Adapting to Love (Joelay)

Adapting to Love

Ray was running for his fucking life; he turned a sharp corner, feet skidding across the slick alley floor as the cold precipitation spattered his jeans. His breath came in heavy, sharp, painful rasps as he pushed himself to keep going forward, knowing his pursuers weren't far behind.

He could smell the rage radiating from the men behind him and he wrinkled his nose as he picked up his pace, the taste of blood and salty sweat in his mouth, lingering there.

Lights shone above him but his vision was slightly blurry, glasses askew, but he could smell the docks ahead of him, and he sighed in relief that he was nearly there.

As he perched at the edge of the dock, he turned to the four men, a cocky smirk on his face. He took off his glasses with slow, deliberate motions, placing them neatly in his front pocket.

"Until next time, boys." He gave them a sarcastic salute as they raised their guns, but he was already hopping into the water. Midair, he began to transform. Gills sprouted on either side of his neck and his feet elongated into long flippers. He hit the water with a loud splash before kicking downwards into the deep; the men never even got a chance to fire their guns.

The next day, Ray was lounging on one of the top branches of a large tree, hidden from view. Though he was precariously laying, he was firmly attached.

"Fucking assholes." He smirked as he saw a man in a black suit and sunglasses walk slowly down the street, looking back and forth shadily before turning back with a resigned look on his face.

Okay, so maybe he purposefully got captured. It was just too fun, escaping them so easily and watching them run around like chickens with their heads cut off. As if they actually thought they could hold in an Adapter. He knew that's what he was, because he had overheard the little assholes call him that once.

He jumped from the tree, the sticky spines retracting into his fingertip as he strolled casually down the sidewalk, making his way towards an open cafe he often visited. 

As he neared, he ducked into a corner, watching his body as it disappeared, skin creeping away until he was completely invisible to the human eye. He passed by a woman who was deeply engaged in a conversation with her date, snatching her freshly-arrived coffee and pizza slice off the table. 

Moments later, the woman called the waiter over, complaining of the slow service and demanding a refund. Ray sniggered, taking a bite of the cheesy food.

He felt a sharp pang in his had and flinched, retreating into an alleyway as he let go, his body reappearing in an instant.

"Fuck." He mumbled, rubbing his temple with a forefinger. Doing small adaptations like gills were easy, but full-body ones were much harder, and he was usually left with a bad headache if he did it too long.

He recalled when he was younger how adapting to the simplest situations was hard, how he had spent hours in his room alone, practicing; first with simple things, then to more important ones, such as the making the skin on his hand flame resistant. He had gotten burnt several times in that practice.

As he grew, he noticed he could do more with less pain, and he relished in the development. Of course he never told his parents; he never told anyone, actually. Even in his young mind, he knew that what he could do was different and to be hidden. For a while, he was actually convinced he was the only one like him, until the first time he was captured by Them.

He didn't know who they were, or what they were called, he only knew that they wanted him, supposedly for experimentation and dissections and probably to make some army of people like him; that's how it always went in movies, anyways. Their attempts were always terrible though, considering he could adapt his way out of every situation. He enjoyed the game though.