Sam’s rational sentient brain knew that mating with Hannah would destroy her and himself. He knew he couldn’t betray his family on the outside, and he knew that mating with Hannah and leaving her would be the last thing she wanted. When this combined with his buck instincts, he came to the simple conclusion that he still wanted Hannah’s approval of him, even if he knew he could never let himself have her, he still felt better at her positive opinion towards him.
He knew in this context that Hannah was just the subject given a name and a face. The same would be true of any of the does in the park. Ironically if he did by some freak miracle manage to win the final round, at least the other bucks wouldn’t look at him darkly for claiming a woman they wanted… but… they wouldn’t anyway… it was proper for the winner to chose his doe.
Most animals weren’t intelligent enough for sociological behavior, so they had it programmed in. Or that was Sam’s theory at least. He hadn’t really studied animals in school in the least! So he was just shooting in the dark. One thing was certain, like some of the does he felt a predictable amount of sympathy to, he didn’t want to find out how the mentality of some selfish frat boys worked out in a stag’s sense of self-presence.
What had confused a good deal of the frat boys was that while they found they were still only attracted to girls, (too much so according to most of the does), they weren’t freaked out by being in only fur among their fellow half-human males, when before they would have headed for the hills looking for leaf loin cloths. Most who thought about it shrugged it off as all of them now having beach worthy bodies and thus nothing the senior members could razz them about. The rest just concentrated on the fact this mean all the ladies were just in the fur too!
The bucks who had managed to score with a doe calmly chatted among themselves, the ones were just ‘in, bang, and gone’ justified it as how bucks acted in the wild, of course, this wasn’t much different from how they acted when they were completely human, well, some at least.
“Man, that dud Sam, can you even –picture- him without antlers?” One lad asked another as if horns had always been the defining trait among males.
“Better question, can you picture beauty queen Hannah WITH antlers?”
“DUD! That is NOT a pleasant picture! Do not say that again!”
“Sorry man. So Lance is reduced to cheering for Jeremy for the semi-finals instead of the other way around! Maybe Lance should go through the gene splicer again and come out as a doe!”
“Nay, I can’t picture Lance without antlers. Would be just too weird. Even if it looks like Jeremy stole his pair. But seriously, I can’t say it’s not an improvement for both of them.”
“Let’s just hope Drake doesn’t win, he said he wanted us to hold a protest asking for the frat and the rest to have our DNA screwed with again so the ratio of Doe to Stag was something more natural… of course with him staying one of the stags.”
“… I pray to GOD that doesn’t happen. So there’s that dud Sam, Jeremy, that business snake Drake… whose number four?”
“Not sure, it’s that third year Spike and an old guy out to be a young dud again something Burns, no, he’s not a power plant Tycoon. Had to take a leak, didn’t see how it turned out.”
“Not that much difference, Spike want us to show the does who’s in charge by us treating them all to a free night. The other guy thinks because we look like stags we should all… hey… were are the does anyway?”
“Huh?… I didn’t even notice they were gone… don’t worry… I’m sure they’ll be back for the finals… I mean, who would want to miss this!”
“Yeah.. I’m sure you’re right.” Truth was, Robbie agreed with John mostly cause while he certainly felt it wasn’t right to be doing this without the does here to be judges, he didn’t want to break up the tournament and maybe never get to see the finals either! He hoped that that doe Jenny hadn’t seen him lose. She had become a bit of a celebrity among the bucks. It was a contest in of itself to see who she’d allow to be in her that night. One frat member once called her a slut, one frat member had to be removed from the park and was still in intensive care. Jenny had gotten his antlers as a gift.
++++++
“Looks like half—time.” Said Keith seeing the bucks taking a breather.
“Bout time, can we go now?” Jackie asked.
“Come on! Don’t tell me you’re not interested in how this turns out.”
“Okay I won’t.” It would have been a lie anyway, it impressed Jackie Sam had made it this far. Two fights left. And the three other bucks all looked like they wanted to win very dearly.
++++++
“Hey… do you hear that?” Jenny flicked an ear in the proper direction. “They stopped.”
“Think they’re done?” Lateisha said. “In that case we may want to scatter. I don’t want to get in the way of those hormones.”
Su Yin shook her head, “No, if they have finished, it’s better we stay together for the time being rather than getting picked off one by one.”
“… I’m gonna check it out.” Said Jenny.
“No way.” Lateisha said not amused.
“Come on, they’d never hurt me.”
“Never hurt you so far you mean!”
“Not all guys are like that.”
“And you seem to think no guys are like that.” Leticia surprised everyone by being the one to say that. “Trust me, I know how my normal team thinks… and if you’re going to see what’s up, we all are.”
“You’re crazy.” Lateisha said.
“Hear me out, I don’t mean go back to the clearing, I mean check out one of the high points nearby and check out the action, that way we can know if those walking antlers are still together or looking for us.”
“I wanted a closer look.” Jenny lamented.
Lateisha put a hand on her shoulder, not as comforting a gesture now with fingers that were clumsy and incased in singular pieces of black armor, but human acts of kindness still shinned though all the fur and tails. “And that’s why I’m keeping an eye on you.” Lateisha looked at Leticia. “And just so you know, if things turn ugly, we make tracks, and fast, and I do mean fast! And we don’t let them see us!”
Lateisha did not think Leticia was out to betray them simply because she was a male who intended to become one again later. Lateisha just did NOT talk Hannah out of being an open target just so Jenny out of mild curiosity could put them right BACK in danger.
Ironically, the sheer noise created by the buck’s fighting had gotten the attention of the huskies (perfectly hidden of course from EVERYONE), the news hounds, the conspiracy mongooses, and a random number of other half-humans.
The bucks of course were too busy being concerned about their antlers and each other to really notice the audience they had attracted. Maybe it was better that way.
And so it was, as the semi-finals finally began, from treetops, high-hills, and hiding places, a great hunk of the park beheld what amounted to the very first guest organized event in the park’s history.