[b][u][center]Shapely Artifacts Part 1 For Faceless_Lord By Draconicon[/center][/u][/b] Julian sat in a small waiting room with two other men. Neither of them were familiar, drawn from the local college population if he were to guess. They must have been here for the same reason that he was: down on their luck and looking for a bit of cash. He looked away from them – one nerd, one jock – and glanced at the sealed pressure door that locked them off from…whatever it was on the other side that they’d be helping test out. As far as he understood, the company was looking for people to handle a few artifacts, make sure that there was nothing out of place with them, and then go back home. Medical care was guaranteed if something went wrong, and it was just a formality so that they didn’t have to get their own hands dirty. If it hadn’t been attached to such a clean contract, Julian would have been concerned. It felt like someone was trying to keep themselves at a distance from something genuinely dangerous, or at least legally shaky. However, when they’d offered him the contract to read through, it didn’t have anything that he felt too concerned about written into the legalese. It was a little bit vague, yes, but nothing downright dangerous. Still, if his bosses hadn’t told him that he had two months before he was getting ‘released’ as a corporation-wide downgrade, he wouldn’t have given these people the time of day. However, if he was going to have enough to live on until he was able to get another job, he needed to feather his retirement fund with as many profitable feathers as possible. [i]And besides, guaranteed medical. There’s nothing that you need to worry about. Probably something that was pulled out of an old tomb somewhere that they want to double-check.[/i] “Julian Santelli?” He looked up as his name came over the intercom. There must have been a camera somewhere, because it continued. “You’re up first. Move to the airlock door.” “Yes, sir.” Standing up, he gave the other two guys a final look. They both stared at him curiously, almost like they were trying to figure out what a guy in a suit was doing here. He shrugged, ignoring them. Not like they really needed to know his situation. Nor did it really matter if they did. The airlock door opened, and he stepped through. It shut as soon as he was clear of it, leaving him in a three-way junction, with a hallway going left, right, and forward. “Please take the left-hand hallway.” The voice was not quite robotic, he realized, which meant that there were definitely watchers up there. He cocked his head at the ceiling, wondering how small their cameras were to be this invisible, then put it out of his head. He was surprised that the hallway was so long, though. He was used to the shorter corridors between one boardroom and another, used to the quick walks from one place of business to the next. They didn’t like to waste time, so having this much space between rooms made him curious. Well, more accurately, they made him nervous. What kind of stuff were they concerned about that they kept the test objects so far from each other? Was there really that much of a risk for contamination? He’d heard of the curse of the mummy before, but this was ridiculous. Finally, he reached the end of the corridor, and he stood before another airlock door. This one had a window in it, so he leaned forward and looked through. Waiting in the room just on the other side was a gold plate hanging from what looked like silver wire. It looked like one of the old priest plates that one sometimes saw in movies involving ancient Egypt, as a matter of fact, and he cocked his head to the side. [i]Now where did they get that…[/i] As far as he knew, Egypt still had their borders locked down on all cultural artifacts, and he doubted that there were many other cultures that had something [i]quite[/i] that distinct. His office had actually dealt with a couple of cases of this nature, where some tourist had gotten lucky and tried to smuggle an artifact out. His bosses got the call when the hunter wanted to find a way to bring the artifact through the borders, anyway, but mostly ended up handling a court case that kept the idiot tourist from getting shot, instead. The fact that someone had managed to sneak something out… [i]Guess this is why they’re pushing all the secrecy and everything,[/i] he thought. [i]Wonder if I can blackmail them for a little extra, considering my connections…[/i] Julian smiled to himself as he thought about it, but made sure to keep it in the back of his head for now. The last thing that he needed was to shoot himself in the foot before he knew he was completely healthy. After all, the Mummy’s Curse had been a thing. This could be just as dangerous. “Opening the airlock in three…two…one…open.” Hiss. The door parted with a sudden shift of air pressure, and Julian wobbled as he had to get his balance back after the air whooshed past him, filling up the room and leaving him dizzy until everything equalized. “Please step up to the table.” Nodding, he did as he was told, making his way to the table. He rested his hands on the edge of it, looking down at the priest plate. It was definitely a chest piece, something that would hang around the neck and weigh you down with your own obligations, and the gems in the center of it looked like they would be more than worthwhile as individual pieces. All told, the gold plate and its gems would probably fetch millions. Perhaps hundreds of millions, to the right discreet buyer. That said, he wasn’t here to steal it. He was here to examine it for them, and make sure that it wasn’t ‘dangerous,’ whatever that was meant to mean. He walked around the table a few times, making sure that there wasn’t anything hidden under the chest plate, then looked up at the ceiling again. “Should I put it on?” “Yes. We suggest taking off your shirt first.” “Why? Wouldn’t sweat corrode it?” “That’s not our main concern. We want to see if it reacts to skin contact, just in case.” “We could figure that out with me touching it, though.” “We need a greater degree of contact.” Not what he was hoping for, but if it was what got him paid… Julian sighed, pulling his shirt off button by button before setting it off to the side. It was cool in the room, he realized, cool enough that he started getting goosebumps up and down the backs of his arms and along his sides. He felt like he was being watched, suddenly, more than previously, like there were dozens of cameras pointed right at him and zooming in. Resisting the urge to pull his arms around his chest, he looked back down at the ornamental chest piece. It was big enough that it was going to be heavy, but… [i]Just do it and get it over with. Then you can go home with the money.[/i] Shaking his head, he pulled it over to him by the wire. There was a strange feeling as he did, almost like he was getting shocked with static electricity from holding the thing, but it didn’t hit him that bad until he pulled it over his head. [i]That[/i] felt like a shock right down the spine, and he stumbled forward, almost falling onto the table. “NNNGH!” “Please state how it feels, for the record.” “That was…electric shock,” he panted, shaking his head. “Need to…take it off…” “If you take it off, you will forfeit all financial gains. You must leave it on for at least…how long, doctor?” “Five minutes.” “Five minutes.” How many people were watching this? And what did they mean, leave it on for five minutes? What the hell was that going to do that it wouldn’t do on contact? And when were the shocking sensations going to stop? Julian gasped for breath as he felt one shock after another shoot out from the plate, spreading across his chest. They seemed to focus on his nipples a lot, almost like there were little shock-zaps shooting right from the plate into the little dark spots on his chest. He bit his lips, trying not to focus on that, trying to focus on…well, literally anything else. And the distraction that he needed came in the form of a sudden burst of heat across his back. He slumped forward even further, the metal plate losing contact with his chest and banging off the metal surface. “Please stand up.” “I…I’m trying…it’s…hard…” And it was. His legs were shaking more and more with each passing second, and he was having to grit his teeth to keep his balance and not stumble forward. His back burned, and the heat spread across his sides, running down as if someone was pouring some horrible oil out along his back. Not that it was painful, exactly, but it was warm. Warm, then hot, hot as a shower at full temperature. Again, not to the point of pain, but enough to make him feel like he was sweating from head to toe. He felt like his socks were soaked to his feet, like his underwear was clinging to him as he drenched it from sweat. His eyes closed as his hair fell over his face, damp and sticky. “Nnngh…hot. Overheated. Too hot…” “Please note that the subject is experiencing a different temperature. Possibly due to the color change.” “Color – what…” He opened his eyes again, looking down at his arms. There was a tawny, almost golden color running down along his arm, falling like water as it poured out of his skin. It grew, fur coming out where body hair had been, only much thicker, holding in heat to an insane degree. The fur didn’t go across his chest, though, or more than a bit up his shoulders. Yet, at the same time, he could feel the same heat prickles rising from his legs, spreading across the backs of his knees, up his thighs, down his calves. His feet felt like they were getting trapped, held tighter and tighter inside of his shoes and socks, and he swore that his formal shoes had never been so tight before. “Nnngh…ah…ah!” He gasped as he watched the fur reach down to his hand, staring as his palm widened and thickened. His fingers were slowly shifting, too, losing some of the gentle slenderness that he had always had and taking on a very different shape. They looked more like the toes of a cat’s paw, except that they still had some dexterity to them, some…some range of motion. He desperately flicked them around, making sure that he could still use them. As the fur continued to cover his arms and his fingers sprouted claws, he could feel something else. The tingle was running back up his head, and he could feel his head itching. The tingles made his scalp clench, feeling like the worst case of dandruff in the world. He wanted to rip it open with his new claws, to scratch it all away, but he didn’t dare do that without knowing what he was doing. He flinched, shaking his head from side to side, and as he did, his hair…his hair grew, too. It fell down along his face, getting longer, covering his eyes, his cheeks, all the way down to his jawline. He could hardly believe what he was seeing, what he was feeling. As his hair grew, he could feel his hips and ass doing the same thing. Julian finally lost his balance, tumbling forward with a yelp as he hit the ground. Even as he struggled to push himself back to his feet, he realized that it was out of his control. Nothing worked the way that it was supposed to. Nothing – RIIIIIIP! He gasped at the sudden relief he had for one foot, looking down – “Oh…my…” His eyes widened as he saw furry toes pushing out of one shoe, the other straining, almost ready to break the way that the first had. But it was the toes pushing free that shocked him. They were…they were not right. They were not his. There were only four toes, each one thick and soft looking, covered in golden fluff, each one topped with a single claw. It was like staring at an animal’s foot rather than his own, and as his toes curled, the rest of his foot lifted off the ground, his ankle rising, his heel following. They were no longer flat, but pulled up like an animal’s paw. The chestplate was transforming him, he finally realized. He hadn’t understood it until that point, but it was, and into something that was most definitely not human. Julian tried to pull himself up using the table, but even that was impossible, now. He could feel his legs trying and failing to support him, all fours required if he was going to do anything. Struggling to get back up to that, he tried to drag himself back to the airlock – “Ah!” Only for the chestplate to hit him with another shock, this time right to his already-erect nipples, and making them burn…burn with pleasure and need. “Nnngh…ah…ah…” He bit his lips, feeling his face warp and pull as much as the rest of him as he looked down. His nipples were swelling, getting bigger and rounder, and pushing out a bit more than they already had. That was bad enough, but as he saw his flesh pushing out with it, his chest starting to gain a set of…a set of breasts… [i]Holy…no…[/i] He panted as they grew in, arching his back and trying to curl up by turns. The feeling of that weight dropping down from his chest, sagging down against the chestplate as his nipples grew, as his breasts filled in, was something that he’d never experienced before. He grunted as they would suddenly swell, rolling forward before dropping a bit, then swell again and push forward once more. The chestplate rose as they grew bigger, his nipples pushing out just under the metal edge of it. His eyes were bugging out as he realized just how big his breasts were getting, and how they were pushing the plate up, as if it was always meant to rest on them. “Nnngh…help…” He panted for it, begged for it, but the words barely came out as a hiss, let alone something that would be heard outside the room. “Please…help…” No better. He stumbled to the door, lifting one forepaw and pressing it against it. He could see his reflection in the glass, see the way that his face was softening, becoming more and more feminine. It was still him, but with smaller eyes, softer cheekbones, less of a jawline. His adam’s apple disappeared, leaving him looking like a woman with all that longer hair. He pushed himself up a bit more, staring at the breasts that were still coming in, unable to believe his eyes as they filled out under the chestplate. They were big enough to make him look like a whore, he thought, something that should be out and fucking, or at least showing off like some sort of bestial stripper. He groaned as his other shoe finally gave in, ripping apart and leaving him standing on two paws and two hand-paws. They were thicker than his old end-of-limbs, and he shivered as he realized how alien they felt. More, he felt that same tightness running up through his hips, along his ass, pushing against the constraints of his clothes. Groaning at the constriction, Julian gave in to the inevitable and lunged against his hindquarters. With three good scratches, his clothes were ripped apart, leaving nothing to hide the swelling hips and thick ass cheeks. He groaned at the freedom, then blushed as he realized that he was completely exposed. “It seems that the subject has gained a few exhibitionist tendencies,” the intercom said. [i]Fuck…fuck that…[/i] He didn’t have any such thing, though he was humiliated enough to wonder if they were giving it to him by their comments. The idea of showing off wasn’t hot. It wasn’t sexy. It was just…there. And it was more comfortable without clothes, he realized, particularly as he kept growing. He was stretching, his back and middle starting to push forward. He was becoming…different. Not like a centaur, or a cat, but… But like a sphinx, he realized. It was something that he had never considered, but he was turning into a sphinx, somehow. The cursed chestplate was obviously the cause, but why, or how, he didn’t know. All he knew was that it was – [i]She.[/i] Julian blinked, feeling a pressure in his head as the plate shocked him again. He stumbled, wobbling about. [i]She. We are she.[/i] We? Who was…the voice…It was soft, but firm, something pushing into his thoughts and impossible to keep out. He wobbled again, his body trembling from head to toe, his ass growing out like some breeding mare, his tits hanging down low. [i]She. Not he. She. You are not Julian. You…we…you…[/i] Even the voice sounded confused, trying to sort things out. Whatever was happening, it wasn’t going to end well. The pressure continued, driving down onto his brain until the pronoun did, indeed, shift. Not he, but she. Not Julian, but… [i]Seshat.[/i] Yet, they were still the same person. She could still remember what she had been, could still remember that this was not her body. At the same time, there was no resisting the magic, no holding it back. The pressure of something growing forced her attention to the top of her spine, and then to the bottom, pressure pushing out in both sections. She groaned, her claws in both fore and hindpaws curling to rake against the floor, until – RIIIIP! She screamed in pleasure and pain as her wings and tail grew in, the lion’s whip of a tail flicking from side to side, the feathered wings flapping hard. Seshat almost tumbled over, gasping for breath, struggling to pull herself together. [i]Think…[/i] She couldn’t think. [i]Stand.[/i] She could do that. The sphinx dragged herself to her feet, her eyes hazy, her breath coming in slow puffs and huffs as she wobbled on all fours. “The subject appears to have completed its transformation. Time from start to finish…four minutes, fifty-nine seconds.” “Almost perfect,” another voice said. “Yes, well, it certainly did more than we expected, despite your reports. Subject. What is your name?” “…It was…Julian…” “And now?” “Seshat,” she said. “The name where the artifact was found.” “Yes, well, that’s not important now. Subject. With the loss of your humanity, you are now company property. Please submit to the security guards that will be arriving shortly. That is all.” Seshat shook her head, trying to pull herself back together. It was so hard to think after the abrupt loss of her humanity, of her identity of her name. This wasn’t fair. She should…she needed time… She turned, feeling something wobbling between her legs, against her belly. So, she still had a penis, then. That was something. That was… A side door opened, and a series of security guards in hazmat suits stepped out. All of them carried cattle prods in their hands, the sticks sparking every time that they squeezed some button at the base. Seshat looked at them, then bowed her head submissively. There was no fighting this. There was no getting away. Fear gave way to the inevitable, and she followed as they herded her down the tunnel. # Seshat found herself locked up in a series of wire and chain when they finally arrived at the ‘quarters’ that she had been assigned. It was little more than a cell, really, and one that was not built up to be comfortable for the occupant, but rather to hold them. Her only garment continued to be the chestplate, though even that was changing since her transformation. It shrunk, and shrunk, until it was pressed firmly against her skin. More than that, it had not moved since it reached a smaller size above her breasts, almost more of an amulet than anything else, and it continued to do…something. It pressed against her, grinding against her flesh. It took her almost an hour of solitary confinement to realize that it was actually disappearing into her, sinking into her skin and embedding itself there. To remove it would be to take out a piece of her body, and she shivered as she wondered whether the company would go that far to get its property back now that she had been turned into…this. The sphinx was surprisingly calm, however. Despite what had happened, despite her humanity being ripped away, she was…calm. Collected. Focused. There was a part of her mind that realized that this was a puzzle, and knowing that there was a puzzle to solve seemed to engage it in a way that she, as Julian, had never been engaged before. They were brought here to touch magical things, and from those magical things, be transformed. Why? Because they needed to know what the artifacts did? Not likely. They were useful, and so was that knowledge, but they could have used any of their lower-paid staff for this. Why outsiders? Because outsiders weren’t likely to know as much? Yes, that was a possibility. They were not likely to question it, not likely to push for anything if they were transformed. Which meant that transforming the employees risked the employees doing something. If they knew that there was a possibility of transformation, it meant that someone in the company knew that magic was a possibility, that curses and such existed. If one person in the company knew that, then it was a possibility that others did. Yes, that was a piece of the puzzle, Seshat felt. Knowledge of magic’s existence meant that a company employee had a chance to use that magic…somehow…which meant that she had a chance to use it, too. Of course, that meant figuring out how to do that, too, which was another puzzle. Thankfully, the sphinx mind delighted in puzzles. However, she did not have time to truly get into them. Bound as she was, barely able to touch the floor with the tips of her toes, she could not pace, could not move, and most certainly could not keep from [i]being[/i] moved, what with the crane that held her aloft. Bzzzzt. The crane buzzed before starting to move her backward, startling Seshat from her thoughts. “What? What are you doing?” “We have decided it is better not to let you think. We did not anticipate a quadrupedal creature, but our stimulation packages should work on you as well as on a biped.” [i]Stimulation packages?[/i] The answer came a split second later, as her ass was spread around a silicone rod. Seshat’s eyes went wide, her head whipping around to try and see what was going on, but her ass was just a little bit too big for her to be able to see it. But she could feel it, alright. Feel the thick rod rubbing right between her bigger, furred ass cheeks. Without even thinking, her new tail went up, the sphinx’s hole twitching against it. [i]The hell?![/i] Seshat could remember her old life. She could remember being the human male, remembered the different sexual conquests that he’d had. Well, perhaps conquests was a bit ambitious of a way to put it, but she remembered that he’d never gone to all fours to take something up the ass. Was it a sphinx thing? Was it something else? What was going – “Ah!” The crane pulled her back another foot or two, and suddenly, that thick rod was past her rim, sliding into her and opening her up. Her toes and fingers curled, not quite able to make fists, but not far from it. The sphinx’s wings pulled in tight, and her ass clenched hard to try and keep the rod from sliding in any deeper. It didn’t work. All that it did was make her all the more aware of how big it was, how stretched her rim was getting. She hissed, huffing softly, her cock starting to throb. [i]Why? Why are you getting involved?[/i] Regardless of why, it was. It was getting bigger, stiffer, thicker, rising up until it slapped lightly against her belly. The sensation was all the more embarrassing as she felt her balls start swaying as the crane pulled her forward, back, forward, back, sliding her along the rod rather than letting the rod push into her. “Mmmph…ah…ah…” She gasped despite her best efforts, lowering her head as the silicone rod went five, six, seven, eight inches up her ass. She didn’t know how thick it was, but it felt large, large enough to be at least three fingers wide, maybe four. And it was still going. She felt it hit ten inches deep, and then – “Ah! Ah, ah.” She gasped for breath as she felt it start vibrating, the buzzing never leaving her prostate. It tickled her from the rim all the way to her depths, and every thrust reminded her of just how powerful a stimulation that was. Her eyes were wide, her back arched, her wings twitching like mad. Her tail lashed about her, trying and failing to hit something and push it back. Seshat tried to grab the floor with her toes, trying to pull herself forward, but she was just far enough off the ground to keep from getting a grip. She couldn’t get away from the toy, couldn’t get away from that hard rod up her ass. All she could do was take it again, and again, and again. As the crane rocked her back and forth, Seshat realized that she was starting to rock with it, trying to slam her ass back that little bit harder against the dildo. When she felt it go right to the base, fake balls slapping against her own, she gasped, her eyes going wide. “Nnngh…no…” “I believe she can’t quite submit to mere anal stimulation. Let’s see if the other new parts are any more sensitive.” New parts. Her breasts. Oh god. Seshat tried to wriggle, but the bindings were just that little bit too tight for her to do anything more than bounce her boobs a little bit. The sphinx’s breasts were tied, pulled forward between tight coils of rope and made to stand out more than usual. That didn’t help when a pair of suction cups came down, the rubber ends already whistling with the air that was being pulled in through them. [i]Shit…[/i] Giving one last attempt, she managed to thrust her chest forward. It bounced one breast up and out of the way… But not the other. “Ah!” She nearly shrieked as the rubber sucker latched onto her right nipple, pulling on it and dragging it into the tube. What little bit of self-control she had left went right out the window as she started arching her back again and again, feeling that little nub forced hard, and then harder still, growing more sensitive with each passing second as it was sucked stiff. “You shouldn’t have moved.” “You shouldn’t – Nnngh!” “You are company property. You will be pacified as such.” “I would imagine – ah – you don’t – mmmph – do this to your – AH! – employees!” There was no answer on the intercom, but rather a shift with the crane. She was pulled back enough for her breast to fall down again, and almost instantly, her nipple was sucked into the machine. She hissed as it was forced as hard as its neighbor, and looked down at them as the pump went wild. They were both getting bigger, stiffer, looking like a proper woman’s nipples. Not merely little nips that were almost invisible unless it was cold, but rather proper nipples, standing out and proud when someone was staring at them, becoming targets for attention. Every suck the machine gave them made her shiver, feeling like tingles of pleasure were being jolted right through them and into her breasts. Her breath was coming faster and faster again, and Seshat realized that she had already given up the fight. Her hips were getting rocked back on the dildo again and again, opening her up, pushing vibrators down on her prostate, while her nipples were being stimulated beyond what they could easily take. [i]Nnngh…gonna…[/i] The sphinx gasped for breath, biting her lips when she could and moaning when she couldn’t. Her cock was jumping, twitching, spitting on the floor below her, and she couldn’t even move her legs or arms to tease it to get it off faster. [i]Want to…need to…[/i] Her bondage kept her forepaws forward and her hindlegs back, preventing her from touching anything that might have been able to get her off. The sheer humiliation of being made to [i]want[/i] this was bad enough, but the fact that they were making it harder and harder to resist… The sphinx moaned, feeling her cock swing up, down, up, down, slapping her belly as her balls swung back and forth. Her hole clenched, the vibrator hit her prostate square on – “AAAAAAH!” And she screamed as she went over the edge. One explosive burst of pleasure after another rocked her to the core, leaving her shaking in her ropes as she shot her load all over the floor. And the crane wasn’t done with her just yet…and likely wouldn’t be until she was properly ‘pacified.’ [b][u][center]The End[/center][/u][/b]