How did I get into this? Well, when it started out, it was just another job. I was one of many trying to make it in the modeling world. Trying to break through, and so on. There was this one ad put out that piqued my interest:
“Revolutionary Modeling Agency seeks female models for temporary to permanent employment. Professional attitudes only. Must be comfortable with magic.”

It was the last sentence that drew me in. Besides, I didn’t have much working out for me - either I wasn’t skinny enough for one place, or my hips weren’t shapely enough for another. I was pretty, though. They always told me that, just before the good luck and you’re-not-what-we-need-so-sorry part.
Their office was a nondescript loft somewhere uptown. There were about five others there with me. We waited for a while, that kind of nervous hope-you-get it banter between us. There was one other girl there who I knew. We’d done a couple shots together for an Abercrombie Ad, but nothing more ever came of it. I was pretty sure her name was Sara.
Finally, the agents showed up, first looking at all five of us, then asking us to come in separately. The woman who owned the agency was in her late 30s or early 40s, had long red hair that cascaded down her shoulders. She had a look of easy confidence, the sort of woman who was strikingly beautiful, knew that she was, but also had a calm intelligence about it. She spoke to us in an almost sullen tone.
“Hi, I’m Angela Swanson. What we do here, it’s not something that just anyone can do. I know you hear that from everyone, we’re so special here, and so on, but I really mean this. If you call your boyfriend to come kill a spider, you’re probably not the kind we’re looking for.”
She went on along those same lines. I was almost intimidated into leaving, but I found her candid tone to be refreshing. I was in a business where there was a lot of indirect communication.
When it came my turn for the interview, I didn’t know what to expect. I had imagined she’d be exceptionally harsh and likely not interested, but I was hopeful. She was different. I liked her, although she had the kind of personality that could be a bit off-putting. It was clear she saw this as a business and little else, but took it seriously.
The first thin she said, as soon as I came in, was “You’re quite pretty.”
“Thank you,”
“Turn around.”
I did, slowly, trying to move my hips a bit.
“Mmm.”
There was a pause. I heard her whispering to the guy and girl who were with her.
“Well,” she finally said, “You’ve got quite a face on you, but you’re just not curvy enough. We’re not trying to send the message that women have to be skinny to be beautiful. And you have a very nice, skinny frame, but we need girls who have boobs, who have hips.”
My heart sunk. I usually don’t get too personally involved in each job, as it’s only business, but this had been something I really wanted.
“However,” she continued, “You have a face that’s quite striking, and your hair is lovely. I believe we might have a spot for you as a head-model.”
This was better than nothing. I agreed immediately. They told me to come back the next day, ready for work.
When I returned, I found myself in their lobby with two others from the day before. Sara was one of them, and the other was a doe-eyed blonde named Annabelle. It turned out that Sara was told that they needed her for a “hand model” and Annabelle for a “leg model.”
“It’s weird that they’re so selective, isn’t it?” said Sara.
“Yea, but the pay makes up for it.”
A man came in, dressed in a t-shirt and jeans. He was young, but had hair that was already starting to go grey on the edges. He wore rimless glasses and held his hands behind his back when he spoke.
“Hello ladies,” he said, “My name is John. I’m the technical director here, I’ll explain to you what exactly it is that makes this agency so different. First I need you to sign these contracts. Just a standard NDA and limited liability waiver.”
We all signed, and then followed him down a hallway into, of all things, what looked like a lab. There were lots of mechanical gizmos that I could only guess at the purpose of.
“So I’m told that you, Lisa, are our new head model. Sara, you’re a hand model, and Annabelle, legs?”
We all nodded.
“Good. So, the reason for all the mystery is we cater to a very specific and lucrative market, and that, ladies is the market of the future. Here at RMA, we specialize in not just the idealization of the human body, but the modification. That is, to say, we are one part modeling agency, but also a technology firm. We find ways to market products using body-forms that are years beyond our contemporaries. For instance, please meet Marilyn.”
I heard someone come in from the far side of the room. What I saw was… well, it was surprising. I hadn’t known what to expect. But the girl I saw, obviously one of the models based on her looks, was, well, reduced by about half. That is, she was a lower half with a head on top. She smiled at us, then just walked out of the room.
“You see,” said John, “We use a kind of technological magic to alter bodies, so as to accentuate the best features of each model. Marilyn here has been with us about a year, this is her second revision. You three will be starting out mainly with accessories, but if you do a good job with those, you’ll have the opportunity to add some pieces to your profile.”
“Sorry, I don’t understand,” stammered Annabelle. “Accessories?”
“Well, shoes in your case.”
“Yes…”
“Well, then this is your machine right here.” John turned around and gestured to some apparatus against the corner of the wall. It seemed to be a metal chair surrounded by a bubble of blue-tinted glass.
“If you would sit down please. The easiest way to get accustomed to this is just to try it out.”
Hesitantly, Annabelle sat down in the chair. The glass bubble was lowered over her automatically, while metal clamps came out from the legs of the chair putting rings just above her ankles. John tapped on a keypad next to the chair and there was a hissing noise, followed by a blue flash inside the bubble. When the flash cleared, Annabelle was gone. That is, except for her feet, still clamped where they were. The bubble rose up, and her feet were automatically raised up and released onto a tray. They were quite pretty feet. It was understandable why she’d been picked for a foot model.
“So you see,” said John, “by vanishing the rest of Annabelle, we draw all the attention to the most individually beautiful part of her, her feet. Furthermore…” He tapped on the keypad again. A monitor above the chair came to life, a confused and footless Annabelle on the screen. Around her was a white nothing.
“Where am I?” she said.
“Your body has been molecularized and digitized. That is, we have what was once your physical body right here.” John went to the chair-device, and from underneath it removed a large black box with a handle attached to it. It was a cube, about one foot on each side. “Of course, all the replaceable elements, mostly water, have been removed. The other copy of your body, the digital one, is what you are now. And these,” he picked up a foot and showed the Annabelle on the screen, “Are your feet. You can walk if you try.”
He set her feet down on the floor. I saw her toes wiggle for a moment, before one of the feet lifted off the floor and took a step.
“I feel so much lighter,” said the digital Annabelle.
“You’ll get used to it. For now, the best thing to do is get used to your new form, so practice walking. You’re also free to explore our computer systems. We have a unit in each room where you’re allowed access, so you can roam around if you like.”
“What about… our lives and such?” said Sara. She was obviously having second thoughts.
“Glad you asked. When you arrive here each day, you just punch in your code on whatever machine you’ve been assigned, let it do it’s work, and then you’re set. When you leave, you can reverse the process. Some of our models prefer to stay in their altered states when they leave, so if you prefer that, you may. As you learn more about our systems here, I’ll show you what else you can do. We even let our models select different templates for recreational purposes, meaning that if you fancy you might want to look like Marilyn, we could do that for you when you leave. Sara, would you mind?” He gestured to the same chair that had just vanished Annabelle.
She sat down in it, and John repeated the same process, putting an empty case into the slot. Her hands were secured to the arms of the chair, there was the same blue flash, and then her hands were brought up on the tray. Sara appeared next to Annabelle on the monitor, her digital body noticeably lacking hands.
“Now for you, Lisa. If you would please step into that cabinet over there.”
I had a pretty good idea of what was about to happen. I began to get butterflies in my stomach. A stomach I shortly wouldn’t have. He had pointed to a blue-glass box that opened at front. Inside was another chair, similar to the one the others had used. However, the box ended at shoulder-height, and had an opening on top where my head would stick out.
I sat down inside, a mix of excitement and dread coursing through me. John pressed a couple buttons, then closed the doors. I felt what the flash had concealed. Something pressed against my crotch for a second, then everything got very hot, then I felt nothing at all. I couldn’t move.
“That’s it,” said John. He reached over and picked up my head with two hands. It was dizzying not being in control of my head. He turned me to face the monitor, where I saw my headless body appear next to the others. I saw Annabelle prod my neck-stump. I also felt it, however in a completely different and distant way.
“I have a question,” I said. “Just how does the machine work anyway?”
“Well, first, we vaporize your body with a blast of heat. It’s a bit like a microwave only far more powerful. Then everything is sucked through a tube and the water is eliminated. So again,” John pulled up a metal box and showed it to me, “This is you.”

So that was how it started. At home, I was just like everyone else. Only I went into work, got in the machine, and had my body vaporized. Then, as just a head, I’d be paraded around for whatever clients might be interested, or so on. There was about a dozen girls who worked there full time, and dozen more or so who’d come in for part-time work.
There was definitely a hierarchy among the models. The ones who had been there the longest got the best bodies. The ones who had just started? Well, we got accessories. Or, depending on how you look at it, we were accessories.
I made fast friends with a couple of the models already working there. Emily, one of those who’d been working there from the start, took me under her wing. Or, actually, under her arm. She had six of them, all coming from the same two shoulders. Unsurprisingly, she was nicknamed “Kali.”
Emily was down-to-earth about the whole thing, and had a great sense of humor.
“Well, when we started,” she told me, “It was just one machine that could vanish your lower or upper half. I was an upper, the other two girls who worked then were lowers. One of them, Marybelle, went on a solo career like that. The rest of her is still in the archives actually.  And then there was Grace. Great hips, long sexy legs, but her face was attractive, but didn’t compare to the rest of her. We made a great team. She used to walk me down to the end of the runway, then I’d lift off her and she’d walk back alone while I took hold of a wire that drew me into the rafters. Everyone just went crazy for it.”
I was debuted at some kind of dinner party. My head was made into part of the centerpiece, and I sat on a pedestal in the middle of the table. I was the only conversation piece you could also have a conversation with. Sara and Annabelle were at the same event, but they were more of a novelty.
Not that those girls didn’t get their moments. Annabelle had more that a few shoe commercials, and Sara of course got a lot of jewelry contracts. They worked on TV and print because they could do things - pick something up or walk around. I was pretty much a paperweight. Emily even used me as one.