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Ambrose shrugged to Amaya. "Well. I think you are - in a good way of course. As much as I feel horrible for saying it... at least we're surrounded by some good people.... I mean, don't get me wrong - no one deserves this, and I wish that he'd stop bringing innocents here on one hand... on the other, I've made some of the closest friends I've ever had here, especially considering that I haven't been here very long. Maybe I didn't get out much back home..." He shrugged self-consciously "But it's true."

Turning to Emelyn, Ambrose looked a bit surprised by the question, but not offended. "I... well, yes... actually. I mean, I've barely had time to even properly come to terms with it myself... I could hear the two of you speaking outside the door before I opened it..." He paused, and his ears visually perked, turning towards the window for a moment, and then swiveling to the door. "I can hear jungle animals... A few people walking around..." Ambrose shaked his head. "It's so strange..." He said quietly.

"And...." He lifted his nose, sniffing a bit "Dear Lord I can smell the cafeteria now that I think about it.... Mmm... that smells good." Ambrose was suddenly reminded that he hadn't eaten that day between the change and then dealing with it. His stomach audibly growled.

"I'm sorry to blurt it out like that," Emelyn said, "...unfortunately there's not a... Miss Manners Manual for something like this." She shoved the limp quills out of view of her eyes- annoyed with herself. She'd been saying only the wrong things for a good long time. "I think curiousity just wanted to... take over all the other emotions. Curiousity doesn't require as much thinking." She decided to just be honest, and voice that aloud. If it left her vulnerable- ah well. At least they'd understand that she hadn't meant to be callous.

"I'm hungry, too," she said, but paused, not wanting to suggest that they go to the cafeteria if he wasn't ready.

"Well..." Amaya stood up and stretched before turning back around to face the two. "I'll let you two go ahead and eat. I should be heading off to bed anyway." As if on command, a long yawn escaped her lips. "By the way, I came over to tell you that Mister Dude is alright... at first he just had a little amnesia, but after I told him all that happened he seemed to remember." She had almost completely forgotten about the reason she had come to Ambrose's duplex in the first place.

Ambrose felt bad - he had almost forgotten completely about the Dude, and all at once the memory of what had happened the night before surged back in his mind and put things into an even starker perspective. "Oh, geez, that's right! Thank you Amaya - I was worried about him. I'm really glad to hear that he's alright." He stood up as well, giving her a final quick hug. "Thanks for letting me know - and for helping out so much last night. You have a good night's sleep."
Ambrose wasn't tired in the least.


Ambrose smiled to Emelyn and blushed. "Just wait here one moment, I'll go get something more decent on."

Avoiding the mirror in the bathroom, Ambrose pulled out one of his standard t-shirts and pants, and slipped them on over the boxers... only realizing as he had nearly pulled the pants all the way up that he had a new apendage to deal with that wasn't going to be surreptously hidden in his pants. With a frustrated snarl, Ambrose grabbed a pair of scissors from the dresser drawer and made some hasty adjustments before dusting his hands off on his pants and giving a weak smile. "Ready. I think."

"All set?" Emelyn asked, noticing the quick alterations he'd made to the pants. "Alright. Amaya's already left, so we can just get going." She gave a smile to Ambrose, hoping it wasn't a weak one, and together they walked out of the duplex into the open air, and towards the cafeteria.

Their walk was a silent one, but Emelyn doubted that it wasn't filled with thoughts... from both parties. And she wondered at the doors of the cafeteria- who they'd encounter.

The Shower is Always the Best Place to Think

The intrusive sunlight found its way through the slats in the blinds the next morning, and right onto Ambose's sleeping face. His sleep, while deep, had not been pleasant. While the nightmares were nothing compared to the ones that the injection of the serum produced, his bottled apprehensions manifested themselves in his unconscious mind.

While the dreams faded quickly upon his wake, the issues that they raised still sat heavily on his shoulders. Sitting up and looking down at the unfamiliar, furry body sent chills down his spine. Even at the most basic level his mind wanted to reject that what he was seeing was really him, and not some strange sort of clothing that he could strip off when he was through with it. But it was certainly, to him, more than just appearances - he could feel the fur against the sheets, stirring in the air from the vent. He could feel the long tail behind him - mercifully less sore than yesterday when it had grown from his spine in some alien fashion. The true mark of an animal. People didn't have tails.

He got up and stripped back down to his boxers, looking at the hole he had decisively punched in the back of his khaki pants yesterday before going out. THere was some frightening amount of finality to that. Acceptance that he demonstrated that he really wasn't sure that he felt. Hell, he knew he didn't feel. Amaya and Emelyn helped yesterday more than he could explain, but it just seemed so quick... The night before last he had been dressed like a musketeer at a dance party and, not to toot his own horn, rather looked the part despite a few now relatively minor features. Now... now was different to say the least.

He walked into the bathroom, grabbing shower products, and once again subconsciously avoided glancing at the mirror.

The hardest thing, he reflected, was knowing that there was no going back... only forward. Stagnation meant a likely painful death. He had built up the hope (admittedly mercifully lessend by Emelyn) that perhaps he wouldn't change again - that this was too much to be plausible. Then, after his second injection, he felt like he looked even less human than Hargun and Greer... And there was no escaping it. Changing ones perception of self - accepting that you look like an animal even when surrounded by people who know what he's going through... it was almost too much. Even what Emelyn whispered, about maybe tryiing to find a way home after their changes completed... could he live with himself - some barely humanoid wolf - around people who wouldn't understand - who would fear or hate him, or at the very least see him as a freak? It was one thing to deal with a few people. It was an entire different thing to have to break the ice with every person that one might meet - to try to explain and prove to them that one wasn't as they appeared. Ambrose had always tried so hard to make his appearance reflect how he wanted to be seen. This was stripping that control from his hands - something that he had always clung to.

He gritted his teeth and pulled down his boxers, stepping in the shower.

Being one of the first ones on the Island meant that he was progressing through the changes more quickly, putting him in the awkard dual position of trying to cope with the changes happening to his own body, feeling like more of a monster than even his friends who were all destined to go down the same path, but also trying to set some sort of example to them and not frighten them with dealing with the changes badly. The Dude's reprimand when Ambrose made a vague reference to his unsatisfaction also gnawed at him. He knew that he was destined for a much better fate, in his and others' opinions, than many other of his fellow subjects - still mammalian at the very least - but that didn't make adjusting to it easy, let alone a welcome change that it almost seemed to be in the Dude's case. At least, he though, Emelyn and Amaya opened their shoulders to him to be straightforward with. But on the same note, a part of him wanted to show them the strength - that they could deal with the changes that would happen to them as well. He was growing closer to Emelyn as the days passed - and he despised the thought that she would think him a weakling - unable to cope with the same thing that everyone else was. He wanted to be the one to protect HER, not the other way around. And he was Amaya's big brother... Likewise, he should be comforting her.

The water, at least, felt good - and in the shower he could let his thoughts wander down the dangerous avenues of apprehension. Agknowledging them, at least, he could try to move past them. If he pretended everything was okay when they weren't then he would have even bigger problems on his hands eventually - he had learned that the hard way already. He didn't like what was happening to him. That was given. He didn't want to be an animal - even if he was luckier than most. He felt like he was losing himself - losing a lifetime battle that had been drilled into him since he was a small child - that people use appearance as a first judge of character - regardless of whether or not they admit it. So he would have to find other ways to project his personality. By the way he dressed, by staying well-kept and clean... even if that meant grooming and shampooing fur and keeping his long fangs white.

He worked up a lather through his fur, forcing himself to look down at his body. For now, he realized, as the water plastered the fur to his body - he was still mostly shaped the same.

The breath caught in his throat, however as his eyes dropped downwards to a more personal location. He had noticed some... minor changes last injection but had chalked it up to some actual regenerative nature of the serums; that maybe the curative properties of this research that the doctor was brandishing actually held a nugget of truth. But as he saw the furrysheath, an animalization of even that part of him, his blood ran cold. What did this speak of relationships?! Even if Emelyn could still care for him looking like this, would she be repulsed by the thouhgt of ever being intimate with him like this?? Would she think of it as being intimate with an animal instead of a man?? And if that part of them changed physically... what about hormones? Feelings? Could those change as well? Even if they were people mentally, Ambrose remembered biology class where they discussed how many feelings that people have are just chemical reactions... hormones.

He slammed his fist into the shower wall with a feral snarl, immediately regretting it as all it resulted in was a sore hand. Shaking it to get the feeling back, he drew in a long breath. Did he feel different already? As much as he wanted to deny it... he couln't. He didn't know if it was just some psychosomatic result of feeling the fur all around him - the new muscle cluster at the base of his spine that controlled a long, furry tail; the way that he could feel his ears perk at something interesting, or press back in result to something disturbing - all of these changes in the way he moved or reacted to things more quickly... but he did feel different. More alert, more tense... more... in touch with that side of them that most people pretended had long been domesticated by 'civilized' living.... as much as Ambrose wanted to cling to that word as a defining quality of himself - he could feel whispers of the proverbial call of the wild, and it scared him. If he embraced these... if he made this Island his home, secured his happiness in new friends around him and new relationships... would he even still be himelf? Or, was it a moot argument entirely - and were these just new things and new changes that he was going through - that he would always be Ambrose - just reacting to these things as he himself would do?

The second vantage was certainly the more healthy option... but could he bring himself to believe it and be happy with it? Letting himself understand what he was going through, and facing his fears and apprehensions? It was much easier said than done.

He finished rinsing the shampoo from his hair and fur and turned off the water with a sigh. Before he even stopped to think about it, he was shaking like a dog - the water flying from his fur against the shower. He froze, the quiet regular dripping of water onto the wet tiles below him as he let the weird feeling sink into him of what he had just done without even thinking about it. Instincts the word reverberated through his mind. He had almost shook himself back at the beach once - he remembered... but he had realized soon enough and flagged the thought as an alien, obtrusive one. Now, he had done so without even a second's thought. Was this minor action just a sign of things to come...? The lack of control terrified him - what was worse was that the impulses were coming from within - not some alienated animal voice telling him to do something, but a change in himself.

Who was he fighting to maintain his identity for..? Himself? Or for the people around him? Did the fact that he felt the urge to shake himself dry really that bad? No... it really wasn't... Hell, someone might even find the action cute. But it was the thought that the things important to him might change - his restraint.

Well Ambrose thought with a smile of finality, The answer is simple, and the answer that I had come to all along. I hold fast to the things that are important to ME. I will identify what makes me Ambrose, what I value in myself and I will hold onto those with an iron fist. I help people.... I'm a gentleman. I take care of my appearance... no matter what it might be. I enjoy meaningful conversations, fencing, reading. I can make it through this. I can.

'Sploring the Jungle with Colche
Ambrose braves the jungles to find a new world of smells and sounds, and runs into Colche. Ambrose's second 'little sister'
http://www.gaiaonline.com/guilds/viewtopic.php?page=15&t=1140393#37721394

Ambrose had returned from his excursion in the jungle not too long ago, feeling much better about himself, all things considered.

He had gone by the cafeteria on his way back for lunch, taken a refreshing shower, and lay down to take a nice nap with a full belly, hoping that his muscles (and in some cases bone) would soon feel less sore and tender.

He was awakened, however, not too long after laying down by a strange sound of metal against his window. His ears pricked and his brow furrowed as he got back to his feet and pulled on a shirt and a pair of pants.

THe sound was coming from one of the front windows, he quickly discerned, and he opened the door to poke his head out... quickly realizing that there was a woman there whom he had never seen before... with a tape measure by his window.

"Ah....... hello..?" Ambrose said quietly, really, really hoping that whomever it was at least knew what was going on.