Chapter 1

CHAPTER ONE

Tuesday August 16 2086

BASE, New York

2:37 AM

Nadia Chase knew she was in trouble the instant she saw the tiger.

She was a majestic creature, 350 pounds of raw muscle and power. And, unfortunately, that was all focused on Nadia from the moment she stepped into the big cat's cage. "Hey, Tanni," murmured Nadia, not daring to look her in the eyes. The Bengal Tiger was supposedly tamed, but that didn't mean she was sweet by any means- Tanni remained one of the only tigers Nadia had been unsuccessful with to date. The other one had been shot to death after attacking three people. Nadia's mistakes were often fatal. That was why she tried not to make any.

The female growled threateningly. One glance at the mucus leaking out of her eyes left Nadia with no doubt that something was amiss. "You have an eye infection, sweetie?" Nadia whispered. She let out her customary high-pitched whine, telling Tanni that she was not a threat. 

Tanni didn't seem to get the message. She hunched her shoulders and twitched her tail. "Woah, there, girl."

Nadia noted that Tanni seemed to be shifting her weight from foot to foot- discomfort, probably in the abdomen, she thought. The tiger snarled and swiped a hefty paw in Nadia's direction. Nadia resisted a reflexive flinch, instead kneeling and blinking slowly at Tanni. The next few seconds would be vital to the operation- Nadia extended a hand slowly and cautiously petted the tiger's flank. Tanni jerked away, but the anaesthetic cream was already doing its job. The tiger began to sway before tumbling into a large, furry heap on her enclosure floor. Nadia waited for fifteen seconds, then stood up briskly and waved in the team of assistants carrying various tools. 

"What was the problem again?" Nadia asked one of them, an apprentice with the rather unfortunate name Scott Watts. 

He responded, "She's been acting up- growling at us, destroying her toys, demanding food all the time, pacing through the night. The feeder is scared of her; she lunged for him yesterday." 

Nadia nodded thoughtfully. "Let me do some hormonal readings. Maybe it's that new beef we've been feeding her."

"The CloneBone? Impossible! It's the best there is- the ultimate cattle, genetically modified for excellency, cloned for consistency."

"You sound like an advertisement- now get me a syringe, I'm going to draw some blood." Nadia rolled her eyes. The younger apprentices were generally quite friendly, but when it was two in the morning and she was called in to do an Aberration Report, she wasn't exactly jovial. It was all she could do to not get herself mauled by an angry tiger- humans were far too complicated.

Nadia took Tanni's massive paw and stroked it carefully. She admired both the brute strength and the efficient graceful qualities of tigers; they were perhaps only second best, in her opinion, to snow leopards. "Can someone tell me why I was called out in the middle of the night for an Aberration Report? Irregular behavior could just be because of our newcomer." A recent addition to the Wild Cat department, a rather friendly lynx, had escaped his enclosure and sprayed urine all over the wall separating himself from Tanni. 

"We weren't told," Scott replied. 

Nadia furrowed her brow, ignoring him as she read through the hormone levels on the handheld analyzer. "I think this is broken," she said to no-one in particular. The apprentices rushed to see what the problem was. "I've never seen anything quite like it," she continued. "A rise in estrogen this high? That's impossible." She slapped the machine into the palm of an apprentice. 

"Get me a new machine. This one's faulty."

"Yes, doctor." He hurried off.

Nadia sighed. This was why she had argued against budget cuts- she was left with constantly out-of-date technology. She prepared to draw blood from Tanni's other leg.

The apprentice returned with a clunkier version of the analyzer. 

"Seriously?" Nadia raised a skeptical eyebrow. He shrugged.

"It's never failed."

She sighed, mentally cursing those budget cuts. 

The numbers ticked up on the screen, same as before. Nadia groaned.

"There's no way these numbers are right!"

Then it dawned on her.

"Unless…"

She turned to the apprentices. "I need an ultrasound, stat."

They stared at her.

"Did you hear me? Go get it!" She waved her hands, dismissing them. They returned with a large chrome rod. 

"Thank you." Nadia sighed and brushed her hair back from her face, mentally preparing herself. It's just a fluke in the numbers, I'm looking for abnormal growths, she told herself. But she couldn't shake the feeling that something was drastically wrong. 

Nadia slowly and methodically waved the rod an inch above Tanni's fur, waiting for the results to appear. And there it was: two small blobs that the computer had identified with no problem.

Embryos. Two of them.

She sat back in alarm. "Tanni's pregnant."

The apprentices froze.

"Did you hear me? I said she's pregnant!" Nadia turned to an apprentice. "Get me Peter Carlson, now." 

Peter appeared no fewer than ten minutes later, hair disheveled. He had clearly been working late. Nadia turned to her colleague with the ultrasound picture in hand. "Tanni's pregnant," she whispered.

"Impossible." Peter muttered. "She was sterilized three years ago. And she's never been in contact with another tiger."

"Twins." Nadia said numbly. "Do you know what this means?" 

Peter nodded slowly. "Tanni is going to be the first tiger to give birth in thirty years." Then he smiled at Nadia. "I would prepare myself for the media hounds if I were you. This is going to be the biggest watershed since the first cloned beef hit the market."

Nadia grinned back. "And then maybe we'll get a bigger budget."

**Remember to like this chapter and add this to your stories if you want to keep up with Nadia and the gang!