Emily plodded along, a couple inches with every step. Walking was maybe the least convenient part of this. At least it was a nice day!
And it’d only take another hour to get the next 100 yards to her dorm!
With any luck, she might find someone to come pick her up.
“Emily?”
She turned her head and saw Claire putting down a book where she was reading in the grass.
“Hiii!” said Emily.
“What happened?”
“Oh. Remember I was headed to visit my sister at MCHE?”
“Yea…”
“Well, I took a tour there and…”
“You’re a head on two feet! What’d they do to you?”
“I’m getting to that!”
“Oh, okay…”
“First can you pick me up and take me over to your blanket?”
“Yea, okay…”
“Thanks… Okay, so my sister was in class, so I thought I’ll just take a tour of the campus.”
“This is like… the official tour.”
“Exactly. So we were headed from place to place, this lab, that lab… blah blah. But then we got to the applied sciences building. That’s where things got really interesting.”
“Ookkayy… and you got like this? Some kind of lab accident?”
“No, I volunteered. But first a couple other students did. It wasn’t a big tour, there were like five of us. This guy and his girlfriend, and another guy, and me, and then this other younger guy.”
“Well, that doesn’t explain how…”
“I’m getting to it! All I mean is, I wasn’t the first one to go, and I didn’t want to be the only one not to.”
“They all did this?”
“No, the first two were the couple. We were checking out the modular body development lab, or something like that. But this grad student was like, ‘Would you like a demonstration?’ And they were like ‘Yea!’ And those two were the first to volunteer. He put these things on their necks and the machine made a huge noise, and then their heads came off.”
“What?”
“Well, they were fine. Except they were pretty much just heads. So he was explaining the theory behind it, and I wasn’t paying too much attention, just trying to imagine what it would be like to do that, but when he put their heads back on he switched their bodies.”
“And they were okay with it?”
“Well, they were dating. So it seemed like it.”
“Did he switch them back?”
“No, we all stayed that way. Unless they went back later, I guess.”
“So you just … okay, so what happened next?”
“Well, the next place we visited was the compression lab.”
“Ahh… so that’s where you got like this.”
“Yea. There was this tall box that you got in. I made the other guy go first. He went in, and they turned a crank, and the box — it folded or something — but when it was done the box was half the height it had been. Then they opened it up and he came out, only it was just like … his head on top of his lower half.”
“Weird! I could never… I don’t think.”
“It was cool!”
“But you’d be so disabled!”
Emily gave her a look.
“I’m sorry. What happened next?”
“Well, next they did it to me. Only the thing squashed me down all the way and I came out like this. It was really cool! It felt like… kind of like being stretched and folded at the same time.”
“So wait. You said there was another guy.”
“Oh him. Well, he was still like a high school student, so nothing happened to him. He seemed really excited to be applying though.”
“Um… So you just did this… I’m so confused why you went along after seeing what happened to the others!”
“Well, they seemed okay with it, and I mean… it’s an atmosphere thing. And why should I be freaking out? It’s kinda cool.”
“I guess. I mean. If you’re okay with it, then it’s okay…”
“I love it! Just not walking really far. That’s a bit of a drag. But I figure I can get people to carry me around now.”
“How long does it last?”
“They said it might wear off after a month or two.”
“A … what????”
“Yea, I might have to go back—“ Emily stuck out her tongue.
“You’re so funny,” said Claire. “And crazy. I don’t think I could ever do that.”
“Just try it. Once you get over the initial shock it’s a bit easier to deal with. And it’s interesting. And different.”
“It must be. What did your sister think?”
“Oh, she just laughed about it. It’s fairly normal for that kind of place, I gathered. She spent last semester as a brain in a jar.”
“I am … just not surprised.”
“So, you wanna know something?”
“What’s that.”
“I think I might try to transfer over there.”
“What???”
“Well, I got a taste for it, and I liked it.”
“You don’t know anything about science!”
“They have an arts program! I could do something over there. And y’know…”
“I mean… if it’s what you want to do.”
“I still have to decide for sure. And also learn how to type with toes. Gonna need to learn that too.”
“All right, well. Okay.”
“Can I ask a favor?”
“What’s that?”
“Can you carry me back to my dorm?”
Claire sighed. And smiled. “Of course. And you know what?”
“What?”
“You are actually adorable like that.”
#
“Give me back my leg!”
A few of the students paused and looked up from their laptops. A girl with red hair came running through the common area, giggling and holding a detached leg over her shoulder. She was pursued by another girl with short blond hair, moving surprisingly fast for someone only hopping on one foot. Even more impressive was that her arms were also, apparently, missing.
“Alison!” screamed the first girl again, trying to jump around a chair, then into the space between two tables.
The other girl just grinned in a juvenile way.
“Here you go,” she said, using the girl’s own detached leg to trip her as she lunged forwards.
“Oh shit—“ said the first girl as she toppled sideways onto the linoleum floor. Upon impact she broke apart even further, her existing leg also coming loose at the hip and her head rolling across the floor to the other side of the room.
“Dammit!” she said after coming to a stop. “I’ll get you for this!”
“You’ll have to catch me first!” said Alison, scooping up the other detached leg and torso, then hefting both over her shoulders. She began to walk back the way they came.
“Hey! Come back and get me!”
Alison did not reply.
A chuckle spread through the other students, distracted from their ‘studying’ (or facebooking, as the case was more common than not).
“Soo… can one of you help me out?” called the girl’s head from the floor.
One of the male students closed his laptop and set it on the table, got out of his chair with a grunt and went over to pick up the girl’s head.
“Thanks Ryan,” she said.
“What’d you do this time?” he asked, brushing her hair out of her face, and bringing her head back to where he’d been working.
“Um… nothing!”
“I don’t believe that.”
“Why?”
Ryan just gave her a look. “Because you’re Isabelle.”
“Oh wow, burned. Yea, I kinda stole her arms yesterday.”
“Kinda?”
“Okay, I did take her arms. But now she took my whole body!”
Ryan just smirked.
“Okay, I took her arms home on spring break. But she was okay! She was going to the beach with Casey and Mick! They had arms.”
“I’m just going to stay out of this one,” said Ryan, returning to his laptop.
“Can you at least bring me back to my dorm?”
“Yea, let me finish this assignment first.”
“Ugh… jeez.”
Ryan just shook his head and said, “You’re welcome.”
#
“You have your waiver and all that stuff?”
“Right here,” said Melanie, handing a packet of papers to the girl working the desk.
“Great! Oh I see this is your first semester here. Have you been to the sports lab?”
“Um… not yet, no.”
“Okay. So before playing intramurals, athletes need to visit the sports lab. It’s… it’s part of a study, I think, and it’s also… well, it also helps prevent serious injuries.”
“What are they going to do there?”
“Cut you into pieces,” said the girl.
Melanie's jaw dropped.
“Wait — you mean like —“
In reply the girl reached and pulled on her shoulder. Her arm popped off with a clicking sound. She set it on the desk and gestured to it with an open hand.
“Ta-da!” she said.
Melanie’s face twisted into a grin.
“Cool!” she said. “I thought that was only for the students in the advanced modularity program…”
“Well, it used to be, but last semester we started testing it out on athletes. It had a dramatic effect on injuries on the field, so… y’know.”
The girl shrugged with one empty shoulder, then picked up her arm and stuck it back on.
“They close at 5, so you should head over now if you’ve got the time.”
A ten minute walk later, Melanie was waiting for the attendant to call her. Her foot twitched in nervous anticipation. When she’s applied to the Maklan College of Human Engineering she’d dreamed of — someday — getting to perform the types of mad science experiments she’d only read about online. Sure, it was a small college in rural Ohio, the weather wasn’t great, and it was a seven hour plane ride from her home in Monterey. But it was one of the best areas to study that kind of stuff in the country.
“Melanie Fischer?”
She looked up startled out of her daydream. A handsome guy in a lab coat holding a metal clipboard was looking at her.
“That’s me!” she said.
“I’m Dave,” he said, extending his hand. “I understand you’re here to get the connectors put in place.”
“They said I had to to sign up for IM soccer.”
“Great. Follow me please.”
Dave led her back down a bland hallway to a brightly lit room with a large metal table in the center.
“So there’s a couple options,” said Dave. “Everyone gets connectors put in on their shoulders, neck, and at the top of their legs. Of course, that still leaves possibilities like a turned ankle, so some have elected to get additional connectors elsewhere. We can do them at every joint, and also your waist if you’d like.”
“Are there any negative effects of that?”
“Well, you’ll have more spots that can come off, whether that’s good or bad is up to you.”
“Hm… give me the full deal.”
“Great! I’ll need you to remove your clothes and lie down the table.”
Melanie stripped down to her underwear, blushing a bit, and lay down on the cold metal table.
“Just relax,” said Dave, positioning her arms and legs so they were spread out. “Okay, I’m going to first fasten these portal shells… you might have seen these before.”
“Yea, they have those at those new stores in the mall.”
“Exactly. Only these are a bit more … well, we’ve got a generator that’s over 200 times the power of theirs, so it’s got quite a bit of juice.”
“Wow, what does that let you do?”
“I’ll show you. One moment.”
Dave finished strapping the portal shells to Melanie’s ankles, knees, thighs, waist, shoulders, elbows, wrists, and finally one at the top of her neck.
“All right. Ready?”
“Sure!”
Dave pressed a button. Melanie was expecting the loud hum of the spool warming up, but instead there was an instant flash of warmth from below the table, Her body felt… Well, she couldn’t feel much of anything.
“Was that it?” she said.
“That was!”
“Wow that was fast.”
Dave picked up Melanie’s head and set it flat on the table. She then had a better view of everything that was going on. With a normal Kryser Field Generator — the sort that you could go play with in the body parts stores — you could run maybe three portals at a time. This one had generated all 14 in less than a second.
“It’s one generator that constantly replenishes to a full-charge. Pretty impressive machine. This is just one of the outlets for it. We have five rooms like this.”
“That’s awesome…” said Melanie. “Are there any classes that would let … like how would I get to work in here?”
Dave smiled. “Ah… well, you’d start with Intro to Sports Sciences. It’s actually still open for enrollment. Part of it’s an ongoing experiment with …. Well, we have the students switch body parts and test how that affects their athletic performance.”
“Oh wow! Is there still room in that class?”
“I would check with Dr. Holstein. He’s the guy who’s teaching it this semester.”
“I definitely will!”
“All right. Well, the connectors. Let’s do those.”
Dave set about installing a connector on each portal, before removing the shell. Melanie watched her body get re-assembled bit by bit, before finally it was time to put her head back on.
“All right then,” said Dave, clicking her head onto her neck again. Melanie shuddered with the resurgence of feeling from her body.
“Want to try it out?” he said.
“Yea!”
“So, the connectors are designed to come away when enough force is applied. So regular pulling on your arm won’t quite do it.”
Dave pulled hard on Melanie’s arm. It felt very attached.
“But, if something sudden happens, they will disconnect.”
Dave used one arm to hold Melanie’s shoulder down, while pulling her arm up and over his own shoulder, then putting all his weight behind it, pulled downwards, wrenching her shoulder into a awkward angle. Just before she was about to cry out in pain, her arm popped free.
“Cool!” said Melanie.
“You can also squeeze directly on the joint if you want to disconnect on purpose,” said Dave, setting Melanie’s arm down on the table.
Dave demonstrated, using one hand to grab Melanie’s upper arm and the other squeezing the joint on her shoulder. Her arm popped off much more easily.
“Okay,” said Melanie.
“Some participants have even learned to detach connections just by flexing the right way,” said Dave. “But that takes a bit of practice.”
“Well, I have something to work on then.”
“Great. Well, let’s stick these back on, and you’ll be good to go.”
#
Stacey could hardly believe it. This was the week, the one she’d been waiting for since the semester started. The legs were going to be hers.
It seemed that nobody had been sure just whose legs they were to start with. Stacey had first noticed them on Alana, and complemented them, but she’d insisted they weren’t hers. She’d gotten them from Alice who’d traded for them from Megan. And she’d already promised them to Sandy next, and after that they’d ended up in Jill’s possession.
They were long, slender legs. Strong. Sexy. Stacey swore they could turn heads all by themselves. Which sometimes, they did. Megan had liked to portal herself down into them and walk around campus that way. Or at least, it was presumably Megan.
But who’s legs were they? Did that person miss them?
Stacey wondered that idly, looking down at her own legs. Not ‘her own’ legs, really. They used to be Alisha’s and the two of them had traded last year. For that matter, Stacey had swapped through five torsos and four pairs of arms since getting to MCHE.
First there was one question to answer. Which pairs of jeans did she have that would fit?
#
Angela looked across to the other tank. Michael looked at her. Both of them stood there, waiting for the experiment to begin.
She had just met him five minutes ago. Her friend Sara had asked for volunteers, and well, she needed the Experiment Subject credits. Sara had been nice enough to let Angela try the brain transplant on her, so now here she was. Standing in her underwear in a glass tube next to a guy she’d just met, also down to his boxers. About to do … something.
Some of the best experiments were the kind that were surprises. Her heart beat faster and she drew in a deep breath.
“Spool is warm,” said a voice over the intercom. “We have power.”
“Check,” said Sara, her voice muffled by the glass tank. “Everything looks green.”
“Ready then?” said the voice.
“Ready.”
“Engaging.”
Angela wondered if they really needed to talk like that or if it was just for show.
But in any case. The experiment was starting. The hose coming in from the top began to hiss. It started getting warm. Very warm.
All over her body she started to feel a tingle. Breathing in, the tingle spread to her insides. Something was happening.
The tingle became a warmth that radiated outwards all the way to her hands and feet. It stayed there until…
She tried to wipe away some sweat from her forehead, but her hand just…
Wait.
Her hand just splashed against her face. She looked at her hand, then at Michael.
They were both melting. And it felt fantastic. Bits of her body starting to flow together. She watched her hand loose its shape completely, and had time to look again at Michael. His head could still be made out, the rest of him dissolving into a shapeless puddle. A moment later, it seemed to have completed.
It was the strangest, most intimate feeling. Every bit of her body sliding against every other. She couldn’t really see, or hear, but there was the impression of something changing. A change in temperature. She felt her body compressing, being pulled gently down a tube, she imagined.
More cold air. Another tank she imagined. Individual blobs reconnected and merged.
New thoughts entered. Another part of her. Another part of… Who was she?
She could only feel it… Something. Her identity slipping away. Memories from minutes ago seeming like they were from another lifetime. This other… this other… No, there was nobody else.
….
…
..
She opened her eyes. Again felt the glass around her. Stretched her muscles. Breathed and tasted the air.
“All right!” said someone. She looked, found an opening. Climbed out.
A girl in a white lab coat was high fiveing another scientist.
Her hands. Delicate, long, wiry. Caught her reflection in the polished stainless steel. Could dimly make out a long body, female, but strong, slender frame.
She was naked too, but that didn’t seem to be an issue just yet.
Context. She remembered being here before. Remembered it twice.
Her hands instinctively went to her face, her forehead as she began to remember… everything. All of it.
She smiled.
“Sara!”
“Yea!”
Sara came over beaming.
“I need a mirror.”
“There’s one in the other room,” said Sara. “C’mon.”
She followed her around the corridor, not bothering with clothes. She was new to the world, in a way, born complete.
Looking at her reflection at last, she knew. She could remember being Angela. And Michael. Remember shaking hands with each of the other. And now.
“What should my name be?” she asked Sara.
“I uh… that’s up to you to decide I guess.”
“This is going to be so strange to explain to Ann.”
“Who’s she?”
“My girlfriend. Michael's girlfriend.”
“I imagine… Well… It’s only for a week.”
She started crying.
“What? What did I say?”
“A week! Nothing. I don’t know. I just happened. And now you’re telling me… it’s like I’ve only got a week to exist.”
“But both of you have different lives!”
“Okay. Yea. But let me … what about this question. If at the end of this thing, I told you I wanted to stay this way, would you let me?”
“I think that’s… I don’t think it’d be up to me. We'd have to go through the dean, the ethics board, and I don't even know what would come next...”
“Well. I’ve clearly got some identity stuff to sort out. But first.”
She wiped away the tears from her cheek.
“You can call me Alex.”