"Sure," said Rick, all skeptical in his tone.
Jim's augmented memories led her to open a little hatch in the side of the Resculpter and remove a Polaroid camera. "Just insurance, so that we can definitely change you back!" she told Rick, just before she snapped his picture. Soon the picture finished developing itself; it was an okay head-and-shoulders shot of Rick, colors a tad off (perhaps due to expired Polaroid film). Jim ignored Rick's derisive snort, put the camera back into the machine, and from a folder next to the machine took several 8-by-10 color glossy prints. "Here, Rick, decide who you'd like to look like for a while," she said.
"You've got to be kidding," said Rick. "And why the hell are these all pictures of women?"
"Uh, Rick, if this whole thing is a fake, what does it matter who they're pictures of? Do be logical."
Rick picked up the folder and put back all the prints but one: Marilyn Monroe in that classic air-vent scene, her skirt up. Jim shrugged, opened the lid of the machine to reveal a glass surface, put the Marilyn photo inside, face down, and shut the lid. She had Rick get a chair from the next room, and meanwhile she plugged the machine into a wall socket and listened to it hum as it warmed up.
Finally they were ready to try the machine. Rick sat in the chair, a chrome nozzle shaped somewhat like the bell of a trumpet pointing at his chest. The Resculpter gave of a stink of heated phenolic plastic, and Rick could see, through a ventilation grille in the machine's case, the glow of vacuum-tube filaments inside it. "Ready?" asked Jim, and Rick grunted an assent. Jim pressed a big red button marked RESCULPT, and...
Fri Aug 23 12:55:53 2002