If I thought the searing pain of the serum was unbearable, this was a million times worse. Oh yes, the feeling of your genes being made able to receive and work with foreign genetic material was painful, but actually having your DNA rewrite itself into the genetic code of another species? That was pain on a level I'd never experienced before.
I don't know how long I was unconscious, but I do know that this time, there were no dreams, just nothingness. My mind, as if aware of the terrible suffering it would face when I woke up, decided to give me a little bit of time, void of feelings, void of fear, void of pain. But it could not have known how badly it would hurt, how awful and intense the pain it would soon feel would be.
The genetic material that was swirling through my bloodstream seeped into the surrounding tissues, spreading throughout me, my cells hungrily soaking it up and analyzing it, calculating the manners in which they could attempt to replicate it. After memorizing this new information, these new patterns, and learning to mimic these strange new compounds, my body decided it was time to get started with the proccess it had been redesigned to carry out.
When I came to, my suffering awakened with me. I screamed, the unimaginable agony crashing over me like an immense an overpowering wave, drowning me.
The change had begun; there was no stopping it now.
Every cell howled in despair, every nerve cried out, every fiber screeched and hissed; they were being torn apart, broken down, destroyed, then built up and arranged in new ways. I felt my organs shift and move, contort and rearrange themselves, my insides tangling and twisting and turning. My heartbeat increased rapidly, my frantic and strange new heart drumming against my ribs, which had already adjusted themselves. Bones, muscles, and organs pushed againt my skin, against each other, and the discomfort this caused was excruciating. Writhing in pain, my vision was blurred by tears, and my breathing was crazed and fast as I gasped for air with lungs that seemed to be shrinking.
Everything burned, everything throbbed, everything ached.
I shrieked as my bones snapped out of their previous places, as my spine became rigid and my vertebrae cracked sickeningly, as my skeleton changed shape and size. My joints popped and my tendons groaned as pieces of me found new places, as my muscles were reshaped and remade. Stiff and straight, my spine creaked as it elongated, tearing through my flesh and stretching so that it now extended outside of my body, skin and muscle forming around it. This new addition, a tail of some sort, thrashed and thumped against the floor angrily as I squirmed in agony.
The brush of my long, black hair was no longer felt against my shoulders, and I moaned as my skull was molded into a new shape, as my brain shifted to fit its new surroundings. My teeth seemed to sharpen to fine, dagger-like points and when I bit my lip, I tasted the metallic flavor of blood. Hooked and razor-sharp claws ripped their way out of what used to be my hands and feet.
The feeling of a thousand tiny needles pricking my skin, which seemed to be melting away, being consumed by invisible flames, made me wail even louder. Something was pushing up through my flesh, like tiny sprouts breaking through the surface of the soil, desperate to see the light of day. Every inch of my body was soon covered in a thick, soft layer of fur.
I whimpered, vaguely perceiving the white hospital gown which I was tangled in, my small form lost inside the now enormous folds of fabric. My sides rose and fell painfully and the final adjustments were made, as everything fell into its proper place.
Then, it all stopped.
My world faded into blackness.
YOU ARE READING
The Beast Within (#Wattys2016)
Science FictionEden's world was turned upside down. She was changed, made into a monster, mutated into something Mother Nature never intended to create. Her genetic makeup was tampered with and altered by people who wanted to create a bloodthirsty killing machine...
