Fetish Magician 3: A sleepover - part three



Soon the girls had waved off the van and Milly asked what was next. By this time I was feeling a bit vulnerable in just Angela's bra and panties, so I decided it was time for another costume change. I asked Priya and Milly to have a quick conference about what costume I should wear, then stepped over to the curtain ring and lifted it to neck level. As soon as they seemed to have agreed on some costume for Angela's body I dropped the ring to reveal to the audience my helper's choice of costume for the female me, and discovery what they had dreamt up. The expressions on their faces showed that the magic had worked totally, producing the costume they had thought up, and that Angela's body looked spectacular in it.

I looked down to try to fathom what I was dressed in. The first good thing was I felt more dressed, which given Milly's attempt to take my show outside the parameters laid down for nudity, seemed to me to be a good thing. It seemed I was in a sari similar to Priya's, except mine was opulent in red with gold embroidery. I moved experimentally and discovered that the costume was practical in that it seemed to stay in place and not restrict how I moved as much as I initially expected.

"Ok, girls it's time for more magic with volunteers. This time it's you two are Artemisia and Tiffany. Come on down!"

The first to reach the performance area, almost before I could ask Priya and Milly to fetch the next illusions, was Tiffany, but that did not exactly surprise as she had long legs, in perfect proportion with the rest of her, she was nearly two inches taller than my normal six foot, but I was shorter at the moment so she towered over me.

"Call me, Tiff," she said unprompted.

"Ok, Tiff, do you have a kind of illusion you'd like to be involved in?" I asked.

"I don't think I want to be cut into pieces," she replied as Artemisia arrived, who added, "Me neither."

"Well in that case I've got you both covered."

Tiffany then asked, "Will we need to take our clothes off, or get changed into some costume." She eyed the costume change ring; she seemed to understand that what can change clothes can remove them.

"No, you can do the illusions I propose to get you involved in in your own clothes, but if you want a costume, you can have one, but nobody is going to see it for long, because you'll both be covered most of the time."

Between them Tiffany and Artemisia agreed not to bother changing and get on with the illusions; whether for a sense of adventure or to get them over with, I could not tell.

The first back from behind the backdrop was Milly. She was pushing a low platform with a circular platform on top and a column supporting a circle of wood above the centre of the lower platform.

"Good, this one's for you, Tiff."

I helped Milly position this illusion centrally in the performance area. When Priya stumbled out with some of the parts for the other illusion, I told her that Milly could help her find the rest once we had finished with Tiffany.

I directed Milly and Priya to undo the catches on the upper platform, while I undid the catches from the circle above. I handed the front half of the circle to Artemisia; she showed it to the rest of the girls, making it evident that there had been a round hole in the circle before it had been taken apart. I then turned my attention to pulling the front half of the platform forward making a gap running along the diameter; this gap was widened by two pairs of semicircle cut-outs either side of the centre. Tiffany took a gulp of air when she spotted this detail; it seemed that what bravado or courage she had before was rapidly dissipating.

"OK, Tiff, I need you to stand in the gap between the halves of this platform (It will be a lot easier if you take off your shoes) and position yourself in the middle with your feet about shoulder-width apart; I'm sure you can see exactly where. And mind you don't bump your head on the thing at the top." I turned to Artemisia. "Arty," I had learnt from Angela that she was generally called that and it had been obvious from the girls' interaction during the pizza supper, "You have a spare hand; could you offer it to help Tiff remain stable while she shuffles into the gap." She stepped up on the end of the lower platform and held out a hand for Tiffany to grab or not.

Tiffany slipped off her shoes and stepped onto the lower platform and began to shuffle sideways into the gap between the two sections of the upper platform. When she was within reach of Artemisia's hand she took hold; I think more for moral support than a lack of balance. She soon reached the middle with her lower shins between the cut-outs in the platform sections. I told her to move backward until the backs of her shins were in the cut-outs in the rear part of the platform. With help from Priya and Milly I pushed the front section into its original place; I could have done it unaided under normal circumstances, but Angela's body was not as strong as I am used to being, so the help was gladly received.

I stepped onto the platform that now trapped Tiffany's shins and from the side I lowered the half circle attached the column at the rear so that it was level with her neck; this took a little bit of support from me and Artemisia, because she had to lean forward to get it down passed the back of her head. I took the section of the circle from Artemisia and completed the circular stock about Tiffany's neck. Tiffany seemed more relaxed now that she was supported against falling over, but still a little tense from not knowing what she had got into.

With help from Artemisia, Priya and Milly, I rotated the whole assembly to show that there was nothing tricky on the back and the only things visible under the upper platform were Tiffany's feet, the platform's feet and the base of the column supporting the neck stock. From inside the sari I produced a tape measure, which I hooked to the back of the arm jutting from the column and pulled down the back of the column and hooked to the base of the upper platform. I decided that Artemisia should be my reader of the tape, so I stationed her behind the platform where she could see the tape. I asked for the initial reading.

"Do you want it in centimetres or feet and inches?" she asked.

"I don't mind," I replied. "Whatever's easiest for you and your friends."

"Ok, that says 148 cm; well, that's the nearest. Is that near enough?"

"Yes, this is magic, not science. So that'll be near enough. Can you confirm that's the distance from the top Tiff's shoulders to the bottom of her shins?"

"Yes," said Arty.

"Good. Now we are going to cover Tiff from her shins to her shoulders. First from behind and then from the front." I pulled a large sheet from within the platform and Milly was quickly there to help fit the curved fabric to the back of the upper platform and the back of the stock, by threading the small hooks on the edges into the eyes on the edges of the sheet. This gave a white background to Tiffany, but Artemisia was lost from sight. "Are you alright back there, Arty?"

"Yes," she answered.

"If anything happens back there shout out, ok?"

"Got it!" she replied and peeked round the side to give a thumbs up.

I pulled the second sheet from its concealed storage and, with help from Milly and Priya, it was soon in place, attached by hooks and eyes.

"And now for the final piece to this illusion," I announced. I leaned down and pulled out a pole that had be hidden in the lower platform. It seemed heavier than I remembered, but then I recalled that I was in Angela's body. With a little bit of struggle, and some protest from Tiffany, I located the pole in a hole in the side of the neck stock and pushed it through until the collar on the pole stopped it with equal amounts of pole on either side of Tiffany's neck. Tiffany gave a squeak when she felt the tip of the pole touch her neck, but after it had passed through she seemed not to mind.

It took little encouragement for Priya and Milly to take hold of the end of the pole and at my instruction pull down on it. This caused Tiffany to say that she was not ready, but I said that she was ready and my helpers agreed. With some cooperation from Tiffany, they lowered the stock ten centimetres, so that her nose was at the level where her chin had been.

"Ok, we'll hold it there." Then to the audience, I asked, "Do you want to see what we've done?" The consensus was that they did. I unhooked the front sheet which was looser now that it had been before. I lowered it to show the awkward pose that Tiffany had been forced into by having the neck stock lowered. Her lower legs were straight up, because they were constrained by the platform, then her thighs sloped backwards and from her hips her torso sloped forward, putting a bit of strain on her neck which had to be bent back to fit through the hole of the neck stock.

"As you can see, Tiffany knew what she needed to do. Shall we see how far she can go?" The audience approved of the plan, despite Tiffany's opposition. I went with the majority and asked Priya and Milly to gradually lower the neck stock, until it was obvious that Tiffany could not fold herself any further. This proved to be a further 10cm. I reattached the sheet to the front told them that magic part started now. Then I instructed my helpers to gradually lower the pole, which would take the stock and Tiffany's head lower and asked Arty to give a give a running count of Tiffany's shoulder to shin measurement. I warned them to stop if they felt more resistance than they had already felt.

Quite naturally they started cautiously, but as they passed the first few centimetres they grew more confident, and the fact that Tiffany was making threats of revenge, instead of screams of pain, encouraged them further. On the way I stopped them to check in with Tiffany about if she was feeling any pain or discomfort, which, judging by her responses, she was not.

Soon the neck stock had been lowered to the upper platform, making the distance between the base of her neck and her shins very few centimetres. I removed the covering sheets completely to show that there was no space for the rest of her tall body between the stocks holding her neck and ones holding her feet.

I turned to the audience and told them that it was time to do something for Arty. Both Artemisia and Tiffany seemed shocked. Arty seemed to assume that reading the heights that Tiffany had passed through was sufficient involvement; Priya soon told her how wrong she was. Tiffany wanted to be back to her normal lofty height, but having asked her directly if she was in pain or discomfort and been given the answer, 'no', I told her she would get to see Artemisia's illusion from a whole new view point, that was a lot closer to the floor than she usually saw things. With Milly's help we moved Tiffany to the side and turned her to face the performance area. Priya had gone behind the backdrop to find more of the stuff for Artemisia's illusion.

I picked up a couple of stands that Priya had brought out earlier and set them up about twelve feet apart and expanded them so that they nearly touched the ceiling. The next thing I set up was a telescopic pole across the top between the two stands. Priya came back with a metallic grey cloth and apologised that it was a mess; she said, "I opened the box and it all sprang out".

It did not take much to disentangle the cloths and I set her to attaching the bottom corner ties to the bases of the stands. It required that the cloths be stretched between the stands, but they were heavy enough to resist the tension. The rest the equipment arrived with the return of Milly, so I enlisted her help with tying the two stretchy sheets to the tops of the stands, while I tied the top of the sheets to various points along the cross bar. The result of all this tying was a pair of sheets stretched across a span of twelve feet and from the ceiling, bar an inch or two, to within four inches of the floor. At some point in all this I remembered to asked Artemisia to remove her shoes.

With all this prepared, I asked Arty to get between the sheets. I pulled up the front sheet so that she could duck under it and get into place.

Artemisia stooped to get under the raised cloth and stood up behind it and in front of the rear cloth. I suggested she leaned down to wave to her friends, an opportunity that she took. I lowered the front cloth until only her feet were visible; the rest of her manifested as a person-shaped bulge in the cloth.

"Arty, are you ok? Can you breathe alright?" I asked.

"I'm fine," she said, "but it is a bit strange having fabric stretched across your face."

"As you can hear, Arty is there between the stretched cloths, but we will see if she is really there. Milly, would you take the big torch behind the cloth and shine it from behind, so we can tell that Arty is between the sheets; because I feel sure you'll let us know if Arty is cheating. (That's my job and I don't need the competition)"

Milly took the torch behind the cloths and waved the spot across the whole expanse, making a clear shadow that matched the bulges in the fabric.

"Great Milly! You can come back out the front; you don't want to miss the magic, do you?"

Milly returned to view.

"Another thing I've heard people suggest is that, because you can't see her, it might not be her. Ok, Priya, bring me the knife!"

Priya looked puzzled until Milly hooked a sheathed knife from the pile of stuff Priya had originally brought and skated it across the floor to Priya's feet. The girl in the emerald sari bent down, picked it up and stepped towards me; she seemed nervous of both the knife and my intent towards Artemisia. Arty also seemed antsy at the mention of a knife.

I accepted the sheath and drew the knife. Despite the size of the sheath and the proportionate size the handle, the blade was about a centimetre long. On seeing this some of the audience made sounds expressing disappointment.

"Arty, I need you to press your face against the cloth. I will take a hold of the cloth; when you are sure that I have the cloth take a half step backwards, so that your face is not touching the cloth at all. Do you understand?"

We saw the bulge at Artemisia's head height, lean forward and nod. I reached to an area of cheek beside the nose's prominence and pinched the cloth. Hesitantly, then more confidently, the contours of her face retreated until I was holding the cloth with no other stretches,

I looked towards Milly, who was still standing near the end of the apparatus we had constructed. "She isn't escaping out the back, is she?"

Milly took a quick step sideways and confirmed that she could see the bulge of Arty's back press against the rear cloth.

There were two sudden ripping noises as I applied the short, but sharp, blade to the cloth; first in a slash downwards passed my fingertips and then horizontally at a level below my hand. There was a round of surprised squeals from the audience and a squeak from Artemisia. I tucked the knife under my arm, freeing both hands to open the hole I had ripped in the cloth. Arty's features were partially visible through the hole.

"Ok, Arty, stick your head through the hole I've made for you." With a bit of a squeeze, Artemisia had her head through the fabric. "Now, it will be obvious if she tries to get away, because she'll have to pull her head back through the sheet. That is unless I cover up her head, in which case, you'd call me out on it, right, Milly?" Milly gave me a thumbs up, telling the audience that while she was my helper for the show, she would betray any secrets of how I did stuff, if she spotted them.

The next section was making holes for Arty's hands to poke through, which with her cooperation was quite rapid, then I sent Milly back to the rear of the apparatus to show that the shadow cast by Artemisia's body was in the right place relative to her visible appendages.

I then made two holes lower down. It was easy to persuade Arty to lift the first foot and put it through the corresponding hole. It took a lot more persuasion to get her to lift the other foot to the other hole, which involved Milly lying on the floor supporting the first foot and me and Priya holding onto Arty's hands; but finally it was achieved.

"How does that feel?" I asked.

"Surprisingly supportive and quite comfortable; like a hammock, except that I'm up and down instead of horizontal. Is that what it's supposed to feel like?"

"I guess so, but as you're the first person ever to feel it, you know better than anyone. I did expect it to be quite nice, and I'm happy that it is. Priya, this time, take the torch from Milly and go behind and check that all the parts of Arty are really Arty's parts and she hasn't gained any company to help with the next part."

Priya went behind the equipment and shone the torch, showing the shadow of Arty's suspended figure and nothing else. From Artemisia's reaction, she touched the bulge against the stretched fabric to make sure it was not fake, before re-emerging.

I asked both helpers what they thought I would be doing to Arty next, she seemed to be of the opinion that being held off the ground between two stretchy pieces of fabric was enough. Priya had no ideas, but Milly suggested that flattening Artemisia was a reasonable option; one I took a mental note of for potential later use.

"While that's an interesting option," I said, "what we're going to do is help Arty, here, to reach the corners of the sheet." Given that Arty was the smallest girl in the room at about four foot nine, it seemed improbable; this explained the sounds of disbelief I heard from the audience.

I took hold of the knife again and carefully pushed the blade through the hole beside her right wrist; she did the wise thing and stretched the hole in the opposite direction. This was good, because it provided the tension I needed to make a slash across the fabric from the wrist hole to close to the top corner of the sheet; I had forgotten that I was a bit shorter than I usually am so the top end of the rip was not as straight as I planned, because I realised at the last second that I needed to go on tip-toe. I repeated this procedure on the other side and made a straighter cut in the fabric.

"Now that you are not constrained by the holes I cut for your hands, please could you reach as far as you can towards the upper corners of the sheet."

She tried but did not get very far.

"I think you need a bit of help," I suggested. I turned to my helpers and asked them to get the plastic grabbers that were in the pile on the floor. Milly bent down and picked them out and passed one to Priya. "Now, use the grabbers to hold Arty's wrists and move them up the slits I've made to the top corners." Artemisia gave a squeal of alarm, but that did not stop my helpers from following my instructions, although I suspected that if there had been any large resistance to achieving the task or screams of pain from Arty, Priya would have stopped; I am not quite so sure that Milly would have.

For a moment Artemisia's hands were twelve feet apart and more than six feet from her head, which looked about in consternation at this turn of events. Then Priya and Milly released the hands from the grabbers and the hands slipped down the slits to their starting positions.

"Well that worked partially. We'll try again with a couple of slight modifications," I said, trying to sound a little downbeat. I went and rummaged in the pile of bits and pulled out a few cable ties. I wrapped one round each of Arty's wrists and fed another into the small gap between the wrist and the tie round it. With this preparation done I asked Priya and Milly to move Artemisia's hands to their spread position and watch while I connected the untied ties to the top corner of the sheet.

Arty looked a little concerned, but not in any discomfort. It did not take long to duplicate a similar situation so that her feet were also twelve feet apart and anchored to the bottom corners of the sheet by a pair of cable ties each.

"Arty, you seem to be able to reach further than anyone would have guessed. How long have you been able do that?" I asked.

"For the last five minutes, I guess," she replied with a smile that told me that she was giving an answer she hoped I would like.

"How would you feel about being a bit taller?"

"A bit nervous, to be honest, but I guess you're going to do it anyway, so there's no point in me objecting, especially if it's as painless as moving my hands and feet. But I don't want one of those zip-ties around my neck; I don't think that would be safe."

"Ok, duck your head down as best you can and we'll do it!"

I drew the knife and hooked it into the top of the neck-hole and then pushed it up to close to the top of the sheet straight up.

"Are you ready?"

"I think so," Arty answered.

I put a hand under her chin and lifted. Soon her head was near the top of the slit, but still resting on my hand.

"How's that?"

"I think it would be better if you weren't holding my head up."

I moved my hand away and her head plummeted. I barely had time to squat down to catch it as a ripping sound was heard that implied that the weight of Artemisia's head was ripping the fabric downward from the original hole I had made for it. The dropping of her head was accompanied by a scream. I caught the head as it reached about level with her feet. With her head once more in my hands I raised it to the original position, but discovered that any attempt to let go resulted in her head falling. I asked for a clip from Milly who found one quickly and clipped the top of the gash that Artemisia had ripped with her falling head. This allowed me to stand back and see what we had achieved.

Artemisia's hands and feet were anchored with zip-ties to the corners of a sheet twelve feet across and seven feet high with her puzzled face in the centre.

I turned to the audience and asked for suggestions about what had happened. Some favoured the theory that Arty's arms and legs had been stretched like rubber bands, while others suggested the possibility that her arms had been ripped from her body or the appendages had been ripped off. I asked Priya and Milly what they thought, especially as they had had the privilege of moving the hands and feet and been close enough to have a better idea of the goings on.

Priya told us that she was clueless about how they had made what appeared to have happened actually happen, although she applied a little logic and dismissed the theory that the hands and feet had been detached from the rest of Arty, on the grounds that the extremities would have fall out of the slits unless there was something behind to stop it.

Milly pondered the problem for a moment, before reasoning, "We're dealing with magic, right? And I assume that you'll be taking it relatively easy, so you don't exhaust yourself before the end of the show, which has got to include, bringing Angela back with your usual body, doing something with Fiona and Keli and the two things you promised to do with me. I guess the easiest way is to detach the hands and feet. Then there's the fact that when Arty's head dropped we did not see any of her body below the bottom of the sheet; that makes me think her head is not attached either. So the remaining question is what did you do with her body? I reckon that there don't seem to be any lumps where her body should be, which only means that you vanished it or invisibly moved it to somewhere that you did not need to hold it up; am I right?"

"Ok, we'll see who's right. Priya would you mind taking the torch behind there and showing us?"

Priya retrieved the torch from the floor and disappeared behind the apparatus. She was soon playing the light over the entire expanse and revealing no shadows, except where Artemisia's head, hands and feet were showing.

I went to each corner and cut the appendage I found there free of the zip-tie that held it there. In a move that surprise the audience, I pressed the extremity backward so that Priya could see where it was and shine the beam of the torch on it. Then I pushed it behind the front sheet and moved my hand away to show the spot of the torchlight unobstructed.

I was about to do something to make Arty's head disappear into the space between the cloths, when Marie's phone rang. I waited.

"Do you want to talk to Angie?" asked Marie. She held out the phone.

I thanked her and accepted the phone. "Hello?"

"I've parked your van the back corner of the rear carpark at Five Maples, it should be safe here overnight. What do I need to do now?" Angela's voice asked.

"That's good you're not too far away. I want you to get in the back of the van and sit in as compact a manner as you can on the patch of chequer-plate you'll find there. It may be a bit hard, but it won't be for long. Ring Marie's phone when you are ready." I hung up and handed the phone back to Marie. Right, we'll need the appearance cage, Milly!"

Milly and Priya went behind the back drop and soon brought out a square cage on legs, with a board for a base. I draped the white fabric from the front of Tiffany's squeezer illusion over the cage then poured some lighter fluid into a low tray inside that cage and lit it as Marie's phone began ringing. I allowed the flame a moment to grow then pulled the cloth draped over the top of the cage down the front to reveal a man with a woman's head inside the cage where the flames had been. The body was mine and the head was Angela's; I was relieved to note that she was still wearing the hat. I opened the front of the cage so that she could climb out, but reached in to take the hat.

A few words of instruction got Milly to drag the cage to the side as I welcomed Angela back.

"Do we have to change back now?" she asked.

"Not, immediately, just so long as we are back in our own bodies before Marie's parents get back, it should be alright," I assured her.

She went to Marie to be filled in on what had happened in her absence.

Carrying the hat I went back to Artemisia. "Say, 'goodbye', Arty." She said, "Goodbye!" and I waved the pirate hat in front of her face and she was gone when the section of the hole her head had been through came back into view. A rapid round of unknotting had the stretchy sheets in a small pile on the floor, not big enough to hide a rabbit and particularly not a small girl.

I went back to Tiff and asked if she wanted to get back to normal, she said that she did. I lifted the neck stock to until the tape measure up the supporting column once more read 148cm, then I draped the stretchy fabric in the empty gap between the neck stock and the upper platform, which was acting as an ankle stock. Moments later I bundled up the fabric and threw it into a corner. I asked Artemisia who had appeared alongside Tiffany's body to undo the neck stock while I enlisted the aid of Priya and Milly to release her feet. While this was all happening I pulled the pole from its position through Tiffany's neck.

Part way through this process, the onlookers noticed that Tiffany and Arty were now dressed in fancy costumes consisting of harem pants and short tops that exposed their midriffs and showed of the sparkling gems in their belly buttons.

"Time for a short break. Angela would you mind organising the milk and cookies, or whatever it is that people have at these things these days, then come to see me about getting your body back. In the meantime, I'll clear up all these cabinets and workout what I've got left for Fiona and Keli and Milly, and if she wants to Jenny."

Most of the audience rushed for the kitchen and set about preparing whatever they wanted to eat and drink between pizza and bed.

A few hung around; they seemed to want private words with me. The first to approach were Fiona and Keli. They expressed a desire to be part of the same illusion and include a costume change; I made no direct promises, but said that I would see what I could come up with. Next was Jenny, who asked for a specific illusion, because having experienced it would, she felt, help her get into her role in the play she was involved in. I told her that I had planned on doing that for Milly, but I felt sure that she would not mind, if I could come up with something else.

Milly hung about and moved some of the used cabinets and other apparatus back to the improvised backstage area. I was surprised and pleased when I went back there that she had not dumped the used stuff, but moved it to the further corners and moved the unused equipment forward.

"Why are you still here," I asked. "Don't think that I don't appreciate the help, but why not go and have a chat with your friends?"

"Because they aren't really friends. I'm here more in the role of homework consultant; they'll be asking me what they need to write to pass the assignments they have for the weekend in the morning. Most of them could probably do it for themselves if they didn't waste time having sleepovers."

"And," she continued, "I was hoping to get a look at some of this stuff to get some clue what you were planning for me at the end of the show. I hadn't noticed before that you've got head chopper as well as a guillotine."

"Don't worry that's not for you, but I think I see just the thing."

From the main section of the room I heard Angela call. I suggested that Milly get something to drink and pushed her towards the door.

"Hello Angela," I called from the area behind the back drop, by way of an invitation for her to come and talk in private.

She peeped round the curtain and seeing that I was the only one there stepped through. "You wanted to switch our bodies back?"

"It was more 'would you like to switch bodies back?' If you want to swap back now that's fine with me, but if you have any specific ideas of a method you'd like to use, maybe we could entertain the girls with it."

"So, how long can we stay like this?" she asked.

"Well, in theory until one of us dies, with downside that the other one dies at the same time. In practice until before Marie's parents get back, bearing in mind that I'm not supposed to be here and you're supposed to be an aunt not an uncle."

"Have I got this straight, I could be a man for the night and it would be alright?"

"Yes, if you want to, but we'd have to change back in the morning. Is that what you want?"

"I think that it would definitely be 'interesting', but if it isn't something you're ok with or it spoils the show, I'm happy to swap back as soon or as late you like."

"In that case that's settled, we'll swap back in the morning, unless you decide that you want your body back sooner. But it does mean that I'll have to stay for the night; not that that's a problem."

"Good, that's sorted. How soon were you planning to start the show again? There's wild speculation about what you plan to do with Keli, Fiona, Jenny and Milly; if you don't start again soon, you run the risk of disappointing them."

"Ok, give me a few minutes to get Fiona and Keli's illusion into place and then we can restart."