Action and Hestitation

Thomas Ratsinger, the dean of Sociology for Colombia University, sat behind his desk playing solitaire. Apart from some administrative duties, which were sparse enough in a department that ran this smoothly, and the handful of classes he taught, he didn’t have much else to do. Grading, teaching, and really, even a lot of the admin duties he allegedly held as Dean, were delegated to various TAs he kept around.

There was a knock at his office door. It was Bethany, one of said TAs; an exquisite specimen of Midwestern beauty with long legs, full, high breasts and a silky dark hair that she’d straightened into something he could appreciate. Largely, he knew to his enormous pleasure, at his own suggestion. She hadn’t slept with him yet, but she was clearly sycophantic enough to be edging in that direction.

What he saw on her face now, though, was concern and confusion.

“What’s the matter?” He asked. “You look pale.”

And was that a look of irritation in her eyes as a response? Not great, but what she said next rendered it largely irrelevant.

“It’s Dr. Jones-Ali. Or at least she says she is. She’s outside, but-”

He interrupted her, furrowing his brow.

“She’s on sabbatical. Something about Middle Eastern communal instincts,” He said. “What the hell is she doing back in the States?”

“I…I don’t know,” The girl said, “But Doctor that’s not the-”

“Send her in,” He said tiredly.

Truthfully, of all the faculty members of his department, Farra was the most tiresome. Not only was she shrill, strident and demanding, but she’d sicked that ridiculous investigatory committee on him. Back when he was coming up through the system, fraternization with one’s TAs was considered a perk of the job. Luckily, they hadn’t found anything, or he’d be out of his, tenure be damned. But his troublesome colleague, as well as the change she represented, had still soured his reputation with the rest of the staff.

“Uhm, professor,” The young woman said, shifting uneasily. “You don’t understand what I’m trying to say…”

He was losing patience with this.

“Do I have a stuttering problem? Some sort of speech impediment that makes it difficult to understand me?” He asked.

The doe eyed beauty blinked in confusion.

“Uhm, no…it’s just that…”

“Send. Her. In.” He repeated.

Bethany gave him an annoying roll of her eyes.

“Fine,” She said, crossing her arms and storming out of the room.

She left and he heard voices on the other side of the door. This exchange had probably undone a few weeks of work on the girl’s image; something else he now had Farra to thank for. He sighed and straightened as the door opened, preparing to do battle yet again with his obdurate colleague.

…and found himself caught completely off guard when she walked into the room.

The woman, girl, really, by his 60 year old standards, who stepped into his office was both obviously Farra Jones-Ali, and in no way capable of being her. She was nearly 30 years younger than his headache of a colleague, to start. Yet her insolent posture, the slyness in her eyes and the permeating confidence were undeniably Jones-Ali’s.

“Hello, Thomas,” She said as she shut the door behind her. She spoke in Farra’s voice, but without the wear 25 years of lectures had “I was a little worried your new girl wouldn’t let me in. She seems a bit smarter than your usual type.”

“Who the hell are you?” He asked.

The young woman put her hands on her hips.

“I think you know the answer to that, Professor,” She said. “I don’t have enough time to explain why I look like this. I’m in a hurry. All you need to know is that I’m not really on sabbatical, and I am about to teach you a serious lesson.”

Thomas couldn’t do much more than blink in surprise. It was Farra alright. As unbelievable as that was, he couldn’t really deny it any longer.

“What are you talking about?” He asked dumbly.

“Let’s be honest, Professor…you’re kind of a shit,” She said. “We all know that your selection process for your assistance has less to do with their intellectual merits than their physical ones. And even though I wasn’t quite able to prove that you were actually diddling them, it remains the worst kept secret at this school.”

The oddness of the situation gave way to a real flash of anger now.

“I don’t know what’s going on here, but the board of ethics cleared me in their investigations,” He said. “Whoever you are, you need to leave before I alert campus security.”

This was all entirely too weird, but standing up for himself was at least giving him a sense of control over the situation…at least until the young woman reached into her hoodie and withdrew a gun. Instinctively, Thomas pushed back from the desk with his hands raised.

“Wait, don’t shoot…”

But he trailed off with a laugh when he saw what the gun actually was; some sort of kid’s toy.

“And what do you propose to do with that?” He asked.

Then his world went pink.

Everything shifted. The world around him grew bigger, but he realized only belatedly that he was actually shrinking. Beneath his dress shirt, he felt his paunch retract into a smooth, flat belly and breasts grow out of his chest. He felt his face shift as blond hair fell around it. Looking down in horror, Thomas got to see his dress pants fuse into a single denim skirt. It shrank up his legs, revealing long, feminine ones. Finally, the bulge against the skirt flattened, as he officially became a she.

Thomas had become Tonya, and now that the physical changes had ended, new memories began to fill her head. She was no longer the dean of sociology, but a TA trying her best to work into the ranks of academia like so many others. She blinked in gape mounted confusion as her life rewrote itself in her head.

“Wait…you’re the dean now?” She asked, looking up at Farra.

“An ancillary benefit. We both know I’m the obvious next choice if anyone ever **** you out, but that’s not why I’m doing this to you.”

“Then why are you?” She asked, examining her new form.

She was a busty girl, apparently, with large breasts on an otherwise thin frame. She had shapely legs that she apparently liked showing off, but even wearing a relatively conservative blouse, her expansive chest was obvious.

Farra leaned over the desk, lifting her chin so that Tonya met her eyes.

“Because you have collected a lot of hard working students under you, and used the power you have over their careers to fuck them. You undermine their self esteem and bring them down to you,” She said. “And if I can get nothing else accomplished with this opportunity I’ve been given, putting a stop to that is at least something.”

She took a step back and Tonya shrank in her seat.

“Does this mean I’m gonna get…” Tonya started, trying to find a way to say it that wasn’t too self incriminated. “Treated like that? Like how you think I treat my students.”

Farra gave a musical laugh.

“No, dear, I don’t think you have to worry about that,” She said. “Lord knows you’d deserve it, but it’s the 2020s now and frankly, there just aren’t enough professors who think like you do these days.”

She shrugged.

“No, I think you’ll find that you’ll be underestimated because of your looks. You’re not stupid, nor without certain social charms, or you wouldn’t have made it to this position,” She continued. “But being a woman, and particularly an attractive one, will make your journey a bit of an upward climb. Not that you’ll really have time to complete it anyway.”

This last comment perked Tonya up a bit.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that when my…well, it’s not really a sabbatical, but let’s call it that for the sake of simplicity,” Farra said. “When my sabbatical is over, I have every intention of changing you back. Maybe not right away. I want you to learn a real lesson here, but I set the change such that I can undo it at any time, so that will be in the cards eventually.”

Tonya breathed a huge sigh of relief at that.

“So this is all just temporary?”

“That depends on you,” Farr said. “I wrote into the transformation that I can undo it at any time, but also that I can redo it as well. If I get one whiff of a hint that you’re taking advantage of your students, your TAs, any research assistance or other young professors, you’ll be right back to where you are now. Do you understand that?”

Tonya briefly thought of denying the allegation again, but gave a week nod instead.

“Good girl! Now, your TA took off so I should be leaving,” Farra said. “In the meantime, enjoy how the other half lives.”

*****

As one of Farra’s bodies carried out Dr. Ratsinger’s transformation, the other watched for any potential trouble in the hallway. She couldn’t get her bodies more than 100 feet or so apart without having significant motor control issues. But cramped as the office complex was, it was easy to keep a lookout.

She also needed to make a phone call. This was her other purpose here; the thing stopping her from running back to the hotel before the TA fetched security back. That her call might not be answered was almost as troubling as that prospect.

“Farra!” Her husband’s voice said on the other line. “Oh thank God you’re alright.”

“Alright might be a stretch, but I suppose I’m doing better than some,” She said. “Listen, omr-am, I need you to meet me at home. We only have four hours of leave before we have to be back at the hotel and the two of us have a lot to talk about.”

“Okay. I have some meetings this afternoon, but I’ll cancel,” He said. “You’ll tell me what’s going on with you and Ryan, right?”

“Of course. And what we’re going to do about it,” She said.

Her other body stepped out into the hall, and Farra linked hands with it.

“I need to run. Maybe literally,” She said. “But I left Ryan instructions to meet us at home, and I’ll be ubering there myself shortly.”

“Alright. I’ll be there within the hour,” George said.

“Before you go, I should tell you what to expect when you see me,” She said. “I know exactly how crazy this is going to sound, so bare with me.”

And then, she proceeded to explain what had happened to her.

*****

Ryan did not heed her mother’s instructions. Rather than going to the family home, she went to Central Park. She needed to think, and needed some time alone to do it.

She was going to lose.

She was going to lose, and would probably be eliminated in the bargain. No turning back, even if someone like her mother won. No going back to her old life or potentially wishing herself into a better one.

That wasn’t an easy thing to look in the face, but now that she did, the truth of it was almost self-evident. She was going to lose, and probably even in the next round or two.

Ryan stopped on a stone bridge over an artificial pond, looking over into the water. Not for the first time, she felt a pang of shock at the beautiful blonde face that stared back at her.

And that was the essence of the problem, wasn’t it? Lindsey and Exe had both diagnosed what this show was; a contest to both seduce Jake and win over the audience. One might have thought becoming a beautiful woman like the rest would put her on a level playing field, but far from it. They were used to this, and she wasn’t.

Maybe a few more changes could catch her up to them in terms of feminine wiles, fashion sense or personality. If she won a round, she might be able to match their comfort level with themselves. But she suspected she’d be out of the contest before she ever got that chance. Because as things stood now, she was too busy figuring out how to live in her new body to do anything she needed in order to win.

Then there was the problem of Jake. Even if she were feminized enough to seriously compete, Jake would never touch her knowing what he knew about her and who she used to be.

So where did that leave her? Screwed, was the likely answer. At least if she didn’t do something proactive about it.

And there the solution was easy. AJ had pointed it out to her when they’d been drinking. They were prohibited from using the guns on other contestants, but not on themselves. And while she wasn’t totally convinced that wouldn’t result in their being penalized anyway, it was a much better hope than any she had now.

That left the what of her self rescue. How would she change herself so that she could have a fair shot in the game? The answers to that were limited only by her imagination, but she felt she needed to talk it over with someone.

She called the number.

“Hey, it’s Ryan,” She greeted when she got an answer. “If you’re not too busy, I’m in Central Park. Do you have a moment to talk?”