Egyptian ankh
It was a solid gold Egyptian ankh, weathered from age but still whole and shiny. Next to it was a slip of paper proving it was a real artifact from ancient Egypt. You aren’t much of a history buff, but you know enough about the time period that this relic would make you some serious cash. You get out your toolkit and set to work picking the lock on the display case. You figure a big place like this could afford more secure locks, but it took mere seconds for you to crack it open. The gentle click of the lock releasing is music to your ears as you lift the lid up off the display case with surgical care and precision.
You can't help but chuckle as you take the ankh in your gloved hands. It has a good solid heft to it and curiously warm to the touch, but you’re preoccupied by the sheer windfall you had on your hands. You hold the relic in your hands like a trophy as you make your way back down the halls, feeling like the luckiest person in the world until a sudden, sharp in your back sends you to your knees. The ankh drops to the floor with a ponderous thud as it starts glowing a bright ethereal yellow. The glow flows over your, feeling like warm sunlight on your skin even through your clothes. The warm glow seeps into the fabric of your jacket and pants, growing hotter and hotter around you and flowing deeper and deeper into your body until your clothing combusts harmlessly into a shower of gold colored sparks, drifting around you like the embers of a campfire before dying down into nothingness.
Naked and alone, you scramble for the ankh, holding it in both hands as you kneel on the soft carpet. The pain in your back flares up again, building into a white-hot metallic stinging that slices down your spine like a razor as two nubs force themselves out of your back, twitching and flapping in the still air as they sprout into a pair of enormous wings with tawny brown plumage. They flap in uneven spasms, kicking up eddies of wind as your body forces itself to learn the motor function of its new appendages. Eventually you learn, and the wings fold up on your back like a bird at rest. Unfortunately, you barely have any time at all to get used to the idea of having wings before another storm surge of change flashes through your body. Your skin starts to feel prickly and hot all over as little golden tan hairs sprout all over your body, converging on your chest and back and spreading out over your body like a brush fire. The temptation to touch your new fur as it grows in proves much too strong, you roll around on the floor like a feisty kitten, running your hands all over yourself as the velvety soft fur finishes covering your entire body save for your head. You glance down at your fuzzy hands, your fingers start to feel swollen and puffy as they shrink down and grow into thick, clumsy feline paws. Your fingernails taper into sharp claws and sink back into the sheaths on the tips of your new forepaws. You flex them inward and the claws slide out, then pull back in when you straighten the digits out.
Written by feder on 19 March 2017
