After scritching the downstairs neighbor's Shar-Pei, I knocked the snow off of my shoes and walked up to my apartment. I keyed in silently as I always do -- I'm never one for the "I'M HOME!!!" DOOR SLAMMING entrances -- and listen. Silence. I check the coat rack, check out the window overlooking the parking lot, and finally, inspect the rooms. I'm all alone. This elicits a smile.
  I turn on my CD player and skip to the fifth disc having already heard the first four. Danny Elfman-composed music wafts through the apartment as I open the fridge for my lunch hour meal. Hrmm, I can take a tortilla shell, and make a turkey, tomato and swiss wrap, maybe with some lettuce, or, I can have half a tube of cookie dough.
  Taking the cookie dough out of the fridge I then deposit it into a bowl and grab a spoon. Dinner is served.
  Wait, forgot the Pepsi.
  As I sit down and pick up my copy of The Matter Myth: New Insights Into Chaos, Quantum Mechanics, and Superstring Theories, I have to admit, I'm happiest with such simplicities as these.
  Somewhere around track twelve on the disc, I feel the cookie dough starting to get to me. Mental note: Improve diet. I blink my eyes owlishly as I feel a wave of dizziness rush over me, followed by a tickling, tingling sensation spreading over my body, and a tightness in my face like insanely extreme sinus pressure. Oh Gods! I double over in pain, whimpering as some invisible force shoves its hand up my ass, grabs onto my tailbone with a firm grip, and pulls hard. The pain eventually throbs down to tolerable levels and I dash for the bathroom. No! I'm only twenty-five! I don't want to die like Elvis! I put my hand on the door handle and stop. Correction: I put my paw on the door handle and stop. It still retained its human shape and dimensions, except now I have black claws instead of opaque fingernails. A good covering of sable fur instead of a few, sparse hairs, and webbing between each of the fingers and the thumb (which has considerably more, to allow it to still be fully opposable). I wait for my heart to stop grabbing my lungs and strangling them demanding an explanation. I close one eye, then the other. That is definitely not my profile. Another wave of pain wracks my body and this time I have to be in the bathroom as I lose the cookie dough. After I rinse and spit and cough out the bitter, acrid taste in my throat, I take a good look at myself in the mirror. I still have my sharp chin, high cheekbones, and deepset eyes, but the profile, if I do say so myself, is more... regal. I strip to get the full effect. Then, just to double check, I take a pair of tweezers out of the medicine cabinet and pluck a hair out from my upper lip.
  "Oh geez, shit, ow!" I wince as I rub the site that once held the strand.
  This was real.
  This was cool.
  I looked a bit like one of Eugene Arenhaus's Lutrai paintings, except without the topknot, or the body paint. I run my hand -- Paw, paw, can't call them hands anymore now can we? -- through my fur.
  "I could get used to this." The phone rang, and my little bluebird of optimistic reverie slammed into the cold steel cliff of truth. If anyone saw me like this I'd be a phonecall or two away from vivisection. I ignored the phone, letting the answering machine take it. One of my two roommates had made the message.
  #"You've reached 555-1213. We're obviously not here. Leave, name, message, and means of contact."#
  My employer said, "This is Dick. Your lunch hour ended five minutes ago, just wondering where you were." Well I sure as hell wasn't going to work anymore, not unless the Wherever, River Otters team needed a new mascot, and I wasn't about to demean myself that much! Okay, calm down, calm down, gotta think gotta think gotta think gotta think... Okay, I'm a 6'3" bipedal river otter, okay, step one step one... There is no step one! It's not like there's a manual for shit like this!! "Okay, calm, calm, easy, easy." On each of these last four words I took deep, relaxing breaths. I'm relaxed now. The downstairs door slammed open and shut and I dove into my room hard and fast enough to slam my head against the far wall. It was the downstairs neighbor coming home.
  First off, I may want to get ahold of my few camping/survival/tribal living books that I have, in case I have to live my life out in the woods for the rest of my life. That brings to mind, now that I'm no longer human, how long do I have to live? I check again in the bathroom mirror. My skin wasn't sagging and my muzzle wasn't showing signs of white, so I assumed I had some life span left in me. However, most otters at 25 are, at best, desiccated strands of skin and tendons stretched tautly over a loose jumble of bones. I pace about nervously, turning off the music so I can think clearer. In one of my turn-abouts I knock off my Pepsi can and catch it. This at least lets me know my reactions -- and possibly my metabolism -- are quicker. That still doesn't help me much. How will I be seen? How will I be treated? What sort of rights, if any, do I have? How will my wife react?
  I need someone to talk to. First, I check in the bathroom mirror again. Yep, I'm still an anthropomorphical River Otter, and I haven't aged any since the last time I checked. I picked up the phone and dialed.
  "Hello?" It was Jesse, and she sounded angry. My phone call had interrupted something.
  "Jesse?"
  "Yes?" She replies with exasperated, decreasing patience.
  "This is Perry, who all is there?"
  "Meta's asleep, so's Laura, Imzodi's in the other room, otherwise it's me and Matt, why?" She clipped each word.
  "I need someone to talk to. Now. Something's come up." She could tell that I wasn't lonely and requesting a social tea-and-cakes visit. This was something serious. She softened considerably.
  "What is it?" I heard Matt ask in the background.
  "Something's up with Per."
  "What?"
  "I don't know." She brings the phone back to her head. "What's wrong Perry?"
  "Look, I'm not sure what, something happened to me. I -- I'd rather not talk about this over the phone, can you guys get here?"
  "Can you give us five minutes?"
  "Uhh, I think yeah."
  "Good, we'll see you in five." I have a feeling what they wanted the five extra minutes for, but I wasn't about to complain. It gave me time to figure out how to best present myself.
  I figure I can trust these friends. We've dealt with possessions, poltergeists, hauntings, and all sorts of weird paranormal phenomenae, and they were far more experienced than I.
  There was a knock at the door and I silently slipped over to the twin peepholes. I can't look out both at the same time due to my muzzle, but I'm used to using only one anyways. It was Imzodi, Jesse, Matt and Meta. I remove the chain and bolt, then step away.
  "Door's open." My voice was a bit higher than normal, but not falsetto or feminine. Jesse opened the door first, screamed, and ran off.
  Matt managed an, "Oh fuck," then took off after Jesse at the same time as Imzodi advised him to.
  Meta managed a, "Whoa." They handled it rather nicely if you ask me. Imzodi and Meta both lit up, Imzodi with Marlboros and Meta with Djarum. I closed my nose shut. Actually, I just wrinkled it, it closed shut due to my new physiognomy.
  "Do you guys mind? My sense of smell is sharper now."
  "Oh, sorry," Imzodi replied as they waved the smoke out the door. I handed them a small bowl intended for dipping sauces to use as an ashtray. They extinguished their cigarettes.
  "White-blue, with green and yellow?" Imzodi ventured, as he looked over the room.
  "Yep."
  "There's solid yellow over in that room there," Meta pointed out. They weren't referring to interior decorating schemes, they were referring to protective auras my wife and I had set up around the apartment.
  "There's nothing in that room over here," Meta nodded towards my roommate's bedroom.
  "Yes, by her request, we didn't shield her bedroom."
  "Mind if I enter?"
  "I doubt she'd appreciate it, but so long as it doesn't look like you ever set foot in there..."
  "Did you sense anything, Perry?" Imzodi asked me.
  "No, aside from the shifting which hurt like a motherfuck."
  "How're you feeling now?"
  "Bit of a headache, I hit my head on the wall earlier. Also, a bit, disjointed with reality."
  "Disjointed how?"
  "I'm not, fully ready to accept that this has happened to me." I did my best to stop my voice from cracking and my eyes from tearing up. Imzodi offered a shoulder and I accepted.
  "Let it go Per, let it go." To all those men out there nauseated at the sight of another man having an emotional breakdown: Fuck Off.
  I hadn't cried this hard since early November of 1993 when my first familiar died. My sobs subsided and Imzodi patted me on the back. "Are we okay now?"
  I sniffed. "Yeah."
  "Good."
  I hit him hard on the shoulder. "Dammit why?! Why the fuck did this have to happen to me?! Lord! Lady! Why? Huh? Why the fuck did this have to happen to me?! What did I do to deserve to be such a Gods rotted freak?! Answer me!!" Meta came out to assist, but Imzodi stayed him. I kicked a table, which caused it to rock back, then forward, spilling it's contents onto the floor. Dizzy, I fell to my knees, exhausted. There was an awkward pause of silence.
  "Are we settled down now?" Imzodi ventured cautiously.
  "Yeah, just a little pissed off at life now, is all."
  "Empathically speaking, I can understand."
  "Well," Meta started with a smile, "You did say your totem animal was the river otter." I had to smile, he was right about that.
  "True, true, but Matt's expressed interest in hawks and dragons, and he's still human."
  "What were you doing the moment this happened?" Imzodi asked.
  "Listening to Elfman, eating cookie dough, and reading this book."
  "Wow, that must have one incredible chapter on alternate realities," Imzodi replied.
  "Cute, real cute."
  "Meta, did you sense anything in that room?"
  "Nope." Meta walked over to the kitchen window and looked out across the street to the four-story H.H. Richardsonian Romanesque monstrosity. "This have anything to do with the little girl?"
  "No, I checked that too. Do you get anything?"
  "No." The 'little girl' is a ghost that lives (pardon the expression) in the fourth floor corner room on the southeast side.
  "Guys, I doubt she has this kind of influence," I interjected.
  "Yeah, I suppose you're right." Meta turned to Imzodi. "Should we check the astral side?"
  "Good idea, I was thinking the same thing too, but we should wait for Matt so we can have an anchor."
  "I'll go check on him." Meta turned, just as Matt came in with a shaken, but composed Jesse.
  "Perry?" she asked, looking at me, as if she just might be able to find the fastenings to some elaborate costume.
  "Yeah, its me."
  "Look, I'm sorry I ran off like that. I really was not expecting this. I'm so sorry."
  I gave a small, zen-master smile, with half lidded eyes. "I understand, and I forgive you. 'Sides, who'd expect a thing like this?"
  "You do? Good, I was so worried... How are you feeling?"
  "Not bad, considering. Phantom limbs I've felt before are considerably more real now."
  "Phantom limbs?"
  "I've always felt I had a tail, but it was only a phantom tail, not existing in the physical realm." Meta, Matt and Imzodi exchanged significant glances.
  "Do you have a candle handy?" Imzodi asked.
  "Any specific color?"
  "Not really, but let's stick with white."
  "Tea candles work?"
  "That'll do fine." Tea candles set up, Imzodi defined the protective area and then he and Meta stared into the candle. Their breaths shuddered, then, for all appearances they were either asleep, or dead.
  "Tell me everything you feel Perry, no matter how insignificant you feel it is," Matt informed me.
  "Nothing as of yet, just the usual refreshing safety and comfort I'd expect with a circle."
  Matt used a calm, gentle voice as he guided the two travellers with his voice throughout the astral side of the apartment building, and even outside. He occasionally looked up at me for interjection. I had no input.
  "Perry?" he asked. "I'm going to open up the circle and I want you to enter, but if anything happens, I'm pulling you out, okay?" I nodded, and he cut a doorway with his finger. I stepped inside. I felt more refreshed, safer and comfortable, which was expected, save for my tail which stuck outside the circle. There was no reaction from Meta or Imzodi either. They came back.
  "How're you feeling?" Meta asked.
  "Fine. A little hungry, now that you mention it."
  "Mind if I grab a Mountain Dew?" Jesse asked.
  "Uh, that's my roommate's. You'd have to take it up with her. You can have all the Pepsi, water, tea or coffee you want, though." Jessa grabbed a Pepsi out of the fridge, then closed the door, I caught it midswing, the momentum knocking out a jar of mayonnaise, which I caught and put back.
  "Damn. Impressive," Matt said with raised eyebrows. I took out the turkey, cheese, tomato, and lettuce, then some bread. All natural, fully organic, cracked wheat berry, baked and sliced on site. No cheap white or wheat for this former human! I took tentative bites of each food item.
  Matt was confused. "What are you doing? I thought you were going to make a sandwich."
  "Seeing if my diet's changed any."
  "Ah," he nodded. "So I see."
  "I'm sorry Perry, this is weirder than what experiences I can draw from. It's all been a dead end." Imzodi was shaking his head in apology. "We could try scientists?"
  "No," I reply emphatically. "No scientists! Do you know what they do to animals?"
  "Okay." He held up his hands.
  "There's some coffee and filters in that cupboard up there, the one on the left above the refrigerator. Could you make me a pot?"
  "What for?"
  "Because if I can't drink coffee anymore, I'm really going to be pissed." The phone rang and we all stared at it like the RCA dog. The answering maching picked it up.
  "Perry, this is Isabeau, come pick me up in the lobby." Great, my wife was off work. As she didn't have a license, she depended on me to shuttle her everywhere.
  "I can't go out looking like this."
  "We can pick her up," Matt offered.
  "Thank you, you are a life saver, but, it'd be best if we called first."
  "You know the number?" I fliped through the tri-city phonebook till I found the number, then dialed and handed the phone to Matt.
  "Hello. Ramada Inn, how may I help you?"
  "Isabeau?"
  "Hold on, she's right here. Isabeau? Phonecall."
  "Yes, this is Isabeau?"
  "Isabeau, this is Matt."
  "Matt, hi! How're you doing?"
  "I'm doing fine. Look, we're at your place now, and we'll be picking you up shortly."
  "I'd really like to go home and change first. I shouldn't have to assume that Perry will be coming with?"
  "Well, he's, he's, uh," Matt looked at me. I made an ill, haggard face. "Melting." Appearently, anthro-otter facial muscles don't translate well with human expressions. Or Matt was lousy at charades. I wrote SICK on the dry-erase board above the answering machine. "Sick, sick and melting, he's burning up with fever."
  "Can I talk to him?"
  Matt handed me the phone with a questioning look on his face.
  "Hi honey," I slurred my speech as much as possible.
  "Are you feeling okay? You poor thing."
  "T'be hones', no."
  "Awww."
  "Howsoon can you be 'ere?"
  "That depends on Matt."
  "Oh yeah, tha's true. I love you, see you soon."
  "I love you too, bye." I hung up.
  "She is going to be pissed when she finds out I lied to her. Then again, couldn't exactly tell the truth now, could I?"
  "No, I suppose you couldn't," Imzodi had to agree. Meta fished out his keys.
  "We'll see you in a bit. Matt, are you coming?" Matt looked at me, I gave him a 'go ahead' nod. Jesse left as well, leaving me with Imzodi. I stood there in a silent, rapid prayer-mantra to the God and Goddess that my wife would not freak out and remove me from her life.
  "Breathe," Imzodi reminded me.
  "Yeah, thanks, so, now what?"
  "Well, I was thinking, if you can't stay here, there's always our place. Though it is a bit crowded as it is, and you would be expected to supplement an income of some sort, even if it's just stocking the fridge with trout."
  "Ha, ha." I paused, then said, "I might want to call the zoo in Omaha and ask about any River Otter caretaking needs I might need to know about."
  "Hey, I said you could live with us."
  I threw a pillow at him. "Smartass." He deflected it.
  "Anyways, that's is a good idea." I walked into my room, rather, my wife and I's room. "Aren't you going to call?"
  "Don't have long distance." I reply as I look out the bedroom window, waiting for the return of Meta's old, grey Taurus.

  "No, you're supposed to be a Coyote! You retard." This was my wife's reflexive reaction when she first saw me.
  I shouldn't have to point out that this isn't the reaction I had expected, but, it was better than I had planned for.
  "No, I am a River Otter." This was the first time I had said this out loud. In a way, it was a test to see how well I had accepted this new reality. Even with the evidence literally in front of my eyes, it sounded hollow, disbelieved. I felt nothing. Perhaps because I didn't know what to feel, or I refused, for sanity's sake, to feel what I should have felt. "Isabeau, look at me." She stared dead on into my eyes.
  "And?"
  "And? Look at me."
  "What am I supposed to be looking at?" Her voice was on the edge of snapping. She just wasn't seeing the picture... just like I wasn't hearing, what, I, was, saying.
  I shook my head.
  "Alright, basic facts. This isn't a costume or a hallucination from some fumes from some weird chemical you used at work. This is what I am." I really hated giving her ultimatums,but... "Now you can either accept it, or I can walk out that door because the Perry you first saw and fell in love with isn't here anymore, and I'm having a damned hard time dealing with it!"
  "What am I supposed to do?!" Her eyes were brimmed with tears and her voice warped and cracked with emotions. "Cheerfully go on? I can't just go on like nothing happened, Peregrine."
  "Then don't, I'm not asking you to!"
  "Then what?!"
  "I don't know!" There was a moment of uncertainty as our tempers simmered down. "I just want to know if you still love me?"
  "I honestly don't know how to deal with this. This is going to take some getting used to." I breathed a tentative sigh of relief. At least she said she'd try to get used to it, which meant she wasn't leaving. Not yet anyways. "Will we have to attend support group meetings?"
  "I don't know, far as I'm aware I'm a unique case. It's not like AIDS or homosexuality. 'Mom, dad, sit down, I have something to tell you, I'm a six-three River Otter.' 'My God son, we didn't realize!'."
  She smiled and glowered at the same time then jabbed me in the ribs. "Alright, smartass. So now what?"
  "I don't know. As late for work as I am, I doubt I have a job anymore."
  "You're not helping any."
  "Sorry."
  "What about these people, would they be able to help?" She held up a pamphlet from P.E.T.A.
  "No. They'd mean well but I fear I would become a political piece, a lobbyist's puppet at best. I don't want that."
  "Well, I'm sure you could take a night job, I can't pay for this apartment with just me and Vicki."
  "Support group... huh..."
  "What?"
  "Earlier you asked about support groups, right?"
  "Yes," she replied warily.
  "What if there are others like me?"
  "It is plausible," Matt interjected.
  "We'd have a snowball's chance in hell, pardon the cliche, of surviving by ourselves out there, but, if we had a community where we could all be together then... They could take all of us out easier, nevermind, it's a stupid idea."
  "No, no, it has merit, it's a good idea, just a little impractical monetary-wise to pull it off," Chris replied.
  I shot up with a yelp of pain. "What the hell was that for?!"
  Isabeau sprinkled a tuft of my fur down in front of my eyes. "That's for threatening to leave me!" All right, I supposed I deserved that.
  "Maybe Warren Buffett was affected as well?" I offered with pathetically plasticine hope.
  "Does your T.V. work?" Matt asked.
  "Sometimes we get the public television station, otherwise it's for tapes only."
  "Oh."
  "We'd have to use your guys's television."
  "It'll have to wait until dark, if anyone sees you." He gave an apologetic shake of his head. I was stuck in the apartment. This made my desire to be out, increase tenfold....
  "Will you please stop fidgeting?" my wife commanded. "You're acting like a --"
  "Like a what? Like a caged animal?"
  "Oh, shut up." Now that the storm of my wife's first reaction with me had been weathered, I could ask Matt a question that had been bugging me ever since they had come back.
  "Where's Jesse and Meta?"
  "They went back home to break the news to Laura. Do you want them to come back, or do you want to go over there?" I first considered going over there in my car, but, seeing as I now have a big-assed tail behind me, there'd be no way I could sit in a seat designed for humans, and drive. Unless Matt or Chris drove my car down there, then one of them brought it back, while the other followed so he could get a ride back. I sagged into a seemingly irreversible state of dark despair.
  I was an automotive junkie of the worst sort. Had been since the second grade. I knew the fastest way around a corner, I knew how to get out of a spin using the 'Power-Reverse' method Geoff Gordon used so beatifully in Talledege a couple years back. I knew how to get a car from its side onto its wheels without getting out and tipping it over. I knew the best places to hit another car to run it off the road, or to disable it. I knew about J-turns, three point turns, bootleg turns, powerslides, sling-shot passes, drafting, how to set up a car's chassis based on tire temperatures and wear. Now, I'd just been cut cold turkey. I'd be on a street corner by tomorrow going 'Hey buddy, can you spare me a set of car keys?' when the jingle-jangle morning comes calling me.
  "Take my car there, we'll go over , but when you bring my car back be sure you have a ride back home. Now if you'll escuse me, I'd like to lay down now." I retired to our room and laid down, biting my pillow in anger as I sobbed silently. With my new form I had just lost my job, and I doubt anybody'd hire me in my present state, so there goes shelter or food as soon as my money runs out. I can't get food anyways because now I've lost the privilege of basic human social interaction, and now 1/3 of my dreams and hopes was gone. At least I still had my history and my writing... big fucking solace that is. Oh wait, I won't be able to be a historian or archaeologist, I'd have to get a job! Can't do that now can we? That leaves my writing which I barely feel is good enough for the Gods rotted TSA! I sure as hell wasn't going to impress any editors with my work.

  When I looked up it was dark out, then I heard a knock at our bedroom door. My jaw was painfully cramped from biting the pillow. River Otters aren't built like Bulldogs. The knocking came again.
  "Perry, you awake? It's dark out." It was Matt.
  "Forget it, just go."
  "What's wrong?"
  "What the fuck do you think is wrong?" Matt turned to converse with the others.
  "I don't think he wants to come."
  "Here, let me try." Isabeau opened the door.
  "I said stay the fuck out!!!" I leapt up and pushed her out, literally snapping at her. She hit the wall with enough force to knock one of her framed paintings off the wall and cracked the glass. I slammed the door shut with a sonic boom. My vision was narrow and I was seeing red, and my temperature seethed with heat. She flung the door open and whipped my otter calander into my face.
  "Here, you can masturbate to this!!!" She slammed the door shut exactly as hard as I had. "Come on, let's just go," she told the others. Chris opened the door to offer me counseling, but changed his mind when he saw I clearly was not in the mood for comfort.
  When I heard the downstairs door close, I dropped into shock. I just laid there, catatonic. Well, what else can I lose today? Aside from my material things, all that I had left was my sanity, and that felt like feathers in front of a turbine engine.
  When they came back around one-thirty A.M. I wasn't any better. My wife left, gathered up a few things and went to their house. I stubbornly refused to believe them saying that there was a news broadcast which proved that I was not alone in this and there were indeed others like me out there. I eyed one of my tapes laying on the dresser, specifically a song entitled Barber's Adagio for Strings. I snorted.
  "I am not a human being, I am an animal!!!" The only reason I didn't go feral off into the countryside was that I was too damned tired.

  The second Isabeau entered the house, she regretted it. She was the type that, when angry, did not like to have other people around her, and at Laura, Matt and Jesse's place, there was more than plenty of people.
  "Hi Is, what's wrong with Per?" Laura asked with a smile and a ready hug. Isabeau accepted the hug then parted.
  "Cu's a complete fucking asshole, that's what's wrong with him!" Her voice was almost a shriek. It was an accepted fact to see the fiery Jesse scream, then stomp away and slam doors, but to see Isabeau do it was something that just did not happen. Until now.
  "He's had a severe physical alteration, and he's taking it out on everybody," Jesse said by way of explanation.
  "Was he in an accident? Was he burned? Was his face cut up?"
  "Uh, well, aaah!" She stormed out of the room.
  "He's a huge River Otter." Meta said with quiet matter-of-factness. Laura's countenance went dark.
  "Meta, I didn't ask for some bullshit answer."
  Matt backed up Meta with, "He's not bullshitting you Laura."
  "Are you in on this too?" she accused.
  "I assure you we are speaking to you with utmost seriousness." She had to sit down, pale of face.
  "Oh my god."

  Laying there, I was marinating in a malaise of bitter, regretful not-quite-acceptance, and it was making me hungry. However I was in no mood to cook, or shop for food.
  A quick scan of the staples and I pulled out a quarter bag of tortilla chips, then I switched the music in my CD Player from Elfman to 'Monsters of Goth' and 'A Century of Recorded Poetry', with Sylvia Plath primed and ready to read. Probably not the best choices, given my current state of mood, but under the circumstances, it was what I felt like.
  As much as I wanted to, I couldn't do a junk food and music meditation. After three chips I put the bag back as I found it and layed back down on the ground. Okay, lets review. I have a problem -- That's an understatement! -- I have turned into a anthro-River Otter and have lashed out at someone who cares about me, causing her harm. Solution: Apologize to her first... right. How? Okay, I'm no longer a human -- Do I have rights? Am I still a citizen?-- I shook my head. I couldn't afford to go off on tangents like that. I can no longer drive my car, that also means I can't get Isabeau to work anymore, which means thanks to me, she'll lose her job as well! Alright I said stop it!

  Mike knocked on the door as he entered Laura, Matt and Jesse's house.
  "Hey, what's up," he asked with unusually good natured cheer before he saw anyone. When he did look it gave him a sharp pause of concern. "Er, what?" Meta was busy making smoke rings by sharply moving his vertically held cigarette up and down with tiny flicks of his wrist.
  He replied without breaking concentration, "Perry and Isabeau had a fight, she's in the bedroom."
  "What for?" Meta and Matt again exchaned significant glances.
  "Perry's changed," Matt replied, not sure how to put it.
  "Changed how? How has he changed?"
  "Imzodi, I'm pinned here with Jesse on my lap. Is the tape we put in earlier rewound?" Imzodi extracted himself from his blankets and crossed the room to the VCR. He ejected the tape, looked at it, put it back in and rewound it. Stopped. Pressed play. Then fast forward.
  "What am I supposed to be looking at?" Imzodi let go of the fast forward button.
  "Just watch." The tape was of the 10:00 news.
  #Wow Bob, three more days of below freezing weather with a seventy percent chance of snow. Not a good outlook.#
  #No it is not, but it will get better, I promise you that.#
  #I hope it does.# The plasticine blonde turned to face the center camera. #Heading off the national news today, are mascots considered insulting? Is Mickey Mouse out of a job? The answer to these questions may be... yes.#
  (Insert news broadcasts here of other LTFee's)
  Imzodi stopped the tape and shut it off.
  "Wow." Mike had a strong urge for a cigarette.
  "Alright, is he still home?"
  "I'd assume so, we haven't called him since we got back though," Matt informed him. Mike crossed over to the kitchen to use the phone... he hung up.
  "He's either not there or not picking up."
  "Think we should go over and check on him?" Matt asked.
  Meta was wary. "Think that's safe?"
  "Is it safe leaving him like that?" Imzodi replied.
  "You're right, good point. Let's go."

  Laura knocked on the door to apartment 1D as Isabeau fished out her keys. Opening the door they could see both of Peregrine's coats were still there but he didn't answer her summons. She then called Laura, Matt, and Jesse's place in case he had gone over there while they were going over here. No such luck.
  "Well, I'm going to use the bathroom, then leave a note. Maybe he'll see it when he comes back, if he isn't his usual blind self." While she was in the bathroom, Mike went into Isabeau and Perry's bedroom. Rifling through a pile of papers, he found one that looked like a list of internet sites and Hotmail addresses and passwords, The top of which was headed: 'Peregrine Quinn Dobhran's Frequently Visited Sites and Addresses' It was chicken scratch, all caps -- some letters were underlined thrice to indicate they actually were capitalized -- it had to be Perry's handwriting. He pocketed the note.

  In the bathroom, she found the air was humid and the mirror was fogged over, indicating that someone had used the bathtub. However the towels were still dry. So, turning around she flung open the shower curtains, a look of righteous fury on her face.
  I lay under the water with eyes and nose shut, hoping she wouldn't intrude on my watery oblivion. Even as she flung open the curtains, for a half-second I hoped it was random poltergeist activity or some weird flaw that suddenly developed caused by the aging of the red vinyl curtains, but I knew it was not to be. My eyes burned with a low burning fire and a growl/hiss was held low in the depth of my throat as I slowly slid out of the water. I guess I wasn't ready to be in a talking mood just yet. She reached for me and I swatted her hand away with excessive force.
  "Fine! We were here when you needed help and you turned us down! If I needed help, I'll expect you to treat me the same as you have treated us!" She walked purposefully from the bathroom.

  Mike went back into the main room. Half a second later, Isabeau came out, in a freshly foul mood, more than ready to leave, and not willing to discuss options.

  It was dark enough, I was bored enough, and desperate enough to get out of the house, that I risked venturing outside. I slipped down the stairs, keeping an eye on the downstairs tenant's door. Ready to sprint back up, should she come out. No such disaster.
  Outside, I leaned against the brick of the building and peered down the side of the wall. There was a light on in apartment 1A. 1B had their bathroom light on... nope, it just got turned off. Across a good sized expanse of lawn, was Saint Luke's Nursing Home. I could only hope that I was too far away to be seen clearly, or, if I was, I would be chalked up by the reporting staff as dementia. I actually felt sorry for the elderly person that saw me, as the doctor prescribed Prozac, or Seconal, or Lithium or whatever it was that he wanted the pharmacist to dispense.
  I slipped quickly to my car. My other choice was to cut through a single line of pine trees into an open field. Crouched down by the driver's door, I was hidden by a mangled red Contour, blocking me from being seen in apartment 1A. Not that they were even bothering to look. My main concern was Saint Luke's. If any of the staff came out for a smoke break. I'd be caught for sure.
  In the driver's seat, it was I had thought. My thick tail was painfully cramped and at an odd angle. But, if I put the seat back all the way down and sat as far forward as possible, it was tolerable for short trips. I felt like the epitome of Asshole for going ballistic over not being able to drive. I forced my higher self to count to ten before it beat the shit out of my inner kit.
  I avoided the busiest streets. Grand Avenue segued into Antelope Avenue, then it was a short jaunt through the countryside along 56th Street, clear over to 17th Avenue on the other side of town. West on 35th Street, which turned onto Camelot Drive. I stopped the car at a dead end on the western edge of town, with its winding roads and near-million-dollar (and a few over) homes spaced acres from each other. I was near the hike bike trail. I left my car, praying that it wouldn't be towed, and went for a walk down to the trail, the same one that I wrote about in 'The Culling Incident'. Difference being that it was nowhere even remotely near as crowded as I made it out to be in that story.
  As I walked the path, listening to frogs, crickets, and nightbirds, and drawing down the moon and the stars, I had to chuckle. Here I am, a River Otter walking along a footpath, when there's a perfectly good canal right next to it.
  Perhaps if it wasn't the dead of winter I would have considered a swim.
  Sitting on my coat amidst the man made forest of Cottonwoods and Pines was something I hadn't done in a long time, and it was the perfect place to think without thinking.
  I really wish I had read Kafka. There might be some clues in that story as to what I should do. Closest I had was Whitley Streiber's The Wild, and I doubt that staring at people would turn them into Otter-Furrys. At most it would disturb them...
  ...Twice they had come by, and twice I had greeted them with violence.
  This was not how a River Otter was supposed to act. This was not how I normally acted, but who was I? I had changed physically, that much was true, but had I changed mentally? Was my psyche still my own?
  "Fine! We were here when you needed help and you turned us down! If I needed help, I'll expect you to treat me the same as you have treated us!" The projectionist that ran my mind's eye seemed to have an obsessive compulsive disorder. It kept playing this same scene over and over and over and over and over, ad insanitum.
  My mind, free to roam where it pleased, wandered unbidden into the dark recesses of usually quickly quelled thoughts.
  I imagined the help she'd needed in the past. The time the man in her old dorm hall was unhealthily infatuated with her. The times she had had violent, physical fights with her old boyfriend. the time I rushed down to the glass blowing kilns at insane speeds because I had heard there'd been an accident and she'd been burned with molten glass. The time she'd been in a car that rolled over and hadn't been wearing her seatbelt... and here I was... What if she needed me now? What if she was burned? Or bleeding? Dead. Or worse? Images grotesque and horrifying robbed me of even the lightest relaxation for hours on end.
  There were whispers in the forest, and people milling about. I couldn't make out what they were saying, but it was critical, judgmental. I couldn't see them walking about, but I could hear their footsteps.
  They re out there, accusing me, heaping guilt upon me and feeding off of my own guilt.
  There! A flash of someone!
  No! Over there!
  Wait! There!
  Faint, distant glimpses, like being inside and looking at a reflection in a window at night from a distance, the figures like something out of Edward Munch's The Scream. Even the nocturnal creatures sounded pained and pleading. The trees were black, and seeped blood, the blood of someone I cared about.
  And here I was. Perfect. Unharmed. This was not fair! Why should I go on unscathed while all around me was scarred and bleeding! What right do I have to be like this! I had no right to be! I fucking hate myself!!
  "Fuck you!! Do you hear me? Fuck you!!" I ripped out a section of fur, not feeling it. "Fuck you!" I growled as I bit at myself, drawing blood with my sharp teeth, leaving specks in the snow freshly upturned by my thrashing about.
  I looked like the tail end of Fight Club where the main character is shown on the security cameras beating the crap out of himself.
  Have I gone mad? Perhaps, but if no one can agree on the requirements of normal, how can they say I'd gone 'mad'? How can there be 'madness'?

  Mary Vellen had had a long day at her firm's library studying research for a lawsuit she was prosecuting. She'd already put in a half day over her normal eight to six day. All she wanted to do was to just get home.
  Something tall, dark, and inhuman cut off the shine from her headlights. She hit the brakes, but she still connected, causing whatever it was to fly over the hood of her sporty red Mustang Convertible. She slammed the gearshift into park, hit the hazard lights and dashed around to see what it was illuminated in the red and flashing orange of the tail lights. It wasn't moving. She wasn't sure whether to call Animal Control, the FBI, or SETI.

  My head felt woozy from the multiple messages of pain my brain was receiving. Flipping out like that was probably the worst response I could have taken.
  "I'm sorry." I whimpered, more from shame than pain, "I'm sorry."
  Mary Vellen immediately scratched Animal Control from her choice of who to call as she reached for the cell phone and dialed Emergency.
  "Emergency dispatch, how may I help you?"
  "This is Mary Vellen, I'm on Cottonmill Road, next to the Cedar Hill Estates turn off, I've hit something, someone."
  "Is the person still alive, are they okay?"
  "Yes, but, he's in very poor shape! Please send an ambulance!" In the background she could hear a second dispatch officer sending out an amublance and a cruiser to her location.
  "Okay, can you administer any first aid?"
  "I wouldn't know where to begin! He -- he's --"
  "Okay, just relax. Do you have a blanket in the car?"
  "No my car doesn't have enough room for one!"
  "Are you wearing a coat?"
  "Yes, a long wool trenchcoat."
  "Perfect. We want to prevent shock by keeping him warm, can you lay the coat over him?" Mary was already doing this as the dispatcher was instructing her to.
  "Is his face pale or red?"
  "He's covered in fur, how am I supposed to know!"
  "Can you see his nose?"
  "It's black!"
  "Are you sure? It's not dirt or something?" Mary could see the lights of the emergency vehicles as they wound their way around the curves and dips of Cottonmill Road.
  "Yes I'm sure!"
  "Ma'am, I need you to remain calm."
  "I'm as calm as I can be! Nevermind! ... I'm sorry, thank you for your help. They've arrived."
  "Okay, you take care now."
  "Goodbye." They both hung up.
  "Alright ma'am?" It was a young crew-cutted rookie. "Can you please step towards my car so ca-hrist!!" The EMT crew shared the cop's reaction when they first saw the bloody form of the huge, bipedal River Otter. If it weren't for years of ingrained standard procedure, they probably would have gotten back into their vehicles and torn away in a cloud of tire smoke muttering to themselves: "I have not seen what I have just seen I have not seen what I have just seen I have not seen what I have just seen..."

  Laura looked at her watch, then outside.
  "I'm going to the college to check my mail." Mike got up.
  "That sounds like a good plan." Isabeau grabbed her black bookbag/purse.
  "I need to write my sister." With their being only two blocks away from campus and parking at college being the nightmare that it usually is, they felt it was best to walk. At the end of the block, Matt ran to catch up with them.
  "Hey Isabeau? I called your place again. Vicki answered, but Perry's not there."
  "Good, do you think I give a fuck?" she snapped.
  "If he's acting this way, don't you think that it's all the more reason to help him?"
Isabeau considered and discarded a dozen replies before she settled on, "Shut up!!"
  Matt held his hands out in appeasing defense. "Hey, I was just trying to help."

  Sitting at a college library computer, Mike pulled out the list and typed in the address http://www.witchvox.com. It was an insanely huge site for earth based religions, full of numerous, twisting links to other WitchVox pages. Immense help in studying Pagan and Wicca related subjects, but of no help for sudden onset of Anthropomorphism.
  http://www.draconic.com, after he put in the name and password required for the discussion list, was of no help either. Other than some jealous "Dragons" who envied and respected a few people who had turned into actual dragons.
  "Hey look at this." Isabeau, Laura and Matt read over his shoulders.
  "Huh, so a few people got turned into dragons?" Matt said out loud, as if needing the confirmation.
  "That's what it looked like."
  "Huh, interesting," Laura said, then turned back to her own computer, unsure of what else to say. Draconic was of no further use.
  http://www.belfry.com was also useless, being only a site full of anthropomorphical comics and a site full of lists of furry related stuff, and links to other furry sites. http://www.flayrah.com held a big clue on their top story in the Furry category.

Sometime around Noon Pacific, One Mountain, Two Central et. al. hundreds of subscribers to the Transformation Story Archive Talk list were radically, and drastically altered to a more animalistic appearence. -- for more, click here.

  Mike clicked this, and it took him to a whole slew of professional reports on 'The Epidemic Sweeping the World'.
  "Is, has he ever mentioned anything about a Transformation Story Archive?"
  "No, he wouldn't put his stories on the 'net for some ass to steal and claim as their own."
  "I think he may have. Everyone on that Archive was struck with the same condition he has." She snorted in reply, then rolled her chair over to take a look.
  "Oh Gods, what perverted, demented, life-sucking list has he gotten himself into this time?"
  "You really hate the internet, don't you?"
  "I'm sorry,but I've lost too many people to the lure of that stupid thing. Talking with someone online isn't socializing. These people don't know how to socialize. If you took the screen from them and put them face to face they'd go into shock. Looks like I'm going to have to retrain him all over again..." She rolled away, with a flash of blackness. Laura left the room feeling extremely uncomfortable from it.
  Mike went to Hotmail next, and typed in the first name and password. Junk mail, as was the next. The next held information regarding Celts and Ancient Egypt, the fourth one Therianthropes, the next Ireland. Another was for RPGs. One held artwork. Isabeau glanced over.
  "What the hell? That's Cu's e-mail!"
  "I know, I snagged this when you were in the bathroom. Who were you yelling at in there?"
  "You're a butt! ... No one, I just needed to yell." Whether he could tell she was lying or not, he let it drop. "Aradia?" she said with shock and disgust, "I thought he dropped that list years ago!"
  "Why?"
  "He wanted to light a prayer candle for some wanna-be-I've-seen-'The-Craft'-so-I'll-do-what's-trendy-Wiccan," she searched for a word, "bitch, because she's going onto the net and looking for pity points for her 'dying mother who was in a car accident'. We got into an argument over it and he promised to drop it. Wonder what else he lied to me about?" She turned back to composing a note to her sister, her brother, and her best friend Heather in Kansas City.
  Mike composed a message to Aradia-

{Forgive me but I've hacked into K-Teunth's e-mail, (If you must know he had his password on a piece of paper.)} I'm a local friend of his. He's become quite sullen and violent, and we need to know what do with him. He's one of the hundreds on the TSA List who have changed as I'm sure you've seen on the news. He's brooding in his apartment right now, save for when we try to visit him. Then he becomes extremely feral and viscious.

Any advice? Please respond ASAP!

~Mike K.

  He highlighted and copied this, then sent it.
  The last address was the one that contained Peregrine's TSA List, and it was flooded past full. A quick perusal of the subject headings didn't surprise him. They all dealt with the changes the list members had gone through. He sent a message to the list. The same one he had sent to Aradia, save for "Cu" replacing "K-Teunth".

  Imzodi and Meta weren't going to bed until ten in the A.M. As they sat there in the middle of a game of Chess -- Meta's turn -- he moved his Queen's Bishop to King's Knight Five.
  "Imzodi, your turn." Imzodi was ignoring him. "Imzodi?" He looked up to see what on the television had preoccupied Imzodi. On the screen was a shot of Good Samaritan Hospital covered with a deluge of reporters and police. Then the camera cut to an inside view of a hospital hallway, focusing into a room. A room covered in EKG's and IV poles and all sorts of monitors. Neither of them could mistake the huge River Otter furry for anyone else, laying on the bed in the middle of it all. It was Peregrine Dobhran.
  "I'll call Isabeau, you get the car ready?" Imzodi ran this plan by Meta.
  "Sure," Meta nodded, and got his car keys out. Imzodi went to the kitchen. He dialed Isabeau's number, but, no surprise, she was fast asleep. He got the anwering machine.
  "Isabeau, this is Imzodi, I'm at 903, I just saw the news, Perry's in ICU, do you want us to pick you up or --" There was an awful screeching and whining as Isabeau fumbled with the phone and the answering machine.
  "Hello?"
  "Yes?"
  "Can you swing by and pick me up?"
  "We're leaving right now."
  "Good, I'll be waiting outside." She hung up. All fog from lack of sleep gone. All her dark, Peregrine-is-a-complete-asshole thoughts vanished. He was in intensive care and that could only mean the worst.

  Isabeau, Imzodi and Meta navigated the revolving doors of the front entrance to Good Samaritan Hospital, but not without a minor, comedic scene between Imzodi and Meta.
  "Mooks." Isabeau replied, grinning. The receptionist wasn't at the triangular shaped desk across from the gift shop, so Isabeau turned right to go down a short hallway to the inpatient processing area.
  "Yes?" The woman behind the cubicle-desk asked with practiced kindness.
  "Can you tell me which floor Peregrine Dobhran was on?"
  "One second please." She filled in the given information, paused, her eyes going momentarily wide. "Can you give me that name again please?"
  "Peregrine Dobhran. First name: Peregrine. Last name: Dobhran."
  "I'm sorry, but we are not allowing any visitors into Mr. Dobhran's room, er, how is it that you know him?"
  "I'm his fiance, hopefully soon to be wife."
  "Well, congratulations." She had heard dozens of such claims from people all morning, all trying to get a peek at the dark-furred oddity. These three, however, had known his name, so she gave them some benefit of the doubt. Still, rules were rules, and her job was her job.
  "Can you at least give me the floor?"
  "I'm sorry, I can't do that either." Isabeau looked fit to rip the computer monitor off from its desk anchoring and bash her head in with it.
  "Is," Meta spoke up.
  "What?" she snapped. Meta positioned himself so his face wasn't in view of the woman at the computer.
  "Let's just go. We tried, we failed." His grin held an entirely different answer.
  "No, Meta. I am not leaving until I see him."
  "Isabeau, walk away from it."
  "Godsdammit Meta, I --" Now she caught the grin. "Fine, you're right, let's go." Imzodi was totally lost, but followed them back into the main lobby. "You better have a damn good reason for making me walk out like this," Isabeau hissed.
  Unfazed, Meta waited three seconds before replying casually, "I saw his room number on the screen."
  "You what?!" Isabeau hoped no one had heard her outburst. "You what?" she repeated more quietly.
  "The screen was angled so I could read it partially."
  "So what is it?!"
  "427." Isabeau tried to remember how the hospital was laid out. Not that anyone would ever be able to figure that out.
  "He's on the fourth floor. You can be a bunch of freaks and take the stairs, I'm taking the elevator."
  They stepped out of the lift car into a T-shaped hallway with an L-shaped hallway off to their left. According to the small hallway placards, the lower 400s went left, while the upper 400s went right.

  Tiffany, the inpatient receptionist, walked to a back room where there was a board with forty-seven marks on it, like a prisoner counting the days. She put in three more marks, smiling. Her guess as to how many people would try and see the creature was getting closer to the as yet unofficial answer in the betting pool. Sitting back down at her desk she picked up a stack of papers, straightened them out and started transferring information from paper to screen. She got in half a page before eight men in NBC suits approached her. One of them flashed a federal ID. At least she assumed it was. The letters F.B.I. in large blue letters were, to her, a tip off.
  "We're looking for a River Otter, bipedal, involved in an accident?" Scared, Tiffany simply pointed.
  "A room number might help, ma'am."
  "Oh. Oh! 427, fourth floor, then to your left." As the men walked away, Tiffany found herself in bad need of some asprin, a cigarrette, coffee, and a fainting couch.

  "427, his door's right here." Isabeau pointed to the wall plaque. Timidly she entered to small room, not sure if he was asleep, drugged, or in a coma. Hoping deeply for the best she clasped his paw in her hand.
  I was adrift in a pleasant drug-dream which was jarred into shattering by the light carress upon my paw. With a somewhat quiet, sharp intake of breath, my eyes fluttered open. Goddess! It's her!
  The fact that she was here filled me with remorse.
  The fact that she was here filled me with hope.
  "Hey," I muttered. She gave a small start as she squeezed my hand. "I'm sorry I --" She cut off any apology with a hard, deep, long kiss.
  "Um, if you want we can wait out in the hall," Imzodi replied feeling rather out of place.
  Isabeau broke off our reunion long enough to say, "If you want to."
  The two of them turned only to be blocked by a man in an enclosed enviromental suit. Actually, eight men.
  "It's best if you stayed." Any of us would be hard pressed to say, out of the four of us, whose eyes were widest. I wasn't sure how hard I shook as my mind raced but, no, I had more reason to be strong than to cower in terror.
  "How long were you with the subject?" one of the suits demanded.
  "A few minutes, possibly longer," Imzodi replied. The two fore-suits glanced at each other.
  "Damn, that's long enough."
  "What is going on here?" It was a medical professional.
  "This does not concern you, doctor."
  "I beg to differ, I'm a veterinarian, this man is my patient!"
  "Veterinarian?"
  "That is correct."
  "So it's changed that much, then?"
  "Yes. I have his records, if you want I can make a copy of them."
  "That would be of immense help."
  "I'll get them right away."
  "Hold." The vet stopped, awaiting further instructions. "You've been in contact with the subject. We don't need you risking further infection in this hospital. No telling what caused this."
  "Understandable, but I've ran tests of blood, skin and saliva samples on myself and have found no ill effects."
  "All the same, we'll have to move the subject."
  "But he's not stable yet! To move him could be fatal!"
  "Look we're the United States fucking Government, when we say move him, you move him. You got that?"
  "But --"
  "No one knows what caused this, or how it's transferred or even if it's transferred. You want to go down in history as aiding a pandemic, it'll be on your conscience, vet." The vet slumped in defeat.
  "Very well then." He looked at us apologetically.
  "Rhys, Davies, take this man to the records room, have him make copies of the subject's records."
  "Yes sir."
  "Where are you taking him?" the vetinarian asked.
  "We have a truck outside that will take him to a helicopter, then a plane to a remote Center for Disease Control. That is all you need to know." Great, I was a subject, an it. This impersonality was getting unnerving. From my experiences of movie watching, I judged the metallic, pistol shaped device to be a hypo-gun, probably filled with a tranquilizer.
  It's not always a good thing to be right.

  When next I came to, I was in a stark white room. The view of overhead lights cut off by men in NBC suits. Next I noticed I was strapped down, then that the pain medication the hospital had given me had worn off a long time ago. But, this was no where near as painful, or as shocking as when one of the men drew a scalpel firmly down my sternum and abdomen. He started using a bone saw on my sternum as I felt others mucking about with my viscera.
  I wasn't sure how long I uselessly screamed before I blacked out one last time.
  Are Isabeau, Meta, and Imzodi with them? If they suspect that they may have caught something from me then it's possible that these people may have, Lord and Lady, please! No!!

  Over some coffee in the break room, one of the suited men remarks to another: "I must say this is most fascinating. These vivisection subjects have been immensely helpful in our understanding of treating the other changelings and dealing with those they've come in contact with."

  I wasn't even sure my eyes had opened, yet I felt like I was awake. I was staring at a soft, white ceiling, with soft fluorescent lights being blocked by men in NBC suits.
  Yes, I gave quite a start.
  To put it in less Victorian terms, the sight scared the fuck out of me. The sight of curious, yet impassive human faces behind plexiglass shields pressing in on me was, a bit much.
  "Hey, please, back away a bit?"
  "Sorry to scare you like that Mr. Dobhran." The man by my left hip gave an apologetic nod and a smile. The simple statement and gesture was an icebreaker to me.
  "S'alright." I would have sat up, but the lightest attempt bought dizzying waves of whitewash across all of my senses. The suited man and woman on my left parted to allow Isabeau and Meta. Imzodi came through by my right. Laura was at the foot of the bed.
  "Really now, road grime isn't your color." Isabeau 'advised' me in a playful manner. I couldn't think of a comeback, so I just gave a smile.
  "Now, Mr. Dobhran, or do you prefer Perry?"
  "'Mr. Dobhran' will do for now."
  "Mr. Dobhran, you do realize that we will have to move you?"
  "To where?"
  "It'd be government paid, and it'd be for the best as we have no means of testing to see how you came to be this way and if there possibly is a cure." I wasn't about to tell them there was a side of me that didn't want to be cured. However, the side that was afraid of the violent social ostracism had its ears perked up.
  "And this would be done at?"
  "The CDC in Colorado." Colorado, Mel, Ravens Moon Coven.
  "CDC?"
  "Center for Disease Control." Neither my Fiance nor our three friends with her had environment suits on.
  "What about them?"
  "Them who?"
  "The four you see in here without suits on." The agent gave me a look that said 'Eh, so I'm an idiot.'
  "They'd have to come to. It's for the best." I shot Imzodi a dirty look. Outside my window was the rooftop helipad, and the helicopter was warming up for a flight. We waited in throbbing, whipping silence until the helicopter took off.
  "Well Mr. Dobhran?" a tall, broad-shouldered man at my shoulder prompted.
  "Just, uh, out of sheer curiosity, what if I say no? I mean, it's not like I could put up much resistance as it is, but..."
  "Well, in that case, we'd quarantine this room, possibly this whole building, and see what develops. Mind you this would be with no medical interference, that could hamper the data on how the disease works. Or, we could take you out in cuffs under arrest for obstructing code CDC-427A Chapter 3, Paragraph 43B."
  "Well put. Were you an understudy for Tommy Lee Jones?"
  "Naah, I've always been partial to Morgan Freeman myself." I would have laughed harder had it not hurt so much. I liked a person who could take a zing, and throw it right back at the original user.
  "Um... could I speak with my friends? In private?"
  "Sure." The first suited man to reply to me waved the others out of the room, then left himself. After the door closed, I looked again at Imzodi.
  "You knew that they wouldn't cut me open?"
  "Well, yeah, I had a pretty strong idea they wouldn't."
  "Why the hell didn't you tell me?! All of this," I indicated my car-smacked body, "could have been prevented!"
  "What proof would I have given you?" I had no response other than to lay there with useless words hanging out of my mouth.
  "Point taken. You can call them back in." Laura opened the door.
  "He's ready." Five of them entered the room. A minute later, the last two came in wheeling what looked like something from the fervid imagination of Stanley Kubrick. Now, I've seen incubation chambers for infants born premature before, but uh, folks, never one quite this large!
  "Can you hear me in that thing?" I asked.
  "That we can." I was sorely tempted to make a blowfish on the plexiglass top that was closed over me, but... naah.

  The trip to Colorado was uneventful. To my recollection, events ran thus: Ceiling, door, ceiling, door, sky, helicopter, ceiling, et al.
  After non-invasive, passive observation, which allowed me to heal and to sleep -- not that I needed the sleep, but there was jack else to do -- they ran tests and diagnoses and procedures. Everything from Acid tests to The Wrinkle Test. There was a shitload of diagnosis groups under every possible documentation system from ALERT to SOAPIER. They ran every conceptual model and every theory, from their own standard textbook to Hippocrates to Da Vinci to Nightingale to Watson. They checked my Functional Health Levels According to Gordon, looking into everything from my energy field to my spiritual well being. They ran me through Doenges and Morclassi Diagnostics from my Activity tolerance (which was embarrassingly low) to my learning and cognitive skills. They had tests and Diagnostics for animals, females and infants that they ran on me. Half the time I had the feeling they entered my room and pulled some random bullshit test out of their ass. They were leaving nothing to chance, save for the integrity of my skin. If I recieve one more needle, my skin's going to fall off.
  In the end, they found that I had a low activity of tolerance, could swim like a rock, had two cavities on my back molars, and had species identity disorder. But seeing as they couldn't confirm my species either, this last item was ruled as a moot point. My hypermetabolism was off the chart for a human, but rather low for a Mustelid. This resulted in a reaction time that they, and I, seemed fascinated by. It also meant that I felt overly warm while my testers had goose bumps from the A/C. I had an altered nutrition level. Before that I had been eating less than I should for my increased energy level, and had been feeling groggy and dazed as a result of it. I had a personal identity crisis due to a Stage IV Biochemical Change, a risk for post trauma response, a somewhat low self-esteem, a risk for low social interaction, and social isolation. I had mild ochlophobia and vertigo, and a fear of ostracism and persecution. Pretty much the same as before, save for a few new developments from my new body. None of it however, was considered as a risk to others.
  The worst of it was, I couldn't have caffeine anymore. Also, the pheromones of female River Otters had a chemo-physical reaction in me, but fortunately no psychological reaction. I wouldn't have minded that test had they not performed it while my significant other was present.

  "...despite our most thorough efforts we are still in the dark as to what could have caused these transformations. And, why such a large scale of differing species, and from people of differing backgrounds. The disease, and I'm beginning to doubt it can be called as such, acts quickly, leaves massive, permanent affects and is not contagious in anyway. Nor have we seen signs of foreign bacteria, virii, or traces of biotoxins in any of the test subject's blood, urine, or stool samples. This is recording double oh, oh, three, four, five, two. Nadya Ferlinghetti, end of week two." The start of her sigh was recorded as she clicked stop. She tapped the capped tip of her pen against her incisor as she tried to force her train of thought into a different track. The question of finding a cure isn't the concern now. We need to focus on social introductions. He hand moved nearly a full second slower than her mind did, resulting in sloppy handwriting as she tried to catch up with herself. Hunger told her it was time to go home and fix supper. She placed the notebook and tape recorder into her cabinet and locked it. After passing through triple redundant disinfectant stations, she was on her way home.