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The Transformation into Belle
3. First modifications
She was disoriented and confused. She had thought that after she’d given up all her clothes something would have happened, but nothing did. Days flew by and nothing changed. At first she tried to preserve her modesty by covering her breasts and nether parts, but got tired of it after a few days. Her restlessness got in the way, she simply couldn’t stand, or sit still long enough, she had to keep pacing, and when she did she started to swing her hands along, she couldn’t keep still. Besides it was tiring always having to keep one arm raised. So when nothing happened, nobody reacted to her nudity, she started getting used to it. She ate, drank, used the sandbox, slept and paced her cell in an endless cycle. If she were to think about it, this prolonged period of forced inactivity, had a very definite reason behind it. During this time her periodic rants against her abductors became rare, and her acceptance of the fact that no immediate rescue would be coming grew to almost fatalistic proportions. But she was still loathe to give in to easily, she would fight whoever was doing this to her to her uttermost ability. Her emotional seesaw slowed way down from the beginning stages of her capture. She still had periods of depression but the forced activity didn’t lend itself to moping. You just can’t be morose when you are literary bouncing all over the place.
By her cruel estimate almost a year went by from her abduction, half a year from the time she threw her last piece of clothing away when something changed. All that time when nothing changed in her routine made the event more surprising for her when something did indeed happen.
One day she went to sleep, bored, exhausted, and dirty just to wake clean, weak, bald as a new born and without teeth. Shocked to a standstill she went blank. She just sat in her corner feeling her bald head with her hand and her empty gums with her tongue, then she flew into a hysterical rage. She started screaming at the walls, pounding her fist against the floor and her head against the wall. Tears streamed from her eyes and fell down her cheeks. In a fit of helpless protest she directed her rage at the only movable things in her surroundings, her food and the sandbox, she threw their contents all around her, stomping the biscuits into small bits. Still her emotional high couldn’t last forever, and her weakened state prevented her from doing serious harm to herself. Exhausted she laid down sobbing her heart out, finally out of strength even for that she fell asleep.
The next day was hard for her. First of all the usual food whistle didn’t wake her up, instead she rose amidst the remains of her meal all mixed with sand. Hungry and weak she dragged herself to the food niche to drink and eat some leftovers that escaped her attention yesterday. Then she went about discovering what was done to her. She figured out that there either had to have been some sleeping drug mixed with her water or food before, or that some sort of sleeping gas had to have been pumped inside while she slept. She was fairly sure she would have woken up if someone had come inside during her normal sleep. Propping her back against a wall she checked her body out. The most noticeable change was the lack of hair, and not only on her head as she discovered yesterday but all over. Her eyebrows were gone and her armpits, legs, pubic hair was gone, the only hair left were her eyelashes. But the more disturbing and invasive modification was her lack of teeth. Now when she was somewhat calmer than before she noticed that they weren’t simply removed. In their place she felt low vaguely metallic stumps. Barely peeking out of her tender gums their spacing was similar but not identical to her former teeth. After a while she discovered by clicking her lower jaw against her upper one that they made a hollow sound, as if they were empty inside. What was the point of both those invasions upon her body she wasn’t sure, but judging from her weakness it had to have taken a lot of time, and she was kept asleep the whole time. Finished with her examination she decided that just as her captors revealed their character again it was time again for them to be reminded of her determination to withstand them in any way possible. Simply put she had nothing else left but her determination. She swept some of the sand form her sleeping corner, sat down and prepared for what she suspected was coming.
The next day as expected she got no food, she guessed that they wouldn’t give her anything before she fixed the mess she made, but just to spite them she decided not to. She knew that it was probably a senseless exercise in self-determination, because sooner or later she would give in just to get something to drink and eat, but she had to mark her independence from them in any way possible. Although weak she managed to hold out for a few days, and during that time she made a disturbing discovery. Her hair didn’t grow back, anywhere! She checked again and again but to no avail, she remained bald all over. Suddenly she understood. Why go to all the trouble of putting her to sleep just to shave her hair if it would grow back. Her captors must have used a permanent method. This put her in one of her depression periods, she was faced with the fact that everything that would happen here to her would be almost surely non-reversible, her teeth surely wouldn’t grow back no matter what. This depression hit her in an unfortunate time because in her weakened state she wasn’t as restless as before her procedures, coupled with her demonstration of independence, she was on a good way to starving herself to death.
In the end she managed to make it only half way there, she simply wouldn’t give them, as she began thinking of her tormentors, the satisfaction of giving up on herself. She still wanted to believe in the possibility of rescue or escape in the future, so she got up on all fours and started sweeping the remains of her fury into the sandbox. From time to time, when she found a bigger intact piece of a biscuit she went to her water bowl to wet it down because having no teeth she couldn’t eat it normally. She kept sweeping and looking for any leftovers when suddenly the sandbox’s content got exchanged for a fresh one. Taking this as indication that her overseers decided that the cell was clean enough, she slept.
The next day she was woken as usual by the food whistle, but instead of the usual biscuits which she had trouble chewing, she got some kind of gruel. It tasted horrible, but hungry as she was she ate it all, carrying it bit by bit in her hand from the bowl to her mouth, in the end she simply licked her hand clean and drank as much water as she could to kill the taste. So begun her period of recovery.
When she was strong enough that she started pacing again, she discovered a new wrinkle in her setup. The gruel wouldn’t refill unless she left a clean bowl, which she achieved by wiping it with her fingers until it shone in the light. The food itself was monotone but at least after roughly a week it had lost its terrible taste, now it tasted vaguely of meat and cereal.
Time picked up again.
Continued in Part 4.