Animal Testing
Story by ArmadilloZero on SoFurry
I dedicate this one to Rack. They wanted to see behind the curtain. But sometimes answers just lead to more questions about what is really going on.
Waking up to the sound of keys jingling in a door lock was a common start of the day for Andrew the Armadillo. His little body curls into a ball in his cage. He listens to the door open and footsteps walk across the floor. A human with a lab coat looks around at the row of caged animals. He bends his face down to check on Andrew. "How are you doing today Andy?" Andrew responds, "Leave me alone." The doctor announces, "If I did that, then you wouldn't have a chance to earn everyone their daily rations. You could starve to death." He shakes a cup of dry dog food.
It isn't always Andrew's turn to earn the food. It was just his bad luck to be picked today. The other animals quietly sigh in relief that it wasn't them.
With resignation Andrew uncurls his body. He lays on his shell and looks at the doctor upside down. Andrew says, "Fine, what do you want today?" The man says, "I have been working on the machine and I think I have improved the process." With resignation Andrew rolls over and walks to the door of the cage. The man quickly pours the food in the other cages and places the cup with the rest beside Andrew's cage. He knows not to give the reward until afterwards.
Andrew is lifted up into the man's chest and is carried through the door. Andrew considers biting the human but knows that it wouldn't end well for him. He has seen other test subjects try that and has never seen them again. The doctor pets Andrew with one sided affection as he walks.
The doctor sets Andrew down in a transformation booth and swings the door shut. The same type of booth that Andrew used when he first became an armadillo. This one was missing the safety lockouts and had wires running to various home made devices. The inside had a faint smell of burnt hair. The booth hums to life as the doctor runs his custom software.
The standard pre transformation safety questions taunt him, "Are you here of your own free will?" Andrew yells, "NO!" The machine lacks a mic to hear him. "Are you sure you want to be ERROR?" Andrew cries to himself at the hopelessness of the situation as the questions continue.
The machine says, "Close your eyes and exhale." Andrew complies and pain explodes in every nerve ending of his armadillo body. His body starts to change as the magical forces rip his cells apart and reassemble them. It only lasts a few seconds and the machine hisses at it's unintended use. Opening his eyes, Andrew looks at the claws on his paws. They looked different but still like an armadillo. He feels his head and still feels the armor on top.
The booth door swings open and the Doctor admires his work. Andrew asks, "What did you do to me this time?" Doc says, "Not much, just made you a nine banded armadillo now. With record breakingly short time since the last time I changed you." Andrew cries, "There is a reason there is a waiting period. It felt like you were killing me."
Andrew crawls out of the booth. The lower half of his body is numb. The doctor notices and starts proding while asking, "Can you feel this?"
After writing down the results, the doctor returns Andrew to his cage. He dumps the food in the cage and says with indifference, "I'm gonna get back to work, just keep trying to move your legs or tail and I will check on you tomorrow."
The doctor looks around at the other cages and says, "I need a volunteer to help take care of Andy." Andrew hears a voice a few cages down. The doctor smiles and says "Thank you Luke!" Andrew's cage opens and a raccoon is shoved in. They both stare after the doctor as he leaves and relocks the door.
Luke says, "Wow, you look pretty bad." Andrew says with a wimper, "I can't feel my legs." Luke walks over and starts poking at them. He asks, "Anything?" Andrew shakes his head. With a sigh Luke walks over to the food pellets and holds them out for Andrew to eat one by one. The opossum in the next cage over watches through the bars.
The bunny on the opposite side says, "Did you see a way to escape while you were out there?" Andrew looks at her and says, "Don't you get it yet? There is no escape!" He doesn't blame her, she's still pretty new here. As the weeks turn into months her attitude will change.
Luke picks up Andrew's tail and drops it with a thud a few times. Luke diagnoses, "Probably severed your spinal cord. Just be glad it was only your legs. It's not like we do much walking in these cages anyways."
Andrew cries to himself. He looks up at Luke and asks "Hold me?" Luke drags Andrew over to the bedding in the corner and hugs against him, as they fall asleep together.
The next morning the doctor looks over the crippled armadillo and says, "I could probably fix you. But it's going to hurt a lot more than last time." Desperate to regain the use of his legs Andrew begs, "Please, I don't care!" Doctor smiles and says, "Luke time to get back to your cage." He grabs the raccoon by the scruff of his neck and sets him back in his own cage.
Grabbing Andrew by his tail, he holds the armadillo at eye level and says, "I think I will definitely get the spell right this time." He walks over to drop Andrew in the booth and rushes over to the console. He turns a nob to increase voltage and starts reading through the programing code. He changes a line of code and then presses the start button.
The booth glows with arcane energy as it overpowers yesterday's work. A howling noise is heard in the booth as Andrew flops around in pain. The machine's hum cuts off and the room is quiet. Doctor opens the door and finds a very black human shaped shadow with glowing orange eyes looking back at him. He tries to slam the door closed but a hand holds it open.
A voice says, "Doctor, You've been very bad." The creature formerly known as Andrew steps out of the booth and grabs the Doctor. The shadow is super charged by the extreme amount of magic pumped into one body in such a short time period. Shadow Andrew grabs at the doctor's clothes and they melt away. He uses his magical strength to push the naked doctor into the booth and locks the door. The Shadow writes a glowing symbol on the door with a finger and the machine begins to hum and glow of it's own volitions.
The doctor's screaming cuts in and out as his body is melted and put back together several times. Walking to the test subject room the door melts as Andrew touches the knob. The animals give a fright at the impossibly black human shaped shadow. Orange light fills the room as the shadow runs a finger across the hinges of all the cages. The doors melt with the extreme power flowing through them and fall to the floor one by one. The living shadow walks off to check on the doctor.
It's orange eyes look through the code on the screen. The shadow touches the screen and the code changes. The booth is now quiet. The animals have exited their cages and peek through the doorway at what their savior will do. The booth pops open and a hamster looks out. Luke scurries over and quickly grabs it.
The shadow begins to change and it shrinks down to the shape of an armadillo. The skin lightens up to a normal grey and the orange glow stops. Andrew the Armadillo is in his original form and looks around confused. He sees Luke holding a hamster and asks, "What just happened?" Luke looks up from the hamster and says, "You did the impossible and saved us from this psychopath."