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Chapter 1: January

Paul hated his job. He hated everything about his job. He didn't like how often he had to get up so early just to be able to make it to his job due to all of the traffic he always ran into on his daily commute. He hated the people he worked with and especially hated the person he worked for. The job itself gave no sense of accomplishment for him. The only reason he didn't just quit his job is because the money he was being paid to do that job wasn't bad and he couldn't afford to quit without having a better job already lined up.

His therapist had instructed him to not think about work on the drive. Instead she wanted him to make a point every morning to head to work and not spend any of that time actually on his thoughts about his job. Instead she wanted him to go to the restroom every day when he gets to work and then just sit there for five to ten minutes while his mind acclimates to doing his job. Though he was skeptical at first he found that it did actually help. Somehow he had managed to condition himself such that neither his job nor how much he hated it ever crossed his mind until after he had been to the bathroom and by then he was already at work and thus couldn't do anything about it.

As he pulled up to the parking lot he takes stock of the sight. Normally he had arrived close enough to when he needed to be there that he didn't really have time to think about it but on this day he managed to arrive a good ten minutes early so he had time to think about the layout of his building. The parking lot was off to the side of the building. He steps out of the car and braces himself for a split second against the cold of the January weather. He grabs his coat and wraps it a little tighter around himself. He begins walking to the side of the building, noting idly the high traffic road that is just outside the main doors to his building. On top of that painted along the side wall of the building is one large advertisement for something or another. Paul could never tell what it was about, only that it was put up there about a month ago. The advertisement was plain enough, simple colors and the quotation about starting a new life but does not mention anything else regarding what the ad is for.

Unfortunately for him, on this particular day when he entered the building and headed towards the restroom he was shocked to find that one of his more talkative coworkers were standing around the restroom talking to another of his coworkers. Knowing that he wouldn't be able to get to be able to do his routine without having to be dragged into a long useless conversation Paul decided to instead try and carry out his normal routine but at his desk instead. When he gets to his desk, however, he finds that someone seems to have left something on his keyboard, primarily a little thing of stone and a note. After hanging up his coat on a nearby coat rack he sits down in his chair and picks up the stone and examines it. As far as he can tell it looks like obsidian but carved in the form of a chess piece. Curious as to what it is for he picks up the note and reads it.

"To Paul:

You are granted the gift of pawn. In chess this piece most likely to start game is that of pawn. It is easily weakest of all the pieces but without it game could never start thus I entrusting this stage of game to you. Just another hand on right insignificant individual. I know how confused you all be but know that a bird falling out of a plane and a thing of death in a place of life are only clue you'll ever get. You take the weird you've bowed away."

Paul stares at it a moment to try and make sense of it all as well as try to find out who it came from before shrugging and crumpling up the paper and throwing it into the trash. He picks up the pawn again and looks at it. It did seem like a rather expensive piece to just randomly give away to someone. But one can't really do anything with just one piece, however nice it appears so Paul places it on the far corner of his desk before going ahead and trying to get himself ready to actually go about working. He didn't manage to get very far in his work however as before he even managed to log into his computer he was starting to feel nauseous. Paul tried just ignoring it but with each second the nausea grew and on top of that his whole body was beginning to ache as if all of his muscles all over his body were caught up in knots.

He stops and turns away from his monitor, grabbing the trash bin in case he had eaten something bad and now has to throw up. But when he reaches for the bin he notices something odd. Distracted he puts the bin down as one arm clenches his ill abdomen and raises the other up so that he can examine it more closely. Everywhere along his body his skin is starting to feel very itchy and at the same time, while looking at his arm he sees that dark brown hairs are beginning to grow from his arm at a rate that, though still somewhat slow, is very noticeably growing right in front of his eyes. His hand cramps up particularly his thumb and when he examines it he can see a change in all of his fingers.

"The hell?" he asks before biting his tongue.

Responding to the pain he raises a hand to his mouth but notices something is definitely not right with his teeth. For starters his canine teeth seemed to be much larger and sharper than they normally are and entire mouth is starting to feel almost cramped, like the teeth are practically fighting each other for space.

Panicking he gets up and heads towards the bathroom to get to a stall where he can hide from everyone else until he can sort out what's going on, particularly if it is real or just a hallucination caused by something. The act of walking causes the ache all over his body to increase considerably as well as make his feet start to feel incredibly cramped inside of his shoes as if he were wearing too small of shoes. The person he didn't want to talk to is still there in front of the bathroom, predictably enough.

"Oh, hey, Paul. Have you heard about-," the man begins.

"I'm sorry. I can't stay and talk. I feel sick," Paul brushes him off before walking right past him.

"Oh, okay. Hope you feel better," the man shrugs before going back to his conversation with one of the other coworkers.

As Paul reaches the bathroom the door opens, almost knocking him over. A man that Paul didn't recognize steps out and walks past Paul. Distracted Paul starts to try and speak before stopping, completely confused at the presence of the man. The man's appearance itself is rather unremarkable. He's fairly well dressed and wearing glasses, but what stands out is the fact he's wearing a white lab coat when there is no laboratory at all in that building.

The increasingly uncomfortable shoes bring Paul back to his senses. He goes into the bathroom and stops at the sink to try and collect his wits for the moment. He looks at the mirror and sees through the reflection something that no longer looks completely human. His ears seem to have become slightly pointed and are higher up than they normally are and his nose has become somewhat blackened and noticeably larger. Paul moves hears motion coming to the bathroom and runs into the stall he normally does his morning routine in to hide. He sits on the stall rather uncomfortably as his tail bone has gotten long enough that it can start poking against stuff but not nearly long enough yet that it can be moved to avoid being sat on.

"What is going on here?" he asks to himself. "Why is this happening to me?"

Paul finally decides to do one thing he can do to make himself a little more comfortable and goes about trying to remove his shoes, which proves to be somewhat harder as his fingers have become considerably less dexterous than they normally would be and are about half as long and twice as thick. After a fashion he manages to take his shoes off. He has to stifle crying out from what he sees. Instead of what normally would be human feet looks animalistic, to the extent of looking more like he was looking at the feet of some stray dog than his own.

Paul curls as much into a ball as he can while sitting on top of the toilet seat and places what remains of his hands against his head as he rocks back and forth slowly as he tries to make sense of everything as well as try to wake himself up or deny the changes going through his body. The changes however do not stop and with every passing second his body changes slightly more and more. Finally the insulation from the fur in his chest as well as a strange impulse running throughout him forces him to try and cool off as he practically ends up tearing off his shirt. Once done Paul looks up and notices that there seems to be an inscription on the door that was not normally there.

"You will not find any reprieve here. If you run away you may still have a chance to retain at least some of your humanity."

Finding it as possibly a means of hope Paul struggles back to his feet and struggles for a moment before managing to open the door to the stall and back into the restroom proper. With the chance of an escape from this horrible condition that is affecting him Paul makes way towards the door and closer to his freedom. But not before managing to chance a glance at the mirror one more time. His face doesn't look even remotely human anymore. In fact it looks not quite like that of a fox. His mouth doesn't quite seem long enough yet and there are still some patches of his normal skin and the ears aren't quite all the way to the top of his head quite yet. He also notices that he seems to have shrunk by a good few inches. He continues running out of the rest room in his bid for escape. As he starts running again he finds that the discomfort and nausea increases considerably from when he was in the stall.

He bursts out of the restroom, having completely forgotten his shirt and shoes and the thought of trying to get his coat for the cold outside completely escapes his mind. His coworkers cry out at his appearance and in the confusion the annoying coworker ends up standing in the way from Paul and the exit. Being more than slightly startled by the outcry Paul doesn't know what to do and instead growls at the coworker before taking a swipe at him and managing to draw blood.

The noise being caused by the panic from the people he used to work with hurts Paul's ears and only makes it even harder for him to try and think clearly. He doesn't even notice his attack on the coworker as he continues his dash towards freedom. He can already see the entire world around him starting to grow at an alarmingly fast rate and before long he ends up tripping over his pants. Growling he moves his rather vestigial fingers to try and undo the button so that he can take them off as the only purpose they seem to have to him is to slow him down. He can't quite manage to work the button and part of him gets frustrated as he finds it difficult how he's even supposed to undo the button. He does manage, however to slip free of the trousers and wiggles his growing tail in relief. He takes a moment to look back at the new appendage and doesn't understand why that makes him feel so much fear all again.

Regardless of his reasoning he begins bolting again as he sees some more humans rushing at him. At first he tries to get back up to run on two legs but his hip is starting to hurt, as are his heels so he decides to instead try and run it on all four legs. Paul is already finding it very difficult to think of anything at this point than the intent on leaving this place and reaching freedom. His motion is somewhat unsteady at first as his front limbs are not quite yet designed to be able to handle the strain of fast motion all that well yet.

As Paul moves it starts to become easier and easier for him to run on all fours and as he starts to get close to the exit his heart leaps in excitement at the chance for freedom. So enraptured with the sight of his own freedom he doesn't notice the glass door and ends up crashing right into it. He spends a moment somewhat dazed as he tries to recover from the blow and then looks at the door. Though it takes him a moment to do so he can figure out what happened and glancing at his body he can see that it has almost completely transformed into that of a fox. As such he can tell that there would be no chance he could open the door up by his own power but he also remembers that there is that little blue button that will open the door for him.

He looks around for the button along the walls as his vision begins to change, making it a lot harder for him to focus on what he's looking at as well as lose the ability to distinguish between some of the colors. He notices something blue on the wall and presses at it. Having shrunk considerably by this point it takes him a few tries before he finally manages to push it in, at which point the doors motion startles him and he jumps back as a reflex. Sniffing the air for a bit as he tries to determine if there's a threat in the door he makes his break for freedom.

As he makes his way out to the assumed safety of being outside of that confining building he doesn't remember why it is that he was in such a hurry to try and escape that building. He spends a split second getting used to the change in temperature, rather surprised that he hardly feels the slightest bit cold even though he's completely naked. As he tries to get his bearings on his surroundings he can start to feel something building up in him again, a sort of pressure that is gradually increasing inside of his chest. Worried that the building might be causing it he bolts away from the building and directly into the road, not able to figure out why there's an almost nagging thought in the back of his head that doing such is not a good idea. He can see large things moving very fast at him from both directions and the noise its emitting at him hurts his ears, as are all of the sounds and smells that are assaulting his senses. He makes it to the other side after a fashion, barely managing to not get hit by one of those large and loud things.

Paul stops a moment and lets his heart stop racing so much as he also starts trying to find a way to stop the still building pressure. Eventually it gets so much that he is starting to fear that it'll end up causing something to explode out of him. Just as he cannot handle anymore he cries out with all of his might and from him comes a burst of red light that radiates in a circle, creating a growing ring before the light disappears and with it the rest of Paul's humanity.

Moments later a red fox is seen running down the streets, terrified of all of the people as it tries to find some place to hide until it can calm down enough to begin.