Back down by the creek there was a serious discussion going on between the two bears and the boar. The others listened silently and Ted and Smokey joined the circle to listen. Ted noticed his friends were listening in too.
“Look Jason,” all of that doesn’t matter now.” Ted heard Dick say, “You poured the virus out and, though it was wrong, I can’t help but thank you for it and your genius in creating the critical DNA structures that made it work.”
Jason softened a bit, “Well, if you hadn’t contributed the protein coat sequence and Ron hadn’t added the human anthro-morph portions, I suppose it wouldn’t have worked. It was a team effort.” Jason said quietly.
Ron Norcott realized that at this point, it was an us or them sort of situation. The survival of the animorphs was more important now than the offer he got from Transgene and he needed to come clean. Surprises would get them all killed or locked away for life to be experimented on until they were of no further use. All the petty status issues that were so important to Ron meant nothing now. He was an animorph and his survival, along with his fellow animorphs, was all that mattered.
“Dick,” Ron said quietly, “I gotta come clean.”
Dick turned and looked at Ron intently.
“I’ve been spying for Transgene. Fred Johnson knows about the project and knows we were on the verge of a breakthrough. I was going to sell it all to them for what they offered me.” Ron said, his head hanging low.
Dick asked, “What did they offer you?”
Ron looked Dick in the eye, “300,000. more a year and project supervisor.” Ron said.
Jason laughed, “So, I wasn’t the only one unhappy with the pay and Dick’s leadership.”
Dick looked embarrassed. He’d ridden them both very hard to get the project completed. Neither of them knew the kind of pressure Rothman was putting on him. Neither of them knew that Rothman had wanted to dump both Jason and Ron and possibly Dick too, to get someone who would get ‘results’. Well, the three of them got results, alright, but at what price now?
“Well, it doesn’t matter now.” Dick said heavily, “All of those concerns are in the past. It’s just a good thing that Jason destroyed the files and put the computer virus in the mainframe so that it would destroy the copies. This can’t happen again unless 4/5ths of the world population were to become animorphs.”
“Well,” Jason said, “not all of the research was destroyed. I have a copy in a very secure vault in London.”
“Well, that’s something we’ll have to worry about later. It’s dangerous information, but as long as no one knows about it, they can’t make any more of us.” Dick said.
“Yes,” Ron said, “but the virus is active for three weeks after release. Jason dumped the stuff just yesterday.”
“You and everyone who was once human knows what the government and people in general will do to us if they see us, our very lives are in danger. Hell, David Rothman will order the cleaners in and they’ll burn the whole damned forest down, shoot everything that tries to escape and dump enough nitric acid in this creek to dissolve a good portion of the rock surface.”
“He’ll do what?” several of the animorphs said.
“Yep, scorched earth.” Dick said. “Now the question of what we do with our pure human friends here. I’m sorry boys, but if we let you go, the government would get you and probably lock you away somewhere.
“Well, that doesn’t sound so bad, we’d still be human and still be alive.” Said Carl.
“No it doesn’t, but I’m going to tell you the absolute truth.” Dick said gravely. “If we were to let you go, they’d get the information they needed out of you and disconnect your higher functions so that you can’t tell anyone anything or perhaps they’d just experiment on you; like the soldiers they were going to test the virus on. I’m sorry, but finding us means your life is now different forever, any way you look at it.”
“They wouldn’t!” Ralph and John said at the same time.
“Yes they would,” said Ron, “count on it. They’ll do anything to protect this project.”
“But what if we say we don’t know anything,” Ralph said.
“And you think they’ll just believe you?” Jason snorted. “They’ll pump you full of drugs and you’ll tell them what color your girlfriend’s pussy is. You’ll tell them anything they want to know and then they’ll ship you away somewhere, just like Dick said. Perhaps you guys heard about the hiker that was mauled and killed by a pack of wolves up here.”
The three anthro-wolves ears perked up at that.
The three nodded and John said, “I brought a gun just incase the wolves attacked me.”
“That hiker wasn’t attacked by wolves. He’d run across one of the animorph mice we’d created and it had pleaded with him for help. Security caught the both of them. That hiker’s drooling on himself under the assumed name of Ian Roberts at a mental institution for the criminally insane.” Jason said with a certain amount of disgust. “The mouse was put down and dissected.”
“They’d tell your folks you died in the forest fire they’ll set. They’ll even have charred bodies ready to put in the family plot for each of you.” Dick said. “Once your family thinks you’re dead, because why would the coroner lie, they’ll grieve, bury you and move on. They’ll never ask any further questions and if they do, the proof that it is you will be readily available. The sad fact is you know too much now. The only other option is that we kill you now, at least you won’t be vegetables and you won’t die in a lab somewhere. I don’t like any of these options, especially killing any of you, voluntary or not, but that’s all there is.”
The three young men were very pale, paler than the moon could make them.
“So, what’s it going to be?” Dick said, “We haven’t got much time. If we let you go or you escape without being one of us, all of us die. The lab and the government will know exactly what and how many to look for.. Will you choose life on the run as one of us or inevitable lobotomies by some government surgeon? If you choose to be one of us, it may end in a lab anyway, but at least you will have a very slim chance, as will we all, to actually survive in hiding. You’re heightened senses and your human intelligence will make it possible to do that. We’re a small enough group at the present that we could escape into the wilds of Canada and perhaps survive. We’ll have to travel at night and when the moon isn’t full, like tonight and the next two nights and we have one advantage; since there hasn’t been a report to the lab, none of them know what to look for.”
Dick looked up at the rest of the assembled animorphs, he was absolutely sick to his stomach with the horrible situation before them.
Ralph, Carl and John spoke quietly among themselves. Finally, there was an answer.
Ralph spoke for the three of them. “We,” Ralph said, tears in his eyes, “we choose to become animorphs. I want to be a wolf.”
Carl spoke next, “I’ll be a stag.”
Finally John spoke, “I’ll be a badger.”
“But there aren’t any badgers here,” Jason said.
“No, but I ran into one about an hour ago and he bit me. It was my fault, I blundered into him and surprised him. From what I’ve been feeling and the descriptions you all gave of the metamorphosis, I’m becoming an anthro-badger. My balls are starting to tingle and I itch all over.
Sure enough, John raised his shirt and they could all see the fur beginning to push through his skin.
“My God! We’ve been working with direct injections of the virus and animal DNA; I should have guessed a bite would do it! Just like a werewolf!” Ron said.
“Yes, but the transformation time seems to be slowed, perhaps because there was less of the virus in the bite than in the semen… or milk” Jason said as he looked at his mate.
“Alright, let’s get to it.” Dick said. “We’ve got to move out of this area before dawn.”
Ralph and Carl went off with their new pack and herd, respectively. It wasn’t said whether or not they had chosen sex or biting as the way in which they’d become animorphs.
“We need to gather up any clothing and destroy it by fire.” Dick said to the assembled group. “That includes the clothes we lost earlier this morning.” Dick said to Ron more quietly.
Ted sat down on the log next to John as John began to remove his clothes. The talked quietly and Ted scratched John’s back.