Nobody raised their hand, as they had not known that this was going to be a magic show with audience participation. “C’mon folks, you wouldn’t want me to just pick someone at random, would you?” After another brief awkward pause, Heather relented, raising her hand, “Aha! Our first volunteer!” The way Heather saw it, she was the only one of her friends with a net gain of limbs, so if she was going to lose something, it would hopefully be one of her heads.

    She made her way up the stairs connecting the stage to the audience, and as she approached the magician, a microphone appeared in his hands with a puff of smoke. He held it up to her original head and asked, “For everyone watching, what’s your name?”
    “Heather.”
    “Wonderful! And yours miss?” He said, holding up the microphone to the bald head being held underneath Heather’s armpit.
    “Oh… I’m also Heather.”
    “How awkward for your friends,” Azure said, chuckling.
    “No, as in I’m the same person.”
    “Ah! my mistake, but who can blame me when you’re disconnected from your body like that?” Azure said, his hand now on his chin as though he were thinking deeply. He broke out of the pose suddenly, snapping his fingers and proclaiming “We should fix that immediately!”

    He ran behind the curtain, leaving Heather to awkwardly stand up on stage by her lonesome for a bit, before he rushed back out, carrying three boxes: two similar cubes and one large rectangular box. “Okay! Now, this is going to be a little awkward to do, but we’re going to get those two heads onto your body one way or another!” He gave her a reassuring look, before continuing on, “Now, the first step to attaching heads to a body, is to make sure that they are both off of the body. I see one of them is already off, so we can just place it in this first box,” as he said the words, he gently placed Heather’s bald head into the first box. Heather found the box oddly comforting, as the bottom was heavily padded so the bottom of her head was comfortable, and the box was just large enough to not absolutely frighten her. Her sole complaint was that the box was also pitch black, so she couldn’t really see anything at all out of that head’s eyes.

     “Now, to get rid of that pesky head that’s already attached,” Azure produced a red headband (the Eternity Cosmetics branding would be visible from even the back row it was so large) and wrapped it around her neck. “So Heather, have you ever heard of the story of the girl with a green ribbon around her neck?”
     “No, I can’t say that I have,” she responded back.
    “Well, let’s just say it was hair-raising,” he chuckled, lifting Heather’s head and neck clean off of her body by her hair. Her jacket slightly obscured it, but if anyone hand wanted to, they would have been able to swipe their hand from shoulder to shoulder without so much as feeling a bump. Azure put her original head into the second box, plunging Heather completely into darkness before moving on to his next point.

    “Now, step two is to restrain the body. You’d laugh, but there’s been more than one occasion where forgetting this step caused some minor discomfort,” he paused, and while making a face as though he were remembering something painful, readjusted his privates (eliciting a small chuckle from the group), “Anyways, let’s move on. This,” He said, hoisting the large rectangular box aloft, “is a specially designed Chinese hand trap, guaranteed to not allow any hands to come out of it.” He placed the box over Heather’s hands, forcing them to kind of look as though she were flexing.

     After the box was in place, he released the catch, causing the rectangular frame to remain in place, but the actual box containing her hands to drop to the floor. He picked up the box, saying, “Yeah… Funny thing about that Chinese hand trap, that guarantee applies to the person performing with the box… So we’re probably going to need to find something to replace those hands she just lost…” He pretending to think for a moment, before snapping his fingers once again. He grabbed the two boxes on the floor that contained both of Heather’s heads, and after taking a moment to make sure they were facing the proper direction, put them into the rectangular frame.

     “And now! The best part of any magic show! The reveal!” He flourished his hands excitedly, as both the frames and boxes dropped away, revealing the new changed Heather. In place of her hands were her heads, her original head on the right (her dominant side) and her new head on the left. The heads were orientated in such a way that their faces faced the way the palm of their hands would have faced. After getting used to the bright lights, Heather looked over her self in horror. “So dear, How do you like your new transformation?”
    “I don’t,” She said flatly, giving him a look as though she were holding back pure fury.
    “You don’t? But think about it, you’ll be able to get a much better angle on things with your heads at the end of your arms.”
    “Yeah, but what about holding things?”
    “You have mouths don’t ya?” Azure chuckled once more, a sound Heather was beginning to find more grating the more he did it.

    “Well, I’m sorry you feel that way, so how about I make it up to you? You girl!” he said, a spotlight beaming down from the ceiling and landing square on Susan, who was still stroking Echo’s hair (much to her delight). “Come on up here, I’m going to need your assistance for the second and last trick of the night,”
     Susan gave her friends a look that read, ‘Do I really have to go up?’ before eventually giving in after seeing there was no way the show was going to end unless she got up on stage and helped with the trick. She deposited Echo’s head into her lap (not without some protests from Echo of course) and made her way up onto the stage. “Now daring, what’s your name?” Azure said, thrusting the microphone into her face in a similar manner to how he had done so with Heather earlier.
    “S-susan,”
    “Well S-susan, glad to have you up here,” he chuckled, “but I’m afraid your fate lies in Heather’s hands tonight. Since she wasn’t happy with her transformation, I think it’s only fair that she gets to pick how I’m going to be combining you two.”

    “Wait! Combining us?” Heather said, shocked.
    “Well of course. After all, that is how I made my name as a magician,” Azure explained, once again producing something out of thin air. This time, it was a poster advertising his show, it read ‘Come see the Amazing Azure! The King of Combinations! The Master of the Merge! The
Connoisseur of Chimeras!’ As magically as it appeared, he caused it to disappear in a puff of smoke.

    “So, what’ll it be Sunshine?"

     How should the two be combined?
     1.) No part left behind
     2.) Blending
     3.) As close to human as possible (one normal body, two heads)