Beyond the Were War Ch. 05

"Sweetheart sweetheart are you fast asleep? Good.
'Cause that's the only time that I can really speak to you.
And there is something that I've locked away
A memory that is too painful
To withstand the light of day."

Pink Floyd, "The Heroes Return"

Gila Pack House

New Mexico

Alpha Robert Hastings walked back into his office flanked by his Betas, having left orders for the mess in the challenge circle. He had directed them to wrap Gabe's body in a tarp and place it by the driveway to the house for now. Maria and Caleb were on their way to the outdoor shower to clean off the blood from their brief but satisfying fight. He had just enough time to strip, leaving shorts and a shirt tied to his leg, before shifting and letting out a war howl. "Reserve group with me, home defense warriors to your posts, all non-combatants to the safe room." It was nearly time for the attack and the plans were in place. The safe room in the basement would contain all the children, pregnant women and elderly who were not fighting. The wolves left to guard them were on each side of the heavy steel door, their mates inside. They would die before anyone got past them.

The reaction team warriors met their Alpha as he moved with speed and purpose towards the ambush site on the east side of the territory near the Highway 40 exit. Will, senior Beta of the group from the Johnson Pack, ran just behind him. His men and their gear were already in a truck on the way there. There was no mental chatter, the group was totally focused on the fight ahead.

"Alpha, contact, we have six vehicles in a column that just blew past the sentry post. Ed was able to take cover, he verified they were shooting silver and wolfsbane ammunition. He was shot once but it isn't bad, it went through his right arm. We've got an armored HUMVEE in the lead, followed by four black armored SUV's and a military ambulance. We can't spot occupants, but estimate the attack force at between twenty and forty. Lead vehicle was using automatic carbines and machine pistols. They are traveling down the entrance road at high speed, five minutes to the ambush point."

"Understood, everyone keep your heads down. Wendy, you respond to help Ed, Doc you stay back near the ambush point. Places, everyone, check in with your Betas when in position. Betas, report to me when your groups are ready." The pack members were settling in, the plan was good, they were ready for this.

His lead beta Daniel and the Beta in charge of defending this approach, Alex, were already in the command post they had set up when the group arrived. Alex moved off with the reinforcements, directing them to positions on the cliff before and after the ambush point. The chosen position for the ambush was perfect; as the road went through the canyon the river below curved about 70 degrees below them. The road was about fifty feet above the river, with rockslides and large boulders below. On the uphill side the road was cut close to the overhanging cliffs, with just a narrow ditch to catch the rocks that would travel down from up to a hundred feet above. The road was just wide enough for two vehicles to pass each other, and there was no safe place to pull off. Along the top of the cliff were numerous large boulders and cracks that were perfect hiding holes for the dozens of wolves and their weapons.

Yes, weapons. The Gila Pack hadn't gotten into open combat during the Were War, preferring to stay hidden, but they had been ready. They had prepared for human attack for decades and they trained relentlessly in the open desert. Marksmanship training had been mandatory for all pack members, as was self defense. The defenders were more than capable of defending themselves.

The opposite side of the canyon, about 200 yards away, was similar in nature and was now populated by a dozen wolves with scoped high power rifles. The Johnson Pack snipers with the .50 cal rifles were on top of the canyon, with commanding views and overlapping fields of fire. Their job would be to defeat the armored vehicles, and to do so they had rounds with armor piercing tungsten tips.

"Alpha, two minutes out." They could hear the column of vehicles approaching. Alex had returned to the post. He had designed the defense and he would run it. "All stations, remain hidden until after the explosion and make sure you are taking cover if you are near the blast zone." Alex looked at his Alpha and senior Betas. "We did some timing with our test blasts, that rock with the red 'x' on it is the trigger point. When the lead vehicle reaches that, we unleash hell on them." They were about 400 yards away, watching with compact binoculars, when the column came into view. "Wait... Wait... five... four... three... two... one...GO GO GO."

A series of loud explosions was the first indication the mercenaries had that their lives would end. A series of holes had been drilled through the rock of the cliff above the road, with explosive charges lowered into each and connected with detonating cord to a blasting cap. Alex had an explosives expert on the hand trigger, when he twisted the device it started a chain reaction explosion that sheared a sixty foot section of cliff face from the rock behind it. The wall of rock crashed down the mountain, burying the armored HUMVEE and two Suburbans below the bouncing rock chunks.

The remaining vehicles escaped being crushed but had their own problems. The third SUV swerved to avoid the rocks, but went off the road. It bounced and rolled a half dozen times before coming to rest on the rocks near the river. "Team 1, cover the SUV by the river and keep them pinned down." Riflemen from both sides of the river started to pepper the armored vehicle with fire, seeking out the openings created by popped out glass and twisted metal.

The last SUV swerved towards the cliff face, stopping just before it hit it. A half dozen mercenaries spilled out, seeking cover between the vehicle and the cliff face. The ambulance stopped but was soon disabled by the .50 caliber rifles, it wasn't as hard a target as the other vehicles. The heavy rounds punched into the engine block as other riflemen took out the wheels and windows. Half the people inside were dead before they could get a door open. Three men armed with rifles dove to the ground and ran for the SUV ahead of them, but only one made it.

It truly was a turkey shoot. The Pack held superior firing positions, including directly above the vehicles once the defenders rushed forward to the new overhang left by the explosives. There was no place for them to hide. The volume of fire lessened over the next few minutes as there was simply nothing left moving to shoot at. The forward vehicles had been flattened, no movement had been sensed from them yet. The SUV by the river had started to return fire but the accurate rifle fire had quickly stopped that. The remaining vehicles on the road were turned into Swiss cheese.

Finally, the shooting stopped. Alpha Hastings surveyed the destruction. "Stay in position until I tell you. Anything that moves, kill it."

For a long minute nothing moved. A white shirt appeared from below the SUV on the road, a bloodied arm waving it. The man made it halfway out from under the truck. "Sniper, take him." A shot rang out and the man dropped to the ground and stopped moving.

Will looked at the Alpha with surprise on his face. "No prisoners? You didn't honor a white flag?"

Robert sneered. "These fuckers were going to attack women and children in order to retrieve a drug lord's fuck toy. Imagine how many casualties we would have taken if they made it to the Pack house, if we hadn't found out they were coming. They have no honor. They get no mercy."

Just then a sentry at the northeast corner of the territory called in. "Alpha, inbound helicopter, it's running fast and low. I can see men in the open doors, they have machine guns hanging from cables."

Robert stood up and blasted over the pack bonds. "OK everyone there is a hostile helicopter inbound. Everyone take cover immediately, shift if you need to, and hide your weapons." Looking over at Will he said, "Do you think your men can take it down?"

"Yes, it wouldn't be the first time for them." He shifted focus to the Johnson Pack bond and contacted his team. "OK, I need the .50's hidden and ready to go. You two coordinate the first shot, everyone else open up when they do." Turning back to Robert, he smiled. "Our guys will be ready. Tell yours to stay hidden until it's over." Robert passed that along.

It took a few minutes until they all heard the sound of the helicopter coming in along the river. The command post had been well camouflaged, with netting and canvas covered with native plants from the area. The helicopter was only a bit higher than the surrounding canyon as it bore down on the attack vehicles.

He could see the confusion on the part of the pilot through his binoculars as the helicopter made its first pass, their hiding was successful as the gunners found no targets. The helicopter banked to turn over the river and slowed down to make a closer path. The helicopter went into a hover just above the river, and ropes were tossed out the side to the ground below.

Will was listening over his bond and passing it along to Robert. "Ready for coordinated fire, three two one..." The sound of the big 50 caliber rifles never made it to the pilot, the supersonic rounds arrived first. One sniper put his round through the canopy and blew the pilot's head out the other side. The second sniper put his armor piercing round through the gearbox of the helicopter, just below the blades. The gearbox ate itself in an explosion of oil and parts. The helicopter started to spin, making a half turn before slamming to the ground below. All snipers on both sides of the canyon then opened up on the helicopter, which exploded leaving no survivors.

Robert turned to talk over his Pack bond. "All Betas, report in with status and casualties." Each group leader checked in, no one had any significant injuries, just a few cuts and scrapes that would be healed before they could get back to the house. It was a complete victory. "Teams B and C, approach and clear the vehicles." A dozen armed wolves carefully moved forward, leapfrogging each other as they used cover to approach the ambush site. It took ten minutes to verify there were no survivors.

"Great job everyone, you defended your Pack with skill and courage. Collect the weapons, ammunition and anything of intelligence valve. Stack the bodies by the side of the road and start working on clearing a path through this mess so we can use it again."

"Yes, Alpha, we will bring in the heavy equipment and we will have this open within an hour." Alex was still keyed up, this was the first engagement he had been in command of and he was so proud of his Pack and his defense plan.

"Alex, you did a great job today. You did me proud." Will basked in the approval of his Alpha before asking to be excused to supervise the cleanup.

Gila Pack House

New Mexico

Robert and his senior Betas had returned a few minutes ago to the cheers and hugs of Pack members gathered in front of the steps. Mates embraced each other, the men getting checked for injuries discreetly while they kissed. The Alpha didn't have that, his mate was up in Montana, safely under the protection of the Johnson Pack alphas. Robert and his senior Betas made their way to his office. "Keep quiet, I need to make a phone call." Pulling out the business card he had been given, he dialed the number for the Albequerque DEA office.

"Agent in Charge Michael Miller speaking."

"Mr. Miller, this is Robert Hastings. I need you to come see me immediately at my Pack house, and I need you to do this without alerting the rest of your staff."

There was a pause. "What do you need to see me about?"

"I can't discuss it over the phone, but it is very important you see this. You can't discuss this either, your Deputy Agent in Charge, Kim Corrigan, is a Cartel double agent. I'm not sure of who else in the office may be compromised."

"How do you know that?"

"I can't talk about that over the phone either, but my information is very reliable. I will see what evidence I can get you, but for now this needs to happen without anyone else knowing."

There was dead silence for a time as he was on hold. "OK, I told my people a personal issue came up and I have to leave the office for the day."

"That's fine." Robert gave him the address of the Pack house for his GPS. "I will have an escort for you when you turn off the interstate."

"OK, I have to grab lunch on the way out of town and it will take me about 90 minutes to get there. I'll have lots of questions for you, Alpha Hastings, and I'll expect proof."

"You'll get it. See you soon." Agent Miller hung up, gathered his briefcase and headed out the door to his office. He didn't notice that his Deputy Agent in Charge had taken a headphone out of her ear and was texting someone on her cellphone after he walked by. No one questioned her when she went into his office and removed the device from the bottom of his phone.

Meanwhile, Robert made a second call on his satellite phone. "Renee? We're all right. No casualties."

Cartel Safe House

Near Albequerque

Juan was nervously pacing the basement as he waited for news. Gabe had not been heard from since he arrived at Pack territory; he had discreetly sent a man past the entrance and his vehicle was still there. That wasn't surprising, he didn't expect the werewolves to react positively to a demand to turn over his Maria. What made him nervous was the silence from the attack team. They had checked in just after entering but had not been heard from since. Radio and cellphone communications were silent, and they should have reported back an hour ago.

"Have you tried contacting them?"

"Of course, boss, but I get nothing. It's like they disappeared into thin air. We have to assume they are dead." Carlos was nervous, Juan didn't react well to failure and it looked like all the money he put into retrieving Maria had been lost. "I think we underestimated what they would be willing to do to protect her. They are risking an all-out war here."

"Risking?" He kicked the door in anger. "Fuck these guys, they just GOT themselves an all-out war. I want them DEAD. I want their families DEAD. I want them to be the example we need to get the other Packs in line."

Carlos sighed, he was more of a thoughtful tactician in these things, and going to war was not going to go well. "I know you're pissed, but we have to step back a little here. This isn't the Mexican government we're dealing with here. These wolves just survived five plus years fighting the American military on their own. You can't buy them, their pack bonds are stronger as are their family bonds, and I won't even go into what they will do for their mates. Even though the Gila Pack is isolated, they are related by mating to many of the other packs. We go in half-cocked and we could end up with every werewolf in the country after us."

"So you just want to let them keep my Maria? Just forget about the men we just lost? They killed a senior member of my Cartel!"

"I didn't say that, Juan, I just said we have to be more careful about how we do this. We need to find out how they found out about our attack and squash that leak HARD. Until we know, we can't really move against them. Then we need some real intelligence on the Pack and their members. We take some time, find their weaknesses, then exploit them. Now, would you be satisfied if they give Maria back or are you intent on wiping them out?"

Juan flopped down into the chair, pinching the bridge of his nose with his fingers as he thought about it. "OK, so the mercenaries we lost are not a big deal, they weren't our guys anyway so we're only out the cash. Gabe was not a huge loss, but we can't allow them to get away with it either. What we need is leverage, a way to get them to turn her over and pay me enough to make up for my losses. We need to grab something they will pay a lot of money for."

"Well, Alpha Hastings is newly mated. His mate is pregnant with twins, and she's rich- she got millions in restitution. If we had her, the Alpha would pay anything to get her back- even if it meant turning over a member of his Pack to us. We'll give him no choice in the matter."

Juan smiled. "You're right." He got up and walked over to the computer system that Carlos was using. "Call our contact at the NSA. See if anyone has been doing queries related to our Cartel or the Gila pack. Also, have our men dig into the phone and internet communications to and among the men on that raid. Find that mole." Carlos nodded. "And find out where Renee Hastings is."

Gila Pack House

Alpha Hasting's Conference Room

The Betas gathered around the table, most with their mates, and that included Maria who nervously sat behind Caleb away from the others. She needed a lot of persuasion to go into that room, and that was one reason Robert asked the mates to come too. He smiled as they all got comfortable, some of the women were still in their mate's laps, others holding hands. "Today was a good day for the Pack. We defended ourselves from a sneak attack, and we did so without casualties." The gathered wolves clapped and congratulated each other, especially those involved in planning the defense. "It would be fitting to celebrate, but it isn't the time now. What was it Admiral Yamamoto said after Pearl Harbor? 'I fear we have woken a sleeping giant, and filled him with a terrible resolve.' The Socorro cartel is going to focus all their resources on us, on destroying us, and they won't give up on getting Maria back. We need to talk about how we are going to deal with that."

"Well, how about we attack them?" Beta Alex stood and addressed the room. "They've attacked us first, I say we go after them right now. We get their safe houses, we call allied packs, and we just take them out before they have a chance to plan the next attack." A number of Betas agreed, their wolves didn't like threats to their Pack and preferred direct action.

Will stood. "Are you forgetting that they are human, living among humans?" He looked around. "The only reason this worked for us is because we were defending ourselves on Pack lands. If we go out there and start fighting, innocent humans are going to get hurt. We'll be in violation of the treaties that ended this war, and public opinion will turn against us. We can't give the Government another reason to go after us." Heads started to lower as his words sunk in. "We don't even know if we can find them. These guys are rich and paranoid, if we start attacking and don't take them all out we've lost. No, you are better off staying on your own land. You have contacts with the military, with the DEA, with the FBI. Use them to take out the Cartel, and use wolves to protect wolves."

Robert stood up and all the conversation stilled. "I agree with Will that we can't attack now, we simply don't know enough. I also agree that we have to focus on protecting our territory. Alex, I need you and two others to focus on that. When we are done here, I will be meeting with the head of the DEA office, and I'll get him up to speed on the threat and see what he can do to help. Joe, I need you to set up a conference call with all the Alphas in the country late this afternoon. Whatever we decide to do will affect all of us, so I need to get them up to speed on what is happening." Heads nodded around the room. "Meanwhile, this Pack is on lockdown. No one travels outside Pack lands without my permission, and in groups of at least three. The safe room is to be kept ready to go at all time, and I expect at least two dozen warriors to remain within sight of the Pack house at all times. If your family is not here, either get them here now or have them seek safety with an allied Pack and follow the same rules. Make no mistake, our entire Pack is a target. These bastards don't respect anything, they will kill your children in front of you and not think twice about it. Keep that in mind as we plan our defenses."