"Did you hear what I said then?" [Eleanore] asked while Alexa put another spoonful of the weak sauce in her mouth.

She had finished her dinner and was about to finish her weak sauce.

"LAKSDHFSDALDFMOGU MOGU." Alexa answered with a smile.

"Alexa dear, that is the wrong onomatopoeia." [Eleanore] sighed, taking back the three vials that she had offered before. "I think that going by the style you are using it would be Pero Pero."

It would?

"SALDFHLSADFH PERO PERO" Alexa said testing the new way to convey her sacred words, it...felt right...but even so she liked more Mogu Mogu. That one encompassed how she bit down on the weak sauce and crushed it and her spoon with impunity. Only to remake the spoon later so she could eat more of the weak sauce.

That was also important after all.

"Okay, let's go again." [Eleanore] took one of the vials, this one had a one sticker on it, "You will need to transform into the owner of this strand of hair."

Yeah, she had said that before. Alexa decided to extend her hand forward and Eleanore placed the vial on her small hand. It was a brown strand of hair, it reminded her of Meli-Meli...Wonder where she had gone to?

"That is a strand of hair from the daughter of the director. He is known to be a doting father, so your mission is to take on her form and infiltrate into the bank." [Eleanore] said as Alexa opened the vial and placed the strand of hair in her mouth. The weak sauce helped giving it a tasty flavour, if anything, mildly weak though.

"New Blueprint data found...data incomplete. Please acquire more information.]"

...That was a new one.

" *slurp* This one has missing stuff on it." Alexa said licking the interior of the vial to see if she could get the missing data from it.

She didn't get anything.

"...We feared that these were acquired from old clothing. We got extra data here." [Eleanore] said, pulling a folder from her bag. On it was the photo of a little girl with brown hair and a cute dress.

Alexa wanted a dress too. No wait, she had one right? She had the sundress that she had made during her original escape...Why hadn't she used one of those after the event?

There wasn't any reason not to-

"[Notice, using the same clothes and dress style can increase the risk of someone linking host to previous dwelling. It is advised that host doesn't use those styles of clothing on this form.]"

...So there wasn't any reason to not use them huh!

Main Core!

"I want a sundress!" Alexa declared as she stood atop her chair and raised her spoon to the heavens to make her demand against the injustice in this world!

She wasn't using her more powerful spork because the weak sauce wasn't worth the mighty power of her spork. But she was willing to do it if needed!

"[...starting creation of Sundress type clothes.]"

Main Core, of course, listened to her commands and started making her new dress.

"...So here you can see that her age matches yours, and while the height and weight are an issue since she is shorter and weighs just a little above the healthy BMI." [Eleanore] said, pointing to the data in question.

That was weird. According to this data, the girl in the picture weighed less than Alexa, but she looked rounder! Perhaps she had a problem in distributing her assets?

Alexa had noticed that if the fatty tissue on her body wasn't condensed properly it tended to grow out of control increasing her size. Maybe that girl had that problem?

"She is the daughter in question, and the one that you need to act as." [Eleanore] said, passing her the image and file with her proportions, mannerisms, and overall attitude. "Can you pull it off? Or should we ask [The Theater Master] for another target? Maybe start with the other forms?"

She of course could do it! Main Core! Work!

"[...starting to build-up virtual machine, building up theoretical base...not enough sufficient DNA data. Starting extrapolation...Building up sub-stabilizing Core...30%...50%...70%...100%.]"

Alexa felt a warm feeling on her chest and it slowly moved across her body, it set on her head, at the rear of her head, just a little bit above her occipital bone.

Or what Alexa liked to call, the top of her spine. Since she had plenty spine to go around!

...Or not, she lost the joke. What mattered at the moment was the fact that a blue screen manifested in front of her, and she quickly dismissed it while answering, "Yes, look!" And sent the required data (Or what little she had) to her new [Temporal Core].

Shapeshifting Core:

A [Core] that grants the user the ability to support the shapeshifting into entities without enough data to build a full blueprint, this [Core]’s job is to compensate for failed parts and to keep stability, as such, this core works overtime keeping the host’s body functional. It can not keep a transformation continuously as this [Core] was made for transformation with limited time. This means that this [Core] behaves like a normal [ShapeShifter Core User], and as such, care is advised.

Instantly, she felt a tug on her energy reserves and a portion of her [Banked Storage] Biomass. Her body emitted a faint glow, and within moments, she sensed a transformation, one that felt distinctly unnatural.

She got the feeling that her body was wrong.

"[Detected emotional instability, possible side effect from dysphoria, counteracting hormonal response, cutting nerve endings affected. Restarting...]"

Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

Alexa grappled with the strange alterations taking place on her head, trying to come to terms with this...body? Form? Change? Stage? No.

This wasn't...that.

Not really?

Was she even Alexa anymore?

Or was she someone else? Who was she?

"[Detected degradation of Consciousness Stream...starting countermeasures...Error, not enough privileges.]"

Was she an Alexa? Or was she something else? What was she? P4? Alexa? Ale? Alexandra? A Saintsworths? A Minion? A Villain? A Bio-Weapon?

A program? A core? A character? The figment of someone's imagination?

"[Sending prompt to local administrator...]"

"Alexa?" The woman in front of her asked, who was she?

"Who?" She answered, who was she? Alexa? Who was Alexa? What was Alexa? What was she? Who was she? Was she even a she?

Or was she an it? Was this it? What was happening here, who did this? What did this?

Notice:

Received a support ticket.. Evaluating.

Detected the use of the wrong [Blueprint] in the make of the new Sub Core and the use of [Broken Mana Core] in the make of [Shapeshifter Core]. Deconstructing...Reconstructing.

Base of [Shapeshifter Core] moved to [Information Core].

Creation of new Sub Core...20%....50%...100%

Depuring Consciousness Stream...Finished.

Restarting host.

"I am not an Alexa!" Alexa declared that the fog within her mind had disappeared, and one of the weird blue screens appeared. "I am!"

Alexa peeked at the documents that [Eleanore] had brought and read her new name for this temporary form, "The proud daughter of Mister Prycewood!" Alexa proudly declared while puffing out her chest.

What was the name of this form? Prycewood something, it wasn't cute so it didn't matter.

"... Then we have the first form confirmed, was anything wrong on the transformation? I saw your eyes go blank for a couple seconds there." [Eleanore] asked as she placed her hand atop the other two remaining vials.

"Some minor hiccups, Main Core dealt with them!" Alexa answered, of course it wasn't only Main Core, but [Core] the one that ended up fixing the problems.

Really, if Main Core wasn't able to solve such a simple problem, what was she keeping him around for?!?!?

He was weak! His sauce was weak too! Weak Sauce! Weak Core! Weak Spirit!

"...Okay?" [Eleanore] said passing the second vial. "Let's attempt it with this one."

Alexa took the second vial and smelled it, this nose didn't work as well as her Alexa nose. Even so, she opened the vial poured some more of the weak sauce and gulped the thing whole.

"Blergh." And almost choked on it; this tongue wasn't good with this kind of sample, it seemed. So this girl had a defective body, defective senses and also defective tongue?

She had a weak sauce too.

"[Analyzing sample....incomplete blueprint detected. Sending data to sub-core, starting build-up.]"

Alexa felt the information flood her sub-core and her body flashed in white light once more, only this time she felt the energy being drawn out from her body. A quick look into her [Core] showed that she had lost already almost a third of her energy.

So it took roughly around five units per transformation? What was the metric being used here? Or was it because she wasn't using as much from her stockpile?

What was the means to calculate this?

Either way.

"And the second is a success too, huh?" [Eleanore] said looking at Alexa as she had changed.

This new form was...different, it seemed to be roughly between Ale and Alexandra, age-wise.

Alexa noticed that her clothes had changed this time too; her sundress had morphed into what seemed to be a shorter dress? Or what was it called? Skirt?

To be honest, Alexa hadn't used one of these before, neither Ale nor Alexandra. Ale preferred short pants, and Alexandra used either tube dresses or pants.

As for Alexa? Anything was okay! For she was the cutestsest of all!

"And this one is...?" Alexa said, finding her voice...not cute at all, it was deeper than she was used to. Also this seemed to include...a different biology?

"That is the son of...I mean, the daughter of one of the executives, she is working there and her fingerprints are tied to the lock of the safe our client wants." [Eleanore] said while meddling with her papers, "Here it is; she goes by Tiffany. But you need to be on the lookout if someone calls her Michael."

...What?

"So...is this form...Male?" Alexa said, tugging at her skirt, and sure enough, there was something there that she hadn't seen before. "And yet it has...these? What?"

Alexa looked at her chest, and sure enough, there were a pair of boobas there, even if they felt...artificial.

A quick poke from her Nanites found a pair of silicone-filled bags on her chest.

Why was...what?

"Tiffany is a transgender woman." [Eleanore] said as if that explained everything that was out of place with this body. "So she is female."

...No, she was not. Alexa could see the [Blueprint], this was not a female body. It was a male body.

"...What is a transgender Woman?" Alexa asked as she slowly released the transformation on this form, she felt that if she went too deep into it she would end with a headache, and those were things more fitting for Alexandra or Ale.

Alexa didn't want to deal with such complex stuff.

"A woman who was assigned the male gender at birth, but that feels that they are female." [Eleanore] answered in such a way.

Alexa didn't get why that was such a problem if this Tiffany or Michael was indeed born with the wrong gender. Couldn't they just swap it out to the correct one?

"Main Core?" Alexa prompted inwardly, "Can we fix the blueprint?"

"[It is possible to correct the wrong aspects implied by society and build a new one that is based on the correct design. Extra Mana may be used since this is going against the design based on the sample.]"

Dang It.

"So you will change into Karla Pricewood first; this form will let you get past most of their security details while the other Minions fulfill their mission in the bank's reception area." [Eleanore] said, first bringing a sheet of paper with some diagrams of the building.

This part was not on the paper packages. Those only included scenarios to deal with the [Heroes] and how to behave in determined situations. Nothing about what they would actually do, since that part was supposed to be up to the minions of the Theater Master.

Either way, Alexa nodded and listened, she had finished her weak sauce, so now all that was left was her mango juice.

"Then when you get past that, you will change into Tiffany." [Eleanore] said showing her a couple of photos, these depicted a room similar to the one Mister [Pig] had as an office, "You will need to find this particular Office and find a safe like this one, the doors will have a panel at the side, you place your hand on them and it will open the doors.."

Next she showed a picture of what seemed to be a small black metallic door, a small door? Smolldor? Smolder? Smalldoor? Smo-

"[Object is a safebox, a device to safeguard materials or documents behind a 5 cm thick metallic door.]"

...smolldor it was.

"Here you need to change into this one next." [Eleanore] gave her the last vial. So Alexa took it and placed the contents in her mouth. She no longer had the weak sauce to improve the flavor, so she just let the nanites on her tongue dissolve and analyze the sample.

"[Found full Blueprint of a corrupted Human. Analyzing...60% is unusable, remaining 40% is viable. Sending to sub-core.]"

A what?

The data flashed in her mind, and sure enough, she now understood why Main Core had said this was a corrupted human. "Who is this?" Alexa asked as she shuddered at the data she was getting.

"This will be the last transformation we need from you. Can you do it?" [Eleanore] said staring at her, "This is one of the executives, Alfred Greene."

Alexa nodded and prompted the shift, she felt her body shine as the shift started. Unlike the other ones, she noticed that her internals weren't changing that much, instead it was only her exterior that was going through the changes.

Her height increased to almost 1,80. Her hair turned from blonde to brown. And while her chest didn't grow a pair of bulges like it had done with Tiffany or with Alexandra.

She noticed her lower body didn't change, was this also a female?

"...is this one...Male?" Alexa asked, unsure of what was happening, still remembering Tiffany's event.

"Of course, why?" [Eleanore] asked confused.

"[No data about either female or male genitalia on the Blueprint. Sex unconfirmed.]"

"No reason." Alexa said, making sure there weren't any mistakes on the make.

This body seemed to be missing some crucial parts, it was closer to a meat puppet than a body, her heart had kept the same size as it had on her [Child Stage], same with the rest of her organs.

The Nanites were doing overwork to keep everything functional. "What is wrong with this body Main Core?" Alexa couldn't help but ask as she returned to normal.

"[Body of a fake entity does not conform with the norms, most of the functions have been replaced by Mana, most of the organs aren't viable anymore. Probability of body being made by Core Power are high. Caution is advised.]"

"When you take on the form of Alfred, you only need to open the device within the safe, it should open as soon as you touch it. So you will put it in a bag provided to you by [The Theater Master]'s Minions. Then return as fast as possible and go to the evacuation route, and with that your job will be done." [Eleanore] said, "Can you do it?"

Could she? Of course! She was Alexa, nothing was impossible to her!

Besides understanding what the heck was wrong with Alfred Greene, his body was wrong on so many levels...

"Yes!" But even so, Alexa answered with the truth! For she was speaking with [Eleanore], so she couldn't lie anyway!

"But I think there is something weird with that one." Alexa said pointing at the papers with Alfred's Data. "Who gave you those vials?"

Alexa wasn't sure how to broach the subject. "His [Blueprint] was weird, it was more as if his body had been made by [Core Powers], he doesn't have anything inside." So she just stated the problem.

"Hmm....These were provided by [The Theater Master], he said that all the samples provided to us came from either his Prop Maker... So that means he either bribed someone or planted a janitor, probably the second since he provided us with cups, half-eaten sandwiches, and toilet trash." [Eleanore] said thoughtfully, Alexa couldn't help but wonder if she could get access to those sandwiches though. "I will pass on your question along with the confirmation, but to make sure. You can change into all the forms even with these doubts?"

Of course she could! She was Alexa!

"Yes," So Alexa nodded, "My [Core Power] allows me to correct some of the flaws and fix some things, I will fix the Tiffany form, but the Alfred one..."

"[No fixes available, would require making a new form from scratch, and that one may not fit the biometrical locks.]"

"That one can't be fixed." Alexa said shaking her head.

"Well, you only need to make it work for a few seconds anyway." [Eleanore] shrugged, and stood, "We depart tomorrow, so prepare for everything Rhapsody."

And in that tone she left, she looked so serious and mysterious...

"Dinner is in the microwave, remember to brush your teeth before going to sleep." Or not, [Eleanore] said that before leaving the apartment.

Well, now Alexa needed to think about what to do for her breakfast tomorrow...

Also about the mission, but that was not important!