Jenny walked along the sidewalk to her boyfriends Eric's apartment. It was evening and the streets were starting to grow less crowded. Jenny was a short, skinny almost waifish red head, and felt lucky to have a boyfriend like Eric.

Eric had always been athletic. In high school he had been a star linebacker. Even in college he had been a football standout, if admittly only at the Division II level. They had started dating senior year, and even then Jenny could remember the incredulous (and envious) looks she recieved from the cheerleaders when she sat on the sidelines to watch Eric practice.

At the memory Jenny adjusted her shirt self conciously. She lacked the... ahem... assets most of the cheerleaders had taken for granted. She had been cursed with a virtually prepubescent chest.

But, somehow, she had ended up with Eric. Eric, who quite frankly had a body reminescient of a greek god. Eric, whose good looks had given him quite the history of past girl friends, the full extent of which Jenny had wisely remained agnostic to. Thinking about it opened up a box of insecurities in Jenny's heart that was not healthy. She had never really seen what Eric saw in her, and constantly felt inadequate. But when she was with her, it was all different. When she was with him, she loved the feeling of attention and caring Eric gave her. It made her feel confident.

Her train of thought was caught short as she passed the alley behind Eric's apartment building. She felt her heartbeat quicken. Some kind of mysterious green glow was filling the alley with a unearthly light.

Jenny looked up and down the street. Aside from stray passing cars it was empty. No one else seemed to notice.

She took a single hesitant step into the alley. She had never heard of muggers luring their victims with strange lights, but there was always a first time right?

Behind the dumpster she found the source of the glow. There was a crater in the cement, as if something had impacted against it with stupendous force. However, at the center was a small cube, the source of the green light Jenny had seen from the alley's mouth.

The crater smoked ominously and Jenny could feel heat as her hand hovered above the cube. Each side of the cube was about 3 inches across, and at the center of each side was a glassy green disk, through which the light seemed to pour out from the interior of the cube.

Jenny tested the cube with a quick touch of her fingers. Instead of the heat she expected, the cube was actually cool to the touch, even though the ground around it seemed recently seared. Up close Jenny could actually see where the brick on the adjacent building had turned black.

Confident now that the cube wouldn't burn her hand Jenny picked it up. She turned it over, and found all 6 sides were identical. Etched into the dull metal were symbols Jenny couldn't fathom, and at the center was the transluscent green disk, beyond which Jenny could only see bright light.

All around her the cube's green light was casting monstorous flickering shadows, especially as she turned it over. With closer inspection she began to realize that the sides were not similar, but instead, the symbols on each side were different. It was writing Jenny recognized, but obviously not English.

Jenny's fingers brushed along the edge of the cube, and suddenly the alley, which had been surprisingly well lit by the cube, dimmed. It was if the energy inside the cube had been suddenly extinguised. Then just as suddenly it brightened again, but this time the energy was focused upward to an area above the cube not an arms length from Jenny's face.

A green shimmering symbol appeared in the air. It shrunk, and then another one showed up beside it. Then another. Finally a strange, alien word was being projected on to the air in front of Jenny's face.

Jenny was paralyzed. Mostly by fear. Was this a bomb! Was it a weapon? These thoughts flew through Jenny's overwhelmed mind. But beyond the fear was a sense of wonder. Where did this cube come from. She'd never even heard of technology like this, projecting the foreign letters onto the very air in front of her.

She was even - despite her dread - more than a little curious. With her free hand she experimentally reached out to where the characters seemed to be hovering in space. Her fingers made contact with them and to Jenny's astonishment they felt smooth cold and solid, like glass, shimmering and floating in midair.

"How in the world...?" Jenny pulled her finger's away and inadvertantly dropped the cube. It fell to earth with a thud, apparently undamaged.

Something did change after the impact. The character's that had been floating over the cube disappeared. Instead it was replaced by something even stranger. There floating over the cube was a Ken sized human figure. It slowly rotated in space. Jenny gasped as it shimmered into shape with its back to her. She recognized the green figure hovering over the cube. As if to confirm her suspicions it rotated until she could make out the unmistakable features of her boyfriend Eric.

Jenny - despite everything - blushed as she realized the glowing green Eric was totally nude. That, of everything that she had seen finally made her look around. The alley, thankfully was still deserted. Jenny finally realized that it would probably best to keep this strange discovery to herself. She squatted behind the dumpster which she hoped would keep passerby from seeing her or her strange find. She scooped up the cube and took a closer look.

She couldn't help smile as she admired the perfect rendering of her boyfriend's perfect body. It was accurate all the way down to his perfect dick. She had the wicked urge to stroke it with her now comparatively gigantic finger tip, but resisted. The minature green Eric stood stock still, rotating for Jenny's viewing pleasure. He had a blank expression on his face. He looked like a jade, anatomically correct Ken doll.

Jenny must have done something as she held the cube because again the image changed to something much less pleasent.

"Good grief, how do I change the channel back," Jenny mused to herself.

Instead of a glowing Eric, now an embarresingly naked Jenny glowed in the open air around the cube. Jenny always had a critical eye for her imperfections, and this God's eye view of her body was almost too much to bear. Too skinny here, too bony here, no cleavage what so ever. Sigh.

Her "self" examination ending. Jenny tried to figure out what had pricipitated the changing image. She had turned the cube with her fingers and... Jenny studied the cube, and how her fingers clutched it. And... she had brushed one of the green glowing disks. That had been what changed the image!

"Hmm..." Jenny wondered just what else the cube was capable of. She wanted to experiment, right here, right now. But another part of her wanted to show off her new discover to Eric. Maybe he would have a better intuition as to just what this strange device was...

What to do?