Nagisa was busy stuffing his fists into his mouth to try and prevent himself from laughing, but it wasn't working too well. The sounds of his giggles kept managing to leak from his mouth, which only infuriated the redhead sitting across from him that much more. Rin was so pissed off he was actually baring his fangs at Nagisa like a wild animal. That didn't help stifle Nagisa's laughter when he saw that, especially when those sharp teeth were accompanied by soft ears and a fluffy tail.

Something had seriously gone wrong with the board game Nagisa had found in his parents' attic. Intrigued by the design and concept, he had texted his friends to go over to Haru's place to play it. When he had rolled the dice and taken a card mysteriously given to him by the game, there had been an eerie wailing that had swiftly knocked all of them unconscious. When they awoke, they found themselves sporting animal ears and tails.

Haru and Rei appeared to be cats, with sharply pointed ears and long, lithe tails that flicked back and forth behind them. Haru's animal features suited him perfectly as they were black like his hair, while Rei's fur was dark as well but also had blue tinges to it, much like his hair only not as vibrant. Ai and Nagisa were both rabbits, with long ears that twitched back and forth on top of their heads and small, soft white tails wriggling on their behinds. Ai's fur was a beautiful silver that matched his hair, while Nagisa sported a white-and-yellow splotched pattern on his ears. That left Makoto and Rin as wolves, with sharply pointed ears that were larger than Haru and Rei's, as well as long thick tails that wagged in true canine fashion. Makoto's fur was a dark olive brown while Rin's was red like his hair, only slightly darker in color.

All six of them currently stood in a circle around the game, and Nagisa wasn't sure if it was because of their heightened senses or not, but the hostility in the room was very clear.

"Na-gi-saaaa!" Rin snarled, baring his teeth again and reaching forwards to grab the small blond by his shirt and yank him forwards. Stumbling, the shorter boy was able to catch himself just before he was to step on the game under foot. It was very clear though that Rin didn't give a damn at that point about what happened to the game.

"Rin-chan!" Nagisa squealed, struggling against the grip on his shirt with hands wrapped desperately around Rin's arm to try and push him away.

"That's enough, Rin," Makoto interrupted, gently pushing Rin away so he would let go of Nagisa's shirt. After releasing a guttural snort through his nose and practically shoving his friend away from him, Rin eventually did as Makoto asked. "It would be unwise at this point to start blaming one another," the olive-haired boy whispered, flashing a friendly smile at the two of them to try and calm their nerves.

"That's correct. Nagisa-kun couldn't have possibly known this would happen to us," Rei chimed in, fixing his glasses as he reached down to pick up the box cover and read it over again as though hoping he had missed something the first time that would explain all this.

"I'm going home. Whatever this is, it will wear off sooner or later," Rin snarled, before turning around and heading to the front of the house.

"Uh- wait for me, senpai!" Ai flashed a guilty look at the Iwatobi team swimmers before darting after his swim captain.

The four remaining friends grouped together closer now, gathering around the box to look alongside Rei. Unfortunately, no matter how hard they looked it appeared as though it would not give any more insight into what was happening to them. Raising their heads from the box, they all threw each other nervous glances. Even the normally stoic Haru looked perturbed by their current situation.

"What the hell!?" a sudden cry from the other room jolted them back to their senses, sending the four of them scrambling to the front hall where Rin and Ai had disappeared just a moment earlier. It didn't take long for them to see what had set the maroon boy off.

He had the door thrown open, and even though his large frame and the smaller body of the boy shadowed beside him was blocking a good portion of the opening, they could see outside plain as day. That was not how it was supposed to look like. Instead of the usual street and town that was supposed to surround Haru's house, they found themselves looking out into a very dense forest. Tall trees surrounded the house, thick underbrush hiding the dirt ground beneath. The soft stench of rotting foliage and fresh air rolled pass their sensitive nostrils, along with the pleasant chirps of wild birds.

"... woods is calling you," Nagisa muttered, barely audible but loud enough for Rin to twirl around and snarl once again at the blond boy, "What did you say!?"

"Life in the woods is calling you, I said. It was on the card," Nagisa pouted, clearly displeased with being yelled at again. Red eyes just stared back at him in shock, before Rei cleared his throat and broke the tension.

"The game said the 'consequences' don't vanish until someone wins, right? Maybe this is just some weird hallucination created by the sound that had knocked us all out earlier, and if we finish it we will wake up."

"That sounds-"

"Great!" Makoto chimed in, cutting off Rin's most likely rude retort. His green gaze glared at Rin before he turned and headed back into the other room. Everyone stood around for a moment longer before slowly following after Makoto. The redhead was still muttering curses under his breath, but at least he had taken a seat around the game like everyone else. Nagisa reached for the dice again, but Makoto stopped him before he could take them.

"You already went, right? So it's someone else's turn now. I guess I'll go... for the wolves," he said, darting a glance at fuming Rin before taking the dice and rolling them in his hands. Before throwing them, Makoto looked over the board quickly and traced the wolf's path to the very end: thirty. Looks like it would take thirty-one moves to finish the game.

One and three. The wolf didn't move, so Makoto reached forwards to run his fingers along its back. As soon as his fingers touched the small animal it began to move. It rotated back and forth much like the rabbit did, only at a slower pace so it appeared to be running rather than hopping. When it stopped moving, a card popped out again and the green eyed boy took it out and flipped it over so that he could read it aloud.

"You find a wounded deer and devour the corpse. Move ahead two spaces."

The wolf moved automatically this time, and Makoto gave a sloppy grin to Rin. "See? This seems easy enough," he tried stating encouragingly, but it didn't give much satisfaction to the other wolf. He merely rolled his eyes to the side and flicked his ears back.

Without saying anything, Rei reached forwards next and took a hold of the dice before rolling them along the ground. He got a two and a five, and with a touch along the cat's back it began to slink forwards along the ground with a much different movement from the rabbit and wolf. When the cat stopped, the card immediately popped up and the blue-haired boy grabbed it, pushing his glasses back along his face before reading what it said.

"A hunter has found your den. Time to run!"

Silence filled the room as all the boys looked up at each other; even Rin and Haru, who had been the least interested in what was going on with the game, looked slightly apprehensive. Nagisa opened his mouth, about to speak, when a loud bang suddenly ricocheted through the air and rocked the walls of the house. Nagisa could smell the fear beginning to permeate the room as another bang rocked the house, this time much closer. Even though it wasn't beside them yet, they could already smell gun powder and what could only be described as the smell of man. It instantly set their senses on fire, and the blond could feel the hair on his neck instinctively standing up and telling him to flee.

"We should leave," Haru spoke up for the first time that day, his face calm but blue eyes reflecting the inner fear that all the animal hybrids currently felt. They weren't sure where they should leave to, but it was very clear that they needed to leave nonetheless. With a quick nod to Haru, Makoto reached down and picked up the game board, while Ai scrambled forwards and grasped the dice in his small hands before standing up.

Another loud bang suddenly rang out from the back of the house which sent them into a fury, scrambling through the front door which was still left open from earlier. It's a good thing he didn't come from this way, Nagisa realized with horror as they fled into the woods. Only a single look back was given before the trees completely engulfed the house, and the only safety they knew of. Now, it was just them and the woods around them.