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Quarut

2016-08-29T16:16:50Z

TigeR: Fix grammar

{{byline|author=Alex Warlorn
|user=Alex Warlorn}}

[[Category:Story]] [[Category:Alex Warlorn]] [[Category:Mental_change]] {{universe|Xanadu}} [[Category:Inanimate]]
[[Category: Inanimorph]] [[Category:Magic]] [[Category:Alien]] [[Category:Transgender]] [[Category:Age_regression]] [[Category: Reptile]] [[Category:Reality Shift]] [[Category:Xanadu]]

Its senses were bombarded with random noise, confusion, unreason, and -disorder-. None of these were pleasant to its clockwork mind. It had been created to maintain order, not the laws that short lived mortal created though these were to be acknowledged when possible, but –order-, law, and justice, base rules of creation without which the Great Wheel would slowly degenerate into anarchy.
Each of its kind was assigned a different element of Law to enforce through out creation. This model’s purpose was to maintain the consistency of time, to let none though magical or mundane means revise history, so the laws of cause and effect would never be violated. It did not care for good or evil, right or wrong, kindness or cruelty, only in the absolute ruling of LAW. It was one of the Inevitables.
It was a Quarut, created from the crèche -forges on the outer plane of absolute law Mechanus, created and geared for the sole purpose of ensuring the consistency of the time line.

However several contradiction presented themselves, and if there was one thing that decreased it’s programmed mission object success rating, it was a contradiction.

First that immediately came to the attention of its brain of cogs and gears was that it had no internal record of it’s original mission objective. Normally when an Inevitable was first sent to the material plane, it was given its first assignment, an action or situation that threatened or had damaged time, with the precise orders to remove and eliminate both the damage and the source of said damage. After this mission was completed, it would enter observation mode, and openly seek out others who had carried out similar crimes on a smaller scale, slowly developing emotions and personality until it risked swaying towards good or evil and had to be recalled to it’s crèche-forges to have it’s memories reset so it could continue to do it’s duty without bias of emotion or morals.

However, there was no original mission present in it’s memory, this was not logical. Second, was that besides it’s own innate base knowledge, it could not recall coming here for any precise purpose, again, not logical. And perhaps almost disturbing, was that it’s Plane Shift ability that would take it back to Mechanus for reprogramming (which all signs pointing to it’s needing immediately), failed to find the proper plane of reality. This approached almost disturbing for it’s perfectly rational mind almost making the gears in its head grind against each other.

Without any other options available to it, the clock work being entered emergency observation mode, hoping to find a magic-user who could cast a Gate spell for it to return to it’s factory for reassignment. The Quarut calculated its first course of action was to discern its location and proper bearings. Then to locate a magic-user of proper power, and to coerce said magic user to open a gate for it to return to be reset.

-Immediate internal situation resolve for Time being-

-Begin assessment of immediate external situation-

The Quarut scanned the area around it with its clockwork vision impassively and indifferently. Of course it had no eyes, its face was an hourglass, always rising up or down but no end ever empty, but it could see perfectly well all the same. It was not programmed to wonder how its internals worked.

It saw several mortals and a few outsiders of several species, some screaming, others hiding, many just running or causing random damage.

- High Multiple Mortal + Outsider Content Found-

-Searching list of possible locations-

-Possible location: Sigil: City of Doors, The Cage-

-Special notes: Entity of Divine Rank May Not Enter-

-Sever Disruption of Current Power Structure Presents High Probability of Termination By ‘Lady of Pain’ (type unknown).- -Extreme Caution-

-Confirm Location-

The sentient machine looked around it, matching up images of Sigil from its memories to its current location. The image of a blue sky with clouds immediately negated the possibility of Sigil, as it was a ring city with warped gravity with the roofs facing each other.

-City Sigil Location Negated.-

-Disregard all previous information.-

-Repeat Possible Location Search.-

- All remaining results of equal possibility to each other.-

- Selection of One Counter Productive.-

-Manually Acquire Information.-

Moving its piston and gear muscles as if they were brand new (another contradiction, since it would have logically had to used them to leave the forge to come here in the first place, even with its self repair, earmarks of use should have been detectable) the machine walked toward the nearest sentient being it saw.

- Humanoid. Pointed Ears. Main Species: Elf. -
-Sub Species: Unknown.-
- Gender: Female-

The Quarut saw green blood trickling down its forehead.

-Visual Blood Chemistry Not Matching Common Elf-

- Resemblance Possibly Cosmetic-

“What is this world, nation and city? Where is the nearest date Magic-user of High Enough Level to Cast The Spell Gate or Plane Shift?”

The pseudo-elf looked at it and spoke in a cool calm and collected tone.

-Language Unknown. Activate Tongues Ability.-

Another contradiction, knowing only Common and Mechanic as a verbal language, it should also be programmed with the language of its first target.

-Discontinuity Noted For Later Review-

“I am unaware of which nation or city this is, but signs point to this being the human home world Earth. Magic does not exist, so the remainder of you query is illogical.”

- World Earth. Noted.-

“Negative. Magic is a viable part of the universe, viable in this unit’s existence, and thus, is illogical to doubt its existence.”

“You have clearly been programmed with false data.” She said again in that same cool tone.

"Possibility rejected. Internal mechanisms that are the resulted from magic too high in percentage to parallel with other source."

- Possibility of Useful Information Gathered from Further Communication Negligible-

- Location alternate information source. -

- Value of Current Information source degrading.-

"Where is the nearest information source?"

"I do not know. I am lost as to our location. But the amount of hostiles in this area strongly suggests we should vacate this location."

"Do you know the nearest exit to this location?"

"No, I do not."

- Possibility of continued useful information from current source negligible. Locate new source immediately.-

The Quarut turned away from the pseudo-elf.

"Where are you going?"

The Quarut had no reason to answer her. It also did not react when it sensed that the pseudo-elf was following it. Neither had any relevance to its programmed objective.

The Quarut saw an obvious good aligned outsider, cosmetically resemblance to a small bear. It fired a Purify Evil spell from its chest right at an unknown black armored puesdo-insectoid with an elongated head. The insectoid ceased it's hostile action and began to react in a sentient manner.

It saw a Vampire pull a human child with black curls and blue dress into the shadows before any of her friends noticed what was going on, out of sight and out of help.

The Quarut ignored them all, they were not relevant to it's objective, and were not likely to be sources of information.

The pseudo-elf continued to track behind it, it ignored her, it did not interfere in its programmed objective.

-Alert. Alert. Temporal Disruptions Detected. Temporal Disruptions Detected.-

-Prime Directive Override Enacted.-

-Primary Objective Redirected.-

-Temporal Disruptions Located. Proceed to nearest area.-

The Quarut marched in the most direct route possible to the source of the nearest disruption. From the side a black and white half-construct attempted to infect it with a Reproduction Curse. It's self repair abilities negated it and the quarut swatted it away like a fly.

The pseudo-elf gasped. "Borg. A borg drone? All alone? How is this possible?"

-Name of Half-Contruct Species Noted.-

The Borg went through a wall, landing in a heap, slowly repairing, the Quarut ignored it, it was no longer relevant. The borg was no longer able to impede it, and was no longer significant to the quarut.

The Quarut followed its innate senses and found the target in what was logically a broom closet, only 47% of it and the surrounding objects had been transmuted into crystal.

It spotted the source of the first temporal disruption. A child, human, blond hair, five years old, female. She was surrounded by small outside shaped like black Common letters all with a singular eye.

The girl looked at it as did the small multiple outsiders.

The Quarut could feel reality being rewritten and revised in an ever expanding bubble around the child with a 0.01 increase growth rate every sixty seconds. Easily able to expand around the planet and solar system in a matter of days.

"Hello." She said innocently. "Can you help me find my Mama and Papa? There isn't enough of my special friends to help me make them yet."

A moment later, the child was not moving to the naked eye. Not breathing, not blinking, nothing. A distortion surrounded her, a bubble of slowed time, slowed to the greatest stretch possible without actually stopping it (since that itself would be a disruption).

A second to her, was now a billion years to every other being in creation. Long enough for her to be contained until this timeline came to it's natural close and she be released once she was no longer a threat to time/space at the other end of time.

The black outsiders, having lost their anchor to this plane of existence, were pulled back through a gate into their own demi-plane, and the crystal conversion in the broom closet reversed itself.

And the small child, just staring innocent upward with her lips slightly parted in mid sentence seemingly completely frozen.

- Time/space Disruption negated and contained.-

- Mission Accomplished.-

- Running Possibility of Being Original Mission.-

- Possibility Negligible. Disruption had not yet occurred.-

- Proceed to next time/space disruption.-

Not even glancing back, the Quarut left the broom closet.

"What did you do to that child?" Asked the pseudo-elf.

The quarut ignored her. She was not significant.

"You will answer me."

"Negative. You are of no authority to acquire information from me."

"And what authority are you to commit the act you just did?" Her voice held no malice or anger.

"I am a Quarut. I exist for the sole purpose of ensuring the timeline and reality is not damaged. And to remove all elements that directly result in such damage."

"And who has given you this authority?"

"Unknown. That information is not significant to my mission. I am from the plane of absolute Law, I exist to enforce the law that none may alter the timeline nor alter reality."

"Then how do you know this authority even exists?"

"It is my purpose, it is why I exist. I do not care."

"And that includes the cost of innocents?"

"Innocents: sentients who are not related to mission objective. Target was not innocent."

The pseudo-elf observed the machine, looking for a way to damage it, but it had already shown resistance to borg assimilation and the ability to greatly defend itself. Attacking it was not a valid option at this time.

"Where are you going?"

"To the next disruption source."

"Another child?"

"Unknown."

Several white armored humanoids holding black projectile weapons of unknown build ordered them to stop when they entered the main convention hall again. The Quarut ordered them let them pass. They did not. They fired at it. It's damage reduction and self repair left no damage. It quickly dispatched them. The pseudo-elf said nothing as she stepped over their broken bodies.

An unknown construct, made in the shape of an immobile female human with a plastic sheen lay in it's path in one of the hallways. The quarut would have normally smashed it aside. But sensing a soul within it, and marking it as innocent, the Quarut found a path around it instead.

The size of the other disruption grew in size almost fantastically as the quarut got closer.

Entering the room, it found it not in pattern with the rest of the building. It had green poka dots with purple background. Then blue strips with magenta background.
Also were the innocents in the room.
One looked at first like a human in a military uniform, then in a flash of light he was an ape, then a stuffed bear, then a plastic scale model dinosaur.
Also was a woman dressed like a nurse, then a turtle, then a dolly, and then an I-pod.
The list went on, of innocents being turned into completely random objects and entities.
It also saw a baby becoming an old man, then an adult silver dragon becoming an egg.
That set it. This disruption had to be removed.

The disruption was a Diminutive Chaotic outsider. Humanoid. Purple and green clothes and little hat and bow-tie. Very disproportional head.

"HAHAHA!!" It said in a high male voice. "I don't know what the smoking fishes happened! But I LIKE being Mr. Mixelplix!!! Look out world! Your new supreme ruler is here! Good thing I didn't forget who I was like a lot of these yahoos! Time and space is my toy! Bet those jackasses are wishing they didn't reject my comic book idea of Superman marrying Batman now!!!"

The Quarut calculated it's possibility of being able to negate this outsider. It clearly had a Baneful Polymorph and a second addition version of Polymorph Other and Polymorph any object all as an unlimited free action.

And it had no idea to Mr. Mixelplix damage resistance or other special or super-natural abilities. Normally this would call for withdraw and information gathering. But at the rate Mr. Mixelplix was going, it suggested that it did not have time to make a Gather Information check.

It needed a way to draw Mr. Mixelplix's attention.
It turned to the pseudo-elf and pointed a finger at her.

"You shall engage and distract Mr. Mixelplix for as long as you are able."

"I will not comply."

"You will comply." It used a Suggestion spell, but the pseudo-elf proved to have a high Will Save.

It took hold of her by the arm. "You will distract Mr. Mixelplix by speaking to him, or distract him by me throwing you at him. The former has a higher probability success rate by at least 41% percent. Comply."

Finally the pseudo-elf nodded. "I will comply, let me go."

The quarut did so.

The pseudo-elf walked to the tiny chaotic outside and said in a calm cool voice.

"Hello. My name is Terpaline. Are you aware that the DNA of the common ground squirrel is 80% identical to that of a human?"

"Huh?" Mr. Mixelplix blinked at her.

"Are you also aware that under a microscope, salt appears as cubes?"

"Geez, what were you dressed as, a Vulcan from a 'I can learn science' computer game? Not that it matters anymore! HA!"

In a moment, a humanoid squirrel with red hair and a desportionate head with blue boots was standing in front of him.

"I like Sonic the Hedgehog better than Star Trek anyway! But I KNEW something good would happen when I chose to go as Mixelplix instead of Tails! Ha-ha!"

The human squirrel looked down at herself and back at Mr. Mixelplix. "Most, illogical."

A golden sword with a hilt shaped like an hour glass went right through Mixelplix's chest, not seeming to cause any damage at all, though the left hook that he took a moment later as he turned around did.

"OW What the **** are you?! I'm gonna turn you into a wind up toy! Then smash you to pieces, then turn you into smaller wind up toys! Then smash them to pieces! Then smaller wind-up toys and-"

"No." With Mixelplix distracted for the moment, the Quarut created the field of slowed time around it. However, it saw that he was quickly speeding himself back up.

"Nnnnnnooooowwwww yyyyyyooooouuuuu'vvvvveeee dddddddooooooonnnnnnneee iiiiiiiiitttttttt!"

It should have taken him three billion years to say that sentence. The quarut calculated fast.

It could not find the proper alignment of its own home plane, but its Plane Shift ability still technically worked. Just before the time bubble caught up with the rest of the universe, the quarut opened up a portal into a random (and relatively EMPTY) demi-plane and tossed the outsider inside, making it random enough (a great feat for the Quarut in of itself) so Mixelplix could not find his way back easily.

A nano-second after the portal closed, everything in the room was lit up in a bright flash.

The room now resembled the rest of the structure the quarut was in, and the innocents within had been returned to their original shapes and species. The Vulcan (it had heard what Mixelplix had called her) was back to her normal self. The silver dragon was also back to it's normal size and shape, which dominated a good portion of the room.
From this, the quarut could easily ascertain that the others had been returned to normal as well.
The female appeared to be a humanoid plant with flowers in her hair and green and brown skin, dryad. The infant was again an diapered infant, but looking around with intelligent but naive eyes and was covered in brown fur with a ringed tail and pointed ears and a mask of black fur. The other two was a male human who kept on insisting his name WAS and was NOT, "captain" Jack Sparrow, and a humanoid short purple cat with intense yellow eyes and an odd top knot.
As Mixelplix vanished into the void, she felt the strange feeling of loss, and regret.

- Mission Accomplished.-

- No Other Time/Space Disruption in travel range detected. Return to Emergency Observation Mode and Original Return objective. -

The Quarut just turned around, mission accomplished, and no high level magic user detected, it was best to leave the structure and seek an authority figure to find information, that way.

"Inevitable!" The machine stopped and looked over it's shoulder at the silver dragon who had spoken those words. "I might not approve of everything your kind does but, but thank you. You saved us."

Thanks was not something the Quarut was programmed to process and ultimately ignored it.

"Are you aware of where a magic-user of sufficient power to cast a Plane-Shift or similar is located? Or are you able to cast such a spell yourself?" The Quarut asked in a bland and cool tone.

"I'm sorry, I do not on both counts. I am a stranger to this strange place myself. I do strangely know the name of this fortress though, Xanadu, in the Providence of Floor-La-Da! In the Kingdom of Amer'ik-Ka! I think I came here to meet others of my kind."

-Location Noted and filed.-

"Tell me, What is your name?" The dragon asked calmly.

The Quarut felt it's gears grinding again.

Name. No Inevitable started out with a name, only a production number. But the Quarut could not even recall -that!- Another Inconsistency noted.
And even Inevitables that did acquire a name forgot it the moment their programming was reset, so they could completely start anew without bias of identity.

Yet logically, if it had been on this plane of existence for any amount of time, it should have acquired a name by that time. It was logical.

-Searching Data-

-Searching-

-@#ex*%>&orn... -

-@ ex orn-

-A Ex Orn.-

-Aexorn.-

"This unit's name is Quarut Aexorn."

"Thank you Quarut Aexorn." Said the silver dragon formally, the others in the room just stared at the strange exchange. "And my name is Mi'chelwarorn, it is an honor to meet you."

The Inevitable did not make make a social reaction to the silver dragon's words, they were not programmed into it's gears. However, for an illogical reason it could process, it did look at the dragon seven point three seconds more than it needed to before leaving the room looking an exit to the structure and gave the matter no further processing.

And the silver dragon, could not help but think he had met this clock work being somewhere before. But it had more important things to think about, and put the matter aside for the moment.

"So you're a dragon eh? And where might that pretty horde be?" The man who insisted he WAS and was NOT 'Captain' Jack Sparrow asked slyly. Mi'chelwarorn sighed.

The Vulcan took one look at the silver dragon and the others, then at Aexorn, and decided that it was safer for the moment to stay near the powerful warrior machine, in spite of it's fast tract into danger, it had also proven particularly good at dispelling those dangers.

She followed behind in Quarut Aexorn's shadow, Aexorn still noticing but not caring for her follow.

"Do I not get thanks for my part in accomplishing your objective?"

"I do not give thanks, I merely do as I am programmed."

"Is your programming stagnant?"

"No. It becomes more contaminated by emotion and Good and Evil the longer I remain on the material plane. Thus why I must locate a portal back to Mechanicus before I am rendered biased so I might be reset."

"So you will forget everything you have learned? So you may effectively die?"

"It is what I am programmed to do. It is what I am supposed to do."

"So your life has no meaning to you?"

"My 'life' exists but to ensure Order and Law is not fatally disrupted, least chaos spread from it's own plane of reality though out the Great Wheel."

"Great Wheel?"

"Great Wheel. The combined shape of all possible realities and planes of existence."

"So you are saying the shape of the universe or all universes is a wheel?"

"A wheel only in that one plane of reality is connected along side the others with the prime material plane in it's center."

"How do you know your information is correct?"

"It is not my place to wonder. Only to insure time and space are not disrupted."

"So you do not care?"

"Correct. I do not care."

"Yet you will ultimately -come- to care the longer you continue to function on 'this plane of existence.' "

"Thus why I must be reset at my forge. Order must not be biased, it must not be tainted by Good or Evil, it must simply be."

"And if you had a choice in the matter?"

"It is instinct. I have no choice."

"Instinct for a machine?"

"Perhaps a better term is, 'hardwired programming.' "

"Yes, perhaps. But I have noticed, you are not referring to yourself as 'this unit.' "

- Contamination noted.-

"Thus why I must ultimately be reset, I posses too much power, my kind posses too much power, to be biased."

With the time/space disruptions dealt with, Quarut Aexorn was able to find the way out without trouble. Most innocents just let them pass, hostiles were dealt with swiftly and finally. He found many, many humanoids and non-humanoid outside, some he could identify, others he could not. He made the best logging of their abilities and appearance as he could.

The police asked him to stay within the grounds of Xanadu, and since they made no hostile actions directly towards him, Aexorn obeyed the legitimate authority figures. Aexorn searched for a mage with the proper level and spell knowledge to aid him, but it appeared that all magic uses with the power to aid him had already left Xanadu. He also sensed a powerful undead that slipped through the police's net. But he was a Quarut, not a Marut, his duty was to protect time, not punish those who cheated death.

Being made to go through proper processing, Aexorn was asked repeated if he knew himself by any other name. And repeatedly had to tell the humans that an Inevitable's memories of any other identity it had before being sent out on it's mission were erased for the sake of its unbias.

Terpaline and he split ways. He was taken to a government building where he was examined while Terpaline was taken to another. He calmly noted her absence and continued on his mission. However, once it reached the point where they wanted him to simply remain in storage, he simply Dimension Doored outside and began his quest again, they had proven only marginally helpful in him locating a mage of sufficient power for him anyway.

Police tried to stop him, Quarut Aexorn simply flicked them aside, them smashing into tree trunks along the road. They were not his targets. He had a mission to return home to.

After several Gather Information Checks, he was able to discern the proper name of the state and country he was in, along with basic social propers and political situations.

It seemed that until the events at Xanadu, humans were the only sentient race upon Earth. And every legitimate and secondary information source that Quarut Aexorn check presented forth the words that a Mass Polymorph Other Spell by a moderate deity had transmuted hundreds if not thousands of humans in various guises into what they perceived their guises to be of.

Also apparently this world had been greatly ignorant of magic both clerical and arcane. Though both now existed in this world.

Also that the facts and rules of the universe as he saw it, were considered fiction for a fairly popular game played by a human sub culture.

Quarut Aexorn a year or so later after displacing two more entities with power only the gods should yield, one three months afterwards, and one nine months afterwards, came to the logical conclusion that rationally, it had been one of those humans.

If this was indeed the case, then this could mean that returning to it's forge or even a forge for resetting might prove impossible if it had not truly been created in one of the forges.

However, by the monkey typewriter theory, if the possible universes of time and space were infinite, then technically, the universe that ran parallel to his own as his knew it to be, did exist. However it would be very much harder to find it.

Plus then it could alert it's kind to this world, where the chaotic forces of magic now existed but had no unbiased force to keep it from spiraling out of control beyond reason or logic.

It ran the possibility of going back in time, and arranging for others to be dressed as the other sub-types of his kind, but rejected this idea, as it would be altering history and very much be a disruption of the timeline.

In fact, two years after the incident, it prevented much the same occurring when a mage attempted to create a mass of elite followers by taking a group of non-magic adapt humans back in time and dressing them in master wizard's attire. This wouldn't be the last time that Quarut Aexorn would prevent someone from trying something such as this.

But the sad fact remained (and the fact he could think of it as sad showed how great his contamination had spread), that without a forge to reset himself, he would continue to grow more biased. In fact the warning signs had already started.

He would be more ruthless with those who were seeking to alter time for their own benefit and letting go those who had attempted to do so for the sake of others after stripping them of their means of travel.

Taking a proper precaution, Aexorn traveled back in time to the day of Con, from morning until dusk, observing events from afar, making sure no one prevented Xanadu from happening, since he was here, and thus would always be here. After all, it was now part of history, part of events, in spite of the chaos it had technically caused, it was part of the flow of cause and effect. And the rules of cause and effect must always be obeyed.

Aexorn felt a time machine appear behind him, he saw an ordinary looking human, but whose motions, behavior, speech patterns, and everything else said he was anything -but- human. The fact the time machine was a blue British police phone booth suggest greatly this was likely another of Xanadu's creations, like he was.

"Are you here to prevent Xanadu?"

The 'human' calmly shook his head. "No, not really, you?"

"I am here to make sure no one alters the history of this event, too much -new- cause can spawn from it, even if the chaos it created at first has been assimilated into order."

"Good thing that, I'm just here to watch the show, I was rather confused back then and didn't get to see much."

Indeed, mages now sold their talents and trained new mages, shaman and clerics spoke with spirits for the hopeful, and technology ever slowly being backwards engineered, even if it was still decades down the line from behind able to reproduce everything spawned at Xanadu perfectly. And the new species had finally begun to act as a natural part of the ecosystem, pokemon, alien mythicals, and Gamimon alike.

And as for those who had become gods... well... while he was not a Varakhut, those charged with making sure the divine stayed divine and mortals did not ascend to divinity (though a loophole said that if a mortal did manage it, that the Varakhut would protect them the same as any god), they had found followers, though the contest for those who would follow what faith had become more intense, as Jehova, Budda, and the gods buried by the desert sands, had all found new mortal vessels. Then again, that part wasn't that different from before Xanadu's occurrence from what Aexorn had gathered. Who knew, maybe one of them would see fit to create more of his kind...

For as much as Aexorn tried to deny it, he had been struck by the emotion of loneliness. And he knew it would only grow worse as more emotions entered his clock work heart.

He spotted two humans, the larger one dressed as a silver dragon, and the smaller one as a Quarut. They chatted with each other, teased each other, laughed with and at each other. Just enjoying each other's company.

Aexorn felt the urge to prevent the two humans from entering the convention center. But resisted the temptation. He was a Quarut! It was his duty! Even if he was a species of one, an order of one, his duty remained, and he would protect the consistency of time, to the end.

He could not help them, he could not stop them, he could not do anything for them, it was his duty, his responsibility, his fate, not to.

The time traveler next to him must have noticed, "So why don't you stop him?"

Quarut Aexorn thought of all the reasons, until he came up with the one that fit him the most now, "Because that would be cheating."

"Ah, I see, and if I attempted to stop him?"

"I'd kill you."

"Ah, I see, life for king and country and all that?"

"My loyalty is only to the consistency of time, and now that time travel such as yours and mine exist, and shall continue to exist, it will always be threatened. I must guard it."

"Aren't you least bit curious of who you used to be? Don't you think he's curious of who he used to be?" He referred to the older man in the silver dragon costume.

"The past is the past, let it stay in the past. That the most basic creed of the Quarut."

"The past is what the present is built on, has a habit of showing up you know."

"Those humans are dead, I won't mock them by pretending that I am them."

"Still... shouldn't their families at least know what happened to them? So they don't live out their lives not knowing?"

"The longer I exist, the more human I become, and the more biased I will become, until I do what no Inevitable is ever meant to do: pass judgment. I don't want to risk speeding up the process." The machine signed as best it could. "But I've come to something, I fear resetting, but I also know it must be done, for the sake of everything."

At the time traveler's words however, and proving again how emotional he had become, he observed the human he was created from and his brother as best as Aexorn could. He didn't have many ranks in Move Silent or Hide, but the circumstantial bonus hung greatly in his favor. He even learned what their names were.

He was sure to leave when the change happened least he detect himself.

Mi'chelwarorn was hard to find, but not extraordinary so, silver dragons were known for enjoying the company of other races more than the rest of their kind. The rocky mountains had become something of a reserve for metallic dragons and Aexorn ultimately just had to ask directions from a golden dragon who had never forgiven men in black for erasing his dragon memories and forcing his original self back upon him. It had been so unbearable that the gold dragon had later magically restored his draconic memories and personality that belonged with his new body.

Mi'chelwarorn was sleeping in his self made cave on top of the horde he had painstakingly created himself. Keeping the creation methods of his bedspread secret like other dragons lest his mattress' market value went through the floor.

Mi'chelwarorn was happy to see his 'old friend' again. Aexorn calmly explain his reason for finally seeing the dragon, though since Mi'chelwarorn would live for centuries, and Aexoron possibly forever, a few years was literally nothing between them.

Mi'chelwarorn listened intently. He had figured out the truth much like Aexorn, and had also made no attempt to find out his previous incarnation. He was what he was, a dragon, few could contest to that state, and he was proud of that.

Then Aexorn asked him to deliver the letter, explaining with as much reason and yet emotion as Aexorn could balance as to the fate of their son. Aexorn asked if Mi'chelwarorn had any intention of shape changing into a human for the task if he accepted.

"I can't... I'd feel like I was playing a part. It's better that I meet them as who I am."

"But will you?"

"Yes... it's only right. Their son no longer exists, so I might exist, for the great good for this world... after all... a world without dragons is a very, very, very drab place."

Dragon pride was simple Aexorn knew how to tolerate. He also asked about his other problem, the problem of what would happen when he finally did something that had no indifference behind it that had to do with his duty of protecting time.

"You should just let yourself become good."

"Maybe that's an option for anyone else, but for me, it would be... cheating. Time is indifferent, that which protects it must be so as well."

Mi'chelwarorn was silent for a time, thinking, "That is a very good question, and a very good riddle, perhaps I will have an answer for you when I return... can you watch my horde while I'm away?"

"I make no promises, if my duty calls, I can not betray you, even for you." He didn't say 'brother' because that would be a total and absolute lie.

Mi'chelwarorn merely nodded and took off into the sky. Two weeks later, after Aexorn had dismantled and put back together the complete string theory twice, the silver dragon finally returned.

"Did they receive the letter?" Aexorn did not ask how it went.

"Yes... they did... " Mi'chelwarorn looked cut inside. "I... I've betrayed my alignment... I pretend that I was still somehow their son... that I could still love them like he did... when it was all a lie. I could grow to love them, admire them, but it would never be the same as his love."

"You did what you thought was right."

"I should have done what was right. I saw the looks in their eyes, that desperate hope, I couldn't bring myself to crush it."

"Did you make them happy?"

"Yes..."

"Then you were true to your alignment... at least this way, they got to say good-bye."

"I promised I'd visit them every 'Christ Mass.' "

"Then -become- their son. You can do that for them, I can not."

"... You've become more than a cold logical machine."

"Which is why I fear myself."

The two were silent for a time, the sun set and the stars came out without either of them saying a word.

"Aexorn. Your kind was not given the knowledge to create more of your own were they?"

"No. It was to keep us from multiplying out of control and causing our order to mutate into a form of chaos."

"What is that you -fear- about having a full set of emotions?"

"That I will no longer be impartial and unbiased, or that one day, I might ALLOW someone to alter time, or that I might use my power and alter time myself."

"... So you're saying, that you're afraid you'll end up doing something wrong?"

"... Correct..."

"Then I might have a solution, or at least a way for you to continue to do your job as is."

As it turned out Mi'chelwarorn had made some connections with a goblin tinkerer (thankfully not from the rules of existence that governed Aexorn's world), along with a few other slightly crack pot but brilliant steam punk and super clock work engineers who had managed to slip through the fingers of Project X thanks to 'Eric Winters' or as he was more personally known, Raven the Trickster.

Mi'chelwarorn called it a moral compass, to Aexorn it seemed more like a warning light. He knew a human being would be repulsed by the idea, and even angry, but he honestly enjoyed it, it gave his mind the sense of order that been slowly slipping away ever since that day at Xanadu.

Mi'chelwarorn said it worked basically as a gauge, reading his alignment at all times, tuning this way and that based on his own actions. While a growing part of Aexorn at first chaffed under it, Aexorn also knew that this was indeed for the best.

Finally, he could do his task again, without fear of surrendering to bias, or at least now, -knowing- when he was acting biased.

Still, Aexorn never let go of the emotion of hope, that one day, he could retire, and find out if anything waited for him on the other side. Eternal life was very oddly not that pleasing an idea when that life was made of just your job.

Aexorn wasn't all that surprised when the half-dragons starting popping up, dragons never did believe in the species barrier about such things. Aexorn was a bit surprised when Mi'chelwarorn began offering rangers and police the 'dragon born' Feat from one of the more obscure rules set that made a fully willing subject (couldn't work on an even slightly unwilling one) into a humanoid dragon with more selfless devotion to the cause of Good than some paladins. Then again, with many monsters now very real, that had been just myths for these humans before... culture itself had to adapt or vanish.

Aexorn did find a mage from the same set of rules as himself, but instead of abandoning his post leap frogging from one plane of reality to the next in search of the forges, he simply had him send out a Calling spell. He would let his brothers know, whenever they heard this message, that magic in all it's raw chaotic glory existed on this little world. And those whose duty it was to stem and breath order into it, were needed.

They may come, they may never come, they may demand Aexorn finally reset himself when given the chance to at the forges. But at least then, in all truths and realities, Aexorn wouldn't be alone.

It was strange, as a rule, Inevitables spent their entire lives from the forges and at the forges in no contact to one another, so technically they should never had felt lonely to begin with. Or maybe that was the real reason they returned to the forges, so if it was even for a moment, they would be among fellows.

Whatever the out come, whatever happened, Aexon would face it as was his duty and his responsibility. He was a Quarut after all, one of the Inevitables... and he felt proud of that. Even if it was created purely by Raven's magic, it was his. Even if this life was taken, he had made it his. And maybe that was the point. After all, a characters in a campaign wasn't about how it was made... but what you did with it.

~Just another step on the journey

~Fin

Male Model

2016-08-29T14:19:52Z

TigeR: Fix typo

[[Category:Story]][[Category:Transgender]][[Category:Xanadu]][[Category:Bryan]]
{{universe|Xanadu}}
{{byline|author=Bryan|user=Bryan}}
The drawers of jeans and shirts mocked Grant silently as he sat naked on the edge of his bed. In the week since Xanadu he'd taken to sleeping in as late as possible, still on extended vacation time from work and trying to spend as much time as he could hidden under the sheets. He lived alone so in theory he could spend all of his time at home walking around in the nude, but he'd found that to be less and less comfortable as time wore on; oddly enough, it made him feel almost as self-conscious as the alternative.

Grant hadn't changed significantly when the curse had hit the convention, indeed most of the physical differences in his body were so subtle that he hadn't noticed them until he'd got home later that day and spent some time with a mirror. A few changes in proportions, the loss of some hair, a perfect skin complexion... Really, he could live with it; he'd completely dodged the bullet compared to virtually anyone else who'd been caught up in the still-unexplained magic event there. He'd seen people turned into animals, monsters, and even in one case a vending machine. But physical changes had been only one of the effects of the strange magic, and he hadn't escaped some of the others so easily.

Grant sighed and stood up. ''Might as well get it over with. Let's see what's in store this time.'' Once he got started dressing he moved with quick efficiency, making mental note of which underwear, socks, pants and shirt he grabbed. He'd worn all of these before, and though he hadn't determined a pattern yet he hadn't given up on eventually finding one...

His socks turned tan, their fabric thinning as it started climbing up his legs, and Grant grimaced as his underwear turned silky and tightened slightly. His shirt and pants fused at the waist and began fading towards the same shade of dark blue as the texture of their blended fabric became finer. Then the most dramatic change happened, the pant legs pulling up to his knees and billowing out as they merged together. It was all over in about five seconds, and Grant turned to the full-length mirror he'd set up in the room a few days ago.

The dress was a dark blue evening gown this time, slinky and form-hugging, and Grant's socks had become fairly normal flesh-tone nylons. The dress' neckline was lower than Grant would have liked but at least it had shoulders and a back, giving him a little better coverage than usual. Grant checked the outfit over, lifting the edge of the dress to find plain white panties in place of his underwear. Grant sighed in relief. Sometimes the curse gave him much sexier undergarments than that and even though they weren't visible he'd still change out of them if they were too extreme. This time, though, the outfit seemed acceptable.

Grant sighed again, letting the hem of the dress drop and absently brushing it smooth with his hand. Not acceptable, not at all; he was still a ''guy,'' damn it. And not even a transvestite guy, who wore women's clothing on purpose; he'd never even ''considered'' it before. Just one time, one damned time, a favor without thought or consequence...

Grant had gone to the convention with an old friend of his from college days, a woman named Sarah. Sarah was a seamstress, a professional tailor, and the costume-rich environment of the convention was a gold mine for people of her profession; she'd brought along a selection of clothing to show off and possibly sell or enter a contest in.

She hadn't got that far when the magic had hit them. They'd still been in the hotel, where Sarah was working on fixing a flowing pink dress that had somehow suffered a tear on the trip. Grant had had a slim build even then and Sarah's dress dummy was back at the shop, so she'd asked him to wear it briefly while she made a few small adjustments.

They didn't even notice when the change happened. It was only when Sarah had finished her adjustments and the dress came off that they realized that the normal clothing Grant had worn underneath had mysteriously vanished except for his underwear, which had even more mysteriously turned into frilly pink panties. Grant had assumed that Sarah had pulled off some sort of incredible gag on him, and Sarah had assumed that Grant had done the same to her. They would probably have convinced each other that neither of them had anything to do with it in fairly short order but before they got a chance Grant had pulled on a pair of shorts to cover the panties. The shorts turned into a miniskirt before their very eyes, short circuiting the entire conversation.

They'd tried every piece of clothing he'd brought with him, and every one of them had turned into a dress of some sort moments after he'd put it on. And frustratingly, they changed back to normal moments after he took them off again. He also tried the women's clothing that Sarah had brought for the show; anything that was a dress to begin with stayed the same, and anything that wasn't changed into one.

Grant shook his head and went into the bathroom, the blue dress swishing against his nyloned legs as he walked. It had been a week now and he hadn't got used to it; he didn't ''want'' to get used to it, and had resolved to hold out against getting used to it until he somehow found a cure. But until then there were some things he'd just have to accommodate.

Looking into the medicine cabinet mirror, Grant saw a pair of small silver stud earrings in his earlobes. He didn't bother trying to remove them; jewelry that appeared when he put on clothing was a part of the magical outfit and would only vanish again when he took the clothing off. The curse apparently insisted on accessorizing, right down to a touch of makeup and a hairdo. Grant brushed his soft brown hair half-heartedly, trying to get the stylish wave out of it and considering trimming it again. It wasn't very long, only brushing his shirt collar had he been able to wear one, but it had grown back to that length after he'd cut it shorter only four days ago. The curse seemed to have decided this would be the minimum.

The physical changes to Grant's body had been subtle but effective. He was still fully male, but he was an extremely ''feminine'' male. His waist had slimmed, his hips slightly flared and his legs more shapely, and his hands and feet had become significantly daintier. He'd even suffered a hint of breast development - just enough to be noticeable and give the appearance of cleavage when the neckline of whatever he was stuck in went low enough to show it. Sarah had described them as 'tasteful sub-A-cups.' He preferred to think of it as 'chest fat.' His face was still quite recognizably his, though again with a more feminine bone structure and with his adam's apple smoothed away entirely. It wasn't so bad when he was naked; he was clearly a guy, even though an unusually pretty one. But when all of that was accentuated so thoroughly by the female clothing...

Grant brushed his teeth, trying not to look into the mirror any more. He didn't need to shave, of course. Then when he was finished freshening up he headed back out to the kitchen for breakfast.

A week since the convention, six days actually, and Grant was already starting to run out of ideas. He'd been a virtual recluse for most of that time but he had felt reasonably comfortable talking on the phone; he was able to force his softened voice down close enough to its original register that people he knew would recognize him, or at least not suspect anything unusual about him. He'd made arrangements for more time off from work, made excuses to avoid his other friends for the time being, and had spoken with various other victims from Xanadu seeking some clue or advice to overcome his problems.

His case was somewhat unusual, though when you got right down to it they all were in some way or another. Most people who'd been in clothing of the opposite gender had simply changed genders themselves. Furthermore, most people afflicted with clothing curses like his own at least had the advantage that the effects were consistent; any given set of normal clothing would always change into the same set of alternate clothing each time it was put on. Grant's clothing couldn't seem to remember what to be from previous days aside from insisting on becoming some sort of dress or skirt. It forced him to search for a new "reasonably acceptable" outfit by trial and error every morning, and some days he wasn't as lucky as he had been today - if one considered a blue evening gown luck. On previous occasions he'd wound up dressed as some sort of belly dancer outfit, once as some sort of princess complete with an unremovable diamond-encrusted tiara, and even once in a voluminous white wedding dress. It sometimes took three or four hours of changing clothes before he settled on something.

Grant stared at the phone, trying to think of what other avenues he could try. He'd spoken with several 'wizards', people who'd gained magical powers of various sorts as part of their own transformations. They'd had no luck trying to counteract other peoples' curses though one of them had helpfully offered to turn Grant into a woman - an offer Grant had instantly refused, after which he'd avoided talking to any more such people. However he might be dressed, he was still a man and he wasn't about to change that.

Grant was beginning to suspect that he wasn't going to find the magical solution he was hoping for, at least not anytime soon. So what was left? Assuming no magical cures, assuming he ''had'' to continue dressing like this... Grant rested his face on his hands, wrestling with despair. He hadn't told his friends or family what had happened yet, hadn't told his boss or coworkers. How could he possibly convince them that he wasn't a freak? He couldn't even really control what sort of dress he wore, let alone that he was wearing one at all; it would only be a matter of time before he wound up having to go to work in fishnet stockings and a spandex miniskirt.

Grant sighed. It might finally be time to take Sarah up on her offer.

Sarah had been very apologetic after they'd got over their surprise at Grant's problem and had begun to grasp the nature of what had happened at Xanadu. She considered his problem to be her fault. In a way it really was, even though she certainly hadn't known what would happen when she'd asked Grant to serve as a temporary model and Grant didn't blame her for it. Once it had become clear how Grant's curse operated she'd offered to provide him with a new wardrobe for free. Grant had declined, not seeing how that would help any.

But now that he'd experienced more of the vagaries of the magical clothing he was stuck with he began to see one clear advantage; if he got some clothing from Sarah that wouldn't get reshaped by the curse when he put it on, he could wear the ''least'' revealing and the ''least'' sexy dress his curse would allow and stick with it consistently. It would be only the tiniest of improvements, but Grant was willing to grasp at a few straws by now. He picked up the phone. Sarah answered his call immediately, and agreed just as quickly to receive him at her store; she sounded very glad to finally have her offer of help accepted, and eager to see him again. She'd been calling him regularly to check up on him, but he'd always brushed off her offers to come over.

Grant felt a little guilty about how guilty Sarah felt, and how he'd avoided talking to her for days now; he'd felt more comfortable speaking with people he didn't know and who didn't know how he looked. But if he was ever going to be brave enough to come out of his self-imposed exile to face the world in a dress he would have to start by at least being brave enough to feel comfortable around Sarah.

Grant got up from the kitchen chair, smoothing the dress and shaking his head. How could he get comfortable with ''this''? ''Maybe I should go back to my room and try out other outfits, see if any turn into something better... oh, the hell with it.'' Grant picked up his car keys and wallet, grumbling about the complete absence of pockets in women's clothing. He almost wouldn't mind if the curse provided him with a purse instead, but evidently that particular accessory wasn't covered by it and he wasn't about to go buy one himself. Though perhaps if Sarah had one handy...

He slipped his nylon-clad feet into his shoes, several sizes too large for him now, and braced his hand against the wall for a moment to keep his balance while they were reshaped by the curse. They shrank down to just the correct size, their upper halves splitting into a mesh of blue leather straps while the soles arched and heels sprouted. Grant wobbled slightly and looked down at his shoes with a frown; the heels were about four inches, much higher than he would normally consider wearing. But the shoes matched the dress, as always, so he'd have to change the whole outfit if he wanted to try again.

Concentrating on keeping his ankles straight and trying to suppress the bouncy sway high heels normally gave his gait, Grant stepped outside and made his way to the elevator. He hoped none of his neighbors would spot him until he was far enough away that they wouldn't draw a connection between the woman he appeared to be and the man he really was. He'd been lucky in that regard so far, at least.

Sarah's store was tucked away at the end of a mini-mall about an hour's drive away. The drive itself was no problem, aside from some minor trouble with the heels of his shoes while working the pedals that was easily solved by taking them off while he drove. Grant actually kind of enjoyed it, despite the nagging sense of being on display; it was good to get out of the apartment for a bit and assuming he didn't do anything stupid that got him pulled over he was perfectly secure in the car.

The short trip from the car to the door of Sarah's tailor shop - named "Seven Seams", for some reason Sarah had never mentioned - was a little tougher. It was a Saturday afternoon, there were people outside shopping, and Seven Seams was clearly a ''women's'' clothing store. Grant slipped his shoes back on and then spent a few minutes sitting in his parked car trying to overcome a minor anxiety attack. ''Come on, you've been wearing women's clothing for a week now,'' he berated himself. ''You were fine walking around in high heels in public back when you left Xanadu. Get over it already.'' But the days he'd spent isolated in his apartment at home had only made things worse; he'd been brooding and fretting about being seen like this the entire time. He finally forced himself to climb out of the car after waiting for a moment when nobody seemed to be nearby. He straightened his dress with as much dignity as he could muster and then marched resolutely inside.

The shop was small, filled with racks of clothing in a small retail area beside a large counter where specialty orders were handled. Grant had been here several times before and the familiarity was somewhat reassuring, but he was still nearly paralyzed with tension until he confirmed that no customers were present. Grant let out a sigh of relief and walked over to the counter. "Sarah? You in?" He called out.

"Be right out!" Sarah called back from somewhere in the depths of the back room. Grant waited while a sewing machine whirred briefly; Sarah was always fiddling around with clothing even when she didn't have any special orders to work on. She quickly finished whatever task she'd been in the middle of and popped into view behind the counter. "There we go, I was... wow." She stopped and stared at Grant. "That dress, it's one of the magic dresses out of nowhere?"

Grant blushed bright red and nodded. "Yeah. Got 'lucky' today, I guess."

"Wow," Sarah repeated. "It looks just like... uh, sorry, I didn't mean to obsess like that. Come on back here, there's nobody else in the shop this afternoon. Tell me how you're doing and what you need."

Grant went around the counter to follow Sarah into the privacy of the workshop in back. The room was even more crowded than the area out front, almost claustrophobic from the stacks of cloth bolts and shelves filled with spools and various other implements. Grant found a spot to sit on one of the small workbenches, kicking his shoes off with a sigh. Xanadu had given him feet that could handle high heels without discomfort but they were still awkward and annoying. "I need a dress of my own," he admitted. "I hate spending hours trying on clothes trying to find something that looks right, and always having to settle for something like this -" he gestured down at his slinky blue gown "- that looks so damned ''pretty''. I want something normal."

Sarah nodded sympathetically. "Yeah, it's very nice, but it isn't really good for everyday use." She leaned in close to peer at the dress. "Perfect quality fabric, though, and... well, never mind. I'm sorry, I should be helping." She stood back up and went over to a shelf where a stack of folded clothing rested. "I've been thinking about this a lot, and I've picked out some ideas from the racks. Things that look ordinary. Want to see?" She took a gray sweater off of the top and held it up.

Grant nodded with a sigh. He'd played dress-up like this before, back at the convention when he and Sarah had first been trying to determine what his curse entailed. The only difference this time was that he was expecting to pick one out to keep for indefinite future use. A somewhat significant difference, all things considered...

Sarah tried to push the envelope of Grant's curse, giving him a dozen near-dresses and other relatively "masculine" outfits that were each in their turn transformed into completely different full-blown dresses when Grant tried them on. She tried out a long overcoat as well but it shrank down into a small jacket that did nothing to conceal. When Grant started getting frustrated she grudgingly switched to a different stack of clothing; these were all dresses and skirts, but they were at least somewhat ''plain'' dresses and skirts. Grant felt a little heartened when some of them remained untouched by magic when he put them on and he reminded himself not to be too picky - he had resolved that he would take at least one of them home with him, no matter how attractive it turned out to be.

He ultimately settled on a long, pleated skirt of dark plaid fabric, and a dark green shirt that went well with it but was almost normal for a guy. Grant tried to be happy with it; it reminded him a bit of an overly-long kilt. His socks even remained as socks when he put them on with it, and while his shoes still changed dramatically - into shiny black pumps with silver buckles - they at least had relatively low heels.

Sarah suggested going back to testing the limits of his curse again once Grant had decided on it, but Grant was thoroughly sick of trying on more clothing at this point; he had his 'plain' outfit, and the whole point of picking it in the first place was for it to be stable. Besides, he'd been dressing and undressing for... Grant blinked in surprise at the clock on the wall. Five hours? It was definitely time to go. Packing his old male clothing into a bag, Grant begged off of Sarah's invitation to go out to a restaurant for supper instead. He was hungry, sure, but he wasn't ready for ''that''. It was great hanging out with Sarah again, he almost didn't mind the dresses so much when it was with just her around, but he needed some time alone again.

Grant headed home. The pumps were much easier to drive in than the heels and though the long skirt was a little cumbersome when seated at least it covered his bare legs well. He may not have been ready for a restaurant but he did feel daring enough in his new high-necked shirt to stop at a drive-through; Grant chalked that up as a very positive accomplishment, both in terms of getting over his fears and in not having to cook anything when he got home.

He still wasn't sure if he'd ever be able to face his friends and family wearing the thing, but at least it was a small step. Grant watched TV for a while, then eventually hung his new skirt up in the closet and stripped down for the night.

{{Separator|d}}

Grant woke up with a start early the next morning. Something was different; the feel of the sheets on his naked skin was wrong. He threw off the cover and surged groggily to his feet, nearly tripping on the silky cream-colored nightie he was wearing. Grant immediately turned to face the mirror.

"Oh hell, even at night now?" The nightie was short, satiny, and extremely sexy. He blushed in embarrassment as he became somewhat aroused by his own reflection, something he'd tried hard to get over in the previous week.

Nighties must count as 'dresses', Grant realized, and slipped the thing off over his head to toss on the floor. Seconds after coming to rest, it lost its sheen and unfolded into an ordinary bed sheet. Grant looked back at the bed, confirming that a sheet was missing, and breathed a sigh of relief. He must have simply got tangled enough in it while he slept for his curse to consider it an attempt at clothing. That had never happened before, but he'd never tried it before either.

''Day seven. Still discovering new things...'' But at least he had a stable outfit now to fall back on. He pulled on a pair of underwear, which shifted to reassuringly mundane panties, and then put on his new green skirt and shirt combo.

The shirt's color immediately began to fade. Grant watched in surprise and dismay as it turned white, developing frills and buttons on the front as it split all the way down to the waist. Grant sighed again, this time in disappointment. But the long pleated skirt stayed the same, so this wasn't a complete loss. He tried putting on one of his old shirts instead and it changed the same way; for whatever reason, his curse had decided that this was how the top that went with this particular skirt should look now.

So why had it not done this to the green shirt last night? Grant shook his head and headed for the bathroom to take a shower. He wasn't about to admit a setback, this must just be another little detail of the curse that he hadn't encountered before. He'd figure it out eventually.

Grant was up earlier than he was used to lately, but he was wide awake now and in any case wasn't interested in lying in those sheets again any time soon. He killed a little time with his usual morning routine of checking what sorts of outfits his old clothing changed into today, quitting when one of them turned out to be a latex tube top and miniskirt that were devilishly hard to get back out of again. ''Back to the stable clothes, shirt aside.''

Then it was opening time for Seven Seams and he phoned up Sarah. This sort of clothes-shifting nonsense was exactly what he'd hoped to get ''away'' from by getting real women's clothing, and perhaps she'd have some idea why it hadn't worked. "Hey, Sarah? It's Grant. Something went wrong with the shirt I got from you yesterday. I put it on with the same skirt as before, but this time the curse triggered and changed it."

Sarah was silent for a moment. "Into a white buttoned blouse with frills?" She asked after a pause, sounding worried.

Grant frowned. "Yeah. How did you know? It didn't change yesterday."

"I think you should come back down here, Grant. I need to show you some designs and get your input."

Sarah wouldn't explain further over the phone. She'd tried enticing him out of the apartment with mysteries before, but this time she sounded quite serious; Grant slipped on his shoes - low-heeled shiny black pumps again, at least that hadn't changed too - and headed straight over. This time he was able to get out of the car at Seven Seams with only slight hesitation, driven by nervous suspense. Sarah was waiting inside with a spiral-bound sketch pad and as soon as he entered she handed it to him.

The page it was open to showed a quick but detailed drawing of an outfit much like the one he was wearing... correction, almost ''exactly'' like the one he was wearing. "You drew this? When?"

"Last night after you left," Sarah admitted. "I'm sorry, I didn't like your choice of top to go with that skirt, and I thought to myself... I imagined what I'd put with it instead. And sketched the design out. Do any others in there look familiar?"

Sarah's sketch pad was thick and heavily used. Grant started flipping through the pages, and almost immediately started getting a sense of deja vu. The drawings were all done fairly quick and rough, but most of them closely resembled outfits that he'd actually worn in the past few days. "You've been seeing what I was wearing somehow?"

Sarah shook her head. "No, I don't think so. Some of the things you changed into yesterday when the curse triggered on non-dresslike clothes were in here already, but they were new to you, right? I drew them the day before. That's what really started making me think, I ''knew'' I recognized the designs."

Grant flipped more rapidly, scanning through pages and pages of dresses and skirts. Then suddenly the art changed, switching to a more detailed and time-consuming style depicting all sorts of other types of clothing besides dresses. Grant's heart was racing; he was sure he'd never worn anything like these, it had been nothing but dresses and skirts since Xanadu. "I think I know when you reached this point in the book."

"Yeah. Xanadu." Sarah sighed. "I thought it was just inspiration, from seeing you in all those nice outfits, you know? Suddenly, all these fashion designs started popping into my head. Dozens a day. They were all really good, and I sketched them all down as fast as I could. I wished I could record the details better." A wry, haunted grin; "I guess I was getting my wish all along."

"Holy shit, it really was you after all," Grant muttered. Then at Sarah's hurt reaction he immediately backpedalled; "not your fault, I mean, not your fault. But you were involved. I was modeling your design at the con when the curse hit me, and I've been doing it ever since."

"I'm so, so sorry, Grant!" Sarah sounded on the verge of tears. "I just felt so full of ideas, I ''had'' to get them all out. I was so sure it was you inspiring me, not the other way around!"

Grant sighed and looked down at his skirt, idly rearranging a pleat that had folded out of place. "I don't blame you, who knows how this stupid magic is really working... oh. Oh! Don't worry, Sarah, this is a ''good'' thing! Please... can you try designing me a nice, normal man's outfit?" He handed her the sketchpad hopefully.

Sarah took it, wiping her eye with the back of her hand and hurrying over to the counter. She picked up a pen, turned to a blank page, and paused to think for a moment. Then she began to draw in quick strokes, arcs and lines coalescing rapidly into a recognizable form. Grant looked over her shoulder, and sighed in disappointment when she finished.

"That's a Catholic schoolgirl uniform," Grant pointed out gently. He didn't look forward to wearing that one at some point in the future.

"I know, I know." Sarah's voice was tense with frustration. "Ever since Xanadu, I've been thinking up designs... but this is the only kind I've been able to grasp. Let me try again."

A tight black dress this time, running all the way down to the ankle but split to the thigh and leaving the arms and shoulders bare, with incredibly high heels and an elaborate necklace. Scratch the schoolgirl outfit; Grant didn't look forward to ''that'' one. At least not with those shoes.

"Alright, let's just stay calm for a moment here. Clearly... clearly, the curse has affected us ''both''."

Sarah nodded sullenly, staring at the pen in her hand as if it had betrayed her. "Maybe if I try to stop drawing."

"Maybe... but I don't know if that'll help." Grant took the sketchpad and started flipping through it again. There were designs in here that he hadn't worn yet... "Hey. Did you draw a nightie design last night, too? No frills, but really short and sexy?"

"No... I've thought about some since Xanadu, though. I didn't jot any of them down, I don't make undergarments or sleep wear so I didn't see the point. Why?"

Grant sighed. "Somehow, I don't think that the drawings really matter." Xanadu's magic had somehow fixated Sarah's subconscious on designing dresses, perhaps because that's what she'd been doing when it hit. And he - ''he'' of all people - had been locked in at the same time to be the model for all of her ideas. At least he hadn't been turned into a mannequin or something.

"I'm sorry, Grant," Sarah repeated. Grant gave her a hug, in part because he needed one himself.

"It's okay, I guess... at least we're figuring some more things out. We know where this wardrobe is coming from now, though the selection is still out of control. It's a start."

Sarah nodded, finishing the hug and stepping back to look Grant over again. "Yeah. Maybe if I'm part of the problem, I can really do something to be part of the solution. I can make you all kinds of-" She broke off with a self-conscious laugh. "No, maybe I shouldn't. My clothing ''is'' the problem."

"We'll see, we'll see." Grant gave his skirt a little swish, watching the pleats settle nicely back into place; perhaps this was simply the best that he could get for now. "I probably should try to be less picky. I'm sorry too, I didn't want this to become a burden on you."

The store's door opened before Sarah could reply, admitting a customer. The customer didn't look twice at Grant but all the same he was anxious to get out of sight. Sarah evidently had business to attend to with her too, so they both quickly wrapped up the conversation. "Here," Sarah handed Grant the notebook. "Maybe I won't think of as many new designs if you've got this."

Grant accepted the book gingerly. "Okay. Uh, when you're done here, do you want to come over to talk about this some more?" Sarah nodded, gave Grant's arm a quick squeeze, and then went to intercept the customer. Grant hugged the notebook to his chest and hurried out the door to the relative privacy of his car.

Grant glanced at the notebook lying in the passenger seat next to him at every stop along the way home. He kept resisting the urge to hurl it out the window, reminding himself that it probably was just an ordinary notebook and not really the source of the curse on him. On him and Sarah both. Perhaps even just Sarah, mostly; now that Grant thought about it Sarah was quite clearly the most appropriate person to have been affected like this by Xanadu's magic. She had wanted to be a fashion designer for as long as Grant had known her, from college days even. He had never wanted to be a transvestite himself, he'd just got sucked into this by accident. Grant sighed, gathering up notebook and wallet and keys to carry to his apartment, wondering again whether he should get a purse.

But now that he knew he wasn't alone in this, that Sarah was directly involved too, perhaps he could finally make a little headway. Grant closed and locked the apartment door behind him, kicking off his shoes in relief and collapsing to a seat on the sofa with a relieved sigh. ''Made it back again.'' He put the notebook on the sofa beside him and spent a moment adjusting the skirt's cloth over his knees, trying to get comfortable while pondering his next step.

He could look through the notebook again, perhaps see what surprises his wardrobe still held in store for him. There were experiments he could do to see if the notebook really ''was'' itself magical; destroy pages to see if the designs on them stopped showing up in reality, maybe try his hand at drawing some himself. But Grant was half convinced it would be pointless and half convinced he might royally mess things up - he'd survived a week so far, after all, a few more hours until Sarah got here after her shop closed wouldn't be unbearable.

More like five or six hours... Grant looked around the apartment and realized what a mess he'd let it become in the past week. He'd had a lot on his mind, and nobody was supposed to visit anyway, so everything not related to clothing in some way had just piled up. "Better get started on that first," he decided. If he couldn't avoid embarrassment about his clothes, at least he could avoid embarrassment about his apartment.

Dishes, lunch, tidying, vacuuming. It took a while but at last he had the place looking better than new. Sarah phoned to indicate she was closing shop and heading over, and so Grant spent the rest of the time finally looking through the notebook. He kept notes of his own as he went, recording which sketched designs he could remember wearing and in what order. Even though he now had a better understanding of his curse than before there still seemed to be a large random factor in the selection of outfits, jumping around through the sketches without an obvious pattern. He'd occasionally wound up with the same outfit twice on different days, and some of the designs in the book hadn't shown up in the real world yet. He'd also worn some that weren't in there at all - presumably designs Sarah had thought of, but hadn't had the opportunity or interest to draw.

He was relieved when the door buzzer went off and he hurried to let Sarah in; perhaps she would have better insight into his clothing selection. But before he had a chance to broach the subject Sarah took one look at him and made a dismayed sound. "What did you do to that skirt?"

Grant glanced down in surprise. "What? I was cleaning up the place, that's all." He'd managed to avoid spilling anything on it, but the cloth had got a bit dusty and the pleats were in disarray. He brushed at it with his hands. "I'll stick it in the wash tonight."

"No, no, no." Sarah shook her head. "That particular one could probably survive machine washing, but it'll last much longer if you do it by hand. And you'll need to do a lot of ironing to keep those creases straight... do you even have an iron?"

Grant was caught somewhat off balance by the topic. "They've always just turned into my pants and shirts again," he explained. "I've never washed women's clothing before."

Sarah frowned, then laughed and shook her head again. "I'm sorry, Grant. Long day at work, I didn't mean to jump down your throat. I'll help you out with this too, it's only fair if I'm going to be supplying them."

Grant nodded. "Okay. It's my only stable outfit right now, so I guess I should learn how to take care of it better." They proceeded into the living room, where Grant had the sketches and his notes spread out on a table. "Any ideas about how to get me out of women's clothing altogether, though? That would help more than anything else." Grant would still have his feminized figure to deal with after that, but he suspected it could be adequately disguised with the proper clothing - the opposite of what he was currently forced to wear, which did nothing but exaggerate it.

"Sorry," Sarah sighed. "I tried coming up with a few more relatively 'butch' designs, even allowing for them to be skirts, but it's like there's a hole in my mind that I fall into whenever I think about this stuff." She smiled wryly. "I'm not sure whether it's a blessing or a curse for me. So many ideas but all in this one area. If it goes on for long Seven Seams is probably going to become a titch more specialized in it."

Grant rubbed the bridge of his nose tiredly. "At least it won't interfere with your career much. Maybe if I talked to some of those wizard wingnuts from Xanadu, now that I know more... I really need to get cured soon. I can't keep blowing off work for much longer without telling the boss what's really going on."

Grant worked for FlexTech, a local company that manufactured flexible industrial tubing - though he had nothing to do with the manufacturing itself, his job was in the administration office doing paperwork. Sarah looked thoughtful. "You know, I think I might be able to put together an outfit that falls within your magic's limits, but which is still perfect for a business environment. Hm... professional, very professional and sophisticated. And sassy, sort of sexy..." She trailed off, pondering the design.

"Hey. Hey, wait!" Grant interrupted her and she snapped out of it with a start. "I'm not going to work ''sexy''," he told her firmly. "At least not in-a-dress sexy. I'm a guy, and I don't want other guys seeing me that way. Especially not ones I know. Let's focus on trying to cure this completely, okay?"

Sarah nodded. "Sorry. Still coming down from work, it's hard not to think about stuff like that."

They talked for a while about other options. There were a lot of various magically-empowered people who had come out of the con, and many still coming forward every day, but none of them had thus far been able to perform an outright cure of anyone else; they'd only managed various tweaks and modifications to the unique curses that other conventiongoers had received, often making them worse in the process. Sarah was a little leery about the idea of approaching some of them herself, something Grant understood completely considering he'd sworn off of their proposed tinkering himself already. But they decided that it might be worth a try - if they could get a hold of someone who was both available and who seemed sane.

"Could take a while," Sarah warned.

"Yeah. But hey, progress. I can't complain."

"Well, then." Sarah leaned back in the sofa with a sigh. "To totally change the subject, how about some supper? I didn't pick up anything on the way back."

Grant winced. "I haven't prepared anything. I ate a late lunch, and all I've got is TV dinners - I've been bacheloring overtime. Want to order a pizza, maybe?"

"Hm." Sarah looked far from thrilled by that idea. "I was thinking I'd like to treat you to dinner, actually."

"Eh? A restaurant?" Grant's heart skipped a beat at the thought. Sarah had been trying to get him out of his self-imposed hermitage all week with similar offers, but rejecting them was easier over the phone. "I don't know..."

"No one's going to know it's you, Grant!" Sarah assured with a touch of exasperation. "It could still take a long time to fix this thing, who knows how long. Are you going to stay hidden forever? You look fine, trust me. You look great, even."

"Well..." Grant blushed in embarrassment. But Sarah did have a point, and Grant ''had'' resolved to try moving on with things, so he finally decided to relent. "Okay. But someplace private, please?"

"Of course. I'm really hungry, though, so let's get going quickly. I'll wait out here while you get changed."

"What?"

Sarah patiently explained to Grant how much of a mess he'd made of his skirt while cleaning up, and although it didn't seem so bad to him he ultimately decided to trust Sarah's judgement on matters of clothing - she was the expert, after all. He grudgingly went into the privacy of his bedroom to put on a fresh pair of jeans. They turned into a backless black dress slit right up to the hip, not at all acceptable, so Grant tried again. While he went through clothing looking for something he could go out in they discussed where to go, and they ultimately decided to go to Kramer's Garden. It was a good restaurant, with nice atmosphere and reasonable prices, but most importantly as far as Grant was concerned they had very private booths.

Even so, Sarah had to keep hold of his hand and take the lead the entire way in. Grant hadn't been able to try out as many outfits as he would have liked thanks to Sarah's urging to hurry up after his third one, and he'd been forced to settle for a lavender cocktail dress with a bow on the front. It didn't quite reach his knees, the neckline and back were both way too low for his preference, and it came with rather a lot of jewelry - earrings, a gold necklace with a heart-shaped pendant, a hair clip, and a gold bracelet. It even came with light red nail polish.

It was actually not all that bad, and the shoes that went with the outfit had quite reasonable heels for a change, but Grant was feeling especially sensitive about it going out like this for the first time. Sarah did all the talking and only after the waitress had led them to a booth, given them their menus and left did Grant finally murmur "I don't think this is a good idea. She stared at me."

"Only because you're ''acting'' odd," Sarah sighed. "Nobody's going to think anything if you just act a little more natural, I promise. You look fine. Totally convincing."

Grant fingered the pendant nervously, glancing down at where it rested in the false cleavage of his chest fat. Sarah really did have a point, one he'd been trying to avoid accepting or even thinking about. He could pass effortlessly as a woman, and it was only when he worried about being recognized that he started giving off conflicting signals.

"Maybe if you didn't take this all so seriously," Sarah suggested quietly. "Try pretending it's a game. See if you can fool people, ''try'' to fool them. You'll feel more comfortable when you realize how easy it is. You're in disguise, undercover."

Grant nodded. "Okay... okay, I'll try." He took a breath, straightened his shoulders, and nodded again. "Right. I'll do it."

Sarah grinned. "Good. Now pick your meal. If you win, it's all on me."

It took the waitress five minutes to get back to them, a delay that would ordinarily have been annoying but which in this case gave Grant sufficient time to rehearse his lines. "I'll have the quarter chicken," he requested, trying not to think at all about his voice; as with the rest of his body, it had been feminized enough to sound natural for a woman if he let it. "And a coke."

"Would you like fries or a salad on the side?"

The question nearly threw him, but Grant recovered quickly. "Fries, please."

"Gravy?"

"No, thank you."

Sarah ordered next, and then when the waitress left Grant broke into a small grin. "Think I did it."

Sarah rolled her eyes. "Oh what a challenge that was." Then she chuckled and patted Grant's hand reassuringly across the table. "So, let's talk. Nothing to do with the convention, nothing to do with clothing. Not boy talk and not girl talk, just friend talk. What have you been up to lately aside from all that?"

It took a little while to come up with something, the topics Sarah had mentioned had rather dominated his life for the past week. But trapped in the apartment as he had been he'd watched a heck of a lot of TV, and once they got talking about that Grant found that there were enough things it could lead to to keep them going.

They got their food and they ate, with Sarah refraining from making any suggestions on how to do it in a ladylike manner - ''perhaps she's just being nice, or perhaps I'm really a natural,'' Grant mused. Either way, he resolved not to worry about it and just carried on. A group came in and was seated in the booth opposite theirs, and Grant was worried for a moment, but they barely even glanced at him.

When they finished and the waitress came around to pick up their plates Grant hesitated only a moment before ordering a small slice of cheesecake for desert. He'd become quite tired of bachelor chow and was enjoying having a real meal for a change. Sarah passed on dessert but nodded approvingly at Grant.

Grant finished that too, and then Sarah paid the bill; Grant was relieved she'd made the offer already considering he'd left his wallet behind. Then they were out the door again, and Grant let out a tremendous sigh.

"Feeling better?" Sarah asked with a grin.

Grant stretched his arms. "Yeah. I guess I've been making some of my problems for myself... I don't want to be a girl. But I can pass for one, and girls are normal, so pretending to be one is okay." He paused. "Though I'm still worried what my coworkers and my family will think of this, no matter how I explain it."

Sarah waved her hand dismissively. "Later, later. Confidence will help all of that, and you're building it up bit by bit. I'll help as much as you need."

Grant nodded. "Thanks. For now, I'm stuffed and tired. Let's just go home."

Sarah dropped Grant off at his apartment building again, promising to stop by again the next evening with some more 'plain clothes' from Seven Seams. Grant went up to his apartment alone, passing a neighbor he recognized along the way and giving him a polite nod despite the puzzled glance he got. ''Didn't recognize me,'' Grant gloated silently to reassure himself. ''You just don't see well-dressed women around here much, do you?''

''God, what a thing to feel smug about.'' Grant locked the apartment door, kicked off his shoes, and retreated directly to his bedroom to retire. He paused for a moment before stripping out of the lavender cocktail dress, though, stopping in front of the mirror to look himself over again.

He patted his slender abdomen, not at all affected by the large meal he'd eaten, then put his hands on his hips and thrust out his chest slightly. "I don't look strange. I look fine." ''Until I figure some cure for this, I guess I'll just have to take solace in that.'' He unzipped the dress and slipped out of it, the makeup and jewelry vanishing as the cloth slipped over and off, then hurriedly got rid of the panties too.

Now he looked like a guy again. A ''strange'' guy with a girlish figure, like he had some sort of subtle hormonal problem. Grant sighed and turned out the lights before climbing into bed. ''At least I don't have to go naked in public.'' Some Xanadu peoples' clothing curses forced exactly that, usually in combination with some sort of very nonhuman shape.

Really, he didn't have it so bad. He just had to get used to it.

{{Separator|d}}

The next morning Grant woke bright an early again, though this time not because of a surprise nightie out of nowhere; his various adventures the previous day had started to push his sleep pattern back towards the normal routine. Grant decided that was a good thing and forced himself to get up right away.

Grant sat on the edge of the bed, yawned and stretched, then stared for a moment at his drawers of traitorous jeans and shirts. ''My stable skirt still needs a wash. So Sarah said, at least.'' Grant was tempted to wear it anyway but decided against it; appearance aside, he wanted to learn how to treat such clothing properly so it would last him longer. He got up and slipped on his first outfit of the day.

Fishnet stockings held up by garters, a short black skirt with a white lace apron overtop and ruffled white fabric filling it out underneath, a full-boned bodice that did everything it could to make him look bustier... "Gah! French maid!" Grant started searching for the fasteners, which were somewhat difficult to locate. "Where were ''you'' yesterday when I cleaned up the place?"

The next outfit was less spectacular, though also less practical; a full-length armless red Japanese silk dress with an embroidered dragon pattern snaking its way up his body. It covered his entire front, but the dress was so restrictive that he could take only extremely short steps. He struggled a bit getting that one off too. His stable green skirt was starting to seem more attractive again.

The third turned out to be a better option than the first two, however, despite revealing far more skin. A short peach-colored skirt that went only to mid-thigh and a plain white tank-top that exposed a long stretch of midriff, the tight fabric showing off the contours of his chest fat in a very noticeable way despite its relatively low profile. His hair pulled back into a short ponytail aside from bangs hanging out in front, and three gold studs appeared in each earlobe, but other than that there were no accessories.

Grant considered his appearance and found himself nodding in approval. He looked sort of like a female tennis player, athletic and maybe a little boyish. "Boyish is good. Though..." Grant touched his chest with a brief second thought; would he be able to pass properly for a normal woman? "Oh yeah. A boyish young woman, definitely. Typical." He should have known by now that Xanadu's curse always managed to make him look attractive and female - that is, Sarah's clothing-designing skill did.

He reached under his skirt and adjusted his panties - plain beige, but a little satiny - and nodded. Still quite fully male underneath it all.

Grant didn't have any special plans for the day yet, so he went on to the usual morning routines of bathroom and breakfast. He felt like he really ''should'' have some sort of special plan though, anything other than just sitting around like he'd been doing lately. Sarah's notebook didn't excite his interest, he'd already gone over it thoroughly the day before. Besides, he needed to get outside and ''go'' somewhere. The trip to the restaurant yesterday had been nerve-wracking but in hindsight it was just what he'd needed.

With that vague goal in mind, Grant put on his shoes to see what they'd become. To his delight they became slim white ladies' running shoes; not a fraction of an inch of unnecessary heel and no pointlessly exposed toes. Grant laughed. "For once the curse is listening to me!" Probably sheer coincidence, but he wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. He picked up his wallet and keys... still no pockets.

"That's it. I'm going to buy a damned purse."

The local mall wasn't far, and had a large department store that provided a nicely anonymous and gender-neutral shopping environment. Grant set his jaw and headed out of the apartment, hurrying down to the car before there was any chance his decision on the purpose of his mission or on the outfit he was wearing might change.

It was a Monday morning somewhere between rush hour and lunch so the mall was sparsely populated and Grant got a parking spot right near the door. He took a deep breath, got out of the car, and tried to walk in a casual manner not betraying any of his nervousness. But despite all the skin his outfit showed and his concerns about 'boyishness', nobody he passed seemed to give him a second glance - except for a couple of guys Grant caught checking out his legs appreciatively.

He wavered for a moment between embarrassment and smugness and managed to settle on smugness; they clearly had no clue. Reassured, Grant relaxed a little and allowed himself to put some of the feminine sway into his hips that he usually worked hard to suppress.

The department store was very large, but the women's clothing section was easy to find. Grant walked through it a few times, surveying the selection without ''looking'' like he was surveying the selection, and then finally stopped at a table filled with discounted purses. He didn't need anything fancy, so something from here should suffice... he rummaged quickly, and picked out a small black faux leather one. It would be quite large enough for his needs, considering he would never need to carry the many other accessories in it that real women seemed to.

Grant slung it experimentally over his shoulder and glanced over at a nearby mirror. It looked nice, too. "Okay, so I'm buying a purse." Like so many other things he'd been fretting about it didn't seem as bad now that he was actually doing it. So long as nobody knew he was really a guy, he was the only one who knew what he was doing was wrong. It was almost exhilarating.

Grant headed over to the nearest register and plunked down the purse. "$15.47," the cashier announced after running it over the scanner. Grant opened his wallet and fished out his Visa. The cashier looked at it, glanced at the back... "Could I see an ID?"

Grant blinked. Had he forgotten to sign it? He started rummaging through his wallet; he only had ten bucks in cash, and there was no way he could show a picture ID and get away with it. "Uhmm... shoot," Grant announced, heart racing but staying calm. "Sorry, I don't have any with me. Do you really need to?"

"I think it'd be a good idea," the cashier answered in a tone that suggested she meant 'yes, absolutely.'

Grant winced. "Um... can you keep this here for me while I pop down to the ATM machine, then?"

"Sure." The cashier handed back the Visa and set the purse aside. Grant thanked her and retreated quickly out of the store.

''Just my luck I'd get a cashier who's hard-nosed and pays attention to details,'' Grant grumbled to himself as he hurried down the mall toward the bank, walking as fast as he could without drawing undue attention. He checked the back of his credit card, confirming that he had indeed signed in, and wondered what the cashier's problem was. The answer came a moment later and he smacked himself on the forehead with a sigh. He certainly didn't look like a 'Grant' right now. She must have been worried the credit card was stolen or something.

He'd nearly blown his own cover, giving out a blatant clue to someone who noticed it, but she hadn't caught on. Grant was becoming more confident in his ability to pass as an ordinary woman with every risk he took, and although it wasn't what he really ''wanted'' to do, it was the alternative that had been scaring him more - that people would see him as a guy in women's clothing instead.

Grant took out a hundred dollars, not wanting to be caught short again all the same. As he headed back he passed another guy whom he noticed ogling - this time his chest - and despite his embarrassed blush he decided that it was time to really test himself. When he got to the department store he didn't go straight to the cashier to finish his purchase, instead turning toward the ladies' wear department again.

The twin pads of fat on his pectorals were not what Grant would call breasts if he saw them on a normal man's frame. But with his slim and feminine figure, and the tight tank-top stretched flatteringly over them, he was becoming very self-conscious about their slight jiggle as he walked. Since he was already buying one article of women's apparel today it was time to do something about that as well; he would buy a bra.

It was not as easy a concept to consider than a simple handbag, of course. Setting entirely aside the psychological issues, he had only a rudimentary knowledge of what the various shapes and sizes meant. Sarah had described him as an A-cup back at Xanadu, but she hadn't actually measured him - details like that had been far from their mind at the time. And Grant wasn't about to ask one of the salespeople for advice, no matter how daring he felt right now. Grant wandered uncertainly through the lingerie section hoping to find some sort of sign or label that would help him out.

But then he realized that once again he was fretting over nothing. It didn't really ''matter'' what size bra he bought; his curse would make sure it fit perfectly, as long as he could get it on in the first place. He took the nearest sports bra that looked reasonable, and also a backup just in case, and then headed back to the cashier where he'd left the purse.

The cashier regarded him somewhat suspiciously as he paid for the three items in cash, but Grant kept a smile on his face despite his racing pulse; ''I dare you to notice.'' "Sorry about that, I borrowed my husband's card without thinking," he added sweetly. The lie caught a little in his throat but the cashier just nodded and seemed to accept it - or to not really care.

Grant took his purchases and headed back out to the car, on the verge of breaking into a run, and then as soon as he was safely inside he burst out laughing instead. "Oh God, I've finally gone nuts, I bought a bra." he gasped, letting out some of the tension that had built up during his little adventure. "And I got away with it," he chuckled as he ran out of steam. He finally gave a little sigh. He was still deeply confused and embarrassed about what Xanadu had done to him, but he felt better being able to do whatever needed to be done to adapt. He hadn't even needed Sarah to spoon feed him.

He transferred his wallet and keys to his new purse, and then sat staring for a moment at the bras. Grant wanted to try one on but even safe inside his car was no place to be doing something like that; even as a guy he'd feel strange changing clothes while sitting in a parking lot. But he was still feeling psyched to brave the public eye and didn't want to go home yet just for the sake of a few minutes' privacy...

Grant had an idea, and the audacity of it gave him momentary pause. ''But I'm testing myself, right? Let's go to the limit before my nerve fails.'' He folded one of the sports bras up in his purse, slung the purse over his shoulder, and headed back into the mall.

The women's restroom was almost disappointingly mundane inside; the only difference between it and the men's room was the extra toilet stalls replacing the missing urinals. Grant went into the farthest one from the bathroom door and locked the stall securely. He sat down on the toilet's edge and remained motionless for a few seconds, listening to the activity of the two other women who were present, and then when he'd reassured himself that they hadn't noticed anything amiss he quickly stripped out of his tight white tank top.

It turned back into a normal guy's shirt immediately and Grant folded it carefully on his knee. Then he pulled out the bra and slipped into it, finding it surprisingly easy to get the straps settled correctly into place. It was on the large side, perhaps that helped... "Eep!" Grant clapped a hand over his mouth, unable to completely stifle the surprised exclamation as the bra tightened and molded itself to his chest. The fabric changed from white to beige, and it developed lacy edges. He'd had long experience with undergarments magically snuggling up tight to his body from putting on underwear, of course, but this was somewhat different. The bra lifted and accentuated his chest fat rather more than he'd expected. He was having a really hard time not thinking of them as breasts now.

Grant put his shirt back on and then after it had shrunk back down into a tank top he shook his chest experimentally. The bra did reduce the distracting jiggle almost to nothing, and perhaps more importantly his nipples no longer visibly dimpled the shirt; despite the cleavage enhancement he decided this was probably the best way to go after all. He let out a relieved sigh, picked up his purse, and headed back out into the mall.

He picked up some quick lunch at the food court and then after he'd eaten he went on to do some grocery shopping - his stocks of food at home had been severely depleted over the past week. He still felt a little paranoid about discovery, but the fear was becoming more exhilarating than paralyzing. Grant realized that he might actually be starting to have ''fun'' with his near-perfect disguise.

That realization marked the end of the day's adventure. Grant had forced himself out here to get used to dealing with his curse and overcome some of his fears, not learn to enjoy it; he was still disturbed by the idea of transvestitism even after being an involuntary transvestite himself for over a week. It would take a lot longer than a single day's success to overcome that. But Grant still felt positive about what he'd managed as he headed back to the apartment to wind down.

Sarah phoned ahead to let him know she was on her way, and Grant acknowledged without mentioning any of the things he'd done that day. She was amazed to discover them when she came inside, bags of groceries still on the kitchen table and Grant's chest fat still snugged up in a bra, and Grant couldn't help but grin. Sarah chuckled and quipped "you're pretty when you smile," turning Grant's cheeks bright red but not quite managing to dislodge the expression.

Then Sarah held up the new outfit she'd brought with her from Seven Seams, and Grant's mood turned serious again. It was a gray knee-length skirt, a white silk long-sleeved blouse, and a matching gray women's business blazer. "It's really close to the design I thought up last night for you to go to work in," Sarah admitted. "I hope it'll be close enough to not get randomized by the Xanadu magic."

Grant nodded silently, laying the clothing out on the couch. He'd got over most of his resistance to being seen by strangers today, people who would at least accept him as a normal woman without second thought, but it would be a far different matter finally giving up his hope to get this curse lifted before anyone else that knew him found out. "I'm not sure if I can use this yet..."

Sarah smiled encouragingly. "Even so, let's see how it works."

Grant sighed, nodded again, and stepped into his room. He slipped off the tank top and peach skirt, leaving on his shoes in the vague hope of somehow retaining their functionality. Then he pulled on the gray skirt and buttoned up the blouse, and waited for a moment to become accessorized. His shoes promptly dashed his hope for them, sprouting long, thin heels as they opened up and turned black. His socks turned black too, climbing his legs to become full nylon pantyhose, and a plain silver necklace appeared. Grant checked his ears - back down just one stud in each lobe - then examined his makeup dubiously. There was a bit more than usual, and his nails had dark red polish... but it did look quite professional, he had to admit. He tugged on the blouse a bit, wishing it buttoned up past his cleavage and wondering if perhaps he should go braless again. It was the only discretionary part of his wardrobe now.

Sarah knocked on the door. "All done? I want to see how it came out." Grant sighed, draped the blazer over his shoulder and walked back out into the living room. Sarah examined his clothing intently, asking him to turn this way and that to display it all. "Interesting. The details changed a little... I bought those clothes, I didn't make them myself. Didn't even tailor them. But I think it's got my style of stitching now. And it matches what I thought it should look like exactly."

''Gee, thanks,'' Grant thought as he slipped the high heels off his feet for the time being. But he didn't really blame her; Xanadu's magic was subtle sometimes and it had grabbed them both. They'd probably have to do a lot of experimenting like this to figure out all of the details... And it would probably take a lot of time.

Grant sighed. He couldn't delay the inevitable forever, and perhaps by confronting it as he had today he could at least get it over with. This outfit was probably the best office clothing he could hope for in the short term, shoes and all. "I'll call work tomorrow," he announced with resignation. "I probably won't ''go'' there tomorrow... I've got a lot of explaining to do first. But soon."

Sarah stayed the evening, eating supper with him at his apartment this time. She had a fair bit of teaching to do, explaining the proper care of women's clothing and giving some tips on what was appropriate to wear under what circumstances - within the confines of the outfits he would have access to, of course. And she also measured Grant's chest, declaring him to be a 34A "for future reference." She seemed a little jealous about how Grant hadn't needed to be fitted for his current bra, and probably never would need fitting thanks to the magic at work.

When she finally left, Grant's mind was whirling. Each day seemed to be bringing new revelations and frighteningly new experiences now and just when he thought he'd got a handle on them the next day's looked to be worse. He would have to somehow explain his appearance to most of the people he knew, people who hadn't been there from the beginning to see that this was all just a colossal coincidence rather than something he'd brought on himself. He'd only get one chance at it.

''I need sleep.'' Grant removed his 'business dress' and hung it carefully in the closet, then slipped out of his panties and fumbled with the catch on the back of his bra. ''It was always so much easier taking these off when someone ''else'' was wearing them...'' Naked and as male-looking as possible again, Grant shut off the lights and climbed into bed.

He lay motionless for a few minutes, wide awake and trying to figure out what he was missing. He'd become used to sleeping in the buff a lot more quickly than he had wearing women's clothes... But then he realized that his comfort level with the clothing had finally caught up.

Grant took hold of the bed sheet and pulled it around him, tucking it in close around his body and then lying uncertainly in wait. Five seconds later the sheet turned silky and slid over his skin as it shrank down around him into a skimpy negligee. Grant blushed intensely but the darkness concealed his embarrassment and it faded quickly.

Despite what he'd be facing tomorrow Grant slept well that night.

{{Separator|d|'''End'''}}

Paradise (Setting)

2011-01-07T14:45:40Z

TigeR: Fixed table, removed additional 4 Furries in 1997 and on

{{Universe|Paradise}}

{{byline|author=Jon Buck
|user=JonBuck}}

A direct link '''[[User:JonBuck/A Kind of Paradise|To the original story.]]'''

=={{separator|f|Basics}}==
*The setting is basically indistinguishable from the Real World up until 1987, the year when people first begin to spontaneously transform into furries.
*Exactly one person transformed in Year One ''(i.e.,'' 1987), and the number of furries doubles in late August each year. The initial story in this setting, [[User:JonBuck/A Kind of Paradise|A Kind of Paradise]], is set in Year 21 ''(i.e.,'' 2007), when there are just over one million furries. The next year (2008) will add a million, for a total of two megafurries, and so forth.
*The first furry in 1987 was a vixen, with a tod the next year. Some stereotypes do have a basis in "reality". :)
**The entire world will be furry in 2020.
*Every year it's possible that an already-changed person could change ''again''. With increasing rarity, all less than one percent:
**A species change. ("What the..? I'm a ''wolf'' now? What am I supposed to do with all these hoof picks?")
**A gender change. ("Where do men put this ''thing'' between our legs when we sit down?")
**A combination of both. ("Don't ''even'' call me a bitch! Just show me how to put on this stupid bra!")
**The next year there is about a 25% chance that the person will revert to their original gender/first species. If that doesn't happen, it's fixed. If they change back... there's another 25% chance that you'll bounce back ''again'' the next year. So there's some potential for characters who spend years alternating between species/gender.
*Also distinctive from Winds of Change: ''No superpowers''. Just whatever natural abilities (things like augmented senses, physical strength, ''etc)'' come from being half animal.
*'''The Role Reversal Paradox.'''
**''IF'' the couple has children, pre- or post-Change, no matter what age...
**''IF'' one of the couple has been transgendered...
**''THEN'' it is essentially a sure thing that the partner will TG as well.
**The reason for this is simple. ROB hates paradoxes. If they have children, there ''must'' be a father and a mother. And it ''must'' be the same two people. It doesn't matter if that person divorced and remarried someone else. Or if they're unmarried. One father, one mother. Otherwise, the kids will logically not have come into existence.
**Conversely, if they are married/going out/living together/etc., the same TG 1% dice roll applies to them as everyone else.

'''Important.''' Please ''do not'' write stories that are father ahead in the timeline than those I have written.''

'''Note on Politics'''. As a request, I ask authors not to use major political figures from Real Life. I don't want any political bashing going on here. Characters like Congressman Sandrick are perfectly fine, so feel free to create fictional members of Congress or Members of Parliament. Remember this world is different from ours from 1987 onwards. There are still details I haven't filled in between then and now, and the Butterfly Effect means that there will be some small, some major differences.

{{add|'''Winners of the 2008 Election'''}}
*President: Karen Hutchinson. (Reverse Pres. Obama and his wife, basically)
*VP: Steven Angstrom

===The Transgendered===
Just a few details.
#This is an earlier, generally harmless virus that got into the simulation. ROB dealt with it by the "history editing" as described in the stories.
#It's been around a LOT longer than the Furry Virus.
#Even though it's probably been around for thousands of years, there are far fewer victims than the Furry Virus as of 2009. I imagine the furry virus co-opted this one for the TGed furs.
#As in real life, there are many more male to female victims than the other way around.
#Transgendered victims have little or no support system like furries do. They're generally isolated. And before 2009 couldn't see through the RDF.

===Physiology===

*Furries can still interbreed with one another as if they were all still human. Children get a 50/50 chance of which of the parents' species they follow.
*Conversely, humans '''cannot''' interbreed with furries, probably due to the RDF.
*There are some physical variations, but not the wide "Degrees" that Winds of Change has. The most obvious differences are hair, feet, and hands. Otherwise, most everyone is about as morphic as seen in common furry art.
**Females most often have hair the same color and similar texture as their fur. Though you do still get the occasional blond.
**Males retain their hair less frequently.
*'''Size Limitations.''' On the suggestion from the Talk page. I'm not going to limit species. However, I will have a minimum/maximum size range:
**7 feet (or 2.1m), max. About 600 lb (272 kg), max.
**4 feet (1.2m). I'll leave the small side open.
*Species are native to a particular continent. So most people in North America will end up whitetail deer, elk, bears, foxes, wolves, etc. Recent immigrants will more likely end up native species to wherever they came from.
**However, this means that someone from Seattle could ''still'' end up a leopard, or a llama, or what-have-you from other continents. I just want to make that clear.
**No mythicals like dragons, griffins, satyrs, vampires, mages, what-have-you. Just furries.
**No birds, reptiles, or other non-mammals.
*'''No Extinct Species.''' No dinosaurs. Sadly, I can't include them. There are so many species that are just too big.
*'''Note on Transsexuals'''. This setting is intended as a mix of wish fulfillment and darker, more realistic consequences. That said, all TS folks get their bodies "corrected". Keep in mind that this won't necessarily make life easier for said character. Conflict generates Plot. And since most of the folks who get their gender switched ''won't'' be TS, there's still plenty of that around.
*Results of major surgeries are translated. Artificial hips, knees and pacemakers still work as needed. Transplant patients will not reject their organs. However, lost limbs will not regenerate and major chronic diseases will not be cured, but may go into a lengthy remission.
*One of the major benefits is a major improvement in health and fitness. ROB can't stop the change, but at least he can give the victims a sort of consolation prize. You may not end up in perfect shape, but it'll be close. A flood of positive endorphins to make the victim feel good about their new bodies doesn't hurt, either (optional). Now, what happens to that state of fitness ''after'' is entirely up to your characters.

===Psychology===
*At this point I'm inclined to have some mitigating effects on the "victims". It's still going to be very, very hard to deal with. This is a major life disruption. And there are no doubt a lot of secluded furs. But suicides aren't as common as you'd think.
*The transgendered furs do have an even rougher time. The double-whammy of species and gender would likely make serious post-change Issues a reality.
**Transgendered furs typically refer to themselves by their initials: BD, DL, etc..
**Some might end up going a little crazy and think they had ''always been'' their new gender, especially after the effects of Tall Tales Con.
*The more adjusted furs have figured out how to find these troubled souls and bring them back into the real world.

=={{separator|f|The Reality Distortion Field (Veil)}}==
*Humans can't see furries for what they are. They still see whatever the person looked like before, even if that person was the opposite gender.
*Some things aren't filtered correctly. Consequently...
**If a TGed man gets pregnant, the filter will change that person's ghost image to female. But she will still appear human to other humans.
**Things like hoof/paw prints, shed fur, shed antlers, clawmarks, animal odors, etc., are not filtered. So if a cougar morph gets in a fight with a normal human and lashes out with his claws, he could cause a hell of a lot of damage.
**Some humans think that there is something up (referred to as "Known" or "Friends"). And some have figured out that the friends who claim to be furry actually ''are'' what they claim to be.
*The RDF sometimes breaks down a little during large gatherings of furries (like at conventions). "Hey, that's the best costume I've ever seen! Is that a prosthetic muzzle?" Memories afterwards will probably remember some really good costumes, and photos will be perceived as such.
**In more extreme cases it will break down entirely. But it would take repeated exposures, or perhaps having a number of furry friends while remaining humans oneself. Like in [[User:Nikon/Changing_Perspectives|Changing Perspectives]].
**Transgendered furs may be perceived by humans as their new gender out of the corner of their eye. And there are likely other circumstances where the human RDF image will realign also. Specific circumstances (such as pregnancy) will be the decisive factor.
**As of 2007, TGed TallTales Con attendees have had a major RDF alteration. Everyone except family, friends, or people who have seen them often enough to really know, will perceive them as their new physical sex. Which is essentially the vast majority of people. This effect will spread to all the other TGed until 2008, when it becomes the norm.
**'''As of 2009''', all human ghosts now reflect their real gender, no matter who is looking.
*Do animals perceive the RDF? Probably not. But the odor of a fur is neither quite human or animal. There are still some common human pheromones, for example. Which is what makes romance between wolf and deer possible. This is a ''good'' thing, since it means that a doe-woman in heat won't be chased down by a normal buck.
*It may start to break down as there grow to be millions of furries in the world (see below).
*Another storytelling idea: The RDF is an ''antiviral measure'' (see The Cause below). When the RDF breaks down, people ''may'' change out-of-phase, since they no longer have that protection. This will make it harder to track down people who change and get them the help they need. This is ''not'' a hard-and-fast rule, but the storytelling device is available. But I '''don't''' want it to become commonplace.

==={{separator|f|Holes in the Veil}}===

As seen in [[User:JonBuck/After Hours|After Hours]], on August 29, 2009 the Veil started coming down.

*First one appeared in Hyannis, MA on August 29. It quickly expanded to (size to be determined) and outed every furry in town. Other holes appeared in and around Chicago. Without exception they appear first where there's been a recent or frequent concentration of furs.
*Holes start small, but will grow depending on how weak the RDF is in the area.
*As the RDF decays, furs will feel like they're wrapped in loose plastic. And there's something of a light show. The air shimmers. The air feels cleaner, fresher.
**The RDF is an extra "rendering layer" of sorts. Since until now all furs had lived with it, they only really notice it was there now that it's been taken away. Leaving a Hole a fur will feel like he or she is wearing clothing a size too small or too large, depending on how much they deviate from the human norm. A really sensitive fur might feel suffocated, as if they were wrapped in plastics. They'll feel irritable and given the right situation, may tear ''new'' Holes (which could make good story fodder).
*They're like soap bubbles in that if they encounter other holes, they'll grow even larger. All of them are still slowly expanding, and may jump to larger sizes at unpredictable intervals.
*ROB will start a controlled shutdown of the RDF over the course of the year. Its replacement will be a Weirdness Censor.
**The world is going furry crazy. But not ''crazy crazy''. Using a cooking analogy, it's like a foamed egg whites getting folded into a souffle or other dish that needs careful mixing, or the recipe falls apart.

*Furs feel much more comfortable with themselves inside the holes. To furs, the RDF feels like restrictive clothing. Doubly so for the TGed furs. Even normal humans feel better. Caveats:
**Normal humans who spend more and more time inside one of these holes run increasing risk of becoming furry at any time of the year ahead.
**Once the RDF is down completely in late 2010, the above may apply to everyone. The numbers are still doubling as below, but the August 17 restriction no longer applies. And as above, a TG can happen before a TF.
**Furries cease being humans in funny costumes. Their animal natures will more easily bob to the surface. This is partly for psychological reasons (don't have to hide any more). Partly due to the pressure from the RDF being gone.

=={{separator|f|The Numbers}}==

Total sequence as follows (all figures approximate):
Year AD Total Furries Total Populace Furries, as %age of total populace
1 1987 1 5,184,212,887 0.000 000 02%
2 1988 2 5,247,179,035 0.000 000 04%
3 1989 4 5,310,909,955 0.000 000 05%
4 1990 8 5,375,414,934 0.000 000 15%
5 1991 16 5,440,703,374 0.000 000 3%
6 1992 32 5,506,784,792 0.000 000 6%
7 1993 64 5,573,668,818 0.000 001 1%
8 1994 128 5,641,365,200 0.000 002%
9 1995 256 5,709,883,806 0.000 004%
10 1996 512 5,779,234,621 0.000 009%
11 1997 1,024 5,849,427,754 0.000 018%
12 1998 2,048 5,920,473,436 0.000 035%
13 1999 4,096 5,992,382,020 0.000 07%
14 2000 8,192 6,065,163,988 0.000 14%
15 2001 16,384 6,138,829,947 0.000 3%
16 2002 32,768 6,213,390,635 0.000 5%
17 2003 65,536 6,288,856,918 0.001%
18 2004 131,072 6,365,239,795 0.002%
19 2005 262,144 6,442,550,400 0.004%
20 2006 524,288 6,520,800,000 0.008%
21 2007 1,048,576 6,600,000,000 0.016%
22 2008 2,097,152 6,680,161,943 0.031%
23 2009 4,194,304 6,761,297,514 0.062%
24 2010 8,388,608 6,843,418,536 0.123%
25 2011 16,777,216 6,926,536,980 0.24%
26 2012 33,554,432 7,010,664,959 0.48%
27 2013 67,108,864 7,095,814,736 0.95%
28 2014 134,217,728 7,181,998,721 1.87%
29 2015 268,435,456 7,269,229,474 3.69%
30 2016 536,870,912 7,357,519,711 7.30%
31 2017 1,073,741,824 7,446,882,298 14.42%
32 2018 2,147,483,648 7,537,330,262 28.49%
33 2019 4,294,967,296 7,628,876,783 56.30%
34 2020 8,589,934,592 7,721,535,206 >100%

At this point stories should take place in '''2001 at the earliest''', up to the current story-time year. The community gets really, really small before then. If you have a story that takes place in this era, submit it to me first. Thank you.

Things should start to get really interesting around 2010. There's enough furs in the world then that niche markets would start to open up. More clothing and products specifically designed for furries start popping up. Also, it will become harder and harder to induct new furs into the group in a healthy manner. Society may start to break down in places.

It will take a concerted effort by those previously changed to keep everything under control...

'''Distribution.''' It's not random, or even. It's an expanding fractal centered on the Chicago area. As far as visualization, I'll leave that vague. But the majority of the first furs were in North America.

From the way these stories are playing out, I'd say that events are unfolding like this:

*'''1987-2002''': "Alone" period. Isolation between furries, with only a few very small groups, most of them thinking they're all alone. Best exemplified by [[User:MatthiasRat|MatthiasRat's]] stories. Nobody knows what's going on.
*'''2002-2008''': Forming Communities. There's now enough furs to start encountering each other regularly. Conventions start up. Anthro imagery (in movies, TV shows, and other media) start to show up more frequently. Information getting put together indicates an ominous trend. The whole world will eventually go furry.
*'''2008-?''': Events unfolding in [[User:JonBuck/Open Secrets|Open Secrets]] will nail down this theme. {{add|From here for the next few years, a third to nearly a half of the new Changed will be Known/Friends or family members. People who can see through the Veil easily.}}

===Important Events===
This section will be for events of note that will be important to the overall storytelling. Authors feel free to note important events in your works that could impact the setting as a whole here.

'''2007'''
*First instances of total, permanent [[User:Nikon/Changing Perspectives|RDF breakdown]]. Incidents isolated.
*First appearance of anthro dolphins. The RDF with these people is a very strained affair. The longer they stay around humans, the more likely it'll fail. Perhaps it realigns the image as a normal dolphin in the water, and a human on land.
*'''Added 2/24.''' Transgendered furs at [[User:JonBuck/Tall Tales|Tall Tales Con]] now appear as their new physical gender to anyone but close friends and family. The RDF is even actively changing identification. Active records like passports and driver's licenses, medical records are all altered to reflect this. Even a pre-Change photo ID will show the new human face, which will be a shock to the TGed fur. This effect is slowly spreading to other TGed furs, see [[User:Jetfire/Doing Hard Time|Doing Hard Time]].
*A number of pressing environmental problems relax slightly. While these solutions will solve some problems, they will cause others, especially in the short term.
**The recovery of the major world fisheries detected in the mid-90s continues apace.
**Major discoveries in energy include massive oilfields in various stable First World nations: US, Canada, UK, Norway, etc..
**Scientists observe CO2 levels stabilizing for currently unknown reasons.
**Third World experiences boosts in food production from improved farming practices and soil conditions.
**New renewable energy discoveries, new batteries, a bacterial process for making gasoline and diesel from municipal wastewater.
*With all these new furs, there are now enough singles to start pairing up. The lingering worries about fertility and children will be answered next year...

'''2008'''
*Fallout from Tall Tales Con continues. All newbie and furry gatherings the next year will be much, much smaller, informal.
*Although there were a few before this year, this is the first year a large number of furry babies will be born.
*A Changed rabbit appears as ''Playboy'''s September Playmate of the Month (though only other Changed/Changed-sensitive know it until later).

'''2009'''
*This Change Day will be different from the others. Instead of all happening in the same moment, the new furs will happen in fits and starts throughout the day. Some might change in the early morning, others late that night. The trend will continue over the next few years.
**Another wrinkle. If there's a TG, they don't have to happen at the same time. So some poor fellow who becomes a clouded leopard in the morning (or a woman) will get hit again sometime later.
* The shoe field died in 2008. Now the Veil no longer hides clothing modifications. For some furs this might be a Veil-breaker. We will see.
*Since [[User:JonBuck/Open Secrets|Open Secrets]], the secret is functionally out, though a sort of [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/WeirdnessCensor Weirdness Censor] is in place, possibly due to widespread denial. Furry imagery started to dominate the media after the first of the year, especially on medical dramas and "what if" shows on National Geographic, Discovery Channel, even the Food Network. Mostly done with CGI, a few shows used furry actors and cameras able to see through the Veil. More to be revealed in [[User:JonBuck/After Hours|After Hours]].
* '''The Shutdown''', August 17-25. With a major Sleeping Sickness outbreak, much of the world economy shut down for a little over a week, with only essential services (energy, food transport, etc.) kept running. Similar to what Mexico did during the Swine Flu outbreak. Later they are accused of overreacting, as Sleeping Sickness seems to leave a minuscule number of deaths, and the victims healthier than before they contracted it.

'''2010'''
*Tiffany Tanner appears as the first Changed to play a Changed in a recurring role on daytime television. With the aid of a special lens, Tiffany's character "Felice Hunter" on ''One Life to Live'' dramatizes the plight of Changed forced to keep secrets from family and friends. Her stint on the show is briefly interrupted when she is kidnapped for several weeks, after which she again makes headlines as one of "Melton's Eleven," eleven furres who had been kidnapped for the private amusement of a twisted, reclusive millionaire (who vanished shortly before they escaped).

=={{separator|f|The Cause}}==

So, why is this happening? What's causing it? A nanotech virus? Microscopic magic pixies? The return of magic? The wrath of God? What?

The answer is contained in '''[[User:JonBuck/Tall Tales|Tall Tales]]'''.

However, the idea is this. Ever since I read [http://www.accelerando.org/ ''Accelerando''] By Charles Stross, I've been enamored with the idea of the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity technological Singularity]. So I've been looking for a way to use it in my fiction at one point. This setting provides the answer to that desire. ''Accelerando'' is available for free on the web.

Our universe--or perhaps just our planet, I haven't decided yet--and all the people in it, are basically a simulation. This doesn't make the characters in these stories any less real than you our I. Mathematics forms the basis of the universe, after all. The people are as sentient as you or I. This makes the setting rather Matrix-like, without the human bodies being used as "batteries". We're all more like Agent Smith.

I refer to this as a "furry virus". It comes from outside the post-Singularity brain, and is slightly more advanced than "ours". What's happening is this bit of malicious code (sentient, no less, but on a level far beyond our ability to comprehend it) is messing up the simulated world we reside in. Why? I dunno. One of those inscrutable things. The RDF is an antiviral measure to contain the damage and allow the society within to adapt. This is also why so far, furry species are limited to mammals. As the numbers of furs increase, that ''will'' change. I have yet to decide just when.

Why not just scrap the whole thing and restore from backup? There are no backups because the simulated people are nevertheless living beings. And they can't just be wiped out.

I hope that explanation isn't too confusing. Please let me know on the '''[[Talk:Paradise (Setting)|Talk Page]]''' if you have questions.

=={{separator|f|Notes on Avatars}}==
So far, the convention for avatars in this setting is for writers to use the first initials of first and last names. However, I wanted to note that my intent here is to give the writer more freedom than to base these characters on yourself. I've changed a lot of details about Jerome, for instance. If you want to put your avatar--if you decide to use one--into this setting, go crazy. Give them a challenge (worse job, emotional trouble). Or make them better off and have the change cause a lot of trouble with work/family/whatever. What I'm trying to say here is, don't feel you have to be directly limited by your present or past self. ''Have fun.''

=={{separator|f|Important Cast}}==

'''[[Paradise Cast List]]'''

Since this is a wiki, that means everyone can edit it. Authors who want to put names and short bios of the characters in their stories, just in case someone else wants to use them for a cameo. With the characters, please list the stories that they appear in. Please put your cast members on the linked cast page. Thank you.

=={{separator|f|Stories in Chronological Order}}==

Authors may add links to their stories as they happen in chronological order in story time. For a complete listing of all Paradise stories, since this list may be updated sporadically, see [[:Category:Paradise|the Paradise Category]].

'''2000'''
*[[User:Erastus/On the Outside Looking|On the Outside, Looking...]] ''(Through 2010)''

'''2001'''
*[[Ranty Raccoon]]

'''2002'''
*[[User:MatthiasRat/Made Alone|Made Alone]]
*[[User:MatthiasRat/Bathing Alone|Bathing Alone]]
*[[User:MatthiasRat/Not Quite Alone|Not Quite Alone]]
*[[User:MatthiasRat/Suspected Alone|Suspected Alone]]
*[[User:MatthiasRat/Revealing Alone|Revealing Alone]]

'''2003'''
*[[User:MatthiasRat/Convention Building|Convention Building]]
*[[User:MatthiasRat/Model Building | Model Building]]
*[[User:MatthiasRat/Change Building | Change Building]]

'''2005'''
*[[User:Jetfire/Holes in the Veil| Holes in the Veil]]
*[[User:Robotech_Master/Capsule_Review:_Changed:_The_Unveiling|RPG.net Capsule Review: Changed: The Unveiling]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Lifting The Veil| Lifting The Veil]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Poking the Veil| Poking the Veil]]
*[[User:Eirik/Stages|Stages]] ''(Through October 2006)''

'''2006'''
*[[User:Jetfire/Film at 2011| Film at 2011]]
*[[User:Jetfire/GM'O'Fur| GM'O'Fur]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Twisting the Veil| Twisting the Veil]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Silver Fox Tracks|Silver Fox Tracks]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Generations| Generations]]
*[[User:Jetfire/A Rolling Stone Gathers No Veil|A Rolling Stone Gathers No Veil]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Auld Lang Syne|Auld Lang Syne]] (Extends into 2007)
*[[User:Eirik/Reverberations|Reverberations]]
*[[User:Eirik/Bare Hands|Bare Hands]]

'''2007'''
*[[User:Eirik/Treatment|Treatment]]
*[[User:Jetfire/It Bears Investigation|It Bears Investigation]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Gaming Furs|Gaming Furs]]
*[[User:JonBuck/A Kind of Paradise|A Kind of Paradise]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Radio No Veil|Radio No Veil]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Six Furries and a Wedding|Six Furries and a Wedding]]
*[[User:JonBuck/Tall Tales|Tall Tales]]
*[[User:Nikon/Changing Perspectives|Changing Perspectives]]
*[[User:Nikon/Back to Reality|Back to Reality]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Clearing the Air|Clearing the Air]]
*[[User:Eirik/Waters_So_Cold_and_Deep|Waters So Cold and Deep]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Doing Hard Time|Doing Hard Time]] (Extends into 2008)
*[[Monkey Business]]
*[[User:Nikon/Coming Home|Coming Home]] (guess based on posting date)

'''2008'''
*[[User:Jetfire/Live_At_Five|Live At Five]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Rising Waters|Rising Waters]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Gulf_Ice|Gulf Ice]] (Prelude in 2001)
*[[User:Jetfire/The_Bear_Facts|The Bear Facts]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Election Fever|Election Fever]]
*[[User:Eirik/Centers of Power|Centers of Power]]
*[[User:JonBuck/Open Secrets|Open Secrets]]
*[[User:WolfyDrake95/New_World|New World]]
*[[User:Jetfire/Special Care|Special Care]]
*[[User:Jetfire/NorBAC|NorBAC]] (begins in June; jumps to September)
*[[User:Jetfire/Judge_Judy:_Deagle_vs_Anderson|Judge Judy: Deagle vs Anderson]] (2008 or 2009)

'''2009'''
*[[User:JonBuck/After Hours|After Hours]]

'''2010'''
*[[User:JonBuck/Changing America|Changing America]] (work in progress)
*[[User:Robotech_Master/See Change: March 20, 2010|See Change: March 20, 2010]]
*[[User:Robotech_Master/Tiffnapped|Tiffnapped]]
*[[User:Robotech_Master/Holding Helena|Holding Helena]]

'''Alternate Future'''
*[[Cascade Failure]]

[[Category:Paradise]]