A Duo Of Transformational Tales
By ThatGuy

Not The Brightest Bulb

"I really don't think this is a good idea," Chandni said for what seemed like the tenth time.

To her irritation, her friend didn't take her repeated shows of anxiety very seriously. In fact, she didn't seem to notice them at all.

"Oh come on, it's almost like you don't trust me."

"Well…"

Another day, another harebrained scheme involving Jenny and her temperamental-at-best magic. Chandni just knew when Jenny approached her at lunch that afternoon that the day was going to go south. Hearing the plan was just confirming what she already knew. Why did she have to have a best friend who was a witch? Why? It's not exactly that she didn't trust her, it's that she's pretty irresponsible with her magic and well… yeah. She didn't trust her.

"Oh, you're killing me here Chandni!" Jenny pouted, "when have my plans ever not worked out well."

"Do you want a list?" Chandni said exasperatedly.

"Oh, whatever. Just minor mess-ups, this one will go perfectly."

Chandni groaned for what also felt like the tenth time. "If you're so sure it's perfect, why does it have to be me? Can't I just supervise this time?"

"Don't be nervous, Chands! This is simple. You know Marisa Gold is planning something – she's been whispering about it with her so-called friends all week-"

Marisa Gold was Chandni and Jenny's personal archenemy. The girl hated them and seemed to dedicate her life to making their lives a living hell. It started when they were kids with teasing and bullying, and as they matured it turned into complex schemes and never-ending cold-hearted one-upsmanship. To tell the truth Chandni hated Marisa just as much as Jenny did, but she was as always a little apprehensive about using magic to deal with her. At least, using magic on themselves to deal with her.

"Look, I want to get back at Marisa just like you, but why not just turn her into a frog again or something?"

Jenny goggled at her as if this was the craziest idea anyone had ever had. "Are you kidding? If I use my powers for revenge again mom's gonna turn me into a scarecrow and send me to my Aunt Beulah's farm!" Chandni cringed – she knew from experience that thanks to all the magic around her Aunt's farm the crows were a little more… aggressive than usual.

"So this is better, is it?"

Jenny ignored her again. "So we'll be subtle. We need to know is what Marisa's plan is, right? So all we need to do is find a way to spy on her. Simple!"

"You want to turn me into a lamp!"

"I know, isn't it genius? Her mother loves tacky looking stuff, right? So I'll just turn you into a goofy looking lamp, make sure she gets it, and a-ha! Instant spy."

Chandni crossed her arms and scowled, mostly at being called "tacky." Years of knowing Jenny had dulled her to her totally careless plans. Mostly. "If it's such a simple plan, why don't you do it?"

"Duh! If I get turned into a lamp who's gonna turn me back? My mom can't find out about this, remember?"

"Right…"

"So will you do it? Please? Please?" The girl gave the most pathetic puppy dog eyes she and her magic could muster.

Chandni rolled her eyes. "Ugh… fine! I can't believe I'm saying this, but whatever. This had better work. And you owe me. I mean it."

"Awesome!" Jenny beamed. "I swear, I'll conjure you up a million dollars once I figure out how."

"I can hardly wait," Chandni deadpanned. She just knew she was going to regret this…

Jenny walked up and started moving her friend into position, with her legs and arms packed close together. After some thought, the pulled Chandni's right arm out at a 90 degree angle, stood back and studied her pose, and then put it back down. Chandni sighed again. "Alright. I need you to stand up straight like that, and stay completely still, ok?"

"Yeah…"

"Alright, here goes." Jenny grinned and closed her eyes in order to remember the spell. With a few hand waves and a few muttered words, she flung a wave of magical will at her friend.

The effect was very quick – Chandni immediately shuddered as if shocked, but did not, or perhaps could not move. They both looked down to see her feet fusing together and flattening somewhat, becoming a base while her tan skin turned into a chrome-ish color. The color spread up her ankles, then her thighs, as her legs fused together as well. Her arms melded into her chest and waist, and as everything fused they also started to shrink – it kind of looked like the girl was going through an invisible tube as her legs molded into a long but thin metal cylinder.

The same thing happened to her waist  – she let out a slight gasp as her stomach contracted. Meanwhile, her hips rounded out into a metal ball, with the same thing happening to her busom. Finally, her face and head grew into a third ball – this one with a transparent shell covering a lightbulb on the inside, as her long braided hair shrunk into a long pull-switch.

Jenny did a little more tweaking so that the three balls were the exact same size and the same distance apart, then admired her handiwork. "Yep, definitely tacky. That's got to be the gaudiest looking lamp I've ever seen." She grinned. "You'll be perfect!"

Jenny almost squealed in delight as she grabbed her transformed friend and ran out of the bedroom door. Were said friend able to talk at the moment, she would have said how much she doubted the plan would work at all. At the very least, the way she saw it there was no way Marisa's mother would take the bait and take her home with her.

"Marisa, you simply must see what I brought home with me!"

Marisa Gold gave an aggravated sigh and dragged herself into the foyer to see whatever piece of junk her mother was dragging into the house today. She could swear the world existed to interrupt and agitate her, and this was no exception. She wasn't surprised by what she saw, but she was sure as hell disappointed – there in her mother's hands was one of the goofiest looking pieces of furniture she had ever seen.

"Mother, I swear you always buy the stupidest things," Marisa scoffed. It was an odd standing lamp with three balls arranged vertically – it looked like someone's poor attempt at modern art. "Can't you ever buy something with some use?"

"I'll have you know the girl who sold this to me said it was one of a kind!" her mother huffed. She should've expected Marisa to be as abrasive as usual.

Marisa sneered. "Probably because after it was made whoever made it realized they should quit and start drinking instead."

She turned and walked back towards the living room, where she was having a meeting with her friends. Her mother called to her back as she struggled to get through the hallway with the lamp. "If you don't mind, dear, I think I'll put it up in the living room."

Marisa let out an extremely aggravated sigh. "Argh! Fine. Just don't bother us, okay?"

When they returned to the room her two friends – well, they were more like followers… maybe lackeys, Marisa wasn't sure what to call them – whatever they were they were sitting on the couch waiting impatiently for her to get back. Marisa took a seat on the comfy chair.

"Sorry about that, girls. You know my mom."  She rolled her eyes, confident that her mother, who was busy trying to plug the lamp in. "Anyways, about that total idiot Jennifer Chantez. She thinks she's so smart, with her good grades and her so-called magic, but I've got her number."

"You do? That sounds, like, so awesome. What are we gonna do?"

"Yeah?"

See? Just like lackeys, or followers, or something like that. "We're gonna knock that witch right off her high horse, her and that clod Chandni. I've got the perfect plan to get back at both of them."

"Really?"

"Yeah?"

"Here's what we're gonna do…"

Just before Marisa could tell her evil plan, the room filled up with light – well, more light than before – as he mother turned on the lamp. There was a flash and then darkness as the power surged and the bulb immediately blew out.

"Oopsie!" Marisa's mother said, "I always forget this outlet is a little wonky. I guess the power's out for the whole room…"

"Ugh, can't you do anything right?" Marisa shouted in a towering rage. A second later she sighed with aggravation. "Fine! I'll go get another light bulb and toggle with the fuse box again…"

The next night, when everyone was asleep, even the mice, nobody in the Gold household noticed the veiled figure sneaking into their abode. Mrs. Gold may have noticed her as the girl who sold her the new lamp, while Marisa may have recognized her long-time nemesis, for it was Jenny Chantez who slipped into the kitchen window. With the kind of catlike tread only magic and/or a lifetime of ballet can give you, Jenny crept into the living room, grabbed her transformed friend, and hurried out of the house without waking a soul. She even remembered not to bang the lamp on any of the walls, though she had a close call with the ceiling.

As soon as she left, Jenny rushed back to her own house and, again making sure not to wake anyone, pulled the lamp into her room.

"Perfect!" she said, once she got the lamp stood up right. "Everything went off without a hitch! Now, all I have to do is change you back…"

And so she did – with the quietest spell she had ever done she turned her friend back to flesh and blood. Once Chandni had her legs back she teetered back and forth – at first Jenny thought she was losing her balance, but when the rest of her body returned it appeared the was maybe doing it on purpose. Which was odd, as it wasn't like Chandni to goof around like that, but Jenny didn't notice.

"Chandni!" Jenny beamed. Chandni turned and smiled goofily at her – she had an odd dreamy expression on her face that Jenny wasn't quite used to, something between confused, excited, and distracted with a pinch of vapid in there somewhere.

"Hello!" her friend said cheerfully. She gave Jenny a highly spirited wave.

"Er… yeah… hi," Jenny raised an eyebrow, but figured her friend must be happy to be herself again. "So, I'll bet you're glad to be back, huh?"

"Yeah… it's nice isn't it?" Chandni walked absently around the room, not looking at anything in particular and humming and swaying to herself.

This was definitely strange behavior for Chandni. "Are you ok?" Jenny asked.

"Mmhmm…" the girl said in a faraway tone. She fell back onto Jenny's bed and tried to hug it behind her back. "Ooh… soft…"

"Riiight…" Jenny made a mental note to bring up her friend's sudden loopiness later. "So, how did it go?"

Chandni sat up so sharply that Jenny flinched, but didn't look particularly alert. "What?" she said confusedly.

"You know, what did you find out?"

"About what?" Chandni cocked her head to the side innocently.

Jenny smacked her hand to her face. "About what? About Marisa of course! You  know, the whole reason you were sitting in that house as a lamp all day?"

"Oh, yes!" Chandni's eye's lit up. Jenny sighed – they were finally getting somewhere. Chandni put her finger to her lips as she thought back. "That was really fun! Let's see, first that lady took me into this nice big house. Then, they put me in the corner – Marisa and couple other girls were having some kind of talk, but they weren't very nice… then Mrs. Gold turned me on and my light went out, so the I sat there for a while while they-"

Jenny's face fell. "Wait… did you say your light went out?"

Chandni smiled even more cheerfully than before. "Yeah. First, it was like a whole bunch of electricity ran through me, then poof! Zap! Sizzle! Ffft! Hehe," Chandni giggled for a little bit, while Jenny looked horrorstruck. "Anyway, then everything went buzzy for a while as they went to go get me a new light. Funny huh?"

Jenny didn't find it very funny. In fact, her heart was quickly plummeting into her stomach. Sure, when someone is broken as an inanimate object, magic can (usually) fix them, but to have something replaced? Every bit of Chandni's being became something else while she was a lamp – the bulb was like her head, and switching the burnt out bulb for another would be like taking out her brain and replacing it with a blank slate…

"Chads…" Jenny said shakily, "this is going to sound weird, but… do you know who I am?"

"Sure?" Chandni said with cheerful confusion. "You're Jenny! Or is it Gemma? No, Jenny's right. You're my buddy! Best buds forever! Hehe!" At that, Chandni jumped up and gave Jenny an exuberantly enormous hug of the bone crushing variety.

Jenny only laughed with extreme nervousness. "Ok… the good news is she's still got her memory. That bad news is…" Jenny glanced down at her friend, who had detached from her waist and collapsed again onto her bed, staring with that goofy grin at the ceiling. "… her brain's totally empty. The lights are on, but nobody's home. No pun intended."

"Home… that's a funny word," came the musings from the bed. "Huh-Ohm. Hoh-muh. Homer! D'oh! Heh!"

"D'oh is right! Oh, what have I done, I don't know how to fix this! None of my spellbooks say anything about this sort of thing, I'll have to…" If her heart hadn't hit her stomach yet, it definitely did at that point. And both of them fell further down to settle somewhere in her lower intestine. "I'll have to ask my mother… I'll have to tell her about all of this…"

"Yaaaay, you're doomed! That's a funny word too."

As Chandni laid on her bed picking apart the worked "doom" in as many ominous ways as possible, Jenny considered maybe forgetting this whole thing ever happened and not telling anyone. But she was too good a person to put her own well being over her friend's mental health – this was her fault, she knew she had to take the consequences and find a way to get Chandni back to normal no matter what. Unfortunately.

"Oh, forget being a scarecrow… my mom's gonna turn me into Aunt Beulah's new outhouse for this…"



Surf And Shade

Cindy Brooks stormed up the sandy shore, ranting all the way about the injustices of the local surfing league and promising to no one in particular how she would surely smash the competition if they just allowed her to compete. Honestly, you cause one enormous disaster a few years back and the whole beach turns on you just like that. It surely wasn't fair.

Competing in this year's surfing competition was her dream – well, one of them anyway, and being barred from it really put a damper on her day. She had no idea how she was going to get over this one…

"Oh hey! Is that Delilah? Awesome!"

Cindy's eagle eye, not the least bit unhindered by her ranting rage, spotted one of her friends basking in the sun in a black bikini, calmly reading a book – though honestly Delilah's pale skin and offbeat goth-esque style made her stand out just a little bit. So far Cindy didn't know any other brunettes with purple streaks in their hair.

"Hey, Del! What's up?" Delilah looked up from her book as Cindy approached and gave her friend a very flat look.

"Let me guess. They didn't let you compete again?"

"Yeah! How'd you guess."

"They never let you in," she said wryly. "It's called an 'educated guess.'"

"Well, it sucks! Honestly, you cause one disaster and-"

"-and the whole beach turns on you just like that." Delilah rolled her eyes. "As you always remind us. Didn't you destroy the whole beachfront?"

Cindy went red and bit her lip. "Kind of… only a little… how was I supposed to know that wave would take me into the lifeguard's tower like that?"

"I dunno… foresight, maybe? Common sense?"

"Whatever. That's still no reason to bar me this time. It's been how many years?"

"One," Delilah smirked, "It's been one year."

"Whatever. I've gotten better, no way that'll happen again, but noooo… they probably thought I was just some dumb blonde who would fall over on her face again. Jerks."

Delilah made her face perfectly straight and resisted the urge to smirk again. She could certainly see why some people would think her friend was all body and no brains, thanks to both her stacked figure and the fact that she often acted like a ditz. It didn't help that in this situation Cindy totally brought this on herself – but she wasn't about to say that, of course.

"Yeah, they're jerks all right," she said.

"Yeah…" Cindy crossed her arms and didn't say anything for a long while, so Delilah figured that was the end of the conversation. She had just gotten back into her book when Cindy's eye's lit up and she shook Delilah's shoulders. "That's it! I've got a great idea!"

Delilah rolled her eyes again and tossed her book over her shoulder. She obviously wasn't getting back to it in a while. "What?"

"You! You could use like a spell or something to help me get in!"

Delilah raised an eyebrow. "Are you assuming I'm a witch just because of my style? That's a terrible stereotype."

"No, I'm 'assuming' you're a witch because I've seen you use magic like a dozen times. I see you trying to sneak out of helping me already, don't think I don't."

"Ok, fine," Delilah sighed. The things she did for her friends. "What do you want me to do, again?"

"Use your magic – put a spell over the tourney board so they'll put me in or something."

"You mean help you cheat your way in? I'm not doing that. You do know if you get in someone who deserves it has to be kicked out, don't you?"

"Oh, come on! You're a witch! And a cynic! Since when do you care about ethics?"

Delilah gave her a flat but forbidding glare. "I'm not helping you cheat. End of story."

"Fine… sorry I brought it up." Cindy visibly deflated, looking so much like a wounded puppy that Delilah couldn't help but sigh again.

"Ok, I may have an idea," Delilah started, sounding resigned and warning at the same time. "But you'll have to keep an open mind."

Cindy brightened again. "Totally! My mind is totally open! Whatcha got!"

"Well, your sister's in the tournament, right?"

"Don't remind me…" Cindy frowned. "Guess they don't think she's such a klutz, huh?"

"Yeah, sure. Does she have a board?"

"No, she's going to borrow mine. How's that for irony. My board gets in, but I don't."

"Maybe you can," Delilah smirked, "What if I told you I can turn you a form that can enter the competition?"

"Like one of the other competitors?"

"Like a surfboard. Your sister's surfboard." Cindy gaped at her. Delilah winced internally – it was a pretty odd idea, after all, and most people would totally reject it – but much to her relief Cindy's eyes lit up again.

"That's… that's brilliant! That way I can compete… sort of… at least, I could be there! Awesome!" She was beaming ear to ear now. "Let's do it! Can you do it before my sister finds out?"

"Or, more wisely, we can just ask her," Delilah said flatly as she gestured over Cindy's shoulder. "She's right over there."

Cindy groaned as she turned to see her sister Ashley walking over, presumably either to comfort her about not getting into the tournament or ask her for her surfboard – probably both. She stopped short as she saw Cindy giving her an enormous, slightly creepy grin, with Delilah off to the side sporting a faint smirk  (which in it's own way was a little unnerving as well).

"Uh… wh-what's going on, guys?"

"Delilah's gonna to turn me into your surfboard so I can be in the competition," Cindy beamed. Ashley gaped.

"That…" she started warily, but mulling over the idea didn't make it any less shocking, "that… I'll be honest, that sounds like a terrible idea. Have you thought about this, what if you never get changed back?"

"Come on!" Cindy scoffed. "This is Del we're talking about. Would she do a thing like that?"

Delilah lifted a finger to helpfully chime in. "Who would?" She, of course, felt resorting to this was a little nuts as well but hey, at least nobody could say she wasn't kind.

"Well… yeah…" Ashley said slowly, clearly at a loss for words for all the myriad of reasons why she didn't like the idea. "but I mean… you wouldn't be in the race, you'd just be… it would all… I mean… it'd be so awkward!"

"Please sis." Cindy clashed her hands together and turned on her best puppy dog eyes, the perfect pleading look. "This is my only chance to be a part of the competition. Please, just do me this one favor – I'll owe you big time, I swear."

Ashley winced at the almost hypnotically pathetic look on her sisters' face and instead turned to Delilah. "You'd be fine with doing this?"

"Yeah, sure. Whatever gets you guys out of my hair and me back to my reading," Delilah snarked. On the other hand, her face was quite straight, which the two sisters knew was the closest she ever got to a genuine smile. "Seriously, though. It's perfectly safe. Just come back to me after the tournament and I'll put her back to her normal irritating self."

"See?" Cindy continued to plead as convincingly as possible. "Please, please, pleeaase?"

Ashley sighed. "Ok… fine."

"Awesome! Zap me!"

"Yeah, sure." Delilah drawled disinterestedly. "Put your feet together and your hands up like this," she said, instructing Cindy to put her hands above her head, which she did without delay. After making sure her pose was just right Delilah concentrated and murmured a few words under her breath, and her hand started to glow.

"You don't really need to pose like that," Delilah explained as she reached out and touched Cindy on the arm. "But it does make it go faster." Cindy shuddered as though shocked, and almost immediately began to change. Altogether, her whole body began to meld into itself and flatten out, resulting in a rounded, pointed ellipse – a surfboard shape, to be precise.

Her body smoothed out into a less curvy, more uniform shape, with her arms making the head and her feet making the back, and through it all the kept on giggling, until she was completely an object. A pretty well made surfboard with the image of a cartoonish woman's body in front, with Cindy's winking face.

Delilah wisely grabbed the Cindy-surfboard before she fell over and handed her to Ashley. "There you go. Even if you totally wipe out, she should be fine. Just make sure she doesn't get lost at sea or anything."

Ashley just stared at the sister-board in her hands, still in surprise. "So… this will work?"

"Absolutely. Now get on with the tournament – the sooner you win or lose, the sooner I can turn her back and we can all stop caring about this. Good luck."

"Yeah… see ya. Thanks Del."

"Don't mention it." Delilah watched the two of them walk off – well, Ashley was the only one doing any walking – with a smirk on her face. "Ah, Cindy… that girl's gonna get herself in trouble one of these days," she mused fondly, "why do I have such crazy friends?"

She shrugged it off and filed it away to think about never, and was about to sit down when she felt a sharp shock on her behind. Instantly furious, she whirled around in a fiery rage ready to put the hurt on some unlucky idiot.

"Hey! Watch it pal, you don't know who you're dealing w- huh?" Rather than the lewd moron she was expecting, she found herself faced with a rather adorable looking little girl.

"I'm real sorry, miss lady person… but my Grandpa needs shade."

"Er… what?" she raised an eyebrow, when suddenly she felt herself teetering over. "Huh?" She threw her arms out to try to regain balance, and looked down. Her eyes widened: her feet were gone! It looked like everything just below her ankles had fused together in a thin stick, and it was moving fast up her legs.

"Huh? W-what's going on?" She tried to move her feet, which only made her teeter more. The waved her arms around again, only to notice that they were getting a lot wider – in fact, they were making a circle around her head. At this point, her whole body was changing rapidly, and she could do nothing to stop it.

"W-wait, stop!" she shouted. Pretty much all of her except her arms was merging into a white plastic pole, and sinking fast. "Don't mmmph… MMMMPH! MMM-" She was cut off as her head melded into the pole as well, leaving her almost totally. Her body fell to the sand, resting on the canopy her arms became.

"Alright!" the little girl said, "Grandpa's gonna like this!" She picked up the ex-girl - now a very large black umbrella, with a purple swirl on the top – and carried it off to her family who was quite a ways down the shore, blissfully ignoring how the pole seemed to jerk every once in a while. After a minute or so of walking she presented to the shade to an old man sitting in a chair (who had been until a few seconds ago had been trying to shield himself from the sun using only his fingers) "Grandpa, I got one!"

"Hey!" He took the umbrella and looked it over some. "This isn't half bad? In fact, this is pretty good!" He stood up the shade over his chair, and the two of them laid back in the large shadow it made.

"Where'd you get it?" Her father said from under his own shade. "You couldn't have bought it…"

"No, I didn't," the girl said honestly.

"Did you borrow it from someone?" "No."

"You didn't steal it did you?" The girl took a second to respond, but again answered with a small but what-she-figured-was-honest "no."

"I found it."

"Well," the old man laughed, "this is a great find. And if it doesn't belong to anyone, well I suppose it's no problem for us to take it home with us. Great find there, sport!"

The little girl beamed. For a moment, grandfather thought he heard what sounded like a faint whimper come from the umbrella and maybe saw it shake a little on it's own, but by the time he checked again it was over, and all signs of motion were gone.

He shrugged it off and laid back again. Man, this was a good umbrella – maybe he would take it to the surfing contest later…