You’ve left your Christmas shopping a bit late, the streets already crowded and the air sharp with cold and tinsel-scented exhaust. Every shop you duck into is packed, queues spilling out onto the pavement, so when you spot a narrow alley that would cut ten minutes off your walk, you take it without thinking too hard. The festive glow vanishes almost immediately. The lights here are broken or flickering, leaving long stretches of shadow between damp brick walls plastered with peeling posters and old graffiti. Your footsteps sound too loud, echoing oddly, and the further you go the more certain you become that you’re not alone. There’s that prickling sensation at the back of your neck, the unmistakable feeling of being watched, of footsteps that stop when you stop.

You barely have time to turn before something sharp bites into your skin. It’s quick and precise, a sudden sting followed by a spreading numbness that races up your arm and through your chest. The alley tilts, the walls smearing into dark streaks as your strength drains away far faster than it should. You’re dimly aware of hands catching you before you hit the ground, of muffled voices and the scrape of something being dragged open, but your body refuses to cooperate. Sensation dissolves into a heavy, sinking void.

Awareness creeps back in fragments. The first thing you notice is the pressure—everywhere at once. Your knees are pulled tight to your chest, your spine curved painfully, shoulders hunched because there’s nowhere to stretch them. The air is stale and smells faintly of cardboard, tape, and something chemical. When you try to move, the walls resist immediately, rough and unyielding, inches from your face. You realise you’ve been shoved into a box far too small for comfort, folded in on yourself like discarded packaging. Each breath feels shallow, the confined space amplifying every sound you make: the rasp of your breathing, the thud of your heart, the faint rustle of the box shifting as if it’s being handled or stacked somewhere else. The festive rush of the city feels impossibly far away now, replaced by cramped darkness and the unsettling certainty that this is only the beginning.

They don’t rush you. That’s the unsettling part. The criminals sit you down at a scarred metal table in the back room of their warehouse and slide over a thin folder, carefully curated—schematics, safety certifications with just enough official-looking stamps to feel legitimate, photos of past “successes” cropped to avoid showing faces. They explain the job first, not the change: winter routes no one else can manage, borders choked with snow, surveillance tuned to humans and vehicles alike. An anthropomorphic reindeer, they say calmly, moves through those spaces unnoticed. You’re given enough information to understand that a transformation is involved, but not enough to grasp its full scope.

When you ask questions, they answer—selectively. Yes, it’s functional. Yes, it’s stable. Yes, you’ll be able to think clearly, speak, follow instructions. They gloss over permanence with phrases like “long-term operational viability” and “post-contract options.” Whenever you press for specifics, they redirect, gently but firmly, reminding you of the alternatives you don’t have. Walking away isn’t framed as impossible—just catastrophically impractical. The clock on the wall ticks loudly, a reminder that the window to decide is closing whether you like it or not.

Eventually, the choice compresses into something smaller and uglier: sign, or let them choose for you. You agree, telling yourself that partial knowledge is still consent, that you can adapt, that you’ll figure out the rest later. They nod, businesslike, as if this was always the expected outcome. The folder is taken away before you can reread it. A side door opens, cold air spilling in.. As they guide you toward the preparation room, one of them finally adds, almost as an afterthought, “You’ll understand the rest once the antlers come in.”

You’d sought them out deliberately, following rumours that drifted through encrypted forums and hushed Discord servers: a crew that didn’t just run jobs, but changed people. Faces swapped, bodies rebuilt, identities rewritten so thoroughly that borders, cameras, and past mistakes simply stopped applying. It sounded like myth, the kind criminals tell to inflate their own legend—until the meeting invite arrived with coordinates, a time, and a warning not to bring anything you couldn’t afford to abandon.

Their hideout isn’t dramatic, just an industrial unit on the edge of town that smells faintly of ozone and antiseptic. The group watches you closely as you’re led inside, eyes lingering not with suspicion but evaluation. They already know why you’re here. One of them even smirks, mentioning how most people come to them by accident or desperation, not curiosity. You admit you’re tired of half-measures, tired of pretending you only want a clean slate when what you really want is something other. Something unmistakable.

They show you fragments of their work—not footage, not proof you can copy, just carefully curated glimpses. A silhouette moving with inhuman grace in the snow. Hoofprints where boots should be. A heavy coat draped to accommodate antlers. They explain the utility of the form in practical terms: endurance, cold resistance, anonymity through absurdity. An anthropomorphic reindeer doesn’t fit any database neatly. You listen, heart thudding, realizing they’re not pitching a gimmick—they’re offering a role, one that clearly matters to them.

Finally, the leader slides a slim tablet across the table, its screen dark for now. They tell you they don’t force this on anyone who walks in willingly; that’s the rule, and the only reason this works as well as it does. Then, almost casually, they ask if you want to hear the full details—what it would mean, what you’d become, and what you’d leave behind—before they make you the offer.