A ghost told me to meet you

An uncomfortable feeling starts at the base of Fern’s tail. Something starts to crawl on her fur. The gray girl ignores the sensation, noting that there are still tons of fireflies in the air. Her attention rests on Rudy, waiting for the details on what happened to Resin. Watching him carefully, Fern’s gaze narrowed as she tries to decipher the young man’s expression. There is sadness in the depths of his eyes and a pang of guilt strikes Fern. She had rushed him and asked too so many questions. Resin had been his mother and Fern knew the acute pain of losing a parent.

More bugs must have landed on her fur because the skin on rump feels like it is crawling. Trying to shake off the strange feeling, Fern feels the need apologize to Rudy for asking him such a raw question so soon. Just as he sucked in a breath, the smaller wolf opened her mouth to stop the conversation, she did not want to push him too quickly. However, Rudy’s face morphs and his head tilts down and jaws spring open. A loud, wet, buzzing cough erupts from him and Fern stills. Since when do coughs… buzz? As Rudy gags and coughs, the gray girl watched as fireflies exploded from his mouth.

Suddenly her legs feel weak again and, for a moment, she is glad to be sitting. The bugs fly away, darting off into the darkness as Fern starts in wide eyed horror at Rudy. This is a joke, right? Some magic trick done to scare and terrify the new wolf into not messing with him… Right? Her mind reels as tries to justify this unnatural phenomenon. When Rudy snarls and coughs out his dismay. The shock turns to concern as Fern moves to stand to go help him.

Suddenly, the feeling of bugs crawling on her skin becomes more pronounced. Something seems off and it takes her a moment to realize the feeling isn’t on her fur, the crawling seems to be coming from under her skin. Eyes round even wider as Fern feels bugs skittering across her muscles, making her skin jump, and nerves fire off randomly. She tries to convince herself it isn’t real; the sensation is just a figment of her imagination and she needs to help Rudy.

Taking a tentative step forward, Fern feels the bugs shift and start skittering up along her spine and into her neck. Gritting her teeth against the urge to plant her butt and try to scratch out the bugs, the gray girl calls out to Rudy, “You okay Rudyard?” Concern hangs on her words as she slowly walks toward him. The skittering sensations increase until Fern can’t stop herself. Haunches meet the ground as Fern leans heavily to her right. Back leg shoots up to scratch roughly at the skin on her neck.

Whimpers bubble out past her clenched teeth as she tries to rip the bugs out of body. Tears shine in her eyes at the extreme discomfort as she digs, roughly, into her skin. A cough causes her to pause in her task of ridding herself of the bugs to check on Rudy and Fern watches him in his misery of coughing out fireflies. Turning her face toward the sky, she screams out in frustration, “Why are you doing this to us? Please stop! Please!” Skin crawls and Fern returns to her fierce scratching, whimpers of discomfort escaping every now and again.