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He reached out and shook the shorter man's hand in greeting. "My name is Joshua. Used to be Professor Rivers before the island, but..." he shrugged slightly, wincing a little at the pain in his stomach. Now that he thought about it, it seemed to be getting worse.

"So, how long have you been here... Marshall?" he asked, moving to sit down on a nearby bench. He moved slowly, carefully lowering himself to take a seat. He was starting to feel a little sick, and his face seemed pale.

Joshua almost smiled when Marshall called him Professor, but the pains in his stomach were getting more severe. "Actually, I... I'm not sure... my stomach is... ughh..." he broke off with a groan, clutching his stomach, trying to make the pain stop even though he knew holding it would do no good.

Fur began to spread over his body, white and yellow with darker orange spotted patterns decorating his fur. It began on his neck, spreading up to cover his face, horns and ears, and then downwards, over his shoulders and chest, all along his arms and legs.

Despite the itching it caused, Joshua himself didn't seem to take too much notice. Instead he was struggling - and failing - to restrain his cries of pain, it felt like something was trying to burst through his stomach. "Oh god..." He knew what was happening, though. He recognized it, he was changing again - what else could cause him this much pain?

The hooves on Joshua's feet began changing, the hard nails growing thicker and looking less like toes and more like cloven hooves. His ears stretched out longer, thinning out and becoming more movable than a human's ears. He screamed out as his neck grew longer - thankfully, not as much as the first time, but it was still extremely painful, like someone was grabbing his head and pulling as hard as they could.

His tail was next, the fur at the end becoming longer and his tail growing out further. It looked much more like a tail now, and it swished wildly behind him, twitching uncontrollably.

An odd sensation filled his mouth then, still painful as his tongue swelled and grew longer, becoming darker and almost black in color. He couldn't fit all of it inside his mouth anymore, the appendage hanging out of his mouth as he screamed.

It seemed to be almost over...

"I... I..." Joshua tired to say, 'I don't know,' but he couldn't catch his breath long enough to get out the entire sentence. Of course, if he had said yes, he would have been wrong. A jolt of pain shot down his spine and he gasped, falling forward off the bench and onto his hands and knees. His back seemed to arch downwards, his entire torso pushing forward, his spine shifting to make for an awkward posture.

But it didn't end there, and the worst pain of all came back full force around his abdomen. Two small, stubby arm-like appendages burst forth from his sides, twitching from the new muscles forming. They pushed against his white button down shirt painfully, and he quickly pulled it open, buttons popping off to allow less restraint on the... things... growing from his abdomen. Joshua could do nothing but stare in horror as the nails on the small stubs grew thick nails on them, similar to the ones on his feet, but smaller.

When the changes finally stopped, Joshua felt queasy - the combination of the transformation and the sudden growth of these new... things becoming too much for him. He managed not to get sick - yet, anyway - still in too much of a state of shocked to react properly. His whole body ached as much, if not more, as it did the last time... and this was only his second time.

It took a few moments for Marshall's words to register that he did, indeed, just speak to him. The normally calm Professor seemed to still be in a state of shock and at a loss for words, but slowly he was collecting his senses again. "Wha--" he tried to talk, but it was difficult to form words now. His tongue was too big to fit inside his mouth and when he tried to talk, it sounded like he had a cold. Joshua struggled to form his words correctly.

"What... what are they..!?" Some part of him knew what the appendages looked like, but his mind couldn't accept what he was actually seeing. "I'm... I'm supposed to be..." Joshua trailed off and lifted a hand up to grab one of the small legs, gasping out in pain when he gripped it too hard. He immediately let go.

They were real. They were attached to him. He couldn't seem to control them very well, every now and then one of the small stubs would twitch suddenly.

He looked up at Marshall as if he expected the other man to have some sort of answer for him. This wasn't in any books he's read about giraffes.

Slowly, Joshua got back onto his feet - he used the bench to support himself, having difficulties standing up straight. His hips were positioned awkwardly now, and he felt unbalanced, like his center of gravity was off. He looked down at himself again. "They said... I was supposed to be a giraffe..." That had, at least, given him an idea of what to expect; but not this...

He didn't understand what was going on, feeling completely unravelled by this new development. Maybe there had been some sort of mistake? How many times have they tried to turn someone into a giraffe before? What if he was just a test subject gone wrong? Could they fix this what was wrong with him?

"I... yes, I think I could use some help, please..." he replied slowly to the younger man. Joshua's mind was having a difficult time adjusting to his changes this time - and to think it was bad enough the first time... He almost felt ashamed that Marshall had to see him like this. It wasn't like him at all - but then again, he didn't look like himself anymore, either. "If you could just get me to my duplex, I... I think I will be alright from there."

"I'm in duplex 43... it's on the bottom floor," Joshua said, glad that he wouldn't have to walk up any stairs. He wasn't sure he would be able to right now - not alone, at any rate. He tried not to lean his weight against the shorter man, resting his hand on Marshall's shoulder as they began to walk towards his duplex. He took careful, slow steps with his heavy hooves.

Joshua was slightly taken aback by the question. Teach? Oh, right. I'm a teacher. Was a teacher. "I taught English Literature," he murmured his reply, still trying to get used to his longer tongue. It was strange to be talking about something so normal during such an... abnormal situation. But Joshua liked normal. Normal he could handle. But this... was almost surreal.