SRU:  Magic


	"I'll Fireball you for five," said David.

	I looked at my hand of cards.  I didn't have anything to prevent
the damage.  "I'll have to take it," I said.  "That brings me down to
zero life."

	A big grin spread across David's face.

	"Good game.  You finally beat this new deck of mine," I said.
"Want to play again?  I noticed some fine tuning I want to make."  I
pulled out the box of Magic: The Gathering cards.  I built this new deck
this afternoon.  So, tonight David and I are testing out our decks for
the tournament tomorrow.  I rummaged through my collection for the cards
I wanted to add to my killer deck.

	David was looking through his collection, too.  "Hey, Lance.  Have
you seen this expansion before?" he asked handing me a pack of Magic
cards.  I looked at the name of the expansion set.  It was called
"Shifters."

	"No," I said.  "It must be new.  Where did you get it?"

	"In this little store in the mall," answered David.  "Spells 'R'
Us or something like that.  I got four packs."

	"Let's try them out," I said.

	David handed me another pack.  "You can use those.  I'll use these
two."

	I opened the packs and the cards looked pretty good.  A lot of the
cards seemed to deal with creature types.  One card changes the type of a
creature to a frog type.  It was a black card and I usually play with red
and green.  So, I looked through the other cards.  I picked out the ones
I wanted to try out in my deck.

	When David was ready, we shuffled our decks and started playing.
The game was pretty much normal at the beginning.  But then David used
one of the new cards.

	"I'm going to enchant your Craw Worm with Pixie Dust," said David
sticking the enchantment card under my Craw Worm creature.

	I picked up the card to see what it does.  Basically it changes
the creature type of the enchanted creature to a pixie.  And it changes
the power and toughness of the creature to 1/1.  "That's a good card," I
said putting it back under my Craw Worm.  But when I did, the picture of
the Craw Worm on the card blurred.  When it came into focus, a picture of
a pixie was in its place.

	"Did you see that?" I asked.

	"Wow," said David dumbfounded.

	We continued playing.  I was pretty close to winning.  David was
down to five life.  I was at sixteen.  "See how you like this," David
said laying out a card.  It was one of the new ones.  I picked it up and
read it.  It was called Role Model.  It enchants a player (which was me)
to make the player a 2/2 player type creature.  If the player is killed
his life is restored to half of what he had before the enchantment was
cast.

	"So, I can attack you myself now," I said.

	"Yeah," said David.  "And you are an easy target."

	I looked down at what cards I had in play.  Suddenly a new card
appeared out of nowhere.  I picked it up.  It was me.  The name of the
card was Lance and the picture was of me.  "These new cards are cool," I
said.

	It was my turn now.  "I'm going to cast this," I said holding up
my Bull Strength card.  It was one of the new cards that gives a target
creature three more power and three more toughness.  And it also changes
the creature type to a Minotaur.

	I put it under my card.  "Now, I my power and toughness is 5/5," I
said.  "You can't kill me with a Lightning Bolt now.  That three damage
won't kill me."

	"But, um.. Lance," muttered David.  "That card of yours changed
your creature type."

	"So," I said.  "I'm still a 5/5 creature."

	"But," David slowly said, "you ..um.. have horns."

	"What!?" I shouted.  I reached up and sure enough.  I had bull
horns.  But that's not all the bull stuff I had.  I had a bull head.  I
had a bull tail.  I even had bull hooves.  I was a minotaur.  I picked up 
the card representing me with my three fingered hands and saw that the
picture was of a minotaur.  The same minotaur that I was now.  "I'm a
minotaur!" I bellowed.

	"I know," said David nervously.  "You are still Lance aren't you?"
He stared into my eyes.

	"Yes," I said in my now bass voice.  "Let's finish the game so I
can get back to normal."  I looked at my cards.  I had a Fireball with
enough to cast it for five points of damage.  "I'm going to Fireball you
for five points," I said laying down the card.

	"Ok, I'll take it," David said.  "I'm down to zero life.  You win.
Good game."

	"These cards are cool.  But let's not play with this one again," I
said holding up the Role Model card.

	"I agree," said David.  "Um, Lance...  You are still a minotaur."

	"I know," I said.  "Shouldn't I have changed back when the game
was over?"

	We both sat there confused.  "I don't know how I could go to
classes as a minotaur," I thought to myself.  "I think it wouldn't matter
if I was a graduate assistant in Mythology instead of Computer Science.
What are my parents going to say?  And what about Michelle?  Would she
still want to date a bull?"

	"Hey, there's a card that will change a creature back to it's
normal form," David said.  "We could play it and see if it works."

	We shuffled our decks again and played until the card David
referred to came up.  David cast the Role Model card targeting me again,
and then he cast the card to change a creature back.  Nothing happened.

	"I guess this is my normal form now," I said.  "I think I could
get used to it.  I'm just not sure how everybody else will feel about a
minotaur walking around campus."

	"Who knows," David said.  "Maybe we can get the athletic
department to change the team name to the Minotaurs.  You could be the
mascot."

	"Funny," I snorted.  "I'm just glad you didn't cast that Pixie
Dust on me."

	Then a chill ran through my body.  I looked at myself.  I was a
minotaur again.  "Look, I'm back to normal," I bellowed.

	"It's good to see you as your bovine self again, Lance," said
David.  "But, I'm still not playing with these cards anymore."

	"Me neither," I said looking through my deck for the new cards.
"Hey, I said they are all gone."

	"Mine are too," exclaimed David.  "It's like they just
disappeared."

	The phone rang.  David collected his cards and went back to his
room down the hall.  I answered the phone, "Hello?"

	"Lance," said Michelle on the other end, "how's my big bull boy
friend?"

	"I feel great," I said.  "It's like I'm a new man.  You wouldn't
believe what just happened.  David got the new Magic cards, so we played
a game.  Now, you've got to believe me.  This is no bull...."