The green eyes staring back at me were a subtle reminder of how much sleep I wasn’t getting. The hot shower I’d just taken didn’t help keep them open either. Steam clouded the bathroom. So much so I had to let the window down. It was small, round, about the size of a large plate. The bathroom itself, on the other hand, was grandiose in comparison to how other Anthros were living inside of the city. Black Harbor was miles away, and I had no intention of ever setting foot inside that abysmal place so many called home. Once Trevor died, I was done with it, with them, with their whole system. But my talents weren’t to go to waste. So here I stayed ... on The Rock.

The Rock was a station seemingly out of touch from the Scalers that patrolled and controlled the city. I’d been the head scientist for the last two years working day and night on a formula, a serum to help their condition. Trevor was the one who insisted I try to perfect it. He hated his scales and wanted nothing more than to be pure Anthro, to be with me. But those dreams were dashed long ago.

A soft knocking at the door drew me from my thoughts and into my room. My room was one with a small kitchenette and a luxurious bathroom. The powers that be kept me comfortable so I’d stay, but the longer I stayed, the more I’d begun to feel they wouldn’t let me leave even if I wanted to.

I pushed my wet, raven black hair back into a ponytail before throwing on my robe and cracking the door just enough to see who was standing there. His short stature and skinny frame weren’t attractive in the slightest, but he smiled and made smart remarks that often alluded to something happening between us. I rolled my eyes, refusing to open the door any more than it was, “What do you want Eric?”

He ran his fingers through his hair, “Only to discuss the latest results with you. May I come in?”

“No,” I told him bluntly, “It’s not even seven, and you’re knocking on my door? I’ll be down there when I’m good and ready. Is that okay with you?”

“Of course,” he blushed taking a step back, “I, just, uh, I just got excited. I’ve been up all night in the lab. I couldn’t sleep.”

“Try harder next time,” I replied. “I don’t want you running tests on my subjects without my approval. You may limit the longevity of their utilization.”

“I got it,” he said raising his hands in surrender, “And have you given any thought to my other test inquiry?”

“Letting you serve me dinner and then treat me like a pet isn’t a test inquiry,” I snarled. “Just stay focused on the work. We’re the only ones who can do this, and I’m tired as it is. Please don’t make this any more difficult than it needs to be.”

“Well, that’s just it! We are the only two smart enough to do what we do. So we might as well keep the brains between us,” he snickered. “Just have dinner with me.”

“Why don’t you go jump off the cliff?”

“You’re playing hard to get, and I love a good chase. So I’ll save this conversation for another time. Meet me in the lab at seven then, yeah?”

“Yeah,” I nodded, “I’ll be down by seven.”

I should have slammed the door in his face, but we still had to work together. A part of me wondered if he enjoyed me being ruthless with his feelings. He always took my verbal assaults with a smile. It wouldn’t surprise me. He’d been a pet too once, but he killed the Scaler who held him captive. There were more stories like that then they would have you believe. Being a pet myself, I’d seen quite a few of my own. But my Scaler didn’t deserve to die, at least not the way he did.

Putting memories of my past behind me, I decided to get dressed and head to the lab before Eric decided to come back again. Once I left my quarters, I knew that I’d have some new work to catch up on; thanks to him. While I was grateful to be useful, exhaustion didn’t even begin to feel what was coursing through me.

The four floors of The Rock Station were split up between the lab and the living quarters. There weren’t many of us here. Outside of the band of soldiers who shuttled back and forth between The Rock and Black Harbor, I’d say about eight Anthros were occupying this station, myself included.

I came here with one goal in mind. It was to help Scalers eliminate the scaling process. Unfortunately, I’ve only been able to slow it down. Trevor had been one of a few I'd come across to want to shed their birthright. I worked tirelessly on it until the day he died. Tears threatened to fall thinking about our last time together. He wasn't a dominant Scaler, and another had threatened to take me. He refused to let that happen, and he lost his life because of it.

It wasn't the time or the place for reflection. I needed to get myself together to start my day. Taking a deep breath, I swiped my badge in front of the sealed door. I could hear the bolts sliding out of their locked position. A low ringing beep sounded before something clicked and the door pushed open.

The lab wasn't anything fancy. Our workspace was always clean for the most part, and we ran most of our tests on the floor above us. This particular floor simply held computers, printers, small workstations, and the subject quarters. We fashioned bedrooms into holding cells to make our subjects as comfortable as possible while we ran our tests. I only had one in the lab at the moment. Scalers were hard to capture alive, and those who were once interested in my work didn't think too highly of me once Trevor died. They blamed me, and they were right to do so.

It wasn't until I stepped inside that I saw what Eric had been working on all night. The one subject I'd been working with looked like she was midscale. Her royal blue underbelly dwarfed her darker grey scales. However, something was off. She hadn't completed her transformation. The rooms were big enough to hold our winged lab experiments, but there weren't any wings. There wasn't a snout blowing flames, nor smoke billowing. Her mouth was sealed shut, scaled closed. Exhaustion and fear beamed from her eyes as I approached her. She reached through the bars to grab for me with tears.

“What the hell have you done?!”

Eric’s sinister laugh from behind me sent a chill down my spine, “I figured out a way to isolate the scale sequence. I can stop it wherever they are in the process by eliminating one of the chemical compounds of the serum, just … in … the … nick of time.”

The amount of pride in his voice was far more distressing than I was willing to admit.

“How do we reverse this?” I asked him stroking the side of her face delicately.

Avery, her name was Avery, and she trusted me to keep her safe while we tried to find a way to strip her of her scales and wings. This wasn't a part of the deal, and she was my last volunteer. The last few we tested ended up scarred indefinitely. Scale patches sprouted all over their body.

"It should wear off in the next hour or two. The last dose I gave her was around five. The fix only lasts about four hours. But think about everything we can do to regain our position amongst these winged freaks! Anthros can be great again. We will be on top! So when's the next time you're bringing a batch of the base ingredient? We need more if we're going to keep running these tests. And I told Shaw that we'd have some advancements to show him," Eric maneuvered around the lab like what he did was normal, or humane.

"I don't know. I was using Avery to gain access to it, and now that you've done this, I can't say," I told him. I knew where to get it, but I wanted him to feel bad for what he did to her.

"You're telling me that you haven't extracted every ingredient in that serum! That's Chemistry 101! What do you think we're working on down here?!"

Before I could answer, the door swished open, followed by the sound of Shaw and his band of camo-clad foot soldiers stomping into the lab. I hated when they came in here. It always took hours to decontaminate the room after they left.

This time something was different. They had something with them.

"Open the door to one of the rooms!" Shaw commanded. Shaw Vance stood at a towering 6'4 with buzzed cut blonde hair and dark brown eyes. Those eyes contained so much rage; I wondered why he hadn't gone crazy yet. I moved out of the way as they shuffled a large black, lumpy bag into the room next to Avery's.

Curiosity gripped me as I peered into the room while the soldiers unzipped the bag. He was the most beautiful creature I'd ever seen. He was unconscious, but the way his hair fell delicately over his face as streaks of daylight beamed over his body, made me silently swoon.

“What’s going on?” I finally asked. I couldn’t help but wonder if I’d seen him before. There was something so familiar about his face the more I looked at it.

“Got you a live one like Eric requested,” Shaw stated firmly. He stepped out of the room and waited for me to hit the button to seal it shut. Turning to Eric, he nodded to him, “And thanks for those serum tipped tranquilizers. It worked like a gem. When can we expect a full arsenal?”

“Arsenal?” my eyes darted back and forth between Eric and Shaw.

Eric made a few faces as if disappointed his secret was out. With a heavy sigh, he gazed into my eyes, "Listen, Addy-"

“Addison,” I corrected him.

"Addison, we have something here that can change the balance of what's going on out there, and it's up to us to see it through. We need more test subjects because the last one we have is going to die soon."

“She wouldn’t be dying if you hadn’t been testing on her outside of my schedule. This isn’t right! We can’t kidnap-”

"It's a war out there, Addison," Shaw said. "We need an advantage, and this is it. We're not trying to exterminate them. We're just trying to make the sides even again."

I wanted to believe him. I tried to look at Eric and trust him again. I tried to understand why they were taking my work and weaponizing it. But all my questions would have to wait. As I turned toward Avery's room, I saw her arm on the ground between the bars. Her entire face scaled over suffocating her. This wasn't what I signed up for. This wasn't the intention of my research. All I knew was that before we began on the new guy, I had to get through an autopsy of her. Eric wouldn't be allowed anywhere near the new specimen. I'd keep him alive, and if I could … I'd help him get out of here too.