Staring back at him in the mirror is her. One girl from a set of triplets whose two sisters insist on calling themselves one and the same person, Manny included.
But that's just the thing. Manny, the boy with the boobs, furry ears, and demon tail just couldn't seem to share that sentiment.
He now had hair as white as snow, and eyes as red as a ruby or a scarlet. His frown looked almost feral, the fangs in his mouth bared, they were larger than he remembered them being.
Though Manny was always the first to wake between the three of them, for some reason, call it intuition, he knew when his identical sisters, formerly his friends, would be awake as well.
The two of them used to be called Claire and Bella. Since yesterday afternoon however, they've kept insisting on calling themselves, and him, Cerberus, after the three-headed dog.
It happened when they were amidst a large crowd at the biggest convention of the year for nerds, geeks, and cosplayers alike. They looked on as the people around them changed, some only subtly, others drastically. Manny saw a young boy wearing a pokémon onesie turn into an actual charizard before his own eyes. And that boy was not even the only one!
As for Manny and his friends? They'd been cosplaying as a group. Between the three of them, Manny was the only guy, a stand-in for Maeve, who got sick before she could join her girl friends for Kubla-con. Not one to miss out on a ticket for Kubla-con, he didn't even have to think twice before joining in, on the condition that he would participate wearing Maeve's cosplay outfit. As the shortest guy in their shared classes, it was no surprise that, with a few tweaks, the red and black outfit that characterises the Helltaker demons would end up fitting him quite comfortably. A white wig on top of his hair, some make-up to mask his more masculine features, courtesy of Bella, and he ended up looking convincingly like one-third of the Triple demon he was supposed to betray.
Now, inside the hotel bathroom, he had his first moment of privacy since the three of them were forced into quarantine. Calling his parents or sister proved impossible since his own phone's facial recognition feature wouldn't work on his new face anymore, and neither would his thumbprint. Yesterday evening was spent in a daze, his two friends completely ignoring any of his attempts at making conversation about their transformation, the two of them so absorbed in their new role as 'Cerberus' that they know longer recognised Manny as a separate individual. Meanwhile, Manny, who hadn't been as 'into it' as Claire and Bella were, had to think about every thought entering his head and every action he made. Because as much as he still felt like himself, as part of this Triple demon act, he was just as much part of a hivemind entity as his friends were.
For example, right now he was wide awake, staring in awe at his new body. But a sudden urge to yawn and stretch overcame him as he stood in front of the bathroom mirror. A cute groan escaped his throat as he felt his spine decompress, the demon tail attached to his back further extending this pleasant sensation.
'Never did I expect to feel excitement looking at my own body.' Came an intrusive thought that, given the circumstances, felt more alien than his own. It had been like this the entire evening yesterday. While Claire and Bella, their minds and psyches twisted beyond recognition, were admiring the grounds and halls at which the convention took place, Manny's mind was forced to separate their awestruck thoughts from his own. And even then, the occasional "Oooh's" and "Aaah's" escaped his throat while looking at the most mundane objects that apparently, in the world of Helltaker, simply didn't exist.
That said though, the dreams of lava and hellfire faded into the back of Manny's mind. It must mean that the rest of Cerberus has woken up from its slumber as well.
