- Shift of Shape -
(Hanna is Not a Boy's Name/HiNaBN (c) Miss Tessa Stone --- Fanfiction Text (c) L.Q. Coverdale)
(Content: Mentions of abuse; spoilers for Chapter 2 of HiNaBN. Possible language for some.)
The soul unfolds as his cocoon cracks, the human skin loosening, sliding off of him like a blanket. He feels an odd sensation in his jaw as it lengthens, now a snout instead of the ape-ish, flattened, crinkled nose his father had. His mother had. What humanity had, and what was so ugly, just as they were. He falls forward, his entire body cracking and squelching.
From the exertion of the shift and the pain in his jaw, he salivates furiously, fingers merging and arms shortening. Sharp teeth become canines to rip and tear, unfortunate for anything that gets in his way. The taste of the air's salt becomes greater, the smell of old fish and washed-up seaweed clearer than ever before. His legs become stumps; he has no need for them any more. Unlike these little bags of wrinkly, bare skin and awkwardly-placed hair, he becomes slicker and smoother. There is an element of fatness, but purely for survival purposes, and allowing for enough leanness to manoeuvre around. Oh, what a glorious feeling!
It is very warm, this sun that shines down upon him - upon his speckled, silvery body. He takes a breath, body aching all over, still tingling and changing from what he had become - but by God, he was free. Is this why his mother had been so bitter? Is this what it was like, what his ancestors had lived through each day, and what he had now attained? Those green eyes of his had never seen more clearly, physically and philosophically. Hell, when had there been a time he had thought this way?
To some, it seemed disturbing to see what looked like a human skinned. The smell of old flesh beneath slightly-bloodied fabric, with grayish-blond hair scattered everywhere, the seagulls circling it hungrily. Wrinkled and torn, as grotesque as it was, it no longer mattered to Veser. By blood, he was one of the seal-kin, and from this handsome, slick new form he attained, he knew he had been missing out on too much.
With a great laugh that comes out as a seal's bark, he leaps into the ocean, into the water's sweet and cool darkness. Possessed by a strength he has never felt before, he rushes forward, darting and swirling about with the precision of a bird in the air. The water bubbles, smelling of its life and its flora, wrapping around Veser in an embrace both snug and loose. This is truly home - not where he would be abused, lied to and frightened, where he would lie in his own blood and tears, and not where he would never be loved no matter what he did.
And then, as annoying and on-time as ever, his alarm clock sounds, waking him from the dream.