Before the Fall

Chapter Eleven - Doctor Park

Aster

My head hurt.

My eyes hurt.

As a matter of fact, everything on my body hurt.

I slowly tried to move, feeling the stiffness like a suffocating blanket.

"You've been motionless for about twelve hours. I would expect you're going to be pretty stiff."

The soft voice came from somewhere near me. I felt my eyes rolling around as I tried to open them.

When I did get them open, it took a few moments to get them focused.

As they focused on the person standing near me, I began to wonder if I was still out and just living in a nightmare.

But I wasn't.

Next to me stood a man, or at least I thought he was at first.

I read the doctor insignia on a tag near his name which was clearly written in Korean, but he was speaking in clear English.

The drugs they gave me must have been truly psychotropic.

"I can see your confusion written all over your face. My name is Doctor Park Jimin. Colonel, and BCU medic."

He smiled and that's when I saw them.

Two rounded fuzzy ears on top of his head. Spotted and furry.

He must have saw me staring. His own eyes traveled upwards and the ears twitched as he grinned.

"Like my ears? Ah, just so you won't wonder, I also have a tail." He turned and a spotted tail whisked past my face.

"You're..."

"A leopard hybrid? Yes, yes I am. Welcome to the BCU, Mrs. Presley."

My throat was dry, but somehow I managed to choke out my biggest question. "Wh-wh-what is the B-BCU?"

He smirked and turned away. "Let me get you some water. My commanding officer will want to talk to you soon. I'll grab the water and let him know you're awake."

He left me alone and I stared up at the plain white ceiling. The room was mostly empty except for a small rolling stool, a locked cabinet, and a sink. I tried to lift my hands and discovered they were tightly strapped to the bed rails.

I didn't have the energy to even try and escape from them.

As if I could.

My heart sunk even lower, taking all hope I might have had with it.

I closed my eyes again and felt myself resigning to my fate.

Whatever that may be.

* * *

Jimin

So far, I really didn't see our new ward as the hostile and combative prisoner we had been warned she was.

As a matter of fact, the only thing she had assaulted me with thus far was her strong human smell.

I would have to make sure one of the nurses gave her a bath.

She didn't even seem to be as shocked about my ears and tail as I expected her to be.

I can only assume this woman had seen some things.

Or perhaps the drugs still had her mind numbed.

Regardless, I still prepared myself for when it really hit her what and who she was surrounded by.

I was headed to the General's office when I saw the flick of a white tail disappear around the corner.

I smiled to myself.

As if he could scare me.

Tapping into my feline side, I silently flattened myself against the wall, walking on the balls of my feet as I slowly inched towards the corner.

He had been trying this tactic for years now.

And every time he failed.

Miserably.

I was sure this would be no different.

As I got closer to the corner, I felt warm breath on the back of my neck.

I froze.

"Doctor Park?"

I whipped around, arm outstretched to grab the throat of my opponent, but he was quicker than me this time.

My own throat was grasped, though lightly.

"Touché, Taehyung," I said, "You've been practicing I see."

"Practicing? You mean perfecting?" His eyes lit up and he grinned mischievously, but he released his loose grip and dropped his arm to his side, shoving his hands into his fatigue pockets.

"Where are you headed?"

"I need to talk to the General. Our new ward is awake."

All of us had been briefed after she arrived. As the officers of our unit, we were required to be in the know about things.

A new experimental ward was certainly one of those things.

Taehyung nodded and moved beside me. "Mind if I walk with you?"

"Of course not," I said.

Taehyung and I had been best friends since we were old enough to know anything. We had been brought up in the same litter, though different in many ways.

That was how H-Corp did things.

All of us entered the BCU at different times, but we were a tight-knit brotherhood.

"So, I see your ears and tail are still in place. Is she not as hostile as we were told?"

I laughed. "Hardly. But then, she's still under the effects of the drugs they gave her before dumping her here. I'm expecting more of a panicked reaction when I get back. Want to come along?"

Taehyung's deep and throaty laugh echoed down the long, stark hallway. "I'm always up for any chance to taunt a human. Count me in."

We laughed and talked all the way to the General's office.

We were the closest of friends, even though I ranked above him, but that was only due to my medic status.

Though science would argue our feline sides could never be compatible, we proved them wrong over and over.

After all, we were the product of a decades' long experiment that should never have succeeded.

So who's to say a leopard and a tiger can't be best friends?