Chapter Text
Caught Between the Moon and New York City. Part 1/?.
I know it’s crazy, but it’s true…
The large building with its panes of black glass always reminded her of a beehive—an unassuming exterior hiding a flurry of activity that few ever saw into. She was glad to liken herself to a worker bee, but she did not like the thought of having a queen bee at all. Being a part of something filled her with a sense of purpose, however being a mindless drone caused her rebellious streak to raise its head. Perhaps that was why she showed up every single day on time for her shifts, but always working a non-standard shift and always in non-standard clothes. She liked the boundaries of her world, but liked pushing against them just as much. Some days she wondered if there would come a time that she would not constantly follow and rebel. Perhaps there was something missing in her life that would lead her to a place of energy without the love/hate aspect. Surely it was possible to thrive living the life that she loved? Her thoughts in their usual swirl, she made her way into the large black complex of the Facility.
Her shoes squeaked just slightly as she made her way down the corridor. The tiles had just been mopped and the prints marked her path. No one was following it, but imagining that they were gave her a thrill. She shook her head and looked back down the hallway as she smoothed the hair at the base of her scalp. She loved her job. She, along with her company, had knowledge that the rest of the every day world lived in ignorance of. Her team needed her, which allowed her to have something in common with other people, which was rare in her life. She didn’t love the feeling the Facility gave her—the feeling that she was being watched, followed, and perhaps tracked. Sometimes she wondered if the Hive analogy she imagined on the outside went a little deeper with internal surveillance.
Like a rollercoaster the thought made her pulse race with a touch of fear and that all too alluring thrill.
Andrea slipped through the door closing it with an arm behind her as her eyes adjusted to the darker hallway ahead. The lights had a flicker that she figured was on purpose because there was no way the money pumped into this facility could explain the poor lighting. ‘Maybe the Manager had a macabre sense of humor.’ She absently wondered to herself. Half turning she re-engaged the security of the door and then made her way to Arrivals. After so many years in school and carrying around books or being buried by them, it felt weird to walk with nothing but a silver chain looped around her waist as if it simply went with her doc martens and dark eyeliner.
At the end of the hall two figures stood looking into the side room of Arrivals. It was one of the few access points to the outside of the building, but it was so deep into the complex it only lead into a highly secured area. It wasn’t exactly the way you’d want to enter the Facility. Vaguely Andrea thought of the Traitor’s Gate at the Tower of London. Although their arrivals came in trucks and were heavily sedated, she wondered if they felt similar upon arrival. This was the worst part of her job—the thought that she was dealing with prisoners. Except that these prisoners had committed no crime other than being interesting in some way. Perhaps not all prisoners of the Tower were guilty, but they had at least been accused of a crime—the individuals that Andrea studied were only guilty of differing from the norm, advancing evolution, or simply being rare in a way that a killer whale, panda, or wolf never could.
Well. A wolf perhaps could enter this facility, but that would depend on the wolf.
Andrea had thought more than once about quitting. It had all come to a head in Paris the previous spring. Never would she go out ‘in the field’ again, thinking of it now, she couldn’t believe she had been so stupid. They had convinced her that she needed to leave the lab. Then they had convinced her that there was a danger to the populace. It had been pure manipulation on their part she had realized too late and with a great deal of misery. She had thrown a silver net to capture a vampire who looked rather like her mother and kept appealing to her for freedom. Andrea wondered if her gift had been mind reading, her pleas had been so spot on. Once grim realization had settled, it had been all she could do to walk away in the night. It was even colder still to realize that she had no place in this world outside the Organization. She had walked back in the early dawn, but refused to study that specimen. Nate would study that vampire and receive all the credit, if he was even able to find out her special gifts.
Sucking in a slow lungful of air, Andrea prepared to greet this next challenge even as she consciously stuffed the old challenges back into the locked files of her brain. She couldn’t afford the distraction.
Leaning against the wall near the glass Andrea asked, “What do we have?” as she took in their excited expressions.
Nate looked at her, his brown eyes sweeping over her body in an instant before he turned back to the glass. “A wolf.” He said reverentially.
Even in her line of work that was rare. Wolves were notoriously careful and even once spotted they were difficult to track—much like regular run of the mill arctic, timber and gray wolves. Andrea stepped forward and turned pushing into Nate to get a look through the window.
The wolf looked up at the same moment as Andrea looked in. It stood looking at her as if transfixed. The blue eyes seemed to search the glass and bore into Andrea’s consciousness. It took the brunette’s breath away looking at it. The intelligence could be seen in the look. The posture was proud and Andy’s hand came up to play with the button of her shirt as she pondered the rare beauty on the other side of the plexi.
“Female.” Nate said with a smug sort of snort. “We found her in freaking Central Park.” He shook his head. Andrea could feel him next to her, but she couldn’t take her eyes off the wolf. “I don’t know what the hell she was doing out there.” He said as if the creature was dim-witted or handicapped. Andrea looked the wolf over, taking in the strong legs, clean coat, and overall bearing. She wanted to know more. “72 inches from nose to tail. She tried to bite me, I tell ya.” Nate clucked his teeth and Andrea wondered if he was a chicken in his former life. “135 pounds, pure white coat, long hair.”
Andrea touched the glass wanting to touch the wolf. ‘That wasn’t the information I wanted.’ She didn’t roll her eyes, but it was a near thing. Instead she asked, “When will she be moved?” In her mind she flicked through facts and dates. Quarantine was at least three days. The weekend was her trip home to Ohio where she wasn’t supposed to talk about Vampires, Fairies, Wereanimals, or wear dark eyeliner. The doc martens were accepted as vaguely military or at least good in the weather.
Nate reached up and pulled her by her arm until she was facing him, but her mind was still at the glass. “You know the drill, Andy.”
His voice had become a whine in the last several months and she wasn’t entirely sure what to do about that. Just because he was one of the few people that she got along with, didn’t mean that she needed to stay with him, right? ‘He’s really nice and always thinks of you and that should count for something, right?’ Andrea closed her eyes and then tried to focus on him. She wasn’t sure where this flare of distaste was coming from, but she really wished he’d remove his hand and let her look at the wolf again. He knew how much she loved them. ‘Maybe it was a full moon?’ Her brain helpfully supplied and then she about started laughing in Nate’s face as she remembered the wolf. No matter the story behind her, it had to be the full moon. Otherwise no way, no way in hell would this wolf be changed and roaming around Central Park.
“Hey, you alright?” Nate asked as he squeezed her arm.
“Oh, you know. I just have a lot going on.” Andrea was good at losing others in a stream of random. “The trip home, this new specimen, those reports and I’m supposed to go out with Lily tomorrow.” Nate lost interest pretty quickly and Andrea knew she would be free of him soon. She thought that her increased annoyance with him had a correlating annoyance for her within his mind. If she could just prove her hypothesis, then maybe she’d be able to deduce her next steps. She wasn’t sure if the causality mattered or which came first. It was a bit like the chicken and the egg for her at this point.
“I gotta go. Dr. Haddarack said we’re leaving at O-Five-Hundred tomorrow.” He smiled at her and leaned in. Andrea turned her cheek to him annoyed. She hated the mission aspect of their work and any and all reminders of it. He knew not to talk about it, let alone act thrilled. As far as she was concerned they were kidnapping folks and it was getting harder and harder to not admit that to herself.
Nate left and Andrea stared at the wolf, leaning her body forward into the glass. Rick had been silent the whole time he stood there watching too. “She’s beautiful.” He said and patted Andrea on the shoulder as he walked away. Andrea pondered why he didn’t annoy her for a second as she watched the wolf look up again at the motion. Then she realized that Rick hadn’t wanted anything from her except to express a shared joy in seeing a beautiful creature. A creature they knew relatively little about.
She turned and watched Rick’s departure down the darkened hallway. He was taller than Nate, had a military hair cut, and blue eyes. Andrea smiled appreciatively as she acknowledged that he was more like her than anyone else in the Facility. He was there because of his brains, not his desire to conquer or capture. She had often caught eyes with him in meetings where the treatment of specimens had shaken them to the core. ‘And he looks good in those pants.’ She smiled. ‘Full moon.’ She scolded herself as he opened and shut the door.
On the other side of the glass the wolf lay down and huffed a big sigh across its paws.
Andrea looked at her again. There was a story there, she knew. There was a person there too. She hated that between quarantine and her trip it would be a week before she could see the wolf again. It whined and looked up at the lights and then the glass.
A little freaked out by the coincidence that she didn’t quite believe in, Andrea pressed the security button. “Hey, can you dim the lights?” When they dropped by half, she buzzed again. “Thanks.” She looked again at the glass but the wolf had closed her eyes and turned her head away from the glass to rest on her paws. Andrea walked away down the corridor.
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