Armful of firewood fell to the ground the moment Irene made her way back into the clearing, her gloved hands immediately reaching for her rifle hoisted to her back. In the clearing where her wooden cottage hid beneath the concave of trees and shrubbery, was her companion, a large and magnificent Kermode bear, grappling the dirt with her paws and its hind legs poised to charge.

“Seulgi?” Irene called out, her voice wary.

The bear huffed with long stringy beads of drool trailing from its open and panting mouth. When the bear looked up to meet Irene’s eyes, she could see that something was not right. This wasn’t Seulgi.

At a blink of an eye, the white matted coat of the bear transformed into the human bare body of Seulgi- but her eyes were still wild and glazed over, moisture of saliva marring her chin.

“Seulgi?!” Irene screamed again, flinching back with her grasp tightening over the barrel of her rifle as Seulgi made a jolted movement in a faux charge. “Seulgi, what’s happening?! What’s wrong?? It’s me!”

Irene desperately pleaded, one palm up and outstretched as if to form a temporary border between the huffing Seulgi and herself. Then Seulgi, still in her human form, began growling, her irises expanding to fill her eyes into hardened black coals, the whites essentially non-existent.

“Seulgi, please!!” Irene called, her pitch high and imploring, taking another step back from Seulgi’s form that began sauntering its way towards her. When Irene blinked again, Seulgi’s human form had already dissipated to transform back into the white coated bear, its black claws grazing against the dirt as it dragged itself closer to where Irene stood.

Seulgi’s eyes were still pitch black and her grated huffs grew more ragged with each step made towards Irene. Biting down hard on her lower lip, Irene shimmied off her rifle and straightened her stance, pressing the against her shoulder as she took true aim.

“Stop! Seulgi, stop!” Irene’s choked pleas seemed to make the bear falter, hesitating in its steps towards her companion, and Irene shuddered out a breath tinged with hope.

“It’s me. Irene. Okay?? Do you recognize me?” Irene asked towards the conflicted looking animal, its restless paw swiping at the dirt and nudging its head against the ground.

“Seulgi? Come on, it’s just me,” Irene continued, but her breath hitched when the bear’s eyes hardened once more, its growl more menacing as she repositioned her hind legs to charge and maul.

“!” Irene yelped, readjusting her aim. “Seulgi, please! Don’t make me do this!” Irene pleaded for the final time, her eyes meeting the bear’s charcoal pits- devoid of any familiar feeling she once saw in them.

Irene closed her eyes as she saw the bear get closer and closer to the bottom of her rifle’s barrel. The bear roared and charged for the final time.

A shot rang out.

-

Sana instinctively groaned out loud when an unwarranted shooting pain down her left temple blindsided her as she was brushing her teeth. Colour draining from her face as she clawed against the basin to stay upright, Sana gingerly spat into the sink and rinsed out as she pressed against the spot that felt like a mechanical drill was burrowing itself into her cranium.

“Sana? What’s wrong, you alright?” Nayeon’s inquiry echoed from behind the glass door to the shower, a lone hand wiping off the perspiration on the glass to reveal a worried looking face peering at Sana. Sana briskly waved her off with a small smile.

“It’s nothing, I almost fell,” Sana lied. Nayeon only nodded before turning around to finish rinsing out her hair. Sana could only clench her left hand into a tightly wound fist as it shook from the sheer force of the grip.

-

Nayeon woke up to an empty spot beside her, which was becoming more and more commonplace as the months went by. Rubbing the sleep out of her eyes and making her way into the living room, she saw Sana seated on the couch, her eyes thoroughly concentrated to the morning cartoons playing the muted TV. Nayeon sleepily reached around for the remote, unmuting the sound for Sana’s sake before landing a quick peck upon Sana’s head.

When Nayeon wordlessly left to go to the kitchen to brew their morning coffee, Sana could finally shudder out a silent moan in pain as the drilling in her temple boomed inside her head. Nayeon would ask her why she had suddenly become such a morning person. The truth was, Sana never became a morning person- rather, the throbbing area of her temple began waking her up in the middle of the night, making it impossible to fall back asleep with the accompanying pain and its tinnitus.

The haunting image of Nayeon wailing in relief when she had finally managed to turn back into a human never quite left Sana alone. So, she decided that she couldn’t afford to have Nayeon worry more than necessary, because she had an idea as to what was happening to her.

The pains began ever since Sana had made a choice in her head, that she would and could never turn back into a cat ever again. Sana understood that someone like Nayeon didn’t have the capacity to take care of a supernatural being with a ‘No Guarantee’ sign looming over their heads- and to be fair, maybe nobody did. And Nayeon had chosen Sana. And so, Sana had chosen Nayeon.

With the low volume of the morning cartoon noises and the clattering of the coffee machine from the kitchen distracting her from the pain, Sana closed her left hand into a tight, quivering fist.

-

Sana climbed on to a foot stool as she reached out to for the top shelf of the kitchen cabinet to fetch Nayeon’s favorite mug. Nayeon had a particularly tough day at work and was slightly grumpy (not at her of course) and Sana wanted to prepare her companion with something sweet and hot to drink in the coveted tabby mug with a handle that was shaped like a cat tail.

As the tips of her finger brushed against the handle, the grinding pain slammed into the side of her temple while both her ears began ringing. With an unconscious yelp, Sana lost her footing off the stool and crashed on to the floor, her paw grasping for her head.

Wait. Her paw. Sana hiccupped as she held the back of her hand out in front of her, her eyeballs hot and leaden as she studied the tufts of white fur sprouting from beneath the skin of her knuckles. Frantic drumming of Nayeon’s footsteps followed, the source of the noise rushing into the kitchen to crouch beside Sana in a worrying fashion.

“Sana? What happened??” Nayeon asked. Sana wordlessly shook her head, the words all jumbled inside her head and scrambling around. When she looked back at her hand, the white fur from the back of her hand was gone.

-

“Ouch,” Sana muttered out, a bead of blood soaring from a small cut on her finger as she set down the potato and her potato peeler in the sink. In the midst of seasoning the curry, Nayeon dropped her dipper next to Sana’s half peeled potato and brought the weeping cut close up to her face.

“I should’ve done the potato peeling while you seasoned the curry. Damn it. Sorry,” Nayeon whispered, bringing the wounded finger in to to run her tongue against the cut and to the wound clean. Sana squirmed underneath the strange and new sensation.

“No, don’t be silly. I told you I wanted to peel potatoes,” Sana whispered back. Nayeon looked up and met Sana’s shy gaze through her eye lashes, still latched onto Sana’s digit.

“…You enjoying this?” Nayeon suggested, and Sana’s jaw slackened.

“Am not!” She spat back, petulant. Nayeon laughed.

“You .”

Sana forcefully collected her hand back with a scoff from Nayeon’s hold and rummaged through the drawers for a band-aid. She quickly closed her hand into a fist when she noticed her nails morphing into long translucent hooks- something akin to animal claws.

-

When Nayeon brusquely checked the time on her phone out of habit when her eyes opened, it was nearing 4am. When she turned over towards Sana, she was reminded what made her eyes open in the first place. Sana was making noises. Specifically, whining and noises- the type someone made when they were sick with a cold or a flu.

Nayeon reached over Sana’s body to click on the nightstand and was left aghast at the sight that greeted her.  Sana’s face was covered in moisture, glistening with the matte sheen of cold sweat. Upon reflex, Nayeon brought a palm to Sana’s forehead, brushing away the wet matted locks away, to find that Sana’s body was absolutely on fire. Jumping to her feet without contestation,