Issue 1 Downtime

A couple of days after his talk with Bear in the woods, John was sitting on the ground by a tree next to a wall. Now he was bipedal again, if a slouched and awkward one. His awakened feral side was still pounding at his thoughts like a monster trying to get in. He was trying to master it, but still couldn't bring himself to think of it as part of himself.

He had no idea what he was doing.

Teri was still confused by what she did or didn't see the other night and had been spending a lot of her free time buzzing around in the trees. Spotting John with one of her many, many eyes a couple locust rush ahead while she lands. The bugs land on John's snout to chirp hello while she walks over, still a little bit further away.

Without thinking, John gave an annoyed grunt and shook his head forcefully.

A couple fall off but two of them hold on, chirping again while the ones that fell off catch their fall by starting to buzz through the air.

He growled a warning.

"Hi to you too!" Teri cheerfully shouts as she runs up to John, the insects not wanting to budge, apparently.

He grunted an annoyed greeting. "Get your damn bugs off of me," he said harshly.

"Oh..." she comes to a stop in front of John. "Of course. We're sorry!" she says and reaches over to pluck the two locust from his snout.

"You're lucky I didn't just smash them on principle," he said coldly, the feral 'other' on full volume in his head.

"Why would you do that? We were just saying hi..."

"Bugs are annoying."

"S-sorry?" she says, sounding confused, almost a little hurt.

He just grunted and rubbed his forehead with a not quite back to normal hand, clearly in a very bad mood. He glared at his fingers.

"I hope Kraven did die... horribly," he grumbled.

"Oh don't say something like that!" she says, giving the big lizard a hug, including a couple bugs orbiting around them.

John's eyes widened and then narrowed. He then rather violently threw her off of him with a snarl in a fit of instinct.

Teri doesn't even manage as much as a surprised yelp before hitting the wall and splattering into a clump of dazed locust.

John snapped out of it and sprang to his feet.

"Oh God... Teri I'm so sorry... I..."

The pile of bugs shifts as they slowly shake off the daze, clumsily jerking away from john as a whole.

Shame and fear washed over him in equal measure. Fear of himself.

"... I'm not... I'm not him..." he muttered more to himself than anyone as he began backing away.

Bug by bug Teri slowly takes to the air, the cloud twitching nervously as a whole before they fly away.