Becoming: Part One

                                    

                                          
"Help! Help Jim!" Aaarrrgghh shouted, running into Vendel's workshop.  Vendel turned around and gave Aaarrrgghh a questioning look.
                          
"What is the matter, Aaarrrgghh?" Vendel asked.
                          
"Something wrong with Jim," Aaarrrgghh rumbled. Vendel walked forward to get a better look at Jim.
                          
"Oh my, that isn't good," Vendel blinked, taking note of Jim's horns. "Put him on the table."
                          
Aaarrrgghh gently set Jim's limp form on the table. Blinky, Toby, and Claire entered Vendel's workshop.
                          
"Vendel! What's happening to Jim?!" Toby cried.
                          
"I  haven't even looked at him, give me a minute!" Vendel barked back.  Vendel gently examined Jim's head before noticing an odd patch of skin  on Jim's neck. He pulled the neck of the hoodie down and his eyes  widened. Was that stone skin?
                          
Grabbing a sharp tool, Vendel  cut a line down the front of Jim's hoodie and pulled the two sides  apart. Nearly his entire torso was covered in troll-like skin, upon  closer inspection, the stone skin was slowly spreading.
                          
"He's turning to stone," Vendel mumbled.
                          
"What?!" Claire and Toby shouted.
                          
"No  not like that. His flesh is slowly turning into troll skin which is  stone. It also looks like he's developed quite a few troll-like  attributes," Vendel mumbled.
                          
"Is he a Changeling?" Toby asked.  Vendel went into a wooden box and pulled out a gaggletack. He pressed it  to Jim's temple and waited. Nothing.
                          
"No, he is not a Changeling.  If he was, the gaggletack would have forced him to be either human or  completely troll," Vendel stated.
                          
"So what is Jim?" Claire asked.
                          
"I  have no clue. I've never seen anything like this. This is unheard of,"  Vendel replied. "Right now, there is nothing I can do for him except  research about this in the library. I shall return soon."
                          
With that, Vendel had walked off. Blinky approached the unconscious form of Jim and brushed the hair in his eyes away.
                          
"Who did this to you?" Blinky asked. Toby and Claire walked up behind him.
                          
"He  was hiding this. He's been wearing hoods, hats, bandaging his hands,"  Claire whispered, picking up one of Jim's hands and rubbing her fingers  across the bandage. "He was doing everything to keep anyone from finding  out about it."
                          
"He must have been so scared," Toby murmured, looking at his best friend.
                          
"Jim smell like troll," Aaarrrgghh said. "But also smell like human."
                          
"How do we help him?" Toby asked.
                          
"I'm  afraid there isn't anything we can do except be there for him. Unless  Vendel finds something we don't have much to go on," Blinky sighed.
                          
"Do you think a Changeling did this to him?" Toby asked.
                          
"Changelings are not masters of magic. They cannot force their nature onto another," Blinky informed.
                          
"This looks like it really hurts," Claire whispered, looking at the stone skin that was slowly overtaking Jim's human skin.
                          
"Yeah...It really isn't a pleasant experience," Jim groaned. "Ow."
                          
"Jim!" Toby exclaimed. Jim coughed a few times and began to sit up.
                          
"Easy,  Jim. You're in rough shape," Blinky advised, helping Jim sit up. Jim  looked around to see the concerned faces of his friends, his eyes then  moved down to his exposed torso.