Warming The Cold One - 24. This land is your land? No, it's really my land!

“How bad is the damage?” Taj asked.

“It’s about as bad as it could get. The audit they produced found almost everything.” Taj’s accountant flipped through the summery pages that got faxed to him. “The only thing I don’t see is your personal accounts.”

“Good,” Taj sighed. “I did my best to put all of my stuff back to where it was supposed to be a few years ago. I haven’t touched the accounts the money was in since then.” Taj took a sip of tea. “How bad is it for Tajsin?”

“Really bad. From this report it looks like he has been syphoning money every month to the same offshore accounts. I don’t think he could have been any more reckless.” He could see the look of sadness in Taj’s eyes as he began to understand the situation. “I’m sorry Sir, but I doubt I can shield him from this.”

“I understand. I tried to warn him so many times that it was going to come back and bite him.” Taj just shook his head. “Any sign of the money Faolan was rumored to have taken?”

The accountant looked things over again. “No. If anything, it looked like he was trying to adjust things to make sure the other clans didn’t find any of their money missing. The only place money was missing was from the Celtic accounts and from the general fund.”

Taj stopped mid-sip of his tea. “You mean he was trying to fix things?”

“Yes Sir. Faolan made sure that only the money that didn’t matter went missing. Not that the Celtic money being missing didn’t matter, but Tobias was covering the areas where that money should have been spent,” the accountant quickly made himself clear.

“He had style,” Taj mused. “A total prick and slimeball but had style as well.”

“Yes, hello,” Hawk sat up. “I am looking for the office of Alpha Tucker Benjamin.”

“This is he. May I ask who is calling,” a middle-aged man asked.

“My name is Haih Bia'isa. I represent the Boise Pack in Idaho as well as handling the requests of packs wishing to rejoin the American Clan.” Hawk flipped his pad of paper to a clean page. “I would like to ask you a few questions about your application.”

“That is wonderful news. Thank you for calling back so quickly. I know my pack isn’t large and I didn’t expect my application to be taken very seriously.” Tucker adjusted in his chair. “What can I answer for you?”

“I take every request seriously. My first and the biggest question is how you heard about the campaign if the first place,” Hawk queried. “I had it posted inside the council, but from what I can tell, you don’t have access to the internal council network.”

Tucker laughed. “I have some sympathetic ears in the council that let me know. It is a long story but that is the easiest way to describe it.”

“Fair enough,” Hawk replied. “My second question is what clan your pack is under right now?”

“My pack is currently administered by the Himalayans.” Tucker shuttered. “They do not care for us very well and thus I have had to send most of my pack away to other lands to live. One of those packs passed the word back to me, by the way.”

Hawk made some notes. “If you were to join the American Clan, would you want to have your pack come back together? If so, would you be interested in have a pack representative?”

“That would be a dream come true,” Tucker said. “Is that even possible to have a representative?”

“It is more then possible,” Hawk responded. “Our clan has worked hard to dispel the falsehoods that have been spread. Every pack can have a voice if they want one. What would you need from us to make that happen?”

Tucker’s mind was blown. He never thought that he would be able to get his pack put back together. “I’d have to run some numbers and see what the state my pack members are in. There isn’t a lot of work in rural North Carolina right now and money is tight.”

Hawk nodded to himself. “We understand. I will talk to the leadership group and see what kind of assistance we can pull together. If nothing else, we want to make sure your pack can be back together.”

Tucker smiled. “I’d like that. Should I call you back or will you call me?”

Hawk laughed. “I think once I talk with the group, one of them will be pushing me out of the way to get to talk to you first.”

“I look forward to that call. Thank you.” Tucker hung up the phone and started to cry.

“So, are we going to have the right space for the Florida pack to have the amount of space they need?” Tala looks over the floor plans for the 17th floor. “They have a lot of wolves at the ready.”

“I can check and see how the buildout on the 21st floor is going,” Clay volunteered. “We haven’t been able to find a dedicated specialist yet, but I can call the contractor.”

Jay perked up. “That would work. I’m sure they have someone that has an IT degree to fill that position too. Has building management gotten a team together for our floors yet?”

Clay shook his head. “Not yet. Are you sure you want to put so much reliance on this one pack?”

Tala sighed. “We don’t have a lot of choice right now. Most of the packs we received requests from are pretty small. They don’t have the capacity to send more than they have already.”

Hawk walks out of his office to meet up with the group. “Sorry I’m late. I just was taking with Alpha Benjamin.”

“Did he answer your questions,” Tala asked.

“He did. I guess Taj has been holding his pack down so much that he sent most of his pack to stay on other lands.” Hawk could see the hurt in Tala’s eyes. “He would love to be able to get his pack together. I told him I would talk it over with the group.”

“While you four talk, I am going to call the contractor.” Clay excused himself.

Tala had a hard time hiding the sadness in his voice. “I’ll call him once we are done. The least I can do is make sure his pack is whole again.”

Hawk smiled. “I told him that. Almost word for word told him that.”

Bjorn put his arm around Tala. “That’s our leader for you. Always out to do the right thing.”

Jay answers his ring phone. “Hello? Oh, hi Dad. I thought I’d try it out. You found out something so soon? Yeah, Tala is right next to me. What? How? Yeah, I’ll let them both know. Talk to you soon.”

All three men around Jay are staring in anticipation. Tala was the first to speak. “What was that about?”

“The fact checkers can verify all the documents on that USB stick are real,” Jay responded.

“And,” Bjorn queried.

“There were documents about how the assets of the Red Pack were doled out.” Jay could see that he couldn’t hold back too much longer or else he’d have three hyper wolves on his hands. He took a breath and quickly blurted out, “the lands the council sit on were owned by a pack related to the Red Pack.”

Hawk froze and his face fell. “This just got serious.”

Tala grabbed a chair from wall where it was waiting to be put in a conference room. He sat down to make sure he didn’t fall. It took him a second before he spoke and when he did it was a very serious tone. “Bjorn, call Rolf. I need to file an amendment to Toby’s fraud claim. I’m going to ask for all of my pack lands and I want reparations for the time and money spent in resecuring the lands.”

“Are you sure?” Bjorn looked worried. “It could tear the council apart. It could lead to war again.

Tala shook his head. “Yeah, it is the only way to make things right. Meanwhile, I need to call Alpha Benjamin.” Tala got up and walked into the room he had been using as a temporary office.

Tala picked up the phone and dialed the number for Alpha Benjamin. “Hello, is this Tucker Benjamin?”

Tucker answered a bit surprised to have a call so quickly. “This is he.”

Tala tried to not sounds robotic or too serious since he was still a bit upset. “My name is Tala. I am the head of the American Clan. I am calling to follow-up on the conversation you had with Sir Haih Bia'isa.”

“I never expected to hear from you directly Master Tala,” Tucker responded a bit shocked.

“I like to be hands-on right now,” Tala explained. “In being hands-on, what can I do to help get your pack back together? Is it money, space, etcetera?”

“To be perfectly honest, my pack looks small because we are looked down upon and I wanted to protect as many of my pack as possible,” Tucker retorted sadly. “You see, I like my pack is made up of red wolves.”

“I don’t understand.” Tala tried to quell his confusion. “What’s wrong with being a red wolf?”

Tucker chuckled. “It is a breath of fresh air to hear that but alas the council is ruled and is focused on gray wolves. When our pack was put under Himalayan management, for lack of a better term, we were told that we were not welcome as we were not good enough.”

“That is horrible. Why was your pack put under new management,” Tala asked still confused.

“Let me see if I can explain it,” said Tucker. “My pack was aligned with an enormously powerful American Clan pack. That alliance was formed centuries ago when a few red wolves fell in love with some Great Plains wolves. Those wolves started have red patches of fur in the same place, so they were named...”

Tala finished the sentence for him, “the Red Pack.”

“You’ve heard of them, I hear,” mused Tucker.

“Yeah, I have heard of them,” Tala sighed. “I am descended from the Red Pack. In a few weeks my mother is going to visit the lands and see what is left of the unturned wolves there. I’m so sorry about what happened to you.”

Tucker tried to cheer Tala up. “You and your ancestor's pack didn’t do this to us. Greedy wolves bent on ruling the world did this to both of us.”

“Funny thing about that,” Tala reflected. “I just had someone give me some records about who ordered it and what they did with the ill-gotten gains.”

“I have some records here too, if you are interested.” Tucker sipped his water and continued. “You are welcome to read them over, but I can’t let them off my lands as they are very valuable and not in a condition to scan.”

“I would love to see them. Can I schedule a time to review them and provide the ceremony to bring you back to the American Clan? I must do some traveling soon anyway to bring all the other packs into the fold as well.” Tala looked over his notes. “Are you going to be available in about two weeks?”

“I will make sure I am. Just let me know the day before and I will make sure you have transportation from the airport. My lands are not real close to the city.” Tucker shuffled some papers around on his desk. “I should start making some calls to get things in motion for my pack to come back. It was really nice to hear from you.”

“It was genuinely nice to talk to you Alpha Benjamin. I look forward to visiting you. Have a great day.” Tala hung up the phone and scribbled a few notes down about things to talk to Jay about.

Hawk stepped out of the elevator on the 14th floor. He walked over to the desk to get directions to the office he needed. “Hi, I’m looking for Regina’s office.”

The receptionist looked up and smiled. “Her office is the third door on the right down this hallway there.” She pointed at a hallway to Hawk’s left. “Can I let her know you are here?”

“Of course,” Hawk replied. “Let her know that Hawk is here to talk about the space on the 18th floor.”

“Done. You can go on back.” The receptionist looked back down to her screen and continued playing whatever game she had going previously.

Hawk walked back to Regina’s office and knocked on the door. “Come in Hawk,” Regina cooed. “What can I do for you?”

“Well,” Hawk began. “I just got done with a meeting with my senior leadership and we came to decision on what we wanted to do regarding the 18th floor.”

“So, what are you proposing you want to do,” Regina asked in a tone that suggested she thought they were being too presumptuous.

Hawk hearing her tone adjusted slightly. “We are proposing that the 18th floor gets split for now.” He saw her mood lighten a little bit. “The thought was we could do something like what your clan was doing now. Store some things securely and have an overflow area for things that are needed but maybe not right away. We found out we needed to escalate our timeline on finishing the front of the 21st floor.”

Regina nodded. “That could work. I’ll have a favor for you though.”

“If I can, you know I will do my best,” Hawk agreed.

“Can you see if you can order some of the upgraded security gadgets you guys have been installing for us? I will transfer you the money as soon as the order is in. That way we both can get a better bulk rate.” Regina had a sheepish look on her face. “Rolf is a bit jealous of what Tala has been doing.”

Hawk tried but couldn’t help but laugh. “You got a deal. I’ll add in enough for all your floors as well as the shared 18th floor and send you a quote.”

“Bjorn, this is serious. What you are asking is going to incite a riot if you’re lucky, war if you’re not.” Rolf adjusted in his chair. “Are you sure this is what you want to do?”

Bjorn shook his head. “No, it’s not what I want to do. It’s what I need to do and what I must do. I told Tala I didn’t want to do this. He doesn’t want to either but enough is enough. You have been stolen from for years, but Tala’s family has been stolen from for generations.

“I’ll talk to Toby. I know he will want to support you, but I need to get some guidance first.” Rolf closed his eyes for a second. When he opened them, he spoke again very solemnly, “Make sure Tala and Jay leave before the council convenes to hear this amendment. I don’t want to see anyone get hurt.”

“You know what you are asking me?” Bjorn sighed and shook his head. “I will not win that fight. I agree but I will stand behind his decision.”

“I call the meeting of the Lycan Council back to order. Please rise for the Circle.” Owen waited for the five members of the Circle to enter the chamber and sit down. “You may be seated.” After all were seated and settled down, he continued. “This council has been requested to reconvene to hear an amendment to the request first put forth by Master Tobias. This amendment is requested by Tala, Head of the American Clan, and is backed by Bjorn Chase. Master Chase, please come to the podium.”

Bjorn walked down to the podium. “Thank you, Sergeant. Fellow members of this body, thank you for returning here so promptly for this amendment request. I would invite Master Tala into the chamber to explain his request.”

Tala was shown into the chamber. He stepped up to the guest speaker podium and addressed the room. “Thank you all for allowing me to speak. It was not that long ago that Master Tobias stood before you and presented his case of fraud. I stand before you with much more dire issues to address. I have received some information from an anonymous source. This information showed that the story I was told about the pack of my ancestors was a lie.”

The crowd started to murmur. Owen quickly put a stop to it. “Need I remind you that anyone attempting to interrupt Master Tala will be asked to leave these chambers for the rest of the session.” The crown settled right down. “Master Tala, please continue.”

“Thank you for your assistance Sergeant.” Tala took a quick sip of water from the bottle he brought with him. “I was able to reach out to a few different resources. Every single one said that what I had submitted for review could be validated. Because of that, I felt it was best to address it now while all the books are open, and all the secrets laid bare.”

Vukasin raised his hand. Owen addressed Tala. “Master Vukasin looks like he has a question. Are you open to his question?”

Tala nodded and Vukasin walked over to the podium up on the dais. “Master Tala, what is it you are wanting. You seem to be grandstanding.” The crowd started to agree but Vukasin put up his hand for silence. “Please summarize your amendment.”

Tala nodded. “My apologies Master Vukasin. It was not my intent to grandstand. My amendment boils down to this. I am asking for the return of all the lands taken from the Red Pack and its affiliated packs. I am also asking for reparations for the cost of trying to obtain what was already ours. That would also include monies be paid to groups that secured land in order to protect it.”

Vukasin looked taken aback. “What lands are there that you feel were taken from you?”

Tala looked straight in to Vukasin’s eyes and responded. “I’m standing on it right now!”