The joys of puberty

"The journey through the interstitial spaces, the raw, unformed chaos between dimensions," I explained for your limited understanding, Humanity, "is not a pleasant experience for beings composed of such… fragile matter. Think of it as being squeezed through a colander made of pure, screaming paradox, then reconstituted on the other side. Usually, a few bits are missing or rearranged. Delightful, from my perspective, but not so much for the seamonkeys here."

For the newly masked students and adults, the transit was a brief, violent tumbling through a violent vortex. Streaking bands of impossible, nauseating color warped past their unseeing (masked) eyes. Those that could see, well, we will see how they turn out when they arrive. Distorted sounds, such as the tearing of metal, the shrieks of dying stars, and the whispers of things best left unnamed, assaulted their ears. A sensation of being simultaneously stretched thin as cosmic dust and compressed into a single, agonizing point overwhelmed them. It was mercifully short, but utterly terrifying.

Then, as abruptly as it began, it ended.

With a final, bone-jarring lurch, they were expelled. Not gently placed, mind you, but unceremoniously dumped, like a sack of unwanted refuse, onto damp earth, sharp twigs, slick moss, and tangled undergrowth. Some fell from a few feet, landing hard in a sprawling, undignified heap of limbs. The air here was thick, smelling of damp soil, decaying leaf litter, strange, unseen blossoms, and a complete absence of anything resembling city or civilization. Towering, unfamiliar trees, their bark like that of a diseased giant elephant, loomed over them, their canopy so dense it cast the forest floor into a perpetual, gloomy twilight.

Groans, retching coughs, and the distinct sound of someone vomiting punctuated the sudden, relative silence. Disorientation was absolute. "Where… where am I?" a muffled voice croaked.

"What was that?" another gasped.

"I think I'm gonna be sick..." came a third, followed by more retching.

"And… touchdown!" I announced from my comfortable, trans-dimensional viewing couch. "A bit rough, perhaps, but perfectly adequate for the purpose. Welcome to your new biosphere, class! Try not to track mud everywhere. Oh, wait, you'll be mud soon enough if you're not careful. That means food. Probably soon too."

Slowly, painfully, they began to untangle themselves, pushing to their knees or, for the more resilient, to unsteady feet. They looked around at the oppressive, alien forest, their masked faces turning this way and that, as they tried to get their bearings in a world that felt profoundly wrong. They called out names weakly, muffled by the unyielding white facades. "Katy?" That was Shirou, his voice tight with panic.

"Shirou? I'm here! What!? Are you…?"

"Ms. Linz? Coach Roberts?"

"The first moments of awareness in a hostile environment," I observed with clinical interest. "Confusion, nausea, dawning terror. Textbook. Let them soak it in for a moment before the real fun begins."

Then, a new sensation. A tangible pulse of energy, warm and electric, emanated from all the masks simultaneously, a silent thrum that vibrated through bone and flesh. As this pulse washed over them, a strange, almost preternatural sense of knowing accompanied it. Despite the identical blank masks hiding every face or the few monsters in their midsts, they suddenly, instinctively recognized the presence and identity of their classmates and teachers around them. The immediate, primal fear of "who are these masked stranger and monsters?" was bizarrely bypassed. They knew Shirou was near Katy, that Fiona and George were together, that Ms. Linz was trying to gather the teachers, even without seeing a single familiar feature.

"Ah, the activation signal for the next phase!" I noted with satisfaction. "And observe that little flicker of ingrained recognition! A convenient feature, wouldn't you say, Humanity? Prevents immediate, pointless inter-species violence based on appearance alone, before the intended inter-species violence can properly commence. Need them somewhat coherent for the initial survival phase, after all. Can't have them eating each other too soon. Where's the sport in that?"

Let's look at a little funny moment, at least to my eyes. Fiona Greene shrieked as vibrant scarlet, yellow, and blue feathers raised along her arms, which broadened feathered wings, her human face sharpening with avian alertness as she saw and recognized her beloved's new beastly form. George Handcock roared, a deep sound as his coarse black fur enveloped his humanoid body, his hands broadened, knuckles thick, tipped with heavy, blunt claws, still recognizably hands but more paw-like; face and features looking no different than a bear's face. The two were hesitant and awkward with each other about what to do, but surprisingly, it was Fiona who acted first to take George into her feathered embrace and began to cry as they continued to confer with each other in their embrace.

But this strange and tender, momentary reassurance was instantly obliterated by what followed. Immediately after the pulse, the masks began to change. They glowed, first faintly, then with increasing intensity, a sickly white light. They grew warm against the skin, then hot. And then, with a horrifying, invasive intimacy, they began to physically fuse into the wearers' faces, into their very skulls.

Muffled screams tore through the masks as tendrils, like living bone or cold, sentient wax, seemed to flow from the edges of the masks, sinking into flesh, burrowing under skin, merging with bone. It was a violation of the most profound and terrifying kind. They clawed at their faces, but there was nothing to grip, nothing to pull away. The masks were becoming part of them, an unholy graft.

"And now, the metamorphosis for the rest of them!" I declared to my unseen audience, leaning forward on my couch of despair. "Witness the shedding of the mundane! The masks integrate, rewriting the flawed human template, unlocking the… potential… I was so generously embedded within their design. A bit of pain is necessary for growth, wouldn't you agree? Beauty from suffering, or in this case, beast from suffering. It's an artistic statement, really."

Rapid, agonizing, body-wide transformations erupted, their human forms twisting and reshaping while retaining a fundamentally humanoid structure. Bones snapped and reset with audible cracks, muscles tore and re-knitted into new, powerful configurations. Skin split, peeled back, or thickened, revealing fur, scales, feathers, or chitinous plates that integrated with their human anatomy. Facial features altered, muzzles subtly forming or jaws elongating, teeth sharpening. Ears migrated and reshaped. Tails, wings, extra limbs, carapaces – the full, horrific spectrum of their new hybrid natures burst forth upon their still-upright frames.

Katy, beside Shirou, cried out as her limbs grew leaner, her hands and feet becoming tipped with sharp, retractable claws, though still retaining a humanoid structure; new ears grew at the top of her head, tufts of fur appeared at the tips of them – a Lynx-hybrid, fierce and agile.

Sarah Lugwid let out a series of terrified squeaks as her humanoid form shrank significantly, fine brown fur covering her, her nose twitching, ears growing large and round – a bipedal Field Mouse. Steve Birk’s transformation was perhaps one of the most unsettling: his humanoid torso became encased in a segmented, chitinous shell, and from his back or sides, several smaller, articulated insectoid limbs sprouted, while his primary arms and legs remained humanoid, now covered in thinner chitin – a large, unnerving centipede-like millipede-man. Ms. Linz gasped, as white feathers softened her form, her arms gaining elongated flight feathers, her neck seeming to lengthen elegantly – a Swan-woman.

Mr. Decker was the first to fall. He gasped sharply, clutching his chest as his skin began to smooth and darken to a soft, rubbery grey. Veins of faint blue shimmered beneath the surface like rippling water. His muscles tightened, posture bending forward as his back bulged and split, a tall dorsal fin pushing through in a spray of blood and sweat. He staggered into the light, breath ragged, eyes wide with disbelief as his reflection in the gym’s wistle revealed something sleek, powerful — and alien. His lips curled into a grimace that could almost have been a dolphin’s smile, stretched too far to be human.

Nearby, Timothy Schwartz cried out in confusion as his shoulders snapped with a muffled crack, the bones rearranging to make room for something larger. Feathers burst from beneath his skin — black and grey, edged with silver — and spread outward in a rush of motion. His arms unfolded like blades as his fingers fused into the beginnings of wings but more resembling that of a bat, every movement scattering down and dust. His eyes, once dull brown, sharpened into a predatory amber gleam. He twisted his neck unnaturally far, scanning the forest, gaze darting with uncanny precision.

Then Nicky Newell screamed. It was not a sound of pain, but of disbelief, high and wet and gurgling. Her hair writhed as if alive, strands thickening, fusing, twisting together into slick, rope-like appendages that waved in the air. The color drained from her cheeks as her skin glistened with a damp sheen, pearlescent under the light breaking through the forest canapea. Moisture gathered across her arms, spreading in patches as her very texture changed — flesh becoming something soft, pliable, and sea-born. Her once-human silhouette blurred; she looked caught between drowning and breathing.

Brett Weiss doubled over first, gasping as the skin along his arms began to harden, strange patterns rippling beneath the surface like living marble. His frame broadened, his movements slowing as if the air itself had thickened around him. He stared down at his right hand, trembling, as the skin pulsed.

Beside him, Winifred shimmered in the fractured light of the forest canopy, her skin catching the glow like a living gemstone. Iridescent blues and greens cascaded down her chest and arms, a segmented carapace forming where once there had been silk and skin. Her breathing hitched as delicate, translucent wings unfurled from her back, fluttering in nervous spasms. For a moment, she looked less like a monster and more like a queen caught mid-coronation — radiant, uncertain, and afraid.

The two locked eyes, neither knowing whether to reach out or recoil. Brett’s shell gleamed dully against her jewel-toned plates; the air between them trembled with the strangeness of what they had become.

Then a sharp cry cut through the clearing.

Their daughter, Mallory, clutched her legs as they elongated unnaturally, her shoes splitting apart in the grass. Feathers — mottled brown and white — spread rapidly up her limbs and across her shoulders, a crest forming along her head. Her eyes widened in terror as her body balanced forward, her spine reshaping, a long tail feather bursting from her lower back to steady her stance.

“Mallory!” Winifred’s voice cracked — half-human, half hiss. Brett staggered toward his daughter, but his altered legs moved sluggishly, weighed down by the new shell that curved along his back.

Mallory’s breathing came in short, panicked bursts, yet her body seemed built for motion now — taut, aerodynamic, restless. She crouched instinctively, trembling, her new feathers glinting in the forest light.

The Weiss family stood together in stunned silence: a jeweled wasp, a cone snail, and a roadrunner — a grotesque parody of nature’s harmony. Brett reached out, hesitant, his voice a hoarse whisper.

“Win… what’s happening to us?”

Winifred didn’t answer. Her wings twitched faintly, catching the faint breeze that stirred the strange, glowing leaves above. Her eyes stayed fixed on Mallory — her daughter — who now looked ready to sprint from a world that no longer made sense.

The first scream belonged to Gail. It wasn’t loud, but strained — trembling with a hunger she didn’t understand. Her lips quivered as her face drew taut, her cheekbones sharpening until her reflection in her mother’s terrified eyes looked barely human. A strange pressure built behind her teeth. She gagged, coughed once, and something long and slender pushed past through her tongue — glistening, segmented, and ending in a fine, needle-like point. She gasped and clutched her throat, feeling the organ twitch and flex with an awful precision. Her breath came out in short, staccato hisses as the realization sank in: she could feel the pulse of every living thing around her — and it made her mouth water, before shortly her tongue and mouth returned to normal as if nothing had happened.

“Gail!” her mother, Juno, cried, stumbling forward — but the ground itself seemed to shudder under Vincent’s voice as he doubled over. His skin rippled like boiling metal, black and silver spreading in waves from his chest. Plates — not scales, but thick, armored segments — forced their way through the surface, locking together with a grinding, metallic sound. He groaned deep in his throat, clutching his arm as the armor crawled down to his fingers, sealing them in dark, articulated shells. His feet split and widened, heavy and solid, anchoring him to the earth. The weight of it nearly pulled him down, yet there was a terrible stability in the stance he found — an immovable, armored bulk, breathing steam through gritted teeth.

Juno’s hands shook as she reached toward both of them, torn between horror and love. The man she had known still stared back at her, but his eyes were ringed in steel-gray and glimmered like polished iron.

Gail lifted her head at the sound of their voices, the proboscis trembling from her mouth as if tasting the air. Her pupils had dilated to deep, glassy black, reflecting her parents’ warped silhouettes.

The family stood frozen in the clearing — the girl with the predator’s tongue, the father encased in living armor, and the mother watching both, her breath catching in disbelief.

Somewhere behind them, the forest stirred — distant heartbeats echoing faintly, calling to Gail’s new hunger.

Beside him, Juno shrieked as a riot of color exploded across her form. Her arms slenderized, bones becoming hollow and light as brilliant plumage – emerald greens, sun yellows, flashes of sapphire blue and ruby red – burst forth, reshaping them into elegant, feathered wings. Her facial features sharpened, her nose elongating and hardening into a proportional but distinctively shaped, vibrant toucanet beak, her eyes becoming keen and bird-like – a brightly plumed Selenidera Toucanet-woman.

Martin Wright’s scream fractured into a low, rattling hiss as his skin began to harden. It started at his fingertips—tiny plates pushing through the surface, dull and pink at first, then darkening into bronze-brown armor that overlapped like living shingles. The texture spread in ripples up his arms and across his chest, sealing him in a lattice of protective scales. His fingers curled, bones cracking and reforming into heavy claws built for tearing into soil. He fell to one knee, panting, the sound of his breath muffled by the rasp of his new armor.

Beside him, Rita Causey gasped, clutching her wrists as fine, silk-like strands spilled between her fingers. The air shimmered around her as her skin dulled to a pale amber hue, smooth and chitinous. Spinnerets twitched to life along her forearms, the first strands of silvery silk drifting out and catching on the forest breeze. She stared at her hands in disbelief, then at Martin, as if hoping he’d know what to do. Instead, he only stared back, scales glinting like dull coins under the strange forest light.

Kent Adler doubled over next, a guttural grunt escaping his throat. His shoulders widened, tendons swelling as a thick greenish-brown carapace burst across his back and chest. His right arm spasmed, bones grinding until his hand split into a grotesque crab’s claw that snapped reflexively with a metallic click. The sound made Rita flinch; silk spooled uncontrollably from her wrists, webbing between the trees like panic made visible.

And then came Pat Duvall. He had been laughing nervously only moments before, trying to make sense of the chaos, but the laughter died as his ears elongated and drooped against his neck. His jaw stretched forward, nose reshaping into a long, sensitive muzzle. He dropped to his knees, clutching his face, eyes wide as the world bloomed into scent—every tree, every person, every drop of blood in the air forming an overwhelming tapestry of information. A desperate whimper escaped his new throat, the sound somewhere between a sob and a howl.

The four of them — scaled, webbed, shelled, and muzzled — stared at one another beneath the dim canopy light. Their breaths mingled in clouds of fear, disbelief, and the faint musk of newly altered bodies. None spoke. They didn’t need to. The forest itself seemed to pulse with their shared panic, whispering the same unspoken truth: there was no going back.

Philip Marks doubled over with a strangled gasp, clutching his stomach as a burning pressure rippled beneath his skin. A dull cracking sound followed — not from bone, but from something harder forcing its way to the surface. Chitin spread in jagged lines across his arms and chest, glossy and dark like lacquered armor. He tried to tear at it, but his fingernails scraped uselessly against the shell forming underneath. His breath hitched, half sob, half growl, as the transformation crept upward toward his face.

A sharp pain split through his jaw. He fell to his hands and knees, coughing, spitting, until the shape of his mouth warped — jawline tightening, teeth giving way to two curved mandibles that snapped into place on either side of his lips. The sound of it was insectile and sharp, like knives clicking together. His scream turned guttural, buzzing faintly in his throat as his voice box reshaped. When he tried to speak, only a rough, clicking rasp escaped.

Beside him, Jack Sutton’s body answered the chaos with brute violence. His frame ballooned outward, muscles straining beneath his shirt until the seams split. His skin thickened into a hide dusted with coarse bristles that glinted under the strange forest light. He bared his teeth — then cried out as they pushed downward, thickening and curving into two massive boar tusks that tore through his lower lip. Blood streamed down his chin as he roared, staggering backward and smashing into a tree. The impact barely fazed him.

“Hey Phil—!” Jack tried to shout, but the name came out as a deep grunt, vibrating through his chest like thunder. His breath steamed in the cool air, his every inhale ragged and animal.

Philip turned toward him, mandibles twitching in confusion, a faint hum trembling beneath his voice. The two stared at one another — one plated and clicking, the other hulking and trembling — both still recognizably human but already drifting toward something primal.

The silence between them felt too heavy to break. Around them, the forest stirred — leaves shivering, insects singing faintly in the distance as if welcoming two new creatures into their strange new kingdom.

Conrad Castillo exhaled sharply, the sound coming out more like a hiss than a breath. His hands trembled as his skin began to shift beneath the surface, growing smooth, tight, and dry. The color drained from his flesh, replaced by faint diamond-shaped markings that shimmered in the half-light like living camouflage. His pulse slowed, every movement becoming deliberate, calculating. When his eyes met the faint gleam of light filtering through the leaves, his pupils contracted into thin, vertical slits.

He blinked once — and then the pain came. His jaw clenched, muscles tightening as something pushed through the soft flesh of his gums. Retractable fangs slid forward, glistening with venom. He spat blood into the soil, staring at it blankly before running his tongue over the new weapons that had taken the place of his canines. His voice, when it came, was little more than a whisper — sibilant, dangerous.

“Something’s… well, I can make this work.”

A few feet away, Silas Blackwood let out a strangled cry as his back convulsed. The fabric of his shirt split down the middle, revealing movement beneath his skin — eight distinct bulges pressing outward. With a wet, tearing sound, thin, dark limbs unfurled from his sides, twitching weakly as they breathed open air for the first time. Silas dropped to his knees, gasping, his hands clawing at the ground as the secondary appendages flexed independently behind him.

His breathing quickened, shallow and panicked. Spinnerets pulsed to life near his wrists, releasing strands of thin, sticky silk that clung to his trembling fingers. His veins stood out sharply against his pale skin, dark and throbbing, as though something venomous coursed just beneath the surface.

Conrad turned toward the sound, his newly slitted eyes narrowing, sensing heat and movement more than sight. Silas’s shadow writhed on the ground — human and not.

Neither spoke. Conrad’s tongue flicked once, tasting the air instinctively. Silas’s extra limbs twitched in reply, clicking faintly against one another. Between them hung a silence so thick it vibrated with unseen tension — two predators waking in the same nightmare, too changed to recognize themselves, too aware to mistake the other for prey.

The air was filled with inhuman growls, hisses, chirps, roars, clicks, and whimpers of agony and terror, all emanating from these newly formed beast-people.

"Fascinating!" I proclaimed, watching the grotesque ballet with rapt attention. "Watch how their inner natures, their suppressed desires, their hidden fears, all bloom forth, made manifest! The summoner gets a touch of vulpine cunning – fitting! The jealous Wasp, a sting of control! The shy Pangolin, his armor! The predatory Viper, his venom! Oh, the variety! Each one a unique expression of their base desires and pathetic little personalities, imprinted onto an animal chassis, yet still undeniably, frustratingly, humanoid in their basic structure. My designs are flawless! My genius, undeniable!"

Finally, the chaotic transformations subsided, leaving behind a clearing filled with over a hundred dazed, terrified, and monstrously altered ex-humans, now bipedal beast-folk. The masks were gone, fully integrated into their new facial structures. They stared at their own changed hands, paws, claws, tentacles, and chitinous limbs. They felt an unfamiliar weight, new balances, alien senses (sharper smell, acute hearing, multi-faceted vision, heat pits) flooding their brains. Then, slowly, hesitantly, they began to look at each other, truly seeing their new hybrid forms for the first time.

The silence that followed was heavier, more terrible, than any of the screams. It was the silence of utter, uncomprehending horror.

"Transformation complete!" I announced with a flourish, though only I could hear my own internal fanfare. "Behold, the graduating class of… well, let's call this little dimensional cul-de-sac 'The Crucible'! Aren't they… something? Stripped bare, quite literally. Their masks made manifest. Now they wear their true selves on the outside, grafted onto their stubborn human frames. Let's see how they cope."

My voice, now coming from everywhere and nowhere, boomed around the terrified, newly minted beast-men.

"WELCOME, my little experiments, to your new forever home!" I declared, my tone laced with mocking grandiosity. "Do try to admire the scenery between bouts of screaming. Isn't it… rustic?" My laughter echoed through the alien trees. "Yes, this charming little backwater planet, generously provided for my entertainment – and yours, I suppose, in a 'character-building' sort of way. My expectations? Simple! Survive! Struggle! Suffer! Entertain me! Show me what happens when pathetic little humans are given a real taste of the food chain, when their flimsy civilization is stripped away and only the beast remains!"

I let that sink in for a moment.

"I must say," I continued, my voice dripping with false modesty, "the transformations came out rather well, wouldn't you agree? A testament to my genius! Each of you, wearing your truest self for all to see! Pathetic, isn't it, how little artifice it took to reveal the monster beneath your skin?" Another chuckle. "Now, don't go dreaming of returning to your drab little lives, your tedious routines. That door is closed. Permanently. This lovely, lethal sandbox is where you belong now. It is your new reality, your new truth."

"So! Best of luck out there!" I concluded, my voice beginning to fade like a dying echo. "Do try not to die too quickly – it ruins the narrative arc and makes for dull viewing. Me? I think I'll grab some popcorn," (the faint, illusory sound of popcorn popping might have briefly echoed through the silent, terrified group) "Sit back on my couch of solidified despair, and enjoy the show! Or perhaps catch up on a few centuries of reading I've missed. Honestly, watching prey animals adapt gets a bit repetitive after the first few millennia if there isn't a good plot. Ta-ta for now! Don't disappoint me!"

And with that, the last vestiges of my perceived presence vanished, leaving them utterly alone in the oppressive silence of the alien forest, grappling with their new forms and the crushing weight of their new reality.