NOVEL NEXT Chapter 19: Harvest Moon
We walked.
And we walked and walked and walked and walked and walked.
I was hungry. God I was hungry. We’d been walking for another three days, snacking on the last of our veggies as we went, and while Erica seemed fine, my stomach was gnawing a hole in my gut. I didn’t understand, she was so much bigger than me, how was she able to get by so easily on so little. I think Erica was starting to worry about me too, she’d been looking at me funny after she’d caught me drooling over some kind of winged deer we saw. Eventually, at about noon, I called for us both to stop before dropping to the ground.
“Erica… I think I need to take a breather. I’m not feeling super great.”
She was at my side in an instant, sitting beside me and looking down concernedly.
“What’s wrong A? What is it? Fuck, A, you’re shaking…”
Now that we’d actually stopped walking I realized that I was in fact shivering. I felt nauseous and weak and cold, and I just hadn’t noticed until now. As I looked up at Erica, I voiced the thought I’d been dreading.
“Erica, what if these changes also changed our diets. Like… You’re way bigger than me, so you should need to eat more, but somehow you’re fine with just what we’ve had. Meanwhile I feel like I might pass out, and no amount of leafy greens or slightly old strawberries is gonna fix that. I just- what if it’s because your metabolism is slower than mine, or maybe it’s because it made you a herbivore and I’m-”
“A carnivore…” She finished the thought for me.
“Yeah…”
I looked up at her, nervous. What if she was afraid of me? What if she hated me? I didn’t know how to hunt, until those ants tried to eat us, I’d never killed anything before. Not even little bugs, but now I was starving, and any time I thought too much about it my claws started to itch, and I started to drool, and some part of me just wanted to tear and bite and eat. That part of me scared me. It’s not that I was against eating meat on the whole, but the way violence had gained such a horrible appeal to me had me frightened. It left me feeling predatory and monstrous.
I suddenly realized I was crying. That was odd. I hadn’t cried in ages, not that I hadn’t wanted to, I just hadn’t been able to do it. Now though, as I sat there shaking beside Erica, I couldn’t stop.
“Erica… Erica please don’t be scared of me… I don’t want to hurt anyone…”
I was sobbing now. Gasping as I panicked and my brain spiraled towards the worst case scenario. Then, suddenly the spiral was interrupted as I felt a massive hand patting the top of my head, the thumb gently rubbing the spot just above my little horn-nub.
“Trust me, I’m not gonna be scared of you pipsqueak. I wasn’t exactly a vegan myself before all this started, we’ll just have to get you some protein then, that’s all. I just wish you’d told me earlier, then you wouldn’t have to be hurting like this…”
On impulse, I twisted towards her, giving her a tight, kind of awkward hug and she let out a kind of squeaky moo.
“Promise?”
She grunted.
“Y-yeah! I promise A. I promise. Could you maybe not hug me so tight! You’re stronger than you look!”
I released her, feeling embarrassed. I really didn’t want to hurt her on accident, but I hadn’t expected I’d really be able to at all. I guess I had thrown her that one time, but I hadn’t been able to repeat the feat since. I guess I'd have to be more careful in the future.
The moment I let her go, Erica stood before scooping me up in a princess carry. I let out a yelp as she did.
“W-what are you doing? What is this? Wha-adslakfasdfdhl…”
My brain had kind of short circuited, unable to process what was happening and I quickly found myself unable to form words or sentences. It was just so sudden, what was she going to do? Wha-
She interrupted my scattered thoughts with a laugh.
“You clearly aren’t going to be walking anywhere anytime soon, but we gotta move if we’re gonna change that. We’ve still got daylight left, let’s see if we can’t get you some grub. Maybe some canned stew or like beef ravioli or something. I get the veg, you get the meat, we both win.”
I stared at her open mouthed.
“You can’t just pick someone up without permission!”
She gave me a confident smirk, it was shocking how expressive a bull face could be, and set me down.
“You’re right. I should’ve asked first. So, do you think you can walk on your own right now? Or do you want my help?”
Grumbling, I staggered to my feet, ignoring the headrush I got from the act. I managed to make two wobbly steps before I had to sit down again. I saw Erica crouch in front of me.
“Well..?”
I looked down, staring at the grass, it was interesting grass, way more interesting than arrogant minotaurs.
“Would you please pick me up..?”
She laughed again, as she gently scooped me up like before.
“Sure, but only cuz you asked so nicely.”
