Dim light from the line beneath the door filled the room with grey shadows. Nothing marked the hours but her growing exhaustion. Stiff white material brushed Amari’s hair into what she imagined was reminiscent of Albert Einstein. A scratchy woolen blanket pulled at her shirt. The familiar sound of material pooling on the ground, Amari looked over the edge of the bed at the lump of nightgown. Sleep had been intermittent and shallow at best.

  A hollow metallic knock reverberated throughout the room. Amari turned her head towards the door, five lines of light dotted the crack. She sighed.

  Another knock echoed. “Miss Spesy. It’s time.”

  Amari swung her legs over the edge, her back leaned slightly back against the wall. Her skin slightly crawled at the griminess of sleeping in her, as her family would call it, street clothes. Rolling her neck, it cracked. As the door clicks open at the third knock, she dead eyed the guard.

  “Thank you, Steve.” Gail stepped in, as coiffed and bright as she was yesterday. “Oh good you are up.”

  “Who can sleep?” Amari crossed her arms and ankles.

  “Oh that might not be good for my results.” Gail muttered to herself. Arms full of paperwork, she waited inside the door.

  “Shucks.” Amari exaggeratedly snapped her fingers.

  Gail flipped the page unaffected by the sarcasm. “Ok, we are going to be getting physical today. Are you up for some obstacle courses?”

  “What?” Amari cocked her head, the smooth metal pressing against her hair.

  “I am going to be running you through a series of tests?” Gail looked up, concern bunching her features. Mumbled words more to herself than to Amari. “Those drugs shouldn’t have long term effects.”

  “Like the military?” Amari tried to puzzle together what Mitchel was searching for.

  “Hmm, yeah. Though we will be testing you in all your forms.” Gail minutely shook her head. Eyes focused back on Amari she smiled.

  “I thought it would be,” Amari paused, “actually I don’t know what I was expecting, but not obstacle courses.”

  “Yes, we find it tests all the attributes of a normal wolf. Agility, strength, speed.” Gail ticked off her fingers as she clutched the papers to her chest.

  “Just not what I was expecting when you said ‘fun.’” Amari relaxed back.

  “Then we will be tackling if you have any extra abilities.” Gail motioned sharply for her to get up and follow.

  “You know of wolves that have extra abilities?” Unmoving, Amari forced calm. She tried to push more awe into her voice than concern.

  “Well I have seen some of your histories, if they are to be believed some wolves have an extra sense even if they aren’t in leadership. Which you and I both know gives a boost to strength and agility.” Gail motioned more sharply. A subtle edge entered her voice, despite the excitement that sparkled in her eyes.

  “Those are like fairy tales like King Arthur or Paul Bunyan.” Amari forced a chuckle, hoping it twisted and rooted in Gail’s mind. It was bad enough she knew about wolves, did she know of other Fae or the variances in wolves themselves?

  “I am now of the mind that until proven false, everything is possible, even if improbable.” Gail stood straighter. “You could still prove different.”

  “Hate to break it to you but I am not going to be any different than your other cases.” Amari determined she wouldn’t push as hard as she could but she would test her acting.

  “Hmmm.” Gail’s brows rose and pinched in. “Are you going to come or not?”

  “I haven’t seen my proof.” Amari pressed her palms into the edge of the bed at the movement of the guard.

  “Oh right, here.” Gail stepped forward. Moving images of Nova passing under Orion’s arm as she entered the hospital filled the screen.

  Amari sighed hopefully. What excuse did the Morningstars give the hospital for her missing her shift? Whatever it was Orion wouldn’t buy it. She just needed to stall.

  “You really should make sign posts or number the elements.” Amari huffed hands on her knees.

  “Can you really not remember the order?” Gail stepped up, her hands on her hips, clipboard fanned out. “Or are you just being obstinate?”

  “And risk my daughter? No way.” Amari kept her face aimed at the ground as she sucked in an exaggerated breath. “I am working on no sleep. Long nights I can handle. But I am not in my twenties anymore, thirty six hours is pushing it for my mental capacity. Signs would help. Unless your research is how a sleep deprived wolf deals with stress.”

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  “Oh, that could be part of the study.” Gail jotted a note in her margin.

  “See helpful.” Amari waved her hand as she stood tall. “I just can’t seem to remember when the turn is in this monstrosity.”

  The indoor arena type space could hold three pitches. Despite her regular run being disrupted since her return home, she was in shape. The track that looped around the edge was in any other circumstances, a dream. Amari pressed her hands into her back as she stretched in an arc. Her eyes checked the count she made of the cameras. Not a single blind spot where she could stop pretending. Cameras covered every angle from the low crawl to the high beam.

  Her mind whirled with how to run the whole course more efficiently. Two seconds on the rope swing if she could grab one handed and release to the cargo net smother. Another half a second, if she skipped a few of the rungs on the bars. Competition made her heart race, but she quashed the thoughts.

  Turning to Gail, Amari drank from the bottled water waiting for her. “Do I have to do this all again as a human tomorrow? Or can you account for the variable of sleep deprivation in your study?”

  “I am going to adapt the study to include this data set. I might call in past participants to do the course again with that same variable change to see if the skew is significant or not. How many hours have you been up?” Gail smiled, the distrust leaving her eyes, as she regarded Amari as a colleague.

  “In all fairness I did have a bit of what we call a twilight sleep.” Amari sat on the bench. Her words were muffled by the towel which swiped down her face. “Or in a clinical term would be microsleep. But I can assure you I am not at peak capacity. Functional but not optimal.”

  “I appreciate your candor, I feel you are a kindred spirit in regards to scientific research. However, I cannot delay you long-term, Mitchel wants his assessment.” Gail sighed. “We will have to press forward and you may become an outlier in the study.”

  “How big is your sample?” Amari leaned back and popped her back.

  “Well your population is not large, but I think I have a significant percentage.” Gail sat next to her. “Do wolves follow the same percentages as the population at large in regards to gender?”

  Amari swallowed her instinct to answer plainly. “You said you didn’t get a chance to test a lot of females? Who have you tested?”

  “No names. But I have had forty seven participants, you included with only about sixteen percent being women. Is that normal?” Gail stared at her. Curiosity burned in her eyes.

  Amari’s mind scrambled. The Morningstar pack only had twenty six pack members. Where did Mitchel get the remaining twenty one? Amari shrugged. “Like Mitchel said, no research has been done. What is your age range cover?”

  Gail looked at her sheets. Her lip pulled between her teeth. “Come to think of it, do you all grow old? I don’t think I have tested anyone older than Mitchel. And he isn’t old.”

  Amari squinted her eyes. Math wasn’t mathing in her mind. Of the members of the Morningstar pack, at least three were elders of the community and highly respected amongst all the packs. Who had Mitchell recruited and what else did he reveal to her? “Sounds like a good study so far. I am rested up, would you like me to run it again?”

  “Oh, yes. Don’t forget that turn.” Gail shook her pen at Amari.

  “Just start the timer.” Amari walked over to the starting block. The long course set before her. Slightly better, but not great should do. Twenty minutes. She’d aim for twenty minutes.

  Two laps around the track. Amari pulled on her strength, as she felt that line of wobbliness in her muscles. Rubber souls gripped the coarse wood of a narrow inclined beam. Amari fixed her gaze away from the ground falling away, as she leapt without hesitation to the platform five feet away. Focused, she hopped on the uneven heighted poles.

  Cracks bit at her palms as she caught herself as her feet just made the edge. Cool metal pinched and pulled at her calluses as she swung herself to the earth. She tried to ignore the artificial turf as it sprayed black beads into her shoes. Arms paddled the air, trying to give her lift as she gripped the fraying rope and launched herself onto the cargo net. Her knees caught on the squares as she scrambled up the slack net. Rolling onto the platform, she kept her balance on the four inch wide beam. The ground swirled beneath her and she swallowed back her rising nausea.

  Making the turn, Amari let her eyes drift to Gail. Her happy bounce stalled Amari’s movement. Under and over, she released her grip feeling the pain ripple out from her spine. Scrambling up, she ran diving to her stomach as she crawled under the razor wire. She circled back to climb the rope and hit the bell. The scrape of coarse rope hair prickled her skin as she lowered herself back to the ground. Sand sprayed as she circled outside the post and zig-zagged though the rest.

  Sprinting, she passed the line at full speed. Amari took an inflated breath. Staring at the ground, she leaned over feigning her exhaustion. “How’d I do? I think I did better.”

  “You did, especially when you didn’t miss the entrance of the crawl. Not the best we’ve had but a solid showing. Middle of the pack so to speak.” Gail chuckled at her joke.

  “Well I tried to really focus this time and not get distracted.” Amari lifted her brows. Killing the urge to roll her eyes as she sat heavily on the bench. “Is that all for today or am I going to have to dance more for my dinner?”

  “No more dancing. But I am going to have you come to the lab with me.” Gail tossed another water bottle at her.

  Amari caught it cleanly and looked around it. “What kind of tests do you have set up there?”

  “We are going to have you run through the tests on your senses. Things we know to be true about wolves, things that were assumed about wolves, and a few more ideas I got from my reading. Nothing too strenuous.” Gail beckoned her to follow after gathering all the papers from the small folding table she was using as a desk.

  “I am going to tell you I am not a fan of blindfolds. Not my style.” Amari shook her head. Her eyes drifted to the closest camera. She felt the eyes watching her.

  “Oh my dear, our equipment is more sophisticated than that.” Gail called over her shoulder.

  Amari’s heart flipped in her chest. “Hey I forgot the hoodie you gave me, wait up a moment.”

  “Hurry up, you took far too long this morning on this, we are brushing up against deadlines here.” Gail huffed.

  “I’m coming, but every lab I have ever been in runs cold enough to bother even a wolf.” Amari shot back over her shoulder as she ran to the rough wooden bench. Tossing the soft material over her shoulder, she jogged to catch up to Gail. A sliver of wood folded into her palm.