literature

Noah's Ark

Deviation Actions

Published: Mar 18, 2014

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Literature Text

A traveling fair has come to your town and of course you check it out. Most of the sideshows are of the usual variety but there is one new attraction; Noah's Ark!

Asking the bearded ticket seller, you are told that the ark is a kind of funhouse shaped like a boat surrounded by wooden waves. The ark also rocks backwards and forwards. Eagerly you pay your entrance fee and set off through the maze of waves and rocky headlands towards the boat itself...

Your path takes you through fake rocky tunnels, along corridors lined with moving walls painted like cardboard waves and over wobbly stepping stones. As you are passing through a dark tunnel you get sprayed with water (or what you hope to be water)!

Finally you come to the entrance of the ark itself. Crossing the gangplank, you enter the ark and come across a sign

< MALES LEFT
FEMALES RIGHT >

Staring blankly at the sign, you feel puzzled as to why they'd separate the guys and girls in a fair's funhouse... what could be the purpose behind it? Since you entered alone and no one else seems to be around, you decide to check out what you'd be missing if someone were to force you to follow the instructions and go right. Pivoting, you head left...

Wooden walls close in around you as you enter the ark, twisting around sharp corners, funneling you into the bowels of the "ship." Fake-candle bulbs flicker in sconces every 10 feet or so, illuminating the tight, low-ceilinged hall. The flickering takes on a slightly strobe-like quality, and you find yourself gazing at each lamp you pass, a faint throbbing beginning to echo in your head, The lights grow dimmer and dimmer, seeming more realistic by the moment. You shake your head, assuming the solitude and silence is affecting your perceptions.

It's becoming difficult to see in the dim glow of the intermittent candles, so you reach your hand out to the wall, it's surface feeling surprisingly rough beneath your palms. Your hands feel faintly itchy and tight, sliding over the wooden planks. You stop for a moment, hoping your eyes will adjust to the lowered lighting, and absent-mindedly lift your feet to flex your ankles... your toes feel cramped in your sneakers. Crouching to scan the floor, you loosen the laces of your shoes to alleviate the increasing pressure. Your fingers feel thicker and clumsier, and you squint at them, thinking the lighting (or lack thereof) has made your hands appear larger, rougher and less dainty.

Rising your take a few more steps before yelping at a sharp pain in your feet! They are squeezed in your shoes, the canvas bulging and constricting your circulation! Did you accidentally grab your little sister's sneakers as you left the house tonight? Quickly, you yank the painfully-tight shoes off, wriggling your toes on the smooth plank flooring with a sigh of relief.

Tying the laces together, you toss the shoes over your shoulder and continue on, twisting around more right-angled corners than you can count. Just when you feel hopelessly turned about, despite there only having been one way forward, you come to a split in the corridor. Another sign hangs before you, this time giving three directions:

< MAMMALS LEFT
REPTILES RIGHT >
^ AVIANS STRAIGHT ^

Reptiles? You shudder. You've never felt a liking for those cold-blooded animals. Birds would be neat to see, you think, wondering what might be at the end of these corridors. But you decided to stick to your leftward-leaning instincts and you follow the sign pointing toward the mammals.

Maybe this leads to some sort of petting zoo, you think, absently reaching up to scratch a tingling behind your ear. You run your throbbing fingers over your scalp, feeling a prickling in your hair follicles. Must be dusty down in these corridors. Dropping your hands, you roll your shoulders a few times, starting to feel confined. You've never experienced claustrophobia before, but your shirt is feeling tight and you're beginning to pant a bit, your mouth hanging open just a tad.

Padding along, you don't notice that you've started to walk on tip-toe, the arches of your feet elongating a bit with each step and you toes plump and expand, a rough callus forming under the ball of your foot and each toe. You gait slows, and your shins and knees begin to tingle, but you have suddenly become absorbed in the flickering light of the next candle. Mesmerized, you reach out, astonished despite the visual evidence to find a real wax candle in the sconce.

As you pull your hand away from the light, you become aware of a faint scrabbling behind the wall beside you. Your ears twitch, following the sound, swiveling a bit on the side of your head. You notice that the candles must be letting off more light than before, because suddenly you can see every crack in the wooden planks surrounding you. Your eyes dart about, your vision sharper by the second.

Reaching up again to scratch at an itch on your upper lip, you notice your thicker fingers feel stubbier, and your nails sharper. Rubbing your mouth, your fingertips feel a short stubble pushing through the skin of your face - it must be time to schedule a waxing appointment again, you think.

The corridor opens out abruptly and you find yourself in a circular room, this time branching in more than ten directions like the spokes of a wheel! You wonder just how large this "ship" can really be on the inside! The signs rattle off more choices, and you're tempted by many:

AQUATIC, EQUINE, MARSUPIAL, FELINE, CANINE, BOVINE

Along with some you don't even recognize, such as

MONOTREMES, ANAGALIDA, and UNGULATES

Choosing to stick with something you can at least decipher, you follow your instincts again and head left, down the path labeled FELINE.

The candles begin to get farther and farther apart, and your feet are really starting to ache. Deciding to sit down for a minute to rest, you let yourself slide down the wall - you feel like you've been in this funhouse forever, yet you haven't seen another soul! Rubbing your short hands over your thighs, you wonder if you have lost weight recently - they feel thinner than you remember. You can feel the nap of fuzz too, and make another mental note to shave your legs the next time you shower.

A crick in your neck has you tilting your head back, and you find yourself slumping against the wall awkwardly as a yarn cracks your jaw. Suddenly exhausted, you decided to lay on your side for a second, just to catch a quick nap... no one is coming through the ark anyway… and your head feels sooo heavy…

… You were having the strangest dream! It’s very dark, a lone candle flickers somewhere above you, but you’re too tired to do more than blink slowly and wriggle into a more comfortable position. Stretching your legs out and arching your back, you roll around for a minute. Your shoulders feel funny, flatter, like they’re pressed in from your back to lie parallel to your spine. Weird. And thinking of it, your spine is tingling a bit, feeling kinda… stretched. You twist your neck to relieve the crick, tilting your heavy head up and down. Something flops under your thighs, tickling and pulsing. Huffing a sigh, you reach up to rub the sleep from your eyes, your fingers feeling rough and stubby while your eyelids feel fuzzy.

Blinking, you realize you can see a little better, the candle must have gotten a bit brighter. The details of the rough wooden walls and ceiling are much clearer. Stretching once more, you allow your arms to reach above you, and you blink again, this time in surprise. Two black forearms with wide, heavy paws are extended above your head, and even as you think it, the toes flex and curl, wicked claws extending outwards. Fascinated and still in a sleepy daze, you lower your arms, the paws lowering as well as your gaze follows them down. A black mass protrudes, blocking your sight as you look where your chest should be. Shifting to your side, the mass moves with you, and you realize with a jolt that it is your chest, your ribs elongated outward instead of side-to-side.

Shaking the fuzz from your brain, your alarm grows as your eyes adjust and your… body becomes clearer. Where are your clothes?! Did you take them off when you decided to take a quick nap?! Your skin is all black, but it seems to gleam in the flickering candlelight and you realize you’re covered in jet-black fur, iridescent flecks tossing the light back! Turning quickly now, you place your arms under you, still shocked when you realize the paws from before are where your hands should be. They’re as large as dinner plates! Your hips twist as well, your thinned pelvis curved under and your legs feeling funnily folded, silky fur rubbing against silky fur as you wiggle and get them beneath you. Pushing up, you find yourself standing on the balls of your feet, your legs seemingly shorter as you straighten them, your spine parallel to the floor. Glancing back, you are no longer really surprised to see two more paws where your feet once were.

Something twitches behind your rear legs, and as you focus a long, sleek tail comes into view, the tip giving little jerks. What’s more, you can feel each movement, whipping it back and forth without thought, the appendage twice the length of your legs! Slowly, still mesmerized by your new tail, you become aware of a protrusion closer to your eyes, as if your nose had flattened and broadened, pushing your mouth and jaws out in front of you, a dark muzzle sporting extra-long whiskers that quiver as your focus shifts. Carefully, you open your mouth, probing with your dry, raspy tongue. Your front teeth feel tiny, but you quickly find four enormous canines sprouted from your upper and lower jaws, somehow easily sheathing themselves together behind your thick lips.

Abruptly, your hind legs collapse, and you find yourself sitting in disbelief. An unfamiliar pressure between your thighs alerts you to another change, and you almost collapse completely, unsure if you can take in any more. Reluctantly dropping your gaze, you lean your hips against the wall, allowing your thinner fur-covered thighs to fall open. Yep, just as you suspected: balls. Large furry, black balls right behind a slight bulge that you just know contains a furry black… erHEM!

You can feel a scream building in your throat, but it seems to get stuck, coming out as a deep, raspy cough. Peeling your lips back, a frustrated snarl builds, coming out as a coughing growl of fear at your inexplicable predicament. Clenching your paws, claws extend, and you cower back against the rough wall as you carve deep gouges into the floor.

A light breeze suddenly picks up, winding gently down the corridor and your whiskers twitch as a scent reaches you on the wind, completely new but somehow soothing and alarming all at once. Huffing and coughing, your mind calms a bit, your nose greedily sniffing the air as your instincts take over. Without thought, you rise, your four paws automatically working in unison as you start to slink along the corridor.

Keeping to the flickering shadows, your pupils narrow as you approach each sconce with it’s trembling flame, dilating in the darkness between lights. The scent is getting stronger, and your pace picks up into a lope, silent paws skimming over the planks as you feel yourself closing in on your goal. Turning another corner, you pull up short, finding yourself at the end of the road. Before you the floor abruptly ends, the opening looking out into the huge hold of a ship, rough planks, thick beams and torches flickering everywhere! Identical openings line the wall 100 feet across from you, four rows high and stretching two hundred feet in each direction!

Dumbfounded (again) you shake your head, your mouth gaping slightly as you pant nervously. A hundred smells assault your sensitive nose just as an awful racket reaches your ears, which you suddenly feel twitching high on your head. Looking down, you realize the floor is teeming with animals, all shapes and sizes and species represented! As you watch, two tall giraffes find each other in the seething mass, their long necks twining together as their dark tongues flick out. A trumpeting draws your attention, and you spy an enormous elephant emerging from one of the openings on the floor opposite, trunk raised as it bellows it’s call. An answering sound echoes across the throng from below you, and you glance down to see another pushing through the crowd towards it’s mate.

Birds of every feather are flapping through the higher beams, two toucans perched beak-cheek to beak-cheek on the trestle above your corridor. Realizing you are on the fourth level above the floor, you begin to wonder how you’ll get down, and if you even want to enter that tangled assortment, when suddenly a familiar scent reaches you again, accompanied by a faint coughing. Eyes searching the zoo, you think you spy a sleek shadow slipping between stamping legs of every kind, but it disappears before you can be sure. Craning your neck out over the edge, you realize the walls are covered in vines, many thicker than your torso, creating an easy path to the floor for one equipped with gripping claws or nimble cloven hooves. Making a quick descent, gracefully leaping from wide-vine to wider-vine, you draw closer to the tantalizing scent.

Winding your way through the excited menagerie, you are suddenly confronted with your shadow, at least, you think it is your shadow for a split second until tawny greenish eyes blink out at you, your shadow suddenly sitting back on her slightly-smaller haunches. Shaking off the shock, you slowly approach, the mob pulsing around you. The scent from before is strong, overwhelming your senses and settling deep within you a strong sense of “rightness.” Circling around her, your eyes take in her smaller size, more petite head and shimmering, glossy black coat. As you come up alongside her, you can feel your long tails entwining, caressing as she leans into you and rubs her cheek against your neck.

Your mouth falls open once more and your tongue pulls back as you finally emit a full-throated ROAR, this time of complete contentment!

Using a setting from a choose-your-own-change transformation site, I may have gotten a little carried away with this one - since I love the idea of alternate possibilities, I encourage additions, alternate paths, etc, but be sure to send me a link because I LOVE to read this stuff!