Flip The Switch

Josh parked in the drive way and wondered why he was here. He could have been at the beach with his girlfriend Theresa, but no his kid sister calls so right after his last class at the University he drove the three hours back home. She did say it was an emergency, but as Josh turned off the engine and sat in the car he recalled what his 17 year old sister calls “an emergency.” Josh slowly made his walk up to the front door. “I swear” he thought to himself, “if this emergency is because she got a rip in her cheerleader outfit or her prom queen status was in jeopardy, I’ll go off on her.” He rang the door bell. He rang the doorbell because he was a college sophomore who lived in his own apartment off campus, this was no longer his home.

His sister Sophie swung the door open she was on her cellphone and twirled around walking back into the home waving him in with the back of her hand.

“Okay what’s the big emergency?”

This was infuriating Josh. He rushes over here skipping out on a weekend with his friends and his sister is blowing him off to chat on the cellphone with her friends. After following her around calling her name he headed back to the front door telling her goodbye.

Sophie ran after him. “Josh what the heck I just had to finish a chat… jeez.”

“Sis this better be important.”

“Oh it is. I have a science project that is due Monday. I’ve been supposed to be working on it for two months, but I kinda got distracted with… you know other things.”

“omagosh. Other things like cheerleading, prom and dating right. Dammit. Now you expect me to work my ass off all weekend to put together a big science project?”

Sophie smiled and shook her head.

“Josh, your’e a good basketball player and a decent history student, but lets face it, your no rocket scientist. I got Ross Quigley to do my project for me.”

Sophie explained that Ross wrote the book on geekdom. He was the smartest kid in the school and a real sci-fiction nut. Naturally, he was shunned by all the cool kids, all except for Sophie. Sophie realized she could take advantage of Ross’s lack of social standing for a trade, his science project in exchange for being seen as his date for the spring dance. Sophie explained to Josh that Ross was eager to accept, it would do a world of good for his social life and that she would just dump him as soon as she got to the dance anyway.

Josh didn’t particularly like the way his sister was a conniving bitch, but he knew this was how it was in High School. So he asked, “Then what do you need me for?”

Sophie took Josh downstairs to the basement where Ross was tinkering with some contraption. It looked like an external computer hard drive sitting on top of a microwave oven. There were two bicycle helmets attached to the microwave with thick green cables and two antennas sticking from the top of each helmet. Josh walked over to Ross who was immediately intimidated by the older boy who towered over him. Ross stuttered a greeting and attempted a hand shake which turned out to be just an awkward hand gesture.

“What is it?” Josh asked.

“It’s a microwave oven attached to an external…”

“No shit, I can see that. Whatdefuck is it supposed to be?” Josh said in an annoying tone.

“It’s a mind reading machine, isn’t that cool?” Sophie answered and gave Ross a quick gentle pat on his shoulders as she could see he was nervous.

“Get the fuck outahere.” Replied Josh

Ross explained that it wasn’t really a mind reading machine. The project was actually based on an article in Science Today that microwave emitters could enhance sensory perception and that while there was doubt that this was going to actually work, the project is designed to replicate the experiment in laboratory conditions. Ross told Josh that he and Sophie would put on the helmets and turn the machine on. Josh would look at standard ESP cards, each which showed a different shape and Sophie would try to determine what shape he was looking at.

Josh at first refused to participate saying he wasn’t about to stick the helmet on his head and possibly be electrocuted.

“Why don’t you and Ross do it?”

“He can’t,” Explained Sophie. “Mr. Collins will know for sure that I didn’t do the project. Ross can’t be here at all. Once he hooks it all up, I am going to video tape the whole experiment to document it. I am going to put it on my web page too, that way they will know it was all my work.”

Josh wondered why mom or dad wouldn’t help her but Sophie explained they were visiting granny for the weekend and all her other friends had plans. After some reassurances, Josh agreed. Ross set it all up and prepared to leave, before doing so he stammered “so, I’ll come by later and help you with the write up?”

“Sure Ross, come by tomorrow morning… not too late, I like to sleep in on Saturdays.” Sophie then blew him a kiss and as Ross made his way upstairs she turned to Josh rolled her eyes and laughed.

Sophie began the video camera introducing the project from the script Ross had prepared. She then introduced Josh. They put the helmets on and faced each other. Sophie with a pad and pencil in her lap and Josh with a deck of ESP cards in his hands. He looked over at his sister and cracked up laughing.

“Come on stop it, this is serious and I’m taping, go on flip the switch.”

Josh leaned over and pressed the on button to the microwave. The timer was set for 15 minutes. As the light came on in the microwave, the antenna on the helmets made a small electrical arc that startled him. He then settled down and looked at the first card a circle. The video captured his point of view so that the watcher would see the card and hear Sophie’s response.

“Three wavy lines,” Sophie responded in a serious tone.

This went on for about six cards, four minutes into the experiment, with Sophie not even guessing one right. Suddenly a bright red spark snapped on one of the antennas on her helmet, then on Josh’s. The next thing either of them saw was a bright orange flash and smelling something that smelled like burned popcorn.

Josh heard the sound of the microwave dinging. He could feel sweat coming down into his eyes and realized he was lying on the floor. He reached for the helmet, yanked it off and began rubbing the sweat from his eyes as he staggered to stand. He felt dazed and struggled to keep his balance when finally his eyes began to focus he looked around and saw himself lying on the floor still wearing the helmet. His brain had a hard time trying to process what he was looking at when he looked down at his chest he saw he was wearing a pink top and had tits. Josh looked at his arms and torso and ran to the mirror on the wall. Looking back at him was his sister. He spun around and saw his own body still prone on the floor.

“Shit. Fucking shit.” Josh couldn’t believe it. He stood staring into the mirror touching it and pinching his arm. The realization hit him; somehow this contraption had switched his mind with his sister. He concluded that his sister’s brain or consciousness now resided in his body. He started toward the body and initially was going to lift it but realized that in his sister’s 5’4 110lbs body there was no way he was going to pick up his 220lbs of dead weight. He leaned down to take off the helmet and gently bring her awake.

Sophie dazed and in a fog heard her voice talking to her. It took her a while to comprehend, by the time she was on her feet she had passed out and Josh in the small frame of his sister spent the next 20 min or so trying to drag his body upstairs to the couch. He brought her some water and fed it to her slowly as she regained consciousness.

She freaked out just as he had.

“What are we going to do now? What am I going to tell mom and dad? I can’t go to school like this! What about…”

“Sis, chill. Don’t worry… I’ll figure out something. Maybe we do it again and reverse it?”

“AGAIN? Heck with that. No way am I putting on that…