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[abrightboy]

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[ukan]

"No, most of my pack are straight." It's just a numbers game. "We just don't sleep with the girl. Anyone who wants to take that risk is free to make that choice but most of them are fine just getting their needs met with humans."

[abrightboy]

"...But our pack has two girls," Malcolm points out. "Is that not normal?"

[ukan]

"Yeah that doesn't happen in the real world. Iris isn't a real wolf like we are; if she was she and Maggie would be tearing each other apart. And Maggie is going to start a pack in her world, and you're going to LA. The Barge pack is different. We work together to make sure we all get our deals, and to set each other up for the best possible next steps, but settled packs are different."

[abrightboy]

"...But Will is definitely one of us, right?" Malcolm confirms, with Lark raising concerns about Iris again.

[ukan]

A sympathetic smile. "He's one of us. Like I said: Iris can't make him into a Time Lord with a wolf ritual. She can only make him a wolf. He's got my blood in him. You can't smell that?"

[abrightboy]

"...I didn't try to smell it. I can tell our pack from another pack by smell?"

[ukan]

"It takes a lot of focus. I can teach you that. Imagine the next crime scene you're on once you're trained up."

[abrightboy]

"What else can I smell?" Malcolm asks curiously.

[ukan]

That has such a broad answer. "Illness. Bedbugs. Hormonal imbalances, the onset of seizures in other people before they hit. Anything a dog can smell you can smell better, and with the advantage of a mind that can problem solve if people try to confuse the trail."

[abrightboy]

"...I noticed illness on... someone. Recently." He pauses. "So I could follow a trail from crime scene like a bloodhound?"

[ukan]

Lark did, too. But Kiryu is keeping it quiet so he doesn't pry.

"Depending on what time you get to the crime scene you'd be able to tell how much adrenaline was pumping through the killer's veins when it happened. You'd know if their blood sugar was low, where they'd been before they got into the scene."

[abrightboy]

"How could I know I was smelling the killer's blood sugar and not some random person who'd passed by there that day?" Malcolm asks.

[ukan]

"By how close in time it is to the decay of the body. Everything the killer left should degrade at roughly the same rate as everything the victim left. But like I said--that's what I'll teach you. How to hone in on one scent in the middle of thousands."

[abrightboy]

"...So if you never came back I wouldn't have known that?" Malcolm surmises. "What else can we know?"

[ukan]

He considers. "Most people can't lie to us. If you pay attention you can hear their heart beat, you can smell their stress as they try to deceive us. It makes playing poker a little easier."

[abrightboy]

"Most people can't lie to me anyway," Malcolm says plainly. No point in being modest with Lark.

[ukan]

"Now you've got even more tools in your belt, then." A way to be even more sure.

[abrightboy]

"Okay, well maybe we should meet once a week or something. I have an inmate and Neal's been in a coma in my cabin and I still do a bit of counselling and I want to go see Will now, so regularly scheduling something might be best," Malcolm suggests.

[ukan]

He nods. He trains up his pups at home more rigorously but, like he said, the Barge pack is different. "I'm going to try to get home on the weekends to see Alec, but any day other than that should work fine."

[abrightboy]

Malcolm is still uneasy about that, but he shifts his weight and doesn't say anything this time.

"Okay, well we can try Thursday mornings for now and if it's not enough we could do two or even three days a week," he suggests.

[ukan]

Lark grins at him. Three days is more like it. "Now we're talking. What are your hours like in the counseling office? Maybe we can work together an hour or two after you get off; might help you unwind."

[abrightboy]

"I work strictly by appointment now," Malcolm tells him. "I was having problems w... I was having some problems and had to take a break and now I assess people before I take an appointment with them. So I don't get walk-ins that don't understand what I do."

[ukan]

"That's how I did it, before we had wardens assigned to the positions." It's less stressful that way anyway, in his experience.

[abrightboy]

"It feels like I failed somehow. When Kiryu asked me to work there, I really thought it was a place where I could do good. It was so exciting. And it just... mostly didn't work out because I'm not really cut out for... talking to people. I guess. I still want to do it, but it just feels... diminished now. Because I wanted counselling to be a thing that could help anyone who needs it and everyone who wants it and I can't offer that to them because I'm not... fit for it," Malcolm explains.

[ukan]

"Malcolm, you will never find a group of people more resistant to therapy than the Barge citizens. You're in a job where you're fighting a half dozen currents at any given time. It's a thankless job. It doesn't mean you don't help; it just means you may not reach people as readily as you will off this ship." Lark has faith in him, enough faith to bring him to Los Angeles--something he rarely does. "Reaching one person here is like reaching five people at home, in terms of difficulty."