Gunpoint

“Leah,” Jake said to the woman under his arm, “I need to go.”

“Yes. So do I,” She said, stretching. “We’ll be gathering to discuss the results shortly.”

His eyes were drawn to her breasts as she did. They strained against her shirt, and Jake couldn’t help but marvel. It wasn’t even a tight shirt, they were just that large on her frame.

She caught his eyes, but said nothing. Jake looked away, embarrassed, but as soon as he did, a gentle hand cupped his cheek, and Leah turned his face toward hers.

“You don’t have to be ashamed of looking, love,” She said. “And…thank you for letting me feel normal for a little while.”

She kissed the corner of his mouth, then withdrew. Jake struggled for something - anything - to say, feeling like a 13 year old boy again.

“I…uh…you’re welcome.”

She stood, tossing her hair over her shoulder.

“I need to go get dolled up for the cameras,” She said. “Give Megan my regards.”

“I’ll do that,” He said, standing along with her.

Awkwardly (everything he did right now felt awkward), he opened his arms for a hug. She took it in stride, though, and returned it. He kept hold of her shoulders when he pulled back, though.

“Leah…”

She stared at him quizzically, but made no move to separate.

“Yes? Spit it out, boy.” She said with a smile.

Jake let out a breath.

“This doesn’t…change anything,” He said. “I’m still not…I don’t want to cheat on Em.”

He shook his head at the weakness of his own statement.

“I won’t cheat on Em.”

Leah smiled.

“Of course not,” She said, moving his hands from her shoulders to her hips. “But if you decide that this arrangement could be mutually beneficial to everyone, well…I trust you can keep an open mind.”

He released his grip as though she’d burst into flames.

“Was this whole fucking thing about softening me up to this harem shit?” He asked, “I thought you just wanted to feel normal.”

“The whole thing was about enjoying ourselves for a while,” Leah said. She was obnoxiously calm, as usual. “That is a thing you’re allowed to do, after all.”

She took a step back.

“But if that doesn’t appeal to you, allow me to speak to your more selfless nature,” She said. “What happens to the others if you’re exclusive with Emily? If progressing their relationship with you is how they avoid the really unpleasant transformations, are not dooming every contestant but her to that if you don’t open your mind to this?”

Jake frowned. She had a point, even if it was one he didn’t want to acknowledge.

“Just a little food for thought, love,” Leah said as the elevator opened. “Come on. Let’s get going.”

He crossed his arms.

“I’ll get the next one,” He said, coolly.

Leah only shrugged.

“Suit yourself,” She said, climbing into the elevator as it opened. “But I really did have a lovely time.”

She gave him a smile just before the doors closed; not her usual sly, insolent ones, but something warm and seemingly heartfelt. Jake let out a sigh and sat down with a beer. He had a lot to think over, and Leah was the least of it.

What was he going to say to Megan after the disaster she’d caused back in the library? Hell, what was he going to say to any of them once he was turned loose at the end of their contest? To Emily, whose feelings he was trying to look out for; to Ryan, who’d undergone such a radical change of perspective? What Leah had said ate at him, too. But did he agree? Or was that just a convenient excuse to infidelity?

As he pondered those questions, the elevator football rang.

God, Leah. What do you want now? Jake thought as he moved to answer it.

But it was Rachel’s face that peered back at him from the little video screen.

“Rachel?” Jake asked, knowing she could see him right back. “What are you doing here?”

“I want to talk to you. Can I come up?” She asked.

Rachel had long been a thorn in his side. She was by no means the only naysayer of his relationship with Emily, but she was easily the most vocal. At the same time, she was Emily's best friend. A0ll of this would go a lot more smoothly if he worked on their relationship a little.

“Alright. I’ll send down the elevator.”

A moment later and it was opening on his suite, Rachel inside. Even having watched her transform, it took a moment for Jake to wrap his head around the idea that it was her. The fit Asian beauty had been replaced with one who was all curves. Toned thighs with defined glutes had become thick and rounded, her small chest had grown breasts that looked huge on her small frame, and her butt, once large through definition, was now a jiggly bubble butt. Her clothes had obviously resized themselves for her curvy new body, but they were styled for a more athletic one.

He felt bad for, but he couldn’t deny the new look’s appeal.

“Hell of a view you’ve got,” She said, looking back toward the elevator. “Did you see the place they gave me and AJ?”

Jake nodded.

“The island suite, right?” He said. “You can see it from my balcony. Can’t miss it, actually.”

She raised an eyebrow.

“You have a balcony?”

“Yeah, you wanna check it out?”

“Sure," she said, heading that way. “Would you mind grabbing something to drink for me?”

“Yeah…no problem. I can get a beer or I can mix something.”

She gave him a suspicious look.

“A beer’s fine. I want to keep my eye on it.”

Jake rolled his eyes as he pulled two bottles from the fridge.

“Listen, Rachel, I know you don’t like me. But for Christ's sake...you can't think I’m the type of guy who would spike someone’s drink.”

“I wouldn’t have thought so,” She said from the balcony, “But that was before this whole thing started.”

Then she paused, adding.

“I saw Leah on the way in. You two have fun while we were gone?”

Jake saw red for a moment, but quickly got himself under control. The accusation was dirty, but then again, it hadn’t been a totally innocent visit, either.

“She came over to watch the results of the contest,” He said, motioning to the TV. On it, Hannah was still wandering Balboa Park.

“Huh…you can watch us, huh? That’s creepy.” Rachel noted, observing it.

She took a seat on a balcony deck chair and Jake brought her the bottle he’d picked for her. Unopened, lest she maintain her shrewish suspicion. He sat down on the chair beside hers. There was something odd about the way she was sitting; like she was protecting her side or something.

Jake tried to ignore it.

“So what did you come up here for, exactly? To trade barbs with me?” He asked, looking out over the island. “Gonna be honest with you, Rachel, I’ve got enough problems with this whole thing that I don't want to be fighting with you all the way through it.”

She nodded.

“Well, we’re gonna find out about that, won’t we?”

He saw her move, and as he turned to face her, found the little silvery gun pointed at him. He opened his mouth to protest, but his world had already gone pink.

*****

Leah should have been pleased.

Her visit with Jake had been an unequivocal victory. She’d softened his position on her, planted some ideas in his head, and even gotten some much needed relaxation in the process. They were building a rapport; one that hadn’t existed even a day ago when he’d proclaimed his hatred of her.

Most importantly, she knew now that he could be had; that sooner or later, in spite of whatever promises he’d made to either himself or Emily, he would crack and let the other constants in. Maybe not all at once, which was not itself a bad thing. But he could be tempted, would be tempted, and eventually, that temptation would get the better of him.

And she would have been pleased if not for Rachel, who’d been waiting at the base of the elevator when she'd stepped out of it.

Rotten bloody luck, She cursed internally.

It wouldn’t just create rumors about her and Jake for the rest of the contestants. That would be bad enough. But they hadn’t watched her fire her weapon yet, either. If she transformed the master, every single person here was in dire jeopardy, and only belatedly had it even occurred to her that she'd only barred the gun's use on the other contestants.

So she moved quickly. Not to intervene. Once Rachel was in the hotel suite with him, there was nothing she could do. They hadn’t even given her access to his elevator so she could head up herself. But she wanted to see what was happening, and pray she could get an intervention out of the producers if things went south.

Her tunnel vision on her suite was so intent that she didn’t even notice anyone in the courtyard until a hand reached out from behind a deck chair to grab a drink; a slender, feminine, tattooed hand. Leah let out a small shriek of surprise before she understood what she was looking at.

“You alright there?” AJ asked, peering around the back of the chair.

Leah blinked, and slowly brought her hand down from her chest.

“Yes. Sorry,” She said. “You just startled me. That’s all.”

“Ah. Well, sorry about that,” AJ said, leaning back and out of sight again.

Leah walked around to the other side to observe her. AJ’s tattoos were back, and plainly visible in the two piece bathing suit she wore. A sleeve of them decorated each arm, and her navel was ringed by a black ink sunburst. Her left leg was clear, but her upper right thigh bore an ivy ring with a long branch that snaked around her leg to the rose and thorn “bracelets” inked on each of her ankles. Curiously, he had kept her long hair from the makeover, and added some golden blonde streaks to it.

Even in a hurry as she was, Leah couldn’t help but admire the look.

“So, you undid the makeover,” She said. “I’d hoped at least one of you would think to use the gun on themselves. Hopefully the audience isn’t too hard on you for it.”

"Eh. Fuck em if they are," AJ said.

“I faced it all, and I stood tall, and did it my way." She added, raising her glass in mock toast. "Is that a note of approval I here, there?”

“Definitely. You’ve brought back some visual variety we needed, at least," Leah said. "As much as you hate me, AJ, I rather admire you. You’ve got a fire in you that I find fascinating.”

AJ considered that, then took a slice of pizza from a small, triangular cardboard container that read Louie and Earnie’s. That must have been where she’d beamed herself to.

“You want some?” AJ asked with her mouthful. “Best damn slice in the city.”

“I’d love to, but I just ate. And in any case, I really need to get going. We’re almost done, you know.”

AJ shrugged.

“Suit yourself.”

Leah turned and resumed her headlong rush back up to her suite, when AJ spoke up behind her again.

“Hey, Leah?”

Leah stopped, sighed, and began to turn around when she heard a chirping sound. Suddenly, her world was consumed in pink. It faded quickly, and Leah balled her fists.

“Motherfucker!” She yelled.

She’d been so fucking, fucking dumb; so fixated on what might be happening to Jake that she hadn’t even stopped to consider that AJ might, and for that matter probably would, pull something like this.

Still, nothing seemed to change. Not that she’d have known, necessarily, if anything had.

“What. Did you. Just do?” She asked, icily.

AJ was standing now, the gun in her hand. Leah noted that all three of its ammo dots were dull now. That was some mercy, at least; she couldn’t shoot her twice.

“Nothing. At least not directly,” AJ said. “Truth be told, Leah, I don’t really hate you either. And if I got rid of you or stopped you from hosting, we’d probably just get someone even worse.”

“You have no idea,” Leah said, “You could have been stuck with Yuki.”

She crossed her arms.

“But you didn’t answer my question. What did you do just now?”

“Just gave you a little lesson in how the other half lives,” AJ said. “From now on, you’re the host and a contestant. You’re gonna play in the challenges with us, you gotta to impress Jake with us, you're gonna have to face the audience just like us.”

Leah nodded. Though she didn’t let it show, she was actually rather excited. She had designed their challenges. She didn’t just know the rewards for crossing boundaries with Jake, but how they were weighed out for each contestant. AJ had **** her to the table, but she was already the dealer. She…

She frowned. And AJ grinned when she saw it.

“Just figuring it out, eh?” She said. “If you had any kind of information or advantage over us, I wiped it. You can still do all the shit you need to make the game run smoothly, but you can’t have power over us and you don't know any of the shit you could stack the deck with.”

“Fuck me…” Leah whispered. “I can’t remember a bloody thing...”

She brought her hand to her temples and rubbed them furiously. How had she not seen this coming?

“First Jake, now me,” She said. “What a mess…”

AJ’s grin broadened.

“Oh I wouldn’t worry about Jake,” She said. “I talked Rach out of doing anything too stupid.”

Leah snatched her wrist.

“Tell me! What’s going on up there?” She asked. “If anything compromises his ability to play Master, we’re all in more trouble than you could possibly realize.”

AJ’s smile faltered.

“Well…I can tell you what she told me she was going to do…”

*****

Jake could feel Rachel making changes, but not exactly what she was doing to him. When the light faded, he looked and felt at himself frantically for changes. Fortunately, none seem to have been made.

“What the fuck was that f-” He began to shout.

But he stopped dead as he did it. She was turning the gun on herself now, and taking on a similar pink glow.

Once it faded, she placed it on the little table between their deck chairs. Jake’s initial instinct was to grab the thing and check it off the balcony and into the jungle. But he couldn’t bring himself to do so much as reach for it no matter how hard he tried.

“I put a mental block on you grabbing or using the gun,” Rachel explained. “There’s one on me too.”

She sat up and faced him over the side of her chair. Jake did the same. Their knees were almost touching as they sat together. He tried to get up to walk away, but he couldn’t do that either.

“You wanna tell me what the hell you just did?” Jake asked angrily.

“You asked me what I came up here for,” She said. “I did it to get some answers. On top of being unable to touch the gun, you can’t lie to me either. And I can’t lie to you. So we’re going to have an honest conversation about what’s going on here, and what you’re about.”

“You’re using your challenge entry just to interrogate me?” Jake asked.

“No,” She said. “I’m using it to play a little game.”

She motioned to the gun.

“If you answer five of my questions to my satisfaction, the gun is yours and you can use it to do anything you want to me,” She said. “If your answers piss me off, or I find out you’re the bad guy I’m starting to think you might be, I get to do the same to you.”

Jake considered that.

“And do I get to ask you anything?”

She thought it over, then nodded.

“Yeah, sure. Five questions. Just like me.”

“Okay,” He agreed. “Let’s get to it then. You start.”

Her dark eyes bore into his.

“Do you have anything to do with us being here? Our ****, selecting us, singing up for this. Any of it.”

Jake shook his head.

“No. I was blind sided just like you guys. I was **** just like you guys and I’m here against my will like you guys. I never asked for any of this.”

Rachel’s gaze grew uncertain. Clearly it wasn’t the answer she’d expected.

“Okay…your turn.”

She’d laid her cards on the table. Now it was Jake’s turn.

“Why do you hate me so much?” He asked. “I’ve never done anything to Emily but date her, care about her, help her with her art and money whenever she lets me, which isn’t even that often. Why the chip on your shoulder?”

To her credit, Rachel kept her head up.

“I think she’s just a rebound fling to you. I can’t even tell if you know it or not, and in a way, that part doesn’t matter. You’re way older than her, and I think you just wanted something fun and exciting after your engagement.”

Now she cast her eyes toward the floor.

“Also, I’m jealous of you. And scared,” She admitted.

The first of those wasn’t much of a surprise. The second, though...

“Scared? What do you mean?” He asked.

Rachel shook her head.

“My turn. Not yours,” She objected, studying him. “Do you love her?”

Jake had been afraid of that one. He let out a long sigh.

“No. I don’t,” He said. “And that’s nothing against her. It’s just not a sentiment I throw around lightly. If I say it, I want to mean it, and I’m not quite there with her yet.”

“Well, that makes one of you,” Rachel said. “You know she’s crazy about you, right?”

Jake nodded.

“Yeah. And it’s tough, because I do care about her. But there’s an imbalance, and that’s weird.”

He hated what was coming out of his mouth. It was hurtful stuff. But in a way, it was a relief to finally cut loose and say what had been on his mind. He’d been so dug into defending the relationship to his friends that he’d have never admitted it to them. And besides them and Emily, who else did he even have to talk to?

“My turn, though. What do you mean you’re scared of me? Or jealous, for that matter.”

She looked miserable.

“It’s not what you think. I’m not…gay for my best friend, or whatever,” She said. “In a way this whole thing would be easier than if I was.”

She grew quiet, and Jake couldn’t tell if she was fighting the urge to tell him or simply grasping for the words.

“I’m not…anything for Emily. Not sexually or romantically or whatever,” She said. “The problem is that I’m not any of those things for anyone else either, and I never have been no matter how bad I wanted to be. Her relationships scare me because someday, someone’s going to take her away and I won’t be left with anyone.”

Rachel was examining her leggings, which she’d balled in her fists. Her hair obscured her face, but he could tell her voice was catching. He placed a hand over hers.

“It’s okay…” He said. “If I’d known that, I’d have tried to be more understanding. I’d have invited you along to stuff.”

Rachel shook her head violently. In spite of the gravity of the moment, he couldn’t help but notice the effect it was having on her expanded breasts.

“I don’t even think I knew that,” She said. “Not in a way I could word out like that.”

She sniffed and withdrew her hand from hers. She wiped at her eyes before facing him again.

“What was Leah doing here? Are you working with her now?”

“No. She just came to watch the results. I think. That and to feel me out take a stab at seducing me, but I didn’t let that get very far,” He said, then added. “Although it went farther than I should have let it. We…snuggled on the couch while we watched. Teens at a horror movie type stuff.”

He studied her as he explained it, unable to stop himself from blurting out something he probably shouldn't have admitted to.

“Is that gonna cost me an ugly transformation? What are you going to do to me if I don’t pass the test?”

“I didn’t really know. Probably make you a woman in one capacity for another,” Rachel said. “But no…couch cuddles aren’t going to do that. I’m still trying to wrap my head around the idea that you’re innocent in all this.”

Jake breathed a sigh of relief at that. It was the biggest skeleton in a mostly empty closet. That hurdle cleared, he didn’t think anything he could admit to would get her to turn the gun on him.

“That one was my third,” He said. “Hit me. What else have you got?”

“I don’t know…I was expecting worse answers,” She said, blowing a bang out of her face. “You really aren’t a jerk, are you?”

“We’ll call that a freebie,” Jake said, then made a wobbling gesture with his hand. “I don’t know, Rachel. I do my best, but my best has its soft points just like anyone else's.”

She nodded, absorbing that.

“Well, if that’s a freebie…is there part of you that’s excited about all this? Having all of us as a harem, or whatever?” She said, “I mean, we’re all here because you think we’re hot, right?”

Jake ran his hands through his hair with a sigh.

“I don’t know. It’s horrifying what they’re doing to you guys. I don’t want this for any of you, and I don’t want to be at the center of it,” He said. “But I’d be lying if I said that having my cake and eating it too wasn’t appealing. Some of you are absolutely gorgeous, and I am a guy who appreciates that. I just wish it weren’t so...awful.”

“I guess that’s good enough,” She said. “As long as you’re not cheering it on.”

“Absolutely not!” Jake said immediately, “I’m not the settling down type, but I’m not mean, either.”

“Okay…your turn,” Rachel said. “I suppose I should let you have a double, too.”

Jake shook his head.

“That’s alright, I don’t need one,” He said. “Is there anything I should know about Emily or the other girls? You guys have had a chance to settle in together. I haven’t.”

Rachel bit her lip.

“Well…I wasn’t supposed to tell anyone,” She said. “But you know how Emily was made all submissive and stuff? And how they made Hannah super into the changes we’re all going through? Well, they’re roommates now, and when Em and I were drunk, she told me about how Hannah started ordering her around and got off on telling her what to do.”

Rachel blushed.

“It made Emily so horny she had to get herself off in the bathroom, but she was really embarrassed by the whole thing.”

“Goddamn her,” Jake spat. “We’re going to have some fucking words about that. She doesn’t get to take her frustrations with me out on Emily.”

Rachel watched this outburst curiously.

“Okay. Last question, then,” She said. “Are you going to take care of us when this is over?”

“Yeah. No question,” He said. “I don’t know how I’m going to pay for it all, but I’ll do whatever I can to look at for all of you. It’s…kind of the least I can do.”

Rachel nodded.

“Your turn, then. Last question.”

There was only one thing he could think to ask.

“Are we cool, you and me?”

She nodded.

“I was wrong about you. And not just about the game and stuff,” She said. “I was so sure you were a jerk, and I think it’s because I just wanted to believe it. But you deserve a chance, and I promise I’ll stop being such a bitch.”

She extended her hand.

“Friends?”

Jake shook with her.

“Yeah. At least we can start trying.”

Rachel stood and stretched.

“Good enough for me,” She said.

She grabbed the gun and held it out for him, butt first.

“Consider this my formal apology,” She said. “I figured if you were a bad guy after all, I’d get to punish you. But if you weren’t, the only thing I could do to even give me a chance in the contest was to give myself up to the person here I liked the least.”

She nudged it toward him.

“Go on. Do whatever you want to me.”

Jake reached out tentatively and grasped the pistol. As soon as his hands closed around it, he felt the same slowdown of time and complete control over his target that all of the other users had. He pulled the trigger, and watched Rachel transform.

Rachel’s “softness” rapidly began to evaporate, her muscles and overall fitness reasserting itself. She regained the lean, panther-esque musculature he’d found so alluring in her in the first place, her core fit and firm. But she kept her expanded breasts, and just a hint of the junk that was added to her trunk, even if it was now reinforced by toned muscle.

As the changes completed, she looked down in astonishment.

“You gave it all back.” She marveled.

“Of course. I could see how much it hurt when they took it from you,” He said, adding almost shyly, “Besides, I always thought you were hot the way you were.”

Standing on her toes, Rachel pulled him into a hug. There were tears running down her face, now.

“Thank you so much,” She said. “You have no idea what this means to me.”

“Sure I do,” He said. “Everyone needs an identity, right?”

She nodded as she withdrew, furiously wiping her eyes.

“Fuck…I thought I’d be all..y’know, soft forever,” She said.

She looked down at herself and squeezed her new breast together.

“I see you kept something, though.”

“Well,” He said, “I didn’t want to completely piss off the audience.”

“I appreciate that.” She said, “Listen…I know this wasn’t exactly conventional, but…I’m glad we could work this out.”

“Likewise,” He agreed.

Something was bothering him, though.

“Hey. Why didn’t you ask me if I was going to cheat on her? Emily, I mean.”

Rachel stiffened slightly.

“Well…you said you weren’t going to,” She said. “I guess I took you at your word.”

That was a lie, and he could see through it right away. Why would she lie about that? Before he could press her on it, though, a familiar voice spoke over the television.

“Okay. Here we go…” It said. "By popular request, here are my changes."

The two exchanged a glance, then went back into the living room, where Emily was shooting herself on his TV screen.