Anneza drifted down the street, looking around at the city. This was the first time she'd been out in sunlight since the sun changed; things were mostly the same, but the shifting hues of the light gave the world a strange, almost ethereal look. She wondered whether the sun would stay like this forever. If she did manage to get changed back, and she wound up out in the sun, would she change again? What would she become then? Was there any way to escape this?
Even by the standards of these sub-human freaks, a green-haired woman flying above the sidewalk was a bit of an odd sight, and she drew more stares than she wanted. A couple guys even whistled at her; she scowled and snapped at them, not that they knew what she was saying beyond the obvious.
This stupid dress...it was no wonder they stared, the way it displayed her free-hanging breasts, the way it hung just low enough to be safely cover her privates but displayed more leg than she would have liked...she needed to get some different clothes!
Even flying itself was a new experience. Sure, there had been her brief experiments last night, but this morning was the first time she was using it to get places; first to the doctors' office, then downtown. She was gradually getting the hang of moving freely in three dimensions, banking around corners like she was driving a car, adjusting her height if she was on level with an awning, drawing up her legs to stop so she could look around. This came so easily to her - why couldn't she have as simple a time learning her old language?
She made her way to the tailor's shop where she got her suits; it wasn't a large place, but they did quality work at a reasonable price. She hadn't been here since the sun changed; she wondered what the staff were like now. She opened the door and drifted inside.
Sitting behind the receptionist's desk was a young woman who appeared to be an anthropomorphic wolf. Anneza couldn't quite tell, but judging by the way her shirt tented, she appeared to have more than one row of breasts. She still didn't like the idea of having to interact with the changed, but she was pretty much out of options right now.
The receptionist smiled and greeted her in a pleasant tone of voice, then asked a question of some kind. Anneza drifted over to the desk and showed her the note the doctor had written, hoping that it said what she thought it said.
The receptionist looked sympathetic and called to the back room. A robot-woman came out, and the receptionist spoke with her. Anneza frowned; this wasn't her usual tailor, or at least didn't look anything like her usual tailor, even to the extent that the changed resembled their former selves. Maybe he was still unchanged and working the night shift...
In any event, the gynoid read the note and turned to her. "Anderson?" she asked. Anneza nodded emphatically. "En! Anneza Karaz jhys ta!"
The robot nodded, then arched an eyebrow in an attempt to indicate asking a question. Anneza held up the hem of her dress and rubbed the fabric between her fingers, then pointed to a rack of pants, then a rack of shirts, then rubbed the fabric again. The tailor gave her a curious look, grabbed the hem of her dress, and pointed to it inquiringly. Anneza nodded.
She was led into the back room, where the tailor indicated for her to take the dress off. Anneza hesitated, but complied; brief nudity was well worth it if it meant having some better clothes. She was given a garment like a hospital gown, and tried it on, but quickly had to remove it when it began to weigh her down.
The tailor watched in surprise as she sank. "Oh, so that's why you want this material," she said. Anneza wondered what that meant.
The tailor examined the silvery fabric under a magnifier, probably trying to figure out what it was made of. She held up a pair of scissors to it and looked at Anneza enquiringly. She nodded her permission for the tailor to take a sample, and the robot-woman attempted to snip out a sample from the underarm area, where it wouldn't be quite so obvious.
It took several attempts and a different, sharper pair of scissors, but she managed. She handed the dress back to Anneza, who put it back on, glad to be clothed again, and waited to see if there was any chance of getting new clothes any time soon.
Sally soon wanted another turn at the keyhole, and tried to get a good look elsewhere in the classroom. She gasped. "What...why's she naked?" she asked, barely remembering to keep her voice down.
Alex gaped. "What!?"
Sally nodded. "It's a bird-girl or something - she doesn't have any clothes on! Do they allow that here?"
Alex wanted to have a look, but...he wasn't about to go looking at naked girls in front of his little sister - that would just be creepy. He hung back and waited.
"Hey, look," Sally said. "There's a girl towards the back with octopus legs!"
He looked; sure enough, not far from where the slug-girl sat, there was indeed. In fact, it looked like her whole lower body was an octopus, at least from what he could see. Weird!
They sat there for a while longer, taking turns looking around the classroom, but after a while they'd pretty much had their fill. They sat waiting for lunchtime to arrive so that they could explore another part of the school.
"Sally?" Alex asked. "Why'd you have to come find me? I didn't want you to get in trouble if something happened..."
Sally scoffed. "Like I said!" she said. "I'm not going to let you just show me up like that! ...besides, what if something happened to you? I almost thought maybe you'd get caught outside..."
Alex smiled. Despite her aggressive, competitive attitude...she really did care about him. He wished they could be close like this more often, not just on these rare occasions...
Jon sat there, wondering what exactly Brittany had meant. The Celtic girl seemed so reticent; Jon didn't want to pry, but it seemed like each conversation with her raised more questions than it answered. She was a relic out of actual history, and yet she spoke of magic - but Jon knew that there was some basis for that, now.
On the other hand, she also spoke of things that Jon thought were solidly in the "fiction" category - she'd known that Tim was a dark elf, and some of the typical implications of that, as if it were just as factual as anything else she said. Did that imply that there was some real basis for that, or was she conflating memories of fiction from her pre-changed life with whatever actual knowledge she had?
Did she have any actual knowledge, for that matter? But she'd known about the stone...or was Jon just reading that into the little she'd said on the subject? She didn't want to go second-guessing Brittany like she didn't know what she was talking about, but this was all so confusing...
She wondered what Tim thought of it. He'd seemed more bemused by Brittany's behavior than confused, so it was probable he was just taking her at face value and not thinking too much about it. Jon wondered if he did that with everybody; did he even put two and two together and figure that someone named "Jon" must have been a guy previously? Should she tell him? Wait, why would that matter? It wasn't like he had a crush on her or anything. But if she told him, then he would know better for certain...
So confusing...
Not far away, Tiffany was sitting at her desk, groggy and miserable. She'd had another nightmare, and had hardly slept at all afterwards. This time it was more directly horrifying than the gradual psychological breakdown of her harpy dream earlier in the week, and she was still shuddering.
She'd dreamt about tearing holes like she had yesterday, just letting all her aggression out and making great big gashes in a concrete wall. It had felt so good at first, but she'd gradually become aware that there were things on the other side of the wall, things that were peering through the gashes at her. Things that wanted to get through.
She'd tried with increasing desperation to stuff the dust and loose chunks back into the holes - go back, go back! But it was no use - whatever the teacher had done yesterday, it was beyond her power. Even with as much tamped back into place as she could manage, the gashes began to widen as things pushed through.
Then...it was like yesterday, with the teacher - she couldn't look long enough or directly enough to get more than glimpses - but these things were far, far worse. There was nothing even halfway normal about them; she knew she couldn't even comprehend them, let alone understand how to make them go away. They were breaking through...
She'd woken up with a scream. It wasn't the first time, either - her nightmares had been increasing in frequency and intensity since she'd changed. Why did this have to happen? She'd become a walking incarnation of sex appeal...she'd learned to assert her true dominance over the weak - why did she have to be plagued with nightmares just when things were really starting to go her way!?
