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Was I perhaps doing this to myself, subconsciously? Given that I seemed to be the only one here, I couldn't force myself to reject the idea out of hand... I shook my head, ears flapping from the abrupt motion. I just couldn't see how, it had to be some other outside agency. Humans just didn't possess the ability to do something like this. And I certainly didn't think that I wanted this, even subconsciously. Which left me back at square one again... though at least, this time, at square one with a bit of food in my stomach. I hoped that these 'helpful' changes to my nose and mouth had not led me astray, and the food would stay there. I tried to relax and clear my mind, focusing again on my general feelings of wellbeing.
After only about 20 minutes of cloud watching through the filter of the canopy, I surprised myself again with the level of relaxed calm that I had managed to achieve. Though my ears remained ever-alert to the slightest hint of movement, and I had quickly developed the habit of sniffing the breeze for foreign scents, the quietness of the forest was for a change working on my side and reducing my jumpiness. It really was quite beautiful, I thought to myself as I chewed idly and drank in my surroundings with enhanced senses. A little creepy, inherently, but becoming more comfortable...
I blinked, halting in mid-thought and backtracking in my mind. Idly chewing? What was I chewing? I spat out the mass I'd been grinding with my molars, and wrinkled my nose a bit at it. It was half-digested bark and leaves; I could remember now bringing it up with a burp-like reflex and automatically chewing on it without giving it thought or even notice. In fact, I now realized, I had re-chewed and swallowed several mouthfuls prior to this one! The thought made me nauseous... or it should have, at least. But as much as I wanted to, I found it hard to feel sick. The stuff had tasted good, even better the second time around than it had the first.
Cud I shivered slightly as the answer occurred to me, finally managing a gut reaction to it analogous to my intellectual one. My nose had led me astray after all, but my stomach had chosen to accommodate it instead of rebelling; this time, my guts had altered their form and function. I was a cud-chewer now. I knew very little about the process, something about multiple stomach chambers and cellulose-digesting bacteria that I didn't like to think about further, but I knew that it allowed animals to eat vegetation that no human could draw nourishment from.
Erp. There was some more, in the back of my throat; the action of bringing it up was like swallowing in reverse, under conscious control only in the most general sense. I wanted to spit it out too, but... I was still very hungry, I knew, and it seemed that this was how I was going to eat. So be it; under the circumstances, I would grudgingly let this change go as well. Starving myself wouldn't change me back; I was sure, any more than stopping up my ears would revert them to their former weaker state. I chewed, dubious despite the fact that it tasted great, and re-swallowed. I wasn't sure, but it did feel like I was swallowing to a different stomach than I had before...
I finished my experimental meal for the second time that afternoon, and after a while reluctantly rose from my resting place under the tree to move on. I was still very hungry, but at least now my nose seemed to be telling me that there was food all around me; as I walked, I picked and nibbled foliage to sample as many as I could. My lack of upper front teeth didn't hinder me, didn't even feel uncomfortable; my upper pallet was tough to the point of horniness, and I didn't need to snip stalks with my teeth. Just a tug to pull it off the branch or stalk and then swallow, I'd chew it more thoroughly later when it came back up as cud.
It took the rest of the afternoon, but by the time evening came I was no longer hungry. Everything I'd sampled based on scent was staying down of its own accord, and I didn't even feel much need to regurgitate any of it on purpose; presumably food was meant to stay in the first stomach longer than it had after my first experiment, perhaps it had been driven more by my extreme hunger the first time than it had by proper instinct. No matter. I felt full enough, whichever stomach the food happened to be in, and I was more than ready to stop walking for the day.
My feet weren't sore but I was still spiritually and physically exhausted. I didn't seem to have made any real progress in all my hours of travel, either, so a few more hours of walking seemed likely to be pointless. As the sun set, I settled in for my second night in this strange forest.
I didn't climb a tree this time, instead finding a comfortable hollow between some tree roots lined with a soft layer of moss; I didn't think my hooves were well suited to clambering around in branches, and this would be far more comfortable. Besides, I was definitely alone here. Even my enhanced senses had not once picked up the slightest hint of any other animal life in this place; not a snap of a twig, or a scuffle of grass, or a hint of scent other than mine and the trees. Even so, it took at least an hour for my twitching ears to at last calm themselves enough for me to sleep soundly.
I woke up just as slowly the next morning. Nestled in that comfortable mossy hollow with the rustle of the breeze in the leaves, and the scent of an approaching spring rain shower making the air heavy and moist was all very relaxing. It kept me in a sort of half-awake trance, really; just lying there with my senses alert but without much in the way of conscious thought in my mind.
But eventually that changed, as the wind began to pick up and the humidity in the air grew tangier; I finally realized intellectually that a rainstorm was about to break, and sat up to check my cover. The canopy over me was dense, but the wind was really starting to pick up; the rustling had grown into great rushes of sound blowing through the forest, and when the first drops of rain began falling I realized that this tree would provide little shelter. I shook my head and rubbed my eyes, clearing the last muzziness of sleep from my mind, and set out to hurriedly find a better place to take shelter. The hills were never very steep, but I was sure there had to be a slope somewhere that would be better protected than this.
The rain caught me out in the open seconds later, descending suddenly in all its fury. Well, in all its annoyance, at any rate; despite the strong gusts of wind, this was not a fearsome storm; just a heavy one. I was very rapidly soaked to the bone. Holding my shirt ineffectually shut with one hand, I hunched over and ran for the nearest patch of big bushy trees that I could find for at least a small modicum of protection. There I huddled, still being doused with a fine drizzle through the leaves and flinching involuntarily at the sounds of distant thunderclaps, for what must have been a full hour. But then, just as suddenly has it had broken, the storm dissipated; the grey ceiling of clouds fragmented back into innocuous white puffs again, and the morning sun streamed down between them.
I emerged from my inadequate shelter, blinking in the sudden light and inhaling deeply through my nose. The rain had made this world seem even more fresh and vibrant than ever, the scents and colors renewed without even having been faded to begin with. I couldn't help but smile slightly, or at least try to curve my altered lips in the approximation of one. "Ith good tho be aliff," I sighed.
My vocal cords had been left intact by the changes to my face yesterday, but my diction had certainly suffered; I sighed, slightly deflated again, realizing that it hadn't got any better after a night's rest. But I didn't let that keep me down for long. The soaking I'd got, while not exactly pleasant, had refreshed me a fair amount as well; I'd been hiking through the woods for two days in the same set of clothing, after all, and I'd begun to get rather filthy. Now that I was already soaked, I took the opportunity to strip to my underwear and rinse myself off in a nearby stream slightly swollen from the rain. It also gave me the opportunity to do my most thorough self-examination yet, and I was relieved to note that other than my face and feet there was still nothing different from what I remembered.
Taking my sodden clothing with me, too damp to do much good right now against the cold, I walked naked through the empty forest to a nearby meadow that I'd passed through yesterday. The ground was thankfully not too soft in this area, or my hooves would have sunk and stuck quite easily; as it was, the mossy peat squished wetly between my cloven toes with every step. It would be a while before I felt like doing much traveling today. Indeed, when I finally got out to the direct sunlight and grassy soil of the meadow, I decided to wait right there until everything was dry again.
I spread my clothing out on a large, flat boulder that rested half-buried in the middle of the meadow, and then after gingerly testing the comfort of the perch reclined on my back next to them to dry myself out as well. The stone was slightly damp and cold, but the gloriously warm sun more than made up for it; I sighed and began to relax again like I had when I first woke up. "Thith ithn't tho bad," I lisped quietly to myself. I was warming up again quite rapidly, but I decided I was in no hurry to get moving again just yet; instead, I decided to take this time to thoroughly think my plans through.
One day's walk one way, one day's walk back, I thought to myself as I watched the fluffy clouds drift overhead and idly chewed yesterday's cud. Not counting my panicked detour, I should be very roughly back where I started... very roughly. I still felt that finding the elevator was my best bet; there wasn't really much else I could think of to do, at any rate. But how would I proceed from here? Spiral search pattern, I decided at last. I just hoped I wouldn't miss it in the process. If only the markers I'd tried to set up hadn't been mysteriously erased like that... flicking my ears in annoyance at that additional puzzle, I thoughtlessly scratched a small itch on my arm. I sat bolt upright with a startled bellow and stared down at my arm, and the rest of my naked body. My skin was entirely covered with short, dense brown hair. All of it! I pawed at my chest, frantically searching for any underlying alterations of structure that it might signify; previously, only my new feet and facial features had had a pelt like this. But I couldn't see or feel any this time, I seemed to have remained human underneath it all. Small compensation. What had caused the change this time?
Glancing at the drying clothing spread out beside me on the stone, I groaned and shook my head as the realization sunk in. Just as I had 'needed' hooves when I lost my shoes, whatever was doing this to me must have decided I 'needed' fur when I'd 'lost' my clothes. It took every opening it could find to make me more and more like an animal. Surging angrily to my feet, I yelped in surprise at an unexpected sharp tug at the base of my spine. I peered over my shoulder as best as far as I could, I was surprised all over again to see a somewhat stubby tail growing out of it. It flicked reflexively erect at that emotion, flashing the pure white patch of fur on my rump that had been concealed under it. "Gah!" What did I 'need' that for? A place to put leftover fur that hadn't fit elsewhere?
Attempting to steady my emotions enough to force my tail back down, I glared at the silent forest around me. "No more!" I shouted, venting some of my fear and frustration. "I don't need any more! I don't want any more! Thtop it, I'm fine the way I am!" I clenched my fists helplessly. Just who was I yelling at, anyways? I still hadn't seen, heard, or scented a single animal here besides myself in all the time I'd been hunting. An animal, I thought bitterly to myself. No way. I can't. I won't become an...
I blinked, and twisted my back to peer over my shoulder at the tail again. I flicked it back and forth experimentally, the motion even more unfamiliar than turning my ears had been but the new reflexes apparently hardwired just as firmly into my psyche now. I recognized that tail. "Deer," I muttered in disbelief. "I won't become a deer."
That didn't change the fact that I was, of course... I considered putting my clothes back on, an act of defiance if nothing else, but in the end I abandoned them there. My new fur was probably just as good or better at protecting me from the elements anyway, and now that I'd had the opportunity to get out of my clothing I realized just how rank they'd become from two solid days of my sweat and dirt. One situation where enhanced senses were a definite liability... I didn't even need them to protect my remaining sense of modesty in this uninhabited wilderness; I hadn't noticed it at first between all the other changes, but a furry pouch of skin had grown up to cover my manhood and hold it securely against my abdomen. I was relieved to find, upon carefully pulling the sheath open with my fingers, that the organ itself was unaltered. But still, what a thing to overlook...
And so, I left my last remaining human clothing behind. It was pointless, and indeed downright stupid, to deny the changes that had happened to me; I would accept and adapt to them, instead. But I also resolved with all my heart to yield no farther, to give no further opportunities to take away what humanity I had left. This far, no farther.
It was a strong and resolute statement. It didn't seem likely to impress anyone, though. Instead, I focused my energy on more tangible, constructive efforts; finding the elevator doors again. I had no idea if returning 'home' would help change my body back, or even stop the alterations from progressing, but it was at least something I knew I could work on.
Choosing a particularly large and memorable tree to serve as the starting point and center of my search, I began a slow and cautious spiral walk outward. I could remember a fair bit about what the elevator door and its immediate surroundings looked like, but nonetheless I'd have to be very alert; it would be very easy to overlook and pass it by.
Perhaps it was purely psychological, at least at first, but as the hours passed I began to become increasingly nervous and jumpy. My ears were constantly scanning the forest, although I didn't expect to hear the elevator, and I froze in my tracks every few minutes to look around and sniff the air. For the first time since my arrival here I began to get the distinct sensation that perhaps there was something else out there watching me. I had no idea whether I should take this as a good thing, a bad thing, or merely as a sign of paranoia. But I could almost swear that I occasionally saw movement, fleeting and only out of the corner of my eye, that didn't entirely match the stirring of the breeze. It made the fur all along my spine stand on end.
Had these things always been around me, and I was just now gaining the acuity to sense them? Were they only now coming close enough, now that I no longer looked or smelled human? I tried to keep from jumping to any conclusions, not even sure whatever they were were real.
Kiki_kittygirl · Thu Oct 20, 2005 @ 05:14pm · 2 Comments |
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