Symon fought for a few more hours of sleep as the morning light began to trickle into the cabin. The sound of the door opening and the thumping of loud, squelching footsteps entering the room finally stirred him awake. He slowly turned around and opened his eyes, before nearly having a heart attack when he saw a large man standing over the bed. His form was slightly obscured by the net full of wriggling  tadpoles on his back. He was a miinu with olive green skin, with shaggy mutton chops and muddy brown hair tucked into a fisherman’s cap. The man was soaking wet, had fins on his arms and smelled of pond scum. The man narrowed his red eyes down at Symon.

Symon screamed and drew back against the wall as he feared he would be attacked by some swamp creature. Thankfully, Aniso was quick to hear the commotion and step in.

“Oh dad! You’re back from your fishing trip so soon,” Aniso said in surprise. “That's quite a catch you got there.”

The man let out a grunt through his nostrils. “Aye, I wasn’t expecting to come home to a stranger in my bed.” He turned to give his son a skeptical look. “I assume you got somethin’ to do with it, boy?”

“Oh! Right, um…” Aniso stammered, feeling a little embarrassed about the situation, “I may have found this gentleman out in the woods…  -But he was hurt! I was just letting him stay here until he recovered. I thought you’d be out longer.” 

Symon let out a nervous little squeak before gingerly holding out his hand, “Uhm, hello. N-nice to meet you, sir. I'm Symon.”

The man stared down at the hand for a moment before dropping his net with a loud wet thump and taking Symon’s hand to shake it. “Corrix.” He replied. 

The man’s hand was moist and clammy, a sensation that wasn’t pleasant at all. Symon retracted his hand quickly and wiped it on the blanket. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. Your son has been very kind. Honestly I…” He looked between the bright pastel blue damselfly and the green swamp man. “-don’t really see the resemblance.”

“I’m adopted!” Aniso said nonchalantly. “Dad’s a water boatman, and the town's fisherman. He’s pretty cool.” 

“Huh, I see.” Symon was a bit surprised by the casual nature of this arrangement. Where he was from, people were oddly dodgy about the question of adoption.

Corrix huffed and tipped his hat up. “Aniso, y’ got a good heart, but I am gonna need my bed back.”

Symon immediately got up from the bed. “Yes, of course I’ll be going shortly. So sorry for taking up space- I mean your bed! Taking up your bed…” He stammered. 

Corrix cocked an eyebrow at the man and turned a glance back at Aniso.

“Don’t worry dad, I’m sure it’ll be no problem finding Symon a place to live in the Grotto.”

“No no,” Symon interrupted. “That won’t be necessary. As soon as I’m back in full health I’ll be off to return home.”

Aniso’s smile weakened. “Oh right, you still have to go get the stone. But you’ll still need time to heal.”

“I am suitably healed for a journey home.” Symon rolled his shoulders to stretch his back, grinding his teeth at the soreness behind the action. 

Despite his proclamation of good health, Symon felt his intestines churn from the movement. The cramping feeling shifted down not where he expected to, but down into his tail-like abdomen. The pressure in the region was so unnatural and sickening. Then he remembered, to his horror, that he had eaten for the first time in a while the day before. It couldn't be possible that with his altered anatomy that his bowels had… moved, could it?

“Ah, Aniso.” He piped with some embarrassment. “Uh, is there a bathroom in your cabin?”

“In the cabin?” He said with a light chuckle, as if it was a silly question. “No. But there’s a public outhouse just past the lake.”

Symon shuddered at the idea of using an outhouse. He’d had to use one once or twice on his travels to more rural areas, but the idea of using them was so disgusting that many times he much preferred to hold it until he found a proper bathroom. But this time, he didn’t have a choice. He let Aniso guide him to the bathroom, a tiny wooden shed that stood alone on a small hill near the lake. It was wide and spacious, but smelled as foul as expected. As he shut the door behind him, he was confused by the scene set in front of him. He noticed no toilets at all. No seats, not even a squat toilet. He recalled having nightmares about this scenario before. Too nervous to ask for help, he looked around, seeing a water basin full of clean water underneath a broken shard of mirror hung up on the wall. No, that was certainly for washing up. He then noticed a few panels on the wall. On closer inspection, they were doors about groin height that opened up like cabinets into a round hole in the wall. As soon as he opened one up, he was hit with the nauseating smell of sewage. The hole in the wall led to a deep, dark shaft into the void.  He quickly connected what he was supposed to do from here, much to his horror. 

He made sure his business was fast, trying to ignore the uncanny sensations in his reorganized bowels. He quickly rushed to wash up as soon as he was finished, feeling dysregulated. He splashed water onto his face, trying to reset. He once again saw his own face in the mirror. It was still something he wasn't used to, seeing his face so dramatically altered as it was. He pressed his fingers against his face, pressing into the leathery black skin on his face. He pulled against his cheek and stared at the tiny geometric lenses that made up blood red eyeballs.

He moved his hand down to his mouth and pulled open his mouth, staring at the sharp fangs and the yellow hued tongue resting inside. He accidently pulled too far and heard a pop, as his jaw wrenched open farther than humanly possible. The slit on his face opened to a thin membrane of olive yellow skin that left his lower jaw dangling like a corpse. He let out a horrified scream as he clenched his jaw back shut with his hands. Thankfully, his jaw popped back into place easily and painlessly, but the terror alone caused Symon to break down. 

He collapsed to his knees in the dark bathroom, crying softly into his hands. He wanted his humanity back. Everything about this new body was strange and overwhelming. He missed his old face. His old hands. His old voice. As he cried, his abdomen once again released a shrill buzzing sound and vibrated against the floor.

A knock came from outside. “Symon? Are you doing okay in there?” Aniso asked from the other side of the door. “Any issues?”

“Of course I'm having issues! That was horrible! This body is horrible! I hate everything about this!” He snapped.

There was silence from beyond the door before it was opened, shedding light on the pathetic man on the floor. Aniso had a worried look on his face, but the two didn't exchange any words for a long moment. Symon sniffed, wiped his face and tried to compose himself.

“Sorry I…” Symon took a breath and started fidgeting with his hair. “This is all a lot to adjust to. Even after washing up, I still don't feel clean.” 

“I’m sorry you’re having a bad time.” Aniso empathized. “You know, I think I might have an idea what will help, Follow me.”

Symon pulled himself back to his feet and followed Aniso flying off towards the creek at the far end of the property line. There stood a small building at the water's edge. It was a simple wooden structure that sat hoisted over the water by mossy stone pillars. The clear blue water passed under the building through metal grates on the side of the stone basement.

“It’s a beautiful morning today. I think the both of us could use a nice bath.” Aniso said, stretching his arms. 

Symon realized it’d been quite a while since he’d bathed, now that he thought about it. It had been at least since he was able to stand on his own as a human, and since then he’s rolled around in his own filth, and the dirt outside. However, the inside was not, as he expected, a couple private baths, but instead the pink ivory hut contained but one large bath where water filtered through from the creek in the form of a waterfall that flowed from the exposed wall at the south side. Suddenly, Symon was a lot more apprehensive about this.

“You get ready up here, I’m gonna turn on the heat.” Aniso said as he crawled down a ladder into a basement level. Soon he could hear the sound of fire and boilers running below the floor of the bath, and Aniso returned. “Okay!

Aniso began stripping his clothes off, folding them and placing them on a shelf. Symon let out a  panicked squeak and averted his eyes, but could help but stare at his body. He had a slim but muscular physique and even more dark blue bands wrapped around his chest and waist. He couldn’t help but trace his figure from the pronounced chest plate down to the subtle curve of his hips. Symon’s eyes fixated on Aniso’s rear and his face grew hot.

“W-why are you getting naked right now?!” Symon squawked.

Aniso, not understanding, let out a small chuckle. “Well we can’t exactly bathe with our clothes, silly.”

“Don’t tell me you expect us to bathe… t-together?” He whispered the last word, almost as if saying it out loud would be too scandalous.

“Of course, why wouldn’t we?” Aniso shrugged as if that wasn’t even a question as he dipped his feet into the water and sat down in it with a pleased sigh.

“Don’t you think that’s a little inappropriate?” Symon questioned.

Aniso raised a brow. “Why would it be? Stop being weird and get in.”

Symon groaned uneasily.

“I literally carried you around town naked for two days. It’s okay.”

Symon reminded himself of the communal baths of ancient cultures, and how many cultures before his saw nothing wrong in bathing with others. He swallowed his pride and surrendered his clothing with a huff. As he stripped down, he couldn’t stop his face from turning gold with embarrassment. He’d never done something like this before, it was far outside of his comfort zone. He carefully dipped his toes in the water. It was warm, being heated by the boilers beneath. Bubbles of warm air tickled his skin. He slowly sank into the water and tried to let himself relax.

The warm water felt nice on his muscles. He felt them releasing from the anxious tension they’ve been holding for days. The soreness melted away like wax. The water even soothed the deep thrumming pain in his back. He let his hair out of the braid and let it fall into the water, floating around him and looking like seaweed with its green hue. He rubbed at his skin to scrub the dirt off. 

“Hey see those flowers over there?” Aniso asked, pointing to large, tubular orange flowers that grew just outside of the waterfall and hung gently into the windows of the bathhouse.

“Ginger lilies?” Symon guessed.

“Yeah! Check this out.” Aniso waded in the water towards one and pulled its flower down. He squeezed his body around it and was quickly drenched in juice that smelled potently of berries and tropical flowers. “Soap!”

Aniso flew down and rubbed the floral scented juice into Symon’s hair with a giggle. Symon flinched. “Ack, Aniso!”

Aniso sat back down in the water, fully submerging his wings, “Sorry sorry, I’m just a little trying to lighten the mood. You’re so tense all the time.” Aniso caressed a few strands of Symon’s long hair in his hands. “By the way, you should let me get all this back here for you.”

“Well, I can wash my own hair, thank you very much.” He said as he reached up to scrub his head, only for his shoulder to move in a way that sent a sharp pain down his back. “Ow-! Ah…” 

“Are you sure you don’t need any help? You’re still hurt.” He tilted his head with an all too pitying smile.

Symon pouted. “Augh… oh alright. But just this once, and do be careful, I’m tender headed.”

Symon turned around, his back to Aniso as his claws dug into his hair and scratched gently at his scalp. After a while, he eased up and leaned into Aniso’s hands. He had to admit, the sensation was nice. He hadn’t been touched in this way in so long, he forgot how nice it felt to have fingers running through his hair, and the crunchy sound of foam in his ears. He hadn't even been to a salon or barber since his youth. The idea of a stranger touching his hair always made him anxious, and he’d spend the next several years of his life cutting his own hair enough to keep split ends at bay, but otherwise letting it grow out. It was a habit his parents hated. But Aniso had been so kind to him since they met, there was an energy to him that eased his nerves and let him relax around him. 

It felt almost lonely when Aniso finished up and removed his hands. 

“Alright, you can rinse it out now.” Aniso announced.

Symon took a breath and sank into the water. His hair fizzled as the soap washed out and the bubbles escaped to the surface. He sat down there, embracing the weightlessness and the rumble of water that put his mind at ease. He was floating in the darkness and silence for a good minute, until Aniso tapped him on the shoulder, not so subtly reminding the man he really needed to come up for air. He emerged from the water with a quick gasp and cleared the wet hair from his face. 

After a good few minutes in the bath, Symon was antsy to get up and get on with his day. He stood up and shivered from the cold as the water dripped off his body. He twisted his hair, wringing the water out.

“Do we have towels?” Symon asked.

“In my bag.” He gestured to the duffle bag on the floor that yesterday acted as his mail sack. 

He pulled out scrap cloth from the bag, scraps of wash cloth that had grown so thin and worn out that it was impractical to keep around, and was more than likely thrown out by some human after they were no longer of use. But now, it was the perfect size for Symon's tiny body. He wrapped it around his body and dried himself off. He also found a wooden comb from the bag that was bigger than his head, with a base that looked like it was snapped off of something larger and sanded down.

“Is this an eyebrow brush?” He asked.

Aniso laughed, “Ha, that'd be a little big for eyebrows don't you think?”

“I meant for hu-” He shook his head. “Nevermind. I may need to borrow it for a moment.”

He ran the eyebrow comb through his hair and brushed out all the tangles and knots that had formed since he arrived. He still wasn’t used to seeing that color in the comb, and he kept hitting his antennae, which caused his body to shiver each time. Just another reminder that he wasn’t human.

“I think it's time we consider preparing to go to my house so we can retrieve the fossil.” He said as he redressed himself. 

Aniso turned, still soaking in the bath. “Already?”

“It must be done at some point,” Symon insisted. “Lord knows what my family shall do with my things if I'm gone for too long.”