Part 3
_____________________________________________________
The genomic origin of Zana of Abkhazia
Ashot Margaryan, Mikkel-Holger S. Sinding, Christian Carøe, Vladimir Yamshchikov, Igor Burtsev, M. Thomas P. Gilbert
First published: 14 June 2021
Funding information: This project was funded by University of Copenhagen Internal grant to MTPG.
Abstract
Enigmatic phenomena have sparked the imagination of people around the globe into creating folkloric creatures. One prime example is Zana of Abkhazia (South Caucasus), a well-documented 19th century female who was captured living wild in the forest. Zana's appearance was sufficiently unusual that she was referred to by locals as an Almasty--the analog of Bigfoot in the Caucasus. Although the exact location of Zana's burial site was unknown, the grave of her son, Khwit, was identified in 1971. The genomes of Khwit and the alleged Zana skeleton were sequenced to an average depth of ca. 3× using ancient DNA techniques. The identical mtDNA and parent-offspring relationship between the two indicated that the unknown woman was indeed Zana. Population genomic analyses demonstrated that Zana's immediate genetic ancestry can likely be traced to present-day East-African populations. We speculate that Zana might have had a genetic disorder such as congenital generalized hypertrichosis which could partially explain her strange behavior, tall stature, lack of speech, and long body hair, but we now know that genetically she was 100% homo sapiens. Our findings elucidate Zana's unfortunate story and provide a clear example of how prejudices of the time led to notions of cryptic hominids that are still held and transmitted by some today.
_____________________________________________________
Claire woke up feeling an unexpected weight on her chest. Maybe she had fallen asleep cuddling one of the drybags? She tried to push it off only to find it was, well, her. Soft and surprisingly sensitive, her breasts had easily doubled in size during the night, her previously overstuffed b-cup bra was never going to contain them. "Holy Shit look at these!" she paused "They're gorgeous." She cupped them experimentally. Her hands felt small in comparison.
She crammed her torso into a previously-loose fitting merino wool base layer, but when she went to put on pants she stopped, shocked. Her feet were getting caught in the cuff and couldn't pass through. Cautiously, she pulled her pants back down. Her feet were absolutely enormous.
Sushmita felt hot. She had stripped down to just her panties to sleep, and even now, in the alpine morning cold, she threw off her sleeping bag. She blinked. It was probably time to get up. She was hungry anyway. She put on a t-shirt and shorts for modesty, and caught off guard by the smooth sensation of the clothes moving over her new hair. It was kind of... thrilling, maybe.
At some point in the night her increasingly dense body hair had achieved nearly full coverage, except her palms, soles and face. Was it possible she had ever seen someone, anyone, this hairy? Hal from Malcolm in the Middle? That Armenian guy that Emily had dated a few years back? Maybe. Certainly she was on their level. Her belly button had its own little nest. She noticed her breasts had also grown again, eagerly cupping them to find that her nipples also had a forest of hair around them.
Emily was curled up on her side, which, in truth, was the only way she would fit in her tent. She didn't wake up until she overheard the other girls talking animatedly.
"You could cut them off at the ankle with my pocketknife, but I still don't think they'll fit. I can't believe you would go hiking in June without a pair of shorts, but you can't have mine and you wouldn't fit into them anyhow."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
Emily stirred. She had a curious idea, and she lay on her back with her feet touching the screen, unzipping the door and laying her head down in the vestibule under the fly, hoping not to draw her friends attention.
"What do you think it means? Look at your fat ass. It's not just your tits, you know. You're absolutely piling on those curves."
"I can't believe you called me fat. I'm in a crisis here."
"You're not fat, you're just changing. We're all changing. Look at me" Sushmita posed left, then right. Her t-shirt and shorts were tight on her fuzzy frame, revealing that the tiny woman had also put on some curves. She seemed very pleased with herself. "Emily probably has something that will fit. Hey! Emily! Get up!"
"Are you calling me fat?" Emily said, emerging from her tent on her hands and knees. She, like Claire, was naked from the waist down.
Sushmita rolled her eyes "That's not what I'm sayi- Oh holy fuck!" She stammered as Emily stood at her new, full height, and for a moment she even straightened up for maximum effect. Emily had been a foot taller than Sushmita before, but now she positively towered. Her body was monumental. Her breasts were massive, bigger than Claire's, and stretching her spandex-poly running shirt to the absolute limit. Her muscular ass had blossomed into a comfortable looking bubble butt. Her bare feet looked substantially longer than Sushmita's.
"No, no, you're right. I don't even fit in my tent, let alone my clothes. Look at me! I'm huge!" She said through a smile, enjoying her full command of her friends' attention.
"Wow Emily" said Claire "You are huge. You must be six feet tall"
"Taller." Emily let a quick smile escape "My tent is six feet, so I bet I'm like six two". What did you guys make for breakfast? It smells great"
"What are you talking about?" Sushmita fumed "Some of us haven't even figured out how to wear clothes yet!"
"So what's that on the fire?"
_____________________________________________________
Down at the lakeshore the embers of the cooking fire smouldered. Above them, someone had replaced the large roasting spit with a number of smaller ones. Four spits hung over the fire, each with four roast game birds on them. The slates held wild onion, chicken-of-the-woods shelf fungus, and the same mushrooms as yesterday that none of the girls recognized. Off to the side were rustic baskets of blueberries, loganberries, and wild strawberries.
"Is that a partridge? Or like grouse or something?" Sushmita looked worried "How does this keep happening? Did the hikers come back? What the hell is going on?"
"Let's talk about it after breakfast" Claire still did not have pants on but she sat down on a log, grabbed a spit of birds off the fire and tucked in. In a couple hours the girls had finished all but two of the birds and a few berries. Emily took the largest share.
_____________________________________________________
They lounged on some fallen logs beside the cooking pit. Sushmita started with the obvious. "Okay, so, I'm hairy like Robin Williams and I'm growing an actual beard, but I'm the only person here who can fit into normal shoes anymore. Claire has hair down to her gigantic butt, Emily is just gigantic,actually we're all getting curvier."
"I'm wearing Claire's old bra, Claire is absolutely poured into Emily's shorts, and Emily is wearing two travel towels as a skirt because nothing else fits. We have no food but some sort of benevolent forest spirit is feeding us. We're still a day's hike away from our car, and we have no idea why any of this is happening, when it will stop, or what to do next."
"That's about it." said Claire "Any ideas?"
"I don't know about you, but I feel like the worst is over." said Sushmita "I'm not ravenous and loopy like I was yesterday. I'm still freaked out, but it's more, like, intellectual than immediate. If you stop thinking about the body horror for a moment, we're actually having a really nice vacation. Great weather. Beautiful water. Free food."
"And the biggest feet you've ever seen in your life" said Emily. She kicked up a leg and wiggled her toes.
