The older man muttered something that sounded roughly affirmative before taking a drink from his cup, as Caden had some bread. He had started on some vegetables when Caleb spoke again, more clearly this time.
"Training us in stealth infiltration seems a bit counter-intuitive, though..." He trailed off that statement, frowning a bit; there was silence for a moment as the older man thought in which Caden refilled his cup and drank some more. “...but I guess it makes as much sense as kidnapping people to force them into military service to begin with.” He forced a half-grin, adding “Must’ve known that an attempt to re-issue a draft would fail if it ever came to a vote, right?”
A very non-committal "hmmh" was all Caden thought to respond; he didn't really feel the attempt at levity was well-placed. That, and he never really thought anything military-related was something to joke about anyway. Oh well; may not be able to avoid it now, depending on how this whole situation plays out.
He had some more soup as he mulled over the thoughts this conversation brought up. He had rather tried to let his mind wander as best it could over the course of the past few days, as he felt speculating on.... whatever this operation was wouldn't get him all that far; they got informed only as much as whoever ran the place felt they should get informed. Though now, he realized, he would in theory have more free time over the course of the day - even if he was stuck in this living suite, there was a bit more opportunity to find things out on his own, especially if he asked for the 'right' entertainment things....

“Must’ve known that an attempt to re-issue a draft would fail if it ever came to a vote, right?”

Heather snorted at that, but leaned back. To Caden she said "You don't know exactly what your power does, but neither do they, they may be hedging bets. Honestly the reason I decided on stealth team was that's the only thing I could think of that my power could be used for and I fit the rest around it. Maybe that will change when they - and we- have a better idea of what we can do."

The other man simply responded with a “hm” noise and a vaguely disapproving expression, and Caleb had to try his best not to roll his eyes. It was rapidly becoming apparent that Caden was a quiet sort of person, and on top of that he didn’t seem to react well to levity. Or, at least, not Caleb’s particular brand of levity--Caden had laughed readily enough at Heather’s pub song comment earlier. Caleb took a drink from his cup to hide a slight frown, wondering how well he and the other man would really be able to get along.

“… Maybe that will change when they - and we- have a better idea of what we can do."

“Well…” Caleb rubbed the back of his neck a little self-consciously, giving the kid a half-smile. “To be honest, I am kinda curious as far as what we can do. And I’m also curious as to why I can only seem to do… well… my thing, so to speak, when I’m in the body of a bird. That just seems weird to me.” He paused, thinking that statement over for a second. “Well, weirder, I guess. I don’t generally think of crows and telepathy in the same sentence, you know? Or big cats and clouds of darkness, for that matter.”

Heather nodded. "Cass only seemed to be able to turn invisible when she was a lynx. Our alternative forms seem to be necessary to use our powers at all." She commented, completely oblivious to how she had been darkening shadows whenever she was nervous.

"And it seems to be very emotion based. I use anger to transform, and I was focusing on wanting to hide when I made the cloud."

Caleb leaned forward on his elbows, warming to the discussion. This was all interesting to think about. How often did one get the opportunity to talk in real-life terms how something akin to magic worked?

“Maybe different powers have different triggers. Yours is more physical and you used emotions to trigger them, intentionally or not, but when I was, er, ‘talking’ to Abel, I was just trying to focus as much as I could on what I wanted to say. Maybe, because mine is more mental than physical, it works differently?”

"Could be, though I'm not sure if I would classify the cloud as psychical. And honestly, I don't think the doctors have too much of an idea what they're doing. I mean, they're not 100% of our powers of other forms until they tested us, and they're the ones who gave them to us."

“I mean physical in the sense that it has some sort of outer manifestation, not that it’s necessarily solid. Like Cyclops versus Psylocke.”

Oh, Jesus. Did I seriously just compare us to the X-Men?

“But that’s true, they may not really know what they’re doing,” he rattled on, thinking back to his encounter with Dr. Gentner. “The sheer range of powers alone seems almost excessive if they had complete conrol over what they gave us. And the doc I met… he said something like ‘not what I was expecting’ or ‘not what I hoped for’ or something before they brought me back to the cell room.”

"There was also redundancy, I saw a couple of wolves. I just can't figure out what their endgame plan is. When we were in the cage room, it seemed the scientists were in charge. Here, it seems the guards. Also, I'm sure this kind of work would get plenty of funding and volunteers, so why resort to kidnapping?"

Heather blinked, then looked around the room, "Now that I think of it, where the hell did they get the money to build all this?"

((Whoa, you two! Seven posts in a bit over an hour? Let a guy catch up!)) X-D

Caden continued contemplating on what possibilities there were during "free time" as Heather spoke; his attention didn't wander back to the conversation at hand until Caleb's "....body of a bird. That just seems weird to me.” Pause. “Well, weirder, I guess." Caden did crack a smirk, accompanied by a quiet short chuckle, at the correction. Talking about things in terms of "real-word rules" certainly seemed to be out of the question from here on out.
He continued eating a bit as Heather and Caleb began discussing the details of their powers, unable to add anything due to not knowing his own "power" yet at all, but also perfectly willing to let others talk even if he did have something to add. The conversation began changing direction from powers to the scientists and the facility as a whole not long after Caleb mentioned the cyclops and.... "cylock"? The reference was completely lost on the younger man.
He did decide to try answering Heather, though.
"Probably the same place most weird groups get unexplained large amounts of money, the black market. I mean, what with all the kidnapping and near torture in the cage room, I can't imagine any of this is being done legitimately."
"It's weird, though; right now, I don't care as much about who these guys are as how they did it. I mean, what did they do to us that lets us break all the laws of physics, chemistry, and biology like we apparently can now?"

((Well, to be fair… we were PMing as we were posting, and a single post would have been just as long as those seven had we chosen to simply collaborate ))

"Now that I think of it, where the hell did they get the money to build all this?"

"Probably the same place most weird groups get unexplained large amounts of money, the black market. I mean, what with all the kidnapping and near torture in the cage room, I can't imagine any of this is being done legitimately." Caleb nodded his assent to the younger man’s words, laughing quietly. That was definitely true enough.

"It's weird, though; right now, I don't care as much about who these guys are as how they did it. I mean, what did they do to us that lets us break all the laws of physics, chemistry, and biology like we apparently can now?"

Caleb bit back his first instinctual response of ‘how the hell should I know?’ and took a moment to think about the issue. It was a good question. The sciences, however, weren’t Caleb’s strong point. Truth be told he had no clue where to even begin with guessing the origins of these new, unwanted powers they all had.

Besides… how they did it wasn’t that important to Caleb. At least not at the moment. Knowing who these people were and what they were planning mattered more when it came to thinking about escape. Unless they pulled a Crichton on us, he mused, thinking back to the last time he read Jurassic Park. These people had complete control over his health; why wouldn’t they build in a contingency plan? If it was possible to alter his DNA to the point where he wasn’t even sure if he counted as human anymore, how difficult would it have been for them to build in some sort of chemical dependency, or something similar, as a failsafe in the event of escape? Caleb looked down at his bowl, suddenly not very hungry.

“No clue, man,” he said with a shrug, trying not to look as uncomfortable as he felt. He did his best to keep smiling as he continued, “I studied English, not Chem. Don’t even know where to start with all this.”

"I studied English, not Chem. Don’t even know where to start with all this.”

"Now that you mention it, I didn't notice any scars, at least not any new ones. Which means whatever they did to us they did without intensive surgery. Maybe something like a virus that overwrites it's hosts DNA. Gah, it sounds like a horror movie." She flopped back. "For all I know they used the Elder Sign and asked Cthulu nicely."

Caleb answered first, saying with a shrug “No clue, man; I studied English, not Chem. Don’t even know where to start with all this.”
"Now that you mention it, I didn't notice any scars, at least not any new ones. Which means whatever they did to us they did without intensive surgery. Maybe something like a virus that overwrites it's hosts DNA. Gah, it sounds like a horror movie. For all I know they used the Elder Sign and asked Cthulu nicely," Heather added.
Caden rested his head on his hands with his elbows on the table, thinking. He wasn't a chemistry major either (though admittedly geology was another science), and was a bit frustrated at the older man's offhand dismissal of the issue - in fact, the older man's demeanor and manner of speaking seemed to Caden almost teenager-like. Or maybe very west-coast (he had said he was from Washington, right?). Either way, it put him a little off-balance.
Heather made a good point - or, at least, Caden hadn't noticed any new scars on himself either. Not that he had really looked, though. Still, nothing really hurt, besides the dull throb of bruises on his shoulder and side, still present from the "testing" they had put him through the other day. Though those were healing up fairly nicely, though....
Still, it seemed like trying to brainstorm how this group had turned regular people into transforming animal warriors wasn't going to happen, at least not in this group. Which was a shame, he was actually fairly curious as to how this was even possible. And there has to be a better explanation than Cthulu, he thought, darkly amused.
He finished off the last of his soup and vegetables, and leaned back seat with eyes closed, relaxing for a moment.

"Now that you mention it, I didn't notice any scars, at least not any new ones. Which means whatever they did to us they did without intensive surgery. Maybe something like a virus that overwrites it's hosts DNA. Gah, it sounds like a horror movie. For all I know they used the Elder Sign and asked Cthulu nicely," said Heather, and Caleb had no clue what an Elder Sign was. He’d heard his sister mention the name Cthulu once or twice but it was always in passing, and he’d never bothered asking for more information.

It was a good point, though. There were no scars that he’d noticed, no incisions. The more he thought about it the more he felt like Gregor Samsa. He’d just woken up different.

Conversation lapsed momentarily, and Caleb studied the other man. Quiet people tended to bother Caleb. There were some notable exceptions, like Rook, but for the most part Caleb just wasn’t interested in having to pry people open to figure them out. And the way Caden asked a question, got a response, and then didn’t bother expanding on his own ideas before falling into frustrated silence… Caleb grit his teeth in annoyance, the only outward indication being a slight shift in his expression as his smile became more forced. If Caden really was the sort who pouted, Caleb couldn’t see them having much to talk about at all.

Still. We’ll have to work together sometime. No need to make more enemies.

Besides, maybe he was misreading the kid. It was a tough position they were all in, and stress could make people act funny. May as well play nice, he thought, suddenly tired, trying to come up with some response to drag Caden back into the conversation.

“Maybe Heather’s right and it’s some sort of virus.” Caleb shrugged, his half-smile still resting easily on his face. “Radiation causes mutations, doesn’t it? And pollution causes mutation in frogs, so maybe it’s some sort of chemical mixture. But outside of fantasy and science fiction, I haven’t heard of anything that can cause this drastic of a change. You?”

"Not outside comic books. If I remember my physics correctly, radiation just causes decay.The thing that gets me is the fact that we can change back. What kind of mutagen is reversible? How did those sirrah splice us with animal DNA? I just dont think we know enough to even make educated guesses and personally I'm not sure I'm smart enough to understand even if they did explain it."

Caden was a bit surprised when Caleb picked up the conversation after having brushed it off earlier. (He thankfully didn't notice yet another of the older man's shrugs due to his eyes still being closed in thought.) “Maybe Heather’s right and it’s some sort of virus. Radiation causes mutations, doesn’t it? And pollution causes mutation in frogs, so maybe it’s some sort of chemical mixture. But outside of fantasy and science fiction, I haven’t heard of anything that can cause this drastic of a change. You?”
He smirked a bit at Caleb's statement, worded so to seem like equating viruses to radiation and pollution. He knew what the older man meant, but it was still amusing. "Nope...." he said quietly in response to Caleb's question; he was going to add more but paused enough that Heather added more.
"Not outside comic books. If I remember my physics correctly, radiation just causes decay.The thing that gets me is the fact that we can change back. What kind of mutagen is reversible? How did those sirrah splice us with animal DNA? I just dont think we know enough to even make educated guesses and personally I'm not sure I'm smart enough to understand even if they did explain it."
He thought about that for a moment. "....Well, radiation can mutate DNA. Normally the cell would then just die or become a tumor, but I guess if you modified the DNA correctly you could change the properties of the cell such that it's still sustainable.... But reversibility...."
What other possibilities were there? He remembered freshman bio from way back in high school, mention of complex "pathways" and versatile enzymes.... Maybe they could explain going back and forth. A fair amount of biological processes were reversible, right? Red blood cells gained and lost oxygen, right, and didn't that energy-bringing tri-phosphorus compound lose and gain one of its parts regularly?
Still, that was all really small scale.... Changing an entire body, and in a matter of seconds, seemed like so much....
He harrumphed lightly as he rubbed his forehead with his hand, heavy in thought, trying to grasp the concepts and wishing he had taken more science classes back in college.

((For the record, I have no problem with Caden. ;D ))

Caden smirked at his words, and Caleb had the distinct feeling he was being laughed at. The only response beyond that was a simple negative which trailed off into silence, and Caleb had to take a deep breath to keep the tight control he held over his expression from breaking. This man, this kid, was infuriating.

Heather spoke next, and Caleb gratefully turned his attention to the girl instead. "Not outside comic books. If I remember my physics correctly, radiation just causes decay. The thing that gets me is the fact that we can change back. What kind of mutagen is reversible? How did those sirrah splice us with animal DNA? I just don’t think we know enough to even make educated guesses and personally I'm not sure I'm smart enough to understand even if they did explain it."

Caleb noted the use of sirrah, and wondered briefly about why that would be in her vocabulary to begin with. She continued on, though, bringing up the fact that they could change back, and finishing up with a statement that Caleb could agree whole-heartedly with. This wasn’t a topic he really knew anything about--in college, all he’d taken was Bio 101, and in the twelve years since he hadn’t bothered doing much reading on the subject. Skirting the science requirements with Anthropology classes had been a good idea at the time, it seemed, but karma was a killer.

Not that it mattered much to him. He wasn’t a dumb guy--he had his degree, he’d done fairly well in school, he’d received a few job offers from decent companies on his first round of applications after graduation. He hadn’t taken that route, of course, preferring jobs with more flexibility to allow him to get away from the city. Others may have seen him as feckless, but he just refused to play the endless game of office politics and promotions that everyone else got sucked into. Being stuck behind a desk would have been worse than death, and he’d take lower paychecks to avoid it. Had he been born in Southern California, he’d often joked with his buddies, he probably would have been a beach bum.

The short of it was that lab sciences just didn’t really interest him, which made it difficult to talk about something like what had happened to them in any way that sounded informed. And if some punk brat wanted to look down on him because of it, then so be it. Still, he supposed that the situation was kind of funny in it’s own way. Never thought I’d actually prefer the fourteen-year-old.

Caden spoke up again in that same quiet, drawn out fashion. "....Well, radiation can mutate DNA. Normally the cell would then just die or become a tumor, but I guess if you modified the DNA correctly you could change the properties of the cell such that it's still sustainable.... But reversibility...."

And then Caden trailed off again. Caleb waited a moment to see if he was going to bother completing his thought, but when it became evident that that was where it ended, Caleb wasn’t sure what he could possibly say in response. Had they been at some sort of polite get-together, he could have simply walked away. Unfortunately, trapped as he was in this room, there wasn’t much to do except try to converse.

“Interesting theories,” Caleb said lightly, seeing Caden rub his forehead wearily and reminding himself to give the other man the benefit of a doubt. People turned into assholes during rush hour, and this whole situation was miles further along the whole stress scale than getting stuck in traffic. Caleb wondered briefly if he should deadpan about there being a built in ‘un-do’ button to their shapeshifting ability, but decided against it. There was a limit to how much scorn he really wanted to take on a day like this.

The how, though… Caleb, for the life of him, couldn’t think of why it was important for them to figure that out. It wasn’t usable. If they escaped, it was unlikely they’d come across a lab sophisticated enough to either reverse or duplicate the results. Knowing what procedure they had been put through wouldn’t make getting out of there any easier.

How was pointless. Did he really think that, were they to actually escape and rejoin society with some modicum assurance of safety, if anyone found out about their abilities they wouldn’t simply become lab rats again? Maybe Caleb was a bit of a cynic, but it seemed silly to think that availing himself of science in the hopes of reversing this ‘condition’ would produce the sort of results he’d want.

What, and Who were first on Caleb’s list, as in “what was this place,” “what am I,” and “who is holding us.” Where he already knew: Somewhere in Bridger. But what he had been turned into, what exactly he could do that he could then use against his captors, was what mattered to him the most. Who was holding them would be important once they got out, so he knew who he had to worry about out in the Real World once he got there. Why he already sort of knew, or at least guessed at, in his own case: wrong place, wrong time. The others, though, may have had some sort of connection he was unaware of. At the moment, though, Why was just as useless as How.

What mattered. How didn’t. But he could play nice like a good little boy was supposed to.

“Whatever it is, they did it in a lab. Did either of you see anything when you were out for the physicals on that first day? That might give a clue as to how they managed it.”

"I tried to look around for a scalpel or something I could use as a weapon when they took me for my physical, but the most menacing thing in that room was a tongue depressor. At least until the guard pulled out a taser. I also noticed there aren't any windows, so I'm guessing we're underground." She shrugged. To Caden she answered, "Even though I suggested it, I doubt it's a virus, or radiation for that matter. Viruses mutate too easily and you can't really control the type of mutation radiation exposure will cause." Heather thought back on the cage room and the mannerisms of the guards.

"These guy are all about control, grabbing every inch of it they can grasp."

((I know.)) X-D

Caden continued thinking, rubbing the bridge of his nose as Caleb spoke back up.
"Interesting theories. Whatever it is, they did it in a lab. Did either of you see anything when you were out for the physicals on that first day? That might give a clue as to how they managed it."
Caden was going to answer - he hadn't seen much he wouldn't expect in a doctor's office in the physicals rooms, especially considering he had been unconscious about half the time - but Heather beat him to speaking, changing the subject in the process.
"I tried to look around for a scalpel or something I could use as a weapon when they took me for my physical, but the most menacing thing in that room was a tongue depressor. At least until the guard pulled out a taser. I also noticed there aren't any windows, so I'm guessing we're underground," she answered Caleb, then turned to Caden and said "Even though I suggested it, I doubt it's a virus, or radiation for that matter. Viruses mutate too easily and you can't really control the type of mutation radiation exposure will cause."
"Right, right...." he mumbled, nodding, as she continued.
"These guy are all about control, grabbing every inch of it they can grasp."
She had brought up several more good points. One, these guys were about control. Viruses and radiation were too unpredictable, but he wasn't about to let go of the 'animal DNA' idea. They had to have gotten it in somehow, and cells with a viable DNA sequence wouldn't mutate readily....
Two, they probably were underground. Which meant that they were either in the basement(s) of a big building - which probably meant being not too far from some sort of human habitation, whether they were under some big complex in a city or under a storage facility off of a highway somewhere - or this place had been dug out of somewhere, which greatly increased the probably of them being nowhere near other civilization. If you wanted to call this place "civilized".
He sighed again, now opening his eyes and leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees and chin in his hands. He was still lost in thought, though, staring intently at nothing in particular in the process.

The other two responded, though Heather said much more than Caden did. That was something Caleb was getting most used to, how utterly silent the other man seemed to prefer being. And while it still annoyed him, the lack of scorn--imagined or otherwise--from the younger man mollified him somewhat.

“We are,” said Caleb, a little distracted as he thought about how he had ended up in this place. “Underground, I mean. And in the middle of nowhere.”

Wrong place, wrong time. Caleb sighed, frowning a bit as he tried to remember more of that last day out in the woods.

If their captors hadn’t taken him and Abel and moved them somewhere completely different, they should be under Bridger. The more he thought about it, the more disastrous the whole idea of going camping in this forest seemed. His sister having to cancel seemed like an omen now, telling him in big capital letters DO NOT GO. Hindsight was always perfect, he supposed, but he wished that even though he had stubbornly decided to take the trip anyway, he hadn’t brought Rook with him.

The only thing that comforted him slightly was that there would be searchers looking for them. But it was cold comfort, since they would likely find nothing. Their trip had only been about halfway done when they had come across the people by the lake. Given another week before they were missed and a few days before he and Rook would even be considered truly missing, it would be a while before any searchers even made it out this far. Combining that with both the sheer size of Bridger and the small amount of supplies the two friends had taken with them… People disappear in the back country all the time. What are two more in the grand scheme of things?

“We are... underground, I mean. And in the middle of nowhere.”

Heather shuddered, for the first time in her life feeling claustrophobic. She was suddenly very aware of the walls around her and how much dirt might be pressing in against them. "Like being buried alive" she whispered to herself. No sooner had she the words passed her lips than her heart started racing. The air suddenly felt thinner and her skin prickled. As she began to hyperventilate the few shadows around her grew deeper, but her eyes saw nothing.

I'll never get back to school, never see Kevin again. I left him just like Mom and Dad left us and I'll never get to say I'm sorry. I'm going to die where ever here is and I'll be just one more runaway who never returned. I want to go home. I want Kevin. I want my life back. I don't want to die!

Her panic attack reached it's climax as a strong, but by now familiar, bust of pain wracked her body. The chair tipped over as the weight distribution rapidly changed, spilled the girl-turn-liger on the floor instead of shattering under the weight.

The transformation has served one good purpose. The sharp pain had snapped Heather out of her panic attack, but she could feel another one brewing just below the surface. For the past few days she had buried her fear, first with anger, then bravado, and finally by focusing on escape tactics. Now that her fear had come to the surface, she wasn't sure how to bury it again.