You are standing by a tree
There are 3 paths.
One appears to go to a jungle,
one appears to go to a cave,
one appears to go to a beach,
you could try and climb the tree,
there is a nearby shop you could go in,
or you could do something else.
So what's its going to be?
Written by catprog on 01 April 2003
In the shop
There is a table with a sign saying
<strong>Free Sample:</strong>
Take one
On the table there is a fridge with a range of liquids. Also on the table are various magical trinkets including costumes. What would you like to take, or would you like to buy something?
Written by catprog on 10 April 2003
Into the shop
You decide to go into the shop to look around.
Inside it is very dusty and is crammed with shelves. There is lots of products that overflow from the shelves and are lying on the floor.
You notice the counter and the old man in a bathrobe behind it. "Welcome <<your name here>>" he says. "How do you know my name?" you ask the old man "Simple, I am a wizard" he responds "Have a look around too see if there is anything you would like to buy".
Written by catprog on 13 December 2005
The Lion Fang
((Hello everyone, I am Lorik and this is my first time to post on an interactive storyline. I do have a fairly lengthy story piece planned out to post to this thread, one a day until its done, but do feel free to branch out on it wherever you like. I am not sure how many branches are allowed to a single post though, so if you are wanting to branch off of the most recent post I made please make sure there is a slot still open for me to continue :)(From admin: Unlimited Posts (although only 5 to start of with)) Also, please feel free to email me at LorikFurdin@yahoo.com if you have ideas or suggestions you would like to see in the storyline I am writing as I really love taking requests and the like. Well without further ado...))
((Changes in this episode: Male human to female liontaur))
As you browse through the shop an interesting trinket catches your eye. Hanging on a peg in a dusty, rather forgotten corner of the building is an ornately jewelled amulet. The actual ornament hanging from the silvery chain is a small circle, perhaps the length of your index finger in diameter. The perimeter is a silver metallic ring that holds a vibrant blue disk of some odd type of rock you have never seen before. Holding it up to the light causes the same shade of bright blue light to be cast on you as the stone seems to filter light somewhat like glass, though its not nearly as transparent.
The focal point of the amulet however, is a bright red stone image of a fang. It has a gentle curve to it, and the tip of it is very sharp in appearance. All in all you decide that the amulet is definitely an interesting artifact that is worth further investigation. You take it to the front of the shop and present it to the shopkeeper. He studies you for a moment and then announces that the amulet will cost you a mere five dollars.
You are slightly surprised but you figure the amulet is just some sort of costume jewelery anyway, considering the shop you found it in. You pay for the amulet then slip it over your head and around your neck and head back home.
By the time you return to your home the sun has already set so you make yourself a light dinner, watch TV for a few hours and head to bed, still wearing the amulet. That night you have a peculiar dream where you are running through the forest as fast as you can, practically flying across the ground and you keep looking back and seeing a lot of men from some sort of tribe chasing you with spears.
Every time they get you trapped against a wall and one of them is coming at you with a rope. The moment he grabs you though you always wake up.
The third time this occurs you can no longer sleep at all. You feel hot and agitated and your boxers feel uncomfortably tight.
You stand up next to your bed and stretch, tugging at the boxers to try to relieve the pressure but its no good. It just gets worse and worse. Suddenly you hear a soft tearing as the cloth of your boxers starts to give away along the seems. Suddenly it does and they flutter to the ground and you look down in utter shock to see that your waist is covered in soft white fur!
You yelp in fright and start to run toward the phone to call for help, but you feel an odd pressure on your feet and tumble forward as you can no longer step properly. Looking back you see that your feet are lengthening and becoming more slender as soft tan fur spreads across them. You reach down to feel them and much to your surprise you discover thick leather pads have already developed on their underside and not only can you feel the fur with your fingertips, but you feel a slightly pleasant sensation in your paw/foot as your fur is rubbed by your hand.
You gently squeeze the paw and are shocked to see lethal claws slowly slide out of each blunt furry toe. You try to rise again but find this impossible as your hips shift and oddly you can feel them start to move backward at an odd angle as two bits of pressure form in your lower body where your legs begin from your waist.
As you stare, the two lumps press down and begin to take shape, forming two slender furry legs complete with the forepaws of a lion at the end. You reach down to stroke the new fur as you can feel your back legs still being pushed away from you as you develop a long slender leonine body between the two sets of furry feline legs.
Hesitantly you rise to all fours, looking back at the lion body, now complete with gentle swaying tail.
But the changes aren't quite finished. You feel a cool chill sweep over you as you feel an odd burning under your tail, and your skin softens noticeably followed by a very strange change indeed. You begin to feel a soft pressure against your shirt and you look down as you see two firm breasts pushing out against your night shirt, leaving you very distinctly female.
Finally you feel a slight stinging on your slender feline belly as four feline teats develop, and the new mounds on your chest tingle slightly and you find yourself purring as you pad clumsily into the bathroom, staring down at the bulge in your shirt in shock. You've become a leotauress. Now you just have to decide what to do first...
((Hope this wasn't too long... but I wanted to have a good plotset ^^)
Written by LorikFurdin on 13 May 2005
Weeks later, in another place
The jungles of India were not quiet, though not for the sounds of wildlife. People hadbeen in a constant panic, a gripping fear, ever since the outbreak of the strange curse that had changed men and women into tigerfolk. At first, some feared that the people affected were in fact rakshasa. As this went on, more began to wonder whether the cause was a wielder of hoodoo, or some form of demon, or perhaps even divine in nature.
Among them was Richard, a tourist from England, who was simply on vacation and in the wrong place at the wrong time. The curse seemed to be centralized in the village he had come to.
He grumbled slightly as he turned on the old television with his clumsy fingers and claws, fumbling with the buttons on the monitor itself. Apparently his hotel had run the remote through the wash after it had gotten caught in the sheets the last time they did the laundry. "The one time I take a good long holiday from the office in five years, and I got hair comin' out above my ass,"
Richard sighed as the screen finally clicked on.
Written by Machaeus on 12 November 2015
Newsreport 1
"– unknown what is causing these changes, but they've sparked in various places all over the globe," the newscaster said, and Richard's eyes bugged out as he saw the picture in the corner of the screen – a coyoteman and a woman who seemed to be halfblue jay, of all things. "No less than twenty outbreaks of what is being called 'zooanthropy' have been seen around the globe. Vivianna has a report, Vivi?"
Vivianna was a wellknown reporter from Spain, who apparently had been caught by these changes as well – she was now a horsewoman, her long black hair now something of a mane. Richard noticed that, despite now being half a different species, she was still a heartbreaker. "Thank you, Harold. As you can see from my own issues, the changes have affected virtually everyone, and the only pattern seems to be original locale, affecting everyone inside a rather fuzzy border, and only creating a specific animalfolk. Each animal has been native to the region where the outbreak occurs. However, each outbreak only seems to last a week, and it does not seem to be contagious."
The camera led to an Indian doctor in a physical room. "Say 'ahh'," the doctor said, and the patient, apparently halfantelope, complied. The voiceover of Vivianna came through:
"Doctors have not found any disease, virus, or other infection to cause 'zooanthropy', as scientists have insisted on dubbing it."
"Zooanthropy is, I suppose, only the proper phrase," said the doctor on the screen in his interview, apparently living somewhere in the US. "I know little of ancient Greek and Latin, but a quick Google will tell you that 'zoo' and 'anthrop' are Greek words, meaning 'animal' and 'human'.
As we all know, lycanthropy is the werewolf curse of the theaters, but this encompasses more species, so we can't call them all wolfmen, now can we?"
Written by Machaeus on 21 November 2015
Shadowrun?
"Scientists are baffled," Vivianna continued, now in a lab in Sweden judging by the snow out the window. "Doctor Kellenson has a rather controversial opinion on the subject."
"We've looked over everything," the doctor said. "Blood, tissue, stool, urine, even xrays and ultrasounds. Nothing. No sign of what's caused it. Either we have no idea what to look for, or we're going fullon Shadowrun."
"What's 'Shadowrun'?" Vivi asked.
"It's, ah, it's a roleplaying game, set in the near future, where magic returns to the world and enacts these kinds of insane changes on humanity," he replied, looking almost embarrassed.
"So for all you know it's magic," Vivi confirmed.
"Yes, that's as much as we know," the man said with a shrug.
"Others," Vivianna's voice continued, walking the halls of a Chinese college, "think we simply haven't been looking for the right thing."
"Perhaps there's a genetic mutation that allows this to happen," a scientist, one Professor Xianyoung, said. "If so, it doesn't rule out the 'magic' possibility, but it also could be explained by
almost anything we do not understand. I believe we are not looking where we should be – we've looked for viruses, but we haven't looked for genetic structure. Though Kellenson is right: we have no idea at this point, and it is frightening."
Written by Machaeus on 20 November 2015
Advice
"What advice do you have for people who go through this?" Vivi asked.
"None. What I have is advice for their friends and family: they are still the person you knew before. No real change in instincts, so the tigerman won't start hunting people. No real changes to intelligence, but some have reported a boost in physical ability. The only thing that has changed is their body. I am, on the record, personally and formally urging the UN to give these people the same rights they would anyone else. They've been through enough as it is."
Vivianna stood outside that university as she finished in view of the camera. "And though it's been a terrifying two weeks," Vivi said, "including for yours truly, scientists say there are two things: One, we've been through the worst of it – the shock that it even happened – and two, that there is likely more to come in terms of changes such as these."
"Thank you, Vivi," the newsman said. "Coming up, public reactions to zooanthropy. The Pope speaks to the world, and tells his congregation to pray for those who would be victimized, saying that the affliction is bodily, not spiritual.
"ISIS members have been seen transformed as well, into caracalmen, also known as the Persian Lynx, and many of them have been killed by their own comrades. A small group of survivors beg for amnesty from the UN.
"And the LGBT community begins to try and claim these folk as their own, which, by and large, is something that is desired by zooanthros. All this and more, when we return."
Written by Machaeus on 16 November 2015
Back at home
Richard turned off the TV. How far had it gone? He pulled out his cellphone and began to dial his boss. "Come on, pick up the phone," he muttered as he waited through the rings.
"Hello?" said a woman's voice.
"Boss, it's Richard, on holiday?" he said.
"Richard! Holy Mother of God, you get caught in that mess?" Phoebe asked.
"Yyes ma'am," Richard stammered, already seeing where this was going.
"Management is having a fit over this. They said anyone who comes in with fur is being told they have one day, and then not to come back. I'm packin' up my office right now."
"What?" the tigerman asked. "I'm out of a job?"
"You're not alone," she replied. "I got caught in this weird changestuff and now I'm a fuckin' vixen. I'm a foxwoman for Christ's sake. The furry community is going to have a field day with me!"
Richard laughed in spite of himself – that humor of hers was one thing he'd always appreciated. "God, Phoebe, that's not your bigger problem right now. Innat illegal anyway?"
"They're claiming it only applies to humans," Phoebe snorted. "If that's the case then my own boss is a zoophiliac."
He chuckled again. "Ah fuck it," Richard said, "I'm coming back home, okay? I'll quit, clean out my desk, and we can hunt jobs together." He blinked. "No pun intended o'course."
"Pun? Oh, right, tigers there. So you really did get caught in this mess. Fuck me."
"Ha, shouldn't we date first?" Richard joked.
"Sure, if ya want," she stammered.
"Oh...uh, we'll make a date when I get back, then," Richard smiled. "I need your cell though."
"Right," she said. "Get a pen and some paper."
A while later, he had her number and was contacting his travel agent. Within the hour, his schedule was reworked. He'd be on the plane in the morning. Early morning, unfortunately, but he was fine with that for now.
Written by Machaeus on 18 November 2015
Back in the apartment
The flight was long. Richard had gotten plenty of sleep in the meantime. When he woke up, he played some card games using a deck he bought at the airport, with himself and with another passenger. A good drink, first of water, then of beer, got him to relax a bit.
By the time he'd gotten back to Manchester, it was late night in the city – almost 10 PM.
He didn't dare call Phoebe tonight, in case she was asleep. He set his watch right as he looked at the time, and began muttering to himself about the job he'd lost for no good reason.
The alcohol had pretty much worn off by then.
When he got home, he noticed a few foxfolk, and some other zooanthros, in the apartments. The majority was humans, though it wasn't more than half of the tenants. The landlord, John, was still clearly human, but he wasn't so upset by his tenants being zooanthros, and the only person he'd kicked out since Richard had left was a drunkard who didn't pay his rent. "Sono trouble, then," Richard asked to be sure. "No raises in rent or nothing? Anything?" hecorrected himself.
"Jus' make sure ya vacuum more often, and I won't charge ya for 'avin' pets," John joked
"Will do," Richard chuckled. "God, can you believe this mess though?"
"Aye," the landlord said. "Bet anythin' t'is magic, though."
"Why say that?" Richard asked, surprised.
"Me own son burned the dog'oose down durin' the foxcrisis. An' 'e says 'e dunno where th' fire came from other n'is 'ands. 'e didn' even know 'ow."
Richard's jaw dropped. "Are you joshing me?" he asked.
"'course nah. 'e was scared as all 'ell too. D'no what's goin' on, but if that Swedeman was right, an' it's some kinda game..." He shook his head and crossed himself. "Poor lads, poor lasses, goin' through this."
"Was anything else hurt then?" Richard asked.
"Nah, jus'sa dog'oose. Even'a dog got oot okay. Lucky, ah?"
"No kidding," Richard nodded.
As Richard laid in his bed that night, he thought about it. If this really was some kind of outright magic, whether there was a genetic factor or not, who cared? He smiled despite himself.
Yeah, he didn't have a job, but he had a date that he could set up tomorrow, and he was sure there'd be a huge outcry against this. There would probably be plenty of jobs, too – hopefully, anyway.
Maybe he could even start a bit higher. His experience was high enough that he'd be in a good spot above the new jobseeker, at least.
He slowly drifted off. Maybe it'd be okay.
Written by Machaeus on 23 November 2015
The end (for now)