"Do you really think this is fixable?" Chelsea asked as she pulled her busted ptop out of her backpack. Her ears were drooping and she pouted, "It's not just the screen, see? Jules stomped the bottom too, now half the keys are missing. It won't even turn on anymore."

  Her ptop was another top of the line 'Air' model simir to the one I'd been using in css today. The biggest difference apart from the damage was she got hers three years ago when she started university. So it was a little older, but it still worked just fine. At least up until today.

  Now it looked like it had been through a blender. Both halves of the aluminum case were slightly bent, so it wouldn't close properly but didn't open right either. The screen was a spider-web of cracks, and a bunch of keys were missing. There was an obvious boot-print on the top of the rose-gold case, and plenty of scuff marks like it had been kicked across the floor.

  "I'm pretty confident I can get it back to brand-new condition," I told her. "Not the conventional way though, I'd be using the little pink ptop. Like how I fixed our front door after Mr. McFarne broke it."

  Chels frowned as she stared down at the broken computer she was bancing against the steering wheel of her car, like she was trying to decide if she wanted it fixed or if she'd rather get a new one.

  We were still parked outside of Frank's pce, and I hadn't had a chance yet to deal with anything he'd said. I actually just wanted to go straight home and hide in my room for a while, so I could process all that stuff in private. Chelsea needed a new phone and ptop though, and we were supposed to go get groceries too. So I was doing my best to push all the Frank stuff to the back of my mind for now.

  After a few seconds Gwen asked from the back seat, "How about your phone? Same thing?"

  "Pretty much," Chelsea sighed as she stuffed the busted ptop back into her bag. Then she pulled the phone out to show us as she said, "The screen's shattered and it doesn't respond to touches anymore, but at least it comes on. So it might just need a new screen?"

  Her phone was less than a year old, it was basically the test model. And like she said, the screen was smashed but it lit up when she pushed the power button. It wouldn't unlock though, so the front camera array probably wasn't working either. And the back was all scratched and scuffed too.

  I gave her a sad look, "That really sucks Chels. Like I said though, I can fix it. That and the ptop."

  "It's up to you," I added when she hesitated again. "If you'd rather get new ones we can do that too."

  The little catgirl stared at her phone for a few seconds before she sighed, "If you can fix them then that's probably the best choice. I can't really afford new ones anyways, considering I can't bug my dad for the money anymore."

  "If you want to repce them we'll get you new ones," I stated. "I'll pay for them, you don't have to worry about the cost."

  Chelsea gave me a funny look, "You'd pay for them? But why? That's thousands of dolrs."

  I shrugged, "You're my friend, you're important to me. I want you to be happy."

  Her eyes widened as her ears lifted up, and a moment ter I noticed a soft rumbling sound coming from her chest. I kind of felt like she was over-reacting, since it really wasn't that big a deal for me to buy her some new stuff.

  "Thank you Lisa," she continued purring as she smiled at me. "That's really generous of you."

  After another second or two she put her broken phone away, then stuffed her backpack through the gap and onto the floor behind her seat. As she started up the car she decided, "I appreciate the offer, but let's just fix the broken stuff. It doesn't make sense buying repcements now, considering they'll probably be announcing new models in a couple weeks."

  "Alright," I agreed. Then I tried not to sound too disinterested as I asked, "So we're going to the grocery store?"

  Chels looked at me again as her ears twitched. Then she gave me a sympathetic look, "You're not up for grocery shopping right now, are you Lisa?"

  My first thought was to lie, to pretend I was ok with it. That only sted a second though, before I realized I should just be honest with my partners. So I sighed and shook my head, "Not really. I know it's important, but I'm really not feeling it."

  "I'd rather just go home and hide in my room for a bit," I admitted. "I need to process everything Frank said. And I want to have another look at that pink ptop, to see if I can find some hidden messages from Annie."

  Gwen suggested, "We could drop you off at the house, then Chelsea and I could do the shopping?"

  "Or we could just get delivery again tonight," the catgirl added. "My treat this time."

  Either way home was the next stop, so Chels put the car in gear and we pulled out of the parking lot. It was only a couple minutes before we arrived, but that was enough time for the two of them to figure out a pn. They decided to do the grocery shopping together, so I could have some privacy while I dealt with all the test revetions and frustrations.

  We all went inside first though, so Gwen and Chels could dump their school stuff instead of carrying all that around the grocery store with them. Then the three of us all shared some hugs and kisses before they headed back out again, while I went downstairs to my bedroom. As soon as I was down there I stripped out of my school clothes and pulled on a nightshirt, then flopped across my bed to try and rex and unwind while I thought about stuff.

  Like on the one hand it felt kind of creepy knowing a complete stranger had been watching me or monitoring me or something. I didn't know anything about this Annie person, but she obviously knew enough about me to trust me with her ptop.

  It also felt weird when I realized she basically gave me her name along with her job. I couldn't help wondering if she changed the user id on that ptop from Annie to Lisa just so we wouldn't have the same nickname. Either way it left me thinking she must have known or at least suspected that I was trans, which once again felt pretty creepy.

  Like it was one thing for my best friend to suspect I was an egg, but once again it was freaky thinking about some complete stranger knowing me that well. Then again she could have just looked it up on her ptop, my character sheet probably would have told her I was an egg.

  I ended up ying there thinking about Frank's mysterious girlfriend for the next ten or fifteen minutes, just going back and forth over everything he told me as I tried to get my head around it. Like if she wasn't from around here, where was she from? Did she know how all this stuff worked, who put it all together? Or was she just another random person like me? Maybe she didn't have any answers either, maybe this was how she got the job and now she was handing it on to me.

  Eventually I let out a loud sigh as I pulled myself upright. I wasn't going to find any answers ying there staring at the ceiling, so I got up and dug that little pink ptop out of my backpack. Then I y back down on my bed again, but this time I had the small computer banced on a pillow next to me.

  I decided to take care of Chelsea's stuff before I started digging for answers again, so I opened up the inventory editor and scrolled through her list until I found her ptop. It only took a few seconds to have that restored, then I did the same for her phone.

  Once that was out of the way I found myself staring at the little screen as I wondered what I was supposed to be looking for. I'd already gone through every directory on the thing a couple days ago, and I didn't especially feel like doing that again now. Except from what Frank said, it shouldn't be too hard to find Annie's message. It wouldn't be btantly obvious, but it probably wouldn't be buried twenty sub-directories deep with a misleading name either.

  So I decided to start at the beginning, in the home directory. It was the first thing I'd seen after I got past the fingerprint stuff, and I pretty much dismissed it all immediately since there wasn't much there. And what was there looked boring.

  Basically apart from a handful of config files the only thing in that directory was a document called 'Curriculum'. I assumed it was some sort of school schedule, but I'd never really looked at it.

  Unfortunately it wasn't a secret message from Annie, it really was a sort of course curriculum. Or at least, that's what it seemed like at first gnce. It didn't actually read like a schedule though, it was more like someone's commentary on what to focus on first versus what could be ignored for now.

  "Look to Codices for study material," was the opening line. Then it continued, "The SysAdmin Handbook is a slog, but it's important. 'Character Editor: RTFM', 'Ins & Outs of Editing Inventory', and 'Check Your Status (Editor)' will be much more fun."

  The next paragraph read, "'Changing the World (With the Realm Editor)' and 'Level Up Your Level Edits' can wait, those are advanced subjects that don't really apply right now. Ditto for 'Looking Good with Localizations' and 'Expedite Your Expeditions', they're both advanced topics that can be saved for ter."

  Finally it suggested, "'Connections: More Than Just Links & Likes' might come in handy though."

  I recognized those st three titles from the work directory. Connections, Expeditions, and Localizations were all executable files. I'd ignored them though, since the Editor apps sounded a lot more interesting. And I hadn't even gotten to the Status Editor yet, since I ended up taking them alphabetically and got derailed when I hit the Realm Editor.

  Assuming this curriculum file was meant for me, it seemed like I'd been following most of the suggestions on my own anyways. Although it would have saved me a lot of time on Saturday, since I had to find the Codices e-reader the hard way. And if the file was supposed to be for me, then maybe it was telling me I'd find my answers in some of that documentation.

  I hadn't come across any secret messages so far, but perhaps I'd find something in the Status Editor. Or the Connections app. The doc title made me think it was probably like a web browser. It actually sounded like it could be a text-based browser simir to Linx, which was part of the reason I hadn't bothered to look at it.

  Then again if someone was going to hide a message for me in the ptop, stuffing it in the big boring handbook might be a good way to do it. That was basically the first thing the curriculum mentioned, so in a way it was kind of like a 'readme.1st' clue. At over a thousand pages though it really would be a slog, and I couldn't see myself reading it cover to cover. I really wanted to think of it more like a reference manual, where you only used it to look stuff up when you needed information on some specific topic or function.

  On the other hand, Frank said it wouldn't be as obvious as a 'readme' file. So after a little more debate I finally opened the documentation on the Status Editor instead. It was a much smaller file anyways, so I figured if anything was hidden in there I'd find it soon enough.

  It turned out the status editor was what I'd almost describe as a 'character editor light'. It let you dispy a near-endless list of status details that you could adjust. It wouldn't make any permanent changes to anything, it was all just temporary stuff. Like how awake or tired someone was, if someone was hungry or bored or whatever. There was even a status that tracked how horny people were.

  And while some of that stuff was kind of interesting, I wasn't sure how useful any of it was. I'd only got part-way through the document though when I heard Chelsea and Gwyneth return with the groceries. So I put the little ptop aside and headed upstairs to greet them, and so I could help put all the food away.

  "Bit of a coincidence but we ran into Zach at the grocery store," Gwen commented as she loaded some food into the freezer. She grimaced as she continued, "He may have freaked out a little when he saw Chelsea."

  I sighed, "What happened?"

  Chels shrugged as her tail swished back and forth, but her ears were sticking up. "Nothing happened. He was a little excited and asked a bunch of questions, but we didn't tell him anything. We definitely didn't mention your reality-bending computer."

  Gwen eborated, "Zach realized Chelsea must have got her cat ears and tail the same way I got my instant transition? And that made him even more curious. He really wants to know how we did it, so he can super-charge his own transition."

  "So I was thinking about that on our way home," my best friend continued. "I know you're not going to let Zach or Kinsley use the ptop themselves, and it's probably best if they don't know anything about it at all? But what if we just get them to describe their ideal bodies, so you can make the changes for them?"

  Before I could respond she added, "We wouldn't even have to let them know it's you doing it. We could set up an anonymous email account, then tell them we used that same secret email. And we didn't tell them about it today because we had to get permission first. And we'll tell them not to spread it around either. That way they get their instant transitions but nobody knows it was you."

  I thought about that while the rest of the groceries were put away, then Gwen and I ended up sitting at the kitchen table while Chelsea started making dinner for the three of us.

  "That's actually a pretty good idea," I finally replied. "The only tricky part will be accessing the correct character sheets, since we'll be doing it all remotely. We can deal with that when it comes up though."

  PurpleCatGirl