It was the beginning of summer. School had just finished and people were out enjoying the hot sun, kids playing in parks and teens going to malls and beaches. A young kid named Marcus was out playing hide-and-go-seek with his friends when a small girl approached him. She asked if she could play with them and he saw no as to reason why she couldn't. The more the merrier, right? He called out to his friends, saying that someone new wants to join. Once the group had re-gathered, Marcus started to introduce everyone.
“This is Bob, Mary, John, Patricia, Riley, and I'm Marcus,” he said as he gestured to each of the kids, then to himself. “And you are?”
“O-oh, uhm, my name is... uhm... Alice,” the young girl said, seemingly having a hard time remembering her name.
“Alright Alice, we're going to do 'eenie meenie miny mo' to choose who gets to be the seeker,” Bob said, arranging the group to be a circle. He started chanting as he pointed to different people in the group, “Eenie, meenie, miny, mo, catch a tiger by the toe, if he hollers let him go, eenie, meenie, miny, mo!” the finger landed on Riley.
“Aw, not again!” she protested, crossing her arms and slumping off to a nearby tree. “One... Two... Three... Four...” She continued counting, slowly making her way up to twenty.
As the kids were scrambling around trying to find a hiding place, Alice beckoned for Marcus to follow her as she ran into a nearby forest.
“A-Alice...?” Marcus called out for her, pausing in front of the forest. “My mom said that I can't go in there...”
“Oh come on, you big baby,” Alice teased as she grabbed onto Marcus' arm, pulling him into the forest. “We're not going in that far.”
Alice's hand felt cold, almost wet on Marcus' skin. He shivered and followed her into the forest, hiding behind a tree with her. That's when he started to feel something crawling up his arm. He looked down at it, seeing Alice's hand turn into a slimy black mass that had started to cover his arm. He looked up at Alice, only to see her blankly staring back at him. He tried to scream and call for help, but as soon as he opened his mouth Alice's hand shot up and covered it, her hand turning into the same slime that covered his arm, and started engulfing the rest of his body.
As soon as the boy was fully encased in the slime, unable to struggle away, Alice slowly started to deform his body, elongating his neck and limbs, forcing him into a more quadruped position. The stretching and tearing of flesh, the cracking of bones, and the small, barely audible whimpers could be heard from inside the mass. Marcus felt every minute of it, the excruciating pain of his body being deformed and torn apart. He wanted to cry out, but he couldn't. His senses slowly faded, the last thing he was able to hear was the cracking of his skull.
Alice pulled back, retracting the slime back into her and smiled, looking up at her newest creation. The late Marcus' body was shaped into a small giraffe, which then fell to the ground, unable to keep itself up. Alice sighed, shrugging and skipping off, thinking of what animal she can try next.