A Hair of the Dog

. 1 .

He could go out.

Aiden shook his head. No, no, that was crazy. It was three in the morning. Nothing would be open. He paced another lap around his hotel room. He turned on the TV, flicked through the channels-- all commercials-- and killed it. There was nothing to do.

But he could go out.

The same jet that had lagged him had delivered him to a new city. Even at night there were sights to see. It wasn't like he would get mugged; this part of town was on the up and up. Nobody would know he'd done it. His friends were all back in the States. They wouldn't ask any questions, and even if they did, which they wouldn't, he wouldn't have anything to lie about, right?

He could control himself.

So he would do it, but he had to take a leak first. He unzipped his pants and swallowed at the sight of the unnatural thing between his legs. It was his cock, or it had been. Now it was something else. Instead of a mushroom-shaped glans, his penis ended in a smooth point. The air was cold against his exposed shaft, which looked as sensitive as it was, all red and raw, traced with delicate purple veins. It peered out from the swollen lips of what he still called his foreskin, though it might have been more accurate to call it his sheathe. Below, his balls hung in a line instead of side by side. The cold didn't touch them; they had their own coat of soft, white fur.

Aiden closed his eyes, cleared his mind, and slowed his heart enough to start the stream of piss. He aimed by angling his hips down at the perfect angle. It had become second nature in the year since the incident, since his fateful over-indulgence. Or had it been two years? He wasn't counting the days. That was something addicts did, and he wasn't an addict. Addicts had tails, muzzles, fur, paws. All he had was a weird dick, not even fully canine. So he had gotten a little carried away once. So he 'd had a little too much. 'Overdose' was such a harsh word, it hardly seemed fitting.

He gripped the flesh of his 'foreskin' and shook the last few drops away. The red tip of his cock retreated back into its home as he zipped his pants. He took one last lap around the room: wallet, keys, phone, passport, room key, coat. He paused at the door to do a mental double check. See? That was careful. He was being responsible.

Besides, he thought as he stood in the elevator, what are the odds I'll find someone tonight? And even if he did, they might not offer him anything, and maybe he didn't have enough cash in his wallet, and even if the stars aligned and all lights turned green, perhaps he would decide he didn't feel like it after all.

A tingle of anticipation tickled the oversized balls hanging between his thighs.

Out into the empty streets he walked. A recent rain had put a sheen over the black asphalt, and only the reflection of the city's glittering lights betrayed the fact that it was a solid street and not an empty black abyss that would swallow anyone foolish enough to venture a step. Ancient and modern buildings rose around him like the walls of a great canyon. The rumble of one of the city's tube cars echoed up through a metal grate as he stepped over it. He made his way down the twisting, chaotic streets, planned in a time before planning, past the age-old sex shops and theaters, past the brand-new designer boutiques and freshly remodeled apartments.

Just as he suspected, there was hardly anyone out. A few drunk party-goers waited woozily for their cabs, and several homeless people wandered the streets to keep their blood warm. Some of the homeless showed signs of the drug: a blackened nose, the start of a muzzle, stunted fingers. He passed a junkie who was sleeping curled in a circle, laying on a bulky overcoat that no longer fit his mostly canine body. He was naked, save a few patches of fur. The cops would have arrested him for public indecency, but they probably figured the pound would pick him up before too long. Aiden glanced between the creature's legs and caught a glimpse of genitals that looked a lot like his own. He shuddered and continued down the abandoned streets. It was pleasantly chill outside, good weather for a walk.

"Looking for girls?"

The voice came from a tall man in a long coat. He stood in the center of the empty intersection like a ghost town traffic cop.

Aiden continued past the man without turning his head. "No thank you."

"Bitches, then?"

Aiden stopped. "Closer."

He turned, and the face of his new acquaintance split into a wide, white-toothed smile. The man didn't look like a lowlife. He was clean-shaven, wearing pressed slacks and polished boots. There was no sign of the drug on him, though that overcoat could conceal a tail, and the leather gloves might have covered rough pads on his palms. "I think I can help you. Just tell me what you need."

Aiden swallowed. "Got any K9?"

The smile widened. "Let's take a walk." His voice was deep and slow, cool, almost cold.

He led Aiden away from the glow of the streetlight. A police siren wailed far away and then was gone. "The going rate is forty a gram."

"That sounds good."

They ducked into a small enclave between storefronts. Here it was very dark, and Aiden suddenly felt extremely vulnerable. What weapon did the man have concealed under that coat? Would he draw it the moment Aiden pulled out his wallet? He reached into his pocket, produced his money clip, and freed a pair of twenties with shaking fingers. The dealer glanced into the street and reached into his coat. In one clean motion, he took Aiden's money and pressed a small packet into the palm of his hand.

"Put that in your pocket now. There you go."

Aiden did as he was told, too anxious to check if the object he'd been handed was anything other than a sugar packet from a cafe. "Thanks."

"The name's Tyrone. Come see me when you run out."

"Sure," Aiden said, intending never to see Tyrone again. "Have a good evening." He felt stupid for saying it, but it was a reflex to mutter the words after a transaction.

"Cheers."

Aiden resisted the urge to sprint back to the hotel. Instead, he strolled around the block, fingering the packet in his pocket. It was a demonstration of self-control, he told himself. He wasn't in a rush. Even so, it wasn't long before he found himself swiping his key at the door to his room.

The packet was a tiny plastic baggie filled with a salt and pepper speckled powder. He lifted it and took a sniff. Scents of gasoline, toothpaste, charcoal, and wet dog filled his nose. It was legit. His body reacted viscerally to the familiar smell. His hair stood on end, and his heartbeat quickened. He tossed it onto the desk and started his preparations.

First, he locked the deadbolt and the stop-bar on the door. Then he got completely naked and tossed his clothes in a pile in the corner. He opened the packet, poured a pile onto the desk, and used his key card to form it into a thin line. It was a generous portion, but tonight was an indulgence, and it would be his last trip for who knew how long. The rest of the packet he secured in the safe, locked behind a code too long for a dog's mind to remember. That was the most important step. He didn't want another incident.

Everything was ready. His heart was beating like he had just sprinted up a flight of stairs, and he took some deep breaths to calm himself. This wasn't a big deal. He'd just have the one line, enjoy himself, and, when he was back to normal, he'd flush the rest down the toilet. The silence of the room relaxed him, but at the same time it added a strange weight to the moment.

He started by licking the residue from the room key. That was it. He'd done it. No more second thoughts about breaking a "clean streak." Now he could enjoy himself. He rolled some cardstock into a small tube, placed one end into his nostril, lowered his head to the table, and snorted the line.

Aiden plopped onto the bed, a nervous smile on his face. It would not be long now. He turned on the TV. The news was playing a story about Chinese boats fishing illegally in the Indonesian sea. A tickle was building in his nose. He licked the itch with his tongue, probing deep into the nostril he'd used to snort the drug. He realized the impossibility of the reach and froze with his tongue buried in his nose.

The K9 dripped from his sinuses into the back of his throat, filling his mouth its chemical warmth. The heat made a bee-line down his throat, through his stomach, into his crotch. His taint muscles clenched, and the red tip of his cock slid a few inches free of his foreskin. He watched with detached fascination as the loose skin pulled itself down the length of his penis and attached itself to his stomach. His urethra pursed into a circle and a bead of clear precum spurted onto his stomach. He flinched in surprise.

The color of his penis changed next, fading from a purple-red into a deep blue. It had frightened him the first time he'd seen it, but now he knew that it wasn't his cock changing. It was his eyes. The TV displayed a mountainous landscape with yellow grass and blue mud. They were talking about something else now. Politics? They were saying lots of names, and it all seemed like a lot of work to figure out. In any case, the heat had made its way into his heart and was now spreading through his body. It wormed through his muscles like electro-stim, making him tense in little shudders.

Aiden turned to the mirror beside his bed and jumped. There was a mutant in his room! No, he realized, it's me; it's just a picture of me, and I look different. He chuckled. His head was much farther along than he expected. His nose was black and shiny with his saliva. His tongue lolled down past his dwindling chin. His ears pointed past his hair, twitching as their muscles came online, throwing the sound of the TV this way and that.

He looked ridiculous. Embracing the absurdity, he leaned forward and licked his reflection. It seemed like the right thing to do. He giggled again, and his voice cracked into a whiny yip.

He was having a good time. Why had he been so worried? He was safe, and the newswoman was here to keep him company.

He collapsed back onto the bed, laying on his back spread-eagle. Closing his eyes, he focused on the sensation of change flooding through him. The heat was most intense at the base of his spine, where his vertebrae were multiplying with a delicate pop pop pop. His skin stretched as his tail came in. The limb wormed between his butt cheeks and brought a feeling of completeness. He hadn't realized how much he'd missed having a tail.

Even though he wasn't moving a muscle, his body moved on the sheets. He was changing shape, leaving his humanity behind for a little while. Thank goodness. Humanity was nothing but stress and thinking and work and worrying. His legs were getting the most of it, knees bending, feet lengthening, calves shortening.

He opened his eyes and looked down. His cock looked more at home between those semi-canine legs. He reached down and wrapped his fingers around his sheathe, stroking his slickened length free an inch at a time. The euphoria of the drug multiplied the familiar pleasure of the touch, transforming the sensation into something altogether new. The bulge of his knot stretched the skin above his balls. He massaged the bump with his fingertips and groaned in bliss. It was so big! His cock had gained a little bump from the overdose, but now it was nearly the size of his fist. Each time he flexed his pelvic muscles, it swelled a little larger. Would it even be able to fit out of his sheathe? Not if it kept growing.

With a newfound urgency, he pushed the knot upward under his skin. It stretched the lips of his sheathe, and for a moment it seemed as though it would be stuck, but then it popped free.

His cock was massive. Far larger than it had been as a human. Did the drug always do this? Everyone's dog-form was different. Maybe it was the case that he was just an average human, but an exceptionally well-hung dog. The tip of his penis laid well past his rapidly shrinking bellybutton. He stroked the raw flesh but recoiled at the intensity of the touch. He turned his hand over to see his palms swelling into roughened pads. His fingers pulled back into themselves. His thumbs, humanity's most prized digits, traveled up his forearms and shrank into dew claws, a useless, evolutionary memory.

A series of spasms in the muscles of his groin caused his alien cock to slap against his belly, leaving little beads of fluid in its wake. Hairs pushed through his skin and tickled his length wonderfully. He started bucking his hips, jabbing his dick back and forth across his narrowing stomach.

His logical mind drowned in the potent cocktail of the drug, the sensations, and his lust. All that was left was an impulse, a base need, a thirst, to maximize the pleasure flooding from his knotted cock. With some difficulty, he flipped over onto his stomach and continued thrusting against the sheets. Then he caught sight of the pillows, and something in his mind clicked. He stood on four wobbly, shifting legs, and crawled over to the pillows. He pawed clumsily to gather them under his body and started humping with abandon.

That was the ticket. He had an overwhelming need to penetrate, to sink his cock into something, and while this wasn't perfect, it was good enough. His mouth hung slack with ecstacy, jaws cracking and pushing out into a true muzzle. The compression of his head seemed to match the growing tidal wave of pleasure, and his skull gave a mighty "Crick, crick, CRACK!" as he came.

The release was impossibly long, endless it seemed. Spurt after spurt of thin canine cum pattered onto the sheets and carpet below. His knot throbbed and burned, and every touch was unimaginable bliss. Finally, the climax faded and he climbed off the pillow and collapsed onto the bed, gazing into the mirror.

He was as much a dog as that homeless man he'd seen. Fur covered much of his body, thicker in some patches than others. His head was that of a German Shepard, though his human hair sat atop like an out of place wig.

At length, he tried to stand again. He was more comfortable on all fours now, but even so, his rear legs were too long for anyone to mistake him as a true dog. His penis hung heavily between his legs, knot swollen impressively, cum still dripping as it swung. He was, perhaps, eighty percent of the way there, and the changes had stopped. That was fine. He wanted to go all the way, but the remaining shred of his analytical mind told him it was a bad idea.

His lust sated, Aiden proceeded to have a small adventure around the hotel room. He tested out his new nose on every single surface. The room was quite clean, but he found all sorts of interesting smells lurking in the corners. He even caught the scent of urine on the dresser, and before he could stop himself he'd lifted his leg and let a small trickle of his own spatter onto the hardwood. Another police siren sounded off outside his window. He lifted his head to howl but managed to stop himself. No dogs allowed in this hotel.

So he passed the next few hours, until the warmth of the drug transitioned into a dull ache, and his body began to revert into his human form. It was a most unpleasant sensation. The meaningless word-sounds of the TV morphed into a vitriolic debate between a politician he didn't trust and a pundit he despised. He pawed the TV remote over to himself and pressed the power button with his lengthening fingers. His friend, the tail, slid back into his body, and lurid reds and greens flushed the world.

A sense of regret and shame arrived with his humanity. He ran a hot shower and waited out the come-down laying under the stream. Almost every part of his body returned to the way it had been. His face reverted to match the picture on his passport, and his penis regained its few hints of humanity. The row of nipples down his stomach lingered. He stared at them intently and waited. And waited. His fingertips grew wrinkly from the water.

Shit.

He got out of the tub and towelled off, noting with distaste the increased sensitivity of the fluffy cloth against his new nipples. This was a disaster. Sure he could hide the nipples with a shirt, but not if it was cold out and they were hard like they were now. His reflection's ears were larger and pointed. The tips even poked out past his hair.

Double shit.

He wanted to panic, but the trips (both drug and travel) had exhausted him. He collapsed on the bed and drifted into a deep sleep.

⢠⢠ 2⢠⢠

Aiden's phone rang. He cracked his eyes. The cacophony of the day hit him, bright light, honking traffic, someone screaming on the street below. His hand shot out to answer the phone.

"Hello?"

"Aiden, where the fuck are you?"

It was Megan, his supervisor. He looked at the clock, it read 13:03. That was. . . one PM? He leapt out of bed.

"Holy shit! Sorry! On my way! Sorry!"

Aiden dug through his luggage and frantically assembled an outfit while he brushed his teeth. He tossed all the components onto the bed next to the bunched up pillow covered in dried dog cum. Much to his disappointment, his new rows of nipples hadn't disappeared overnight, nor his pointed ears. He grabbed his suitcase, pulled a beanie over his head, and dashed out the door.

He made it to the office in record time, but he'd missed the meeting to prepare for the dinner with the Anderson Collection tomorrow night. This was the client that was so important, his company had flown him across the ocean. He rescheduled for the afternoon, but he'd already lost face. Nobody even asked about the beanie, though he wore it inside all day. A lax dress code was a perk of working with numbers instead of people.

Aiden was an insurance actuary, an occupation that was perhaps the polar opposite of being a dog. It was all mental, all sitting still and staring into a screen, mind tied up in thinking about risks and probabilities. It was sensory deprivation sitting in that office, but the distractions weren't much better than the work.

One of the locals had brought their dalmation, Mischa, into the office that day, and once she caught a whiff of Aiden, she stuck to him as surely as her own spots were stuck to her fur.

"She really likes you," said the owner. Aiden nodded politely and put his headphones on. He could smell her. More than that, he could smell the tantalizing scent of her femininity. His cock shifted an inch out of his sheathe. He moved to a different room.

He worked until he was too exhausted to continue. The hotel was a good half hour walk from his office, and the local sights and sounds eased his busy mind. He was so absorbed in the atmosphere of it all, he hardly noticed that his feet had led him back to the same corner where he'd met Tyrone the pimp in the wee hours of that morning.

It was a very different place during the day. Tyrone, of course, was nowhere to be seen. Workers were enjoying beers in the pubs, tourists snapped selfies, and kids played under the watchful eyes of their parents. Did they know how the neighborhood transformed after everyone retired to their beds? Street corners had their own secret second lives, just like the people walking on them.

The walk was calming, but by the time he reached the hotel, the waistband of his pants had nearly rubbed his lowest set of nipples raw. Inside his room, he stripped naked, freeing his sore eartips and nipples from their prisons. Perhaps hiding them wouldn't be as easy as he thought. What was he supposed to do for the big dinner tomorrow night? He couldn't wear a beanie in a nice restaurant. They'd have to sit outside. He rubbed his temples. All this worrying would give him ulcers.

He wished he had more K9. What better way to unwind from a hard day crunching numbers than to take a break from one's humanity? He wanted to forget about the big dinner, the approaching deadlines, the social awkwardness. Still, he was glad he had been smart about limiting himself. He was wise to flush it.