"Ok Rick don't panic," you tell yourself as you look around the room you suddenly found yourself in. That was a little bit hard though considering how you had got here. One second you were walking through the state park and the next second you're in a room with torches along the wall. The only way that you can think of for an explanation to this is that you stepped through a portal. You have read some stories where stepping through a portal is just like stepping through a doorway from one room to another. Well that may be true for those that are used to going through portals. For those that aren't it's pretty disorientating. Just imagine stepping through a doorway without being able to see even the tiniest bit of the room beyond and then have the room be really different than the one you left.
You turned around to see a door and thought that perhaps the portal was still there so you walked towards it. Once it became clear that the portal was either gone or was one way you tried to open the door only to find that it was either locked or stuck. "Now what?" you asked yourself as you looked around again. There had to be an exit around here somewhere.
"Oh you'll be lucky to find the exit," a female voice said right inside your ear. You quickly turned to see who else was there but saw no one and that voice giggled before saying, "You can't see me silly but I can see you."
"Are you a ghost?" you asked still looking around.
"Well I'm not sure if that's the right term for me," the voice said sounding thoughtful. "You see a ghost is the spirit of someone who died but I didn't die. Instead I was transformed by this tower as you will be soon."
"You mean to tell me that I'll become like you?" you asked having accepted that transformations were likely. After all you went from a park to this place that was who knows how many miles away from the park in just a step.
"You may or you may not," the voice said not committing to one or the other. "As far as I can tell I'm the only one who has been transformed into this ever. Of course one of the others may have been before I was caught."
"There are others here?" you asked a little shocked.
"Oh yes," the voice said matter of factly. "There are those that have been here for hundreds of years."
"Hundreds of years!" you exclaim your jaw dropping. You couldn't really imagine being in this place for hundreds of years,
"Well that's what I've been told anyway," the voice said. "By the way my name is Betty. And you're Rick right?"
"How did you know my name?" you asked your jaw dropping again.
"Well you did say, 'Ok Rick don't panic,' and I figured you were talking to yourself," Betty said amusement in her voice.
"I thought I was alone but apparently not," you said laughing a bit. "So what happens during a transformation?"
"Well first your whole body begins to tingle and then that's when your transformation happens," Betty said giggling a little. "Sometimes your clothes will transform with you and other times they don't. My last transformation my clothes didn't transform with me so I'm completely naked now though I don't mind it. I'm not even sure where my clothes are. Oh and expect to be transformed more than once."
As soon as Betty had finished speaking you felt your whole body tingle. "I think I'm about to transform," you said looking down at your hands.
"Oh I wonder what you'll become," Betty said the hint of a smile in her voice.