Frankie's next punch stopped midswing. He tottered unevenly, as if frozen in place, his eyes wide and mouth agape. Lucas took advantage in order to straighten up a little, "Frank..."
"No," Frankie muttered, softly and hoarsely, "No, no, no...stop it!" as if something this would forestall the change coming over him, "Not me...not ME!"
"Look!" Ben gasped, pointing to Frankie's feet. His sneakers were pulsating, the material shifting and throbbing with movement. Frankie gritted his teeth, bending down, breathing like he was about to do suicide sprints.
"Frank!" Lucas put his hands on his friend's shoulder, their quarrel forgotten, "Frank, come on, man..."
"Shut...shut up," Frankie growled, "I'm trying...got to stop it..."
"Mike said," Ben began, "We should accept whatever happens to us."
"Shut UP, man!" a vein pulsed in Frankie's neck, "I'm not letting...I won't..."
"What do you feel, Frank?" asked Lucas, "Man, what's happening to you?"
"Like...like my feet are breaking," he almost moaned, "Burning. But I...I can't...AGH!"
The toes of both sneakers break clean off, revealing Frankie's toes...the three that remain on each foot. Lucas and Ben both cried out as Frankie's moans increased in volume.
"NO! No, no, that...that isn't ME!"
The nails on each of Frankie's feet are pointed like daggers, arching outward with agonizing slowness. His skin was tight and gray, almost translucent. Lucas could see the bones shifting beneath.
"Aw man..." Ben moaned, turning away to be sick.
Frankie doesn't even pay attention, looking only at Lucas, "My feet...what's happening to my feet, man?"
"I don't know," said Lucas, "They look..."
Frankie screamed again, his legs bracing against Lucas, the heels of his sneakers were bulging, a claw-like appendage tearing through the socks and, finally, the material of the shoes. With a shock, Lucas realized...
"Talons."
Frankie kept muttering, some desperate variation of, "Got to stop...", "Strong enough," and "Not a freak," as his high socks began shredding, the waxy, almost scaly patina of his feet moving up his legs. The ruins of his sneakers and socks were kicked away, revealing what was essentially a pair of overgrown bird legs. Frankie let out a hoarse scream at the sight, tears shining on his cheeks.
"Help me, man..." he whispered.
"I don't know what to do," Lucas confessed, "Frank, whatever this is...we saw what it did to the others."
"I can't..." he was hoarse, desperate, a way Lucas had never seen him, "I've got girls back home, man. A LIFE. I can't..."
"You won't be alone," Lucas promised him, "You have us. Me," he forced a laugh, "C'mon, man, when have I ever left your side?"
"It's gonna be okay, Frank," Ben said awkwardly, "We're brothers, right? We took a pledge."
"That...that's not really what a frat pledge is for man," Frankie rasped.
"Still."
The change continued up Frankie's legs, beneath his shorts. Abruptly, he seized with a bit back cry, "Ach! No, no...not there. NO!"
"Oh shit," Lucas realized, "Frank..."
"My dick!" he howled, "My dick and balls, I...I can feel them..."
The usually prominent bulge in his shorts was shrinking rapidly before their eyes.
"Frankie, Frankie look at me!" Lucas begged, "Don't think about it."
"It's my DICK, man!" Frankie spat, "How do I not...AHH," he moaned, his voice a half-octave higher, "No, no, Lucas..."
"Is it..." Ben began, "Gone?"
"No," he muttered, "I...I can feel SOMETHING...inside me. And..." he moaned again, clutching his chest, "Oh man, oh God...I'm changing inside! I can feel it!"
He began tearing and tugging at the band shirt he was wearing, trying to get it off. In the brief flashes of flesh that were exposed, Lucas and Ben could see brown and black feathers sprouting from his skin around his waist and abdomen.
With a mammoth grown, Frankie tore the shirt off completely, revealing a torso covered up to the shoulders with feathers though, peculiarly, they stopped there, sparing his collarbone, his arms, and everything above
"Lucas..." Frankie panted, his legs giving way as he fell against him. The feeling of him against his body was strange and foreign. Lucas tensed, breathing in the strange smell of the new feathers.
"What am I?" Frankie panted brokenly, "Some kind of fuckin'..." but before he could finish speaking, he screamed again, arching his back. Lucas realized two growths had begun to form, right where his hands had met in his embrace.
"Lucas..." Ben warned, "I think..."
"I know," he nodded, "Frank..."
"Ugh," Frankie met his eyes, "I can do it."
For the first time, Lucas got the idea he didn't mean he could fight the change.
"I'll do it," he nodded, "Come on..." he pressed his eyes shut, "Come on...come ON, you fucking..."
Two huge wings burst from Frankie's feathered back, spreading wide behind him against the jungle canopy. With a cry almost like a birdcall, Frankie collapsed to his knees, glassy eyed, his arms spread to either side of him. He and Lucas locked eyes only briefly before he fell forward, passed out, the wings folded up behind him.
"Oh my God..." Lucas muttered feeling tears on his face, "Oh God, Frank..."
"It was..." Ben moistened his lips, "Kind of cool, though, wasn't it?"
"You're kidding? Our friends..."
"All of us, man," Ben reminded him, "Now it's...it's just a matter of time."
Lucas looked at his hands, as if to commit to memory what they looked like now. He turned to Ben, who met his eyes. Neither of them moved.