Steven had always had a fascination with toy cars. Some would say he was too old for them, but he heartily disagreed. He worked long hours to keep himself financially stable, so he felt he had the right to have fun however he wished, even if it was in a way that some would dismiss as childish. Today, he had just gotten a new one, a relatively large one at that. He “drove” it around the home, fantasizing about what it would be like to be able to ride around his home in it, from such a tiny viewpoint, traveling through his house as if it were a massive open field of wood and carpet, with massive landmarks in the form of furniture and other objects.
It was at what was about to be the end of his play session that he noticed something odd: a little button on the side of the car. It was quite odd, considering that this toy car didn’t contain any batteries. Such a feature would usually be reserved for something that would light up, make a noise, or some other interesting electronic effect. So what could it be in this case? There was only one way to find out, and so he pressed the button.
Suddenly, he was no longer touching the floor. Before he could process what was going on, he was falling. He gave an alarmed squeak as he looked down at the floor. It was coming closer and closer, until finally he landed, not with the expected thump but with a soft squeaking noise, as if it had been a squeaky toy that had fallen. He bounced a bit, then came to a stop.
He stood up and looked himself over, initially wondering if he was injured but quickly discovering that something far more strange and perhaps even more alarming had happened. When he looked at his arms and hands, he found that they looked very strange. They looked to be made entirely of felt, even having a seam running down them. His arms were gray and his hands were pink, lacking most of the individual digits. In fact, his hands now more resembled mittens than hands, with a thumb sticking out of the side and the other four digits being merged into one larger mass of cloth.
He felt the gray thing poking out in front of his face, finding it to be shaped just like a muzzle, though in his case it was not a functional one, unable to open. At the end of his muzzle was a cute little pink nose. It felt like his body was very soft, as if it was filled with stuffing. Given that he appeared to be made of cloth, that wasn’t especially unlikely at this point, absurd as it sounded to him.
He looked down, finding his torso was made of the same cloth, white in front and gray elsewhere. As he looked at his torso, he found that attached to the back of it was a long pink cloth thing, which he could feel and could control by mental command. It was... a tail. A long, pink tail. Looking down further, he saw that he had gray legs ending with simplistic pink feet, lacking any toes. As unlikely as it seemed, it appeared he had become a little toy rat.
He looked around. Everything looked so huge now! Even the very same toy car he’d just been playing with seemed much bigger now. In fact... it seemed just the right size for him. A part of him wanted to be scared of this new transformation. A part of him wanted to worry about whether he would ever be able to return to normal. He felt that he should test that button again, as that might be the way to turn back to normal, yet... he felt like there was something more important to him at the moment, something he always wanted to do, something that he wanted to try before worrying about changing back. This car was clearly magical, so perhaps, despite not having batteries...
He walked to the car, opened up a door, and hopped up into the driver’s seat. Then he closed the door and stepped on the gas pedal. It lacked the roar of an engine like a normal car, but it started moving all the same, at which point Steven gave a squeak of delight. He grabbed the wheel and began driving around the house, ready to live out his playful dream.
The prompt for this day was Vehicle. My first thought was a vehicle TF, which I suspect was what whoever proposed that topic had in mind. I even had the idea of a potential paper airplane TF, but decided against it. I am not particularly fond of vehicle TFs, really. They're too plane. I just don't have the drive. I haven't trained for them. It doesn't float my boat. I don't have the proper motor skills. Okay, I'll stop now. Unless my brakes stop working.
Doing the usual comparison, it seems CrizBN decided on a more traditional route with a plane TF. That said, it's okay. It was a trade, so the recipient got their revenge. Honestly, I'm not sure why I didn't go a similar route to CrizBN here, making some of the stories trades or commissions. Then again, I suppose this is already pretty high-pressure, and that would add in the aspect of ensuring customer satisfaction to make things a bit more tense. Perhaps if I didn't have to do a job alongside Octransfur stuffs and therefore had more time to take things slowly and methodically here. But for now, I'm too obscure to make a living off my writing and visual art alone.