Eric was surprised how quickly he'd fallen into a sense of normalcy at the lab. His daily routine wasn't much different from before. The main difference was all the soldiers, and even that had become "normal" terrifyingly fast. Every day, he set up new samples to process in the morning, and while the machine did its thing, he sat down to study the results he already had. Soon after lunch, the sequencer was ready for a second round, and he'd set that up, and it finished after he'd left for the day. 

The other doctors and technicians were similar to his old lab, too. They were scientists, after all. Eric wondered how many of them knew what was really going on here. Surely so many people, normal people, people he joked with over lunch, couldn't all be involved in this giant conspiracy to hold a group of other people captive and study them, simply because they were different.

Eric hadn't been in contact with anyone from White Falls in over two months. Alpha Williams hadn't wanted to endanger Eric's possible cover in any way once the process had started. Once he had his first interview lined up, that had been it. He'd been on his own. Now, two weeks into his new job, he wondered how much help he could actually be. Other than his lab, office, and the employee break room, he really didn't have access or reason to access any other areas of the lab. And there seemed to be an unspoken agreement that no one talked in-depth about work at lunch. Sure, they might talk about breaking a jar, or accidentally dumping a sample tray, but that was as far as anyone went. They could have been talking about baking in the kitchen if you just swapped a couple of nouns around.

As Eric dug into his work this morning, though, he sensed that things might start to change. He had that nervous excitement that came over him just as he was about to reach a turning point in his work--either a breakthrough, or closing a failed line of thinking. Dr. J had provided him with a control sample of comparison DNA and had asked him to look for markers that would signify a common difference in the new samples. He hadn't said what he was looking for, but Eric knew the were looking for the marker that identified the ability to shift, and Eric thought he might have found it already. Which was insane. It should have taken him months, but he might have managed to trip across the right strings already. As a scientist, Eric was ecstatic, as a spy, he was torn. Alpha Williams had told him there would be times he would have to give Gecko the information they wanted so that he could win their trust. But this... this was huge. If they had this information, with this equipment, they could identify any shifter by their blood in under a day. But if Eric was going to get deeper into Gecko, he had to give them something, something they desperately wanted. And this could be it.

Eric dug through the data a little longer. Even with the fast speed of the sequencer, two weeks had provided him with still a relatively small data set, but every single one had the markers he was looking for. So Eric had to make a choice... did he tell J? Or did he keep it to himself?

In the end, it wasn't his duty as a spy for his pack or his responsibility as an employee that made the decision... it was his excitement as a scientist. He needed to share his discovery with someone who would acknowledge it for the revolutionary achievement it was.

Eric quickly printed out the basic information he'd need to bring J up to date. He was sure the other man would want to see the details, but this would be enough for now. Excited, Eric practically skipped down the hall, his brain wrapped up with the implications, both beneficial and detrimental, this could have for his pack, and for all shifters. Belatedly, he realized the hallway was suddenly blocked, two soldiers escorting a man between them. The man was tall and skinny, nearly as tall as Eric, and his hair was long and bedraggled, as if he hadn't bothered to comb it in months. Eric pressed himself against the wall to let them pass and saw the prisoner's nose twitching. The prisoner's eyes zapped to Eric's as Eric finally pulled his thoughts out of the sky and focused on the here and now. The man in front of him was an omega, the first captive he'd seen since starting his job. The strawberry basil scent of the man captured all of Eric's attention, and Eric felt his instincts rising to the surface, wanting to pull the two men holding the omega to pieces, to grab the omega and carry him away somewhere safe.

The omega's reaction was immediate. He started struggling in his captor's hold, lunging at Eric with a furious shout that dissolved into a growl as he lost control of his human form, his shift into wolf slow, furious, and painful. One of the guards pressed the omega into the ground and it was all Eric could do to keep himself still and not come to the omega's rescue, Alpha Williams words echoing in his ears: "You are not there to rescue them. You are there to get the information to rescue all of us." 

But he wanted to help the omega. It took every strand of determination in his being to stay still as the guard still standing took out some kind of epi-pen and jabbed it into the wolf's flesh. Slowly, the wolf's struggles weakened, and then he lay still. 

"Sorry, Dr. V," one of the guards said. "You okay?"

It took Eric a moment to realize the guard was addressing him. No, I'm not okay. That's my omega you just sedated. MY omega. I want to rip you limb from limb for touching him. He couldn't say that out loud, so he said nothing at all. And soon, a team of technicians had descended on them, accompanied by Dr. J, who came straight to Eric. Eric watched in astonishment as not one single person showed any sign of surprise that this man had turned into a wolf. These people, who Eric had eaten lunch with, and joked with, who he had thought couldn't possibly know what the purpose of this lab was... they weren't surprised. And that nearly tore Eric up as much as watching them cart the omega away. No, not just the omega, Eric realized. His omega. His mate.

Finally, he realized Dr. J was trying to talk to him. 

"I'm sorry... what were you saying?"

Dr. J placed an arm around Eric's shoulders. Maybe he meant it to be consoling, but as he used that arm to guide Eric down the hall, it simply felt controlling. Until now, Eric hadn't really been able to grasp the enormity of what was going on here. But now... now it was all too real.

"I'm so sorry you had to witness that scene," Dr. J said. "I'm sure it was a shock to see a man turning into a creature."

A wolf. He didn't turn into a creature, he turned into a wolf. And it sure as shit not as surprising as seeing how much people just didn't fucking care.

Dr. J guided Eric to his personal office, spouting calming bullshit the entire way. Finally, he closed the door behind him. Eric still hadn't said anything. He didn't know how to trust himself to say anything. Dr. J seemed to be operating under the assumption that Eric was in shock from seeing the omega shift, and Eric didn't want to ruin that assumption by opening his mouth. Dr J stepped back once Eric plopped into a chair and leaned against his desk.

"I haven't been completely honest with you, Dr. V.  But, with what you've witnessed today, I think you deserve to know the truth." There was a dark glint in Dr. J's eyes as he spoke, a dark excitement that hadn't been there in any of their previous conversations, and it chilled Eric to the bone. "I'd like to remind you that all previous agreements to secrecy that you've signed still hold, and we take them seriously."

This was it. This was the moment that Dr. J was going to take him into his confidence. Eric had hoped to attain that by providing the information about the markers, but now he could hold that in reserve. He didn't need to betray his people for their greater good... yet.

Eric nodded, still not trusting his mouth to behave, keeping his words as short and to the point as possible. "Tell me."