Flip (OFFICIAL WATTPAD UPLOAD)

Chapter 4

"Alright, step one of getting paid," Velvet mumbled, marching through the forest with the plastic-wrapped bacon and cheese sandwich clutched firmly in his hand. "Don't get eaten by the sexy eldritch cryptid man." 

He had his equipment: Camera, tape recorder, extra batteries, flashlight, raincoat, and extra sandwiches, all stowed in his day pack. Frankly, he wasn't exactly looking forward to this, especially the potentiality of getting his head ripped off.

Luckily, his backpack was where he'd left it at the base of the cliff next to the creek, sitting open and drenched with rainwater. Velvet winced, debating whether or not to just leave it and get a new one.

"Ant?" He called nervously.

Silence.

"Listen," he said, awkwardly clearing his throat. "Uh, sorry about running off like that, but, uh... look, don't eat me—"

—Something tackled him to the ground, and the canopy of the forest seemed to crash over him like a heavy blanket, blotting out the sky as birds shrieked warning calls somewhere in the distance.

Velvet screamed.

"My safeword is pineapples!" He screeched, shoving the sandwich out in front of him like an amulet of protection as a set of razor-sharp claws sank into his shoulders. "PINEAPPLES! PINEAPPLES, GODDAMN IT!"

"You—what the hell?" Ant froze, crouching on top of him, hackles raised. Before Velvet's eyes, the traces of tawny fur slowly flattened and melted away into the being's skin, and his pupils widened from needle-thin slits to vertical ellipses. Velvet grimaced at the feeling of claws retracting from where they'd ripped straight through his T-shirt.

"Is... is that for me?" Ant asked, staring at the sandwich hungrily.

"Yeah—" Velvet started to say, but before he could finish his sentence, Ant snatched the sandwich out of his hands and dashed away. Luckily he didn't go far, merely bounding over in an unnervingly catlike manner to crouch on some moss-covered boulders in a nearby clearing.

There, he devoured the sandwich like a starving animal.

"Listen, I uh, I felt kinda bad about running off on you," Velvet said awkwardly. "I mean, whatever the hell you did scared the shit out of me. Like, almost fried my brain, I think. Does the sandwich qualify as a peace offering, or—"

"I'm sorry."

Velvet screeched, nearly shitting himself. In the microsecond it'd taken him to blink, Ant had vanished and reappeared directly behind him.

The being's features had softened, his pupils going from narrow ovals to rounded almost-circles. His teeth had shrunk and his claws had gone back to fingernails, and his proportions and the way his joints moved were the closest to correct that they'd ever been.

Sure, he might've been absolutely filthy and perpetually dripping wet, but Ant looked... startlingly human, right now.

He was also nearly half a foot shorter than Velvet when they stood face to face, and it took every ounce of his willpower for Velvet to keep from teasing him about it. Knowing Ant, he'd probably get his pancreas ripped out, and Velvet very much wanted to keep it.

"I'm sorry I was so... intense," Ant mumbled, adjusting his glasses. "I haven't talked to anyone... well. It's been a long time."

The trees rustled unnaturally. Out of the corner of his eye, Velvet spotted the golden eyes of a mountain lion perched on a nearby tree branch, silently watching them.

Waiting.

"I mean, I figured you were lonely," Velvet said.

Ant nodded mutely, wandering away to sit at the edge of the creek. If he'd had a tail like the mountain lions he seemed to emulate, it would've been swishing rapidly behind him.