Night of the Alphas

Chapter 40

"95754!" Akiran yelled as he came over to the closet. "How are you alive?"

I felt myself start to freeze up, but I stood up and resisted the freeze. "Call me by my name."

"Excuse me?" Akiran squared me up. "Do I sense aggression, 95754?"

I stumbled and had to grab onto the closet door for support. Don't freeze, you'll die if you freeze. "Call me by my name, Akiran Machado!" I summoned all my strength and stood up straight again. "My name is Zane Fernard, address me as such!"

As soon as I said my name, Akiran started to look dizzy.

"That's right!" I squared him up. "Zane Fernard! Just like my late father, Logan! Who you knew!"

"What is going on?!" Adrian stood and tugged on my jacket sleeve. "Who are these people?"

"Oh, how rude of me," Summer took on a honeyed, sweet tone. "My name is Summer. And this is Sir Akiran Machado, leader of AFM-"

"And the killer of my parents!"

"What?!" Adrian blocked a blow that Summer threw at her.

I threw myself at Akiran, claws out, vision crisp. He seemed dizzy and disorientated, and I used this to my advantage. I had him pinned to the floor, my claws around his throat. "So, is it true?!" The voice that came out of my mouth wasn't mine. It belonged to a deep, dark part of me that craved death and violence. The voice that existed in every Alpha alive. Some said it was purely an instinctual thing that we couldn't control. Some said that it was the voice of Satan himself. Whatever it was, it was emerging in me for the first time in my life.

"So what if it is?!" He came back to his senses and threw me against a wall. It cracked as soon as I hit it, and I wondered, absentmindedly, if this would cause the house to crumble. Akiran crept up from the ground, his eyes blackened, and his jagged fingernails growing out longer and sharper than my own. "It was a small price to pay for the justice of Alphas everywhere."

"That's bullcrap and you know it!" Adrian yelled from across the room. Her eyes weren't black, but I assumed that it was because she was too scared for it to happen. Some Alphas could go into their enraged state as a fear response, but most couldn't. Usually, as it was with Adrian, it came as an anger response. "What justice?! Does that wall around the city look like justice to you?!" Summer lunged at her and pinned her to the wall.

"Adrian!" I tried to make my way towards her, but Akiran grabbed my leg and pulled me back. His claws tore open the fabric on my pants, and left deep cuts on my calves. I kicked him in the face. "She's right!" I exclaimed as I tried to claw my way to where Summer was beating Adrian nearly senseless. "You're not fighting for the rights of Alphas! You're fighting for power and privilege!"

Summer stopped beating Adrian. I saw her bruised, bloodied face and a pit opened in my stomach. She's dead! I dragged Adrian off to her death! Tears welled up in my eyes as I let out a wail of despair.

But I should have known Adrian better.

Her eyes sprung open, her irises glowing against the blackness of her sclera. She growled, and Summer's crooked grin faded as she realized that she had just messed with someone more powerful than she was. Adrian grabbed her neck and picked her up. Summer kicked and grabbed at her throat, but she couldn't pry her hands off.

"Aren't you gonna help her?" I asked Akiran. "She's your second-in-command."

"I can replace her easily." He dragged me closer to him and flipped me over on my back, where I was vulnerable.

Replace her easily! I reached up and cut his stomach. "How could you say that?! You murderous, conniving-"

I heard a crash behind me. Akiran and I both looked up from our fight to see Adrian standing over a hole in the floor. Summer was nowhere to be seen. Suddenly, I heard a loud moan from the floor below us.