The shampoo

John stepped into the shower. As he was about to start the water up, he noticed that he was out of shampoo. He realized what he had forgotten to buy at the store that day. He looked around, trying to figure out what he could wash his hair with when he thought of something. He had raised a few baby raccoons, and had special shampoo for them. He still had some left and figured that if it was safe for them then it should be fine for him.

He quickly found the bottle and looked at the directions for anything that might be useful. He noticed a warning that said "Not for human use". This puzzled him, why would it say that, its just shampoo right? He concluded that this was probably just a marketing ploy and ran back upstairs with the bottle in hand.

Running the water, he got into the shower. After wetting his hair, he put some of the shampoo in it and lathered it in. As he was putting it in, it made his hair tingle and feel oddly warm.

"Maybe this is why it says not for human use?" He thought. He noticed that his hair seemed to be very soft and the texture felt wrong. He finished lathering the soap in, and washed it out.

His hair still felt strange and as he was feeling it, his face started feeling funny. Touching his face with his fingers, he nearly jumped when he felt fur.

"What is going on?" he said. His ears started to tingle and feel incredibly warm and the top of his head felt strange. Turning off the water, he quickly got out of the shower and ran towards the mirror. As the fog on the mirror cleared, what he saw shocked him. His face was completely covered in fur, and the coloration and pattern of the coloration was all too familiar. His ears were gone, or so he thought at first. It didn’t take him long to realize that they were now at the top of his head, but they no longer looked human. They looked rounded, and furry. Fur started to grow down his chest and arms that very quickly spread and thickened. He felt the fur and it felt familiar. Another look at his reflection, and he realized what was going on.

"This is impossible, when it said ‘not for human use’ I didn’t expect this to be happening! The stuff is turning me into a raccoon!" he said. The fur growth reached his hands; a light coating of fur grew on the top of both hands. His hands Started to reshape right before his eyes, his thumbs changed shape, each becoming a fifth finger. The skin on each hand changed, becoming much more sensitive. His finger hails grew, becoming sharp black claws.

The fur growth continued down his body and he started to shrink. As the fur growth reached his legs and hips, he heard the bones in his legs and hips making awful cracking noises. He could feel the bones shifting and changing, somehow it didn’t hurt. As the bones shifted, he found himself being pushed forward onto ‘all fours’. His legs had changed length and shape such that standing on ‘all fours’ was much easier and natural now.

His feet felt strange and he watched as fur grew on top of them, with each toe changing shape and size such that they were now all about the same size and length. He felt a tingling, followed by a pulling sensation just above his rear end. He had a feeling what was going on, and his feelings were confirmed when a long, ringed and furry tail grew out from his spine.

He continued to shrink until he was no larger then an adult male raccoon. Running into his bedroom, he jumped onto the bed and looked at his reflection in the mirror. His reflection was that of a very handsome male raccoon. A quick examination of his body confirmed it. He tried to speak, but only sounds that he was familiar with from having raised raccoons before came out of his mouth. Sitting on the bed, he contemplated what to do next. It was late, so he decided to sleep on it. Instinctively curling up into a little ball, he went to sleep.

The next day he awoke, the sun was shining on him and it felt great on his fur. He looked at himself in the mirror.

"So it wasn’t a dream" he thought to himself. He got up and jumped off the bed. He was hungry and wanted to find something to eat. He walked downstairs to the kitchen, standing on his hind legs, he put his paws on his hips, realizing that there was no way he was going to be able to cook anything. He decided that he needed to get outside. Certainly he should be able to find food out there.

It took a lot of effort, but he was able to get his back door open, and he walked outside. He walked into his backyard and saw something he wasn’t expecting. Near the back of the yard were 2 raccoons, he wasn’t sure how, but he knew them somehow. When they immediately ran up to him and started sniffing and purring he remembered exactly whom they were. They were the two he had raised. It had always pained him to release them and he often wondered how they were doing. At least he now knew they were fine. He could tell that they knew who he was. The two of them made a wide assortment of sounds, and motioned for him to follow them. As he followed them, they made a sound that he recognized as ‘welcome’.