Something new I'd like to try, Shortwrites. They'll be maybe 3-4 pages and will usually focus on a single theme and happen in a single scene. For my first one, I've written a POV story of the reader waking up in their apartment to find that they've turned into a giant anthro elephant overnight. Large & heavy elephant in small & tight building shenanigans ensue. Kinda follows the idea of Kafka's Metamorphosis, haha.
--
Peanuts, peanut butter, talking peanut people…
It was quite a dream. You peel your eyes open from sleep and take in a deep breath.
Hufff
There’s a heavy feeling in your chest. Heavier than usual, and not just in your chest. Your whole body feels much weightier. Did your bed always feel this small? You try to sit up, but your body is not used to moving with such a massive weight acting upon it. You lurch yourself off your pillow again, but fall back into the mattress.
CRUNCH
The bed gives out beneath you, wooden planks and metal bowing before snapping in half. With a deep groan, you roll off the now flattened mattress and onto your side to help climb to your feet. You stretch out your arm to brace yourself… and it has taken on a gray tone.
You rub your eyes with the other hand. That hand is also gray. You focus your gaze on it, spying blunt white nails topping thick leathery digits. Something is clearly off about your body. You reach a hand to your face and touch a long tapered appendage where your nose… was. It immediately clicks what has happened to you.
You let out a startled trumpet, as many newly-transformed elephants would. Surely, your startled cry would wake the neighbors and warrant a noise complaint, but that is not a concern at the moment.
The wooden flooring creaks under your mass as you begin to push yourself off the floor. It is a long and laborious process, but you eventually liberate your pachyderm body from the cold wood. You stretch to your full height and promptly bonk your elephantine head on the ceiling, leaving a crater in the drywall with a great THUMP. Another thing to fix…
Now stretching to a somewhat-arched height, you look about the room. You tower over your belongings, now dwarfed to your size. Gazing down, you spot a large gray dome of a midsection where you were once clothed. The tattered remains of your pajamas lie on the flattened mattress.
You compose yourself as best you can, thoughts still racing. Then you figure a nice breakfast should help to calm your nerves. Of course, there is now the problem of getting out of your room. You are far taller and several times wider than the door frame at this point. The non-elephant you would never have needed to worry about fitting through doors. Disgruntled, you huff and begin to crouch through the portal.
Even moving as sluggishly and carefully as possible, you could not get through the doorway without cracking the frame and chipping off pieces of drywall. By the time your blubbery mass popped free, the doorway to your bedroom had become a hexagonal threshold. Now a doorway to fix.
The floor creaks and groans as you stumble your way to the kitchen. It’s a good thing your apartment didn’t have any hallways, or else you’d have one hell of a repair bill. Finally reaching the fridge, you pull it open, unknowingly crushing the handle within your giant hand. Your eyes peered at the fridge’s stock, trying to pick out what would be appetizing, and suitably filling.
It is beyond your immediate knowledge, but your brain has adapted to only allow a herbivorous diet. As your gaze passes over meats and dairy products, you feel a sickening taste. “Why did I ever like eating that slop?” You wonder to yourself. Finally, a head of lettuce and some other vegetables find your gaze. “Now there’s a meal.”
No plates or cutlery would help you enjoy your meal, so you scoop up all the veggies and turn about, knocking the door shut with your heavy rump. The action leaves a massive dent in the door’s surface. “Whoops…”
At your new size, chairs are totally out of the picture. Thankfully, you are big enough that you can plant yourself on the ground and still eat comfortably at the table. You fumble with the lettuce for a moment, trying to fit it into your triangular mouth to take a bite, before realizing that your maw is large enough to take it whole. Using your trunk for the first time, you pinch the lettuce head and toss it into your jaws, then mash it up with your big teeth. Lettuce, carrots, beets, broccoli, and more veggies turn out to be a fabulous breakfast choice. What could have been a salad large enough to feed a family ended up a perfect meal for an elephant like you. You stretch out your back, then get up on your feet in the short space.
“Maybe being an elephant won’t be so bad.”
CRACK
Wood splinters under foot. You don’t even have time to react as more cracks fracture the floor. The supports underneath the wood strain under your heavy frame, before giving out altogether and sending you tumbling to the room below.
You land on a dining table, instantly turning it into splinters. The tenant of the apartment, a mouse, stares wide-eyed at you from the kitchen while pouring an overflowing mug of coffee. Without being able to apologize for falling into their apartment, you hear the floor beneath you start to buckle. Just as quickly as you landed in this mouse’s apartment, you disappear as the wood and supports below buckle under your immense weight.
With a resounding BOOM, you land in the next apartment. A horse runs on a treadmill. Earbuds blasting music prevent them from hearing the mighty cacophony. Three more seconds of cracking wood and splitting beams and you plummet again.
CRASH
A cat doing yoga practically leaps onto the ceiling as you land mere feet away from her.
SMASH
A tortoise reading a newspaper croaks “Just like the cartoons of my young days!”
BOOM
Finally, you reach the ground floor.
“Ouch…”
You pick yourself up from the mess of collapsed beams, panels of drywall, and wood fragments, and dust yourself off. There’s no point in sticking around here any longer. Even after repairs, this place would never be suited for one of your size and weight. You shamble outside, where you can stretch to your full height at last, and relieve that fall-induced crick in your back. A pedestrian watches your giant form emerge from the building and stretch with awe.
“Sorry for asking,” you say to them, “but do you know any apartments that can house elephants around here?”
"And do you know any places that sell peanuts close by?"
--
Peanuts, peanut butter, talking peanut people…
It was quite a dream. You peel your eyes open from sleep and take in a deep breath.
Hufff
There’s a heavy feeling in your chest. Heavier than usual, and not just in your chest. Your whole body feels much weightier. Did your bed always feel this small? You try to sit up, but your body is not used to moving with such a massive weight acting upon it. You lurch yourself off your pillow again, but fall back into the mattress.
CRUNCH
The bed gives out beneath you, wooden planks and metal bowing before snapping in half. With a deep groan, you roll off the now flattened mattress and onto your side to help climb to your feet. You stretch out your arm to brace yourself… and it has taken on a gray tone.
You rub your eyes with the other hand. That hand is also gray. You focus your gaze on it, spying blunt white nails topping thick leathery digits. Something is clearly off about your body. You reach a hand to your face and touch a long tapered appendage where your nose… was. It immediately clicks what has happened to you.
You let out a startled trumpet, as many newly-transformed elephants would. Surely, your startled cry would wake the neighbors and warrant a noise complaint, but that is not a concern at the moment.
The wooden flooring creaks under your mass as you begin to push yourself off the floor. It is a long and laborious process, but you eventually liberate your pachyderm body from the cold wood. You stretch to your full height and promptly bonk your elephantine head on the ceiling, leaving a crater in the drywall with a great THUMP. Another thing to fix…
Now stretching to a somewhat-arched height, you look about the room. You tower over your belongings, now dwarfed to your size. Gazing down, you spot a large gray dome of a midsection where you were once clothed. The tattered remains of your pajamas lie on the flattened mattress.
You compose yourself as best you can, thoughts still racing. Then you figure a nice breakfast should help to calm your nerves. Of course, there is now the problem of getting out of your room. You are far taller and several times wider than the door frame at this point. The non-elephant you would never have needed to worry about fitting through doors. Disgruntled, you huff and begin to crouch through the portal.
Even moving as sluggishly and carefully as possible, you could not get through the doorway without cracking the frame and chipping off pieces of drywall. By the time your blubbery mass popped free, the doorway to your bedroom had become a hexagonal threshold. Now a doorway to fix.
The floor creaks and groans as you stumble your way to the kitchen. It’s a good thing your apartment didn’t have any hallways, or else you’d have one hell of a repair bill. Finally reaching the fridge, you pull it open, unknowingly crushing the handle within your giant hand. Your eyes peered at the fridge’s stock, trying to pick out what would be appetizing, and suitably filling.
It is beyond your immediate knowledge, but your brain has adapted to only allow a herbivorous diet. As your gaze passes over meats and dairy products, you feel a sickening taste. “Why did I ever like eating that slop?” You wonder to yourself. Finally, a head of lettuce and some other vegetables find your gaze. “Now there’s a meal.”
No plates or cutlery would help you enjoy your meal, so you scoop up all the veggies and turn about, knocking the door shut with your heavy rump. The action leaves a massive dent in the door’s surface. “Whoops…”
At your new size, chairs are totally out of the picture. Thankfully, you are big enough that you can plant yourself on the ground and still eat comfortably at the table. You fumble with the lettuce for a moment, trying to fit it into your triangular mouth to take a bite, before realizing that your maw is large enough to take it whole. Using your trunk for the first time, you pinch the lettuce head and toss it into your jaws, then mash it up with your big teeth. Lettuce, carrots, beets, broccoli, and more veggies turn out to be a fabulous breakfast choice. What could have been a salad large enough to feed a family ended up a perfect meal for an elephant like you. You stretch out your back, then get up on your feet in the short space.
“Maybe being an elephant won’t be so bad.”
CRACK
Wood splinters under foot. You don’t even have time to react as more cracks fracture the floor. The supports underneath the wood strain under your heavy frame, before giving out altogether and sending you tumbling to the room below.
You land on a dining table, instantly turning it into splinters. The tenant of the apartment, a mouse, stares wide-eyed at you from the kitchen while pouring an overflowing mug of coffee. Without being able to apologize for falling into their apartment, you hear the floor beneath you start to buckle. Just as quickly as you landed in this mouse’s apartment, you disappear as the wood and supports below buckle under your immense weight.
With a resounding BOOM, you land in the next apartment. A horse runs on a treadmill. Earbuds blasting music prevent them from hearing the mighty cacophony. Three more seconds of cracking wood and splitting beams and you plummet again.
CRASH
A cat doing yoga practically leaps onto the ceiling as you land mere feet away from her.
SMASH
A tortoise reading a newspaper croaks “Just like the cartoons of my young days!”
BOOM
Finally, you reach the ground floor.
“Ouch…”
You pick yourself up from the mess of collapsed beams, panels of drywall, and wood fragments, and dust yourself off. There’s no point in sticking around here any longer. Even after repairs, this place would never be suited for one of your size and weight. You shamble outside, where you can stretch to your full height at last, and relieve that fall-induced crick in your back. A pedestrian watches your giant form emerge from the building and stretch with awe.
“Sorry for asking,” you say to them, “but do you know any apartments that can house elephants around here?”
"And do you know any places that sell peanuts close by?"
Category Story / Transformation
Species Elephant
Size 50 x 50px
File Size 70.9 kB
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