Georgia locked the cellar doors behind her as the tornado bore down. She had been biking home when the funnel touched down what felt like right behind her. She pedaled as hard as she could for the closest shelter.

Gasping for air, Georgia skidded into the short driveway and saw a young man barring the windows on the upper floor. He saw her turn in and leaned out the window he was about to bar. "Get into the cellar. The entrance is out back," he yelled.

Georgia rounded the building and found the cellar door. She opened them and went down. The basement was lit by a few bare bulbs. It looked like it had been converted into some sort of workshop. There was a workbench right next to her opposite a wall of parts bins. There looked to be some metal working equipment at the far end of the basement. She could hear the young man bustling around, battening everything down for the storm. The house creaked as the storm hit, the the lights flared and went out.

Georgia fumbled around in the dark. Before the lights had gone out she had seen a flashlight standing on the work bench. Her questing fingers encountered something cold, metallic and cylindrical. She grasped it, sighing internally. She hated being stuck in the dark. She picked it up, found the on off button and pressed it. Nothing happened. She shook the light and tried again, still nothing. She pointed the flashlight at her face and pressed the button again, no light, but there was a strange pulling sensation and all sounds of the storm outside disappeared as did the musty smell in the cellar.

"What the hell?" She said, or tried to at least. She didn't hear her voice, didn't feel it in her chest either. She didn't feel her jaw move, or her lips part; there was just nothing. Georgia stopped. Something wasn't right. She tried to yell but nothing happened. Frightened, she dropped the flashlight (here was no clatter of it hitting anything) and tried to scream. Her bearings were gone. Chest heaving in panic, blindy she felt around, looking for some sensory input to indicate where she was. Her hand smacked into the workbench and she immediately clutched at it. Her other hand found another piece of workbench and it clutched the edge similarly. Gloria futilly tried to scream again, then she felt a warm hand on hers.

A second hand went over her other hand and just stayed there, not moving, comforting. Gloria felt her panic lessen. She still didn't know what was going on, but other than her missing senses she felt alright. After a few minutes, when Gloria's breathing returned to a normal rate, the hands slid up up her arms to her shoulders. And gently pushed her to the side. Gloria went with it. She took a few steps befor the hands stopped her. They twisted her shoulders and she turned, then there was a downward pressure and Gloria sat, pleased that there was a chaor waiting to catch her.

The hands left her shoulders. Gloria sat, waiting. She didn't know what else to do. All of a sudden there was a riot of colour and a cacophony of noise for an instant, then things went quiet aside from the chugging of a generator, and an image resolved of the young man whom had been securing the windows upstairs pointing the flashlight at her.

"Holy shit, it worked,' he said. His free hand clenched into a fist which he pumped enthusiastically. "Woo hoo!" he crowed.

"What. What worked?" Gloria asked. "Who are you? What happened?"

The young man calmed down. "My name is Larry. You took shelter in my workshop and must have inadvertantly activated my newest creation."

"What?" Gloria asked. "What do you mean creation? What happened?"

"I'm an inventor," Larry explained. "I work on advanced technology. What's your name?"

Gloria was getting a bit frustrated with his not answering her question. "My name is Gloria. Now, Larry, what happened to me?"

"You stored your head and most of your neck in my teleportation buffer." Larry said it like it was the most obvious answer. "On the other side of that wall is a supercomputer that stored your head until I emitted it back onto your body."

Glorias eyes glazed over. "What?" She asked.

Larry nodded, recognizing the look. "I can see this is a lot for you to take in. The storm is passed. How about you come upstairs. I'll open things up and we'll get you something to eat or drink." Gloria nodded.

"So you're LS from Sanders Engineering?" Gloria asked incredulously. Larry, sitting across the table from her with a mouth full of noodles, nodded. "But you're so young. How can you be the president of such a large company?"

Larry slurped up the noodles, chewed and swallowed. "R&D head actually," he corrected her, "I let other more qualified people run the business part. I like to tinker."

"You don't even look 30." Gloria stated.

"I'm 28 actually," Larry said. "The matter compression technology that I made in university revolutionized shipping and transport. I connected with some of my peers and we created the company. Now we have the youngest executive board in the world." His voice was tinged with pride.

"So what was that downstairs?" Gloria asked.

"My next big thing," Larry replied. "Have you ever watched Star Trek?"

"It was hard not to when I was a kid," she said.

"Well, I'm working on a transporter," he explained. "I have the scanner and the emitter worked out, but the pattern buffer has been tricky. I'm really glad for you that it worked. I wasn't able to test this latest iteration before the storm hit."

"Test?" Gloria asked. "What happened to your other test subjects."

"I used to have a lot of cats." Larry replied. When he saw Gloria's horrified look he laughed. "No, I've only ever had Mr. Mistoffelees. I used mice, but they never made it into the buffer. Mr. Mistoffelees helped me clean up the messes."

Gloria's dark skin durn a lighter shade of brown. "They didn't survive?" she asked.

"They did not," Larry affirmed. "Lucky for you, this time it worked."

Gloria was a bit shaken. "Yeah," she said.

"What was it like?" Larry asked. "I mean it was wierd coming down stairs and finding you with no head. Definitely unexpected." He leaned in. "What was it like having no head?"

"It was scary," Gloria admitted. "I had no idea what was going on. I was terrified. I couldn't see, smell, or hear anything. I thought I was going to hyperventilate until I felt your hand. That helped. How long was I like that?"

"No more than a couple of hours. I had to re-polarize the emitter before bringing you back. The diffraction index got misaligned when you dropped the scanner," Larry said before taking another mouthful of noodles.

"Two hours?" Gloria asked. "It felt like maybe five minutes."

Larry waved his hand. "That's probably because the human brain is much faster than the supercomputer your head was simulated within."

"Wait, Simulated? You said it was stored." Gloria said.

Larry swallowed before answering. "Well, kinda. It turn out the only way to keep organic system functional in a computer is by simulating it's functions. Your old head was destroyed. It was simulated in my super computer, then reconstructed back on your body."

Gloria had stopped eating. "This isn't my head?" She asked.

"Nope. It's a new head, exactly like the old one." Larry confirmed.

"But I felt things. I thought things," she said. "How was that able to happen?"

Larry had a manical smile. "I don't know, but isn't it great?"

"Kat. I need you to open up the server farm for me," Larry said into his phone. "I need more power for Project Langellan."

Kat sighed into her phone. "Larry, you know the kind of havoc that could cause with our existing operations. You can't have unrestricted access, not anymore. Things don't work that way."

"You don't understand Kat." Larry pressed. "There's been a breakthrough. There's been an accidental partial human trial."

Kat immediately straightened up in her chair. "What? What do you mean 'accidental partial human trial'? Are you alright?"

"I'm fine Kat, so it Gloria." Larry reassured her.

Kat relaxed a bit. "Who's Gloria?" she asked.

"Someone who stumbled into my workshop. We had a twister and she needed shelter," Larry explained. "It was a legit mistake. I was securing the house when she got in. By the time I got down there the deed had already been done."

"What exactly happened Larry?" Kat asked.

"Open the farm and I'll tell you." Larry teased.

Kat leaned back in her seat and sighed. Larry did this type of thing too often, but she couldn't deny the results he had achieved. She sighed. "Don't do anything. I'll be there in under an hour, you tell me what's happened and then I'll decide if it's worth potentially comprimising our other business endeavours."

Larry was jubulent. He was sure Kat wouldn't say no. "Sweet. Get your ass over here stat. You're going to love this."

Kat pulled her red BMW into Larrys driveway fifty minutes later. She stepped out and straightened up, looking comically tall next to the car. With her laptop tucked under one arm she walked up to the front door and rang the bell. Her and Larry had started the company with a few othewr fresh grads. He had done R&D while she maintained the server environment.

Larry was quick to answer the door. He gave her a hug and ushered her inside. In the livingroom sat who Kat assumed was Gloria. Physically she couldn' t have been more different. At 5 foot 10 inches and 140 pounds, Kat was a beanpole of a woman. At just under 5 feet and also 140 pounds, Gloria was all curves with good proportions. Kat's obvious irish heritage resulting in firey hair and milky skin contrasted with the chocolate skin and black hair brought on by Gloria's african genes.

Gloria was sitting on the couch with her legs tucled up underneath her, absorbled in Larry's laptop. The screen was full of numbers and code that neither Kat nor Larry understood. "This model is amazing. The level of detail is incredible," she said is awe. "There is so much I could do with this."

Kat looked at Larry. "What is she talking about? Is this Gloria" she asked.

Larry snapped his fingers. "Ah, right, introductions. Gloria, Kat; CTO and sysadmin extordinaire. Kat, Gloria; fresh comp eng grad specializing in advanced computer modeling."

Gloria looked up from the laptop, saw Kat and grinned. "Nice to meet you," she said, extending a hand. Kat crossed the room and shook it.

"Nice to meet you too," Kat said, taking her hand and shaking it.

Gloria continued, "I would have gotten up but..." She unfloded her left leg and Kat saw that it ended in a stump just above the ankle.

"Oh, what did you..." she looked at the screen, back down to Gloria's leg, then up to Larry. "You son of a... I told you to not do anything."

Larry played innocent. "It wasn't me. It was all her. She did this to herself. I had nothing to do with it."

Kat rounded on Larry. "Nothing other than provided her with the tools and ability to do it, I'm sure," she replied. "That does not absolve the company of responsibility. I don't want to have to call Grayson in on this."

"Don't worry about it Kat, she's cool," Larry pleaded. "Besides, I got her to sign an NDA and a waiver."

Kat crossed her arms. "Well, I guess you've got bases covered. But I'm still mildly annoyed at you." She cracked a grin. "It's good to see you again. You need to come into the office more often, and let me know when you do so we can do lunch."

Larry grinned back. "You pull off stern really well, you know that?"

"Comes with being a mom." Kat replied.

Gloria laughed on the couch, her footless leg kicked. Larry and Kat both looked at her questioning. "Sorry," she said, "I tickled myself in the computer."

"What?" Kat asked.

"I gave the simulation of my foot a poke, and I felt it," Gloria explained.

"Really?" Larry asked. He laughed. "That's fantastic."

"Holy shit." Kat said at the same time.

"You guys," Gloria said, "this is amazing. What else can we do?"

Larry srugged. "I have no idea. Nobody has ever done this before."

"Hold on," Kat interjected. "Don't go crazy messing with that simulation. Larry, can you export the state of the simulation?"

Larry shook his head. "Not on the equipment I have here. I need more CPU horse power and several terabytes of storage."

Kat pursed her lips. "I can give you fifty percent of the datacenter."

"Seventy five," Larry shot back.

Kat shook her head. "Seventy five is too much, that would compromise business operations. Max I can do is fifty five percent."

Larry's eyes narrowed. "Sixty percent," he counteroffered. "That will leave you a safety margin for a couple of failovers."

Kat clicked her tongue. "You've done your homework. Sixty percent it is." She sat on the other end of the counch from Gloria and set up her laptop on the coffee table. A quick fingerprint login and she brought up the datacenter management tools. She shuffled a few virtual machines around and increased the allocation to Project Langellan. "There, you have sixty five percent of the datacenter," she said.

"You're the best Kat," Larry declared.

Kat snorted. "It's only because of her tickling herself virtually." She said, pointing to Gloria. "I want to see where this goes."

Gloria looked up from the screen again to meet Kat's eyes."So do we," she said.

Gloria tsked. "This is very inefficient," she said, shaking her head. "Putting a second exit condition in this loop could speed up this whole simulation by five percent." She looked up at Larry and Kat. "The people that made this were brilliant but lazy."

"That's what you get when you offshore," Larry said. Him and Kat were both looking at the stump at the end of Gloria's leg. It looked like a fuzzy, glittery crossection. It was both gross and facinating at the same time. Kat was more disturbed by it than Larry; he'd seen Gloria witout her head. Compared to that, this was nothing.

Kat gingerly leaned over and poked Gloria's stump. Gloria's reaction was rather dramatic. Her leg jerked and she nearly fell off the couch. The laptop slid, but Larry was able to catch it before it hit the ground.

"Jesus! Don't do that." Gloria said.

"Sorry. I couldn't help it," Kat replied. "...Did it hurt?"

"Not really," Gloria answered, "I just didn't expect it. Ikve never been touched inside my body like that before, you know?"

Kat shook her head. "Not really, but I imagine it's a bit disconcerting."

"Just a bit." Gloria agreed. Larry gave her back the laptop. "Just give me a few more seconds, and..." Gloria quickly typed in some numbers "...there," she said, hitting enter with a satisfied smile. "Larry, give me my foot back."

"Alright," he said, picking up the emitter. He pointed it at Gloria's stump and pressed the button. Gloria giggled as her foot reappeared. There was a wave of pins and needles, and then eveything felt normal. It didn't look it though. Instead of regular toe nails like on her other sandled foot, Glorias left foot now had toenails that looked chromed.

"Wow, that's amazing." Kat exclaimed. "You recoded part of yourself in the computer. Holy shit. Do you know what this means?"

Larry's eyes were ablaze. "It means nothing will ever be the same. We will change the world."

A silence hung in the sair for a bit. Then, quietly, looking down as the bean pole body, Kat said, "Or we could just change ourselves."

"Why would you want to do that?" asked Gloria.

Kat looked up at her. "Do you see me? I may as well be a guy. I'm a carpenter's dream."

"Being stacked isn't as good as you think, Kat." Gloria replied. I get cat call and whistled at all the time. People don't see me, they just see these." Gloria hefted her sizeable breasts. "You're tall, graceful, and beautiful."

"But I've seen my husband's gaze linger on girls like you," Kat said. "Do you know how heartbreaking it is to watch him be mesmerized by someone else's breasts, knowing that I'll never be able to do that? Instead I have floppy pancake breasts. There is nothing enticing about them. I hate them."

Larry was wisely silent. He knew that any input from him wouldn't be well received at this point.

"At least you have people talk to your face and not your chest." Gloria said. "It's bad enough with men, they at least appreciate them for the most part. Women are the worst. I don't even go to the beach because I can't stand the lust, envy, and hate heaped upon me regardless of what bathing suit I wear. You have no idea how embarassing it is to be thrown out of a public pool for wearing something too revealing when you're wearing a one piece."

"I'd like to." Kat replied. "I would love to have that happen to me, just once."

Larry sensed an opportunity. "We can make that happen," he said. "We can give you that now."

Kat looked at Larry flatly. "You just want to see my boobs."

"Not untrue," Larry agreed, "but it wouldn't be the first time, and we can really do this."

Kat was teetering on the fence. Gloria thought of what she was capable of once the data was in. She wanted to play and she couldn't do that from inside the system. "We can do this Kat. Your boobs go in, I'll change them, then your new boobs come out again."

Kan gave a wan smile. "You say that like it's no big thing."

"You're talking to someone who had their head removed then reconstructed." Gloria said encouragingly. "If the system can handle my brain, your breasts should be no problem."

"Did it change you?" Kat asked.

"Not a far as I can tell," Gloria replied, "but it can change you. It can give you what you want."

Kat drew in a breath held it for a bit, then released it. "Let's do it," she said. Larry crowed and clapped. Gloria grinned. "First I have to make a few calls though," Kat said.

"I should too," said Gloria, "my roommate is probably wondering where I am, and I'm sure my parents are worried after the tornado."

"Alright ladies, make your calls. I'll make preparations," Larry said.