Cobalt's entire body lurched as he suddenly gasped for breath, his heart beating strong with renewed vigour. He lay on his back for a while, eyes locked with the rocky ceiling as he panted, shaking all over. The duct tape around his wrists and ankles had been cut away, and any remnants of Alison's maddened experimentation had since been cleared away. Swallowing hard in an effort to moisten his parched throat, he gritted his teeth and eased himself off the pool table. With one foot placed on the ground, he tried to stand up, only to nearly topple over as his entire centre of gravity seemed to shift.

Something wasn't right. His entire body felt... off.

"Alison...?" Cobalt called, wincing as he held a hand to his throat.

It hurt to speak, and he sounded strange.

"Oh, you're alive! Thank fuck for that!" replied the voice of the human from somewhere deeper in the lamb.

Emerging from the depths of a crate she was rooting through, Alison Titch popped her head out and fixed him with a brilliant smiled.

"I was getting worried for a moment! Your heart stopped like six times, and my defibrillators only lasted the first four. Had to resort to these," she stated, holding a pair of cattle prods aloft.

Wincing, Cobalt glanced over at the computers piled upon the scientist's desk. According to the clock on one of them, it was around nine o'clock.

"Six times... in an hour...?" he gasped, his entire body heaving as he struggled to remain steady.

"Ye~ah, about that... You've been out for an hour... and a day..."

"What?!"

She began frantically flapping her gloved hands.

"Okay, maybe I fucked up by giving you all the compounds at once! I thought your body would be able to take it!"

Cobalt shook his head. It felt fuzzy, in a strange way.

"Lust demons have notoriously weak constitutions... What exactly did you do to me...?" he asked, leaning against the edge of the pool table.

She tugged at the collar of her scorched lab coat.

"Maybe I oughta show you, first. Might be easier to explain..."

Rummaging through a carboard box, Alison produced a cracked hand mirror. Wiping the dust off, she trotted over to Cobalt and handed it to him in an uncharacteristically sheepish manner. Frowning, he gazed deep into its reflective surface.

The face that Cobalt was met with was that of a woman he did not recognise. She was a Succubus - such was obvious from the purple skin - but her eyes were an unnatural amber colour, and as he scrutinised her features, he saw that her hair was both unkempt and an unusual shade of navy.

"What the-?"

He froze, as did the girl in the mirror. His eyes widened, as did hers. Both of their mouths dropped open.

A few silent, stunned seconds passed before the realisation hit Cobalt like a runaway freight train.

"ALISON, WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO TO ME?!" he screamed, dropping the mirror.

He frantically looked down at his hands. They were purple, just like his face. Not only that, but his shirt seemed to have gotten baggier, and he could feel a subtle rise in his chest. Craning his neck, he looked back to see that he had filled out his trousers somewhat. Only the spade of his tail remained unchanged.

There was no point in denying it. One way or another, Alison had somehow turned him into a Succubus.

"Look, calm down! It's perfectly reversible, I assure you!"

"THEN REVERSE IT!"

"I- It's not exactly safe to do so right away! J- Just calm down and I'll run you through what happened, okay?"

Though he was fuming, Cobalt swallowed his anger and took a seat on the edge of the pool table, if only to prevent himself from collapsing right then and there. Swallowing hard, he bared his teeth.

"You better have a good reason for this," he hissed, unused to the raised pitch of his own voice.

Taking a deep breath, the human nodded.

"A- Alright. I injected you with three separate chemical compounds, if you remember. One was to stimulate rapid growth of your hair. Another was to grow a temporary layer of purple skin. And the third... well, i- it's a little more complicated," she stammered, making a series of rapid gesticulations.

Taking a deep breath, he bit his tongue and looked down at his new feminine form.

"That's one way of putting it. You know, I'd be impressed if I didn't consider this a serious breach of my rights."

"Um... thanks? Look, lemme explain real quick."

Delving into her pockets, Alison retrieved a stoppered test tube containing the same silvery fluid she had pumped into him.

"Programmable nanosurgeons. Basically tiny robots."

"I gathered as much."

"These ones were programmed to adjust your bone density and musculature, as well as shift fat deposits around to give you a more feminine physique. Before you start to worry, you're still technically a guy; all the essential bits are still in place. I checked. Just to make sure."

Nodding slowly, Cobalt clasped his hands and internally reviewed the situation. Though Alison was doubtlessly a few cards short of a full deck, he had no reason to doubt her handiwork. She was clearly a savant in regards to the sciences, and though her methods were... questionable... he had to admit that she did a pretty good job.

One thing was bugging him, however.

"You said you just happened to have these things on hand?" he asked, folding his arms and raising an eyebrow.

"W- Well, like I said, they were old projects I thought needed some revival. I thought the nanosurgeons could be a decent alternative to transitionary treatments once I hammered the kinks out of their programming. As for the hair and skin things, I just cooked those up while I was baked last week."

Leaning forward in his seat, Cobalt fixed the human scientist with a piercing glare. She averted her own eyes for a few moments, deigning to stare at literally anything else. But it wasn't long before she cracked.

"Alright, I admit it; I wanted to help that Imp girl you were talking to!"

"So your first thought was to have me pretend to be her girlfriend?! Alison, I don't even know where to begin-!"

"Don't tell me it wouldn't work! I made you this way and I think you make a pretty convincing woman! Besides, she said it would only be for one day, right? That'll give me plenty of time to write a new script for the nanosurgeons to turn you back to normal!" she cried, throwing her hands up.

Cobalt bit his tongue. Of course. It was the kind of plan that caused every inch of his body to cry out in protest. Quinn was his student first and foremost. Pseudo-Succubus or not, he couldn't rightly call himself her teacher if he was pretending to date her for the sake of fooling her parents.

But Alison made a compelling point. No-one would know it was him, after all...

Sighing dejectedly, Cobalt pulled his tie off with one hand and gathered his newly-grown tresses up with the other. Tying it back into an impromptu ponytail, he frowned and turned back to Alison.

"Do you at least have any makeup I could put on?" he asked, scratching the back of his head.

She raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah, a little. Do you know how?"

"More than I'd like. My sisters used to play dress-up with me when I was younger. By force, if necessary."

Nodding, Alison skipped over to her nest and delved her head in, only to return with a beaten makeup bag a few moments later. She handed to him along with the mirror he had dropped. Staring at his reflection, Cobalt deigned to set aside all apprehension and just get it over with. After all, the quicker he was done with this, the quicker he could get back to normal.

------

Though he was now essentially an entirely different person from an outsider's point of view, couldn't help but feel the burning stares of everybody he passed on the way back to the B.I.D. campus. He kept his arms wrapped tight around himself as he made a beeline for the dorms, struggling to swallow the lump in his throat all the while.

"What business do you have here?" spoke a sudden voice, causing Cobalt to freeze right as he made for the girl's dormitories.

Heart hammering like a drum, he slowly turned on his heel to see none other than Elya Yalfre sat one one of the benches, dressed in her nurse's uniform despite the fact that it was the midterm holidays. She appeared to be eating from a lunchbox filled with rice, though as he watched her pluck a few grains using a pair of chopsticks, he realised that it was raw.

"S- Sorry?" Cobalt asked, doing his utmost not to betray his true identity.

Setting her paltry lunch aside, Elya drew herself to her full height and peered at him over the rims of her spectacles.

"You don't wear a uniform," she stated simply.

It was a miracle she didn't recognise him, given that she was still upholding her professional façade.

"Um... I'm here to see someone."

Her eyes flashed.

"Someone close...?"

"Yes miss. My, um..."

He squeezed his eyes shut.

"... my girlfriend...?"

Almost immediately, the Fallen's entire posture relaxed. Stretching her stony wings, she nodded slowly before returning to her lunch.

"Young love. How droll," Elya commented dryly, picking at her equally dry rice.

He laughed weakly and clawed at the door handle. As he pulled it open, however, Elya called out once more.

"Wait!"

Cobalt's heart froze.

"That ribbon... in your hair..."

"Sorry miss, I really have to go now!"

Before Elya could get another word in, Cobalt rushed inside the building, staring hard at the floor. He barged past a few lingering students as he zipped up the stairwell, but felt far too embarrassed to stop and apologise. Reaching Quinn's dorm room, he hammered his fist on the door.

"Eh? Who's there?" called the Imp from within.

"Quinn, it's me. Open up."

"Don't sound familiar to me."

He sighed.

"Just open the door?"

He heard her swear beneath he breath before the key turned in the lock. The door swung open, revealing a rather tired Quinn Redtile.

"Spit it out, love. I'm in the middle of summat," she yawned, rubbing her eyes.

"It's me."

"I told you, I don't know you."

"For the love of- Quinn, it's Cobalt!" he hissed, glancing about nervously.

She just stared at him with squinted eyes and a slackened jaw. Blinking a few times, the Imp rubbed her eyes once more before resuming her scrutinisation of the pseudo-Succubus' face. Slowly, it dawned upon her.

"No fucking way..." Quinn breathed, taking a step back.

"Can I come in or not? I'd rather not discuss this in the hallway."

"Uh... Yeah, sure, come on in."

He stepped inside, only to be greeted by possibly the worst-kempt bedroom he had seen in his life. The floor was an ocean of discarded clothes and crisp packets, whilst the walls were plastered with graffiti that definitely voided the room's security deposit. A trio of old televisions were stacked upon the coffee table, as well as a plethora of tools and wiring equipment. It appeared that Quinn had a handy side to her.

"Alright. Let's get this out of the way..." the Imp murmured, shutting the door with her foot.

She gestured to his modified body.

"What the fuck?"

Sighing deeply, Cobalt sat himself down on the Imp's couch, only to grimace as something crunched beneath the leather cushions.

"Never mind how, just listen. I've decided to help you out regarding the situation with your parents," he explained, clasping his new dainty hands.

Quinn nodded slowly in an odd display of bemused acceptance.

"I can see that. Cor, never knew you were into crossdressing. Or that you would be so bloody good at it!"

He waved her statement away.

"I have nothing against it, and less against those that practice it, but know that it is far from my cup of tea. This is a once off, and we will not be speaking of it ever again once this day is through. Do I make myself clear?"

Folding her arms, Quinn took a moment to consider, before she suddenly burst out laughing.

"Ha! It's a deal!" she tittered, breaking out into a wide grin.

Leaning against the wall, she nodded at her teacher.

"But seriously, how the fuck did you manage to pull this off?"

"Please, don't ask."

"Alright, alright... One more thing, though; what do I call you when I introduce you?"

Leaning back, he thought for a moment.

"... Copper."

"Copper?"

"Well, my Mom wasn't expecting me to be born a boy. She had planned to called me Copper before having to settle for Cobalt."

With a cheeky smile, Quinn gave him a wink.

"Copper it is, then. Don't worry about having to say anything; I'll think up a backstory for us while we faff about down town."

"While we what?"

"What, you didn't think we were just gonna hole up in here all day until Mum and Dad arrive? Come on, let's go have some fun!" Quinn cried, grabbing her weathered leather jacket.

Though every fibre of his being - down to his recently extended hair - urged Cobalt that going out in public was a terrible idea, his weary mind simply told him to oblige the Imp and hope that they didn't draw too much attention to themselves.

As he had told himself before, it would be over soon.

Hopefully...