A quick look at the hospital directory told the mysterious Andrew and his friend Henry where they needed to go. A quick look at Henry's watch revealed they had roughly thirteen and a half minutes left before security discovered the intentional sabotage of their video system, but as long as they were out of Rick Plunkett's hospital room and back in a public area of the hospital before then, everything should be all right.
They hoped.
Finally managing to get out of the traffic jam and reach the police station, Frank Tucker raced inside hoping to free his younger sister and take her back to the hospital to complete Rick Plunkett's transformation, only to discover that she had been escorted across the street to the courthouse for her arraignment hearing on truancy charges.
Doctor Kathy Tucker stared into the microscope once more, staring at the latest blood specimen of her patient.
The news was mixed. With time and effort, Rick Plunkett might survive his transformation into a werecheetah, but despite his extra X chromosome, he would remain male with some serious feminine features.
She looked at the clock and saw there was still a few minutes before she had to get up and go over to administer the next round of hormone shots and check on her patient. Besides, the chair felt good to a tired lady five months pregnant, and she still had to call Doctor Frances Twist and make arrangements for the therapy treatments Rick would (hopefully) need when this was all over.
Henry and Andrew stood in the hallway between Doctor Tucker's lab and Plunkett's room. While the lab had a glass window, the Venetian blinds were mostly closed, obscuring vision both in and out of the lab. However, the door to the hospital room was only partially closed, to allow quick access to the patient. They dared not close it all the way once inside for fear of drawing undue attention.
"I'll stay out here and keep watch while you do what must be done," Andrew advised Henry with eleven minutes of known safety left.
Frank Tucker managed to enter the juvenile court room just as his younger sister Diane was pleading her case before the judge with a court appointed attorney standing next to her.
"I realize now I've messed up my life, but in all honesty your honor, I didn't know what else to do," she said to the judge. "After my parents died, my oldest brother Frank was the only one who wanted me, even to the point of becoming my legal guardian. I come from a pretty big family, yet none of the others in-between him and me would give me the time of day, let alone wanted the burden of raising a teenager. But no matter how much Frank tried, I just didn't fit in. I never have been the 'rebellious' sort, so thankfully I've never done anything totally stupid like drugs or alcohol, so in time, just 'dropping out' and not going to school seemed like the best idea. I really don't know how I'm going to make everything up to him, my aunt, and everyone else; but I certainly intend to try."
"You truly sound sincere young lady, and I do wish you all the best," began the judge. "Unfortunately, you've already missed too much school this year to have any hope of completing the tenth grade, even with a team of tutors. Therefore, I have to demote you back to ninth grade for the rest of this term. But if you get good grades and stay in school the rest of this year, you can restart the tenth grade next fall, and we can all put this behind us. Court is adjourned," said the judge, as she banged her gavel to conclude the session.
Diane Tucker took the handkerchief from her lawyer and started trying to dry her eyes as her big brother came up and hugged her.
Inside the hospital room, the mysterious Henry paused to look over Rick Plunkett's chart. The Moon Lake Hospital staff was doing everything within their power to keep the patient alive and successfully transition to a werecheetah, but that would be the most they could ever accomplish. Without additional help and surgery afterwards, he would still be Rick.
Unless...
Henry reached into his jacket pocket and took out the case, before removing the syringe with the odd colored liquid. Walking around to Plunkett's right arm, since it was the one free of IVs and monitor connections, Henry quickly found a vein underneath the light patch of cheetah fur that was there and injected the serum into his pseudo-patient.
Walking back around the bed, Henry stopped by the left side of Rick's head and whispered, "Be well, and enjoy your new life."
Rick tried to open his eyes, but everything was dark, and not because the hospital staff was keeping the lights low to not disturb him so much. For some odd reason, the fact that he was standing totally naked in an unknown location didn't bother him.
He thought he heard a man speak, and asked in a parched voice, "Is someone there?"
"It's just us Rikki," he heard a female voice purr.
Rick turned and saw a beautiful werecheetah standing before him. She was a tad over six feet tall. Her furry body was alternating shades of yellow-orange, with cheetah spots spread out in what he thought was a very exotic pattern across the sexy curves of her body. The werecheetah had white highlights around the bottom half of her muzzle and across her tummy from the bottom of her ample bosom to the top of her apparently very moist vagina, for he could smell her excitement in the air. Her tail swished back and forth behind her attractive, furry rear as she sexily sauntered toward him.
"Who are you?" asked Rick, to which she issued a slight laugh.
"Who am I?" she repeated with a lusty purr. "I'm you Rikki. Or at least, the Rikki you're destined to become," she added, tickling his chin with a furry paw. "Can't you feel it? The moment approaches," revealed the werecheetah, as she put her furry arms around him.
Rick stared deeply into her green, feline eyes as the werecheetah said, "The time is upon us. Embrace your destiny and become the furry lady you're supposed to be," as she started to kiss him.
Rick felt his whole body grow hot, as fur began to spread across his skin.
As the two werecheetahs broke their kiss and started to rub noses together, Rikki Plunkett put her furry arms around herself and said, "Diane."
Henry slipped back out into the hallway and stood next to the mysterious Andrew with no one the wiser, as if he had been out there the whole time and not in Plunkett's hospital room. Henry simply nodded to Andrew, acknowledging that the deed was done, while a quick glance at his wristwatch revealed they only had a little over five minutes left before hospital security became aware something was amiss.
As they started to walk back down the hall to the main exit, Henry whispered to Andrew, "Who's Diane?"
"Frank Tucker's youngest sister. They own and operate the horse ranch I've been hiding near. She's the one who accidentally scratched him," whispered Andrew in return.
"Plunkett was calling for her."
"Probably to complete his transformation, but I have no idea where she is right now. Let's hope all our efforts weren't for naught," replied Andrew, as they rounded the next corner.
Doctor Kathy Tucker came out of her laboratory just as two men rounded the corner at the end of the hallway.
Thinking nothing of it, she entered Rick Plunkett's room to check on her patient.
The vital signs were far from perfect, but at least they were stable. Plunkett would still have to be closely monitored, for there was about two hours left before they would know for sure whether or not their treatment was successful and Rick successfully became a werecheetah, despite being a man.
Otherwise...
Kathy observed her patient as her head nurse came in to change the IVs, administer the new round of hormone shots, and draw the next blood samples for examination.
Rick's lower face was starting to form a slight impression of a feline muzzle, for the nose was beginning to jut out from his face. The now pointed ears were almost to the top of his head. Fur was spreading across the visible half of his body, but not as thick in some areas compared to others. His chest area remained the same from earlier reports, with only the nipples of the Gynecomastia tissue more pronounced, as if he was sexually excited. Probably just from the continued exposure. We should drape a towel or something across them now to protect his modesty, she thought to herself.
Moving downward, Kathy Tucker removed the light blanket that was covering the lower half of her patient's body. The stub of a tail that had started growing was still bare, but longer now than during her last examination.
If this was a normal transformation, a new werecheetah would have walked among them hours ago.
Then Kathy took a clinical look between her patient's legs and gasped in shock.
"What is it Doctor?" asked her nurse, as the woman moved closer in case Kathy needed assistance.
Speechless, all Kathy Tucker could do was point where she was looking.
The nurse turned and gasped in shock herself.
Their patient no longer possessed a visible penis!
There was just a small blob of unformed tissue between their patient's legs.
When Doctor Kathy Tucker finally found her voice again, she said, "No matter what happens, no one, and I repeat: NO ONE says anything to discourage the patient and interrupt this... whatever it is going on! And find my niece, STAT!"