Once inside, the heavy scent that rattled Alex’s brain forced itself into his consciousness. It hung in the air like a cloud, lingering against every crack in the rocks, surrounding him and weighing down the air, making it hard to breathe. Pledged, the bear-mind told him. This cave belonged to someone, in a way no possession Alex had ever owned did. His hackles rose, tense and wary, but he edged his way forward, on into the unknown.
What little light from the opening of the crevasse quickly faded as the passageway turned, the ground beneath his feet angled downward, into the belly of the mountain itself. In the darkness, Alex’s tension grew with each step, a knot forming in the pit of his stomach as his feet carried him further into Bear’s cave. The walls dug at his shoulders, tufts of fur catching and tearing free as he stumbled onward, his paws outstretched in front of him in the darkness. Where the wind outside had been a constant droning in his ears, here all was still, unmoving, only his own movements stirring the air.
His claws rapped painfully against the stone wall, echoes of the impact rebounding off of the narrow walls. The bearman whuffed in annoyance and began feeling in the dark for the latest turn, but what met his paws made him wince from more than the dull ache of the impact. The tunnel shrank even further ahead, half the height of the previous, already-cramped space. Kneeling, Alex could see dim flickers of movement ahead, bouncing off the wall past another turn in the tunnel: his destination, if only he could reach it.
Alex felt around the opening, measuring it with his paws, and then tried to squirm past, but he only needed one test to decide he’d have to find some other way to continue: he could barely squeeze both shoulders into the tunnel at once, and there was no way he’d get the rest of him to follow at that size. The shifting slivers of light ahead taunted him, showing him just how close he was, and yet the last ten feet might well be a hundred miles, if he couldn’t find some way past this shrunken gap.
Damnit! Alex’s thick pawpad smacked heavily into the stone floor, making his elbow twinge in pain and small clouds of rockdust swirl, settling into his fur. He wasn’t about to turn back here, and yet where was there else to go? He could find no other openings with his hands, and he hadn’t felt any along the walls as he’d entered. He could see light ahead, when he looked, so there had to be someone past this opening, but there was no way past? He simply couldn’t fit as the bear.
What about as the man? The bear-mind wondered.
Even as the idea came to him, he rejected it as unacceptable. He’d fought so hard to escape that life; he wasn’t about to embrace it here. This was his chance to be himself. Willfully adopting his human form, in his own dreamscape… could he even do so? And did he want to try? The notion rankled, but the more he studied it, the more it seemed the best solution, if reverting to the furless skin he’d so eagerly escaped could be called the best. At least it got him where he wanted to go, or so he hoped.
Alex turned his attentions inward, concentrating on the rising and falling of his chest as he knelt, his forepaws on his knees, trying to ignore the thick shag of his pelt beneath his pads. Draw in the man, draw out the bear. Focus on the trappings of humanity, the apartment, the job, the daily grind. After so long unlearning the importance of the things that held him beholden to his previous life, to try to consider them meaningful now, or even to think of specifics, made his forehead furrow, but slowly he called up images and ideas that belonged in the World of Man: the comforting hum of an air conditioner on a hot day, the steady flicker of fluorescent lighting, the smell of fresh-brewed coffee.
His body slowly bent and twisted under him, the fur receding from his rapidly lightening skin. His massive claws slowly shrank back to cracked and split fingernails, the ones on his hinds retreating back into his toes. He felt light-headed, weak. A familiar weight settled against his chest, the bear-claw poking him through the tangle of wiry, greyish brown hair. He ran his fingers through his hair, pulling it back and out of his face, then scratched at his untrimmed beard briefly before rearing back to squat over his heels, looking at his hands, pink and furless. The real me, he thought cynically.
With his reduced bulk, the tunnel walls were close but still gave him plenty of room to pass, and he crawled down the last ten or twelve feet in a hurry, cursing under his breath as the loose rocks that had gone unnoticed under his dense pawpads now dug painfully at his unprotected skin. More than once he scraped something harshly against the rocks, making him flinch and swear again, but soon he rounded the final corner, the tunnel quickly widening beyond into a large cave, in the middle of which blazed a fresh wood fire. Wisps of heavy, savory smoke rose from the flames, blending with the heavy scent of predator that so long back had attracted Alex to the cave.
Of Bear, there was no sign.
“Hello?” Alex said almost reflexively, his human voice small in the large cavern, echoing faintly in the enclosed space. “I have come to see Bear.”
No voice spoken in answer, but the bear-mind asked him if that were really why he were here.
Alex blinked, not expecting the internal response, but having gotten one, he continued. “I have come to see if I am a Child of Bear.”
Are you? The bear-mind asked quietly.
“That’s what I’ve come to find out!” Alex burst out, looking around, feeling a bit foolish for talking with himself. Not only that, he thought, but arguing with myself as well. If I lose, I’m going to feel really stupid. “Watcher sent me here to find that out.”
Are you? The bear-mind asked again, just as implacably. It seemed unconcerned by the outburst, as it had by the rest of Alex’s frustrations.
“You don’t know?” Alex asked peevishly, the hair on the back of his neck rising.
The bear-mind chuffed a laugh. If you are, then you are. Why ask me?
“You’re saying if I say that I am, then I am?” The answer seemed too simple, even for the child-like innocence of the bear-mind.
No, it told him calmly. If you are, then you know you are. If you have to ask, then you aren’t. Being a Child of Nature is as simple as believing it, but that belief must come from within. It cannot be given, cannot be taken, and cannot be stolen. It must come from within, and it must be accepted with an open mind and an honest heart.
The bear-mind then scowled, and Alex shivered, feeling its anger for the first time. You say you believe. You even think you believe. If you truly believed, though, you would already know it.
Alex rose on the balls of his feet, turning his head towards the ceiling. “I am a Child of Bear!” he called out, his voice ringing feebly off of the rocks, hollowly resounding in his ears.
Are you? The bear-mind asked him again simply.
Alex’s head dropped, and he stared down at his hands: hairless, clawless, furless. The real me. He’d thought in anger and disgust, but he’d thought it. The crushing weight of understanding collapsed inward on him, as if the mountain above him had suddenly given way. The flames snuffed themselves, plunging the cave into darkness, and Alex fell heavily to his bare knees and wept bitter tears into his pink, padless, human hands.
Ow, ow, fucking goddamn ow.
It’s a little bit of a setup for Alex, here. He’s off his game and taking directions from another person, you can hardly blame him for being a little unsure of himself. Would he have gone into the cave without Watcher telling him to?