Survivors

After Luke had spoken they’d all been so relieved that they’d all hugged him and each other. Joe had wept tears of joy he was so happy that Luke was okay. It hadn’t taken long for the normal cheeky Joe to come back though. He couldn’t resist taking off one of his shoes and throwing it across the room calling “Fetch!”.

The Lukebrador growled a little before pouncing on his brother knocking him to the ground and then vigorously licking his face covering Joe in as much slobber as he possibly could. Holly and Bretnel had laughed so much that they only got round to rescuing Joe when it looked like he was in danger of drowning in dribble. Luke then bounced around the room doing a mixture of barking and shouting wagging his tail excitedly. Holly and Joe joined in the bouncing and shouting. The breakfast things got kicked around and the chairs were scattered but nobody cared. Bretnel laughed as he watched.

Bretnel let them play for a while before he got them all to calm down. He then sat in front of the Lukebrador and said “Okay Luke. You need to change back now. I want you to concentrate on the words I taught you. Try really hard, just look into my eyes and think again what it’s like to be you, to be a boy, to be human”

For a few seconds the two of them sat staring at each other.

“Can’t we leave him like that” said Joe “He’s much more fun”

After some barking and shouting Joe was ejected complaining from the room.

“Now concentrate” said Bretnel.

This time almost instantly Luke began to change back into himself. As he finished his transformation he grinned at Bretnel and Holly. He was a little surprised that Holly suddenly looked uncomfortable and had instantly looked away smirking. It was at that point he realised he was completely naked. As he’d transformed his pyjamas had split and the tattered fragments had fallen off when he was running round the room. He grabbed a cushion to hide his embarrassment.

“Now you see the necessity of the stretchy garments” said Bretnel grinning. “Shall we get you decent?” He handed Luke a dressing gown from the back of the door.

“Thanks” said Luke bashfully.

“Now young man” said Bretnel “I’m guessing that you are feeling a little exhausted, and very hungry”

“Yeah, now you mention it” replied Luke “I do feel odd”

“That would be a mixture of the shock, the energy you used transforming and the adrenalin that’s probably pumping through your system. I suggest a lay down and while you are getting comfortable I will fix you an energy drink, of my own special concoction”.

“Do I have to, can’t I just go back to bed?” Whined Luke.

“For just this once, Master Luke may I suggest that you do exactly what I ask you to do without the need for a debate”

Luke looked like he was about to protest but then sighed deeply and rubbed his hand over his eyes suddenly feeling absolutely worn out.

“Okay, okay” he said “But you better be quick with that drink or I’m going to be asleep”.

An hour later Holly, Joe and Bretnel had tidied up the room and were having a cup of tea.

“I still can’t believe it” complained Joe “His first words as a dog are to bloody moan at me!”

Holly bit her lip trying hard not to laugh.

“I think it was a good indication” said Bretnel “And I think it demonstrates a huge amount of self control that he was able to make a joke. It’s a really good sign”.

“A sign that no matter what he turns into in the future he’s still going to be a git!” Said Joe in a mock sulking tone. In truth he didn’t give a damn what Luke had said, he was just glad he was okay.

“I don’t understand” said Holly “I thought you said we weren’t supposed to change unless we did those specific commands you gave us. A conscious effort you said, and from the way Luke reacted I don’t think he meant to change”.

“That would be my assessment of the situations also” replied Bretnel thoughtfully. “My initial diagnosis and assumptions, based on the limited facts we have so far would be that Master Luke had a heightened emotional response that triggered the transformation. Emotions as we all know are chemically induced, fear, anger joy even love have a chemical driver. If the driver is strong enough it causes a sort of short circuit in the logical thinking parts of the brain. This causes irrational, unpredictable behaviour. I recognise that I am someone of a distinctly limited emotional range. I don’t see why that’s funny Joe!

Anyway, as I was saying, it would appear that my mental state is much less susceptible to the sort of emotional hijack we witnessed today. My, now obvious mistake, has been to use my own lack of emotional response as the benchmark for adequately controlling the transformations. What I should have considered was the inherent emotional instability of recently post pubescent youths!”

“What!” Said Joe “I’ve got no idea what he just said”.

“I think he means that as we’re likely to get more emotional we’re more likely to change without really being in control of it”

“Beautifully and eloquently put Miss Holly” said Bretnel

“And I suppose that’s bad is it?” questioned Joe.

“Well it’s not exactly good is it!” Said Bretnel somewhat exasperated.

Joe still looked confused.

“Look” said Bretnel “If every time you get angry, upset or jealous you turn into the first animal you think of I don’t think you will get invited to many dinner parties!”

“Oh that’s okay then” said Joe “I’ve never been invited to one of those anyway”

Bretnel rolled his eyes and then looked at Holly for help.

“So what do you think we need to do?” she asked.

“Well as I see it you’ve got two choices. One, I give you some drugs that inhibit your emotional states, for example a low dose of tranquilisers that would dull the senses and make you feel a little sleepy. You’d never get really cross, or really happy you’d never get really anything emotionally”

“Sounds awful” said Holly shuddering “And choice two?”

“You need to control your emotions. When you feel yourself beginning to lose your emotional equilibrium you need to use relaxations techniques and achieve focus to regain stability”

“Aww no, you don’t mean chanting and going hmmmm like Darius tried to get us doing, do you?” moaned Joe.

“No I don’t mean going mmmmmm, but I do mean learning some self control and some self discipline. Something that some of you will find much harder than others” said Bretnel glancing at Joe who didn’t seem to notice. “Now I think I’ve got a book on that which might have something interesting in it” muttered Bretnel, mostly to himself as he got up and wandered off.

“Well” said Holly when he’d gone “You know what this means don’t you?”

“Oh yeah” said Joe unconvincingly. Then after a pause “No, actually I have no idea”

“It means we can do it too. We can change whenever we want!”

“Cool” said Joe “This is going to be a blast!”