FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Chapter 13 - November 30

Can the clock go any slower? Sophia fretted impatiently in her desk in Environmental Science, her stomach starting to hurt. If Shadow showed up with a rabbit right now, I wouldn't say no.

The uncomfortable sensation of an empty stomach had set in an hour after lunch, while she was in drawing class. Despite having eaten a full meal, she increasingly felt as though she hadn't eaten anything all day. Alas, between her still injured hand and stomach, her attempt at the blind contour drawing exercise resulted in a complete mess. After making it through art class, she made a beeline for her locker where she had stored the box of granola bars she had purchased earlier in the week in anticipation of any pre-full moon need for munchies.

Once the box of bars were in hand, she smuggled it into the girl's bathroom. She had intended to only eat one at a time so she could get through the day, but found herself still hungry after just one and opened another bar. Before she knew it, she was holding a box full of empty wrappers. After discretely disposing of the packaging, she headed off to class, smug that she'd anticipated and headed off the pre-full moon hunger.

Damn it, how much food do I need to eat to get through the day? Sophia started chewing on the end of her pencil, before catching herself.

Instead, she tried to force herself to immerse herself in her teacher's lecture.

"A food web is a way to illustrate how energy flows between organisms in an ecosystem," Ms. Honeycutt stated, pointing to a screen with arrows leading to and from various plants and animals.

Oh no, Sophia nearly groaned.

Oblivious to Sophia's discomfort, the teacher continued, "organisms are grouped in categories called 'trophic levels' depending on how many steps they're removed from the ecosystem's primary producers."

Sophia started gnawing on her pencil apprehensively.

"Primary producers, or autotrophs, are organisms that don't rely on other organisms to produce their energy." Ms. Honeycutt paused to look around the room before continuing. "In the montane ecosystem, or those ecosystems found on mountain slopes, the sun provides energy to organisms, such as plants, that don't rely on other organisms for energy."

No matter how hard she tried, Sophia couldn't keep her eyes drifting to the rabbit on the slide. The memory of Shadow tearing into the rabbit flashed through her mind, making her stomach ache more. It disturbed her that she found it so enticing, but she was getting desperate.

"The second level is typically made up of herbivores, such as the rabbit, deer or other plant eaters," Ms. Honeycutt used her pointer stick to indicate the level above the plants.

Sophia continued to chew on the soft wood of her pencil and drool was starting to form at the corners of her mouth.

"The level above herbivores constitutes predators - organisms that prey directly on other organisms," Ms. Honeycutt declared, pointing directly at the wolf on her slide. "Frogs prey on insects and wolves will eat rabbits and d..."

SNAP

The teacher broke off mid-sentence as Sophia's pencil loudly snapped in her mouth. Everyone turned to stare at her. Mortified, she felt blood rushing to her face as she removed the broken end of the pencil from her mouth. Several kids laughed while Ms. Honeycutt cocked an eyebrow.

"Sorry," she mumbled as she hastily hid both ends of the pencil in her pencil bag and replaced it with a pen.

"Pencils are typically not found on the food web," the teacher resumed her lecture in a lighthearted tone. "However, as they're mostly made of wood, their consumers would be herbivores."

The classroom chuckled and Sophia forced a smile, trying to brush it off. In truth, she wanted nothing more than the floor to open up and swallow her. Worse, she was starting to shake from how hungry she was. As the teacher resumed her lecture, Sophia gripped the cold metal frame of the desk and squeezed, trying to channel all of her stress into it.

One minute ticked by, then two... Just ten minutes left of class...

"Yes, Sophia?" Ms. Honeycutt acknowledged Sophia's upraised hand.

"Could I please use the bathroom?" Sophia asked politely, trying to keep her voice from shaking.

"There are only ten minutes left of class," the teacher replied, glancing at the clock. "Is it an emergency?"

Sophia hesitated before nodding.

"Alright, be quick though."

Standing up unsteadily, Sophia ignored the stares from the other students as she swiftly fled the classroom. Instead of going to the bathroom however, she went in the direction of the cafeteria. Despite being in the middle of class, no one stopped her. Once in the cafeteria, she walked over to the vending machines and fumbled for the cash she kept in the tight pocket of her jeans.

It took some effort to get the cash in the machine with how badly her hands were shaking, but she managed it. Punching in the code for the cookie package, she had her hand in the machine before it even finished falling. Tearing open the bag, she stuffed two small cookies in her mouth. As soon as the sweetness of the cookies hit her tongue, her shaking subsided as her body anticipated the calories.

Knowing the cookies wouldn't be even close to enough, she used up every bill she had and carried her small haul of chips, candy and cookies to her locker as she finished her first cookies. It didn't satisfy her hunger much, but at least it would get her through the last few minutes of the period. After quietly closing her locker, she rushed back to class. Ms. Honeycutt arched an eyebrow as Sophia entered and took her seat.

"Sorry, really had to go," Sophia apologized meekly.

"As I was just saying, you need to do the food web activity at the end of chapter 5 for Monday," Ms. Honeycutt said, sounding somewhat annoyed.

The bell rang as Sophia finished writing down the assignment. Looking up, she saw Ms. Honeycutt had returned to her desk and was looking at her notes for the next class. Relieved, Sophia quietly joined the rest of the class filing out of the classroom and immediately headed back to her locker. There, she immediately unwrapped a candy bar and ate it, chewing it just enough to swallow. Then she grabbed the chips and scarfed that down before wiping out the remaining bag of cookies.

She self-consciously brushed the crumbs off her face when she noticed the student who had the locker on her left staring at her.

"Didn't have much for lunch," she mumbled after swallowing the cookie she had been working on.

The kid shrugged, but said nothing before walking away. Too hungry to care, she grabbed the last two cookies in the package and quickly scarfed them down. Hoping it would be enough to get her through the last class, she grabbed her Sociology material and set out in search of a water fountain.

The snacks turned out to be enough, barely. By the time Sophia arrived at the grocery store, she was starving again. Taking advantage of the twenty minutes until her shift started, she bought a family sized portion of fried chicken and a bottle of water to wash it down. To avoid any awkward interactions, she took it to the rear of the building where the dumpsters were. That area was partially fenced in, affording her some privacy as she filled her stomach with juicy poultry. By the time her shift started, she had wiped out the entire container and discretely disposed of it.

I've never been so glad to work at a grocery store, Sophia thought wryly as she scrubbed the grease off her hands and face in the women's restroom. I only hope it's enough to make it through the night.

After drying her hands, she left the restroom, clocked in and headed towards her register.

"That was a lot of chicken," Janet commented as Sophia opened up her register.

"Oh, uh, some of my friends asked if I could get some for them with my store discount," Sophia thought up a quick story, feeling a little guilty for the fib.

"Ah," Janet replied as she closed her register. "Hope they enjoyed it. Have a good night now."

"You too," Sophia replied automatically, avoiding the older woman's eyes.

A customer started unloading as Janet walked towards the back of the store. Sophia forced her guilt down and began ringing the new woman up. After the woman paid, Sophia grabbed the receipt and handed it out.

"Your hand is burning up!" the woman jerked her hand away in surprise as her hand brushed Sophia's. "Are you feeling okay, dear?"

Crap, no wonder I've felt so cold today. Sophia anxiously moved a strand of hair behind her ear. I wonder if I'm running a fever; I don't feel sick.

"I'm fine," Sophia reassured the woman and forced a smile. "I'm just a little warm, I guess."

"I didn't mean to raise a fuss, I was just surprised," the woman replied, recovering her composure.

"No big deal," Sophia reassured the customer, trying to sound nonchalant.

The woman left and Sophia made a mental note to avoid making skin contact with anyone else.

Thankfully, it was a slow night and the chicken had more staying power than the junk food from earlier in the day. Her stomach was just starting to have the first pangs of hunger by the time her break rolled around, and she bought a small order of chicken and potato wedges from the deli. Normally, she would have had leftovers from such a meal, but she had no trouble gobbling it up.

I'm still a little hungry, she meticulously pored over the remains of her meal, looking for any remnants of meat or potato. It should get me through the last hour of my shift at least. How am I going to make it two more days though?

By the time her shift ended, she was back to feeling famished. Once she punched out, she grabbed a cart and began filling it with as much as she thought she'd be able to carry home. In went the store's last two rotisserie chickens, a large box of leftover fried chicken, sausages, a couple bags of jerky and several packages of hot dogs. She tried balancing the meat out with vegetables, fruit or even cereal, but kept finding herself drawn back to the meat section of the store. As it turned out, the only non-meat product she managed was a box of cookies. Rolling her cart to the register for Rob to ring her up, she braced herself for the manager's usual sarcasm.

"Your dad having the guys over?" he asked instead, his eyes nearly popping.

"Nah, it's for me," she replied, smiling innocently.

She took no small amount of satisfaction from the uncertainty that passed over his face nor how he paused to stare at her. After a moment, he shrugged and continued checking her out. Once she had paid the far less satisfying bill, she took her cart outside and began moving whatever she could to her backpack. By the time she set off for home, she had three plastic bags and a very heavy backpack.

Five minutes into her trek home, she could no longer withstand the assault on her nose by the scent of warm meat. Roughly dropping her bags on the sidewalk, she tore off the lid of one of the rotisseries and began messily peeling long strips of chicken off. By the time she regained control of herself, she had consumed most of the breast and had a terrible case of the hick-ups. Embarrassed at her sudden bout of gluttony, she looked around and was relieved to see no one was watching. After snapping the lid back on, she resumed lugging her groceries home, trying to stifle her hick-ups the whole way.

Despite her father finding and swiping several pieces of chicken from the fridge, the food managed to get Sophia to Friday night. Between classes, she'd grab as much as she could sneak into the girl's restroom and she wiped out two servings of lunch. Unfortunately, her voracious appetite was rapidly depleting her available cash and she found herself with very little left by the time her shift ended that night. All she could manage for the trip home was a couple of sausage sticks.

This is going to be a problem, her empty pocketbook depressingly light in her hand. A few days just cost me most of an entire week's worth of work. I don't know how I'll afford anything else if this is a monthly occurrence.

As she stepped into the night, her skin began tingling. Surprised by the sensation, her step faltered and she gazed up at the moon. Taking a deep, contented breath, she stood a little straighter and resumed walking home.

One more day, she told herself as she unwrapped a sausage stick. If only I could head off to the mountains now. I feel like I'm going to explode, and not just from anticipation.

The waistband of her pants dug into her stomach uncomfortably as she walked. Like her first transformation, all the extra food had added several pounds to her body. She had not had a bowel movement since Wednesday and she was starting to feel rather bloated. Her bladder was another matter though.

It's like having another period, Sophia mused as she felt the urge to pee, despite having gone before she left the store. This'll be worth it though.

Finally, she arrived home and again stopped to stare up at the moon, longingly. Despite the desire to stay out longer, her bladder and stomach conspired to send her inside. As she stepped through her door, the tingling sensation on her skin faded, but didn't disappear entirely.

Between the frequent bathroom emergencies, midnight snacking and just her overall excitement, the night was a sleepless one. Her appetite had started to wane sometime after midnight, but her digestive system made up for it by noisily gurgling away as her body raced to store as many calories as it could in preparation for the evening. By the time the first early morning light started streaming through her window, Sophia found herself wide awake, staring at the ceiling. Deciding sleep was a lost cause, she set about finding ways to make the time pass until evening.

Shivering, she donned her robe and then grabbed the thermometer she had taken from the bathroom, she waited as it took her temperature. She had been running what would be considered a slight fever in a normal person the last couple of days and she had taken to tracking it. The air in her bedroom was humid and the window had completely fogged up. Although she had not been sweating, her breathing had been enough to nearly saturate the air.

Wow, it went up, she read the thermometer after it had beeped. 102, I should be in bed unable to move right now, yet I feel fine.

Not knowing what else to do she tried searching for werewolves and temperature, but unsurprisingly found nothing. Her search for others like her had so far proven unfruitful.

I wish I had someone to guide me through this, Sophia felt a twinge of loneliness as she pulled up the pictures from last time.

The rest of the day went by slowly. Sophia kept to her room for most of it, either watching movies or shows under several blankets. When she wasn't trying to absorb herself in her laptop screen, she paced around her bedroom, looking at the clock every few seconds and sighing. She had tried drawing, but her hand was in a fair bit of pain and her fine motor control still wasn't back to normal. Even without that handicap, she found it nigh impossible to focus on a page or screen for long. It felt like every nerve in her body was wound tight, waiting to spring.

Still, however slowly, the day progressed. Morning became afternoon and afternoon gave way to the yellows and oranges of twilight. As night approached, Sophia's restlessness only grew. It felt as though some otherworldly energy was coursing over her skin and the burning need to get away from the trappings of humanity took root deep within her. In her chest, the tempo of her pulse rose and sweat began to form on her skin as the sun dipped below the western mountains.

Crap, I haven't prepared for the night at all, she frantically began pulling clothes out of her dresser. I've had all day and didn't even unload my backpack! Concentrate Sophia, there isn't much time.

Quickly, she changed into a sports bra, t-shirt and sweatshirt before pulling on sweatpants. Then, she pulled out a pair of socks and hesitated as she remembered her prior experience with them.

I can't afford to ruin another pair of socks, Sophia reluctantly put the socks back. How will my feet handle boots with claws? What about gloves?

Sighing, she dumped her backpack on her bed, threw her camera in and hurried to the kitchen. It was nearly dark outside and the need to get away from the artificial world was becoming overwhelming. Every nerve in her body felt like it was firing and she was starting to sweat profusely. Her skin felt like it was freezing and burning all at the same time.

Keep it together for a few more minutes... she shook her head as her vision started to swim. I don't remember it being this intense or this early.

Grabbing a water bottle, she held it under the faucet with a shaking hand and threw it in her bag. Opening the fridge, she grabbed what little was left of the sausage she had purchased. Her joints were starting to ache and she grabbed what little she had thrown together and rushed for her boots and coat. Unable to concentrate enough to lace up her boots, she forced her feet in them and awkwardly rushed towards the backdoor with her coat in hand.

Fumbling with the lock and ignoring the pain in her right wrist, she managed to get the door open and staggered out the door. The cold air of the night hit her and she started shivering hard. She had just enough presence of mind to close the door behind her before lumbering through the snow across the yard.

As she reached the edge of the yard, the moon appeared from behind the eastern mountains, illuminating her. Exhilaration flowed through her and her anxiety dissipated. The icy cold of the night faded from her mind and she managed to get her backpack on with her coat draped through the straps. Her gait quickened, and she began sprinting across the field despite her loose footwear.

I need to find my pack! Unfamiliar instincts began to make their demands as she tore across the field.

Her left foot unexpectedly came loose from her boot and she fell into the cold, wet snow as pain seized her. One foot bare, she desperately crawled into a depression in the ground as her gums, nose, eyes and ears started to ache. Somehow, she managed to wriggle out of her backpack before collapsing onto the ground. She curled into a ball, clutching her stomach in agony as she felt her insides squirm. Sealing her burning eyes tightly, tears streamed out as it felt like her ears were being roughly pulled out of her head. It was everything she could do to keep from screaming.

After what felt like an eternity, the intense pain in her stomach subsided and she was able to open her eyes again. The respite was all too brief as a stabbing pain flared in the tips of her fingers and toes.

Oh shit, my claws are going to tear up my boot! she struggled against the pain sweeping through her body to yank her last boot off.

She got them off in time to watch in awe as her nails transformed into black claws and then lengthened. Breathing heavily, she lay on her side as the pain in her body subsided. The smells of the night flooded into her consciousness and she inhaled deeply.

So many smells! She closed her eyes, trying to isolate and identify each one. I'm going to enjoy...

Pain flooded through her once more. This time it was concentrated in her hands, feet and lower back. Her clothes felt tight and chafed uncomfortably against her skin. On her stomach and chest, it felt like someone was poking her with a hot iron.

It's not stopping! She pulled on her sweatshirt in a panic. I need to get my clothes off before they strangle me!

After a brief struggle, she managed to get her sweatshirt over her head and pulled her arms out. Removing her sweatshirt revealed a fine layer of fur now covered her arms and chest. Rolling onto her front, she grasped the band of the exercise bra and pulled it over her head. It fell away from her torso as she rolled onto her back in the snow, freeing her breasts. Faintly, her brain registered that her upper back didn't feel nearly as cold or wet as she would have expected. In fact, it felt quite insulated, especially compared to her lower back, butt and legs.

She lay on her back for a moment, breathing heavily. Then the pain in her lower back surged and the weight of cloth against her changing body was too much to bear. Forcing down the impulse to tear off the remaining clothes, she blocked out the pain as best she could and brought her hands to either side of her pants. Arching her butt off the ground, she pulled her pants and underwear down in one swift motion. With the aid of her feet, she finished removing the last garments from her body.

Now fully nude, she flipped onto her front as it felt like someone was roughly pulling her spine. Reaching behind her, she placed her hand above her butt. Despite the sensation in her fingers feeling strangely muted, she could feel a thin covering of stiff hairs on her lower back. For a moment, she lost herself in the strange feeling of her own fur. Then her hand found a bulge at the very top of her butt and froze.