As the early light of a new dawn filtered through the natural canopy, Victor slowly stirred from his restorative slumber. The glad had transformed in the morning light, the glowing plants retreating to give way to a mosaic of hues as shafts of sunlight played upon the vibrant flora. For the first time since the monster had woken up in this new world, he appreciated the color and visual bounty the forest provided.

He had never cared much for the natural world. Cultivated gardens and manicured laws were merely a means to an end, a sign that you had enough wealth to pay someone else for yard work. The woods represented something more primal, more natural. There were no gardens or grass cut with mechanical precision. It was raw, feral strength, life in its purest and most savage form. Victor felt more at home hunting the woods than his palatial Texas estate.

Uncoiling with languid grace, the monster emerged from his protective nest, the conscious mind awakening and spurring him to follow the trail to the enigmatic heart of the alien forest. Along the well-trodden path, Victor remained keenly aware of his surroundings, his new senses honed to detect even the most minute movements, the tiniest whispers of life that populated this vibrant and strange ecosystem.

And the smells. Oh, the smells, Victor thought as he inhaled the forest’s multi-layered scent.

He could smell the thousands of little signatures of animals and insects fighting or fucking. If he wanted, Victor could follow his nose to hundreds of victims, doomed to be killed and absorbed. But no, he had a mission, a biological imperative that drew him onward.

Fortunately, he didn’t have to leave the trail for the forest to deliver a symphony of life in all its myriad forms. Something was different about the day. Yesterday, fauna had eschewed the central path, preferring the hidden depths of wood and plant. Today, they met him along the road, attacking without provocation as if the forest knew he was coming for its heart.

Unfortunately for the local wildlife, Victor was no longer the weak and defenseless snake he used to be. He was a twelve-foot-long monster from tip to tail, garbed in organic armor of keratin plates and dense scales, bearing four scythe-tipped limbs like a horrific cross between a Utahraptor and the Zerg.

With predatory precision, Victor occasionally struck out to slay the wildlife that ventured too closely. It was constant carnage as he descended into the beating heart of the woods while exerting his dominance as an apex predator, never stopping but always consuming biomass on his relentless journey to the center.

The day turned to evening, the forest transitioning again as the twilight descended, casting deep shadows that harbored whispers of mystery and unknowable danger. Victor had more than enough energy to continue his quest this time, but his logical mind counseled rest. He found value in spending the evenings visualizing his battles. It was an essential exercise that helped remedy any mistakes he had made and improve future performance. The tactic had served him well in the Iranian War and even in his political post-debate analysis. He saw no reason to give up such an effective tool.

This time, Victor decided to bed down in a shallow embankment just to the side of the road. He hadn’t run into anything too dangerous during the daylight hours and didn’t want to risk an ambush deeper into the woods.

As Victor performed his nightly ritual, an expansive life signature blazed like a bonfire to his senses as a curious scent traveled through the night air. The monster tensed, each scale rippling with alarm as his golden eyes scanned the dimly lit trail for visual confirmation. He uncoiled from his temporary den and cautiously crept toward the path. The object of his attention wasn’t very far. A bipedal humanoid walked in his direction, seemingly unaware of the predator that lurked just off the beaten path.

Use him, the thought came unbidden.

Victor shook his head, trying to clear his mind and get a better look at his next victim. The humanoid was dark-skinned with black hair. Pointed ears jutted from his finely curled locks, making him look elvish and exotic. He bore no weapons, armor, or even an indication of hostile intent. Instead, he was painted in swirling blue paint shaped like curling vines and blooming flowers. He strode down the path like a visitor admiring the landscape, completely at odd with the savage brutality of the forest. Either he was very brave or very foolish, and Victor intended to show him the error of his ways.

Use him, the thought insisted, urging Victor forward, but for what he didn’t know.

The monster ignored the biological imperative, adjusting his frame and rising on his haunches to get a better look. The man abruptly halted, peering into the gathering darkness. Eventually, his gaze landed on Victor’s monstrous form, and he tensed.

Victor wasn’t sure what gave his presence away. He was still mostly concealed in the shallow ditch. Only his serpentine head stretched from cover, but it didn’t matter. The time for ambush had passed, and combat was the only means left to him.

Use him, the annoying voice advised, and Victor shook his head again. He didn’t have time for errant thoughts and enigmatic instructions when there was killing to be done.

The man lowered into a slight crouch as Victor rose to his full height and stepped upon the road.

“Silvys’ tits,” the man's moss-green eyes widened, and he cursed when he caught sight of the monster. “What the fuck are you?”

Victor didn’t have the necessary biological components for speech, so he didn’t try. As the silent exchange of gazes intensified, the stiff tranquility of the moment shattered like fragile crystal, giving way to a primal surge of aggression that roiled within Victor’s belly.

With astonishing speed, he lunged forward, a battering ram of scale and muscle, his bladed limbs darting toward the slender humanoid with murderous intent. The man, though unarmed, moved with fluid grace that spoke of deep-rooted agility and a deep knowledge of martial arts. He deftly sidestepped the initial attack, a dance of evasion that echoed the serpentine movements of the aggressor.

For all his nimbleness, the elf was without weapons, while Victror’s were a part of his body. The man was caught in the punishing grip of fear and desperation as the monster relentlessly pursued. Victor could smell the fear, relishing the sickly sweet stench.

The road became an isolated battlefield, a tumultuous struggle between predator and prey, each maneuver a testament to their instinctual mastery over their bodies. It was soon apparent that the man was the better technical fighter as their conflict carried them off the path and into the underbrush.

The unarmed man used his surroundings to box Victor in and dodge his frenzied swipes. However, Victor was a being forged in the harsh crucible survival, a monster whose very existence was predicated on overpowering his foes with savage might and then evolving the organic traits that made him more effective.

With a furious burst of speed, Victor leaped forward and planted a clawed foot into the chest of the more petite elf. The tactic surprised the man, likely not suspecting a woodland creature to be so capable, and he crashed through the underbrush.

Victor stalked forward, chasing after his downed victim with animalistic rage. He reached the man just as he sprang to his feet, clutching his chest and wheezing. The monster licked his lips with a forked tongue as he noticed the blood dripping from three long furrows in his victim’s chest caused by his taloned toes. Victor regretted that his feet weren’t connected to the paralytic ducts that supplied his scythe-arms with their soporific touch. Otherwise, their fight would already be over.

The alien quickly turned to flee the pitched battle, sprinting to put as much distance between him and the eldritch monster. Victor hissed in annoyance and sprang after the man, his clawed feet chewing up the space between prey and pursuer.

When Victor got close enough, he swiped at the back of the man’s with a bladed arm. The paralytic-coated edge ripped open the back of the man's leg, and he screamed in surprise and pain before tumbling to the ground in a heap of tangled limbs.

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Victor slowed his pace before kicking the man in the ribs, causing him to roll to his back. The monster placed a clawed foot on his victim’s chest and leaned down to hiss maliciously. The man resisted valiantly a figure of slender strength struggling against the relentless pressure, his movements becoming desperate, wild, a frantic attempt to break free from Victor’s rib-snapping weight. The monster raised a bladed arm, prepared to deliver the killing blow.

Use him, the voice interrupted his triumphant display.

Victor shook his head and plunged two of his blades into his victim. Strangely, his blades didn’t sink into his prey’s heart as he expected, piercing the man’s shoulders instead and pinning him to the ground. Without conscious instruction, the monster’s paralytic compound flooded the pinned target from Victor's bioweapons.

A strange stupor fell over Victor, a fuguelike state he recognized from the dreams he’d been having since he arrived on the planet. It wasn’t direct control, just instincts he had never known he possessed rising to the fore of his consciousness.

With an eerie solemnity, Victor awkwardly scooped up the man’s limp form, a predator securing its hard-won prize. The forest bore witness to a psychopathic procession, the monster cradling the battered body with a chilling deliberateness, his muscular form weaving through the foliage, disappearing into the deeper, darker recesses of the woods, where the shadows swallowed all traces of their presence.

Victor found a shallow cave in the depths of the wilderness, likely the den of a bear or pack of wolves. Usually, the monster wouldn’t dare take up residence in the stony shelter, fearing reprisal from its former owner. However, his mind wasn’t operating along its typical logical framework. When he reached the end of the cave, Victor dropped the man to the rocky dirt and waited patiently.

He wasn’t sure what signal he bided his time for but eventually arrived in a pain that set his nerves on fire. Victor felt an unprecedented agony erupt in the core of his being, a churning maelstrom of suffering that felt like a living entity squirming in the depths of his gut. The monster’s entire form convulsed, a robust frame overcome by violent spasms that caused dust to fall from the stony ceiling.

As the torture crescendoed, Victor realized in a surge of desperation and fading lucidity that he needed to immobilize the man further to ensure that no escape was possible in his moment of vulnerability. In a frantic rush of predatory instinct, he administered another frenetic dose of paralyzing venom into the man’s prone form, a potent immobilizing compound to render any escape futile.

As his bladed weapons withdrew, a ghastly transformation took hold of Victor. His sleek form writhed uncontrollably in the dirt, a series of brutal convulsions culminating in a grotesque retching sound from his core. The monstrous entity movement in his gut could no longer be contained, and an involuntary reflex saw Victor vomiting a corrosive, viscous fluid onto the cave floor, a macabre cascade of digestive fluid mixed with a writhing snakelike form that had caused the internal turmoil.

As this abhorrent expulsion occurred, a surreal shift in perspective occurred, a conscious transition that defied the boundaries of physical science. Victor’s consciousness fragmented, spiraling into a narrow tunnel of frantic confusion and loss of self. The world twisted and morphed, a grotesque distortion of reality, as Victor suddenly found that all his evolved senses were stripped away. Leaving nothing but inky darkness broken by the bright life signature lying prone just inches away.

Victor slithered toward the light in a vastly different form, a minute, snakelike parasite that navigated the world through a lens of slimy flesh and pulsating tissue. With the instincts of a parasitic entity driving him forward, Victor—or what remained of Victor in his transitional state—slithered inexorably down the depths of his victim’s throat, a terrifying journey into the internal landscape of another sentient being, an invasive voyage venturing into the depths of blood and bone.

The man, paralyzed and unable to resist, could only bear silent witness through terrified eyes as the parasitic entity invaded his body, a horrific realization dawning in the depths of his consciousness that now harbored a second presence, a foreign entity that bore the fragmented memories and predatory instincts of the serpentine monster., now taking residence in the sacred temple of the man’s physical form.

As Victor ventured deeper, navigating the complex pathways of his victim’s internal systems, a bizarre symbiosis took root, a disturbing fusion of consciousness that blurred the lines between predator and prey, assailant and victim, monster and man. It was a blending of nightmares and memories, a chaotic melding of fears and desires as two beings became unwilling partners in a sickening game of gods.

You’ll need to evolve in this new world, or you will die. Those are your only options.

Shelter.

Use him.

As the voice taunted Victor, his original form stepped forward and awkwardly used its forelimbs to position his new body against the cave wall. It studied him with golden eyes before turning and taking a sentry position at the mouth of the cave, resolved to protect its patriarch with its life. Victor could feel a tenuous connection with the monster, fuzzy and indistinct like a radio tuned to a slightly off frequency. He thought he could sharpen the bond with practice, but the effort was beyond his current strength and focus.

Victor’s consciousness spiraled further into his victim’s being, a descent into unknown depths that echoed with surfacing memories, of secrets unearthed in the heart of darkness, a mazelike journey to the center of the forest. The monster could hear the man, Merus he now knew, screaming in the depths of his mind, trapped by the parasite that claimed his body for its own, but he couldn’t bring himself to listen. He was tired, so tired. He need to sleep and recover.

Darkness swept over Victor and washed away conscious thought with a flood of dreams and memory. He saw the faces of his wife and daughter, Lynia and Marys.

No, that isn’t right…Emma…and Alice.

The dream faces blended together. Wives and daughters screamed into the abyss, replaced by monstrous figures with scaled hides and savage claws. His armies flooded into an alien city, burning down the buildings and capturing the residents.

Victor’s soldiers pulled unwilling hosts into subterranean pools filled with squirming, writhing parasites. Their struggles soon ceased, the hosts replaced by new members of the Scourge. Behind them, a pulsating hivemind coordinated their efforts, bolstering Victor’s commands.

The images faded away, leaving Victor lost in the shadows, searching on hands and knees for the beating heart of the forest. If he could just grab it, he could fulfill the mission delivered by his god.

Dim sunlight flooded into the cave, pulling Victor from his troubled slumber. He blinked slowly, his eyes burning from the unexpected illumination.

My eyes!

Victor was startled awake and jumped to his feet like he had touched a live wire. He looked around the confines of the cave, stony walls dripping with coalescing moisture. The air was thick with humidity, and he could hear the trills of birds and the buzzing of insects in their endless pursuit of food and mates.

“Was it all a dream?” Victor said aloud and then clapped his hands to his mouth. That wasn’t his voice.

Looking down, he saw finely shaped hands with digits that looked dexterous enough for watchmaking. They were a nutty brown color, like rich tree bark.

These aren’t my hands.

Victor gripped his hair as pain lashed through his head. He was having a hard time remembering. Was he a man or beast? Did he have hands or claws? Everything was so muddled.

The hands he remembered were rough, calloused, and wrinkled. These almost resembled a woman’s manicured hands. Victor looked down and studied the rest of his body. He realized he was wide-shouldered and well-proportioned but had a slender frame like a dancer or acrobat. His hair was short, curly, and black as coal. His body was utterly unfamiliar, a fever dream he couldn’t wake from.

He wasn’t wearing a stitch of clothing. Instead, his body was painted in blue woad. The symbols and designs were unfamiliar to him. Parts of the artistry were washed away by dried, green-black blood that Victor assumed was his own. Looking at where he had laid on the ground, he saw that the dirt had been clumped with the same colored substance.

A shuffling sound caused a cascade of pebbles to break the silence. Victor jumped, automatically falling into a combat crouch to find a hulking brute blocking the sunlight at the mouth of the cave. Victor’s monster form studied him intently like it was waiting for orders. Despite his confusion, he was comforted by the predator’s presence. He wasn’t alone.

“So,” he whispered. “It wasn’t a dream.”

Victor straightened as his heartbeat slowed, his mind regaining its iron-clad control over his emotions. There was no use panicking. This was merely another phase of the game he needed to learn.

The horror of the moment fell away as Victor came to a realization. This was what he had been made for. His mission made more sense. He could infiltrate society in the most insidious of ways. Bodies were disposable commodities he could evolve or shed based on his needs. Even better, if his new physique was irreparably damaged for some reason, he could simply move on to a different body—scourge, indeed.

Speaking of injuries…

Victor glanced at his body and found that the parasitic process wholly healed all the damage it had sustained from the previous night. During his investigation, he noted a glaring problem.

How was he going to consume more biomass to fuel his mutations?