He was curious. Curious about what he felt was the ultimate mystery in a man's life - the opposite sex.
It wasn't that he wanted to be a woman, or when he had been younger, a girl, but he was interested to know what it was that made a woman be a woman. "Was it simply chemicals and hormones and what-have-you, guiding you through a series of unknowns to an even bigger unknown?" he constantly asked himself. "Or is it perhaps society, guiding you about, much like a dog on a leash? Perhaps both?"
Unable to answer this, and knowing that most would find him rather creepy for asking, he instead applied himself to the fields of academia and applying for grants, began taking courses at the three local colleges.
Starting with Biology, he shifted to Psychology, then to Sociology, and from there, in one series of lectures after another, never finding what it was that he was looking for. When the colleges told him that he had to declare a major, Drake choose to walk away, feeling that he could not tell them why it was that he was taking all the courses he had taken.
From the colleges, his studying brought him to the library, where he began to peruses the stacks, checking out book after book and borrowing from the inter-library loan section and only taking a job when both society and his own mother demanded that he do so.
Ten years later, he gave up on trying to find the answer through books and began to wander, trying to glean at least one clue that might point him in the direction he needed. Coming home late one evening from work, Drake remembered that he needed several new pairs of pants and many of his socks had holes in them and heading instead to a department store, he made his way back towards the men's department, where he began to go through the section of pants, looking for at least three in his size.
When he found what he needed, he headed toward the section that had socks and selecting a couple packages, he turned to leave, but stopped when he heard somebody run into what sounded like a shelf and then curse really loudly in a feminine voice.
Peering over in the direction of the boy's section, Drake watched as a young woman bent down to pick up several shirts she had just knocked over. And then, to Drake's astonishment, the woman began to change. Watching carefully, sure that he was witnessing some sort of hoax, Drake watched as the woman shrunk down before his eyes, her hair recede and lighten and looking about for cameras, he wondered if maybe what he was seeing was some sort of Hollywood movie scene being filmed.
When it became apparent that there were no cameras, Drake looked back at the woman and did a double take. For standing in her place was now a kid of about six, seven, maybe eight years old with a bemused look on his face. Wondering what just happened, Drake watched as the kid stepped out of the woman's clothes, clearly revealing that there was no doubt that he was definitely a male, and for a couple seconds, just stood there before finally picking up one of the shirts on the floor and pulling it on over his head. Taking a pair of shorts from the cart next to him, a pair of shoes and then taking one final look at something on the floor, the kid wandered off, leaving Drake to wonder to himself, "What the hell just happened here? Woman don't just turn into little boys."
Approaching slowly toward where the young woman/little boy had just been a couple seconds, Drake looked down at the floor the kid had been staring at and spying a medallion, he considered going after the kid to try and give it back.
Instead, he reached down and grasping it by the chain, he picked it up and letting the amulet part of it spin slowly, he read aloud the word, "Zulo," and wondered what it was supposed to mean.
On either side of the medallion, Drake saw an image, but couldn't quite make out what had been stamped into the metal. Looking away from the amulet, and searching for the kid, Drake asked himself, "Is this what turned the young woman into a little boy? And how?" but unable quite believe that something like a amulet with a funny word on it could do such a thing, he thought about dropping it and just going to pay for his purchases.
Instead, he set down the several pairs of pants and packages of socks he was holding and contemplated that maybe, just maybe, this thing before him could actually change a person.
"Maybe it somehow changes a person's sex and gender," he muttered and almost dropped it right then, but something stayed his hand as he thought, "But how is that possible? Is it some kind of magick and can it reverse what has happened and turn the person back into who they had been before the transformation."
Suddenly thinking that maybe this could give him answers, especially if it were possible to return to being who he was, Drake pondered over the implications of being a woman, but then right away dismissed them as the notion that he would be a girl with his male mind sent a shudder through him and once again, he thought about dropping the amulet back where he found it, telling himself, "You do not want to be a woman with the mind of a man."
"But suppose it makes me a woman in mind, soul, and body?" he asked himself and spinning the medallion, he wondered how it worked.
After a bit more deliberation, Drake decided that if he couldn't find the kid who had had the medallion before him, he would give it a try and forgetting his purchases, he put the amulet round his neck and began to search the store. When it became apparent that the kid wasn't going to be found, Drake considered trying to page the kid over the public announcement system, but immediately dismissed the idea completely as he didn't even know the kid's name.
Heading back to the boy's section of the store, Drake took one more look around before heading toward the woman's section. There, he began to browse, but found himself confused as to what was what. Searching his memory for stuff he had learned, Drake eventually settled on several facts; the first being that he wanted to be small in stature, but also smart. Unsure how to accomplish either, he eventually wandered into the Junior's section of the store, unaware that he had left the missus section and browsing, Drake eventually picked out a pair of white, cotton boxers, deciding that if he was female, he wouldn't wear any of the conventional forms of underwear.
From there, Drake selected a white, cotton bra with no underwire and a box of something that claimed to have four "Perfect Bras" and reading the back, he found that it was something that fitted over the nipple and areola, but the left the rest of breast exposed.
Afterward, Drake moved on to the shirts and taking a tight looking number down and glancing at the tag, he noted that it had an S. Checking the tags on the boxers and bra, he noted that they as well were size S and figuring he didn't want to be a really big woman, Drake figured this was okay as he selected a pair of bib-overalls, also in size S.
Unsure if he was doing this right and that it required contact with clothes, Drake paused a moment and after a moment of thought set what he was holding down and took the amulet out from under his shirt, muttering, "This is just plain crazy," as he did so.
Looking at the medallion, which he had started to thing of as Zulu's Necklace, he thought about how he didn't want to be female because he hadn't been born as a girl. But then he thought about how he had always felt that there was something in his life that was missing and how it felt that whatever that something was, was somehow tied to the opposite sex and gender and asking himself, "Can you really do this?" he decided, after a couple seconds, in the name of curiosity, science and better understanding of the human race, that he could, he collected all of what he picked up, touched the items to Zulo's Necklace and then to his exposed hand.