Missing

by bet it aint me

Picks up after Four Points In The Dark. Paul has been missing for 2 years. His absence has had a profound impact on the pack. Isaac especially who has become bedridden with overwhelming grief. Without closure the pack is beginning to come apart at the seams. Peter, the one with Paul when he was taken blames himself and has searched tirelessly. Finally, a clue, a scent.

6. Chapter 6

8 Months 2 days

Paul screams as the electricity flows through his body. Eventually no longer able to sustain consciousness his body goes limp. "Fuck." One of the technicians says flipping the power off. "I told you it was set too high." A female says angrily shoving past him to check the readouts on a display. "I've seen them use this setting on him multiple times before it's never caused a blackout." The man says angrily. "Did you forget about the new blocker?" She asks loudly. "New blocker?" He asks stopping and looking at his colleague. "They found a way to make the serum more potent. It costs a fraction of what it used to keeping him dosed. One big side effect is.." "He's weaker now." The man says finishing her sentence.. "No I didn't know. Sometimes I'm not sure what our focus is. Results or saving money." The woman scoffs and walks to the cage. "Robert and Austin were given a blank check and got nowhere. Knight has Dr. Allen keeping a far tighter hand on funding now. After the break through last month they are going to want to continue to see results." The man exhales heavily. "I don't know if I would call that blip we picked up for 1/100th of a second before the array burnt out a break through. It could have been a false signal generated by the impending failure of the array." "Do you want to tell Dr. Allen that?" The man visibly pales and he looks down busying himself with the console in front of him. "No of course not." He says. Her face wrinkles in disgust. "It'll be hours before we can continue now." She says walking towards the door. "He shit himself again, since you're responsible you clean him up. Don't forget to disconnect the leads this time. If you short out the heart monitor again I'm not covering for you."

Peter and Isaac are walking out the front door when Deaton pulls up. He exits his car and approaches the two carrying a tablet.. "Gentlemen, I have word on our friend Milton." "Where is he?" Isaac growls out fighting to control the shift. Peter puts his hand on the younger wolf's shoulder and gestures for Deaton to come in the house. Isaac drops the back pack he'd been carrying and follows them inside. In the study Deaton places his tablet on the desk and pulls up the information. "He is possibly staying in Texas." "Why possibly?" Isaac asks. "As you both know he is incredibly adept at covering his tracks. Simply looking for him is dangerous because he can easily be alerted by people asking around about him. We have found one of the aliases he is known to use checked in to room 714 at the DoubleTree in Midland Texas.

"You'd think with as little they feed you there wouldn't be much waste." The man says distastefully approaching the cage where Paul remains motionless. He crouches down disconnecting various cables from the cage. When he reaches for one near Paul's hand Paul reaches out lightning fast and grabs the man's hand pulling him off balance. Paul gets to his knees and grabs the man's head and slams it against the floor several times. Pulling the lifeless body closer Paul frantically searches his pockets eventually finding a ring of keys. In moments he is out of the cage. Grabbing the hose used to clean him and the cage Paul very quickly washes as much of the weeks of grime and filth off himself as he can before stripping the man. He is reaching for the door to the hallway when it opens and the woman from before walks in. Her eyes go wide with shock when she sees Paul but is unable to do anything as he grabs her and pulls her in the lab. She struggles trying to cry out. Paul grabs a scale from a nearby shelf and smashes it against her head. She drops to the floor unconscious. Slipping from the room Paul makes his way towards a staircase at the end of the hall. As he is passing an elevator the doors slide open and several people step out going in different directions. Three security guards also step out. "01!" One of them says. Paul tries to run but a baton to the backs of his knees drops him to the floor. He rolls and is quickly back up on his feet wielding the baton. He makes quick work of the first guard catching him across the forehead with a vicious strike. Paul kicks a screaming bystander attempting to get away from the scuffle in to guard number two. Guard number three goes down when Paul catches him across the knuckles with the baton shattering them. Spinning behind the man a loud crack fills the hallway as Paul snaps his neck. Guard 2 comes at him with a shout of rage. His skill clearly superior to Paul he quickly disarms him and begins battering him violently. The two exchange blows but Paul out matched, and weak from torture soon drops his guard. Once his head is slammed against the wall he goes down. By now the commotion has drawn several higher level guards who are armed. The elevator door opens again and Dr. Allen steps out. He sees the armed guards watching as the security guard continues to brutalize Paul. Breathing heavily the guard collapses on top of Paul and begins smashing his head against the floor. "Enough!" Dr Allen snaps. The guard continues unabated. "Stop this!" He shouts at the armed guards who are laughing. "Fucker had it coming!" One of them says. Dr. Allen pulls the side arm from one of the guards holster and shoots the one straddling Paul in the back of the head. He falls to the floor. Dr. Allen then turns to the guard who had spoken and shoots him in the face killing him. Holding the gun on the other shocked guards the doctor speaks again. "Does anyone else think that killing the subject of our largest project is a good idea?"

"No Dr. Allen." Both men say in unison. "Get him to medical." He says calmly. "If he dies, or suffers any permanent injury due to your inaction you and your families lives are forfeit am I understood?" "Yes Dr. Allen." Both say again. "Move!" The doctor yells. The two guards quickly pick up the bloodied un-moving Paul and carry him to the elevator. Dr. Allen looks at them until the doors slide shut before handing the gun to one of the shocked people looking on and walks away. "Get this cleaned up."

"We don't want to spook him. There is no way of knowing what his defenses are. For all we know the rooms surrounding his are full of hunters. Just walk down the hallway. Look for any cameras and see if you can hear him in the room. If he is in the room signal me. We'll go in together." "Why don't we both just go and kick the door in?" Isaac says angrily. "He knows me if there are cameras he'll see me and have time to call for help." Peter says with annoyance. "How do we know he doesn't have cameras and pictures of all of us?" Isaac says shoving the door to the stairwell open and striding out. "Sometimes the simple approach is the best approach." Isaac says striding down the hallway. Peter sighs shaking his head and follows. Once he's reached the room Isaac braces himself against the door and pushes. The wood door frame splinters with a soft crunching sound allowing entry. Isaac strides into the room eyes narrowing when a man seated at the desk jumps up in fear. Before he can take a single step Isaac has him. Peter closes the door pleased that Isaac had not just kicked his way through the door affording them some amount of privacy. He enters the main room and frowns when he sees who Isaac has. "Where is Milton?" He asks the man with a sigh looking around the room. Every flat surface is covered with fast food wrappers and room service trays. The floor littered with clothes and garbage.. "This isn't him?" Isaac demands tightening his hold on the man causing him to cry out in pain. "I don't know anyone named Milton." The man says shakily. Both Isaac and Peter sense the truth in his statement. "Why are you here?" Isaac asks barely able to control the shift. "It's my job!" The man cries out. "I get a phone call and am told where to go and how long to stay there. They provide me with credit cards and identification. I've never seen anyone. I owe a lot of money to a lot of people. I don't ask any questions." He says. Isaac starts breathing heavily as his wolf begins to break free. "Isaac…" Peter says. "We're not done with him yet." "Dead end!" Isaac shouts. "Another dead end!" with a roar of fury Isaac hurls the man at the large window that runs the width of the room. The window explodes outward. The mans scream cuts off almost a few seconds later as he impacts the ground 7 floors below. Peter shakes his head in frustration and grabs Isaac's shaking hands. "Come on. Act like you didn't just murder someone." He says grabbing the laptop and cell phone off the desk before stepping out into the hallway dragging Isaac behind him. Pulling the door shut he pulls the sullen wolf along behind him back to the stairway.

In their rental car headed to the airport Peter calls Deaton. "Midland was a dead end. Milton has people using his aliases staying in hotels to provide false trails." "Interesting." Deaton says. "I don't suppose you have any other leads?" Peter asks glancing at Isaac who is shifting from Beta to human every few seconds. "At present no." Deaton replies. "Hopefully Danny will be able to garner something useful from his phone and laptop." "I take it our friend had nothing useful at all?" Deaton asks. "No, it was a…...short interview we'll have to rely on his equipment." Peter answers with a shake of his head. "I see." Deaton says gravely. "I will let you know if I hear anything further."

"This has to stop happening." Peter says to Isaac. "He was useless! No information." Isaac growls out more wolf than human. "There is a technique to this sort of thing Isaac. It's not just brute force. He was telling the truth, he had no direct knowledge but often times with proper interrogation you can find out pieces of information that they didn't know they knew. He had no idea who we were or what information he might have that would be relevant to us. You can not let your anger of what these people have done to you get in the way of clear, methodical rational thought." "No one wants him back more than I do!" Isaac roars glaring at Peter with murder in his eyes. "Then you need to decide right now what is more important!" Peter snaps. Rampaging around like a wild animal killing anyone who gets in your way? Or wringing every possible bit of information from anyone even remotely connected? For all we know Isaac you just threw the key to finding your mate out a seventh floor window!"

The color drains from Isaac's face as he shifts back to human. His shoulders slump as he looks out the side window. The scent of fear and loss fills the car. "We're going to find him Isaac. I promise you. We just have to go about it the right way."