Chapter Text
“So, that’s the general idea,” Marvin said. His bright blue eyes, highlighted by the cat mask he wore, flickered back and forth between the two of you. “We just need to test it out.”
Jameson twisted his mouth as he considered the magician’s offer and spoke, his voice silent but a speech slide with his words flashing before Marvin and yours eyes after a slight delay. “Sounds fascinating, but are you sure it’s safe?”
“I’ve done the research and the spell itself is good, we just need to make sure the timing delay works.” He looked at you as he added, “The last thing we want is any surprises on the big day.”
You nodded, even though you could understand why Jameson looked so nervous. Something about this spell Marvin had dug up just in time sounded too good to be true, but then you weren’t sure how long he had been searching for it, either.
“And,” Marvin added as he held up another book, “I have a reversal spell right here if it doesn’t go back the way it should.”
Jameson tapped his finger on the long table that took up most of the space in the room. As far as you knew, the conference room in the Septic ego house was barely used outside of the occasional Bro Average video shoot, and Marvin had claimed that it would give you all more privacy than the other rooms. Plus, it gave him extra space to spread out all of the books and materials that he apparently needed for this spell.
“I still don’t see how this can work as a surprise if we need all of this,” you said, and the magician shrugged.
“We already know who we want it to affect, and for how long. Knowing that much, I can easily set it up beforehand so it can be triggered at the right time, even by someone else.”
“But why an hour?” Jameson asked Marvin. He glanced at you, his brow furrowed. “That seems like a long time!”
“It’s a nice, round number, and easy to scale,” Marvin answered. He grinned and added, “Plus, it’s just long enough for us to have some fun if it does work…Or, you know, fix it before we get in trouble or risk spoiling the surprise.”
His smile faded as he locked eyes with you and added, “Of course, we don’t have to do this if you don’t want to, Y/N.”
“No, I want to at least try,” you said and, seeing that Jameson was still concerned, added, “I’ll be okay, really.”
He returned your smile out of reflex, but he still seemed less than sure as he said, “Then take it away, magic man!”
Marvin nodded and began to read aloud from the thick leather volume that took up most of the space in front of him. The words blurred together into a variety of whispers and it was hard to keep the masked magician sitting across the table from you in focus. Beside you, Jameson also blinked and shook his head as if trying to stay awake.
But it was when Marvin turned the page without pausing for breath that you felt something lurch in your stomach and had to lean forward, your forehead almost touching the table, to keep from being sick as the room spun around you. It wasn’t until the speech slide flashed across your vision that you realized the spinning and the spell had stopped.
“Golly! …That don’t look right, Marv.”
For a moment, you wondered how you had ended up on the floor as you stared down at the polished wood beneath your hands and knees, but it slowly occurred to you that there was carpeting in the conference room, not hardwood floors. You looked up and the room seemed to twist again before settling into the image of Marvin across the wide expanse of the table between you, his mouth open but no sound coming out, and the shape of Jameson looming large to your left and behind you.
Both stared down at your small form as you slowly got up to your feet and patted yourself down. Aside from the size, you otherwise seemed fine.
“…Marvin?” you asked, and a choked sound came from the magician before he clamped a hand to his mouth.
“Mark is going to kill me. Dark is going to kill me…They’re going to fight over who gets to kill me first.”
“Or maybe they’ll team up and do it together,” Jameson added, receiving a glare from Marvin in response. The ego leaned down so that he was on eye level with you and you quickly backed up until you were around the center of the table. That close, Jameson was just too big. “How do you feel?”
“Better now that the spell’s stopped, but…” You gestured down to yourself and turned around to face Marvin. “What went wrong?”
“I don’t know, I don’t know! It should have worked, I went over it again and again, I—” Marvin paused in the act of flipping the page back to the start of the spell. With a dawning sense of horror, he turned the page again before using his thumb to peel apart what turned out to be two pages, stuck together by…yeah, you don’t want to think about what was sticking them together. He groaned and his forehead hit the table with a thump so hard it nearly shook you off your feet. “I mixed two spells together.”
“Can you fix it?” you asked and felt a sudden surge of relief when you heard the muttered yes come from the magician’s slumped form.
He tilted his head up so that his chin now rested on the tabletop and studied you for a moment. “A simple growth spell should do it?”
You exhaled through your teeth and said, “Not really sounding sure there, Marvin.”
“Don’t worry, I can fix this,” he said, making an effort to sound more sure of himself as he sat up and began flipping through the second book. The frantic flipping of the pages sent breezes of air your way that smelled of dust and old paper, and you had to turn away to keep from coughing or sneezing.
“Well, now we know if the first spell doesn’t work, we always have a backup plan,” Jameson said. He reached out carefully with a single finger and gently, gently touched the top of your head. “A tiny Y/N would make for an adorable birthday present!”
“Knock it off!” you said, pushing his finger away but trying not to laugh. “I don’t think I’d ever live it down if the others saw me like this.”
“Ah, we can fix this before any of the others find out, and definitely before I get into trouble,” Marvin said, just a split second before someone knocked on the door.
The world around you went dark as Jameson dropped his bowler hat on top of you, and through the fabric you could hear the clatter of chairs knocking back before Marvin asked in the guiltiest voice ever, “Who is it?”
“Howdy bitches!” You heard the giggle that immediately followed that greeting and didn’t need the speech slide from Jameson to realize who it was.
“Jack! What brings you around here?”
“I thought I’d drop in for lunch with you guys today,” Jack said, by the sound of it walking fully into the room. “Huh, I thought Schneeps said Y/N was in here with you two.”
“They, uh, had to go home early—” Marvin said, just as Jameson’s speech slide crashed into view with the words, “They went to their room—”
Both stopped short, and the three of them failed to see you facepalm in the darkness beneath the hat before you reached underneath the brim and lifted it up and over until the hat rolled back.
“Hey, Jack,” you said, and he immediately clamped a hand to his mouth. Well, now you knew where Marvin got that gesture from.
“I can fix it?” Marvin said, one hand tugging nervously on the corner of his blue cape.
“Marvin was trying to help me with a spell,” you said quickly, before Jack could say anything to the ego. “We were just testing it out, and something went wrong.”
“Just a LITTLE wrong,” Jameson said and grinned when Jack couldn’t fight back a smile at that.
“You…” Jack swallowed back whatever he was going to say, looking a little disappointed in himself for laughing at that. “What have I told you about trying out your magic on the others?”
“Have a camera running in case it’s funny?”
You shot Jack a look and he shrugged. “Funny’s funny. Can you really fix it?”
“Just a simple growth spell,” Marvin said again as he turned back to his book. “Just give me a second.”
“Then I’m going to do this,” Jack said as he pulled his phone out of his pocket.
“Don’t you dare,” you warned, but he’d already snagged one picture, and then he and Jameson were kneeling beside the table, camera angled to catch you standing behind them.
“You guys suck,” you said after he was done, as if you didn’t stick your tongue out or make faces in more than one of those pictures.
“Okay, got it!” Marvin said, and pointed his finger at you as he began to read from the second book. You saw green sparks fly around his finger, but when he finished the returning back to normal thing failed to happen. He tried again, and again, before dropping the book and sinking back into his chair with a groan.
“…Mark might actually kill us,” Jack said and the magician’s head hit the table.
“I should have stuck to card tricks.”
“But you’re much better at real magic than that flim-flam sleight of hand!”
Marvin muttered something dark into the surface of the table.
“Marvin?” You called his name but the ego just groaned again. You looked up at Jack and Jameson, both of whom looked completely lost as to what to do now, and walked over to Marvin. It took several seconds to cross the distance of the table before you could reach out and pat the top of the magician’s head. Your arm sank halfway up to your elbow in his long green hair but he shifted slightly, showing that he at least felt it. “I know you can figure this out. You’re Marvin the Magnificent, right?”
“…That’s what it says on my underwear.”
“Could’ve gone without knowing that,” you said, and the ego chuckled.
“Perhaps we could take a second look at the original spell?” Jameson suggested. “Or spells. You said you had a way to undo one of them.”
“Well, I had a way to undo what the spell was supposed to do, in case the timing effect failed—”
Marvin looked up so quickly that his forehead knocked you off your feet and you had to cling to the top of his cat mask for support, only to have the table disappear from beneath your feet.
Marvin hissed and quickly caught you in his hand before you could fall. “Sorry about that, but I just realized, the hour effect, see?”
He put you down on the book and pointed at the first part of the spell, as if any of the words scrawled beneath your feet had meaning for you.
“Uh, what?” Jack asked.
“The spell, I was testing how it would respond to a kind of timer,” Marvin explained. “All we have to do is wait an hour from when I cast it, and it should wear off!”
“You’re sure?” you asked, wary of getting your hopes up this time.
“Yes, yes, it makes sense, the timing and who it’s supposed to affect are in the first parts of the spell; it’s just when I turned the page that I missed what it was supposed to actually do.” Marvin ran his finger down the page as he spoke and then flashed a smile at you. “I’m sure of it. All we have to do is wait an hour.”
You frowned, thinking about what Marvin said. “But why did it just affect me then?”
The magician shrugged. “It could be a side effect of mixing the two spells. It was supposed to affect one of you and then the other, but it’s not like there was anything to transfer in this case.”
Jameson pulled out his pocket watch and tapped it before saying, “I told you an hour seemed like a long time!”
Jack exhaled and it was only then you realized just how worried he had been. “But we can handle that, and no one needs to tell—”
He broke off as a tune started to play somewhere in the room. At the same time, you felt the vibrations running through the table and book beneath your feet and glanced back at your phone, normal-sized and lying where you left it by your seat.
Jack leaned over to look at it and said, “It’s Wilford.”
“Yeah, I better answer it,” you said. Last time you missed a call from him, he barged into the room you were in with his gun drawn, reciting lines from Taken. Not the best way to wake up at 3 in the morning.
Jack propped up the phone and you had to use both your hands to get the green answer button to respond and to turn on the speaker so he could hear you.
“Hey Wilford,” you said, and immediately had to clamp your hands over your ears when he responded in his usual loud, booming voice.
“Y/N! Where are you, you scamp?”
“I’m at the Septic egos’ house today, remember?” you said, taking a step back from the phone as you did so.
The distance didn’t help as Wilford’s voice boomed out again. “Well, get back over here! We’ve got things going on here, you know!”
“Uh, I’m kind of busy here, Wilford,” you answered. “If this is about the meeting—”
“Meeting?! We have a meeting today? You should have told me, I’ll be there in a second to pick you up!”
“No! I mean, no, that’s okay, Wilford,” you said, trying really hard to ignore the other three right now. “Mark said he could handle the meeting by himself this time, remember? And you’ll be there to help him, right?”
“You know, it almost sounds like you don’t want me coming over there,” Wilford said, laughing even as his tone changed.
You looked up at Jack and the two egos, who silently tried to gesture and mouth answers all at once. Even Jameson was avoiding using his speech slides, as if afraid Wilford might “hear” him.
“That’s because…I’m working on a surprise for someone else, with the Septic egos,” you said. “And I really need to keep it a secret from the others. You understand, right?”
“Oh, a secret,” Wilford said. “Say no more, Y/N, I can keep a secret better than anybody! Why, I can even keep a secret from myself if I want to, and don’t even get me started on keeping secrets from the audience.”
“…Okay? I mean, thank you for understanding, Wilford, I—”
“I’ll just be by to pick you up after the meeting’s over!”
Before you could respond, he hung up and the phone went back to its lock screen.
“…I really hope you’re right about that time thing, Marvin,” you said, trying hard not to imagine what Wilford might do if he found you this size.
“I suppose we have nothing to do but wait,” Jameson said, but then a mischievous grin crossed his face and he scooped you up in hands. “And use our remaining time to show the others!”
Your protests were soon drowned out by Dr. Schneeplestein, Jackieboy Man, and Chase cooing over you as Jameson proudly showed you off.
“You all. Suck. So much,” you said when he finally put you down on the coffee table in the living room.
Your only consolation came roughly forty-five minutes later, when it turned out that Marvin was right about the spell only lasting an hour and you were back to normal size, if a little embarrassed to be sprawled out on the couch on top of Chase.
Well, maybe not your only consolation.
After all, it turned out that Marvin’s spell had worked even better than he thought, if not quite in the right way. Jameson crossed his arms as he dangled by his vest from Jackieboy Man’s thumb and forefinger, his speech slide a little faded as he said, “An hour is way too long!”
“He might be right,” Marvin said to you quietly as the two of you stood and watched the others at a distance. “Are you sure about an entire 24 hours?”
You bit your lip but nodded. “If you think we can get everything figured out in time.”
“We’ll work out every little problem,” Marvin said, and shrugged at the look you gave him. More serious this time, he added, “And we’ll all be there for you, the day after. Promise.”