At first Oz wasn't sure what he was hearing, even with his heightened hearing the sound was faint and muffled coming from the top of the stairs. Oz watched as the door opened and suddenly Oz was able to hear exactly what was causing the noise. It was an argument.
"You have no right to be here!" Her voice carried down the stairs as she came into view, her body half-turned blocking his view of whoever was on the receiving end. "You have every report the consortium has received, and if they don't feel the need to make a visit, I don't see how it is any of your business."
"Why Juliette, I'm your second." After all this time, Oz finally had a first name for her. "Don't you think I should get a feel for what you are doing here?"
"No, Wayne I don't. The Consortium hasn't given any indication that they plan to replace me, and we both know, if there comes a time when you take over, then my work here won't matter. You'll be doing your own. What you are doing here today is nothing more than intimidation tactics. A dog marking someone else's territory to claim it as his own!"
"An interesting choice of words; does it do that? Mark its territory?"
Oz watched as a man pushed past Her and started down the stairs, and by the smell Oz recognized him. It was the one she had told him about. The one who could take her place. And he was huge. He was tall and broad, but not an ounce of it appeared to be fat. Oz was used to people towering over him, but it had never bothered him before. It was bothering him now.
The man walked up to the bars and stared hard into Oz's eyes. "So, there it is. It's not very big."
Those eyes. They kept staring at Oz, a challenge, and the wolf knew it. Oz felt the wolf rising and forced himself to break eye contact. He didn't care if it made him look weak, he would be weaker if he let the wolf take over.
The man, still staring, stepped closer to the bars. "Come closer."
At that moment there wasn't much Oz wanted to do less, and he found himself unconsciously looking at her for support.
The man, 'Wayne', turned back to her. "Open the door."
"What?" She asked in disbelief. "No!"
"I just would like a closer look."
"Colonel Simmons I was put in charge of this project. There has been no reason for you to think that you have any right to be here, and I plan to let them know of your visit."
"Dr. Roberts, I don't know why you think they don't already know. All I want from you is to let me it to the cage for a few moments, to have a look, and I'll leave."
She pushed around him to the door. "Fine, if it will get you out of here." She opened the door and stepped aside.
The colonel stepped up to Oz, who continued to keep his eyes averted at least until grabbed his chin and forced his head around. Oz jerked his head away and stumbled back a step, but the colonel reached out with his other had and grabbed Oz's upper arm pulling him back, fingernails biting into his arm. The wolf-snarl Oz had been fighting to keep in finally broke free and yellow eyes met the colonel's brown ones.
"Ok, that's enough!" The doctor hurried into the cell.
"You still think there is humanity in that thing?" The colonel let go of Oz's arm. "I'm done here. For now."
He walked past her, out of the cell, but when he reached the bottom of the stairs he turned back. "Doctor, you are playing with fire. This one is no different from any of the other...things... we have dealt with. A demon is a demon not matter what form the body takes. You'd do well to remember that."
He was up the stairs and gone before she let her anger out, picking up an empty glass tube and flinging it across the room. It was too short and thick to properly shatter and fell cracked to the floor.
"That sanctimonious military asshole!" She took a breath and sat down in the desk chair, looking at Oz for the first time since the colonel had left. He had gotten the wolf under control and was watching her. She noticed his skin was already bruising where the colonel had grabbed his arm, and there was blood where the fingernails had dug in. She sighed and retrieved disinfectant.
A little while later Oz had been sitting on the mattress reading, when suddenly he didn't feel well. He felt nauseated, dizzy, and weak. He lay back on the mattress, fighting the urge to vomit. He felt like he was burning up. Something was wrong... He looked over at Her. She was working at the microscope and hadn't noticed anything wrong. His stomach cramped and his body curled in on itself, his chest tightening. With a strained voice he said three words to her he never thought he would say, "Please. Help me."