01-01-2021, 11:14 PM
It was not elegant, the way he leapt into the air, stumbling back to earth with wild eyes and an unexpected yelp. He had been transfixed by the face looking back at him from the uneven surface of the water. It was his face. He knew that, though he had never seen it quite like this before.
Feline, and blunt-nosed. Slit eyes, shearing teeth, and a bewilderment that he would know in any form. It was an exact match for what he was feeling, and no thoughts of how impossible this was could alter that fact. Mikael stared at her as he had been staring at himself. As though this white and black patterned creature was something thoroughly alien to his world.
She wasn't, though. Not really. And he found himself smiling almost frantically at her subtle comment. She liked his spots. So calm. So demure. As though wearing a spotted fur coat was the most natural thing in the world. Not a dream. Not the impossibility he'd been yearning for since he was a foal and his half sister and his cousins and his father and aunt had all been able to shed one skin for another, and he'd been left behind. Shaking his head, he couldn't wipe the smile from his lips, so he figured he'd better say something before she took him for a loon instead of a leopard.
Looking over his shoulder, he admired his own cloak of fur. "Thanks," he replied, still dazed but coming to grips. "They're new." Curious, he paused. Could he push this new body the same way he did as a horse? For a moment his mind went blank. Too many possibilities fought for attention, and he found himself searching for something simpler. Ah. There it was.
Black bled away, deep purple intensified, until...
He breathed a contended breath, eyes half-shut in pleasure. He was white now, with his own unique pattern of spots now jet black against the snowy background. It had worked, he had worried it wouldn't, but it did. Now two monochrome cats stood on the edge of the river, and he felt his heart swell with the knowledge.
"You caught me out at a weird time," he admitted, tongue rasping unfamiliar against the roof of his mouth. A very weird time. If this was more dreaming, it was thoroughly convincing. "I'm Mikael," he offered, arranging his new limbs with care beneath his body as he spoke. Every joint felt liquid. Bizarrely stretchy. He picked up a paw, marveled when he could twist the wrist and see the underside with no effort to speak of.
@[Mazikeen]
Feline, and blunt-nosed. Slit eyes, shearing teeth, and a bewilderment that he would know in any form. It was an exact match for what he was feeling, and no thoughts of how impossible this was could alter that fact. Mikael stared at her as he had been staring at himself. As though this white and black patterned creature was something thoroughly alien to his world.
She wasn't, though. Not really. And he found himself smiling almost frantically at her subtle comment. She liked his spots. So calm. So demure. As though wearing a spotted fur coat was the most natural thing in the world. Not a dream. Not the impossibility he'd been yearning for since he was a foal and his half sister and his cousins and his father and aunt had all been able to shed one skin for another, and he'd been left behind. Shaking his head, he couldn't wipe the smile from his lips, so he figured he'd better say something before she took him for a loon instead of a leopard.
Looking over his shoulder, he admired his own cloak of fur. "Thanks," he replied, still dazed but coming to grips. "They're new." Curious, he paused. Could he push this new body the same way he did as a horse? For a moment his mind went blank. Too many possibilities fought for attention, and he found himself searching for something simpler. Ah. There it was.
Black bled away, deep purple intensified, until...
He breathed a contended breath, eyes half-shut in pleasure. He was white now, with his own unique pattern of spots now jet black against the snowy background. It had worked, he had worried it wouldn't, but it did. Now two monochrome cats stood on the edge of the river, and he felt his heart swell with the knowledge.
"You caught me out at a weird time," he admitted, tongue rasping unfamiliar against the roof of his mouth. A very weird time. If this was more dreaming, it was thoroughly convincing. "I'm Mikael," he offered, arranging his new limbs with care beneath his body as he spoke. Every joint felt liquid. Bizarrely stretchy. He picked up a paw, marveled when he could twist the wrist and see the underside with no effort to speak of.
@[Mazikeen]