Doctor Kadowaki had nothing.
"A lot of things happen in this place, but no one's ever turned themselves into a half-dragon before," the Doctor sighed.
"Well, technically I turned myself into a full dragon first," Rinoa pointed out.
"Semantics. Point is, I don't have any frame of reference here. So, sorry, but I guess everyone's going to have to get used to this for at least a little while. Especially since taking blood samples is out."
"...Ah, none of your needles can get through the scales," Squall said.
"That and the fact dragon's blood will basically destroy all the machines I have to test human blood samples."
"Well, I mean, it could be worse, I'm able to fit through doors and stuff. The full dragon couldn't. Wait, I know, I can try turning back into the full dragon and reversing the spell!" Rinoa realised.
"...Somewhere else, please!" Kadowaki panicked as Rinoa lifted the book.
"Oh, yeah, good point, Doc. Uh, before I go, how's Zell?"
"Sedated as hell. Please don't come back until we explain it to him."
Squall sighed as they headed for the Training Area, where Rinoa planned to try her spell again. Not because of what was happening as such, but because Selphie had shown up.
"Isn't this cool, Squall? And if Rinoa figures it out maybe I can become a dragon too, and use it on missions! The bad guys are like 'hah it's just a little girl!' then I'm like ROAAAAAR and melting their faces with fire!" Selphie giggled.
"We're trying to get Rinoa back to normal first if we can, Selphie. I don't think Zell can handle two dragons," Squall said.
"...I have an idea you two might find controversial. See, I'm maybe having problems because I'm casting on myself, so... if it's another subject I might do better?"
Squal blinked. Selphie whooped.
"Alright! I'm game! Dragon me!" the enthusastic Trabian almost demanded.
"...Try your current plan first, Rinoa."
"Alright!"
The half-dragon sorceress then began chanting until Squall's eyes widened.
"Wait, Rinoa, your clo-"
With a rip and tear, said clothes were shredded and Rinoa resumed her full dragon form. Selphie looked on in awe as Squall facepalmed.
"...I'll get replacements, try reverting while I'm gone," he sighed.
Squall returned a few moments later - and his eyes widened again. Standing atop a pile of shredded yellow and white cloth was a small winged dragon, with Selphie's hair, and short horns, waving a smooth lizard tail almost in embarrassment. Beside her stood the nude half-dragon Rinoa.
"Okay, so, bad news, didn't work, and also bad news, kinda jumped the gun and started testing on Selphie? So, uh, could you be a darling and fetch her some clothes?" Rinoa tittered.
"...Uh, maybe I should have you get them, kinda weird to have your boyfriend root around in my drawers," Selphie's large draconic eye winked.
"Eh, he's a professional."
"Given I walked away and let you two do this stupid plan, I'd like to argue otherwise," Squall sighed, as Rinoa took the offered clothes.
"Let's try reverting me now then," Selphie suggested.
Rinoa began to reverse the spell, and as Squall half expected, Selphie indeed only reverted to a Humanoid dragon.
"Whoops. Well, I guess we need to find an intact copy of that book someday! Shame we can't save clothes or switch between them... can we?" Selphie wondered.
"...Okay, you know what, you two just do whatever crazy things you have planned now, I'm going to go get Irvine and Quistis to go track down another copy of this book and good Hyne Rinoa what did you just do?!"
The Sorceress had turned straight back into a dragon, seemingly at a whim, then popped back down to humanoid
"We CAN shapeshift! If we can get back to human this'll be really useful!"
"You also shredded more clothes," Selphie pointed out.
"Ah, yeah. Uh, Squall, can you..."
"Don't bother, I got it!" Selphie said, the yellow-scaled half-dragon rushing out.
"I should probably give her a citation for streaking or something," Squall sighed.
"Oh, be nice, besides, Irvine will love it!"
A few weeks later, things had somewhat settled. Though no luck with finding copies of the book had happened, Garden was adjusting to the two Dragon-Women on campus. And experiments continued. So far they'd learned shifting was pretty simple for both, and that Selphie was a lightning-based Dragon. They'd also learned that minor injuries sustained humanoid vanished when they switched, and after Selphie had turned Dragon on a monster-clearing mission, learned even more severe ones like broken limbs could be fixed.
However, one hurdle beyond becoming human again still could not be passed.
"...Whoops," Selphie said as she heard the ripping of clothes yet again.
"Okay, so, that material doesn't work..." Rinoa noted.
"None of them work," Zell sighed.
"I dunno, the fact Rinoa and Selphie get naked every time seems like it works for me! Squall too, I bet!" Irvine leered.
Quistis slapped his hat off his head.
"If you're not going to be Less Irvine, Irvine, you can leave. This is a serious and professional set of experimetns and stop chasing your damn tail Selphie you're not a dog!" The instructor fumed.
Squall sighed.
"Serious and professional? That's not been the case here for a long time."
"I notice you didn't deny liking the outcome," Rinoa winked.
"With you, sure. Selphie, not so much."
The Dragon paused.
"And what's that supposed to mean?!"
"I don't make a habit of staring at naked women who aren't Rinoa," Squall said calmly.
"Oh, fair enough then," Selphie said, returning to chasing her tail, as Xu entered.
"Commander, I have a possible lead on a copy of the book. A terrorist group captured a number of magical artefacts in Esthar, and Laguna's hired us to go in and get them back. He thinks the book Rinoa used might be amongst them."
"Well, that's handy! All hands on deck?" Selphie said, reverting to her humanoid shape.
"Let's get the Ragnarok ready," Zell agreed.
The good news was the terrorists had been stopped. The bad news was, the book wasn't the same one. The worse news - Quistis had been stabbed in the stomach by a magical blade, the wound resisting all healing.
"She's just not stopping," Selphie cursed,holding bloodied bandages over the wound.
"I'm sorry but I can't quite stop bleeding on cue!" Quistis snapped.
"We've got to figure out something..." Rinoa sighed. She'd brought the book, and was studying the other one, looking for some healing spell, but no luck.
"Wait! The dragony-thing! We both heal from anything!" Selphie realised.
"Yeah,but you're stuck as half-dragons?" Zell noted.
"Zell, plan B is I bleed to death!"
"And that's a bad plan," Irvine noted.
"Death is way worse than being a dragon," Squall said.
"Well, yeah, there's some real benefits, right, Irvy?" Selphie winked.
"Squall can tell you too... or better yet, me and Selphie can," Rinoa added.
"...I'm not kinkshaming you guys but I'd rather not hear about that right now, kinda bleeding a lot?" Quistis said.
"...I could stand to hear a little more," Zell said.
"Okay, yeah, on topic, everyone back up, I'll see if this fixes Quistis."
"I'd get undressed first but, yeah, these clothes are a bit ruined," Quistis gestured to the blood-stained orange.
Her skin began to turn orange as her body expanded, skirt tearing as her hips widened, blouse ripping. Her glasses fell from her head, pushed away as it expanded, horns growing, snout elongating. Her skin became scaly, below ripped cloth, as her size grew too much and the garments just gave out entirely. Her pantyhose held out a little longer but laddered, popped, and tore as the wide scaly legs grew. From her tailbone grew a long spiked whiplike tail. Her ears grew out, slightly furred at the tips, and her back saw wings erupt and elongate.
Crucially, the wound on her stomach closed up, some blood still present on her skin, but the cut itself fading.
"...Alright, it worked!" Selphie cheered.
"Yeah, but now we have three sexy dragon chicks," Irvine grinned.
Quistis narrowed her lizard-eyes at him.
"...We might have one incinerated sniper in a second, Irvine," She snorted, warm air releasing.
"No burning my boyfriend!" Selphie yelped.
"Well, I'll turn you humanoid for now, and Irvine, you'll lend her your coat... because Selphie said nothing about freezing you," Rinoa said.
"I was going to offer it anyway, Rinoa!"
"No freezing him either!"
"Can you at least electrocute him a little bit?" Zell suggested.
"Dick move, bro," Irvine whined as Selphie hmm'd.
One revert, coat handing over, and slight electrocution later, Quistis was out of danger, and the mission was therefore at least a partial success as far as everyone was concerned.
"Now we really need another copy. At this rate half of Garden will be half-dragon by the end of the year," Squall sighed.