"Whoa," the obese young man trudges to a stop as the nervous girl creeps forward from the entrance on the other side of the hall. He watches her eyes dart back and forth before falling on him and stopping there.

A huge smile fills her face as she rushes over to him. "Oh Chadwick, I'm so happy to see you."

Chad, as most people call him, tries to look at her excited face, but his attention keeps getting drawn to her slim body. Reigning in his thoughts, he stutters out a response, "Uh, yeah, Teri. You too." The held back thoughts burst forth like a crack in a dam. He tries to stymie the flow and manages, "You look great."

She blushes a little. "Thank you. I managed to trim up over the vacation." Then looking around nervous again, she confides, "I'm afraid that people will start looking at me or treating me different." Her eyes return to his, "But we're still cool, right?"

Her pleading eyes bore into him. Why would I treat her any different? We've been gaming buds and hang out friends forever. "Yeah, we're good." Then as a joke to ease her mind he adds, "Just so long as you tell me you workout secret."

They both laugh at that. Chad knowing that she won't tell him, and he only wants to know a little. The bell rings to send them to class. Before they separate, she asks him, "Wanna hang out at my place? I'm stuck on a game and could use an extra pair of eyes."

"Sure. See you after school." They part and attend classes. Afterwards, they walk home, shoulder to shoulder talking about the latest games and where they are at in each.

Before long, they are at her house and studying at the dining room table. Both of their parents had instilled in them, the need to get the work done before the play. During their study time, they do get interrupted from time to time. The first is a grown version of Teri. "Hi, Mrs. Berry."

She smiles as she looks at him, "Good afternoon, Chad. Will you be staying for dinner?"

"No. Mom wants me home for dinner for once," he smirks at the thought.

She chuckles, "Be sure to tell her how good her food is."

"Of course." With that out of the way and seeing them working like usual, she continues on her way to wherever she was going. Not long after, Teri's older sister enters and checks on them with a grunt. On her way to the kitchen, Chad greets her, "Hey Kerry."

Hair in a pony tail and shuffling past in her lab coat, she doesn't even look at him as she growls, "Hungry. Need food." She finishes her journey, leaving them behind.

Chad turns to Teri, "Big project?"

"Oh yeah, she's working on her final, and it's huge. If I had to guess, she probably hasn't eaten in 48 hours."

Chad has seen this before, so nothing more needs to be said. They dive back in. Helping each other, it is done in no time, and they move to lounging and playing the games they talked about before.

Chad spots what she missed, and soon they are both working on finishing the game. They don't quite make it before dusk and he has to walk home. "I'll see you online."

"Yeah, see you there," she answers as she closes the door on him. Chad knows that she is probably rushing to her room and logging in to their favorite MMORPG. I should hurry home so she doesn't get too far ahead of me. He hustles home a block or two away, stopping frequently to catch his breath.

Over the next couple of weeks, things do change, and Teri does get noticed. Chad notices the cheerleaders talking her up, and Teri sliding away from their company. Also, he sees boys starting to approach and surround her in the halls.

It all comes to a head, one day, when she grabs him and pulls him into a closet. Panicked, she burst on him, "You gotta protect me, Chad. I can't get away from them." She shakes him a little by tugging on the two fistfuls of his shirt that she has in an attempt to tell him of her fear. "If you walk me from class to class and promise to stay near me, I'll give you the secret to my weight loss."

"I'll try, but we don't have any classes together." Chad sees the concern in her eyes, "What about Liz?"

"Liz?"

"Yeah, Liz. You know, we've known her since 3rd grade, she sometimes hangs out with us and games with us?" She nods trying to remember. He continues, "You said she was in some of your classes."

"Oh! Her. Yeah, she's kinda cool." Realization coming to her eyes.

"Right," he continues his case, "I'll be there as often as I can, but you should check with her to see if she'll be backup."

"Okay," Teri starts to warm up to the idea. Then she turns on him, "But you'll be there as often as you can?"

"I will," he agrees. The following weeks are much smoother. With Chad at her side, fewer people approach her. He figures the same is true when she is with Liz. Teri confirms this.

One day, she presents him with a Q-tip, "Could you swab your mouth with this?" With her help, he does what she asked. She places it in a sandwich bag and into her backpack. In the weeks that follow, she has more odd requests, like taking the tissue from his bloody nose.

"Why are you doing these things," he asks Teri.

She throws a hand in the air like it's no big deal. "Don't worry about it. Kerry did the same thing to me when she was getting ready for my weight loss program."

Reminded again of her Spring Vacation transformation, he does a quick once over of her no longer pudgy, overweight body. While not toned or muscular, she certainly doesn't have any fat on her.

As graduation approaches, students’ minds get distracted by finals and vacation, so Teri gets bothered less and less.

Chad, too, gets distracted with the end of the year. It's only when there is a week left that Teri breaks him out of it, "Hey Chad, my family is going on a month long vacation as soon as school gets out. Get permission from your parents to come with us."

That night, he tells his mom who calls over to their house, "Hey, Sharie? Chad, here says he's invited to a month long vacation with you guys. Are you sure you guys can handle him that long?" His mom laughs with Teri's mom, and they talk some more over the details. When she is done, she turns to him, "Get ready for a long trip with your friend. We'll miss you. You'd better start packing. A month is a long time."

Chad heads to his room and after homework, he tosses in some of his clothes into a suitcase. Each day for the rest of the week, he adds more until it is over-full. His large belly and flabby legs and swollen body easily close the baggage enough for him to zip it closed.

After school lets out for vacation, he gathers his stuff and heads over to Teri's house. As expected, the whole Berry family is waiting for him when he opens the door.

Duncan Berry, the dad, gives Chad a sock in the arm before grabbing the suitcase and taking it into the living room, "This'll be here when you get back." What? Isn't he going to put it in the car? This is not what he expected to hear.

Teri's mom heads for the kitchen, "Chad, honey, do you want a bite to eat before you go?" Before I go? Isn't this a family vacation? Uncertain, he looks to the last two standing there. Kerry, he now notices, is in her lab coat practically drooling with excitement while looking at him. On the other hand, Teri is smiling at him with her hands folded in front of him.

He decides to go with the more sane looking one, "Should I, Teri?"

She shrugs, "Either way. But you won't be eating her cooking for a while."

Again, he is given a response, that makes no sense. Won't be eating on a vacation? What's going on? He calls after their mother, "Sure, Mrs. Berry."

"Call me Sharie, dear. You are practically part of the family already." That does make sense.

The older sister starts to dart at him, but is restrained by an outstretched arm of her younger sister, "Hold on, Kerry."

Then she turns and looks him in the eye. "Chad. We aren't going on vacation. That was an excuse for Kerry to have enough time to test one of her experimental pills on you."

This was not what Chad was expecting. Not at all. What did this mean? His mind fills with questions, none of which have answers.

He gets shaken a little and his eyes focus and see Teri looking up at him nervous. "You with me, Chadwick?"

"Yes." He corrects himself. "No." That's too harsh. "Maybe? I don't know. What's going on?"

Teri pokes her forefingers together. "Well, you see. When I told you about the exercise program, I was fibbing a little." She waits a moment for him to process it before continuing, "You see, I got recruited to try out Kerry's final project. One of the side effects from being her guinea pig was that I lost a lot of weight."

Again she waits, watching his face, "That's why I didn't want to tell you at first. I mean, who is going to believe that I did a science experiment and got like this?" She gestures to her slim, attractive figure. "And when you started protecting me from the creeps, I knew our friendship could handle it. It can, can't it?"

Chad processes all of these words. He's still not sure on all the details of what she's saying. But the gist of it seems to be that they are not going on a vacation and that he is going to be a test subject for Kerry. And Teri did it before him. So, it must be safe, right? He looks over her head to Kerry, "And it's safe?"

She nods her head. Then she starts bouncing on her toes in excitement, "Oh yeah, super safe. In my spare time when I'm not working on my final, I've been making a 3D model of you for a month using the samples you've been providing. I've got your DNA and specifications all on record and should anything happen to you I can--"

He gives a nervous chuckle, "You had me at 'super safe'. I trust you, Kerry." Looking down at Teri, "It was okay?"

"Oh yeah. No pain, and I just got to sit around for days," she smiles seeing him won over.

Taking them in for a moment, he asks, "What do I need to do?"

They lead him through the house to the garage. He has been here before, from time to time and recognizes all the science equipment as Kerry's. Off to one side there is a small room that has been converted into a bathroom for Kerry when she goes into 'full science mode.'

Upon opening the door, there is the usual bathroom stuff of toilet and sink, but also there is a five gallon bucket and another bucket of dirt. He enters and turns around to face them outside the door.

Kerry takes the lead, "Okay Chad, I bet you are wondering about what's going to happen to you. So, I'll give it to you straight." He nods. "My final project was on 'Giving People Chorophyll so They Can Feed Themselves'. You know to try and end world hunger?" He nods again, still following.

"Well, I succeeded and failed. I can't get chlorophyll to stay in people, but I can get people to not need to eat." This kinda loses him, but he keeps trying. "Teri was one of my sorta successes. So, I gave up on that project and finished it for the grade, but I decided to continue my research along the lines of what happened to Teri. That's where you come in."

Chad is lost now. What's going on? Seeing the confusion on his face, Teri interrupts her sister, "She's going to change you into a plant for a while."

WHAT? He opens his mouth to protest, but their words echo back into his head, 'Super Safe' and 'No Pain' and 'Reversible'. Well, they didn't say that last one, but Teri is standing there before him and that's hard to argue with. "I'm going to become a plant?"

"A humanoid plant, but yes. I have made a genetic alteration to the pill that Teri used, so this is an experiment. Are you still okay with this?"

"I guess so."

Teri crushes him in a bear hug. "Trust me. You'll like it." She stops and then starts again, "I'll be with you the whole time, playing games so you can watch and not be so bored."

With more courage than he feels, he says, "Okay."

Kerry hands him a white oblong pill with a number '7' on it., "Good. We will close the door. Once we do, undress and put your clothes in a pile by the toilet. We don't want them to get dirty." She smiles at her statement. "Then take the pill, step into the bucket and fill your bucket with as much dirt as you're able. After 5 minutes or so, we'll come in and check on you. Ready?"

"Ready." They close the door, leaving him alone. He does as requested, putting his clothes in a pile. Naked, he takes the pill with a water chaser from the sink. He steps in the bucket and starts scooping the dirt from one bucket to his bucket.

The changes start almost as soon as he gets the first handful in. Starting at his crotch and working its way down, his legs start fusing together. He realizes that bending and scooping are going to be hard quick. Chad grabs the handle on the dirt bucket and lifts. As best as he can standing on one leg, he dumps the full bucket into his almost empty bucket. The transfer dumps some on the floor but most makes it into his bucket.

Then he notices another change. Instead of the top of the bucket being knee height, it goes up to his groin. "I'm shrinking."

A female voice from outside, he thinks it's Kerry, "Oh yeah. Didn't we say that?"

"Not really," he calls back as his toes and heels split multiple times and start stretching like they are searching for something. Roots. Right.

Then the bucket drops, hits the side of his container, and pours what's left of its contents out onto the floor. I didn't drop the bucket. He looks over at his hand that is shriveling up. What? Oh. I'm a plant. But don't plants have limbs?

It's not long before his arms have shrunk so much that they pull into his shoulders. That's not all he feels a similar pulling sensation down there. He starts to look there to check when his body starts tipping forward. Not having arms to counterbalance, he stops looking and leans back.

It works. He is balanced again. Not daring to look around and possibly lose his balance again, he sits and feels other minor changes to his body. And then he waits.

It's not long until the door opens again. First an eyeball peeks through the crack, then it opens wider and two faces look in. "Chad, are you okay?"

Yes. He tries to say, but no words come out of his mouth. He tries to nod. That works.

The two girls surround him, packing down the dirt and adding more. Teri's voice comes up to him, "Feel free to watch if you like." Chad looks down and sees Teri getting ready to lift. She does and turns him.

Chad looks into the bathroom mirror they faced him at. It takes him a moment to process what he is seeing. I'm a human and a mushroom. His torso except his arms and male parts looks normal albeit pale. His head is almost normal, not including the massive mushroom cap atop his head. Not that he can see below the dirt, but it now makes sense that his legs and feet are a stalk or whatever a mushroom is called underground.

Looking closer, he notices that his cap is blond, well yellow, but it's the same shade as his hair used to be. Considering how short his hair is, it is no surprise that none of it shows below the 'hat.' In examining his head, he notices again how small he is. Teri and Kerry are holding his bucket, in their hands, and in his reflection he sees their shoulders above his head.

And then his eyes move down. His large pot belly and massive girth from sitting around and eating junk food is still there like an oversized stem. There he is, an armless mushroom version of himself. A little depressed, he asks himself, Why am I doing this again?

With an awkward shuffling movement, they get him out of the bathroom into the darkened garage turned lab. "Hrrrrrrruhhhhhhhhh," the two girls grunt as they lift him up. He finds that he is above the level of the screen.

Teri turns to Kerry in front of him, "Okay, spill it. What did you do to him?"

Her sister raises an eyebrow, "I just made him a fungus."

She slumps one shoulder in disbelief at her sister. "Really," Teri asks in a sarcastic tone, "because you totally didn't change me into that."

"Okay, okay. I give up," Kerry says holding her hands up in a surrender gesture. "Look closely at Chad while I turn off the bathroom light."

The room goes almost black before a dim green light begins to illuminate the mushroom. Teri gasps and then speaks through her hands covering her mouth, "You. You."

"Yes, he's a bioluminescent mushroom. Seeing how long it took you to burn your excessive fat. I decided to have the next batch use energy, in this case, light energy. Maybe that will cut down his time as a mushroom."

Teri hugs Kerry, "What a great idea. Thanks Sis!"

Turning on her friend turned plant, she asks, "Ready for a gaming marathon?" Chad opens his mouth to speak but nothing comes out. Remembering he can't speak, he nods. Kerry cocks her head before walking away. Teri continues, "Then I'm going to play games until you are back to normal."

And she does. Or at least, she tries to.

After turning it all on and plopping down into the beanbag chair between Chad and the game, she plays and plays and plays until she gets called for dinner. Then comes round two where she lasts until almost breakfast. Teri dozes off just before their mom calls them. Kerry calls back that she's busy as Teri stumbles into the house. Chad watches Teri try to entertain him and falling asleep on a regular basis.

Sounds of glass touching glass and liquids being poured come from behind him. Occasional mutterings come from Kerry and sometimes clicking on a keyboard.or mouse. Machines whirl up and then down. Chad wonders what she's doing back there. I guess she'll tell us soon enough.

Days pass, Chad's sure. Although, the only thing he has to mark time is the meals Teri leaves for and the progress in the game. Mom and Dad Berry do come out and check on him, once each.

Then one day, Kerry walks in front of him. She doesn't really acknowledge him, but she says as she passes, "Must eat. Be back." It sounds like normal par for the course for Kerry, so he doesn't pay much attention to it.

However, a couple gaming sessions later, an alert, smiling Kerry returns. She pokes at Chad's belly. Coming along nicely." She looks over at the napping Teri as her avatar bounces around in her idle animation. Looking back at him, she continues, "I'm going to let you out early. But I need you to do something for me. Okay?"

Let me out early? Change me back? Teri's right. This isn't so bad, just sitting around all day. And if it weren't for Teri, I would have been bored. Then his thoughts turn to Kerry. But what does she want me to do? Does it matter? I'm practically family. I hope it's not embarrassing. He has long since learned he can't speak, so he shrugs.

"Don't know, huh? I suppose that makes sense since I haven't told you what I want you to do." She looks left and right despite no one else being awake enough to hear her speak. "Okay. I tweaked your DNA into another pill so that I can test my new experimental formula. So, I'll be turning you right back into a mushroom. Will you do that for me?"

Chad nods and for the first time since he changed, he looks down. His bulbous shape has thinned. He still has a small pot belly, but in general he almost likes how he looks or how he would look if he weren't a mushroom.

Kerry returns with a syringe. Chad wasn't even sure she was gone. She plunges the needle into the soil and dispenses the fluid therein. She reaches for his bucket then releases it. "Oh yeah. It took two of us to get you up there. You'll have to get yourself down. I'll go get your clothes." She heads for the house. "It shouldn’t take long for that to get to your roots and take effect. You should be safe."

Chad does feel a new liquid enter his roots. Tingling works its way up his stalk. Pressure builds as his legs separate and widen against the packed dirt. Similar sensations to when he became a mushroom flow through his body. The screen with the idling character seems further down.

Very carefully, he balances while trying to lift his locked leg out of the container. After a few wobbles from weak muscles and a different center of balance, Chad manages to step onto a chair before heading into the bathroom. Should I clean up? Nah. She said I'm about to become a mushroom again. He gets dressed and heads back out.

Expecting Kerry to force a pill on him, he is surprised to find her still working in her 'lab.' "Kerry?"

Without looking up, she replies, "I'm going to have Teri go first." Chad looks for Teri in the beanbag chair that she has lived in while he was a mushroom. She's not there. Kerry must have taken her to bed when I was changing.

While waiting for Teri, he flops down into the beanbag and starts using her character in game. Awww mannnn, she's way more leveled than I am. Still, he wanders around killing monsters and completing her quests.

Teri staggers into the room rubbing her eyes. As she's yawning and stretching, Kerry ushers her into the bathroom. In a few minutes she exits with a mushroom version of Teri. Since Chad is paying attention to the game, he doesn't get a good look at them.

Then Kerry slaps a pill into his hand, "Your turn. Same drill as last time." Chad enters the bathroom and does the same as before. After swallowing the pill with sink water, he steps into his bucket and looks around for the dirt bucket. There isn't one.

Like before, he feels the slight weight on his head signifying that he has a mushroom cap. The lip of the bucket draws closer to his face. His arms suck into his shoulders while his legs fuse together. This time because of the lack of stabilizing ground, he starts tipping forward. He tries to correct for it, but nothing seems to work.

Instead, he tenses his body hoping that his diminished size will lock in the bucket and not tip it over. It works. His feet slide into a corner behind him, and his plump belly hits the rim in front of him.

Balanced, he risks a look down. The floor is not coming closer, and the bucket isn't going to tip over. Relief washes over him for a moment before some pale flesh dangles in the lower periphery of his vision. He looks further down at the rest of his body to see what is hanging.

A quiet scream pierces the closed door.

Kelly flings the door open. Not seeing a fire or catastrophe, she enters slower. "Chad? Are you alright," she asks.

Between panicked breaths he says, "I've got breasts!"

"Yeah. So?" Kerry answers him, "You are also a talking mushroom." She picks Chad up to inspect him. She smiles and nods, "Perfect. You came out just like I planned. Now to get you to your room mate."

The room swirls around Chad as Kerry spins and heads back out to the lab. He manages to catch sight of a door frame before things settle and he's looking down on a red capped Teri looking up at him, err her.

With one hand surrounding her stalk, Kerry uses her other hand to dig a hole next to Teri. Once it is deep enough, she lowers Chad into her hole, blushing the whole time with no arms to cover her breasts. Teri's face matches her own.

"So, you see," Kerry says while tucking them in with dirt, seeming oblivious to their embarrassment, "when I saw how mobile you both were, it occurred to me that you should be able to breathe with your lungs, if I gave you some. And if you had a voice box for the air to pass through, then you could talk."

Grateful for the distraction, Teri finishes, "So you decided to try that on us. It seems to work."

Kerry continues, "And since I was playing with your DNA, I decided to mess with your hair as well."

"Which explains your fire hydrant red hair and cap," Chad adds.

Teri agrees, "And your sapphire blue shoulder length hair."

"And cap, I assume?" Teri nods. "And I suppose while you were in there, you gave me breasts."

"Well, yeah, you'd be fully female if you weren't a mushroom," Chad looks down and sees more curves she didn't see before. "except that mushrooms aren't male or female, so I didn't figure it'd be a big deal."

"Well, I didn't want to look like this," he grumps.

Teri touches her cap to his, "Well, I think you're cute like this. And since we are sharing the same pot, I glad to be here with you."

I guess this isn't that bad, Chad thinks to himself.

With everything said, they lapse into silence. It lasts a little while before Chad thinks of something as Kerry heads for food, "If you have tested the modifications, shouldn't you change us back?"

"Can't talk. Getting food." Kerry leaves the room and doesn't come back for a while. During that time, Chad and Teri talk to each other, grateful that they can communicate like this.

Distracted by talking back and forth, they almost don't notice when she returns. She flops into the beanbag chair and grabs a controller. "Hey," Teri calls over her sister's head toward the screen, "You'd better not mess up my character."

Chad joins in even though neither of them can see the game from their spot on the floor, "Yeah, use one of her alts to create your own character."

"How?" They hear her mash buttons on the controller.

"Lift us up and we'll tell you." Teri leans one way to see around and Chad bends the other way. Neither can see anything beyond the bean bag.

Kerry gives them a profile, not quite looking away, "Nuh uh. You guys are too heavy."

"Pleaseeee?"

Kerry drags herself out of the chair and into the house. She returns a minute later with Duncan Berry. They lift them back up onto the perch where Chad was before. "Who are these beautiful young ladies?"

Teri gives a plaintive cry while rolling her eyes, "DaaaAAAaaadddd."

"That would make you," he points at the red capped mushroom, "my daughter. And you," he adds pointing to Chad, "my third daughter." He chuckles at his own joke. "How are you doing, Chad? Or should I all you, Chelsea?"

"It's okay, 'Dad'. We're just waiting for Kerry to change us back. Speaking of which," Chad tries to leans around the bigger man, but it doesn't work, "Kerry, when are you changing us back?"

Her voice answers him even though he can't see her, "I'm waiting on a couple of more things. The first is that I'm waiting for you both to lose your paunch." Chad looks over at Teri and see that the eating and playing non-stop has added a little around her middle. He hadn't even noticed. "And the other is ..."

They hear grunts as she gets out of the plush black hole. 'Dad' gets out of the way as Kerry approaches. With gentle hands, she bends each far backward and looks up their gills. "Not ready yet." To them, she says, "You two are still new mushrooms, you'll probably be ready tomorrow or the next day."

With that, she says as she heads back to the game, "You guys want to help me?" Kerry picks up the controller and soon both of the mushrooms are helping her through character creation and the tutorial area.

Before long, since they have no sense of time in the bucket, but they are sure Kerry slept somewhere in there. Not that, that indicates anything since Kerry stays up days at a time. But at last she stops playing and heads back to them.

Crouching to look at them face to face, Kerry pats Chad on the head, first. A dark mist surrounds him for a moment and then settles on the ground. Then she repeats the process with her sister. The same thing happens. "Now, we wait," she says as she heads back to play.

"What did you do," Teri calls after her.

Chad thinks about what he knows about mushrooms, "Those are our spores ..." The science bug bites him, too, "I wonder what kind of mushrooms will grow."

"Oh yeah. Right? I bet I get more red ones than you get blue ones," Teri challenges.

Without looking back, Kerry says, "All three of us will have to wait." And with that they dive back into the game, the two back-seat drivers giving advice and help on levelling and questing and character development.

More enjoyable time passes. Chad almost finds it more fun to direct Kerry than play himself. All of a sudden, Kerry pops up and sprints into the house, "Oh no! I forgot!"

Returning with food, she apologizes, "Sorry, Chad. Your month is up, but my experiment isn't done yet. So, I had mom call your mom to say we've been delayed on our vacation."

Oh yeah. I forgot we said that, he muses.

"And from what I'm seeing on the internet, it might take the rest of your vacation for them to grow," Kerry continues.

She unpauses the game, when a phone rings. "That's mine," Teri says.

Kerry pauses the game again and forages through the pockets of clothes. She holds the ringing phone in triumph, before answering it, "Teri's phone. ... Hi, Liz. ... She can't come to the phone right now..." Then Kerry looks over at the two of them, "Oh? You're bored and want to do something with Teri?" Kerry's face fills with the smile of an invention idea, "Are you busy for the rest of summer? ... No? ... Then tell your parents that you are going on vacation with us for the rest of the time and come on over. ... Okay! ... See you then." And she hangs up the phone.

With the phone off, the smile gets creepier. "What," asks Teri.

"I suspect that you two are not only making red and blue mushrooms, but also purple mushrooms as well."

Chad tries to follow this line of thinking, and it makes some sense. He looks over at Teri who is smiling dreamily.

Then he looks back to Kerry. "How would you like to make a rainbow of colors? Because 'Yellow' is on her way over now."