"Oh! Careful! It's uh, broken." Simon snatched the Chronivac up before his Friend got it. "I gotta mess with something on it. So, what's for breakfast?" He made a point of changing the subject.
Luckily, Bryan and Jay were both hungry, and took the cue to pass out plates. Simon and Bryan had Pop-Tarts and juice, but Jay had a bowl of carrots and apples, and water in a wide-mouthed glass.
The donkey boy grinned. "Man, your mom is the greatest! She always has stuff for me here, and my special glass."
Bryan snorted. "Well, you spend enough time over here, she probably figures you are stabled in Simon's bedroom."
It was really strange. Simon's two friends were talking as if Jay had always been like this! Curious, he went over and pulled out the box of photos he had in his desk. Sure enough, every picture with Jay in it showed a donkey-boy of equivalent age. A naked donkey-boy. Apparently, he was considered an animal by full humans.
Simon was really curious now. Still holding the Chronivac, he pointed it at Bryan and hit the switch. Just like Jay, Bryan's human size appeared. What would happen if he changed the other boy in front of Jay?
"So, what's that thing do?" Bryan saw him pointing the Chronivac, but seemed only mildly curious. Jay chewed on one of the carrots, looking content.
"Um, not much." Grinning, Simon set the controls like they had been for Jay, but then altered the species to Bull. "Just a kind of remote control thing. Not sure how it works yet." He pressed the button.
At first, nothing seemed to happen. Then Bryan's skin started to darken. The boy frowned slightly and stretched his neck, not noticing that it was getting thicker. Actually, he was getting thicker all over! Muscles rippled under his skin, which was rapidly growing a coat of jet-black fur. Horns pushed out from his forehead, which fell back and his nose and mouth formed a very bovine snout.
"So, whatcha messing with it for?" Jay picked an apple chunk from the bowl and crunched it absently, paying no attention to his now bullish friend. "What's it go to?"
Bryan's feet were now cloven hooves, and his hands become three-fingered like Jay's. However, when the change stopped, Bryan was obviously more animal than the donkey-boy. His whole head was bovine, making him more a humanoid animal. A minotaur! Bryan shook his head and gave a low bellow, making some gestures with his hands. He couldn't speak!
Jay grinned. "Only a 'remote' chance he can fix it? You're the only person I know who doesn't need to talk to make bad jokes. Sometimes I'm sorry we all took sign language classes."
Simon stared at the two bestial boys, and then checked out the pictures. Now the photos all showed Bryan as a minotaur calf, also naked. And - he had a bowl of greens and a wide-mouthed glass of water for breakfast.
This device not only changed people, it also made the changes part of reality! Simon was the only one who knew his friends had been human. He looked at the Chronivac. What would happen if he used it on himself?