“Erm, hi, this is me, uh, William. Oh, William Arnolds, that’s my, erm, assigned name.” Fionna hated that name. And yet here she was, introducing herself like that into the little camera on her friend Cody’s phone. Apparently, you had to give consent via video recording for this process to be legal.

She felt a little bit guilty for taking advantage of her friend’s situation like that. The main reason she was so eager to become his familiar was to get away from her family.

Ever since finally figuring out she was trans a few months ago, walking around at home had been like walking around in a bedroom filled with Lego pieces. She’d always had to keep her behavior in check, always had to act like the ol’ reliable son.

Even getting permission to start growing her hair out had been the result of a heated debate where she had to prove she’d still be just as manly, as if growing your hair out would produce estrogen or something. Oh, if only…

She’d heard Cody talk about his hatred for the bureaucratic process of getting a familiar quite often, including the fact that, if he were to enroll at a university, there’d be a place for her in student housing and she could attend specialized magic classes for familiars if she wanted to.

At least that’s what she’d pieced together from the bits and pieces she’d heard from her friend. And even if that would turn out not to be her cup of tea, she would still finally be financially independent from her parents. Plus, magical HRT or something was probably a thing that existed.

And that’s why she was in this awkward situation at the moment. Cody looked down at some notes he’d taken. “Alright, so you’re aware that this will cure any of your illnesses—not super applicable here—but you won’t become invincible; and some parts of your body might come to resemble the animal in question; there might be some other slight changes; your mind won’t be altered; this won’t cost anything; you’re not required to stick around me; and I think that’s it.” He took a deep breath after all that.

Fionna nodded. “I am aware of… all that and I give my consent to becoming your familiar.”

Cody turned off the camera and smiled. Even aside from the other benefits for her personally, she was happy that this’d mean she could spend more time with her friend in the future. Whenever she’d brought up the topic of trans people at the dinner table with Cody and his parents, they’d seemed very supportive. As such, as soon as she knew she could live independently of her parents, she decided she’d come out.

Her friend took her by surprise when he announced they’d be doing the process right then and there. “It’ll be easier when the sheep are asleep,” he said. “Plus, the process takes a toll on you and you might sleep for up to four hours. So doing this at night is more efficient.” With a wink, he added, “Also, since we’re already bending the rules, might as well go all-out and do it at night. Like some stealth movie.” He gave her a goofy smile, and she couldn’t help but roll her eyes. As smart as he was, he could be a giant goofball sometimes.

Getting permission from Cody’s parents, the actual owners of all the sheep, was pretty easy. They were good people, but didn’t really have much contact with magic. All Cody had to do was tell them that they needed Betsy for “some magic thing” and promise that it wouldn’t be painful for the old sheep. Her friend ensured them that she wouldn’t feel a thing and pass away peacefully.

And so, here they were, surrounded by sleeping sheep. Cody slowly approached the other side of the room, and in that moment Fionna was very happy for the straw laid all over the floor. It made being stealthy a lot easier.

Following her friend, she could immediately tell which sheep was Betsy. While all the other ones were sleeping soundly, her breaths sounded clearly pained. It made her feel a little bad for the creature. Her last moments would be in pain. But, then again, if Cody’s words were to be believed, all of her moments from now to when she’d be put down would be in pain.

But now, there was another problem. “You know,” Fionna pointed out, “do you really wanna cast this spell right here? Where there’s, like, over ten sheep that’ll likely wake up and panic?”

Cody, in the middle of looking at his notes one last time, froze. “Well, we will get teleported out of here by the time anything could happen to us.” He put his fingers to his chin. “But even so, I really don’t wanna cause a ruckus if I can help it.  Hang on, lemme verify something…”

He slowly approached Betsy, but instead of going straight for the creature, he investigated the simple wall made of wooden boards that she was resting against. Fionna was a little scared that he would tear it apart or something, but he just nudged some of the boards a tiny bit so that a small but sizable gap got created. And through it, faint moonlight poured into the room.

“Well, that confirms that at least. If we just go around the building, I can just do the spell at the back wall, which is…” He pointed at the wall he just finished examining. “...right on the other side of that wall!” Continuing his monologue, he went towards the exit. “So, since the spell seeks out the nearest applicable animal, we can just do the spell from there and it’ll locate Betsy through the wall.”

It was obvious to Fionna that he was about to go on another one of his long-winded explanations again. And while she’d love to listen, they really couldn’t afford to wake the animals now. “Hey, psst, indoor voice. Sheep are sleeping,” she hissed. And so they exited the building in an awkward silence.

Once outside, Fionna could see her friend taking a deep breath, preparing to pick off his explanation right where he left off. Before he could get going, she tried getting a question in. “So how do we know I won’t get fused to, like, a termite or some other insect that might be closer at the time? Or a worm in the dirt or something.”

Cody gave her a cocky grin. “An excellent question, my dear, but it is elementary.” She couldn’t help roll her eyes, what a dork. “You see, in order for the procedure to work, the animal has to be of a certain size and, well, let’s say complexity.” He began staring at the ground while walking, lost in thought. That was a very safe course of action to take in the middle of the night.

“That said, you raise a good point,” he mumbled. Fionna sure didn’t intend to raise any kind of point, she was just curious, but she didn’t wanna correct him. “Technically, small insects can produce mana just as well as, say, mammals. It’s just in a smaller quantity, since they themselves are smaller, but that should pose no issue when fusing, since you’ll largely keep your size.”

While still gathering his next thoughts, Cody tripped and was on his way to fall to the ground. Thankfully, Fionna anticipated that such a thing would happen and pulled him back by his shirt. Her friend just made light of the situation. “Thank you, my knight in shining armor.” Immediately, she let go of his shirt, almost causing him to fall down again.

 “Should’ve fallen down,” she mumbled to nobody in particular. He really didn’t deserve that, she knew that full well, but being called that just ticked her off. One of the few perks of her size—or Cody’s lack thereof—was that she could mess with him like that.

After gathering his thoughts, Cody went right back into nerd mode. “Alright, so, as I was saying, there’s really no inherent reason to differentiate like that. And yet, anything smaller than your average mouse just won’t be recognized by the spell. I suspect it’s one of many intricacies encoded in the very simple incantation.”

Not really listening anymore, Fionna just nodded absentmindedly. Normally she would’ve eaten up this information, but now that she was so close to breaking free of her parents, she really couldn’t focus on that.

After a walk that really shouldn’t have taken as long as it did, mostly thanks to Cody’s tripping and just trying to carefully navigate in the darkness, they finally turned the last corner and reached the other side of the building. According to Cody, somewhere on the other side of this wall was Betsy.

Only issue was, it wasn’t exactly a short wall. They could probably spitball it, but confirming it would take a while.

Fionna sighed. “So, are we gonna have to search this whole wall now?”

Cody just gave her that smug grin he had when he was three steps ahead of everyone else. She knew it full well from playing games with him. “Well you see, my sheep-to-be, just call my phone number and you’ll see.” Had he been saving that stupid line ever since initiating his plan?

Taking out her phone, she did as he said and pulled out her phone, going to her contacts and selecting her friend’s number. She knew where this was going, but she wanted to act at least a little surprised to give him some satisfaction.

After she dialed the number, they both heard a distinct vibrating noise from the grass a little bit further along the wall. Cody brushed some dirt off his phone and raised it triumphantly.

Fionna made sure to give him her best impressed face. However, she couldn’t keep her act up for long, and soon fell back to the usual banter. “You know, I’m glad you didn’t accidentally set it to ring. Imagine if some awful ringtone woke up all the sheep!” She chuckled to herself, and Cody joined in.

Regardless, they’d now found the spot closest to the sick sheep, and they hopefully wouldn’t cause too much collateral damage. Cody motioned to the wall. “It’s best you sit down there so you’re as close to Betsy as possible. Better safe than sorry, y’know?”

Fionna did as he instructed, getting dirt on her jeans in the process. She didn’t value them very much, sure, but it still felt like something easily preventable to her. Well, no use crying over spilled milk.

Usually, Cody was pretty much always an aloof guy. However, in what Fionna considered a minor miracle, he actually looked her over with a serious glare. “Are you sure you wanna do this? No going back once it has started.”

Taking a deep breath, Fionna reassured herself that things would work out. Anything would be better than sticking with whatever plan her parents would’ve worked out for her. And so she steeled herself one last time. “Yeah, I’m ready.”

Cody just nodded and took out his wand. He soundlessly whispered some words to himself before facing Fionna and pointing his wand at her. “Here goes nothing… Hadzan ruya hazeban belan!”

The spell rang weird in her ears, so simple yet apparently so powerful. However, she barely had time to register that. Immediately after Cody had spoken the incantation, a brilliant blast of light flew directly in her face.

She could sense the energy flowing through her, but it was too much to handle, too much to process. She blacked out only a few seconds later, the last thing she felt before blacking out being the sudden appearance of a soft bed under her.

underFlorence

Everyone else: Haha look at these eggs.

Me, a genius: Watch this.