(>45) The mannequin.

"They'd stare right at you and won't notice. That'd be cool."

Jen had no time to consider the details, so this choice was as good as any other. Except the voice made it sound more badass. She never stopped to ask herself why that mannequin had no feet, why it would be big enough to fit a person inside and, finally, why it was stored in this particular room. All it was for her was a momentary hiding spot.

She separated the large seams easily and stepped in. First she closed the legs, then lower and upper body. The plastic was even more smooth and slippery on the inside. Then the head. The arms with four out of five fingers glued together had to go last. Thankfully, it connected quick and easy, and all Jen had to do was lean on the wall and watch through the blurry plastic lenses.

The door opened seconds afterwards. Three people came through. From what she could see through the lenses, they were all wearing maid dresses. One of them had short brown hair, the other had long blonde, while the third apparently wore a black helmet.

"You sure you heard something, Tiff?" — the brown-hair asked.

"Aisha, I swear. Somebody just closed this door." — the blonde responded. — "Unless she went out and sidewards, like, real quick and we missed it."

"Alright, let's look around, but... be careful, please. You know where we are."

It was getting rather hot and stuffy inside the mannequin, so Jen was hoping that the girls won't hear her barely audible breathing and just head out, minding their business. Their talking, however, planted a thought inside Jen's mind.

"MALFUNCTIONING PRODUCTS"

That was where they were. She knew 'perfectly working' products were designed to lock and **** the wearer. According to the maids' reaction, the question 'what's a malfunctioning product then?' had an unpleasant answer.

"Check the box." — Tiff said.

"Dolly did. Clear."

"Maybe under this dress? It takes a lot of space around here."

Jen thought she was either overheating or the smooth plastic was beginning to get hotter than she was. Her disguise was working, but the feelings it gave her were becoming more and more alarming. The plastic head around her own one was getting tighter, and so were the sleeves. The body and legs did not feel much as they had steel swimsuit and boots between the skin and the material that was getting closer and closer to boiling.

The decisive moment came when the blonde stared right into her eyes. Apparently, they were completely non-transparent from outside, and Jen was relieved to see her glance off to her body features and then away from this part of the room.

"Nothing. I think she really got away." — Tiff said.

"Good for her. Nobody messes with malfunctions."

As the maids left the room one by one, Jen was getting overwhelmed by the sensations. As soon as the door closed, she tried to rip her disguise off, but her soft plastic limbs had gone extremely rigid for some reason, denying her to perform such sophisticated action. The girl raised her hand to her eyes to see what was wrong and, to her horror, found it much smaller, perfectly fitted around her actual one and completely seamless.

"Is it merging with me?! Oh no, oh no, oh ffffuck!"

"Don't worry all that much. They'll probably dress you in plenty of their pretty things."

Defeating the very purpose of her disguise, Jen screamed at the top of her voice — or, rather, tried to, because mannequins do not make sounds. Nobody came back for her. Meanwhile, the malfunctioning mannequin was only gaining ground. The lenses replaced Jen's own retina, and her boots dissolved to finish off the perfect statue that was once a living girl. No one was ever going to know if she was still there deep inside or gone completely as she was deprived of the last of her ability to move or give any sign to the outside world, trapped for the next eternity inside a faulty product.

ENDING #47