As Brad sniffs a bit, trying to locate the direction of that strange, unpleasant scent, she winces. Realizing that she thought of herself as Brad, she lets out a laugh, a bell-like sound, as the wind blows against her, blowing through her tails and clearing up her slight fatigue. “I’m not Brad anymore. I never truly was, but now I’m truly free from those shackles. What to name myself then. I’ve always liked the wind, and the image in my deepest desires was assigned the name Ventus. The wind welcoming me like this just confirms that I was right all along

As if a weight she never knew fell off her, her tails wave wildly in through the air as she begins to walk towards the smell. However, seeing all the destruction in the woods, and some buildings in the distance being damaged, she begins to pick up her pace, first into a jog, that turns into a run, and finally a sprint.

With reflexes she never knew she had, she agilely jumps over the fallen logs, ducks under low hanging branches, and avoids falling despite her speed.  Her tails move instinctively to counterbalance her actions, preserving her balance. Despite this, they start to fill with twigs and leaves, a mess to clean for later. She soon finds herself outside of the former park. 

Attempting to halt her sprint suddenly, she ends up stumbling into a fall, only managing to put her arms in front of her head to prevent her face from hitting the asphalt of the road.

“Ow that hurt.” She mutters, picking herself up off the ground, ears splayed as she looks around, tails clinging close to her and down as she’s clearly embarrassed. The embarrassment soon fades though, as she sees no one around. 

Examining her arms and legs next, she does not see anything other than some reddening of her skin. Surprised at the lack of even skinning, she sighs with relief as she walks over to where the smell was the strongest, only to see scorch marks nearby. 

She kneels down to look at them, not noticing how her knees get ash on them. Though her dress is short, her tails block people from seeing anything inappropriate even if they approach from behind.

Amidst the scorch marks, there are scrapes in the asphalt  from large claws like those of the mole-creatures she encountered only minutes ago. With her doubled sight, she sees a burnt claw mixed with the ash.

Picking it up, despite the ash that now covers her fingers, she sees that it is burnt black and cracked. Being the same color as the soot and ash, it was difficult to spot amongst the scorch mark. Despite the damage, it is clearly larger than any creature that would have lived around here would have, if not larger than anything that lived in the world in recent centuries..

Suddenly, as the wind gusts, there is a quiet rustle of fabric scratching against stone Despite being quiet enough that human ears would never pick it up, the slight noise causes a twitch in Ventus’. Standing up quickly and smoothing her dress, she looks over in the direction of the sound to see a young man in a clean black shirt, and black, bulky pants with a number of pockets. He is pointing a gun at her without an expression on his face.

Backing up rapidly, Ventus raises her arms “Let’s not do anything hasty, I have no idea what’s going on here.”

The young man, not convinced, aims the gun at her left foot, and squeezes the trigger seven times, though only one bullet fires. 

Ventus, seeing the bullet twice in her strange vision, observes it being far too slow. The red glow from it’s initial exit from the chamber almost immediately turns back to the normal color of metal, and the bullet begins to be compressed against the air itself. Despite this oddity, she manages to move her foot slightly out of the way by judging the first of the two images of the bullet she sees. Despite moving out of where it would hit, the bullet ends up fully stopping in the air about six inches from her before falling to the ground, flattened at the tip. The entire few moments, the bullet had traveled as if through water, before hitting a solid wall right next to Ventus.

“Why’d you shoot at me? And what kind of weird bullet was that? I have so many questions.”

The young man sighs and approaches, holstering the gun as he approaches. “I’m not going to answer questions of a monster, unless you have some way of proving you're one of the changed people.”

“Changed people? What are you talking about? I mean yes I changed, but all I have from before that is my house key and my ruined phone. What even is going on?” As she finishes asking this, her strange, fabric-like sight shows several versions of this man approaching from different angles while he isn’t moving in her normal sight.

Before she even notices the copy of him in her normal sight moving, the young man is right next to Ventus and staring into her eyes. The brilliant white shining in the moonlight can be seen reflected in his dull brown eyes due to how close they are..”Hmm, you do seem to be confused. What’s your name? And you’re taking me to your house, I need to see the key work to believe you.”

Keeping her arms raised so the seemingly crazy person doesn’t attack her again she starts walking home while responding “That’s fine I suppose, I was going home anyway when I smelled something strange. As for my name, it was different, but I’m going by Ventus now. Also, how did you move like that?”

“Different you say? Makes sense, assuming you’re one of the changed people, then a new name for your new body makes sense. What was your old name though?”

Wincing at the question, and frowning at the lack of response to her questions, Ventus quietly answers, “My name used to be Brad, but I always detested it” before realizing something, and exclaiming “Oh no how am I going to explain to my family about the change?”

The man looks sharply at Ventus before chuckling “Ah, that won’t be a worry assuming they’re alive.The internet is still working, even if cell phone service isn’t.. However, you’d best make your calls quickly, before the government drafts you.”

“Wait what? Why would the government be drafting people? There hasn’t been a national draft in over fifty years.”

“Well miss Ventus, the problem with that is that all the nations around the world are forcibly recruiting the changed people to combat the beasts coming out of the caverns.”

“Do you mean the mole creatures?” I can see how they’d be a bit dangerous, and they’re certainly durable, but why wouldn’t the normal military be able to defeat them? Guns that work properly are powerful after all, and I was able to char one’s brain soon after I woke up.”

“Wait? You’ve killed one? Well that’s some good news. You’ll likely be deployed pretty quickly, since you won’t need to acclimate to the danger.”  Pausing for a breath, he then continues, “As for the guns, only the scientists have a theory. Sure they explained it, but I was too focused on my patrol route. Speaking of which, we’re headed the right way for my route, but are we almost to your house? I need to check if you're telling the truth?”

Ventus nods shakily, a bit out of sorts with all the revelations happening. “Yes, we’re about three doors away, and uhhh we should probably hurry”  before slowing to a halt, blushing as her stomach rumbles loudly, almost like the sound of thunder, which causes her to freeze, her tails all outstretched and frozen in surprise her blush spreads across her entire head and neck. Her arms circle around her stomach as her tails hang weakly.

“When’s the last time you ate miss Ventus?”

“I don’t honestly know, what day is it?”

Ventus nervously laughs in embarrassment as she gets to her door. She fumbles with the key a bit until she is able to focus on her normal sight, unlocking the door with a smooth click.

“The date’s 1/30/1 PE, and seeing that you told the truth, name’s Vincent.”

“What does PE mean, and that’s a weird date.” she asks as she walks in, soon taking a deep breath and curling over gagging due to the overwhelming smell of mold. She covers her nose with her hands and her tails wrap around, trying to cover her nose as well. Wind rushes into the house as her only thought is for the smell to blow away.”

“Gah warn a guy next time, and you’ve really been out for a while hmm?” Vincent responds before grabbing under both of Ventus’s arms and dragging her out of the house, straining against the wind funneling in as well as the energy pouring off of Ventus’ body. Muttering to about monsters in humanoid skin, though it passes by Ventus unheard due to the amount of wind flying past.

Soon, a shattering of glass is heard as the windows of the house break.. Shouting over the wind, Vincent states “PE stands for post eruption, and the 1/30/1 means it’s the first month, thirtieth day, of the first year since then. And before you get confused, it took a few months to settle on this properly, deciding on twelve months of thirty days as well as five days not confined to a month. The days are a remembrance of the eruption, and each of the solstices, so if it were accurate, it’d be 4/30/1. Mind you there’d be an extra day in there due to the Spring Solstice, but all in all, that’s why I needed so much convincing to believe you. I should mention, the first official day of the new calendar was the Spring Solstice.”

Muffled, Ventus responds “You mean it’s been nearly five months since I fell in there? I, ugh that was nasty. Yes I can see why you needed convincing. I shouldn’t be alive after all of that time without food or water.” 

Soon she notices that she is out of the house and slowly uncovers her nose, tails unfolding, but raised high behind her in wariness as she drops her desire on whatever she did to make the wind flow so wildly. Despite the strength of the wind and the duration, she is not as drained as she was from either the sneaking or the fire to burn the mole.

Vincent looks surprised, and sets Ventus down before going back into the house. “You say you've only just awoken. No one else was out for more than an hour from what reports the higher ups have shared. Do you have a landline here?”

Ventus nods, ears quivering at the thought of going back inside the house, her tails lowering to be tight against her thighs and each other. Sighing softly she covers her nose and mouth with her hands and walks back in, heading straight for the stairs.

With her tails,  she gestures for Vincent to follow with a come here motion. After showing him the landline at the bottom of the stairs, she goes up them, grateful that the smell didn’t manage to pierce the door to the second floor. 

Closing the door behind her to keep the smell down, she presses the power button on her computer. Upon seeing the device flare to life she smiles happily before muttering, “I hope the automatic payments continued these past nearly five months, or this will be a problem. I still have power though, so that’s promising.” She then logs in, smiles at her background, which is an image of how she had pictured herself before her change. 

She loads her text conversation with her family, before panicking as she sees all of the messages asking about her, ending with one that mentions a funeral scheduled on 2/1/1 for her old self. She quickly sends “Wait I’m alive, I only just woke up tonight from whatever changed me. Please don’t have a funeral for me when I’m alive.”

Without waiting for a response given the time, she then messages her partners, telling them both that she’s alive. Despite the time, both respond rapidly, which isn’t that surprising. They both express their happiness about me being alive and they have things to talk about. However before they can say what they have to talk about, they both message that they have to step away to get a call. I left a message saying good luck, and I had something to tell them too.

Sighing from the relief of knowing those she cares about are alive, Ventus lays on the bed, curling  up on her side when laying on her stomach hurt due to her chest. She then wraps her tails around her to cover herself and rolls around a bit unable to contain her glee that even if this is all a dream, she has yet to wake up. Not caring about the small leaves and twigs in her tails, she hugs them tightly, just enjoying being alive for the first time in her life. Everything from the slide of her smooth thighs against one another to how soft her skin is, even the way her tails being the perfect weight and the feeling of her hair being long enough to touch her back are enough to send her into a giggling fit of glee each. The flick of her ears at every little noise causes a big smile. She is just happy to be herself. 

Half an hour of glee later, she calms down enough to go take a good look at herself. Looking into her mirror, she sees what her mind had always told her that she should look like, despite some of her tail’s fluff being tangled around leaves and twigs. She gets lost in how everything seems right. Vincent soon walks in and powers off her computer.

“You'd better be ready Ventus, it’s time to head out, you’ve been drafted, and the soldiers picking you up so  that I can return to patrol will be here in a couple minutes. You’ve been permitted to keep your tech, after it is inspected to ensure no viruses compromise the security of the dorm you’ll be staying at. You should be happy though, because thanks to your internet access here we have something interesting happening for you, in part as an apology for an overzealous soldier, in part as a bribe to hopefully let us examine you, and in part as motivation so that you don’t slack off”

After finishing that statement Vincent looks down and mutters about not being that overzealous.

With a goofy smile still on her face she looks over to Vincent before the smile vanishes as she realizes what he said. Despite wanting to stay happy and giddy, her smile quickly turns into a frown as her tails wrap tight around her body and her ears fold tight to her head.. “You’ve been monitoring my internet usage while we were here? That’s not good, but I don’t really have a choice do I? Do you have any documents, because sorry to say, I don’t fully trust your word alone given you shooting at me.”
“No, you don’t. Unless you can go against the entire country that is. Well really, due to treaties, the world is uniting. So no, you don’t have a way to say no. As for documents, the soldiers on their way to escort you there will have it.”

Ventus’ ears fold tight against her skull, her teeth baring slightly before nodding. Angry enough at the situation for her tails to lash out, compressing the bed in a complaint of metal and cracking of wood before relaxing. The mattress decompresses, but the frame has a massive crack in it. “Fine, I’ll be the government’s Kitsune, but you’d better make sure they don’t call me a fox.

Covering her sensitive nose once more since downstairs still stinks of mold, she heads towards the front door. Despite the air being a bit easier to breathe with the broken windows cycling air through the bottom floor of the house, it is still a challenge to not gag. In her haste to get out, she stumbles on the door frame, though it was in part due to her vision not catching the lip of the door due to her doubled vision. 

She quickly catches herself, muttering about her doubled vision. Vincent, hearing this, taps Ventus’ shoulder and asks “What doubled vision? The change has, thus far at least, put everyone into perfect physical condition.”

“It’s normal vision on one part, and kind of a fabric for the other. Where solid things are, the fabric is thicker, or perhaps denser would be the better word. Also, I’ve seen things move there before I see them in my normal vision. I will however say, when I focus on the normal vision, I can certainly see further than before I fell into the cavern.”

Vincent smiles widely, thinking about the usefulness of the potential precognition she seems to have described. His smile isn’t noticed by Ventus, but she does hear a soft half chuckle. He then waves down the incoming HUMVEE, covering Ventus’ ears right before the HUMVEE’s tires squeal as the brakes are hit too hard.

Ventus, having seen the HUMVEE coming, is grateful to Vincent, but lifts his hands off of her ears, her spine having tingled when he touched them a similar feeling as when she hit her breasts upon waking up  blasts through her spine, causing her tails to stiffen. “Please don’t touch them again, though I do appreciate the assistance. That felt,” she pauses “weird to say the least.”

Vincent nods before ordering the soldiers around and guiding Ventus to the HUMVEE. “They’ll take you to the dorms for the changed. You’ll be alone in your room for a few days to a week, but then you'll have some room mates. Just expect to go through some tests tomorrow, and to dive into the cavern after that. We know that whatever the energy in the air that the changed can manipulate happens to be originating from those caverns. Your job will be to search for the source, along with others,, and to deliver anything interesting that you find to the researchers. Any questions before you depart?”
Ventus sighs as she sits in the HUMVEE, jumping and yelping slightly as she leans back on her tails, before sitting up straight and blushing softly as she sees Vincent’s amused expression. “Several, first, are you a so called changed? Second, what would my rank be? Third, not really a question, but please don’t let this be a dream. Also, the draft documents please” she pauses as her stomach growls again before she states with a slight uptick in her tone, her blush appearing once more “And clearly some food, please..”

Vincent chuckles before answering in rapid fire, having seen the soldiers finish loading Ventus’ still functional tech into the HUMVEE “Classified for now, Currently Civilian contractor, as far as we know it isn’t a dream. The documents are right here, not that you have much of a choice in accepting, you’re free to go over them. As for food, yes there is a mess hall you’ll be led to first.”

Taking the documents, Ventus quickly scans them before chuckling “I’ll obey for now, but they need to fix some of this information. I’m not human anymore, and certainly not male, or having the name of Brad. The rest of the information from when I initially joined the mandatory draft queue upon turning 18 is a mixed amount of accurate and not. However, seeing you could get this, you’re probably genuine.”

Before Ventus can ask more, or Vincent can clarify anything, the Humvee rumbles back to life. The overwhelming noise causes her ears to flatten against her skull as her eyes shut tight, trying to endure. The soldier that’s sitting in the back with her slides a helmet onto Ventus’ head to help with the noise. Reopening her eyes and turning to the soldier to mouth thanks, she, out of the corner of her eye, spots Vincent move across some of the threads in the air, but doesn’t see him at all in her normal sight. Sighing at the mystery, she wonders what’s next as the Humvee rumbles towards where she will seemingly be living for the foreseeable future.