Instincts

Chapter 1 - Encounter

Instincts

2012 © All Rights Reserved

Author's Note:

Hello, all! Ferrett here, and I am very, very happy to welcome you to my very first story. I am so grateful for you readers; just by reading this sentence, you have brought some joy to my life! *Twinkling eyes* Alright, sorry with the mushy stuff--it just had to be said. Getting to the formalities, I just wanted to talk briefly about this story. (Don't worry, I am not a fan of long author notes...this is just to clear some things up, so if you want to skip ahead to the story, be my guest!)

I'm going to be up front: Initially, I hated werewolf stories. I looked down on them. Sure, some of them online were really well written, but I just could not take them seriously. So, one day, to distract nerves before a major surgery, I took a bet to actually write a werewolf fiction, which were incredibly popular at the time. At first, I intended it to be completely satire: I was going to parody the CRAP out of the genre. Things didn't exactly go as planned. As I continued to write, unexpectedly, the characters began taking on human (well, for dogs) traits and they actually began to develop! It was totally insane and completely unintentional. But, I ended up connecting with the characters, and so did my friend who was also reading it--she was the one who encouraged me to post the story. In the end, after an intense battle with shyness, I took her advice. So, thank you all so much for reading my little ultimately irrelevant-to-the-actual-story monologue, and I hope that you all enjoy the story! Happy readings!

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Her body moved slowly along the ground, her hind legs almost dragging after the many moons of effort. She couldn’t decide if she preferred the snow that had seeped into her bloody, crusty fur and matted it, or the newly fresh grass, with which each tiny blade felt like a bear’s claw when it made contact to her wounds. She supposed that she should just be fortunate that she was alive.

She had thought that she could have taken that beast on her own; she had done it once before by herself. It had only taken some well-thought out planning and a good execution, just like her father had taught her; it was always the best to learn from one as blessed as her father. Luckily, she had picked up on some of his genetic abilities, which had helped her and Kyuu out a number of times. But, it still didn’t mean that every hunt was successful. In fact, not a lot of them landed her a big prize; most of the time, the big game got away, but, this time, it decided to fight back. And it had won, sending the poor she-wolf fleeing with a still empty stomach, a goring wound to the back half of her body, and the overpowering feeling of failure. She wasn’t usually one to dwell, but the loss of a hunt was a deep-rooted blow to her pride every time it happened, but, it wasn’t so bad since she had been on her own; at least now she could only disappoint herself.

But, now, she wasn’t sure if she would even have herself to disappoint anymore. Her forepaws were shaking and her back set had completely given in, her tail dragging through the mud. Each pant was forced, her ears bent back on her head with effort. Her amber eyes, which were usually filled with so much light, were now dim, and her sight was beginning to flicker as well. Most of her functioning senses were blocked by her impending demise; her sight already going, her nose overpowered by the scent of her own blood, her slowing heartbeat in her ears, the numbness in her limbs, the taste of death. She was going, and she knew it.

If the Spirits wanted to take her, then she was ready, even if she was a bit sad—she felt incomplete. But, if that was how she would be contributing to the Circle, then that is how it would be. There was no use fighting it, and, anyways, it might help others; her remains could be eaten by another of her kind just as bad off as she was, and it would save them; that would make her happy.

The bloody scent deriving from the open wounds fell for a second and gave way to a completely different smell. Her ears pricked up and she opened her eyes, alert to the new stranger in front of her. How had she not have been able to detect someone who had been so close? It could only be one, due to the faint scent. Her vision finally caught a blurry figure in the distance—or was it up-close?—that, was in fact, not the same as hers. It was upright and tall, standing on two limbs and masked with material that covered the uncoated skin. It had a mane of long fur on its head, but that was it. And its forepaws were crossed in front of the figure’s chest as it seemed to be looking in the opposite direction.

That was no wolf. It was a human.

Humans were something she hadn’t seen in a while. Yes, they had been swallowing up the land, but they generally feared getting too close to the denser areas of the forest. Why was this person here? Was he a brave one?

No. Regaining some more of her sight in a last-ditch bodily effort to find safety revealed that the human was not out of the norm. It was, she, in fact, that was limping along the edge of a valley that was overlooking a land of destroyed forests, covered over with a sheet of solid grey and stacks of rock walls that were jutting out of the ground, reaching for the stars, but cut off evenly. But, the strong smell and the sight of them on the ground below confirmed that this human was certainly not the only one around here.

So, why had she come to a place like this? There were so many humans here. She really had not been making any conscious decisions in the direction she was going; she had been following. Instinct was what pulled her on her entire life, and it was pulling her until that very moment. Confusion racked her muddled brain. She really hadn’t thought that Instinct would take her near anything. Wasn’t she on her Final Walk?

She let out a slight whine, one full of curiosity and pain. This caused the human to turn for the source of the sound.

The moment she was fully able to sense the being in front of her (near or far, she could not differentiate), everything froze. The whole world stilled. She forgot her injuries, her feeling, and her incoming end. All of her deteriorating thoughts and her frail emotions locked like her raw joints. Instinct held it all.

The human didn’t move either.

Suddenly, the earth moved faster than her paws. Her entire body was consumed by inner flames. Her wounds seared, her feeling thawed out, and there was no memory of an end; only what was in front of her. Her thoughts and emotions were carried away by the whipping wind. Instinct was devoured by the fire, and it came back as one thing:

Want.

Her struggling pants and attempted whines sounded like breaking branches in her own ears, but that was just barely audible above the humming of the inner heat. Every inch of her body burned as she felt her coat melt away, her limbs grow further out, her mind turn some kind of switch in the opposite direction. The pain was profound, and she was unable to vocalize at all during the entire transformation. But, when it was completed, and her head was lying atop the frigid ground with her lengthened mane extending from her scalp and fanning out around her face, her mind centered around a new, painful, all-consuming, and dominating factor:

Need.

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A bit confusing, yeah? Sorry if you found it to be so. Don't worry...It will be cleared up soon! If you liked it, I would appreciate the vote! Thank you all so much for reading! :)