Page 109 of Tracked and Taken

I break the first cabinet with my fist.

Nothing useful. Lab consumables. Glassware. Reagent bottles I do not recognize.

Second cabinet. Same. I put my claws through the lock because opening it properly would take seconds I do not have.

Specimen samples. A row of vials in cold storage. I scan the labels — none of them say counteragent. None of them say exposure protocol.

JINX, urgent: “Tael. Far wall. Right corner. Cabinet labelled in red.”

I cross. I see it. PERSONNEL SAFETY PROTOCOL. COMPOUND EXPOSURE.

I break the lock. The metal screams.

Three vials. One auto-injector.

I pick up the vial whose label reads SB-COUNTER-7 // INDUCTION COMPOUND // PRE-BOND PROTOCOL.

JINX, fast: “Tael. The label fragment ‘SB-COUNTER-7’ matches a partial entry in the BioSystems compound database I pulled from V-6. The entry indicates broad-spectrum efficacy across at least three Draelith-equivalent species. I cannot confirm efficacy on humans. I have no calibration data for this formulation in human physiology. I cannot tell you it will work. I cannot tell you it will not hurt her.”

“Copy.”

My hand on the vial. My biology is going where the compound is taking it. The lab is not far enough from the chamber for the air to be clean. Every breath is a fight not to put her on the floor and finish what he started with my mouth.

I am gambling.

I am gambling on a vial whose label JINX cannot fully read against the chemistry that is working on my mate.

The alternative is I mark her in a room that still smells like him.

I load the auto-injector.

“Natalie. I am going to inject you. JINX cannot confirm this works in humans. I am out of options. Tell me yes.”

She looks at me.

Her eyes are glazed, but they find mine. The set of her jaw — somewhere under the compound she is herself enough to give me a yes.

“Yes.”

The auto-injector goes into the artery in her neck. Three seconds. The vial empties. I pull it out.

I hold her.

I keep my teeth off her. It is the hardest thing I have done in five days. Harder than the door. Harder than not killing him myself.

The first minute, the counteragent does not, by anything I can read, do anything.

She is still saturated. Her skin still flushed. Her pupils still at full dilation. Her breath still shallow.

Her hand comes up to the front of my tactical kit.

“Tael.”

“I’m here.”

“Tael — the compound — I—“

I shake my head against her hair. I cannot say it.