The following behind-the-scenes footage was cut and leaked before the release of the Wednesday episode of America’s Next Great Assistant Season 2 on one of the many ANGA fan sites. On some channels, they elected to play the clip before airing that night’s episode.
While the bus ride home had been rather uneventful, the bus ride back was an absolute nightmare, and one that Drake had to deal with alone while all of the girls were still formless lumps in glass bottles. Firstly, after only a few minutes of driving in the desert, one of the bus’s tires popped, and it took the driver almost a half hour to properly replace it. They would have gladly been on their way, but then after only a few minutes, their progress was stopped by a runaway stampede, a large group of cows and other large creatures somehow managing to escape from a local ranch, that Drake later learned had been illegally cross-breeding between magical and non-magical beasts.
Just as Drake thought their luck had turn, only being about thirty minutes away from the hotel, when the weather just had to get worse, and the driver had to turn into a local rest stop due to a severe weather warning! By this point, Drake had accepted that he wasn’t going to be making it back at a reasonable hour, and finally called the production team to tell them they could have the rest of the day off.
It was around two AM when Drake and the skeleton crew he had taken to Gullermo’s Magic Spa finally managed to get to the hotel. While the original plan had been to restore the girls as soon as they got home, he knew that if he woke Howard at this hour to restore them, he would have a lot of explaining that he was entirely too tired to do. So, he placed the bottles in the lobby, told the skeleton crew they were excused from any filming the next day, and went up to his own luxury bedroom in the hotel.
~~~
Lobby
“Drake! Where were you yesterday?!” Howard asked sternly, the second he stepped out of the door to help deliver the punishment.
“Howard. I don’t want to hear it, I had an abysmal day yesterday-“
“Don’t you start with me Bordignon! These girls are my responsibility, and you know that if anything happened to them, the press would have an absolute field day!”
“Yeah, yeah,” Drake went over to the craft services table, grabbing one of the waiting paper cups of coffee and drinking it down in a single gulp, “I’m well aware of all that Howard. I already told the producers about what happened yesterday. Maybe they’d be more willing to pass my messages along if you didn’t curse them out anytime they tried to tell you something.”
“I’d be more willing to listen to them if they didn’t feel the need to constantly push their own agenda into my finely crafted TV series! Seriously Drake, a health spa promotion? What exactly does that have to do with Performance Magic?”
“Hey! If it wasn’t for these promotions, chances are we wouldn’t even have this second season in the first place. So how about you get off your high horse and do what you were paid to do, magic man?” Drake threw his cup away.
Howard’s face turned red with anger, but before he could start get in a word, Drake spoke up, sounding tired as he said, “Uh, uh, uh don’t you start with me, Magic Man. Don’t you forget what I had to do to even get you this job in the first place. Let’s just save the bickering for after we get the girls back to normal. Alright?”
Howard’s face still seemed angry, but nevertheless he gruffly responded, “Fine.” The footage cutting as he walked away from Drake.
The Main Program
“Good Morning everyone!” Drake announced to the audience watching at home, Howard looking more sullen than usual in the background, “So, what delightful punishment have you devised for the girls today, Howard?”
“Well Drake,” Howard said, the slightest tinge of anger in his voice, “Seeing as how the girls seemed to have performed worse than when they were working as a team, I it appropriate to design a punishment that would allow them to relive that first week of partnership in the contest, with a twist of course,” Howard grinned evilly, as he had the stagehands wheel out two slightly larger glass bottles.
Howard grabbed the Annette bottle and the Sable bottle, pouring the two assistants into the first and after some stirring, resulted in a mixture that had a sort of maroon color to it. He then grabbed the Sinopia and Maya bottles, pouring them into the other class, the two liquid assistants taking significantly longer to stir and settle into a uniform consistency, but the resulting liquid had a similar, but lighter auburn color to it.
After the mixing process was done, Howard attached all three bottles with liquid assistants in it (The two combinations, and the single Elise bottle) to a board, which he instructed two stagehands to flip over the board on his command. On the count of three, they flipped over the board, and slowly the mixtures began oozing out like molasses, the liquid assistants coalescing into three separate human shapes.
The first of these human shapes was Elise, who very obviously looked the same as she had when she had been melted down into her bottle, which is to say she was in nothing but a two piece, baby blue swimsuit.
As for the other two girls, they were people (well, one of them looked like a regular person) that nobody had seen before. The first looked the literal definition of if someone had been trying to morph Sable into Annette, but stopped halfway. She was the average of the two girl’s heights, her maroon colored two-piece swimsuit doing very little to hide her decently sized breasts. Really, besides the fact that her face looked like if you could squint, you’d be stuck in figuring out if it looked like Sable or Annette, the only other thing of note about her appearance was the fact that her hair was an off-gray color.
The Sinopia and Maya combination, on the other hand, was drastically different looking than what a combination of the two girls would have theoretically looked like. For starters, her head had three eyes, one large eye that seemed to be slightly smaller than Maya’s original one eye, but only so that Sinopia’s two eyes could have space on her cheeks, her slightly curly amber hair partially obscuring them. She had two pairs of arms, Sinopia’s situated above Maya, and likewise had two pairs of breasts, ironically enough Maya’s situated above Sinopia. The only thing that seemed to have merged smoothly were the girls’ lower halves, which were wearing a brown colored bikini bottom.
“Huh,” Howard said, curious about the resulting abomination, “I guess I didn’t let them stir for long enough. Oh well. If you need me girls, Drake and I will be discussing important matters in my office,” Howard walked over, wrapping his hands around Drake, as he led Drake into the Golden Elevator, leaving the girls to figure out their new bodies on their own.
Elise looked at the two amalgamations, asking, “Um… Who’s exactly in there?”
“Well, we’re a combination of Sable and Annette,” the shorter of the two girls spoke, her voice a much lighter southern accent than what Annette normally had, “and they’re Maya and Sinopia. Although, since our brains are all mixed up, and we sort of have vague recollections from each other, it would probably be better to say that we’re new people formed from their consciousnesses.”
“…Yeah,” the other combination said airily, as though she were struggling in order to say the words, “We’re new people.”
“Alright then, what should I call you two?” Elise asked.
“Well, We believe what most people do is combine the two names together. So we guess we’re Sann, and you can call them Mayopia?”
“…Sounds good,” Myopia said, looking down at her strange and transformed body.
Elise stood there, eying the two girls before shrugging and saying, “Well, I’m going to go practice now. No use in wasting the day, especially since you four are probably not going to be able to get any progress on your plans,” she walked over to the golden elevator, and left the two combined girls standing in the lobby, looking at each other.
~~~
Annette’s Room
“Does it hurt?” Sann asked. The two (really four) girls had gone up to Annette’s room to continue to explore their bodies, after a brief visit to the twin’s bedroom to pick out some clothes, Sann borrowing some of Sinopia’s clothes, since their new height was closer to her than to either of the girls they had originated from. Rocky had originally freaked out upon the intrusion of two mysterious girls, but after he realized that Sann looked and smelled suspiciously like Annette, he quickly caught on.
“…What?” Mayopia looked up from where she had been holding all four hands in a circle pattern, trying to focus on casting any form of magic, but finding that with the combination of Sinopia’s limited magic reserves and Maya’s already magic resistant DNA, they weren’t having much luck casting anything.
“Does it hurt having three eyes?” Sann clarified.
“…It’s a little too much… but we can handle it,” Mayopia slowly crossed her arms around her body, a pair in between her pairs breasts and a set below it.
“As long as you don’t feel any worse off. You’ll tell me if you start feeling sick, okay?”
“…Okay, moms!” Mayopia grinned, their banter seeming familiar despite the fact that they were essentially two completely different people. Mayopia stayed quiet for a while before asking, “…What do you think will happen when we split up again?.. Will we just disappear forever?”
“We’re not certain,” Sann said, laying back on the green grass of Rocky’s enclosure, “We’re pretty sure a small part of our memories will be split between each of us, but we’ll probably just think it was closer to a shared dream than anything concrete. After all, two brains are sort of nebulously taking up the spot of one right now.”
“…But do you think there’s the chance of… one of us remembering the memories of the other?”
“Like if Maya and Annette were to remember what Sable and Sinopia have lived through?” Sann asked.
“…We think that’s what we meant.”
“Well, We don’t think so,” Sann said, “Do you remember Bennifer?”
“…No.”
“He was apparently a friend of ours at Annette’s school,” Sann explained, “They were a couple, Ben and Jennifer, who merged half way through sophomore year because they thought they were soulmates. When they broke up during winter break Senior Year, they didn’t remember what the other was thinking nor much of anything they had learned as Bennifer. They both had to retake senior year because of it, and we couldn’t really be friends with either, since they weren’t the same person anymore, quite literally.”
“…So… If nothing that we do will be remembered… What’s the point in even doing anything?”
“We’re not sure,” Sann shrugged, standing up, “but don’t you think that’s rather liberating?”
“…What do you mean?” Mayopia sat up, looking up at her half-sister.
“Well, if there’s no reason to worry about consequences, don’t you think we should choose to at least make this dream an enjoyable one? We should go out into town and explore!”
Mayopia stood up, a look of inner conflict on her face, until one side clearly one out slowly saying, “…We never signed a contract… We’re new people after all!”
“Wonderful to hear you’re seeing things slightly clearly 'sister',” Sann grinned.
~~~
Out on the Town
The girls changed into some more appropriate clothing for what they planned to do for the day, choosing to wear some dresses of Sinopia that would be appropriate for any occasion, whether mundane or exciting, and taking out some of the emergency stash of money Sable had hidden away from the production team.
They first stopped by a small french cafe a couple of blocks away from the hotel. The two girls electing to sit near the large windows of the cafe so that they could watch the city move while they waited for their coffee. Despite the fact that all four of the girls had enjoyed coffee before, the new sensations of their mixed taste buds meant that they got to enjoy the nice, creamy flavor of their lattes for the first time again.
After indulging in a few macaroons, the girls moved on from the Parisian getaway to checkout some of the free things to do in this tourist trap outside of Las Vegas. There wasn’t much, but thankfully there was a miniature golf course, and the girls got to play a relaxing eighteen holes, Mayopia managing to edge out a win by about six strokes.
By the time they had completed a lap around the city, it was already getting dark, and the girls knew exactly how they had wanted to end their night of debauchery, by checking out the nightclub scene. Of course, as a town outside of Las Vegas, there was plenty of options to choose from, and on the third attempt, they finally found a magic club with a bouncer who was willing to let them in despite the lack of ID, warning them, “Just don’t be drinking anything, or else I’ll have to come in and kick you two out.”
The dance club was absolutely packed with regular and transformed alike, seeing as how it was a magic club. Their weird looks didn’t even manage to pull a passing glance, as everyone’s attention seemed to be drawn to a man with eight legs and a man with tentacle limbs were busy having a dance battle in the middle of the floor. The girls made their way towards the bar, where the neon sign showed the club’s name with pride: ‘Salamangka’s’. The two girls stood at a cocktail table, hoping that they could attract someone to buy them something.
Luckily, they didn’t have to wait very long, as a man with two heads approached them, a smile on both of his heads, “What’s a couple of girls like you doing in a place like this without any drinks?” He asked with the head on his right.
“My sister and we- Oops, sorry, I,” Sann chuckled, “Left our ID’s at home. They’ll kick us out if we tried to order something.”
“Well, let my brother and I,” he gestured to his second head, who gave them a wink, “Go ahead and buy you something then!”
As the guy left, Mayopia turned towards Sann, whispering, “…He seemed cute.”
“Yeah, but we’re not budging unless we know you and us are getting some action tonight.”
The guy returned, cradling one of his two heads under each arm, his mouth slightly leaking as he said, “Drink up girls! The Guillotine special, on me!” When he placed his heads down on the table, the girls noticed that the tops of his heads were cut open, his empty head being used as the drink container.
After having taken a couple of sips (Mayopia having completely finished her drink, while Sann had only pretended to drink some, looking out for her half-sister in the case that this guy had less than honorable intentions), Sann asked, “So then…”
“Gary!” Gary said from his now empty head.
“We were wondering,” her eyes had a sense of lust to them, “Is your second head natural?”
“Oh yeah!” Gary grinned, “Had a professional clone me back in College so I could do sports and study at the same time. Never really bothered to undo it.”
“So… What you’re saying is that you’ve got a second body back home?” Sann asked.
“Yeah. I tend to just leave it in bed when it’s not being used,” Gary said.
Sann looked towards Mayopia, who nodded, leading to Sann to propose, “How soon could you get your second body over here?’
~~~
Back at the Hotel
Many drinks were passed around between the three (really seven if you were to count the individual bodies that composed the group), until Sann felt like Gary was drunk enough that he would not remember them leading him back to the Weiss hotel. It was pretty obvious from the things they were saying to each other, what exactly was on all of their minds.
Unfortunately, things were not meant to be, because standing in the lobby, looking like his head was about to shoot off of his body, was Howard Weiss. “Annette! Maya! Sinopia! Sable! Where have you been for the last- Who in the world is this?!” Howard’s scolding switching topic mid-sentence. “Get him out of here!”
“Woah man, chill out,” Gary said from one of his heads. “Are you their father?” He asked from the other.
“No! I’m only one of the most powerful magician’s in the world, and if you’re not out of here in the next ten seconds, then I’m certain that’s a fact you won’t soon forget,” Howard walked up to the Garys, towering over him. They stared at each other for a while, before Howard grabbed each of them by a shoulder and started pushing him towards the door.
“Alright man! Chill!” Gary said, his other body making a 'call me' gesture as he was escorted off the premises.
“And as for you four!” Howard turned around, “What in the world were you thinking? Leaving the hotel to go boy-hunting! Do you realize what could have happened to you out there? You don’t have any ID! You could have gone to jail! You could have been kidnapped, or worse, killed! You didn’t even know that man, and felt it acceptable to bring him back here!”
“…We’re sorry,” Mayopia squeaked like a mouse.
“And what about you!” Howard asked specifically towards Sann, “She’s clearly not in her right headspace, and you chose to take advantage of that! You could have permanently hurt her and not even realize it! Don’t you-
“SHUT UP DAD! I HATE YOU!” Sann screamed, tears coming out as she ran past Howard managing to slip into the elevator doors.
“D-Dad?” Howard was sincerely perplexed by the combined girls outburst. “Dad?” He looked around at the production team, and then at Mayopia, who clearly wasn’t in any mood to be able to answer any questions. “Dad?”
With his entire mojo thrown off, Howard didn’t have the energy anymore to lecture Mayopia, telling her to return specifically to Maya’s bedroom, and to not come out until after they’ve reverted back to Maya and Sinopia, worried that Sann might convince her to do something drastic again if they interacted.
He turned towards the camera, addressing the audience at home, “Ladies and gentlemen. I’ll be uncertain of what footage you’ve seen here tonight until after the production team has completed editing it, but I would like to be clear that I had no control over the events that had unfolded. I will be speaking to the members of the production team who allowed this to happen in private, and you may all be rest assured, that this lapse in judgement on their part, will not happen again. I wish you all a good evening and pleasant dreams.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
& Question Corner &
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To Maya: “Seeing your eye pop was mildly terrifying, like the incredible effects they did for Raiders of the Lost Ark. But I'm impressed with how long you lasted, even with your nonhuman magic resistance: it's not easy to maintain form in such extreme circumstances.” -@@WanderTones
Myopia: Um… The Maya part of me wishes to say thank you for the compliment… I think. I’m still not that good at really differentiating between who each thought belongs to… I think that Monoeyes might also have some resistance to heat?.. But I’m not sure if that’s accurate information, or a misconception from the Sinopia part of my mind…
To Elise: “You did yoga? I admit, I mostly skipped out on yoga and went straight for contortion training, but I've dabbled and have had experience training with a yogini, so I know how much you can develop body control and physical endurance with it. Do you still practice, or if not, when did you stop? And what asanas have you found most worthwhile?” -@@WanderTones
Yep! My mom was mainly more into it than I was, but she would bring me along anyways because she wanted to have an activity that just the two of us could do without my dad or brothers bugging us. It was a lot of fun!
Mom and I still try to make a habit of going once a month, since it feels so good! But the problem is that all of the hot yoga places nearby are so expensive, and my mom absolutely hates the idea of having her daughter pay for it (even though I’ve told her multiple times that it would be perfectly fine, and that I make enough off of YouTube to treat her).
As for my personal preference for asanas, I find that a mix of some of the easier ones and some of the mid-range ones works out pretty well. You know, like mixing in some Sun Salutations with Warrior Poses, before moving on to some of the mid-range stuff like a Malasana, or Camel Pose, or the Half-Moon Pose. My Mom’s a lot better at the high range stuff though, like she’s able to do a Makisikanagasana (or grasshopper pose).
To Maya: “You okay in that bottle? Is it too tight?” -@@quad2
Myopia: The bottles were just fine… Since we were liquid, we didn’t really feel like we were stuck… It was also rather difficult to think, but less like it is now, more like because our brains were spread out around our bodies… And sort of getting scrambled whenever we moved.
To Elise: “If you need a cheaper place when your discount is gone, I got a place in mind. PS. it's my head shop. We got a head spa for you... Tee hee. No offense to Guillermo.” -Rei
Elise: Oh, I’m certain your head spa is lovely! I just hope that you have a location open near wherever I end up!