The air was damp, the cool wind hinting at the real winter weather starting any day now. The hint of the sun glimmered through the cloudy sky above, seemingly reluctant to show its face. Her jogging motion kicked up the leaves that had fallen on the winding dirttrack that led through the local forest, obscuring the edges enough that she'd found herself in thick undergrowth twice already and had had to backtrack to find the path anew. Her early morning routine had helped her settle in this new town a lot faster than anticipated, and Iris smiled to herself as she looked around her at the beauty of the place she now could call 'home'. The large birches and other trees were shedding their leaves in a display of yellows, reds and the more common browns, contrasting to the green of her tracksuit or the white sneakers she wore underneath.

Slowing her pace, she reached up for her zipper and tugged it down a bit to pull the towel she had slung around her neck like a scarf up to dab at her forehead. Focusing on her immediate surroundings again, she noticed a dead tree had snapped in half and walked over to the top part of it, sitting herself down on the log after first checking for spiders. "Pfew.. one forgets the time here." she mused, looking at her watch. "Half past eight already.."

"Is it?" an unfamiliar voice quipped from behind, and Iris jumped up and turned around to spot an odd girl just beyond the decaying tree. The oddest part of her wasn't that she was practically in the nude.. sporting no more than a simple T-shirt that looked like it hadn't been washed in some time, but Iris needed another moment to realize what was bothering her about the girl; There were two antennae sticking up out of the girl's forehead, almost like the eyes on a snail or slug! The deep black-in-black eyes on the girl's face were the ones staring at her, however, so Iris ruled out the possibility of them being eyes. But it was still an odd sight to see!

Noticing what Iris was looking at, the other girl raised an eyebrow a bit. "You seem to like my antennae. Would you like to come have a closer look?" she offered, motioning for Iris to hop on over the log to her side. "It'll take me a bit to slide around to join you, so if you could?"

Baffled by the vision before her, and request made, Iris almost moved on autopilot, setting her hands on the log and pushing off from the ground to swing her legs over to the other side. They landed with a soft squish in something wet and sticky, and Iris immediately looked down to spot a large wet spot on the leaf-covered ground, with a trail of slime leading over to the other girl. "Ah.." she started, then noticed the girl's lower body, which had been obscured by the tree before, and her eyes went wide in surprise!

"Hmm? Oh, yes.. sorry for that. I'd been sleeping there." the girl shrugged, then tilted her head slightly and slid over with her oddly shaped body. From the top part, it was quite a normal girl Iris was gawking at. Apart from the antennae, that is, which were moving a bit curiously to indicate the girl's mood it seemed, but from her waist down the dark brown of her human skin started to look more and more moist as it trailed off into a slug-like tail rather than a pair of feet! Raised up as the girl was, the front of her 'foot' was plainly visible, and with it the clear hints at her genital area was exposed behind the extra folds the slimy body provided for her to slide around on.

"Are you ok? You look a bit pale.." the girl wondered, and Iris snapped out of it to back off a bit against the tree she'd just jumped over.

"Ah! Who? Me? Yes.. yes, I'm.. er.. how.. what er... I mean.. who are you?" Iris stammered, trying to balance her obvious shock with some sense of manners towards someone doing a darned good job of being at least partly human in appearance and behavior. It didn't help that each step she took was accompanied by a soft squishy sound and the feeling of the slime tugging at her sneakers as if trying to make the earth swallow them.

The slug girl stopped at the question and looked difficult for a moment. "Hm.. that's a question I haven't heard in a long time. Of course, people don't usually come here." she mused, holding onto her chin with her left hand while looking up at the canopy. Iris' eyes were drawn up to follow the other's gaze, but saw only hints of the cloud-filled sky above through the dense, yet clearly thinning, blanket of leaves.

"I think I was.. Abigail. Or that was my mom. I'm not sure." the slug girl continued, shrugging helplessly. "The animals here don't really care about names. It's hard to remember."

Iris blinked at the girl in front of her who, mainly due to the absence of legs, came to about half her size. "The.. animals?"

"Well, yes. As I said before; humans don't usually travel this far into the forest."

"This far?" Iris blinked, looking back over the broken tree towards where she thought she came from and realizing she couldn't spot her footsteps on the ground. "Oh shit.."

"Eww! Where??" the slug girl meeped, quickly scanning the ground around her! "I didn't sleep on it, did I?" she sniffed the air a bit, turning her upper body to try and sniff at her sticky tail as if worried it might have feces sticking to the moist brown skin with darker spots..

Iris couldn't help but chuckle at the insanity of the situation she'd found herself in, putting the back of her right hand to her mouth to stifle her laughter a bit, but then moved that hand up to rub at the back of her head lightly. "Er.. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to imply.. the actual presence of.. well.. shit.. I just.. it's.. er.. It's what we say when things go wrong. Where I come from, I mean." she tried to explain, curious at the other girl's lack of understanding of something so common, even if she spoke fluid English! "Erm.. so.. what are you exactly, if I may ask?"

"Hmpf.. don't scare me like that. You don't want to know how icky it tastes." the slug girl started, folding her arms under the bumps of her small breasts, making some dried-up dirt fall from her shirt. Iris could just make out part of a letter, faded and discolored to the point where she wasn't sure any of the rest of it would still be readable - even without the dirt obscuring it. "What am I? Well, I'm a slug of course!"

"Errr..." Iris started, but got interrupted by Abigail, "Not a normal slug, silly. I think I used to be a human girl, like you. But I'm me now."

Iris blinked at that statement, then had to rub at her forehead a bit to try and make sense of it. "Ok, so.. you're.."

"A slug."

"Right. But you used to be.."

"Well, I think I used to be. I think I can remember having had.. ... er... those things before." Abigail offered, motioning to Iris' legs.

"Legs."

"Legs?" Abigail blinked, but then nodded. "Yes, those things."

Iris rubbed at her head some more. "So you used to be human, but you're a slug now.."

"That's what I said, yes. Want to see how it happened?"

"I.. what?" Iris blinked, caught off-guard by the offer.

"Want to see how I became like this?" Abigail wondered, tilting her head lightly. Iris blinked some more, but then shrugged and threw her hands in the air as if giving up on trying to understand it.

"Sure, I guess..?"

"Catch." Abigail grinned, grabbing something shaped like an american football from behind herself and throwing it at Iris' face! Iris quickly responded to grab it from the air with both her hands, stopping it from impacting with her face and opening her mouth to shout at the slug girl in mild dismay!

"Hey! Are you trying to... oh my god what is this???" she started, but then went wide-eyed as the slimy brown ball she was holding opened up what appeared to be a ring-shaped mouth to reveal a dark pink tongue stretching out! Before Iris could respond to it, the tongue had already wrapped itself around her neck and pulled her forward towards the ball in her hands! Holding it tightly, Iris tried to push it away, twisting and turning her head to try and dislodge the tongue, but it was far stronger than her and the slimy outside of it made holding onto the ball a feat in and of itself. It didn't take long for it to slip out from between her hands, which impacted with one another in a wet slap, as the ball collided with Iris' face and immediately swallowed it whole!

Flailing blindly, Iris started on an odd dance as she felt herself get pulled in farther, the tongue still wrapped around her neck but the mouth opening wider to start swallowing her shoulders, and soon her arms were pinned down her sides as she slid in more and more.. As she struggled to get free, she lost her balance and faintly felt two hands press onto the sides of the soft shell surrounding her, keeping her from hitting the ground. She felt herself get cradled as her left sneaker slipped off of her foot, but then the mouth closed around her feet and she felt the tongue let go of her neck.

Iris could do nothing against the shell compacting around her; the slimy interior and pressure from the flesh making her expend her energy much too fast to allow her to keep up even the faintest idea of a struggle. She tried kicking, but couldn't do anything against her legs folding up as she was forced into a ball, gasping for air within the enclosed space. The problem of air was quickly made a non-issue as the tongue came back around to force itself into her mouth and down into her throat, the slimy tendril opening much like the 'mouth' of the ball itself had and spraying copious amounts of slime past her larynx and into both her lungs and stomach!

Gagging on the appendage in her mouth, the depleting oxygen levels in her system made her head swimmy while she felt her stomach distend as more and more slime spilled into her body. Moments later, she lost consciousness...

When she came to again, she was still enveloped by the slimy interior of the ball, her body feeling strange and numb. Strange, in that her legs seemed bent in a way that went beyond straining muscles and into the realm of breaking bones. And numb in that she felt as if the stuff still being fed down her throat contained a heavy sedative. Strangely, as she tried to make sense of it all, she felt the gentle sway as if she was being carried.. Her mind only had a minor reprieve of the darkness, however, the drug-induced sleep returning with a vengeance after only a few seconds of consciousness.

Again she woke, but this time to the sensation of the numbness dissipating slowly. Her arms had moved during her sleep, wrapped around something soft and soggy that felt like it was part of her. The tip of it had replaced the tendril that had been in her mouth for however long she'd been in here, and her belly felt full, but no longer like it was being filled up beyond what it could take. Her lungs were full of the liquid that surrounded her, which had changed consistency to a less sticky, but more fluid state. Oddly enough, she was breathing fine even with the liquid being all she could take in. She took a deep breath, the feeling of the liquid passing through her nostrils almost making her want to gag from an almost automated response coming from her years of swimming rather than an actual gag reflex. When her body refused to, her mind started to wake up more fully and she found herself pondering why.

The tightness of the sack around her was slowly letting up, allowing her some freedom of movement again, and she reached up to brush her hair from her eyes. A sharp twinge made her gasp and she felt something recede into her forehead, her eyes opening to the darkness around her. Only shadows could be seen, and she prodded the thing which she had been subconsciously suckling at. It seemed like a solid, squishy object, feeling somewhat like the calf of her left, no her right.. no, both! It felt somewhat like both her legs had merged and formed a single calf which she was now prodding at. It also felt more squishy.. somewhat like all the muscles had gone from it.

Iris mused at that a bit, her mind still swimming in the aftermath of whatever anesthetic she had been administered. As she was trying to wake up fully, she felt a movement behind her and suddenly all the liquid around her started to pour out from a hole opening up. Before she could respond, she too was being pulled out and splashed wetly on the floor of a small cavern, the stone chafing her moist skin as she rolled out! The moment she was out of the quickly deflating brown sack, she unrolled herself automatically, flopping over on her belly and feeling her legs..

..well, the feeling was quite odd, really. It felt almost as if her legs sucked themselves tightly to the granite floor, sticking her in place. She didn't quite have a lot of time to think it over, however, as her stomach grumbled and she felt her body convulse to expend the liquid from her lungs, puking it out in short - painful bursts until she ended up spent and curled up crying from the experience. The darkness of the cavern prevented her from doing more than just hold onto her oddly shaped legs, curled up in a fetal position once again, and she cried herself to sleep without Abigail being present to account for her new location or detail about what had happened exactly..

"Hey.." a soft voice called out to her, and Iris tried to blink her weary eyes open only to find them stuck from having had something dry up on them while she'd had them closed. Her arms let go of her legs and she felt them unfold again, her hands reaching up to rub away the hardened bits to try and regain some vision. "Careful there.. let me do it for you, it's quite a mess." she heard, and the sensation of a pair of soft hands pulling her own away made Iris whine but submit to the caring voice. A soft texture, slightly moist, got dabbed at her face, and she felt some more of the hard material break away.

When she found her eyes being able to open on their own accord again, she opened them and blinked at the blurry visage of Abigail dabbing something that looked like a patch of moss at her. A few dabs later and her eyes had lost enough of the blur to make her realize it was indeed a patch of moss, with which the slug girl was gently cleaning her. "Easy now.. I'm sorry I wasn't there when you got reborn. I was out getting some food and moss.." the girl offered, and Iris made a confused sound, then scraped her throat when she realized her voice wasn't responding as she had intended it to.

"Grhg.. grah.." she coughed, then found her way to more intelligent sounds. "Wuh.. what happened?"

"What's the last you can remember?"

"I.." Iris frowned, feeling some hard bits stuck to her eyebrows break away. "I remember meeting you in the.. Hey! You threw something at me! I.. I.. er.. I.. floated? I.. eergh.. my head feels like I've been hit by a battering ram.."

"Here, eat this." Abigail offered, handing over some kind of mushroom towards Iris.

Iris stared at it for a moment, then glared up at Abigail. "Er.. don't take this the wrong way, but I don't eat mushrooms..."

"But it'll make you feel better!" Abigail retorted, looking slightly offended.

"Besides, it's red with white spots. That's toxic, isn't it?" Iris continued, pushing up from the ground into what she thought was a standing position. Strangely enough, her legs didn't quite give her the height she expected, and Abigail even managed to look down at her, only by an inch or two.. but the girl was noticably larger than Iris could remember. Confused by this, Iris started to look back, but was stopped by Abigail's hand on her cheek.

"Seriously, have a bite first." she offered, looking concerned. "It'll help."

Iris got more and more confused and annoyed by this girl's behavior and the feeling in her legs was getting to her. "Will you stop treating me like a child, damnit? I don't care what kind of depraved demon spawned you, but I'm fully capable of handling anything life throws at me, ok? I'll just get a Zofran when I'm home and I'll be fine."

With that, Iris pulled away from a shocked-looking Abigail, and turned to face her legs. A mistake, as Abigail had tried to explain, as the shock of seeing no legs but instead a slimy brown foot extending about the length of her former legs behind her sent her brain into a meltdown trying to understand the situation and she blacked out once again..

"..did you listen? No.. And you insulted me on top of that.. What did I do to deserve that?" Abigail muttered as Iris woke up to the feeling of having small bits of something pushed into her mouth. She instinctively chewed on them before swallowing, and noticed an immediate improvement in how her head was feeling. Her nausea had almost completely disappeared, and in its place a light euphoria had taken possession of her. With a smile growing on her face, she opened her eyes to see Abigail push a bit of the broken-up red mushroom into her mouth. Iris opened her own to speak, but then noticed the tears leaking down the other girl's face and closed it again as a feeling of guilt overtook her.

As Iris pushed up from the ground, Abigail's eyes met hers and the girl turned away to rub her tears away. Iris couldn't but move forward to wrap her arms around the girl from behind, the odd feeling of the two slug bodies rubbing up against one another moved to the back of her head as a problem to be tackled another time. "H..hey, I'm sorry for what I said before.." Iris tried, but Abigail shrugged it off.

"You meant it. I could see that. I think that's why I stay here, in the forest.."

"No, I didn't mean it like that.. I.. just.. I don't.." Iris stammered, letting go as Abigail wriggled herself free, and drooping her arms down her sides. "I really am sorry.."

"Yeah.. right.." Abigail snorted, pushing another bit of mushroom in her mouth. "Thaphs ghahs ghey aww saiph.."

Iris blinked, then giggled softly as the mushroom's effects still made her feel giddy. "That's so cute!"

Abigail swallowed and turned around to face Iris, a look of confusion on her face. "Huh? What is?"

"You! Talking with your mouth full!" Iris grinned, totally forgetting her situation for the moment.

"I.." Abigail started, but then colored a deep dark on her cheeks. "Nuh-uh!" she refuted, and turned around a bit to hide herself. "Not so."

"So are!" Iris decided, moving forwards again to wrap her arms around the dark-skinned girl and huggle her close. "You look awfully cute, and your reaction only makes you look more cufph!" Iris was cut short as Abigail pushed another bit of mushroom into Iris' mouth.

"Shush.. You look much cuter than I do. Especially now you're a slug as well." Abigail huffed, trying to get the blush on her cheeks down.

"Oh.." Iris blinked, realizing her own situation was as her mind had feared it would be but hadn't been willing to accept until now. "I.." she started, then clung tighter to Abigail and pressed her face against the girl's dirty shirt. "W..why?"

Abigail wriggled uncomfortably at the question. "I.. was lonely?" she tried, sounding a bit timid and unsure herself.

Iris fought the tears as she felt them come, but lost ground as her mind went over what had happened the previous day? How long had she been in that thing? She cast a glance upon the odd-looking sack on the ground, and noticed it looked like it had withered away. "H..how long have I.. er.."

"Three days."

"!" Iris swallowed strongly at that. It had been a.. Tuesday, was it? "What time is it now?"

"I don't have a watch.."

"Oh!" Iris pulled away from Abigail and looked at her wrist, only now noticing she was still wearing her track suit! Well, the top half at least. The bottoms were completely gone, and with good reason! She moved her sleeve out of the way to peer at her watch, flicking at the glass a bit to break away the dried up whatever from it. "Half past eight.. In the morning?"

"No, you've been sleeping for most of the day."

"In the evening??"

"Well, that would be implied.. yes." Abigail snorted, holding up another bit of the mushroom. "Last bit?"

Iris was about to comment on her not eating mushrooms again, but then realized she had been eating mushrooms.. and she had been feeling a lot better for it.. and leaned her head forward to nom on the bit held out to her. "phanphs." she smiled, and started to chew. As she did, she looked down at herself and noticed the track suit had hardened around her body. Tapping it made the hard bits break away, and Iris amused herself for a bit with trying to make it look decent again before trying the zipper. It didn't want to go down at first, but as she tugged at it it started to break through the merged bits and go down fully. Underneath was her towel, hard from the dried-up moist, shirt and bra.. each getting a quick inspection from Iris' hands and eyes before she looked up again to watch Abigail chew on a handful of earthworms...

"Want a taste?" the girl offered, her face looking about as innocent as could be, but Iris' face must've shown how she felt about it and the hand of squirmy creatures offered to her got pulled back as a shrug got given. "Suit yourself.. It's going to be difficult finding anything but these as it gets colder. There's snow in the air."

Iris swallowed at that. "Look, I got a nice condo over in town with a fridge full of food.. If you show me how to get back to town, I'll.."

"You'll what?" Abigail offered, a bit of piece of worm dropping from the corner of her mouth to the floor. "You'll slide into town, leaving a trail of slime behind you, narrowly avoid getting run over by a truck, get people screaming in anguish at the very sight of you, get your parents running in fear and get chased around by people with pitchforks?"

Iris blinked at that. "Is that what.."

"No, but I saw Frankenstein when I was human."

"Ah." Iris coughed, then waved it away. "I'm sure it won't be -that- bad.. People are openly discussing body modification after all.. they could pleasantly surprise you?"

"Won't matter to me.. I've been here for.. many moons."

"Moons?"

"Sounded fitting."

"Well, you could've said seasons.."

"True.. but I didn't."

"Right." Iris coughed, moving to look anywhere but at Abigail or her new lower body. An uncomfortable silence fell over the small cavern, until Iris heard the sound of squishy squirmy things getting chewed on again and noticed Abigail continuing her dinner. "Still... I'm not sure I want to try those... Could we try and get to town? You can stay here if you want, I'll go on alone once I know the route?"

Abigail swallowed her mouthful while shrugging, then nodded. "Sure. We'd best go after dinner then. Not sure you want to go to town during daylight, do you?"

Iris remembered how crowded even this small a town could be, population less than 5000 but with a large number of tourists visiting the serene woodland area and nearby lake. Winter would isolate the town more, but some tourists would try and prolong their stay until the first snowflakes would hit the dirt.. she was sure at least one of the hotels would still be full. "Right.. let's go tonight then, if possible? How.. er.. how fast can we move anyway?"

"Well, once you get the hang of it we can actually move faster than our non-human family."

"..family.." Iris repeated with some contempt, but irked as Abigail narrowed her eyes.

"Yes, family. We're slugs. They're slugs. They're family. Stop whining already! I had an awful lot of time on my own trying to get to terms with this, ok? Don't judge me for making the best of my situation!"

Iris cowered from the ferocity of Abigail's retort, finding herself backing up against the wall opposite the other girl and pulling her lower body up towards the front to hug it.

"Ah.. we were talking about cute before.." Abigail chuckled at that, motioning a hand towards Iris.

Iris just bit her lower lip at that, then opened her mouth and took to suckling on the tip of her lower body again, like she could faintly remember having done in the sack. "Bite me." she offered to Abigail, but went wide-eyed as Abigail's face looked like she was actually considering it a valid response...

"Hey, don't look at me like that... I've seen some of our family eat their kin.. cannibalism is not unheard of, ok? Besides, I probably wouldn't eat you." Abigail tried to comfort Iris, but failed miserably. "Ok, well, if I promise I won't eat you, will you stop looking at me like that?" Iris nodded quickly, and Abigail groaned. "Ok, I promise I won't eat you. There.. happy? Can I go back to eating my worms?" Another nod from Iris. "Thank you." Abigail ended, stuffing her mouth again.

It was not two hours later that Abigail finally finished her meal, consisting of the worms, some more mushrooms, of which Iris got some to try as well, and some green stuff which looked familiar but Iris never was much of a botany enthusiast and Abigail was ambiguous about it. Under the cover of darkness, the two slugs slid out into the forest, Abigail in front, and Iris trailing as close behind as she could manage.

Initially the whole process of sliding around was easier than she had imagined it would be, which made her think of the process and then it suddenly became a whole lot more difficult! Abigail had snorted as Iris stumbled and managed to plant her face in the dirt just outside the cave, chiding her for overthinking what was an instinctual process until Iris reluctantly agreed with her. The next part of the journey she tried to do everything but think of how she was moving forward, which resulted in her thinking more about how she was moving forward, and subsequently causing her to fall behind. Abigail managed to pick up some more mushrooms while waiting for Iris to catch up again, and they helped clear Iris' mind to the point where Abigail had to take hold of her hand to steer her to where they were going...

Finally, then, they arrived at a familiar spot where a not-so-white looking sneaker sticked out of the mud near a tree that had fallen down. Abigail immediately moved to slide around it, but Iris lingered a moment to pick up the shoe and poke her new lower half with it, smirking to herself. "So I can basically throw my shoe collection away?" she sighed, to which Abigail tossed her hands up in the air and let out a loud groan. "Sorry.." Iris pouted, dropping the shoe and following the girl in silence until they reached the edge of the forest.

"This is as far as I'll go." Abigail stated, looking nervously towards the collection of buildings and pavement and domesticated creatures. "Be careful around salt."

Iris blinked, then meeped and pulled her arms up to her chest. "Ack! I totally forgot about that!"

"Yeah, do that.. it burns like crazy and you won't come back from it."

"...that bad?"

"Well, I dunno.. I know what it does to our family.. but I never tried on myself.. I hope you understand why." Abigail offered, folding her arms in front of her chest.

"Right.. Should I take a new shirt with me when I come back?"

"Are you?"

"Am I what?"

"Are you coming back?"

"Well.. er.. I can't.. er.. leave you here by yourself, can I?" Iris blinked, scratching an itch.

Abigail pondered that a moment, then smiled a genuine smile. "I would like that."

"What?"

"The shirt, of course. Who would need a useless slug like you? You can't even slide around normally!" Abigail scoffed, but then grinned wide. "I mean you, silly. The shirt would.. well.. erm.. If you have my size, it'd be nice. I've gotten used to surviving the winters here.. but some extra warmth is always welcome."

"Har har.. I'll see what I can do then." Iris chuckled, then took a deep breath and set in motion down the dirt track and onto the regular pavement. She squirmed a bit as her foot hit the tarmac, feeling the difference in texture from the leaf-covered ground of the forest but sped up once she recognized the street she was in. Even with hardly a soul outside, Iris took to the darkest patches and small alleyways until she reached her apartment building; a four-story complex made up of red bricks painted over to make it blend in with the wooden buildings surrounding it. She lived on the third floor.

"Ok.. I can do this." Iris told herself, looking out of the alley beside the complex to see if anyone was coming. No-one was, and so she slid out full speed, rounded the corner, went through the door into the lobby, and froze in place. Just across the hall was one of her neighbours, snogging his girlfriend while both were standing up against a side wall. They weren't in the way, standing off to the side with enough space for an elephant to pass by comfortably, and they were too busy kissing to notice even a marching band come by, but for Iris this was her first encounter with humans after she, a former human turned slug, had been 'reborn', as Abigail had put it.

Looking behind her at the trail she was leaving on the floor, she swallowed strongly, but then balled her hands into fists and held her breath as she started towards the pair. As she did, she noticed him slipping his hand up his girlfriend's leg, pushing her skirt up higher. Iris watched as she let him for a little, but then the girl pushed his hand back down again. Iris tried to speed up, but was about at her limit, still going at a snail's pace.. no pun intended. He tried again, and this time the girl slapped his hand before pushing it down again. Iris passed them by and closed her eyes as she crossed the distance between the pair and the staircase, hoping he wouldn't try again.

Another slap was heard and Iris felt a chill go down her back, not daring to stop moving, nor look back. "I said no!" the girl was heard exclaiming, and a thud was heard before her heels indicated she was walking off. Iris reached the base of the stairs and opened her eyes to slide up as quick as she possibly could, hoping they wouldn't look towards her. "But baby.." the man said, and his shoes were heard following the girl, who had reached the door by then, judging by the sound of it opening quickly. "No, James. I said no. I'm going home!" The sound of her heels hitting the pavement helped relax Iris somewhat, and she went around the corner and up the next flight of stairs while hearing the man curse at himself. "Abigail," Iris blinked at that and wondered at the chances, but the man continued unaware of his audience, "wait up! I.. eww.. what's this stuff? Gah.. Abi!"

Iris heard the door close behind her neighbour, and she slid further up the stairs with her cheeks burning from embarrassment at knowing the trail she was leaving behind. In her mind she played out what would happen if she stayed in town until morning. The supervisor would come home, or some policeman would follow the trail leading them straight to her apartment.. and if she would still be there.. what then? Would they shrug it off and go back to business? Would they sell her to a laboratory? Or would they do as Abigail feared; chase her out of town into some windmill and torch the place?

"Come on Iris.. stop with the silly thoughts.." she chided herself, digging up her apartment key from her pocket and breaking off the dried up bits from it. She slid it in the door, turned it, and passed through into her dark apartment. The aroma of stale coffee lingered, and she remembered she'd left half a cup on the table in the kitchen before going off to jog the other day.. Her cup would be stained badly by now.. She put her keys on the side table and.. broke down on the floor.

Her tears came whether she wanted them to or not, and she buried her face in her hands to sob for what seemed like hours... This couldn't have happened to her! What did she do to deserve this?? How could this even be real?? She was a slug now? A slug?!? Who in their right mind would believe her?? What would her family say? Or the few that actually gave a damn whether she was alive or not? And what about her job? She couldn't go back to that.. probably was fired for not showing up anyway.. The only reason why she didn't give up and become a curled-up bundle of self-pity there and then was because she remembered Abigail.

"I can't abandon Abigail.. regardless of whether she put me in this situation or not.." Iris reasoned, pushing up from the ground and rubbing at her eyes. "Maybe a shower will help.." she pondered, sliding towards the bathroom while undressing. Her outfit got thrown into a corner and she stared up at the bathtub with her head slowly tilting to the side. "Ok.... conundrum. How am I going to get in there?" At first, she tried to pull herself in, but the bath gave little support for her hands to grab a hold of. Then she tried to push herself up and over, but that didn't quite have the desired result either. Then she suddenly realized her foot had a hell of a lot of grip on even the smoothest surfaces! It might be her slime, or something to do with her foot creating a vacuum, she didn't know the scientific part of it, and didn't want to know! She just wanted to feel somewhat clean again..

With a careful start, she slid up to and up against the edge of the bathtub, sliding forwards and noticing she sort of automatically continued in her motion up the bathtub's outer edge, over it, and into the bath without having much problem except for this odd feeling of gravity shifting around her as she went vertical. "Well.. this is convenient, I must admit." Iris muttered, reaching for the shower head and turning on the faucet to have freezing cold water pour out beside her into the tub. A few turns of the knob and she got lukewarm water to come out, even if most of it was brownish.. "Damn pipes.." she groaned, but then realized it was better than what she was looking forward to. The forest had some creeks leading towards the lake, but judging by Abigail's shirt those weren't going to cut it.

"Either that, or the girl just never learned to take proper care of herself..." Iris pondered. "I mean, she eats worms..." The water running over her body was very welcome, and did a good job of washing the hard bits out of her hair, even if she didn't dare use her shampoo. Likewise, no soap was used but she did wash her new lower body as good as she possibly could given her inexperience with it. Immediately she had taken note of some.. new erogenous zones.. and her shower took a bit longer than expected as the result..

With a newfound sense of appreciation for her new slug body, Iris turned off the faucet and attempted to slide out of the bath. With a soft squeal of amazement, she found it to be as simple as stepping out of it had been when she still had had her legs! With a towel around her chest, and her hair still dripping lightly on her lower body, she slid into her bedroom and opened up her dresser. With a smirk she looked at all the pairs of jeans she had in there, then reached up for some tops and went through them. "Forest.. in winter.. So we're going to need some proper vests.." she mused, pulling some out of the dresser and tossing them on her bed. "Where did I leave my backpack?"

About an hour later, Iris slid back up to her door and grabbed her keys from the side table to replace them with a note apologizing for the mess she left behind, and explaining where she could be reached. She had indicated one particular landmark along the trail, not too far from town but not too close by, and explained she would check there once a month for messages. Included, also, was a cheque for outstanding rent and some other things that would take care of otherwise unfinished business.

A backpack hung from her shoulders, while a cloth grocery bag was held in her left hand. She wore a brown turtleneck vest, with a green baret (similar to those used in the military but from a 5 dollar costume store) forcefully hiding her antennae from sight. The vest had the added bonus of hanging over her hips, obscuring the front of her lower body just enough so that someone would have to look behind her to understand why she was missing a feet or two in height. As a last check she opened the hallway closet, looking up at her coats and lamenting how most of them hung down low beyond her hips, as had been the fashion most of last year. "Why did I give away my clothes to Aunt Elsie?" she sighed, then groaned as she witnessed all her beautiful pumps and boots lined up neatly on the shelves. "Ah.. my precious shoes.."

It took Iris a minute to tear herself away from her shoes, especially that white set of pumps with the ankle straps covered in fake diamonds.. the ones that had that impossible heel which no-one looked good in wearing but her.. or the boots with Hello Kitty print over them that made her look half her age whenever she wanted to get a bit of an ego boost getting turned down at bars unless she showed them an ID.. She closed the door and rubbed a tear from her right eye.

"Come on.. we can do this.." she told herself, opened the door and closed it for the last time. It was early morning, but she couldn't say for certain how early. She'd tossed her watch somewhere and hadn't picked it back up. She thought it was around three, or four AM.. but couldn't really care. Abigail was on her mind, and she knew the girl would be lingering around the forest's edge. Sliding down into the main hallway, she dumped her keys in the supervisor's mailbox before moving into the street.

The empty streets made her turning her back on civilization as she'd known it seem like an odd kind of justice. It seemed, to her, as she slid through the streets all by herself, that the town had turned a blind eye to her. The slug girl formerly known as Iris an alien in the town she once called home. As the tarmac made way for dirt, and Abigail's form became visible to her as a faint outline in-between the trees, her heart skipped a beat. "Abi.." she whispered, but then glanced back and remembered what her former neighbour had called his 'friend'. "Abigail.." she spoke up, a tad louder, and a teary-eyed slug of african descent slid out into the open.

"You came back for me.." she cried, and Iris slid up to pull her into her arms.

"We're in this together now. You and me. Let's go home." Iris offered, feeling Abigail tremble as she clung to Iris as if she'd expected her to never return from her trip. "I got clothes."