Archive of Our Own ^beta

The men cursed Amir's name.

Well, the name he gave them.

The maze of crooked buildings, built with little regard for infrastructure and more out of desperation, offered no escape route. Walls caked with decades of old posters and painted clay rose in front of him at every turn. Roads abruptly vanished where the memorized maps promised paths.

Amir ran because there was nothing else he could do. He ducked under canopies. He hid behind carts, laid out false trails, and dispatched one guard who had smoked out his hideout.

Al-Thajar's men were relentless. Their cell's leader lay on the floor of his counsel room with a slit throat, but they chased him instead. Amir wasn't sure if they hunted him because of his bloody dagger by Thajar's body or the blown safe behind the hidden panel.

It wasn't one of his stealthiest moments. But he felt rewarded for his efforts. All the same, he wished for a timely exfil.

"Guys," Amir panted into his coms. "Turning eastward."

Nothing. Amir didn't luxuriate in the feeling of disappointment, though. He didn't spare a moment to think, "of course," either. There was no time to be realistic or fatalistic.

Faces blurred as Amir ran. Some shouted as he knocked into them. Fists shook in the air after him.

None tried to stop him. None tried to help him either.

The militants behind Amir were persistent. He heard them at his heels, their cursing louder instead of quieter.

They were going to catch him.

Amir regretted arguing against McG or Jaz for coming along. Their sharp fangs would have been useful.

Then again, Thajar's group relished in kidnapping and burning shifters live on the Internet. They had laughed. They had jeered. And last week, they had sworn more would die.

No, it was better Amir went alone.

"...location?"

Amir jerked. He almost lost his footing when his coms came back to life. Preach must have finally found the cell's jammer.

"...'mir?"

Dalton's voice was sharp, a clear demand for an answer despite the snarling static.

"I have the list." Amir skidded under an archway that once belonged to a building. It now stood orphaned after the recent civil war.

Amir veered sharply to avoid a pile of forgotten rubble. Too sharply. A stinging heat burned from his right knee and down the side of his scarred calf. He clenched his teeth. He ignored the pain, disregarded the urge to hobble now, and pushed on.

"What's…status?" Even garbled, Dalton sounded terse.

"Top, tell DIA I have their next targets. They're—"

"Where are you?" Dalton seemed fixated on Amir's whereabouts instead.

"The northeast corridor of the marketplace," Amir wheezed.

A brick red clay vessel that hung above Amir's left shattered. People around him screamed.

"Who's firing?" It wasn't clear who shouted this time.

"Top, I don't have a shot," Jaz answered before Amir could.

Another shot. Someone behind Amir shrieked, feet stamped behind him, and panicked masses rushed for cover. And unknowingly shielded him.

Another shot. A child wailed for her father.

"...almost there...find somewhere you can..."

"Up," Amir rasped. To whom, he could not tell. His ears filled with the loud rushing and whooshing sounds of his own breath. "Roof."

If Amir couldn't put distance between him and his pursuers, then he would put elevation instead.

Amir twisted too heavily on his right ankle. Pain flared from his foot to his knee. He stumbled with a half-stifled groan. He spotted a set of stairs hooded under the shadow of a balcony. Hopefully, they led to somewhere.

More shouting. More innocents screaming.

"…'mir, where the hell are you?"

He couldn't respond to whoever it was; he continued to climb up.

Three. Four. Five.

Roof.

The breeze was a shock to Amir's flushed face when he erupted out onto the roof. He leaped across to the next building.

The buildings huddled together, the stability of each structure reliant on the other. A short jump carried him across. Still, the landing rattled up his legs, and the ache smoldered on his lower back.

"I see him! The spice warehouse, quadrant Charlie! Moving!" Jaz shouted in Amir's coms.

"ETA?"

"Three minutes! Who has eyes on the ground? Where are they?"

"Two minutes!" Preach half-replied, half-bellowed. Amir never heard Preach yell like that before. "McG, do you see him?"

"I see him, guys. Shit, so did—"

"Contact!" Dalton shouted. "Amir, find cov—"

It was too much; Amir couldn't tell who was yelling. He ignored everyone and took a running leap across the narrow gap to the next roof. He feared he might miss. He didn't. He clumsily rolled into a tumble and onto his knees. He gritted his teeth, and, with his fists, pushed himself back up onto his feet. And ran for the next ledge.

Amir managed three more rooftops before his pursuers appeared in the first one. He heard a shot. It kicked at his heels. Another shot thumped hard and hot on his shoulders. The impact spun him off balance as he took a leap.

"Amir!"

Amir crashed onto the ledge and immediately slid off. He stopped his descent when he caught the edge with his fingers. He heard the men reach the roof across from him. He braced himself. They screamed obscenities at him as they took aim.

He prayed Dalton can retrieve the list off his body.

"Jaz!" Dalton barked into the coms.

Jaz's rifle got his would-be executioners before they could fire, but Amir knew she wasn't close enough to him.

"Amir!" Dalton shouted into the coms again. "I'm in the building across from you!"

Still too far. Amir's left hand started to cramp.

"Top—" Amir rasped. His chest seized and stopped his words.

"Almost there," Dalton panted. "Almost at the same level."

Same level?

Amir grimaced. He tried to turn his head to the building Dalton was apparently at. But the slight movement loosened his grip. His right index finger spasmed.

"Top," Amir croaked. "The list is inside my left boot heel—"

"Stop talking," Dalton ordered. "I'm almost there. I need to go higher for a better angle."

A better angle for what? To see where Amir's body falls? McG and Preach were still on the ground. They could track—

A pebble bounced off Amir's left eye. Amir jerked and his right hand flapped in the air for one terrifying moment before he slammed it back around the jagged edge.

Maybe he could...Amir grunted as he tried to pull himself up. But his fingers didn't have enough of a hold and his left shoulder burned. Oh. So that's where he was shot.

"Stop moving!" It sounded like everybody shouted in his ears now.

Amir's hand was numb. It felt like his left arm didn't belong to him. He swallowed, his throat working when he realized something.

"You will not make it," Amir rasped. He wasn't sure who was listening. Maybe all. Maybe none.

"Let go."

Amir blinked. It sounded like—

"Amir, listen to me." Dalton sounded hoarse. He shouted the whole time. Still is despite the rough quality of his voice.

Amir looked up at his fingers curled around the crumbling masonry. They painted it blue long ago. He watched, detached, as his fingers clutched less and less of the edge. Something hot dribbled down his back.

That's right. They shot him. He felt nothing, though. Maybe that meant it wouldn't hurt later. He was tired of hurting.

"What?" Dalton sounded like he was by Amir's ear now. "Hurt? You hit?"

An odd thing to ask, Amir fuzzily thought, when you considered what was to follow.

"Amir, let go," Dalton's command pulled Amir's eyes away from the inevitable.

"You'll be able to see where I fall?"

"See where you f—Amir, I won't let you fall!"

If he could at least hold on long enough for McG and Preach to have him on visual. Left boot heel. Did he tell them it was inside his left boot heel? He thought he did. He hoped he did.

"Amir," Dalton grunted. "I'm right across from—don't move too much! I have you in my sights!"

Amir stopped trying to confirm Dalton was there. Then again, why would Top lie to him? Dalton wasn't CIA.

Amir's ears buzzed as his coms filled with too many voices. They asked him more than he could offer at the current point.

Top's demand broke through the noise.

"Let go."

Amir swallowed. An icy sliver of fear slipped between his ribs. Dalton asked for a lot more than letting the inevitable happen.

"I'll catch you."

Dalton vetted him and still allowed him to remain with the team.

"Let go."

Dalton wouldn't have allowed Algiers to happen.

Amir closed his eyes. When he opened them again, he felt strangely calm.

"Left boot heel," Amir whispered. Just in case. He glanced up, his jaw set. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes again, and let go.

There was an odd moment of weightlessness, of being suspended in midair before Amir fell.

There was a scant breeze against his cheek. It was a kiss hello from a ghost.

The sun was warm against his shut eyes.

One of his earwigs dropped. He heard the market below.

And a howl.

With a roar loud enough to ripple the air, everything became that sound.

Amir's eyes flew open when something slammed into his back. Sharp pricks pierced the back of his collars. His shoulders jerked up. Suddenly, Amir fell in the other direction. No, he was flying.

Amir caught a blur of painted brick, the flash of a dirty window, and the sheen of silver fur. He squeezed his eyes tight as brick and window rushed up.

There was the sound of glass shattering.

There were small sparks of pain all over him.

Then Amir knew nothing more.

Hands.

Voices.

Amir jerked. He lashed out. The hands retreated.

"Man, why are you always hitting me?"

The voice teased a name. Sort of.

"You probably deserved it," a voice deadpanned.

"For what?"

"For everything."

Amir's eyes peeled open, but his head hurt less if he kept his eyes at half-mast.

A blunt snout poked his left shoulder under the bullet hole that was now making itself known.

Amir recoiled. He turned his shoulder into his own body. It hurt less that way.

"Top, Top, come on, man. Ease up. Let me look him over first."

The sound of nails on wood retrieved the rest of Amir's recollection.

"Top?" Amir rasped. He forced his eyes to open further.

A silver wolf stared back with unblinking lake-green eyes.

"Where's all that blood coming from?" McG fussed. His hands swept over Amir's torso.

Amir opened his mouth to say, but a hiss came out instead.

"Never mind. Found it. Clean through. I'll patch it up for now. I can fix you up when we're airborne." McG nudged the wolf, who was determined to fill the space in between them.

"Geez," McG exasperated. "Not yet, Top. I'm not done, would you—Preach?"

Amir noticed Preach at last, a mute shadow, as he patted the wolf's flank.

"Amir's fine," Preach murmured. He gave the wolf a rather undignified shove. The Alpha yipped as it skidded back. Tiny tinkles dropped around scrabbling paws.

"Glass," Jaz explained, perched by the window, left agape with jagged teeth of glass. Jaz glanced over. Her mouth twitched up at the corners when Amir blearily blinked back. She grunted and turned back to her watch, her weapon aimed towards the streets below.

The bullet-scarred walls were alien. His last memory was the sky. Amir stared at the nail-riddled floor. He sat—sort of—with his legs splayed awkwardly in front of him, glass all around him. Blood-tipped diamonds.

Amir blinked at the silver wolf and its eyes that held the colors of his childhood lake.

"What?" McG mumbled around a packet of antiseptic wipes clenched between his teeth. "You didn't think Top could catch you?"

Amir thought that, but he opted not to say it when the wolf's chest puffed out; the tail thumped to the ground. Dalton appeared rather indignant. The wolf stood on all fours and gave itself a violent, full-body shake.

"Hey!" McG shifted to block Amir from the brief glass shower. "Knock it off. I'm still trying to get the glass off him."

Amir watched distantly as McG prodded him. Amir's head pounded in unison with his heart. The medic asked Amir to lift his arms, turn his head, and look at his annoying penlight.

The Alpha hovered behind McG, almond-shaped eyes steady on Amir while McG worked. Dalton looked faintly disappointed, its triangular ears folded down in a half droop.

"You said you would catch me," Amir murmured, almost to himself. But he settled dazed eyes on the wolf.

McG clasped a warm large hand over Amir's right knee and the pain there as if to capture it.

"Top caught all of us," McG said quietly, his harried voice now calmer in a tone that would soothe a child to sleep. "The Alpha always makes sure none of his pack falls."

Amir tore his eyes away from the wolf's stare. His throat worked.

"What?" McG paused, bandages unraveling in his hand.

"I just...." Amir side-eyed Top. The wolf's whiskers quivered as it scowled. "But then why would he—"

Suddenly, Jaz doubled over and laughed.

"Jaz," McG grumbled. He glared at the sniper, but he remained by Amir. "Seriously?"

Jaz, with a snort, wordlessly pointed out the broken window.

Amir leaned towards the window despite McG's grumbling and his boot's hasty sweep of glass. He squinted.

"Three o'clock," Jaz chortled. She pressed her scope over Amir's right eye without warning.

"Watch it!" McG complained. "He needs stitches over that eye."

Amir ignored McG and Jaz's bickering as he peered in the direction Jaz pointed. He blinked.

"Is that..." Amir blinked again.

Behind Amir, the wolf grumbled.

McG choked. "Top, aren't those your pants?"

Sure enough, a pair of desert fatigue trousers, caught on someone's clothesline, flapped in the breeze.

"Shifted mid-air," Preach rumbled. He chuckled as the wolf dropped on its belly, snout under its front paws. "Impressive. Few can do that."

McG sniggered. "Wonder if DIA got a satellite image of Top—"

The wolf growled under its breath.

"Er, probably not."

Amir peered through the scope at the pants. He thought of the Alpha as he jumped and shifted in mid-air to catch a borrowed human.

"Told you Top always catches us," McG murmured. His hand briefly squeezed Amir's knee.

Amir's throat tightened. He peered through the scope again. The room was quiet as he lowered the scope and locked eyes with the wolf.

Dalton's ears perked up. Expectant green-blue eyes settled on Amir.

Amir pointed towards the window with the scope.

"Am I supposed to salute it?"

Preach exploded into a guffaw. Startled, McG flailed off his crouch and landed on his ass. Jaz lightly punched Amir in the good shoulder.

Dalton glowered at Amir as if saying, "Not you, too?"

"Come on," Preach said after getting under control. "Exfil in two. There may be others."

Amir rose unsteadily. Glass chimed as they fell. He glanced around the floor. His right knee buckled.

"Whoops. Don't worry. I gotcha," McG rumbled. His hand settled on the small of Amir's back.

The ground steadied under Amir's feet, but not enough for McG's satisfaction. He mumbled in Amir's ear as he counted down the steps. The wolf loped alongside, glass still tickling as shards shook free. The wolf was a warm, solid brace against his right leg, there every time his knee threatened to buckle. Amir kept his eyes on the back of Preach's head as he hobbled, Jaz's alert dark eyes and gun behind them.

The C-130 drowned out McG's snoring.

Amir blearily stared across at the others asleep in their bucket seats, harnessed in because even a heavy class transport struggled with turbulence.

The row of five seats tucked behind their locked down gear was often empty. At the rear of the plane, it was always too loud, too dark, and too cold for anyone. If it was a full company, the green soldiers (or Amir) sat there.

Amir preferred it.

His entire body ached—a crash into glass was always inadvisable—and his shoulder was a mix of drugged numbness and hot spasms.

Amir had limped over and tucked himself into the farthest seat, anyway. His right knee throbbed in chorus despite the cold compresses McG strapped down the entire length of his calf. It was also retaliation; Amir's refusal of pain medication rose a few decibels past cordial as they boarded the plane.

It was loud in the back, loud enough that his dark thoughts scattered before they could fully form barbed and cutting. He refused to call it brooding but acknowledged he wasn't good company at the present. Better for everyone if he stayed away until they landed.

The chill coursed up and down Amir's back in shivers. He hunched deeper into his jacket. His gray suit was ill-suited for the cold.

Amir watched the rest of the team, partially blocked by their crates of gear. They stopped their surreptitious watch after Amir moved to the back.

Wait. Where was Top?

On cue, the silver and gray wolf slinked around the crates and padded over.

There was no time to recover Dalton's clothing, only his gear. And nobody packed his spares. Only Preach's extra shirt fit, but Dalton's vicious snap at everyone's heels conveyed what he thought about sitting in the C-130 with no pants.

Amir tracked the Alpha as it made its way towards him. The wolf paused. Amir stared at the wolf. The wolf stared back. Then, Top nimbly hopped up into a netting seat next to him, curled up, and fell asleep.

The plane vibrated its way to Incirlik. The rest of the pack stayed in their seats, now asleep with an occasional snuffle from McG. He grumbled in his sleep whenever Jaz elbowed him to be quiet.

Amir mulled over McG's earlier words. He repeatedly turned them over in his head. He couldn't find the well-intentional lie. He studied the wolf.

"You didn't have to catch me."

The wolf didn't stir.

Amir found it easier to talk when no one listened.

"I told you where I hid the list." Amir's jaw clenched. "Shifting like that was a risk." He supposed Top would survive the fall. But...

"If you fell and stayed shifted as a wolf." Amir glanced over at the wolf swaying in the netted seat.

"ISIS is not amicable to wolves," Amir said stiffly. "I was right to go alone."

An ear twitched.

Amir rubbed the bandage on his left hand. He was careful not to peel it. He told McG it didn't need stitches. He didn't want to be proven wrong.

Amir glanced over at the rest of the team. He thought about the shouts in his ear. He thought about Top's promise he would catch Amir and McG's belief that the Alpha always catches anyone from his...

"I didn't think you would—could, I mean..." Amir fidgeted to find a spot that didn't hurt.

One lupine eye opened and gazed at Amir. It reminded Amir of the first night when he landed on Incirlik. Dalton stayed the night, on the bunk opposite Amir's, possibly to monitor the intruder, but inadvertently also guarded Amir from the nightmares that plagued him since he was nineteen.

"Catching me," Amir clarified. He rolled back a shoulder—ouch—and hunched deeper into his seat.

The one eye became a solemn pair as they stayed on Amir.

It felt like he was on another precipice. Amir cleared his throat. He studied the plane's framework above McG's head.

"I never had that before."

The wolf breathed out through its snout.

Amir massaged the cold compress over his knee. He thought about the sand burned into the slashes as he dragged himself and his ravaged limb out of the proving ground. The pack of feral wolves pounced on him and the boy. Amir, or Hamid, survived the trials. The boy did not.

They didn't bother to retrieve the boy's body. They only burned the wolves Amir regretfully had to kill.

ISIS thought they had helped Hamid save his leg. They congratulated themselves that they recovered Hamid's ability to walk. There was no thought about the boy Hamid tried to rescue. As long as their brother Hamid Khedani walked among them, the death of a weak recruit was nothing.

But it was Amir who hobbled out of the compound before the Predator struck.

Blue-green gleamed as the gaze considered Amir's knee.

"I deserved this," Amir croaked. He continued to rub the compress over his knee. He stopped, though. The pain refused to abate.

Amir shook his head at the barely audible whine. "I was told I would have lost my leg if I waited too long. And who helped me? The very monsters who…" His throat worked. He huffed out a laugh. It tasted bitter on his tongue.

"My handler waited for the permission to extract me." And for orders on Amir's warning about Algiers. "Langley wanted me to get more…valuable intel they could use."

A fang flashed as the wolf's lips peeled back in a silent snarl.

"Thank you." Amir exhaled shakingly. "For not letting me fall. For…t-thank you."

The Alpha woofed softly. The sound sank under Amir's skin. He shuddered. He didn't know why. An admonishment? An assurance? No. It felt like a promise.

Amir nodded.

"Okay," Amir whispered. He wasn't sure what he agreed to, but it felt like he took another leap.

The wolf gently bumped its nose on Amir's knee. They just shook their hands on something. And whatever it was, it quelled the gnawing in Amir's chest that haunted him since he couldn't chase moonlight anymore.

Amir roughly scrubbed his face with a hand. He wondered what it would be like to have such certainty; to know he could stand at a dagger's edge, sure someone was close by to catch him. Sure someone cared to.

The nose bumped Amir's knee again. The wolf huffed out a wordless question.

"It's fine now," Amir told the wolf. When the wolf squeezed a glare up at him, he amended, "It's getting better."

Satisfied, the wolf lowered its regal head. A gusty exhale out of the muzzle revealed impressive fangs, but it assured Amir rather than intimidated.

Amir listened to the plane. He listened to McG's snores. He listened to the creaks next to him as the wolf squirmed for a better spot in the netting.

A beat later, Amir casually murmured, "Too bad, though."

Dalton's ears flicked towards Amir.

"It's a shame we didn't take a picture of those pants."

In front, someone snickered.

The wolf narrowed its eyes. It huffed, wiggled closer, and swatted Amir's hip with a paw. Definitely a reprimand. The wolf blinked up at Amir before it shoved its snout under enormous paws with a grumble.

Amir faintly smiled. He leaned back in his seat, closed his eyes, and listened to the C3 take them home.