Variations Three (2 page)

"Oh, you’re a clever one, you are!" the
little woman had said, playfully slapping Brandi’s wrist. "That’s
what we like to see. It’s so much easier, you know darling, to make
a smart girl pretty than it is to make a silly girl smart."

"We’re going to win," Brandi murmured,
half-asleep.

"That’s right, darling," Trish said,
slipping the glass from between the girl’s slack fingers. "We
always win."

* * *

"THIS MAY STING a bit," the nurse said
pleasantly.

Brandi didn’t answer. Trish had woken her at
dawn, hustled her into a robe and turned her over to a hefty young
woman whose name, according to the tag on her shirt, was Susan.

Susan had ignored Brandi’s request for
breakfast, taking her instead to the "back of the house," where she
had been poked, prodded and examined by at least a dozen white
coats. When she’d protested that she’d had a thorough physical as
part of the pre-contractual, and that Trish had the file, she’d
been variously soothed and ignored. When she demanded an
explanation of Susan, that stoic individual had lifted her
shoulders and let them fall, heavily.

The nurse finished swabbing her ankle, broke
the seal on the needle and made the injection. Brandi barely felt
the prick; or the second one, delivered a moment later in the other
ankle.

"There now," said the nurse happily. "The
techs will be here in just a minute and we’ll get started on your
make over." She patted Brandi’s hand and smiled. "Feet to
head-top," she burbled; "a brand-new you." Carefully, she tucked
Brandi’s unruly hair back under the blue paper cap. "You’re a lucky
girl. Veela and Jeffrey are very, very good. They did my own make
over, you know--and Suzie’s. Didn’t they, Suzie?"

Susan shook her massive head from side to
side. "You talk too much, Millie."

"Oh, pooh," said the nurse. "The problem
with you techs is that you want to treat all the make overs like
they were lab mice--as if they couldn’t understand what was said to
them. There’s no harm in helping the poor young lady feel a little
comfortable, is there? In letting her know that there are others
who understand--who’ve experienced what she’s about to experience?"
She finished fiddling with the cap and patted Brandi’s hand again.
"Don’t you worry a bit. We’ve all been through it, here. We all
understand. There are some scary parts, but it’s worth it in the
end. Even Suzie will admit that."

"Yes," Susan said, glancing down at her
broad hands. "It was worth it."

"See?" The nurse said brightly. "Don’t you
let Suzie intimidate you. She’s just an old softy." One last pat
and she was gone, slipping out the swinging door, which immediately
swung back, admitting two more in the seemingly endless parade of
white coats. The smaller of the two walked over to the wall
monitors. The taller came to the head of the gurney.

"Good morning, Brandi. I’m Veela,
ImageMakers’ team leader. We’re going to be starting your make over
in just a few moments. In your case, we’ve decided on a progressive
zonal approach," she smiled, coolly; "which just means that we’ll
be working from your feet up. Today, we anticipate completing
infrastructure alterations in both feet and ankles. Tomorrow, we’ll
do your legs. Then you’ll have a rest day before we work on your
hips."

"A rest day?" Brandi asked. "Why should I be
tired? The nano does the alteration, right?" She blinked up at the
tall tech, suddenly wary. "You’re not going to cut me, are
you?"

"Certainly not!" snapped Veela, then smiled
again, and reached out cool fingers to touch Brandi’s hand. "I beg
your pardon. ImageMakers is state-of-the-art, nano-alterations
only. We are not a hack shop, like some I could name. No. The
reason we recommend a rest day is that the amount of infrastructure
reorganization required in length manipulation, especially in the
legs, tends to be rather exacting." She laughed, a brittle little
"ha," slightly off-key. "You could say that the rest day is more
for the techs than for the patient."

"Oh," said Brandi. "I see."

"Good," said Veela. "Any other questions?
Then here’s Jeffrey with your breakfast. Please drink it all, and
then just relax and let us do the worrying." She half-turned;
glanced back.

"I should mention that Jeffrey and I have
done this many, many times. As a team we have done one hundred and
fifty-five make overs. Before I joined ImageMakers, I was a
reconstructive therapist at Boston University Hospital. Jeffrey has
been associated with the Bronx Zoo Reclamation Project and the
Philadelphia School of Cosmetology." She smiled. "So you can see,
you’re in very good hands."

"Very good hands," repeated Jeffrey,
appearing at her other side holding a tall glass full of a pinkish
foamy something vaguely reminiscent of strawberry milkshake. He
grinned, showing perfectly even teeth. "Time for your ’shake. Help
her sit up, Suzie."

A strong arm slid under Brandi’s shoulders,
propping her up. She took the glass with a shy "Thanks," and drank
it down.

It tasted slightly chalky under the
strawberry. Brandi handed the glass back and Jeffrey saluted. "All
right! This one’s a trouper, Suzie. Lay her down gentle. You all
comfy now, Miss Schenk?"

Through a strawberry-fuzzy fog Brandi tried
to smile. "I’m fine."

"That’s great," he said, from far, far away.
"I’m going to take your glasses off, so we don’t break them by
accident--Veela’s a clumsy somebody. And then we’re going to get
busy giving you the most beautiful toes you’ve--"

Click.

* * *

THEY HADN’T TOLD her that it would hurt.
They hadn’t said painkillers slowed the work of the nano, or that
the organics kept working long after the techs had called it a day.
The techs, said Suzie, made the pattern and set it in place. The
organics followed the pattern, and made it real.

Brandi twisted in the bed, her feet locked
into the cureboxes. Her favorite space opera was on the vid, and
she tried hard to pay attention. But the pain kept gnawing at her
feet, chewing at her ankles; and she finally gave up, buried her
head in the pillow and cried.

Trish came in as the tears spent themselves,
gave her ice water to drink and coaxed her to swallow some
soup.

"It hurts," moaned Brandi and Trish looked
stern.

"I thought you wanted to be beautiful," she
said. "Really, darling, for a smart girl you can be amazingly
stupid! Did you think we were just going to cover up the bad parts
with paint?" She stood and shook out the skirt of her robe. "This
is the real thing, darling. No pain, no gain." And she left.

Brandi cried again, weakly. The gnawing hit
a crescendo, then blessedly slid off into a kind of constant cramp.
In the relative peace, she fell asleep.

* * *

"IT HURT!" she screamed at Veela next
morning.

"Really?" the tall tech asked, and shook her
head. "But it doesn’t hurt now, does it?"

"No-o." Brandi admitted.

"Good," said Veela, and motioned to Jeffrey,
who appeared with a glass, this one filled with blue foam.

"Beautiful toes," he said, coming close.
"Prop her up, Suzie. OK, now, Miss Schenk, you know the drill. This
one’s going to hurt, too--you know that by now, eh? ’Course it is.
Makes sense that it will. But the key is to hold the AfterImage in
the front brain. You’re going to be able to ride the pain out, Miss
Schenk, because in just under ten days now you’re going to be
standing in front of a full-length mirror looking at the New You!
That’s what’s going to make it all worthwhile. And all this stuff
you’re going through now? Well, that’s just going to fall right out
of your consciousness, just like they say happens to a new mother
at the sight of her--"

Click.

* * *

HER LEGS BURNED, melted--and stretched.

Brandi clawed at the covers, part of, then
apart from the agony. She thought her mother came in and hung,
frowning, over her.

"All this fuss. So what if you ain’t a
beauty? You’re a smart girl, a nice girl. You got pretty eyes. You
need to find some nice young man, somebody who’s got the sense to
see the real you. Who’s got the sense to value a nice girl with
brains..."

"Ma?" Brandi, twisted, cureboxes pinning her
to the bed. "It doesn’t work that way, Ma. Being smart isn’t
enough. Money. You’ve got to have money, if you want to go to
Harvard..."

"Grand prize is $850,000 cash," Trish said
briskly, rustling papers in her suite at the New Lord Baltimore
Hotel. "Then there are the ancillaries: a full four-year
scholarship to the college or university of your choice--if they
accept you, of course, darling--a luxury ground-car; several
wardrobes; guaranteed modeling contracts--that’s the best case
scenario." She pinned Brandi with her bright raptor’s eyes.

"Unfortunately, the odds of taking the big
prize are not favorable. Lesser prizes include smaller amounts of
cash, clothes, modeling contracts. Not enough, frankly, darling, to
make this kind of major undertaking profitable for the
Syndicate.

"ImageMakers has been in business for quite
some time. Two of our Images have taken the top prize in Atlantic
City, and we have an outstanding track record on the smaller beauty
circuits." She rustled more papers, drew one out and slid it across
the desk to Brandi, who wiped a damp palm surreptitiously down the
side of her black polyester skirt.

"That’s why we ask you to sign this
contract, darling. If you don’t take the top prize, we don’t want
to lose our investment--and we don’t want to turn you out on the
street without hope, like some shops I could name. Our contract is
unique in the business. It guarantees you work, a sliding scale
expense account, wardrobe, transportation--and it guarantees the
Syndicate a return on its investment. No matter what." She smiled.
"Questions? No? Good. Just sign here, darling." She offered a slim,
pink enamel pen.

The pen flew out of Brandi’s trembling
grasp. She bent to retrieve it from the plush carpet and nearly
lost her glasses. That disaster averted, she signed, hoping her
signature, of which she was usually so proud, would be legible.

When she glanced down to make sure, she saw
her name glinting damp, dark red, as if she’d signed in blood.

* * *

DAY AFTER DAY, the nano ate her. Ate her and
melted her and reshaped her. The pain locked her in: waist,
ribcage, collarbone, throat.

By the time they started on her face she was
delirious, lost in a world of dreams and restructured realities
where the pain was an ecstasy, stretching her toward Nirvana.

On the day they did her eyes, she saw
God.

* * *

ON THE TENTH day, there was no pain.

On the eleventh, Susan helped her totter to
the shower, soap, rinse and wash her hair.

On the morning of the twelfth day, she woke
to bird song and a room filled with rosy light. Trish arrived in
her rustling white robe, with a tray and a steaming pot.

"Good morning, darling! Breakfast, coffee
and a chat, then the unveiling! Help her sit up, Suzie--still weak
as a kitten, of course. That will pass, trust me. All you need are
a couple of good meals and a glimpse of what Veela and Jeffrey have
done for you..." She set the tray on the bed stand, rattled cups
and handed one to Brandi. "Both hands, darling--that’s a good
girl."

Brandi bent her face into the coffee-steam
and took a deep, appreciative breath. The hands that cradled the
porcelain were slim, tapered--smooth, elegant hands, with pearly,
square-cut nails.

Brandi took a careful sip of coffee,
struggling to recall, through the near-haze of pain and fever
dreams: Had her hands not been short; calloused across the palms
and fingertips? Hadn’t they been crosshatched with old cat
scratches and the scars of cooking accidents? The elegant hands
cupping her cup trembled, and Trish reached over to slip the thing
away, and replace it with a plate holding a toasted bagel, one half
smothered in cream cheese, the other half smeared with strawberry
jam.

"Oh!" said Brandi longingly, while her brain
relentlessly tallied grams of fat and calories. "Oh, no, I
just--it’s so fattening..."

Trish laughed and sat on the edge of the
bed, crossing her legs in a swirl of white. "Nonsense, child,
you’ve hardly eaten anything for ten days! Besides, Veela and
Jeffrey have done a little tinkering with your metabolism while
they were putting things right--you’ll never have to count another
calorie! Suzie has your documentation. Look at in your spare time.
Now be a good girl and eat up."

The stranger’s hands fed her well: Brandi
gobbled the entire bagel, ate a fruit cup replete with cherries,
melons, blueberries, more strawberries, and had two cups of coffee,
sweetened with dollops of heavenly real cream.

"Wonderful!" said Trish, who had been
prowling the room, pulling open the curtains and tugging at the
blinds. The room blared with sunlight and Brandi blinked, put up a
finger to push back her glasses--and hit herself squarely between
the eyebrows.

"It’s time," Trish announced. "Help her out
of bed, Suzie--and take off the gown."

Brandi stood before the double-wide
full-length mirror and stared at the naked stranger before her. The
stranger had slim, elegant feet to match her elegant hands,
nicely-turned, slender ankles and curved, satiny calves. Adorable
knees preceded firm, invitingly plump thighs. The waist was narrow;
the ribcage a shadowy suggestion beneath pearly skin--narrow, also,
but more than enough support for the tight, rounded breasts--the
collarbone was heartbreakingly delicate, the arching column of
throat unbelievably fragile.

"Oh," whispered Brandi, and put up her hand
to touch the firm little chin, lay a finger on the fresh, moist
mouth, stroke the round and rosy cheeks. The stranger’s large dark
eyes followed her every move, eloquent of dawning delight. "Oh,"
Brandi said again, and buried her fingers in the warm, zany mop of
curls.