After Dave had been safely taken to the backroom with Mr. Carter where the boy would be distracted with snacks and toys, Leslie allowed herself to return her attentions to Rose, Terri, Jessica, and Kevin.
"Should there be any changes to the remaining four members of our second family, audience?"
Leslie turned to the enormous board, now glowing with new results. The audience waited in breathless anticipation. As the results flashed up, a family portrait of four—complete with Terri as a young mother, Rose a baby in her arms, Kevin a middle-aged father to Terri, and Jessica an as an aging grandmother and matriarch—appeared onscreen. Above it, in bold letters, were the words:
"JESSICA, 68 GRANDMOTHER & MATRIARCH, KEVIN, 42 FATHER TO TERRI, TERRI, 20 YEAR OLD MOTHER TO ROSE, ROSE 1 YEAR OLD BABY."
Lesily clapped her hands, her crystal glowing brighter in her grasp. "Oh, you all really are on fire tonight!" she teased, glancing at the four, who was still standing obediently on stage, oblivious to what was about to happen. "Well, out with the old and in with the new!"
The crowd erupted into cheers and laughter as Leslie pointed the crystal directly at the family of four. A radiant beam of shimmering light enveloped him, swirling like a storm of gold and blue, crackling with energy. The most notable change occurred to Jessica first, who grew older as if on fast forward, gaining a bit of weight, gray hair, and fine lines on her face. Her clothes grew and accommodated her new body. Kevin's transformation was the second most remarkable as he shot up and past through puberty, his body stretching up to 6'3" and then putting on muscle and then a bit of weight on top of that as he aged through the decades of adulthood. His hairline receded a bit and some gray began to appear at his temples. His clothes shifted from what a preteen would wear to that of a middle aged father. The third most fascinating transformation was that of Rose as she lost year after year, height, weight, and age all stripped from her as she grew ever younger until she was only a year old baby that was picked up by the now slightly younger but still young adult Terri whose body looked like it shifted to have recovered from having a baby in the recent past.
The glow faded, revealing revealing the new family, who were quickly escorted off stage to the green room.
"And now, to resolve our missing boy's missing family... I need a volunteer--preferably a single young man who'd like to tryout being a parent."
Leslie saw a few hands shoot up across the audience, but Leslie saw one particular young man, who looked to be about his late twenties, just the perfect age for a parent of an eight year old boy.
"You, sir, in the third row!" called out Leslie, the spotlight shifting to shine onto the young man with wavy light brown hair. He stood up and came up to the stage.
"Introduce yourself to the audience," encouraged Leslie.
"I'm Ted Kowalski, and I'm twenty-eight years old," said the young man with a bit of a blush.
The crowd applauded politely in response. Leslie pulled out a deck of cards from her costume's jacket.
"Well, before we bring your soon-to-be son out, we must first decide what your relationship to him will be. Now, on these cards there are various different parent or guardian relationship situations... from plain old father and mother to stepparent, much older brother looking after their younger brother, adoptive parent, you name it, there's likely a card for the scenario. Pick a card, any card, Ted."
Leslie fanned out the cards and held them out for Ted to choose. Ted hovered his hand over the deck of cards and then selected...