people virus!

Just an idea for maybe how our hapless animals gained the disconcerting abilities of thought, memory and shapeshifting.
It would be really weird and the worst luck in the world for a scientist to be experimenting on how to give humans favorable animal traits and winding up with animals that had favorable animal traits.
So maybe- just maybe- there was some sort of idealist employee who experimented on the animals in the OTHER direction- without the knowledge/approval of anyone else. Gave the animals a "People virus!"
.... that's what cross would call it anyway. I bet the real name would be long and faintly Greek.

Jacket here! Yesh, the people virus! *cough* Anywho, this idea is great! Now as for the motive behind the scientists/facility/government wanting to capture our characters; if the animals infected with the 'people virus' are obtained by enemy countries then there could be problems. Big ones!!! For the animals can look like humans or animals which would make them wonderful spies. Not only that but they have abnormal abilities in human form which they use to their advantage. The government doesn't want the haphas falling into the wrong hands so they want to quickly re-capture all of them, and either (now there is going to have to be a vote on this one) erase them or try to subdue them and make them submit to their wishes. Okay, have fun deciding!