FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

A Little Ape-ish

---

Written by Arian Mabe (Amethyst Mare)

Commissioned by Harlock27

_ _

_ _

Dr Michelle Sanderson was a hard worker, often kept herself to herself, though only because she was so busy with her work. She always had a smile on her face, her cheeks a little fuller and brighter than they had been when she'd been younger, a relaxed look about her shoulders even on the longest of nights working in the lab. Michelle just found it hard to be stressed about things when, well, she was in the best job possible.

Research. Study. Experiments. Testing. Trials. Oh, how she adored it! She'd worked hard in school and gotten lucky when a job had come up at one of the local research labs, developing sports drinks at that time, which had gotten her started in her career. Michelle was by no means a stranger to how luck played into things and was grateful indeed for the cards she had been handed, determined to make the best of them.

And that was just why she took in every moment, from slipping into her lab coat (she often wore a scoop neck blouse-type shirt underneath, without buttons, for comfort when it grew too warm for the protective coat) in the morning to the quiet precision of checking through samples on slides. She wanted to remember it all, the soft peace that enveloped her, how it felt simply natural to be there, in the environment that meant the most to her.

It had always been important to her, the soft whirring and clicking of automated machines in there, even the hum of the printer churning out something of her colleague's. She was not alone in there, with a couple of other scientists working with her, though they were new to her lab, even if they were just as experienced as her.

Her curly, blonde hair, of course, was tied back – but for the work that they were doing that day, it did not need to be covered, which she appreciated. It was getting warmer as they moved into the summer months and, honestly, she didn't like to be all that covered up, most of the time. It felt kind of restrictive, in a way that often had her twisting and tugging at her clothes during the day, trying to get comfortable, if she felt like she was wearing “too much" safety gear. Of course, that did not mean in the slightest that such equipment and clothing in the laboratory were not necessary, but more of a requirement for doing the work she loved.

“Hm…"

She surveyed the small, nondescript vitamin, just one of many in her first human test batch. It was perfectly safe (she had made quite sure it was) and all of her test subjects so far had responded favourably to varying extents. It was a small, single vitamin designed to be taken once daily. Even though it would be useful for the Western world, she had had less wealthy countries and communities in mind, hoping that it would be distributed to those that needed it the most, to make sure their nutritional needs were met.

In essence, it was a “super vitamin," something that covered all vitamin needs for the smaller nuances of nutrition that could have a severe knock-on effect on the function of the body even while such necessary foods may not be available. The poorest, if she was able to argue for the funding to have it supplied and distributed worldwide, would benefit the most from it. Those with money could simply enjoy another feature of good health, made easy, in the world that they lived in.

In short, there were no downsides and Michelle smiled proudly at her creation, however plain it might have seemed in the little, yellow capsule.

And there was no reason that she could not test it out for herself too, she thought. It had passed all human rounds with zero side effects (which was hardly heard of!) but she had spent an awfully long time making sure that it would not have any negative effects. It was making sure that the compounds within the vitamin did not interact negatively with each other, throughout the digestive process, that was the difficult part.

But she'd done it and, even in a small way, it was time to reap the spoils of her labours and her hard work, just as she deserved to. It would be good to see if there were any additional effects that she could document, after all, by taking the pill personally. Even if it was not quite the done thing, no, not all that often…

Michelle checked briefly that no one was keeping an eye on her as she popped the pill in her mouth and swallowed quickly. She didn't have to worry, because the others were busy, though it still made her feel like she was doing something that she wasn't supposed to be doing, heat rushing to her cheeks. Damn her fair skin!

That was annoying, quite so, though she busied herself with work. Lunch was coming up and she was sure that she would have time to pop out and grab something from the café, see what fruit smoothie options too that they had that day. It was time for a little bit of a healthy celebration!

The cake and wine with friends would come at the weekend, of course…

“Charlotte, Oliver," she said as she left the lab for lunch, popping a messenger bag up on her shoulder with an easy smile. “I'm just popping out for an hour, to the café. Would you guys like anything?"

“Oh, could you get me a coffee?" Charlotte said quickly, grabbing a notepad, her hair trying to wisp free of the ponytail that she tried to keep controlled within. “Here, I'll write it down, they never seem to get my order quite right…"

Michelle suppressed a sigh, though did not catch Oliver trying to meet her eyes and roll his own, attempting to share a moment with her. Charlotte was…interesting. She was not the kind of person that Michelle would have at all chosen to be friends with and they were mostly friends simply because they worked at the same place and nearby: work friends. And not all that good work friends yet, even if she had vaguely known of Charlotte and seen her at work parties before too, just when Charlotte had been in a different department there.

Either way… It was likely that Charlotte was not going to pay her back for the complicated coffee order that was going to take up more time getting ready and picked up at the café than what Michelle had allowed for, putting her behind and frustrated. But she would not say anything, no, because she wanted to make sure that she was still maintaining good working relationships, yes. She knew what a rougher workplace felt like, where everyone was butting heads bumping shoulders, everything uncomfortable and no one really at all working together as she liked in a lab. She just wanted everything to be easy, all so she could get down and focus on her work.

Whereas that was not a bad thing at all, she was liable to end up with ridiculous coffee orders that were never paid back from time to time, among other things. Perhaps it was a small price to pay.

She headed to the café regardless and bit her tongue when the person in front of her got the last smoothie before the blender broke. That was just bad luck, though Michelle thought that she could not get too frustrated, considering that it was no one's fault really. She just might have gotten her banana and strawberry smoothie if she had not been waylaid by Charlotte and stood there for a few minutes while Charlotte went over her coffee order just to make sure everything was absolutely, completely correct.

It wouldn't be right anyway, not when she got it back to her, the cup steaming and full to the brim. And it meant that Michelle wouldn't be able to hang out for her lunch hour in the café to relax and decompress, heading straight back to the lab to get her lunch eaten and ready for the rest of the day.

“Ah, yes…" She said to the cashier, who was looking at her with a bored yet expectant look in his eye, as if he had had a long shift already. “I'm so sorry… Instead of the smoothie… Ah, I'll have a couple of bananas instead, please, that'll be okay."

It wasn't the smoothie that she'd wanted but it would get her the daily hit of potassium she wanted. Briefly, Michelle wondered if she shouldn't be getting fruit and other food like that while she was testing out the supplement, but, well, it was not as if it was a strict test. She just wanted to see if there was anything further that she needed to look into or perhaps something that she had not expected. Trying it for herself was just out of curiosity.

Yet Michelle could not have imagined what was to happen to her after she ate her lunch quickly on the walk back to the lab, bemoaning inwardly her lack of smoothie, the coffee awkwardly balance in her other hand. It was not easy to get everything done at a pace that would keep the coffee hot and she ended up with some time left of her lunch break and nothing severe that she needed to get back to in the lab.

Ifs he had a little time left, well then… There was no need for her to rush, after all. So, she headed outside to the little green space in the inner courtyard of the lab complex and sat down to at least enjoy her bananas and an instant coffee that she had whipped up in the kitchen. A little kick to get her through the rest of the day wouldn't be at all a bad thing.

“Heh, maybe I should have tried the vitamin earlier," she chuckled to herself, so quiet that no one passing would have heard her. “Oh, well…"

There was no sense at all in worrying about it and she bit into the banana with a soft sound, chewing, enjoying the moment, the sunshine, the light breeze tickling her skin. She would have liked a view other than the concrete and glass buildings but it was still interesting to her to think about all the other work that was going on in the labs and other facilities within. Maybe she would change departments one day too, as she was looking at cellular regeneration too in her free time, with a focus on curing disease.

Wasn't science wonderful?

However, Michelle was going to prove to be the first to find out just what side effects the little, innocuous pill could really have. She didn't know quite what was happening, only that she felt warm all over and very comfortable, very firm. And there was no one out there in the little grassy courtyard for relaxing and eating lunches that day to tell her what happened either.

“Unff…"

Michelle dropped the banana skin, her snack finished, as her arms thickened, muscle layering down them as if she had donned some kind of suit that was designed to make her look much larger and bulkier than she naturally was. She shook her head, her neck feeling tight and uncomfortable – but only for a moment. Everything thickened as she stood and grunted, trembling with need.

Hungry! So hungry!

“Gnnghhh…"

Sure, she'd already had lunch but she was starving, so much so that she couldn't think of anything else, not even as her shoulders hunched and her upper back rounded over a little more too, as if it would have suddenly been a lot more difficult for her to push her shoulder blades back. Her blouse pulled taut across her upper back and around her neck, where the tightness had come from, and ripped with a snarl of fabric giving up, revealing her darkening skin, how more and more pigment was being added to it. And the hair… It tickled and itched, bidding her to scratch roughly at herself with larger, fatter fingers with big, chunky nails, as she tried to get rid of the uncomfortable sensation.

But not the hair. In her mind, that wasn't a problem at all, no, not something that she even registered, because it was just something that she was having to deal with in that moment. Her nails grew a little more ridged, but it was the massive amount of hair coating her that was different! It almost grew tangled where it thickened up even more under her armpits, spreading down her arms, though it was thinner and lighter at places like the underside of her arms and her lower legs.

“Gnnnfff!"

She grunted, her pupils dilated, though her only focus was hunger, yes, the muscle feeling right on her body. Maybe she had been sleeping before, yes, which had been why she'd felt so tired initially, but her mind did funny things trying to rationalise things away. Even her hair darkened while the curls remained, springing into a wild mass of black-brown hair that matched the thick hair coating her body, all as if it had already been there.

If Michelle had had her own mind, her intellectual mind, at her disposal, she would have been able to look in the reflective glass windows of the lab and see herself as she was. Nothing more than an ape-woman, some kind of hybrid that had ended up a cross between an ape and a woman, even if aspects of both were visible. Her face was not completely covered with hair, though her eyebrows were a lot thicker and bushier than they had been before, almost overshadowing her eyes, and her eyes were a darker blue-brown than they had been before, not the light blue that Michelle would have expected to see set into her face.

She would have seen that she stood a good head and shoulders taller than she had before as her calves thickened with muscle, flexing and contracting as if she was trying, even then, the suss out the limits of her new body. Yet she was hunched over, her arms hanging forward as if her body found it more natural to let her arms drag and swing as she swung her head inquisitively back and forth. The mass of her dark, curly hair, seemed to blend into the sides of her face where additional hair was growing, even though it did not hide her features.

Strong. Powerful. Sexy. She was neither human nor ape and her skin was somewhere in an ape-like appearance, even though her feminine features remained. Her smile was still there, though it was a little more open than before, as if Michelle no longer saw the need to keep her mouth all the way closed. Her teeth were exposed and she whooped and threw her arms up, clenching her fists, the muscle in her arms and shoulders bunching into contraction.

She was glorious, truly, and there was no other way for it as she leapt and bounded off the bench, her second banana forgotten. She didn't need it anymore – she was hungry for more! More than a banana! There was a statue, set on a plinth with a description of what the statue referenced, but she couldn't work out just what it said, for she had never paid all that close attention to it.

And it was not important to her, not as she comfortably revelled in her strength as if it had always been a part of her – for, in her mind, that was exactly what it was, what had been. There was nothing else in her mind as she lumbered and clung to the statue, spinning around it, hanging off it, though it was not as interesting to Michelle as she would have liked. Her mind worked in stranger ways and she had to interest herself, even though the minutes passed and, still, no one came out there to join her. That was probably for the best as Michelle dropped heavily back to the ground with a thud that sent a reverberation through the ground.

She didn't notice it, however. It was just normal, natural for her. She shook herself off, chewing and grunting as she pounced into the flowerbeds there too. Not because she wanted to rip them up or anything, but that was a side effect of her storming through them, leaping and lumbering as if her weight was something that made her even more destructive than before. Not that Michelle had been very destructive at all.

She couldn't work out how to leave the patch of grass and the hard stone that ringed it, no… No, that wasn't where she was supposed to be, there was no food there. She wanted food, her stomach gurgling and churning, rumbling with a simple, basic need. There was nothing there, however, for her to eat, not even food on the one, lone tree that was at the side of the courtyard.

Her body, however, did not stay like that. Slowly, she melded back into a human form, hair slipping away from her, leaving a pile of it all around her body. Her clothes hung slacker around her while her mass softened to a size that she was more familiar with, that settled across her body more comfortably. Her skin retracted, no stretch marks in place after growing so much, straightening her back and blinking rapidly as even her blonde, curly hair softened back around her head and shoulders. However, the problem there was that it was still a mess, tousled and matted, as if she had just been engaged in a lot of physical exertion.

Blinking, Michelle lifted her hands. Why was she standing? Ah, maybe it was time to head back inside after lunch… But something was different. She lifted her arms, feeling just how the cloth of her blouse floated around her lightly, moving more than it should have.

“Agh!"

Her clothes! Why was her blouse torn? It was practically slipping forward off her shoulders and she yanked it back before her bra could be exposed. But what if someone saw her? Maybe she had caught it on the back of the bench? She couldn't imagine just how her clothes had gotten so torn, turning around, grabbing at them, trying to make sure that everything was in the right place, that she wasn't showing any skin that she didn't want to be showing.

“What on earth…"

Horrified, Michelle clutched at her clothes, dragging them around herself. At least her black trousers were still okay – but, wait, that wasn't right either! They seemed to have stretched, much looser around the waist than they had been before, though she hadn't worn a belt either and those had never been particularly snug around her hips either.

Hitching her trousers up, she snatched up her lab coat from where she had left it over the back of the bench and ducked back into the lab, her heart pounding. She didn't know how on earth all of that had happened but she wasn't about to hang about and let anyone see anything of her body that she would rather keep to herself.

That day, Michelle had to leave early, her second banana left in her private locker for the next day, where it would ripen a little more before she managed to find the time to eat it.

As part of her experiment, she took another vitamin the next morning, taking the pill bottle of the test batch home with her. It was easier to take it first thing with her usual porridge for breakfast, though she felt a little hungrier than normal that morning too – enough so that she added some of the good honey and blueberries to her porridge just to give it that little something extra.

It wasn't enough, or it would have been enough if not for the vitamin making her just that little bit hungrier. Not enough for her to worry but enough that she was not quite comfortable during the day.

She had her second banana for her mid-morning snack that day, preferring to eat it before it went too ripe for her or even went off. No… No, she didn't want to eat it if it didn't taste right, but Michelle didn't know that her ape-hybrid form was not going to worry about something like that.

That time, she was in the bathroom before she transformed. Her transformation powered through her more quickly that time, her intelligence dropping, even though it would still be there, behind the façade of the ape-hybrid that took control at that moment. It was not meant to be permanent, though the problem was that she didn't know what was happening to her while she was in the hybrid form and neither did Charlotte end up with any recollection of it either.

Her shoulders burst straight through her button-up blouse that time, splitting it across the seams and done the middle of the back, ruined beyond all compare. She'd been wearing a skirt that day, long and flowing due to the warmer weather, and the elastic waistband stretched and stretched as she groaned.

“Nngghh…"

Michelle couldn't help herself, losing her mind faintly – though there was not much loss at all to be had in it, no. It was there, yes, but in a softer way, a beautiful way, a way that let her be simpler. She didn't always have to be worrying about everyone else or what was going on around her, oh no – none of that. None of that was needed, not in the slightest, not as her arms rippled with that dark hair and her skin took on a darker shade. The mirrors reflected her and she stared at herself, blinking slowly, her eyes changing to a rich amber-brown, dark and intense.

But they were not the eyes of a human being, even if there was a hybrid mind behind them as her thighs thickened and her back hunched over, slipping right back into the more comfortable stance to stand in and move through, her shoulders rounding out more and more. They were like cannonballs – though that was a term more often used in the gym to refer to people that were actively bulking up their shoulders, even if Michelle would have thought that their appearance would have been quite pleasing if she had had the intellect there to convey such a thought.

Yet that was not needed, not as raw energy coursed through her, her stomach grumbling. She was just so energetic and she grunted, whooping like an ape as her hair curled into that wickeder mess of dark brown-black shades, though she'd already had plenty of curls to begin with. Even with the thick hair coating her back, the muscle could be seen through it – well, it would have if her button-up blouse was not covering most of her back at that moment. There were big, dark rips across the top and down in lines from her underarms, where even thicker, lightly musky hair sprung forth. She was not built for an environment such as the lab with a transformation and a body like that upon her and there was only so much Michelle, as an ape-hybrid, could do about something like that.

Not that it bothered her, no. With her transformation into ape-woman complete, she blinked at her reflection, itching the back of her head, her chunkier, thicker nails acting like claws, though there was still something feminine about the edge of them, as if her humanity could still be seen underneath. Her face was a little longer and flatter down the cheekbones too, but that could have partly been the thicker hair (not so thick that it overwhelmed her features) at the sides of her face affecting just how she saw it.

And she knew that the reflection was herself even as she turned from it, investigating the bathroom stalls and slamming each door open with a bang.

SLAM!

BANG!

SLAM!

“Whhhoooo-oooop!"

She leapt up onto the counter by the sinks, leaning on a tap and cracking it with her weight, her feet a little more flexible than they had been before, though, luckily, she had kicked off her flat shoes in the process of the transformation. There was, indeed, something to be said, after all, for not wearing socks, even if Michelle much preferred closed shoes that protected her feet in the lab. It all depended on what experiments she was running and, of course, there was always safety gear, when she was normal Michelle and not ape Michelle, that she could put on to cover her feet and any bare skin.

It was better for her like that, however, towering so high that she was forced to curl down again while she was up on the counter so as not to accidentally push up against the ceiling. The space was small, too small, and she ran her tongue curiously around the inside of her mouth, feeling her teeth, which had slight gaps between them, the canines a little longer than they had been. She couldn't, however, make that comparison.

And then the door opened and someone that she recognised but no longer had the mental ability to put a name to open the door. The woman with her red hair tied back in a prim bun started and shrieked, one of her hands shooting up in a flail as if she thought that she would be able to fend off the ape-hybrid.

“Agh! What the…"

Michelle bellowed and thumped her fists on her chest as the red-haired woman flattened herself to the wall, her eyes wide, heat flooding to her face as her body locked into fight or flight mode. Intruder! Were they looking for her food too? She was hungry – and there was no food in there!

She would not have been so aggressive if she had not been trapped in a small space, not wanting someone else in there – not in her territory! Space, she needed space, and she didn't know who the stranger was either. She was just an intruder who needed to be forced back and Michelle did just that, charging at her with the force of a single-minded beast, even if she truly meant the redhead no harm at all.

It was not much of a chase, for the moment that the red-haired woman saw Michelle coming for her she let out a scream that hurt the ape-hybrid's ears even more, piercing and shrill. Michelle grunted and faltered at the stark pain of it, which was more than enough time for the stranger to scrabble away from her, lunging for the door that swung back on her heels.

Michelle was not trapped in there, understanding how to use the door handle to get out if she wanted to. But the space! She gnashed her teeth and followed her first thought – or notion, as it appeared in her head.

She needed space… So, she would make it for herself!

With both hands, she grabbed the top of the nearest stall, howling as she ripped it from where it was fixed down into the floor, tiles ripping up, shattering under her feet as she leapt and slammed down. There! That was better. With just one stall opened up, there was a little more room to move and she wrenched at the wall of the second, slamming away the freely swinging door with enough force that it cracked and snapped right off its hinges. The toilets were not something that she recognised and so she smashed down into them with both hands clenched into fists, cracking the porcelain and sending a spew of water spilling across the floor.

The water did not bother her so much, no, not as she worked her way through every stall, satisfied with how the space opened up around her. Sure, there was more underfoot for her to avoid, though that was not so much of a problem for Michelle when she felt that she could easily avoid them, her feet folding and moulding over the rubble and carefully avoiding any sharp edges that were left behind.

It was no worry, no, no trouble at all to her. Not as she brought down the last stall wall and used the big, flat boards that they had been to cover the floor, keeping her up and out of the water. The last toilet was ruthlessly shoved into the wall, spouting water, but Michelle ignored it when it was not something that was causing her any concern. For good measure, she tested the counter by the sinks too, leaning into it and curling her fingers around the rim of it until it cracked and crumbled under her grip.

Relishing in her strength, she whooped all over again and bounced excitedly on the balls of her feet, completely ignorant to the greater and greater volume of water spilling out across the floor. It was good to be strong, even if she was hungry too, yes, confident in her own power, her sense of self at peace. The sinks were pushed back, uncaring of the damage she left behind – for it was not damage, in her mind, but essential remodelling. One way or the other, after all, she had to make space for herself, all in the little nook of her territory.

Michelle changed back as she left the bathroom, her form lighter and wobblier, as if she wasn't able to quite keep her balance. She hummed to herself as she blinked, not noticing at first that her shirt was ripped across the back for, thankfully, everything that needed to be covered up was covered. Her skirt did seem a bit looser but she put that down to the natural changes in her body, merely tucking the waistband over itself for a little extra tightness there, to keep it more snugly in place.

“Huh…"

She ran her fingers through her hair. Damn, she had a brush in her locker… And what had gone wrong there – where were her shoes? She blinked, swallowing hard. Shoot, something… No, she didn't know what had happened and the stirring of unease in the pit of her belly was not something that was at all held lightly by her, not as everything threatened to twist itself up into knots of worry.

I don't even remember going to the bathroom…

_ _

Hurrying to her locker, she quickly swapped on a pair of low-heeled shoes and, on finding that she had caught her buttoned shirt on something yet again, changed that out for a spare one in her locker too. At least she'd had the foresight to put some spare clothes in there so she didn't have to run home in a hurry again!

If she'd known why she was changing, she would have been shocked. Not horrified…but certainly shocked.

She headed back to the lab after setting herself right and feeling much more herself than she had before, even striding out more confidently. She was hungry and looking forward to lunch and she had already determined, in a conversation with herself, that she was going to make sure that Charlotte did not interrupt her lunch break this time for a coffee.

Charlotte is perfectly capable of getting her own coffee – and it's okay if I don't offer to get it for her.

_ _

Michelle paused.

Perhaps I should raise the money with her too…

_ _

That was a step for another day, however, allowing her confidence to grow, even though she did not think that she was actively doing anything to change it. If she was feeling better, however, despite the oddness with her hair and her shirt tearing, the clumsiness that she could only suppose was taking place, Michelle wasn't going to complain.

She slipped into her seat, checking on e-mails. There was some grant funding that she was hoping to get acknowledged so that she could move on to the next stage of developing the pill coating for her vitamin. But her mind was already on other projects, always looking ahead.

Her colleague, Charlotte, made a soft noise at her workstation, though Michelle ignored it. At least, she did until Charlotte spoke up.

“Someone says that the bathroom on this floor, the one down the hall," Charlotte said with a frown. “It's… Out of order? Huh. Something about a flood?"

Curiously, Michelle glanced back at her, even if she was more focused on her own project than what Charlotte was going into. Her work was more interesting.

“What are you reading?"

“Oh, Susie sent me an e-mail, said she tried to go to the bathroom and it's, like, flooded all across the hall, water everywhere… Wow, something went wrong in there."

Michelle shrugged.

“Well, it was fine when I was there. I'm sure they'll get everything sorted soon, maintenance is so good here."

But the fact of the matter was that Michelle didn't remember coming out of the bathroom at all. She chose to ignore the fact that the bottom hem of her skirt had been damp, brushing up uncomfortably against her bare ankles throughout the day.

Bananas sounded good to Dr Sanderson, so she made sure to stock up on a big basket of them, along with other fruits and veggies, some of which she had not tried before, when she headed to the supermarket. Meat seemed a little less appealing than usual so she went with the flow of what her body was telling her that it needed.

I'm still taking the vitamin, she thought as she checked out, ignoring the look from the cashier as to the amount of fresh produce she was buying, and not much else. Maybe this is a side effect? My body is adjusting to it…so now I am craving other things to fill in any gaps in nutrition?

_ _

Or perhaps the pill covered the vitamin needs from meat, which was why it seemed less appealing to her. Either way, it was an exciting new development and she headed straight home to write up her theory, even though it was a weekend day and, of course, she really shouldn't have been doing any work at all. It was hard, however, to completely detach herself from something that gave her so much life and simply made her days feel whole, just the way they were.

She groaned, setting the bags down in her house. Wow, she was hungry! She couldn't wait to make a lunch for herself and dug into the bag of bananas, all of her produce set out on the counters for her to put away, though Michelle did chuckle a little at herself for not even getting that far.

“Ah, what am I like?"

She shook her head but allowed her body to give in to the urges nonetheless, for it was not as if she had to fight back against the urge to eat and make sure her belly was comfortably full. First, one banana disappeared into her mouth, chewing quickly and eating for sustenance rather than pleasure, even though the smooth texture of the food sliding over her throat, sparking off her tastebuds, was inherently pleasurable in itself. There was just something about eating that tapped into something basic and primal in the mind of any animal, even human beings, a knowledge that they were taking care of their needs.

For the weekend, she had worn a loose, baggy T-shirt, choosing something less restrictive so that she could go without a bra too, for her bras seemed to be getting stretched out, the elastic going at the back and the underwire even popping free on one. That had been on the day of the bathroom incident but there was no way for Michelle to understand just what had caused that, not when she had no memory at all of it.

Her body grew, filling out the T-shirt but, that time, not ripping it. On her bottom half, however, her shorts had been a little tight on her thighs and stretched to fill out the new muscle, the hair more obvious now that she was not wearing something that covered up her legs. The ape-woman grunted deeply, rolling her shoulders back and diving into the food as her entire ape-form settled over her like a second skin, yet one that sank even more deeply into her than merely being a woman.

Her fingers grabbed. Food! Yes, food, that was what she'd needed, what she had not realised that she so very desperately needed to fill her stomach with. She didn't know what the names of the foods she saw before her, in the strange, bright room, were, but she didn't need to if she wanted to fill her stomach with them, no. She peeled the bananas expertly, turning them “upside down" to squeeze and pop them out easily, moving onto oranges, though she ate some of that peel too in her haste to fill her belly.

But it was so good to eat, even though the postman passing the house to drop in the letters through the letterbox did pause and rub his eyes, sure that he was seeing things. He went off, however, glancing back just once to look through her kitchen window, which faced the front of her house, a small garden separating her from the street beyond. No one stopped the ape-woman as she feasted, demolishing everything that she had bought until her stomach was ever so lightly distended and so very comfortably full.

Michelle had not felt that full since before her first transformation. And it was a good feeling, a soft, heavy feeling that made her want to sit down and rest.

But her ape-self liked order too and had enough intelligence, even there, to put away the produce. Her shorts tugged tightly around her thighs and she took a big, wrenching step to break free of them, even though that meant that they both split right up the inner thighs and exposed parts of her that really shouldn't have been. Her mangled underwear was subject to the same treatment under them, of course, though that was beside the point.

She was happier to move freely, letting out a soft rumble as her lips twitched and she looked through the food left. That should be stored, yes, stored. Then she would have more food again whenever she was hungry next. That was a good plan, a fool proof plan, one that she liked very much. Storing food for later was just as important as keeping it for the moment of hunger, after all, even though she would have liked to have kept eating and eating, simply because the act of doing so felt so good to her.

Still, she had to concern herself with other things, like putting things away in the cupboards, yes. There was a big, cold cupboard that she crammed some things into, haphazardly placing them on the shelves. They would be safe there! And there were some shiny, hard cupboards too, places to store it, though Michelle did not remember what they were called, beyond that in her ape form.

The cupboards took whatever she shoved into them and she grabbed a bunch of grapes that dropped out, shoving them back in a little too roughly and crushing some. It was okay though because the food would still taste good when she ate it and she knew to eat food before it went bad, yes, that was something.

Settling down afterwards on the sofa for a well-deserved nap and to let all of the food that she had eaten digest more comfortably, Michelle sighed, her eyelids drooping more and more heavily with sleep. She was too big to settle into her sofa as she was, leaving one leg hanging off and her arm flung up behind her head, snoring faintly as she slumbered.

In her sleep, she transformed back to her usual form and body, though the hair left behind from the ape side of her would prove to be harder for Michelle to ignore that time. It was everywhere, layered around the sofa and sticking into the carpet, dark and thick and unlike anything that had ever come from any pet animal that she had ever known.

Her body slowly shrank, as if it was lulled by sleep, losing the hair first and then the muscle, no stretch marks at all remaining on her skin to show what had passed. Even the thicker hair clumped away from her armpits, leaving only a natural prickle of hair behind Michelle preferred to keep herself shaved under her arms. It didn't disintegrate, though it seemed like less when it was on the sofa and the carpet, even though it was quite a large amount.

“Hm?"

Michelle blinked slowly, coming back to herself. She felt…odd. In a good way, a satisfying way, the kind of way that, honestly, she wouldn't have minded waking up like that every morning for the rest of her life. Yet it seemed to be early afternoon and she was so comfortable already as she wriggled more into the centre of the sofa. Her hand rested lightly on a full, satisfied stomach, though she swiftly felt brighter and more alert, more present in herself, even though Michelle, quite honestly, did not have any will to move.

Just where was there for her to move to, after all? Where was there for her to go? She didn't have anything to do and she just felt…whole. She felt as if she had finally gotten what she needed, a good night of sleep or the right nutrients and vitamins as a whole.

She smiled faintly, not expending any more energy than, in that moment, was absolutely necessary. She didn't want to be wasteful and it was so peaceful there, birdsong filtering in through the open living room window, the faint sound of traffic moving by on the road beyond, though it was not a busy street, not in particular, that she lived on.

It was good to rest there, settling and enjoying, being comfortable and present, at long last, in her own body.

She only wished that she'd known just how she'd gotten there… She would have liked to document it!

Things continued in the same vein, though Michelle began noting down when she had her “blackouts." It would have been difficult for her not to notice that she was losing chunks of time when the weather changed outside or Charlotte got nosy and asked her where she'd been. Even Oliver looked concerned and, well, it was his worry about her that prompted her to look at things a little more closely. She'd been finding a lot of hair around too and the cleaning staff, who came by at the end of the day, had started complaining that someone was bringing a pet into the lab.

Still taking the vitamin pill to record her findings on a personal level and enjoying her newfound pleasure in eating bananas daily rather than her old favourite smoothie, the changes kept on coming.

In the gym, when she was working out alone. The only one to bear witness to that one was the gym owner who'd received an alert from the security camera system monitoring her twenty-four-hour access gym. She'd thought that someone was playing a prank on her.

When she was driving, squashing her seat and breaking her seatbelt, her hands overly large on the wheel as she had drifted to the side of the road. Her ape form was intelligent, yes, but not enough to suddenly know how to drive a manual car without previously being taught. It was not as simple as opening a door!

She transformed when she was heading to see her boss for a meeting too – something that Michelle had very much not been looking forward to. He was always so rude and pushy, barging into her space. And he didn't exactly know anything at all about the experiments that she was running and the pills she was designing. He didn't even seem to care about helping people – and wasn't that what all of them were there to do?

His attitude… Well, it was one that Michelle did not understand. But it was just as well for her that she transformed into her hybrid body before entering his office, for her boss was not able to link the two people together. Not as the ape-woman stormed in, standing tall and crossing her arms, waiting on the fool before her to make himself known.

“What is all this?" He all but sneered, expecting that his employees, in some fashion, were trying to pull one over on him. “I haven't got the time for this. Is this Michelle's doing? I didn't think she'd have it in her to try on something like this, but, really… I don't have the time for this!"

He paused, expecting the ape-woman to do something, anything, though all she did was glower. Who did the small ape think he was, talking to her like that? She recognised the aggressive posture of his body, how his movements were sharp and jerky, as if he was trying to make a point about something, the short, clipped nature of how he made sounds from his mouth. There was eye contact too, the stares boring into her and raising her aggression, even though Michelle would have rather chosen anything other than to be aggressive to anyone around her.

No… No, that would never have been her first choice nor the choice of the ape-woman. But she had to do something when the small ape came and grabbed her by the shoulder and hip, making as if to forcibly move her from the room.

She bellowed, turning and easily jerking herself free of his hold. He wouldn't handle her like that!

She snarled, showing her teeth, though it was more of a show of dominance than anything else, forcing him back, snapping at him while she closed her fingers around his upper arms. He squeaked, something high-pitched and not at all like anything that should have come out of his mouth but, well, she wasn't all that concerned about that.

“Unff… No…"

She growled, her voice much lower and deeper than it had been as a human, striding out towards the office door. In her mind, it was her space once again, her territory – and that was something to be protected at all costs. Michelle lumbered, though carefully, not dropping him, not squeezing him too hard, though the hard, intense look in her eyes was one that very much was not to be reckoned with.

“Eep… No… You…"

She didn't care for his words, kicking open the door (and smashing it right through the frame) to hurl him out. It only took a single fling of her arms, rippling with muscle, to send him back where he belonged, away from her, out where he could, for the time being, do no harm to anyone else.

Later, she'd wonder why she found herself sitting in her boss' chair and then hurried back to her workstation, trying to make out that she hadn't been gone as long as she thought that she had. Something extremely strange, at least for Dr Sanderson, was afoot.

Michelle joined MatchR, a dating app. It was just something that she wanted to try and she thought that she could give herself a little bit of a break from the craziness that her life seemed to be turning into, as well as her research was going. There was something odd there and she just needed to go out, to have a good date night, even if it led nowhere. Someone new too couldn't hurt, she reasoned with herself as she dressed up in a nice but moderate dress: something that showed enough skin to be interesting and hid enough to be her. She didn't want to let it all hang out on a first date. She had special lingerie for that…

The date… Yeah, okay. Maybe she'd had high hopes for it but it wasn't all that bad. They didn't click as well as she would have liked and the problem there was that he had said a few misogynistic things that weren't “that bad" but bad enough for her to not want to see him again. She knew a red flag when she saw them!

However, after they split the tab, which was sort of okay, she headed to the bar for a few drinks, trying out a new cocktail. Michelle did her best to sip it slowly, but it tasted great, actually like it was familiar to her, though she couldn't quite place all the different flavours dancing over her tongue.

“Hey there, gorgeous…"

Ugh.

_ _

Now, that was very much not her favourite part of heading out to the bars, which was just why she didn't usually go out to that kind of place alone, or with friends. But the vibe and the buzz, the feeling of life and vibrancy around her… It was intoxicating and it felt like more of a social environment that she needed to be a part of, seeing others around her, hearing them, letting the simple enjoyment of being around people ease into her.

Not that guy though. Not that sleazy bloke with slicked-back hair, the one that looked like he would use her and toss her aside. No one would go out with a guy like that, sliding across the bar to her and scooting all the way up into her space.

“I'm not interested."

“Aw, come on, you're here alone and I'm here alone, what's the harm in a friendly chat?"

Although Michelle was wary of it, the problem was that…she still was somewhat of a people pleaser. So, she allowed it, even though she obviously scooted her bar stool away from him, deliberately making sure that he knew that she was putting distance between them.

“Another of these then."

“Alright!" The guy, who had not even introduced himself, clapped and rubbed his hands together, grinning while he showed too many teeth. “Now, we're talking! Bartender!"

He snapped his fingers: what a sleaze. She saw his eyes on her modest bust, how he roamed over her body, instantly regretting accepting a drink from him. In hindsight, Michelle could not have remembered if he had given a name or even what conversation passed between them. It was worse than small talk, mostly just him trying to schmooze on her, talking himself up, though nothing he could say would ever make himself seem at all impressive in Michelle's eyes. She'd never been impressed by show boaters like him.

“Yeah, well…" She started, glancing at her drink, which she'd had half of, and stirring it lightly with the straw, making the ice rap against the glass. “It's been fun but I've really got to be getting on now…"

“And I'm getting an X20 jag next week, it's going to be sweet, really hold their value…"

She made a face that she didn't intend, lips pressed together.

“Excuse me." Michelle would have to be less direct with him, sneaking out – she didn't owe the guy anything, after all. “I've just got to pop to the bathroom…"

She slipped away before he could do something to get her to stay there, feeling ever so slightly woozy. What Michelle did not know was that, while she had been looking for an escape earlier on, he had dropped a pill into her drink.

Her drink…which had real banana flavouring added to it. It had a slower effect than a regular banana, though there was only so much her body could take before it had to react, with the influence of the vitamin still in her system.

Her stomach lurched and she gulped, trying to hold everything down. Stumbling into the ladies' bathroom, she shook her head, but didn't quite catch the door banging open for a second time behind her.

“Ah, yeah, c'mere, sweetheart, now I can make you feel real good, just like you deserve…"

She turned. Why was the bathroom so…spinny? It was tipping and slanting, things going off-kilter, though the guy lurching towards her was not at all the sort that she should have ever hung out with – not even if she was trying to please people. But she'd worried about offending him and then he was in there, trying to take advantage of her, pinning her up against the bathroom wall, shoving her into a stall with his lips on hers.

He groaned into her mouth but Michelle did not see him. No… Not as her body transformed, shoulders ripping through the straps of her dress and her hefty bosom overly filling out the front. It split at the back, popping the zip off, though that, at least, allowed most of her body to remain covered up, even though the dress was forced roughly up her thighs. Exposing the thick hair of her legs, her body rippled with muscle and Michelle, as her hybrid self, howled and hurled him out of the stall with just one hand.

“No!"

She thundered, her pupils dilating. Who did he think she was, to treat her like that?

“No…more!"

She stormed after him, though the guy was dazed, having hit the wall, though not as hard as he could have been. Michelle snarled and hefted him up with one hand, slapping him crudely, though it was more than enough to snap his head to one side and then the other, as she continued the blows. She squeezed him roughly enough with her other hand to leave deep, crude bruises in his flesh, though it was hardly as if anyone would believe him if he told the story anyway. And Michelle was not at all in her human mind enough to hold herself back from giving him every slap and punch, sinking her fist into his gut to knock the air from his lungs.

That would make it harder for him to follow her…and even though she could have killed him or seriously maimed him, she did not. Because that was not what Michelle did in self-defence, even when she was defending her body rather than her territory.

So, she left the slapped-around man there on the floor, hurling him into the furthest stall where the door locked after him. He groaned but she did not care as something within her surged and she launched herself out of the bathroom into the darkened club, the lights dimmed for the dancing to really kick off.

“Wooooo!"

She howled and threw her arms in the air, taking to the middle of the dance floor away from where she had been having drinks at the bar. She didn't need that anymore, not as she threw herself about, her dance moves wild and crazy, sharp and juddery, though they were every last little bit the ape-woman as she had ever been.

She had never been that much of a dancer…but being confident changed everything, people giving her room, dancing with her, trying to get her to spin them. She was easily as tall as most of the guys there and no one knew who she was, though it was not as if they could see who she was either. She was a stranger in a crazy get-up who was skidding and jumping and flipping, shaking her hips and her arse while her breasts, admittedly, were very nearly spilling out of her dress. It was only by the grace of whatever god happened to be watching at that time that her breasts remained contained, though it was not to remain that way forever.

No… For one bad date did not mean that she wasn't going to find who she wanted. But, for that night alone, she stayed there to throw shapes and all the moves that she would never have had the boldness of heart to do before.

And that was just why, finally, she asked out Oliver from work. Not before she had had one incident at the gym where she had transformed in the bathroom and escaped out the window in nothing more than tiny booty shorts (due to her change) to later wake up as Michelle again, wondering why she was strutting around in barely anything at all. And not before she transformed again at home and showered with wet hair plastered to her body, grunting and groaning, her fingers digging between her thighs into the heat of her pussy.

After all, there was so much lust to be had as an ape and she could take far more from her new body than imagined. It was a hybrid form of impulse and desire, one that took what was needed at any given time, even though Michelle was not devoid of ethics and morals either.

The date with him was…nice. Pretty standard, though she dressed in a slightly shorter skirt than usual, feeling more comfortable in her body. That had been a recent development, perhaps another happy side effect from the vitamin, though she didn't mind that at all, no. That was a good thing, a nice thing, something that made her feel confident flirting mildly with the brown-haired man sitting across from her in the quiet restaurant.

He'd chosen one lit atmospherically with candles lit on every table and she couldn't help but lean in closer to Oliver over the table. He had such an easy, nice smile…

“Well, I can't ask you about your work," she teased, brushing her fingers lightly across the back of his hand and noting just how he shivered at her touch. “You already work with me…and it's going splendidly! I can't wait until you get the funding through for your next project."

“It's good to do good there, yes," he said, “but I do also go rock climbing at the weekends, bouldering too if I can go further afield, out of the city. What do you do?"

“Oh!"

She hadn't gotten the chance to really talk about herself like that for a long time, though Michelle happily told him about her knitting and how she was getting on at the gym. He didn't seem to believe her that she was lightly muscled, at least by usual standards, under her clothes, and she even was confident enough to slip off her jacket for him, letting him see her truly, though he immediately shot her a highly appreciative grin.

“Wow! I never thought you'd be one to lift weights, shows you how much I know," he said, joking with her and making a jest about it with himself as the punchline. “I should have asked before – we should definitely go rock climbing together! Would you be up for that?"

She grinned. So far, things were going much better than she had imagined. He was even into things that she would try out too!

“Yeah, that sounds really good, in fact. Are you free this weekend?"

It was bold of her to offer that so soon, but she just felt like she had a connection with him. And that was a good thing, especially as she let Oliver take her home, her heart pounding.

Never before would she have taken a man back home to her house on a first date, always wanting to practice safety…but she knew Oliver. And she liked Oliver. Even if Michelle did not know that she was more than capable of looking after herself if anything did go wrong.

But nothing was going to go wrong, no. Not at all, not as they kissed and they lost their clothes, piece by piece, even though Michelle wasn't so sure about how her dessert was sitting in her stomach, slowly being digested.

What she didn't know, however, was that, as she straddled his lap in her bed, both of them in their underwear, she had ingested a dessert that had used real banana flavouring at the restaurant. Due to it only being a small amount and her using a little extra cream to really enjoy her dessert, and ever so slightly tease Oliver, she had not realised it – and neither would have stopped her. However, it was a small enough amount to at least allow her to get home, despite her stomach grumbling a little bit, before the transformation happened.

“Mmm… Michelle… Hey?"

He put his hands on her arms – but something was wrong. With his eyes wide, he took her in, the light from the lamp set on her bedside table illuminating them both and allowing him to take in the full scope of the change. It happened quickly, so swiftly that, for a moment, Oliver didn't know at all whether someone (probably not Michelle) was playing a prank on him, but that wouldn't have been her speed. No… Not even as she rippled with muscle and thick, dark hair, her smile stretching into an almost lewd grin, though it suited her.

Even more so as he moaned, her larger, ape-ish hands ripping off his clothes as his heart surged. Oh, he didn't know what was happening, not at that moment, but he was more than ready to go along with it, letting lust flow through him.

But the ape-woman Michelle was something different, someone even more special than the woman that he was surely and slowly falling for, bit by bit. She was aggressive, practically hurling him back down on the bed and whooping as she struggled to get him out of his underwear, ripping them from his form. He tried to help her with her bra, a laugh of true joy on his lips, but Michelle was, once again, too quick for him.

She took his cock in hand and groped him – but not too roughly that time. It was more as if she knew exactly what she was going to do with him, for him, groaning out his name in a deep, guttural tone.

“Oliver…"

She dragged out the syllables more than she would have normally, though she didn't notice that. All she saw was her grinning partner below her, his hands on her hips, ripping what was left of the fabric of her bra from her – what was that? She didn't need that!

With his hardness in her hand, she pumped him quickly, grunting thickly, need flowing through her. She clearly had not been taking care of her needs as much as she should have been, though that was of no matter right then. No… Not as she ground her pussy up over his hips and down into his cock, pressing it flat, briefly, to his lower abdomen. The man under her spat out a muffled curse that she did not understand, though it didn't matter. Not as he gripped her and groaned for her, trying to drag her forward as if he wanted her to take him right then and there.

So, she did, sliding down onto his cock, humping and grinding, his hand down on her clit. She had not thought of that but still moaned openly, her lips parted, arching so that she could press into his fingers on her clit even more with every hump and every grind of her hips.

“Mmm… Goooood!"

She howled out her pleasure, relinquishing herself completely and utterly into the moment, lust rolling through her. It was good, as she'd said, so very good, leaving her as nothing more than a creature of pleasure, passion escalating with every pant of breath that she managed to drag into her lungs.

Oliver grabbed at her, his orgasm swiftly racing upon him, though he was still reeling from seeing her change. That would have been a shock to anyone, though her gripping his cock so wetly pulled on his desire like nothing had been done before and he could not help but at least try to thrust up into her.

She pinned him though, forcing him down into the bed, resting her hands on his chest. It was so very easy for Michelle to hold him there and he groaned openly, submitting to it.

She was going to have him one way or the other and he didn't need to be up and thrusting to know that she was exactly what he wanted. In the bedroom and outside of it.

Still, it was her losing herself to climax that did it for him, moaning out his lust as her pussy tightened around him and he felt her wetness trickling forth around the join of their bodies, everything so much slicker and wetter than it had been only a few moments before. He heaved and panted and gave in, crying out as he spent his seed bareback inside her, his cum taken by her, though he did, briefly, hope that that was okay.

They came down slowly, Michelle curling forward over him, her shoulders rounded, though it looked like quite a natural position for her. She transformed back slowly, blinking, though she didn't understand why she was suddenly on top of Oliver. Hair drifted from her as she groaned and tried to get the strain out of her lower back.

“Oof… Oliver! What happened?"

She blushed heavily, but he stopped her from moving away from him too much, resting his hand on her arm with a reassuring smile.

“Now, this is going to sound a bit strange…but you just turned into, like, a big ape-woman thing. Like you were both human and a big ape at the same time!"

“What?"

She blinked, pulling back, though not too far. Sure, that was embarrassing but…that did make sense. The smashed-up things she'd been finding, the way she'd been having blackouts, all that dark hair she'd been finding all over the place.

Had that been something to do with the vitamin? And her craving for bananas?

“Oh, god…"

She groaned, slumping down on the bed beside him as he laughed and rubbed her back.

“Chill, it's all okay! But… it did take me by surprise."

“I bet…" She said, muffling her voice with the pillow, his hand still moving across her upper back. “Mmm… That feels nice. Ugh, it must be the vitamin. I've been wanting bananas… And you said I was an ape-hybrid… I'll have to do more tests, I can't have random people just transforming into apes because of my vitamin pill!"

He chuckled, running his fingers through her hair more tenderly as he soothed her, though there was little embarrassment to be had.

“Will you…take a photo, if I try to get the thing to happen again?" She asked, briefly lifting her head, though it felt only natural to nestle in a little closer to him. “I need to see…"

“Yeah, of course," Oliver said easily. “But maybe you should keep your batch of current vitamins around… You know… For fun!"

She laughed.

“Sure thing, Oliver… But you're the one who'll have to deal with it!"

Either way, there was nothing wrong with being a little ape-ish. And the two of them were going to find out just how much they liked it, all in due time…