Between the little plane Donna had crafted for the trip east, and Gwen’s contribution of a GPS unit, there were no navigation issues on the way home.  Donna modified the craft further until it could hit Mach 2.5 without drawing the kind of attention that had plagued her the previous month. The fuel draw was considerable, so she’d had to increase the size of the plane to make room for more crystal storage.  Gwen suggested she add a crystal converter to continuously power the craft.  Between stops to deal with the remaining mid-size city ghouls, Donna found a design that efficiently converted magic crystals to thrust, bypassing the fuel step entirely.  Even better, it was nearly silent.

The ghouls themselves proved no challenge at all.  The last one, in Sudbury, proved puzzling.  Instead of healing and suiciding or crumbling to ash, it simply vanished.  Donna spent some time trying to figure out what had happened.  Eventually Gwen suggested it might have been a decoy.  It took another, broader search to find the ghoul itself, dug into a cave outside town.  It had been too far from any source of power for some time, and was on the verge of death when Donna appeared.  It thanked her weakly for the healing, then passed on.

Donna sighed.  “I guess we got lucky with Bunhill.”

“You refused to let her die until she’d paid for her sins,” noted Gwen gently.

“It wasn’t meant as a kindness.  Should I have tried to stop these ones too?”

Gwen shook her head regretfully.  “No.  It sucks, but this one was already long dead.  The best we can do is hope their souls moved on before the damage was too great.”

“Do you really think that happened?” asked Donna hopefully.

“There is always hope.”  Gwen touched the slope of Donna’s crystal roughly where a human shoulder would be.  The nudge changed Donna back to human, and she accepted Gwen’s hug gratefully.  “Let’s go home.”

Pushing the drive crystals to the limit, they made it back to Victoria shortly after moonrise.  Donna left the plane at her house, in a newly added hangar tucked into the roof of the carport.  Instead of staying to reassure Sidney, Donna used Robo-Duncan to fill her in while she and Gwen darted off to Arwen’s.

Donna was unsurprised to find Zoey there, sitting on Arwen’s desk in her permanent form, a translucent pink breast insert with improbable looking eyes and a mouth.  Liana was sitting quietly on a nearby couch.

“Hey, Zoey.  Here for an upgrade?”

“How did you know?” asked the little pink blob, incredulously.

Donna smiled inscrutably.  “Because I can see into your very sooooul.”

Gwen laughed.  “Because you can feel people’s desired forms, more like.”

“Spoilsport.  So...”  Donna peered at Zoey more closely.  “Tentacles?  Well, that’s not the direction I would have expected.”

It was Arwen’s turn to laugh.  “Tentacles?  I...”  She schooled her expression at a glance from Donna.  “Really?  But that’ll make her even less human.”

“Don’t act so surprised, Doctor,” said Zoey.  “You know I don’t want to be human.”

Arwen set her head in her hands.  “I am so not trained for this.”

Donna blinked closer to her, and set a hand on her shoulder.  “There is nobody in this world more suited for it.  Look at her.”

Arwen sighed, and studied the pink blob once more.  “Why do you want tentacles?”

“I didn’t,” said Zoey.  “Until Donna mentioned it, anyway.  I’m just tired of being helpless.  Armless, legless, more or less bodiless... that’s all fine.  But I’m getting tired of being so useless at home.”

Arwen turned to Liana.  “And what do you want?”

Liana tapped on her chest, her fingers thumping against the buried metallic structures.  “I want out of this tin can.  I understand why I needed it, but I want to be able to hug my Mother with my real arms, not fakes.”

“Not Zoey?” asked Donna.  “I could make her big enough for you to hug.  But that’d make her hard to use as a breast insert.”

Liana shook her head.  “I stopped dancing when Mom and Dad stopped trying to run my life.  They’re paying for the apartment and my classes, and not asking questions about who I’m seeing.  I don’t need inserts any more.”

“Do you still want the suction breasts then, or not?”

“No, I...”  Liana looked over at Zoey, who was staring up at her mournfully.  “But if you’re big, there’s no point!  I loved having you over my breast, but that won’t be possible.”

“Actually,” said Donna, drawing multiple sets of eyes, “I’ve done enough two-body forms, one more would hardly be a challenge.  I could give Zoey two little insert bodies, with or without tentacles.”

“With, please!” piped up Zoey.

Donna grinned.  “With tentacles it is, then.”  As she continued speaking, Zoey’s body began to change, tentacles wriggling and squirming their way out of her.  “The big body could be just a scaled up version, or with a little tweaking, something that might pass for human from a distance.”

“No arms!” said Zoey firmly.

“No arms,” agreed Donna.  “Just lots of tentacles.  I was thinking that with practice, you could move bunched tentacles somewhat like arms and legs.  Maybe enough to go outside wearing a heavy robe.”

Zoey wiggled back and forth, shaking her body with her new tentacles.  “No arms.  If that means I’m stuck inside, I’m okay with that.  I’ll have the little ones to go out with Liana.  I’ll be fine.”

“Are you sure?” asked Arwen.  “It’ll be hard to go anywhere.  Vacations, even just coming here.”

“Can you make my big body squishy enough to fit in a roll-around suitcase?” asked Zoey.  “I don’t need to breathe, so we could even fly places like that.”

Donna snickered.  “I wonder what the security agents would make of that X-ray.”

Liana giggled.  “Maybe we’ll just drive wherever.”

“Or fly Donna Airlines,” said Donna with a grin.  “The only Mach 3 passenger service in operation today.  Schedule’s a little on the restrictive side, though.”

Zoey shrugged her tentacles.  “We’ll figure it out.  Just being able to move is such a new experience.”  She danced around on Arwen’s desk.  “I like it.  Can we do the rest now?”

Donna nodded, and a second copy of Zoey started to bud off from the first.  While that was happening she turned to Liana.  “So.  Do you want to keep one of these squirmy little cuties in your breasts or not?”

“Two, if you please.  It would be really nice to have my old body back, just as it was before...”  Liana turned away, “You know.”

Donna appeared in front of her.  “I know.  And I am truly sorry that I failed you that night.”

“Failed me?” exclaimed Liana.  “You saved me!  I owe you my life, a debt I can never even hope to repay.”

Donna touched Liana’s brow.  “Then don’t try.  Find something worthwhile to do with that life, and pay it forward.”

Liana looked up at her then, eyes bright with reflected luminance.  “Yes Goddess.”

Donna’s expression faltered slightly, then she smiled down at yet another of her faithful.  “You don’t need to call me that.”

“I know.  But you brought me back from the dead.  It’s the least I can do to acknowledge that.”

“Services are every month, on the night of the full Moon.  At the Blue Vixen, of course,” said Gwen with a saucy grin.

Donna returned it.  “I like the sound of that.  Are you coming to service?”

Liana ducked her head again. “Do I have to dance?”

“Of course not!” exclaimed Donna.  “We’ll figure this out as we go.  We’re going to need more room before long, I suspect.”

“Maybe we can hold the service in the Crimson Kitten after it closes,” suggested Gwen.

Liana looked up curiously.  “What’s the Crimson Kitten?”

“Ray bought out the restaurant next door,” Gwen explained.  “It’s going to be a furry-themed restaurant, even more so on the good nights.  Actual catgirls!  And bunny girls, and maybe blob-girls, if Zoey wants to try her hand at it.”

While they’d been talking, Zoey had budded a second time, and three little tentacle-blobs were turning this way and that to follow the conversation.  “Do you really think I could?” they chorused.

“I think it would be good for you to get out once in a while,” said Arwen.  “Being shut in all the time isn’t healthy for most.”

The Zoeys bounced up and down.   “Let’s do this!”  One started to grow.  Not only larger, but more and longer tentacles as well.

“Liana?” asked Donna.  “Ready for your body back?”

“Yes!  Yes please, I would very much like to be human again.  With breasts my original size, but able to hold my sweeties inside them without getting too ridiculously big, please.”

Donna looked over at the squirmy little Zoeys.  “They’re bigger than before.  I’d need to hollow you out a bit so that your breasts would look the same once they take up residence.”

“That sounds...”  Liana pondered it.  “Tickly, I think.  But in a good way.  Please?”

Liana sighed happily as her body shifted in largely imperceptible ways.  Donna could feel the changes, metal and cable becoming bone and sinew, but from the outside Liana looked much the same once she’d become fully human.  She slipped her top off and cupped her breasts. “Oh, soooo much better.  Thank you.”

The little Zoeys clamoured for attention, and Liana scooped them up in her arms.  Soon they were wriggling their way into her breasts, cooing as they settled into their new homes.  Liana giggled and squirmed, her face flushing.  She laughed even louder when she noticed, touching her burning cheeks in wonder.  “I feel...  alive.  Thank you.”

“It is a pleasure to create such happiness.  Thank you,” said Donna.  “Now give your sweetie a proper hug.”

The large version of Zoey had slithered her way off Arwen’s desk, and was now standing perhaps four feet tall on her mass of tentacles.  Topping them was a large semi-opaque sphere with two large eyes and an even larger mouth.  Eyes and a mouth that were very much Zoey’s, despite the scale.  Zoey slithered uncertainly forward, until Liana grinned and kneeled in front of her.  She opened her arms wide, and got wrapped up in tentacles.  “Oh, Zoey.  Did you think I’d find your new body hard to love?”

“I...”  Zoey sniffed.  “A little.  I know I’m a freak.  A... monster.”

Donna laughed.  “I’ve met real monsters.  Killed a good number of them.  You are no monster.   You’re a sweetie.”

“Listen to our Goddess,” said Liana.  “She speaks the truth.  You are beautiful, and I love you.”

Arwen smiled at the two of them.  “Well.  That’s far better than I’d hoped for.  How are you going to get Zoey home?”

Donna gestured grandly, and a sparkling pink case appeared beside Zoey.  It even had her name monogrammed on it in flowing letters.  “Here.  Your home away from home.”

Zoey giggled and unentangled herself from Liana.  She popped the latches and swumbled herself inside, then pulled the suitcase shut.

Liana tapped on it gently.  “You okay in there, hon?”

The muffled answer satisfied her, so she settled her top and started rolling the case toward the door.  “Thanks for everything, Donna.  We’ll be by later to say hi.”

Arwen smiled at them indulgently until the door closed behind them, then turned on Donna.  “You’re not going anywhere just yet.”

Startled by her vehemence, Donna sat on the couch that Arwen was pointing to.  “What?”

“I saw the look you gave Liana when she changed.  You hid it well, but there’s something hurting you.  Tell me.”

Donna laughed bitterly.  “Oh, yay, I get to be human again instead of a robot!  It’s so amazing!”

“So?  Be human.”

Donna’s crystalline body reformed into flesh and blood in an instant.  She poked at it gently, then shrugged. “It’s still the same stuff.  A moment’s inattention and I’m sparkly again.”

Arwen looked over at Gwen.  “Help me out here?”

Gwen shrugged.  “Engineer or emotional?”

“Engineer,” said Donna, without hesitation.

“You’ve infused your creations with normal matter before.  Do that with this body.  Stabilize it for now, make it real.”

Donna shuddered, then started to cry.  “Thank you,” she whispered.  “It won’t last past the week, but...”

Gwen sighed, and hugged her friend tight. “Yes it will.  You can make this body permanent.”

“But when I’m not possessing it, it’ll be comatose.”

Gwen rolled her eyes.  “For a nigh-omniscient being, you can be awfully dense.  Put a crystal in it, same as your robot bodies.  Use it as a flesh-based telepresence point when you’re not in it directly.”

“Oh!”  Donna blushed slightly.  “Right.”

Gwen studied Donna’s work.  “You’re not infusing much matter into it.”

“I want it to be shifty, still.”

“There’s shifty, and there’s a moment’s thought will turn you into a bra.”

Donna giggled.  “What if I want the latter?”

“Still?” asked Gwen.  “Bah, just make a crystal-linked bra or three, so you can pretend you’re part of your wife’s wardrobe whenever you like.”

“Hah.  I don’t know if she’d go for that or not.  But if I make them sparkly enough, I bet she’d be okay with it.”

“Try it.  Later.  Right now you need to infuse that body so it’s not going to disappear on you, and make it permanent.”

“Yes mother,” said Donna without rancor, doing as Gwen asked.

Arwen shook her head.  “You two seem to have this all figured out.”

Donna smiled at her.  “Gwen is amazing.  I owe her everything.”

“That sounds like more than just a debt,” said Arwen softly.

“I love her.  And Duncan is married to Sidney.  It’s... complicated.”

“If you want to talk about it, I’m always willing to listen.  Any time.”  Arwen smiled.  “You’ve done so much for my clients, I wish I could do more for you.”

Donna smiled.  “Thanks.  That’s one wish I can’t really grant, other than by sitting here and talking more.  I...”  She sighed.  “Sidney’s growing used to having Gwen around, they were friends long ago.  They chat a lot, and Gwen’s told Sidney about everything that happens at the club.”

“Not quite everything,” amended Gwen.  “Like that pounce-and-kiss that led to the declaration of love that she overheard.  Or the time way back when where my lust for you made you turn yourself into a mannequin.”

Donna giggled.  “I was mortified at the time, and this close,” she held up two fingers, touching, “to jumping you right there.”

“Why didn’t you?” asked Arwen.

“Among other things, Gwen wasn’t in her right mind.  I’d healed her back and legs, and when the Moon blessed her, we kissed.  It was magic.  Literally, the Moon’s power poured through me in a way I’d never felt before, and it muddled Gwen’s mind.  Made her a huge narcissist, and her attraction to me seemed part of it as well.  Some of that faded in a week.”  Donna looked over at Gwen affectionately.  “Most of it didn’t.  She stopped trying so hard to get into my panties, though.”

Gwen blushed.  “Yeah, I was crazy that week.  But you know what?  I don’t regret a moment of it.  I wish...”  She slapped her hands over her mouth so fast it left a mark.  “Sorry!” she mumbled through her fingers.

“That didn’t go so well either time, did it?”

Gwen shook her head, keeping her hands over her mouth.  Arwen asked for an explanation, so Donna told of the time an ill-considered wish tore her mind in half.  “Losing so much of myself was… I wouldn’t call it traumatic, exactly.  Devastating, perhaps.  Certainly no solution to Sidney’s proposal that I divide myself so Duncan can be with her, and Donna with Gwen.”

“The other might be,” muses Gwen.  “You’ve had practice being in two places at once.  Could you compartmentalize so each is unaware of the other?”

Donna ghosted out of her human body, forming a second, crystalline Donna.  They took turns opening and closing their eyes in alternation, then tried having one eye open each.  The crystal one evaporated, and the remaining Donna shook her head.  “Doesn’t work like that.  I can block one or the other, but I don’t have two minds, just one.”

“What about Unit Kate?” asked Gwen.  “She has a robot mind and a normal one.”

Donna shook her head.  “She really doesn’t.  She just thinks she does.  It’s all...” she giggled at the thought, “in her head.”

Gwen rolled her eyes.  “Really?  Well, there goes that plan.”

“What plan?”

“Turn Robo-Duncan into a real AI, and disconnect from him.”

“I could do that, sure,” said Donna confidently, then her eyes widened.  “Oh wow.  I really could.  Just dump that part of myself into him, leave off Donna, and...  I don’t think Sidney would go for it, though.  Getting the copy instead of the real thing.”

“On the plus side, no magic to cause chaos,” said Gwen, warming to the idea.  “We should at least offer.”

Donna chuckled softly.  “I suppose.  But you know what?  I’m pretty sure she’d miss the magic if she was told she’d never get to be tiny again.”

“Tiny?” asked Arwen.

Donna grinned.  “You should have seen it.  We spent a whole day doll-sized.  Courtney loved it, and despite her complaints I’m pretty sure Sidney did, too.”

“Yeah,” agreed Gwen.  “She really started to loosen up.  You know... let me work on her for a bit.  I bet we can find a way to work this out.”

Donna’s expression must have revealed something, because both Arwen and Gwen pounced on it.  “What?”

Donna shook her head, grinning.  “Let’s just say, she has some interesting fantasies.  We might be able to make a four-way work.”

Gwen’s eyes went wide.  “You can’t possibly be serious.”

“Might have to be Robo-Gwen and Robo-Donna the first time.  AIs.  Think you could live with that?”

“If I get to watch, sure.”

Arwen chuckled softly.  “My door is always open if this comes crashing down around your ears.  Maybe Sidney should visit me.  She sounds... interesting.”

Gwen and Donna nodded at that.  “I’ll suggest it.  If nothing else, she’d probably jump at the chance to get out of the house.  She’s stuck there most days with the kids.”

“Even with Duncan clones around to keep an eye on them?  She really should take more advantage of that.”

Donna tipped her hand back and forth uncertainly.  “I’m not so great at multitasking between programming and family.  It’s like my mind is in a completely different phase.”

Arwen tilted her head curiously.  “So you already had some experience with swapping between mental states, before all this?”

“I hadn’t thought of it that way, but... I guess.  Not really as controlled, though.  I lose everything else when I really get into a problem.  There isn’t a personality, there’s just the problem at hand, and the associated data.”

“Have you ever tried programming while you’re like this?” asked Arwen.

Donna shook her head emphatically, sending her hair out like a halo.  “Duncan gets a little lost on these nights.  And getting so focussed on something might cause the rest of my reality to disappear.  I’m not sure it’s safe.”

“It would be if I was there,” offered Gwen softly.  “We should try.  Later.”

Donna grinned.  “It’s a date.  Speaking of which, I bet they’re waiting for us at the Vixen.”

Arwen nodded.  “This went on a lot longer than I’d figured.  I have some other clients to bring by later, would that be okay?”

“Sure!  Just tell Rowan, and we’ll find time for whatever you need.  Bring your sweetie along, too.  Maybe you can find time for a fantasy of your own.”

Arwen laughed.  “It sounds like you’re eager to turn me into something kinky.”

“Because you enjoy it so.  Don’t be shy.  Later!”

Donna’s body shrank to a point in half the time that Gwen’s did, and they raced away, playing tag through the night.

They slipped into the Changing Room in the Blue Vixen without notice, but as Donna started growing them back to normal size she heard and felt the attention of the dancers in the green room.  Unlike the usual clamour, it felt a little more organized, hushed and waiting.

Donna opened the door, to find Vanessa standing there, a smile on her face.  “One, two, three...”

She started into song, in a throaty vibrato that was part Dolly Parton, but also entirely Vanessa.  Donna recognized the opening of “House of the Rising Sun”, then the lyrics changed.

There is a house in Vic-to-ria,
They call the Blue Vixen.
It’s changed the life of many a girl,
A Goddess dwells within.

Donna’s eyes went wide as Vanessa gestured to the dancers behind her, and they joined in the next verse.  This wasn’t just a song.  It was a hymn.  To her.

Each of us found our own way here,
Our stories are our own.
The dance has made us sisters,
The Blue Vixen is our home.

Our parents call us sinners,
abhor what they think we’ve done.
My sisters know what we do here
Does not harm anyone.

Donna smiled at them beatifically, feeling their faith and love suffuse her.  She did not know when it had happened, but her ‘mortal’ body had been shed like a chrysalis, and she was in full Goddess mode, head brushing the ceiling and body glowing with power.

We are refined in your blazing sight,
Our bodies flow like clay.  
By night we are your anything,
Mould us as you may.

Donna’s power lept out to them, and the other dancers that had gathered around the spectacle, haloing each in glorious lunar energy.  It would take nothing at all to change them just as they had asked.  Donna held back, letting the power grow around them instead.

There is a house in Vic-to-ria,
They call the Blue Vixen.
It’s changed the life of many a soul,
Our Goddess shines within.

As the last notes echoed on the air, Donna went to her knees before her congregation, opening her arms wide to gather them all into a hug, putting all her love and affection for them into it.  “My daughters.  Thank you all for this gift.”

Donna sat back, and even kneeling she was taller than all of them.  Vanessa curtsied to her, power flaring around her like a robe.  “Thank you, Goddess, for your blessing.”

Donna bowed her head, feeling how her power wound through every person there.  The trust they’d placed in her was incredible, she could have changed them into anything.  Instead, she left the power with them.  “The gift is yours to use as you see fit,” she said softly.  “Enough to become anything you want to be.”

The crowd started to chatter among themselves, she could feel their desires and fantasies tugging at the power.  It would be so easy to nudge those dreams into reality, but better yet to let their imaginations play.

Gwen put a hand on her leg, and Donna turned to her friend.  The power was on her, too, though it felt different.  On the others it was an excess, spilling off of them uncontained and uncontrolled, leaking through the room and making it glow.  Gwen had pulled hers in tight, turning it into a crystalline overlay, conformal to her skin like a suit of armour.  “What have I become?”

Gwen smiled at her.  “Don’t fight it.  Accept it.  You have earned this.”

Donna sighed in relief, smiling at her favourite daughter.  “Thank you.”  Her body evanesced, becoming one with the Moon’s light, and suffusing not only the green room, but the entire building.  Her awareness encompassed all the souls within, then flashed outward to the city as a whole.  The city stilled for a moment, as everyone within felt an inexplicable sense that something greater than them loved them for who they were.

Her power settled briefly in a familiar body and a familiar home to put the feeling into words.  “I love you.”

Sidney looked over at Duncan curiously.  “Are you confessing your love to Gwen again?”

“To everyone.”  Duncan’s voice contained multitudes, a crystalline host.  “Everyone in the city felt it.”

Sidney’s eyes went wide.  “That feeling was you?”

“My sisters sung me a hymn...”  Donna coalesced in front of the two of them, crystalline and glowing brightly.  “I should return to them.”

Sidney stared up at Donna in awe.  “Oh.  Wow.”

“Before I go, two gifts.”  A glowing crystal settled in Sidney’s hands.  “This will let you change yourself, once.”

Sidney grinned, and started to shrink.  “And the other?”

Donna stared at Duncan for a heartbeat.  “I’ve... impressed this Duncan with a partial copy of my mind.  Sort of an artificial intelligence clone.  Hopefully he’s better company.  I’ll be... distracted.”

Sidney looked up at Duncan, towering above her dwindling form.  “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

Duncan petted her softly.  “I’ll be careful.  And she can take over if she has to.”

“I...  Is this about Gwen?”

“It’s a test.  Of what, I’m not yet sure.  Be well.”

Donna flicked back to the Blue Vixen, but could still see Sidney through Duncan’s eyes.  She seemed happy enough, so Donna turned to Gwen.  “What’d I miss?”

Gwen giggled and pointed at Tawny and Carmen.  “They couldn’t agree who would be the tail, so...”  The two girls were stuck, hips to hips, conjoined without legs.  And arguing about whose fault it was.  

Donna nudged them enough power to turn their arms into legs, and smooth out their conjoined body into a more pleasing form.  A head sat atop a pair of legs at either end, and six breasts dangled between.   “There we go.  A sexy push-me pull-you.  It’s a good look on you.”

“Yes, Goddess,” they chorused.

Donna sighed.  “I did it again, didn’t I?”

Gwen giggled.  “Ah, this time I think it was well deserved.  They’ll be back to normal soon enough.”