With Ashley busy taking a phone call, Mary turned to her other friends.
The following ten minutes involved two more succesful teleports. Penny, a girl who liked to dress up in gothic and punk-looking clothes a lot, arrived wearing clothes that fully covered her body, up to and including heavy black and white make-up, with dark lines below her eyes. She wore a black mask over her mask that also covered her nose, and she'd chosen to wear eye lenses that were of a color bright enough that they could glow in the dark. The same counted for the dreadlock wig she wore. Finish it off with striped black and white socks beneath a gothic dress, as well as platformed boots, and suddenly the previously tiny goth girl stood at almost equal footing as Mary herself.
Mila took a much different approach, opting for something more inhuman. A cat-mask that she could lift over her head, paired with clawed paw gloves and a tail that she could strap on her waistband. The others gave her some time to let her undress inside the teleporter so no other clothes were in the way, before Mary activated the machine. Some more time waiting expectantly, Mila came stepped out of the teleporter, fully clothed again, but now her face was transformed into that of a cat, much more realistic looking than the initial mask, combined with soft fur all over her face, whiskers, cat ears and mouth, and fanged teeth inside said mouth. Her claws had actually created some rips inside the clothes she put back on, but with concentration she could actually retract them inside her paws again. Lastly her tail was lazily waving behind her. It peaked out from underneath Mila's shirt, not running interference with the jeans she was wearing.
After all that excitement, Mary decided to check the machine logs, and she stumbled upon a small, but manageable problem.
****TELEPORTATION PROCESSES ANALYZED****
*Control panel... functional
*Closing chamber... functional
*Chamber 1... functional
*Chamber 2... functional
*Doors function... functional
*laser status... problematic error: OVERHEATING
*Emergency protocols... low function: DNA SPLITTING ERROR
*Failsafe... secure
*Cooldown required... please wait: 0h4m53s
****ANALYSIS COMPLETE****
Mary read through the machine's analysis of its own functioning, and then she warned the others, including the ones who hadn't had their turns yet. She figured that the DNA splitting error was what they were abusing all along.
"Guys, it seems like the teleporter needs some time to cooldown, because of problems with the laser overheating. The problem with that is that, between teleports, the length of the cooldowns seem to have been increasing.
"The cooldowns are increasing a lot with each teleport however, so I'm not sure if I can turn everybody back by the end of today if we let everybody try it right now."
The only ones without a turn thus far had been Marcus and Cynthia. Marcus was a geek, wearing the typical glasses, and even the braces, whilst not having the arrogance and holier-than-thou attitude that most nerds seemed to have whenever Mary encountered them. Marcus was much more approachable, and, contrary to some of the other guys in Mary's class, he actually treated the girls in her friend group like normal people. Admittedly, not many girls were active in the STEM-field, and perhaps the guys in Mary's and her friends' classes were envious of the multitude of sci-fi experiments they undertook, but Marcus didn't care.
Cynthia had the exact same attitude, but then from a popular girl perspective. A life-long friend of Mary's, she didn't look down at her like she was some outsider. And although she usually spent more time with her own clique than with Mary and her friends, she occasionally came over to check up on what they were doing. It was Cynthia who first introduced Mary to Ashley. And although at first the fell out with each other, now the three of them were pretty close-knit.
Marcus felt bummed at potentially missing out on this chance, but miraculously, he came up with an idea that seemed brilliant to him.
"What if we decide to teleport in pairs instead during the next turns? Knowing that each person goes from one room to the other in order to merge and unmerge, they shouldn't interfere with each other's teleports, right?"
Mary and Cynthia mulled over the idea for a moment. Eventually they turned to look in each other's eyes, before nodding and agreeing with Marcus.
"We could try that out," Mary figured. "Maybe then we can reverse the changes in time, before everybody has to go home.
"So what have the two of you decided to wear?"
Cynthia gestured down at herself. She was wearing a cheerleader outfit, holding two pompoms in her hand by her middle. "You're looking at it. I have practice this evening, and I figured that this was the perfect outfit to try on if I wanted to put in a good performance... if you're okay with not turning me back before tomorrow, that is."
Mary shrugged. "Fine by me. Marcus, what about you?"
Marcus had carried a duffel bag along with him. Finally, he opened its zipper to show what was inside. "I've borrowed my brother's muscle suit from him. I wanted to test it and see if I was going to become buffer from merging with it. That way I don't have to put so much effort into getting my dream body.
The girls collectively giggled, with Marcus giving a big grin in return. "Opting for the easy way out, don't nya?" Mila commented.
"Well, it's always worth a try," Mary oppered. "And Mila, right now you're living proof that this teleporter can make even the stupidest of mask into the most photo-realistic feline faces I've ever seen on a human body." Mila conceded the point.
It took several minutes of waiting, but eventually, it was Marcus and Cynthia's turns to enter the teleporter. Once Marcus threw his actual clothes out of the teleporter, confirming he'd changed into the bodysuit, Mary activated the teleporter once more.
Then, a large error appeared on the command panel.