I woke the next morning curled up with Jake and the worst case of morning wood in the history of the subject.

Groaning inwardly at myself, I rolled out of bed carefully so as not to wake him. He was so peaceful there, sleeping with a smile frozen on his face. A shame, really, that I would be ruining that.

I found a can of "essential" Cheeze Whiz in Jake's bag and sprayed some of it on his hand. Stifling my giggles as best I could, I dragged my tail across Jake's nose and then jumped back as his cheese-covered hand flew into his face, splattering it with the substance.

"Brent!" Jake screamed sitting upright and glaring at me through the cheesemask he had applied to himself. I fell to the floor laughing my ass off at the sight of Jake's eyes sticking out of the layer of gunk on his face and just how cartoonish it was. "You're a fucking dick, you know that?" 

I nodded. "Yeah, but, oh man if only you could see the look on your face." Then I took a picture on my phone and watched as it uploaded to Facebook. "And now everyone can see the look on your face."

He growled and pounced, pinning me as he wiped cheese from his face to mine, smearing both of our fur with the substance. We were laughing and just horsing around. I was trying to push him off of me, and we were having so much fun that we almost forgot where we were, until our captor, Laney the psychotic panther, opened the door and screamed. 

"What the hell is going on here?"We sobered up fast and bit our lips.

"Nothing," we both said. 

"Get cleaned up!" she shrieked. "We have work to do!"

Doing as we were told, we made our way to the bathroom with our tails tucked between our legs like little kids do when scolded. 

"Your last name's Thompson, right?" Jake asked out of the blue. 

"H-how did you know that?" she managed, almost dropping her guard. 

"I'm psychic. Oooh!" Jake shut the door to the bathroom before she could respond. 

"What was that?" I asked when I heard her footsteps moving away from the door. 

"What?" 

"How did you know her name?" 

He smiled that coy smile that shows he has the upper hand. He has a terrible poker face if you know him well enough. "Well," the wolf said, "While she was freaking out at you, screaming at you and whatnot, I found a piece of mail that was addressed to Laney Thompson."

"But why did you ask her for confirmation?"

"So you can go to her Facebook and find pics of her to jerk off to."

I splashed water at him and laughed. "Yeah, cause I'm totally into crazy."

"I saw you checking her out," Jake laughed. 

But did you see me checking you out?

If he did, he never brought it up. Laney came back to the door and pounded. "Hurry up!" she called. "We got stuff to do."

"But I'm not done with my makeup yet!" Jake whined.

"Just get your faggy asses downstairs in five minutes!"

And we did. When we got down, there was a couple baseball bats on a table, as well as some cheesy-looking human masks.

"What, are we going trick or treating?" Jake quipped.

"Well it'll be a treat for me at least," Laney said.  

"What're we doing?" I asked. 

"There's a local cop that likes to pick on furry kids as they come back from school. He put some kid in the hospital last week. We'll be returning the favor."

"That's gonna do nothing but perpetuate the stereotype of us being savages!" 

"Freedom by any means necessary," she said bluntly.

"Okay, Malcolm X, but what if things get worse? What then? Will you still do things by force?" Jake was angry now too. 

"Then we'll send a bigger message."

"Like what?" I asked. "Blowing something up?"

The panther just smiled. 

"Okay, Loony Laney," Jake said.  

"Stow it, faggot!" she yelled. 

Jake and I both growled but she ignored us. 

"Put on the masks."

* * *

It was a bright and sunny day and normally, I'd feel all sappy and gooey inside but today felt... Not so good. 

There he was, just a normal guy, walking a beat in this quiet little hamlet. And then I saw the guy's true colors. There was an otter on crutches with a cast that I could only assume was the kid that got put in the hospital earlier. As he walked down the street, the cop's fat leg sticks out and the kid goes down.

Before I knew it, I see the guy go down from a blow to the kidney. 

I thought it was Laney, but it wasn't. 

It was Jake.

"You think that's okay? That it's okay to abuse a little fur like that? How do you like this, you fat fucker?" he was screaming as he swung again, and again, screaming and cursing primally. Laney joined in, swinging her bat at the cop's stomach. I stood, frozen as I watched my best friend brutalize a helpless man. He might've been speciesist, but he didn't deserve that. 

"Hey!" I yelled as the blood from the guy finally hit my sneakers. 

They both looked up. 

"He's had enough!"

I knelt down and helped the otter up. He was shaking in fear. I lifted my mask and his eyes lit up with recognition. "Shh. Let's just keep this a secret, okay?" 

The otter nodded and hobbled off. 

"Let's get the fuck out of here," I said. 

Before I left, I made sure to make a call to the police on a pay phone. 

* * * 

"What the hell was that?" Laney screamed when we got back to the hideout. 

"I can ask you the same question!" I yelled back.

"You knew what we were going to do! Don't be so surprised."

"You almost killed him."

"He deserves it!" she yelled, slamming her fist on the table.

 "Even if he did, that doesn't give us the right to murder a guy! It'll just make things worse for us!" 

"Think about how much easier your life would have been if you had killed that fucker, Arnold, back before all that shit happened a year ago."

"You," I pointed at her, "Shut the fuck up. That's got nothing to do with you. And if you want my help, then we're gonna do things my way instead."

Laney threw her mask across the room and screamed. "Who do you think you are?" she snarled.

"I'm the only guy here who knows what they're doing! Who else overthrew a tyrannical leader of an organization? Just me? Then we're gonna try a plan that doesn't involve murder."

Laney groaned in disgust before storming off outside, locking the door behind her.

"And you," I directed my attention at Jake. "What the hell was that back there? You could've killed him."

Jake sat in the corner, staring off vacantly. 

"Jake, if you think this is a good time for one of your shitty jokes, you're horribly mistaken. Now what happened?" 

"I don't even know," he said, voice strained. "I really don't. One second I was there with the rest of you and the next, I was moving. I- You saw what he did, Brent. That poor otter..."

"You mean the otter that's now traumatized over seeing someone beaten senseless in front of him?"

"I know!" Tears formed in his eyes and he buried his face in his paws.

"Then what happened?"

"I lost control of myself. It was like the human part of me clicked off and the animal part just... Lashed out." He looked at the blood splattered on his hands and tried rubbing his hands, violently, like if he rubbed hard enough, he could get rid of his transgression. "Oh, God! Get it off! Get it off!"  

He continued rubbing his hands in terror. I grabbed his hands and he looked at me, like seeing me out of a haze. 

"Jake, it's okay. Calm down, okay? It's over now." I sat down and held him tightly as he quivered. "I'm here, nothing's going to happen to you."

"Brent, can we leave?" he whispered. 

"You mean go home?"

"No... Just... God, I can't be with her anymore. She almost made me a murderer today." 

I was torn. On one hand, I wanted to leave with him and forget this all. Turn it all into a half-remembered dream. But on the other hand, I wanted furs to be free. My kind was being abused and it didn't sit well with me. But it wasn't my problem. 

"Sure. Tonight, we're out of here. Promise." 

* * * 

We loaded our packs before she locked us in, getting organized. I had managed to find a loose brick on a wall downstairs and removed it, hiding it in a pocket. Thank you, cargo pants. Time was off the essence so we'd have to move fast. When Laney locked us in, we put our packs on, and moved the mattress to the door, propping it up so she'd have a bit of difficulty giving chase. 

"Brent?" Jake said as we sat in the darkness. 

"Yeah?" I said, noting to myself how even in the low light, I loved looking at him. God, I'm so pathetic...

"Thanks... For, y'know, not hating me because of what I did."

"Jake... One, you're my best friend. Two, you weren't yourself. Three, we all do things we regret. Remember the time we were playing in your garage as kids and climbed up the shelf?"

"And the whole shelf fell on top of us!" Jake finished, his teeth practically glowing in the moonlight. 

"Your dad had to hose us off in the yard

before bathing both of us!" I continued. We both laughed, warmed by the memory. "Did you know we kept a constant supply of fur soap at the house, just in case you needed it?" 

I nodded and we sat there in silence for a minute or two. 

"Hey, Jake?" 

"Mhmm?" 

"Do you ever miss being human?" 

"Not really. I always pictured myself as a wolf anyway. Even as a kid."

"But you spent most of your life as a human," I pointed out. 

"Never felt like one. I tried to use some of my dad's hair growth on my arm as a kid to grow fur. All it did was give me a rash."

We both laughed again."I'm glad I know you," I said, feeling instantly cheesy. 

Rather than call me out, all he did was say, "I'm glad I know you too."

I heard Laney close the door in the room across the hall, the bathroom.

"Ready?" I whispered.

Jake nodded and I threw threw the brick as hard as I could at the window, shattering the glass on impact. I ran to the window and threw our packs down, knocking down smaller shards from the window. I helped Jake out first and when I got myself to the frame, I heard Laney behind me, fiddling with the lock. I slid out and fell ten feet. 

Hitting the ground, I groaned, but grabbed my pack as Jake and I booked it, legs carrying us as fast as we needed. We ran for probably an hour or two, keeping to the woods as best we could. 

We were feeling safe, and with a silent nod we put the tent on the ground and hit a button, releasing the tent from its tiny storage pod as it popped up, ready to be used. 

Climbing in, we went to sleep without hubbub or ogling.