Tim stared so intensely that Garok had to laugh. "What? Am I not speaking clearly?"
"But...how?" Tim felt stymied. His friend has been reduced to monosyllabic bursts and now the so-called jungle man spouted off with totally unexpected verbosity.
Naked Richard, his cock slowly deflating, crowded closer, invading Tim's personal space and assaulting him with that pungently ripe body odor. "You Richard friend," Richard pleaded, clearly able to at least fathom the seriousness of his situation. "Do something."
Garok stretched Richard's slender swimmer's form and admired the smooth, graceful physique of the 22-year-old history student. Looking toward his former body, which was causing Tim some discomfort from mere proximity, the man produced a sneering laugh. "Get back in your cage, beast," Garok commanded.
Tim threw up his hands and bellowed. "Stop!"
Garok blinked in bemused surprise while Richard's jungle man form actually cowered and adopted a hunched position as he kneeled knuckles down on the floor like some shaggy supplicant in front of his frustrated friend.
Tim, surprised that his tiny tantrum had worked, took a deep breath and immediately regretted it. "Listen to me, Richard. I'm going to get you back to normal..."
Garok interrupted with a peal of dubious laughter. "Perhaps this is his new normal," Garok suggested in Richard's most smarmy tone.
"Puny man shut up," Richard retorted and raised a blocky fist.
"Richard, control!" Tim snapped. He had begun to analyze the curse and came to the evident conclusion that Richard's volatile temper and innate self-centered nature seemed to be worsening the effects set in motion by the relic. The changes to Garok put a new spin on things. "You've got to restrain yourself. Can you do that?"
"Me try," Richard said with a forlorn look.
"And Garok might have a point," Tim added. "As long as you look like that, we can't have you running around free. It might be best for everyone if you returned to the cage."
Richard jumped back into bipedal mode, which made him tower over Tim and his former body. "No like cage!"
"I know you don't like the cage..."
Richard wasn't having it and felt his anger rise. He raised his blocky fists and pounded on his furry chest as he roared again. "Not going in stupid cage!"
"I'll go get you a whole bunch of nice bananas," Garok inserted a bribe into the mix.
"Not helping," Tim started to say when he saw his best friend knuckle-walk over to the door of the cage.
"No trick?" Richard asked as he looked back at Tim and his former body.
Garok smiled at Tim before he answered Richard. "No trick. You can have all the bananas you want. I promise."
Although Garok achieved Tim's goal of persuading Richard to return to the cage, Tim still felt bothered to see his degraded buddy tricked and manipulated by the former jungle man.
After securing the door, Garok kept his word and crossed the floor to a nearby desk and fetched a banana, which had probably been part of someone's lunch. He walked back and held it outside the bars of the cage.
"Beast still want a banana?" Garok asked, waving the fruit in front of a fixated Richard.
"Want banana," Richard said and reached for it. Garok patted the shaggy forearm with one hand and surrendered the banana to Richard with the other hand.
Richard seized the banana and fled to a corner of the cage. Tim watched him eat, grateful that Richard at least peeled the banana before he ate the fruit in a single bite, discarding the peel by flinging it through the bars of the cage. Richard chewed noisily, something his upbringing had completely discouraged.
Without bothering to finish his chewing, Richard asked for more, in the process spewing forth a spray of pulverized banana.
Tim grimaced but promised to bring more bananas. Now that he had Richard settled, he turned back to Garok, who remained nude. "Come with me," Tim said.
"Of course, my good compatriot," Garok said.
As they left the room with the cage, Tim said, "We need to get you in some clothes. I may have some things that will fit you."
Garok smiled and followed. If Tim had seen the leer that Garok gave as he stared at his ass, Tim might have been concerned.
Moments later, dressed in some of Tim's looser clothing, the jungle man would have easily passed for the real Richard except for the lack of footwear. "We'll never be able to cram your feet into my shoes," Tim said.
"It's quite all right, my good chap," Garok said.
Tim frowned, but his expression changed again when he spied the pair of sandals left near a door. He wasn't sure if they belonged to one of the expedition's team members, but this was an exceptional circumstance. "Those should work," Tim said and pointed.
Garok shrugged and picked up the sandals. With Tim watching, he nimbly placed them onto his feet.
"Let's go to my office," Tim suggested. "We can do some research on my computer."
"I fear it may be an exercise in futility," Garok said.
Tim stared at him. "Don't you want your body back?"
Garok simply smiled. "Certainly," he said after a moment's consideration that gave Tim misgivings.
Putting them aside, Tim slid into the chair behind his desk and booted his laptop. Garok stood behind him and watched. While Tim busied himself with log-in details, Garok gently placed a hand on Tim's shoulder and gave a light squeeze.
Even as he typed his password, Tim felt an unseen response to his friend's touch. Richard had never been as demonstrative as Tim wanted, and now the former jungle man reached out and made physical contact without the slightest hesitation. As the laptop pinged and opened to a pre-selected browser, Tim adjusted his pants and tried to focus, unaware of a broad smile on Richard's former face.