Geo Trade

Yet another boring Wednesday in the office. Answering calls, fixing problems, avoiding coworkers. Nothing that made it seem like an out of the ordinary day for Geo. He yawned and looked through his phone idly, waiting for something to come across his desk for work. The phone was empty though. Such a boring Wednesday with absolutely nothing to lift the monotony.

It’s a proven fact that a bored raccoon is the most dangerous kind of raccoon. When in that state most raccoons start to get fidgety hands and dart around their surroundings looking for interesting things to mess with. For most raccoons that’s where the story ends though. They find a shiny something-or-other and their boredom is sated. Geo wasn’t most raccoons though.

For one thing, he was able to use his imagination to change the world around him in all sorts of silly ways. Basically if Geo could imagine it, he could make it happen. There were limits of course such as only making it happen within a short range… but otherwise anything was free game. He just had to be sure not to stretch reality too far; it would accept prodding and stretching but eventually everything had to go back to normal. And the second thing that set Geo apart from other raccoons was the fact he didn’t have any easy way to relieve his boredom right now. He wasn’t supposed to get up from his seat except for bathroom and water breaks; after all, what would happen if he left and a call came in for him? That meant he was limited to only things in the immediate area for entertainment.

But there were only so many times he could mess with the knick knacks on his desk or check his phone before things began to get out of hand. And the computer couldn’t offer any reprieve either thanks to his bosses monitoring their computer activity. Pulling up Tumblr to poke at the internet for a while wasn’t an option. Geo felt like time was slowing down, taunting him with the hours, minutes, seconds that dragged on for eternity.

It simply wasn’t fair. How could any business expect a raccoon to stay entertained in these horrid circumstances? It was a tragedy, a crime against raccoon-kind, and Geo wasn’t going to allow it. Someone had to take a stand against the boredom oppressors for the sake of shenanigans and silliness everywhere!

Geo decided to start off simple. More badgers in the office could make things cuter. He peeked over the wall into his neighbor’s cubicle, a skinny male wolf in a polo shirt inhabiting the area. But with just one thought the air around him started to shimmer and his coworker had to pull his chair forward to continue typing at the keyboard now that his arms were much stubbier. His polo shrank along with the changes, refitting itself around the black and white furred body. His claws tapped much more audibly on the keys and his little feet didn’t quite reach down to the floor anymore as they dangled in midair.

He still hadn’t noticed the changes yet, nor would he ever. As far as he was concerned he’d always been a badger in this world. Nothing out of the ordinary in the slightest. After all, everyone in this building was a badger. From CEO down to lowly mailboy. It was a pretty nice place to work all things considered. Wasn’t easy to find jobs for fuzzy, gruff folks like himself. And the fact they were all badgers made for some fun amenities like the all-grub-cafeteria and the employee lounge full of comfy couches to curl up in.

The only exception to this hard rule of ‘badgers only employees’ was a single raccoon, named Geo. Who was currently bouncing up and down in his seat happily as he watched the grumpy employees waddle all around the office. One of his bosses walked up to the cubicle and raised an eyebrow. He coughed to get Geo’s attention, who promptly stopped bouncing and turned around. He expected to be told off and looked up where he expected his boss to be, before remembering what he’d done and looking down instead.

“Heee. Morning there, boss. How’re you feeling today?” Geo asked, barely containing the grin on his face.

The BadgerBoss grumbled and adjusted the glasses on his face. “Fine, fine. Just checking in. Making sure you’re keeping up the pace. Lots of work to do today.”

“Yup! Nothing out of the ordinary. Plenty of badger-related IT work to do.”

“Good. You know the rules though. Stay right here for your shift,” he said, before waddling away. Geo was a little annoyed with his boss lately though. Too much extra work these days. And going into badger mode himself was only so useful when it came to the stupid problems that his coworkers came up with. If only his boss was a little more understanding. A little more compassionate. A little more… snuggleable.

With a shimmering aura around his body and a short turn to face Geo again, the badger plush opened his arms wide. “And if you don’t mind, could I get a hug before I go? Something to keep you focused on the day ahead,” he asked. Geo blinked, but he certainly couldn’t turn down a cute little guy like that. He bent over to pick up the BossPlush. The raccoon held him close, the soft synthetic fur brushing against his face as the badger nuzzled in. The plush actually squeaked when squeezed and Geo chittered happily.

He hadn’t meant to change his boss further but now that he thought of it, was it really so bad to just let things change around here? This office was stuffy, the coworkers were uptight, and the job itself was terribly boring. No one was really going to ever know that things had changed; he could make sure of that. And if things got a little too out of hand that would be fine. Reality would slip back into place eventually anyway. Why not give it a try?

“Okay okay, that’s… oof… maybe a little more hug time wouldn’t hurt,” BossPlush said as his plush mitts encircled the larger raccoon’s body.

---

Daniel struggled to get his tie adjusted correctly as he sat in his car at the office parking lot. A whole week being sick made it so the usual routines were thrown out of whack. He never used to be late to work or have to struggle to get everything done before coming in. It revealed exactly how much a creature of habit he really was. Truthfully, Daniel already knew that about himself, but an entire week away from his office... if the morning had gone this poorly, he really wasn’t looking forward to the rest of the day. Especially not all the work that was sure to have piled up while he was away. The flu was a cruel mistress; he made a mental note to be sure to get the vaccine next year.

The otter took a deep breath and looked himself over in the rearview mirror one last time to settle his nerves. Brown fur, plain white dress shirt, blue tie (with fish pattern of course), everything in its proper place. He was ready to face the day.

He didn’t recognize the receptionist as he walked through the revolving doors though. For some reason they’d lost the pretty fox attendant and instead brought in someone new. A ferret from the looks of it. Still pretty good looking. And hey, maybe he could have a better chance with her. They were both mustelids, that had to count for something.

“Hi there, I don’t think we’ve met. I’m Daniel. It’s nice to meet you,” he said, offering a paw for a handshake.

But the ferret simply giggled. “Oh Daniel, I know you’ve been gone for a week but I wouldn’t forget you that easily. Head on upstairs, you have a meeting with your department head to catch up on what you missed.”

He stopped for a second, confused by the response. He couldn’t just stand there with his hand out like that though, so the otter withdrew his webby hand and nodded in response. Mentally shaking off the encounter the otter swooped into the elevator. That was... odd. She was definitely new around here, so how could she have known him? Especially after being gone for a week. Maybe the higher ups had let her know he’d be returning today and she just made an assumption?

As the elevator doors opened on his floor a badger’s face greeted him. The otter squeaked and looked away, scooting past with a hurried “excuse me” before being stopped with a hand on his shoulder. Turning around he saw the badger had stopped him with a perplexed look.

“Are you feeling okay Daniel? You know we’re supposed to meet now right? Just follow me to my office, you saved me a trip downstairs to ask about you,” the badger said. He sounded extremely familiar. Just like his boss Andrew actually. And he had a nametag labeled Andrew, and a tie he knew belonged to his boss and just what on Earth was going on anyway?

Nodding numbly he walked past all the cubicles and into the office of the badger posing as his supervisor. They talked about nothing in particular, just mostly making sure that Daniel was ready to return to work and wasn’t feeling under the weather or anything. His boss Andrew would frequently growl in thought or gnaw on a plate of bugs, making is extremely difficult to focus on the work that needed to be done. The badger eventually dismissed him to return to his desk, unable to get much in the way of new information from his employee.

Daniel’s ruddertail swayed back and forth in deep thought at the strange puzzle set before him. First the receptionist, then his boss, and now it looked like the entire floor was completely different. Everyone was badgers! Well almost everyone. There was himself, and that ferret receptionist. But as far as he could tell other than that it was white and black fur and stubby limbs all across the office.

It was hard to imagine that something could have happened to them to turn them into badgers. Things like that simply didn’t happen, and surely someone in the world other than himself would’ve very clearly remembered the change. No one was freaking out or worried in the slightest. Maybe he was the crazy one instead.

“Pardon me chap, but do you have any extra paperclips? I’ve run out.”

Daniel’s mouth gaped as the raccoon peeked above the walls to their cubicles. Someone who wasn’t a badger. There was hope for figuring this out yet! Geo coughed and slowly dipped back down. “Ahh nevermind, can see you’re a little distracted by something,” he said, referring to the dumbfounded look on the otter’s face.

The otter snapped out of it and jumped up to look over at the raccoon again. “Geo! What’s going on? Everyone is badgers!”

The raccoon just shrugged. “Not sure what you mean, chap. They’ve always been badgers. Don’t you remember that?”

“No, no. I know for sure Oscar from accounting was a badger, not a badger!”

Geo grinned widely. “Oh, I agree, you’re absolutely right. But you’re not totally correct. There are a few ferrets too after all.”

Daniel smacked his lips, rolling his words around in his mouth carefully. He tried to say some of the other species of his friends but every time he did his mind just came up with badger or ferret again. Only Geo seemed to have remained untouched.

“Okay, ferrets and badgers, but only you’re the one who’s normal. You know something don’t you?”

“Well, maybe I do. I guess I could share with you. But only if you do something for me in return,” Geo said with a swish of his ringtail.

Daniel responded with a swish of his own ringtail as well. “Whatever you want is fine, I just want to know what we’ve done! Err. You’ve done. Sorry.” The dress clothing was shimmering and fading slowly, replaced instead with a red cap and the beginning of a blue vest. Daniel was none the wiser.

“I do love it when people say that. So many possibilities, “Geo said as he wandered back to his seat to think about how this next week was going to play out. “I’ve been meaning to take a weeklong vacation. But the work never stops piling up, as I’m sure you know. So you’re gonna help me do both at once.”

“Oh I don’t see why we couldn’t do them both. Especially if we can just convince someone to sit in for us.”

“And that’s where you come in, chap. I’ll just scoot out of here and off to have some adventures or poke at the internet,” said Geo as he slowly began to change colors from his usual black and white to a more brown shade, and his muzzle rounded out. “See, I just had a bit of fun a few days ago with the office. An office full of badgers. And that was fun, sure. But not as entertaining as adding some dooksters into the mix too. And turning some annoying coworkers into furniture. Mmm. That was lots of fun.”

“Badgers and ferrets are far more fun to work with throughout the day. And they don’t mind because I also did a little bit of mental whitewashing. They’ve always been badgers and ferrets. Clever, right? But you weren’t here for the past few days. I must’ve forgotten to change your memories too.”

Daniel blinked and opened his mouth to ask what was going on with his coworker when he swished his tongue around in his mouth and found it didn’t feel… right. A little longer. And the teeth weren’t quite in the right positions. He poked at his nose with his fingers and wait, where were his webbies? The striped tail behind him floofed up in surprise and swished, suddenly realizing just what had happened.

Geo just smiled, a mirror image of Daniel just moments ago. “I see you just realized. Don’t freak out chap, you’ll be just fine. Promise!” he said to calm down the raccoon in his now much squeakier voice. The raccoon-turned-otter brought his webbed hands up to his mouth to cover it when he squeaked on accident. “That’s going to take getting used to. Anyway, I’m just taking a short break for a few days. You take good care of my body!”

But Daniel wasn’t on board with this plan at all. He tried to follow after Geo, but his usual swooping wasn’t working quite so well in the stumpier raccoon body, knocking into a desk, and a wall, and nearly tripping as well. Geo on the other hand was apparently well acquainted with the mustlid body type; before Daniel could protest any further the otter was out of sight. There was nothing else he could do now. Daniel was stuck in an office in someone else’s body with coworkers who had all had their species entirely changed. And Geo had never given a real timeline for when he’d return. Just ‘a few days.’ He may as well have just said ‘when I feel like it.’

He rubbed his temples in heavy thought, considering his next move. At the very least he knew he’d have to get some sort of work done. It didn’t matter who’s body he was in; there was work to do after being sick so long. So he made his way back to Daniel’s desk… no, wait, his own desk. His brain was adjusting a little too well to the swap. Couldn’t let that happen.

“Geo, when you get a second please come into my office. We need to go over what you’ll say at the investor meeting today,” a voice from behind Daniel quipped. The raccoon turned around, standing face to face with the company’s CEO. He stuttered and stumbled to think of a response. How did Geo manage to get on first name basis with the CEO? And an investor meeting? This didn’t bode well.

“Uhhh, right,” Daniel said, carefully trying to choose his words. “I’ll definitely be prepared for that. Exactly. Uhh, see you in 15 minutes in your office?”

The ferret dooked in agreement and smiled before swooping off. Oh boy. This was going to be a long couple days.