<html> <head> <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"> </head> <body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000"> Intended to post the rest tonight, but I didn't realize how long the final two scenes were. -LurkingWolf --- <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"> Lois drooped once the door was closed and Balrog was no longer nearby. His shoulders sagged so much that the robe he wore very nearly slipped from its position and fell to the floor. The fighting ring had been draining, and he had seen very little progress. He was certain that if he were forced to defend himself with his current level of skill, he would be killed before he had to any chance to even launch a counterattack. That wasn’t even considering the dull ache that completely pervaded his body. He rubbed his shoulder, but it only made it worse.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> With the consideration of fighting, Lois’ mind drifted to Balrog’s suggestion. Fight from all fours, like an animal… it was so easy for that insufferable lutin to suggest! He had never had his mind wrested from him by a magic beyond his control, beyond his comprehension! He had never seen his memories shattered, fragments melting away the more he pressed. He had never felt the gnawing desire to go back…<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Lois snarled and gouged a set of claw marks in the provided side table. The candlestick wobbled a bit, but unlit as it was he was in no hurry to right it. Why should he desire the mind, the life, of an ermine? It offered nothing to him but a meaningless existence! Yet the thought was there, the incessant nagging that suggested to him that being an ermine would be better than what he was now, a man thoroughly robbed of memory, of purpose! He could convince himself that he had no true desire to be an animal, but the moment acting like one was remotely suggested he panicked, denied the thought, fought it with every fiber of his being! Why was it such an abhorrent idea if the desire was not real?<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> The ermine sighed and sat down on the edge of the bed, head low. There was nothing for it. He could only do his best to resist whatever magic now afflicted him. For now, the best he could do was to get some sleep so that he would be clearheaded in the morning. He adjusted the bed for a few moments, and then lay down to take his rest.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> His attempts to rest met with utter failure. It was not even so simple as just tossing and turning. Every time he closed his eyes for a few moments, an indescribable feeling of anxiety overtook him until he opened his eyes again. No amount of tossing and turning, no amount of self-encouragement, and not even leaving the candle lit for some illumination could lift that disquiet. In only a few minutes after he had begun his attempts, Lois sat up on the edge of the bed once more, shuddering as he tried to settle his nerves.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Despite how little he recalled about whom he was, Lois knew that this was not the sort of person he was supposed to be. He was convinced that no man could live with this sort of anxiety. He put his head in his hands, growling his frustration to himself. There was a clawing emptiness inside, and the lonely silence only piled more misery upon that. He wanted to find Balrog to break the silence while he calmed down, but he did not want to disturb his friend after leaving him on such unfortunate terms.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Sitting there on the edge of the bed, he finally began to feel some semblance of calm. At the same time, quiet questions began to prod at his mind, unheard but utterly real. The more he relaxed, the more he wondered, until he finally lifted his head slowly, and beside it, his right hand.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> While the memories of what he had looked like before the recent change were unclear at best, the knowledge of what a human hand should look like was hardly lost. His hand was a mix of that and an ermine’s paw, the proportions of the mix uncertain but clearly favoring the ermine. His fingers were significantly shortened and the padding on them was thick enough to dull the feeling in his digits. The thickness of those digits also hindered their independent movement. He could grasp things well enough, but precise movement, or artistic pursuit of any kind, would be nearly impossible with a hand like this.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Was letting it go truly so much of a change?<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> With that thought, Lois watched as his fingers dwindled until they were nothing more but the toes of an ermine’s paw, albeit larger. It was barely an effort at all, he mused. The change in shape was so minimal, though, so why should it have been difficult?<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> By the time he glanced at it, his other forepaw had already taken its most feral form, and was retreating slowly into the sleeves of the robe. This development was unsurprising; his arms were still too long to be forelegs, after all, and making that simple adjustment was a logical next step.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> He stood before proceeding with the next step. In a few short moments, his body had gained several inches, stretching him out into proportions ideally suited to the animal whose semblance he bore. Sighing, Lois willed his legs to change. The alteration of his joints was perhaps the most dramatic of all of the changes, and yet it passed in a moment, his knees and hips adjusted to prefer quadrupedal to bipedal movement. He still stood on his hind paws comfortably, but attempting to walk on them would result in considerable discomfort.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> He dropped to his four paws, feeling the grain of the rough-hewn wood beneath his pads and claws. It was a welcome, familiar feeling, one that relaxed him further as he willed his size to match his shape. When he had accidentally accomplished a similar shift earlier in the day, his two-legged stance had caused considerable disorientation during this adjustment. Now, though the rapid loss of size still made his head swim, his quadrupedal stance made keeping his composure a simple task.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> His robe enveloped him now, thick and warm. Rather than panicking at its sudden cavernous size, Lois slipped easily from among its folds and stepped atop it. The ermine tested several spots amid the haphazard folds until at last curling up amongst them. He wound the material close about his body, a ward both against the cold and potential intruders.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Only once he had again settled into his bed and closed his eyes did he truly realize what he had just done. The anxiety returned in force, and he sat up, fully intending to shift back. Something stopped him, however.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> He realized, lying there in a discarded robe as though it were the pinnacle of luxurious bedding, that he felt more at ease in this state than he had felt since regaining his senses. This begged him consider the state of his mind, but a simple perusal of his thoughts, and the realization that he maintained the ability to think in such a way, quickly aided the conclusion that he was still thoroughly human in that regard.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Why was he not panicking? It was an easy question to ask, but the answer proved as elusive as a pearl in a pauper's pocket. His reaction to Balrog's combat advice had been immediate and reflexive, requiring no level of thought deeper than that which motivates the blink of an eye. Now, however, rather than resistance being so natural, the opposite was true. Shifting into the form of a feral ermine had been easier than any discernibly human thing he had attempted since waking in the morning, and it had come almost unbidden. After demonstrating his repulsion at the idea of emulating an animal in combat, he could only wonder why fully adopting the form of that animal failed to produce a comparable answer.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> This question and several others hounded his mind as he once more prepared to sleep, wrapping himself in the fallen robe. As he began to approach unconsciousness, however, only one of them stood out in his mind.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> "Will I still remember being human in the morning?"<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> As troubling as the question was, it was not enough to dissuade him from drifting further towards sleep. It did delay the process, but it could not fully stop it. Finally, just as he fell asleep, one satisfactory answer settled into his mind.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <span style="font-size:11.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;line-height:107%; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language:EN-US;mso-fareast-language:EN-US;mso-bidi-language:AR-SA">"I would rather be an animal than live in fear of becoming one." <meta name="ProgId" content="Word.Document"> <meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 14"> <meta name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 14"> <link rel="File-List" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CNathan%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtmlclip1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml">  <link rel="themeData" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CNathan%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtmlclip1%5C01%5Cclip_themedata.thmx"> <link rel="colorSchemeMapping" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CNathan%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtmlclip1%5C01%5Cclip_colorschememapping.xml">  <style>  </style> </body> </html>