Here is the second part to The Story of Kainik. Chapter 2 - The Scaled Experience. The full thumbnail picture is available to view here

Chapter 1 can be found here

Of course, there's another transformation within, so please, enjoy! ^.=.^

Below is a transcript of the story for those who can't download the PDF

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“Why do you want to see me? Is it to mock me? Do you want to flail your arms and raise your voice and tell me how much of a psychopath I am? Because lady, I’ve run this rodeo a thousand times – there’s nothing you can tell me; no pill you can feed me; no amount of falsified, unjustified therapy that you can force me to attend that will convince me that I wasn’t transformed into a lizard.”

“But, you’re human now?”

“Well, of course I am! That overbearing biologist: joke-of-a-father-to-his-own-child ‘Doctor’ Richards wanted to inhibit the spread of his own self-made disease. He was the one that had me admitted, you know! Have you idiots investigated his property yet?! He’s living alone – his son’s God-knows-where and his grandson moved off to College last I heard. It’s prime time to-!”

In a frugal attempt to finally interrupt Michael Richards’ exasperated plea for justice, Jordie threw her hands forward, as if to shield herself from any further exhaustive listening.
“I’ve gotta’ admit, you’re stubborn.”

Intrigued by his interrogator’s sudden change in tone, Michael leaned back into his padded chair and subconsciously cocked his head rather dramatically to the left. “You’re not police, are you?”

Following a short pause, in which Jordie considered falsifying an authoritative position in the hope of opening Michael to further inquiry, she responded with a defeated sigh; “Not at all. In fact, I’m just an art student; investigating your case… for a relative.”

In surprised disbelief, Michael remained silent – crossing his arms and staring inquisitively at Jordie’s pleading eyes, before giving a hard, cold smirk. “Listen, lady. I dunno how you got in here, but I’m not about to hand out stories to the fangirls that happen to fake their way through facility security – I’m sure that inside, you’re begging me to give myself up on a plate, but you kids have got to learn that guys like me are way out of your league.”

Feeling a demoralizing wave of irritation fill her chest at Michael’s distasteful acknowledgement of disinterest, Jordie glanced at the camera in the corner of the cell and rubbed her forehead as she leant closer to Michael’s face. “I’m sure that you separated yourself from the rest of the family because of your own screwed-up issues, but I am not your fucking fangirl, you got me? Just last week, my cousin was turned into a giant lizard by a vial of chemicals he spilled in your brother’s secret laboratory after another mutant creature almost killed him. I need to know if you’re telling the truth, and I need to know how your brother reversed it, because I’m not having the animal shelter, or the government, take my cousin, torture him, and put the dead husk of a living human mind they leave to live in here!”

Following Jordie’s emotional retort, Michael straightened – his eyes widening to the point of painful distortion. “So, I’m not insane?!”

Furrowing her brow, Jordie affirmed Michael’s uncharacteristic reply in emotional confusion, “No?”

Suddenly, a metaphorical switch was flipped in Michael’s tortured mind. “I’m not insane! I’m not insane! You hear me?!! I’m not insane!!!” Michael leapt to his feet, startling Jordie as he circled the padded cell – arms outstretched.

“Wait, how’d you get out of the handcuffs?”

Michael turned his head to Jordie as he placed his calloused hands on her shoulders from behind. “I used to rob banks, honey – these things are textbook.”

In jovial satisfaction, Michael seated himself again, chucking the broken handcuffs onto the table and inspecting the gap in the back of the chair – as if making room for a non-existent tail as he relaxed his posture. “I can still feel it sometimes, you know.”

“Feel what?”

“My tail!”

“Your- your tail? The one you don’t have anymore?”

“I still have it! Just not physically. When Richards changed me back, some of me remained… on the other side, as it were…”

“Like… a phantom limb?”

“More than that, lady… Much more than that…”

Following a short pause, in which Jordie attempted – and failed – to imagine experiencing the physical sensation of such a phenomenon, she shook her head and looked down at the handcuffs. Maybe she’d been too eager – too forward – with Michael. Maybe this was all a waste of time, talking to an inmate on the verge of insanity… Maybe she belonged here.

Experiencing the first bout of troubled empathy he’d felt in a decade, Michael slowly pulled the cuffs away from Jordie’s gaze. “Do you want to hear what happened?”

In a slow, upward gaze, Jordie finally met Michael’s eyes, widening hers in surprise. It was as if the brown iris in each of his eyes contained a few single strands of bright, yellow pigment – unnoticeable unless carefully discerned…

“Absolutely.”


“Though my body was ten years younger, the memory of the week I transformed was vivid. I’ll admit, Monday and Tuesday were rather stagnant – I’d just had myself busted for speeding for the second time in a month, and had been trying not to tempt myself into driving again by improving my basketball skill in the living room court-”

“I’m sorry,” Jordie interrupted as she rubbed her eyes in irritation and leant forward onto the table again, “are you going to tell me about this transformation, or do I have to listen to your whole life story?”

“Do you not want context?!” Michael snapped.

Jordie placed her hands on the table. “Not if it’s got nothing to do with the subject matter!”

“Well, if you hadn’t interrupted, we’d be there by now!” Michael reoriented his mind before continuing; “-I was playing basketball in the living room for the third day in a row on Wednesday, when my brother decided to pay me a visit.”

“Doctor Richards?”

“The one and only…” Michael gestured regally with his right hand. “How he located me, I’ll probably never know. I’d made it so impossible for him to ever find me that I thought I’d never have to lay my eyes on him again – but somehow, there he was… I, being my charismatic self, attempted to make him feel welcome, but no. What’s he do? He just rattles on and on about how much of a jackass I am! He’d printed some wacko papers from court and rubbed it into my face how much I’d disgraced his impeccable family name!”

Jordie’s expression gained a hint of confusion. “But, why would he care so much?! You removed yourself from the family – it’s not his business to come and torture you about it.”

Michael’s eyes widened as he threw his arms outwards. “Exactly! Well, we come to a lull in the argument – all the while I’m confused as to what he wants from me – when he mentions some offshore scientific fund he’s trying to acquire from a medical facility… Ah – and it all falls into place! He thinks these people are going to look into his family record to test for his legitimacy, and when they see my ugly mug on their screens; arrested thirty-four times, drug user, bank robber – and worst of all: still alive – well, they’re not gonna’ fund old Brother Biologist Richards, now, are they?!”

“I’m guessing that made you happy, eh?” Jordie suddenly questioned why she was rooting for a criminal… She decided she would put that thought away in a box and pretend not to think about it.

Michael made a dismissive smirk. “I was content – for five minutes – before the argument finally came to a head. I thought I’d triumphed – I thought I’d finally stopped him from owning any more of my life, just by existing…! Of course, well, he had a solution for that, too, didn’t he?”

“Okay, so, wait…” Jordie had been following the story perfectly, until her mind leapt ahead to a seemingly inaccurate conclusion. “Are you about to tell me that, ten years ago, this sixty-year-old man was able to overpower his younger brother, of only thirty-five?”

Michael shrugged in defeat. “Whoever his father was, he’d obviously had stronger genes than mine. After giving me a choice whether to admit myself as psychologically unstable and change my name, or try and overpower him, I thought it’d be an unfair fight…”

“He- he challenged you to a physical brawl?”

“Exactly that. He gave me a choice. He knew I wasn’t going to let him silence me. He knew I wanted him to fail.”

“And what happened?”

“I woke up on Thursday morning on my living room floor – only one bruise above my eye, and a sharp pain in my lower back…” Michael shuffled uncomfortably in his seat as he recalled the memory.

Jordie once again raised an eyebrow. “How long do you think you were out?”

Michael hesitated. “Uh, maybe twelve-ish hours? From about seven to seven – why?”

“Well,” Jordie explained, “it only took the chemicals that spilled all over my cousin about three hours to activate – then, he transformed completely almost immediately.”

“It’s been a decade – he’s probably perfected the formula.” Michael replied dismissively, before continuing. “Throughout the morning – from about seven to ten – the pain in my back remained constant. However, as I’d assumed that my brother hadn’t had the heart to kill me, I was in high spirits. I thought for sure I’d never hear anything about his ‘world-changing achievements in biomedical science’ ever again. Part of me even hoped he’d be thrown off of his committee indefinitely. What I hadn’t yet come to realise was that I was already doomed. He’d already won…”

“What happened at ten?” Jordie’s investment in the story was urging her to keep Michael on-track.

“Well,” Michael continued, “at almost exactly ten o’clock, I felt this massive crick in my back – exactly where that pain had been – and immediately, the pain was gone!”

“But, let me guess,” Jordie smirked, “there was a lump right where the crick was?”

“There was! There was…” Michael seemed to zone out for a few milliseconds before he snapped himself out of it and continued. “Though that wasn’t the only odd thing. I vividly remember an electric shiver shooting up my spine and into my head when I first touched my tai-… t-the lump… and realised there was something there. Whatever that shock did to me, I couldn’t stop thinking about how good I was going to look when the lump finally started growing scales and elongating into a tail.”

“That just… popped into your mind? You knew exactly what it was, before it was even recognisable?” Jordie placed her chin on her fist in inquisitive contemplation.

“Yup! That’s what happened!” Michael shrugged again. “There was no fear after that crick. Of course, I was utterly confused as to what was going on, but all of my emotions had been dulled…”

“Your mind had been nerfed,” Jordie added.

“Wh-? I- Uh, is that a new-age term?” Michael chuckled in confusion.

“Hm? Oh, yeah, you’re like fifty… Doesn’t matter – continue!” Jordie waved an arm before her face dismissively.

“Hey, I’m forty-five. Give me a break, please…” Michael exhaled in a disappointed sigh. “Anyway… From ten ‘till about twelve – this is where things get a little fuzzy – I couldn’t bring myself to do much else but lie on my bed and touch my tail every ten minutes, to feel how much it had grown. Scales started sprouting from the very end at almost exactly midday. I remember, because my ‘Please Get Out of Bed You Lazy Shit’ alarm went off when I noticed the first few deep-green scales shimmering in the midday light as I slithered my tail over in front of my face to stare at it in renewed awe for the twelfth or thirteenth time.”

“Sounds like you really had a thing for it,” Jordie said smugly.

“Yeah… It was something else…” Michael reminisced. “I guess, all while I was busy admiring my tail, I hadn’t noticed that I’d subconsciously removed my shoes to make way for my growing talons. You see, I must’ve found something powerful and majestic in watching as my elongated, puffed-up toes slowly ripped through my socks, because for the life of me, I don’t know why else I would’ve kept wearing them if I’d already taken off my shoes.”

“Maybe it was just the chemical overload?” Jordie suggested.

“Whatever it was, it never really went away,” Michael admitted. “I eventually used a shaking hand to pull my socks off – fighting the instinct to rip them off with my teeth, just so that I could bring my mouth and nose closer to my soft, warm, scaled feet. By then, all my toes were coated in screen scales – top and sole – and a huge black talon was visibly curling out of each one – ten in all – whilst I instinctively flexed them. I couldn’t help but bring them closer to my muzzle – I just wanted a close up look at my paw-uh… f-… uh, I guess they were…?” Flustered, Michael moved on. “Somewhere around one p.m., I wanted to experience, scale-on-scale, what my new talons felt like. I remember sliding my tail along my tasty left paw when another electric shiver went up my jagged spine… Oh, by then, I’d also ripped through my shirt with my front talons, as it had become extremely restricting.”

“But you grew smaller? You became the size of a normal lizard later?” Jordie questioned.

“I guess you’ve got to get bigger before you shrink? I dunno – I’m not the scientist,” Michael exclaimed in a defensive retort. “The part of the change I remember the most vividly was the final time I admired my body in the mirror – it was the last time I was able to stand on two legs. At about two-thirty, the scales had spread up my barrelled chest, and further down my strengthened arms and shortened legs – my tail had become massive. It was seriously heavy, though, by that point, I was almost able to control it on its own – before then, I’d been lugging it across the room by paw, in conjunction with the shadows, so that I could keep my body within the beam of sunlight streaming through the window.”

“Your body temperature was becoming dependent on the sun?” Jordie reiterated.

“I was, in all ways, becoming a reptile. Though, I’ve never, to this day, found out exactly which species I was joining,” Michael admitted.

“Maybe it wasn’t any known species at all?” Jordie proposed. “Maybe, you’d become something totally new.”

“Who knows…?” Michael glanced at the cell’s padded door. “I know I never will… Anyway, as I was saying… At around two-thirty, rather than just bask in the experience of slowly letting my humanity slip away – mentally and physically – I wanted to see myself changing. The first time I tried to stand, my oddly-bent legs pulled me back to the floor again. I considered crawling on all fours, as it would be easier for my altered body, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to view the full beauty of my glistening scales if I couldn’t stand before my dressing room mirror. The last time I stood on two paws that day – that month – I had to hoist myself off the concrete floor; onto my bed – using my front talons – and lean back onto my tail, whilst I hissed in irritation as I wobbled on my hind legs. I staggered over to the mirror, where I was able to lean on the wall to keep myself from crashing to the ground and hissed again in glee when I saw the deep green – almost brown – muzzle, extending from my face. The moment I flicked my tongue for the first time in animalistic content, a third shock washed up from the tip of my tail to the tip of my tongue, and any previous memory of human existence began to fade.”

“Did that part scare you at all?” Jordie questioned worriedly.

“By that point,” Michael replied, “all I was worried about was trying to eat the injured moth I’d found by knocking down my dresser when I finally fell to the floor. I remember, as much as I wanted to retain the person I was, the moth was a much more compelling goal. I explicitly recall trying my best to reach behind the fallen dresser – opening my massive mouth and using my tongue to try and grab it – getting saliva everywhere… I eventually shrunk down enough to be able to eat it, and I remember it being one of the most satisfying meals I’d ever consumed.”

“So, you remember being a lizard, then?” Jordie’s confusion had again overridden her intrigue.

“After the moth, I don’t remember much – glimpses of something here and there, but trying to remember what I did as a lizard now is as difficult as it was to remember ever being human when I was a lizard.” Michael starched his arms upwards and placed them behind his head in satisfaction.


“So, that’s it then?” Jordie finally asked, after a contemplative silence of almost thirty seconds.

Michael’s blank expression suddenly regained some semblance of life. “Yeah… What else did you want me to say?”

“Well, how’d you turn back?”

“Oh…”

“Huh, yeah! That’s half the reason I came here…!”

“Well, I…”

“What?”

“Wh-”

“You don’t remember, do you?”

“It was a while ago, and-”

“Oh, come on?! You remembered the transformation so well, surely you’d remember this too?!”

“Okay,” Michael finally explained. “All I remember about turning back into a human was my brother pouring some clear liquid over my reptilian body – some months after I was originally transformed, mind you – and arguing with himself about how he should’ve realised that me scratching or biting another human would turn them into a reptile as well.”

“That can happen?!” Jordie’s face went white.

“Maybe?! It was all a haze… All I know is that I woke up here, and I’ve been called crazy ever since… You’re the first normal person I’ve spoken to in a very long time… Are you going to leave now? You’re going to leave now, aren’t you?”

“Listen,” Jordie glanced at the camera again, “I’m making a case here. Is there anything – anyone – you remember encountering as a lizard?”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m going to help you – I just need to know if there are any other victims of this biological phenomenon.”

“Anyone else?”

“That you encountered when you were a lizard – yes – I was just saying that.”

“Uh…”

“There has to be someone – something – anyone, please.”

“Oh! Yes! Yes, I do remember a something! A- A person!”

“What?! Who?!”

“Someone else was admitted the same day as me – they might also have been afflicted.”

“What is their name?!”

“Their name…? Uh, I think it was…”

“Tell me!!”

“Alright, gimme a second… Uh…”

“This is going to take a while, isn’t it?” Jordie slumped back into the chair, and awaited Michael’s response. She figured it would be a while before she was able to open her ever-unfolding story’s next chapter.

“Wait, I’ve almost got it… her name is on the tip of my tai- uh… tongue…” Michael rummaged his broken mind, searching for that incriminating name-badge she was wearing when they locked eyes in the security van.

“It’s okay,” Jordie sighed. “I can wait…”