13:09, read the clock in the corner of Rachael's laptop. It was a time to savor. At last, all twenty girls were checked in to Leaf Dorm -- and only nine minutes after the printed deadline. An impressively punctual crowd this year, she mused. Her stomach was complaining already, but lunch had to wait until she could lock her laptop away. She carefully put the machine in its case and headed back towards her room.

The girl staggered backward in surprise as she was met by an unexpectedly massive version of Jess Scott. Still, despite her clearly fraying grip on reality, the rational part of Rachael looked down for heels. The girl was wearing combat boots with small platforms, but that hardly explained more than a foot's difference. She looked back up, and noticed more changes: a buzz cut, an emerald pendant, lips painted white, and tattoos of of what seemed to be lizard scales on both arms, inked in a dizzying array of greens, reds and oranges, and quite vibrant against the dark skin surrounding it. It was all too much to take in, to try to rationalize at once, and Jess didn't give her a chance to recover.

"Hi, Rachael. Let's talk. I'm not worried about privacy; no one's going to bother us. Lock the building doors, would you? Oh, first put your computer down somewhere, I'll take care of it later."

Jess was grinning as she talked. Rachael wasn't sure if the girl had any intention of explaining what was going on, but didn't feel she had a choice but to follow and listen. Weird things had been happening all around her ever since she arrived at Leaf dorm, and this was just the next one. She was intimidated and freaked out, sure, but calm enough to meekly obey, walking in turn to each of the two main doors and the hidden emergency exit to lock them. Calm enough to look up at Jess, trying to convey an attitude of subdued impatience, and almost succeeding.

"Congratulations. You did well."

". . . I did? What did I do?"

"You remember, don't you? Well, maybe you don't . . ." Jess put a hand on Rachael's shoulder. The girl felt as if she'd been hit by lightning, as the memory suddenly filled her mind: the bizarre daydream she'd had about Jess, and the moments preceding it, when an inexplicably huge version of her had grabbed a spare keycard, snuck into Jess's room and stabbed her in the neck with a toothlike metal object, which had woken Jess up and turned her sweaty and desperate, but Rachael had left without fucking her, because she had to move on to the next room, and the next . . .

She came out of the reverie and realized that she was now standing just as tall as Jess. She was still wearing her glasses, but they fit awkwardly. She took them off, seeing more than perfectly without them, and while she was looking at her newly massive arm in disbelief, some impulse made her close her hand around the frame and crush it. When she opened her hand again, all that was left was a tiny ball of black matter with smoke escaping from it.

"Do you understand now?"

Rachael thought deeply. She realized she was able to focus and think clearly, for the first time since meeting Onyx -- and she quickly realized that was the key. Onyx had asked for access, for a keycard to Angel's room, and had emerged with a physically changed Angel. Rachael had taken access, and now Jess had grown. The changes may not have been immediate, but the pattern fit. Onyx, that mind-bending beauty, had been the first -- she must be responsible, or at least the vanguard. And now Rachael was a budding giantess herself -- and probably had been since the previous night, given the memories she'd just gained and everyone's reaction to her today. She'd just somehow been made oblivious, like she'd been made to forget that memory, save one teasing fragment, though she'd even forgotten that in her daze.

"I think I do understand. I still don't know when I was converted."

"My mistake." Jess didn't sound apologetic. "I gave you your missing memories, but I forgot to replace the one Onyx edited."

The girl touched Rachael's arm again, and a much smaller shock hit. Rachael relived her first meeting with Onyx for what seemed like the millionth time, but . . .

Onyx took the cards, slid them into her wallet, and took her ID back. Then she leaned over the counter and placed a kiss -- pillowy soft lips broken up by the exciting harshness of the stud -- and on the mousy resident advisor�s lips.

Onyx laughed briefly, grabbed her bags, paused for a few moments as she waited for the girl to recover, and headed down the hall.

Rachael smiled slowly. "It's not easy trying to solve a mystery when you can't remember the clues."

"Maybe she just wanted to see a smart girl squirm."

Rachael continued smiling, if a bit awkwardly. After a beat: "I can guess why you didn't need privacy, except from outside."

"Right. None of the other girls will even hear us. Onyx has delegated their power, for now, to me."

"Onyx is . . .?"

"Onyx is the one Goddess of this world, and you're going to worship her, because you don't have a choice." Rachael shuddered. Of course.

"For most, she's perfect. By definition. But for us . . . well." Jess looked thoughtful. She moved to sit on one of the plush couches that flanked the former hotel lobby's entrance, and gestured for Rachael to join her. The couch would have been large enough for three normal-sized people to sit without touching, but the two amazonian girls were a tight fit, and their thighs rubbed together whenever one of them shifted. Rachael found herself leaning into the touch. Jess turned, smiling.

"Rachael, not everyone who has a Seraph chip inside them can call themselves a Seraph. And those who have that distinction may not keep it. But we have it. We may not be allowed to keep that gift forever, or even for another day. But for now, we've got limited free will, and the chance to conceive of Onyx's faults -- and even to discuss them with her, if she is in the mood to allow it. Which, lately, she hasn't been."

"Why not?"

"Something . . . happened. My best guess is, there was something terrible in her past, and she got reminded of it recently. She's frustrated, I know that. She wants to make someone pay, but she can't."

"How do you know all this, Jess?"

"We did fuck earlier." No change in tone. "Though it was before and after when the real information came. Onyx let me into her mind a bit, on purpose, and I saw her pain. And I saw some things she won't let me talk about. But most things she won't let me see at all."

"Is there anything else? Do you know where she comes from, why she's here?"

"Not more than you've pieced together, I think. She won't let me see he past, before she got here." A pause. "She's not happy about the state of the planet, I think. She wants to reconstruct it, but isn't sure she can. And she's not happy with men, in particular. But it all traces back into things I can't see. All I know is she's conflicted. Sometimes she's militantly angry, sometimes she's delicate and flinches from violence. And . . . I get the sense that she sees both of those things as a weakness."

Rachael nodded. "If she's going to rebuild the world, she needs self-discipline. But to let go of anger and compassion would make the task impossible. As might letting someone else get close enough to help." The redhead sighed. "It's strange, analyzing the Goddess like an ordinary person. Even though I know I haven't seen her that way for long. It still feels . . . blasphemous." The word felt odd rolling off her tongue.

"It should. She is the Goddess, and we must take care to be respectful when thinking about her. She could strike us down blamelessly if we allowed ourselves insolent thoughts. Do you see now that free will is a heavy responsibility?"

"Yes. I hope I can handle it. And Angel, too."

Jess looked distant. "I'm not allowed to say what I've seen."

"That tells me something, too," Rachael mused.

"Really?"

"Based on what you've said . . . she may consider her closeness with Angel a weakness, too."

Jess looked pained, but didn't respond.

"Hey. You didn't give it away. I thought so already. I've seen the way Onyx acts around her."

Rachael didn't sound entirely sure, but Jess sighed and relaxed anyhow. And before they knew it they were hugging, strong arms embracing strong bodies, boobs nestled like gears. Tears started escaping Rachael's cheeks -- the new Jess was just so beautiful. Jess was smiling and crying too, and there was melancholy but no pain, just relief, and a mutual sense that they had endured something important. And when their lips touched, it was as if they were flying. There was little exploration, little movement, just lips against lips, softhard flesh bracing flesh, slowly snaking arms just seeking comfort, enhanced scents mixing so fundamentally that Rachael began producing Jess's safflower, and Jess began leaking Rachael's cinnamon scent from her cunt.

. . . The dorm advisor felt something trying to emerge from her back. Rachael tried to untangle herself, which was easy, because Jess was doing the same thing. They both stood, and Rachael looked in awe as a metal exoskeleton crept out behind Jess, expanded, and began sprouting feathers. She saw Jess with the same awed expression, and could feel the same thing happening to her. Experimentally, Jess tried flapping her sea-green wings, and in a moment got the hang of it and lifted off the ground. Rachael did the same thing, having a bit more trouble but eventually feeling something unlock in the recesses of her mind, and she glid around the room on white wings a few feet at a time.

"This is . . . a little underwhelming when the ceiling is so low."

"Well, we should remodel it."

Rachael looked at Jess quizzically. "Can we do that?"

The tattooed girl flew up into a corner, spreading her wings flat against the ceiling. "I'll teach you how if you come up here." Rachael tried to join her, but as soon as she stopped beating her wings fully she started to fall, so she couldn't quite get high enough. Instead, she let herself drop to the ground, raised her wings then took a running jump and flapped her wings once, sending her rocketing straight into the corner. She pressed her wings up, and before she could fall gripped Jess's hand. The buzzcut girl stayed firm enough for them both.

Jess grinned toothily. "Clever, but I should show you how to do it properly. I'll teach you so many things, Rachael . . ."

She leaned in to kiss the redhead, and as warm as the flow of information that pumped from the Seraph chip growing deep within Jess's brain to that in Rachael's, through the skin and through tiny waveguides that followed their bloodstreams while they reconstructed their bodies, so much warmer was the artificially induced love growing between the two girls.

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