Lovechild

This story contains a woman transforming in response to things she is reading and characters she likes. As a result, it is a little absurd.

If that is something you object to, I would suggest reading something else.

*****

“Oh, Ava, don’t let me forget to give you that stuff from the sales.”

They had been talking for an hour over lunch with no mention of what said stuff was, but it was a phrase Ava’s yard sale loving grandmother uttered nearly every time they met. It could mean she had any number of things for her grad student granddaughter, from clothes to kitchenware. One time it had been a couch. She pursed her lips while getting up. What was it this time?

It was both hot and humid outside. So much so that the air was nearly a blast of steam when she pushed the door open. Her clothes started to stick to her almost at once, highlighting the edges of her bra through her shirt. A guy walking with his girlfriend on the sidewalk happened to glance over and kept staring until they had passed the diner. Ava rolled her eyes. After getting that reaction for close to twelve years, it was only mildly irritating anymore.

While such gawking happened year round, summers were the worst. They made it impossible for her to disguise a body most would consider a sexual fantasy. Even with loose capri pants and a baggy extra large shirt, her ample butt and massive boobs would not be hidden. That she was also quite tall and her bronze skin tone was obviously not just a tan only seemed to add to how she magnetically held gazes. People looked at her with this mix of awe, pity, and fear which just got exhausting to deal with after a while.

Her grandmother bustled past her and moved towards her old Forester. She opened the trunk to reveal her spoils in a battle of savings. This time, it was another box of paperback books. The third in six weeks. Even though Ava picked out quite a few titles already on her shelves and a couple more that she hated, she swallowed her sigh and smiled as she pulled the box out. There was part of her who loved the deliveries that accompanied a visit, after all who turned down free books? However, her grandmother’s habit of just buying the whole box for a couple dollars was starting to get frustrating.

Ava dreaded digging through what was probably another twenty books she did not need to maybe find volumes she was missing from a series or to discover a new story that she enjoyed as much as something on AO3. Even the used bookstore was starting give her grief about bringing in yet another set of Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings books for credit and it was not like the university library needed any more copies either.

Once she got it out of the car, the box was heavier than she expected. That was another thing she liked about fan-fiction, it only weighed as much as her tablet. Shift her grip to get under it a bit more, the corner of the box, like clockwork, jabbed her in the boob. No matter what she did, they always seemed to be in the way like that. It had been an issue ever since high school.

“Thanks, Gram,” she said, trying to keep annoyance out of her voice. She popped the trunk of her Civic and dropped the books in.

“I just want you to know that I’m always thinking of you,” her grandmother said, leaning against her car. “I know your life kind of derailed, but…” she continued on, retreading how puberty had been so unkind as to ruin Ava’s chances of being a professional athlete.

Try as she might to steer the conversation in another direction or to get out of it, Ava’s grandmother continued her greatest hits set list. All of which boiled down to the fact that she wanted great-grand-kids and did not understand how a woman as sexy as Ava was could not land herself a man.

“If I had been half as curvy as you were in high school-”

“You probably wouldn’t have married Pappi and we wouldn’t be having this conversation.” Ava said it harsher than she intended, but it was hot and they had been standing in the sun for nearly twenty minutes. She might as well be standing there in her underwear from how tight her clothes were sticking to her. Being a little irritated felt justified.

The older woman’s face flickered through several reactions and settled on hurt as she pulled herself up to her full height. “That was not called for…”

“It wasn’t? Gram, we’re standing in the parking lot of Friendly’s while you essentially bemoan that I’ve not dropped everything in my life to pop out a kid yet. This is not the first time we’ve had this conversation. We’ve been over this. Multiple times.”

“You’re right, chica…I’m sorry.”

“It’s…it’s okay. I get where you’re all coming from, Mom gives me the same grief, but I need to live my life okay?”

“It would’ve been so much easier if-”

“If a lot of things had been different, yes. Look, Gram, let’s…let’s talk about this next time, okay?”

-*-

As she hauled the box up the stairs to her apartment, she could feel her bra slipping over her slick shoulders as her boobs bounced against the edge. Feeling her clothes literally falling off only escalated her stoked annoyance. Frustrated, she fumbled with the keys and dropped the box on her foot. She bit back a flurry of cursing as her mind flashed all the wonderful phrases her uncles had taught her. Instead she kicked the box into her living room and flopped back first onto her couch.

She eschewed the bra entirely at that point, throwing it in the direction of the hamper and letting her girls melt over her rib cage. She fumbled for the remote to turn on the A/C. The hum of the unit started up and she closed her eyes, enjoying a moment to calm down and cool off as the window unit’s breeze wafted over her. When she finally felt like she was not being microwaved, she leaned over to look at what Gram had bought.

Propped up on one arm, she reached into the box and first pulled out another Drizzit omnibus and sighed to herself. Setting it aside, she grabbed another book and encountered a cover she had never seen before. She rolled onto her back as she took in the artwork.

A girl, or perhaps woman, with dark hair and light brown skin stood at the ready with a glowing rapier. She was wearing a white shirt with a high collar that was unbuttoned and folded down as well as a pair of tight pants tucked into boots that ended around her knees. She was lithe and small and all of the things Ava had not been since middle school.

At her left shoulder was a swarthy man with a square cut beard, wearing spike-covered pauldrons over a mail shirt while wielding a heavy looking hammer. He was built like a linebacker, but was not all that much taller than the main character. At her right was another fencer looking character wearing greaves and gauntlets over a similar outfit. It was not clear from the illustration if the character was a man or a woman. Behind the trio was a tall, willowy woman who looked like someone’s idea of a Japanese elf with outfit that was one part Leoglas and one part traditional kimono. She held a staff in one hand and a jagged ball of ice in the other.

“Illusionist’s Game, book one of the Brave Fencing Knights trilogy,” she read aloud as her hand brushed the book’s cover. As her finger traced the embossed length of the light sword, she felt a flutter at seeing a character that looked like her front and center on the cover of a fantasy novel. Granted, she was anything but petite now, but it was an odd thrill to see that the story was ostensibly about a woman of color.

“I wish I could go back to being built that way. Maybe then at least people would have conversations with me and not my tits.” She laughed to herself and looked down at boobs that filled out her t-shirt even without the support of her 36E bra.

As she flipped the book over to read the blurb, the edge of the cover caught her finger at the joint. The quick slice did not draw blood but it did smart. She sucked on the paper cut while reading the back.

The premise sounded very YA. Rather ordinary girl turns out to be great at something, falls for a guy, and they go on a life affirming adventure. In this case, a contest of champions. Frustratingly they did not mention the other two characters on the cover at all.

“You are known, in great part, by the company you keep,” she said, reading the large words at the bottom of the cover. “Sounds about right.”

She put the book down on her chest and thought about getting up. She had a major paper due in a week, but the allure of a book she had never heard of, even one that was obviously aimed at a different age group, was too great to resist. She wiggled down to get comfortable and cracked the book open.

The girl’s name was apparently Mina and she started out not as a fencer in training, but as a scullery maid in the castle of a multidimensional kingdom. Ava was surprised that Mina bucked genre conventions by not being a wide-eyed teen, but a woman in her twenties. Still, the story seemed rather trope-heavy as Mina was soon discovered by some knight while she was play fighting with the handle of a broom. He introduced himself as Kellen. Some of the dialogue was wooden, but Ava could not help laughing at the zingers the pair traded with each other as they moved towards an obvious play-fight confrontation.

Mina bested him in combat while he was obviously holding back, but he still felt she had promise and started to train her. That inevitably gave rise to a crush as they spent many nights practicing in the courtyard. The chemistry between them was surprisingly fresh and the opposite of so many other romances aimed at young girls. Kellen owned his flaws with his own actions and did not seem to be waiting for Mina to reform him. Mina quickly outgrew the puppy love stage as she realized Kellen was more than a fairy tale hero.

It had been two hours by then, but things were getting interesting. They were dispatched on a mission, because Mina was Kellen’s squire at that point, she traveled with the knight. The duo, along with a few other knights, were on a mission to bring a missive to the republic in another dimension.

While the other older knights in the party were telling war stories over beer, the pair of them snuck away to train. Mina let it slip that she had feelings for Kellen. That turned into a genuinely heartbreaking moment as Kellen confessed that he was not what Mina believed. In a passage that brought Ava nearly to tears, the knight revealed she was a woman.

All of a sudden Ava found herself pulled into a fascinating take on the story of Mulan, only instead of Mulan pretending to be a man, it was effectively Shang. Mina found herself dealing with the fact that she was attracted to a woman, but still had to act like Kellen was a man. She was forbidden from saying anything at the risk of exposing Kellen’s secret to the court as, of course, only the lord of the castle knew.

Kellen, too, had to deal with the sudden change in their relationship and did so by following through on the expectations of her as a knight. She vouched for Mina’s prowess and convinced the lord of the realm to knight her.

By now, Ava was heavily invested in the idea of them working out their romance and having a life together, but it was getting dark and it occurred to her that she probably should get up and at least eat dinner or something.

She swung her feet over and went to stand up only to find herself falling forward as something about her legs was very off. Landing on her hands and knees, she realized the t-shirt was considerably larger than it had been earlier. Her hands jumped to her chest and were met not with overflowing mounds of flesh, but bumps that just filled her hands. Scrambling out of the shirt, she stumbled to the bathroom and snapped the light on.

For a moment she thought it was Mina starting back at her instead of herself, but slowly her face became familiar as she realized what had happened. In an afternoon, she had shrunk from five-eleven to five-five at best. Her overwhelmingly curvy figure had given way to the build she had imagined while growing up. The longer she stood there however, the more she realized there were traits from Kellen mixing into her new appearance. She wondered just what was going on as she rubbed her now more square jaw.

“It’s like the book is changing me,” she said aloud. “How though?”

-*-

Making dinner was a surprising challenge. Even with a only few inches difference, it felt like everything was so far away. She had never thought about owning a stepstool until she had climbed up on a chair to grab something from the top shelf. Unsure if she was stuck this way, she made a mental note to get one. Even in less extreme ways, just having shorter arms meant having to move more to grab things. What had been a casual lean to fish a spoon out of the drawer had become a dramatic stretch.

Showering also turned out to be an adventure. She was hit full in the face by the rush of water when she got in, sending her staggering back while sputtering. It used to hit her in the chest, but not any more apparently. Once she adjusted the head, she absently rubbed her arms. She enjoyed the renewed strength she felt in her muscles as she felt definition lost from not being able to work out for long periods. Even so, she was so dramatically different physically that it felt like she was in a stranger’s body and she hurried to finish up.

Her towel was huge now, but that was actually kind of fun. Getting dressed to lounge about was another story however. Not one pair of sleep pants fit and she was swimming in all but her smallest shirts. It took digging around in boxes her old things to find something close and even then, it was still quite long.

“I guess I’ll have to order something before I can go out…” She glanced at the book and its sequels that she had dug out while eating. “Or I can figure out how this spell or whatever works and change myself back.”

Was that really what she wanted though? Had she not spent the better part of her adult life wishing to be this size again? Maybe the answer was something more complex. She flipped through Illusionist’s Game to where she had left off and fell into bed on top of her comforter.

Despite a bevy of hurdles, things were looking great for Mina and Kellen now that they were both knights. Which is of course when a new character entered the picture. Devlar was a half dwarf from the far away city of Agamar and he was visiting as an envoy of his mother, the Queen. Kellen and Mina were assigned as his protection, giving Mina a great deal of time with the visiting noble.

Devlar was likely the swarthy man on the front cover and his description was pretty close. Ava found it interesting that he kept his beard short as it was a departure from commonly heald ideas of Dwaves. It was a fact that characters in the novel found equally contentious, even disrespectful.

Despite that mark against him, he was every inch a prince raised in the world of honor that was Mountain Dwarf culture. He was utterly respectful to anyone, regardless of their status-so long as they earnestly tried their best and did not lie. When not at court, he was out in the town offering his skills. He worked in the forge. He worked making bricks. He even taught a class on Dwarven history.

Ava could not deny that she was falling for him as she began to look for signs that Mina was as well. She focused on every line, searching for developing feelings. As she realized what she was doing, she began to feel warm. Looking over the edge of the book, she could see her legs getting more defined. The shadow of stubble spread up her calves. A glance at her arms found equal growth both on the muscle and hair front. Was she bulking up in response to shipping Mina and Devlar? What was up with the hai-oh, right. Even if Delvar shaved, Female dwarves were just as hairy.

Curious about why the changes had happened, she flipped back through the last chapter and re-read. This time, she looked for signs of Mina and Kellen’s relationship advancing. In response, her body softened slightly, her stubble fading back to a fresh shave. She still felt strong, but in a different kind of way. Perhaps it was a feeling of finesse? As she pondered that distinction her heels slid over the blanket, her feet moving away from her as her legs lengthened slightly. She must have shrunk a bit more because of Devlar.

“It’s like I’ve become the lovechild of my ship. I wonder how far that goes…”

She re-read the chapter a few times, alternating her ship. Each time, her body morphed to carry the traits of both Mina and her partner. No two transformations were quite the same, but they all felt good. This was close to where she wanted to be in life and yet, she was curious. What else could happen?

She pulled out her tablet to read another story with characters she shipped. This one was a sci-fi affair, starring some bland space marine types. However, in the supporting cast was a human-alien couple she was a big fan of, especially since the alien came from a world heavily influenced by Aztec culture. As soon as she began to read a scene with them, her body responded as her tan skin tinged with a purple blush. After a couple more paragraphs, there was a tingling along the heel of her hand. Holding one up, she watched as an extra finger formed.

“Ah! This going to be so awesome!”

From there, she began to experiment with her newfound ability in earnest. Unable to sit still, she paced in her room as she flipped through stories with characters she loved. Unlike before though, reading them did not cause her to tingle or change. She remained purple and six fingered. “Perhaps it only works with characters I identify with?”

She read another scene with characters she liked, but was not personally invested in, and again nothing happened. That seemed to confirm her suspicions. Armed with that knowledge, she sifted through her favorites for traits she wanted to develop. Foremost, she wanted to get her height back. After scrolling for a moment, she opened a story about Fran and Balthier.

The fic was old and she had not read it in years, but as her gaze moved over the digital pages, she remembered just how much she identified with the amazingly talented, and very tall, sky pirate. There was a tingle in her feet that gave way to a stretching sensation, reshaping her toes into the paw-like digits of the graceful rabbit-like fencer. The stretching feeling rushed over her body, lengthening her limbs until she felt like she was the right height again. Enjoying being back in that world, she kept reading and what had once been mumbo jumbo about engineering slowly became comprehensible.

“That doesn’t make any sense,” she said, pondering this new development. “That’s learned information, not something inherited…”

Experimentally, she continued on with the story. A creeping itch ran up her scalp from her ears. Around her face, her dark hair bleached white. She tentatively reached up and found long ears covered in short, soft fur sprouting from the top of her head. She was not just gaining traits from Fran, she was becoming her.

Had the rules changed or had she not understood them? Either way, she had to get rid of the rabbit ears. In a panic, she switched to a story about girls in high school band. Scrolling through to the awkward confession of lesbian love, she felt the changes from the other story melt away. It was fascinating to watch her hair regain its color as if it had been dipped in ink.

She lingered on the story, wrestling with her own feelings about relationships. She still had not told anyone in her family she was not that keen on guys-at least recently. She still found them attractive, but was not quite into the idea of sex. It was a difficult concept to articulate.

Identifying strongly with the protagonist and her goal to be someone special, Ava’s fingertips began to tingle and the color drained out of them. Her curly hair relaxed, becoming a straighter veil. All of a sudden, she knew how to play the trumpet and speak Japanese, the knowledge crashing over her like a wave.