Someone Else Comes Along

Just as you think the skunk's about to spray you, it stops, perking up both ears. You hear it too: footsteps, fast approaching, of some late-night jogger. You almost want to shout out for them to turn back and go the other way, but you know that you might as well just pick up that skunk and squeeze its musk right into your face if you're going to do that. You have no way to give him any kind of warning, any sign to turn back, without alarming the creature that sits motionless before you, and all you can do is sit and wait for the inevitable.

Within a few seconds, the jogger comes into view. On seeing you and a rubber skunk both facing him, both completely motionless, he doubles his speed, apparently curious to see just what the heck is going on. You want to shout to him, tell him to turn back, warn him before he comes too close, but you still can't risk provoking the skunk. He's soon upon the two of you, and just as you'd expected, the skunk turns and spritzes him right in the face with a healthy dose of stink. By the time he's fallen to his knees, coughing and spluttering from the spray, the skunk has already bounded into the forest to escape this apparent predator.

With the threat gone, you rush to the man's side... only to retreat a few feet when you actually smell what he's been sprayed with. The stench is awful, and you find that you have to pull your shirt partway over your face and start breathing through your mouth just to dull it. You give the jogger a pat on the back as he coughs a few more times, and then he looks at you, asking "what the hell was that?"

You open your mouth, ready to give an explanation, when he lets out a loud "OOH!", jolting forward and grabbing his waist at the back. He looks both confused and disturbed, and at first, you can't understand why, but then you can see the small, shiny white and black bulge quickly making its way out from the base of his spine. You back away, more than a little scared by this development, as the growth expands outwards, inflating like a balloon as it lengthens and curls, the black covering most of its surface and the white forming a pair of white lines that meet at its tip.

The tail is something that you recognize all too well, resembling the one you'd seen just moments ago, and this prompts you to take another step back. The man just looks at you, quite visibly afraid, but when he tries to stand and approach you a series of squeaks are emitted from his legs. Looking at them, you see that his shoes have ripped open at their tips, rubbery paws peaking out their fronts. You can see these paws extending into his pants, and though you can't see inside of those you can guess fairly easily what they hold. He reaches a hand out as if to say "save me," but soon that hand changes as well, darkening and gaining that same latex sheen as the tail and paws, his fingertips growing claws and his hands becoming more feral overall, more paw-like.

All that remains is his head, his face now expressionless and his eyes glazed over. He merely stares into space as what human flesh remains shifts to a rubbery black, his mouth and nose pushing outwards into a muzzle, his ears rounding and shifting and a white stripe reaching out the back of his shirt to crown his head and travel down to his nose. His eyes shift colour to a beady black, completing the transformation and leaving a six-foot-tall skunk man wearing mostly intact human clothing standing and still staring blankly before you. Unfortunately, his expressionlessness melts away rather quickly, giving way to a snarling face as he turns to look at you, his teeth bared and his eyes filled with the signs of instinctual actions.