A "Winds of Change" Story

By Jon Sleeper

I had my concerns for my two friends named "Brian" (no matter the spelling). Dinner was very silent that evening. Tim ordered the biggest salad I’d ever seen and glowered at Maxine and I from across the table. Janet was nowhere to be seen, thank God. She was more than likely with her brother at the hospital. Tim had hit "Buck" pretty hard with that fist of his.

Bryan was sitting to my left, hiding his face from Brian, who was ordering a salmon dish from the rodentine waiter. I noticed Brian avoiding any direct eye contact, something I remembered him telling me when I’d been a golden eagle morph. Something that Maxine could do for me again, if she was agreeable. But the question was would I be agreeable again? I could answer with a definite maybe

I loved being a whitetail. I loved my reddish brown fur, my large ears that twitched at every sound, and that I could move with incredible accuracy, and that gave away my state of mind. I loved my black, leathery nose that could pick out most any scent no matter how faint. I loved my unguligrade, cloven hoofed feet (_not_ digitigrade, I’d found out from a book) that enabled me to run with more speed than a "mere" human ever could; even faster in norm form. And of course I loved my tail. That twitching thing that gave my species its name.

I loved being a deer. It was that simple.

But my Change had left two holes in my sense of self. The first had been filled very recently by Maxine. The hotel we’d chosen was an Embassy Suites (we decided that a couple nights in a nice hotel wouldn’t kill us, and Brian and I still had our rewards for our police service) and Maxine and I had separate bedrooms. Neither of us wanted to give Tim reason to try to punch me in the mouth. Though I gathered she’d had to do some fast talking to keep the bull morph from doing that.

This other hole in my sense of self only came to my attention when we’d crossed back into the U.S.. I remembered staring at the incredible expanses of oak, maple, aspen, and other deciduous trees. I could smell the natural whitetails all around, even over the rushing of he wind as it went by.

I didn’t sleep like I used to Before the Change. I took a nap once during the day in the afternoon, then have a really active period around sundown. Then up once again before dawn. It’s a routine I’d been in for four months, part of some instinct that wasn’t a part of that inner voice. Just something I’d started doing and didn’t even think of stopping. Like I’d done it all my life. It was the very same way as to how I’d slept. I slept in norm form. Always. Ever since the first night after the Change.

It was three in the morning when my inner clock woke me. A bit earlier than usual (by about two hours at this time of year) but I found that I just couldn’t calm myself enough to fall asleep again. There was also a rather odd feeling. Both in my head, and a feeling almost like heartburn. But not quite.

I shifted to morph, got out of bed, opened the curtain and looked out at the view. From what I’d seen of Boston I liked already. There was a certain allure in the air, a kind of energy that California lacked. I saw the light from the homes that were nestled in the open woodland that passed for suburbs. We were in a sixth floor room, on a hill, no less. So the eastward view was nice. I made out a faint, nearly invisible glow on the horizon where the sun would eventually appear.

I was at a table, keys in hoof-hand, pen in the other, before I really knew what I was doing. I didn’t even remember what I wrote exactly in that note. Perhaps it was: "Gotta go do something" or something just as vague, wishing Brian luck with his interview, and apologizing to Maxine. I then quietly left the room and went down to my Toyota.

It was such a vague feeling that I really didn’t have a plan on where to go. After about a half hour of driving around I eventually found an interstate that went north towards New Hampshire. Amazingly I hit no other cars and the semis just seemed to avoid me like magic. I never questioned what I was doing. I didn’t even know what I was doing, in fact. It was just and odd compulsion to find something. Just what, I didn’t know.

By the time the sun came up I was already well north of Boston. At some point I’d put in an Enya CD, which only added to the surreality of the whole thing. I broke out of my near-stupor long enough to marvel at the forest that was right up against the road. California had nothing like this. I smiled at the sight, and continued driving.

The sights got more and more amazing as I drove up into the White Mountains of New Hampshire. Great expanses of forest so large I boggled at the sight of all those fall colors. Reds, yellows, oranges. The forest was on fire but it wasn’t burning. I got off the Interstate at the next exit, and took the road that looked like it might take me deeper into that fire. And I realized one of the reasons why I was out here. To find the Perfect Spot.

I almost missed the turn off onto a dirt road. The tires squealed and I was suddenly bumping over the rough ground, trees so close on both sides branches would frequently whack against the windshield and then be thrown aside, probably scratching the paint. I drove onward for some unknown period, still not knowing where I was going. Until the Universe decided for me. There was a loud pop sound and I nearly lost control of the car. That shook me out of my odd mood.

I grumbled and got out of the car. Intending to just go to the damaged tire and replace it with the spare that was mounted on the tailgate. I didn’t even take a single step outside of my car before I froze at the sight before me.

It was a small meadow bordered on one side by a small river. Surrounded it were trees in the glory of Autumn. Oak, maple, aspen, birch, and others I didn’t know the name of.

Before I knew what I was doing I shifted to norm and started to make my way among the trees. The scent of other deer was heavier here than anywhere else I’d ever been. I found myself in a more dreamlike state than anything. As if what was happening wasn’t happening to me, but to some other person. Strangely, it seemed that that other person was also me.

I found a small cache of acorns and ate them. I sniffed around, scenting at least two other bucks and twice as many does. But that wasn’t what I was here for. Not at all. Though I did stop to make my own mark at a scrape that hadn’t been used in a while, adding something that unmistakably said "Jon was here". Then I turned and walked to the other side of the meadow, stopping briefly to smell my Toyota, as if I didn’t know what it really was, even if it smelled familiar. The dreamlike quality swelled.

The sun was near its height when I finally found the correct spot to bed down for a while and chew my cud. I seemed to have lost several hours, though foggy recollections of wandering through the woods, the fallen leaves crunching quietly under my hooves, eventually winding up in the meadow again just out of sight of my car. When I bedded down in my bed of leaves I found myself so comfortable that I did something that deer seldom do when it’s hunting season, and daylight. I fell asleep.

And then, quite naturally, I dreamed.

Next came a certain sense of detachment. I was awake, but not really. Unlike my drive up to this Perfect Spot I wasn’t really in control of my body. But someone else was. He opened eyes that otherwise belonged to me, and looked with wonder at the world around him. Somehow during my dreaming I’d shifted to morph. And this person who was in control didn’t quite seem to know how to go about getting up onto two legs. He seemed to remember always going on four, before. Though there seemed to be a hazy recollection of something that was above him telling him that two legs was just as natural as four. This person struggled with my body a bit, then crawled out of the thicket. He then awkwardly used my hands to help him stand up on two wobbly legs.

Then came a single thought filtering down from above. It was filled with wonder. Why didn’t I see any of this before? The voice was a familiar one. It was my deer instincts, but there was clearly something different. Something new. He looked around at the meadow as if he’d never really seen it before. Warily, he let go of the branch and started to walk. So this is how he does it, came another thought. Not so hard... And then, of course, he tripped.

The slight jolt awakened me some, but not enough to do more than observe a bit more closely. He got up and dusted himself off. Then the wind shifted, and I smelled the scent of the upholstery in my Toyota. Curious, he (I) walked over towards my RAV-4 and looked inside. There was a word for this... came the thought from above. Then he stopped cold. Word? I’ve never used them before. He shook my (his) head violently, only managing to make him (me) dizzy. The mental tone changed from wonder to confusion.

The bit of dizziness was enough to get him (me) off balance, and once more I (he) fell onto the dirt. The sudden shock jolted me awake. What happened next was incredible, and unexpected.

There was a split second where we stood in the forests of my mind, staring at each other in slack-jawed amazement, like looking in a mirror. Then between one eye blink and the next, some force seemed to pull us together! There was a blinding flash, and my physical body once more fell into the carpet of leaves, and I blacked out.

I came to with a pounding headache and feeling rather dizzy. There was a kind of ringing in my ears that was probably all in my head. I felt leaves from the trees above falling on me. I snorted, blowing a couple away from my muzzle, and slowly got up to my hands and knees. Without even thinking, I shifted to norm to steady myself. The pain started to fade, and the world steadied itself. And I felt...

..reborn.

My memories had even changed, or maybe they hadn’t. I didn’t know anymore. Sometimes I remembered looking in the mirror at my spotted coat, as a fawn. Sometimes I was still human, but playing in the meadows and clearings with my sister, while mom was just out of view, but still watchful. There were amalgam memories, too. Where I was a morph and the world was a mix of open woodland and houses that were both shelter and open to the sky.

But these memories changed every time I revisited them. Sometimes I was human, sometimes I was a deer, sometimes I was a morph. I stumbled in my walk back towards my Toyota, my legs suddenly wobbly like a newborn fawn’s. I shifted to morph and decided to lay down for a while in the short, dry grass. Nothing will ever be the same again, I said to myself. Then I came to yet another revelation.

Since the Change, I might have changed physically, had to alter my lifestyle a bit. That sort of thing. But I’d been basically the same person. Me an my instincts had been separate from each other. Now that we were one and the same, things would be different now. Though I didn’t really know how. I mused over this as the sun got lower in the west and it got darker.

The headache eventually vanished and so did the dizziness. My memories were coalescing into more logical amalgams. Perhaps one of the best of these was getting up one morning when I was fourteen, looking in the mirror, and seeing the first bud of velvet coming from my pedicles. I was getting my first set of antlers. Mom was a gray fox morph in those memories, oddly. As if the Change had never happened, and people had always been furries. But I knew that wasn’t true. Because I still remembered the Change, clear as day. Clear as the transition that I’d just gone through only hours before.

It was getting darker, and I realized I still had a flat tire to fix. I heard the beeping of the car’s warning that I’d left the keys in the ignition, pinpointing it’s location right away. When I caught sight of it I stopped a moment and stared. This thing meant a sort of danger, especially in the headlights. But this thing belonged to me, after all. So there was no danger. I shrugged it off with a bit of apprehension and went and removed the keys from the ignition.

I’d never changed a tire before, so this was another first. I wondered why I was doing this when I had four perfectly good hooves to get around on, but there was a problem in that my friends were about a hundred fifty miles away. A long walk. These humans things had their uses after all. I opened the rear door and took a scissors jack out of a storage compartment. Looking at the manual in the fading light coming down from the path that the road made.

It took me the better part of an hour before I got the tire changed. I didn’t hurt myself too much doing it, either. I was putting the blown tire on the rear mount when I smelled him. But I didn’t look back until I was finished. When I turned around I saw that the fellow eight-pointer was giving me a look that said: Are you crazy?! He was also in a bit of a belligerent mood, and I smelled does nearby.

The scents of those does made me think of something that I hadn’t for hours, and I kicked myself for not doing it. Maxine was probably back at the hotel, worried sick. "Sorry, friend. I can’t spar now. I’ve got a doe waiting for me back in Boston. Maybe some other time?" The buck blinked, looked back at the does that were finishing off the cache of acorns that I’d found, then he looked back at me unbelievingly. "Shoo! Or I’ll get angry!" I said sternly. The buck bounded off.

The world had changed for me in a way that was hard to quantify. To myself, I really didn’t seem any different. I knew I wasn’t really a natural deer; there were still human memories as well as deer ones. Though I could call up several versions of pre-Change memories at will ranging from fully human to fully a deer. Of course, there were some memories that didn’t translate very well to a deer’s life. Like a long trip to Kansas taken while I was nine. I knew I couldn’t run that fast, after all.

But there was also a sense of completeness of self that hadn’t been there before. I was what I was, and nobody could argue with me about it. They could either accept me or reject me. I wasn’t going to change what I was.

It was well dark when I neared Boston again. I took the freeway off ramp near the hotel, parked my car, and went inside.

The scent of my friends, as well as their worry, was so strong that I stopped in my tracks. "Jon?!" came Bryan’s voice.

Tim and Maxine were sitting together with their backs to me. My heart went into my shoes when I realized she’d been crying. When he heard my name, he jumped to his feet and stormed my way with glowing horns of his Nullification Power. He was starting to pull a fist backward, winding up for a punch.

I didn’t hear Bryan’s warning, because I was suddenly focused on my rival. My neck started to throb and a sudden strength filled my muscles. I glanced in Maxine’s direction for a moment, she’d finally broken out of her sobbing and was looking at me with both total relief and horror about what her brother was about to do. Tim closed in and threw his huge fist at me with all his might. I saw it coming and merely put my hand up and stopped it in it’s tracks. It stung quite intensely, but I was able to brake it’s advance and stop it cold. "Bad idea, bullyboy," I said dangerously. "But I’m not going to fight you."

He looked at me, shocked at what’d I’d just done. He tried to throw another punch with his other fist, but I dodged this one. Then he threw another, and another. His glowing horns kept me from using my shield, but I seemed to know his moves before he made them. Not due to any Power, but because of he way he smelled, the way his muscles moved. I dodged three more punches before hotel security came in to stop him. A strong and large polar bear morph and a rhinoceros morph grabbed Tim and held him down.

And oddly familiar low Degree red fox morph who was apparently the hotel manager arrived. "What’s going on here?" He looked at me. I was panting from my exertions. "This must be the friend you’d told me about, Mr. Derksen?"

Bryan nodded, looking at the fox morph with one eyebrow raised. "Yes. That he is. Thanks for your concern." He looked at Tim, who was still struggling a bit.

The polar bear glared at the bull morph. "If you don’t calm down I’m going to have to sedate you. Hear me?" he growled. Tim seemed to realize what he was saying and stopped struggling. "Good. Can I let you go now?" Tim nodded slowly. "Good. But I’ll be nearby if you do it again. I’ll also see to it that you won’t stay another night in this hotel. Get the picture?"

In the meantime Maxine had rushed over to where I was leaning against a support pylon. Her expression had gone from relief to anger. "Where the hell were you?!" she said. Then I looked up at her and she her reproachful look changed back to concern. Clearly there was something about me that somehow communicated that I’d changed. "Are you okay, Jon?"

I stopped panting, turned to her, then put my arms around her shoulders. I drunk in her scent and smiled. "I’m okay now that I’m back with you again." Then I lick-kissed her on the muzzle and hugged her tightly. I could feel Tim’s gaze boring holes in the back of my head all that time. "But maybe we should talk about things over dinner. The only thing I had today was some acorns."

I turned towards my friends and smiled at Brian. "So, how’d your interview go?"

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