Form Fitter - Part One

Walking back towards my apartment I can't help but shudder with each swing of my arm, the small box grasped in my clammy hand rattling slightly at the end of each arch. I try to shake the thought of just what was rattling around inside the palm sized box from my mind, instead focusing on the warm sunny rays bearing down on me and the scent of the rain baking off of the sidewalk.

"Wait..." I mutter under my breath, my hopes of not thinking about the little gift I ad been given falling apart almost immediately. "What would they do to me if I enjoyed the sun like this? Tan me?" I mutter, looking down at the plain white plastic case.

As I cross the street I raise the box up, bringing it closer to my face as I turn it in my hands. With each spin I don't find much in the way of instructions or any useful information, the only words on printed on the plain white surface simply reading.

Standard Form Fitter

One Week Dosage

Form Fitters were a marriage of dozens of separate technologies across numerous disciples. A real miracle of technology, utilizing everything from nanotechnology and large language models to fitness tracking and gene-editing to create one cohesive product.

The delicate balance of achieved between all these various technologies was a self-guided swarm of nanobots capable of not only reshaping the human form, but doing so merely through the use of plain text prompts they provided based on a person's daily activities.

While other Form Fitters existed allowing for more direct input, allowing a person to build themselves a perfect body, the far more common yet still rarely seen variant relied on the nanites to generate their own designs based on a daily activity log of the user. Whereas the more direct version was prohibitively expensive, those more passive Form Fitters could not be purchased at all, the Government retaining a strict stranglehold on their distribution.

These were issued to those deemed in need of help, those drifting through life and potentially in need of a refresh. The pitch was simple, in exchange for taking the Form Fitter the user would be given a guaranteed stipend, just enough to cover their expenses, and an opportunity. The opportunity for most was too good to pass up, with the assistance of the nanities they could make the best body for themselves as they could over the course of the next seven days.

Hitting the gym to rapidly build muscle, cramming in the library to build brain function, and taking a crash course in dance to suddenly become an expert were all examples of just what the nanites could do when tasked with helping to fit a body to the activities around them.

However, while the system sounded either dystopian or wonderful depending on who was asked, the underlying technology was not without flaws.

The most common issue was simply due to the haphazard nature of the pairing process. Due to the any number of issues from poor internet connections to older phones it was not impossible for a Form Fitter to connect to another account in the cloud, either copying or swapping the activity inputs of another user before accidentally actioning them on the unsuspecting user. Over the course of the next week the poor subject would find their body warping and changing in ways that seemingly made no sense, eventually winding up in a body completely foreign to their own.

Less common, but still just as dangerous, was that issue of diverted connectivity. Based off of general large language models, it was not impossible for the nanties to simply connect to another application somewhere on the user's local area network. Each day they would seek input from what they believed to be the host server, becoming susceptible to changes coming from this unknown source in simple plain English terms over the course of the week.

Regardless, the end results of these bugs and errors were plain to see. These drastically changed persons often times needing far more support in restarting what seemed to most to be a whole new life.

I had been offered a chance to use a Standard Form Fitter due to the length of time that had past since being made redundant from my teaching position at the local college. In exchange for covering my rent until I 'got back on my feet' I would simply have to deal with the tiny machines swinging through me for the next week.

"It'll be fine..." I mutter, really failing to convince myself as I slipped into the lobby of my apartment building. As I trudge up the steps I pat down my pockets for my keys, grabbing them out of my back pocket as I clutch the small box in my other hand with white knuckled tension. "Just live your life normally..." I sigh, taking a deep breath as I reach my landing up the lengthy climb of stairs.

"Maybe..." I huff, shuffling towards the door. "Maybe I could add in a little bit more exercise this week..."

With a rattle and a click I open the front door, shuffling inside as I quickly kick off my shoes and shut the door behind my back. Leaning back against the thick slab of wood I look down at the box once more, my fingers moving over it as I search for a seam. With a small pop I find the container yield, an internal latch coming undone as the flimsy plastic flicks open to reveal a singular large metallic black pill sitting at the bottom.

"That's... Unnerving..." I muse, reaching down for the pill before clasping it between my left thumb and index finger. As I pull the pill out I watch as its contents shimmer and twist in the dull light of my apartment entryway, the millions of tiny little robots contained inside swirling around as the pill is lifted higher and higher.

As I hold it close to my face I let out a long low breath, my eyes going wide as I feel the pill quiver and twitch at the warmth moving over it.

"Really unnerving" I huff in a low hushed tone, swallowing hard at the thought of putting that thing inside me. Dropping the white box to the floor I fish around in my pockets for my phone, quickly unlocking it as I search for the Form Fitter app. Booting it up I watch as the screen turns white, a simple block of plain text explaining;

Please Initialize Standard Form Fitter to Begin Pairing

With a deep breath I pop the pill into my mouth, my heart hammering as I have to fight back gag reflex after gag reflex as I struggle to force the thick pill down my throat. Pushing and fidgeting at the pill with my tongue is soon met by a tingling warm sensation to slowly fill my mouth, my eyes going wide as I realize all to late how fragile the pill actually was.

Filled with panic I finally manage to swallow the oozing tingling mass and the shell from which it was escaping down, my apartment soon being filled with the sound of heavy footfalls as I race to the kitchen in search of something to drink. As I open the fridge I quickly snatch out a carton of milk, guzzling down mouthful after mouthful in an effort to force the nanites out of my mouth.

Coming up for air I feel my breath come out in a rattle, my vision blurring as I feel my body tingle from my scalp to my toes. A sudden heat begins to rip through me, the shock of which causing me to drop the milk carton to the floor as I stagger backwards against the kitchen counter.

 My blood boils as I'm hit with the hot flash, the nanites spreading throughout my body as...