Going Native

Story by Blue Jay on SoFurry

, , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

A young scientist arrives at an outpost on an alien world, only to discover that the aliens aren't on the outside...

This is my submission for the Sci-Fi Summer (2013) contest, and while I'm fairly sure a lot of others will vastly outclass me, I know some of you will get a bit of a kick out of this. It's also my first hybrid work, so I'm hoping that element works out well enough here.

Edit -- Good news, everyone! While I knew I wasn't going to win first place, I still amazed myself by snagging 12th place (alongside a fellow contender)! https://www.sofurry.com/forum/view/thread?id=29097&page=7

Hooray for me!


"Oh, relax, you're not going to be punished," the old beaver assured his subordinate as he finished pouring himself a glass of whiskey, the ice hissing as it cooled the liquid.

"I'm not?" the young arctic fox, Arthur, asked in surprise.

When he'd been summoned to the CEO's office, a feeling of dread had welled up inside of him, slowing his gait to a crawl as his mind turned over a dozen different ways he'd be grilled. He had been so utterly sure that his re-submission of the Schock report, in which he corrected over thirty mistakes a senior bioengineer had made, would result in a summary punishment, perhaps even job termination. After all, telling your superior he was doing his job wrong wasn't a smart thing to do.

"Goodness, no," Cresswood said, sinking into his chair. He took a sip of his drink. "No, you're not in trouble. In fact, I was kind of looking for a reason to reprimand ol' Gamble, because he rubbed everyone the wrong way and yet it was never enough to tell him where to stick his high-minded opinions. But with you catching all those errors on a brand-new client, making sure that we don't scare them off with abused trust that makes us look like greedy lying bastards, well, I think Gamble can be sent on a couple weeks' unpaid leave. His wallet will be sore when he comes back, if anything."

Feeling more relaxed, Arthur smiled.

"That's better. Now, I know you're pretty new here, but since you did a good job and saved a four million-dollar relationship, I talked the right people into waiving protocol. You're going to like your reward."

"A raise?" Arthur asked, brightening up and tail twitching. He was making good money, especially under Future Gene, but more was always better.

The beaver laughed heartily. "No, no, sorry. No raise. I'm talking about a learning experience. You'll get to work with fresh, raw materials right there in the field, and under one of the best in the business, no less."

Arthur's face fell. "Oh. I see. Well, I'm sure it'll be a great experience."

Cresswood took another sip. "It will. Patricia Venkmann is amazing, knows more about genetics than just about anybody I've ever seen. That we managed to hire her before the competition...god, what luck! She's added about twenty mil to our company portfolio alone, and we've only had her for about eight years!"

Arthur's heart skipped a beat. This Venkmann was certainly very impressive.

"Now," the CEO continued, "you'll be taking a ship to Goober IV, which is where she's stationed. Since you two are in the same field, you'll be assisting her with everything, and I have no doubts that you'll learn more than any academy can cram into your noggin."

The fox nodded. "How long will I be working with her? A few months?"

"Nope. Two years is standard rotation time. Starts once you make planetfall." Another sip. "Sorry if that ruins any plans you may have been making."

"No, it's all right," the youth assured him. "I kind of live a simple life."

"Good! Keeps the mind focused on the work! Now, you may want to start packing. You leave in eight weeks. Earliest we could get you."

****************************************************************************

The trip had taken three weeks real time, but Arthur had slept all the way in a medically-induced coma, his body kept in a stasis pod and given nutrition drips directly into his system. He had been brought out a day early, to work the kinks out, and the crew had shown him the "travelogue" they made to show him some of the celestial bodies they caught glimpses of and the worlds they passed.

Of course, this was only when they were at each of the way stations, which were placed to guide ships lest they make a wrong jump and fly into any one of a thousand space catastrophes.

"You look cute when you're asleep," one of the pilots, a giraffe named Julian, complimented Arthur when he had been awoken, which made the smaller male blush fiercely.

Their arrival on Goober IV, the only hospitable planet in the system, happened to fall into the afternoon of the midweek. The sun's setting turned the skies a dark orange and the endless jungle a deathly shade of greenish-black, but the huge landscape was utterly beautiful, and Arthur could just make out lilac-colored mountains capped with snow in the far distance.

"It's amazing!" he breathed. "Such a wide and luscious terrain!"

The other pilot, Zeke, a border collie, chuckled. "You sound like you want to be one of them terraformers that're brought in to set up operations so we can colonize."

"Well, yes, I'm sure I'll have an impact on their success rate," Arthur replied, slipping into intellectual mode. "After all, without an understanding of the flora and fauna and their effects on people, then colonization is futile."

"Here we are," Julian announced, swinging the dropship in a wide orbit of the facility FGWO-85.

The installation was not very large, occupying a clearing with high fences around it to prevent wildlife from roaming around, its low, dome-shaped buildings no more than a story high, with the rest of its wonders hidden underground. The landing pad was at the base's south end, a hundred yards from the security office; soldiers' barracks weren't necessary for a low-hostility world such as this was. The entire facility was connected by a metal floor, as it had been brought in completed rather than built on-location; the process was much easier to just insert a facility into a hole in the ground.

"Thanks for the lift!" Arthur said, grabbing his bags and walking to the back of the dropship. As the boarding ramp lowered, Julian came up and wished him well, sealing the goodbye with a playful slap on the butt and a sultry grin.

"Make sure to ask for me when you make the return trip, okay?" the giraffe advised.

Blushing, Arthur assured him he would and departed, waving as the vessel took off up into the atmosphere. Hefting his bags, the fox trotted over to the security building.

"Hey there," a large, muscled coyote said, brushing some lint from his uniform's shoulder. "Take it you're Dr. Barrow?" At Arthur's nod, he continued, "I'm Hanson. I'll show you to Dr. Venkmann's lab. She should still be there."

"Does she often work later than others?" the white vulpine asked as he followed the guard, the pair making their way across the installation to its north side.

"Since we got here. It's like she gets no sleep, but she's friendly enough and keeps an eye on all of us, making sure we get regular shots and even monitors our diets to adjust for the world's influence. Here we are."

Arthur thanked him and entered, setting his bags on the chairs to the side of the lounge. Beyond that, through glass doors, he could see a well-stocked laboratory, with beakers and machinery of all kinds, the work stations helmed by various scientists. One of them was a female snow leopard, who was currently speaking with a nodding grizzly as they looked over some Petri dishes.

Deciding to go ahead with it, Arthur entered the lab, his entry not noticed by anyone. When he neared the pair, Venkmann glanced at him and broke off conversation with her fellow. She was a head taller than Arthur, five-ten to his five-three, with full breasts and slender hips that he found himself glancing at involuntarily.

"Dr. Barrow? Pleased to meet you," Patricia said, shaking his hand. "I need you to come to my office."

"May I ask why?"

She waved a hand. "You're new here, and all new arrivals have to get a cupcake. It'll help keep you from getting constantly nauseous."

For a moment, all he could do was blink at her. When his mouth got to working again, he asked, "I'm sorry? I don't understand."

She took his arm and led him out of the lab and across the lounge, the two entering her private office and the feline slipping around her desk to a mini-fridge. She removed from it a cupcake, exactly as she'd said, its dark brown body topped with bright pink icing and rainbow sprinkles.

"Here," she offered. "It'll taste awful, but it'll stabilize your systems. Everyone eats a cupcake to keep the nasty stuff down."

Sheepishly, Arthur accepted, and true again to her word, it tasted sour as the devil. He forced it down and earned a smile from the grey-furred beauty.

"Now, since it's late and I don't need you to do anything, you can take your bags to the bunker, unless Sergeant Hanson already has. After that, you're free to do whatever you like. We start at eight in the morning."

*************************************************************

Arthur had settled into his quarters nicely, even if they were a little cramped. As the first couple of weeks passed, he found that Patricia really was nice, showing genuine interest in him as both a scientist and a person. He had to admit that working so closely with such a brilliant female excited him, both as a professional and as a person: it was impossible not to be impressed by the spotted lady's incredible intellect or her appearance.

Most of the time, she had him parsing out the genes of the wildlife of the world. As he'd learned, the beasts were of all sorts, possessing a smorgasbord of anatomical features: multiple arms, legs, tails, or even head (sometimes a combination of them); wings; massive serpentine bodies; armor plating; and more.

"Such diversity in them!" Arthur commented. "They evolve into all manner of things to survive in their environments. I can't think of a single person who's got six arms or two arms and four legs or huge wings or anything like this."

"Oh yes," Patricia laughed. "They're truly interesting. Makes you wonder just what we'll evolve into down the road." Her eyes took on a dreamy look. "I can't tell you how beautiful I find wings to be."

Smiling, Arthur joked, "I'll grow a pair and let you ogle me twice a day."

"Much better to look at than these," she chuckled, quickly pulling up the file photos of the native creatures. They had an almost lifeless series of faces, rough and with little in the way of expressions, the leathery skin hiding few facial muscles. If Arthur had to describe them, they were much like gorillas, only with permanently bored looks.

Beyond that, he quickly found that Hanson had been right, Patricia staying behind to work an hour or two more on things. Unable to refrain from asking what she was up to, the answer he got was, "Mostly organizing the mess called my notes so that others can read them, but maybe I'll surprise you down the line."

*******************************************************

One day at lunch, one of the structural engineers joked about how the two of them were practically dating, since Patricia had never shown such friendliness to any other. Arthur felt flattered.

"Well, I am a really nice guy," he said, blushing. "Mom always said I was cute."

In spite of how fun and comfortable work was, he had an issue. Perhaps the only thing about working on Goober IV that he firmly disliked was how he had to regularly get shots. Once a week he'd have to roll up his sleeve and let the snow leopard dose him with a hypodermic gun, always feeling groggy afterwards for a short while.

When he asked the others, they had only shrugged.

"We all go through it," a tan-furred bunny named Felicity said. "Patricia insists it's helping us against microbes from the planet, since we don't filter the air outside the buildings. She says if we bred here, then our children and grandchildren would have better resistance to the environment."

"But corporate says they'll pull out anyone pregnant, since we're not a colony yet," said a stag named Mac. "We're allowed relationships in general and half of us rut with the other half, but so long as we aren't sporting round bellies, it's cool."

As the others chuckled and went back to eating, Arthur rubbed himself on the upper back. He'd been feeling sore there at times, but the pain always went away, except when he tried to sleep. In bed, he had to lay on his side because for some reason he felt profoundly uncomfortable on his back now, as if his shoulder blades were trying to duke it out during slumber time.

And that wasn't all: he would have the strangest dreams, in which Patricia had a creepy leer on her face and a large needle in her hand, telling him it was time for his shot, but the fluid glowed a sinister red and he kept telling her he wasn't sick, really he wasn't...

*********************************************************************

"Arthur, you look sick."

Caught by surprise, the arctic fox didn't know how to respond at first. Patricia had asked him to share lunch with her in her office. In the six months he'd been there, she'd never eaten around him, and so far as he heard, never ate in the cafeteria to begin with, but he had been growing fond of her and accepted, a budding hope in his chest that perhaps he'd found the female he was meant for.

"I don't _feel_sick," he told Patricia, who was examining his face closely.

"Your eyes look like they have bags under them. Have you been getting good sleep?"

He set down the glass he'd been drinking from and blinked, shaking his head as his vision grew hazy. He tried to answer, tell her that it was all right and that he'd only been having strange dreams where she was out to get him and silly things like that, but instead he collapsed forward onto her desk.

"Arthur!" she cried, racing around to grab his shoulders and sit him up.

At this point, his mouth was acting of its own accord, drool spilling out. His body wasn't responding to his dimmed thoughts, the muscles spasming randomly. His eyes watered as his gaze met hers, those soft green orbs bursting with fear, and he wanted so badly to say he was sorry for upsetting her like this.

Patricia went around her desk again, hurriedly pulling fluids and a hypo-gun, mixing colored liquids and loading them into a syringe and then into the hypo-gun's chamber. She pressed the barrel to Arthur's neck and injected the chemical cocktail. The white canine felt coolness spreading throughout his body quickly, washing away the warmth that had overtaken him. His muscles stopped acting up and his vision cleared, the ache in his mind vanishing.

"Thank...you," he rasped.

"Thank heaven you're all right," Patricia said, helping him carefully to his feet. "Maybe you'd better take a rest."

"Yes," he nodded. "Yes, I think that would be..."

He trailed off as his body's temperature went up higher and higher, sweat matting his fur. It didn't feel like fever, since he was strangely becoming more energetic and quite aroused, his loins stirring.

The white-furred fox collapsed onto his hands and knees, trying to ask for help but his voice wouldn't work, and a part of him wasn't even sure he wanted help, because he was feeling so very, very good. His pants tented almost to the point of ripping, his (usually) small cock somehow giving them a run for their money.

A wave of tremendous pleasure swept over him, removing all worry. He didn't even notice when the back of his shirt and lab coat burst open, two large, white-feathered wings flapping with freedom. His new wings were strong enough, in fact, that the right one smashed clean through his superior's desk, splinters and papers going everywhere.

More ripping could be heard as his shoes split apart. His feet had turned tridactyl, only three large, long toes with thick, hooked, glossy black claws at the ends. The arches had shifted as well so that he'd be standing on the balls of his feet.

The arctic fox panted heavily as he stood up, his trousers terribly uncomfortable. His hands made short work of them, freeing his massive tool. The modestly-sized member had swelled to a jaw-dropping foot in length, almost three inches in girth. It was arterial red and had kept both the tapered point and the knot, but the latter had also gained in size, almost triple its old form.

Arthur could almost see the intense heat rolling off the huge phallus. It twitched and pulsed, begging to be used. The fire in his loins seemed to intensify, his hunger for a mate almost overwhelming him.

"You look more beautiful than I had imagined," Patricia breathed, coming up to him and running her hands over his chiseled chest, another gift of his metamorphosis.

"You...did this to me?" he asked, brow furrowing in confusion, his lust and need to mate momentarily abating.

"Of course I did. Didn't the company tell you that I'm utterly, absolutely brilliant? But for all my smarts, I can't for the life of me find a male that I like." She traced a circle on his chest. "But then you were assigned to this base, and I was able to factor you into my plans." Her voice was sultrier than ever, her honeyed words soothing him, making him less worried about his changes and more eager for what she wanted.

"Plans?"

She nodded. "Mhmm. I didn't want to just make up a cure for the common cold: I wanted to revolutionize life itself. I've always had an interest in hybrids, ever since I was a child, but because not a single person safely and naturally developed hybrid traits, and especially not on a large scale, I was forced to look to alien species, such as the common beasts here. Because of their genetics and the company's assets, I've been able to slowly concoct a series of formulas to make everyone vastly more suited to any world."

She paused, stepping back. Slowly, deliberately, she used the claw of her right index finger to snip the buttons from her blouse, letting her breasts become unveiled.

"And now we get to the best part..."

***********************************************************************

Hanson was in the security office when he started sweating badly. At first he had thought the growing heat and pressure, especially in his crotch, were signs that he was going to be briefly nauseous, but when his head started aching and all the muscles on either side of his neck growing taut, he knew something was very wrong.

He grabbed for the radio but his hands shook too much and he only knocked it away, the plastic device skittering across the floor. Pushing aside as much as he could the rising urge to succumb, the coyote got to his feet and took one staggering step after another towards the door. If he could make it outside, then somebody else would see him, and he'd get help. Surely Patricia could figure out what was ailing him.

His plan was dashed, however, when he knees buckled and he dropped to all fours. The tension in his trapezii seemed to build even more than ever. Just when it was about to burst, a wave of relaxation and pleasure flooded his being. The canine couldn't resist giving in to the new sensations, glad that something other than excruciating agony was coursing through him.

His eyes closed and his body went just a bit rigid as a lump formed on each trapezius, swelling rapidly and pushing out. Features grew more and more refined, the lumps becoming heads just like his own, complete with skulls, vertebrae, and organs. Each time his new bones popped into place, a surge of power ran through him, until he felt as if he would explode.

Had he been paying attention, he would have heard his clothes ripping to shreds, his muscles inflating to sizes that rivaled a bodybuilder's. In mere moments, he'd gained a hundred pounds of hard muscle, and if he tried to sit in his usual chair it would break immediately under such stress.

With his changes stabilized, Hanson opened all six eyes, and found his view had changed fiercely. He could see in front of him, from his usual perspective, but there were two new angles now, granting him sight to the left and right. He turned his primary head as best he could and inspected each new one, and found them to be exactly like his formerly sole one. Looking at himself from three directions was strange, yet he wasn't afraid.

Pushing himself up onto his knees, he looked down with all three heads to find that there was almost nothing to hide his chiseled new body. Snorting, he tore away the last strands, and three muzzles grew three smirks. His cock had not only become engorged, the knot fully inflated, but the phallus had altered to almost a foot in length, its thickness easily double. And that knot was practically a grapefruit shoved inside the base of his dick.

"Heh, heh..." the hulking canine grunted. His paw could still wrap around it, but it was far more filled, his fingertips just barely managing to come together; no doubt he'd wreck any female he put this monster in, especially if he forced the knot through.

Female...

Touching himself, and the transformation, had already greatly fired up his sexual hunger, but the thought of rutting, knotting, and especially breeding a female set his loins ablaze. Teeth bared, he got to his feet and made for the door.

He'd only just reach it when a young female's voice called his name. The portal slid open and in fell Gwen, a penguin who worked in the electrical department. She was barely able to push herself onto her hands, and as he watched, her breasts enlarged to double-D proportions, threatening to reintroduce her to the floor.

"Help me...Hanson..." she rasped, shuddering as pleasure rolled through her body. The poor dear was in the clutches of heat.

His six eyes shifted past her, and he saw her legs had been fused together and were finishing up extending, bringing her total length to a marvelous twelve feet. All three of Hanson's tongues licked their lips as he watched the thick body flex and twitch, the powerful serpentine muscles reveling in their freedom.

The security officer's attention was brought down below as Gwen rubbed her beak against his balls, her own tongue flicking the underside of his knot. The male groaned at the teasing.

"God, your smell..." Gwen said between her ministrations. "Your musk, it's so good...!"

"Gonna give you more than that," he replied.

It was child's play to turn the black-and-white avian naga onto her back, his new muscles providing plenty of strength; he had the feeling he could lift a truck overhead.

Gwen's eyes were all but glowing with the desire to be taken by a dominant male, her small hands kneading her large tits. Hanson didn't waste time with foreplay, penetrating her swiftly and having his secondary heads tackle her mounds while his primary dove in for a kiss.

Their tongues wrestled for only a few moments before they split apart, her throat loosing gasps, shrieks, squeals, whimpers, and pleas for more. Hanson didn't respond, his mind becoming focused entirely on the fucking, and most importantly upon getting his knot inside and securing offspring. Had he tried this on a normal female, he'd have spread her out so much only something with a dick like a horse could satisfy her.

"OH GOD HANSON I LOVE YOUUUUUU!!!" Gwen cried out, her arms wrapping around his new heads and her breasts nearly engulfing his central one. The female's walls clamped down on his cock, and both went over the edge, his boiling, hyper-potent cum roaring into her welcoming, hyper-fertile womb. Enhanced by Patricia's secret gene therapy, his balls continued to produce a massive quantity of cum, so much so that Gwen's pussy was overfilled, her gut distending to resemble a female easily three months along. Her outcry was matched by his secondary heads' howls.

Finally his sac emptied, and after a few minutes, filled with heavy panting from both, his knot deflated enough to be withdrawn; his cock gave a couple weak, last-second squirts to decorate Gwen's snatch before stopping entirely.

Exhausted, the coyote laid down on his stomach next to his new mate, unable to resist the need for sleep.

************************************************************************

Patricia was bobbing up and down in full-length strokes on Arthur's huge cock.

She had begun to explain how the mutagenic compounds she'd infected everyone with had given them incredible stamina and massively boosted their reproductive systems, but he'd grown impatient. Her scent had teased him, whispering in his ear and pulling at his noseto pin her and rut her until she was fat with his cubs.

When she had taken a small spray bottle out of a cabinet and given herself a few squirts, Arthur had lost it, lunging at her. He'd positioned her so that her back was to his chest, his thick cock causing her throat to bulge out lewdly as it pistoned in and out. Up above, his tongue snaked through her feminine folds. The feline scientist convulsed, her sex weakly and futilely squeezing his tongue as it ravaged her depths, small rivers of her honey matting her crotch and ass. On the floor, a small puddle of drool, pre, and female juices was collecting.

Strangely, Patricia was growing heavier in his hands, and Arthur was forced to set her on the office floor. As he watched, her own transformation kicked in, her legs swelled obscenely before splitting apart down the middle to form two more. Her ass pushed out and out, a thick body growing between the two pairs of legs.

When the change had finished, she looked up at him, a wicked glint in her eyes. Rolling onto her back, she spread her legs, inviting him to continue.

"You look incredible," he growled as he lowered himself into position.

"Needed...a body...that would hold a lot of cubs..." his mate breathed, licking her lips hungrily. "Easier to walk on four legs than two with a loaded belly."

Had he been able to form a coherent sentence, Arthur would have agreed. As it was, his mind was to drenched in pleasure and too focused on thrusting respond.

The pressure and the ecstasy finally became too much, and Patricia's silken folds clamped down while Arthur's rod swelled. The spotted feline wailed in fierce bliss as a gallon of hot cum surged into her. Once milked dry, the fox collapsed onto his mate, exhausting dragging him closer and closer to sleep.

*****************************************************************************

"Landing procedures initiated," Julian said as he dropship descended towards the landing pad.

It had been two years since they'd made a run to Goober IV. While each had spent the time well, earning good pay and seeing a lot of sights, Julian had been kind of missing Arthur. The giraffe had certainly gotten with a few of both sexes over the last couple of years, but not an arctic fox like Arthur, and Julian was curious to see how his brief acquaintance was doing.

"Gonna hit up the cafeteria when we touch down," his co-pilot, Zeke, said. "Dunno why, but them foodstuffs the company gives them actually taste good."

"Only because your tongue was secretly experimented upon, giving you a warped sense of flavor," his orange-and-brown friend chortled.

As before, the area was visibly vacant of its populace, everyone keeping inside the buildings. The pair disembarked, and Zeke headed towards the cafeteria while Julian made for the labs.

Hidden, several pairs of eyes watched them.

**************************************************************************

"Hello?" Zeke called as he entered the cafeteria.

He had figured it would have a few people in it, being late morning local time, but to his shock, he couldn't spot a single soul. Admittedly, the responder on the commo had sounded odd when he and Julian had called down to inform them of their impending arrival, but he hadn't thought anything amiss.

"Is anybody here?" he yelled again.

He moved to the far back, approaching the serving line, and saw there was indeed a soul to be found: a brightly-colored tabby was rummaging through a reach-in fridge, their body blocked by the door save for a quite voluptuous ass.

"Hey there," he said. "Can I get a bite? And where is everyone? Almost lunch, isn't it?" He tried to keep his voice level; for all he knew, it was laundry day.

"Oh, hey!" the tabby replied, head popping up over the door. Amazingly, she kept inspecting the fridge, her body shifting oddly.

The border collie scratched his head. "Um, isn't that painful, stretching your neck that way?"

"Nope!"

Zeke went cold as a second head joined the first...and then a third, fourth, and fifth head.

"I feel just fine!"

All five spoke at once in perfect harmony, the same voice emanating from each mouth. As the multi-headed feline stepped out from the cover of the shiny steel door, Zeke's heart skipped beats left and right: she had a fantastic body, but no arms, and with all her heads on lengthy necks. She must have been rifling through the fridge with those, he thought.

"Oh, you're a cutie!" the hydra-like tabby grinned. "I've already got a mate, but I don't see the harm in a little fling, do you?"

Zeke could only stare in horror as she easily mounted the counter, five leering heads coming straight at him.

**********************************************************************************

"Arthur, you there? It's Julian!"

"In here!" came the reply.

Grinning, the giraffe entered the office across from the main laboratory. He was surprised at how empty the labs seemed, but pushed the matter out of mind.

"Hey, good to see you again--oh, I'm sorry!"

Behind the desk sat a female snow leopard, and she only smiled at him.

"Quite all right. Have a seat, why don't you? My mate will be back from hunting soon."

"Mate?" Julian asked as he sat down. "Arthur? When did you two tie the knot?"

A laugh. "Oh, just six months after he arrived. He really is a wonderful person, and such a good father."

She seemed to get up, but Julian realized she hadn't been sitting in a chair. When she rounded the desk, he blinked.

"Do you like your females to be quadrapedal?" she asked, completely ignoring the stunned look on his face. "As I've told Arthur, having four legs makes carrying a batch of young loads easier."

"I...I think I'd better go, ma'am," Julian said, his voice straining. He had no idea what the heck as going on, but the instinct to flee was growing more and more powerful.

He'd only just gotten out of his seat when the door opened again, this time admitting a tall, muscled arctic fox, his huge wings pulled in close to his back.

"Ah, Julian," Arthur smiled, but it was a lusty smile that only made the other male's fear swell. "Glad to see you again. I hope your offer still stands, even though I've got a big family now."

"...Offer?" the terrified giraffe squeaked.

Arthur's hungry grin only broadened. "Oh, yes. You wanted to hook up with me, remember? That slap on the ass was a tease years ago, but now I want the whole thing."

Suddenly, a sharp prick was felt in Julian's arm. Grabbing at it, he pulled away a small syringe designed like a dart, its contents empty.

"Sorry," Patricia said, "but I'm really very curious to see what Arthur whipped up for you. I'm sure you won't mind."

Staring at the dart, Julian felt something bubbling inside him...

The End