"...didn't even believe the news at first; I thought the station was messing with people for god knows what reason. They had to be! Except of course everyone was talking about it, and then it wasn't long until I saw her myself."

The radio came on at 10 AM sharp in Alyssa's bedroom, waking up her and Kat. A woman was talking, the audio having that distinctive quality of a phone call—no doubt the regular DJ was taking calls from listeners again as he always did in the morning.

"Were you, or are you, at all scared? Many people are finding this to be somewhat of a scary situation; what do you think?"

"What are they—"

"Shhh!" Alyssa interrupted Kat. She had no idea what they were talking about either, and she wanted to hear for herself. Hopefully there wasn't anything terrible happening, like a war. "...Sorry," she whispered.

"Well, I mean yeah, I am worried in the sense that I have no idea how the world will handle it, what people will do...there's lots of scary possibilities for sure. But for the most part, I'm excited. It's almost like I woke up and suddenly I'm in another world."

Kat looked at Alyssa with a smirk, but Alyssa was too concerned with what was going on to notice the coincidental metaphor.

"Have you tried it yourself yet?"

"Well call me crazy, but I'm still having a hard time believing I can actually do it...I mean yeah, lots of people have, but this whole thing just feels so unreal...that doesn't mean I'm not gonna try when I have time of course. Though what I'm really excited about is that other thing—"

Alyssa fumbled around for the TV remote, accidentally knocking it to the floor in the process, as Kat, increasingly interested in what the radio was saying, finally spoke up, talking over the sound of the radio. "Wait a second, they're not talking about..."

"—sure the clothing companies aren't as excited as you are, especially when you look at how much all their stocks have already—"

The TV went on, and the headline confirmed all suspicions: "IMPRINTING DISCOVERY CAUSING HEADACHES FOR BANKS"

Alyssa and Kat audibly gasped. What was going on? What happened to bring imprinting into the public eye so soon? Hoping to find a news story explaining it from the start, Alyssa reached for her phone. Noticing she had a missed call from Tara, most certainly about the news, she made a mental note to call her back later. She also had a voicemail from work, delivering the welcome news that they were giving people the day off because of what was happening.

A bank employee was being interviewed on the news. "So of course as soon as we heard that people were figuring out they can go right through solid walls, that put us all in a panic. Now we've got our entire security team keepin' a constant watch on the vault, hopin' it'll even do some good."

"Oh come on, no connection?" Alyssa was irritated.

"And how has the Internet blackout affected business for you?" asked the TV reporter. "I know lots of people are finding it hard to deal with that, to put it mildly."

"Oh jeez," groaned the banker as she recalled the situation. "As soon as the word hit that the Internet providers would be cuttin' off everyone's access for a while, we knew we'd be in for one hell of a treat. Don't get me wrong, I know they got to do it to protect people and all, but that don't mean it ain't hard."

"And how have you been handling the difficulty?"

"Well the line was buildin' up fast and everyone was gettin' real impatient; not only is everything slower without our online system but we've got more people comin' in cause no one can do their banking online. Luckily one of the other tellers figured out the new trick for herself, made a bunch of copies of herself at the computer to get more (bleep) done...oh, excuse me."

"Now that's certainly not a solution you hear every day!" the reporter noted lightheartedly. "It's rather nice that you found a way to use the situation to your advantage, to help you deal with the problems it's causing, wouldn't you agree?"

"Oh, definitely! This'll help with so much! And the problems'll only last 'til we figure out how to deal with 'em; the good part we'll have forever!"

"Well, I'm sure I can speak for everyone here at News 7 when I say we hope you're right! I know not everyone is quite so optimistic that there's any way to solve these issues without sacrificing things we've always relied on."

"Oh I'm sure we'll find a way, 'specially since this new thing can help us do all kinds of (bleep). You know there's some smart people out there."

Kat spoke up. "You know, if I find out how that barrier thing we have in my world works, we can patent it and become rich! You have patents here, right?"

"Kat, this is serious," said Alyssa. "I don't know how this happened, but we're probably responsible for all this; if we can help this world adapt we should do whatever we can, not find ways to get rich off it."

"Responsible??" retorted Kat. "If tons of people bet on this being impossible, and they were wrong, then that's their problem!"

"Kat, please," insisted Alyssa. "It's everyone's problem, no matter who's responsible. If there's something you can do to help this world adapt—which there is—you should want to even if you aren't technically obligated...and even if it's not your own world."

"It was probably that nurse or whatever from last night," continued Kat. "She said she was going to tell some scientists about it or something; didn't she?"

The TV caught their attention once more as they heard a familiar voice. It was Sandra!

"Well it all started when I got called to someone's house on account of an apparent medical emergency, just last night. I don't think I'm allowed to go into too much detail on that part because of confidentiality, but I will say that there was nothing actually wrong; it was a reasonable misunderstanding."

"And when you arrived at their house you walked in on them using this ability for something?"

"Close. It was as I was taking the patient to the ambulance, just before we went out the door. Tara was the one who made the call, because she thought something was wrong with her friend who lived there."

"Wait, is Tara famous?" asked Kat.

"Did she...oh god, the copies!" shouted Alyssa. "They weren't there last night! They had no idea!"

"Calm down," said Kat. "You're acting like something terrible happened. I think it's a great thing for your world...even if it didn't come at the best time."

"I just feel like it's my fault for not thinking to tell the copies, if that is how it happened."

"Alyssa. It's not your responsibility...and even if it was I wouldn't say it's your fault...besides, it was bound to happen anyway at some point."

"Just stop," pleaded Alyssa, on the verge of tears. "It doesn't matter who's responsibility it is. I feel like I could have prevented the problems and given the world time to prepare for this opportunity...and I wish I had done that."

"Aww, Lyss..." said Kat compassionately, noticing Alyssa's tears. Leaning in close, she put her arm around Alyssa to comfort her. "I'm sorry, I just wanted to make you feel better. It's done now, and...at least we don't have to worry about figuring out how to tell people, right?" Putting her hand gently on the back of Alyssa's neck, she let her skin ripple a little as she caressed her inner feelings themselves, transferring calm feelings to her which she gladly accepted.

"Mmmmmm..." Alyssa instantly calmed down and smiled sweetly.

"You like that?" asked Kat, merging her hand deeper with Alyssa until her entire hand was gone, lost inside of her. For the time being, at least.

"Yessssss..." purred Alyssa in ecstasy. "Your essence feels so wonderful inside me......"

Kat reached in deeper until she was down to her shoulder, her arm phasing into Alyssa's rippling skin where it vanished, not coming out the other side. She scooted closer to Alyssa on the bed, until she eventually slipped completely inside Alyssa's body, and they were occupying the same space. As they became one, Alyssa's hair changed as it had the last time, turning black with a blue and white streak. But this time, something else happened as well—Alyssa's outfit changed. Her shirt turned a darker shade of blue, a white star appearing on the front, and her pants turned black.

Noticing the change in her outfit, Alyssa gasped. "Wait—I wasn't wearing my nightshirt, was I? I must have changed your way without thinking!" She smiled excitedly, taking a hand mirror from her nightstand. "I love the way we look, by the way," she said as she looked in the mirror. "Real cute!"

However, Alyssa noticed something odd. She noticed a sense of surprise from Kat, as if this was something new to her, even though it certainly wasn't. "Kat?"

Okay, how did your clothes change? Kat's mental voice sounded intrigued.

What do you mean? asked Alyssa, remembering she didn't need to open her mouth to speak to Kat when they were merged. Aren't you used to this?

Yes, but...when we were merged before, your clothes didn't change because they weren't a part of you...I realized then that was why you were having trouble changing them before; they were separate from you. And what we're wearing now feels separate too...and yet it still changed. Those weren't Kat's exact words—in fact for the most part she didn't even use words at all—but Alyssa got the message even clearer than she would have from words.

So if that's separate from us and we can change that...let me try something, Kat continued as Alyssa felt her arm—their arm—move without her input, not an unfamiliar sensation to her. As their hand calmly but intentfully brushed against the blue bedsheet, it turned black under their fingers, a spot of black which quickly expanded to fill the entire sheet. An audible gasp left their lips, coming from both of them equally, as it happened. As if she needed more evidence that things were in fact as they appeared, Kat then spread their fingers out, causing hot pink stripes to shoot across the bed.

"Wow, let me try!" exclaimed Alyssa, speaking out loud from excitement even though she knew she didn't need to for Kat to hear. She placed her palm on the white wall and thought about her favorite light blue color, which instantly appeared under her hand and spread to cover not just that wall, but all the walls and the ceiling of the bedroom—no, the entire house, from what they could tell. With another thought, a cloud pattern appeared across all the walls. As she removed her hand, and her concentration, from the wall, the color remained, not even fading a bit. She had changed it permanently, or at least until she eventually decided to change it again, if she did. But she was keeping the new decor. "This is amazing...hey Kat, can you separate from me again? I wanna see if I can do this on my own."

Kat did as asked, sliding out of Alyssa until she was once again her own person, and Alyssa's appearance returned to normal. Alyssa looked at her nightstand and picked up the first thing she saw, her alarm clock, with the radio still on at a low volume. Simply holding it in her hands with the intent to turn its black plastic surface white was enough to cause the change to manifest. At the same time, Kat jumped off the bed and brushed her hand against the carpet, trying to change its color just as she had with the sheet.

And...nothing.

"Lyss, you having any luck?" she said disappointedly.

"Yeah," she said, holding up her alarm clock for Kat to see, as she changed it back to black, then blue, then white again. "Why?"

"I just can't do it," she said in frustration.

"You did it before," said Alyssa.

"Yeah, and it came easy then. Why can't I do it by myself?"

"Aww, I wish I knew! All I can say is just keep trying, I guess. Sorry."

"Keep trying? I already know exactly how to do it! If I was capable of doing it on my own it would have worked when I tried again."

"Well I mean we are from different dimensions...it's not at all unreasonable to think there could just be differences in the way things work for us like that."

"No, that can't be it..." said Kat as she puzzled over this situation.

"Why not?"

"Because things like this...different dimensions are just...I can't put it into words..." A smile crept onto Kat's face. "Luckily I don't have to." She closed her eyes, and shared her understanding with Alyssa over their mental link.

"Oh wow, I keep forgetting about that," said Alyssa as she started to receive the telepathic message. "Oh, so...oh! Yeah! So sort of...the dimensions we're from are just different physical places, you're saying?"

Kat nodded.

"And cause of physics it can't be because of part our bodies or whatever that we can imprint and I can change things and stuff, but something higher. So we could do it regardless of what our human genes gave us, cause that only affects the body...yeah, that makes sense!"

"I couldn't have explained it better," smiled Kat as she put her arm around Alyssa and patted her on the arm. "I just wish I knew why I can't do the same things you can..."

"I really don't know what to tell you," said Alyssa. "I hope you get it to work...but in the mean time I hope you don't mind if I play around with it some more, see what else I can do...plus we can always merge again and you can play with it all you want."

"Of course, go ahead," said Kat. "And I'll take you up on that offer, just you wait!" Kat smiled at Alyssa. "Mean time I'll keep watching the news, see what else is happening." She picked up the remote and pressed rewind, putting it back just before they had stopped paying attention.

Meanwhile, as she said, Alyssa was playing around with her new ability some more. "Hmm...I wonder how those clouds would look on my curtains," she said to herself. She reached over to the curtains beside her bed, straining herself to stretch out her arm. She didn't think she felt the curtains touch her hand, but she figured she must have touched them because they changed just as she wanted. Both of them somehow.

Looking down, she noticed the bed was still black and pink from when Kat (in her body) had changed it. Alyssa firmly tapped the bed with one hand, near-instantly changing it to the same pattern. "Hmm...maybe I don't want it on the walls after all; it's a little much," she said to herself. Placing a hand on her wall, she thought of what she might want. "Maybe stripes instead?" she said as the walls reacted. Like before, it started at a small area before quickly spreading to fill the wall, then the entire room, then the entire house. The walls were left with a thick, vertical, blue and white stripe pattern. It looked good, so she decided to keep it. This is pretty cool, Alyssa thought to herself, not saying it out loud lest it come across as bragging to Kat—she hoped she wasn't able to hear anyway.

Then a thought hit Alyssa. There was no reason to think this would be limited to simple color and pattern changes. What else could she do with it?

Alyssa picked up a drinking glass from her nightstand. Holding it in her hands, she considered what she wanted to do with it. She started by trying to mold it like clay—and incredibly, it worked! It was still made of glass, but it was no longer shaped like a drinking glass, as Alyssa's hands, or more accurately her thoughts conducted through her hands, reshaped it into a perfect sphere. She wouldn't have been able to make such a perfect sphere with clay—at least not without help from her new talent.

Holding the glass sphere in one hand, Alyssa pressed her other hand's index finger into the glass, creating an indentation much like it would in clay. Alyssa thought about green, that shade of green often seen in glass, while moving her finger around in a spiral pattern. As she did, green color seemed to flow from her finger and form a spiral inside the glass, as guided by Alyssa's thoughts. As Alyssa idly molded the glass some more, thinking about different colors and even materials which instantly appeared under her hands as soon as she thought of them, she lost herself in the activity for a few minutes, focusing only on being creative and doing whatever came to mind, and forgetting about just how amazing it was that she was doing what she was doing. It was like the best sculpting material imaginable, able to take on any consistency, color, texture, or material desired, and shaped by actual desires above mere physical manipulation. And the best part was, to Alyssa, everything had these properties. As it seemed, anything Alyssa could pick up could be molded and reshaped however she desired, an idea that felt amazing.

The former drinking glass was now an indescribable abstract shape of swirling colors. Rather than simply being made of glass, all sorts of random materials were strewn throughout with no rhyme or reason, left over from Alyssa's experimenting. The way they blended together, one material gradually fading into another, was particularly striking.

"What on Earth is that?" asked Kat as she looked over, pausing the TV.

"Don't know what to call it," said Alyssa. "Somehow I made this from a glass on my nightstand."

"You did?"

"Yeah, watch," said Alyssa as she grabbed a corner and pulled it outwards, not so much stretching it as she was extending it, somehow creating new material as she did. Pinching it in her hand, she pulled the new part off and closed her hands around it, forming it into a sphere of pure, clear glass, the same size as the one she originally formed.

"Wait, that's glass?" Kat reached over and felt it as Alyssa continued to mold it. To Kat it just felt like regular glass, just like it would to Alyssa if she wasn't trying to change its shape. It didn't feel at all malleable, despite the fact that Alyssa was molding it like clay as she did.

"Well, right now it is," said Alyssa. She then brushed her hand against the surface of the material, changing it to steel, then again, changing it to wood. "It becomes whatever I think of...hmm, can I...?" Alyssa thought of water, and once again ran her hand over the thing. As she did, it instantly melted under her hand, collapsing into clear water that soaked the bedsheets. "...Oops." Alyssa smiled. "Oh well, that'll dry up."

Kat was just staring, her mouth wide open.

Wanting more material to work with, Alyssa grabbed some from her wooden bed frame, which molded like clay in Alyssa's hand. She pulled some off, once again pulling out new material that didn't exist before rather than leaving a chunk missing, though she did leave a rough patch on the frame from where she pulled it off. Alyssa rubbed a finger on it to feel the texture; it felt like rough wood that needed to be sanded, like a knot in the wood. Of course, Alyssa had something much better than sandpaper—another rub of her finger, this time pushing it like clay with the intention to smooth it out, was all it took to make the bed frame as good as new.

Holding the blob of wood in her hand, she started molding it, curious how well she could duplicate the shape and material of an apple. As she formed the wood into the shape of an apple, thinking of an apple as she did, the visible part of the material changed under her hands from wood to green apple skin. After recreating the shape and texture perfectly with hardly any effort at all, she grabbed some material from the top and made a stem, which sprouted a leaf as soon as the thought to add one struck Alyssa, something that made her smile.

As Alyssa held the apple in her hand, she realized just how much it felt like an apple—if she didn't know better, she wouldn't have believed it wasn't a real apple. Though could she really say it wasn't? As far as she could tell it felt completely real. If she recreated the material perfectly, why wouldn't it be edible? She scratched the skin with her fingernail—it still felt just like a real apple—and smelled where she scratched. It smelled real. Thinking for a moment, she took a bite. "Mmm, delicious!"

Kat was still staring. "...That's...incredible..." She marveled at Alyssa, who had apparently turned something completely inedible into likely-nutritious food using only her hands and mental intentions to do so. "Can you make something more complex? Like...say, a smartphone?"

"I don't know, I can try," said Alyssa. She flattened out the apple, forming it into a rectangle. As she did, she made it metal, except for the top face which she turned back to glass. What she was holding now looked like the shell of a smartphone, with a clear window where the screen would be, showing no components inside. "Hmm..." After some thought of what to do next, Alyssa simply brushed her hand across the clear window, thinking about what she wanted, despite not knowing how anything was supposed to work inside. As she did this, the window took on the usual appearance of a screen under her hand. Running her thumb along the side, Alyssa created the power button, which she then held down for a second or two.

Shortly after, the screen lit up. Rather than displaying a manufacturer's logo, it simply said "alyssa" in stylized white lowercase text—she was the manufacturer, after all—on a sky blue background, next to white hearts. (image) Clouds were visible on the screen, which slowly slid to the sides. The logo screen was only visible for a couple seconds, before it faded to a display much like Alyssa's current phone, only seemingly custom-designed to fit her personality and habits. Alyssa was impressed with the results—using it felt so intuitive, and had her subconscious come up with that design? The universe itself? Wherever it came from, she loved it.

"No way," said Kat in disbelief. "How can you do all this all of a sudden?"

"I don't know..." Alyssa was beaming as she realized more just how much she could do. "But this is amazing! I can make anything I want! I can...hey, I wanted to call Tara back, I wonder if this phone has service."

Alyssa selected the "phone" icon on the screen. All her contacts were there, and Tara's contact was pre-selected, almost as if it had known she wanted to call her. Which would actually not be surprising, considering what she had seen before. She placed the call.

"Hey Alyssa," said Tara after a single ring. The audio quality was very impressive; Alyssa had never heard such quality on a phone call before.

"You called?"

"No I didn't, why?"

"I've got a missed call from you."

"Must have been one of the other me's...I'm the one who spoke to you last night when I was scared to death at that email place. I'm still in California; they canceled my flight home of course." Tara sighed.

Oh, that's right, Alyssa thought. Of course, she needed the right copy to answer. "Ah, forgot about that...why'd they cancel your flight?"

"Oh, don't tell me you didn't hear the news," said Tara. "One of my copies sent herself all over the world, revealed imprinting to everyone at once!"

"What???" shouted Alyssa. "That's how it happened?? All over the...how many copies of you are there now? And why didn't she talk to me first?"

"Wait, all over the world??" Kat interrupted.

"I don't know how many. It's so weird having tons of copies of myself make my image world-famous overnight. Pretty cool." Tara laughed. "And she probably wanted to surprise you; I could see myself doing that without thinking...I often get ahead of myself, get so focused on something that I do stuff without thinking." Tara expressed her annoyance at something that had undoubtedly caused problems in her life before. "I have to tell you, it hadn't crossed my mind how difficult this would be for some people...of course I'm sure it's worth all the trouble."

"Yeah, I neglected to mention that to your other copies. Just before I called you last night we had this whole discussion with—"

"I know; that other me spoke to me about it last night when she got home. You know, the one I thought was an evil spy or something." She laughed. "Anyway unless there's something you want to talk about I'll leave now so you can try again for the right Tara."

"Okay, bye!"

As Alyssa was about to call Tara back, her phone rang. Or, rather, her phones: both her old one and the new one she made.

"Hello Tara," Alyssa answered on her new one. It was so much better for her that she saw no reason to ever use her old one again.

"Hey," said Tara. "I take it you were returning my call? Sorry, one of my copies must have answered before. Anyway you heard the news, right?"

"Yes...was it you?"

"Of course not; not after last night. There was a fourth one we didn't know about. She went to a mail server too. I guess it wasn't as scary for her because that one didn't try to delete her."

"...Your copy in California told me there were tons of you all over the world now—"

"Yeah, but they've started joining together again. Tara #4 did all this without thinking..." Tara sighed. "Had no idea what she was getting into. If only she had done a little thinking...it's a problem I have, I get real excited about something and don't even think before I do it. I sent myself an email telling all of them what Kat said about joining together, and...oh god, you should have seen my inbox." Tara was laughing. "So many emails, all from my own address—all of us were so relieved they'd be able to become one again. It'll take a while though since they're all over the world. But I don't know, maybe having a copy of me living in every country could be fun! Just not, like, dozens in every major city or whatever. You're lucky I thought to tell all of them not to answer the phone, or you'd never have gotten a hold of me!"

"This has got to be so stressful for you though," Alyssa said sympathetically.

"Oh, I'm having fun seeing myself do stuff all over the world. Even if some people don't like me...I had to call the police because not everyone in the crowd outside my house was very friendly."

"Oh god, I'm glad you're okay."

"Yep, they're doing a good job...anyway was there anything else you needed? I've got to respond to some emails from myself."

Alyssa giggled. "No, see ya."

"Wait, wait! One more thing! Can you come over to my place? There's something really cool I want to show you."

"Sure! Kat and I will stop by right away!" She looked over at Kat, who smiled and nodded.

After Tara gave Alyssa her address, they hung up.

"You know, I kind of wish we could get some of the attention for this, instead of just Tara," said Kat. "I know it's no big deal, but it's still kinda lame."

"Attention isn't always good. Tara even said she had to call the police...but I guess if we did things the right way it would be different...hey, you said you can talk to people in your dimension telepathically like what you did with me, didn't you?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Why don't you ask them how that thing works that blocks imprinting—people here could use it. And we could get some recognition for that, I guess."

"Ooh, good idea." Kat closed her eyes.

After a good minute or two, she opened her eyes again, looking disappointed. "They don't know."

"Can't they look it up or something?"

"They tried. There's like no information; it's just one company that makes them and it's some closely-guarded trade secret or something."

"Ouch, that's not good," said Alyssa worriedly. "Can you...can you have someone tell the company what's going on here and see if they can help?"

"It's worth a try."

Kat started to close her eyes again, but Alyssa interrupted. "Ooh! Or maybe I can make one! I don't know how a phone works and I made that!"

"Oh! Yeah! I can't get over how amazing that is—see if you can!"

Alyssa looked around, then picked up her old phone. "I'll try with this," she said. "Actually, let me make it bigger first." Alyssa stretched the corners of her phone, causing the device to grow in size until it was larger than most tablets. Remembering what the barrier devices looked like from when she was looking in Kat's mind, Alyssa started reshaping the corners of the device. It wasn't long until each corner of the phone had a device on it that looked just like the ones in Kat's dimension, and Alyssa's intent was there to have them work the same too. Red laser beams lit up, connecting each corner and outlining the device.

To test it, Alyssa placed her hand on the screen and willed herself inside of the device. Her body entered the device very easily, and her face appeared on the screen. "Nope, didn't work. Sorry." She exited the device and landed back on her bed.

"Eh, it was worth a try," said Kat. "I'll see what the people in my world can do." She closed her eyes and sent a quick message back home.

So Alyssa couldn't use her power over matter to solve this particular problem. Oh well. Her new ability would still undoubtedly prove to be quite possibly the most useful thing ever, carrying near-infinite practical utility as well as great potential for creativity and just plain fun. So much so that she still hadn't completely come to terms with just how powerful she had to be now. Alyssa had no idea why, or how, she had been gifted, for lack of a better word, with this incredible power, but she knew that even if she couldn't do it in that one particular way, she looked forward to using it not just for her own purposes, but also to help solve the world's problems, including but not limited to the ones caused by the unique situation the world was currently facing. And she'd have fun doing so!

Not sure what else to do right at that moment, however, the two of them left home, excited to see what exciting thing Tara had to show them.