"Where do you think she could have gone?" Maa’ti asked Ruut as the pair walked down the wooden, spiraling paths that snaked through their village. It took surprisingly long after Sarah snuck out of the medicine tent for the pair to noticed she'd left. Maa’ti didn't know why - but she recalled that she and Ruut had a long history of getting lost in intense, childish arguments. Once their argument peaterd out, they immediately noticed and Maa’ti insisted they set out to find Sarah.
"The medicine was helping though!" Ruut complained, annoyance tinging his boyish voice. The sun was setting and the smoke of the village cook pots filled the air with enticing smells. Ruut's stomach rumbled, adding a sharpness to his frustration. He knew his herbs well and didn't see why it was so important to find Saa'rok when the medicine he gave him would settle any of the boy's confusion.
"Ruut! That didn't help. It did the opposite of help!" Maa'ti replied, her voice tense. Sarah was perhaps her only as-yet fully cognizant link to her old world and Maa'ti knew that if she were to escape this world and this body, Sarah might be able to help. Chatok was fading fast, Ruut had long accepted his tribal boyhood, and she felt her own mind yearning to give into Maa'tis.
As they walked, Maa'ti tried to run through key details of her old life, hoping that through rote repetition she could prevent details from fading. She found, however, the list of things she recalled uncertain. Her old name was lost, Maa'ti was all that remained. What she remembered of her old tongue sounded guttural and wrong. The Germanic harshness of English was a stark contrast to the melodic tones of her people. Only a few example words remained of that strange old language.
My new language is better anyway...The language of the jungle goddess she thought. She knew that this thought and the knowledge it contained was foreign, and unlike her. She knew deep-down she shouldn't believe in the idea of a 'jungle goddess.' All the same, an even bigger part of her knew the goddess to exist and knew her new language was her gift passed down to her people centuries ago. A gift in exchange for tending to the jungle.
She shuddered as an understanding of new religion depend in her memories.
As the two walked, they found themselves merging into a group of women and girls slowly making their way forward. Not just a few women, Maa'ti realized, but many. Every woman in the village it seemed was pacing down the same path as her and Ruut.
Seeing Maa'ti one of the women turned, a warm smile crossing her face. "Maa'ti, we were wondering where you were. The evening meal is cooking, and the men are cleaning their kills."
Another chimed in, "I know you prefer to help the men with their hunt, but you are still a girl. It is only proper you wash yourself before the meal." A sharpness underpinned her words.
Maa'ti recalled that she'd been making a habit of skipping the evening wash. It was their custom that women cleanse themselves before the evening meal. After a long, tiring hunt the men of the village 'deserved' a clean home to return to. In their culture, that cleanliness extended to the women.
A sense of anger filled Maa'ti. She hated this practice and what it represented. All she wanted was to be with the men, tend to the animals and learn how to properly dress a kill and prepare it for their use.
As they approached the Great River, Ruut elbowed her. "Look! Its Chatok, and Saa'rok!" He said, excitement in his voice. Set up by the river's edge, Chatok and Sarah were close to finishing their work.
Maa'ti paused, her thoughts replaced by her sense of urgency. The Sarah she saw was a far cry from the one who had bolted from the tent The jungle clearly had started to mold her form. She was crouched low before what was left of the kill - the low working stance one common among their tribe. Her height was slightly shorter given her diminished age, though the loss in height wasn't quite as dramatic as Maa'ti's own or the boys.
Of course he is taller, he is older after all Maa'ti thought.
By now, Sarah's breasts had completely diminished, shrinking into the flat chest of a teen boy. Where once was fat was lean muscle. While as yet the chest of a teen boy, in a few years it would develop into manly pecs. Maa'ti felt an unexpected flutter of excitement. Her eye's traced Sarah's' chest in appreciation before moving to her arms. She noticed they too were different; the mix of fat and muscle had changed. While they weren't the built muscles of a man, there was a thickness of strength that hadn't existed before. The red ring of pigment acted to accentuate this change, causing Maa'ti's heart to flutter even more.
Before her eyes Maa'ti noticed subtle transformations still shaping the girl. Her smooth legs thickened slightly, shifting from lithe smoothness to a harder edged teen masculinity. Sarah's well shaven skin started to darken as dark leg hairs began to emerge. The same color already painted the roots of Sarah's head hair, but suddenly that color began to advance quicker pace. The dirty blond melted away, leaving behind her people's reddish brown. Maa'ti couldn't confirm if the changes had spread beneath the loin cloth yet - but what she knew was that Sarah's old self was fading quick, her skin, face, and possibly what was between her legs was all that was left to change.
Feminine laughs broke through the air, and Maa'ti noticed Sarah look up from her work. The women of the village had begun to cleanse themselves in the Great River. All were shirtless and many, Maa'ti noticed, were fairly well endowed. Maa'ti noticed Srah's gaze was locked, eyes unable to turn from the women. The soon-to-be teen boy was admiring their bare chests as they splashed water over themselves. While bare chests weren't abnormal in their tribe - teen boys were still teen boys, and Sarah's mind had evidently begun to adopt the desires of one.
Maa'ti felt an unexpected pang of jealousy. Seeing Sarah's changing body and emerging desires, filled her with strange, eager emotions. She realized she wanted him to stare at her, not those other women. Yet she knew she was too young, not yet developed. While Maa'ti knew she too should be ogling the women in the river, not thinking of Sarah's increasingly masculine form, looking the women over she felt nothing.
An image of Sarah's old self entered her mind. Well endowed, athletic, beautiful. Everything Maa'ti had wanted when she was...her old self. Those mental images still stirred powerful emotions; desire to have, was confusingly replaced by a desire to be. Maa'ti found herself fantasizing about having a similar body, something she knew teen boys like Saa'rok would notice. More than anything, she realized, she just wanted to be a few years older - Saa'rok's age.
A sudden breeze began to flow over the river. Maa'ti felt her hair catch in the wind. A hand rest on her shoulder, but looking down - nothing was there. Seemingly coming from the wind, itself, came a light, feminine whisper
If you wish to be the boys age, it will be so.
Maa'ti felt a sudden guest of wind seemingly flow through her back. Then suddenly, she felt her body begin to change.