Coincidence: How It All Started
Author's Note: This is the first chapter in what may become a series, I dunno, yet. It's just an idea that popped into my head, so I ran with it. I marked it as 'adult' because I described the act of peeing and there are references to boybits... but there's no smut in this chapter. In any event, I hope you enjoy... and I really do thrive on feedback.
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Seth awoke with a start, pulling in a ragged gasp that left his chest feeling a size too small. Panting softly, he brought a paw up to his face and cupped the side of his muzzle, soft tremors running through his body. Seven years, it had been. Seven years since he had left his life in Ashok and almost every night the dream was the same. Impossibly tall, willowy figures drifted out from a tree line he didn't recognize. Their bodies and shapes were amorphous, their features blurred and smudged. They drifted ever closer, blackened fingers reaching out toward him, those fingers curling and grasping as a begging, pleading, keening noise filled the air. They would touch and caress his naked body in a way that left him feeling soiled and filthy, their fingertips leaving black trails through his white fur. Their touches drained the life from his dreamself, left him feeling hollow and empty. They were trying to turn him into one of them. At the moment of transformation, he would always wake up and for that he was thankful. He couldn't imagine what it would be like to be one of them, even in dreams.
Sighing quietly, he drew back the covers and sat on the edge of the bed, tail draping over the edge with his legs and feet. Sweat clung to his skin beneath his fur and he licked his nosepad, scenting the air. It smelled like it always smelled, cool and a little stale, the way all apartments do. Shaking his head softly, he reached over and turned on his bedside lamp, its dim light flooding the room. It was a sparse affair but Seth had always been accused of being too Spartan; a queen size bed, two bookshelves, and a desk with a computer next to it. Being conscious, his body reminded him that certain biological functions needed to be performed and he gave a soft grunt as he stood to make his way to the bathroom. With bleary eyes and a half sleep addled brain, he gazed down at his body as his paws moved on autopilot. Pull the sheath back, point the penis down, relax the inner muscles.
His thinking mind, however, drifted along the unsettled feelings his dream had left him. He'd never known what those creatures were but, then, it was a dream and dreamthings are unknowable, for the most part. He'd never understood why the dreams had started when he left his homeland, the thought triggering memories of tall mountains and green pastures, rounded houses and his fellow fox-kin. Heaving another small sigh, he tore off a piece of toilette paper and wiped the end of his penis, tugging his sheath back up as he dropped the soiled paper in the toilette. He flushed out of pure rote, then took the two steps required to make his way to the sink.
As his paws turned the water on, he stared at himself in the mirror. There was his vulpine face staring back at him, red eyes seeming to glow slightly in the dim light coming from his bedroom. His muzzle was shorter than he would have liked, ears a little too pointed for his tastes. Even with the minor quibbles he had with his appearance, he always thought he was handsome, even for an albino but as the longer he stared in the mirror, the more unhappy he grew. He looked haggard, worn out. Beneath the fur around his eyes, he could see dark circles which only made his albino appearance look all the more unsettling to his own eyes. He blinked in slight surprise as steam fogged the bottom part of the mirror and he looked down to the sink to realize that he'd been standing there long enough for the hot water to turn scalding. Cursing silently to himself, he adjusted the temperature and washed his paws. He dried them on a towel nearby and shambled back into his bedroom.
His computer chair creaked in protest as he sat down and opened his laptop, the bright glow of the monitor outshining his dim bedside lamp. He looked down at the clock and rolled his eyes. 5:45 AM. He wouldn't need to be awake for classes for another three hours but he knew his body and mind well enough. He was awake and that was that, no amount of lying back down or cajoling would alleviate his condition. His mind was conscious. He snapped the laptop shut a little harder than he meant to, his frustration at his condition bleeding through in his actions. He stood and made his way to his closet, tugging out a pair of red running shorts and white socks.
If he was going to be awake, he might as well go jogging. He had a family history and propensity for obesity and he did try to make an effort to combat it. He was by no means fit, having a little bit of extra weight around his belly but he tried. Again, his body moved on autopilot as he dressed and found his keys, his mind wandering once again to childhood memories. He thought of his dead mother, Amma, and her shortbread cookies, muzzle watering slightly at the memory. He thought of the delicate crumble of their texture and smooth, buttery flavor. He thought of how he'd never really appreciated just how good those cookies were until after she'd passed away.
Hindpaws moved of their own volition as the door unlocked, opened, and shut behind him, keys jingling as they leave the lock on the door and slip into his pocket. She'd been dead for a little more than seven years. It was her death that had prompted him to leave his homeland and seek mental refuge in a foreign land at a foreign college. There were too many memories there for him to stay, too many ghosts hiding in too many shadows. He made his way down the stairwell to the parking lot of his apartment complex, idly wondering if his dreams were simply a manifestation of the shadows he thought he'd left behind.
He groaned inwardly as the seemingly unnatural heat of his new homeland boiled up from the pavement as he made his way out of the parking lot. It wasn't even six o'clock in the morning and already, it felt like it was eighty degrees. It was enough to make him want to cry at some points and scream at others. He'd chosen Trian University because they had offered him a scholarship based on his ACT and SAT scores, though if he'd known how unsufferably hot the climate would be, his choice might have been different. He picked up the pace as he cleared the roundabout at the entrance of the apartment complex, starting to jog down the sidewalk.
The first rays of dawn's light were beginning to filter up from the horizon and it made everything appear to glow with shadows. Reds and oranges streaked together in a subtle hue on the sky, his mind wandering again.
"Be happy, my son," he remembered his mother saying in her thick Slavic accent, "I vill always be proud of you, my handsome white kit."
His brow furrowed as her words echoed in his thoughts, body moving down the sidewalk with a measured pace. Had he followed her advice? Was he happy? He felt accomplished. He'd been going to college for six years and had completed his first two degrees. He was working on his Masters in the Socio-religious Migration, the study of how the migration of people from one area to another affected religious beliefs and the social structures that arose from them. He'd tracked every major religion on the planet back to what he surmised as their places of origin, he'd spent countless hours making charts and maps and diagrams to support his hypotheses and suppositions. He enjoyed his study and the work that went into it... but was he happy?
Fence after fence, street sign after street sign passed his field of vision, the albino fox taking no more note of them than he would a passing insect. As he ran, his ears tucked back against his head, fluffy tail gently swaying out of pure reflex. He was so absorbed by his thoughts that he had no clue he was about to be struck by a dumptruck as he ran across what he thought was a "Walk" street sign.
Seth gave a pained, startled yelp as he felt himself suddenly being lifted into the air by the scruff of his neck, his eyes going wide as he saw things much higher up than he was used to for a few seconds. Something big and seemingly ironclad had a grip on the back of his neck and his body thrashed about, paws striking out to grab and cling as his hindpaws dangled. The next thing he knew, he was on his hindpaws again and he was fairly certain that his fur had fluffed out to three times its normal size.
"What in the nine hoary hosts of Kali's cunt?!?!" he cried out as he spun around and found himself muzzle to solar plexus with something, someone, large.
He froze mid-step as his eyes followed upward across a muscular chest in a white tanktop, neck having to lean as his head tilted upward as he looked up into what could best be described as an equine face. Brown fur, large black eyes, pink snout, black arched eyebrow, amused smirk. Seth's jaw dropped a little as he gawked up at this stranger, still having no clue as to what had just happened or why.
"Heh, you're welcome?" the large horse rumbled down to him in an amused tone of voice, words followed by a well intentioned snicker.
"I... wait... what for?" Seth asked as he tilted his head to the side, still terribly confused.
The horse didn't say anything and just extended a thick finger in response. The albino fox's eyes followed the finger and he saw the large, green dumptruck's rear end as it zoomed down the road well past the intersection. Seth's jaw dropped a little further as he looked back up at the horse, a deep blush flooding his ears as he met the equine's eyes.
"Ah... I'm sorry," Seth said as he rubbed a paw at the back of his neck, his heart just barely beginning to slow down from its frantic, adrenaline fueled pace, "Th-thank you... um... ?"
"Dalton," the equine said, muzzle splitting into a warm, genuine grin as he extended a paw towards the fox.
"Right," Seth said, voice trailing slightly as he took the paw offered to him, his own feeling practically dainty by comparison, "Thanks, Dalton. I... guess I should pay more attention."
"Ah, it's alright," Dalton said as he shook Seth's paw, then withdrew his own back to himself, "So do you normally come jogging this way? I haven't seen you before."
"Hmm? Oh," the fox replied, looking around for a second or two, quickly realizing that he had no idea where he was, "Um, no... actually, I think I'm a little lost."
"Haha!" the equine belted out, teeth showing in a broad smile, "Well, I don't normally ask a guy this before the first date but what's your address?"
Seth's brain threatened to fly out of his now crimson tinted ears. It wasn't Dalton's question, it was what Dalton had prefaced the question with that caused the poor, albino fox's grey matter to either wrinkle or liquefy a bit. Was he being hit on or was this just the large horse's way of being jovial? He seemed the sort prone to being jolly or cheery but the word 'date' stuck out to Seth in big, gigantic neon letters.
"S-Salizar Lane," the fox stuttered out, fighting the urge to tuck his tail a bit between his legs, instead pointing back in the direction he'd come.
"Ah, jeeze," Dalton muttered as he brought one of those massive paws up to his muzzle, thumb stroking over a short cropped patch of black chinfur that was a well trimmed goatee that Seth had just then noticed, "You musta really been out of it to jog two 'n a half miles without noticing. Oh! Yeah, heh, where are my manners? What's your name?"
"Oh, um," Seth started, his ears perking straight up as he realized he hadn't offered it, "Seth. Seth Yugladiovic."
One of Dalton's ears swiveled to the side as Seth pronounced his last name, a slightly bemuse look spreading across his features as he chuckled. "Right, well, it's nice t'meet you, Seth. I gotta admit, I feel kinda lucky."
"Wait, you feel lucky?" Seth asked incredulously, arching an eyebrow up to the horse, "You weren't the one who just got yanked out of oncoming traffic."
"Yeah, 's lucky I was there," Dalton admitted, brow furrowing a little as he gave a nod of his head. The large equine turned to start walking back in the direction Seth had come from, motioning with a large hand for the smaller fox to follow him.
"Sooo?" Seth asked as he followed, having to walk at a slightly brisker pace than normal to keep up with the equine's larger than average strides.
"Hmm? Oh, yeah, me feeling lucky." Dalton answered, looking to his left and down a bit at the fox, a sly grin on his muzzle, "Well, I'd say it's lucky for me that you owe me a favor."
The fox's steps faltered at Dalton's words, his brow steepling as he looked up at the horse. He was acting as if he'd known the fox his whole life, as if they'd been friends forever! Part of it was somewhat endearing but it was also somewhat infuriating. Was he expecting money? Was he actually trying to take advantage of him? What in the world was happening with his morning?!
As if he could see the thoughts in the fox's eyes, Dalton chuckled softly and waved a paw dismissively in the air. "Quit your worryin'," he said with a genuine amusement in his voice, baritone voice rumbling deep in his chest, "I'm not tryin' to take advantage of you and I'm not gonna ask for money. I just figure you owe me one for savin' your fur is all."
"Well, if you're not going to ask for money and you're not trying to take advantage of me, what good does 'a favor' do you?" Seth asked rather bluntly, tired of playing word games. He shivered softly despite the heat, the jitters of passing adrenaline settling into what felt like his bones and the effect made him feel a little snappy.
"Ah, I figure you won't say no if I ask you on a date," Dalton said as he beamed down a wide, happy smile down to the fox, "'n if you do, I'll collect on that favor 'n you'll have to agree to go on at least one with me."
If the fox's steps had faltered earlier, they flat out stopped when the horse finished speaking. Seth stopped dead in his tracks and just gaped at the horse, eyes wide and muzzle hanging open. For a few seconds, all he could do was stare, brain simply looping over and over around the words "a date".
"You can't possibly be serious!" Seth cried in stunned disbelief, "I'm straight!"
Dalton gave a nonchalant shrug, smile not abating for even a second as he stopped and turned to face the fox. "So? I'm not askin' t'fuck you, y'know?" he said with a hearty chuckle, "I'm just askin' if you'll go out to dinner with me."
Despite Seth's best intentions, his brain conjured up a million horribly lurid images in a tenth of a second as the word "fuck" left Dalton's muzzle, his crimson blush coming back with a vengeance and his pale fur doing little to hide it. He shook his head, partly in disbelief and partly to try to clear those mental images away as he looked up at the horse. He tried to think of a response, tried to think of a way out but his brain was just fried. Kaput. Out of Service. Please call the Operator.
"Tell ya what," Dalton said as he reached into one of the pockets of his denim shorts, Seth's eyes fixating on what seemed to be a prominent bulge in the front, "How about I give you my number 'n you c'n call me later to tell me yes or no." He withdrew a cel phone from his pocket and flipped it open, waiting for Seth to give him his phone number so he could text him his own.
"555-7813," Seth said, blinking in surprise as the numbers left his muzzle seemingly of their own volition. Why had he given this strange horse his phone number? Why had his eyes fixated on Dalton's groin when his paw had gone into his shorts? What in the world was going on?!
Just as things felt like they were going to reach critical mass in his head, the phone at his hip vibrated. He reached down and opened it, reading Dalton's phone number.
"T'get home, just hang a left here 'n you'll probably realize where you are. I gotta get going, got work in half an hour 'n I stink like sweat," Dalton said, that same friendly, welcoming grin coming back to the horse's muzzle, "but 'm glad I could run int'you, Seth. 'm glad we met."
Before Seth could reply, Dalton had started jogging down the road at a pace faster than Seth decided he could or wanted to keep up with. For a few long minutes, he just stood there, staring at the empty space where the massive horse had stood and replayed the events of the morning over and over in his head. He blinked a few times and shook his head, turning to make his way back to his apartment.
If his morning had been like this, he shuddered what awaited in for the rest of the day.