The Confession

Happy New Year! We have something very special for today.

Remember Ageiss? She used to post a lot on this site, and she wrote some of the most popular stories this blog had. Some even have more views than my oldest ones!

Maybe you’ve wondering where she’s gone, since she hasn’t posted a thing for nearly a year. She has retired, and as you know, I’m retiring soon too.

Naturally, this means Ageiss wants to do things properly and she devised this little story as a farewell to all of us.

I’d really recommend you to read this one, for there’s a twist on it that some of you’ll probably want to hear. Also, it’s a metafictional story, and it features an unexpected protagonist: yours truly!

I guess this time you’ll have to leave us a comment. But maybe I delude myself as much as the main character deluded herself within this story.

The Confession: Ageiss' Final Story

by Ageiss

The girl known online as Planet of the AP wasn’t, of course, an actual writer.

She was just, since very young, an enthusiast of age-related transformations. The problem was that not many others were, judging by the lack of genre-specific media. So how was she going to satisfy her thirst for those stories? There was only one way: she had to write them herself.

And that was when she created her Planet moniker, and when she set up this humble website. And though her abilities as a writer weren’t, as she knew, up to it, she had some fun and found a few steady readers. Then, as months passed, she made an interesting discovery thanks to her blog: there were more than enough people interested in age transformations. It just seemed that almost none of them wanted to create content of their own.

“Of course, you dimwit,” Planet told herself. “Not everyone is going to open a blog to write a story. But, hey! What if I share my blog with everyone else? What if I offer my readers to submit their own ideas from time to time?”

And excited about that possibility, Planet devised the Reader’s Entries, convinced that she had finally achieved a way to have other people share their own stories.

But it was soon obvious the readers weren’t as interested. So the easily frustrated Planet impulsively said:

“I wish for another person to post their stories here!”

That was a very reckless thing to do, since she should have learned from her own stories that wishes sometimes come true, and that you should get careful about what you ask for. But how was she to know magic was real outside the stories and that some unidentified force had listened to her plead?

Planet had just had dinner, so she thought she was getting a case of food poisoning when a short but stinging pain hit her stomach. Overwhelmed for half a second, she fell on her knees.

Something decidedly weird was happening to her; that much was clear. Her skin was hot like wax and her bones felt numb. Then the most amazing thing occurred: she was shrinking! She held her hands up. Yes, it was true. All her fingers were becoming a bit shorter, as were her arms, legs, and her torso. Her feet were swimming in shoes that were now a couple of sizes too big, and her shoulders contracted when her back got narrower. Similarly, her chest was losing a bit of mass, and her bra was useless: she hadn’t been so small since her early teen years.

Planet crawled to the nearer mirror, but it wasn’t close enough to reach it. Despite knowing it should be impossible, she couldn’t deny that she was going through a magical transformation. Was it an age transformation? Was she regressing back into a teen or a child?

But, no, she knew it was something else. She caught a glimpse of the hair that fell over her face, but it wasn’t yellow any more. It was darkening and almost looked brown now, and before long it was almost black. She clasped it, noticing that though its length wasn’t changing by much, its texture was. Then she realized she was becoming a completely different person. She was getting slightly slimmer, but her midsection was becoming a tad wider, and the belt she was wearing was too tight for her now, so she undid it with unfamiliar hands.

Her face started to crack and bubble. It was obvious that a lot of radical changes were going on there, and she was certain she wouldn’t recognize her own reflection. Sure enough, once she made it back to her room, she was greeted by a total stranger in the mirror.

The transformation was subduing now, and Planet was able to get back on her feet with some effort. Everything looked enormous around her: she was over a head shorter now, and her sweater loomed baggy over her now petite frame.

Her expression of surprise was recognizable as her own, but her features were all new: the expected brunette hair was paired with darker eyes and freckles over a longer nose. Her eyebrows were a bit wider and her lips fuller, and in all, she thought it was a very cute face. She seemed to have become a girl about her same age, maybe a couple of years younger.

Besides being shorter, her figure had also altered. It was an interesting change from her usual curvy shape, as she was now very skinny, with narrower hips and chest. Her waist was a bit fuller, but still flat, and it went quite well with her current proportions.

Planet started to study her new self in more detail. She discovered all kinds of differences: freckles on her shoulders and her back, a small scar on her ankle… she opened her mouth and found larger teeth and a longer tongue. But nothing of that could match how much different she felt. Every sensation she got was odd, even smells and colors seemed off.

Moving was also difficult and strange, but she managed to walk around slowly. Then, she heard a sound at the door and her -presumably also transformed- heart started beating wildly.

Just her luck that her mother would come visiting just when she wasn’t herself. Planet stood paralyzed there as her mom looked at her without any sign of recognition and greeted her, asking her where her daughter was.

Planet was able to understand her mother’s Portuguese, but not without some difficulty. She had to think a lot to fully comprehend the words spoken in her own maternal language.

Even stranger was when she answered timidly and she realized she had never thought about testing her voice before. It was throatier than her own, not to mention the heavy Spanish accent that came with it.

“Uhm, hello. I’m… Isabel.”

Planet quickly pretended she was one of her own workmates and that she had been sent by herself to find a file she had left home. Her mother saw the unknown girl knew details about her daughter’s work, and she had no trouble believing her. She left afterwards without any suspicion whatsoever.

The transformed girl sighed in relief and immediately took a decision. She couldn’t risk being caught at her home again, so she had to leave for the time being. A hotel would do, and she packed quickly the smaller clothes she owned, which were usually tight on her. She didn’t want to risk getting caught driving her car either, so she left it too. She took her laptop with her, though.

There was a hotel nearby, but nevertheless she had never been in there before. She paid for a room and immediately went for a nap, wondering if everything would be over after some sleep.

But she awoke just a couple of hours later, and she was still the unknown dark-haired girl. She was beginning to accept this was real, and with that acceptance came worry.

What the heck was going on? Who was this person she had become?

She wondered if reality had also changed a bit, like in some of her stories. But no, the name and picture on her ID were still her own. That would make it much more difficult pretending to be “Isabel”.

She wept for a while, but even the sobs coming from her sounded too unfamiliar, so she tried to recover quickly. The crying itself was not very like her. Could she have become more sensitive?

It seemed it could. After all, the changes were beyond her looks. She had already realized her thought process was happening in Spanish. Planet’s memories were mostly intact, but the same couldn’t be said about her personality. She had developed new traits.

For the next days, she had to learn to live as Isabel. She had managed to get sick leave form work, while her family believed she was travelling. Instead, she was very close by, inhabiting a stranger’s body.

The weirdest thing to adjust to was her size. For years now, she had gotten used to being very tall, and even though she was now of average height, she felt tiny. She hadn’t been that short (or that flat) since she was 12, when she was already the biggest girl in the class. Back then, she had felt huge and inadequate, but now she felt fragile like a preteen girl, yet this Isabel body also had to be in its early twenties like her own had been.

Personality traits she couldn’t recognize emerged every day. She had become a bit more worrisome, yet she had a taste for mischief she didn’t really have before. She was slightly girlier, or so it seemed to her, and she enjoyed reading books and watching films that never interested her before.

It was natural, then, that she thought of transformation stories that hadn’t occurred to her before. She had felt the impulse to write them ever since the first day, but she hadn’t wanted to invest time on that while she went through such a bizarre ordeal. Yet, the urge was growing too vast to fight, and twelve days after her change, she decided to give it a try, even though her English was even worse now than when she had been herself.

She decided to start with the simplest story she had thought of, that of a girl whose belt became too tight after transforming into an adult, and which was, of course, inspired by her own experience.

Once the story was finished, she opened the blog and wanted to post it. She could do it under Planet’s username, yet something inside told her to use a new pseudonym, for she really wasn’t Planet any more.

“Well, this way, at least someone else will post a story on the blog,” she thought.

And that’s when it clicked. The wish. That’s what had caused it all! She wanted a new person to write stories in her blog, and she had been turned into that new writer.

She considered many usernames, mostly consisting of variations of the words “Age” and “Isabel”, until Ageiss sounded just right.

And thus I was born.

For I’m Ageiss, yet I’m Planet too.

I instinctively knew this was it. As soon as I posted that first Reader’s Entry, titled “Belt”, I could feel the odd sensation again. I was getting taller, bigger, and my clothes were tight once more. Before long, I was back to my usual blonde self.

I was so glad I cried again, this time with joy, and it felt even weirder to cry as my regular self than when I’d been the touchy Isabel.

I was back to my house, my work, and so very happy to be with my friends and family and being recognized by them. But in the back of my mind, there was an idea growing.

There were all those new stories. New stories I wanted to write without the pressure of being Planet, the blog’s administrator. I wanted to feel freer and less judged, maybe, and try my hand at approach or subjects I never used to tackle as myself. And I almost wished Ageiss could be back.

I also considered that if Ageiss started to post more stories, maybe the Reader’s Entries idea could get livelier, and more people would join and write, inspired by the first participant. This second thought triggered it, I think. Before I knew it, my body was shifting again and I was soon the smaller brunette from Spain whom I had named Isabel.

 

I discovered I could control it. It took a lot of concentration at first, and I had to spend many an hour in front of the mirror, focused on my intent, but after a while I was able to shift willingly from Planet to Ageiss and back.

I even started using my new form for other reasons than writing, and I enjoyed the freedom of being someone else entirely when I went out on my free times.

But of course, I mostly used it to pen stories. It was soon obvious that the Ageiss charade wasn’t really attracting new writers. A few had started participating on their own accord, like the exceptional BLZBub, but the Reader’s Entries were mostly a big failure.

And yet I had grown fond to keep posting stuff as my alternate persona. I took it far sometimes: I used to shift between Planet and Ageiss just so that they could comment on each other stories. Also, I used to write my Ageiss stories in Spanish, then having Planet translate them for her.

I even discovered I could become other people if I really wanted to, and I wrote a couple of ideas using identities other than Ageiss’. I can’t say I much like it being a burly male, yet I wrote a few stories as one, including the first part of the successful “Special Vitamins” series. And I’ll say this: being a guy, I temporary gained a completely different appreciation of the stories’ pictures than I had as either Planet of Ageiss.

But as you know, Isabel was my favorite form. I became her at least twice a week, yet it was impossible to grow truly used to the transformations, or to being a wholly different woman. The experience felt always new and exciting.

And there was a moment when I started posting more as her than as Planet, and I realized things had gone too far. So I forced myself… to be myself.

It was difficult. I realized I was suffering from withdrawal. Why was that? I like my life as Planet. My family, my job, and I’ve always been pleased with the looks I was born with, so why did I need to be different so badly?

I guess its human nature. You always would jump at the change to escape into a different life for a while. But it’s part of my personality (much more than Isabel’s) to fight against those impulses, and step by step I’ve been completely back to myself. I’ve only stumbled… occasionally.

But without Ageiss’ stories, my current ones would be different. “Premature Maturation”, for instance, would be less bold, and my longer stories wouldn’t exist. It was Ageiss who first started that approach. So I’m glad of my time as her.

I’m sorry if you don’t care at all about this reveal. I felt like I owed you all this confession before I… before we… went away from the blog for good.

So with that purpose, I’ve decided to get back to my Ageiss body once more. I transformed again today for the first time in months. It’s exhilarating. Feels great.

I raise my hands and inspect them, as if I were seeing them for the very first time. So dainty and small. I touch my face welcomingly. I had missed this.

Okay, now to write the confession. How should we start?

Let’s try this:

“The girl known online as Planet of the AP wasn’t, of course, an actual writer…”

PS: While -obviously- my transformation into Ageiss was just symbolic in real life, and sadly not as literal as in this short story, all other facts remain true.

A few things.

So, before anything, here's another reminder that I'm not really gone, and I've just been unable to post the past few days. There's two main reasons for that:

1- Things have been crazy here because of the Olympics. I'm not exactly at the center of things, but its ripple effects across the country have been maddening. In short, very busy in real life.

2- I'm again a bit down about the lukewarm response to our last post, the third part of New Year's Expectations. Whatever you think of that story, it represents a difficult coordination effort from three different authors, two of which don't post regularly any more, while I've been quite busy with my long story, Premature Maturation. Yet, the blog remained silent as a tomb, and you know how I get about that.

So, as soon as I have the time, I'll post a few things, like more Special Vitamins. Today, I checked my blog-related e-mail for the first time in a while, and I found a new update on Elisabeth's... thing, which I post under the title A Testimony. So that will come too as soon as I have time to check it.

On a different but very exciting (at least to me) note, there's been significant updates on that upcoming Age Progression on Gotham which I reported a while ago. Most of these happened in the last couple of days.

First, they posted a first look at the adult form of the progressed girl, Ivy, as played by Maggie Geha:

I don't know about you, but I'm personally glad that the first major live action AP in years has the character looking like that. Makes the changes much more powerful when they're that radical.

Indeed, her looks have caused a stir on a few websites I've seen, though most people seem to find the idea of the progression itself very strange, and even horrible.

Anyway, there's also confirmation that we'll see some kind of transformation scene, and that she won't simply come back changed this season after an off screen change. Indeed, the child actress who played her thus far has posted a few pics of herself at set. We know she's not just visiting, because she's in costume:

Probably one of the main doubts I had was that this could end up not being a real AP, but rather a time shift for the character, something like she really lived all those years in another dimension, which wouldn't really count as a transformation for me.

But I found this article, which confirms this really will play like a true to genre AP story:

Geha says the transformation happens "after an encounter with a monster from Indian Hill. She wakes up still feeling like a 14 year old but she is now in a 19 year old body."

“Gotham” executive producer John Stephens explains that the transformation of Poison Ivy into a different version of herself is keeping with the basic plan of the series. Every character goes through some type of major change even the insecure Bruce Wayne who will one day be the fist-flying Batman.

“So with Ivy, when we began, Clare Foley did a wonderful job of her as a 15 year old girl,” Stephens says. “Canonically, Ivy is a character who makes use of her seductive powers to get what she wants in the world. So transforming Ivy early in the season allowed us to play to a lot of this canonical abilities that Ivy has while, at the same time, playing the fun of somebody in a body that is not theirs and trying to grow it very quickly. So it becomes a coming of age story told sort of super fast.”

Executive producer Ken Woodruff adds, “So we took Ivy from a 15 year old sort of odd socially odd girl to someone who is a little bit darker, maybe more willing to do things and to harm people that she wouldn’t have had before the transformation. So that was a big part of it.”

Read more here: http://www.fresnobee.com/entertainment/ent-columns-blogs/fresno-beehive/article94519487.html#storylink=cpy

That sounds wonderful, and I never thought we'd get something like that on TV before. The only part that could possibly detract from the fun (though I totally expected that) is the reference to "waking up", which probably points towards her discovering the changes after being unconscious, which I think points towards no process being shown.

But at least, it confirms a discovery scene will take place. Indeed, I think we got a split-second glimpse at it during a promo that aired recently:

In the quick shot, we see Ivy looking at her reflection and flipping her hair. That's either the first time she sees herself as an adult, or her vanity compels her to check herself out frequently, and thus mirror scenes will happen regularly. Hope that's the case, since I hope the actual transformation happens while she's wearing her kid clothes.

An update

Hey, everyone!

You might have noticed I haven't been posting as regularly as I was doing lately (about once weekly).

Don't worry, I'm not going through yet another dry spell, as so many times before. The reason I've been a bit absent is because I'm working on my next long form project. And by long, I mean it's not even finished and it's already longer than both An Offer and The Graduation.

Despite having written so much already, I can't share any yet, because I'm not sure I want to serialize this one. BUT, I can give you a short taste of what it's going to be about by talking you about its inspiration.

Maybe some of you read an announcement a few years back about an studio film coming out titled Premature Maturation. It was pitched as The Hangover meets Big, where "group of middle school kids who transform into adults and crazy shenanigans ensue".

For us, that sound like a very exciting prospect, but years have passed and I haven't heard a thing about the film, so it looks like it'll never get made.

I decided to turn my disappointment into action, and write my own Premature Maturation story, imagining what it could have been. I'm having much fun writing it, and despite being based on something else, I think it's one of my most original stories.

So it might take me a while, but you know I'm still working for you. Also, don't forget that:

-Special Vitamins is in progress, but I got so hyped with this that I put it on hold for a while.

-New Year's Expectations is pretty much over. Just expecting for an update from one of the authors.

That's all for now! I hope this project thrills you.

Live action AP alert! - UPDATE

I don't normally post about these kind of stuff, but these news sound so exciting I had to share it with you all. It seems we're finally getting a live-action female AP in Gotham season 3!

I don't know much about the show, but these first two seasons, the character of Poison Ivy has been played by young actress Clare Foley (remember Gotham takes place years before the Batman mythos, when Bruce just lost his parents and was a boy himself.)

Foley is 14 at the moment, but she looks younger, and I believe the character was supposed to be around 11.

Take that in consideration. Now, in Season 3, which takes place just months later, Ivy will be played by beautiful adult actress Maggie Geha.

Now, at fist that sounds like a simple recast like they do on soap operas, but then read the official description with the announcement:

Following an encounter with a monster from Indian Hill, Ivy Pepper finds herself reborn, and one step closer to the DC villain she is destined to become: Poison Ivy.

 So there's an actual physical transformation. Now comes the more exciting part, for it confirms age-shifting:

Now a 19-year-old woman who’s harnessed the full power of her charms, she sets her sights on Bruce Wayne.

 It's interesting they seem to be playing with Ivy's "charms", since AP in media often shies away from the aged character's sensuality, but Ivy has always been a flirty character on the comics, and Maggie Geha, who is an absolutely gorgeous actress, seems perfect for the role:

 All of this sounds too good to be true, so there's probably a catch. There's still multiple ways they could screw this up for us, but at least we can dream for a while.

For instance, this could be more of a time skip/travel than an actual transformation, but the descriptions doesn't make it sound that way.

I'm having hope because Ivy's powers are plant-related, so that could explain her physical growth.

On the other hand, they could make all of this happen off-screen, but I hope we see the monster and the transformation, or else the description is a bad tease. But that means I want the little girl to return for an episode.

Then, I doubt there's much chance for an on-screen process. Maybe they'll do it with a boring "cocoon",  or maybe she'll simply wake up like this. But how great would it be if there's at least a bit of visible changes to her face and body (if they do this, they'll probably only show the height increase).

So much speculation in my head right now.

UPDATE:

It seems Foley is returning as young Ivy for at least an episode, and that could only mean good news for our side. A website reports:

The actress tweeted a photo of herself at the New York City home of “Gotham” as production on Season 3 begins. Perhaps the show is going to actually show her transformation from the younger to older Ivy. That would certainly be fun to see.

Fun to see indeed! This is really great news towards watching a bit of the transformation.



Even if it's probably bound to disappoint, it's still big news. These things are rare, and this is the first one in years, probably since the True Blood one (which had it's moments, but was very short. This seems to last more than a couple of episodes, since Greha was cast as a regular).

Please comment about your expectations, if any. I just know I can't wait for September now.


Now for a bit of trivia:

-It's fun this comes just as I finished Marvel Girls. For a while, I considered doing another chapter where more girls turned into DC/Marvel villainess, and the very first I wanted to do was Poison Ivy.

-Claire Foley (young Ivy in Gotham) is also the girl used in Ageiss continuous story for young Isabella. It seems she's destined to play little girls who progress into gorgeous women. In any case, a good coincidence!

FEATURED TF: Beach Blanket Beauties

This week, I’m going to feature a work by a fellow genre author, so instead of my usually comprehensive pictures and plotlines, I’m going to keep those to minimum to diminish spoilers.

If you’ve been a member of this community for a time now, then it’s highly probable you know DreamTales’ work, since he’s one of the few who produces dedicate material about Age Transformations. He also focuses in other genres, particularly growing and shrinking, and he usually ends up mixing them, so if you’re reading a comic where a girl undergoes AP, chances are she’s also going to end up as a giantess.

But since I’m not into that, I’ll start by reviewing one of the comics that focuses purely on the Age TF, namely Beach Blanket Beauties.

Now, it’s probable you’ve read the story of the same name, also by DreamTales. This is an adaptation, though it features major departures from the original.

The comic starts with DreamTales’ stock characters, Suzy (blonde) and Marilyn (brunette), a couple of statuesque women who seem to be around their mid-twenties.

They are mortified because they haven’t caught the attention of a guy yet (which is usually the drive of choice in DreamTales’ characters). The only ones on the beach are around 18, and thus too young and wouldn’t be interested in them. Yeah, right.

Enter Mandy, a redhead little girl (her age is literally impossible to tell. She looks 12 in one panel, and 7 on the next) who Suzy has babysat in the past.

Mandy has access to a ray gun that can make the girls younger, so that they can woo the boys (again, yeah, right).

Since that’s the author major selling point, I don’t think it’s an spoiler to tell you the gun works further than they anticipated, making them much younger than intended.

Meanwhile, Mandy switches the gun's settings and fires it on herself.

Mandy grows up into a beautiful young woman who can rival the former Suzy and Marilyn. She immediately becomes the sensation at the beach (adult men suddenly abound there, despite the fact Suzy and Marilyn had been unable to find them).

From there on, I won’t detail anything else, except that Mandy tries to humiliate the others as much as she can.

That is, in fact, the defining trait of the story, and of all of DreamTales’ comics. Whenever I struggle with his work, I simply remind myself that we pursue completely different things. What I like about Age TFs is a character finding itself better and empowered, and thus, that's what I showcase in my stories. DreamTales obviously has a fetish for the opposite: the complete humiliation of a character. The empowered ones are just there to further humiliate the other one.

And that’s fine, really. Everyone likes different things.

My main grip is when you replay the same scenario over and over again. If I review more DreamTales’ comics in the future, you’ll find many of the same points that we have here: the beach, the same humiliation devices (fall of their clothes, being spanked and bossed around, etc…), the horny girls who aren’t interested in anything but overly muscled guys, etc.

And then there’s those stock characters. Suzy and Marilyn. Or Lauren and Betsy in other stories. That would be fine if they were part of an overarching narrative, like Ageiss does monthly, but in this case, the story resets itself each time. And the problem with that is that you end up looking at the same characters transforming over and over.

The art is, as usual with DreamTales, excellent. This one is drawn by one of his most frequent collaborators, PalComix, and he’s very apt at drawing beautiful females. The images are also beautifully colored. I think those panels I shared will stir your appetite for the whole thing.

The beautiful illustrations aren’t accompanied by a strong script, though. It’s not only the lack of innovation between one comic and the others, it’s that all the situations are amusingly improbable, and they –and the dialog- often play like the story of one of those stereotypical porn films they parody elsewhere, though I believe this one is among the lesser offenders in the author’s repertoire, and thus one of the best.

Now, is it worth it despite that? Definitely, considering the shortage of material in this genre.

If you don’t have it, check this purchase link:

http://www.dreamtalescomics.com/Blog/2011/beach/