"Thank you for agreeing to meet with us, Katie." The woman said. Katie nodded.
"I figured it was worth my while." Katie shrugged, reaching out towards the full plate of cookies. She was a little concerned they'd picked out her favourites, but the plate wasn't all chocolate chip, so perhaps they hadn't discovered her enjoyment of the sweet treats... And besides, it would be rude not to take them.
She, the woman, and two other women sat around a table, in a well-lit conference room. The plate was beside Katie, and none of the others were interested in the sweet treats. There was the woman herself, in her early forties, with shoulder length black hair. One of the other women was blonde, a woman in her thirties named Chronoa who had met with Katie to try and arrange this meeting. The third woman was about twenty, and had spiked red hair.
"You have met Chronoa, I believe, but you have not been introduced to myself or my other colleague, or indeed, to our group properly. I am Lady Libra Scales, and the red-haired girl is one of our operatives. Her codename is Clockwork."
"Chronoa told me the basics but if it wasn't for the demonstration I probably wouldn't be here."
Clockwork giggled at that.
"Well, of course. She did bring you to this office..."
"I don't believe that was what she meant, dear." Chronoa gently noted.
"Quite. Well, I know that you were told we are a group of mages that has mastery of magic relating to time and space, and indeed you were brought to this world as a demonstration of that, but we are a group that seeks to keep balance. We largely observe, and catalogue events of the universes we find. One aspect we have noticed is that many worlds have various parallels..." Lady Libra said.
"Other dimensions?" Katie asked.
"Yes. However, sometimes, a world did not come into being with its own parallel timeline, or, there are only some of the possible timelines made... And that is where we have stepped in. Clockwork, can you explain all we do?"
The younger woman stood, and spoke.
"When we identify a universe without any parallels, or with an incomplete set of parallels we seek events in the timeline where their creation would be of benefit. Complete and balanced realities have every action with an opposite reaction, and create stable timelines, ensuring that there is a level of harmony in the reality overall."
"And the incomplete ones?" Katie asked.
"W e have noticed these worlds become imbalanced and chaotic. We therefore carry out a three stage attempt to make a new timeline, using our three main powers." Chronoa answered. Clockwork continued.
"First, we use the power of time to select a portion of the timeline and copy all events of that time. We then use the power of space to create a bubble dimension, where we place the copy of the portion. In fact we're in a bubble right now, though we are only using it to ensure any demonstrations we have to make don't affect a real timeline. Anyway, with that copy, the original timeline is unaffected, and we can experiment with our third power to try and create the missing alternative timelines. Once the timelines are made, we burst the bubble, so to speak, and the paralell then mimics the past of the other timeline, and the changes we made affect its future. It's a complex task but luckily, we have the numbers. Every dimension has a version of us, and all the versions of us are united in seeking balances."
"Okay, so, how do you make the changes? What's the third power?" Katie asked.
"Influence. It's a somewhat superhypnotic power that can very subtly alter a reality, especially a small enclosed one such as within the bubble dimensions. We use influence to help bring about change, having a nail be present in a horse shoe or not, But the power is limited. We can only change small things. For example, in each bubble, we can create small objects from nothing. In this one for example, let me demonstrate..." Lady Libra said.
Lady Libra then closed her eyes. A moment later, a new cookie plopped onto the tray.
"Infinite cookies? Nice..." Katie said, trying to hide the pleasure at this revelation.
"It can create various other small objects too, but for meetings like this we find it's nice to keep the biscuit tray filled." Chronoa added
"Influence is one of our key powers that allow us to bring balance to the multiverse. With the suggestions and magical manipulation of events, we have create other worlds from common roots. Many times after filling in a few blanks the parallels create themselves... But recently, we have had problems." Lady Libra explained further.
"What kind of problems?" Katie raised an eyebrow.
"Gender balance. Numerous worlds have had major events be male or female led, and there has been no other universe to balance it where genders were reversed. Such a parallel has been identified as a keystone in the stability of the various universes, and we have tried to create these parallels with Influence, but gender has been difficult to always change. We need to effectively alter births to ensure girls or boys are born in place of boys or girls. It has met little success." Clockwork explained.
"Ah, so... You want me to help out."
"Yes. We will make a bubble of a world where there is a gender imbalance in a group leading a key event of that world's history. The world was saved at one point by a group of fourteen, of which only three were female. It lacks a world where the ratio of male to female was identical, or a world where the balance is reverse."
"But why me? Surely there are others who can help?" Katie asked.
"Simple. Your own powers are based on balance, and changes you make alter genetics using a sample. We can influence a sample to be an exact female version, allowing you to create a distaff counterpart, so to speak. Your powers will be more balanced than a simple alteration entirely, as some others who can use magical power like yours in the universe make alterations that are... imbalanced." Chronoa answered
"Of course, we are planning to use others later. We merely seek those with balanced powers, and where needed those balanced powers make it easier for us to use Influence..."
Katie held up her hand.
"Okay. I'll help you out but to be honest, I have no idea at all what any of all that meant. I got the basics though. You want me to turn four of the eleven males that saved a world into females, and you guys will make it so they were always female so it makes a stable time line. That's the important part. I get to zap guys into girls and save the universe, or something"
"That is it, more or less. Clockwork will assist you. We will make the bubble universe shortly. But for now, please make yourself at home. Help yourself to any more of the cookies. After all, we have plenty of them..." Lady Libra smiled.
Katie didn't have to be told twice.
About a half hour later, Katie and Clockwork popped into existence in another timeline. They were now away from the conference room, and in the middle of a mountainside town. Thick snow covered everything, and it seemed the town was built around a large mineshaft.
"Okay, so... Where are we now?" Katie asked, looking around the snowy village.
"This is the mining town of Narshe. The bubble we picked started from three hours earlier, and ends in about three more. We identified four targets for you to... zap. I'll do the rest. Influence works a lot easier making retroactive changes when there's only a short timescale to be retroactive in." Clockwork said
"So, who do I zap?" Katie asked.
Clockwork pointed at a man who rounded a corner, and froze in his tracks. He had brown hair, a multi-coloured bandanna, blue trousers and a matching vest.
"Him. Locke Cole."
He also looked very surprised a stranger knew his name.
"...Who are you two? Empire?" He hissed.
Katie answered with a zap. Locke gasped, and blinked as the yellow light struck him. Katie enjoyed the feeling, able to know the changes she was making. The male lost much of his body hair, and some muscle mass was lost, while some more was redirected. Hips widened, his chest began to expand. His hair on his head grew longer and longer, and then he groaned as the changes affected his lower extremities. His crotch shifted, his legs too, and the target's bottom became slightly more defined and feminine.
The change had luckily a lot of room to fill into, and the man had been somewhat lightly built to start with.
"Very impressive, Katie..."
"What... What did she just do?" Locke asked, then realised something.
His voice... was higher.
No, her voice. She reached for her chest, and blinked in confusion at what was there.
"I'm... a girl?"
"Not yet. You're a man turned into a girl at the moment but let me fix that..." Clockwork said, getting to work.
Most of her changes were subtle. Influence allowed her to make Locke's past alter. In the past, she had decided to wear her hair as a ponytail. And so, her hair became a ponytail. Clothes more her size had been a past choice as well, and Locke's clothing shifted to her new form. And as for her past, well, a few seconds of Influence altered some events and names. Her best friend Rachel replaced his fallen Girlfriend. Her name was left unaltered, as it was somewhat androgynous. But the key influence, was that Locke remembered being female for all her existence.
Since this was only three hours, technically, this was not a hard task for Clockwork.
"That should be all. Thank you, ma'am!" Clockwork waved, grabbed Katie's hand, and then vanished.
The self-professed Treasure Hunter blinked.
"Wow... I need to watch what I eat... Those mushrooms must have been off..." She told herself. Surely two women hadn't just dissipated after pointing at her and knowing her name?
They appeared atop battlements, a castle shrouded by night and lit softly by a desert moon. The shaded sands stretched for miles, and so most of the interest to Katie was the castle itself. She looked around, and it seemed to be a traditional fortification rather than an ornate palace.
"Ah, a castle. I'm creating a princess?"
"Not right now. This is Figaro Castle, and there is a King. He has a twin, a Crown Prince, but he comes later. First, we make the King into a Queen, and his twin..."
"A Crown Princess?"
"Yes. As I say, they are twins, so we'll need to make the change, and then quickly go to the other one. Time is of the essence..." Clockwork began to explain.
"...Why don't we go fetch him?" Katie cut in.
"Hm, I hadn't thought of that."
"I'd have thought it was obvious..." Katie sighed.
Clockwork vanished, and reappeared, her hand around the arm of a confused, heavily built blond man wearing white trousers and a blue tank top, who had about half a second to say one thing before Clockwork grabbed Katie and warped into a bedroom inside the castle. The man sleeping there woke up instantly, wearing light blue pyjamas.
"What? Who are..."
He blinked.
"...Sabin?"
"Now, Katie."
A couple of yellow zaps, and the changes began. Both of the pair grew their hair out even as Sabin lost his chest hair. The pair lost much of their bodyhair, and the changes that occurred contrasted the pair.
Sabin had been a bulky, muscular man. Edgar had been less physical in life, and had been more lightly built. Both retained these aspects, but Sabin lost much mass and bulk. She remained muscular, but in a more feminine build. Edgar remained light, and the pair both had their chests expand, though Sabin's musculature meant that her chest looked less developed, not that it was as hidden as Edgar's.
The pair were too shocked by seeing each other to have really reacted yet, and only when the final changes happened did they even make a sound.
Clockwork was already working. These changes were simple. Twin girls... Raised as Princesses, until the death of their father meant one had to take the throne. But as twins, succession was difficult. Little of how it was resolved changed, little of why Sabin left was changed. She fled the castle at disgust over how her father's death was treated, just as she had when male.
Edgar however, had a slight alteration. The King had been something of a womaniser, and a flirt. The Queen was made to now be somewhat more in the middle... A change that meant that the Queen remained flirtatious, but no longer with anything in a skirt. The skirt was only applicable half of the time.
Finally, names were altered along with memories. Female had been their lives, and for Edgarina and Sabine, they were now females, just as they always had been.
A few seconds later, both were very confused. Had it been a dream they had saw their sister? And who had been the strange women, Sabine wondered?
Edgarina was more concerned why she had dreamt her sister present when two pretty women had appeared in her chambers. That did not bode well for her subconscious.
The pair landed in an open field.
"Last one. Who's our lucky girl? Oh, and was there an order here?" Katie asked.
"Yes. The group that forms, forms because of the influence of a woman named Terra. She met Locke, then Edgarina, then Sabine. Technically, Sabine would meet our next target, though there was a male before she would meet. However, Cyan Garamonde currently has a family, a wife and child. Altering them would mean too many shifts in Cyan's life to easily sync up, an effort we don't need to go to when there is another suitable candidate soon enough after to make seven out of fourteen."
"And where is he?"
Clockwork pointed to a small skin of fur. Below it, a boy no older than fourteen slept. He had long, unkempt green hair, and wore self-made animal skins.
"This change is simple. Memories of gender won't mean much to this boy. He is a feral child, and for us, it's simply a matter of changing him to her."
"Does she have a name?" Katie asked, already referring to a her.
"No. Sabine will name her Gau after a noise she makes. She will speak some English, but not much. She has had little contact with other humans."
Katie shrugged.
"Well, not much to change. She'll be a teenager, and a feral one at that."
"My mother used to say ever teenager was feral..." Clockwork noted.
Katie didn't really care. She made the changes.
There wasn't much to it. Slight shifting of build, a small expansion of chest. Gau had not developed much at all, and the changes were for the future really. Well, except one. Gau shifted in her sleep as that part altered, giving a strange groan.
"Gaaau..."
"Huh. She'll do that a lot then?"
"It's why Sabine will name her that..." Clockwork shrugged, making the changes. The pair then left the feral girl behind, the changes to her future now set.
Katie and Clockwork were back in the conference room.
"Ah, congratulations. The new timeline has been made successfully, and the other timelines have started to naturally form. In less than seven hours relative to us it could very well be the case that the world you helped alter will be completely stable!" Lady Libra grinned.
"Cool... So, will we go somewhere else?"
"Not right away. We need to check this world does form correctly. The gender-counterpart alternate hasn't formed yet, so we might need you still. You'll be paid, of course."
Katie pondered this.
"Hm... Well, I did have fun doing this, so that's all right. I do have one question though. Any more cookies left? They were petty good... Kind of moreish..."