Page 6 of Marked Omega

CHAPTER 3: LILY

My consciousness returns in waves.

The first thing I’m aware of is the ringing of steel on steel. Something being hammered. Behind that, farther away, are other sounds that I’m not able to place at first. Strange, almost musical sounds that I’ve only ever heard in audio recordings.

Birds. We’re outside.

My eyes fly open with a jolt of panic as my drugged brain finally starts to grasp the significance of that fact.

My bare back is scraping against something hard and rough, which I realize is the bark of a tree. My arms are raised over my head, and something is biting into the flesh of my wrists.

I roll my head back to look upward, and there in the dots of light poking through the leaves overhead, I see that I am shackled to a heavy iron chain. One of the troopers—I cannot tell which because his face is obscured by his helmet and breathing mask—is hammering a metal spike through the center of one of the links into the thick tree trunk, securing the chain in place.

Cool wind ghosts across my bare skin. Still weakened by the effects of the drug, my head lolls. I look down at my body and see that my protective suit has been removed, leaving me naked except for my underwear.

I glance to my left to find Sara. She has been stripped down to her underwear too, and her body is already hanging limply from a chain nailed to the tree. Her eyes are rolling beneath her closed lids. She’s just beginning to wake up too.

We are both exposed. We have no protection against the contamination of the zone.

A woman’s voice is screaming. It takes me a second before I realize it’s me.

“Shut that bitch up,” a distorted voice growls.

The man standing over me has finished his hammering. His broad, gloved hand backhands me across the jaw. Dull, white pain flashes behind my eyes.

“Careful,” a different voice calls. “We don’t want them unconscious you fool. They are supposed to be live bait, after all. The more screaming the better.”

I decide to keep quiet. I don’t want another blow like that one. Instead, I look around, taking stock of the situation.

We are in a large, mostly circular clearing like a shallow, grassy bowl rimmed with dense, dark forest. In the very center of the clearing is the single, massive tree that Sara and I are chained to.

Under other circumstances, I might find this place beautiful.

Beside me, Sara stirs as she finally begins to wake up. She blinks her eyes, her expression confused and dreamy. Then realization spreads across her features as she rattles the chains over her head and looks at the four dark-clad masked men standing in front of us.

Now it’s her turn to scream.

“Sara,” I hiss, “be quiet. Screaming will only attract Alphas.”

Her tear-filled eyes grow even wider at the mention of that awful word. But she stops screaming, for the time being at least.

“Oh it doesn’t matter too much,” one of the men says, stepping forward.

His voice is modulated by his visored helmet, emerging from the breathing grate with a curious sibilance. Still, I can guess from his slightly shorter stature that he is Dr. Lucian.

“As you well know,” he continues, “Alphas have a strong sense of smell. And soon, with a little luck, at least one of you will be deep in estrus.”

Estrus. Heat. And what did he say before about bait?

“Why are you doing this?” I demand. My cheeks are striped with tears, but I manage somehow to keep my voice level and firm.

The sound of Dr. Lucian’s chuckle filtering through his mask makes my skin crawl.

“Alphas are such elusive creatures,” he says strolling toward me nonchalantly. “After almost a hundred years, the quarantine zone should be crawling with them. The betas have all but died out, but the Alphas and omegas have continued to mate. Yet they manage to stay hidden somehow. We have penetrated as deep as our contamination resistant vehicles will allow, yet we’ve never managed to bring in a live Alpha. Oh we’ve had our share of run-ins, to be sure. But we’ve never managed to capture one.”

“Hurry up, Doctor,” one of the big men growls. It must be Bishop. “Time’s wasting, and I don’t want to get caught out here with my dick in my hand.”

“Patience, Commander. We need to make sure that the mutations have taken effect.”