Marcia worked her way through the press of bodies at the coven's Halloween party until she finally found them, holding court in one corner of the big party room, surrounding by people who were asking questions about their costume. They were definitely a “they,” because from the collarbones up they were pretty distinct. One of them had olive skin and a swept-back afro, and the other one was fairly pale with a black pixie cut. They only had two arms on their slightly widened torso, though, and from the waist down they were completely unified.

“Excuse me,” said Marcia, stepping up when it looked like they were at the end of a sentence. “I’m Marcia. Is one of you Tamara?”

“Yeah, hi!” said the one with the afro. “I’m Tamara.” She reached out the hand on her side, and Marcia shook it. “And this is my wife Jill.” Marcia switched hands to shake with the other one. “I love your vampire costume!”

“Thanks.” Marcia posed a little to show her costume from some other angles. It was nice to get a compliment from a professional, even though she’d just gotten out her most revealing outfit, added some fishnets, elongated two of her teeth slightly, and overdone the eyeshadow. “Well, I mean, I can’t compare to you, though, right? Is that like Harley Quinn?”

Tamara and Jill looked down at their costume. “Oh, yeah,” said Jill. “Tammy, was that the idea? We didn’t do any hair dye or anything.”

“No, but I guess we can next time,” said Tamara. “I totally didn’t realize that until just now.” Their costume was a full leather bodysuit, red on Tamara’s side and blue on Jill’s, but the seam between the two colors down the middle was kind of swirly. Each of their boots was a different color, but the one on Tamara’s side had a bit of a heel and the one on Jill’s side was flat. Apparently Jill was a little taller than Tamara. Both of the boots were equally sturdy leather, though, with wide buckled straps that matched the ones on the corset and the fingerless gloves.

“Well, it looks great,” said Marcia. “It isn’t bunching up anywhere or anything, and it moves really well. Did you work a bit of stretch in there or something?”

“No,” said Tamara, “but you know, it is magic. It’s actually in two parts, a red one for me and a blue one for Jill. Both suits have to be pretty closely tailored to us, but once they’re connected and winched together, the magic kicks in and makes the whole thing move properly.”

“So is that how you’re able to walk so easily?” said Marcia. “Because that’s actually what I wanted to talk to you about. I’ve tried to go two-headed before, but I usually end up with a completely separate copy of myself. If I merge with her, we just go back to being a single person, and if we try to merge partially, we just get tangled in a mishmash of limbs.”

“Her?” said Jill. “Your duplicates are separate people?”

“Yeah, take a look.” Marcia pointed across the room. “You see that floating woman over there dressed as, I guess, a cyber-mermaid or something? The cat-lady she’s talking to is my girlfriend Reina, and that’s another Marcia with them. She’s the one who told me that you make costumes.”

“Oh, yeah,” said Tamara. “I remember Iolana. So did you want to order one of these?”

“I just wanted to know how the two of you got so used to moving with a shared body like that. Unless that’s part of what the costume does?”

“No, the costume just merges us,” said Tamara.

“I think it’s just a couples thing,” said Jill. “We know how to work together, we know how to make room for each other. What’s mine is hers, and stuff. If I need both hands, she just knows to back off and let me cook. If she wants to walk somewhere, I just go along for the ride. It’s like a dance.” They put one arm out and the other arm around their waist and swayed back and forth in a conjoined waltz.

“So it might just be a state of mind thing?” said Marcia. “Maybe I could make it work if both of me were focused on working together with ourselves?”

“Sure,” said Jill. “It’s worth a try. Here, put your hands on our shouders.”

Marcia put one hand on each of their shoulders, and Tamara and Jill put their hands on either side of Marcia’s waist.

“There,” said Jill. “That should help you aim better.”

Marcia closed her eyes and thought about splitting her torso like a wishbone. Her waist needed to stay the same, but her head and shoulders needed to split. She let her head go a little fluid as she felt her consciousness divide and flow, until she had the change she wanted.

“And?” said Tamara. “How did that go?”

“That might have worked,” said Marcia. She turned to the side. “How’d it go for you?”

“So far, so good,” said Marcia. They turned their hands back and forth, and then they looked up and stepped toward Jill and Tamara. Both of them tried to take the first step at the same time, so they immediately collapsed to the floor. Their torso came loose from their legs, and a second torso popped out of it. Each torso only had one arm, but a third arm lay detached on top of them. The two heads bounced off of their necks, eventually coming to a rest at Jill and Tamara’s feet.

Jill and Tamara knelt down and picked up the two Marcias’ heads. “So,” said Tamara. “Mishmash of limbs, huh?”

“No, this is actually better than usual,” said Marcia.

“Yeah, we got completely wrecked last time,” said the other Marcia. “Would you mind helping us assemble this heap into at least one working body, and we can try again?”