"Hello. Anyone here?" asked Wes as he walked into one of the lab rooms. Ever since Dr. Zaskin step down as head scientist, Dr. Manx had taken over his spot. "Dr. Manx?" called Wes, searching around the room, but she was nowhere in sight.

He walked around the room, looking at several projects his father had her working on. Most of which were just paperwork right now, which was something Wes wasn't too fond of, but he figured he would have to start at least being interested in it. After all, one day this would all be his.

On her desk he noticed a folder of papers. He walked over to it and took a seat. He wasn't trying to be nosy, but something caught his eye, on one of the papers the word 'morpher' in bold. He pulled the paper out and began scanning over it reading what stood out to him.

His father was having her study morphing technology and some of the information was based off the Quantum morpher, as well as his own. Along with information that appeared to be provided by Andros, on the technology of his team's morphers, as well as a few others. "What the hell is going on?" As far as Wes knew he had never disclosed any information on his morpher.

BARK. Wes jumped, just barely missing the laser blast that nearly grazed his shoulder. "What in the world?" Wes couldn't believe his eyes; a robotic machine that appeared to look like a dog was standing in front of him. The robot dog was now growling at Wes, then it walked up to Wes's feet and peed on him. "What the hell?"

"It's only kool-aid." Kat came walking in. "Bad dog, RIC," RIC then coward away from Wes and went into a corner appearing to pout.

"RIC?" asked Wes.

"Robotic Interactive Canine," announced Kat.

"Oh." Wes nodded his head, now understanding where the dog got its name. He shook the blue juice off of his black boots. "Quite a personality he has."

"Yes, there are still a few bugs that need to be taken care of. He'll come in very handy with the Academy." Kat turned to look at her masterpiece of work, or at least partly hers. She couldn't take all the credit for RIC.

"Academy?" asked Wes. Was he the only one around here who had no idea what was going on?

Kat turned to him questioningly. "You don't know?" This surprised her, especially since she had been made aware that Wes would be one of the lead commanders of the academy once it was started over. He would have a huge role in training and selecting cadets and officers.

"Know what?" Wes glared at her, finding it hard to read her face. Wes shook his head, the whole business of the Academy wasn't his main concern right now. "Never mind the Academy. You're researching morpher technology based off of mine and Eric's morphers, along with another set of morphers?" he questioned her. He wanted to know for what reason she would be doing this.

Kat then saw the folder open on her desk and looked to him. "Yes. At your father's request; didn't you know?" How could he not know anything about what was going on here. Had things changed? Was Wes no longer going to be playing a major role in the SPD Academy? No one had told her anything had changed.

The way she said it made it as if she had thought he had known about this. Wes decided that perhaps it was best to just go with the flow and at least act like he knew what was going on within his fathers company. "Ah yeah." He smiled assuring her. "Must have forgotten." Why would his father keep this from him? Did his dad still think he was lazy and didn't care what was going on at Bio-Lab? "I better go. See yah later Dr. Manx, sorry for troubling you." He started to head towards the door with full intentions of confronting his father. He wanted to know what the hell was going on here.

"Ahh!" Kat felt a strong pain in her head.

Wes turned around, concerned. "Dr. Manx, are you all right?"

"I'm fine."

"You sure?"

She nodded her head. "Yes, thank you Wes," she smiled faintly at him.

Wes smiled faintly and headed out of the lab. Once Wes was gone, Kat's appearance suddenly changed into something cat like, a half cat, half human. She heard RIC starting to whimper. "It's all right, RIC, you can trust him, after all." She turned to him. "You were created from his imagination."

She then went over to the cabinet on her desk. She opened it up and took out a greenish looking liquid and drank it. In seconds her cat-like features were gone.

1983

Little Wes sat close to his mother on the couch watching as she drew out a sketch drawing of a futuristic mechanical dog. Wes was six, eager and pleased to watch his mother work.

"Yeah, that's how it goes."

Andrea smiled, she had always enjoyed this alone time with Wes. "You have some imagination, kid-o." She leaned over and kissed him gently on the cheek.

"Do you think Dad will let me have a dog now? I bet he wouldn't get allergic to this dog," he said excitedly. He always wanted a dog of his very own, but because of his fathers allergies he hasn't been able to get one.

"I bet you're right, sweetie."

"Can you build him, can you Mom, please?" Wes looked up to her, all wide-eyed.

"Of course I will, but it might take a while, can you wait?" she asked.

"Yeah!" he cheered.

She laughed. "What should we call him?"

"I don't know. You pick, you always pick out the best names."

"All right. How about RIC?"

"RIC?" He thought about it for a moment. "Yeah, I like that. Thanks Mom, you're the best!" Wes hugged his mother tightly, and she returned the hug, holding him close to her.

"Come in," announced Mr. Collins at the sound of someone knocking on his office door.

Dr. Manx entered the room. "Mr. Collins."

"Dr. Manx, I wasn't expecting you today. I thought we had gone over everything a few days ago."

"Your son came into my office today. He found the papers about the research on the morphers." Kat wasn't going to waste anytime. She was going to get straight to the point.

Collins looked slightly uncomfortable. "He did?"

"Yes." Kat stepped forward and took a seat. "I thought you said you were going to talk to him." She knew Wes had been lying, she could see it in his eyes that he was completely in the dark about what was going on here. And she wanted to know why. She wasn't already keeping one big lie, she didn't want to be keeping any others, especially to Wes who she has come to respect a great deal.

He sighed heavily and ran a hand over his face. "I know. Andros is coming at the beginning of next week. It was supposed to be this week, but he needed to take care of a few things on his home planet. I'll discuss it with Wes then. Tell him everything." Alec knew he had avoid the conversation long enough. It was time he told Wes everything.

Kat sighed, nodding her head. "I know it's hard, but you can't protect him forever. He has a right to know." She can understand that him as a father would want to protect his child, but Wes wasn't a little boy anymore. He deserved to know the truth about the changes that were happening here, that would happen in the future and even the changes within his own DNA.

"Yeah. Thank you for telling me." Collins got up and shook the doctor's hand. "I'll see you next week when we begin trial runs with the morphers."

"I'll be ready." Kat then started for the exit.

"I still don't understand though, how you didn't seem to be affected like the others."It was the one thing that just didn't make any sense, everyone had been affected, blood result all showed changes in their DNA, everyone but the Doctor before him. How was it possible that she had been unexpected?

Kat froze for a moment. "Lucky, I guess," and without another word she made her way out of his office.

"Hey Eric." Wes was lying on his bed talking into his cell phone.

"Hey Wes. How've you been?"

"Okay I guess." Wes's voice was down in the dumps. He didn't know what to think anymore. First the thing with Andros, then Gunther, and now research on the morphers. What other secrets were his father hiding? What else didn't he know that was going on at Bio-Lab? Did he even want to know?

"You okay, Wes?"

"Ah, I don't know. Did you know my father is having Dr. Manx research our morphers, as well as a few others?" Wes knew that Eric and his father had a strong relationship with each other and just maybe his father had confined with Eric.

"No. I didn't know that. Do you know why?"

"I was hoping you could tell me that."

"Sorry Wes, but I'm just as lost as you are. The last time any research had been done on my morpher was back in 2001, at least to my knowledge anyways."

"Oh," Wes sighed.

"Wes, maybe I should come back home-"

"No, no. I-I'm fine Eric. Really. Besides Hayley's transfer will be finished in a month or two and you'll both be back here."

"You sure? Because I can come back now, if you need me."

"I'm fine. Really."

"Okay."

"How is Hayley?"

"She's good. She says hi and that she misses you."

"Tell her the same for me." Wes paused for a moment. "So did you ask her?"

"Yeah, last night. She said yes."

"That's great man. I'm really happy for you."

"Thanks. So will you be my best man?"

"You bet, wouldn't miss it." Wes smiled on the outside. He was truly happy for Eric, but he couldn't help but feel a little jealous. Eric had everything he wanted. Ironic, Wes thought; there was a time that Eric had wanted everything Wes had, friends, a father who loved him, a secure life. And now Wes would give that all up to have what Eric had. "Well, I should be going."

"Yeah. Me too, talk to yah later, Wes."

"Yeah. Bye, Eric."

"Bye, Wes."

"How was he?" asked Hayley, walking over to Eric. She sat down next to him on their bed.

"He seemed okay," answered Eric, but he knew better. Over the course of their friendship Eric had come to know very well when something was not right with Wes.

"Jen?"

Eric shook his head. "I'm sure that's part of it, he didn't say it, but-"

"But he didn't have to," finished Hayley. It had taken a while for Wes to get back on his feet, to get better than just okay, but they all knew he still missed Jen very much, probably always would. "Did he say anything else?"

"I think he thinks his father may be hiding something from him."

"Is he?" asked Hayley, looking into Eric's eyes.

"I don't know, and even if he is, it would have to be with good reason." Eric knew Wes's father wouldn't keep anything from Wes, unless it was with good reason, either to protect Wes or because he didn't want Wes to become overly concerned.

Hayley wrapped her arms around him. "Maybe you should go back home. It sounds like he needs you."

"I asked him and he said no, that everything was fine."

"And how many times did you tell him everything was fine, when it wasn't fine?" Hayley asked as she kissed him on the cheek.

Eric smiled. "I guess you're right."

"Besides, we have the rest of our lives to be together," said Hayley as she lay down, taking Eric with her.

"Do you enjoy being right all the time?"

"Just as much as you enjoy being a pain in the ass," grinned Hayley as Eric leaned down and kissed her deeply on the lips.