My hands were knotted together in the hospital waiting room, back teeth firmly gritted together as I surveyed the space around me. The blend of other wolves’ scents mixing in with the clinical, chemical smells around me were somewhat overwhelming, and I was fast developing a headache — or, at least, worsening the one I already had, which had faded in and out since I last spoke to Dylan.

That phone call hadn’t gone well. But how else could I have expected it to go?

I messed up our relationship the moment I hid my history of lunitis from him. It was the kind of error you couldn’t come back from. Maybe time would soften the way he felt about my mistake, but that was certainly no guarantee. Either way, all I could do was allow him to walk away, no matter how badly it hurt.

In the meantime, I had more medical bullshit to endure. I glanced down at the cotton bud covering the site of my fresh blood test. Although the doctor had given me the all-clear last time and confirmed I wasn’t contagious, he wanted me to head to Seattle General for some further tests. Quite what the purpose of these could be, I wasn’t sure, but in my current state of mind I wasn’t exactly fit to argue — so here I was.

All I wanted to do was go home and hide under my bed in that wolf-shaped blanket fort. Instead, here I was waiting anxiously for results that shouldn’t even matter to me. Results I hadn’t even asked for.

I caught sight of a slim little omega trying to catch my eye from across the waiting room, and looked quickly away. My entire chest felt like it was caving in just vaguely imagining anybody else. Maybe this was why I’d avoided romance for all these years, if only subconsciously. The way it screwed you up when things went bad was unlike any other pain imaginable.

I felt like I’d failed my evolutionary purpose as well as my relationship.

Exhaling heavily, I sank down into the too-stiff hospital couch. It shouldn’t be too much longer now. Maybe I could swing by for some koshari or vada pav on the way home to treat myself for enduring all of this. Food didn’t really taste of much right now, but there was no harm in trying.

“Mr. Hickam?”

I perked up, standing straight away as I heard my name and following after the nurse. He seemed edgy, and kept looking back at my arms as if my tattoos would somehow leap from my skin and onto his. It wouldn’t be the first time somebody had acted cagey around me because of the way I looked. Hell — I’d had parents moving their kids away from me on public transport. Normally, it didn’t bother me any more., but I wasn’t exactly at my best today.

“Ink’s non-transferable,” I said as I caught him looking again. “Don’t worry.”

“Oh. Sorry; I was just… you know. Admiring them.”

I rolled my eyes, preferring to hold my tongue than to get into an argument with him. Another side-effect of being covered from head to toe in tattoos was that people sometimes assumed you had aggressive intent no matter what you did. Better that I didn’t risk getting thrown out of the hospital for threatening the guy with my mere presence.

It was bad enough having more blood drawn, but if I was asked to leave before I actually got my results, I’d have waited all this time for nothing.

“Right through here,” said the nurse, terse to the point of rudeness now. I still said nothing as I stepped through the door, taking a seat opposite the clinician. Luckily, she didn’t seem so unfriendly.

“Hi, Mr. Hickam. Can I call you Jack?”

“Sure, no problem. And you’re…?”

“Helen.”

I shook Dr. Helen’s hand, surprised to note that she was human. Normally, they didn’t deign to work on wolf medical problems. Maybe she wasn’t a lunitis specialist after all?

“Okay, Jack. Sorry to keep you waiting there. It takes a little time to process these blood tests; believe it or not, that’s about the fastest we can do it. Normally I’d have to ask you to come back in 48 hours.”

I frowned, trying to read between the lines. “That’s okay. Is it urgent?”

“Well, of course,” she said — then paused. “Haven’t you been told what these tests are for?”

I shook my head, settling down further into the chair. I was too tired for this shit. Dylan’s residual scent on my bedsheets was keeping me awake at night, even after I’d laundered the full set several times. Maybe it was in my head, at this point. Whatever the cause, it didn’t make for a restful environment.

Wait — I should be focusing. I turned my attention back to Dr. Helen.

“-normally require permission before requesting the tests, so I assumed you’d know. I certainly apologize for that.”

“It’s fine. So. What is it…?”

“This is very early stages,” she said, pushing her red, thick-rimmed glasses further up her nose. “So let’s not get in over our heads, but researchers here at the hospital believe we may have identified a key component in lunitis-related genetics that might unlock the way to a cure. In fact, we’re pretty certain about it.”

I blinked. “Oh?”

“We’ve tested the theory on mice so far, and it’s all kosher. Essentially, um… the kind of virus that lunitis is? There are different strains for various different species. Most species that have their own strain are approximately 99% susceptible — that is, 99% of the population of that species is capable of contracting the virus.”

“Right,” I said, brow still furrowed. Science wasn’t one of my strengths. If she didn’t get to the point soon, she was going to lose me.

“The other roughly 1% of the population is fully immune. Now… I’m saying 1% because that’s the way it’s split for lunitis. Musculosis, which is the strain affecting mice, is a much more even split – about 60-40. From that 40% immune group, we managed to synthesise a fully effective vaccine for the disease.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, my head continuing to thud. “I don’t mean to be rude, but I’m a little confused. I don’t understand what this has to do with my tests. I’m not contagious.”

“But you have been exposed to lunitis without dying,” said the doctor. “On that basis, we knew there was a possibility that you’d fall in the magic 1% — and if we can find a willing donor within that extremely rare group, we can almost certainly replicate our success with the mice to create a working vaccine for lunitis.”

I wasn’t sure what to say. It didn’t take a mind reader to see the truth on her face.

“Well… Jack, I’m thrilled to tell you that you are immune. Your cooperation could bring an end to the threat of lunitis in modern wolf communities across the world.”

I felt my head throb again, this time more out of shock than anything else. “I… seriously?”

She nodded. “Absolutely. Now… before you say ‘yes’,” she said, holding up a hand, “I need to explain some things to you. We need a lot from you if we’re going to make this work. Please don’t take that word lightly; I really mean a lot. It will require very invasive surgery.”

“Surgery? For what?”

“Brain samples,” she said, voice soft as if that could ameliorate the seriousness. “We don’t take more than we need; it’s not dangerous in that regard. However, it is a complicated surgery. It is risky. Things can go wrong.”

“How likely?”

She took a deep breath, folding her hands in her lap. She couldn’t meet my eyes.

I repeated the question. “How likely?”

“Fifty-fifty.”

The clock seemed to tick louder in the silence. I cleared my throat. “Fifty-fifty that there’ll be complications, or…?”

“Survival,” she admitted. She looked down at her hands, folded in her lap, and then back up at me. She had open, honest eyes. I felt I could feel the world spinning beneath my feet, but at least Dr. Helen was solid. Clear. Direct. “We will have the very best surgeons working on you, and you’re young and healthy, so you’re in good stead. But… these surgeries are extremely delicate by their nature. Patients can be lost. It does happen.”

“Holy shit.”

I sank back into the chair, eyes fixed on a blank spot on the wall. For the first time in decades, I wanted my mom. Wished that I could have her by my side to talk this over. It made me feel like a kid, but I couldn’t be ashamed. This was serious. If I agreed to this, it could mean that no kid like me ever lost his mom to lunitis again.

“I know it’s a lot to think about,” said Helen. “And it’s an awful lot to ask. I don’t need a decision from you right now, but… please take a couple of days to think about it. Longer, if you need it.”

I nodded slowly, still picturing the faces of my parents in my mind’s eye. At least this was a distraction from Dylan — but thinking of him them was still painful. I could never have asked my mom what she thought I should do about this. She had died many years ago, but if I hadn’t been such an asshole, I certainly could have spoken to Dylan about this.

Now he never wanted to hear from me again.

“Yeah,” I said, hearing something crumbly and uncertain in my voice. I hadn’t considered my own mortality in years. To be confronted with it now was unsettling. “Course I’ll think about it. I just… wow. That’s a lot.”

“I know,” she said, smiling weakly. “I don’t want to bombard you. I have a folder full of information for you here.” She pushed a manila wallet across her desk towards me. “Of course, if you have any questions, I’m on the other end of the phone, and… if you don’t want to help us, we will absolutely understand. You’re under no moral obligation here, okay?”

“Sure,” I said, following her lead and standing up from the chair. She showed me out, handing my folder to me as we walked. I felt like I was wading through water. Helen could tell me that I had no moral obligation, but I didn’t buy it. I had the opportunity to stop the spread of lunitis forever. How could I possibly say no without being enormously selfish? My life meant nothing in the balance of the world’s entire wolf population.

Just before she left me in the reception area, I turned to catch her.

“Helen…?”

She turned on her heel, fixing me with a warm smile. “Jack.”

“If… y’know. If the operation goes bad.”

Helen nodded, keeping her composure.

“Can you still…? Are the samples okay?”

She nodded. “Oh, yes. As soon as we have your permission, it’s one hundred percent guaranteed that we’ll get what we need. Nothing else factors in.” She paused, prooferring her hand to shake mine goodbye. Her tone was softer as she continued. “It wouldn’t be in vain.”

I nodded, giving her hand another firm shake. “Alright. Thank you. I guess I’ll be in touch.”

“Take your time.”

I headed out of the hospital with the world soaring and spinning around me. For the first time, I felt like I could detect the earth spinning on its axis, and the planet roaring through the vast vacuums of space. Nothing was fixed. I had a hard time making my way to the line of cabs outside the hospital, quietly grateful that I hadn’t driven.

I had a lot to focus on. The traffic would have been one factor too many.

Now that I was out of the clinical environment and sliding into the back of a cab, my brain switched right back over to its favorite topic of the last week. I could picture his face, even though it hurt my chest to do it. No, I couldn’t ask for his advice about this life-altering decision, but I could still torture myself thinking of the decision he’d made about me.

The other thing that stuck out from that conversation was a far finer detail, but it still stuck between my ribs like a knife. As I climbed into a cab and gave my home address to the driver, it was this smaller detail that was echoing through my thoughts. I was still mad at myself that I’d even set this up. It wasn’t the kind of thing I’d usually say, or think, or feel.

But in the moment, when I was afraid of losing him, it had slipped right out.

There’s something about us, Dylan. It’s just right. Cards on the table, it’s… it’s just fucking right, more than I ever thought it could be. And now there’s a baby on the way, and I love Josie about as much as I-

Don’t, he had cut in — and ‘cut’ was right. I felt the sharpness of it even now, shifting in my seat in the back of the cab as I tried to force the feeling down. He didn’t want to hear me say it.

My blood ran cold. I’d fallen into something I shouldn’t have, and maybe that meant there was only one choice left to make. I slipped my phone out of my pocket and hit the first number on my speed dial.

“SeaTac Tat; this is Mark speaking. How can I help?”

“Hey, Mark. It’s me. Listen, I know I said I was gonna be out today, but I need to come in and talk to you guys. I think I’m gonna need to take time off work for a while…”