The doctor was a whirlwind of activity despite her bulk. She next moved onto Mikhail where she reached around and grasped the Russian boy’s exposed bear tail poking out the back of his shorts, giving it a firm yank and causing him to emit the full-fledged roar of a wild bear. Mikhail was startled at the loud sound effect that seemed to come from his throat and the swarthy teen couldn’t suppress an embarrassed blush when he realized that the other guests in the lobby were now staring at him.
Pirouetting like a dancer the doctor then pulled a tongue suppressor from her bag and with a flourish stuck it into Kelly’s mouth. “Open wide, my dear!” said the hippo encouragingly, staring down past the girl’s lengthy rodent-like front teeth and beyond her tonsils into the darkness of her belly. Taking a lit candle from her bag the doctor searched around the space and gave a quick yodel, which returned a satisfying echo.
Finally, the hippo moved on to James and Cheryl who weren’t sure what to make of the performance thus far. The doctor’s eyes darted from the tips of the duo’s pointy ears down past their still-human torsos and legs to their partially transformed feet. For a moment, she stared at the feet and rubbed her grey wrinkly chin in thought. “I know what you need, doctor” interrupted the zebra nurse and reaching behind her pulled a tape measure from thin air and handed it to the physician. “Ah, excellent. Thank you Nurse Stripes!” complemented the doctor beaming with pleasure. “Now if you two could please remove your sandals.” The two teens hesitated for a moment and then reluctantly removed their leather footwear to go barefoot in the lobby.
The hotel carpet felt delicious under James’s elongated soles and he curled his three-toed pawfeet in pleasure as the doctor began to measure from his heel to the tips of his bulbous toes. James had a healthy growth of grey ink and paint fur covering the tops of his feet as well as each of toes and suppressed a shiver as the doctor’s pudgy fingers accidentally rubbed across the patch of fuzz. The doctor made a big show of extending the tape measure which, rather than inches and centimeters or even shoe sizes, had hashmarks with strange notations running from “Fully Human” where James was pretty sure his foot had originally stopped before its change, to “Kind of Nutty” where his foot now ended, to “Total Tree Critter” which appeared to be six inches beyond the length of his bulbous middle toe. The zebra nurse carefully watched the whole process and dutifully noted the reading from the tape measure, which the doctor then let close with a snap.
Cheryl had also observed the doctor and nervously started to rub one huge furry foot over the other wondering what the tape measure might say about her. She wanted to get back to normal as soon as possible but she couldn't deny that a part of her enjoyed feeling her fuzzy plump toes running through the strawberry-colored ink and paint fur that had sprouted over her other foot. “Apologies Miss, can you please stand still?” Nurse Stripes asked with a kind smile on her muzzle. It was mortifying having so many people staring at her oversized rabbit-like feet and it was now Cheryl’s turn to blush as she realized that her feet were even longer and furrier than James’s partially toony footpaws. Once Cheryl fixed her stance, the hippo doctor began by measuring from the back of the teen girl's furry heel. Although the “Fully Human” hashmark was lost toward the back, where Cheryl’s middlemost two toes ended the tape measure read in bold letters, “Silly Stompers.” Several inches beyond that was yet another hashmark with the text, “Hippity Hoppity.” Once more, the zebra nurse jotted down the information in her notebook.