@thegirlwiththebuffytattoo
Cosima had received the file in error, and would never have noticed it in her DYAD inbox if it had not come in flagged as [Top Priority]. She wasn’t sure why she’d been BCC’d but, she opened the e-mail anyway and then unzipped the file with haste.
Subject: Project Wolfbane
This is all we have, Rachel. Breathe nothing to Aldous; burn after reading.
There was no signed name and the e-mail source was nothing she’d seen before. But within the file were pages and pages of scanned handwritten notes, as well as genetic codes unlike Cosima had ever seen. She quickly copied them to her jump drive, then deleted all mention and trace from her work computer. At home, she’d made a cup of green tea, curled up on her couch and began to delve into these mysterious genetic markers. The hours passed, the sun rose, and 7 cups of tea and a sleeve of Fig Newtons later, she’d become more baffled and extremely aware that something altogether supernatural was occurring.
The subjects of Project Wolfbane were 8 in total, all kept within isolation in the underbelly of DYAD. From what she could piece together, the genetic make-up of each subject contained human genes, as well as extraneous markers from the lycan genus, and another set that was nothing she’d ever seen before. Whatever and wherever the genes came from, the subject were born this way. They were not genetically altered by DYAD; they’d been captured and kept as study subjects.
She dove through the file again around lunchtime, chewing on a falafel and pita while she watched 12 individual videos of subjects. Some were simply interrogations. Where were they born, how long have they been as they were. Was this condition triggered by the circadian rhythms of the moon? But there were 3 videos of these subjects becoming something other. Merely documentations of nights when the moon was full and the unknown genes made them something between human and wolf. Cosima dropped her pita onto the plate, rewinding over and over to see what changed occurred. As a scientist, she was shivering with elation over something so brand-new and beautiful. She could have admired their groovy mutations for hours.
What chilled her enthusiasm was the treatment of the subjects. The abuse. She was one woman, one clone. She couldn’t do it all by herself, staging a coup and rescuing them. But if Rachel was dipping her fingers into every DYAD pie, she knew she had to do something and do it alone. She wouldn’t risk her sisters, no matter how invaluable their help would be. So as night felt, she readied herself to pull a Sarah. Go in, be sneaky and kick ass. Or maybe, just go in for some reconnaissance.
She knew from lab blueprints that their were bio-metric scanners. Score one for being a clone, negative three for looking and sounding nothing like her. She had something passable in her closet, somewhere. And wigs were easy enough to find with a little effort. Her heart was racing, was she really going to do this?
In the mirror she hardly recognized herself, but any movement was a tip-off. Be quick, she told herself, then get gone. At the scanner, her eye was read and her fingerprints taken.
[Voice Recognition, state your name]
Shit, fuck, shit, she thought. Collecting all of her inner myna bird, she pipped out
Passable enough for the machine, the door released and she slipped inside the lab. She slipped down the long corridor, past the sampling and centrifuges and to the research computers. None were on and she didn’t have a cleared log-in. So she moved on to the containment area. There were 7 out of 8 subjects, with room for 4 more. Most of them were up and about, looking at her with rage. They’d seen her face before, but not the consciousness behind this one.
“I’m not Rachel.” she stated in her own voice, know that the cameras would pick up nothing but the visuals, ‘and I’m here to help.”
This was Arcadia’s fault. Had she not insisted on pursuing the bounty hanging over this corporation’s head figure, her pack wouldn’t have been compromised. Not a day went by that she didn’t replay the events in her mind, searching for a different outcome—of how she could have pulled off sparing the other’s lives while being the sole captor. Loyalty to their Alpha ran thicker than their fear, and here they were now, endlessly tortured and tested to further the human’s knowledge about the supernatural.
Recovering after a severe trial earlier in the day, Arcadia sat upon the tiled floor, head resting against the wall. Her muscles ached something fierce, bruises and lacerations littering her figure, blood soaking through the white scrubs that adorned her body. At what point was it time to give up and throw in the towel? Months of this subjection had taken a toll on her spirit and her body—and it was only a matter of time until they tried to kill her kind off with silver.
When the door’s air lock released, she gave a heavy sigh, head falling forward into her hands. Not again. Pushing herself to full height, and towering at 6 feet tall, the wolf hastily shuffled to the shatter proof glass that held the containment cell closed. A round of ferocious snarls resounded, slamming a fist against the glass to quiet her comrades. “Quiet,” she hissed, golden hues focusing on Rachel—the human who brought this upon her people. All because someone else needed her dead and didn’t have the skills necessary to see it through.
The scent hit her before words were spoken, eyebrow raising in confusion at the woman standing before her. This had to be a trick—A devilish chuckle escaped as Arcadia shook her head, refusing to believe the ploy, “You expect us to believe that? You might not be Rachel…but you obviously work for DYAD. How else would you be able to navigate this far underground? I don’t trust you as far as I could through you. And trust me pet, that’s pretty damn far.”
pixelskylines
jacobvanloon
snowghoul
yousharknotpass
germansingergirl
dededos
janainaart
titsay
