a snippet.
Not sure where this one is going, but it's been banging around in my head for a week or three. The scenario is a classic "what if?" type: What if you, along with a small percentage of the world population, changed into whatever form you were dreaming about? (ala List transformed)
I was sitting at the workstation I normally occupied at work, trying to get this gods-be-damned system to work with the image that was supposedly tailored for it. I should have called in sick, as my lower back had been hurting ever since I woke up that 'morning'. (with me working second shift, 'morning' was usually around 9:30 to noon-ish.) The pain meds I had taken were not helping much either, but as we were short staffed at work, I plowed on. Looking at the clock and seeing that it was nearly 10:45, I decided to take a break and get a drink. As I slid off the task chair I was sitting in, my legs decided to buckle instead of hold me up, and I was unceremoniously dumped on the floor, and in a lot more pain then just my ass. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately, in hindsight), I was by myself, so I had absolutely no one to cover for me. Just as I was trying to figure out how to get a hold of security to come and get me, I noticed that the pain just actually increasing and spreading rather then just settling down. Just as the pain was getting to be unbearable, I felt something emerging right where my tailbone was normally. The sudden realization that I was growing a tail threw me for a second, which took my mind from trying to crawl to a phone for the time being. Before I could get my arms down to my pants in order to disrobe, I felt the tail wiggling and painfully burst through my underpants and the seam on my trousers, and it continued to grow. As the sensation of the tail started to die down a bit, I felt like my legs had gone numb from my hips all the way down, and as I looked on, it was probably a good thing. Both legs were bent in a way that no human leg could bend. The skin on my new tail started to tingle, and as I looked back at it, I saw black and dull orange fur start to grow in. I looked back at my mishappen legs, and the realization of what was happening finally hit me like a ton of bricks.
I managed to pry both shoes off before the feet turned into paws, which was fortunate as they grew considerably wider then what the show would have been to contain. As the skin on my legs started to tingle, the rest of my body reminded me that it, too, was changing, by causing my arms to go numb as well. This had the effect of causing me to fall over, and I smacked my head on the floor, knocking me stupid for a few minutes.
The phone ringing brought me back to my senses somewhat. It took a few rings for me to get to my four feet, and I discovered that I could at least see color and in 20/20 vision. Thank dog for that at least, I mentally thought. I managed to half-jump with my front paws up on the task chair to look at who was calling, and it was someone that I could probably ignore for a few more rings. I tried saying something, and was surprised when a human sounding voice came out of the tiger's muzzle which was now my face. I gingerly pressed the speakerphone button, and dealt with the caller in a rather quick way by telling them to submit a work request, as I was slightly occupied at the moment. After I hung up, I tried to see if anything was out of place, and to find out if I was done. I was, and even manged to not destroy my clothing, although I looked extremely silly now. Who ever heard of a full grown Siberian tiger wearing human clothes?
I found that I could still use the computers we had, even though I couldn't fit in the chair anymore. I managed to log off the "usual" workstation, which was on a work surface that at standing height. Switching over to the lowered surface, which was desk high, I logged into it, and decided that I probably should call my boss, and see what he wanted to do. Typing was slow going. I tended to leave holes in the keytops from the clawtips if I tried to type too fast, but the fingers on my paws were too thick to be of any real use. Too bad I wasn't able to switch back and forth between human and this. That'd be kinda cool actu- And my thoughts were interrupted by my body painfully reversing the transformation that had just taken place not 15 minutes earlier. This time the transition was faster, one minute as opposed to five, and just as painful. As it finished, I found that I was back to human, except for the tail, and the eyes. I decided I could live with that, and decided to call the boss anyhow to see what he'd say. He was surprisingly cool with what had happened, stating that they had broken in on all the news broadcasts with the news that people all over the world had changed in a similar manner, just into different species of creatures. He said that he'd come in if I wanted to go home early, but that if I could stay human during the rest of my shift, that he'd be ok with me staying.
I managed to stay the rest of the night, and even got home still as a human with a tail. Well, a human with a tail and tiger eyes instead of the normal human eyes. Boss did insist that I take the next day off and get checked by a doctor before I could work though, which was well within his prerogative. This turned out to be a good thing, because about the time I started to drift off to sleep, my body painfully shifted back into the tiger form. This was not as painful as the initial transformation, but i did manage to rip the sleeping bag that I was using as a bed with my back paws. I muttered "fuck it" and went to sleep.
My body woke me up in a most painful way: by shifting into a second form, that of a bipedal tiger (or a were-tiger). As it was a Thursday, the housemate heard me and knocked on the door to investigate. "You OK?" I silently asked the gods to favor this form with a voice and tried to say "Just peachy". Something else came out, which *I* thought was fine, but the housemate later told me it was a staccato series of hisses, grunts, and assorted mewling. I heard "Did that mean 'No'?". And I desperately thought Shit, I can't communicate in English in this form. As I was thinking this, I felt my body go through another sequence, and I shortly found myself as mostly-human again. "I'm... well, not fine. Something happened to me last night. It's easier for me to show you, but it might freak you out." I put on a robe, figuring that it'd be easier this way, and stepped out of the room. To her credit, my housemate didn't freak out... much. Fortuantely, she too had seen the news and at least had an idea what she was in store for.
I was sitting at the workstation I normally occupied at work, trying to get this gods-be-damned system to work with the image that was supposedly tailored for it. I should have called in sick, as my lower back had been hurting ever since I woke up that 'morning'. (with me working second shift, 'morning' was usually around 9:30 to noon-ish.) The pain meds I had taken were not helping much either, but as we were short staffed at work, I plowed on. Looking at the clock and seeing that it was nearly 10:45, I decided to take a break and get a drink. As I slid off the task chair I was sitting in, my legs decided to buckle instead of hold me up, and I was unceremoniously dumped on the floor, and in a lot more pain then just my ass. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately, in hindsight), I was by myself, so I had absolutely no one to cover for me. Just as I was trying to figure out how to get a hold of security to come and get me, I noticed that the pain just actually increasing and spreading rather then just settling down. Just as the pain was getting to be unbearable, I felt something emerging right where my tailbone was normally. The sudden realization that I was growing a tail threw me for a second, which took my mind from trying to crawl to a phone for the time being. Before I could get my arms down to my pants in order to disrobe, I felt the tail wiggling and painfully burst through my underpants and the seam on my trousers, and it continued to grow. As the sensation of the tail started to die down a bit, I felt like my legs had gone numb from my hips all the way down, and as I looked on, it was probably a good thing. Both legs were bent in a way that no human leg could bend. The skin on my new tail started to tingle, and as I looked back at it, I saw black and dull orange fur start to grow in. I looked back at my mishappen legs, and the realization of what was happening finally hit me like a ton of bricks.
I managed to pry both shoes off before the feet turned into paws, which was fortunate as they grew considerably wider then what the show would have been to contain. As the skin on my legs started to tingle, the rest of my body reminded me that it, too, was changing, by causing my arms to go numb as well. This had the effect of causing me to fall over, and I smacked my head on the floor, knocking me stupid for a few minutes.
The phone ringing brought me back to my senses somewhat. It took a few rings for me to get to my four feet, and I discovered that I could at least see color and in 20/20 vision. Thank dog for that at least, I mentally thought. I managed to half-jump with my front paws up on the task chair to look at who was calling, and it was someone that I could probably ignore for a few more rings. I tried saying something, and was surprised when a human sounding voice came out of the tiger's muzzle which was now my face. I gingerly pressed the speakerphone button, and dealt with the caller in a rather quick way by telling them to submit a work request, as I was slightly occupied at the moment. After I hung up, I tried to see if anything was out of place, and to find out if I was done. I was, and even manged to not destroy my clothing, although I looked extremely silly now. Who ever heard of a full grown Siberian tiger wearing human clothes?
I found that I could still use the computers we had, even though I couldn't fit in the chair anymore. I managed to log off the "usual" workstation, which was on a work surface that at standing height. Switching over to the lowered surface, which was desk high, I logged into it, and decided that I probably should call my boss, and see what he wanted to do. Typing was slow going. I tended to leave holes in the keytops from the clawtips if I tried to type too fast, but the fingers on my paws were too thick to be of any real use. Too bad I wasn't able to switch back and forth between human and this. That'd be kinda cool actu- And my thoughts were interrupted by my body painfully reversing the transformation that had just taken place not 15 minutes earlier. This time the transition was faster, one minute as opposed to five, and just as painful. As it finished, I found that I was back to human, except for the tail, and the eyes. I decided I could live with that, and decided to call the boss anyhow to see what he'd say. He was surprisingly cool with what had happened, stating that they had broken in on all the news broadcasts with the news that people all over the world had changed in a similar manner, just into different species of creatures. He said that he'd come in if I wanted to go home early, but that if I could stay human during the rest of my shift, that he'd be ok with me staying.
I managed to stay the rest of the night, and even got home still as a human with a tail. Well, a human with a tail and tiger eyes instead of the normal human eyes. Boss did insist that I take the next day off and get checked by a doctor before I could work though, which was well within his prerogative. This turned out to be a good thing, because about the time I started to drift off to sleep, my body painfully shifted back into the tiger form. This was not as painful as the initial transformation, but i did manage to rip the sleeping bag that I was using as a bed with my back paws. I muttered "fuck it" and went to sleep.
My body woke me up in a most painful way: by shifting into a second form, that of a bipedal tiger (or a were-tiger). As it was a Thursday, the housemate heard me and knocked on the door to investigate. "You OK?" I silently asked the gods to favor this form with a voice and tried to say "Just peachy". Something else came out, which *I* thought was fine, but the housemate later told me it was a staccato series of hisses, grunts, and assorted mewling. I heard "Did that mean 'No'?". And I desperately thought Shit, I can't communicate in English in this form. As I was thinking this, I felt my body go through another sequence, and I shortly found myself as mostly-human again. "I'm... well, not fine. Something happened to me last night. It's easier for me to show you, but it might freak you out." I put on a robe, figuring that it'd be easier this way, and stepped out of the room. To her credit, my housemate didn't freak out... much. Fortuantely, she too had seen the news and at least had an idea what she was in store for.