Warning: mild body horror and swearing. Reader discretion is heavily advised.
I ran as fast as I could away from the dreaded Barnaby Manor. I can clearly hear the flapping of wings behind me as I ran. My breaths were coming out in panicked, sporadic puffs. I bet you are wondering, Ali, why are you running? What are you running from? To that, I can answer both questions honestly. The first answer is that I'm running from Barnaby because... to put it simply, the cat got out of the bag. He figured out I'm a shapeshifting hedgehog instead of a ghost owl girl that he thought I was. I think I broke the sound barrier six times while I was escaping from his iron grip and murderous tendencies, but who's counting? Anyways, let me tell you how he figured it out.
The short answer: breath test. The long answer is as follows: I began my day at the Barnaby Manor as normal. But Barnaby himself was acting strange... uh, stranger than usual. His swirling golden eyes always narrow suspiciously every time he sees my reflection. And every time I pass by him, he seems much more irritable. By that, he is always telling me to stop breathing because he sees it as a bit of a gross habit. Yeah, it is quite problematic because well, in case you haven't guessed yet, I'm not a ghost and sure as fuck not dead.
So, it finally got to a point where Barnaby cornered me with a mirror one day. "Ali, you've been acting weird with this breathing nonsense, and I must find out why my favorite 'granddaughter' is breathing despite the fact that she is technically dead." He told me, his grin a little bit too crooked for my liking. His face shifted so that his mouth was on the side of his head.
Then he promptly shoved a mirror in my face. The glass fogged, betraying my living status. And he tried to pin me against the wall. I dodged that talon swipe. "The glass only fogs when something living is here!" He said, hooting almost maniacally. I ran, shifting into a blue female hedgehog.
Then I started running at four hundred miles per hour. I felt something sting me, but I didn't stop running.
~~~~~
It took me an hour to shake off Barnaby. It took twenty minutes to get myself to Green Hill Zone. I hear intense music playing in my ears as I ran. I sneaked into Sonic's manor. Just as I was about to head upstairs, I hear Sonic ask, "Al, you look pale. Did that insane, dead, ghost owl lunatic see through your shifting?" He asked. I nod, tears in my eyes. Things have been... well, rough with Barnaby lately. I head upstairs, sobbing. I begin assessing the damage. The only physical problem is a strange bite mark. I rinse it under hot water, wondering how the fuck that got there. I shrug it off. Physically, I'm mostly fine. Mentally is another story. My anxiety has been through the roof.
Sonic has been worrying about me for a while now, but he tries to keep that worry hidden. I can't blame him. He is my father after all.
~~~~~
Tonight is a new moon. I sit outside. I noticed that the new moon looked bigger, darker, even. Then I hear something like a twig snapping. I look at my arms. They felt as if they became putty, stretching out. My gloves rip as my arm started getting covered in black feathers. I double over, exhaling painfully. I clutched my body as I started growing taller. It was painful. Somehow it was much worse than the werehog transformation. It felt like every bone in my body is being snapped, twisted and shoved right inside of my body. I yell as I grew taller, my clothes ripping to accommodate my long black wings. My quills felt as if they were pushed in. I groan in pain as I grew larger, my shoes exploding to a pair of giant black talons. It wasn't long before I was covered in feathers. Even my tail became tail feathers, which are long, black and luxurious.
I was starting to hoot in pain, gripping my ears... my ear feathers or plumicorns if you want to be a bunch of technical smartasses. I screech, not realizing that my eyes are now swirling orange eyes with a red pupil. I panted, then I hear Sonic calling for me. "Stay away!" I whimper. "I... I'm a monster! I don't want to hurt you or kill you!" My voice got fruitier. I turn my head to the new moon and let out a howling hoot:
"Ahooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooot!"
Then I pieced it together. Barnaby bit me and my body is taking that to mean, "Bird up! Let's make you into a copy of that ghost owl!" I fly, terrified of what happened to me. I land inside of the Sonic House dorm, hiding in the shadows. I decided to wait it out. I stick my tongue out, unaware that it was now orange. I realized that my eyes and mouth glowed as if someone has stuck glowsticks in my mouth. I cried, orange tears stinging my eyes. I fold my new wings tightly against me, trembling like a leaf. I was afraid that I was just killed.
I tried flying outside to clear my head. That was a mistake. I end up spotting a flicky and catching it in my new talons with ease. I swallowed it whole, my head feeling foggy. I had many memories of my mother controlling me, forcing me to be something I'm not. I felt something I didn't feel before. It felt as if there was a hollow pit where my heart used to sit. It felt like it was on fire. I spent the night hunting down any unlucky animals that crossed my path. I did catch a weird, rotten girl named Hannah Alexander and cooked her up on a kabob.
I was hyperfocused from anger until I see Sonic running towards me. "Ali! I know this isn't you in there!" He yelled. He waved his arms around. I tried chasing him. I got tired within fifteen minutes. I land, and that was when I felt something wrap around me tightly. "Ali, listen. This evil hunting ghost owl that you transformed into... it's not you!" Sonic yelled.
"Of course it's me!" I hooted maniacally. I was letting sixteen years worth of anger and self hate come out of my beak. I was about to pounce on him when I realized that he was standing his ground. He was refusing to move.
Then Sonic dropped a bombshell. "Ali. I know now that your mother told you not to stim! I know she controlled you! I know you are angry, but you can't take it out on every flicky you see!" Sonic started reasoning with me. I froze, my hypnotic orange eyes widening. "I never told you to stifle your stimming! I was trying to do some research on your stimming and your mother interfered, stating that it was bad for you! It's not! I've never told you not to stim!" I tried to find a memory of any time that Dr. Maurice Weahagu (aka Sonic in disguise) telling me not to stim. I quickly realized that he never told me not to stim or to stop stimming, not even once.
Newer memories poured, memories of Sonic taking the time to get me to start stimming. It took a lot of coaxing. When I first arrived at Sonic's home, the first thing he did was have me sit on a rocking chair. Then he told me, "You know what to do." And I started rocking. Then he started having me fidget with him. I remembered how easily his large, gloved, white hands engulfed mine. That was when the tears begin to form in my eyes. I remember the many night terrors he helped me through, how he basically told me to stim. I ask him why he wants me to be annoying but he shushed me with a grin. That was when I realized that I was a lot more mentally fucked up when I arrived at STH Academy because my mother did not let me be myself. I remember the jealousy I secretly felt towards Airalain. I felt incredibly jealous because she was never discouraged from being herself. Something in me broke. I started sobbing.
~~~~~
The next morning, Sonic woke me up with a poke. I wake, seeing that he is now bigger than me. I glance down at myself and accidentally hoot. I was back to normal! My blue quills shone; my green eyes were blinking sleepily. The only evidence that something was terribly wrong was the fact that there was a feather in my sneaker, which has miraculously went back to what it looked like pre-transformation. I hug Sonic tightly.
Sonic grunted, gently shoving me so that he could hug me properly. Then he hugged me tightly. "There there, Ali. I'm here." He murmured; his cheesy voice soft and melodic. Then he had me stare at him, using his gloved hand to guide my own green eyes to his. "I noticed that you were bitten yesterday. What happened?" He asked, his eyes narrow. I told Sonic everything, my heart thudding. That was when Sonic figured out my predicament: I became some sort of creature that only comes out on the new moon.
I was scared that I lost my shifting ability. So I tried shifting into a kitten. My body made a puff noise as if it was filling with air. I become tiny. I look at myself. I was now covered in rich cobalt fur. My green eyes were catlike. I look at my fingers and find dainty claws. Then I shift back to normal. "Barnaby threw a hissy fit because I wasn't dead." I replied. Then I grin, "At least I didn't lose my shapeshifting abilities!" I hug Sonic again, and he hugged me back.
Then Sonic gave me some homework. "Shift into something, anything... tonight. After sundown. Hopefully this new form of yours doesn't happen every night." Sonic told me, his voice a little worried. "That's your homework."
Well, this got a lot more complicated. And the music above pays tribute to what was going on in Ali's head... and a sly nod to my childhood. God I miss playing Sonic the Hedgehog 2 on my mother's GameGear. It felt GOOD holding a piece of tech like that. Anyways... DANG! I'm going to be honest: I definitely kin Barnaby, and so does my brother to a degree. But seriously. Thank you so much for reading this. I'm going to keep adding different ways Barnaby offs people. It's going to be a lot of fun trying to write someone getting turned into a stuffie or something goofy like that.