“Anyway I just came by to remind you guys about the school dance that
is about to begin tonight. You guys don’t want to be the only dogs on
campus without a bitch to dance with!” Steve barks with excitement while
his tail wags from side to side. “Oh and the theme for tonight’s dance
is 1920 by the way.” He adds before dropping down to all fours and
racing down the hallway to his room. “See you dogs there!” Steve howls
from down the hallway.
Driven on by the confusion and curiosity that they smell from one
another, Dale and Mitch slowly pad their way to the entrance of their
dorm room on their hind legs. Dale’s docked tail bobs along as he
shuffles his shaggy bulk up to the door first and perks his ears up.
Mitch closely follows behind him with his feathered tail swinging softly
from side to side as evidence of his apparent confusion to their
situation. His ears twitch and he smiles a toothy smile. Mitch pants to
keep himself calm. Alan, using his tail as a balance as he moves on all
fours, pads his way to the entrance and squeezes his head in between the
legs of his two now canine friends. All three of them peer down the
hallway, cock their heads and twitch their ears in bemusement as they
watch Steve, fellow student and now Rough-Haired Collie, gets up again
on two legs near the front door to his dorm room. They watch as he
reaches up to a dog collar that is hanging around his neck and detaches
a key from it. He opens up the door to his dorm room with the key and
then reattaches the key to his dog collar. Steve then walks into his
room and closes the door behind him. The minute Steve closes his door
behind him, the threesome try talking to each other about how their
botched spell affected Steve and maybe the whole entire campus.
“Wait a minute, guys.” Dale says to his two friends as he holds up both
of his shaggy paw-like hands to get their attention. “Why are we
assuming that botched spell of ours has affected the entire campus like
it did with Steve and us?”
“How can we not after seeing Steve like that?” Mitch asks him.
“But how can we make such an assumption after seeing that Steve is in
the same physical condition as we are? I told you guys a few moments ago
that the spell wasn’t powerful enough to get past the spell circle that
Alan had inscribed onto the floor. And even if it did somehow, it
wouldn’t have gone too far thanks to the other wards that Alan placed
around the periphery of our dorm room.” Dale tells Mitch as he looks
down at Alan for support.
Alan pushes his way through the legs of his two friends, turns around
and then squats down on his haunches. He looks up at Mitch before
backing up Dale on his assertion.
“Dale’s right, Mitch, the wards that I placed around the room as part of
a class assignment are the same as the ones used in the labs in the
Arcane Sciences building. And we all know how those wards were designed
to contain spells that went off accidentally or deliberately wild.” Alan
comments.
“Okay, okay, so our botched spell shouldn’t have gone more than a few
feet beyond the confines of our room. But your comment doesn’t quite
explain why Steve was affected.” Mitch says to Alan with another of his
toothy smiles.
“Steve was probably at our front door and getting ready to come on in
and tells us about the dance tonight when we were in the middle of that
surge of wild magic...” Dale starts telling Mitch.
“...And the wards that I placed around the room were at the weakest at
the front door where I couldn’t effectively inscribe them into the
carpet.” Alan says in turn.
“So here is what happened to Steve. He comes up to our door and gets
ready to come on in and tell us about the dance. Our spell goes wild and
it breaches the protective wards of the spell circle as it affects us.
It then hit the wards surrounding the room where most of it was
contained and dissipated. But a portion of it came into contact with the
weakened portion of the ward near the front door and breached it. The
spell then came into contact with Steve and transformed him like it did
us. Hence he was the only other person to be affected by our botched
spell.” Dale says to Mitch with a concluding remark. He smiles and hangs
his tongue out to pant.
But his explanation at trying to convince Mitch about what happened to
Steve falls on slightly deaf ears.
“Mitch?” Alan asks with a look of worry on his canine face.
“Earth to Mitch, anyone home?” Asks Dale who is wondering what’s up with
his friend.
They both notice that Mitch is looking down at the other end of the
hallway. His ears are perked up and twitching as he hears something
coming from behind from one of the close doors at that end of the
hallway. Alan and Dale cock their heads to one side in puzzlement and
perk their ears up to hear whatever noise that Mitch is hearing. Mitch
then looks at Dale and cocks a furry eyebrow.
“I think you had better think again about who got affected and who
didn’t get affected by our spell, Dale.” Mitch tells him.
“Huh?” Dale looks at him questioningly.
Mitch gets Alan and Dale to look toward one of the doors that is down
the hallway and on the opposite side. They then hear the sound of a door
opening up. Ears and furry eyebrows perk up in surprise while tails and
jaws drop. For down the hallway, they watch as first a huge fawn-colored
Mastiff and then a slender gray Greyhound wearing dog collars,
saddlebags and backpacks step out of the room.
“Oh boy, looks like Steve wasn’t the only one after all to get affected
by that spell. Looks like Adam and Mario have gone to the dogs too.”
Alan smiles and comments to no one in particular as his tail sweeps the
floor behind him.
Not sure if he is really seeing things, Dale uses his right hand to lift
up the thick, shaggy mass of fur from his eyes. He peers out from
underneath his shaggy paw-like hand as all three of them listen to Adam
brag about his latest girlfriend to his roommate.
“ I am telling you, Mario, my latest bitchfriend has a great temperament
toward others and comes from a good breeding stock. And she won some
best bitch awards from her home town’s canine pageantry last year.” Adam
boasts to Mario. “How can you say that your bitchfriend is better than
mine?”
“I think she is better than yours because of her mixed breed ancestry.”
Mario explains to Adam.
Adam and Mario then stop their little discussion about their bitches and
greet Dale, Alan and Mitch.
“Hi guys, what’s wagging?” Adam and Mario nearly say to the trio in
unison.
Happily wagging their tails and panting contentedly at the sight of the
trio, they first give Alan who is sitting down on his haunches a
friendly rub behind his ears. And then they offer him their paw-like
hands to sniff. Alan surprisingly begins to pant contentedly from their
gestures of affection and sniffs their hands. Adam and Mario then greet
Dale and Mitch in turn by coming up to them and hugging them fondly and
sniffing behind both of their ears. Not wanting to seem out of place,
they hug and sniff Adam and Mario in turn. Their returning gesture to
Adam and Mario surprisingly feels good to them and seems to ease the
tension out of their furry bodies. Adam and Mario step back from the
trio and Adam looks at them with a puzzled look to his blackened face.
“Is something wrong here, guys? You guys smell confused and curious
about something.” He asks curiously.
“No nothing is seriously wrong, Adam.” Mitch says to him with a
dismissing wave of his paw-like hand. He smiles again another one of his
toothy smiles.
“Yeah, nothing is wrong, Adam. It’s just that we were working on a class
project just a few moments ago and we didn’t quite get the results we
were looking for.” Dale sheepishly tells Adam and Mario.
Alan and Mitch nod their heads to show their agreement to what their
friend said.
“Which project?” Adam questioningly asks Dale with a raised eyebrow and
a twitch of his tail.
Dale looks to his friends for help as he tries to come up with an answer
that doesn’t sound awkward to his own ears.
“I am betting that you guys were working on one of Dr. C’s assignments
from yesterday. Am I right?” He says to Adam as he cocks his
questioningly and perks up his ears for an answer.
The trio looks at each other blankly for a second as they try to figure
out who is this “Dr. C” that Mario is talking about. But then Dale nods
his head in agreement and tucks his tail between his legs from
embarrassment.
“Yeah we were working on one of Dr. C’s assignments from yesterday. And
we’re just confused as to why it didn’t turn out like we expected it
to.” Dale again sheepishly says to Adam and Mario.
Adam and Mario give the trio looks of sympathy. Adam reassuringly pats
Dale on the shoulder.
“We understand now about what we were smelling from you guys.” Adam says
sympathetically to the trio. “Almost everyone here on campus has heard
about how difficult Dr. C’s assignments can be.”
Adam and Mario then switch topics with the trio and talk to them about
the upcoming dance tonight and the latest exams in arcane theory that
they all had to take recently. And they try to include the trio in the
little debate they were having before greeting them. A few minutes pass
by and Adam looks at his wristwatch and motions to Mario that they
really have to get going. Alan gets up onto his hind legs and stands
next to Dale and Mitch. They are given another friendly hug and sniff
from Adam and Mario. And they give them a hug and a sniff in return.
Tails a-wagging Adam and Mario then leave the trio and walk down the
hallway. After Adam and Mario leave, the trio quickly pads their way
back into the deluxe-sized room of theirs. Once inside Mitch closes the
door behind Dale and Alan and locks it. And then all three of them
receive quite another surprise from what they see of the ‘living’ room
of their deluxe-sized room. They stop and stare and pant. Mitch smiles
again as they see that everything in their living room is just where
they remembered them to be. But everything in the room has a canine feel
to it now. In the small pantry area of the living room where they keep
their snacks and other easily storable foods, they see two large bags of
Eukanuba dry dog food and some cans of canned dog food of several
different flavors from Purina. Above the cans and bags of dog food, they
see a shelf with some flat, plastic dog food dishes on them. And above
that shelf they see some plastic bottles advertising some brand of
spring water. They see that the bottles of spring water are resting in
front of what appears to be human snack food. Some of the furniture
looks the same. They see that Mitch’s small entertainment center with
its’ TV, radio, VCR and DVD player are still in the corner next to
Dale’s small refrigerator cube. But instead of a couch they see several
different bean bag couches made of some tough-looking yet flexible
plastic lying all over the room with pillows thrown on them. They see
dog toys and text books littering the floor next to a wooden chest that
Alan brought back from home last week. And in the middle of the floor
they see that the place where they had cast that botched spell is still
there. But the spell circle looks like it has burnt itself out.
On the walls they see that some of Alan’s movie posters have changed a
bit too. His Lord of the Rings poster now says Lord of the Collars on
it instead. And it shows a quartet of terriers of different breeds
standing in front of an Irish Wolfhound wearing woodsman’s garb, a sleek
looking whippet holding a bow and an arrow with both paws and a really
shaggy Komondor in wizard’s clothes. At the bottom they see that the
catch phrase for the movie is now ‘One Collar to collar them all.” His
Top Dog poster shows a Briard wearing what appears to be a policeman’s
uniform. Looking at what has happened to their room, Mitch looks at his
friends with another smile.
“Guys, I don’t think that we’re in Kansas anymore.” Mitch tells them
with his tail tucked between his legs.
Alan rolls his eyes at the catch phrase while Dale shakes in his head
from bemusement and mirth. The smell of confusion, curiosity and oddly
enough, happiness, begins to permeate the room. They then walk up to the
door leading into Mitch’s bedroom and walk inside. Like the living room,
the changes are very apparent here. His dressers, closet, bookshelves
and desk are all in the same places as they remember them to be. But
instead of seeing his bed positioned next to the window with its’ view
of the quad, they see a rather huge, plush-looking dog bed resting on
top of a raised platform. The plush-looking dog bed has a stack of
pillows and blankets piled on top of it in a neat pile. Mitch walks over
to his desk and begins to look at his books. He sees that his magic
books are the same as he remembered them to be. But his science fiction
and fantasy books now have that ever present canine motif to them. His
books on werewolves now deal with that legendary creature known only as
Man. After looking at the books on his desk, he goes over to his
bookshelf and starts to rifle through his magic books in search for
answers to their current situation. As Mitch is doing that, Dale
shuffles past him and spies one of Mitch’s bandannas lying in his
clothes hamper. He picks it up and uses it as a head wrap to hold his
shaggy head fur out of his eyes. He joins Alan by the window and looks
outside. Their ears twitch and their tails wag slowly from side to side
as they peer out into the quad. Mitch stops briefly in his search and
looks at Dale.
“Hey Dale, what’s look like out there in the quad?” He asks him
questioningly.
Dale turns his head to the side so that he can look at Mitch and into
the quad at the same time.
“Looks almost like a typical day in the quad to me.” He responds.
“It would look like a typical day in the quad if it wasn’t for the fact
that everyone out there is a dog like us.” Alan quips in.
“Everyone?” Mitch asks the two as he sees them wag their tails some more
and perk their ears.
“Everyone.” Dale resignedly tells him before looking back outside into
the quad.
Alan and Dale watch one pack of dogs taking turns with each other in a
game of frisbee. At the far end of the quad they see another pack of
dogs playing a rather good game of flyball. They see dogs walking in and
out of the quad on all fours and on two legs. And they see that the dogs
in the quad are wearing the same type of collars that they saw on Adam,
Mario and Steve. Some of the dogs are wearing either shirts or shorts
and not much else. Some are wearing nothing more than their backpacks
and saddlebags. And other canines are just wearing nothing but their fur
coats. Alan walks away from Dale and the open dorm room window feeling a
mixed bunch of feelings. He squats down on his knees next to Mitch’s bed
and spies a tennis ball lying almost under it. He picks it up and begins
to play with it as he tries to make sense of the moment. He doesn’t know
what to make of all this. But what he does know is that his impatience
and desire to be a real dog somehow resulted in their current
predicament. He juggles the ball between his paw-like hands. He looks at
Dale and then at Mitch who is still going through his spell books.
“Do the two of you have any idea now as to what happened to us and
everyone else on campus?” Alan asks his friends for a reassuring answer.
“Because I am really at a loss myself as to how the three of us and the
entire campus went to the dogs.”
Dale doesn’t answer right away as something in the quad catches his eyes
and apparently his nose. He sniffs the air coming through the open
window. He sniffs once and then twice. And then he sniffs deeply before
gasping and turning his shaggy head away from the window. Mitch and Alan
look at him and notice that their shaggy roommate is panting rather
heavily and covering his privates with both paw-like hands. They
silently get the impression that Dale is blushing under all of that fur.
Alan gets up off the floor and stands up while still playing with the
tennis ball.
“What’s wrong with you, Dale?” Mitch asks questioningly while looking
his friend up and down.
“Uh guys just a thought, everyone on campus is a dog right? Just like
us?” Dale says sheepishly.
“Yeah everyone on campus is now an anthropomorphic canine like us. So
what?” Alan tells him while quirking one of his eyebrows up in
puzzlement. He looks at Mitch and Mitch shrugs.
“Well if everyone on campus is an anthropomorphic dog like us, that
includes the girls from the all girls dorm that is two buildings down
from our building, right?”
Mitch and Alan nod their heads and wonder what is the matter with Dale.
And then before one of them can ask him about what he is getting at with
this round about questioning, they put two and two together. Barking
laughter and snickers from both Alan and Mitch fill the room as both of
them realize that their friend must have caught the scent of one of the
girls in heat. The girl’s musky scent must have really aroused their
friend to the point of embarrassment and sexual desire. Still covering
his privates with both paw-like hands and now tucking his docked tail in
between his legs, Dale pads away from the window. Alan gives him a
reassuring rub on the back as he passes him. Mitch smiles and tries to
collect himself and spare his friend from anymore embarrassment.
“Well that certainly explains a question that has been on my mind since
we found out that the botched spell transformed the entire student body
into anthropomorphic dogs.” Mitch wonders out loud to himself. Alan
chuckles at his friend’s comment.
“Oh man, your comment, Mitch, just reminded me of something I read in a
magazine before all of this happened.” Alan says to Mitch before
chuckling again.
“And what would that be?” Dale asks after regaining his composure.
“Well the magazine article said that when you have a large number of
girls living together in the same building, their period begins to
synchronize with one another. So if all of the girls on campus are now
bitches...” Alan tells them.
“... then they all would be in heat now!” Says Dale catching on to what
Alan was just saying. “No wonder that girl I saw just a few moments ago
was wearing padded shorts and attracting practically every male in the
quad. Oh boy!”
Their comments set off another round of barking and woofing as they all
find themselves amused by the fact the all of the Stonewood girls are in
heat.
After a few minutes of laughing and friendly hugging, Mitch goes back to
looking through his books of magic while Dale and Alan go back to the
opened window and look outside at the activity in the quad. They chuckle
a bit and wag their tails as they see that some of the guys in the quad
have disappeared in pursuit of the bitch that was in heat. But soon
enough, Dale spots a Scottish Terrier wearing familiar clothing walking
through the quad.
“Hey, Alan, isn’t that Professor Dunnel walking through the quad right
now?” Dale asks him questioningly.
“Is he coming toward our dorm building, Dale?” Mitch asks him after
overhearing his question to Alan.
That question makes Alan let out a yelp and makes him want to hide under
Mitch’s bed. Dale grabs him by the scruff of his neck. Still holding on
to a struggling Alan, he looks out the window.
“Uh, no he isn’t, Mitch. He looks like he is on his way to the
cafeteria.”
“Are you sure that he isn’t coming over here?” Alan questions Dale about
the professor.
Alan relaxes when Dale directs him toward the window and shows him. He
sees the professor walking though the quad calmly as can be. He then
looks away from seeing the professor and the rest of the quad and looks
at his friends.
“Guys, any clues as to how this all happened?” He asks them while he
continues to nervously play with the tennis ball.
Dale looks at Mitch and the pile of magic books lying across his desk.
“Didn’t find anything that can explain how we and the entire campus got
into this mess?”
“Not a thing, I am afraid.” He says to his shaggy friend. “Let’s sit
down and go over in our heads about how all of this had happened to us.”
He beckons Dale and Alan away from the window and gets them to sit down
on their haunches in the middle of his bedroom. And he gets them to
recall the incident that made them and everyone else on campus go
literally to the dogs. Dale starts the whole thing off by recalling how
he found the timed version of the Polymorph spell in a seldom used
portion of the campus library and how he wanted to show his roommates
the potential recreational use of this particular spell. And the
discussion goes from there to the point where Alan’s Indian relics got
accidentally tossed into their already-in-progress spell circle. When
they get to that point in their discussion, Dale looks at Alan with a
peeved look in his eyes.
“Alan, what were you thinking of by introducing new magic to a spell
that was already-in-progress? Didn’t you remember from Professor
Lindstrom’s lecture two weeks ago about the dangers of spell
corruption?” Dale angrily tells him.
Alan smells Dale’s anger and reacts submissively towards him by
flattening his ears and tucking his tail.
“I didn’t know that the spell that we had cast on one another was
working.” Alan cringes.
“Well you would had if you had stayed in the spell circle with the two
of us instead stomping out of it in your impatience.” Dale barks back at
him.
“Back off Dale, nice and slowly.” Mitch says to Dale in a commanding
voice.
Dale’s hackles go limp and he takes in a deep breath to calm himself
down. He smiles meekly at Alan and silently apologizes to his friend.
Alan’s ears perk up as he picks up on Dale’s scent cues. He reaches over
and gives Dale a back rub to show him that he has no hard feelings
toward his outburst. Mitch smiles at the sight before turning to Alan.
“Alan, can you tell me what was in the Indian bundle that you had
accidentally tossed into the spell circle? It might help us understand
just how the original spell got altered.” Mitch asks him inquisitively.
“Well the bundle of Indian relics that I brought from home during our
last vacation from the campus contained a clay dog’s head to place our
minds into the proper mindset while preserving our memories and true
identities. A piece of leather gang line like the ones used in sled dog
equipment to establish a pack bond between us. An old coyote leg bone to
slip us past the restraints put upon the world by the natural laws of
science. And a tuff of wolf’s hair tied together with some human hair to
insure that we would have a link between our new existence as canines
and our former one as humans.” Alan explains to them in detail. “The
relics together were used by my tribe as part of a skinwalking ritual.”
What he tells them makes Mitch groan and whine. Dale and Alan look at
each other in confusion as to what could possibly make their friend
upset.
“Um, is something wrong, Mitch?” Alan asks him nervously.
“Alan, do you remember when you came down with the flu and missed one of
Professor Dunnel’s lectures?” Mitch asks him calmly.
“You mean the one we had before we all left for vacation? Yeah I do
remember missing out on it because of the flu. You allowed me to copy
your notes afterward.” Alan tells him as he clutches his muzzle and
tries remembering that day.
“ Do you remember what the professor’s lecture was all about?”
His comment gets Alan to think back to the notes that he copied from his
friend.
“I seem to recall that the lecture that I missed was on the apparent
differences between hermetic magic and the natural magic of shamanism.”
Alan tells Mitch.
Upon telling Dale and Mitch about what he remembered from his notes, he
whines and then slaps himself on the head. Dale looks at Alan
questioningly.
“Is there something I am missing here? I never took any of Dunnel‘s
courses.”
“Oh man! Of all the stupid, stupid things for me to forget! I was so
disappointed when that timed Polymorph spell didn’t change us
immediately into real dogs and so impatient to be a real dog, that I
forgot that my bundle of Indian relics wouldn’t mix with the magic of
the spell circle.” Alan says to them in an exasperated whine of
frustration.
“And why wouldn’t that bundle of Indian relics work with the spell
circle?” Dale asks him with an upraised eyebrow.
“The spell circle is hermetic magic while Alan’s spell bundle was
composed of shamanistic magic. Those two forms of magic are completely
incompatible with one another. Professor Dunnel told us in his lecture
that the two forms of magic have been known to create wild,
unpredictable surges in the local mana background counts.” Mitch joins
in and explains to Dale.
Dale catches onto what Mitch is saying about the dangers of mixing
magics and creating wild surges. He opens up his mouth in an “O” of
astonishment before calming down again. Mitch and Alan see him go
contemplative as he tries to recall something from one of his own magic
courses.
“In a wild surge, our original Timed Polymorph spell would have been
altered in many different ways by the introduction of Alan’s spell
bundle.” Dale tells them.
“Indeed it would have been altered. Our spell altered through the
accidental introduction of shamanistic magic could have empowered it
just enough to breach your wards, Alan.” He says to the two of them
before looking at his wristwatch. “And judging by the time on my watch,
it does look like our original spell has been extended to the point
where we don’t even know its’ new duration now.”
Mitch stops briefly to look toward his bedroom window before continuing
on in his explanation.
“And considering that our spell has affected everyone on campus, it
looks like the wild surge enlarged the spell’s range and maximized its’
effects to consider everyone as an active participant.”
Mitch’s explanation gnaws itself into Alan and Dale’s minds. They try
recalling the parameters of the original spell and the effects of a wild
surge. Alan frowns and looks at Mitch.
“Wait a minute, Mitch, if you are saying that our spell was empowered,
extended, enlarged and maximized by the wild surge, then how come the
spell transformed us and the rest of the student body into
anthropomorphic canines?
“Alan’s right, Mitch. If I remember correctly from my notes that even
though wild magic is unpredictable in its’ effects, it should have
followed our intent to make us into real dogs. It shouldn’t have done
what it did with us and the campus. It should have made the entire
campus go to the dogs literally.” Dale tells Mitch.
“Here is another puzzling question that has to be answered. How come we
three appear to be the only ones bothered by our sudden transformation
into anthropomorphic dogs? We all saw that everyone in the quad and in
the dorm building was acting perfectly content being what they are now.
But they shouldn’t be, should they? They should be in the same state
that we are. They should be trying to find out how they got to be this
way. They are all acting as if they have always been anthropomorphic
dogs.” Alan asks both of his friends questioningly.
“And remember how Steve acted when he came into our room after the
botched spell went off? He derided us for trying to become something
that from his point of view doesn’t even exist. He was acting like he
was never a human being to begin with. What was up with what he said?”
Says Dale chipping in.
Dale and Alan’s questions befuddles all of them. Mitch gets up off the
ground and begins walking around the room with his arms crossed and with
one hand scratching the underside of his muzzle in thought. Dale and
Alan follow him around the room with their ears and eyes. They watch him
ponder about what they said to him. After a few moments he plops himself
down on the ground next to Alan.
“Well guys, I can think up at least two possibilities that might clear
things up for us and help us find a solution to our current problem.”
Mitch tells his friends.
“And they are...” Dale asks him.
“Well the first possibility is that our botched spell did what we were
just talking about a few minutes ago. Our timed Polymorph spell went
wild when Alan accidentally tossed in his spell bundle into the spell
circle. It changed us first but not in the way we were expecting it to.
Instead of changing us into real dogs for just an hour. It turned us
into anthropomorphic dogs for apparently an indeterminate length of
time. The botched spell then came into contact with Alan’s wards and got
altered again. It breached the wards surrounding our room and proceed to
transform everyone else on campus into dogs just like us. What makes the
spell different at this point of the wild surge is that not only did
physically transform anyone it touched, it also altered their memories
to the point where they believed they always been this way.” Mitch tells
them.
“But why anthromorphs?” Asks Dale.
“The tied together tuff of wolf hair and human hair in my spell bundle!”
Explains Alan much to their surprise. “Instead of tying our new canine
form to our old human forms. It fused together our canine and human
bodies together and made us into anthromorphs.”
“But what about our room and the campus, Mitch, how did the spell change
it to now reflect our new existence as anthropomorphic canines?” Dale
asks him with a puzzled look to his shaggy face.
“Remember where we are, Dale. We are living in a place where reality as
we know it is more malleable than it is on the outside world. Reality
here can be bent in whatever direction a person or persons perceive it
to be. There are no normal people around here to reinforce the natural
laws of existence and set up a paradox to dampen out our magical
talents. If a person really puts his mind to something here, his magic
can make it happen. Our room and the entire campus didn’t get changed
by the spell. It got changed by the altered memories of our fellow
students and teachers. Their new perception of the world around them
changed reality. As for us, only we remember what reality was like
before the spell mutated a second time. We may remember what our reality
was like, but after hearing and seeing Steve, Mario and Adam, our
subconscious minds must’ve reset our reality to deal with it, thus
changing our room. In other words our perception of what was wasn’t
strong enough to counter their perception of what is. So that is why our
room looks like the way it is. And that is why Steve acted the way he
did.”
Dale and Alan try to digest their friend’s hypothesis. It sounds
farfetched to them but considering what they had seen so far, it sounds
very plausible to them.
Okay, I’ll try buying that excuse for what has happened to us, Mitch.
Even though it sounds hard to believe at all. So what is the second
possibility for our predicament?” Dale asks him.
Mitch smiles from embarrassment.
“Do you guys remember me making that quip about not being in Kansas
anymore?”
Dale and Alan let his question sink into them. They look at each other
and then at him as the nature of his question dawns upon them. Their
eyes widen at what he is implying.
“You have got to be kidding us!” Dale says to Mitch in disbelief.