New writer's note on this branch:
I've been cogitating about Karyn's words from the previous page, "I'll do anything for you." I find that to be quite a bold lie (if it is left alone on its own without any sort of elaboration and revisiting), in direct contradiction to her apparent unwillingness to allow Jon to wish her to find him attractive as he was. This is because that is the only means he has of returning to being a boy since wishes can't be reversed and he already wished she would find him attractive and be willing to date him. Karyn has to be willing to sacrifice her lack of attraction to guys in order to allow Jon to get back to his own body, and if you consider it fairly, this is a MUCH smaller sacrifice than the one she is demanding of Jon, while hypocritically saying "I'll do anything for you". This makes me angry. She should stand behind her words. She should be willing to do anything for Jon if that's what she says, not sit there and force him to make a much bigger sacrifice than the one she is refusing to make herself. Forcing him to be in a different body, just because she doesn't want to find him attractive? She doesn't even have to stop being a lesbian, she could just become bisexual - or even less than that, wish for Jon to be the ONLY exception, the only guy she likes. And that's not much of a sacrifice at all. It wouldn't even be very unusual by normal standards of human behavior. She has some nerve making an outrageous claim like that she's willing to do anything for him when she literally has him TRAPPED like this and has an easy path to letting him escape but is not letting him have his only way out! I believe even hard leftist/progressive SJW feminist types would have to agree with my justification - ask yourself which is worse, forcing someone into a sexchange against their will, or giving someone else just a spark of romantic interest in ONE person who they already like and would not otherwise be sexually attracted to? Not taking anything AWAY from them, just giving them this thing they've never had on top of what they were before. You have to do one or the other. You can't just say "they're both bad things to do to someone". One or the other has to happen. Which one is worse? There is no indication that this version of Jon is a transsexual. He looked down and FROWNED when he said the stone gave him the information about how to make things right. Obviously he's NOT happy with being forced into it, ergo that DOESN'T make it right.
And so I continue it in an alternate branch from this root from before 9-11, than the branch which is also a decade old and was apparently abandoned anyway and looks like she's just about to have meaningless sex anyway. Let's see if I can do something with this. Keep those considerations of mine in mind if you read on:
And now the story:
"Oh my god. I can't stand this, I don't like it, I HATE this!" Karyn said, still with a shaky voice.
"What? What's wrong! What don't you like?" asked Jon, still on the verge of tears herself.
"That was too easy. You gave in too easily. I can't believe you just accepted it just like that."
"Well, I want you to like me. Even the stone said this was the way to make it right."
"Fuck the stone! The stone can DO anything, that doesn't mean it KNOWS everything, that CERTAINLY doesn't mean it knows WHAT'S RIGHT! Is it an absolute authority on OBJECTIVE MORALITY NOW?"
"But I thought that was what you wanted!" Jon cried. Jon was genuinely crying now, tears were flowing freely, involuntarily. Jon was losing all control. "What (hic), what do you want!?"
Karyn put her forehead against Jon's, as a tear rolled down her face too, while Jon's crying intensified. "To hell with what I want! Your whole life shouldn't be focused around achieving happiness vicariously through ME! You're IMPORTANT TOO! You're valuable too! You MATTER Jon, YOU MATTER! You're not DISPOSABLE, you're IRREPLACEABLE, you're not my PLAYTHING, and you're MISERABLE! You're trying to console yourself with thinking about taking me to the stupid prom! Fuck the prom! In 20 years you won't give a shit about the prom and neither will I. I can't let you be forced into being in the wrong body for the rest of your life just because I wasn't happy to make a SMALLER sacrifice. And make no mistake, it WOULD be a smaller sacrifice. I wouldn't even have to stop being a lesbian, I could become bisexual, or you could be one special exception and the only guy I could have eyes for. Compare that to the sacrifice you're jumping straight into, because I don't want to be changed? Surely you see the unfairness THERE!"
"But you (hic), you said you didn't want to (hic) find the old me attractive... (hic)... that you accepted who you were and..."
"I just said I was willing to do anything for you! I meant it! I would be a damn hypocrite if I let you do this and yet had the BALLS to still claim I was willing to do anything for you! What about YOU? Don't you deserve to not be made into something you're not too? Aren't YOU important too!? I didn't mean I was completely unwilling to be changed to find you attractive, just that I didn't want it. I said please don't change me into something I'm not, I didn't demand it. Is it any better for you to be forcibly changed into something you're not?"
"Well, maybe this (hic) isn't so bad, maybe (hic) it's worth it if it will (hic) mean you'll like me!" and at this Jon began a fit of deep sobbing.
"Oh, sweetheart, I do like you. That's not what it means. Being a lesbian just means I'm not thrilled with the idea of having sex with you as a man. But I like you Jon. I LOVE you! I don't know what I would even DO with myself if you were gone. I didn't even know I could like a man as much as I like you. You're my bro and I'm there for you, whenever you need me! Please Jon. If you DID make this sacrifice for me because I wasn't willing to make a lesser one for you, how do you think that would make ME feel? I would NEVER be able to forgive myself! I would never be happy if that was how things turned out, always knowing that I couldn't make a LESSER sacrifice and because of that you were STUCK in that body, as if I thought I was so much more IMPORTANT than you! But you're IMPORTANT Jon! Jon, tell me you're important!"
Jon continued crying.
"Jon, SAY IT! SAY YOU'RE IMPORTANT AND WHAT YOU WANT MATTERS!"
"Karyn, (hic) isn't it..."
"SAY IT JON!"
"I'm (hic) important."
"And?"
"and what I want... (hic) matters. (hic) (hic) (hic)" Jon was in a crying fit. Jon wanted nothing more in that moment than to be loved by Karyn, but was drowning in those feelings that she was expressing that evidently went far beyond her (Jon's) expectations.
"Shhhhhhhh..." Karyn cuddled Jon. "Let's outsmart the stupid stone. That's the BEST it could do? We won't bother asking it for any proofs of any famous unsolved mathematical theorems, I can tell you THAT, it may be as powerful as Q but it's dumber than Beavis and Butthead. Let's find a better solution than the one it thought of, that it arrogantly said would 'make things right'. That isn't right. That is all wrong. And we need to find a way to fix it."
"But (hic) how? One of us needs to sacrifice (hic) something. Either what you want from me, or (hic) what I am. The earlier wish can't be undone, so it must be fulfilled somehow. It's not like I can (hic) be both things at once."
"Yeah, I guess you're... Jon, you're a GENIUS! That's a GREAT IDEA!"
"What? What idea."
"Ha. Jon, let me have the stone," Karyn asked.
"Karyn, what are you going to do?"
"Just an idea. Trust me, I won't do anything just yet, I just need to check on something. Let me have the stone."
Jon handed it to her.
"Ok rock, I wish for Jon's wish that turned him into a girl to be repeated audibly for us both to hear right now."
A voice shimmered in the open air. A recording of Jon's old voice, Jon's male voice, as another reminder. "I wish Karen would go to prom with me, and she found me very attractive and wanted to date me."
"Ok, I'm setting this thing down right here on top of this big dandilion here." She set down the stone. "Because it scares the hell out of me and makes me nervous as hell holding it when I'm about to say something long."
"No kidding," said Jon.
"Ok, so there are 3 parts to this. If we find an alternate route to satisfying all 3 parts, then we can create a new wish which specifies the specifics we want in how that earlier wish is to be elaborated on, just like making that blue branch dark blue or light blue, right? The first condition is that I have to go to the prom with you. That's EASY. I'm perfectly willing to go to the prom with you in any case. Hell, I'll do all SORTS of crazy things if I only have to do it once, to get you out of this. The last one is also doable. It's just semantics. It isn't hard to argue that we have been DATING all our lives together, that just means we go out and do things together. All sorts of things. And I DO want to continue doing things with you. It's the middle condition that's the cause of the problem. That I would find you very attractive. And here's the key to it. Who says I need to find you 'very attractive' all the time?"
"So some of the time?"
"Jon, if I found you very attractive 10% of the time, then that would still be finding you very attractive, would it not?"
"I guess. 10 percent of the time? You want me to be a girl one day a week? That's kind of..."
"No, no no no no. That could get you in trouble later. Your boss tells you that you have to work weekends, your airline flight happens on the wrong day and your photo ID doesn't match you, you don't need that hassle. Nothing as rigid as that. I'm just going to wish for you to have the power to change back and forth at will, whenever you want."
"Oh." Jon scratched her head. "That's.... would that work?"
"Why not? The only thing that happens is you get shapeshifting powers out of the deal. You don't lose anything, you just get something else on top of it, which you can enjoy as often or infrequently as you want. No one has to make any sacrifices. Surely you would find it FUN to OCCASIONALLY be a girl anyway, right? I'm sure I'd find it FUN to OCCASIONALLY be a guy. If we do anything sexual together, I will want you to be a girl then. But that's going to be what, maybe a few hours at a time? If you want to be nice to me and make our dates more exciting to me, you could stay that way for an evening maybe, at least for the good night kiss at the end. But it would be no pressure. You could literally switch just like that," Karyn snapped her fingers. "Ranma style but without even the water. It would be easy. And I'd be more enticed to being your girlfriend even if at the moment you were a guy, if I knew you could easily change just like that too, just because then there would be the allure of what you COULD be at the drop of a hat, and sexiness is in the mind. Maybe I'll even experiment a few times with you as a guy. That wouldn't be SO bad. I want to make you happy too. Plus we'll eventually want to have kids together one day."
"That's a pretty good idea," Jon agreed. "A KID? And also, a few HOURS?"
"So I'm going to go for it then, ok Jon?"
"All right. A few HOURS?" Jon wasn't sure but was thinking that in that moment she might have fallen in love with Karyn a little bit more.
Karyn picked up the stone and said "I wish that the way in which Jon's earlier wish would be granted wasn't that he got indefinitely turned into a girl, but that he would have the power to change into this female form of his here and back to his male body at will, as many times as he wants, whenever he wants, and then I would find Jon VERY ATTRACTIVE, if not 100% of the time, I would still find him very attractive, and I'm willing to date him and go to the prom with him anyway so you don't need to do anything to make that happen."
Jon felt a warm, fuzzy feeling. "I think it's done," she said.
"Try it out," Karyn said.
Jon instantly shifted to his male form. "I'm back!" And he immediately turned female again.
"What, why did you turn right back?" Karyn asked in confusion.
Jon almost knocked Karyn to the ground jumping into her embrace, and then passionately kissed her. After about 10 seconds, she pulled back. "I can afford to live vicariously for your happiness a LITTLE bit. That makes me happy, making you happy."
"Awww..." Karyn said. They walked back to class, arms locked, both their little hearts pit-a-pattering fast. Karyn realized she was still holding the stone. "Another thing, while I still have the stone. I wish that for everyone besides us, everyone would identify Amy and Jon as the same person and that nothing would seem strange about that at all, they'd call you Amy when you're a girl, Jon when you're a guy, realize you're a girl when you're a girl, and a guy when you're a guy, and yet see you two as the same person like opposite sides of a coin, and just would not be able to find anything the matter with that."
"That's... weird. But that makes it easy, now I can stay like this for class and not worry about keeping any weird lies straight."
She figured it would be a matter of moments before she was expected to give Jon... or should she say Amy... back the stone. She thought for a few moments, and then whispered too quietly for Jon to hear, "I wish I had the same condition as Jon, able to turn into a male version of myself and back as many times as I want, whenever I want." She felt tinglies, from the warmth of the wish being granted, plus her own tinglies of excitement. "Who says I have to be the one who will be having all the children?" she thought to herself, with just a tiny hint of a smile on her face, imagining Jon as a pregnant Amy. She wanted to do things with pregnant Amy. The image was so cute, even in her imagination, it staggered her mind. And it was only fair after all, to be fair, Jon did kind of owe her, but she would absolutely never capitalize on it for THAT reason. But file that thought away for later in life. It may not be an easy sell. Hopefully she could talk Jon into seeing the appeal in it. The pendulum swung both ways. They were a couple now, and not everything matched up, so they would make small sacrifices for the one they loved. That was half the fun of it after all.
