Effie rode down to the dining room with Mikey, then hopped down her arm onto the table. Yes, somehow or other, the table felt solid, and she could even put her hand down on the surface and feel the wood grain. Her mind boggled as she tried to figure out how this was possible. Did her host have some kind of omnidirectional radar that could map surfaces? Or was this all just interpolation based on visual data? Or maybe it was just magic?
That last possibility seemed simultaneously to be completely ridiculous and yet the sanest theory to explain everything she was observing. She wouldn't have even thought it possible this mor-uh, three weeks ago, but after being changed from a man to a piece of software that somehow took the form of a girl, she felt a little more open-minded.
Effie looked around the table. It was a bit sparsely set; only three places had dishes at them but were two other chairs besides Mikey's that had none. She remembered her host mentioning an older brother, but it seemed there were six in the family? She wondered who the others were.
In any case, she felt like experimenting. She moved around to the other side of the napkin-holder. There she found a salt and pepper-shaker set. Well, if it were radar, this wouldn't be visible...would it? Actually, Effie had to admit that she had no idea how radar worked - maybe it could bounce back and catch objects that weren't directly in line-of-sight? It certainly wasn't visible, as the napkin-holder obscured things from Mikey's view.
If it was magic, she wondered, did that mean she could interact physically? She tried picking up one of the shakers, but it wouldn't budge. Her hands stopped on its surface as though they were real, but she couldn't actually exert force on it. All the limitation of being solid, and none of the advantage! This just kept getting stranger and stranger...
She walked back around towardsher host, shaking her head. Yeah, Mikey said, speaking silently in text-only form, I don't get how this works either. They can't even see you right now!
Effie looked around. While she was experimenting, the diners had taken their seats. There were a mom and dad who looked to be ordinary humans, and a little girl of seven or eight, seemingly normal except for her hair, which was powder-blue. She looked back at her host. Aside from her hair and ear-antennae, Effie noticed that Mikey's eyes had, instead of irises and pupils, translucent lenses of a somewhat darker green than her hair.
Despite all this, and despite the perfect symmetry of her face and flawless surace of her skin, there was a definite family resemblance between Mikey and the two adults at the table. How two humans could have a robot daughter, Effie didn't know, but she was more intrigued by the fact that the little blue-haired girl didn't share this. Her features were markedly different; was she related, or a guest?
"So how was your day, dear?" Mrs. Madison asked. "You said you were talking with someone from the Internet?"
Mikey nodded. "Uh-huh. I found a site for people like...people like me, and they helped me get all protected so nobody can get inside my mind if I don't want them to. And I made a friend there, too!" She smiled at Effie, but decided not to mention that said friend was now living in her head - at least not yet.
"That's nice" her mother said, smiling warmly. "I'm so glad there are still people who like to help others online. Becka, how was your day?"
Becka stared for a moment, then realized she was being addressed. "Um, good," she said. "Pretty good." She paused for a moment, looking like she had something else to say, then decided against it and started eating. Effie found herself wondering again what this girl's story was.
A couple hours earlier...
Becka looked around the vacant lot, still trying to get used to the way her new side-locks brushed her cheeks when she turned her head. She smiled. "I useta play here a lot," she said. Many of her memories from her old life were fuzzy and indistinct, but the memories of this place were crystal-clear: many hours of touch football with her dad, back before it had gone from being a game to being her life. She sighed, a bit overwhelmed by the nostalgia.
Trident smiled. "Well, all the better, then. You can practice on your home turf."
Becka nodded. "What're we practicin'?" she asked.
Trident shrugged. "We'll start with triggering your transformation and work from there, I think."
Becka frowned. "I don't wanna 'nother transformation!"
"No, not like that," the tiny young woman said, taking a graceful leap from Becka's shoulder to a nearby branch. "This is just to switch you into magical-girl mode, that's all. You'll go right back when you're done."
The little girl looked skeptical. "Promise?"
Trident smiled. "Promise. Now, hold your totem in your hands and count to three."
"Why?"
She sighed. "Three is your number, okay? I don't know what that means, it just is."
"Oh." Becka clasped the ornament on her necklace in her hands and closed her eyes. "One, two, three!"
A gentle breeze blew up around her, gaining force as it encircled the little girl. As it blew, it whipped at Becka's dress, somehow changing its shape. The tri-lobed sigil that had vanished into her collar bone now reappeared, glowing bluish-white. The wind ceased, and she opened her eyes.
As she looked down at herself, Becka found that her outfit was completely different. There was a battered old mirror leaning against the fence that surrounded the lot, and she rushed over to inspect.
Her dress had somehow split in two. The lower half was a pleated blue skirt that hung to mid-shin, met by knee-length white stockings that slipped down into navy-blue mary-janes. The top half of the dress had become a sort of white dress coat that split into three coattails around her waist - one on each side of the front, and one in the back. All three tapered to points, looking rather like flower petals. She could just see the collar of a powder-blue undershirt underneath the coat. Her side-locks, which had hung loose, were now held in place by barrettes which bore, in wrought gold, the same tri-lobed symbol.
Even stranger and less easily explained were the shapes behind her. Three triangular shapes, fanned out in a circle, were behind her. They weren't solid; rather, they seemed to be traced lines of bluish-white light. Becka turned and looked over her shoulder - not only did they appear to have no substance, they weren't even connected to anything! The bases started from thin air a few inches from her back and tapered to thin points about a foot and a half out, yet they moved when she moved!
"Are they s'posed to be there?" she asked, perplexed. Trident nodded and clapped her hands, beside herself with glee. "Yes, yes!" she said. "This is all just as it should be! You look perfect! Now come on, let's see if we can't manifest your weapon!"
