Guardians #1: Retrieval

Chapter 1

A Bad Dream Wannabe Just Got Worse

You know those dreams where you're running, running, running, as fast as you can but don't seem to be going very fast and your enemies are gaining on you? Then you fall off a cliff or into a hidden pit and wake up feeling you crashed flat on your back in your bed? Now imagine that in reality and if you fall you'd land in an ocean filled with sharp rocks sticking out of the surface. Got that? Now you're racing for you life with your family to protect as well as yourself and if you get caught you'll probably get tortured to death or something. And if you happen, by some unlucky chance, to fall into the ocean or get caught and killed, chances are you'll never wake up. So you're probably thinking this is fiction. A fake story from the depths or someone's wild imagination, meant to entertain you. Think again, buddy. It may be "just a story" for you, but not for me. If you decide to keep reading this, welcome to my wonderful, glorious, life. If you decide that this "story" is going to be boring and you put this book down, you'll either have made the smartest or worst decision of you life.

We were all sprinting for our lives, me (Andromeda), Teddy, Chase and Ruby. The menacing growl of their dog-mutation things reverberated through the forest. The mutant-dogs were Rottweiler-cross-wolf-cross-somethings to create a creature with the general body shape of a Rottweiler; the fur of a wolf that was always matted with mud, blood, and who knows what else; and the strength, ferocity, cunning, speed, and agility of both combined. The forest became denser as we crashed noisily through the undergrowth; moving quietly didn't matter anymore, they were already hot on our trail. The barking and growling was growing closer and louder by the second. Teddy, Chase, Ruby, and I ran faster, the trees were thinning – a bad sign.

My lungs were burning with the exertion of running so fast for so long. Our paced slowed as we all became tired. They were almost on us now. Soon the forest thinned into a stretch of long grass… then a drop-off to our deaths. "Guys! Get down in the grass!" I yelled. We all fell forward and hid ourselves the best we could in the golden-yellow tides of grass. Camouflage didn't do us much good, Ruby was wearing bright pink, Chase has on green (not grass-green), Teddy, black, and I was wearing light sky blue. The mutation dogs were sniffing around the field and we stayed perfectly still. But despite my high hopes, I knew we were in trouble when a huge black shadow loomed over us and thundering barks echoed, magnified a thousand times over, against the cliffs. Flickers of human shadow joined the mutts' silhouettes, then the barking ceased. The scientists. Only they could controls the dogs.

Now before the action starts, you need to know a few things. First, we are the Guardians. Me, Andromeda; Teddy; Chase; and Ruby. We can all shape-shift into an animal and have a partial form, which is like a half human-half animal form. I can change into a peregrine falcon, Teddy a russety-brown wolf, Chase a snow leopard, and Ruby a long-eared jerboa. You may be thinking how do a wolf, a mouse-like creature, a bird of prey, and a wild cat cooperate together? The answer is, in our animal forms, we can sense each others' presences and we keep our human minds, so if we're in, say, a pack of brown wolves, we'll sense, oh, that one's Teddy. And Teddy will sense Ruby the jerboa and think, we're not going to hurt that. That's my adopted sister.

Then there are the scientists. They made us by combining animal DNA with ours to see what would happen. We had a wild thought that magic was involved somehow, too, because how else could you shape-shift as though you were born with the ability? So once upon a time, a long time ago, we escaped from the scientists and the lab where we had been living since we were born. We've been on the run since then, until now.

"Rise, and be still," ordered a voice. A horribly, terribly, familiar voice. I stood, and around me I heard the grass rustle as the rest of the guardians stood up. My eyes quickly scanned the mass of scientists and the several men dresses in black that were the mutts' wranglers. Then, from the center of the white-coated people stepped a man with long light brown hair pulled back in a ponytail and warm hazel eyes.

"Ryan," I gasped. Ryan was our creator, the one who was in charge of the combining of our DNA with the animals'.

"Yes. Andromeda, Teddy, Chase, Ruby. Nice to see you are coping well, though you were created to survive," said Ryan with a smile that we didn't return

One of the only females in the group, one with short curly blond hair and waaaaaaay too much makeup, giggled shrilly. She stifled the idiotic sound at a glare from Ryan. The air crackled with tension and it was heavy with it. I paced forwards towards Ryan. "We trusted you," I choked. "We trusted you. And you betrayed us." My voice was rising and cracking. "You—you're—YOU'RE NOTHING BUT A TRAITOR!" I screamed.

Ryan stepped forward to meet me, his hands held out in a gesture of peace and forgiving. Yeah, right. "Andromeda, listen, you don't understand."

Teddy put his arm around my shoulders, but I shook him off. This was not his battle to fight.

I stood stiff and tense with my fists clenched and trembling. "You. Are. A. Traitor." I hissed, low and deadly.

With a feral snarl I drew back my hand, preparing to slap Ryan senseless. "Wait, Andromeda, I can explain. Please, just give me a chance." Ryan sounded a little scared and desperate. He knew how hard I could slap when I wanted to.

"Shut up," I growled. "The less you talk, the less this will hurt… if I feel like it."

Ryan truly did look scared now. He, and pretty much everybody else watching, had seen or experienced my rage. I was dangerous when I got mad. I lunged forward, but Teddy locked his arms around my middle, holding me back. I twisted, writhed, and squirmed with all my might, breaking his iron grip. Screeching, I leaped into the sky, switching into my demi form. Huge peregrine falcon wings sprouted from my back. 9 feet long each, blue on top cream speckled with brown on the bottom, and wickedly strong. I worked my wings hard, and as I did so my nose and mouth elongated into a cruel, sharp beak. I glided high over the trees and everybody standing on the ground shrank to teeny little black specks. I circled once, then, with a war cry, dove with the speed of a peregrine falcon. As the ground sped closer, I positioned myself right over my target, and then changed into a full human. For a second I plummeted straight down through the air before slamming feet-first as hard as I could into Ryan's chest. As my feet impacted with his chest, I thought I heard something crack. Ooh, good! Maybe I broke some ribs!

Ryan was knocked back flat on the ground, completely winded, with me on all fours on his chest. I grinned evilly at Ryan (I must have looked either pretty scary or like a raving mad lunatic because he quivered) before drawing back one hand and slapping him as hard as I could across the face. I jumped off Ryan (now unconscious) and said to the stunned and watching scientists, "Job done, you can take us to the lab now.

A second's stunned silence, then a male scientist stepped around Ryan's body and addressed us. "If you stay still, this won't be a problem. We're just going to knock you out until we get to the lab."

Four cronies aimed stun guns at us and fired. The last thing I remembered was the schk, schk, schk, schk of a helicopter.

When my eyes fluttered open, I was in a hospital-like room. My ankles and wrists were bound to the sides of the shiny metal bed by thick steel bands. My head was held in place by two steel dividers, as was my middle, but I could still sense the others stirring around me. The door banged open and a bald guy with a fuzz of a beard stormed in. "I thought I told you I wanted them unhurt!" he growled.

Ryan cowered behind Fuzzbeard. He had an angry red wheel where I had slapped him and he walked with a limp. Jeesh, were my knees really that hard? Fuzzbeard whirled around and Ryan flinched. "I said, I wanted them unhurt! WHY ARE THEY HURT! TELL ME! YOU WERE IN CHARGE OF THEIR RETRIEVAL!"

Ryan croaked, "They wouldn't come… quietly? See, we had… to use the… stun… gun?" he ended on a squeak.

"We did to come quietly!" My voice rasped from lack of use, but I still managed to inject venom into my words. "After I finished some business with him"—I jerked my head the best I could at Ryan – "I actually said, 'OK you take us back to the lab now' to the other scientists."

"Zee girl speeks zee truth, sir," said a scientist who had just entered. I recognized him as one of the stun gun guys.

"So you did use the guns?" roared Fuzzbeard.

"Y—yes we did sir," squeaked Stun Gun Guy.

"RRARGHH!" with a feral snarl, Fuzzbeard threw Stun Gun Guy. He crashed through the swinging doors that led into our holding room and flew across the hallway (several other scientists had to jump hastily out of the way to avoid him) and slammed into the opposite wall with a sickening, crunching thud. He lay slumped on the floor, unmoving, with blood flowing from his head.

Fuzzbeard strode across the room and drew back the blinds. Sunlight streamed in giving a false cozy impression to the room. He stood at the window for a moment, then turned around. "Andromeda," he said. "I am doctor Richard Jacobs, second-in-command of Smith Laboratories."

"Good to know," I said sarcastically, "I don't really give a crap to who you are. But as for your name… I liked your old one better."

"Old name?" inquired Dr. Jacobs. Ahh, sometimes scientists can be soooo stupid.

"Fuzzbeard." And because he was looking mad I added, "Well, duh."

Fuzzbeard quickly bypassed red and turned blue, which then changed to purple. "You…" He looked like he was going to explode at any second.

"So," I said cheekily, "It describes you and that poufy little beard of yours, doesn't it?"

Fuzzbeard began hopping up and down in rage, looking like some sort of messed-up mutant chicken trying to dance. A group of scientists passed the door and stared in a Fuzzbeard, gawking like idiots. (Which, by the way, they were) Fuzzbeard saw them and quickly regained his composure. Like nothing had happened he continued, "Well. Edward Smith, he's the head of these labs, had a mission for you. He will explain it in a few minutes." He said.

Eight scientists walked in and rolled our beds (which were apparently on wheels) away, two scientists for each of us. We were carted off down the hall past Stun Gun Guy's unmoving body (the scientists pushing us gave him a wide berth) and into a room with a flat screen TV glowing on one wall. We were wheeled into a line facing the screen; I was next to Teddy.

The television flickered to a silvery-gray colored and blinked the message, "Airing live to Smith Laboratories HQ in 3… 2… 1"

A man's face appeared on the screen. He had graying black hair and fierce brown eyes, and looked Asian. His hair was awry and tangled. Despite his gruff appearance, his face was care-worn and wrinkled with smile lines. "Hello, Andromeda," he said pleasantly, "And Teddy and Chase and Ruby too!"

None of us said anything so he continued, "I am Arnold Smith, head of Smith Laboratories. Normally I would speak to you in person, but due to the circumstances, I cannot

"You were created for a reason, not just as an experiment. Actually, I had nothing to do with your creation; it was a test done behind my back. I knew I had a spy here for Omega—"

"Who's Omega?" blurted out Chase.

"Omega is evil scientist, and not the sci-fi type," explained Mr. Smith. "So, like I said, I was aware that he had posted a spy in here, to find out what we're doing and gather secrets. I got someone to steal his laptop which contained everything Omega is planning. When Omega found out his spy's laptop had been taken, he was mad. The spy was executed, or tortured. I did not intend for that to happen, but on the laptop there was some very useful and secret information on a plan Omega calls the Mother Plan, which is the foundation for all his experiments. At the time, Smith laboratories was just another group of scientists trying to find cures for cancer and such, but my trusted friend knew that we must do something to stop the Mother Plan from activation, or we'd all be blown to bits and floating around in outer space. So he started the experiment to create you secretly, without my knowing. The experiment got too big for him and a couple of his friends to handle, so he told me. I must admit at first I was disappointed that he had not told me in the first place, until he told me his intensions. He was right, so I helped get him proper funding and material.

"When finally the experiment was completed, we had found the flaw in the plan; we had sensed it even before we discovered it, but then we could not name it. The flaw, the problem was – is – you."

The final word dropped like a rock in the stunned silence that followed. "How are we mistakes? Flaw? Problems, whatever?" I demanded.

"The original intention was to make some sort of super-animals that were as intelligent as humans, but still had their survival instinct. But you were what came out of it. In a way you four are miracles, works of art. Being able to transform into animals at will and having their survival instinct is amazing. You were more than we hoped for.

"Remember how I said that there was a spy for Omega in here? Well, it was a double-edged blade because we also had spies in Omega's labs. They told us that Omega had temporarily suspended the activation of the Mother Plan. Again, another nice surprise, something we hadn't anticipated. That gave us time to train you properly for infiltrating the labs. Recall all the 'torture' you went through when you were living here. That wasn't 'torture' for the fun of it, it was meant to train you for the real world, what it might be like trying to break into a top-secret, heavily guarded laboratory."

Well, gee whiz, that explains a lot, I thought sourly, why couldn't they have told us this before we ran away?

"Anyway, since you ran away, we've been monitoring you to see how well you cope on your won. Apparently you've been doing nicely."

"Get to the point already!" I snapped. "We haven't got all day `cuz according to you, the world only has so long to live before we're all just a grease spot floating in outer space!"

"Well, like I said, you were created to stop Omega's Mother Plan as super-animals. You are obviously not super-animals…"

Ouch. That hurt my feelings. What are we? Mutants? Yeah, we are.

"… but that doesn't mean you can't save the world."

What?

"Dr. Jacobs will fill you in and give you supplies for your mission."

"Do we have a choice as to whether we go on this 'mission' of not?"

Dr. Smith shook his head slowly, smiled, and then the screen turned to static.

Well, crap.