Chapter Text
Ze roused to the symphony of birdsong, melodic chirps gently prying him from the hazy embrace of sleep's tranquilizing arms. Reluctantly, awareness began its spread to the rest of his senses one by one like the viscous pour of molasses, until it lastly reached the forefront of his brain.
He made no move to shift his position as he absorbed the dawn chorus as he blinked away the blurry fog from his eyes. He was sitting, his slackened forearms crossed over one other in his lap, just below an unloaded gun—because, right, he somehow fell asleep on the chair.
The lack of sound proofing could have been seen as just another drawback of an old cabin to anyone else. Slightly annoying at times, but definitely far from the worst thing that came with living in the middle of dense wilderness.
To Ze, however, he couldn't see it as an inconvenience at all—not when the first thing he got to hear each morning was birds' dedicated hymn to nature's new day. That, and it sure as hell beat shooting awake to the ear-piercing brass of reveille. Or the honks of vehicles stuck in perpetual city-traffic.
He thought he would have been content to let the entire early morning pass by like that; doing nothing but sitting and listening to the world as it took the first deep breaths of a renewed day.
The more he actually, consciously, sat awake on the very chair he had slept on, however, the more he remembered exactly why he had once deemed the piece of furniture the single most uncomfortable work of furnishing crafted since the age of the neolithic period.
After he had placed his gun back inside his jacket's pocket, Ze pushed himself off the chair with only the slightest bit of reluctance. A series of grotesque crackles and pops followed the stretching of stiff joints, filling the room. Geez, every single limb in his body ached. Especially his back, for reasons he would pointedly ignore.
Was that chair actually made out of a really light type of stone, or something? Stone chiseled into a chair? Stone chiseled into a chair and painted as wood? Was that possible?
Moving to stand in front of his window, Ze took a look at his reflection, internally cringing; he'd grown unaccustomed to seeing himself, meaning that every time he got the chance to look at himself with fresh eyes, only one adjective popped into his mind to describe his visage: terrible. He still looked terrible. Well, not as terrible as he remembered himself looking a few months ago, but still not great. Any progress was progress though, he guessed.
He brought his hand up, ignoring the darkened rings of skin surrounding sunken eyes—he's long since accepted that those wouldn't be going away anytime soon—and brushed past messy eyebrows to pull the black bandana from his head. Calloused fingers ran through short, spiky hair, reaching the length along the dome of inch-long fuzz to the nape of his neck, massaging the knot that had formed there overnight. At least his hair seemed to be coming back in nicely.
The day after he buzzed off his hair, it didn't take long for the regret of his decision to start sinking in—four years of growth since he'd gotten out of boot camp, and it was all swept off his apartment floor after a single, stressful night. A night he was supposed to be cramming for an upcoming exam. Ze remembered believing that any last-minute studying wouldn't have made a dent in his crappy score, either way. It might've saved his hair, though. Or it could've made him go off the deep end and shave off his eyebrows, too.
In any case—he guessed the haircut was sort of convenient now, out here. Made showering with a limited supply of collected water way less of a hassle. He always hated taking care of wavy hair, anyways.
Grrowwl.
The low rumble of his stomach broke away his train of thought.
He'd been trying his best to ignore it—the gnawing hunger in his gut. It wasn't like he was starving, or anything. Besides, he'd never really been one for breakfast, either, so he wasn't sure why—Oh, who was he trying to kid? He knew exactly why he was hungry.
As painful, and humiliating, and excruciating as it was for him to look back on—so he would not be looking back on it at all—the sequence of events which unfolded yesterday evening lead him to forget to eat dinner, one way or another. Because that's just how the cookie crumbled, or whatever- all in all, he'd really like to avoid reflecting on his actions. Reactions. Cookies crumbling—
Yeah, no, he was totally starving.
Ze wrapped his bandana back around his head, tying it off as he walked the few paces it took to his small pantry.
The thin wooden door opened with a loud shriek of its hinges, sounding as if they hadn't been oiled in at least a century—and likely wouldn't be oiled for another three or four as Ze took a step inside the cramped space, overshadowing the meager natural light that filtered in.
Let's see… He picked up the first can he saw, holding it a ways away from him with a squint. With more trouble than he'd ever admit, Ze soon discerned the blurry label as reading Sweet Peas, the words directly followed by the unappetizing image of Baby-Puke Green sweet peas sitting in a bowl right below them.
Nope. He placed the can right back onto the shelf, taking a step back to squint down at the wide variety of shelf-stable goods. Canned corn, canned carrots, canned potatoes, canned green beans, canned regular beans… he turned his head rightwards of the vegetarian selections, glancing only briefly at the canned chicken and tuna. On second thought, he wasn't in the mood for anything canned.
He reached above the tinned food to the top-most shelf, grabbing a mason jar that should have contained some type of jerky. But as he pulled the unusually light jar forward… it completely empty, save for a few crumbs at the bottom.
When did he…? Jesus, his brain fog must've been worse than he thought, if he forgot he ate an entire 32-ounce jar's worth of jerky. Ze set the vacant jar were he'd gotten it—he'd rinse it out later—and grabbed a similar, full jar next to it, closing the pantry door behind him with another shrill creak.
He walked the few steps it took to his undisturbed bed, the neat sheets wrinkling underneath his weight as he sat on the edge. Twisting the jar open, he pulled out piece of jerky, ripping it in half with his teeth and chewing through the tough, dehydrated meat as he lifted the jar to eye-level. He squinted uselessly at the handwritten label, refusing to hold it out. His eyesight was fine, he didn't need to do anything special to read a stupid label… was what he was thinking before he eventually gave in and held it an arm's length away. Cutthroat trout.
Ze popped the other half into his mouth, glancing out the window visible from where he sat. The navy blue of dawn had lightened out a bit, but any golden rays of light remained nowhere in sight; he still had a good hour before the sun rose, give-or-take. Perfect time to fish for some more trout—especially since his initial plan to do so the other day had gotten…disrupted.
Once Ze finished his jerky—coughing briefly as he choked on a hastily chewed piece—he collected his fishing rod and small cooler with more energy than what had the right to fuel his sore body. It was roughly a thirty-minute walk towards the river, it'd do him good to head out as soon as possible.
As he reached the door, however, he found himself stopping. His hand stilled on the doorknob mid-twist.
The weight inside his jacket suddenly felt heavier, almost as if intentionally making itself known to Ze again. Reminding him of its existence because, as ashamed as Ze was to admit, he had almost forgotten about it completely.
He lowered his cooler down onto his chair, propping his fishing rod up against it. He still had one more thing he needed to do.
Ze walked past his bed, opening his nightstand's drawer. Contained inside was a small box of which he lifted the thin cardboard lid with one hand, the other pulling out the warm pistol from his jacket.
His eyes contemplatively flicked between the gun and the box ammunition before him.
Finally, he slid the emptied magazine out and pushed only three cartridges inside, reconsidering only momentarily before decidedly loading the magazine it back into his pistol.
Three shots.
Three chances to kill if it tried anything.
Not threaten, not hurt—kill. Mercy was a luxury afforded only to the creatures he knew he was dealing with. Ze couldn't afford to waste anymore valuable resources on something he had no idea how to deal with. He didn't have to entertain that things absurd excuse for a game—the next time it would appear, it would get no warning shots. No chances. Nothing except the white-hot pain of a bullet piercing its vitals before the life promptly drained from it.
Ze closed the drawer, slipping the pistol back into his pocket with a self-assuring pat. That thing might have officially made itself known yesterday, but it was still spineless. As embarrassing as it was, Ze had made it clear that he meant business—and though he didn't sincerely believe he had managed to scare that thing off, he at least knew he'd made himself clear; he would never go down without a fight.
He returned to the door, picking up his cooler and fishing rod as he took a deep breath, steeling himself for the stare that would surely follow him the instant he stepped outside. Just another day. It would be just like any another day.
He couldn't feel it.
There was a sharp tap on Ze's line, followed by a few light shakes of a head that traveled from the submerged hook in the water to the base of his fishing rod.
The watchful gaze.
He rapidly reeled in his catch with one arm, the other holding the bending pole steady as the fish struggled against the relentless pull of a force unknown to it.
It was gone.
It was putting up a good fight, the fish—Ze was almost certain it was a brook trout, though there was a small possibility it could be a cutthroat—aggressively thrashing against the line in a desperate bid to free itself. A little over a minute later, however, a slimy, sleek body emerged from the cool freshwater.
But even as Ze worked on getting a firm hold on the vehemently flapping fish, he couldn't yet swallow down the small knot of unease that had built in his throat.
Green-brown spotted scales and a red underbelly—just as Ze thought, it was another brook trout. A pretty decently-sized one, too, but that much was obvious while he was reeling it in. He unhooked the fish and dropped it in with the two others he'd caught. Had it already been two hours? Two hours and-a-half?
Ze shut the cooler, allowing the fish to have its final, struggling moments alone with its fallen comrades as he took a seat atop the lid. He looked to the water but made no move to cast his line again. He'd caught enough fish for the day—that thought alone should have instilled in him some sense of accomplishment. Under any other circumstance, it definitely would have.
It was bothering him, though.
He knew he'd fallen asleep daydreaming—and soon after, actually dreaming—about that thing leaving him alone for once. But this was just… well- it wasn't necessarily strange—he had tried shooting at it multiple times yesterday—but it was… unusual? Strangely unexpected?
Ze knew he should have been overjoyed. Thrilled at the very prospect that the thing might have been intimidated enough to fuck off for a few hours, and hopefully the entire day, the week, and maybe even the whole month! Such hopeful fantasies should have made him at least somewhat giddy.
It wasn't like he wasn't relieved. He definitely was. Extremely so, actually. He didn't want that thing's nonexistent eyes boring into him at his every waking moment again. Not having that for the first time in weeks felt like a wonderful, beautiful breath of fresh air. He could finally get some time to himself! So what the hell was the issue?
That was thing—Ze's issue was that there was no issue. Now, he didn't know that thing—God forbid he ever would—but Ze had gotten the vibe that it was infuriatingly persistent. Unrelenting in its mission to be perhaps the most unnerving nuisance these woods had to offer. So would it really have backed down just because of Ze's little freak out? Truly?
Taking a breath, Ze dug the heel of his palm into his temple. Another headache took hold of him, not too dissimilar from yesterday's in its invisible pressure compressing the top half of his face. He ignored the throbbing discomfort behind his eyes as he slid his gaze up from the river's dark blue to the cloudless contrast of the sky's. Maybe the headache had always been there, and he’d just been too distracted to notice?
Ze closed his eyes, huffing out the air he had been holding and expelling the carbon dioxide that had replaced the oxygen in his lungs. In two sudden movements, he smacked both of his palms down onto his knees and stood abruptly.
He took up his rod and cooler full of fish. Before beginning the lengthy trek from the river back to his cabin, he looked up at the sky one more time.
It was still early in the morning, and it had been a while since he'd last gone foraging for any plants. He might as well take advantage of the fact that that thing wasn't tailing him anymore. Ze was starting to get sick of his high-sodium diet, and right now, ripened wild berries sounded amazing to him.
Okay. So. Ze might have made a slight miscalculation as to where he last saw a small thicket of gooseberries earlier that month.
He would admit it had been a while, and he only saw them in passing while he had been preoccupied with hurrying home without making it seem like he was nervous. So it was completely understandable that his memories of the exact location would be even just a tiny bit hazy.
Unfortunately, though, no matter how justifiable and understandable and reasonable and whatever-other-synonym-he-couldn't-think-of-right-now, there was one glaring issue he had to address. He was…—not lost, per se, but… uh-
Ze took a long, hard look at the mid-sized rock formation in front of him, right smack-dab in the middle of a perfectly circular land clearing.
Fine, okay, he was a little lost.
Ze smacked his hands together, the basket hanging from the crook of his elbow lightly swinging from the movement. So far, he had only managed to pick up some mushrooms he vaguely recalled as edible from a survival manual.
Alright-y, then! Foraging trip over. He had no idea where he was, and he was still sharing these woods with an unpredictable, invisible creature of unknown intent—among other wildlife, of course.
Christ- at least he decided to pull this shit while that thing was gone. For however longer that would last—
Ze squashed the thought, turning on his heels and leaving the clearing. He'd be fine. All he needed to do was retrace his steps—then he'd be home soon enough, and he could act like he didn't make the rookie mistake of wandering unprepared into unfamiliar territory. That sounded easy enough.
But as it turned out, it was not easy enough. Because nothing could ever just be nice, and easy, and convenient for Ze in his miserable fucking life.
If an hour had passed since his initial venture into the deeper woods, Ze was sure another thirty minutes easily passed him by since he left the clearing.
He swore he'd been retracing his steps correctly—walking down paths he remembered walking up, right turns where he'd originally gone left—mirroring the route he came from to a T.
So he didn't know when or how it happened, but after a while of walking and successfully recognizing places he'd been, he suddenly stopped seeing those familiar checkpoints assuring him he'd been going the right way. No more stones he remembered kicking, no more bushes he remembered pulling leaves off of in passing, even the patches of lush he recently stopped to scrutinize looked different from the ones he'd seen on his way there.
Everything looked different! Or the same? Maybe everything looked different because it all looked the exactly the same and he was fucking lost and he had no idea how to get home and what if that thing was out there with him and it—
"Okay- Fuck! Okay," Ze breathed, leaning back on a tree as he tried to calm his racing thoughts. "I'm fine. I'm good," he muttered rather unconvincingly. "I'll find a way back—in fact, I'm probably close by anyway." It was minimally working, even if the logical part of his mind could have presented over a dozen contradictions to the statement.
Without thinking, he added, "It's not like getting a little lost has ever hurt—" immediately, he faltered, "uh- I mean, has ever killed—" he stopped himself again, a million different examples of headlines and missing people flitting through his brain.
Defeated, Ze sank into a crouch, the fabric of his jacket catching against the rough bark at his back. He rested his head against the tree trunk, looking up at the abundance of clouds that had formed while he was walking.
"This is fucking stupid," he finally whispered, closing his eyes. He couldn’t see how this could get any worse- Wait, he shouldn't be thinking that. He could, in fact come up with a couple hundred other ways the situation could worsen—
Plop.
Plop.
"…?" Something wet dripped onto Ze's cheek. Before he could react, however-
SHHHHHHHHH
Large, heavy drops of water poured down from the sky, pelting the earth.
"What the fuck!?" Ze shot up from his crouch, holding his arms above his head in a feeble attempt to shield himself from the downpour. "Oh my God, are you fucking serious?!"
Why did these types of things always happen to him?! What the hell did he do to deserve this?! And these trees fucking sucked at cover!
"Shit!" He screamed out in frustration, kicking at the rapidly moistening dirt at his feet.
He tried looking around for at least someplace to take refuge under, but even as he tried his damnedest to peer through the thick sheet of water obscuring his view, he saw nothing. There was…! Nothing?
Ze furrowed his brows, narrowing his vision to the box-shaped blob in the distance. It was hard to tell in this weather—not to mention that it was partially hidden behind another tree—but… it was some kind of structure?
Hesitating only briefly before deciding he'd get soaked all the same, Ze stepped away from the tree's poor shelter and dashed towards the dot in the distance.
How the hell did he not notice it before? The closer he got, the more obvious it became—it was a shack. A shack in the middle of the woods.
Standing in front of it, Ze took in the tiny building. It was rundown, looking as if the aged outer planks were held together with little more than hopes and dreams, its angled roof seeming haphazardly stacked on top like a particularly risky game of Jenga.
He stepped closer, ready to push the door open. Still, he had to consider—was getting out of the rain possibly worth the fate of being crushed under a shit-ily constructed shack?
Sorta, yeah. At this point, if the roof came down on him, Ze was just ready to accept it as the final nail in the semi-metaphorical coffin that this universe despised him so utterly that it was finally ready to put him out of his misery.
While Ze hadn't been worried about there being any inhabitants still residing within the rundown building, the interior of the shack painted a story of something that once was.
Two chairs occupied the small space, both placed across each other at a crooked table; a stack of old books sitting on top with a few stray papers littering both the table's surface and the dirty floor. Right in the middle of the disorganized chaos, however, was a portable radio left at the focal point.
Looking back outside through the open gap in the wall, the rain didn't seem to be dying down any time soon. Ze figured he might as well poke around while he was in there.
Transferring his gun to his jeans, he hung his damp jacket on one of the chairs, next removing his sopping bandana and wringing it out before storing it inside the basket of mushrooms he had, honestly, forgotten about. He set it on the ground next to the chair, turning his attention to the table of items.
First, he looked at the papers; most of them seemed to be old crayon drawings, though he saw no crayons inside the shack. The drawings themselves were nothing to speak of—just a few kindergarten-level panoramic sketches of nature; but the implications they brought were far more interesting. Did a kid used to live in this shack with a parent? Didn't seem like an appropriate place for a small child to grow up in, but then again, that was probably why it was abandoned.
Ze picked up the the first book on top of the stack. An architecture textbook. He looked at the one underneath it—a collection of poems. Book after book, they seemed to fit a theme. An outdated English dictionary, a math book containing addition, subtraction, and multiplication, and a few picture books. Though he hadn't bothered to peak inside any of the yellowed pages, it was fairly obvious they all centered around education—specifically, a child's. Well, all except for the architecture book—that one seemed completely outside the grasp of a kid's knowledge.
After stacking the books back into the same order they were, Ze finally took a look at the small radio at the center of the table. It was definitely an outdated transistor, though it looked closer to being manufactured in the early 2000s than the mid-1950s. When he curiously opened up the back, however, he cringed. The battery compartment was corroded to hell and back—the metal connectors a bright teal—and the batteries… grossness aside, they might've been as old as the radio itself, their brand unidentifiable.
Ze wondered if the radio would even work at this anymore? Even if the terminal wasn't caked in potassium carbonate, was the circuitry still even good? Could radio frequencies still even reach it? The antennae seemed to be fully intact…
Ze didn't know. He set the radio back onto the table, sitting on the other unoccupied chair on at the table.
How much time would it take for the storm to subside? Even if- when the rain subsided, how was he going to make it home?
He didn't know. He didn't seem to know much of anything, these days.
He sat there for a while, only listening to the pour of rain and expectantly looking up at the ceiling for some kind of leak where there was surprisingly none, before he felt his eyelids droop.
Unlike that morning, it was the absence of sound that woke Ze.
His thoughts jumpstarted, the reality of his situation flooding back to him and leaving no room for confusion. Shit, when had he fallen asleep? What if it was already night?
Ze briskly walked towards the gap in the wall, poking his head out of the glass-less window. To his relief, there was daylight to be seen; the sky had cleared up completely, leaving only gentle sunshine and the fresh scent of petricor in its wake. His headache seemed to have eased up, too.
Putting on his still-damp jacket, Ze picked up his basket. He needed to begin his search for his cabin as soon as possible, unless he wanted to see what it would be like to be stuck in an unstable shack for a night.
He tied his significantly drier bandana on, but before he could leave, he couldn't help but look back at the old radio on the table.
Despite his eagerness to get going, he took the time to pick it up, turning it over to look at the crusty battery terminal again; it took AA batteries—three of them. He had a few of those. Maybe he could take it with him and try to fix it up when he got back? Its not like anyone would necessarily miss it.
But would it even be worth the clean? Even if—by some miracle—it hadn't been damaged by the severe battery corrosion, there was still bound to be at least a couple problems with a decades-old transistor.
Ze looked between the door and radio. He should just leave it—he needed to get going if he wanted to find his way back before sunset. It was unbelievable he'd already wasted half of his one day unobserved by that creature-thing on getting lost.
But then again, what would really be the harm in taking the radio? Its not like he'd lose anything; beyond the bleak responsibility to survive, Ze didn't have much to do in his spare time. So what if the radio didn't work? It would be good to distract himself with something like this for once—an actually healthy distraction—rather than spending his time resenting the past and dreading the future.
Convinced by the prospect of quieting the incessant thoughts for once, he placed the radio into the company of soggy mushrooms, stepping out of the shack with more haste than required as a gentle breeze blew in.
The process of finally finding his cabin was disgustingly easy, for all he'd been worrying that he'd end up dead in a ditch before finding familiar terrain. It turned out he had been right about one thing—he was relatively close by, his home only having been an extra fifteen-minute trudge through slick mud, southeast of the shack. How had he never ran into it before today?
He didn't think he ever felt anything as euphoric as the sheer, all-encompassing relief that washed over him, thawing away the biting ice of uncertainty like a hot shower on a freezing winter night.
Now in dry clothing within the safety of his cabin's walls, Ze admired at the cleaned battery terminal sitting in front of him on his small coffee table. It hadn't actually been too difficult to clean it out—becoming more tedious than anything; all he had to do was carefully scrape away the hardened powder with a screwdriver and blot away the residue with the dampened edge of his undershirt.
His own tabletop radio sat beside sat beside its senior model, comparatively modern, yet they shared the same type of batteries. He hardly used the device, never taking any particular interest in music—it was all just noise to him—though it surely would've saved him the grief of getting caught in a rainstorm if he had actually remembered to tune into the weather broadcast. His own lack of foresight genuinely astounded him, sometimes.
He popped the batteries out and transferred them to the older, sliding the plastic compartment shut with a click.
Now came the decisive moment... He pulled the antennae out to its maximum length, switching on the radio. Surprisingly, the hand-held brick immediately sprung to life, filling the room with the piercing garble of static.
Ze sat, momentarily dumbstruck, before finally deciding he had enough the harsh din, sliding the sidelong knob along to surf any stations it might've caught, if any.
["—the Democratic Party, I'm tellin' ya- everything they own or do, they're inspired by Satan- they're owned by Satan-"]
He slid the knob. Static, static—
["—he will be facing three counts of second-degree murder if the court proceeds with-"]
—Static, some more static, overly grainy Colombian instruments of remixed Cumbia-
["—Give us this day our daily bread;
and forgive us our trespasses;
as we forgive those who trespass against us-"]
Ze switched off the radio. That was a good enough stopping point.
The rest of the day went by thankfully uneventful. Ze had hung his damp clothes to dry in the evening sun once the weather showed no signs of worsening again, checked how much more water had gathered in his rain barrels, and eventually returned for the forgotten firewood he had been chopping the previous day, laying the pieces down on his porch to dry out as well.
Dinner was made in comfortable silence, save for the sizzling of diced mushrooms and fish over a charcoal stove. The first few bites were depressingly bland—every day, the regret of not bringing any spices with him into the woods only grew stronger—but as he finished his meal, he was at least grateful he didn't have to eat anything canned, thinking back to the peas he hadn't considered eating that morning. What compelled him to buy those in the first place?
After cleaning his plate, he retrieved his clothes, the sky having been the same hue of navy it was well over twelve hours earlier, though there were no birds chirping, and the sky would only darken from there.
Ze yawned, locking the door behind him as he carelessly tossed the dried articles in his arms over the dusty armchair he had in place of a couch. It seemed that sleeping on nothing but chairs throughout the day didn't necessarily count as restful, judging by how drained he felt.
He kicked off his shoes as he shuffled to his bed, dropping face-first onto the stiff mattress before lazily climbing up. One leg hung limply off the foot of the bed, the arm opposite hanging off the side as curved fingers nearly touched floor. He found himself too tired to care as he closed his eyes. No point in staying up when there was nothing to do.
CRASH!!
"Ghhh-Ah, goddammit- fuck…!"
Ze startled awake, moving into action before he knew what was happening. He swiped his shotgun from its place under his bed, spinning around. He aimed the gun towards the entrance of his cabin where he saw nothing but a toppled chair in the dark of night.
"Who's there?!" His voice cracked, still rough with sleep. It felt like needles were stabbing through one of his arms. His eyes raked the ground from his elevated position. He couldn't see—
He noticed a writhing shadow on the ground. His heart pounded with confusion. Holy shit, what the fuck was that?!—
Until something quickly sat up, raising what looked like two thin, clawed hands in surrender—it wasn't a shadow at all.
Behind the intruder, pale moonlight illuminated a bony silhouette lined with some type of hair—fur, he realized. Patchy, unkempt fur.
"Waitwaitwaitwaitwait- Stop! Stop! Stop-" A voice far deeper than humanly possible penetrated the air, its distorted quality reverberating off the walls in a panicked plead.
Ze tried to track the origin of the voice, but his eyes only further widened as they raked over the figure. It had no visible head of any kind, half of its torso missing as light filtered through exposed ribcage.
Ze jumped off the bed with a heavy thump. The same stab of pins him shot through his leg. It didn't stop him from stepping toward the creature.
"Fuck- stop! Wait-!"
"What the hell are you?!" The sleep was gone from his shout, leaving only a ferocious demand for answers.
The question stilled the inky entity.
Before it erupted into an animated outburst, dropping its hand-like paws.
"Fucking- What am I?! I take my fucking eyes off you for one fucking day and you decide to steal my shit! You're a fucking thief!"
Bewildered by the accusation, Ze lowered his gun slightly. "I- Huh?! I didn't steal shit, you fucking idiot!"
"My fucking radio!" It roared, slamming a fist into the ground before pointing a finger towards Ze. "What the fuck did you do to it?!"
"Your—" Radio. Oh. Oh shit.
Ze should kill him- it. Ze should kill that thing right now, while he still had the chance. Blast through it with his shotgun and leave another gaping hole in whatever was left of its already mutilated torso-
He walked forward, shotgun aimed back up at the creature. It shrunk back in response, its lanky body somehow seeming smaller as it curled into itself.
"S—stop, wait!"
Ze tossed the radio at it, its arms shooting up to block the projectile in a violent flinch. The plastic transistor bounced off it, clattering softly to the ground.
A few seconds passed by before the creatures tightly coiled form cautiously eased. He slowly brought his arms down, feeling around the floor for the object.
"…I changed the batteries."
It picked the radio up, holding it a two-handed—two-pawed—grasp.
"You changed th…" he trailed off. In that moment, it seemed to forget all about the deadly weapon pointed at him.
Carefully. Very, very, carefully, it flicked the device on.
The two jumped as the radio's static blasted from the speaker. Underneath all the static, however, blared the catchy, upbeat melody of a pop song—noticeably not the Christian station Ze had left off on.
[—Take me, I'm yours, into your arms
Never let me go
Tonight, I really need to know]
The creature stilled again, watching—well, Ze assumed he was watching- no head, and all—the radio in stunned silence as the beat dropped.
[Tell it to my heart
Tell me I'm the only one
Is this really love or just a game?
Tell it to my heart
I can feel my body rock
Every time you call my name]
Ze shifted in his spot, the floorboard groaning underneath him.
That seemed to break whatever music-induced trance the creature was in—and there it was; the familiar feeling of eyes boring into Ze.
[The passion's so complete-]
Gone as suddenly as he appeared, the creature vanished, the music cutting off as it disappeared with him. The only evidence something had been there at all being the knocked over chair.
Ze collapsed onto the floor, the shotgun temporarily pushed aside as he tried to calm his breathing.
Did that really just fucking happen?