“I’ve got some change to spare,” a short, black-haired girl said. “And besides, you own this thing, right? If we want to get the money back, we can just open it and take it back out, so it's not like we’re losing anything.”
Happy grinned sheepishly. “Well, uh, I haven’t found a hatch for where you can get the coins out, actually…”
Phoebe barely held back a sigh. “Okay then, you’ll need to make it a point to look for that later. If we’re gonna use this for the fundraiser, we need to collect the money at the end of the day. Unless you’re fine with us breaking it open.”
“Uh, right.” Happy nodded. “So yeah, Wanda, you can try it out.”
The black-haired girl stepped up to the wooden base, and dropped a coin in the slot, expecting nothing. As the quarter rolled in, she was pleasantly surprised to see the ball start gently glowing.
“Oh, it still works,” Phoebe said. “Or at least, it still lights up. How about it, Wanda? Are you seeing your ‘true self’ in there?”
“Believe me,” Wanda said, smiling, “I’d be VERY surprised if this thing could show me my ‘true self.’ And even more if it could help me become it.”
As Wanda looked into the orb, its surface suddenly became reflective, and she saw her face staring back at her. But not the face she’d seen in her bathroom mirror this morning.
A face she’d only seen in her hidden art notebooks.
With a gasp, she immediately put her hands over the orb, trying to keep anyone else from seeing it. “Happy! What are you doing with this thing? Where did you get that picture?”
“What picture?” Happy asked.
“The one I just saw in the orb! There’s no way you got that picture without doing some real digging! I thought I could trust you not to go through my stuff!”
“Now just a minute,” Phoebe raised a hand. “Wanda, am I right in guessing that what you see in the ball, could be… er, considered compromising? And something that nobody else should have been able to see?”
Wanda nodded emphatically. “Very!”
“Well, I know Happy well enough to say she isn’t capable of a scheme that could get compromising information of yours, then rig it up to display in a crystal ball nobody but her had seen before, nor would she be willing to.”
“Yeah, that’s right!” Happy nodded, not picking up the backhanded compliment.
“Especially since she had no way to guarantee you’d put a coin in first, or any way to manipulate it to display the apparently compromising image. Plus, she’d need a plan for if anyone else volunteered. Do you think she's got blackmail material on every member of the sorority?”
“...No,” Wanda admitted.
“That’s right! Which means…” Phoebe frowned slightly as she realized the implication. “...The simplest explanation is that this thing might actually do what the person who sold this to Happy said it would do.”
“Sweet!” Happy cheered, then turned to Wanda. “So! Wanda! What do you see! Any cards telling you how to become your true self? Or maybe it’s written right on the ball?”
Wanda sighed. “Could all of you just… look away slightly?” Happy nodded, and she and the other girls moved to the opposite side of the ball. Wanda pulled her hands back from it, once again seeing a feminine face covered in yellow scales looking back at her. Were it not for everyone around who could easily catch a glimpse, the sight would have been heavenly for her.
“Uh, Wanda,” the young gamer girl, Jessie stammered. “Are… Are your hands feeling okay.”
Wanda looked up at the other girls, who were all staring down at her hands in shock. She held them up to look at them, as well, and gasped when she saw that her palms were covered in yellow scales, and more were gradually poking their way through the skin on the back of her hands, and down her arms.
The orb was helping her become her true self.
A wave of awe, mixed with panic, blended seamlessly with joy, hit her.
“Th-this is a dream, right? This isn’t really happening…” She looked up at the other girls again, a few of whom were backing away.
“W-Wanda,” Jessie pointed to her. “Your tongue… your teeth, too…”
Wanda stuck out her tongue far enough to catch sight of it, confirming her suspicions; it was forked. And more than that, she could taste the scene of her friends in the air. As she pulled her tongue back in,
“Girls, I…” She shivered, watching the yellow scales crawl further and further down her arms, until it reached under her shirt. “I don’t really… I…”
She struggled to figure out what she wanted to say. Tell them not to worry? Or would that clue them in that she LIKED this, on some level? Or would it be better to be honest, since this WAS her “true self” and they were probably putting things together anyway?
The glow of the orb slowly died down, and the changes seemed to stop.
“Wanda,” Happy said, moving carefully closer. “Are you feeling okay?”
“I…” Wanda looked around, the other girls looked tense. “I’m… not feeling bad. It… I kinda wanted this.”
“Wait,” came the sorority’s otaku, Lidia, “are you into monster girls?”
“Not exactly… it’s more…” She sighed. “Uhg, no point in hiding it. I’m a furry.”
The girls exchanged glances.
“You’re not into vore or hypnosis or something, are you?” Asked one voice in the crowd she couldn’t pick up.
“No!” Wanda practically shouted.
“...Okay,” the voice said, “we should be safe.”
The girls all spread out a little more, looking over Wanda.
“C-could you please stop staring?”
“You heard her!” Phoebe spoke up. “Everyone just step outside for a minute, and DON’T speak a word of this to anyone! Happy and I’ll try to figure this out.”
Wanda looked down at herself. “Looks like the change finally stopped. I was kind of hoping it’d go a lot further.”
“Hm,” Happy put a finger to her chin. “Maybe it’ll go further if you put more money in.”
Wanda gave that thought some consideration.
“Well, we should be happy it didn’t!” Phoebe said, “it’ll be hard enough to get you out in public like this.” She turned to Happy. “Happy! You bought this thing, did they say anything about how to undo it if something like this happens?”
“The shopkeeper said if I didn’t like how it was going, I could take it back to the shop to get everything fixed.”
“Great!” Phoebe sighed in relief. “Wanda, I’ll get my car, and you- WHAT ARE YOU DOING?”
Seven more quarters were already rolling into the slot.
“S-sorry, Phoebe… I really wanted to try it…”
She shivered slightly, before falling back into one of the chairs. Scales spread further under her clothes, which were quickly caught up in the changes as well, her simple red t-shirt and blue jeans weaving together and reshaping into a black dress. Her legs began to shrink, pulling back into her body, becoming less distinct the further they went, while her tailbone grew, and grew, and grew, becoming a thick, flexible tail that extended out at least six feet. Her hair receded, leaving her bald, as scales began to grow from her face. Her ears shrank back into the sides of her head, while her nostrils flared forward with her growing jaw, becoming a flat, angular snout.
She closed her eyes, opening them to reveal pupils that looked like little more than narrow slits under the bright indoor lights.
“WHAT WERE YOU THINIKING?” Phoebe shouted.
“S-sorry! It’s… It’s a dream of mine.” Wanda smiled sheepishly.
“Well, I’m happy for you, Wanda,” Happy said, patting her on the back.
“Happy…” Phoebe groaned.
“What?” Happy asked. “The crystal ball made Wanda her true self! And she looks happy about it, too! See, I told you it’d be great for the club. Imagine what else we could do with it!”
Phoebe buried her head in her hands.