Jim was in his room over the garage with the window open, and next door -like 8-10 feet away the neighbor was out working on his car with his gawd-awful boom box blasting. Glancing up from the Chronivac, Jim saw the neighbor out the window: he was balding, and had a beer belly, but otherwise was hairy and muscled. He looked a lot older than he was. Looking back at the keyboard, Jim had an idea.
"First, I will do something about that noisy neighbor," Jim said aiming the Chronivac scanner dish to the open window.
It took a few seconds, and then pinged.
"New Subject Scanned."
Jim read:
"Subject 1B:
Gender: Male
ID Name: Clarence Jacob Smith"
"Clarence, really? I thought his name was Jake," Jim said with a smile. He continued to read:
"Age: 32
Height: 5'9"
Weight: 195
IQ: 128"
Jim commented, "He's smarter than I thought."
The hair color was Black, subnote: Male Pattern baldness 25%, body hair was rated 8 for denseness, eyes Brown, pigmentation was 8 on whatever scale the Chronivac used- had to be higher than ten since the guy was clearly white (unless black was 1). Jim thought, "Only one way to find out." Under new parameters, he typed:
Gender: Male
Age: 23
Height: 6'1"
Weight:175
IQ:90
Hair: Blonde
Male Pattern Baldness: 0%
Body Hair: 0 denseness
Skin Pigmentation: 1
Sexual Orientation: Gay Submissive
Personality Options:
Likes Adult Alternative Music
Secret Crush on neighbor Jim Baker
Hobbies: Baking
Clothing Choices:...
Jim paused and looked out the window at the blue jean clad man in the dirty t-shirt and leather biker vest. He typed:
Metrosexual, Speedos.
There were other options, but he couldn't wait. He hit enter.
The computer hummed. The Heavy Metal music blared on. Then the room got blurry for a second.
Black Sabbath was replaced by the lighter lyrics of Mumford and Son, and the sound dropped at least 20 decibels.
"Hm?"
The neighbor's car was gone. In its place was a Scion XC.
The neighbor's garage door was up, and the music was playing, but the neighbor wasn't visible. Jim got up and stuck his head out the window craning to see his new creation. It had to have worked, just look at the car. And the lawn.
Jim remarked, "Damn, pops is going to expect me to clean up our yard to look as good as his is now. The manual did warn of unexpected consequences. Still if I turn myself into a muscle stud, the work will be easy." He pulled himself back into his room. He thought, "I better check on Clarence, and see if there are any other side-effects before I tweak myself."