Dallin sat on the stone table while the yetis paced all in different places and directions, all trying to piece things together. None of them thought they'd ever have to deal with a situation like this.

"Okay, I think the first question we need an answer to is how. " Meechee thought out loud. "If we find out how this happened, maybe we can find a way to reverse it."

Dallin nodded.

Meechee stopped in front of him and looked him in the eyes. "What do you remember from before you woke up as Fleem?"

Dallin shrugged. "I just went to bed. Nothing unusual happened."

"What about before that?"

"Uhh, I don't know. It was just like any normal day."

Kolka came up beside Meechee. "It couldn't have been that normal. Think! What were you doing, while we were down there?"

Gwangi appeared on Meechee's other side, and Migo stood next to him. "Who did you talk to? Where did you go? Did you touch or see anything different?" Questions came from all sides, boxing Dallin in.

He glanced in every direction, trying to focus.

"I went to work." He offered helplessly. "You were all there when I came out."

"Then?" Meechee's gaze was intense.

Dallin shrugged again. "I think I talked to a yeti."

"Who?"

"I don't know! I'm not super close to any yeti. I usually just talk with them for a bit when they stop to say 'hi', and then I go home."

"That's all?" Kolka leaned closer with a frown.

"Yeah, I….wait, no, I met someone on the way home." Suddenly, everything clicked. "Dr. Laker!"

His sudden excitement made the yetis perk up even more, if that were possible.

"His project! He built a device that was supposed to help us improve our communication!"

Gwangi leaned closer to Dallin's level. "How was it supposed to do that?"

"I'm not sure exactly. But Dr. Laker said it was supposed to use empathy to help us understand what each other means, I guess."

He smiled sheepishly, looking down at his body. "I don't think this is what he had in mind, though."

Meechee gave a soft chuckle. "So, can this device be used to switch you back?"

Dallin sighed and stood up from the table. "I hope so. I really do."

"How does it work?" Kolka asked.

Dallin shrugged helplessly. "I'm not sure. Dr. Laker gave it to me, and asked me to help him test it. But he got distracted and I couldn't find him. So I took it home, planning to give it back later, but…"

"Hmmm." said Gwangi.

"He also said he gave the other one to a yeti." continued Dallin. He grimaced.

"Guess we now know who." muttered Kolka.

"Yeah. But I'm more interested in whether or not it's still where he put it." Dallin looked back at Meechee intently. "Did you see him take it anywhere?"

Meechee shook her head, looking troubled. "I didn't notice him holding anything. The night was normal for us as well."

She glanced at Kolka, Gwangi and Migo, then back at Dallin. "We'll have to search his room. That's the most likely place for it."

Everyone nodded in agreement.

"All right then. We'll get back into the village separately. I'd rather not have to explain this to my dad right now."

Meechee turned her attention to Dallin. "Fleem. Or, Dallin, you said it was?"

He nodded.

"You can come with me. We'll follow everyone else in a bit."

Back together, the five approached the house Dallin had woken up in. "You'd better go in first." said Meechee. "In case your mom is home."

Dallin snapped his head around to look at her. "My what?"

"Or, Fleem's mom. I don't think they see each other that often anymore. They've both kind of gone their separate ways. But it would make more sense for all of us to be there if you act like you've invited us."

Dallin nodded, still nervous. "Yeah. Right."

He moved to the front of the group and pushed aside the cloth door, peeking inside.

"I don't see anyone."

"Keep going." Kolka whispered.

Dallin forced himself forward. He didn't really want to run into a yeti who thought he was her son. It was just too weird. And he probably wouldn't do a very good impersonation.

He breathed a sigh of relief as silence greeted him. No one appeared to be inside.

"Okay, we're clear." Kolka pushed Dallin forward and towards a hallway. "Your room is over here."

Dallin recognized it now. They passed through the hallway, and into one of the rooms.

The room he had woken up in a few hours before.

He resisted the urge to look at the mirror again. He wasn't sure he had quite come to terms with what had happened yet.

"All right, let's do this fast." said Meechee, bringing him back.

The group nodded and spread out as much as they could in the little room.

"What does it look like?" asked Migo.

Dallin looked back. "It's black, and it has a weird shape. You'll know it when you see it."

Along with everyone else, he searched through the decently cluttered floor, looked under furniture, and moved rocks.

Actually, pretty much everything was rock. And if it wasn't rock, it was ice.

Then he searched again. And again. Again, as time passed fruitlessly.

Dallin lightly pounded the wall in frustration. Where could Fleem possibly have hidden a distinct and unique object in such a small room? He'd been all over it, and there were no hints, no clues, nothing!

His companions obviously felt the same. They glanced at him with frustrated looks and kept going.

After what felt like an hour, everyone gathered together in the middle of the room.

"Okay, this isn't working. We need more information." Meechee looked at Dallin. "Is there anything you can think of that could help us find this device?"

Dallin looked down at his feet apologetically. "No. I've told you what it looks like, but that's all I can say until we know what Fleem did with it. Sorry."

The others let out slight groans as Meechee stepped back to think. "He went right to bed after we came up last night." She mumbled. "Where would he put it?" She hummed. "It's possible he could have still been holding it when he went to sleep…."

"We search the bed, then." Gwangi suggested. He crossed the room and pulled off the sheet of what must have been mammoth fur, exposing plain dark rock. He sighed. "Nothing."

Meechee walked over, looking over the surface. Her eyes went to the rock at the end, probably a yeti's version of a pillow.

She lifted it, and Dallin saw her straighten. "Oh. Is this it?"

She turned around, a black object in her hand.

Or rather, what was left of it.

Dr. Laker obviously hadn't expected a yeti to put it under a rock. It was mostly destroyed, with a multitude of cracks and wires visible.

Just looking at it made Dallin's heart jolt as much as if he had seen a bear. He closed his eyes, unable to look. What could they do now?

"It was." He responded with despair.

WHY, Fleem?

"Don't freak out just yet." Kolka grabbed his shoulder reassuringly. "A few yetis have been trying to learn from the smallfeet about their advanced devices. We can see if any of them can fix it. We're not giving up."

The group voiced their agreement, but Dallin still didn't feel reassured.

Without this device, I'm stuck like this.

Fleem:

Once Fleem had food in his hands, his hunger completely took over.

Percy had taken him to his home, and told him to sit on the couch while he got him something to eat, leaving him alone with Brenda. She still didn't believe Fleem's story, but she was nice enough. She'd gotten him a blanket to put around his shoulders, and asked him a few questions about his day until Percy came back with a bowl of something.

Fleem knew from both the smallfeets' looks that he wasn't supposed to eat it like it was a rock fruit, but he was too hungry to care.

And neither of them were saying anything, so, whatever.

As he finished up, Percy sat on the floor across from him, looking...stumped. That probably wasn't a good sign.

"So….Fleem. How in the world did…..cause….what?" Percy looked him up and down, at a loss for words.

Fleem sighed and set his bowl in his lap, wiping his face with an arm. "You sound as clueless as I feel."

"Because this doesn't happen! It isn't possible." Percy rubbed his eyes as if he were only seeing things.

Brenda, on his other side, rolled her eyes, her expression saying, I could have told you that.

"Well, it happened anyway. Now how do we undo it? I'm tired of being a smallfoot, and it's only been one day." Fleem wasn't quite sure what he was expecting. Percy couldn't magically change him back into a yeti.

"Smallfoot?" Percy raised a questioning eyebrow.

Fleem sighed. "That's what we call your kind."

Percy glanced self consciously at his feet, but before he could say anything, Fleem cut in. "Can we focus? You've invented a lot of things in your village here. Is there anything that can turn me back into a yeti?"

Percy started to shake his head but paused.

"How did you turn into a human in the first place?"

Fleem shrugged. "Heck if I know. I've been trying to figure that out from the moment I woke up. As a smallfoot."

Percy tilted his head a little. "Did you happen to run into a guy with red hair yesterday?"

Fleem looked pointedly at Percy's hair.

"Not me! A guy with redder hair than me."

Fleem nodded. "Yeah. He wouldn't stop jabbering. Then he gave me a weird thing and ran away. He was weird."

Both Percy and Brenda let out soft, 'ohhh's. Percy put his head in his hands. "Was he overly cheerful? With a ton of energy?"

"Huge understatement. But yeah."

Percy slowly looked back up at him. "Of course, if the impossible happens, it can be traced back to Dr. Laker."

"Oh boy." Brenda said, looking a little more serious now.

"You believe me now?" Fleem gave her a tiny smirk.

"Well, where Dr. Laker is involved, I've learned not to question things too much." Brenda stood and put a hand on her hip. "If anyone can turn a yeti into a human, it's him."

She looked back down at Percy. "I'm guessing we'll need that device he gave him in order to turn him back?"

Percy stood as well. "Probably." He turned to Fleem. "So where is it?"

Fleem paused. Had he seen it in the house he had woken up in? Had it been one of the many smallfoot things scattered around the place? It had to be there. Otherwise, he just didn't know.

"Uhhh…..I think it's in the house I magically appeared in."

Percy glanced at the window, as if he could see it from there.

"All right, guess we'd better start there. We'll find it, and take it to Dr. Laker. He should be able to, hopefully, change you back."

He scanned Fleem with his eyes again. "But first things first. You can't go out again like that."

Fleem looked down at his smallfoot body, then back at him. "Why? What's wrong with 'this'?"

Percy looked at him in disbelief. "You'll freeze! You've felt how cold it is out there! You don't have a coat, or even shoes!"

"Oh."

Percy gestured for Fleem to follow him. "Until you get your fur back, you're gonna have to take a few tips and tricks."

Fleem left his bowl on the couch, but pulled his blanket closer as he followed Percy down a hallway, to what he assumed was his bedroom. Percy opened a door, revealing a closet.

Fleem watched curiously, and a little suspiciously as he dug something out of it.

Percy turned around, holding out a pair of smallfoot foot covers, and…

""What's that?" He pointed to the white fabric bundle.

"Socks." Percy smiled. "They'll help keep your feet warm. Put them on."

Fleem took the bundle and looked down at his feet, unsure what to do. He glanced uncertainly at Percy again before slowly sitting down on the floor, letting go of the blanket and trying to figure out how in the world this was supposed to go on his feet.

After a moment, Percy knelt down and pulled it apart, revealing two separate foot shaped fabric covers. Then, after watching him struggle for a moment, he sighed, took them back and pushed them onto Fleem's feet himself.

Fleem immediately fought the urge to pull them back off. They felt weird.

Percy pulled another fabric out of the closet. This one was green, and it had longer arms. Fleem stood up as he approached and backed up suspiciously. "What are you doing?"

Percy held it up. "This is a shirt. You wear it under your coat."

Fleem glared at him as he backed up further. "I don't need it."

"Trust me, it will help. Now hold still!"

One furious tussle later, with Percy proving to be the stronger of the two, Fleem had a baggy green layer on over his white layer. He tugged at the 'sleeves', irritated. It only added insult to injury that Fleem was now shorter and thinner than Percy.

Then Percy held up the foot covers again. "You're not going outside without these."

Fleem turned away from him. "Hmph."

But he let Percy shove them on, over the socks. "I swear, you're like a little kid." Percy muttered.

Fleem glared at him. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Percy shook his head with a sigh, and pulled Fleem to his feet, supporting him as he got used to his new foot covers. Fleem barely managed to snag his blanket from the floor.

"You know, I would never have come looking for you if I knew the torture you were going to put me through." Fleem said grumpily.

"Just come on." Percy took his arm and led him back to the other room, where Brenda still stood waiting.

"Right. Can we go now?" Fleem asked impatiently. He was even more done with all of this now.

"You still need a coat." Percy said warily. "I have an extra one. Wait here." He left Fleem with Brenda, who gave him a once over.

"What?" Fleem shifted self consciously from foot to foot.

Brenda smiled. "You have a lot to learn about humans."

Fleem glared at his covered feet. "Yeah? Well right now, I'm learning things I didn't want to know."

Brenda folded her arms. "You'll thank Percy later."

Percy came back a moment later, with a blue coat much like his own. "Here. Are you going to put it on yourself this time?"

Fleem scowled and snatched it, grumbling to himself as he slid his arms into the sleeves. But something didn't feel right…..

Percy chuckled. "No, that's on backwards. Here. I'll help you."

Fleem sighed, resigned, and held up his arms so Percy could put the coat onto him, and zip it up.

Percy and Brenda gave him a dissatisfied look. The coat was too big. Fleem held up an arm, frustrated with the too long sleeve that completely covered his hand, with extra to hang towards the floor. "Seriously?"

Percy gave him an apologetic look. "That's what I have. I don't know how old you are as a yeti, but this body is basically a teen, and you're a fair bit skinnier than me. You'll just have to deal with it."

Fleem groaned. "Fine. Let's go get this over with."

Fleem threw the blanket back over his now coated shoulders. Percy gave him a look, but let him keep it as he and Brenda led him outside, to their 'snowmobiles'.

Already, Fleem was grateful for the foot covers. He could walk on snow now without freezing his toes off.

Once again, Fleem got onto the back behind Percy.

"You'll have to direct me." reminded Percy.

Fleem looked around at the buildings, with their lights and height. They still all looked the same to him.

As Percy started his snowmobile, Fleem began to get a little worried. He wasn't entirely sure he could remember the way to the house. He didn't even get a good look at the outside before he took off.

Regardless, off they went. He would have to try.