A Bug in the Spell
The image infected my mind and lingered there all afternoon like a pebble stuck not in my shoe but in the actual flesh of my heel. At the dining hall during dinner I stared straight ahead, unfocused on my friends' conversation. After they returned to their dorms I was left sitting there alone for a while, and the idea came to me then, the design for the perfect weapon, and how to make it.
I went to the workshop and clicked on my desk lamp, flipped through my old schematics. No one else was around that late so I had the whole shop to myself.
My design fused two devices we'd made for previous assignments that year. One was a get-ready button, which when pressed either dressed us up in formal attire or stripped us nude, depending on our intent when pressing the button. Presenting that in class was a brutal test of our confidence in our wiring. I fetched my button from the shelf and pried the top off to inspect the circuitry inside. The button closed a circuit to either the dressing stone or undressing stone, activating their respective spells. Both stones were removable.
The other device I needed was a small granite ball that enforced the rules of tag--once you were tagged by the ball and became it, you lost the ability to speak until you tagged someone new, someone who hadn't been tagged yet. This went on until someone tagged a plant or another speechless life form and discarded the ball. I fetched mine from the cabinet behind our instructor's desk and laid out my devices and tools on my workbench. I pinched the undressing stone out of the get-ready clicker and chiseled gangue off the tag ball until it separated into its constituent gems. With my wand, spell textbooks, and a lot of coffee, I set to work through the night.
By morning, I'd combined the two: the new tag ball would, in addition to muting its target, strip them naked.
That Friday we were supposed to present our latest assignment in the auditorium. I waited for Serena to walk in so I could sit near her, hiding around a corner so she wouldn't notice. Emmet stopped by and gave her a kiss on the check, wished her luck. I endured this. When she walked in, I followed close behind and snagged the seat to her left.
I knew Serena because everyone knew Serena, but she had no reason to know me unless Emmett had told her. He never posted any photos of us online, and to the extent logistically feasible he quarantined our relationship to just short-notice visits in the night. So when I sat down beside her it didn't even register.
The first part of my plan was delicate. I had to activate the ball by tagging myself, then tag her. And to ensure she could not tag someone else, I had to sprint away with the ball as soon as she became it. Failure in any of these crucial steps would be high-cost.
I presented before her, thankfully. My levitating paperweight worked to spec, and once our instructor was convinced of that I returned to my seat. In spell casting and wiring I rarely erred.
Later they read Serena's name from the roster, and I made my move just as she rose from her seat. First, I tagged myself with the ball to activate it, and at that point I was a little confused as to why I was still wearing my clothes, but I was in act-fast mode and didn't pause to consider the implications. Then I tagged her. The ball made the water-drop sound it makes when it establishes a new it, but Serena was still fully dressed.
When I felt the cold metal of my seat against my bare skin, a tremor of horror moved through me. Serena looked down at me with a vicious smirk, and I knew I was naked in more ways than one. She was grad student working on genetic spells, gamete modification--big-brain stuff--so she understood the bug in my device instantly. I began to say, "I--," but I couldn't. I had crossed the wires. Instead of muting the new it and making the it's clothes vanish, it imposed these effects on the person who tagged--me.
Serena leaned into my space, one hand on the back of my chair and the other on my desk. "Emmett told me about you," she said, her eyes crawling down my body, "I suppose you'll want my help undoing that. Come with me to my dorm after class and we can talk terms."
I unfolded the auditorium desk to cover my lap and hunched over, tried to be small, but our classmates noticed me, stared. A boy behind me offered his jacket, but it didn't work with the spell in effect. As soon as I slid my arms into it, it vanished.
On the walk to Serena's dorm I tried to stay behind her but she kept weaving her path left and right, I think on purpose. "You have nothing to be embarrassed of, Mai. If I were you I'd walk in front with my arms at my sides."
I did not care for her opinion.
Inside she asked me for the tag ball. "It's me who has to tag someone with it to free you, right? Hand it over."
I did, but instead of indicating any intent to help, she ran straight to her room and I heard the sounds of a safe gear turning, a heavy metal door opening and then shutting again. I did not know how to untangle the spell without that rock. Even if I had to beg an instructor to undo it for me, they'd need to see the spells on the ball to devise a reversal. Handing the ball to her was like chaining myself in a shock collar and handing her the remote. I had become defenseless, subject to the whims of the very person I wanted to torment.
"Now look here," she said from down the hall, hurrying back from her room. "I'm not the one you should be upset at, am I? It's Emmett that mistreated you. I'm just the girl he wanted next."
She waited for me to nod. I didn't move my head, kept a vacant look on my face.
"Anyway, we can work something out. I sort of don't like him either. The way he bragged about how you'd come over any time of night, thirsty and willing to degrade yourself for him even when he refused to pleasure you, it rubbed me the wrong way. Bit rude, you know? Bit oblivious.
"So here's my proposal. It's painful for you too, sorry, but you know, everything you're feeling right now is something you were trying to make me feel so I think it's fair. My proposal is a trade: I'll trick Emmett into tagging someone--me and a friend can pull that off even with the bug your spell. All I ask in return is that you go out and get a teaspoon of Emmett's come. It would help me with my research. Lots of regulations and red tape involved in acquiring that. I could ask him myself of course, but I've got to make you regret. Do whatever you've got to do. Just bring it here--and it better be his.""
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