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"Some of 'em, yeah," mused Foxglove. "Like me, I'm the fragile speedster in our little gang, fight-wise, and, well, look at me." She poked her stomach, losing her finger up to the second knuckle. "Laburnum's ... well, she has her cheerful moments and her stupid moments, but she's never like this."

Laburnum rolled onto her back, spitting dust. "Why does my mouth taste crunchy? ... Bored now." She jumped up and started running up and down the corridor again, giggling.

"So airborne. And blue... Blue..." She frowned.
"That.. seems familiar......"
She frowned.
"Say.. Fox? Would you say that our problems.... seem to be related to our personalities?"

Hearing the familiar voices of his mothers, he tucked his tiny body into a corner and waited till they were gone. Being a toddler with the natural curiosity and disobedience of a kitten, he wasn't keen to give up his newfound invisibility. He sucked his claws and listened.

"Luna, honey, it's not that bad!" said Cheri comfortingly, patting her girlfriend's ankle.

"Not that bad?! This is horrible! I'm ... I'm ..." Luna babbled, struggling to finish her sentence. "You've turned into a carnivore, and ... and ..."

Pompom peered out at his parents, realising that whatever had affected him must have also affected them. Cheri appeared entirely normal, except for the fact that the tiny rabbit-eared woman, usually a strict vegetarian, was holding a half-eaten chunk of raw meat and pausing occasionally to take another bite from it. Luna had suffered much worse, and was now ...

"A human! I can't believe it, I'm a human! I hate being human!"

"Oh, don't overreact! You're just a little bigger than usual."

"A little?" Luna was now easily two-and-a-half times her normal height, and as she lacked her usual long tail, was having to lean against the wall to walk without falling over.

Cheri sniffed the air. "I think he's this way, c'mon."

Foxglove pointed back into the RC. "Marile seems to have escaped. She's been in her tank all day, whatever this is must be spread by touch, or maybe airborne. Wait, on second thoughts ..." Foxglove went back into the room and peered into the tank. "Hang on, there's a bit. She sort of has a blue rash - I didn't notice it before because she's patchy-coloured anyway."

The Mini-Deepcoiler hissed indignantly and waved her fins.

Re-entering the corridor, Foxglove stumbled over Laburnum, who was still lying flat on the floor. "What the hell are you doing?"

"I'm making dust angels!" Laburnum declared gleefully.

The handshake was rebuffed, to Suicide's complete lack of surprise, so he shrugged one shoulder and tucked the hand into a trouser pocket instead. He was hardly insulted or disappointed, not when everything was shaping up so nicely. The results of their entrance had been nicely chaotic, a couple of the nurses were clearly disappointed that their would-be moment of embarrassing had been defused, and at least one of them looked vaguely ill at the memory of Ithalond--which, to be fair, was entirely expected given what the Elf gone through. (Not long after the incident, Suicide had taken it upon himself to taste a Dibbler pie and had temporarily gained the will to live. It had been so unnerving that he'd privately promised himself that he'd be less hard on Ithalond.)

"Dio's fine," he said to Jenni. His arm was still draped around her, partially because it felt good and partially because he rather felt that the 'my territory' message hadn't quite been conveyed to the skeptical Nurse Elms enough yet. "She used to have her moments, though. Spending time on the Island Where Dreams Come True might not've been the brightest idea."

He gave a genial, no-loaded-pies nod to Immac, and was about to reply to Nurse Mirrad (in the years since he'd come to the PPC, several painful experiences had taught him not to underestimate short bald men with uncannily serene dispositions), but Elms' use of the shit-eating grin was deemed a matter for more urgent attention. That was his favorite expression, thankyouverymuch.

If you think this is bad, he added to her, his tone congenial, you should've seen me before I died the first time. I wouldn't question her taste, though: my masters always told me that when you find a woman who knows what she wants, the only thing you can do is give it to her as much as possible. The sad thing was, that actually counted as a masterfully subtle innuendo where Suicide was concerned.

((I'm sorry, I couldn't think of anything to do with them. fails Su would have to be maintaining about three different conversations at once for me to utilize them properly, I think.))

At the mention of magic, something seemed to twinge in Portia's brain. registering as a slight twitch on one of her eyeborws, but that passed (relatively) unnoticed as she collected herself.

"Look, I don't know half these people, but I think that the more information we have, the closer to figuring this all out we'll all be. So Gurgan, if you'll please start by letting the fox go?" She started in the stoat's direction as the giant ghoul-turned-chicken removed his good from the CAF. "Now," She asked Skyfire. "Where are these other people you mentioned?"

I think-- and this is just a thought, don't get me wrong --that maybe we should find somewhere that's not the middle of a hallway to figure things out in, Lee suggested. She eyed Emm's CAD, and then added, Preferably without any CADs, for a start.

"That includes you, brainiac," Kay said to Emm, who was just getting out his own CAD.

"... ex-Subcaptain of the Nighthunt, honorary member of the OFUR Long Patrol, responsible for the containment of Molly Rath," Skyfire rattled off with a brief salute. "I actually am usually a stoat, just not a pink one. And this-" she said, holding Drake out for inspection, "is Drake. He is usually a fox, but significantly more human-shaped and less nauseating. He was responsible for the last shapeshifting crisis, but I don't see how he could have done this. The effects are a bit random for the transformation gun."

Ally watched the ensuing events and tried not to laugh. "This just gets weirder and weirder."

Grace frowned. "Could this be magic, maybe?"

Ally raised an eyebrow. "A DoSAT intern speculating about magic?"

"I've seen what magic can do," Grace replied, shuddering at a certain bad memory. "It's why nobody from the Dresden Files continuum is allowed into DoSAT anymore. And we never did figure out how she turned the blaster into a banana."

"Yeah. Normally I'm a ghoul-a kind of mutant from the Fallout 'verse." He wormed the cigarette around his mouth. "'name's Gurgan, by the way."
He turned to his companions. "Don't have the foggiest what they were. Shoulda asked. I'll ask now." He took a drag and yelled. "HEY! Who were you before all this happened?"

Skyfire scooped up Drake. "We woke up like this. It could be worse; his partner's now pocket-sized, my son's divebombing everything in sight, and one of our friends is now behaving like a Teletubby on speed. Am I to assume the chicken thing isn't normal either?"

"Okay..." Gurgan took his foot off of his prisoner. "But you keep that little F***er away from me: I have no intention of winding up as a bunch of nuggets." He paused, and glanced at Skyfire. Then at Drake. "Is pink normally a color associated with foxes?"

"Hey.. nice Moses..." She eeped at this as the otter took on a short ride that was cut short as Storm brought him down.
"Hey.. don't drop me!!" she yelped. As Storm started to unpry, she started to relax.

That's when Moses started to chew his her head. She flialed, managing to get free. She panted.
"Oh.. FOx... question." she panted while scrambling up Stormsong's arm to his shoulder.
"What happened to your hell hounds? Is this related to all, or just us agents?"

and struggled to get out from under the foot. He was whining and trying to get to Sky. To his mind, Sky equaled safety.

"And I'll have you know I don't eat things that talk back." She glanced down at herself. "Please don't comment on the pink."

"Holy s***, there are more of them!" He yelped (erm, squawked.) He gave the senior agent a wary look. "You gonna pounce on me too?"

That got a reaction. The hand was met with a flat stare—nobody in that room was going to take such an abrupt reversal at face-value, and Elms was no exception—but any comment she might have made was cut off by a squeak from Immac, who was sitting at the table next to Parwill.

"Oh! I've heard of you!" she said, bouncing slightly in her chair. "You're the one whose partner came down with Bursar Disease, and you put that poor elf in here with a Dibbler pie. Nathonea told me all about it!" She was caught somewhere between excitement at making the connection and worry that Suicide was going to pull some sort of questionable pastry out of a pocket right then and there.

"Immie's from the Disc," Jenni said for Suicide's benefit, leaning contentedly against his side. This was going to be interesting. "'Course everyone's heard of Ithalond. I missed the Bursar Disease thing, though. Diocletian seemed sane enough when I saw her, allowing for circumstances."

"Agent Astreth vanished before completing her course of treatment, I believe," Mirrad intoned. The Minbari had relaxed once it became apparent that no attack was forthcoming, and stood with his hands folded serenely across the front of his cream-colored robe. At just under five and a half feet tall, he wasn't someone most people would expect to hold his own in the middle of a fight with someone like Suicide, but then again, he did have the 'bald man with a Denn'Bok' thing working for him. The others regarded him with clear respect when he spoke. "But no matter. Since our humorous prank seems to have rebounded on us, let us remember our own manners. Agent Suicide, please allow me to introduce Nurses Elms, Immac, and Parwill, and Intern Bjørnsen. I am Mirrad." He raised his hands, one laid over the other with the palms inward, thumbs raised and touching to form a triangle. "Congratulations on a successful . . . courtship. It seems I underestimated just how successful. Elms was very astute, however." His dark eyes definitely had a bit of a sparkle to them, for all his polite demeanor.

"I'm still not sure this is appropriate," Alex murmured into the remainder of his coffee. The edge of his keenness appeared dulled by the stains on his jacket cuffs and an impressive blush that spread all the way up to his hairline.

Elms overheard and rewarded him with a comradely slap on the back that almost spilled his cup. "Loosen up, kid. If you can't be nice and comfy with the things folk get up to at night of their own free will, you'll never hack it in this department. Jenni gets it, even if her taste is gods-awful. The Dibbler pie guy? Really? And since we're on the subject of the Disc, I gotta point out the whole Cohen the Barbarian thing." She shook her head sadly, though the effect was spoiled by the persistence of a shit-eating grin. Being reminded that she'd just won a tidy little betting pool did wonders for her mood. "I've lost respect for you, Jen, I really have."

(( I'm sorry, this lot could talk forever. >.>; If I let Jenni respond they will, so I'll stop here and give Su a chance to defend himself and/or her. Or just directly snark back at Elms, I suppose. g Also, everything I know about Parwill is on the FicPsych Personnel wiki page, so feel free to write him/her/whatever if inspiration strikes. Immac, too; she's your basic bubbly excitable type, not tricky to write. I figure she comes in handy for cases of wangst and emo-ness. ))

The mustelids tried to catch Moses and pull Naomi out of his grasp, but otters are slippery at the best of times, and when wings are brought into the equation they're almost impossible to catch. Stormsong wrapped the leash around his paw and yanked Moses down to head level, then began the arduous task of extracting Naomi from his paws.

Skyfire looked from them to the corridor Drake had run down, shouted "You deal with Naomi, I'll bring Drake back!" and ran off before Stormsong could object. He mouthed something unsuitable for mixed company, then turned to Foxglove and mouthed Help me! Foxglove grabbed the otter and let Stormsong, the one with more manual dexterity, prise his claws open. Moses, thinking of this as a fun game, laughed and started chewing Naomi's hair.

Skyfire ran up, waving her paws. "Don't kill that fox, he's an agent! Sorry, normally he's humanoid, his partner would be here to help out but she's a bit busy being attacked by my son at the moment ..."

And the large eyes went even larger. Drake started to yip, trying to explain, but everyone knew that CAFs didn't speak english. The big pink bow on his neck reading Drake was also there, but he was in too much of vulpine history despair. Imagine, a fox being stepped on by a chicken.

Ally nodded to Portia, decided that maybe she wouldn't kill anyone, and followed along until the sparkly fox appeared. She fingered her knife. "Hmmm. Do foxes make good eating, do you think?"

Grace thought about for a moment. "Doubt it. Anyway, this one sparkles."

Ally shuddered. "Point made."

"If I don't like the answer...I'll give you to them." He motioned towards his companions. "Now then-Whattaya say? Speak quickly, fella."

Gurgan placed a little extra pressure to make sure that the fox got his point. "Not so fast there, @$$hole. You wanna tell me what the F*** you think you were doing?" He took a drag on his cigarette before continuing. "If I LIKE the answer, I'll let you up and we'll go our seperate ways. But if not..." He gave a savage grin and leaned down to whisper something in the foxes ear.

That was the sound of six feet of seemingly antique hardwood whacking into the skull of the Cute Animal Friend, sub-definition Vulpes Vulpes. As the pounce crumpled and the fox whammed into the floor, he could hear someone say. "Are foxes supposed to sparkle like that?"

It was a woman's voice... but why did the matching face, gracile as it was, have a beard (cut unevenly to about half a foot in length)? Then larger problems came into play as the giant chicken set down one scaly foot on the foxes back, preventing it from getting up. "Normally, I wouldn't react this generously to someone who tried to pounce on me, but given all the weirdness going on, we need all the answers we can."