the price we pay (David/Graysen)

David hadn't talked about this outside ARI. He knew how badly it could look to the outside world even with the paper being published internationally. He also knew they'd nothing without a test to identify mutant genes in normals. So as he entered Avery's office following the meeting request he did wonder to himself why he was here.

He seen a file on Avery's desk which looked a lot more organised than his shared long table with Artemis but he did lock files away when they weren't being used.

"Good morning Avery, How can I help you today?" he cheerfully said.

Avery Ashford
Graysen Maddox

"Hi David," she said as she nodded towards him and then she spoke because she would not be herself if she did not get right down to business in the end. "I am to understand that you know Mr. Maddox, excuse me Graysen." She said. What her employees did on their time off was their business at the end of the day but still she was well informed.

"So I hear that you have been working on a catalyst of sorts that might turn a human into an oddity if they have a dormant gene inside of them, is this correct?" If not she needed to be corrected because she needed to understand it completely.

David Lightfeather

"Good the two of you know one another," she said as she stood up. At the end of the day Ethan was the face of Ashford since the last name was his and hers too since she was married to him but everything else went by Avery, approval and everything as she took a second and thought about how to word it because she did not want this to be strange.

"Graysen here seems to qualify for a trial that we are starting. He has brothers that are oddities but it somehow seemed to have skipped him. It's like when twins run in a family but skip a generation so we are going to poke him just a little bit and put some stuff in and see what happens. I mean look at him he's big and broad, he can handle it." Small doses of course. "It'll be the three of us and who knows possibly sometime in the next month or two we might see a new oddity come into our course."

Still there was the bad side. "There is the chance that he might experience bad rejections though, become extremely sick but we have just about ruled out all death so that is good."

David knew death was likely if a person didn't have the oddity gene in the first place and they got the treatment in constant unbroken stages. That had been shown as possible in both papers but he was planning on not being a sadist during the processes Graysen would go through. Medical trials didn't go smoothly but since his brothers were oddities there seemed no reason why his friend shouldn't be able to join the club too. It would be done with recovery time between treatments just like doctors would do elsewhere in the world.

Avery certainly sounded confident about this and Graysen didn't seem to mind needles. It would just be the three of them involved which made things easier too. Looking at the both of them he did reply saying "since we don't have a test for normal humans yet I should be able to use standard DNA double helix tests as we know what an oddity DNA is supposed to look like. If the first round of the catalyst works that will show in a DNA scan as Graysen's will start to change to match ours.

I've figured out how to make this process easier to deal with; I'm not a sadist so you'll be at least under a low level anaesthesia and it won't hurt so much but you will need to be concious for some of the time for it to work. So we can ask you questions. It will put your body under stress and that is what will unlock an ability; As Avery has already said their is a chance of rejection but you'd have the same chance after an organ transplant".

So with existing medical science having some of the same issues they did have something to work with but he did have a question he posed to Avery. "Where are we going to do this?"

Avery Ashford
Graysen Maddox

He stayed quiet at first so that the lady could finish and then he spoke. "I think that it can go well. I am used to the fact that it might make me sick and some days due to the transistion of going from a human to hybrid there might be days where i do not want to get out of bed and even days where I have to stay here for perhaps days on end or at least check in and leave samples."

Still in knowing that he was going to hopefully not die, he still seemed very positive. He supposed he would see how it all played out in the end.

David Lightfeather

He thought for a second. So far all of his affairs were in order and he wasn't expected back at home for a few days anyway. "Today is fine," he said. He expected the worse, well not death but he felt like he would feel as if he did not even know his own body in the end and maybe that was a good thing. Plus he would get to step into that world, the world of being an oddity.

So with room 5 of lab two picked out David looked round it carefully to assess what else they'd need. It had the bed and the little cupboard when Graysen could store this things already but he'd need a drip holder; not difficult to get here but it still lacked a certain something as Graysen wouldn't always having treatment. It hit him as he used one everyday once he got home.

"I think we need a radio to keep Graysen entertained while he's resting between sessions" David mused. At least here they could observe him closely and he'd get rest and privacy. They'd also be running some longer treatments during the night when he'd be sleeping anyway but you couldn't go wrong with a radio. "One with long wave and medium wave would let him get other channels" he added. Perhaps he might even find a ballgame to listen to. This was the happiest he'd also seen Avery but it didn't concern him. She just seemed to like being hands on to him.

Mallory Nottingham
Graysen Maddox