"So what happened?"
"An incident. A little girl, my niece — she took a liking to RJ. One day, two of her dads were chasing her outside the medical center. She screamed, they were playing. RJ heard. Saw it. Misunderstood it. He shifted and charged toward them. He had to be tranqed. Within a week, RJ lost verbal capacity, motor regulation, behavioral stability. Everything collapsed." She looks at me steadily. "He was transferred to the newly created Feral Academy. Gray went to Gold House. They haven't had direct contact since."
Gray. Across the compound. Success story. Reintegration review next quarter. And RJ in a chain-link run, four steps and turn. Same mountain. Same pack. Different endings. And Cal and Stone watching from the positions they built for themselves — close enough to see, not able to fix it.
"The incident that broke him," I say. "Have you talked to him about it?"
"No. RJ couldn't articulate anything, and the regression made further exploration impossible. Cal believes it's tied to a pre-feral memory — something from before the mountain. A trauma fragment that surfaced."
"Bodies don't forget," I say.
Lumi looks at me sharply. "No. They don't. The mind can wall off a memory. Dissociation, repression, blackout — the brain has tools. But the body stores everything. Muscle memory. Reflex patterns. Sensory triggers. The body keeps the record even when the mind locks the file."
She's not just talking about RJ anymore.
"The memory that caused your blackout," she says. Quiet. Direct. "The same principle applies. Your body's responses — the aggression, the heightened senses, the physical capabilities emerging now — those are the body's record. They're telling you what happened even if your mind won't."
I let that sit. It's heavy.
"I want to see RJ," I say.
Lumi doesn't react immediately. She holds still — not frozen, not surprised. Processing.
"In what capacity?"
"Supervised. Controlled. Whatever it takes for you or Sven or Gavin to sign off. I don't care about the format. He said my name. He's in a room by himself with a chain and a slot in the door and he said my name. He's trying. And they're punishing him for trying."
"They're containing a situation they don't understand."
"They're locking him in a box because he reacted to me, and his reaction is the most human thing he's done. Cal was at the medical center. Cal saw what RJ was becoming. Does Cal think isolation is helping?"
Lumi is quiet. The candle flickers.
"I can't promise anything," she says. "RJ's containment protocol is Gavin's jurisdiction, and after the nighttime breach, the security parameters have tightened. But I hear you. And I'll consider what options might exist."
She'll pitch it to Gavin in language he can approve.
"One more thing," I say. "Cal told me his categories don't fit me. Every baseline in this facility is male. Every precedent is male. And the Panel is going to use those baselines to evaluate."
"Yes. And bonding pre-review will affect your placement. A bonding female in a male containment facility is not a scenario anyone planned for. The Panel will see your bond activity as a destabilizing factor, not a biological inevitability."
"Even though I didn't choose it."
"Especially because you didn't choose it. If you had agency over the bond, they could ask you to stop. The fact that you can't is what makes you a risk classification."
"Every bond event in your file — the fence, the nighttime breach, whatever happens next — is ammunition for people who want to solve the problem by separating the components."
"The components being me and my mates."
"Yes."
She stands. Walks to the window. Looks out at the compound — the buildings, the fences, the mountain behind.
"Denied is not undone, Alex. You can deny the bond access. Refuse contact. Present as stable and cooperative when the Panel evaluates you. And the bond will still be there. In your wrist. In your blood. Denial buys you time. It doesn't buy you freedom."
"So what does?"
She turns back with an expression I haven't seen from her before — not warmth. Something fiercer.
