Melody meekly raised her hand. “Owner, if I may, this situation will not be made any better by panicking. If you take a moment to calm down, I am certain we can determine a solution.”
Jennifer glared at her for a moment... before realizing that she was looking with the eyes in the back of her head, and turned around. Melody shrank back.
Jennifer sighed, and looked back at the much smaller friends list on her phone. She sighed, and ran a claw through her hair. “Okay, okay. You’re right, I simply need to be a little more creative.”
Kylie smiled. “That’s a start.” she said, a hint of optimism in her voice.
“Yeah, there’s an easy solution to all of this,” Jennifer said. “Melody, use Transform or Dare on Kylie; if he, heh, sorry, SHE picks transform, alter her personality so she’ll be friends with me. If she picks dare, then dare her to be my friend.”
Kylie’s smile and optimism were gone.
“Even if that doesn’t break the curse for whatever reason,” Jennifer went on, “There’s no way a good friend would leave me looking like some hideous freak if she had the power to change it, would they?”
Melody seemed to hesitate. “Owner, I believe this command may be rather difficult to follow, at least, in terms of producing the intended result.”
Kylie looked away. “Yeah, it’s not gonna work out like you think.”
“And what do you mean by that?”
Kylie went quiet.
“I speculate that Kyle… or do you actually prefer Kylie, now?”
“I-”
“HER opinion doesn’t matter! She’s the one that did this to me.”
“Yes, Owner.”
“Wha-what?” Kylie stammered. “You’re just going to let her decide, just like that?”
“A toy can only bend under its owner’s will,” Melody stated, without a trace of emotion.
Kylie nodded slowly. “Oh, I understand, believe me.”
Melody continued. “As I was saying, it may be that the curse could simply produce another sycophant, and further-”
Jennifer sighed and rubbed her forehead. “And THAT is why you’re going to word it so this stupid curse doesn’t have any wiggle room, Ms. Dictionary!”
“Yes, Owner.” She turned back to Kylie, holding the vixen’s rubber hand. "Transform or Dare Kylie?"
"Transform," Kylie said hopefully.
"For your transformation, your personality will change to that of someone who would be genuine friends with Jennifer, while your body will change to what you've always-"
“Nope,” Jennifer interrupted. “Don’t change how she looks, even as some kind of balloon animal freak, she’s still way easier on the eyes now than she ever was before, and I want her to stay that way a while.” She let out a laugh.
Melody frowned. “...Yes, Owner… Your body will not change in any way, for now, Kylie.”
Kylie shut her eyes as images of Jennifer began to appear in her mind, displaying what a caring, compassionate, motivated person she could be. Jennifer helping out Kyle with a homework project, bringing Kyle gifts on his birthday, hanging out with him and shooting the breeze during lunch and recess, as well as images of him helping her out on projects, introducing her to friends of his, giving her a shoulder to cry on when she needed it...
Kylie tried to remind herself that all of these images were false, but the power of the game, the curse, was too much for her. She groaned, doubling over on her bed, causing her rubber body to creak and squeak as she held her head.
Jennifer looked at her reflection in Kylie’s window, waiting for her changes to start reversing. But as the clock ticked, nothing seemed to happen. “Come on, what gives, I ‘made’ a friend, I should be going back to normal, right?”
Melody tried to comfort the squirming Kylie with a pat on the head. “Perhaps the conditions of the curse require the friendship to be reciprocal, rather than one person attempting to be a true friend, and the other only seeing the first as a means to an end.”
Jennifer groaned. “Ugh, the decades-old town curse that ruins everybody’s lives is really gonna be picky about a little thing like that?” She shook her head in disgust, not bothering to turn around and face Kylie, who was still squirming on her bed, reaching out for the nightstand. “So, what’s bothering her? Shouldn't she be curing me, like any good friend would?”
“I suspect your request may have resulted in a great deal of cognitive dissonance,” Melody said, standing up. “After all, Kylie is likely being convinced by the curse that you must be her friend, and yet, her curse on you to remain this way until you make a friend remains. I hypothesize she is, metaphorically speaking, at war with herself.”
“Whatever. She’s my friend now, right? And she’s not gonna be affected by that ‘no cursing the person that just cursed you’ rule you mentioned.”
“We still haven’t confirmed if that rule, (the existence of which, we have not yet confirmed, either,) was the reason for my inability to help you, or if it was a product of the wording of Kyle’s-”
“Whatever! So that means she’s not gonna just sit back and let me keep suffering like this, when three little words from her can turn me back to nor-”
Jennifer was interrupted by the sound of Kylie’s cell phone dialing.
“Hey, this is Simon Fletcher, what’s up?” Came the voice on the other end.
“What are you doing?” Jennifer shouted.
“Hey Simon, this is Kyle Perkins, the geek whose history essay you flushed down the toilet. Transform or Dare?”
Both Melody and Jennifer let out a panicked “WHAT?” Jennifer desperately scrambled to grab the phone from Kylie. Melody stood back, already knowing it was too late.
“Transform or-? Oh, that old ghost story,” came Simon’s voice over the phone as Jennifer wrenched it from Kylie’s hand. “You don’t really believe that stuff, right?”
“Pick one or the other or you get both,” Kylie yelled, trying to be picked up by the phone.
Simon laughed. “Oooh, spooooky! Why don’t we split the difference and hear both, I’d love to tell the other guys what your revenge dreams look like.”
Still holding the phone in one hand, Jennifer grabbed Kylie with the other three, and shook her, causing more squeaking sounds. “Dare him to use the curse to change me back, ‘friend!’ I can’t live like this!”
“Wait, is that Jennifer I hear back there?”
“If you insist,” Kylie continued. “Within the next hour, you’re going to transform into a lizard man, and stay that way until you help three students you’ve bullied with their homework, treating it as seriously as if your own grades were on the line! And I dare you to not try to hurt or humiliate anyone you’ve bullied again, including using Transform or Dare on them.”
“If you say so, man.” Simon laughed, and hung up.
Melody was aghast. “Kylie, why-?”
“What kind of horrible ‘friend’ are you, you freak?” She threw Kylie back onto the bed, the vixen’s rubber body barely registering the impact. “Uhg, you’re useless!”
“...I’m sorry…” Kylie curled up into a ball on her bed, avoiding eye contact with either of them.
“You’re SORRY? That’s all you have to say? You’re sorry? You didn’t even TRY to help me.”
“Kylie,” Melody mumbled. “We were supposed to share the curse for experimentation. Why are you trying to play vigilante, instead?”
“I ca-” Kylie choked back the words. “I di- It’s n- ...I’m a bad friend… that’s all.”
Jennifer headed back toward the door. “Fine then, if this curse isn’t gonna break when I make a friend, the only way back is to get someone who actually gives a damn about their friends to get the curse and change me back.”
“You’ll need a friend for that,” Melody reminded her, “and you don’t have a lot left.”
“Which is why you’re going to help me!”
“Yes Owner.”
Jennifer shook her head, and awkwardly moved herself through the door. Melody turned back, and whispered to Kylie. “I don’t think you’re a bad friend. I know you wouldn’t behave like this without a well-thought-out reason. Just… tell me what it is…”
Kylie looked at Melody sadly, and then turned away.
“In any case, we’ve confirmed my hypothesis that the curse has some power to hide its effects just enough to prevent panic. If you wish to join us, you’ll likely not be absconded by government agents, or anything of the kind. If you wish to follow us, I have no objections.”
And with that, Melody left.
___
Jennifer had been acquaintances with Simon, who’d been friends with her ex, James Moore, and had a pretty good idea where he might go after the game had finished that day. She approached “Eddy’s Diner,” a place decorated with various bits of sixties and seventies memorabilia, where most of the team would usually go after class. Jennifer had never liked the place, but she’d eaten there a few times while dating, and mercifully, it wasn’t too far from the Perkins home.
She desperately hoped Simon hadn’t already been transformed and left. Her hope proved true as she finally got close enough to see through the windows, where she saw him eating and laughing with the other members of the team, still fully human.
But that didn’t last long. Before Jennifer could move around to the door, blue scales already began to creep over Simon’s face, and his teeth began to sharpen, startling the other teens around him. Simon himself soon couldn’t ignore it, as his hair began to drop off in clumps, and his jaws began to stretch forward into an angular snout, his nostrils shifting to the front of the new part of him. His eyes widened in shock, while his ears shrank back. Though Jennifer couldn’t see it, much of his body had already been coated in blue scales, and now, even he was starting to see it, as his hands grew scales, and claws poked through his fingertips. He scrambled to get up, and get out of the restaurant, the long, scaly tail suddenly shooting out of his backside knocking over a waitress, who seemed ready to scream, until he was out of her sight, when she went from terrified at what she saw to simply alarmed at Simon's behavior.
He stumbled out right in front of Jennifer, panting, none of his clothes badly damaged, save his shoes, but all of them ill-fitting. He looked up at her and Melody, startled.
“Wh-what the Hell? J-Jennifer? I thought something weird happened back at the game, but I couldn’t think of what… It was this stupid curse, wasn’t it?” He shook his head. “You look hideous.”
“Like you have room to talk, scaley!”
“Ugh, when I get my hands on Kyle, I’m gonna…” he suddenly paused. “...Be real nice to him…” He blinked a few times, then punched a wall. “RRRG! That stupid dare of his!”
“Yeah, tell me about it! Now look-”
Jennifer was interrupted by the sound of a cell phone going off, coming from Melody.
“I’ll get that,” Melody said, pulling off one of her drill-like pigtails. She pulled her cell-phone out of the hole left in her head, before replacing the hair. She picked up the phone, and moved away slightly.
Simon finally noticed her over Jennifer’s overwhelming, creepy presence. “Wait, who’s the doll that looks like a weeb’s wet dream?”
“Another curse victim, and not important. Look, neither of us want this, right? So, why don’t you use this curse to change me back to normal, or do something to her,” she gestured toward Melody, “‘cause she’ll do whatever I say, and then once I’m normal, I can fix you too, okay?”
Meanwhile, Melody restrained a sigh, as the voice of her grandmother came over the other end of the line. “It’s nearly six now, why aren’t you home yet?”
“There have been… unexpected difficulties.”
“I’m sure there have been. You’ve just been hanging out with Kyle and Hugh again, haven’t you? I told you, again and again, those boys are a waste of time. Now, if you’re not home within the next hour-”
“I’m sorry grandmother, I cannot comply.” A hint of a less-painted-on smile appeared on her face. “A toy can only bend to the will of its owner.”
“A toy can-?” There was a pause. “Oh no… Oh, don’t tell me you’ve gotten caught up in the town curse. Who did this to you? Was it Kyle or Hugh? I bet it was- no, it wouldn’t be them. Tell me where you are, and what you look like, I’ll be there to fix you myself!”
“Hey,” Jennifer called to Melody, “Get over here!”
“Yes, Owner! I’m sorry, grandmother, I must go.” Melody hung up the phone, and moved mechanically toward Jennifer.
“Now Simon,” Jennifer said, “are you gonna help us, or what?”