Would you let me see beneath your beautiful tonight?

Dani gasped when she reappeared and sucked air into her lungs. She thought she was going to suffocate for some reason, but she didn’t.

It took a minute for her to gain her bearings. When she did, she began muttering expletives.

“What a stupid fucking challenge,” she muttered, tightening her grip on the gun. She should have know that things would go this way. Dakota had completely screwed her over. She’d arranged for an absolute nightmare to take hold.

“I have to transform somebody… what a fucking awful challenge.”

Dani hated being transformed. All the horrible things that the audience had subjected her with, warping her, turning her into something that she wasn’t, it was all so sick and wrong.

And now she had to do that to someone else?

She couldn’t do it.

It was like Dakota had devised a challenge specifically for the purpose of screwing her over. The kind of challenge where she wouldn’t stand a chance.

Dani had to do better than Kim. That much was a given. After all, Kim was her buddy. As long as she beat Kim, she’d be safe.

But… that would involve playing the game. If she didn’t play the game and transform someone, she would automatically fail. Could she do it?

Would Kim to the same?

Dani didn’t like competing like this. Kim was her friend, after all. But then, this was always what would happen, wasn’t it? No matter what the challenge was going to be, it would always come down to this.

A situation where she’d have to prove that she was a hypocrite if she wanted to win.

She held her handle of her gun so tightly she was afraid it might break in her hands. This… this was reality.

“Transform someone, and be a hypocrite. Or don’t transform someone, and ensure your loss. Those are your options!” That’s what she imagined Dakota was saying to her. And it was nauseating.

Roaring in frustration, she nearly chucked the gun away. But she stopped herself at the last moment, because… she had to.

She couldn’t give up. Not now. Not when it meant not just her safety, but the safety of Carly as well. If Carly couldn’t succeed, then she’d be at risk of elimination as well. And Dakota would give her an exit transformation that would probably turn her into some brainless sex doll for Nick’s pleasure.

Would Carly even be Carly after what Dakota would do to her?

This isn’t just about me, she reminded herself. This is about making sure that Carly is okay!

And that was enough.

Dani might not be playing to win. But she would play to keep Carly safe. Even if she had to fight and eliminate someone else, she would do so.

And if she had to inflict an unfortunate transformation on someone… well, she’d take her lumps for that, too.

“This is what you want, right?” She growled to the faceless audience just out of sight. “You want me to play, don’t you? You want me to make other people hurt and suffer, don’t you? Well fine then! If that’s what you want, I’ll give it to you! I’ll make sure that whoever this is gets the worst transformation of their lives!”

She was standing in front of a dilapidated shack beside a scrapyard that looked like it had been abandoned. But there was at least one car in the driveway that still worked, unlike the mountain of rustbuckets behind the wire gate. The dry air made her gag, and she heat made her wince. But she knew this was where she was meant to be, even if she’d never step foot into a place like this if she could help it.

“Hey! Come on out!” Dani shouted, knocking on the door, gun tight in her other hand. “I need to talk to you for a second!”

There was no one else for miles. Whoever she was transforming, they would be here.

The door opened, and Dani saw the glow that signified that this was her target. She raised her gun and prepared to fire, but her finger froze on the trigger and her eyes widened.

“…Joan?” The name slipped from her lips before she realized what was happening.

The blonde standing in the doorway looked confused and frightened, wondering what was happening. But their eyes widened in dawning realization.

“…Dani?”

Dani’s hand began to tremble. Her target was right there. She had to fire.

But she couldn’t. The gun fell from her fingers and she flung herself forward.

“Joan, you’re okay!” She cried, hugging her ex tightly. “I was so afraid…”

After Dani broke up with Joan, she’d spent a great many sleepless nights fearing the worst. After a breakup like that, and after what Joan had to return to, well…

She knew the statistics.

She knew there was a very good chance that Joan had taken her own life.

But all that had disappeared the second she saw her lover’s face.

“D-Dani…” Not knowing what to say, Dani’s ex wrapped an arm around her, and hugged her back.

Big mistake.

Dani’s eyes snapped open as a surge of pleasure shot through her, as if someone had been playing with her pussy. It was her boon at work again. Thankfully, she didn’t actually orgasm all over the place, but in that moment it really felt like she was going to.

Stunned, she broke off and caught her breath.

“You… Joan… you’re still alive…”

Then, she caught sight of those dull eyes, and she realized how wrong she was.

“It’s John,” her former lover stated coldly. “I’m John now.”

His lips were tight in a line, and Dani looked at him for the first time. He had a beard now, a scraggly thing, and more muscle on his physique than he remembered. He was older than her, and nearing thirty like her, but there was so much about him that had changed.

The spark she’d fallen in love with was nowhere to be seen.

“What happened to you?” She whispered, fighting back the tears in her eyes.

“I changed,” John said, his voice cracking slightly. “That person you knew back then… that was just me being an irresponsible child. Having fun. It wasn’t real, Dani, none of it was real.”

“That’s a lie!” Dani snapped, clenching her fists. “I was there, remember? I know what you had to go through, I know that they-”

“You know?” The light returned to John’s eyes, but it did so with a furious fire. “You have no idea what I had to go through, alone, what they-!”

He forced himself to calm down and took a few deep breaths. “…Those sins I committed, they were in the past. But I’ve repented. I’m happy now. I have a wife, Dani. Children. I have a family.”

Dani couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “You’re happy?” She shook her head incredulously. “Look at you! You expect me to believe that, when you have such soulless eyes?!”

“I’m not the only one who’s gone through some changes, you know,” John snapped, glaring at her. “Look at you! You’re wearing a skirt. I remember you telling me you’d NEVER do something like that. And your hair is down to your ass! And not to mention, where are your muscles, huh?”

He gestured to Dani’s arms, which were fleshy and soft, like the rest of her. Then he glanced down at her chest. “And are those breast implants? You want to talk about changes, Dani? Because you’re looking a lot more like a woman than I ever did.”

His eyes widened as he said that last part, and he clasped his hand over his mouth.

“Forget it,” he muttered, moving to close the door.

But Dani didn’t let him. She shoved her foot into the crack and pushed it open. Now she was angry. The transformations that had changed her?! She didn’t want this! She didn’t want to be like this! She just wanted to be herself!

And John, who had all the freedom in the world now, couldn’t even do that, either.

“What’s the matter, huh?” She snapped. “Afraid your family’s going to hear you tell the truth!?”

She was yelling at the top of her lungs.

“Dani!” John was red in the face. “You need to leave! My wife is going to be back with the kids any moment now, please!”

“No! No, I won’t accept this!” Dani shouted as tears rolled down her cheeks. “You can’t be happy like this! You can’t! You… Joan… don’t you even bother with your art anymore?! What about your dreams?!”

John looked like he was going to cry. “N-no, you don’t… you don’t get it!” He snapped. “That’s all in the past! I was never a woman! I’m not some… some… fagboy!”

Dani winced at the word. It looked like it hurt John to say even more. He sort of crumpled, curled up on his knees, and began to rock.

“Just go away…” He pleaded. “I put that part of my life behind me now! Okay?! I’m done! Just go, and never come back!”

Dani had heard about enough.

She could see the glowing light around her former lover, and she knew. She could do it now.

“You’re running your dad’s junkyard, I see,” she spat, crouching down and picking her gun up off the floor. “I remember you telling me you’d rather be dead than wind up like that.”

“W-wait, Dani!” John held up his hands in surrender. “You… you’re not going to shoot me, are you?!”

“Why shouldn’t I?” Dani spat, not realizing in her anger that John thought the gun was real. “I mean, take a look at yourself. You really call this living?”

The house was coming apart at the seams. It was obvious that John didn’t give a damn about anything anymore. He was just going through the motions.

And Dani couldn’t bear the sight of it.

Maybe it was hypocritical. Maybe it would make her an awful person.

But she didn’t care.

She pulled the trigger, and a blast of light shot out of the gun, hitting her old lover right in the chest.

And then that chest began to shrink. Along with the rest of John’s body. The muscles he’d built up began to tighten, and his ruddy skin smoothed out. His scraggly beard sucked itself back into his face, which softened and took on a more feminine quality as his blonde hair straightened and began to clean.

Standing in front of Dani was a woman she recognized far more than the man she had once been.

Dani had brought Joan back to the surface. She was older now, and a few changes had been made to her body, but… it was her.

“Ah…” Joan began to shake. Their chest felt odd, and all their clothes hung off her. “What… I’ve been shot? No… what did you do?!”

Her hands leapt to her chest, and she felt the weight there. Her breasts were small, but they were breasts.

That was the first sign of bad things to come. Then her hands reached down to her stained overalls, and she felt her genitals.

Something very important was missing.

Dani lowered her gun and wiped the sweat from her forehead.

“You always told me you wished you were born a woman,” she said. “And, well, now you are. Congratulations.”

Joan didn’t look grateful. She looked horrified.

“How could you!?” She demanded, leaping to her feet and lunging at Dani. But she stopped herself before she attacked her. “Transforming me like this… I don’t even know HOW you did it, but do you know what you’ve done!?”

“I’ve turned you into a woman!” Dani snapped. “I thought you would be grateful!”

“You… you…” Joan’s mouth flopped open and closed as she tried to process what she was hearing. “Are you insane?! How… how did you even do that?!”

Dani scowled. “This gun,” she said, raising the gun. “It can transform anybody I shoot, just by pulling the trigger. So I decided to turn you into a woman. And not only that, I made it so you’ve always been a woman!”

“But… what about my kids?!”

“…Huh?”

Dani stared blankly at her.

“I have children, Dani!” Joan exclaimed. “Oh, god, Daniel is 4, and Scott is 2… what were you thinking!? Do I… do I even have my children anymore?!”

“Uh… well…”

Dani maybe should have thought of the ramifications of her actions.

“Change me back!” Joan pleaded. She remembered two timelines now, the one she was presently in, where she’d never had kids, and the one she was desperate to regain. “Please! If I’ve always been a woman, then I wouldn’t have been able to father Carmen’s children! Dani! You were right, okay!? Maybe my life is miserable! Maybe I hate the fact that I don’t have these breasts, or that I have a penis! You’re right, okay!? I hate it! I can’t stand it!”

Tears rolled down her cheeks. “But I’m still a mother! …Father, fuck! Dani, I can’t lose my kids! They’re the one thing that matters most to me!”

“Right, right, I’m so sorry!” Dani wailed. “I wasn’t thinking! I just, I mean, you hated your life so much…”

“Change me back!”

Dani pulled the trigger and undid the transformation. Joan became John again, and John remembered his children again.

He sighed in relief.

Then Dani pulled the trigger again.

“WHAT?!”

And, just like that, Joan turned back into a woman.

“There! Now you’re a woman again, but this time, everyone remembers you having been a man. So your kids still exist! Everything’s okay now, alright?!”

“NO!” Joan screeched. “NO, it’s not alright! Do you have any idea what my parents are going to do to me, when they find out that I somehow changed to become biologically female?! And what about Carmen!? There’s no way she’ll stay with me now! She’ll leave me, and take the kids!”

Dani was really fucking this up, huh?

“I-I just wanted to make you happy!” She cried, wiping away her own tears. “You weren’t happy back then, and you knew it! But this… at least this way… you’re a woman, just like you wanted…”

“Dani, it’s not that simple!” Joan wailed.

Dani could just scream.

Then the door swung open.

“Honey! We’re home! Did I hear you talking with someone? Do we have guests?”

“Uwaagh!” Startled, Dani whirled around and pulled the trigger, hitting the woman walking in. The groceries she’d been carrying scattered all over the ground as she transformed into the first thing Dani thought of, which was Joan.

So now there were two of them.

“Carmen!?” Joan exclaimed. “Oh, god! Dani, what did you do?! What did you do to my wife?!”

“I-I don’t know!” Dani stammered.

“Well, change her back!”

“I don’t know how!” Dani shook her head frantically. “I don’t remember what she looked like!”

“How could you just shoot my wife without even thinking?! Are you crazy?!”

“Honey? What… what’s going on?!” Carmen, who was now identical to Joan, stared at the two women standing in her living room shouting at each other. She looked down at herself and screamed.

“What did you do me?! Who are you?! Why are you two in my house!?”

“Honey? Honey, it’s me, it’s Joan!” Joan rushed to her wife’s side. “I-I mean, John!”

“John?! What- no, you’re a woman! You’re not my husband!” Carmen pushed her away and stumbled back, and caught a glance of herself in the mirror.

She looked exactly like the frantic blonde woman. Which lent credence to the idea that maybe it WASN’T so crazy, the idea that John was turned into a woman.

“…John?”

“It’s me, honey, where are the boys?” Joan sniffled, wiping her eyes.

“They-they’re in the car…” Carmen stammered, not taking her eyes off the crazy woman carrying a ray gun. “Honey, what’s going on?”

Joan sighed. It was a long story.

“Dani…” She turned to Dani with a pleading expression on her face. “Please…”

“What do you want me to do, huh!?” Dani wailed. “I don’t know the first thing about your wife! How am I supposed to change her back, huh!?”

Joan didn’t know either.

“Wait, Dani?” Carmen looked at the blue-haired girl in a new light. “John, is that your ex?”

“Ex?” Dani frowned. “We weren’t serious enough for that.”

“Is that really the important thing right now?” Joan demanded. “Dani, how are you going to turn my wife back to normal?!”

“I don’t know, okay!?”

“Well, isn’t there an ‘undo’ button on that blasted thing?”

“It’s a ray gun that uses psychic thoughts to transform people with magic, no, it doesn’t have an ‘undo’ button!” Dani snapped.

“Photos!” Carmen gasped. “John, we can use all the photos you took of me!”

“Oh, right!” Joan nodded. “We have photos here somewhere.”

Unfortunately, the house wasn’t the perfect example of wedded bliss. Carmen and Joan scrambled to find anything current. Thankfully, Joan remembered that she had a phone, and showed Dani the pictures.

“Okay…” Dani took a deep breath, and focused on the curly-haired brunette she saw in the photograph. She pulled the trigger, and Carmen was returned to normal… more or less.

“It doesn’t quite look right,” Joan said, shaking her head. “Carmen, were you always so…”

She gestured as Carmen’s ass, which was very slim.

Dani scowled, and Carmen rolled her eyes.

“What did you expect?” Dani snapped. “That photograph was only taken from the front!”

“It’s okay, it’s okay!” Joan was desperate to keep Dani from panicking the way she always did. They needed to stay calm so she wouldn’t freak out. “I have other photos! Don’t worry!”

Joan kept scrolling through her phone, showing Dani all sorts of different angles of her wife. As she did, Dani’s expression softened.

In spite of what she’d thought, in spite of how miserable Joan looked, when she arrived… it was obvious that Joan loved their wife.

“You always did like taking photos,” she said softly.

Joan blushed. “I-I mean… I can’t really find time to paint, so…”

Dani’s eyes widened. “Then you didn’t give up on your art after all?!” She grabbed Joan and shook her. “That’s great!”

“Yeah, it’s stellar. I’m glad you’re so happy for me, you know, after you completely wrecked my life,” Joan said sarcastically.

Dani winced. But then she got angry. “Hey! You know as well as I do that you were never comfortable like that! You have more passion in you now than you did before!”

“Or maybe it’s because I’m freaking out,” Joan fired back. But she couldn’t meet Dani’s eyes. “Besides,” she quietly added, “it’s not like it matters anyway…”

They pieced together enough different angles from various photos of Carmen that Joan had taken, and soon enough Joan’s wife returned to some version of herself. It wasn’t perfect, of course, there were little details here and there, moles that had disappeared and the like, but it was close enough.

Close enough for her kids to recognize her anyway, as Carmen went to get them out of the sweltering heat and get them to their bedrooms for a nap.

When she returned, she wasn’t happy. The three of them took seats in the living room, and sat in silence for a moment.

“…Okay, what’s going on here?” Carmen snapped. “John, who is this woman, and why does she keep calling you Joan? Is she really your ex?”

Joan winced.

“Yeah, something like that,” Dani muttered.

Now it was Carmen’s turn to look upset. But not angry, almost… sad.

“She’s… not like you described,” Carmen said quietly. “Didn’t you describe your ex as a sporty girl, with muscles?” She began playing with her hair as she looked enviously at Dani’s body. “You said that what you liked about me was that I was so feminine…”

Joan looked absolutely miserable.

“Wait, it… it’s not what you think,” Dani said quickly, somehow finding herself in a very uncomfortable position. “This is… look, I was transformed, too. My body was completely changed! Before, I used to be really tough and with huge muscles!”

Carmen’s eyes widened. “So that gun… did you get shot with it, too?”

Dani flinched. “That… Not exactly,” she said, shaking her head. “I just, well… look, it’s a long story. But basically, I’m on this game show where my body gets transformed. And for my current challenge, I’m supposed to use this gun here to transform your husband. So I did.”

“And you turned him into a woman? Why would you do that?”

Joan sunk a little deeper into her armchair, refusing to look at her wife.

Dani glared at the cowering blonde. “You need to fix this,” she said. “You need to be honest with your wife.”

“Or, you could just turn me back!” Joan snapped. “I was getting by just fine as a man!”

“You were miserable!” Dani countered. “And no, don’t give me that ‘I’m fine’ bullcrap, or talk about your family. Even if you love Carmen and your kids, I know how miserable you are more than anyone!”

“Joan, what is she talking about?” Carmen demanded. She looked at her husband/wife with a pleading expression.

Joan was like a trapped rat. She didn’t know what to do, and she couldn’t get Dani to change her back, even though she knew she would be miserable as a man.

Facing down Dani’s fierce glare, she did what she had been too cowardly to do before.

She told the truth.

“Carmen… the truth is… I’m a woman in a man’s body.”

Joan sat up a little higher in her seat, like she’d just taken a massive weight off her shoulders, saying that.

Carmen stared at her. “…What?”

Joan struggled to keep looking at her. “I’m… ever since I was a kid, I’ve always known that I was a girl. Back when Dani and I were seeing each other… I was ‘out’. I was wearing feminine clothes, presenting as a woman… But then my family wanted me to come back and live at home. I couldn’t bring myself to be honest with them, not when I knew what they were. But… it’s different with you, Carmen.”

She looked at her wife with watery eyes. “You were always supportive of my photography… you said that even though you could see I hated my job, you were happy that I found something I could enjoy. Something that brought me happiness.”

Joan turned to Dani with a wistful expression on her face.

“It’s thanks to Dani that I found my love of art,” she informed her. “It was an escape for me. I may have been an amateur, but every time I considered quitting, I thought about what Dani would think… and I kept going with it. I was never good at drawing, but photography… it’s something I’ve always liked.”

Dani blushed. “I… I’m glad… that some good came out of that mess of a relationship.”

Joan turned back to Carmen, and her voice ached with desperation. “I know this is a lot to take in. I’m not the man you married… damn it, Carmen, I’m not a man at all! But I can’t lose you. If you want me to go back… I’m sure Dani can arrange that…”

Dani honestly didn’t know herself. She didn’t want Joan to suffer as a man, but it was clear that she would be even more miserable with Carmen.

“…I mean, I’m fine with it,” Carmen shrugged. “John-err, Joan, if you’re a woman, then I can accept that.”

Joan’s draw dropped. “…Say what now?”

“I’m pansexual, remember?” Carmen reminded her wife. “I can be attracted to women, too. And I love YOU, Joan. You took care of me, when my husband was beating me. You gave me a home to come back to. And I love you for that. Male or female. Explaining it to the kids might be a little strange, but still. I love you, just the way you are.”

“C-Carmen…” Joan broke down sobbing. She jumped from her chair and threw herself into her wife’s arms as Carmen hugged her.

Dani smiled.

But there was still one issue.

“But Joan… even if I like you this way, your family… they won’t accept it,” she said quietly. “Aren’t they still helping with the bills here?”

Joan winced. “That… that’s right. That’s what I was trying to tell Dani.” She turned to her ex. “Dani… I love you for doing this. But… I can’t. It’s not right.”

Dani frowned. “Even now, you still can’t stand up to your family?”

“What if you change it so that Joan was always a woman?” Carmen asked. “…Wait, no, that won’t work… then our kids wouldn’t have been born…”

Dani shook her head. “We already covered that. Joan, there’s only one option at this point. You’ve got to stand up to your family, and cut them out of your life. Because there’s no going back!”

She got up from her seat, and pointed the gun at Joan again. She pulled the trigger, and hit her in the chest.

“Uweeh! My boobs!” Joan screeched, holding her hands over her chest as it expanded.

“It’s gonna be hard to hide that,” Dani said. “Well? Are you going to stand up to your family now?”

“Dani, it’s more complicated than that!” Joan wailed. “Turn me back!”

“No way,” Dani shook her head adamantly. “I’m not making you miserable again.”

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but Dani’s right,” Carmen nodded. “Joan, I’ve always hated your family. They’re awful.”

“I know they’re awful, but we need them!” Joan protested.

Dani sighed. They were getting nowhere with this!

“Ugh, if only my family wasn’t completely awful, then none of this would matter!” Joan screamed, pacing back and forth. “If only, then…”

Then Dani had a great idea.

“Wait… I just thought of something!”

Her lips curled up into a vicious smile.

---

“Dani, are you sure about this?” Joan asked. “I don’t know…”

The two women were sitting in her pickup truck in the front yard of a dilapidated farmhouse.

“It’s going to be fine,” Dani assured her. “Just point and think, then pull the trigger.”

Joan swallowed. The gun in her hand felt incredibly heavy.

“Okay… okay, do it!”

“Give ‘em hell,” Dani said, patting her friend on the shoulder. “Make them feel all the pain you had to go through.”

Dani was sick and tired worrying about “ethics” or “morality” at this point. She climbed out of the car, and followed Joan into the house, kicking the door down.

“Who the hell-?!”

“What are you doing in our-?!”

ZAP! ZAP! ZAPZAPZAP!

Dani leaned back against the wall as she watched the light show go off before her eyes. Joan went wild, letting out all her repressed grudges on her family. Sure, maybe Dani wasn’t technically the one inflicting the harsh transformations, and sure, maybe Joan wasn’t the target of them. But the other girl was thrilled.

And honestly? Joan’s happiness meant a lot, too.

Dani just had to hope that this would please the audience enough to put her ahead.

“Dani! You want a couple shots?” Joan, thrilled beyond belief, held the gun out to Dani.

Dani smiled and nodded.

“You know, Joan, I think your dad would be just great with a couple more pairs of breasts,” she agreed, and pulled the trigger.