[b][u][center]A Purchase of Scents
A Colorful Council Story
by Draconicon[/center][/u][/b]








The Baroness in Jade twisted the gem that shared her name, and the portal to one of the under-verses - she'd already forgotten which one, but it was on some paperwork, somewhere - shut behind her. The seagull resisted the urge to stretch in the cramped quarters of her shop in this particular dimension-verse, satisfying herself with minute tilts and scrunches as joints and bones popped away down her shoulders and spine. When the worst of the travel tension was dealt with, she maneuvered through the too-narrow spaces, sidling sideways and climbing over crates and shipping palettes toward the front of the alley-width store. 

With every flat-footed step, the ramshackle nature of the shop pushed at her, reminding her that every shelf was overstuffed, that there was so much product to move, that everything was resting on the most precarious of balances. 

[i]What else is new?[/i] she thought, chuckling as she smoothed her skirt back down from a too-wide step. [i]Everything's precarious these days. Inter-dimensional tariffs: who thought that was a good idea?[/i]

But it meant that there was always business for someone like her. Importing/Exporting was just a legal way to say smuggling, as far as the Baroness was concerned. 

Light came through the tiny holes of the metal shutters covering the front door, which meant she'd been gone all night. Shaking her head, she mumbled a word of thanks for the Re-Distribution clause of her last job (she smuggled more than physical things, after all, and 'averaging out' the stamina of a room-full of tireless demons and one mortal seagull worked out in her favor) before pushing the button by the door and stepped back. The sliding barrier rolled up in the blink of an eye, letting in the afternoon sunlight as well as the endless noise of a 'modern' city, with screaming horns and revving engines and the occasional shout of four different languages rolling over each other and becoming a cacophony. 

No, six languages today. Must have been more tourists in town. 

She walked behind the front desk again. The cheap metal and glass barricaded the front of the shop, keeping anyone that didn't belong from going further back than they should, and there was still barely room for her behind it. The seagull dragged a stool up, took a seat, and gave herself a once-over on the wall mirror on her right. Gray-white feathers were pulled back and properly groomed, preened into place, and her blouse and vest - a cold but light green top with a dark jade vest - were properly pressed and cleaned. Her skirt rode a little higher than she liked, but eh, there were customers that liked a 'mature' (ridiculous that late thirties were mature, here) woman in something a little skimpier. She leaned back, adjusting the bangles around her legs, making sure that the pink talon-flesh that ran from her thighs down wasn't going to get roughed up, and sat properly again. 

"And here...we...go..."

The Baroness sat there, hands folded on the top of her desk, for barely ten minutes before the first client came by. The well-to-do puma gentleman addressed her with the same sort of posh talk that she expected: grandiose, genteel, and fairly objectifying. Fairly typical of the upper-class, seeing the role rather than the person, but business was business. Their short exchange ended up with him paying her a few thousand - pounds, dollars, whatever the local currency was, but one of the better ones - and walking off with a small idol of turquoise and stone. 

Well, that's what he assumed it was, she imagined. [i]She[/i] knew it was fake, and if he'd been smarter, the comparatively low price-tag would have tipped him off. But far be it from her to instruct her 'betters' in the facts of the world. 

The puma was followed a few minutes later by a red wolf looking for some fancy cigars for himself, and he was followed by a rabbit woman that was looking for some 'exotic' goods that would keep her children under control. Each one brought cash, each one bought something different, and the Baroness treated them all the same: as a customer. 

All in all, it was a fairly boring, standard day for the store-front. Less risky than making import/export deals with demons, honestly, particularly the ones that were on the shady side even for that particular under-verse, but [i]far[/i] more dull. She leaned forward more and more over the desk with each successive customer, feeling her brain falling asleep with the lack of anything interesting. 

[i]You'd think that they'd come here wanting something different than fake idols or cigars or medicines,[/i] she thought, tapping her chin. [i]What happened to all the interesting people that wanted something new instead of just something exotic?[/i]

Shaking her head, the Baroness leaned over the counter and past the edge of her shop. Panning her gaze across the street, she saw a few vehicles coming from both sides and few pedestrians. The initial rush had calmed down, and likely wouldn't pick up again for another few hours. If she was lucky, she'd get another customer sometime in the next forty minutes, maybe two, but no more than that. For all that her stuff was [i]mostly[/i] real, there were plenty of other, cheaper knick-knack joints along the road. 

So, she leaned back and pulled out the stock-book. Might as well take the time to write down the new stuff. 

[i]Twenty pounds of Hell-Crystals, type B. Earmark half of those for the black-ops sites and their energy needs,[/i] she thought, writing it down. [i]Ten pounds vein-silver. Probably get about thirty-thousand from the lycans hiding out here - no, that's one universe over. Okay, make a shipment at the end of the day to have it in the right spot. They'll want that post-haste; who would have thought vein-silver would make them immune to the silver weapons out there? Heh. Five pounds sex-essence - the 'Cubi Guild tried to get me to pay through the nose for that -[/i]

"Excuse me?"

The Baroness's pen paused mid-stroke as she looked up at the new customer. A poodle stood just in front of the desk, bundled up in a thick hoodie and the baggiest sweatpants that she'd seen in a while. Pink fur mixed with a few streaks of black here and there, with pom-poms on dangling ears and around the wrists - almost like cuff-links to the cheap hoodie - standing out rather brightly. The seagull closed her book, opened her beak - 

Then paused. She cocked her head to the side as a faint scent hit her, and she nodded. 

"You're here for more than meds, aren't you?"

"I...I heard that you've got...things to help," the poodle said, their voice down so low that it sounded croaky, cracking, and most importantly, put on. "I - I'm -"

"Come in; we'll get you that proper boy-smell back."

She lifted the slat that blocked customers from walking past the front desk. The poodle hesitated, but he must have been desperate, because he side-stepped through the narrow gap and sidled into the rear of the shop. The Baroness tapped the button for the shutters, letting them close behind her; this was private business. 

"How long have you been off your T?" she asked. 

"I - four months."

"And how long on before?"

"...Two months."

Sounded about right; long enough to start noticing some changes, not long enough for them to stick around happily. One of those worlds where everyone had to take the long way 'round when biology slapped the wrong parts on. She'd known that, but she hadn't had one of those customers here yet. 

It was still business, but - well, she had a discount or two. Particularly for someone still so new to the process. 

"I heard that you could -"

"Save the talk until we're in the back."

After making their way past the same palettes and shelves that the seagull had climbed over to the front of the shop, they finally squeezed into a space just large enough for three people. Not much better for two, but at least they weren't bumping up against each other in the process. The poodle turned around, shaking his head as he coughed and cleared his throat. 

"I heard from...from a few friends that you could, uh...that you could make things go...faster."

"[i]That[/i] costs more," the Baroness said. "And looking at you, there's not much that you have to offer."

"But -"

"What I [i]can[/i] do is give you something that'll keep you going. It won't be much faster than the stuff you were getting, but it won't stop if you lose your supply."

The poodle jerked his head up. The Baroness saw the same thing that she'd seen too many times in this business: desperation, not for a solution, but for stability. It was that look that anyone could get when life was so chaotic that you stopped hoping for it to get better (because that was impossible), just that it would stabilize. After all, you could live with 'stable,' because at least then you knew what was coming. 

"You can do that?" 

"For the right price, I can do just about anything." The seagull shook her head. "So, two months on T, four months off. Anything else you gotta tell me?"

"Not about that."

"Take off the hoodie, then."

"W-why?"

"If you want my products, you do this my way."

"...Okay." 

Leaning back against the shelves, the seagull studied the poodle a bit more. The hoodie came off, revealing the expected chest bumps: not large, but clearly still there. No surgery then, but she hadn't expected the poodle to have had one. Someone that could afford that kind of surgery wouldn't have been looking for her. Without the hoodie in the way, she could see that there were still some bits of remaining femininity, but not as much as she'd expected. Despite the four months off, he'd done some serious working out. 

[i]Little lean now, but looks like he pushed those two months pretty hard...[/i]

Despite herself, she smiled. She appreciated someone that knew how to use the resources they had. 

"What?" the poodle muttered. "Don't look at me like that."

"Just taking in the hard work," the Baroness said, sighing as she stood up. "Okay. You've got enough to pay."

"I - what? But I just -"

"I don't take cash for this. Besides, it helps me, too."

"I don't understand."

"Well, birds have an advantage, I guess; nobody expects us to be more than flat."

"...Wait. You mean -"

Shrugging, she pulled the front of her skirt up until her panties were exposed. The poodle's eyes went wide, and she knew what he could see. It wasn't much, these days, not after some of the other trades she'd made, but she still had the old bits down there. Shrunken, a lot, but she couldn't be bothered to tuck and tape something that diminutive away anymore. Still showed, but not enough to mess with her skirt. 

"...You too?" he whispered. 

"Not like anyone can hear you back here, but yeah. Me too." Letting the skirt fall again, she clapped her hands and rubbed them together. "Shall we?"

After receiving a single silent nod from the poodle, the Baroness set to work. Leaning the poodle against the wall, the seagull rubbed her hands together and rested them on the canine's shoulders. This little trick didn't require any kind of physical contact, but it helped, [i]and[/i] it was faster. Didn't want to miss a sale, after all. 

[i]Distribution[/i] was the name of her little ability. Her colleagues - the Duchess in Blue, the Baron in Purple, the Czar in Gray, and more - all had their own little trick, but that one was hers. It was how she got things from one dimension to another, one universe to the next, and, more importantly, how she was able to trade in things that nobody else could touch. Who else could stand in the middle of a square and equalize the bank accounts of everyone present at a whim? Who else could authorize the 'sale' of an Olympian's muscles to the smallest, meekest creature? Who else could make prey into predator with nothing but a thought?

She reached inside, a mental list already tabulating. From the exact inches of her flesh to the milliliters of blood to the hormones in her organs and fat and fluids, she knew herself down to the microscopic level, even down to the amount of oxygen and carbon dioxide and other gasses that filled her at any given second. If she wanted, the Baroness knew that she could spread that same awareness through the building and have a mental list of everything around her, but that was hardly required at the moment. 

Once she had her list, she reached that same awareness toward the poodle, focusing on the imbalance. Fatty tissue in the chest that didn't belong, more estrogen than the poodle probably ever wanted - clearly hadn't had enough time on hormone blockers - and no sign of any sort of surgery or any other medical work just yet. 

[i]Won't need it if I do this right.[/i]

The Baroness slotted a few things around in her mental abacus and decided on the proper balance. She took one breath in -

[i]Testosterone, functioning organ, production, hormones, [b]scent.[/b][/i]

And let it out again. 

[i]Estrogen, fat, shine, [b]scent.[/b][/i]

The poodle stiffened. She hadn't bothered to make it quiet; the shift happened instantaneously, and the Baroness sighed with the faintest smile on her beak as she felt the shift in weight around her hips and along her chest. The latter wouldn't last for long (there were always buyers for augmentations) but it would last for a little bit, at least, and it'd be nice while it did. Better still was the sudden swell in a different sort of chemical through her body and the oddly 'correct' feeling of having something new among the other organs further up. 

Wouldn't have worked with surgery, and she doubted she'd enjoy it for long - organ transplants always sold well - but this was good. 

The poodle, on the other hand, huffed as she let go of him. He reached up to his now-flat chest, his mouth working soundlessly as he groped at a flat stretch of flesh under his shirt. He lifted it up, patting at pink-black fur, squeezing for things that were no longer there. 

She knew that wordless shock. Oh, she knew it quite well. 

"Feel the other difference?" she asked. 

"I - I - you - I -"

"Take a breath. Kinda important."

As the canine sucked air, she leaned against the shelves behind her. The Baroness dragged a finger under her own shirt, then brought it to her nose to sniff. 

[i]...Better. Closer, at least.[/i]

Her little sniff seemed to give her customer permission to do the same. He jammed his hand under his sweats, running it along his thigh and where the leg met the hip, then brought his hand back up. [i]She[/i] could smell the difference from where she stood, but then again, she had a stronger sense of smell than most birds. Most things beside canines, really. 

When the poodle got the hit of male pheromones, he almost cried. The Baroness shook her head. 

"Don't start that; I get it, but you're going to be ugly after that."

"Sorry, I just...oh god, that's..."

"God had nothing to do with this one. If there is one, they are [i]remarkably[/i] capricious with the happiness they're supposed to care about." She shrugged. "Then again, maybe they're just looking out for peddlers of it and giving us a job."

"How - how can I -"

"I'll get paid with what I took. You just take care of the new testicle."

"The new - what?!"

Before he could grab around for it, the Baroness rolled her eyes. 

"It's not outside; wouldn't really look right without the full set, anyway," she said. "I did a little finagling with your organs. Don't ask how it works. Took out the ovaries and gave you one of my old testes; should still have more than enough chemicals in it to keep you going. Always did have abnormally high levels..."

"...That...that's so...how?"

"Heh. You aren't paying for hows. Just whats. And you got your what."

It wasn’t so simple as just transplanting organs, of course. Distribution, unless she deliberately used it another way, helped tweak the rough edges on an idea, making it fit without causing overt complications. Most of the time, anyway. Still, sometimes an idea was a little too complicated to explain, so one learned to give a basic - if somewhat inaccurate - simplification.

She could tell that he wanted to hug her, thank her, something. That wasn't what she was here for. Instead, the Baroness in Jade picked up the poodle's hoodie and tossed it back at him. 

"Get dressed and head out. Pretty sure you came here with money; spend it on something good."

"I...I still can't believe it."

"Well, go find a mirror and believe it. Long as you don't do anything stupid, that'll keep giving you everything you need. No more breasts for you, and enough of the other stuff to start building up masculine traits. Can't give you a penis, but -"

"I'll figure that out. This...this is more than enough."

He tried to hug her and she ducked out of the way, pushing him to keep him moving back toward the front of the store. The thanks were enough. For that matter, they were embarrassing as it was. 

With one last 'thanks' from him before she opened the door and nudged him out, the seagull took her place at the front of the shop and folded her hands in front of her. That'd be her good deed for the day, she supposed. If there was something out there measuring the good and the bad, she was ahead. She chuckled; if there was a god out there, she knew where her soul lay on its abacus. 

[i]Try and damn me when the time comes,[/i] she thought, watching the crowd as it started to grow again with the afternoon swell. [i]I know just what I am, and I'm more than in credit.[/i]








[b][u][center]The End[/center][/u][/b]

Summary: A little exploration of the Baroness in Jade, a member of the Colorful Council. While technically a criminal mastermind like the others, the Baroness likes to keep a side business of little shops going between the bigger events. This is an example of her day to day, including a little deal with a down-on-their-luck poodle. 

Tags: TransM, TransF, Trans/Solo, No Sex, Mild Nudity, Exposure, Colorful Council, Transition, Helping Transition, Business, Just Business, Seagull, Poodle, Minor Transformation, Transformation, Modern,