Once again, the contestants found their senses attacked as they entered the auditorium. All around them, fans screamed and cheered at them. Ushers were placed strategically to block the aisle so that the fans who were desperate to touch them or get an autograph couldn’t storm them and cause a stampede. Many of the fans were wearing branded ANGA t-shirts of their favorite contestant, and a select few super fans were wearing their own handmade t-shirts or outfits emulating the normal dress of theirs.
    “Ladies and Gentlemen!” Drake said loudly into a microphone, sending the already ravenous crowd even more into a frenzy, “Last week, we tasked these assistants to base a magic trick on an everyday household object. Today, we get to see what these lovely contestants have came up with! You’re task is simple: Watch them all and enjoy!” The audience somehow managed to get even louder.

    “Alright! Let’s get ready to Magic!!!”

~~~
Leela

    “Excuse me,” Leela said, jogging on stage from the wing. She was wearing a Red tank top and black running shorts, her hair tied up into a bun. “Are you open?” she asked to David, who had his back turned from the audience and was standing behind a waist high partition.
    “Of course we are,” David said, turning towards her. Over his trademark suit, David was wearing an apron that had a coffee cup embroidered on it, and was wearing a ball cap that had the same logo.
    “Great,” Leela said, pulling out her phone, “I’d like a large, french pressed and a large, plain to go, please.”
    “Sure thing miss, it’ll be a few minutes though because I need to make both fresh.” David said, beckoning off stage, from the opposite side of the stage came a second Leela, wearing her standard performance uniform came out. He patted the partition, the normal clothed Leela jumping up on top.
    David placed a cloth over Leela’s bottom half, and waved his hand over it pulling it away and revealing a bucket of small chunks of flesh that perfectly matched Leela’s skin tone. What had went unseen to the audience was underneath the cloth, Leela had disappeared her lower half and had replaced it with the bucket of herself that she had prepared the night before. David took the bucket and filled a rather large french press 3/4 of the way up with Leela chunks. From under the partition, he pulled out a pot of boiling water, filling the french press all the way to the top.
    “I don’t think that’s how a french press is supposed to work,” the running outfit Leela commented.
    “Oh, don’t worry about that miss. It’s just how we prepare our special Indian blend,” David said, pressing down on the top of the french press. As the plunger moved downwards, the chunks of Leela began to push against one another, compressing more and more as the plunger reached the bottom. About halfway down, a brown liquid began to escape from the chunks of Leela, causing the chunks to gradually shrivel and the overall boiling water to take on a more brown tone. Once the plunger stopped moving, the boiling water was now a rich smelling dark coffee, and only the remains of several shriveled up chunks of Leela remained at the bottom of the french press. David pulled out a plastic coffee cup which shared the same logo as his apron and cap, and filled it with the french-pressed Leela. He quickly scribbled ‘Lela’ across the cup, before moving on to the other half of his assistant, which was sitting patiently on the partition amusing herself by poking at the point on her body where her legs had been.
    David grabbed this remaining half of Leela under her arms, and helped her into a large glass coffee pot. He placed her and the pot on an even larger stand, where flames immediately began licking the sides of the tub from the bottom. Within seconds, Leela began sweating, and even quicker than that it became clear that this sweat was actually her skin melting, as her left arm fell off at about her forearm, followed by her head rolling off her neck and hitting the bottom of the pot with a splat. Thankfully, her sari was melting with her, keeping her modesty hidden as the rest of her body dissolved towards the bottom of the tub.
    David turned off the stove, grabbing the comically sized coffee pot and giving it a good shake, the uneven brown and red mixing to match the shade one would expect from a pot of coffee. He awkwardly held the pot above a standard large coffee cup, pouring the perfect amount and putting a lid on it. He quickly scribbled ‘Lilla’ across the cup, before handing both cups to Leela. “There you go miss, enjoy.”
    The remaining Leela took a sip, saying, “Mmm. Delicious, although it could use some milk.”
    “We have some-“
    “Don’t bother,” Leela said, giving David a cheeky smile, “I brought my own.” She turned away from the camera to keep her modesty as she lifted her shirt up. The sound of a squirting liquid could be heard through her microphone, and as she lowered her shirt and turned around, it was clear that liquid in the coffee had gone from a dark brown to a more milky brown. She took another sip, before saying, “Aah. That hit’s the spot. Thanks David!” She waved, leaving the stage to whoops and hollers mixed into her applause.

~~~
Jill

    “Alright Jill, what have you got for us today?” David asked, cracking his knuckles.
    “Well,” Jill said, looking slightly embarrassed, “it’s a rather easy sounding trick, but I thought it would be interesting to try and squeeze myself through this garden hose.” The garden hose Jill held was your standard green hose.
    “Sounds simple enough,” David said, grabbing the hose out her hand, “Any particular way you want to do it?”
    “I was just going to push myself through, I just want you to hold it,” Jill said, looking determined.
    “Alright then,” David said, stretching out the whole garden hose across the length of the stage, “Have at it!”
    Jill walked over to the end of the hose that was closest to her, she awkwardly pressed the top of her head against the hose. She knew it was going to look rather silly, but it worked like a charm as her head began morphing and being pulled into the hose as she focused on what she wanted to accomplish. More and more of her body was pulled in, and just as it had reached past her breasts, the top of her head was beginning to poke out the other end. The trick continued to go off without a hitch, until her breasts had popped out of the opposite end, while the original end hit her hips. Jill remained in this position for several moments before Jill finally spoke up, “Hey David…”
    “Yeah Jill?”
    “I’m stuck?”
    “You’re stuck?” David said, doing his best to hold back laughter.
    “This isn’t funny David. I’m seriously stuck.”
    “Sorry. But you have to admit, it’s a little funny.”
    “No David, help me out here.”
    “Oh wait! I have an idea! You keep trying, I’ll just do something to try and entertain the audience a bit.” David began maneuvering the hose by lifting up each half of Jill and pulling it, until he had successfully formed a knot out of the hose that contained Jill’s body.
    “David, that’s hardly helping,” Jill whined, her face practically red from exertion.
    “But watch this!” David said, pulling out a pair of gardening sheers and cutting the garden hose within the knot he had just tied.
    “David!” Jill said, the audience laughing at Jill’s plight.
    “Just wait,” David said, “I didn’t actually cut you up,” He grabbed Jills upper half and pulled, the knot of garden hose closing up and unraveling, revealing the hose was actually still whole.
    “Great. Now can you please help me?”
    “Alright, alright,” David said, grabbing Jill by her arms and pulling. As he did, Jill’s hips finally were pulled in, shortly followed by her legs and feet. However, yet another snag occurred as Jill’s hips snagged on the opposite end of the hose.
    Despite how hard David pulled, it was clear that Jill was not coming out, “Great. What now?” Jill asked, exasperated.
    “Hang on, I have another idea.” David walked off stage, pulling out a modified water cooler. Rather than a spigot, the front of the water cooler had a valve that matched the opposite end of the garden hose perfectly. “Now, this is going to be a tight fit, but it will work out just fine,” David said, attaching the free end of the hose to the water cooler and pressing a button on the water cooler.
    Almost immediately, Jill began to be pulled back in to the hose. The opposite end of her body began entering the large plastic container of the water cooler. Eventually, Jill was finally out of the hose, but now she was awkwardly compressed into the water cooler’s container, her face visible next to one of her feet as her body unnaturally accommodated their smaller space of existence. “Great David, but how are you going to get me out of this?”
    “The same way you get anything out of a water cooler,” David said, unscrewing the hose and plugging in a spigot. David opened it up, and Jill’s flesh began to leak out of the water cooler as thick, liquid flesh. Eventually, all of Jill was out of the water cooler, and she finally solidified. “See, it wasn’t that bad.”
    “Yeah, yeah, let’s just take our bows,” Jill said, a smile on her face betraying the idea that she wasn’t in on the trick the entire time.

~~~
Cammie

    “Alright Cammie. Today we’re going to go into your psyche to try and see what makes you tick,” David said. Cammie was in her new performance outfit, a relatively plain black leotard. She had her black shoulder-length hair done up in a ponytail behind her. David was seated in a large armchair, while Cammie was relaxing on a psychiatrist’s chair.
    “So we’re going to be using clocks?” Cammie asked, sitting up from her relaxed position.
    “No, we’re going to be using this,” David said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a rather plain looking zipper pull. At this point, both David and Cammie stand up from their seats. “So, let’s see what’s hiding underneath your psyche.”
    David placed the zipper pull against Cammie’s chest pulling downwards. As he reached the bottom of her body, he pulled the layer back, revealing Cameron underneath. “Huh, interesting.”
    “What’s that?” Cameron said, pulling off the rest of his female self’s skin.
    “It seems that your next immediate identity after your own is of your male self. Which in hindsight makes a lot of sense,” David said, writing something down on a clipboard.
    “So when we’re done this I get to keep that zipper right? It seems to be much less stressful than my stopwatch to get the same effect,” Cammie said, patting himself down and making sure that everything was still there.
    “No,” David said, pulling the zipper down once more and revealing what appeared to be two asian looking children, one sitting on top of the others shoulders. The one on top looked like a child version of Cammie, while the one on the bottom looked like a child version of Cameron. “I see, inner child- or should I say children- is next.”
    “Whoah!” The two Camerons said as they fell backwards onto the psychiatrist chair. Despite the fact that they should have disconnected, it became clear that the two Camerons were actually fused together. David gave them a questioning look, as the young Cammie spoke up and saying, “What? I’m not as good as Leela. I can’t actually split into two separate people.”
    “Yes, yes,” David said, attaching the zipper. The dual bodied skin fell away, revealing a Cammie whose skin, hair, and outfit were pure yellow. She wore a smile on her face, and starting dancing and singing a tuneless song, as David commented, “I see. We must have gotten past the initial layers of consciousness and are now experiencing the emotions that make up Cammie’s personality. This must be happiness.”
    A zipper pull, and now there was a blue Cammie sobbing in heap of flesh of her yellow counterpart, “Sadness.”
    Another pull, another Cammie, all in purple and standing like a deer in headlights and looking out towards the audience. “Fear.”
    Finally, an all red Cammie, who started yelling, “and Anger.”
    “Shut it David! I’m sick of your psycho-analyzing of me!” The red Cammie shouted, rushing towards David with her fist raised. David easily sidestepped her attack.
    “Cammie! Calm down, you’d do good to avoid attacking a magician.”
    But Cammie wasn’t listening, as she turned around and charged towards David, “Oh yeah? And why’s that?” As Cammie whizzed past, David quickly maneuvered the zipper pull around Cammie’s right arm, it falling off as a useless sleeve on the ground.
    “Because they know magic obviously,” David said, moving like a blur and doing the same maneuver on all the rest of red Cammie’s limbs.
    Of course, red Cammie still had a bit of fight in her, mimicking a famous black knight’s line, “Okay then… We’ll call this a draw.”
    David just rolled his eyes, as he zipped down her chest once again. Although unlike all the other times, something much large popped out, and it was a massive clone of Cammie all in gold. "Ah, this must be the Ego.”
    “Your right, and I’m the best part of Cammie’s personality,” the giant golden copy of Cammie said.
    "That must mean the only thing that’s left is,” David paused, flourishing the zipper pull as the giant golden Cammie collapsed. From the pocket that emerged on the massive flesh suit, a tiny little monkey crawled out, jumping up onto David’s shoulders, “the id. a human’s instinctual drive.” He scratched underneath the monkey’s chin as the audience clapped.
    “Alright, time to get this all back to order,” David said, unzipping the monkey, which dropped to a lifeless suit on the ground. David rifled through the various skins that trashed the stage, eventually finding Cammie’s original skin. He placed the zipper against the opening in her skin, pulling it upwards. Cammie re-inflated, however she stood there lifelessly.
    “Oops. Forgot the personality bits,” David chuckled, reusing the zipper and turning Cammie into a useless skin. He gathered up all the various costumes from around the stage and stuffed them into the Cammie skin, almost causing her to look like her normal filled self. David placed the zipper pull back on her, filling her out and finally turning her back to normal again.
    The two took a bow, Cammie shaking her head in confusion as she left the stage.

~~~
Saffron

    “Well ladies and gentlemen,” David said, looking at his watch, and addressing the audience “I don’t know where Saffron currently is, but I’m just going to forewarn you that the following trick is a bit more… risqué than I normally do. It was what Saffron wanted to do so-“
    “Oh gosh! Sorry I’m late David,” Saffron said, running on stage in her much too small two piece outfit. Her face had several small pimples that had not been there earlier in the night when she had arrived. She carried a large pink bag that clattered with the sound of glass bottles hitting against one another as she ran.
    “Saffron? How is this even possible? I saw you come in with the other contestants,”
    “Yeah, but then I thought it would be a good idea to take a nap since I was going second to last. And look, I didn’t have any time to prepare my makeup. Do you mind helping me?” Saffron offered David the large pink bag.
    “Sure thing, but I’m pretty useless with makeup,” David said, opening the bag, the stench of perfume immediately hitting his and everyone’s noses in the auditorium.
    “Okay, I can talk you through it,” Saffron said, rolling her neck and tying her hair back. “First things first your going to want to look for the jar labeled ‘face cream’ it’s used for wrinkles and stuff, and apply a layer over my entire face.”
    “Alright then, David said, applying a slightly tan looking substance over the entirety of Saffron’s face.
    After several moments passed, Saffron commented, “David… Something feels off with my face,” She reached up, and around the edge of where David applied the face cream found something to grasp. She pulled it off, only to pull her entire face off with it, the imperfections of her face staying on her body. “David! That was the ‘face peel cream’!”
    “Sorry!”
    “No, no. It’s my fault, although now we’re going to have to act quicker since this stuff is going to dissolve my face in a few minutes. There should be a mannequin head you can just stick me on in there.” David found the faceless mannequin head easily, carefully adjusting her face on it so that it didn’t look unnatural. Ignoring, of course, the fact that her skin color did not match up with the mannequin’s at all. “Okay, you’re going to want to find the zit vanishing cream and apply it on my head now.”
    “Alright,” David said, making sure to read the labels of the various bottles this time around. Of course, it wouldn’t have been a good trick if things had gone expected to plan, so as David applied the cream to Saffron’s bare face, the zits did vanish… along with the rest of her head.
    “David! Are you being serious right now?”
    “I warned you I wasn’t good at make-up!”
    “It’s fine, you just need to apply the magical foundation to reform my head.”
    “Is this the foundation?” David asked, pulling up a clearly empty jar.
    “Ugh. Why is this happening now?” Saffron groaned. “Okay, give me that vanishing cream you used earlier. I have an idea and we’re running out of time.”
    “Alright,” David said, passing her the jar he had used earlier. Saffron turned around, unhooking her bra and dropping her pants, a little yellow smiley face labeled censored, appearing on the screen to hide Saffron’s ass. She rubbed some of the cream on her private parts, turning around and getting various catcalls from the audience. David’s face turned a deep shade of pink in embarrassment.
    “What David? There’s nothing naughty to see.”
    “Y-yes… b-but.”
    “Oh hush, we need to act quickly, I can already feel the face peel dissolving,” Saffron said, which was true, as it looked like her face was slowly melting off of the mannequins head. “So, first, grab some lipstick and just draw a pair of lips.”
    “Okay,” David said shakily, doing his best to avoid looking at Saffron’s naked body. He reached into the bag and pulled out a tube of lipstick. He took the lipstick, closed his eyes, and did his best to draw a pair of lips where her vagina had previously been.
    As he completed the pass, The lips began moving, having Saffron’s voice as she said, “Wonderful, now there should be some pairs of contacts in there, apply them on my breasts.”
    David just nodded, rifling through and finding two contacts, placing them in place of her nipples. In his rush, he managed to get two different eye colors, one blue and the other amber, but Saffron was just happy that she would be able to see. It was at this point in the trick that her face mask had completely dissolved.
    “Okay, just give me the bag, I can finish up my make-up. It’ll mean we’ll have less mixups too,” Saffron said, snatching the makeup bag and pulling out a variety of stuff. She used an eyebrows pencil to give herself proper brows, applied proper eyelashes, a nose ring changed her innie belly button into a proper nose, and dotted some freckles all across her stomach. “There. Finished. We should have just enough time to-“
    “I’m sorry to cut you off Saffron, but it looks like they’re giving us the hurry up signal.”
    “Great… Oh wait! Pass me that mannequin head!” David passed her the head, she dropped it into the makeup bag, before immediately pulling it back out again, this time it was a dead ringer for her disappeared head. She reached into the bag once more, pulling out the face peel cream David had used earlier, and applied it over the entire front of her body. Her front came off like a massive mask, which she handed to David to pull. She pulled out a cream specifically designed to tighten skin and dabbed it over her giant face, the face shrinking down to the same size as her old face, which she then applied to the mannequin head.
    She attached the mannequin’s head to her body, and beside her obvious lack of privates and mismatching eyes, she was completely back to normal again, “Ta-da!” she said, taking a bow with David.

~~~
Ophelia

    “Tonight, my mistress and I shall perform an ancient rejuvenation ritual,” David said, wearing the same outfit he had worn last week, face shade and all. Ophelia, likewise was wearing her puffy, black wedding gown once more. From below the stage, a hidden elevator began rising, bringing up a rather large, but unassuming looking orange plant pot.
    “Mistress has granted me the right to prepare, and perform the ritual upon her,” David explained, bowing towards Ophelia, who nodded her head in approval. David opened up a black chest that was stationed next to the potted plant, pulling out various plant based ingredients, such as dead insects, dirt, a golden leaf, and a variety of white flowers. The final ingredient David poured into the plant pot was a drop of a strange looking green liquid, which caused the entire mixture with the plant pot to bubble and smoke.
    A green stem began growing out from the pot alarmingly quickly. As the bud began to form, David began the next part of the ritual, “Mother Gaia! We are gathered here today in order to offer up a vessel to your awesome power. We hope that you accept this vessel, and return anew a vessel stronger and more powerful for the lonely spirit, who has so gracefully offered her body unto you. May your decision be wise and just, as it always has and always will, and may our sacrifice be enough to satiate your hunger for the briefest period of time!” As David completed his speech, it became clear exactly what was growing out of the plant pot. The bud opened up, revealing razor sharp teeth lining the four edges of the monstrous looking flower. The flower stretched outwards, racing towards Ophelia, and closed its massive jaw around the shockingly calm witch’s upper half.
    As the plant began retracting, Ophelia’s lower collapsing to the ground, as the strange black liquid from her previous trick flowed out of her body from her cut. However, unlike her previous trick where the black liquid coalesced into something else, this black liquid simply spread outwards lying still on the floor, her lower half melting outwards into the puddle. David waited patiently, as the upper half of Ophelia’s body could visibly be seen traveling down the stem throat of the plant, who was smacking its large plant lips in satisfaction. When the lump reached the dirt, the plant quickly began withering away, its dried remains breaking up and floating away in the wind, despite the fact that there was clearly no wind within the auditorium.
    David dug his hand into the dirt that still remained in the pot, pulling out a black seed that looked similar to a large avocado’s seed. “Blessed be this day! Mother Gaia has granted us a gift!” David proclaimed. A stagehand brought out another plant pot that was filled with fresh looking dirt. David dug a little hole with his hands, placed the seed in, and poured out another drop of the green liquid.
    Once again, a stem began growing outwards, however unlike with the other plant, this plant’s stem was a pure white, with the slight bulb that was forming was a pure black. As the plant grew upwards, and definition began forming along the stem and two branching leaves, purple vines began climbing upwards along the stem. As time went along, it became clear that the plant’s stem was now that of a woman’s body, and its leaves were stretching out to form her arms. As the plant reached its maximum definition, the bulb burst open, the petals transforming into Ophelia’s standard haircut, although it was slightly longer it was before the performance began.
    “Mistress! You have been reborn! Shall you take a new name?” David asked, helping Ophelia awkwardly climb out of the plant pot. The purple vines that had been covering her body now formed a purple dress that was much more simple and plain than the elegant black wedding dress she had been wearing at the start of the trick.
    “No, my old name shall suit me just fine,” Ophelia said, shaking off her dirty feed, “Now, you may join me in a bow.”
    The two stood as equals, giving a bow and accepting a rancorous applause.

~~~

    “Let’s give another round of applause for David and his lovely assistants!” Drake said, the audience screaming as loud as they could in appreciation.

    “Now, once again we begin the hardest part of our evening. For you see, it is up to you all watching at home to decide which of these beautiful assistants we need to send back home. Using your smart devices, click on the link below to vote off who you think performed the worst, or want to see kicked off the show for whatever reason. I want to wish all of our contestants the best of luck. Good night, America!”

    To Ophelia: “They said it'd be a "Water hazard". And explaining it further, complained that the temperature could cause property damage. I guess they just don't want pets.” -FlexibleAnatomy

    It is their loss then. I guess I’m relatively lucky then, in the sense that Lucien and I own the small house we live in. Although it is going to take a while for the two of us to completely fireproof our house. Especially with all of the ancient spell books we have just lying about.

    To Leela: “Is that some "Soft Body" magic I see? For someone so sleek, I didn't know you could be so doughy. But really, congrats on finding a workaround! I'm sure those knives could be something you can play around with now. Have you played around more with it? I'm sure you could get a lot of mileage out of pottery- and sculpture-themed transformations.” -FlexibleAnatomy

    That was indeed some ‘Soft Body’ magic. I learned it from my second master who taught it and a bunch of my other mid-level magic to me. It never occurred to me that I could use it to help me out with the knives and stuff, but it seems to me more like a temporary fix for a more underlying problem that I want to resolve.
    A roommate of mine once had me guest star in one of her instagram videos. She has one of those accounts that focuses on making ‘strangely satisfying’ videos. You know, the ones where they’ll mix slimes, or slice through kinetic sand, or other weird stuff. She saw me making little sandcastles and stuff with my soft body and asked if she could borrow some of me for one of her videos. I didn’t mind, although I asked that she give me some credit for appearing in the video. Really confused a lot of her viewers who knew nothing about magic.
    For you beginner magic users out there, if your interested in soft body magic, one thing my second master warned me of was to never actually put your body in a kiln or any oven. Just because your body is the same consistency as clay, doesn’t mean your body is actually made of clay. You could actually hurt yourself by cooking yourself without proper magical protection.

    To Saffron: “I would love to see Fernando perform. I just hope he doesn't steal David's thunder.” -FlexibleAnatomy

    Thank you! I think that’s what David is really afraid of in putting Fernando out on stage. I mean, which would you rather see, some old fart doing magic? or a giant teddy bear doing magic! It’s a no brainer. Honestly, I should patent this idea before someone tries to steal it. If I don’t win, this would be the perfect fall back!

    To Ophelia: “Have you thought of a way to include Phaedra in your latest act? Just thought that you might find something interesting out of it.” -quad2

    Sadly, I was not able to think of a logical way to work Phaedra into the act. However, I will go ahead and say that Phaedra definitely served as an inspiration for the trick I did tonight.