Stacked Against Short Odds

"Hey, where's the rest of the gang?" Roger asked. Standing in the kitchen of the small apartment were just Jeff, their forever-DM, and Audra, the only player in the group who was totally cool as far as Roger was concerned. "Couldn't make it on a Tuesday?"

"Just you and me, buttercup!" Audra smiled wickedly, shooting Roger a look through her thick cat-eye glasses that framed a slightly plump face adorned with ashy gray eye-shadow and soot-black lipstick. She brushed a lock of bleached-then-dyed gray hair behind one of her ears, set with enough stainless steel piercings to look like some sort of robotic snake had died and been fossilized in her lobe. Her thick skirt was made of black and grey plaid, and it hung heavily over chubby thighs that showed through her artfully ripped, black leggings before terminating just below the knee in tall, glossy boots. No bonus points awarded for guessing the boots' color.

The only bit of non-monochrome on her was the t-shirt she wore, though it was mostly black as well. On the chest was the drawing of a cartoon unicorn, blue in color, with weirdly human goth clothing and make-up (Roger found the idea of a horse with lipstick a little off, even for him). A bright, light violet cartoon unicorn stood behind the wizard-horse, decked in punk-like attire. The blue unicorn was giving off an arrogant smirk. Starting above and continuing below the pair of unicorn characters was some text reading "THE GREAT AND POWERFUL TRIXIE ASSURES YOU - IT'S NOT A PHASE!" Audra kept grinning, much like the gothy unicorn cartoon on her shirt, while drumming her coal-black nails on the countertop as Jeff fetched snacks and drinks out of the fridge.

In contrast to Audra's perpetually elaborate 'funerary punk witch fairy vampiress whatever' affectation, Jeff always dressed casually. Since he worked remotely, Roger wasn't even sure he owned a button-up shirt and tie.

He briefly pondered whether Audra kept her steel-studded body jewelry, collars, belts, and jackets on hanger hooks or if she had a bunch of magnets on her closet walls to stick them to. She didn't seem to be bothered by whatever ungodly dressing routine her fashion sense must cost her every day, but Roger preferred to keep it simple. For his part, Roger wore only black short, white sneakers, and a black hoodie to this unusual session. He usually changed out of his ridiculously annoying branded work uniform in the bathroom before clocking out because he wasn't about to ride the bus in purple slacks and a pink polo shirt emblazoned with the cell phone store's logo. Usually he wore nothing but the undershirt beneath his hoodie; less stuff to carry around in his messenger bag all day. The bag he was placing on the counter right now, symbolically leaving the workday behind. Even his haircut was simple; every other week he went over his head with the #4 guard on his trimmer, and he kept his face free of inconvenient whiskers with a (mostly) daily pass with a shaver. No muss, no fuss.

"Just us?" Roger asked, confused. Jeff had texted him to be ready with his new character sheet for the preliminary session of their next campaign. It was almost a month since their last campaign fizzled out; originally they had six players and Jeff DMing as always. Two players quit after a few sessions, then the party devolved into bickering and accusations more often than die rolls. It was a familiar pattern by now, sadly. For some reason Jeff just wasn't great at getting a group together. Not a single campaign so far had gone past level twelve, with the last few withering around level five. Roger, Jeff, and Audra were the only veterans of all six aborted attempts.

"Just us," the tall, lanky host confirmed as he placed some soft drinks on a tray already laden with starchy snacks. It was his apartment, but the group usually met at the comics shop and on Sunday mornings when it was open to tabletop groups to try and generate foot traffic and interest in gaming merch. "I figured we'd do a Session Zero this time around to try out your characters and see if we can build up a group with some staying power," Jeff explained.

"Sweet!" Roger exclaimed. It would be great to get a little game time in without all the bitchy whining and accusations stalling things. He could always rely on Audra to go along with him during play, she tended to laugh off everything. Not like the others who came and inevitably left, bringing their drama and hangups to the table. Roger played to turn off his brain and have fun, not try and write a fantasy novel or put some sort of frustrated Theater Kid energy to use. "Let's get started!" he said as he grabbed a soda from the tray.

"Okay," Jeff said after arranging a few pages of his notes behind the dungeon master's screen. "Let's start off with you, Rodge. It's a crossroads fifty miles from any other settlement. Mostly a trading post town. Places to stay, places to do business, no farming to speak of. Any long-term townsfolk are merchants, traders, or some sort of service economy types. You're walking through the common area of a tavern, looking for a table to rest for a bit and refuel. Describe your character, please."

Glancing at his character sheet, Roger took his first swig of soda. "Daria Darrowcleft is a she-Dwarf wh-"

"You owe me five bucks!" Audra cackled at Jeff, who was busy rolling his eyes.

"Wait, let him finish. Go ahead," Jeff urged.

"She's a Dwarf who has no beard, stands about four feet tall. Her clothing is unusually light and breezy for her kind, and she's armed only with a dagger she keeps in a sheath hidden from view under her skirt. Her legs are thick and strong, but her arms aren't as beefy as most Dwarves'. And she has a bust that hangs down to her navel," he added.

"God dammit Roger," Jeff said, his forehead sinking into his hand.

"Pay up! Five bucks!" Audra snickered with an outstretched hand. Jeff was digging around for his wallet.

"Hey, I have a type. So sue me!" Roger said defensively. "Anyway, Daria-" he was interrupted by a large, rumbling belch that seemed out of proportion to the amount of fizzy drink he'd just sipped. "Whoa, nice one eh?" he chuckled, smacking his lips. There was something off about the aftertaste, he thought. "Daria's short and stacked. You might call her a-"

"Shortstack," the other two said in unison, very familiar with the term by now. "Where did you say here tits were, again?" Audra asked with a smile.

"Down to here," Roger said, holding his hands down almost to his hips. "Big ol' Dwarf tiddies," he said, beaming.

"You know, this is a major reason nobody sticks around to finish a campaign," Jeff said as he handed a bill to the other player. "Didn't I ask you to tone it down a bit after the goblin? And before that it was a Halfling- no, TWO Haflings, both with ridiculous tits! And you always play them like they exist to be characters in your own private porno. It's a shared world, man! Everybody has to buy into it, not just you."

"C'mon, it's not that-" BUUUUUUUUUUURP "-ugh, 'scuse me. It's not that bad," Roger insisted, reaching for another gulp of soda. "I'm just having fun, ya know? I don't see Audra throwing a fit," he said. "Look, she's having a blast with these characters I do."

"I'm certainly going to have fun with this one," she replied, glancing to the side at Jeff who was looking resigned. "Keep going, what color is her hair? What's she wearing? I want the deets!"

Roger was mildly surprised at her enthusiasm. While she was normally really carefree about his character designs, now she was downright eager. "Uh, she's got.... brown hair? Down to here," he said, holding his hands about mid-chest. "And, like, brown eyes? I dunno, I hadn't thought that far ahead," he admitted.

"But you know all about her huge tits," Jeff accused. "And you're playing a four foot tall female Dwarf who happens to have no beard at all? Not even shaven, just none? That's not the lore, and you know it. This is all about your ..." he struggled to find a polite wording, "kink, Roger! It's not even subtle. Do you know how many new players have told me they had a problem with the way you play your fetishy women? It's every game, dude. Half a dozen female players and even a few of the guys we tried to bring onboard have just written tabletop games off completely because of you, and did you notice how fewer and fewer of our own friends wanted to join up for a campaign attempt? Dude, this is sick. I'm tired of you sabotaging all our games. It's got to stop."

He pulled a printout from one of his binders behind the screen and tossed it at Roger's side of the table. "Here's a character sheet for a female half-orc. Six-foot-six, average bust. Try playing that, just this once, I'm begging you! I even gave her unfair stats and a few homebrew bonus feats, she's completely broken as a character. Just stop doing what you're doing and go along with it for the next campaign, okay? Try her out right here, right now, in session zero. Please, Roger?"

"What's the big deal?" Roger asked, feeling like he'd just been railroaded by a prosecutor and the jury was ready to sentence him to The Chair for jaywalking. "It's just a-" another massive belch fought its way out before he could finish the sentence, leaving Roger surprised once more. "It's just a game. Just..." his eyes seemed to fog over for an instant before he regained composure. "Did you get a bad batch of soda? It doesn't have that fake sugar in it, does it?" he asked, examining the label. "It tastes kinda weird. Herb-y, or something. It... uh... tastes kinda weird. Tastes kinda weird." Without even thinking, he robotically took a few more gulps.

"It's, uh, the kind they bottle in Mexico. The kind that uses raw sugar," Jeff said, taking his turn to glance at Audra. For her part, she seemed enrapt with Roger. "Anyway, getting back to the game. You want to be this character? Fine. You're at an inn, it's crowded, you're a Dwarven female named Daria and you're looking for a table."

"Yeah, I'm... at an inn..." Roger repeated, his eyes slowly unfocusing. "Daria... Daria Darrowcleft... she... I'm..." he tried to focus on his surroundings. He was thirsty. Another sip of that bubbly soda might help.

It was Audra who urged him on. "Go on, 'Daria Darrowcleft.' Tell us all about yourself. What do others see when they look at you? What's your figure like beyond the boobs?" she said, resting her chin on both hands like a kid at story time.

"They see... uh... big... " Roger stammered, holding his hands out in front of his chest. "Big... boooooobaaaaaah..." he trailed off into a weak but prolonged belch that left him feeling dizzy, his heart pounding, hands and feet tingling a bit. But he immediately forgot about that, because-

She was Daria Darrowcleft, a Dwarven outcast, striding confidently through the crowd of larger but frailer folk in the smokey common area of the inn. Most of the tables were crowded with travelers from the same groups. She was looking for one that wasn't occupied.

There aren't any that are empty, but you spy one with only a single occupant. A tall figure, wearing what looks like a ceremonial headdress, sitting by themselves and taking gulps from a tankard. It seems like the only seat left in the place. You might as well try that one.

She might as well try that one table with only a single stranger. Her thick legs carried her over with surprising speed and grace. "This seat taken?" she asked curtly. The stranger...

The stranger is a tall female creature you've never seen before. She's clearly some sort of druid or enchanted being, possibly fae or fae-touched. She pulls back her hood, and you see that what you took for a headdress is actually a mismatched pair of growths jutting out from her head; one an antler of some sort, the other some kind of irregularly-shaped goat's horn growing straight back. Her hair is short and bone-white, her face a light brown color. Her jaundiced eyes have red pupils, and a single tusk-like fang hangs down from one corner of her mischievous mouth. She looks you up and down, taking in your short figure and generous curves approvingly. Then she says "Holy shit, is it working?"

"Shhhhh! Whisper or he'll hear you," Audra scolded Jeff in hushed tones while tugging on his arm to draw his attention away from Roger's face. Their inert companion's eyes didn't follow the DM. "When you speak loud and clear it sinks into him and he internalizes it. Whisper and it goes below his radar.

"But h-" he started before Audra clapped a heavily ringed set of fingers over his mouth and mimed silence again. Jeff steadied himself and glanced over at Roger, who sat with a thousand-yard stare and hadn't blinked for the last minute or two. "Is he under?" Jeff asked, quietly, once Audra removed her hand from his face.

"He has to drink the whole thing or it'll stop working too soon. Let me RP my character, okay? Stick to the script we worked out," she whispered into Jeff's ear. "Start again with the 'then she says' stuff, okay?" She got up from her seat by Jeff and crept over to Roger's subtly moving form.

"Ahem, then she says..." Jeff said in a loud tone before handing it off to Audra.

"Holy shit, this booze must be working!" Audra said, rescuing Jeff's botched lines in-character as the stranger at the table.

"Excuse me?" Daria asked, confused by the lanky being at the otherwise empty table.

"Holy shit, this booze must be working!" the creature said in a surprisingly normal, human female voice. "I'm already seeing double. Why don't the two of you sit down, and your Dwarven mount too?" she added with a chuckle, sliding a chair out to Daria.

You realize it's her crass way of flirting with you.

It took the Dwarf a moment to catch on. She wasn't used to women playfully flirting with her over her well-developed bust; usually she got their envious scorn instead. Maybe this would be a fun one. She climbed up into the offered chair and made a show of hefting her enormous bust onto the table with a heavy impact, maintaining eye contact with the she-creature across from her. "Thanks. Didn't catch your name?"

"Eris," the being said with a smile that displayed her singular fang as well as her confident manner. She turned to the nearest serving girl. "Wench, another drink for my friend here!" Turning back to her new companion, "I've heard you Dwarfy ones can really put 'em away. Is that true?"

"Aye, lady," Daria said, squaring her shoulders up a bit with Dwarfish pride. "There's no swill brewed yet that a Dwarf can't swallow, and by the barrel!" So it seemed her new 'friend' was going to try and get her drunk, possibly for fun purposes and possibly for larcenous ones. Well, either way she was up to the task. "You lay down the coin and I'll put 'em away 'til you're pauperized."

"Oh that won't be necessary, just a demonstration, if you don't mind," the suspicious femme said with a smirk. "Here, try the small one first and I'll buy you a pint next."

Daria looked down to her hand, which had a half-sized drinking cup full of frothy ale. "Is this an insult?" she asked. "I may not be whatcha call 'vertically endowed' but I'm not some featherweight!" she said indignantly. Bringing the cup to her lips, she took a deep breath and threw it back down her open throat. She then let out her breathe in a quick puff, which was soon followed by a very Dwarfish belch of satisfaction. "Got that pint ready for me yet?" she asked.

Jeff quietly opened another of the sodas and handed it to Audra, who replaced the empty bottle in Roger's hand with the new one. Unbeknownst to the young man with the vacant stare, this bottle was marked with a 2 written in Sharpie.

"Nice," Audra said in her character's voice...

"Nice," the stranger said. "Go ahead and down the next one, then we'll see if my coin lasts longer than your sobriety."

Daria looks down to see that there was already another stein in her stubby hand.

She blinked, not recalling the serving wench being back to refill her.

It looks and smells exactly like booze, and there's no off-colors or tell-tale signs of tampering. You're sure it's safe.

Oh well, booze is booze. If this woman-sounding thing at the table thought she could soften Daria Darrowcleft with mere alcohol, she had another think coming. "Bottom's up!" Daria said, raising her stein in a one-sided toast before chugging its contents without pause. She finished the foamy brew off with another prolonged, reverberating burp. That one tasted a little different, she thought. "Care to join me and make it interesting?" she asked the stranger who was paying for her drinks.

"Maybe later," Eris said with a captivating smile. "Tell me about yourself while we wait for the next drink to arrive, miss...?"

"Daria," she said, setting the drinking vessel where it would be seen and refilled. "Daria Darrowcleft. Is there a last name to go with 'Eris' then?"

"No," her tablemate said. "Just Eris. Anyway, I've noticed you're not quite like the other Dwarfish folk I've seen. In fact, I'd say you really stand out," she said, bringing her hands up to mime a gigantic set of breasts. Daria noted with some interest that one of her hands had a scaly appearance, and the other seemed like a thick and fuzzy glove.

Daria, your looks are an asset you've relied on countless times. You have no body image issues; if anything, you like your own looks a little TOO much. But who could blame you, you think. Your combination of curves and disarming height has served you well to get you out of a jam, or into a warm bed for the night, or to grease some lips when you needed information. You've come to consider your looks, and especially your outsized bust, to be one of your better gifts. And you know full well you enjoy their usage as much as your chosen marks do.

"Ah yeah, the girls 'ere!" she said, cradling the sides of her heavy bosom casually. "They do come in handy when I need room 'n board and don't have the coin for it," she said with a knowing wink. "Worth their weight in gold by now, I reckon."

"Mmmm, that's a lot of gold," Eris acknowledged. "You really do love to show those off, then. No qualms at all about using your figure to get your way."

"I suppose I do," Daria said. "What can I say? Layin's fun AND useful, ain't it?"

"Just the men?" Eris asked. "You strike me as the type who wouldn't turn down a night of fun, male or female. Yes, that's you for sure, right?"

"Anything with a pulse," Daria said, almost boastfully. "Why be picky?"

"My, what a broad appetite! So is that why you're striking out on your own? A little too ... libertine for buttoned-up Dwarfish society?"

"That's about the size of it," Daria agreed, stroking one of her outsized breasts absentmindedly. This Eris girl really seemed to have her number.

"Audra! It's really happening!" Jeff hissed under his breath. He was watching the two 'players' talk about Roger's character, Audra attentive and alert while Roger was completely spaced out and monotonic as he sat motionless. Well, not QUITE motionless. He seemed to be... sinking. And something was pushing forward beneath his pullover hoodie, as if his chest puffed out with each steady breath but forgot to retreat on exhaling, then advanced again on the next one. The goth woman winked at Jeff knowingly, then continued to ply details through her character.

"And no beard, why, your face is as smooth as a baby's bottom! In fact, I bet you're rather smooth all over; you seem to have missed all that glorious Dwarven body hair," Eris remarked.

"Yeah, I never did fit in with the hairy lot," Daria agreed, rubbing her chin thoughtfully. She seemed to recall her complete lack of body hair being a point of some contention, but her memory felt slippery. "Kinda... un-Dwarven-like, y'know?"

"And your arms," Eris pointed out. "Even Dwarf ladies tend to be pretty beefy, but yours are quite slender in comparison, nicely proportioned to the rest of your body. I'm sure they're strong despite their adorable size," she said.

"Eh... kinda..." Daria struggled to think of something to say.

"I bet that helps when you want to seduce someone who isn't a Dwarf," Eris suggested.

"Exactly!" Daria said with a finger-snap. "Frailer folk prefer delicacy in their females. At least in some spots," she said.

"Not those nice, thick thighs, though! So smooth and round and shapely, they must be a lot of fun to show off. What your legs lack in length, they more than make up for with eye appeal," Eris stated. "Especially with that pronounced thigh gap! Giving onlookers a tease of your cushy, firm backside and all that."

As always, Eris had a knack for the obvious. Everything she said had been true. You often use your sex appeal to your own advantage, but your legs were also made for moving in a hurry when need be. You're proud of them for more than just their effect on thirsty bards. The fact that they turned heads was more of a bonus, really, but one you're quite fond of having.

"Too true, girl," Daria said. She was quite proud of her strong legs and how her hips and butt were well padded but not at all fat. Firm, impeccably contoured muscle throughout.

"And no beard could compare with that pretty, chestnut hair of yours," Eris observed. "Why, it hangs down so smooth and trouble-free past your shoulders to frame those great tits! You must be one of the lucky girls who never has to mess with her hair at all."

"What can I say?" Daria demurred. "Good genes."

"What can... I ... say?" Roger said softly, his voice cracking unevenly as the register of his speech went up slowly. "Good... genes..."

"He's so short," Jeff said, nearly forgetting to whisper as Roger kept changing gradually before his eyes. The still, sitting form of the enchanted ... person across from him at the table still hadn't blinked. Roger just limply repeated things Audra said into his... her? ear about the character. With his feet no longer reaching the floor, Roger had already lost a foot in total height, but gained a lot up front. And now his shorts were creaking as the flesh within them slowly grew in girth even as it shed length. Unlike his hair, which was piling up on his shoulders in soft, brown curtains. Audra was brushing locks of it out of Roger's inanimate face as she kept prompting him in-character. Well, 'him' in maybe the loosest sense. At this point the person in the chair definitely looked more woman than man. Even Roger's 5-o-clock shadow had vanished, leaving his face and neck perfectly smooth.

"You're really going to keep going?" Jeff asked, nervously. He was having second thoughts about this now that he was watching it happen, and how small Roger looked... other than the obvious things in front, which would've been huge even on real women by this point. Roger's penchant for unnaturally short women always weirded him out, and he was approaching that limit right before their eyes.

"We're almost there," Audra whispered confidently after telling Roger about Daria's wonderful hair. "He's the one that likes 'em short, remember? Anyway, you're going to love the little twist I'm adding."

"Wait, we didn't discuss a twist," Jeff objected in a sharp hiss. Audra once again motioned for him to hush, pulling a phone from her purse and unlocked the screen before returning her attention to their entranced quarry, waiting blankly for the narrative to proceed.

"Just keep reading the lines, dungeon master," Audra said quietly.

Not wanting to find out what happened if they stopped the process now, Jeff sighed as though his party had just decided to fight the town guards instead of ask for directions. Returning to the agreed-upon narration, he cleared his voice and began speaking aloud again. Roger sat, breathing and slowly morphing but otherwise completely unmoving.

"Daria, you've downed two drinks and haven't even gotten a buzz yet..." he recited.

Daria, you've downed two drinks and haven't even gotten a buzz yet. You're not sure if this stranger is up to something, but you're confident you can handle whatever it is. You're relaxed, easy-going, and feel secure. If she tries anything, you know you can handle yourself.

"You know," Eris said as she leaned in closer. "This town is a trading post, everything we're enjoying here was grown somewhere else and shipped through. The inn takes a share of the cargo as payment in lieu of coinage. I happen to know they stock an Elvish drink here called Posey Pale. It's very smooth, deceptively light, but it packs a real punch. I bet that would knock even a short, stacked little veteran booze-killer like yourself off your feet. Up for a pint of it?"

So that was her move, eh? Try to soften Daria up with booze, then move on to a different drink with a kind of poison in it after her senses were supposedly dulled. Foolish creature. Dwarven livers not only processed vast quantities of booze without breaking a sweat, they also held up against almost any poison invented. If this 'Eris' thought she'd have Daria at a disadvantage, well, that could be played to her advantage.

Daria didn't wait for her companion to order the drink for her. "A pint of your Posey Pale!" she declared, raising her stein for attention.

You see them pour the drink, but you also see that the server nods to Eris quietly before leaving the table. You decide there's no danger here, you can handle whatever she's planning.

A portly serving woman reached for something behind the bar. She brought a glazed clay jug over to their table and uncorked it. Floral notes drifted outwards before fading into the smokey atmosphere of the inn as the server filled Daria's stein with half the jug's contents before corking it again. As she turned to leave, she gave Eris a clandestine nod. Daria smirked behind the rim of her stein. This was the moment. She'd have to pretend to fall under the influence of some drug and be incapacitated or something to lull Eris into a false sense of security, then wait for an opening. With her nose full of the flowery Elvish drought's springtime essence, she chugged down the drink as though she didn't suspect a thing. Eris was right, it was very smooth and light-tasting compared to the ale she'd been guzzling to that point. Definitely something an Elf would make.

"You know," Eris began once Daria had killed her drink and clanked the stein's foot on the tabletop. "What caught my ear about that drink was the name: Posey Pale. I used to have a few ponies, my favorites were a pair of sisters. Posey and Fluttershy. Posey was temperamental, wandered off one day. Guess she thought being a beast of burden was beneath her dignity. But Fluttershy stayed behind and really earned her position as my little pony. She was the sweetest, cutest, most adorable little mare ever. Always obedient, always well-mannered, a very mild and lady-like little gal, not a single bone of contention in her entire body. Just the most obliging, submissive girl you could ask for. Let me show her to you; look down at my hands as I make this illusion. Study it, memorize it."

She holds out her paw-like right hand and as you watch, a glowing image of the pony came into view. You see the creature's image in front of your eyes.

It must have been some fae breed. The coat was a bright, daffodil yellow and the mane and tail were carnation pink, whereas the eyes had a greenish-blue hue and seemed inordinately shiny and round. There was some kind of brand or marking on her hind thigh... three pink butterflies that seemed to be growing into a pattern on her coat. But what really caught Daria Darrowcleft's eyes were the small, folded, canary-yellow wings the diminutive creature held close to her sides. A pegasus! Rare and magical indeed. What business did this barely-humanoid creature have with a pegasus?

"Her sister was not so sweet and accommodating. She was independent-minded and irritable. Had a short fuse and was quick to anger when things didn't go her way. She was stubborn and cantankerous at times, really insistent on being her own boss rather than letting others tell her what to do. And she was a pony relegated to the Earth, for she lacked any wings, unlike her sister. Otherwise she was quite similar in appearance to my dear, sweet Fluttershy. See how similar they are?"

As you gaze into the image, you see it shift with the motion of her fingers. Now you see Posey the pony. She looks almost identical, though the lack of wings is an obvious distinction.

Daria's eyes fixed onto the illusion, scrutinizing it to find the differences among the similarities. The mane was styled differently, the pony's attitude displayed a less demure mood, and there was something different about the markings on her thigh. But the two were very similar in appearance otherwise.

"See them both?" Eris asked.

"Yeah, what kind of horses are they?" Daria asked as the illusion dimmed and Eris withdrew her thick, padded, fuzzy hand.

But your companion doesn't answer the question. Instead, her scaly talon-hand brings something up into view. It is a single die, one of those triangular-faced types popular with academics rather than the simple, square deals used by your typical gambler. It seems to be carved out of a type of stone that glistens in the dim light of the inn, showing rainbow iridescence. Opal, maybe, but with the sparkle of a polished diamond.

"Roll this," she said.

Her words drew your glance away from the open hand for just a moment. You look down again and see that her bird-like claw is empty. You blink, confused. Another illusion? Just as you start to lean back suspiciously, you feel something is in your palm. You open up your right hand and find the strange object you hold is the gaming die, somehow apparated into your grip without your knowledge. Now that it's in your hand, you think, any way you put it down will probably count as a roll.

"What's this, then?" Daria demanded angrily.

"What...s...thissssssss....thennnnnnn....?" the absolutely tiny woman slurred out slowly in a painfully cute and girly voice, despite its complete lack of emotional color.

Jeff's discomfort was palpable now that the transformation was finished. Before him sat, in a trance, a woman who couldn't be more than four feet tall. Her arms and legs where small but proportionately thick, her face was adorable and well-shaped, her brown eyes staring out blankly from the newly-grown locks of silky brown hair that hung down beside... those things.

Even though Roger always played females with huge tits and described them in detail at every opportunity (much to the other players' discomfort and annoyance), actually seeing what he'd been talking about in real life was something wholly else. Jeff had never been able to imagine their sheer dimensions like he was seeing them now. As stocky and compact as this woman's body was, the disproportionate share of her weight had to be dedicated to those round masses of fat which filled Roger's tortured hoodie. They were so vast they completely filled the distance between the woman's small chest and the edge of the table, pressing up against the rim. They must be resting on top of those thick, stubby thighs all the way out to the knees, he realized.

There was nothing of Roger's looks left, and the voice was totally different. If he hadn't experienced the continuity of the transition first-hand, Jeff would have thought the average-looking guy from before had left the table and some complete stranger wandered in and stole his spot in the interim. The combination of impossibly huge breasts, wide curves on the bottom half, and the miniature stature gave a positively obscene effect that he didn't like. Aside from the child-like height that would put so many things out of reach, the bulky bust must be absolutely debilitating to live with. Just getting through the day in a world designed for average people would be a challenge, he could tell. And any average-sized person would seem like an absolute giant to her.

He had no idea how Roger could obsess over this kind of figure, and sympathized with the former players who had left their group over it. It was just disquieting. Jeff felt relief that he'd never understand this fetish; the undertones of it seemed inherently cruel.

Audra, at least, didn't seem phased at all. While Jeff experienced his mix of revulsion and empathy, she continued the roleplay in-character without missing a beat. It helped Jeff steel his resolve to play through to the end and give Roger a taste of his own medicine. Having cleared the dialogue Audra added about the horses, they'd almost reached the conclusion of the narration he and she prepared ahead of time. But as he scanned ahead he saw that she'd added more lines before printing the pages out. This must be that 'twist' she was talking about. Sighing under his breath with apprehension, he continued to read the script out loud for the person that used to be Roger.

"The figure of Eris leans in closer, her strangely-colored eyes holding your attention... perhaps against your will. She says to you..."

The figure of Eris leans in closer, her strangely-colored eyes holding your attention... perhaps against your will. She says to you what the roll of the die determines about your fate.

"It's simple. Roll a 20, and you go back to being the original you. Roll between 17 and 19, you stay Daria Darrowcleft-"

"What do you mean?" the beardless Dwarf woman asked with growing alarm.

"That 'Posey Pale' you quaffed was laced with a potion of True Polymorph, and now we see what you poly-morph into, my lovely little plaything!" Eris announced with her most wicked grin yet. "There's no use refusing to play along, the only way out now is through. Care to hear what the other results could be?" she asked, drumming her mismatched claws on the table eagerly.

You were about to draw the hidden dagger, but something inside you resists. Perhaps it's your better judgment. You've clearly underestimated this being, and now she has you trapped. The potion is already inside your body. If you don't play along, she'll likely impose something truly horrifying on you. Violence will clearly not solve this problem to your liking now. You decide to hear her out, so you'll at least know your odds.

"... go on with it, then!" Daria said, not bothering to conceal the contempt in her voice. She gripped the evil die tightly in her hand to avoid any further mistakes.

"As I said, a 20 will turn you back completely, while a 17, 18, or 19 will let you stay who you are now," Eris repeated.

"What do you mean 'back completely'? Back to what?" Daria asked.

"Never you mind. Anyway, rolling between 6 and 16 will give me a cute new Fluttershy, whereas a 2-5 will let you walk away as my dear, departed Posey."

"And a 1?" Daria asked with trepidation.

"Roll a 1, and you won't mind the outcome. You won't mind anything at all, ever again," she replied with menacing vagueness.

"Death is on the line, is it?" Daria asked, sweat beading coldly on her brow.

"Not at all," Eris countered. "I didn't say you'd die. I'm not that kind of creature, you know. Death makes everything sooooo boring!" Daria could read between the lines. If a 1 wasn't death, then it had to be some sort of fate that Eris would enjoy but that Daria herself would consider to be even worse.

You look around at the other patrons, wondering if help could be at hand. But at some point when you weren't paying attention, everything else at the inn seemed to have stopped in place. The other patrons and their servers were all painted statues, motionless, balanced in mid-stride or mid-drink. Even the fire has petrified into a solid sculpture of glowing tongues, no crackling possible, a couple of embers stopped in their arc through the air like fireflies resting on clear window glass. The river of time seemed to have frozen solid for everyone except the pair of you. No help is coming, and you get the sense that this creature had all the patience required to wait you out. Your path is clear, and this certainty helps to uncloud your mind. You consider the stakes coldly and with the calculation of an experienced gambler now, instead of the panic in a waylaid victim.

So Daria composed herself and reviewed the odds. A one-in-twenty chance of 'changing back,' whatever that meant, and an equal chance of whatever horrible fate this loathsome creature could cook up. The two outcomes about being polymorphed into one of the yellow ponies occupied the largest share of the odds, and they were weighted towards this 'Fluttershy' the being seemed infatuated with. Tallying in her head, she put the chances of getting one of those outcomes at 3-in-4. Only a three-in-twenty chance of staying as she was.

"Okay, real talk," Jeff whispered into the steel-clad ear of the gray-haired woman who was enjoying this far too much for his liking. He'd left his familiar, comforting DM screen behind to pull her aside and discuss what was going on. "You're not actually going to turn Roger into a horse, right?"

"Of course not, don't be silly," Audra grinned with a glint in her eye. "You can't turn a person into a horse."

"Yeah well I didn't think you could turn Roger into one of his sick fantasies, either," Jeff whisper harshly, turning to indicate the tiny woman who was nearly 33% breast by volume that sat motionless at his table, feet dangling off the ground in his chair. Roger's black cargo shorts, thought they were straining at the seams around the hips and thighs, hung wide open halfway down her calves, and Roger's shoes were clearly too big and at risk of sliding right off whatever tiny feet were in them.

"Then why did you go along with this?" Audra asked.

"I thought this was just going to be, like, a hypnosis thing. You know? Just kinda... put him under, have him live out a hallucination, then bring him out of it and hope he learned something." Jeff didn't believe Audra when she said the one-two combination of hypnotic potion and that other one (he forgot what Audra called it, so he just referred to it as 'potion of polymorph' internally) would literally, physically turn Roger into that thing at the table. He assumed she was just being overly figurative. This was already beyond what he'd prepared himself for, and he wasn't sure he could condone any more of it. When he scanned ahead on the script, reading the different outcomes of this die roll, he started to get cold feet. That's when he pulled Audra aside to make sure they were on the same page.

"Jeffery Denver McConnell," Audra said, invoking his full name while putting one hand on his shoulder and raising the other to adjust her cat-eye glasses. "You're getting too worked-up." She lifted the heavy, black plastic frames of her eye-wear. The lenses caught some source of light and flashed his eyes brightly momentarily. "Don't worry about it, just go with the flow," she said through the dazzling glare. He winced from the piercing brightness, not realizing that all the other tension had left his body. "Roger deserves what he's getting. It's really the only way."

"You're right," he said after taking a deep breath and blinking away the after-image from her (probably inadvertent) blinding flare. "I guess I am getting too hung up on this. We did ... we did agree on it, after all," he said, rationalizing his change of attitude. "If this is what it takes to keep Roger in line going forward, I guess I can't complain too much."

Their discussion was interrupted by the sound of plastic clattering on the table. Jeff looked back to see that Roger had just rolled the die Audra handed him earlier.