Riven Coyle was not the kind of man who drew attention. He had always lived in the background, a technician, a quiet observer of the chaos that swirled around the world. It wasn’t that he preferred isolation—he simply knew the value of keeping his head down, staying out of the limelight, and getting the job done. He worked for the United Terra Corporation, fixing and maintaining the machinery that kept their off-world mining operations running. An unremarkable life for an unremarkable man. Until the day it all changed.
The day he woke up feeling... different.
It had started in the middle of the night. A low, persistent ache in his bones that kept him tossing and turning in his bed. He had assumed it was stress from the constant grind of his work, long shifts beneath artificial lights with the sound of machinery grinding around him. But by the time the sun rose, Riven knew something was wrong. Something deeper than exhaustion or strain.
His muscles felt swollen, like they were being stretched taut beneath his skin, pulling at his joints in ways that felt unnatural. His head throbbed with a dull pressure, as if the blood vessels in his brain were thickening, pulsating in time with his heartbeat. But the strangest part of it all? His reflection.
When he stumbled into the bathroom, barely able to keep his eyes open, he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. His eyes were bloodshot, and his pupils were dilated. He could barely recognize the face staring back at him. His jawline had become more pronounced, sharper, the skin along his face tighter as if it were being pulled toward some hidden force. The veins in his neck were pulsing, thick and dark, as if something inside him was fighting to break free.
At first, Riven thought it was just his mind playing tricks on him. Maybe he was still too tired, still too disoriented from the sleepless night. He rubbed his face, splashed cold water onto his skin, and tried to calm his racing thoughts. But no amount of water could wash away the growing feeling that something was wrong.
The pain in his muscles escalated, and with it, the strange sense of power. His hands, when he looked down at them, appeared larger. The fingers were thicker, the knuckles more pronounced. His forearms had swollen, his veins almost pulsating through his skin. It was as though his body was remaking itself from the inside out. Riven stumbled back from the mirror, staring at his reflection in disbelief.
“Okay... okay, just breathe,” he muttered to himself, trying to calm the rising panic. But it wasn’t working. His breath was ragged, his pulse quickening. And then, with a sickening crack, his bones shifted.
The noise was faint, but it echoed in his ears like the sound of thick branches breaking underfoot. He clutched at his chest, feeling the bones there stretching, elongating, a deep ache radiating from his ribs. His skin tingled as though it was too tight, too thin, as if it couldn’t contain the bulk of what was coming. The shape of his body—his very form—was changing, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.
He could feel it now—something primal awakening deep inside him, an animal instinct clawing its way to the surface. His heart raced faster, a fierce pounding in his chest as his breathing grew shallow. The world around him seemed to grow dimmer, as if reality itself was warping. He staggered toward the door, desperate for air, but his legs felt like they were moving through molasses. Heavy. Too heavy.
Suddenly, his body seemed to lock up, like some kind of cruel puppet being jerked around by invisible strings. His skin burned, his muscles rippling beneath his shirt, expanding in unnatural directions. The seams of his shirt strained, the fabric unable to contain the expanding mass beneath. His fingers clenched into fists involuntarily, and he could feel his bones cracking and reshaping. It wasn’t just strength; it was size. His entire body was growing, shifting, becoming something else—something... monstrous.
Riven’s vision blurred as his spine contorted, his neck elongating. His jaw cracked audibly, a grotesque transformation occurring in the space of seconds. A deep, guttural growl rumbled in his throat as his teeth began to lengthen, sharp and brutal like a predator’s. His reflection in the mirror, what little of it he could still make out through the haze, was no longer the face of the man he had known. No—what stared back at him was something far more terrifying.
His skin was rippling, his muscles swelling and bulging with unnatural power. His arms had thickened, the veins running like dark rivers beneath his skin. His chest was broadening, and his back was arching, the muscles tightening as if preparing to explode. His lower back ached as his legs reshaped, the bones snapping, elongating, becoming more... beastly.
It wasn’t just hulking out, no. His mind recoiled at the growing horns on the top of his head—curled like some kind of bull or ram. His head seemed to grow heavier, his eyes burning a deep, unnatural yellow, glowing with a faint, fiery light. And the horns... they were thickening, spiraling outward like the twisted coronet of some ancient, monstrous king.
Riven tried to scream, but all that came from his throat was a deep, monstrous roar. His voice had been swallowed by the beast growing inside him, consuming his humanity, reshaping his very identity.
He stumbled backward, knocking into the wall with a force that cracked the plaster. His hands—now massive—scraped against the doorframe as he tried to steady himself. The transformation was nearly complete, but in the depths of his shifting mind, a single, desperate thought screamed through the haze of primal rage: **This can't be happening.**
But it was happening. Riven could feel it with every inch of his new body, every second of his existence now irrevocably changed.
The transformation had begun. There was no going back.
And whatever he had been before was lost to the monster he was becoming.