With her resolve set and her expression stern, Gabby returned to her room where the lifeless plush raccoon and rat lay abandoned. Her intention was clear—she would confront Jeff directly and get to the bottom of this bizarre situation.
"Which one's Jeff's?" Susan inquired, her fingers hovering over the two memory cards tangled in her palm.
"I don't know, they're not labeled," Gabby replied, frustration lacing her tone. In a rush to confront her brother, she hastily grabbed a card and slotted it into the raccoon plush, ignoring the 50/50 chance of it being the wrong one.
Susan flicked the power button on the raccoon's back, and instantaneously Marc's consciousness booted up into Jeff's plush form. Marc's plush eyes opened, confusion and concern flooding through him as he realized the mix-up.
"What's going on? Why do am I a raccoon plush?" Marc's voice came out in a synthetic, yet unmistakably his own.
Gabby, taken aback by the plush's reaction, stepped forward. "Jeff? What's this all about? Are you trying to spy on us?"
Marc panicked. "No, no, it's not like that at all! You've got to believe me." His plush paws gestured frantically. "I think the cards got mixed up; I'm Marc, not Jeff!"
That's when Maria's eyes sparkled with an idea as mischievous as it was ingenious. "If their minds are just stored on these cards...," she mused, trailing off invites the others to connect the dots for themselves.
Gabby and Susan shared a look, and the same devilish grin spread across all three girls' faces. The potential for pranks and payback was too good to pass up.
Marc, sensing their intentions, started to squirm. "Wait! You can't—"
But it was too late. Gabby swiftly pressed the power button, and the raccoon plush went limp once more. As excitement danced in their eyes, the trio huddled around the computer screen, the Chronivac ready to beckon their wildest imaginations into reality.
The girls huddled around the Chronivac's interface, the power of Jeff's psychological blueprint at their fingertips. The air was tense with the anticipation of mischief. Gabby, Susan, and Maria exchanged ideas as they navigated the software, their every suggestion more devious than the last.
"Make him really believe he's part raccoon," Gabby insisted, clicking through the behavior options.
"Yeah, and he should obey us," Maria chimed in, dragging the obedience slider to its maximum. "And he's gotta be super annoyed by it but powerless to resist!"
Susan leaned over the keyboard, typing with purpose. "Oh, and whenever he tries to swear or complain, let's just beep it out!"
The girls giggled at the image of their friend-turned-plush, his language now a series of comical beeps rather than his typical verbose protestations.
"And don't forget the pat reflex," Maria recalled, pointing to a small checkbox in the interface. "Cross-eyed and adorable every time he gets a pat on the head." They tested the feature, ensuring his eyes would adorably cross and his demeanor soften whenever his plush head was touched.
Satisfied with their customizations, they saved Jeff's new profile to the memory card and proceeded with the exchange—Marc's consciousness returning to the rat plush body and Jeff's new, modified persona placed back into the raccoon plush.
As the raccoon plush was reanimated, its eyes blinked, and Jeff's voice fought through the surprise. "What the—what's going on?" He attempted to shake off the disorientation, briefly relieved to be conscious again. Gabby wasted no time putting their plan into action.
"Jeff, clean my room," she commanded with a smirk.
Jeff started to respond with his usual defiance, but what came out was an array of bleeps, each one censoring his incensed reply. "You can't just—bleep!—make me—bleep!—do—bleep-bleep!" Every attempted curse word was reduced to a silly electronic noise, much to the girls' delight.
His instincts kicked in, and Jeff—against his new programming—attempted to resist. However, each attempt to rebel was undercut by an irresistible impulse to comply. His little plush limbs moved almost of their own accord, starting to tidy the room. The frustration was evident in his digital eyes, yet every time he tried to voice it, only a sequence of beeps escaped his muzzle.
Then Maria reached out and patted Jeff's plush head. Instantly, his expression went slack, his eyes crossed comically, and his limbs wobbled, causing him to flop into a more relaxed, endearing plush position.
"Oh my gosh, look at him! He's adorable when he's all spaced out like that," Susan squealed with laughter.
Gabby nodded in amused agreement, patting Jeff again just to watch his eyes cross a second time. It was clear the girls had seized control of the situation, turning their once scheming brother and his best friend into the highlight of their slumber party. And as Jeff slowly gathered his wits, still under the programming of the Chronivac and his sister's newfound whims, he couldn't help but wonder just how long he'd remain a conscientious objector trapped within the fluffy body of a raccoon plushie.
Marc flapped his plush arms with exaggerated motions and clumsily attempted to navigate around the room, his propeller noises punctuating the air. As the silliness began to wear thin, he desperately tried to communicate his desire to return to his human form.
"Roger, mission complete. Requesting permission to..." Marc's voice trailed into a blur of programmed phrases, "...return to base."
Gabby tilted her head, feigning confusion. "Base? Oh, you mean where we keep all the toys when we're done playing with them?"
Susan snickered, watching Marc's animated attempts to make his point clear. "Yeah, Marc, do you want to go back to being a boring old human?"
"Affirmative! Mayday, mayday! Requesting immediate transformation!" Marc blurted out, interspersed with an optimistic "brrrrrr."
Maria laughed heartily. "Okay, okay, Pilot Marc. Let's bring you back."
The girls approached the Chronivac, and after a few quick adjustments, they positioned Marc among his heap of clothes on the floor. Gabby clicked the 'Revert' button, initiating the transformation sequence.
A luminescent glow enveloped Marc's plush form, the fibers beginning to unravel as his body stretched and morphed. Within moments, a dazed but definitely human Marc sat in a tangled mess of clothing. He quickly scrambled to his feet, slipping into his clothes with haste, eager to preserve his modesty before the giggling audience of girls.
Marc straightened up, ready to express his gratitude and, more eagerly, his relief. But as he opened his mouth, all that came out were the familiar pilot catchphrases, much to his dismay.
"Ready for... roger that? Uhm... brrrr?" Marc stammered, his hands patting down his chest as if to reassure himself he was indeed back to normal, aside from his speech.
The girls erupted into laughter. Clearly, the memory card had retained the speech edits, leaving Marc sounding more like an action figure than his true self.
"Oh no," Gabby gasped between giggles, "it looks like we forgot to reset his speech before switching him back!"
Maria wiped tears of mirth from her eyes. "Don't worry, Marc. We'll fix it... right after we have a little bit more fun!"
Marc's eyes widened. It was clear this slumber party had taken a turn he hadn't anticipated, and now he'd have to prepare for whatever the girls had in store for him next.