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sakon76
Your Smile Remains The Same
by K. Stonham
first released 7th November 2021
He would never admit that it had been a move born of desperation.
Because, really, there had been no other way it could have gone.
They'd been investigating a string of child disappearances, which had left neither hint nor body behind. Just... missing children, vanished away from their parents in the middle of stores.
There was never a situation in which that kind of thing had a good cause or positive outcome. And sadly, revoltingly, this time had turned out to be the worst possible scenario.
Douxie hadn't quite vomited over finding the mangled corpses of children, but it had been a very, very close thing. Most of the rest of Team Trollhunters had. He had a feeling they'd all need therapy after this.
But discovering the bodies had meant they were on the right track, and if any of them had carried doubts about their purpose before... well, they didn't now.
Deeper in the cave system, where not even snakes or bats dared venture, they'd come across a shallow lake. And on the far side....
Well, it had been a long time since Hisirdoux had last seen a warlock, and if he never did again, it would still be too soon.
The man might have been an incel once, or a cult fanatic, or... any number of disturbing possibilities, really. But now he'd combined magic and murder, using blood sorcery to fuel his transformation into a pasty, bloated figure opening a rift in reality.
Not the kind of rifts Claire might open to the Shadow Realm, or the type Douxie himself might use to send imps and demons back to Limbo.
No, this was far worse.
It was a crack in reality itself, widening by the moment, with the things on the other side, things from outside of reality, screeching, trying to wedge themselves through.
"I'm gonna be sick," said Toby, and promptly was, again.
"I wish I could be sick," said Krel, staring.
"Step one," said Douxie lowly to Jim, "kill the warlock." Jim nodded, focused, Excalibur in his hands spilling white and gold sparks to the ground. "Step two," which would be Hisirdoux's job, "close that rift."
"Douxie," murmured Archie warily, taking a step back. "You can't...."
"I have to, don't I?" he asked his familiar, knowing already this was going to hurt. But that was what being a Guardian of Arcadia was about, wasn't it? Doing the things no one else could do, to protect the world.
"Douxie," said Claire, her eyes filled with worry.
He shook his head. "I don't think you can help me with this one, Fair Claire. Though if you could portal us all across the water, that'd be grand."
Whatever she saw in his expression, she clearly didn't like it. But nonetheless she squared up her shoulders and nodded. "Let's do this."
After that, he lost track of what Jim and the others were doing, save that four-on-one against an ascended warlock was being a tighter battle than they'd anticipated.
As for himself, he was applying layers and layers of spells over the rift, like plasters against a gut wound, trying to keep it stable just long enough that he could metaphorically stitch the edges together and pull it closed tight.
The things on the other side didn't want that.
Spells and lances and things that might have been tentacles but weren't lashed at him through the crack, Archie taking them out with firepower as best he could. Douxie was sweating, straining. One stitch after another, draining him down to his reserves, and it wasn't enough, the infernal screeching deafening him as his limbs trembled.
One last drop of power, and it was all he had, scraped raw and empty, but it still wasn't enough--
The creatures were going to rip loose--
His friends were going to die--
He didn't know if he screamed or not.
But he knew that he could not allow this, not even at the cost of his own life.
Something ripped loose deep inside him, an agony that he'd never known before, to fuel his final spell.
And he could only hope it was enough, blue magic blinding and deafening him as he collapsed into blackness.
He woke slowly, his senses coming back in waves. Smell returned first, bearing a nauseating stench of pus and rot and burnt flesh that made him want to gag. Next came touch, with the awareness he was laying on something cold and hard, rocks jutting into his back. His shoes pinched, and the stone beneath his fingertips was both rough and wet. Sound came back, a dizzying array of voices, their words babbling and swirling with concern. Their speech was muddled, but each voice was familiar, easing a weight that he hadn't even known was compressing his chest. Finally came sight, his eyes fluttering open like they'd been stuck asleep for a hundred years. He winced at the bright light until it dimmed, being moved away, and he realized it wasn't all that bright after all, the vast black depths of the cavern swallowing up all attempts at illumination.
Several overlapping voices said his name, all at once, as he levered himself up from where he'd been laying flat on the black stone. There was a strange note in their voices, a question, a worry he wasn't quite sure of.
"Everyone all right?" he asked, and froze.
That... wasn't his voice.
His hand flew to his throat, but stopped halfway there.
That wasn't his hand.
Except it was. It was definitely attached to his body, and those were his bracelets, and his tattoos poking out from the bottom of his cuffed sleeve.
But something about the proportions of it was wrong. He wasn't weak but he also wasn't muscular like that.
Further down his body, his jeans were now a couple inches too short, and his hightops were still pinching his feet like they were suddenly a size or two too small.
And all his friends were staring at him.
Hisirdoux was not stupid, but it took him far longer than he'd like to admit to add two and two together and get (probably) four.
"Oh, fuzzbuckets," he said.
That, oddly enough, made the five of them relax.
"It is you!" Claire said.
"Apparently," Douxie replied, still trying to catalogue exactly what was different.
"Ha! So humans can transform." Krel punched Toby in the shoulder and held out his hand. "You owe me five bucks."
"What?! No way, dude!"
Douxie ignored them in favor of patting himself down, finding nothing obviously injured. Just... different. He looked up at Archie, the pleading in his eyes, he hoped, going understood.
"Well," his familiar said, "not what I would have expected you to look like, older. But, I suppose, not bad."
"Older?" Douxie demanded.
Archie was silent.
"How much older?" he asked.
"I'd say... ten, twelve years?" Archie hazarded.
Douxie blinked. Then, "I can't be thirty!" he said. "I'm nineteen!"
"Not at the moment," Jim said, hauling him to his feet. And, ow, the shoes thing was starting to really make itself known.
Douxie surveyed the shore and the cavern wall. There was no more trace of the dimensional rift. "The warlock?" he asked.
Jim wrinkled his nose. "Toast," he reported, and from both what Douxie could smell, and the faint glow of embers over near where the once-human abomination had been, he guessed that was a literal as well as a figurative answer.
"All right," Douxie said, summoning his staff. He still felt scraped raw, but depending on how long he'd been out... yeah, there was just a drop of power seeped back into the staff's reserves. He pulled it forth and ran it over himself, adjusting everything. Suddenly his clothing was properly loose again, and his shoes felt like they actually fit once more. His hair was falling around his face more than usual, though. Vanishing the staff back into his vambrace, he pulled off one of his leather bracelets and wrapped it around his hair (longer, by the feel of it), shaping it into a makeshift ponytail. "I've got just about nothing left," he reported. "Claire, can you portal us to the other side?"
"Or back to the cave entrance," Jim suggested. "We need to... let the police know about those kids."
And that statement sobered even Toby and Krel's playfighting.
Archie jumped up onto Douxie's shoulder even as Claire did as requested. The cat-shaped dragon scrabbled momentarily, misjudging what had been a familiar leap for centuries. And, okay, it's not like he had missed the fact that he was suddenly taller. But Douxie really didn't want to confront that any more than he had to.
And he didn't want to look in a mirror.
The Arcadia Oaks police were not particularly happy with the fact that five teenagers (and a cat) had gone into the cavern, and four teenagers and an adult (and a cat) had come back out. It was only Douxie summoning his staff, all four of the teenagers (and the cat) glaring at them, and the very exhaustedly given excuse of "magical accident" that had led them back to concentrating on the fact that they had a murder scene to contain... and would shortly have some bereaved parents to break the news to.
Each of them giving their statements was harrowing enough. Jim never knew how much of what they told the AOPD actually made it into "official" reports. He also didn't care. The result was the same: a bunch of dead kids, and a stupid self-centered dabbler in the magical arts dead. And the world saved one more time.
Go team.
He looked over to where Douxie, an actual freaking grown-up now, sat on a boulder, done with his own statement, petting Archie, looking determinedly away from the cavern entrance and all the police setup with lights and search dogs going on there. He wondered what Douxie was thinking. Was feeling. Or if he'd just mentally shut down, the way Jim had once or twice after his own set of involuntary transformations.
"All right," Detective Scott said, patting Jim on the shoulder. "I think we're done."
"You know where to reach us if you need more," Jim said, automatically.
"Yeah." The detective paused, looked over at Douxie. "Your friend going to be all right?"
Jim wanted to say yeah, sure, definitely. But he just couldn't. "I hope so," he said instead, and stood up, walking over to the wizard.
"Hey," he said, making Douxie and Archie both look up at him. "I think they're all done with us. Ready to go home?"
Douxie looked down at his hands for a minute, then back up. "As ready as I'll ever be, I guess," he replied in his new, deeper voice.
"Hey." Jim put a hand on his friend's shoulder. "You've got this. And we've got you. And if there's anyone who knows about uncomfortable, unexpected transformations... it's me."
That won him a smile. "I shall follow in your footsteps, oh master," Douxie snarked. "Come on, Arch, let's go." The cat scrambled onto his shoulder as he stood, then went one step further and stretched up, resting his front paws on top of Douxie's head as he looked around.
"Oh, I do like the new view from up here," Archie reported.
Douxie laughed at that. "Cheeky."
"And don't you forget it," Archie said, returning to his usual shoulder perch as the other members of their team also stood and they all wandered back to the parking lot, a quarter mile away, where they'd left Toby's (heavily renovated with both magic and Akiridion tech) van.
"So," Claire said eventually. "Dimensional rift?"
Douxie opened his eyes to look at her. The pair of them had claimed the rearmost seat in the van, with Jim sitting in the middle and twisting around now to listen to their conversation. Judging from the low conversation going on between the driver's and shotgun seats, Toby and Krel were arguing (again) about why the driver got to pick the music, and why Krel never, ever got to drive.
"Right," Douxie said. "So. We exist in a sheaf of nested dimensions. Think of it... like an onion. Or maybe a book. With each dimension being a layer of the onion, or a page of the book."
"Got it so far," said Claire.
"And you and I, as wizards, can access some of those other layers. The Shadow Realm, in your case. And Limbo, among others, in mine. So over the millennia, magic-users have explored, labeled, and codified those realms."
"The Darklands," Jim suddenly spoke up.
Douxie nodded. "Another dimension in the sheaf. But what our dead adversary back there was trying to do was... rip a hole in the onion's skin, or the book's cover, more or less, so that everything outside could come burrowing in."
"And that's bad," said Claire.
Douxie nodded. "Exceptionally bad. It may or may not be that the creatures outside are in fact benevolent in the long run, but when it comes down to it, they'll destroy everything in our sheaf of realities, forcing their way in, so does it really matter what their intentions are?"
"But if opening the rift took killing all those kids," Jim asked quietly, "what did it cost you to close it?"
Hisirdoux shrugged, looking out the window. "That's what I don't know yet."
Barbara came home to the smell of a roast in the oven, and the usual horde of ravenous teenagers sitting around the dining table. Well, three of the usual ravenous teenagers.
And one adult stranger.
"Hey, Doctor L!" Toby greeted her, along with Claire and Krel's greetings.
But it was the stranger's greeting that kept her attention: "Hello, Doctor Lake."
Her eyes widened. She knew that accent, and that greeting, even if the voice was deeper now. "Douxie?" she asked, rapidly cataloging the familiar features - black hair with blue tips, unusual heterochromic eyes, his vambrace, his dark clothing. "What happened?" Because there were a lot more features that were unfamiliar, it seemed, at the moment. He was older, taller, his shoulders broader, and what she could see of his forearms more heavily corded with muscle. His face was almost a stranger's, his jaw brushed with dark stubble.
If she hadn't known it was him, she might not have known it was him.
He grimaced. "Magical accident."
"Damage taken in the middle of trying to close a dimensional rift," Jim said from the kitchen, where he was chopping something. Onions, from the smell of it. "We're not sure quite what, yet."
Her gaze flashed to her son. "Did you find those missing kids?"
Jim's knife stilled. "Yeah," he said. His tone told her all she needed to know.
Her hand flew to her mouth. "Oh. I'm so sorry."
"Yeah," said Toby. "That makes all of us."
Douxie excused himself to use the washroom before dinner. He didn't make the mistake of thinking his exit had gone unnoticed, but at least his friends were gracious enough not to comment on it.
He locked the door before he turned to face the mirror.
He didn't want to see what had changed.
But he also needed to see what had changed.
He didn't recognize the person looking back at him.
They had the same blue dye in their hair, and the same eyes, but... that was it.
The man in the mirror was older, much older, his face more square than Hisirdoux's own. He had dark stubble over the lower half of his face. Wordlessly, Hisirdoux took off his hoodie, exposing familiar reflected tattoos over unfamiliar arms. Strong ones, he noted. They actually looked like they could punch something and have it have an effect.
The man in the mirror was roguish, good-looking.
He was also a complete stranger.
Hisirdoux didn't even realize he was hyperventilating until, untouched, the mirror broke, shattering his false reflection into a hundred radiating shards.
"Shit shit shit shit shit," he breathed, bringing up a hasty hand and a touch of magic, frantically smoothing the mirror back into a cohesive whole. They couldn't know what he'd done.
The person in the mirror was red-eyed, like he'd been crying.
Ignoring his reflection, Douxie took a deep breath, splashed water on his face, wiped it dry, and went back down to dinner.
To say that Archibald was concerned about his familiar was an understatement. He knew Douxie wasn't happy about this new development. But Douxie was also an expert at bludgeoning his trauma into submission and presenting a happy, unconcerned face to everyone.
Even, sometimes, to Archie himself.
Which was why he didn't let Douxie out of his sight for a second, even after they'd returned to their tiny apartment over the bookshop. The way Douxie's calm, cheerful expression cracked just a fraction over having to magic his pajamas larger almost gave him an opening - but then Douxie smoothed everything away again and made a stupid, eminently forgettable joke about if good things came in small packages, it was a problem for larger fellows, eh, Arch?
Worried, Archie curled up against his familiar in the bed that had barely been big enough for a gangly teenager and his cat, and which was definitely not quite big enough for that same teenager turned into an adult, and his cat. But as always, he made do, choosing to sleep on top of his person.
Yet somehow he woke up in the morning in the middle of an empty bed, Douxie completely absent from the premises.
The man, no longer a boy, returned just a few minutes later, before Archie's concern could bloom into full-fledged worry. "Got you a bagel with lox," he said, waving a white paper sack from the bakery a few doors down. His fake smile was firmly in place. "And a latte."
Douxie was clearly ignoring the whole situation to the best of his ability. Or so Archie thought until his familiar absolutely refused to leave the apartment for the rest of the day. "I've got things to do," he said, looking around at their little eight-by-ten dwelling. "Cleaning, you know. And. Catching up on Twitter or something."
"Resizing your clothes," Archie shot at him.
Douxie twitched. "Yeah, that," he muttered.
"Well, then," said Archie, forming a plan, "I shall leave you to it." He leapt up to their little high window (painted over on the outside), wrangled it open, and prepared to go out. "I'll take in a bit of fresh air and catch you later, shall I?"
"Yeah, you do that, Arch," said Douxie, looking for just a second like he was upset, then covering it up again.
"Back in a while," Archie said cheerfully (Douxie was not the only one in their family of two who had trod the boards), and leapt out, letting his wings catch the morning's meager breeze.
He headed for Jim's house.
The situation was worse than he'd thought.
"Seriously?" asked Jim.
"You know Douxie," Archie replied over a cup of tea. "The only thing he's better at than magic is repressing things."
"I'm sure he'd argue music's up there somewhere too," said Jim, "but, yeah, you're totally right. So what's your idea?"
"He can't very well hide in the apartment forever," said Archie. "Though I'm sure he thinks he can."
Jim started to grin. "So you're suggesting, what, we drag him outside to make him deal with his new... everything?"
"Precisely," said the dragon.
Jim already had his phone in hand, texting people. "I think we can arrange that."
When the knock came on Douxie's apartment door, he was half expecting it. Archie hadn't returned, and he'd had that particular body language earlier that meant he was up to something.
Still, he was not expecting to find Claire standing on the other side of the door, bright smile on her face and hands tucked behind her back. "There is life outside your apartment," she sang to him, "I know it's hard to conceive. But there is life outside your apartment, and you're only gonna see it if you leave."
He stared. "Really, Claire? Avenue Q?"
She grinned. "Do I have to get to the line about 'he's resisting' or are you going to come quietly?"
He leaned out the door and looked at the gang of teenagers who were just waiting along the wall. "You're not subtle, you know," he told them.
Jim grinned. "When have we ever claimed to be? Come on, Doux. Lunch at the cafe."
"Yes. I want to have one more fun meal before Aja and the oaf return from Akiridion-5 tomorrow and I am stuck listening to the lovey-doviness all the time," Krel put in.
Douxie sighed. "Fine. Alright. I'll come."
Half an hour later, he was regretting that decision. Not that his friends seemed to care what he looked like... but everyone else did.
His fellow waitstaff at the cafe didn't recognize him. And he was hyperaware of every set of critical eyes that looked over their party, every whisper of concern wondering what that grown man was doing with a bunch of teenagers....
He couldn't have said what he ate, only that it tasted like ashes. He kept one hand on his glass of lemonade, and the other in his pocket, to hide how they were shaking. He smiled and laughed at Krel's complaints about Earth technology, at Claire's stories about the college drama department, at Toby's grandiose gestures and plans for Stuart's taco truck to branch out into a second vehicle and then, eventually, a taco truck empire.
Only Jim didn't try to entertain. Only Jim watched him, quiet concern in his eyes.
"Hey," Jim said quietly, while Claire and Toby were trying to explain advertising to Krel, "you don't have to try so hard with us, you know."
"I'm fine," Douxie responded automatically.
"No you're not," Jim said, calling him out cold.
"I will be fine," Douxie amended, as if he could make it be so by force of personality.
Jim's mouth thinned into a line, but he nodded and backed off. Douxie appreciated it.
He begged off anything after lunch, though, claiming he had to get back to his apartment and finish "fixing" his wardrobe.
"And, dude, maybe pick up a razor at the corner store," Toby suggested, rubbing at his own chin in illustration.
Douxie laughed. He had to. It was either that or cry. "I'll do that," he promised, and indeed did so, numbly, by rote.
He was very quiet when he got back to the apartment, opening, shutting, and locking the door almost silently, so as not to awaken Archie, who was napping on the bed.
He looked around their tiny flat. At the armchair that had been perfect before, but which was too small now. At the bed that had been cozy, and was now cramped. At the clothes that no longer fit, and the fucking razor in his hand because he now apparently needed to shave.
At the wastebasket that held the shattered remains of two mugs and a bowl because it was too easy to put too much pressure on things, and at the doorframes he'd bashed himself on repeatedly, remembering wrongly how he fit into the world.
The mirror in the bathroom was spiderwebbed with cracks, and he didn't want to fix it. Didn't want to see the stranger looking back at him.
Douxie slid down the wall, buried his head in his arms, and cried.
Archibald awoke to hitched breaths and stifled sobs.
He was guiltily glad that Douxie's friends had been able to do what he hadn't - make the pain in his familiar break open, so that it could be excised, purified, and healed.
That didn't mean he liked it as he quietly crossed the room, pressing up by Douxie's side until the boy-man took him almost automatically into his arms. Archie purred, and rested his head on Douxie's shoulder, outwaiting the flood.
"I hate this," Douxie finally whispered. "I fucking hate this. I can't even have lunch with my friends without people looking at me like I'm some kind of fucking pedophile."
"Oh." That was a complication Archie hadn't considered at all. Granted, he was better than most non-humans at estimating human age and gender, but their social nuances sometimes escaped him. Why on Earth should anyone look at an age difference of twelve years, at most, between friends, and assume there was something sinister going on?
"No one at the cafe knew me," Douxie continued. "I've been working there for five years and they didn't even recognize me. I keep breaking things and hitting up against them, and nothing fucking fits anymore--"
"Your clothes?" asked Archie.
Douxie laughed something wet that wasn't a laugh. "My clothes, the furniture... nothing. My whole life doesn't fit anymore."
"Oh, Douxie." Archie rubbed his head against his familiar's tear-streaked face. Against the interesting roughness of his new stubble. "We'll find a way to fix it," he promised.
"I don't want to leave and start somewhere new," Douxie whispered. "I like it here. I have friends. But maybe we should."
"There are ways," Archie assured him.
Douxie pulled back. "Like, what, a Glamour Mask?"
Archie shook his head. "You're a wizard. Living an illusion won't do you any good."
Douxie's expression crumpled again as his thin ray of hope vanished.
Archie purred, trying to make the vibration resonate in his familiar's chest. "You know what you did, Douxie. It was a very brave thing. But there's no going back from it. Only forward."
"I can't be thirty," Douxie whispered. "I'm nineteen."
"Here, yes," Archie agreed, one paw over Douxie's heart. "But here?" He patted Douxie's face and shook his head. "You gave up ten years or more of your life to seal that rift, Doux. And since you're immortal, it had to come off the front end."
Douxie buried his face in Archie's fur again. "Makes you wonder," he said eventually, still sniffling, "just what Master Merlin did to end up looking in his seventies."
"Indeed," said Archie, who had never wondered before about that, but now had to.
"You can't tell them," Douxie said suddenly.
"They'll figure it out on their own," Archie said.
"No they won't. None of them know enough about magic. Not even Claire."
"Douxie." Archie waited until his familiar was looking at him. "I will not tell them," he said, "because you are going to."
Douxie was paler than usual. "I can't--"
"You can," Archie insisted. "Either they're good enough friends that you trust them with this, or there's absolutely no reason for us to stay in a place which makes you uncomfortable and unhappy."
Douxie's mouth was in a line. Eventually he nodded. "I'll tell them," he promised, his new lower voice now very quiet.
Between him and Archie, they spent the whole afternoon fixing the apartment up to fit someone who was suddenly several inches taller and broader. Which involved moving all the furniture around three times to come up with an arrangement they could both live with after it turned out that upsizing the bed meant it no longer fit where it had before.
There was a metaphor in there for this whole experience, Douxie thought grimly, blowing his hair out of his face yet again. "Hairties," he muttered. "Or a trim."
"I rather think it looks good long," said Archie.
Douxie paused. "Really?" he asked. To the best of his memory, Archie had never commented on how he chose to wear his hair. Plenty of comments on the ever-changing human fashions of clothing, yes, most of them acidic, but never a comment on his hair.
"Yes, it softens the whole..." Archie gestured at him while clearly searching for words, "rugged specimen of man look you've got going on there."
Douxie blinked. And had to laugh. "Thanks, Arch. It'll just get in the way, though."
"So put it in a ponytail. Or a bun. Claire has longer hair and does those all the time."
"I am not going back to a man-bun," Douxie argued, images of himself at the age of Camelot flashing through his mind.
"You don't have to go through life hating yourself, you know."
"I was an idiot when I was a moppet."
"You're an idiot now," Archie countered. "My idiot. And you were a very sweet child. Earnest. Loving. I find nothing to be ashamed of in that."
Douxie was quiet for a minute. Then, "Thanks, Arch."
"Not a problem." The dragon took to the air, surveying the room. "I think this time we've got it. The new arrangement looks workable."
"I'm going to get messed up about where everything is for weeks," Douxie grumbled.
"And then you'll get used to it, the same way you have every time we've moved and rearranged our lives."
Finally, though, the room and his clothes and... everything... was done, and he couldn't put it off any longer.
Sighing, he sat down in the armchair and used his phone to look up videos to figure out how shaving worked.
Douxie approached the shattered mirror like he was facing an enemy in battle. Which was not ideal, Archibald thought, for his acceptance of himself and the fact that he'd be looking like this for the rest of his life.
Still, Douxie made no verbal complaint as he magically mended the mirror, revealing his new reflection, which he looked at for a long, silent minute, turning his head one way then the other. "There's nothing left of me," he finally said.
Archie snorted and jumped onto his familiar's shoulder. "There most certainly is," he rebutted. He batted idly at the blue bangs. "This messy hair, for instance, is absolutely the same, if a bit longer. And I would know those eyes anywhere."
Douxie leaned in a little closer, peering at his reflection. "Everything else is different, though."
Archie sniffed. "It most certainly is not. You still have all your freckles. And your smile remains the same."
Douxie looked up at him. "Really?"
He didn't, Archibald realized, compliment his darling idiot familiar nearly enough if this was how Douxie kept reacting to the faintest amount of praise. "Yes." A paw touched Douxie's cheek. "Absolutely the same."
A smile blossomed, just for him.
"Right, then," Douxie said, turning back to the mirror and picking up his razor. "Time to figure this out."
He called in sick to the cafe in the morning, his new deeper voice making his claim of not feeling well somewhat more believable. He'd have to face that, and his coworkers, eventually, but... one thing at a time, Douxie promised himself. He did do his shift at the bookshop, which was quieter work, without as many people looking at him. He and his coworkers rarely saw each other except at shift change... and given that it was an arcane bookshop, Beth and Jamie were far more likely to accept the explanation of a magical accident at face value than anyone who didn't bear a wand.
Early in the afternoon, though, a text came in from Krel: Aja, Eli, and the oaf have safely returned! Pool party at 5. Be there, or be cuboid.
Douxie had to smile. Krel and Aja tried so hard to get human slang correct, and all the ways it continued to evade their grasp were wonderful.
He showed the text to Archie. "You're going," said the dragon.
Douxie gave him a look.
"We're going," Archie corrected himself. "You promised you'd tell your friends, and this is the perfect opportunity."
"I'm not going swimming," Douxie told him. The idea of stripping down to swim trunks, letting everyone see all the ways in which he was suddenly different--
He couldn't handle that.
"Would you if this hadn't happened?"
"Probably," he admitted. He liked swimming, and the Tarrons' house was the only one of his friends' that had a pool.
"Then you should," Archie said. "You're still you, Douxie, there's no shame--"
"I'm not ready yet," Hisirdoux bit out. Archie immediately looked contrite. "It's only been two days, can you not rush me on this?"
"I'm sorry," Archie apologized. "You're right. It's your body. I'm just pointing out that you shouldn't feel ashamed."
Douxie put his head in his hands, elbows on the counter as he concentrated on breathing. "I know I'm stuck like this," he said quietly. "And I know I need to get used to it, Arch. But just... let me take some time on some things?"
Archie jumped up on the counter, brushed his head against Douxie's. "All the time you need," he promised softly. "All the time in the world."
Mother, Ricky, and Lucy were clearly confused by his new shape, until Krel showed up at the door, shooing the robots away and instructing Mother to take a new scan of Hisirdoux and enter it into her memory banks.
"Hamburger and hot dog ingredients, with all the fixings," Douxie said, handing over his box of party food to Ricky. Their team had a rotating wheel of party food contributions, and this time he'd drawn main dishes.
"Well done, champ!" the robot replied, and carried them to the backyard and the grill.
"Did you remember extra mustard for Aja?" Krel asked, walking with him through the house.
"Three jars," Douxie assured him. It was a mystery and a wonder how Aja thought the condiment was a beverage, but somehow a communal decision had been made not to correct her on it. Mostly because all the humans (save Steve, who was a besotted idiot) found it equally weird and hilarious to watch her drink it.
That, and they'd all seen Stuart consume far worse. Compared to his crude oil topped with iron shavings, mustard seemed... benign.
"So." Krel stopped him before they went through the open doors to the pool area. Archie swooped out ahead of them. "You are still tall."
"And older," Douxie put in.
"Like I would know," Krel said. "How you humans look as you age is a mystery. And you are over nine hundred years old anyway."
"Fair," Douxie granted.
"Regardless, I would have expected this to wear off by now?" Krel cocked his head to the side and raised his eyebrows.
Douxie sighed. "It's not going to. It's permanent."
"Ah." Krel regarded him for a moment. "Not what we expected, but... are you all right with that?"
"Getting there," Douxie admitted. "I kind of have to be, don't I?"
"I could always try to rig you a transduction," Krel offered.
Douxie shook his head. "Thanks for the offer, but no. As Archie pointed out to me, a wizard trying to live a lie is... just not a good idea. On many levels."
"Well then." Krel's hand landed on Douxie's shoulder. "I am sorry this has happened to you. Getting used to a new form is not easy. But I am glad you are still you, even if you are taller now."
And of course that would be the main difference Krel would see. Douxie had to smile. "As am I, my friend."
Steve was relaxing poolside with his awesome alien princess fiancee on one side and his weirdly tall and good-looking Creepslaying partner on the other. He still wasn't used to the results of Pepperjack's growth spurt, but it was good to be able to look him in the eye now.
"Hey, who's that?" Pepperjack asked, looking at the door to the house. Where Krel stood, talking with someone who was... um... was....
"Hmm?" Aja looked over at the door just as the stranger smiled, and Steve blue screened. "Oh, that is Douxie."
"What?" Steve said, gesturing. "No. There's no way that's Douxie. Douxie's like, skinny and shorter. And our age."
"Oh, my sweet Steven." Aja patted him gently on top of his head. "Trust me. That is the Douxie."
"Pepperjack," Steve whined, turning to his other side, "back me up here. I'm right, aren't I? There's no way that's Dumbledork."
"Um." Eli blinked a couple times. "Oh. No, I think Aja's right."
"That can't be Douxie!" Steve said to no one in particular. "He's, like, hot!" Then, as the thought actually caught up with him, "Wait, I think he's hot? What?!" He buried his head in his hands and whimpered.
"Uh, Steve, you okay there?" asked Toby.
"No," Steve said. "I think I'm, what's the word. That thing where you can use both hands."
There was silence for a minute, then Claire asked "...Ambidextrous?"
"Yes! That! No."
"Do you mean bisexual?" Jim offered.
"That," Steve moaned.
There was silence again for a minute, then Toby spoke up again. "Steve, buddy, I hate to tell you this, but we all figured that out about you years ago. I mean, the first time you met Douxie you asked him if he was a model."
"And there was all that fawning over Lancelot," added Claire.
"I thought you and I had something special," Eli chimed in.
Steve whimpered again and buried himself in Aja's arms. "My princess, queen of my heart," he said pathetically to her, "I think I like boys too."
"Oh." Aja was nonplussed. "Is... that not normally how it works?"
"No!" Steve wailed. "Guys like girls and girls like guys!"
"Most of the time," Jim said.
"There, there, my Palchuk," Aja soothed, patting his back. "I, too, like boys. So why should you not?"
"Um, what's going on?" the wizard in question asked, walking up to their group. Steve risked a glance up, blushed red--ohmygod he's so hot! his brain shrieked-- and promptly buried himself in Aja's embrace again, whimpering.
"Congrats, Douxie," Claire said. "You've broken Steve."
"Thanks...?" Douxie responded.
"Eh, don't mind Steve. He's just having his ambidextrous awakening," said Eli.
"So, like, how long is this going to last?" Toby finally asked, gesturing at Douxie's new appearance, when they all had plates filled with burgers and chips and Jim's famous potato salad.
"Um." Douxie looked around, sighed, set down his soda. "Forever," he said.
"It's permanent," Archie said into the resulting silence.
"What?" Claire finally whispered.
"Took ten years or so of my life to close that rift, apparently," Douxie said softly, not meeting anyone's eyes. "And since I'm immortal, that cost, as Archie put it, came off the front end. So I'm now thirtyish for the rest of eternity."
"Dude, that sucks," said Steve feelingly.
"Yeah," agreed Douxie. "But it is what it is."
"Okay," said Toby, propping his head on a fist. "This is so not fair, you getting older and even taller." He gestured fruitlessly at Douxie. "Can't I just, y'know, have a little bit of that height?"
Everyone laughed, and Douxie smiled. "Sorry, it doesn't work like that."
"Hey, I have an idea," Jim said. "Krel, hit the sunshade?" Within a minute, the awning over the pool area was out, casting it into filtered sun. "Which one of us is taller now?" Jim asked, standing and transforming, with a flash of blue, into his half-troll form.
"Let's find out," said Douxie, standing also and moving back-to-back with Jim.
Before, Jim's half-troll form had been the tallest of them all. Now....
"It's a toss-up," Claire reported. "You've both got fluffy hair, so it's hard to tell."
"Krel, do you have a ruler we can use?" asked Eli.
"I've got it," said Archie, flying up into the air. He hovered, putting a paw on each of their heads, pushing down their hair flat to their skulls. "Sorry, Jim," he reported after a second. "Douxie's got an inch or so on you now."
"Aww, man!" the Trollhunter complained.
"Sorry, Jim," the wizard echoed his familiar, turning around. A sudden smirk crossed his face. "Tell me, you done eating?"
"Yeah, why--" Jim cut off with a shriek as Douxie suddenly hoisted him up and carried him over to the pool. "Doux, don't you dare--"
Jim was tossed into the pool.
"Holy fuck," Steve breathed, staring. None of them were strong enough to shift Jim in his half-troll form.
There was a flash of blue from the bottom of the pool, then a human Jim surfaced, spluttering and swiping his hair out of his eyes. "I'm going to get you for that," he promised.
Douxie grinned. "You can try," he said, as Jim put a hand on the pool's lip by his feet.
"Believe me," said Jim, in another flash of blue, "I'm going to." And then he grabbed Douxie's legs, lightning-fast, and hauled him into the water as well.
Jim was still grinning as Douxie surfaced, laughing.
Douxie was trying to hold onto that one perfect moment of the day before, the sudden mischievous realization of hey, I can do this now just prior to tossing Jim in the pool, and let it steel his spine for every single awkward and difficult interaction he was going to be having for the next year. His friends didn't care what he looked like. How could they, when almost half of them shifted forms regularly anyway?
It was everyone else that was going to be the problem. And he was clinging to Jim's advice of "Screw them. Only the people you care about count. What other people think doesn't matter."
It only kind of worked as he walked into the staff area of Benoit's for his morning shift and was confronted by his coworkers' dubious stares. "Uh..." Gabriel said.
"Gabe, you think your little brother Logan's kind of a dick," Douxie said before anyone could even try to tell him he didn't belong. "Sheree, you dated Crystal for three months and we got raspberry froyo when you broke up. Brian... tie your shoelaces." Brian instinctively looked down, swore, and scrambled to do so.
"Douxie?" Gabe gaped and Sheree shrieked.
"The same."
"What the hell happened to you?" Gabe demanded.
"I went on vacation and it aged me a few years," Douxie deadpanned.
"Bullshit," Brian said, straightening. "I saw you just last week, and you weren't... this." He gestured to all of Douxie.
"Magical accident," Douxie said, which was as far as he was willing to discuss it. They all knew that he had magic, if not the particulars of his being a 900+ years old master wizard. "Unfortunately it's permanent."
That earned him a hiss of sympathy, a "Shit, dude," and an awkward pat on the shoulder.
And that was, more or less, the end of it. A few of the customers, regulars, gave him strange glances, and he could see them trying to do the math - had something happened, or was he his own older brother? - but in the end no one asked.
It would die down eventually. It would be mostly forgotten. He would be the guy who suddenly grew up and filled out literally overnight. He just had to keep his chin up and push through until then.
He could do this.
He absolutely could not do this.
Douxie stared at the record store, and it was only the presence of his friends that kept him from backing away and bolting.
"Come on, Teach, you got this," Claire cheerleaded, taking his arm and trying to lead him to the door. "Anyway, what's the worst she could do to you?"
"Spells," Douxie listed out. "Hexes. Stealing my hair dye, she did that once--"
"Pfft. She steals your dye, I'll buy you more and we can do a dye party together," Claire said.
"So much for the big tough wizard," Toby jibed from his other side.
"Guys, this is Zoe," Douxie whined. "Have you met her? She's terrifying. She likes stabbing things! Or turning them into biscuits!"
"Go in under your own power, or we're going to make you go in the most humiliating way possible," Jim told him. "Claire, portals?"
"On it," she said, raising a hand.
"All right!" Douxie said. "I'll go. But if she stabs me, I'm blaming all of you."
"Well, I mean, that's fair," said Toby.
Douxie blew his bangs out of his face and approached the door.
"Hey, welcome to Zimoc's--" Zoe's usual greeting died away as she got a gander at the customer who had walked in.
Definitely a hunk of meat, she thought appreciatively, looking over the tall, solid build. She could stand to climb him like a tree.
But when she got to his face, she paused.
He was looking at her like... well, not like he'd seen a ghost, that was for sure. But like he expected her to be seeing a ghost.
Why?
She was pretty sure she'd never seen him before; she'd definitely have remembered musculature like that. But, at the same time, the more she looked at him, the more she felt like she had.
Black clothes. Black hair. With blue-dyed tips--
Her eyes flew wide so fast it almost hurt. "Douxie?" she asked.
He grimaced and rubbed at the back of his neck. "Hey, Zoe."
Oh lord and lady, it was definitely him despite the fact that his voice was now in the toe-curling register.
Ignoring that, Zoe hopped the counter to circle him. "What in the name of the seven rings happened to you?" she demanded.
"It's a long story...."
"With you it always is," she grumbled, completing her circuit. She looked him up and down again. "Is this temporary or permanent?" she asked, gesturing at... all of him.
A familiar sheepish grin made its way onto his older, unfamiliar face. "Seems to be permanent so far...?"
"Ugh. This is wasted on you," she complained. "Because even if you're all hot now, I would rather be burned alive again than go out with a disaster like you." The entirety of the seventeenth century had solidified in her that she could never, ever date one Hisirdoux Casperan. She had a firm policy against dallying with dumbasses.
"Yes," said Archie, appearing by his familiar's feet. "Sadly, even if he's physically adult now, the rest of him still hasn't caught up."
"Hey, you're supposed to be on my side," Douxie complained to his familiar.
The door to the shop opened again and Jim Lake poked his head in. "Can we come in yet?" he asked.
"Sure, cutie," Zoe told him, and hopped up on the counter, crossing her legs as he, and several other members of the Trollhunter gang, filed in. "So tell me, what the fuck have you lot been up to that ended up with him--" she gestured at Douxie, "like that?"
It would be two weeks later that Douxie would call her, practically begging for a depilatory spell. Which Zoe, to her credit, gave him without blinking an eye.
"It's a waste of magic, and an expression of vanity," Archie told him disapprovingly.
Hisirdoux glared at his familiar. "This is stupid, I'm having to shave twice a day just to keep looking neat, and I'd think you wouldn't mind a spell that kept me from scratching my skin off."
Archie shut up after that.
"Barbara," Walt called, entering the house from the garage, "I'm home."
"We're in the dining room," she called back.
"Goodness, you won't believe the day I ha--" he said, stopping short as he actually entered the room in question and realized Barbara was not alone. And it wasn't Jim sitting with her, either, but rather a man he had never seen. And judging by the cups of tea and crumbs of cookies on their plates, the man had been there a while.
Waltolomew Stricklander would sooner die a thousand deaths than ever entertain the notion that his wife might be cheating on him, but as his eyes raked over the younger man's appearance, he admitted he might have felt a small twinge of jealousy.
Tiny.
Almost vanishingly small.
It nonetheless burned, seeing the admittedly good-looking stranger sitting opposite Barbara, his body language relaxed and casual, his thick black hair pulled back into a half-bun, a smile hovering at his lips as he regarded Walt.
"I'm afraid I haven't met your guest, my dear," Walt said finally.
And Barbara's face was full of mirth. "Oh really?" she asked as the man stood, tucking his hands into the pockets of his jacket. That mischievous smile never left his face.
"Are you sure about that?" a distressingly familiar accent asked, in a deeper-than-usual voice.
Walt choked on his surprise. "Casperan?" he asked, eyes wide.
"Indeed."
"What in the name of-- what happened to you?" he asked Jim's friend, who the last time he'd seen him, four days before, had distinctly been a teenager, not a full adult.
The wizard sighed and looked at the ceiling. "Magical accident."
"Battle damage, more like, from what he and Jim have said," Barbara corrected.
"That too."
Eyes still wide, Walt took a seat, watching as Casperan followed. Trying to get used to this new appearance. Though, he noted, Casperan moved like someone who wasn't quite used to a new body yet, over-careful of the placement of his hands and arms. Well, that would fade quickly enough, he expected, if the aged-up transformation lasted. "Tell me," he invited. "What happened?"
"Well...."
Jim arrived home to find his friend and his stepfather eagerly swapping magical dimensional theory, his mom listening on with a smile on her face.
"Hey," he said in greeting. "Doux, you ready to head down to Trollmarket, or should I wait until you get to a good stopping place?"
Douxie looked at Strickler, who nodded. "I think that's enough for today," the changeling said. "Though I do look forward to discussing this further at your leisure."
"Anytime," the wizard replied, standing. "Tunnels or riverbed?" he asked Jim.
Jim chose the riverbed entrance because the tunnels always smelled dank and suspicious and he was sure someday they were all going to inhale black mold or something down there. Regardless, within fifteen minutes he and Douxie were heading down the crystal staircase.
Since the pool incident the day before, Jim had been itching to see Douxie really figure out what his new body could do. As far as Jim knew, given his half-troll form's density and the affinity with stone that rooted him when he needed it, Douxie shouldn't have been able to do that. And, okay, Douxie had been hiding his changed body from the rest of them as much as he did when he looked younger, but Jim had seen him in swimming trunks at Aja and Krel's before, and he was pretty sure the rest of his friend didn't look like that anymore.
"Master Jim!" Blinky greeted them when they stopped by the library on their way to the Forge. "And Master Douxie!"
Jim blinked, surprised. As did Douxie. "Wait, you're not surprised?"
"Surprised at what?" asked Blinky.
"At...." Jim gestured at Douxie. "All of this."
Blinky blinked. "Is there something I should be surprised by?"
"Just a bit of a change," said Douxie.
Blinky peered at him. Then, "Ah! I see. You've had a growth spurt."
Douxie's face went through a rainbow of expressions.
"A... different haircut?" Blinky asked, sounding less sure all of a sudden.
And that was all it took to set Douxie laughing so hard he clutched his stomach and sank, wheezing, to the library's floor.
"Can you... seriously not see a difference?" asked Jim.
"Alas, no," Blinky said, watching Douxie with concern. "I must confess, the subtleties of human appearance are somewhat confounding to me. Is he all right?"
"Fine," Douxie said, giggling and waving Blinky off. "Of all the possible reactions, have to admit that wasn't one I'd even considered."
"He's like ten years older than he was a week ago," Jim informed his mentor.
"I see," said Blinky, who clearly didn't. "Should I be concerned?"
"Not a whit." Douxie's hand found the edge of a table and he hauled himself back to his feet. "Thank you for not seeing a difference, when bloody everyone else does."
"You're most welcome," Blinky told him.
Douxie was mostly over his giggles by the time he and Jim actually reached the Forge. Taking in the grand arena, which never failed to impress even when its mechanics were hidden away, he looked over at Jim, who was fiddling with the controls. "So. What are we doing?"
"You," said Jim, "need to figure out what you can do now."
"I do not like this line of inquiry," Hisirdoux told his friend.
"Tough," Jim replied. "You either do it now or you do it when we're in the middle of a disaster."
Douxie's breath hissed out between his teeth. Jim was right, he admitted. There was no way they weren't all going to get caught up in another spot of trouble, of some magnitude or another. And he needed to know his new limits before then. "Fine," he said, instinctively rolling his neck and dropping his shoulders. "Speed, agility...?"
"Strength," Jim added. "No way you should've been able to throw me in the pool."
"Right," said Douxie, stretching his hands high over his head, then lowering himself backwards until his hands touched the ground in a backbend. He kicked out of it into a walkover, and felt pleased that so far he seemingly hadn't lost much agility to his new bulk.
(The thought occurred, and lingered, of how much distance he might be able to get now with a bow and arrow. Something to test later in Jim's regime, he thought.)
"All right," he told Jim. "Bring it."
Jim smirked and hit the control panel.
By the end of the training session, when they were both laying panting on the ground, Jim and Douxie had determined three things. First, that though the wizard hadn't lost anything in his reflexes and agility, the differences in his proportions kept tripping him up. Second, that he was, regardless, a hair faster than he'd been before. And, third, that he was now capable of taking on a half-troll Jim hand to hand, the two of them fighting to a draw.
"Well," Douxie said, "that was enlightening."
"Yeah," Jim agreed, turning his head to look at Douxie, who shot him a grin. After a moment, though, the grin faded and Douxie returned to looking at the ceiling.
"What's up?" Jim asked.
"Just thinking I should go see Master Merlin, let him know."
"Ugh." Jim let his head fall back against the ground, looking up at the same distant ceiling Douxie was. "Better you than me."
"Mmm."
It wasn't that Jim hated Merlin... he simply didn't have much respect for him. Douxie got on better with the older wizard than just about anybody else, but even he had admitted there was a reason he'd refused to go with Merlin back to Camelot. A reason why he'd chosen to stay in Arcadia Oaks. And it had nothing to do with more convenient takeout locations.
"Maybe next Monday," Douxie said. "I've got the day off. And I have a feeling it's going to be a long conversation. With plenty of disappointed looks and silences in it."
"Fuck him," Jim said. "He wasn't there fixing things. He doesn't get to criticize."
Douxie snorted. "Since when has that ever stopped Merlin?"
Douxie rolled his shoulders back and forced them to drop as his airship broke through the clouds and Camelot came in view. None of the others had been able to come with him, due to attending classes (most of them) or teaching classes (Krel). But he had several sacks at his feet, things they'd sent along for Merlin, Morgana, Nari, and Galahad. And he himself had picked up a wide selection of fast foods as an offering.
"Right," he breathed to himself, and not at all to the dragon perched on his shoulder. "Here we go."
He circled the castle once, waving to Sir Galahad at the battlements before bringing the ship in (less recklessly than Merlin, he should note) to a landing.
There was no one waiting, save for the enchanted suits of armor, as Hisirdoux hopped out of the ship, followed by one familiar and the levitating packages. He made his way to the throne room, hoping... but it, too, was deserted.
He sighed. "The tower it is," he said to Archie.
"Oh yes, all those steps are simply beyond you," Archie snarked.
"Shut it. You get to fly them," said Douxie.
"As could you, if you chose to," Archie replied as he flew off, leading the way.
It actually happened that they didn't need to go that far after all. "Douxie!" a familiar voice cried in glee as they crossed one of the lush courtyards. A tiny green goddess pelted down the path and flung herself at Hisirdoux, who caught her, laughing.
"Nari! It's so good to see you," Douxie said, kneeling to hug her.
"And I you," she replied happily. "Oh, you are taller now!" she said, patting the top of his head. "May I see the view?"
"Certainly," Hisirdoux replied, assisting her to sit on his shoulders before he stood. Nari spread out her arms and turned her face to the sky in bliss.
"We've brought you a few new plants for your collection," Archie told her, hovering by.
Nari giggled and scratched him behind his ears. "Any seeds?" she asked.
"A bucketload," Douxie replied, spinning just to make her laugh again. "Where are Morgana and Master Merlin?"
"Oh, let me take you to them!" said Nari. She leaned forward, pointing the way. "Forward!" she cried.
Laughing, Douxie acted as her steed.
Merlin and Morgana, apparently, were spending the day in one of the other courtyards, equally lush under Nari's tending, where Merlin was reteaching his elder apprentice the herbs she had forgotten. Douxie stood at the edge of the garden for a moment, watching. Marveling at how his master had finally seemed to discover the art of gentleness, showing Morgana a patience Merlin had certainly seldom shown with himself.
Nari scampered ahead as Hisirdoux hesitated. Morgana, her head bent over dill fronds, greeted her with a sweet, innocent smile.
There truly was nothing of Arthur's proud sister, or the Pale Lady's vengeance, left in the sweet, beloved girl who stood in Camelot's garden, so much younger than her true age.
The Order's fury had burned Morgana back to a clean slate, almost helpless in her childlike mind. It was good to see that Merlin and Nari were helping her to learn, and to bloom.
But no sooner did Douxie move, taking a step forward, than Merlin loomed up before him, his face stormy. "Who are you?" he demanded. "How come you to Camelot?"
Douxie blinked. This, he hadn't expected. "Master, it's me. Hisirdoux."
Merlin's contemptuous gaze raked him head to toe. The old wizard scoffed. "A likely lie. Hisirdoux is a mere waif of a lad, a scrawny and skinny boy."
"But Master--" Douxie protested.
"Don't 'but master' me--" Merlin's angry expression suddenly broke at the familiar phrase and rebuke, his eyes flying wide. He quickly scanned Douxie up and down again. "Hisirdoux?" he demanded incredulously.
"That's what I've been trying to tell you!" Douxie protested.
"What the blazes happened to you?" his master demanded.
Douxie sighed, looking skyward and rubbing at the back of his neck. "Oh, you know. Ran up against a warlock, had to close an extradimensional rift...."
"Dear Avalon." Merlin's eyes were still wide. "How long ago?"
"About a week and a half," Archie reported, swooping up behind Douxie. "It's taken him this long to stabilize."
"That is a lie," Douxie told his familiar even as Archie transformed to a cat, sitting at his feet. "It took four days. At most."
"Mmm, tell me that when you've fully got the hang of shaving," his familiar told him.
Douxie sighed and looked back at his master, hoping for sympathy about Archie's sass.
He didn't get any, but he did at least get a hand on his shoulder. "Come," said Merlin. "Let us talk about it. And let me introduce you."
Douxie let himself be led over to the red-haired woman he'd known centuries ago. "Morgana, this is my former apprentice, Hisirdoux Casperan. Hisirdoux, my newest apprentice, Morgana Le Fay."
"A pleasure, my lady," Douxie said, bending to kiss her hand with his best remembered court manners.
"A pleasure," she echoed shyly. And when he looked up, he could see a faint flush staining her cheeks as she looked at him.
Douxie straightened, giving the poor girl a chance to collect herself. "I've brought gifts," he informed them even as Sir Galahad finally made his way into the courtyard. "Also gossip, and lunch from the world below."
"Haha!" Galahad bellowed, half-deaf as he was. "Do I finally get to try this 'McDonalds' that I've heard so much about?"
"You do indeed, Sir Galahad," Douxie assured him. The hearty pat that he got on his shoulder once would have left him wincing in pain. Now it seemed merely a friendly buffet.
"Seems you've finally filled out, lad!" Galahad told him. "Good for you. Now, let us feast!"
Douxie had to smile as the six of them, the last remnants of old Camelot, settled in for a pleasant afternoon in the garden.
Nearly a year later, Douxie realized something when he saw a bat-shaped vampire, roughly the same size as a bulldog but of a far nastier temperament, head straight for Toby's exposed back...
...and, grinning, simply punched the thing out of the air, using the instinctive right cross Jim had spent weeks drilling into him.
Finally, he realized, he felt at home in his own skin again.
Author's Note: Sopa proposed how Douxie might suddenly get aged up, and drew art of an older Douxie. Which promptly broke many of us on the Discord server. Scenarios of how various characters would react got batted about, and for fun, I wrote a few of them (Zoe and Strickler) into scenes. And then I just kept writing, borrowing lines here and there from the scenarios. Two days and 10K+ words later, this is the result. It happens in what is probably a post-RotT reset in which everything goes right and no one dies! This being me, there are, of course, a few references hidden in the story. The idea of a sheaf of connected dimensions comes from Diane Duane's novel Stealing the Elf-King's Roses. Douxie getting Archie a latte is an homage to Ascaisil's fic Lifting Atlas. Claire sings a few lines from There Is Life Outside Your Apartment, from the musical Avenue Q. Any time I mention a (background) character named Jamie (working in an arcane bookshop!), I am most assuredly picturing an older Jamie Bennett from the movie Rise of the Guardians. Aja drinking mustard is a callback to the Teen Titans cartoon, wherein Starfire (also an alien princess!) greatly enjoyed the "tangy yellow beverage." There was definitely a discussion on Discord at some point about whether or not half-troll Jim would be able to swim, or if, like Stitch, his molecular density would be too dense and he would only sink in water. And, finally, there's also a recurring HTTYD reference in people gesturing to all of Douxie.
