Matt slipped through the shadows of Pleasure Island, his bare feet crunching on broken liquor bottles and cigar stubs. The air smelled like burnt sugar and sweat, laughter turning to distant brays as more boys succumbed to the curse. He'd seen it happen—first the ears sprouting like strange mushrooms, then the terror in their eyes as fingers fused into hooves. The fence ahead was splintered wood, easy to vault. On the other side, amber lights pulsed through a field of towering corn stalks, rustling like dry bones. A maze? Seemed safer than the collapsing carousel where a boy had screamed himself into a donkey last night.
"Psst—hey, dummy!" A hand yanked him behind a barrel. It was the freckle-faced kid from the ferry, now sporting gray-furred ears and trembling hands. "That's not corn," the boy whispered, voice cracking. "They're plants. For feeding." Matt laughed—too loud, too sharp—because of course it was fake. The island was a twisted circus act, some rich freak's idea of horror theater. Boys didn't actually turn into donkeys. He'd wake up tomorrow hungover on the docks, his pockets stuffed with counterfeit coins, the whole thing one giant prank.
A scream ripped through the cornfield—human at first, then devolving into wet, guttural brays. Matt's stomach lurched. His fingers twitched toward the cigarillo behind his ear, the one he'd stolen from a velvet-draped booth. The freckled kid was shaking now, snot dripping onto his already-furry chin. "Look at me!" The boy sobbed, pawing at his elongating jaw. "Look at what—" His words dissolved into choked coughing. Matt backed away. Special effects. Hypnosis. Something in the rum. His own reflection in a broken bottle showed normal teeth, normal ears.
He rolled his eyes at the boy. "Ugh-huh." Good outfit he had to admit, too much drink, smoke, he was buzzing, he needed fun as he went to the maze. The maze entrance yawned before him, its archway woven from dried corn husks that crackled like old parchment. A sign hung crookedly from twine: ESCAPE IN TEN MINUTES OR EMBRACE YOUR TRUTH. Underneath, scratched in what looked like charcoal: Run, you little shit. Matt kicked the post. The wood splintered too easily, revealing pulpy black rot inside. Hollow. Like everything here. He stepped through the arch—and the stalks behind him snapped shut with a sound like vertebrae popping.
The maze walls breathed, stalks shifting subtly to erase his path. Above, the moon was a jaundiced eye. He passed a pile of discarded clothes—denim, striped shirts—all stiff with dried sweat and stretched at the seams. Further in, a lone shoe, its laces chewed through. Matt's pulse stuttered. Ten minutes? Clock's ticking, jackass. The maze exhaled hot air that smelled of hay and wet animal musk. His fingers brushed the cigarillo again. Light up, calm down, think. But his hands shook. What if—
A rustle. Left. He spun. Nothing. Then a giggle, high and manic. "Still got your thumbs?" The voice came from everywhere, nowhere. "Bet they'll be gone by the third turn." Shadows pooled between the stalks, thick as tar. Matt ran. The rules had been clear: ten minutes to escape or... He skidded around a corner. A boy crouched there, as he had donkey ears, his spine arched unnaturally. "You're late," the boy sang, licking blackened teeth. Behind him, the maze shuddered, stalks knitting together like muscle fibers.
The cigarillo fell from Matt's lips. His hands—still human, still his—clutched at his hair. The boy lunged. Not playful. Not drunk. Feral. Matt's elbow caught him in the throat, sending him sprawling into the stalks with a wet crunch. No time. The maze pulsed around him, walls contracting. He sprinted down a narrowing corridor, corn silk whipping his face. A glint ahead: a pocket watch nailed to a post, its hands spinning wildly. Six minutes left. The air tasted like copper and hay. His tongue felt thick. Too thick.
Left turn. Dead end. A donkey skull grinned up from the dirt, its eye sockets stuffed with crumpled cigarette packs. Matt's laugh came out strangled. "*Born* to be?" He kicked the skull. It shattered into dust that stung his eyes. Behind him, stalks creaked. Something sniffed. Not a boy. Not anymore. He didn't look. Rules? Fuck the rules. He clawed at the corn wall—fibers tearing under his nails—and forced himself through. Stalks sliced his arms. The maze screamed. Or maybe that was him.
The new hallway stank of ammonia and cheap cologne. At the far end, a figure in a striped sailor shirt galloped on all fours, pants splitting at the seams as hooves punched through leather shoes. "*Wait—*" Matt choked. The donkey-boy twisted its neck backward, lips peeling away from elongated yellow teeth. Its bray echoed like a broken calliope. The pocket watch in Matt's pocket burned. Three minutes. The donkey charged, shirt flapping around its barrel chest. Matt dove sideways. The thing crashed into the wall, corn husks bursting open to reveal—
Another pathway. Dank, narrow. Something wet dripped from above. He didn't look up. The donkey staggered up, froth dripping from its muzzle. He slapped its flank hard—flesh weirdly spongy under his palm—and bolted past as it screeched. The corridor branched. Left: a flickering gas lamp illuminating a pile of chewed-up neckerchiefs. Right: complete blackness. He chose the dark.
His foot hit something soft. A groan. Not animal. Not human. Matt bit down hard on his tongue—why did his teeth feel wrong?—and kept moving. His jacket sleeve snagged on a corn husk. The fabric tore. Or maybe it was his arm tearing. No. Focus. The pocket watch buzzed against his thigh like a live insect. One minute. Fifty-nine seconds. Fifty-eight. He didn't look at his hands gripping the watch. Didn't dare.
Something warm trickled down his ankle. His shoe—too tight now—squelched with every step. The maze walls pressed closer, corn silk whispering against his cheeks. Your cheeks are longer now, sang the voice in his head. He swatted at it like a fly. His fingers met fur. Not yours. Can't be. The gas lamp's glow ahead wavered. Shadows licked at his legs. His hind legs. Fuck. Fuck. He skidded around the corner—hooves striking sparks—and collided with a figure.
The impact sent them both sprawling. Matt's vision swam. The other boy—no, donkey—flailed on the ground, his striped shirt ripped open to reveal a barrel chest already matted with coarse hair. "G-get off!" the donkey-boy screamed, voice fraying into a wet whinny. Matt kicked him square in the ribs. Bones cracked like dry twigs. The donkey-boy wheezed, forelegs scrabbling at the dirt. Fuck that guy. Matt vaulted over him, landing hard on—oh god—*hooves.*
His own fucking hooves.
Matt didn't stop to stare at them—didn't let himself process the horrible click-clack sound they made against the packed earth. The donkey-boy behind him was already scrambling up, wheezing through a muzzle that split wider with each ragged breath. "Wait—*wait*—" the thing gurgled, but Matt was already bolting down the narrowing corridor, his new legs moving with a sickening, instinctual grace. The maze walls blurred. His jacket—too tight across the shoulders now—ripped open as something bulged beneath his skin.
Ahead, the path forked again: one side lit by sputtering lanterns where half-transformed boys sobbed into their lengthening hands, the other plunged into hungry darkness. Matt veered left—toward the light, toward the sobs—because at least there, he could still see. His hooves skidded on a pile of discarded pocket watches, all shattered to reveal gears stuffed with tufts of donkey hair. The nearest boy looked up, his face a grotesque mix of human terror and animal muzzle. "H-help m—" His plea dissolved into a wet snort as his nostrils flared wide, black and glistening.
Matt didn't stop. Didn't fucking care. He barreled past, shoulder-checking the donkey-boy into a wall of cornstalks that immediately twined around his thrashing legs like living ropes. Good. One less thing. His own breath came in ragged grunts now, too deep, too wrong, but he clenched his teeth—except they weren't teeth anymore, just flat yellow slabs that ground together with every step. The lanterns pulsed brighter as he ran, their light revealing patches of his own skin erupting with coarse gray fur. Nope. Not happening. He ripped off his jacket, the fabric tearing where his spine arched unnaturally, and used it to smother the nearest flame. Darkness swallowed the path behind him. Let the maze choke on it.
The pocket watch in his waistband shrieked—a high, metallic sound like a dying cicada—and exploded in a shower of gears and donkey hair. Thirty seconds. Matt's ears—long, twitching, disgusting—pinned flat against his skull as another bray erupted behind him. Close. Too close. He vaulted over a pile of chewed-up suspenders (some still sticky with fresh blood) and landed hard on all fours. No no NO— He forced himself upright, but his balance was shot, his tail—*fuck he had a tail now*—lashing wildly as he careened into a dead end. The wall ahead wasn't corn. It was mirrors. Dozens of them, cracked and fogged, reflecting a nightmare in fragments: a boy's tattered shirt stretched over a donkey's heaving ribs, human hands melting into hooves mid-gesture, lips peeling back from elongating teeth.
He turned—*hooves skidding on broken glass*—just as the freckled donkey-boy barreled into the clearing. The thing's eyes were rolling white, froth dripping from its muzzle. Matt's hind legs bucked on instinct, smashing the nearest mirror with a sound like a gunshot. Shards rained down, one slicing his cheek—*wrong, the cut was vertical, like a horse's nostril*—but he was already running faster, less than twenty seconds left, the maze walls convulsing around him. The mirrors behind him didn't reflect. They absorbed. The freckled donkey-boy slammed into one headfirst—and the glass swallowed it whole with a wet schlup, leaving only a pair of twitching ears before they too dissolved.
Ten seconds. The exit loomed ahead—a rusted turnstile—but the ground was shifting, roots erupting to snare his hooves. Matt vaulted over them, his body moving with a grotesque animal precision he didn't understand. Five seconds. A shadow detached from the wall: the Coachman, grinning through a cloud of cigar smoke, pocket watch in hand. "Tick-tock, jackass," he singsonged, stepping aside to reveal the exit. Three. Matt lunged—just as something yanked at his tail. The freckled donkey-boy had him, its teeth sunk into the tufted hair, dragging him back.
Zero.
The countdown ended as Matt's hind hoof connected with the freckled donkey-boy's muzzle in a sickening crunch of cartilage and bone. The force of the kick propelled him forward—just as the Coachman's pocket watch let out a final, deafening ding. Fireworks exploded overhead in lurid greens and reds, their light glinting off the sweat-slicked fur now covering Matt's body from neck to haunches. He landed hard on all fours across the rusted turnstile, his new hooves skidding on the damp earth. "Congratulations, jackass!" the Coachman crowed, kicking a crate toward him with a booted foot. "You're ripe for the salt mines."
Matt tried to scream. What came out was a bray—long, shuddering, and final. His tongue lolled uselessly between teeth that had fully flattened into yellowed slabs. The Coachman grabbed his muzzle, forcing it open to inspect his gums like a horse trader at auction. "Ahhh, perfect," he purred, blowing cigar smoke into Matt's nostrils. "No more talking. Just labor." Behind them, the maze convulsed, cornstalks twisting into a grotesque archway that spat out three more donkeys—their clothes in tatters, their eyes rolling in terror. One still had human fingers, desperately clawing at his own elongating throat.
The fireworks overhead fizzled into acrid smoke that stung Matt's watering eyes. His body ached in ways he couldn't articulate—not just the spine rearranging itself, but the hunger. A hunger for hay. The realization made him heave, but his stomach only gurgled, empty and animal. The Coachman kicked the crate again. "Get in," he chuckled, nudging Matt's hindquarters with a boot. "Unless you wanna plow your way to the docks?" The other donkeys whinnied in panicked laughter, their brays overlapping in a cacophony that made Matt's new ears twitch backward.
A whip cracked—close enough to split the air by his flank—and Matt lurched forward, his hooves finding purchase on the splintered wood of the crate. The world tilted as he tumbled inside, landing shoulder-first against another donkey. This one was warm, trembling, its ribs heaving under matted fur that smelled like stale beer and sweat. The crate door slammed shut, plunging them into darkness pierced only by slats of lurid carnival light. Outside, the Coachman's voice boomed: "Load 'em tight! The circus pays extra for screamers!"