Lore [12/???]

cw: animal injury, body horror

Jordan runs a hand along Polly's flank, checking for injury. The dog has been acting strange all morning - curled in on herself, licking at her back leg, avoiding her breakfast.

Polly gives a short warning growl when Jordan's hand prods at her haunch. Jordan clicks their tongue at her; she immediately goes quiet.

Then they find the problem. There's a lump of some kind near her patella. Something hard, something that doesn't move under their rolling pressure.

Shit.

Polly whimpers. Jordan soothes her, voice a soft and comforting thing. "It's alright, girl. We'll figure it out."

They need to tell Deerly that a veterinary visit needs to be scheduled. Something like this is too big for them to handle. It's too big for Nadia, despite her skills.

As they are about to pull back their hand, something... shifts. Moves under their fingers.

Presses back.

Polly yips; Jordan pulls away, eyes widening as they watch the lump wiggle. The hard circle expands, thick tendrils pressing up against the skin.

Polly falls to her side with a series of yelps, legs spasming, paws tearing at the dirt, eyes rolling with terror.

Jordan grabs their phone and calls Deerly, hands shaking. When she doesn't answer, they curse and call Nadia.

"Get here. Now."

And then, they end the call and reach for Polly. She snarls and bites, teeth latching onto Jordan's jacket. Jordan winces at the pressure, the prick of teeth. They try shoving into the dog's maw to gag her, to get her to release.

But she doesn't. She's clenching down as if her life depends on it.

The thing under her skin slithers along her side as if seeking something in particular. Her heart? Her lungs?

Her mouth that is actively holding them in place? A new host in the form of Jordan?

With a desperate motion, Jordan grabs their knife from their boot and cuts into Polly's skin right in front of the mass. Polly doesn't even notice; her fevered thrashing is the same.

The thing moving beneath her skin bursts upward through the incision. A blood-slick, thick wiggling thing. Seeking. Waving blindly toward Jordan.

They grab it - it's stupid, but they are working on a terror-filled sense of duty to the dog, to saving her.

The mass is razor-sharp and oddly fatty beneath their palm as they grip and tear it from the lashing dog.

It keeps coming, unfurling, writhing.

And then it's out, wriggling in Jordan's fist, jerking like a live wire.

Nadia tears into the dog run, her feet throwing up dust as she drops beside Polly and Jordan. "What the fuck-" she gasps, out of breath, eyes flashing from the bleeding dog -now unmoving, exhausted, possibly unconscious- and the thing in Jordan's grip.

"Jesus Christ," she whispers. She can't tear her eyes from the thing, her mind reeling.

It's a vine. A thorn-studded vine.

"Nadia!" Jordan snaps. Their voice is shaking; Nadia is surprised to realize they're scared. "What do I do with it?!"

Nadia swallows and rips open her bag, hands trembling as she produces a water bottle and dumps the contents onto the ground. "In the bottle," she orders, no-nonsense, focused.

The pair struggle to get the writhing mass into the plastic bottle. Closing the cap over it, Nadia watches as it thrashes against the plastic sides.

"Nadia!"

Nadia turns to Jordan. They're pulling their hand from Polly's slack jaws, the other holding the dog's bloody side. "Tell me what to do!"

"Muzzle," she orders. "You need to muzzle her and hold her down while I disinfect and stitch her. Then we need to burn that thing."

Jordan nods, re-focuses, and ignores the blood on their hands. Polly's on one, their own on the other. "Right. Muzzle. I can do that."

Nadia doesn't watch as they stumble away, adrenaline-drunk and swaying. Instead, she focuses on the vine - it's already weakening in its cage, curling up into a tight ball as if to conserve energy. Or feign dormancy.

"Jesus Christ," Nadia repeats.