Page 1 of Caging Fire
Chapter 1: Ryker
Acloud of dust stirred down the road, a few miles from the checkpoint. With my heightened vision, I could see it long before the two soldiers, who were lounging against the barricade, passing a cigarette between themselves and discussing plans once their shifts had ended. They mentioned something about going to a beta bar in the city.
I couldn’t remember the name of the stocky, blonde soldier who attempted to emasculate me by puffing out his chest and standing on his tiptoes every time we interacted. But Billy, the one to his left, was all right. For a beta, I guess. He was always in a good mood, despite how painfully boring these shifts were.
I briefly wondered how betas spent their entire military careers in menial positions without complaint. I preferred the action our unit saw at the Border Front, even if it was more dangerous.
Cade's announcement that Arca Command had stationed us in Falcon City for the foreseeable future, working checkpoint security, made me groan in frustration.
“Fucking checkpoint duty!? Really? That’s a job for betas! So.Fucking.Boring. There has to be something better. Someplace better!Anything,Cade!” I whined.
Pitching my voice a few octaves higher, mimicking a female, I continued teasing him.
"Did you talk to your daddy dearest? I know he gives his favorite alpha special treatment," I said, pouting my lip and batting my lashes at him, trying to bait him into a confrontation.
He never took the bait, though. Being Unit Captain and managing all four of our unique personalities required self-control, way more than I had.
Cade pressed his thumbs to his temples, rubbing in slow circles, a telltale sign he was about to scold me like a petulant child. He took a deep breath, grounding himself and exercising a level of patience only he seemed to possess. But I could tell he was completely over my shit.
“Killian almost died. He’s had four surgeries in the past month. He’s finally walking again. Our options were checkpoint duty, or we would have had to leave him here alone. I fought hard for those checkpoint rotations. And yes, it was a favor I had to call in with my father, which you know I don’t enjoy doing,” Cade said, scolding me.
He paused, eyes hardening at some stray thought before sighing and continuing.
“I’ll certainly pay for it in the future, which you also know, Ryker. Killian will be back to himself soon enough. Don’t be soeager to leave. Trust me, they won’t hesitate to ship us back out to the front lines the second they get the chance. Arca Command doesn’t leave valuable merchandise sitting in storage for long. But if you’re unhappy with my decision, you are welcome to challenge my authority as leader of our unit.”
There was no real threat in his offer to let me challenge him. We both knew who would win. I was no match for Cade. He still considered me a pup.
I rolled my eyes, but a sliver of guilt gnawed at me for all my teasing and complaints.
I saw Killian moments after it had happened. I arrived at his location just seconds before Cade. Blood-curdling howls and shrieks had led us both there, along with the trail of dead direworgs, winding like a pathway to his broken form. In the distance, all you could see was bright red. The blood was stained and stark against the white, snowy ground. A massive shape, so mangled and contorted that it was hard to make out a man, even one as fucking big as Killian.
Command had already dispatched a medical helicopter to his coordinates. Minutes passed as slowly as hours, and Killian lingered in a purgatory between life and death. I had never seen Cade so terrified.
Once they stabilized Killian, Arca transferred him to Falcon City’s Base, which had a medical facility better equipped to handle his specific injuries than the Border Front Base.
As far as being stationed in Falcon City, I knew Cade would never leave his brother, so we were all stuck here as long as Killian was recovering. They had been thick as thieves ever since Cade was three and their father had brought his little brother home for the first time.
Killian was Cade’s half-brother, conceived during their father’s sordid affair with a beta hooker who worked in Falcon City’s red-light district. Killian was massive and brutish, which was often the case in rare circumstances when alpha babies were born to beta mothers. General Green would’ve never brought the bastard son home if he hadn’t been born eighteen pounds of pure alpha.
Cade’s mother never forgave his father, and she hardened in a way that only scorned women do. She hated Killian and made that hatred known every chance she got, tormenting him throughout his entire childhood. Something about all that hate bubbled within her, turning toxic and then cancerous, ultimately poisoning and killing her from the inside out. About five years ago, our whole pack attended the funeral, without Killian.
I’m not sure I could embrace the reminder of my father’s infidelity the way Cade had with his, but I suppose with a cruel, self-medicated mother and an apathetic asshole for a father, Cade and Killian really only had each other. That changed over a decade ago when our unit of four formed.
My attention turned back to Billy as he took one more hit of the cigarette, then stabbed it out on the barricade, grinding it under his foot for good measure. They had finally noticed the cloud blooming on the road, growing closer and moving at a steady pace. I rolled my eyes as they fumbled with their guns, pulling them from over their shoulders to in front of their chests, trying to present themselves as authorities to whoever was making their way down the road.
A hilarious vision entered my mind as I pictured what fumbling messes these two would be if Arca transferred them to the Border Front. I could only imagine the look on their faces at the sight of their first direwog, or worse, a wraith.
Everything beyond the border was fucking deadly, and I never understood how factions of people survived on the otherside of the wall. New Arca, while not without its obvious flaws, was the only truly safe and prosperous society left. It had almost begun to resemble the old world.
“There you go, boys! Woah,woah!Watch where you point those. Jesus, make sure the safety is on so no one gets hurt!” I joked. Giving betas shit was almost as fun as giving Cade shit. Billy just laughed, but No-Name glared at me with dagger eyes. His anger made me giggle.
I popped a toothpick into my mouth, eager for the oral fixation. Watching them smoke after so recently quitting was chipping away at all my fucking resolve. I guess seeing Killian at death’s doorstep had given me the strength to part with one of my favorite vices.
As the car moved closer, I didn’t bother hopping off the spare barricade I’d been sitting on just past the checkpoint. These idiots were more than capable of handling whoever was approaching without their alpha supervisor.
My mind instead wandered to the brunette beta bunny who had so greedily sucked my dick in the bar’s bathroom stall at The Rusty Tap last night. Her face was a blur in my memory, so I focused instead on the wet gurgled sounds of choking that came from her throat as she tried desperately to please me. Beta women are so thirsty for alpha cock. I took pity on her, giving her a nice long drink to quench that thirst.
She swallowed every drop happily.
