"Dude, you need to come over RIGHT NOW. I have something insane I need to show you."
After reading the text message once again, Ryan looked up from his phone, staring ahead at the front door of his best friend Joe's house. He knew Joe to generally be a pretty mellow guy, so if he was this worked up about something, Ryan knew that it had to be something pretty important. But what could possibly be so important that it would get Joe this excited? With a shrug, Ryan put his phone back into his pocket and knocked on Joe's door, hoping he would be able to provide some answers.
After just a few seconds, the door opened. Standing on the other side was Joe, wearing the biggest grin Ryan had ever seen - on him or anyone else. "Oh good, you're here!" said Joe, grabbing Ryan by the arm. "Come upstairs with me. I need to show you something."
"Wait, hold on!" cried Ryan, pulling his arm away. "What is going on? Why are you acting like this?"
"You'll find out, okay? Just come with me?" Grabbing Ryan's arm again, Joe started pulling him up the stairs again, up to where his room was. As soon as they were inside, Joe closed the door, locking it behind him. "Alright," he said, taking a deep breath. "You ready?"
"Yeah, okay," said Ryan, starting to lose his patience with this whole show Joe was putting on. "Just show me what this crazy thing you're so excited about is already."
"Okay, okay," said Joe, taking another breath. "So. I was in the attic the other day, just kind of looking through all the old junk we have up there, when... I came across what looked like an old journal. I began flipping through it, and I found a bunch of notes that were written there in my mom's handwriting. From what I could gather, it looked like she was doing a bunch of research into our family history, and..." He paused, standing there silently for a moment with that excited grin still plastered across his face. "And..."
Ryan frowned. "...And?" He said. "Go on, don't keep me waiting. What is this super-exciting thing you discovered in that journal?"
"Hold on," said Joe, holding his hand up. "I'm trying to figure out the best way to... ah, screw it. There's no way I can tell you without sounding completely crazy, so I'm just going to show you. You ready?"
"Okay, sure," said Ryan with a sigh. "Go get your journal and show me whatever crazy secret is hidden inside, okay?"
But Joe wasn't moving to get the journal. Instead, he was just standing there, his eyes closed as if he was concentrating on something important. As he stood there, his hands suddenly flew to his chest, patting it down as if he was feeling for something underneath his shirt. Before Ryan could do anything, Joe suddenly reached down and pulled his shirt over his head, tossing it aside. "That's better," he said. "Don't want to rip it up like I did the last one."
"Wha- dude!" yelled Ryan, recoiling. "Why'd you just-" Before he could finish his sentence, he suddenly caught a glimpse of Joe's bare chest. The skin there didn't look normal... it looked like it had a bit of a greenish tint to it, one that was growing darker by the second. Were Ryan's eyes playing tricks on him? He reached up to rub them, but that didn't seem to help; another look only revealed the green tint to be even darker and more prominent than before. Not only that, it was starting to spread across his entire torso, and even seemed to be spreading to his arms as well. As he stared, Ryan suddenly realized that the skin wasn't just changing color: its texture seemed to be changing as well, thickening and hardening into what he could only describe as reptilian scales.
