Dara touched
my shoulder, poi
nting to one side of the
room. I nodded, going with her. I wouldn’t waste a chance to see
firsthand what was going to happen.

“For those who didn’t realize what is going
on, our existence is no longer a secret.” One of the Council alphas
spoke, looking around the room. “Most governmental agencies around
the world already know we are here, and now they want to use us.
Meetings like this are taking place in all the territories to
gather the local opinions, and then we will decide what will be
done.”

“
What do they
want?” The local rat alpha asked.

“Volunteers for their experiences and
tests.”

No one needed
more details. We could imagine exactly what the human government
interest was: our abilities, such as the shapeshifters’
regeneration capacity, the longevity of the witches and elves and
the near immortality of the sidhe and the vampires. And we also
knew what would happen to the “volunteers”. No one would
survive.

“
What are
our
options?” The vampires’ servant
asked.

“Disclose our existence to the public, in our
own terms.” A new voice spoke, startling everyone.

Claws and
fangs appeared around the table even before the person who had said
that crossed the door. Of medium height, with skin that had a
bluish tint, long dark hair in a braid and golden eyes that were
too apart for a human, he looked around the room, shaking his head
and smiling when he saw everyone was ready to attack. His eyes,
when they appeared, were as sharp as a vampire’s fangs.