(Woman to Bear)


Sarah looked around the woods, shining her flashlight through the bramble.  There had been numerous reports of disappearances throughout the forest recently, and of course Management wanted her to look for where they’d went.
She sighed, brushing some twigs out of her hair.  She couldn’t blame them; she was the youngest and most sociable of the park rangers, having a natural talent for talking to others.  If people actually had gone missing, Greg and Frank would probably just scare them off.  Amber was too ditzy to help anyone, and Old Man Hendricks was a little quick to grab his trusty shotgun.
That left Sarah to be the only one to explore Amity Park, and she was just thrilled that Management asked her to look for them at night.  In her first few minutes outside, she’d found some tracks, and had decided to follow them on an impulse.  She regretted that impulse now, her light shining up on a set of bear tracks left in the dirt.  Maybe Old Man Hendricks was right to bring his gun everywhere.
Her flashlight dimmed, and Sarah’s eyes widened.  She frantically tapped it against her thigh, but had no luck in resurrecting the dead batteries.  She quickly holstered it, slipping her walkie-talkie out from her back pocket.
“H-Hello?”  The park ranger ventured, breaking the silence of the night.  No dice; the only thing that greeted her reply was the faint chirping of crickets.  Lovely.  She tried her phone next, but it, too was dead, a black screen the only thing her eyes could make out.  At least the moon was bright, illuminating the area around her with a faint blue glow.
Except...  Only the area immediately around her seemed to be glowing.  No sooner had Sarah made the observation than the glow shifted to a purplish tint, the grass rustling around her even though there was no wind.  She immediately snapped up her dead flashlight, an old instinct from when she was younger, to ward off spirits—for this was definitely the work of something unnatural.
The glow coalesced into a large phantasmal bear, nearly twice her height.  It shook its head slightly, a few wisps of energy falling from it as though it had just shook some loose hair from its form.  Then, it looked to the trembling park ranger.
“Um.  Easy, now.”  She held up her hands in a warding motion, but the bear began to advance towards her, sniffing at her eagerly.  Sarah opened her mouth to call for help, but the second her lips parted, the bear lunched at her, turning into an ethereal mist that entered her open mouth.
She gagged, but found herself unable to close her lips as the glow entered her body, running through her throat like cool milk.  Her hands snapped to her sides, palms wide open as the mist continued to pour into her.  Sarah’s flashlight fell from nerveless fingers, and she squeezed her eyes shut, tears forming at the corner of her eyelids as the ethereal bear finished entering her body.
Her flashlight hit the ground with a dull thud.  Just like that, the glow had vanished and Sarah was in control of her body once more.  She gasped for breath, patting herself all over as she tried to fathom what had just happened.  That couldn’t have been real, right?  Of course not; she must have been hallucinating from lack of sleep or something.
Sarah shook her head, bending over to pick up her fallen torch.  She needed to calm down, make her way back to the station, and take a well-needed rest.  But first, she needed some light.  Sarah said a silent prayer, trying to thumb her flashlight on.  Only her thumb only met air; not the cold steel of her light.
Odd.  She held her hand up to her face, gasping as the flashlight slipped from her fingers.  She fumbled with her other hand, awkwardly catching the torch in a two-handed catch.  She looked down, finding the flashlight slipping from her grasp once more as she stared numbly at her hands.
It looked like her thumbs had slid into her palms, making it seem as though she had five finger.  Sarah tried wiggling one of her thumbs, finding the stubby appendage moving to her thoughts.  That...  definitely wasn’t right, right?  A numb shock had settled in over her mind, and she tried to reason out why her hands looked like that.
And allergic reaction?  Maybe the swelling just made it look like her thumbs had reshaped?  She swallowed nervously, then cringed, as her throat burned.  Sarah coughed twice, her eyes watering like she’d just taken a shot of Greg’s homebrew.
“What’s h-urrpening to me?”  The park ranger grunted, cringing at how husky her voice sounded.  She tried to talk again, but all that came out form her throat was a low, animalistic growl.  No sooner had she processed that than her body warmed up, filling her with a sudden heat.
Her tongue slipped from her mouth as she instinctively started to pant, her face flushed with the warmth that coursed through her body.  It was like she was wearing several layers of clothing, the summer air filling her with unbearable warmth.  She tore at her clothes, hooking all five of her fingers between the buttons of her shirt as she tried to alleviate the oppressive heat.
Sarah whined with discomfort, her fingers proving no match for the thick khaki of her uniform.  Responding to her distress, her nails pushed out into claws, driving her fingers back a knuckle into her palms.  Now she cut through her shirt with ease, tearing off her pants soon after.
The changing woman had no time to even consider her nudity before more changes assailed her form, a wave of thick dark fur sweeping our from her body, covering her from collar to toe.  It was thick, shaggy, and smelled like her own hair would if she hadn’t showered for a few weeks.
Sarah’s nose twitched as she sniffed her fur, and she crossed her eyes to watch as it turned darker, flattening out on her face.  She gasped, her paw-like hands flying to her nose as though she could stop the changes.  All she succeeded in doing was getting a deeper whiff of her own thick scent.
Sarah couldn’t deny it, something was somehow changing her into an animal.  But how?  Her ears twitched as they started to slide up her head, and she covered her eyes, hoping it was all a bad dream and she’d wake up in a few moments.
Her new ear twitched at the sound of something tearing, and Sarah looked down to find a pair of nearly-formed bear paws having burst through what she’d thought were thick leather shoes.  The only human part about her feet were the toes, though those soon sank into her body, her nails growing longer to compensate.
She looked to her hands next, wondering if the same changes had occurred there without her noticing.  As though they sensed her attention, her nails doubled in length, darkening and wrapping around her fingers.  Sarah gasped in surprise, stumbling back over some roots to fall against the ground.  She yelped as a jolt of pain shot out from just above her rear, rolling to her side to find a small tail growing from just above her backside.
That was too much for the changing ranger.  She scrambled to her feet, turning to run toward the rangers’ lodge.  Her head shook from side to side at the unnatural feeling of her hair receding into her scalp.  As she did so, she felt more hair sprouting form her cheeks, shielding her from the branches that whipped at her face.
She could feel her torso expanding, her breasts sinking into her flesh, becoming a pair of teats that was soon joined by two more.  It became harder for her to sprint, her new bulk shaking with each step, the heavy fur rustling every way imaginable.
Her hips clicked, and Sarah was sent to all fours, stumbling into a four-legged run.  Her paws slapped at the ground before her, and she grunted at the feeling of her human feet slowing her down.  The Rangers’ Lodge couldn’t be that far away, right?  She could go in, try and send a message to—
Her paws skidded on the ground as she came to a halt.  Old Man Hendricks was the only one in the station right now.  If she came bounding up to him, growling and huffing for attention, he’d probably greet her with a scowl and both barrels.
Sarah roared her dismay, her jaw cracking away from her face, merging with her nose into a distinctly ursine muzzle.  Another roar in the distance greeted her cry, and her right ear flicked as she turned to look deeper into the woods.
Her eyes tingled, and she could suddenly see more of the woods before her.  But sight alone wasn’t helping her too much.  Sarah stood on her rear paws, sniffing at the air curiously.  Sure enough, her own scent filled the air, but there were others like it, the smell of sweat-matted fur with just a touch of man-made soap still lingering on animal forms.
Well, at least that solved the matter of people going missing, though she had to get a message to the rangers at the lodge.  She had to think, had to stay calm.  Amber would be the most likely to listen.  Maybe when she was on duty...  The girl might take longer to get through to, but she was a hell of a lot less trigger-happy than the other rangers.
Sarah’s ears twitched at the sound of a door slamming, her nose picking up the faint scent of Old Man Hendricks’ evening cigar.  That wasn’t good.  For now, she had to go deeper into the woods, to find the others like her.  That would be her best bet at surviving until she could get a call for help out.
She set off at a light trot, steadily padding her way towards them.  Maybe they would have more answers as to what was going on, maybe not.  But it was a start.