Matthew ran about outside, tossing his small blue rubber ball up in the air, catching it. It was about the size of a baseball, and he got it at a toy store quite a few years ago. Since it was such a nice day (and he was just so happy to be outside doing something), he was having quite a good time with it. While tossing the ball up in the air, though, he stopped to sneeze, looking back up just in time to see the ball hit a rock and bounce off down the hillside. Matthew ran down the hill after it, watching as it bounced off through some thick brush that he'd never even noticed was there before. He ran through after it, catching sight of it just as it rolled down a hole. He left his sandals by the hole, and began to crawl through after it. The hole was small, but Matthew was just small enough to barely fit through, even if it was a tight fit. He crawled through the hole, which led slightly downhill. As he crawled, he felt the dirt under his hands turn to a hard material.
He emerged in a large room. There were small holes in thick vines and tree roots in the ceiling of the room, sending shafts of sunlight beaming into the room, lighting it up enough to see. Everything in the room, even the room itself, was made out of a light grayish-colored stone. It was obviously very old, as parts of the walls had crumbled, leaving somewhat large piles of rock laying here and there on the floor. The only things in the room were four pillars serving as additional support for the stone beams that made up the "ceiling", which was just two of those beams with the tree roots and vines growing around them, the hole Matthew had just crawled in through, and a huge pedestal. It was shaped like a huge snake-like creature, one that Matthew had never seen before. The pedestal itself was the creature's tail coiled up, and the creature's head loomed overhead, looking down at its coils, almost as if it was keeping watch. As far as Matthew could tell from the statue, the creature had a small snout, large eyes, wing-like ears, and a ball of some sort under its neck. There, on the top of its coils, lay a small, blue crystal ball, which looked almost exactly like the one he lost down the hole. Carvings of what looked to be the same creature as the pedestal covered the walls of the room and the sides of the pillars. While most of the carvings were worn and mostly faded, there were still a few preserved very well. Matthew looked around, and though most of the writing accompanying the carvings was in a odd foreign language, there was a carving near the pedestal in English: "Dragonair".
Matthew was interested by the odd room, a shrine to this Dragonair creature, but decided an adult should probably see this instead. He was about to crawl back out through the hole, but he decided to take the ball off the pedestal to prove he really found such a room. Matthew went over and picked it up the ball, which seemed to be made out of some kind of glass. He gasped in surprise and dropped the ball back onto the pedestal, though, when he felt his fingers on his right hand (the one he picked up the ball with) beginning to fuse together. It didn't hurt, but he distinctly felt the skin on his fingers start to fuse together, starting at the base of his fingers where they joined to his palm, moving up his fingers. His thumb, while not fusing to his hand, began to shrink slowly back into his palm. He looked at his hand in shock, also noticing his skin was beginning to turn a shade of blue. He gasped, frightened, quickly pulling off his shirt to see if it was affecting him there. He found that his torso, too, was turning blue, except for a white stripe down his front. He felt the change begin to spread up to his face, and he reached up to feel his face, placing his hands there just in time to feel his nose shrinking, disappearing from his face. He felt his teeth changing shape and becoming smaller, his ears flattening out against his head and fusing with it, leaving only two hardly noticeable holes for his ears. His vision began to blur as his eyes began to change shape as well. As he continued to feel his face, he felt his lower face begin to extend, a snout pushing forth, and a small bump on his forehead beginning to grow into a small, pointy horn. He felt the top of his head, only to find his hair was beginning to fall off in clumps, as was the rest of his hair all over his body. His vision cleared as his eyes finished changing, becoming large and solid black. Tears began to build up as the last remnants of his hair fell away from his shiny blue head, and what felt like feathers began to grow around his ears.
He looked back at his hands again; the fingers on his right hand had completely fused together and his thumb had almost completely disappeared, leaving a blue mitt where his hand once was, and his left hand was beginning to suffer the same fate. He looked down at the rest of his body -- his skin had already turned completely blue, except for a white stripe which began at the front of his neck, went down his torso and belly, and down the inside of his legs, all the way to and including his big toes. As he looked at his feet, he noticed they, too, were beginning to go through what his hands went through. The skin of the toes on both his feet began to meld together, leaving a featureless general blue foot shape. His left hand finally finished transforming, leaving both of his hands blue, thumbless mitts.
Matthew was too terrified to think of it before, but tears began to stream down his face as the fear finally set in. He knew he needed to get help, and fast. He turned to run back to the hole, but when he tried to run, he fell forward, unable to walk on his new feet. He felt the change begin to spread downwards towards his waist now, and he pulled down his shorts and underwear slightly, finding to his horror that the change had already begun. Just like with his fingers, his legs had begun to fuse, starting at his crotch and working their way down. The transition from his torso to where his upper legs were was already done, leaving it completely smooth and featureless. Matthew felt around back of him, also finding his rear end was just one smooth mound, with no breaks or openings anywhere. The fusing of his legs together continued down, pushing his shorts and underwear further down as it went. His legs straightened out, his knees and ankles becoming completely straight. They did not stop fusing until his feet, too, were drawn together. Matthew looked down, running his hand from his belly to his knees, finding nothing but smooth, flat skin. The white stripe remained on the top of his legs, though, and it continued all the way down to the tip of his new "tail". Suddenly, Matthew felt his arms beginning to undergo the same process, as the skin on his arms starting at his armpits began to fuse to his sides, his elbows and wrists straightening out. Matthew began to cry even harder, tears streaming down his face. He tried to call out for help, but all that came out of his throat was a loud, high-pitched, pitiful shriek. He tried to say something, anything, but all that came out was high-pitched squeaking.
Within seconds, his arms finished fusing to his body, and they were indistinguishable from the rest of his body. He felt his waist straighten, and his neck crack sharply, moving his head in an odd direction, practically forcing his neck to bend backwards as his head fixed into place. His shoulders, torso, and butt began to shrink, making his entire body a very thin snake-like shape. He felt his insides begin to rearrange and his body elongating. As Matthew looked back at himself through his tear-filled eyes, he realized that he was beginning to look exactly like the creature whose picture was carved all over the wall and what the pedestal was modeled after: a Dragonair. The feelings of his body rearranging finally stopped, and he felt a lump beginning to form on his throat, feeling the same sensation near the tip of his tail. He looked back, finding two blue, shiny crystal orbs -- they looked exactly like the one sitting on the pedestal, he realized -- growing around his thin tail as a similar crystal ball grew under his neck. Once they finished growing, Matthew waited, but felt no other changes to his body. The transformation was finished; Matthew was now a Dragonair.
Matthew looked over his new body and couldn't help himself as he began to cry even harder. His pitiful, haunting wailing echoed loudly in the room. He just wanted to be a normal human boy again, and go back home to his parents and friends. He suddenly stopped crying as he noticed movement by one of the rock piles in a dark corner. He looked carefully, finding a pair of large black eyes staring back at him. To his shock, another Dragonair slithered up to him. Matthew began to back away, frightened of it, but the other Dragonair smiled, wrapping its body around Matthew's comfortingly and nuzzling its head against his. With that, it went back over to the hole near the pile of rocks it had come in through, waving its tail at him to follow. The other Dragonair disappeared from sight, and Matthew was about to follow, when he looked back over at the hole he came in through. He thought about trying to return to his home. He wondered if there was some way to let his parents know what happened to him. He wondered if any doctor in the world could even begin to try to help him turn back to normal... and yet, at the same time, he didn't care. He wanted to know where that Dragonair went, where it came from, and what would happen to him now that he was a Dragonair, too. With a flick of his tail, almost like a wave goodbye to the life he once knew, Matthew followed the other Dragonair into the hole, disappearing into the darkness...