A lonely creature’s delt hand

Night settled once more over the battered survivors. The shallow caves and rock overhangs offered better protection than the last encampment, and the recent feast of monster meat had dulled their hunger, but true rest remained an elusive dream. The air in their cramped shelters was thick with the scent of unwashed bodies, fear, and the lingering, gamey odor of their recent kill.

"Night in 'Camp Carnage'!" The Great I said with a certain satisfaction, observing their uneasy slumber from my usual, infinitely more comfortable vantage. "They've eaten! They're sheltered! One might almost think they were adapting! But oh, Humanity, never underestimate the delightful ways new horrors can bloom from within, even when the external threats take a brief pause. The body, you see, has its own insistent, often monstrous, little demands."

Sleep, for most, was a fitful, shallow affair, punctuated by nightmares and the constant, low-level anxiety of their situation. Those on watch – a rotation now more grimly adhered to – peered into the oppressive darkness of the forest beyond their rocky refuge, every snap of a twig, every rustle of leaves, a potential threat. Minor wounds from the monster fight throbbed, and the memory of the battle, the sheer alien violence of it, replayed in their minds.

But this night was a different kind of torment for Gail Southernland, the Kissing Bug hybrid. The strange meat had done little to satisfy a specific, gnawing emptiness that had been growing within her since her transformation. It wasn't a hunger for flesh, but for something far more specific, something her new instincts screamed for with increasing, terrifying intensity.

She lay huddled near her parents, Vincent and Juno, but found no comfort. She was wide awake, her eyes, now with a faint, unsettling sheen in the dark, darting around the sleeping forms of her classmates. A fine tremor ran through her slender, chitin-accented limbs. She kept touching her mouth, where the horrifying proboscis lay hidden, a subtle, almost unconscious gesture. Her breathing was shallow, her senses alert, not to external dangers, but to the pulse of life around her, the warmth of blood flowing just beneath the skin of those sleeping nearby.

"Ah, our little hematophage awakens!" I noted with keen interest, focusing my attention on Gail. "The monster meat, it seems, did not satisfy her… particular palate. That specific craving, that delightful little evolutionary imperative I so generously bestowed upon her, is getting rather insistent. Look at her, Humanity! Shivering! Eyes darting! Practically vibrating with suppressed, unholy desire! It's like watching a pressure cooker about to blow! Popcorn, it's refill time, I think! Oh, I desire it to go in the direction of my envisioned desires of outcome."

The sounds of the sleeping camp – the soft snores, the occasional whimper, the rustle of someone shifting position – were, to Gail, a symphony of temptation. Each sleeping form was a potential vessel, a source of the vital fluid her new body screamed for.

The rational, human part of her mind was horrified at the breaking point after fighting its insistent calls for the past week in a state of starvation, recoiling from these monstrous urges, but the threat to drown her in its dark, irresistible current of her desire now that she had grown lax from a regular, proper meal. She clenched her fists, her newly formed, slightly sharper nails digging into her palms, fighting a battle no one else could see.

The rational, human part of Gail’s mind screamed in silent, horrified protest, but it was a fading whisper against the roaring, insatiable typhoon of her new Kissing Bug instincts. The hunger, that specific, gnawing craving for warm blood, had been building for days, a relentless pressure behind her eyes, a coiling tension in her limbs. The monster meat feast, while filling her stomach, had done nothing to appease this particular appetite; if anything, the taste of flesh had only sharpened the edge of her actual, terrifying need.

"And she makes her move!" The Great I, observed with delighted anticipation, leaning forward on my couch of solidified despair. "The internal struggle is over! The pathetic human conscience has been thoroughly routed by glorious, primal insectoid imperative! Observe, Humanity, the 'honeytrap' technique – a classic predator behavior, now adapted for humanoid interaction! Such delightful cunning!"

Her eyes, gleaming with an unsettling, dim light, scanned her classmates' huddled, sleeping forms. She wasn't looking for strength or weakness in a tactical sense, but for something else – perceived lack of immediate defense, maybe just an unfortunate soul sleeping slightly apart from the central cluster.

Her gaze settled on a boy huddled near the edge of their small, fire-lit circle – one of the quieter students, not part of any particular clique, his transformation was unassuming, a western fence lizard. He was stirring slightly in his sleep, vulnerable. Perfect. “But what was his name again? Victim B? No, Villager A? Ah, Michael Ross, the cute boy that always gets forgotten in the background, you think Humanity as a social species, your population would do more to make actual connections,” said The Great I.

Gail slipped from her spot near her still-sleeping parents with a grace that was entirely new to her, a silent, fluid movement born of her new nature. She moved like a shadow, her transformed limbs making no sound on the cave floor. She approached her chosen target, her expression carefully schooled into one of gentle concern, a far cry from the ravenous hunger coiling within her.

"Hey..." she whispered, her voice a soft, silken caress as she knelt beside the sleeping boy. He mumbled, stirring further. "You awake? I... I couldn't sleep either. It's so cold in here, isn't it?"

The boy, Michael, blinked his eyes, slowly focusing on her in the dim light. He looked confused, a little startled by her sudden proximity. Gail offered him a small, hesitant smile, a masterpiece of feigned vulnerability. She reached out a hand, her fingers, now a fraction too long, too slender, with nails that had a subtle, chitinous sheen, and gently touched his arm.

"Just... feeling a bit scared, I guess," she murmured, her eyes wide and seemingly innocent. "Thought maybe... talking to someone for a bit?"

"Oh, the artistry!" I applauded silently. "Feigned vulnerability! Proximity established! Disarming familiarity deployed! Textbook! Will the unsuspecting victim fall for it? Or will he notice the slightly-too-intense stare, the faint tremor in her touch that speaks not of fear but of barely suppressed hunger, the way her lips part almost imperceptibly over where her proboscis lies hidden? Unlikely! Your species is so very susceptible to a pretty face and a damsel-in-distress act, Humanity!"

Still groggy, Michael likely registered a pretty girl showing him attention as if he were in the middle of a nightmare. He mumbled something incoherent, a sleepy, awkward agreement. Gail leaned closer, her movements slow and deliberate. Her feigned concern, masking her focus on her task, now consumed her entirely. The air was stifled with unspoken, unholy intent.

Michael Ross, still groggy from his fitful sleep and disoriented by the strange dream while seeing the sky outside the cave, only registered the surface details: Gail, one of the prettier, wealthier girls from school, was kneeling beside him, her voice a soft murmur, her touch surprisingly gentle on his arm. He mumbled something incoherent, a sleepy, awkward agreement to her whispered suggestion of talking for a bit. It was all very dreamlike, surreal. He was probably still half-convinced this was all some elaborate dream.

Gail leaned closer, her movements slow, deliberate, almost hypnotic. Her feigned concern, that mask of innocence, was perfect, masking the predatory intent that now consumed her entirely.

The air around them felt stifled, and Michael's sleep-fogged mind couldn't quite grasp it, only registering it as a subtle wrongness, a faint, bloody taste he couldn't place in the back of his throat. Her nearness, the faint, unfamiliar scent of her transformed self, the way the dim moonlight caught the unsettling sheen of her skin — it might have registered as odd, but comforting. Still, it was perhaps not immediately alarming in this world of constant oddities.

“Hmm, you're wondering what ultimately led to this predicament and why there was so little foreshadowing for this moment? Well, there was a lot more as a small subplot, but it was part of that dull slop I had us skip on by. No, use for it anyway, like I said at the beginning, not like humanity in this day as having an attention span longer than that of a goldfish, anyway. Now, back to the story, Humanity. Hold your questions,” The Great I said with disdain and enthusiasm for the poor little masses of this captive audience.

"I just… I keep hearing things," Gail whispered, her voice trembling prettily. She shifted closer, her shoulder brushing his. "Every little sound out there makes me jump. I feel so alone, even with everyone around." She looked up at him, her eyes wide and luminous in the dim moonlight. "Can I just stay near you for a little bit? Just until I calm down?"

She didn't wait for an answer, but leaned into him slightly, as if seeking comfort, her head resting near his shoulder. Still half-asleep but now acutely aware of her proximity, her scent, the soft brush of her hair against his cheek, Michael felt his heart pound for an entirely different reason. With a surge of bewildered hope, he thought that she might be about to kiss him.

Her face was close to his neck, her breath warm. "It's just… I'm so scared," she murmured, her lips near his ear. Then, he felt her breath hitch, and a strange, soft panting sound began, like a small, eager dog. He looked down at her, wondering what she was doing or if she was acting as if she had a fever.

Her tongue, shockingly, flicked out, tasting the air near his throat, and seemed to grow longer, looking more like a serpent's, impossibly slender and questing.

Before Michael could process this bizarre, terrifying shift, the questing tongue hardened, straightened, instantly transforming into a sharp, needle-like proboscis, gleaming wetly in the faint light. It quivered with a terrible, eager life of its own, aimed directly at the vulnerable, pulsing vein in his neck. A low, guttural hiss, almost a sigh of satisfaction, escaped Gail's lips, "Blood..."

The shift from feigned tenderness to raw, predatory intent was instantaneous. One moment, she was a scared, pretty girl seeking comfort; the next, a monstrous parasite poised to feed.

Michael Ross, his sleepy confusion was vaporized, replaced by a sudden, ice-cold spike of pure, uncomprehending terror. "No! Get—!" A choked gasp, half scream, half word, tore from his throat, but a hand clutched his throat tight as he saw, too late, the monstrous weapon descending. He tried to jerk away, a futile, instinctual recoil, his muscles screaming in protest against their sleep-induced lethargy. However, once gentle, her grip on his arm and neck was now like iron bands suppressing his strength.

"There it is!" I exulted, my non-existent heart thrumming with delight. "The money shot! Forget kissing, she's going straight for the juice box! Such efficiency! Such a horrifying biological adaptation! Give the girl points for commitment to her new dietary needs! No hesitation! No remorse! Just pure, beautiful, hungry, and satisfaction! This is the kind of decisive action I appreciate!"

But, alas, Humanity, your protagonists rarely oblige a good villain’s desires in these sorts of tales, but happen very commonly around you. Funny, isn’t it, Humanity?.

The sound of Michael’s choked cry, though brief, was sharp enough to pierce the uneasy quiet of the cavern. Katy, whose senses were always on a knife's edge, reacted instantly. She had been dozing lightly, curled near Shirou, but that sound–raw, primal fear–had her on her feet in a silent, fluid motion, her golden eyes already scanning the dim, moonlit space, her body coiled like a spring.

Shirou, startled awake by Katy’s sudden movement and the faint, desperate sound, scrambled up, his ears swiveling, trying to pinpoint the source. "What was that?" he said.

Katy didn't answer, already moving. Her gaze locked onto the struggling forms of Gail and Michael near the firelight's edge. She saw Gail hunched over Michael and saw the unnatural glint of something sharp near his throat. "Gail! No!" she yelled, her voice a sharp, commanding snarl that cut through the cavern.

Her shout and the sudden commotion alerted others. George, sleeping heavily nearby, jolted awake with a startled roar, his massive form struggling to orient itself. Ms. Linz and some of the other adults, startled from their own fitful rest, shouted questions about being under attack and looking around in a drunken daze.

But Katy was already there. She launched across the short distance, a blur of tawny fur and desperate speed. She slammed into Gail’s side with the force of a car backing up, her shoulder connecting hard.

The impact sent both girls sprawling. Gail shrieked with rage and frustration, her proboscis retracting with an audible slurp as she was knocked away from Michael. Michael, freed, scrambled backwards, gasping and clutching his heart, his eyes still wide with terror, trying to put himself against the wall.

Shirou arrived a second after Katy, his own claws clutched open at the ready, though he had no clear idea what to do with them. He saw Gail, her face contorted into one of hunger, fury, fear, and regret. He saw Katy, crouched on top of her snarling, ready for any move that could be made.

"DENIED!" The Great I said as the internal wave of genuine disappointment washed over me. "Oh, the 'heroes' spoil the fun! Always! Leaping into action like poorly choreographed stunt doubles from one of your cheap action films! Look at them wrestle the poor, starving bug-girl! Is this a rescue? Or just delaying a perfectly good meal? Tsk, tsk. Always interrupting the best parts of the show!"

Now fully awake and grasping the situation, George Handcock lumbered over, his massive presence adding to the sudden chaos. "What in the blazes is going on here?!" he bellowed, his voice echoing through the cavern.

Gail, her eyes still fixed on Michael with that terrifying, hungry light, tried to lunge again, but Katy didn’t relax and kept her pinned to the ground. Seeing his chance, Shirou moved to help Katy, trying to help restrain Gail and prevent her from becoming or creating a potential victim. It was a chaotic, desperate scuffle in the dim, flickering light of the dying fire and the cold glow of the moon, the sounds of snarls, hisses, and terrified shouts filling the cave.

The chaotic scuffle in the dim, moonlit cave ended as abruptly as it had begun. George Handcock’s booming voice and massive, bear-like presence had frozen everyone, including Gail Southernland, who was now securely pinned beneath a snarling Katy and a grim-faced Shirou.

Michael Ross, the intended victim, was still pressed against the far cave wall, hyperventilating, his eyes wide with a terror that had yet to recede fully. The other students and adults, jolted from their fitful sleep, were a collection of wide, horrified eyes and gaping, transformed maws, staring at the scene.

"And... cut!" The Great I, announced with a theatrical flourish, though only you, Humanity, could appreciate my directorial finesse. "A lovely bit of action! The near-miss! The heroic intervention! The damsel is in distress. Well, the damsel is causing distress in this case! Now for the emotional fallout! The tears! The recriminations! The delicious, uncomfortable truths!"

Once it was clear Gail was no longer an immediate threat, Katy cautiously eased her grip, though her cat eyes remained narrowed, her body tensed. Shirou, still breathing heavily, helped pull Gail into a sitting position. The Kissing Bug hybrid didn't resist. The crazed fury that had contorted her moments before had vanished, replaced by a horrifying, broken sadness. Her beautiful face crumpled, and she began to sob – deep, shuddering, gasping sobs that wracked her slender frame.

"I… I couldn't stop it," she choked out between sobs, her voice raw with self-loathing and terror. "The hunger… it’s not like normal hunger… it burns… it needs… blood." She looked up, her eyes, still shimmering with that unsettling sheen, filled with tears. "I didn't want to… I tried… but it just… it took over! I'm a monster! A real monster!" She buried her face in her hands, her hard shell accented fingers trembling.

Her raw, terrified confession sent the assembled students a fresh wave of fear rippling. If Gail, one of their own, could succumb to such horrifying urges, what about them? What monstrous instincts lay dormant within their transformed bodies, waiting for a moment of weakness to erupt?

The silence was broken by a hesitant, shaky voice. It was one of the quieter students, a boy whose transformation had left him with the lean, robust build and amber eyes of a wolf – Carlos Alfonsi. "I… I understand," he said, his voice low and gravelly. "When that… that thing attacked us in the last encampment… I wanted to tear its throat out. Not just defend… I wanted to kill it. To taste its blood. It was… strong. The urge."

Another student, one of the smaller insectoid hybrids, Arthur Finley, the Toe Grabber, nodded slowly, his raptorial forelimbs twitching. "I keep wanting to… hide in the water… wait for something small to pass by… and grab it, I have dreams of it and why I would waste time by the river even if the fish were the size of guppies." He said, with hollow eyes staring off into the night sky's stars.

Otto Patel, the Beaver hybrid, looked down at his powerful incisors. "I just… I have to chew on wood. All the time, as if I were a cat with a post or something. If I don't, it feels like my teeth will only continue to grow till they reach the ground. I mean, they are already two centimeters longer today than they were yesterday."

"Waterworks! And confessions!" I cackled, thoroughly enjoying this impromptu group therapy session for burgeoning monsters. "Oh, the humanity! Or rather, the distinct lack thereof! 'I can't help it, I need to drink people!' Followed by a chorus of 'Me too, but with biting!' or 'I just really want to build a dam right now, it's a primal urge!' It's a support group for the damned! Far more entertaining than any of those tedious reality shows your species produces, for the most part, but when those families tear each other apart live is prime television, but seeing it through memories of others isn’t as entertaining, I admit."

The fear was contagious now, not just of external threats but of themselves and each other. The masks had indeed stripped away the mundane, revealing not just altered flesh but altered, terrifying desires.

Amidst the rising tide of fear and horrified confessions, Ms. Linz stepped forward. Her countenance was pale but resolute. Mr. Decker and Coach Roberts flanked her, their expressions grim. The adults had to restore some semblance of order, some hope, before the group completely disintegrated into panicked mutual suspicion.

"Alright, everyone, calm down," Ms. Linz said, her voice carrying a surprising firmness despite the tremor she couldn't entirely conceal. "What happened with Gail… it was terrifying. For all of us. Especially for Michael." She looked towards the still-shaken boy. "But these… these urges… they're part of what we've become. We can't ignore them, and we can't let them control us."

"Easy for you to say, Ms. Linz," Kent Adler, the Green Crab, sneered from the shadows, though his voice lacked its usual aggressive confidence. "You don't feel like you need to suck someone's blood to survive."

"Perhaps not," Mr. Rafner, the Raven teacher, interjected, his voice calm and analytical. "But we all have new needs, new instincts we don't understand. The key is to understand them and then to manage them. Gail," he addressed her directly, his tone not accusatory but almost scientific, "this hunger for blood… is it constant? Or does it build?"

Gail, still sobbing, managed to shake her head. "It… it builds. It gets worse when I'm really hungry… or stressed."

Pat Duvall, the Bloodhound-hybrid, who had been listening intently, his brow furrowed, spoke up. His voice was rough, practical. "Back home, when we hunted deer, Dad always said you bleed 'em out immediately. Preserves the meat longer. Stops it from tasting… gamey, I mean we have been doing that anyway with the small kills we’ve had here anyway." He paused, then looked at Gail, then at the adults. "If this hunger is for blood, specifically, and we're going to be hunting these creatures for food anyway…" He hesitated, clearly uncomfortable with the implication. "Maybe… just maybe when we make a kill… Gail could… take what she needs? It would drain the blood faster before we butcher it for the rest of us? Controlled. You know, kill two birds with one stone sort of thing."

"And from the brink of chaos, a solution!" The Great I, applauded with genuine, if still malicious, admiration. "Not hugs or understanding or tedious moralizing, but good old-fashioned blood management! 'Don't drink your friends, drink the dead alien squirrel!' Pragmatism! I approve! It lacks a certain… flair compared to letting her run wild and drain the cast one by one, but I suppose it keeps the narrative going longer. Marginally."

The suggestion, though grim, hung in the air. It was unsettling, yes. But it was also logical. It offered a way to manage Gail's horrifying new need without endangering others, and it even had a practical, if gruesome, application in meat preservation.

The opportunity to test Pat's practical solution came sooner than expected. The previous day's hunt, the one where they'd killed the multi-limbed horror, had yielded a massive carcass. While most of it had been deemed safe and used as dinner that night, some portions had been set aside and not prepped for preservation yet.

Under the watchful, uneasy eyes of Ms. Linz and Coach Roberts, one of the wrapped slabs of meat, still covered in blood, was unwrapped and presented in front of Gail. It was a grotesque thing when uncooked, but it was undeniably still fresh flesh. Gail, pale and trembling, was led to it. Katy stayed close by her side, a silent, supportive presence that starkly contrasted the fear and revulsion of many other students glancing at her from the back.

"Just… what you need, Gail," Ms. Linz said softly, her voice full of an almost unbearable pity. "Please be careful, dear."

With a shudder that ran through her entire body, Gail knelt. She opened her mouth and her tongue extended and hardened into her proboscis, which slowly, this time, almost reluctantly, came into form. She found a small puddle of blood at the base of the meat in the leaf rap and gave an almost inaudible sigh; She began to feed, with embarrassment, and acted squimish. It was a disturbing sight, the pretty girl with the monstrous appendage drawing sustenance from a dead creature like a milkshake. But as she fed, a visible change came over her. The tremors lessened. She moved her proboscis away from the little puddle that had dried up and stabbed it directly into the slab of meat itself. A little color returned to her cheeks. The mad, desperate hunger in her eyes softened, replaced by a profound, exhausted relief.

When she was done, she pulled back, her proboscis retracting and looking like her normal tongue when she talked to them. Many people stared at her mouth and wondered how she did that or how it was possible. Gail looked at her hands, the monster's meat, and Katy, tears streaming down her face. "Thank you," she whispered.

"The procedure commences!" I noted, with the air of a scientist observing a successful, if distasteful, experiment. "Turning a biological imperative into a controlled, if somewhat nauseating, chore. Efficient! Look at her go! Still creepy as all seven hells, but less likely to cause immediate fatalities within the group due to random nocturnal exsanguination. Progress? Or just sublimation of a truly delightful character flaw.

Ah, one of my many unnamed admirers wishes to question the possibility of disease because of the insect’s nature as a carrier. To that simpleton, I say it doesn’t matter, as she has never come across that pathogen before and can’t carry it even if she has the disposition to do so. But know many of you dumb hot-blooded filth out there, the majority of the boys are blushing more about getting to almost always now get a second-hand kiss from this beauty when they eat meat from now on. You can see their eyes full of fire already. Pointless."

Though unsettling for everyone who witnessed it, the act provided a grim but necessary function. It gave Gail relief and the group a way to manage one of the most terrifying internal threats they had yet faced. Rex Bouras and Ann King then took the remaining meat of the monster, and with renewed (if still wary) determination, they began to assess it for general consumption.

The immediate crisis of Gail's attack had passed. A solution, however grim, had been found. But the atmosphere in the cave was irrevocably altered. The fragile trust that had begun to build through shared hardship had been deeply fractured.

"And... quiet returns," I observed, as the students slowly settled back into uneasy, watchful groups. "But it's the quiet of paranoia, not peace! The delicious, simmering suspicion! Everyone's eyeing everyone else, wondering who's going to snap next! Who else is hiding a monstrous hunger, a terrifying new urge, just beneath their transformed skin?"

Vigilance in the camp redoubled, but now it was directed inwards as much as outwards. Guards posted at the cave entrances peered just as intently at their fellow survivors as they did into the dark forest beyond. Students huddled in smaller, tighter cliques, whispering nervously, casting suspicious glances at those whose transformations were more overtly predatory or unsettling – Conrad Castillo the Pit Viper, Silas Blackwood the Brown Recluse, even poor Rita Causey, whose bone-collecting habits suddenly seemed less eccentric and more… ominous.

The knowledge that the person sleeping next to you might be fighting an overwhelming urge to bite, sting, constrict, or, in Gail's case, drink you dry or turn you into a milkshake was a corrosive fear that ate away at their sanity. Some were now giving cautionary glances at the fly and the spiders over their shoulders when moving around. The masks had indeed melted away, revealing their true faces and, it seemed, the true, often monstrous, natures that lay beneath.

"This builds character!" I declared with satisfaction. "And ratings! Sleep well, kiddies, knowing the call comes from inside the camp! Oh, I love this part! What's next, Humanity? Bored yet? Because The Great I, certainly am not now! This is just getting good!"