Magic short 14: Topless Top Swap

Anna was relieved as she felt the stagehand take control of the cabinet she was in. Despite rehearsals, it still felt dangerous as the cabinet glided towards the wings with nobody in control from the point where Mark pushed the cabinet in the direction of the edge of the stage to the point where Hans was supposed to catch it and let her out. Of course, it did not help that her top half was not attached to lower half, or even in line with it.

The relief was short lived, because she had work to do. Hans released the catches that held the cabinet doors shut and rolled the wheeled table to within arms-reach, then rushed off to prepare something for the next part of the act. As she opened the top door at the side of the upper half of the cabinet, she caught a glimpse of Sinitra, her fellow assistant, having her top slid sideways onto the table that stood beside the lower portion of the cabinet, in which her legs stood. Sinitra was launched into the opposite wing and would be caught by Simon.

While Mark stood on stage and basked in the adulation from crowd Anna and Sinitra had work to do, and not much time to do it in.

With an effort Anna used her arms to raise her torso and swing it sideways out through the cabinet door and onto the blade that topped her lower half. It felt good to have her body lined up, even if it was seperated by a three millimetre sheet of steel, but she still had more to achieve. She leant forward to snag the table and mentally cursed Hans for not leaving it the right way round, so she had to waste precious seconds turning it so that the correct end would be next to her legs when she stepped them from the cabinet.

With the table in place, Anna opened the side door of the lower half of the cabinet and mentally prepared herself for the dislocation she always felt when part of her was not in its accustomed position relative to the rest of her; Sinitra seemed to relish being in parts and moved about; in fact, Anna had been glad to cede her place in the mismade cabinet to Sinitra.

Anna stepped her legs sideways, being careful not to trip on the threshold of the cabinet or be put off by the step down to the floor. This was the point where she wished that she had at least three arms; one to control the table, one to help her legs stand upright and the third to find the belt fixed to side of the table that went round her waist to attached her lower half to the table.

Soon she had belted her legs into position at the back of the table and transferred her upper body to the forward section of that table; she took a moment to ponder that having her upper body displaced a metre ahead of her legs did not feel as strange as having it a metre sideways. She gave the cabinet a small shove to clear some space for her to turn the table so that she was facing on stage once more and with the casters at the bottoms of the tables legs aligned to take her there when her legs pushed.

As she looked across the stage she could see Sinitra manoeuvring her table into position and that she was topless. This had been a bone of contention with Mark; why did they have to return to the stage topless, in the sense of wearing nothing on their upper torsos, as well as topless in the sense that their legs did not extend up beyond their upper waists? Mark had told them that it was essential to the incongruity of the scene and if they did not want to do it, he had a list of other girls willing to do it in order to become his assistants.

Anna sighed and pulled her top off over her head and dumped it on the blade that formed the lid of the lower half of the cabinet that she had stepped her legs from.

A moment later the cue to return to the stage happened and with a push from her legs Anna guided the table with her upper torso perched on the front forward; on the other side of the stage, Sinitra was doing the same. It felt good that the audience responded positively to the sight of the the two assistants returning to the stage in two halves, their upper halves sitting on tables pushed by their lower halves.

The next bit had taken a few hours of practice to make it seem accidental. At about the point that the audience noticed that the two assistants were doubly topless, the two tables needed to collide and the assists had to wrap their arms around each other and fall sideways, while remaining on the table tops; Anna could still feels the remains of some of the bruises she had sustained during rehearsing this; when she and Sinitra had fallen of the tables a couple of times, the worst were the ones that had been caused by landing on the edge of the cut surface.

Sinitra gave a squeal, while Anna gave a yelp of surprise when the tables hit each other. Anna wrapped her arms around her fellow assistant and allowed her momentum to carry her forward and a little to the side so that their upper halves were sprawled side by side on the top of Sinitra's table. Anna had to hold on, because the table was not wide enough for both of them, so she had effectively knocked Sinatra's upper half off of her table and was holding on to stop her falling to the floor.

Mark began to act panicked and swiftly circled the tables, which had locked together. He grabbed Sinitra from Anna's arms and took the weight allowing Anna to release her colleague. Anna could now steady herself and arrange herself upright.

While Anna put herself upright on Sinitra's table, Mark took Sinitra's torso and placed it on the stump above Anna's legs. Even though she was expecting it, the sudden loss of sensation when Sinitra's caramel-skinned upper body fused with Anna's pale pink upper waist was still jarring. Anna steadied herself and put on a look of shock at the blatant disregard that Mark had shown for who's parts belonged with which other parts.

Mark released Sinitra from Anna's table after the few moments it seemed to take Sinitra to take control of the legs that were now connected to the rest of her body. Then the two came and lifted Anna's torso and dumped it on Sinitra's legs. Anna remembered that they had tried this with Anna being put on Sinitra's legs first, but she had not the other assistant's aptitude for quickly becoming well controlled on a strange pair of legs; she also remembered being very perturbed by the sensation of having two sets of legs, one connected and not her own and the other her own, but not connected.

Anna and Sinitra mimed their consternation at the part swap, much to the amusement of the audience. Then Mark shooed them from the stage, seeming to dismiss that there was any problem.

Anna and Sinitra walked from the stage with mismatched legs. They would spend the rest of the show in long skirts or opaque tights, to give the impression that they had as easily swapped their legs back somewhere backstage. At the end of the show, Mark would switch them back before going home; until then there was a show to keep on the road.