It had been a week now since Kell began studying Adrian’s blood. Although intensely curious, he held back on his desire to introduce normal blood to the samples. What he was working with was a biohazard and he needed to be careful. After holing himself up in his b for so long, he still had no idea what he was looking at and it disturbed him. He couldn’t understand the processes by which the silvery parasites functioned. The napkins were gone now, each of his samples having grown bigger. He’d seen them strip the napkin for resources and use it to rapidly build copies of themselves.

  It confused Kell as he didn’t understand how they did it. Looking up from his microscope, he took a deep breath. A knock on the locked doors caught his attention. He stood up and made his way over to unlock them. The doors slid open, revealing Adrian and Rann. Kell looked at Rann curiously.

  “Jyn wants him accompanied on the ship at all times,” she expined.

  Kell nodded. “Adrian, come in. I’ll take it from here Rann.”

  “I’ll still have to wait outside.”

  “That’s fine, but the doors will be locked.” Rann shrugged and took up her position. Adrian entered further, waiting for the doors to close. Once they were, Kell motioned towards his desk and sat Adrian down in front of him.

  “What did you need to talk to me about that it had to be in private?” Adrian asked, mildly worried.

  Kell regarded Adrian with unsure eyes. “It’s not something I wanted to talk about but I’m getting increasingly worried.” Steeling himself, Kell continued. “I was looking at a sample of your blood an –”

  “You were what!?” Adrian shouted angrily. “Why would you do that? How did you get your hands on a sample of my blood?” he asked in a cold fury. “We threw out the napkins that –” Adrian blinked. “No, you threw out the napkins. You secretly kept them without anybody knowing, didn’t you?” he accused. Kell looked away, a guilty expression on his face. “When will it stop, Kell? When will I finally stop being an experiment? That’s all I wanted. You knew that and yet here we are. Why couldn’t you just leave it be?”

  “Adrian, I’m worried about what might be happening in your body.”

  “I don’t want to know, Kell. Let me at least still feel human. If I know,” Adrian choked, “then I have to face what I’ve really become. I don’ think I can handle that.”

  “But—”

  “I don’t want to hear it!” Adrian yelled in a broken voice. “Keep it to yourself and promise me you’ll stop looking. Please,” Adrian begged, his voice heavy, “leave me my st shred of humanity. You think I don’t know I’ve changed? How often I’ve spent wondering? I know the changes the best. They keep me up at night, Kell. I don’t want to know the results, because then what does that make me? Let me cling to the illusion. It’s all I have left of the original. Please don’t take that away from me,” he choked. “It’s all I have left.”

  “I can’t promise you that,” Kell said. “What if you’re slowly dying? Infested with a disease? It’s my job as a doctor to heal my patient. There’s something wrong with you and we need to figure out what it is. I took an oath, Adrian.”

  Adrian leveled him a cold, frigid stare. “Fuck you, Kell,” he spat. “Is it so hard to respect my wishes? Can you handle the fallout of what you’ll learn? Everything you learn is going to be weaponized. I don’t want the loss of life to be because of me. I refuse. But you can’t respect that because all you see is something you don’t understand. A puzzle to be solved. Have you thought about the consequences of solving it? What you’d be unleashing?”

  “Adrian, think of the good we could do if we figured out what they did to you!” Kell said, changing tracks. “Not everything has to be weaponized.”

  “Stop looking, Kell,” Adrian said darkly. “You’re not going to like what happens next if you don’t. Destroy it. Destroy the sample and go back to pretending I’m a person like the rest of you.”

  “Are you threatening me?”

  “Do you feel threatened, Kell?” Adrian asked quietly. “Why?”

  “Because you clearly just threatened me!”

  “If that’s how you choose to interpret my words then there’s nothing I can do. Be ready to take responsibility for what happens next. I’d ask you again, but I know you’re not going to listen. Your curiosity will eventually get the better of you and you’ll go digging. Be very careful with what you find,” Adrian spat.

  Adrian stood up and stormed out of the med bay, only to be stopped by the locked doors. He immediately drew parallels between being locked in his old cell and the med bay. He turned towards Kell. “Unlock the doors, Kell, and let me out,” he said ominously. “I will not be held in a b against my will ever again,” he growled. “This time,” Adrian said slowly, “it’s a threat.”

  Kell saw the feral look in Adrian’s eyes and became acutely aware that he didn’t have his gun on him. Standing up slowly, he said “Give me a moment, Adrian. It wasn’t my intention to keep you locked in here.” Slowly making his way over to the control panel next to the door, Kell’s nerves fred when he saw Adrian tremble in a barely restrained rage. With sweaty hands, he unlocked the doors and they opened.

  Adrian flew out of the med bay and sped off the ship, catching Rann by surprise. She shouted for Adrian to wait. Jogging to catch up, she tried asking about what had happened only to be silenced by a furious gre. As they descended the ramp, Rann caught Adrian by the arm. “What’s going on, Adrian?”

  “Did you know?” Adrian asked coldly as he whirled on her, a dangerous edge to his voice. He searched Rann’s eyes but only saw confusion. She had no idea that Kell was studying a sample of him.

  “Adrian, you’re not making any sense! What’s going on?”

  “Kell’s been studying a sample of my blood,” Adrian seethed.

  Rann blinked. “Since when?” she balked. It had been understood that they weren’t going to be studying Adrian at all. Adrian expined the situation to her, Rann’s eyes growing wide. “He shouldn’t have done that,” she said darkly. “I can see why you’re this upset.”

  “No, Rann, you don’t. Your military’s going to want to know all of my secrets and I’m terrified I’m going to be put back on an operating table so they can find out.” Tears welled in his eyes. “What is it that’s so interesting about me that three separate species want to perform live experiments on me?” he cried. “Do you really understand what it means for me to be researched? Until when can I be left alone?”

  Rann didn’t know what to say. She wasn’t like Reya. “I had no idea he was studying you,” she stammered out. “Aren’t you the least bit curious about what they did to you?”

  “No, I’m not.” he replied sadly. He wrenched his arm free from Rann’s grip. “I think I need some time alone,” he said, the anger draining out of him. Rann watched his fury gradually be repced by a deep, existential terror before he spun away from her. She could only watch helplessly as he walked with heavy steps towards the back of the house. He disappeared from sight and Rann knew it would only be several hours before she saw him again.

  Worried, she entered the house and went to find Reya, who was sitting on the couch in the living room. Jyn was sitting in the recliner, reading his data ste. Looking up from the holoscreen, Reya immediately spotted that something was wrong. When she asked what happened, Rann reluctantly filled her in on the details. Her shock was palpable.

  Reya’s immediate reaction was to ask after Adrian, wanting to make sure he was okay, knowing that what had happened must feel like a nightmare for him. Her worry only grew when Rann told her she didn’t know where Adrian was. Reya’s mind immediately fshed to their special spot, knowing that she would find him there.

  Kell entered the house, searching for Adrian. Reya marched up to him, furious. “Is it true that you’ve been studying Adrian?” She was beyond livid at the thought. Adrian deserved to be left alone after all that he’d been through. She already knew some of the changes that were done to him and didn’t want others learning. Adrian would be given no respite once they did.

  “Yes,” Kell said seriously, “but it was for –”

  A resounding sp cracked as Reya’s hand left an angry red imprint on Kell’s cheek. The room stood in stunned silence, Kell the most surprised of all. “How dare you!” she roared. “He’s a person, not a b rat! Why couldn’t you respect his wishes? You’re no better than the gru’ul. You take and you take until there’s nothing left! Until when will it be enough? How many pieces are you willing to break Adrian into until you’re satisfied?” Reya seethed, trying to cover up the hurt of having one of her team members breach her and Adrian’s trust so massively. “Am I next, after what they did to me?” Her eyes were hard and unforgiving.

  “Reya, calm down,” Jyn said. “I’m sure Kell had his reasons. We all know Adrian’s been hiding things from us. Don’t you think it’s time we learn what they are? We deserve to know.”

  Reya whirled and faced Jyn. “Fuck you for even thinking that! He doesn’t owe us those answers. Are you telling me you want to perform even more experiments on him? That’s the only way you’re going to learn.”

  “If that’s what it takes, then yes.”

  Reya looked at Jyn with utter disgust. “You really think that, don’t you?” she said, searching him. Any leftover shred of affection Reya still had for Jyn died on the spot. Jyn was forced to watch the moment that he became nothing to her. It tore at him. It hurt, being reduced to so little in the eyes of the woman he loved.

  “We need to know if he’s dangerous to us,” Jyn shed out, withering under Reya’s cold stare.

  “You have no idea what was done to him!” Reya said, her voice holding a dangerous edge. “He’s done nothing to warrant being treated this way. Absolutely nothing!” She turned back to Kell. “I’m disappointed in you.” Her eyes mirrored her words, filling Kell with shame. “Destroy the sample, Kell. Stop studying it.”

  “Are we supposed to think you’re saying this out of the goodness of your heart?” Jyn asked bitterly.

  “What do you mean by that?” Reya asked indignantly.

  “Face it, you don’t want to know what’s happened to Adrian so that you can keep on pretending he’s normal. Do you think you’d still love him if you knew what he really was?”

  Reya looked appalled. “You think so little of me?” she asked, tears welling in her eyes as they turned hard. “Why can’t you see him for the person he is?”

  “He’s a freak, Reya, not a person! Kell studying him confirms it!”

  “You don’t even know what he found!” Reya shot back, not noticing Tassie and Beor, who had slipped in unnoticed. They looked at Rann with wide eyes at the accusations being thrown around by Jyn. Having missed most of the argument, they were both lost as to what was happening. Regardless of the specifics, they could tell that it wasn’t good.

  “I don’t need to! I don’t understand how you can love such a thing.”

  “Stop twisting this around with your jealousy! By the gods, is that what this is about? You think he deserves to be another experiment because you’re jealous?”

  “No,” Jyn insisted. “This is about Adrian having potentially dangerous secrets that we need to know in order to be safe.”

  “After all this time, you only see him as a threat,” Reya accused. “Wake up and start seeing him as a person.”

  “Reya, I didn’t mean to study him,” Kell interjected. “I just wanted to make sure he was healthy.”

  “I’m sure the bloodied napkins you stole just magically ended up under your microscope,” Reya rolled her eyes. “You knew exactly what you were doing, which makes it worse! How are we supposed to trust you when you pull shit like this?”

  “Aren’t you curious about what they did to him?” Kell asked. “Imagine the discoveries we could make!”

  “There it is,” Reya accused with narrowed eyes. “The real reason you took the sample. Admit it, you don’t care about Adrian. You only care about how different he is.”

  “I’m doing this for Adrian’s sake! What I found is worrying. There’s something seriously wrong with him and I’m concerned it might be harmful. Look me in the eyes and tell me you aren’t curious about what they did to him.”

  “I am curious,” Reya admitted. “The difference is that I’m not curious enough to go behind his back. I don’t need to know what he’s hiding to love him. I don’t care what you found. Keep it to yourself. He’s clearly perfectly healthy as it is. There’s no need to go digging.”

  “That’s fine and all,” Rann spoke up, “but Adrian’s missing. We need to find him before anything happens.”

  Reya sighed. “I know where he is. I’ll go bring him back.”

  “How is it that the two of you always know where the other goes?” Tassie finally asked.

  “Call it an educated guess,” Reya replied, choosing not reveal any information on where she was pnning to go. “I’ll go grab the fre gun and head out. I don’t know when we’ll be back.” Nobody moved to stop her as she put her shoes on and exited the back door, not caring about dragging dirt into the house in the slightest. As she passed by, she shot Kell one st disappointed look. She didn’t spare Jyn so much as a gnce.

  Rann pinched the bridge of her nose. “Why did you have to do that, Kell?” she asked.

  “Could somebody please tell us what’s going on now?” Beor asked. He didn’t like being left out of the loop, especially while the events were happening right in front of him. Tassie nodded along. Rann gave a quick run down on what had transpired.

  “Wow,” Beor whistled after hearing all of the details. “That’s a low blow, Kell.”

  “I was doing this for his own good! His blood was the wrong colour, Beor. You might not have seen it properly when Adrian cut himself, but I did. I was worried there was something wrong with him! So I took a sample back to be sure. What I’ve seen is unbelievable. I have no idea what I’m even looking at.”

  “Man, all the guy wants is to not be treated like an experiment.”

  “I’m sorry!” Kell said defensively. “I couldn’t help myself. Admit that you all want to know just as much as I do.”

  “I’m not sure I want to know,” Tassie spoke up quietly. “You haven’t seen the price Adrian paid for some of those experiments.”

  “You have?”

  “Yes,” Tassie said gravely.

  “Does this have to do with the cssified information we’re not allowed to know about?” Jyn interrupted.

  Tassie looked at him with a heavy weight behind her eyes. “It does. I’m not going to tell you what it was that we found, but it was nothing short of horrific. It’s even worse for Adrian. He got to watch himself go through that onscreen while reliving it in his head. You should’ve seen him afterwards.”

  “We did see him afterwards. He was a zombie.”

  “No,” Tassie shook her head. “Before that, while he was in the room with me. The man was an utter wreck. Can you imagine what that’s like, watching yourself be tortured horrifically? Because that’s what it deserves to be called. The amount of suffering in that video is sickening.”

  “You found a video of one of his experiments,” Beor realized. He paled. “And we made him watch that?” Tassie nodded and he felt himself turn green. “By the gods,” he swore. “Then he finds out we’re studying him, holy shit. That has to be such a mind-fuck.”

  “It’s why we were so out of it when we got back. I’m not telling you anything about the experiment. Leave the man his dignity and never try to find out,” Tassie said with a shudder. Rann looked at her in concern, but was waved off. “Nobody deserves to go through what he did,” she said hollowly.

  “Tassie, what did you see?” Rann asked gently.

  Tassie shook her head. “I’m not saying.” She shot Rann a level look. “He deserves that much.”

  “What could be so bad about it?” Jyn questioned.

  “May you never find out.”

  “Stop being so dramatic about it and either tell us or not. Stop making allusions.”

  “I won’t say anything more on the topic.”

  Jyn sighed in frustration. “Fine, I get it. It’s technically cssified and we probably shouldn’t even know this much, right?” Tassie said nothing. “That’s what I thought.”

  Tassie turned to face Kell. “Please destroy the sample, Kell. This really isn’t fair to him.”

  Kell looked torn. “You really want me to throw away the only opportunity we have to learn something?”

  “Yes,” Tassie said forcefully. “If you keep looking, don’t be surprised when the Tribunal comes knocking. They’re not going to be happy.”

  “Is that a threat, too?”

  “No, it’s the reality of the situation that you don’t seem to understand. Did somebody else threaten you as well?”

  “Adrian did, when I told him that I was studying him.”

  “I knew he was dangerous!” Jyn said triumphantly. After all of this time, he finally had proof. “I told you he couldn’t be trusted.”

  “Shut up, Jyn!” Tassie rebuked. “We’re the ones that are dangerous. This is him reacting to that. You can’t hold that against him. The only thing we reliably do is find ways to threaten him. Eventually we were going to go too far.”

  “This is what crossed the line?” Kell asked. “Me studying him?”

  “Yes, since our Tribunal passed a decree saying that we literally can’t experiment on Adrian. Weren’t you told this?”

  “I didn’t think me viewing a sample constituted as experimentation!”

  “That’s up for debate. Keep the fact that you ever had that sample hidden and destroy it before somebody finds it in your possession. It’s for your own good.”

  Kell didn’t know how to respond. Neither did the others.

  ***

  Reya found Adrian curled in a ball, back against the rock, right where she knew he’d be. He looked so small, sitting like that. Reya joined him wordlessly and settled in next to him. He unfurled himself and leaned against her, letting her hold him. “Do you want to talk about it?” she asked gently.

  Adrian looked her with red-rimmed, puffy eyes. “Kell’s studying me,” he said, his voice tinged with fear. Now that he’d had some time alone, he began to process the ramifications of being scrutinized under a microscope. It terrified him. He told Reya such. He expined his fears of how he would inevitably end up being experimented on again. He broke down at the thought.

  Reya let him get it all out, gently running her fingers through his hair. “This shouldn’t have happened,” she said finally. “I had no idea my cooking lesson would bring this,” she said, tears welling. “You wouldn’t have gotten hurt,” she hiccupped, “you wouldn’t have been studied. Everything would’ve been fine.”

  “I loved your cooking lesson,” Adrian sniffed. “I wouldn’t trade that time spent with you for the world. Speaking of, I never did get to bake with you.”

  “I’m serious, Adrian.” Reya cried. “It’s my fault any of this happened.”

  Adrian shook his head. “It’s Kell’s fault for taking the sample and studying it. All he had to do was throw out those napkins. I was hoping this day would never come, but it’s here. How much longer until he continues to study me?”

  “I told him to destroy the sample. Yelled at him, actually. I may have s – you know what, never mind. Point is, he should destroy it.”

  “I don’t trust him anymore, Reya. We both know he’s going to keep it and pull it back out one day. I’m sure he’ll have a good reason, but it doesn’t change the fact that he’s still studying it. I don’t want to know what was done to me. I don’t want to truly know how much I’ve changed. I just want to know why they did it. What was so interesting that I was vioted like that? But if the only way to get those answers is by learning how I’ve changed, then I’d rather leave the questions well enough alone. All I want is to be left alone, free from scrutiny.”

  Reya didn’t say anything for a long moment, mulling over what she’d been told. “That’s not going to be easy. Whatever happens, I’ll be there to help you through it.” Envisioning possible scenarios in her head, she was forced to ask herself whether fallout was something she was prepared to endure. She felt him sag with relief and look at her, the sentiment reflected in his eyes. Wondering how many others would see him this vulnerable, she made her decision as she leaned for a soft kiss. “I won’t let you be alone,” she said after breaking apart. “Not any longer.”

  ***

  Dinner was a tense affair that evening. Reya had brought a rather nervous Adrian back. He was calmer now, after their time spent together. He stuck next to Reya like glue throughout the evening as she helped him navigate the events that had transpired after his departure. Kell said very little, sporting an unhappy expression at the thought of having to destroy his sample. Jyn was mildly annoyed at the trouble Adrian had once again caused.

  The table split into private conversations. Rann, Beor and Tassie spoke to one another while Reya and Adrian conversed. Eimir, Kell and Jyn formed the st group, occupying the end of the table. When dinner was mercifully over with, Kell retreated back to the ship.

  Entering the med bay, he went back to his microscope and took one st look at the sample still pced beneath it. Sighing, he took the sample out from under the lens and inspected it in the light. He collected the second sample and pced them side by side on the counter.

  With a pang of regret, Kell cleaned out the container with the leftover blood, carefully disposing of the contents. Unsure whether the whatever was in Adrian’s blood would eat away at the casing, he pced the blood in a gss container and sealed it. Once he was done his task, he took the containers and beled them as a biohazard.

  He thought for a moment, debating where to put the containers that contained anything tainted with Adrian’s blood within. He stored them in a special section of his b dedicated to biohazard disposal. Whatever was there was to be thoroughly incinerated.

  He returned to the two samples he’d left on the counter and picked one of them up. He looked over to the disposal unit, then back to his cabinet where he stored them originally. Collecting the other sample, he made his choice.

  He put both of them back in the cabinet. Just in case.