Two Bodies, One Soul

Job Details:

Job Sign-Up: Page 34, Post Number 831

-Capital Crocus, early afternoon-

Wearing her white Steel Matron t-shirt and khaki cargo shorts with white tennis shoes, Victoria also wore her backpack of supplies, which included her Crown of Persephone. She would need it because she was going into the "bad" part of the city where she had grown up in order to find someone special. That special someone was an elderly mage who claimed to be connected to the Sheridan family and the one who had changed her form from the tall and curvy brunette she was now to the shorter and flat form commonly seen in Sorcerer's Magazine and the form she had when she was part of Black Rose. Victoria was not sure how the person had learned her name, but if what they claimed was true, this was a chance to find out why she had been transformed at an early age and how the magic had worn off that day in Ace Of Spades.

Victoria merged with a crowd passing by Capital Crocus Mall and followed it past that monument to conspicuous consumption. She did not need anything from there today. She was headed for the "bad" part of the city where she had grown up and where she had met Lawrence Sheridan. She would need something special for this trip, something to fortify her for the journey ahead. She would need to go to a convenience store and get some vodka because she was going to go on a journey down memory lane.

Normally the brunette did not drink on the job, but today would be different. She would need a drink or two to get through what she was about to go through. While walking towards the border between the "good" and "bad" parts of town the brunette spotted a convenience store called 9 To 5 that sold alcohol. That was perfect.

-Inside 9 To 5-

Victoria stepped in the store and heard a bell go off. She returned the casual wave by the young male clerk wearing a black Plague Doctor t-shirt with the band's name in red and blue jeans who was manning the counter and made a beeline for the corner where alcohol was kept. She walked across the somewhat clean floor past racks of potato chips and pretzels and browsed the alcohol selection that 9 To 5 offered. There was malt liquor, wine coolers, beer, gin, and some vodka. Her eyes lit up when she saw the vodka.

Victoria looked at the vodka bottles and her excitement turned to disappointment when most of the vodka was CEIL. That was the cheap brand she tried to avoid unless there was no other choice. In this case there might not be any other choice. The brunette looked a little harder and all the way on the right side of the cooler was a bottle of Albino Gander.

Jackpot!

Victoria opened the door and grabbed the bottle of Albino Gander with her right hand, then looked to see if there was any more Albino Gander near the back. She did not see any more of the good vodka, so she turned to leave when she turned back around and grabbed four bottles of CEIL. It might be useful for bartering with the locals or as a last-resort drink should the Albino Gander run out early in the trip.

Victoria walked towards the counter with her purchase and the clerk started to ring it up when a man in all-black clothing and a black ski mask over his face burst through the door waving a snubnose revolver.

"GET DOWN!" He yelled at Victoria, waving his pistol to and fro before pointing it at her head. Victoria blinked. This was the most stereotypical convenience store robbery ever and she was right in the middle of it. Victoria set her alcohol on the counter and got on her knees to lower herself to the ground; she then stopped and put her hands together in front of her while the robber was busy threatening the clerk and trying to get him to open the cash register. She formed them into a gun, then channeled magic until a golden spark formed on the end of her fingers, and aimed at the man in black.

The Taser Spark hit the robber in the left side while his pistol was pointed away from the clerk and he screamed loud enough to communicate with dolphins as he flopped to the floor and trembled from the electrical shock. The clerk looked at Victoria with an expression of shock. He was riding an adrenaline rush and did not quite know what to do now that the threat had been stopped as suddenly as it had started.

"Dude, you just flattened that guy in one shot! You with the Rune Knights or something?" He asked. Victoria turned her left shoulder towards him and rolled up her shirt sleeve to show him the Sabertooth guild mark.

"No, I'm part of Sabertooth." Victoria replied calmly. She then pointed towards the robber who was lying on the floor.

"You might wanna call the police." Victoria suggested to the clerk. He nodded and reached for his back pocket.

"Dude, I got this. Hang on." He said, producing his iLac and calling the authorities while trying to hang onto the iLac. His hands were trembling, but his voice remained steady as he spoke to emergency services. Victoria remained where she was because she had stopped the robbery and her testimony would be needed to make sure the would-be robber got arrested. She also wanted to make sure that the robber did not recover from the Taser Spark and make an escape, then come back and rob the store with his criminal pals when Victoria was not around to stop him.

-Twenty minutes later-

Victoria and the clerk hung around the store in an awkward silence while waiting for the police to arrive to take the robber into custody. Victoria was not happy that the vodka she had intended on purchasing was getting warm, but right now she wanted to make sure that the robber got arrested for his flagrant stupidity. Somewhere Itori was probably smiling because Victoria had used less-than-lethal measures to subdue the man instead of turning him into Swiss Cheese with her Shotgun or Light Machine Gun. While she was still not on board with using the less-than-lethal approach for every problem, the brunette had mentally matured enough to see that Fox Lady had a point about the benefits of less-than-lethal force. The brunette had avoided killing unnecessarily and no one had been hurt... well, no one except the robber.

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-Three hours later, outside 9 To 5-

It took about thirty minutes after the 9 To 5 clerk called the police for them to show up, but thankfully the robber did not try to move again after he had been shocked once. The police picked him up without incident, then found his revolver on the floor underneath the potato chip rack. Next they requested the security camera footage from the clerk, who was all too happy to provide it. Finally both Victoria and the clerk were asked to come to the Capital Crocus Police Station to give their testimony.

After a lengthy interview and testimony from the clerk it was determined that Victoria had acted in self-defense and had not used excessive force. The brunette was free to leave and so was the clerk. The pair returned to 9 To 5, where they found the vodka Victoria was intending to purchase had been left on the counter where she had set it hours ago. While the clerk could not give her replacement vodka for free, he gave her a half-off discount on what she had brought to the counter before the robbery. Even though she had not stopped the robbery with intent to profit from it, Victoria considered the discount to be compensation enough for her trouble and gladly paid for the vodka.

Now she was outside the convenience store with a brown paper bag full of vodka bottles. Victoria put them in her backpack and zipped it closed, then faced the "bad" part of town. She was about to go in to find the mage who had altered her form all those years ago, but before she did she needed to consult the job notice that she had stashed in her right side pocket. Victoria needed to know what address he or she lived at before she went to the wrong part of the wrong part of town and got into trouble with more local toughs than she could handle.

Victoria read the job notice and found no address or other hints to the person's location. She then flipped the notice over and found an address.

1794 Robespierre Street.

That address was in the bad part of town, but not the "bad bad" part where the roughest hoodlums lived. Victoria had a faint idea where Robespierre Street was, but she would need to ask directions from some friendly locals... if she could find any. She would also use her ability to detect magic signatures to help her find the mage because there were not too many mages who lived in the slums. Most of Capital Crocus' mages lived in the upscale part of town.

Victoria pocketed the job notice, then took a breath to prepare for the journey ahead. It was going to be a tough one with a lot of memories from the bad old days. She gently exhaled and headed into the slums of Capital Crocus, a place that the upper crust would rather forget existed.

-In the slums, ten minutes later-

Victoria walked through the bad part of town and looked at the buildings around her. They had seen better days; their exteriors were crumbling and they were all in dire need of repair, repair that was never going to happen because the city council was not going to spend money to repair buildings in the "bad" part of town. Empty bottles of alcohol and empty cigarette packs lined the side alleys and cigarette butts were plentiful in the worn-down gutters that were on both sides of the street. The whole place felt like it was on its last legs and its inhabitants were not much better off than the dilapidated buildings that they squatted in.

Next to a building she spotted an older man in tattered clothing taking a swig from a can of really cheap beer while leaning against the wall of a side alley. Victoria walked a little further and saw another older man in a back alley sleeping on a cardboard mattress and covered with a moth-eaten blanket that barely qualified for the term "blanket." A short distance away was a third man sitting with his back against a side alley wall with six empty beer cans sitting to his right. He looked at her with a drunken expression and Victoria walked by without flinching. If she stopped now she might never get moving again.

Victoria could see people watching her from the buildings. They were wondering who this brown-haired young woman was and what right she had to be here. This was their turf and they were not going stand for rich kids using their neighborhood for adventure tourism before going back to their multi-million Jewel homes to brag to their friends that they walked through the slums and survived. Victoria could feel a mix of curiosity and anger from the inhabitants and she began walking briskly. While she was not the helpless child she was twelve years ago, she would rather not fight the poor people if she could help it.

She had once been one of them and if the wrong things happened at the wrong time she could end up right back on the streets.

Victoria looked at the worn-down and rusting street signs on the corners and passed by Teresa Avenue. On the street corner next to the sign was a man in a camouflage jacket and stained green tank top with blue jeans and worn-out brown shoes swigging from a nearly empty bottle of vodka. She glanced at it and saw that CEIL was the brand. Maybe he could point her to Robespierre Street.

"Hey lady, you look too well-dressed to be runnin' on this side a' town. Whatcha doin' here? Did you run away from home or somethin'? Ya lookin' to escape an abusive boyfriend or husband?" The man asked. Victoria could smell the vodka on his breath. However, he seemed friendly enough.

"I'm looking for someone who lives on Robespierre Street." Victoria answered. The man's eyes lit up in recognition.

"I betcha want that Ernest guy. He's a mage. Used to teach at the university 'fore he got fired durin' the economic downturn or somethin'. Folks 'round here say he can change yer appearance for the right price." The man replied.

"Yeah, that's the guy." Victoria said, trying to sound interested but not too desperate to find him. The man smiled.

"Robespierre Street's about five streets down from here. Just keep goin' straight and then turn right onto tha street once ya see it." He told her. Victoria used her ability to read body language and saw that he was telling the truth.

"Hey, thanks Mister. Here, have this on me." Victoria thanked the guy. She opened up her backpack and dug into it, fishing out a bottle of CEIL. She then zipped her bag and handed it to him.

"It's not very cold, but it's still good. I bought it from the 9 To 5 about ten or so minutes ago." Victoria told him. The man smiled, exposing some missing teeth.

"Hell, I'll take it. Warm vodka's better than no vodka." He said. She nodded and smiled a little. He then looked around before speaking to her in a serious tone of voice.

"You might wanna be careful walkin' around here, lady. The streets get meaner close to Robespierre. They get really mean past Robespierre." He warned her. Victoria blinked. What did he mean by that?

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"What do you mean?" Victoria asked the man.

"Past Robespierre is gang turf. You'd think they'd band together to help the community, but instead they only gang up to take what they want. They don't care what happens to us just as long as they get theirs... they only see us as pinatas to beat up and take the valuables from. It's not like we got all that much to begin with. I mean, look at the place." The man explained why the area past Robespierre Street was dangerous even for a run-down place like this and gestured towards the run-down buildings to make his point. Victoria knew that gangs were a part of life. She had run from several of them when she was younger, shorter, and without magic. What made these guys so dangerous?

"You know how gangs have a territory and tend to stick to it?" He asked her before taking a swig of CEIL from the bottle she had given him. Victoria nodded.

"Well, these guys are growin' by the day. They're after the whole neighborhood and go anywhere they want. They get into clashes with other gangs and usually win 'cause there's so damn many of 'em." He added, implying that the gang's threat came from the sheer number of them. Victoria was used to being outnumbered. She had dealt with that situation when she had fought the Corlones in Rose Garden, slavers in the Phoenix Mountains, zombies in Silent Cemetery and in Fulci, and Zupazu's Executioners in the Haunted Guild and in Silent Cemetery.

"Is there any way to identify them so I can stay away from them?" Victoria asked. The man simply laughed.

"There's no stayin' away from 'em, lady. If they take an interest in you they'll chase you to the ends of the earth. And you'll know 'em when you see 'em. They all wear a yellow headband. Call themselves the Auric Street Crew." He answered, giving the curious brunette a name for the gang. He looked up at the sky. There was still some daylight left, but Victoria had better not hang around here all day if she wanted to get to 1794 Robespierre Street in time to avoid trouble with the local hoodlums.

"Well, I've delayed you long enough. You'd best be goin' towards Ernest's place before it gets dark and the Auric Street Crew come out to play. As soon as it gets dark I'm headin' for my shelter and ain't comin' out 'til morning. Good luck out there and remember... don't go past Robespierre Street!" He cautioned her.

"Thanks." Victoria said before waving goodbye to the friendly street guy and following the road straight ahead. Now that she had been warned about the Auric Street Crew she walked at a brisk pace so that she did not spend too long on the streets. If she lingered another gang might get her before the Auric Street Crew did.

-On Liberty Street-

Victoria walked past the sign for Liberty Street and could not help but to notice the name. There was liberty all right. The area's inhabitants had the liberty to starve, be miserable, steal from one another, and even kill one another as long as they did not bother the rich people by stealing from them or venturing beyond the bad part of town.

Victoria looked around and saw the state of the area. It was slightly more run-down than Teresa Street... one or two of the buildings looked like they would collapse if hit with a strong breeze. Around her were people who obviously took an interest in her because she was not one of them. Looks of curiosity and hostility were cast at the brunette as she walked down the street. Victoria did not return them for fear of attracting the wrong sort of attention, which was all too easy easy to do in these parts.

Her backpack did not help matters. She was sure that some people saw her as a walking pinata just waiting to be broken for the valuables she carried. They did not care whether she lived or died just as long as they got what she had. If anything they would have plenty of reason to make sure that she did not survive the mugging. Victoria tried to put aside the paranoia and look unperturbed by the fact she was walking in an urban jungle.

She had lived on the streets before, but having lived her version of the good life for eight years had made her forget just how harrowing life on the streets could be. Seeing the people staring at her and seeing a few of them start to move towards her quickly refreshed Victoria's memory. She kept moving towards the ironically named Charity Street and prepared to bring out her Light Machine Gun or Shotgun if any of the people got any ideas about robbing her.

-On Charity Street-

Victoria walked down Charity Street and was greeted with more of the same. Worn-out buildings long past the point repairs would do any good and worn-out people who looked like life had dealt them bad hand after bad hand until they ended up here with nowhere else to go. There was no charity to be had here, no helping hand to lift these people up and give them any hope for a better future.

The brunette kept moving down the street at a brisk pace and felt the eyes of the locals burning into her. They obviously did not want her here, but they would not mind having her backpack, Crown of Persephone, or any Jewels she happened to be carrying. Victoria's attitude hardened.

Victoria had been victimized when she was younger. People attacked her for food, water, or just because she was around and they were looking for some fun. Now she had the means and the will to defend herself. If anyone wanted to come after her she would fight back.

A man wearing a beat-up brown leather jacket with blue jeans and black boots walked into Victoria's path and stopped, deliberately barring the way.

"I want your backpack." He said to her.

"You do?" Victoria asked. This looked like it would end in a fistfight or knife fight. If it was really bad it would even end in a gunfight.

"Yeah. Give it to me." He demanded, reaching for the left pocket of his jacket. Victoria read his body language and saw that he was serious. He was willing to fight and kill a complete stranger over her backpack.

"It doesn't have to be like this. Just walk away." Victoria warned him. She was giving him an out that would save both of them a lot of trouble. If he walked away now there would be no violence and no one would get hurt. No one had to get hurt or die over a backpack. However, the choice would be his and his alone.

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The standoff between the street man and Victoria was a tense one. The brunette was not sure how she should deal with the man. Her first impulse was to bring out her Shotgun and just blast the guy so that he did not come back to fight her later, but that would cause more problems than it solved. She was sure that the police would come to investigate gunshots in this part of town even if it took them awhile to dispatch several cars. It would also not look very good if Victoria shot someone who did not pull a gun of their own: the worst-case scenario would be if Victoria shot someone who did not have a weapon at all.

Victoria also did not want to kill any street people if she had to. It would feel like kicking someone when they were down and she had been kicked plenty of times while she was down. Being poor and alone without regular access to food was bad enough without someone actively adding to her misery.

However, she was not going to be anyone's punching bag. She was through with that. If anyone wanted her belongings or her life they would have to fight her for them.

"Give me the backpack. NOW." He said to her, reaching deeper into his left jacket pocket.

"No." Victoria answered despite the risk to herself. She was alone and heavily outnumbered by people who were apathetic towards her at best and enemies at worst, but she was tired of being a punching bag. Just because the man did not have much of anything did not give him a blank check to go around robbing other people.

"What a shame." He said in a mocking tone.

"Then I'll just take it off of your body." He finished and pulled out what was in his left jacket pocket, which was an old and poorly maintained but still deadly snubnose revolver!

Victoria put her hands in front of her and formed them in the shape of a gun, then channeled magic until a golden spark formed on her fingertips. She aimed and fired the Taser Spark just as the man leveled the snubnose revolver at her head. The Taser Spark hit him in the chest and he screamed as he fired harmlessly into the air before flopping onto the ground and twitching.

Victoria knew that the police were likely to investigate the gunshot and she did not know if the gun-wielding man had any friends in the immediate area, so she quickly moved on while under the watchful eyes of Charity Street's residents. Whatever happened to the guy next was up in the air. Maybe his friends would rescue him and take him to a safe place for the Taser Spark to wear off, but if he any enemies he was not going to live very long once they found him. Victoria felt somewhat bad about what she had done, but it was either him or her and it was not going to be her.

-On Hope Street-

Continuing the trend of ironically named streets was the last street before Robespierre Street, Hope Street. Victoria took one look at the place and saw that there was no hope to be had here. The looks on the faces of the inhabitants told her everything she needed to know about the place.

The grimy side alleys had a lot of homeless people living in them since half of the buildings around had obvious structural damage brought on by decay due to a lack of maintenance. It was so bad that only the most desperate people lived in them. Speaking of desperate people, she saw a few people who were in the early stages of starvation and shuddered. Starvation was a terrible thing to endure and something she would not wish on her worst enemies, not even slavers or Francesca Corlone. From what she heard one winter in the run-down apartment she had once called home, starvation was not a quick and painless way to go.

She recalled being stuck in the building and hearing a man beg for food, any food, anything to make the incessant hunger go away. It took him almost two weeks to pass and by the time he died he was begging for someone to kill him. Victoria never saw the man and was glad she did not. That memory was a part of why she had such a jaundiced attitude towards Capital Crocus and its wealthier inhabitants.

That man did not have to starve to death, but the rich would rather waste money on parks and fancy houses than helping people who were down on their luck.

While funding relief agencies and services was a stopgap measure at best, it would have gone a long ways towards saving people who did not have to die from starvation or hypothermia. Instead the rich just had to have the umpteenth park in a city full of them. They just had to have a new mansion even though their current mansion was big enough to house fifty people with no problems. Victoria was sad and disappointed with the city for its attitude, but now was not the time for outrage towards Capital Crocus. She had to get to Ernest's house and get out of here before nightfall.

Victoria risked another look around and saw that the area's inhabitants were clearly unhappy with their circumstances but could not find a way out. Instead they just looked tired and defeated. They looked like they were tired of struggling and just wanted it all to end. They looked at Victoria with empty expressions as she passed by them. She could not feel anger or curiosity, only resignation and suffering that would not end until they took their last breath.

Victoria kept a brisk pace as she hurried through Hope Street in case someone worked up the guts to go after her for her belongings. She quickly reached Robespierre Street and was glad to be off of Hope Street.

-Robespierre Street-

Victoria found the street she was looking for and immediately went right like the man on Teresa Street had instructed. Here the buildings were in slightly better shape; the most obvious faults had been repaired the best they could be. They were not in immediate danger of crumbling, but it was still not advisable to pack them full of people. The inhabitants were also in slightly better shape because they were up and moving. She noticed a lot of empty alcohol bottles and cans littering the gutters, suggesting that the people here self-medicated with alcohol to numb their pain and get through the day.

Victoria began to look at the numbers on the sides of what passed for houses and found 1794 Robespierre Street after a five-minute walk while being watched by the locals. The house was one that was weathered by the elements but still in good shape for the neighborhood. Undeterred, Victoria walked up to the weathered front door with a few fist-sized dents and knocked on it three times, then stepped back. Moments later the door opened.

"Go away, I don't want what you're selling! I can't afford it anyway!" He ordered. His attitude changed when he saw Victoria looking at him quizzically.

"Oh, I'm sorry about that, Miss! Do come in!" He implored her.

"Are you Ernest, the former teacher at the university?" Victoria asked him. He frowned and nodded and the mood briefly turned dark.

"Yes. I was a teacher at Crocus Magicka University until those damn office politicians forced me out." He answered grimly. Then he smiled again. The mood shift hit Victoria like a ton of bricks, but she still had the presence of mind to use her truth-detecting ability to see if he was real or just a liar who had killed Ernest and stole his house. This guy was Ernest the former teacher.

"Please, do come in!" He requested. This time Victoria complied. She entered the house and the door was shut behind her.

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-Inside Ernest's house-

Victoria stood in the foyer of a small but serviceable house that belonged to Ernest. On the wall in front of her were diplomas hanging in glass picture frames that had no dust on them whatsoever. It was obvious that they had been positioned to show his guests that their host was no lazy alcoholic but a university-educated man who used to be a professor at Crocus Magicka University before undisclosed problems caused his fall from grace. It also went to show that poverty was not limited to people the rich considered to be lazy and worthless, which was anyone who had not been born into their exclusive club. It was not something brought about by moral failings but was an unfortunate event that could happen to anyone in any social class or occupation.

Ernest guided her to the right and into a small room that was his living room. The hunter green wallpaper was peeling off the walls, but the floor was as clean as it could be and there was no dust around the baseboards. There was a small bookshelf sitting against the right wall crammed with books, magazines, and actual paper newspapers that were a bit mildewed but still legible. Just to the left of the bookshelf was an old leather recliner that was missing some patches of leather from the back and armrests but was otherwise intact. In the seat sat a book on magic theory, whatever that was.

"So, what brings you here, Miss?" Ernest asked her. Victoria took a closer look at the man and noticed that he wore an old gray turtleneck with black dress pants and black shoes that had been recently polished. He still had a full head of hair that had been recently cut, but it was turning gray. He was a well-dressed man for this area and looked the part of a former academic.

"I'm here because you sent for me." Victoria replied. He looked at her and tilted his head to the left.

"And who might you be?" He asked her.

"I'm Victoria Sheridan. I'm a member of the Legal Guild Sabertooth." She replied, rolling up her left sleeve and showing him the guild tattoo on her left shoulder.

"Oh, yes! I remember you now! I remember that last name too!" He told her. Victoria was clearly surprised to hear that.

"Really?" Victoria asked.

"Yes. I met two Sheridans about twelve years ago. Come into my kitchen and I'll tell you the story over a drink." He invited her. Victoria nodded and the pair went left into a small kitchen with black-and-white checkboard tile flooring.

-Inside the kitchen-

"I met two Sheridans over twelve years ago, back when I was still at the university." He started his story while opening a small, single-door refrigerator with an exterior that had been cleaned but still looked old and yellow from age.

"You did?" She asked him while he rummaged through the refrigerator looking for something. While the storage area just inside the door was blocked by his body, she had seen enough of it that she could barely make out an alcohol label. It belonged to a familiar brand of alcohol, Slatheron vodka.

"Yes. They came to me looking for somewhere to hide their daughter. She was a small, green-eyed girl with chestnut brown hair in a ponytail a lot like yours." He said to her. She heard a soft CLINK as a bottle of something was seized and pulled out of the refrigerator before it was closed with a gentle nudge from his hip. Victoria glanced and saw that he had pulled out not one bottle, but two. One was a bottle of orange juice and the other was a bottle of Slatheron vodka.

"And what did you tell them?" Victoria asked calmly.

"I told them while I couldn't hide their daughter, I could change their appearance so that the daughter could hide in plain sight." Ernest answered. Victoria was growing more interested in this story by the second. She had been analyzing his body language the entire time and everything he had said was the truth.

He paused and walked over to a small round wooden table with two wooden chairs pushed under it and sat the bottles in the center, then walked over to a cabinet just above the sink and opened it. He pulled out a wine glass and shut the cabinet, then walked over to the table. She knew where this was going.

Ernest was going to make a Screwdriver.

The former professor began to open the orange juice and vodka while Victoria watched. He looked at her and smiled.

"Sorry, Miss Sheridan. I forgot my manners. Did you want a drink?" He asked her. Victoria smiled. She unzipped her backpack and brought out the slightly cold bottle of Albino Gander, something the former professor was quick to notice.

"I brought my own. Do you mind if I drink it?" She asked him. He looked at the label of Albino Gander and smiled.

"If you don't mind sharing, I'll make Screwdrivers for the both of us." He offered. Victoria happily handed over the Albino Gander and he quickly closed the bottle of Slatheron, opening the Albino Gander to pour out the vodka for a better Screwdriver.

"Feel free to get a wine glass from the overhead cabinet." He instructed her. Victoria wordlessly obeyed, getting a wine glass and shutting the cabinet, the walking over to Ernest and setting the glass down a short distance to the right of his own. He mixed his Screwdriver, then mixed one for Victoria. His mixing was not very good, but he was doing the best he could with what he had. She gratefully accepted the mixed drink and took a sip shortly after he did, tasting the former professor's version of a Screwdriver.

Vodka and orange juice... how delightful. The mixing could use a little work, but Albino Gander was good enough to mask the shortcomings of inadequate mixing skills.

"You said that the small girl the Sheridans had brought to you looked a lot like me. What appearance did you change her into?" Victoria asked her host.

"It was so long ago, but I kind of remember changing her into a little girl with short, spiky brown hair that had two sprigs that always stood up no matter what I did and a tomboyish look." He replied. Victoria's eyes widened. That was a good description of how she had looked before she woke up one day looking like a model.

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He looked at her again and his eyes narrowed as he studied her in between sips of his Screwdriver.

"Say, you look like that little girl before she was changed. How old are you?" Ernest asked her with suspicion. He probably believed that she was an imposter who was playing him like a kazoo for information. She was used to being labeled an imposter... both Ratatoskr and Serena Anderson believed that she had been killed and replaced by a more attractive young woman who was using Victoria's identity as a cover for something sinister.

"I'm eighteen." She answered. He continued to study her.

"When's your birthday?" He asked her.

"May 14th, from what I remember. My adoptive father Lawrence told me it was." Victoria replied to the best of her knowledge. That was what Lawrence had celebrated as her birthday. She did not know whether May 14th was really her birthday or it was the day her adoptive father had picked to make her birthday to try and give her some semblance of a normal life after being rescued from the streets.

"I'm not sure if you're really her, but what you've told me adds up. Mrs. Sheridan told me that her daughter had been born on May 14th and had just celebrated her sixth birthday when they came here looking to hide her." Ernest made his verdict. His eyes returned to normal as he studied Victoria more out of curiosity than suspicion that she was a fake. He seemed to recognize her on some level.

"Do you think that your spell could wear off?" Victoria asked Ernest. He took a sip of his drink and seemed to consider that possibility for a few moments. He then set the glass down and looked her in the eyes.

"Maybe. I had to cast the spell in a hurry, so it wasn't cast at full power." He answered. Victoria gave him a blank look.

"What I mean is that since I had to rush the transformation spell it wouldn't last forever." He clarified what he had meant. Victoria gave a thumbs-up as she sipped her drink.

"Do you also think that me gaining magic weakened the transformation spell?" She asked him. Victoria was woefully ignorant of magic other than what she used and what her opponents threw at her. He hmmm'd and looked at her.

"Perhaps. I remember the little girl not having magic when I cast the spell on her. None of the Sheridans I met had magic." He answered. She briefly wondered if he had ever met Lawrence but was more interested in learning that her parents were mundane people.

"Transformation magic used on mundane people is quite different from transformation magic used on mages... at least in theory. It's possible that your gaining magic weakened the spell until one day it broke completely when you became too strong for the spell meant for mundane people to conceal any longer. And you are a rather powerful mage." Ernest added. Victoria was interested to hear that. She never knew that there were different types of transformation magic for normal people. She had always assumed that there was a one-size-fits-all transformation magic.

"If you used the spell on me once before, do you think that you can revert it back to how I was? The short, tomboyish girl?" Victoria asked. He frowned.

"No, that spell's been broken and it no longer affects you. But I can cast a spell that can change you back into that form. What's more, I can grant you control over it so that you can shift between forms whenever you want with no strings attached." He offered. Victoria took a deep drink of her Screwdriver.

She liked her taller and curvier form. It made her feel strong and beautiful and look unmistakably feminine. Going back to her old body made her feel like she was trading a tuned-up sports car for a beat-up "soccer mom" van.

However, being able to shift between forms had its benefits. For one, she could prove to Ratatoskr once and for all that her other form was not an imposter but just a different Victoria. She could also prove to Florence that the girl she had been hanging around with really was Victoria. Despite those benefits a few questions remained.

Did she really want to go through with this?

Was trading her new body worth it for access to her old body?

Could she really control the transformation or was he just saying that in order to get her to be a guinea pig for a magical experiment?

"So, do you want me to do it?" Ernest asked her. Victoria took another deep sip of her Screwdriver. Having a smaller form to go into at will could help her avoid trouble with a temporary disguise or by letting her crawl into small spaces to avoid detection.

"Yes, please." She answered. Ernest smiled.

"Just give me a few hours to get sober and I'll be glad to do it." He said to her. Victoria did not argue. Him casting a transformation spell while drunk could be disastrous. He could either turn her into a guy, turn her into something that would make Picasso nauseous and H.P. Lovecraft cry, or turn her into something else entirely. This was one case where she could wait for something to happen.

"Sure thing." Victoria readily agreed to wait while finishing her Screwdriver. She had barely made the agreement when she had already begun to have second thoughts. She felt like she had made the wrong choice in taking him up on the offer, but she had committed and was going to follow through. Besides, she could use her previous form to her advantage in order to crawl into small places or to make her hair next to impossible to grab in combat.

Victoria finished her Screwdriver and politely refused the offer of having another one mixed up. She wanted to go into this sober and with full knowledge of what was about to happen. She rinsed out the glass and filled it with tap water. She sipped from it and the tap water tasted atrocious, so she poured the rest out and settled for plain old orange juice instead.

[Post Word Count: 1,042]
[Total Word Count: 6,986/7,000]

-Ernest's living room, eight hours later-

Victoria stood in the former professor's living room in the middle of a ritual circle the professor had made using a combination of rare herbs and ingredients that he had saved from his days at Crocus Magicka University. The ingredients that had went into forming the circle were aged, a property the professor claimed would strengthen the control she had over her transformation so that she was not locked into either form. The professor stood in front of her with his hands raised.

"Once I cast this spell it's for good. It's weak enough that you'll be able to change between forms at will at any time you want, but I can't undo it once it's cast. Only time can wear it down and that might take decades, if not centuries. Do you want to do this?" Ernest asked her in a serious tone. Once he did this there was no going back.

"I want to do this." Victoria affirmed. She had made up her mind long ago. She would go through with this and get in touch with both sides of herself so that she did not have to derive confidence from a curvy body and long, silky hair.

"Very well then, Miss Sheridan. I will begin at once." He said. He immediately closed his eyes and began chanting as his hands glowed all seven colors of the rainbow in sequence. They cycled through red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet slowly at first, but as he continued to chant they cycled through the colors faster with each time the sequence began. Victoria noticed the circle glow all the colors of the rainbow and saw the professor be obscured by a beam of rainbow-colored light. She then began to float in the air and was surrounded by a cocoon of light that closed around her.

Victoria felt herself beginning to shrink slowly but surely. Her hair began to shorten again and her chest began to shrink. The chanting grew faster and the colors of the rainbow cycled faster and faster until they became a rainbow-colored blur. The professor chanted so fast she could not understand what he was saying and the colors of the rainbow cycled beyond her ability to pick out individual colors.

"METAMORPHOSIS, I BIND YOU TO HER! GRANT HER YOUR POWER! HENCEFORTH MAKE HER FORM BE OF HER CHOOSING!" Ernest called out. The light overwhelmed Victoria and she closed her eyes. When the light finally subsided she felt her feet back on the ground and noticed that her viewpoint had changed. She was shorter again. She looked down at her chest and was disappointed to see that it was flat again.

The professor looked upon his handiwork and his jaw dropped.

"Oh my." Was all that he said. Victoria did not like the sound of that. Did she look like something that H.P. Lovecraft would weep at?

"What? What happened?" The Sabertooth mage asked him. Her excitement and anxiety were growing by the second.

"It worked. IT WORKED!" He exclaimed. Victoria saw that her Steel Matron shirt still fit and so did her shorts. She was glad that she had paid that lady in Ace Of Spades to make her clothes and armor magically resize themselves.

"It did?" She asked him. He nodded.

"Yes indeed. Hang on, let me go get a mirror from my bathroom so that you can see!" He exclaimed. Victoria stayed still as he hurried to the foyer and past it. She heard footsteps on wood as he hurried back to her and saw him enter the room with a small hand mirror.

"Here, look and see!" He urged her. She took the offered mirror and raised it to her face.

Victoria looked the same as she had when she started her mage career with Black Rose!

"Nice." Victoria said laconically. Imai was sure to be happy with this development.

"That's not all. I gave you control over your transformation. To change forms, just think of the form you want to be and snap your fingers." Ernest told her. Victoria visualized her taller self and snapped her fingers. Just a moment later her long hair and curvy body were back.

"Niiiiiiice." She said with genuine satisfaction. If she did not want to be flat any more she could just change back to "Tall Victoria" in a matter of seconds. If being "Normal Victoria" was more advantageous she could do that too.

"Now try it again." He urged her. Victoria thought of her "normal" form and snapped her fingers. She looked in the mirror and was short and boyish again. Victoria was liking this.

Victoria imagined her tall form one more time and snapped her fingers again. A moment later she was tall. Victoria gave a wide grin.

"Thanks, Ernest. I was told that you had a fee for your services. How much do I owe you?" She asked. He smiled.

"Well, you already gave me part of it when you shared your Albino Gander." He told her.

"Keep it. Keep the whole bottle." She told him without hesitation. She then took off her backpack and brought out the three bottles of CEIL she had in reserve.

"You want some CEIL too?" She asked. Ernest nodded.

"I've got a pal who can't get enough-" He answered halfway before she shoved the bottles at him.

"Take them. I can't thank you enough." Victoria told him. He took the bottles and put them into his refrigerator. Victoria was elated to finally have the ability to change between forms whenever she wanted without consequences.

"Now then, what will you do from here, Miss Sheridan?" He asked her.

"I'm going to go back to my guild hall and prove to people I really am who I say I am." Victoria told him. Ratatoskr came to mind. So did Florence Manderley and Serena Anderson.

"I see. Well, good luck. And be careful with your new ability. If your parents were so worried about their enemies that they had me change you, those enemies might still be out there." Ernest warned her.

"I'll be careful. And thanks again. Thanks for everything." Victoria thanked the man. He waved goodbye and she walked towards the front door. She only had an hour or two to get out of the neighborhood before the gangs came out to play, but she was no stranger to cutting things close. Now that she knew where exactly to go she would make it out of here in time to reach the guild hall before the next morning.

She could not wait to show Ratatoskr that her claim to being Victoria Sheridan was true.

[Post Word Count: 1,114]
[Total Word Count: 8,100/7,000]