Cammie’s Practice

    “Alright then,” David said, slightly winded after there rehearsal, “I think this is going to work well.”
    “Thanks,” Cammie said, changing back to her normal self.
    “My only issue is that I feel like I might be a little superfluous to the overall performance.”
    “Well, we could add another section where you interact with me more,” Cammie said, thinking through some ideas of where to add it.
    “Sounds good,” David said, “so Cammie, how have the other contestants taken your reveal?”
    “Well,” Cammie said, thinking through, “it seems like Jill and Saffron have accepted it pretty easily, however it kind of seems like Ophelia and Leela have been avoiding me since I came out.”
    “Do you need me to talk to them?”
    “Nah, it’s okay. They didn’t really talk to me much before anyways,” Cammie shrugged.
    “If you say so, Cammie. Although I would recommend at least trying to talk to them,” David said.
    “I’ll consider it,” Cammie said, leaving the practice room to get on with the rest of her day.

~~~
Ophelia’s Practice

    “Alright, and what sort of food am I supposed to let Phaedra eat?” Ophelia asked David, writing down his response to her previous question in her personal spell book.
    “Well, Phoenix’s are pretty self sustaining creatures. If you just let her out for an hour or two twice a day like I recommend, she should be able to find some food to feed herself.”
    “Okay. Do Phoenix’s get along with wolfs at all?”
    “I’d honestly be more worried about the wolf attacking the Phoenix than the other way around,” David chuckled.
    “If Phaedra gets sick, would I be able to just take her to a regular veterinary? Or do I have to go looking for a proper magical pets hospital?”
    “Ophelia, she’s a phoenix. If she dies from the sickness, she’ll just come back again.”
    “Speaking of rebirth, what is the average lifespan of a Phoenix? Will it be the same Spirit, or would I have to reintroduce myself or will she already know me? Is there a chance that Phaedra will come back as a boy?”
    “You know Ophelia, I really like the new you this Phoenix has brought about. You seem much more like a human and less like a Spirit of Gaia when you actually come out of your shell a bit,” David smiled. Color rushed Ophelia’s cheeks from David’s comment, but he ignored this, continuing to answer her questions instead. “The average lifespan of a phoenix can be anywhere from eight to fifteen years, although it can be much shorter or longer depending on how well you take care of it. It’s going to be the same Spirit, and it will definitely recognize you if you took good care of it in its previous lives. Phaedra will always remain female in all of her reincarnations. Anything else you need to know?”
    “Um. Y-yeah, but I can just ask you later.”
    “Oh no, I’m not busy,” David said, “go right ahead and ask.”

~~~
Saffron’s Practice

    “…And then Fernando can come out and do a little dance with me!” Saffron said, the giant bear doing a little jump with joy at his inclusion.
    “I don’t know Saffron… It seems a little. Unnecessary?”
    “But Fernando has been dying to get up on stage, look at him,” Saffron said, pointing to the large bear. Fernando’s face did not change from its normal, adorable, beary disposition, as the spell Saffron used did not allow for the stuffed animals to emote. “Besides, he’s a trained thespian. Go on Fernando,” Saffron said, reaching up and disconnecting her head from her body, “Do some Hamlet for David.”
    The large adorable bear accepted the detached head, trying his best to hold up Saffron’s head in one of its nubby paws as it silently began acting out the famous scene. He would occasionally wave the head around slightly, eliciting some giggles from Saffron, but leaving David utterly baffled at what he was trying to get across. After several more minutes of silent acting, Saffron started clapping, saying “Bravo! Amazing!”
    “Well… As excellent as that was Saffron, I really think that including Fernando as part of the trick might takeaway from the focus of the task. And besides, the audience has already seen Fernando for almost two weeks now. I don’t think including him in the trick would be seen as too normal for this competition.”
    “Too normal? He’s literally a living teddy bear!”
    “Saffron, I know you love Fernando, but I’m telling you now. Don’t include him in the trick,” Saffron tried her best with the puppy dog eyes trick once more, but David was prepared, saying, “No Saffron! I’m not falling for that one twice. Seriously, don’t include Fernando in the trick.”
    “Fine,” Saffron said, giving him a grumpy face, “but he better get a part in next week’s trick.”
    “Sure he can,” David said, rolling his eyes.
    “You hear that Fernando!” Saffron said, grabbing Fernando by both of his paws, “You’re going to be on stage!”
    Fernando responded by jumping for joy with her.

~~~
Leela’s Practice

    “Alright, I have some good news and some bad news,” David said, walking into the practice room. Leela had finished warming up, and was itching with anticipation on starting to work on fixing her weakness.
    “The good news is that I have come up with a relatively safe idea for how to get the trick looking the way you want it to.”
    “Okay, and what’s the bad news?”
    “I can’t directly tell you.”
    “What! Why not.”
    “Well, the producers already yelled at me for helping a contestant with their problem earlier in the competition, so now I have to run it by them if I help them design their trick at all. They said since you did so well in the other contests, and I would be helping you with a problem that is exclusively your own, I can’t help you out by telling you what to do,” David couldn’t look at her in the eye, scratching his arm as he delivered the bad news to her.
    “Dang. That really is a low blow.”
    “Well, it’s okay though, I’m sure that you’ll probably be able to come up with something on your own. But if you’ll excuse me, I have to go to the bathroom quickly before we start.” David casually dropped something to the floor as he turned towards the door, heading to the bathroom.
    Leela stretched out her arm to pick up what David had dropped, and noticed that it was a a little ball of flesh that had a color to it that looked suspiciously similar to David’s skin tone. She thought back to what David had done while talking to her, until it finally dawned on her. Leela grabbed a bit of her forearm between her thumb and pinky finger, imagining what she wanted to accomplish she pulled back, a chunk of flesh pulling away just as she hoped. She squealed in delight at achieving her goal.
    David returned, looking rather puzzled, “What are you cheering about?”
    “Well David,” she said, tossing him back the chunk of his flesh, “I think I figured out a good idea for how we can do the trick tomorrow. And all it will require is a bit of preparation on my part.”
    “Excellent,” David said, smiling knowingly, “then let’s get to it.

~~~
Jill’s Practice

    “Uk! David it’s too tight!” Jill said, grasping at her chest for air.
    “Jill! Calm down!” David said, “You need to stay calm and focus on the trick, and the motions exactly as I described them.”
    “David- I can’t” Jill gasped.
    "Jill. You have to. If I have to cut it off, you’re never going to be ready in time to do this trick for tomorrow."
    "David-"
     "Trust me,” David said, looking Jill straight in the eye. What little bit of consciousness jill had left focused on the instructions David had given to her on how to perform the magic for the trick. The little movements that would happen that would allow her to breather, despite the heavy constriction on her air cavity. The fact that her body was impossibly shaped was none of her concern. The minutiae would be taken care by the magic, she just had to focus on the image of what she wanted.
    “Gah!” Jill gasped for air, her magic finally kicking in and allowing her to breath normally, despite her weird shape.
    “There you go!" David said, proud that Jill was able to get the trick working.
    “Don’t ever do that again,” Jill said, looking at him sternly.
    “Jill, I would never let any serious harm come to you.”
    “But you nearly let me asphyxiate?”
    “Jill, if you actually got that far I would have intervened. I just knew that you needed a little bit of emotion to actually get your magic to kick in.”
    “Speaking of, why did the magic not kick in immediately like with the other tricks we’ve practiced?” Jill asked.
    “Well it could happen for a variety of reasons. Mental conditioning, allergies to certain branches of magic, some other strange abnormality. Although, I’m pretty sure that this is just a classic case of trying to do a trick that slightly above your magic level,” David explained, “but thankfully, now that you’ve done it once we won’t have to worry about that. Magic you’ve already done before tends to be easier to repeat.”
    “Okay… And if I hadn’t been able to do it?”
    “Like I said earlier, you probably wouldn’t have been ready to do it for tomorrow, and we would have to do your trick mostly on the fly.”
    “And what about the rest of the trick?”
    “If you can do this, I’m certain you can do the other stuff you want to do,” David said, “although… Maybe it would be better if we run all the way through the trick first before I start making promises I can’t keep.”
    “*sign*…”

    To Leela: “I know how troublesome being incapable of doing something can be. Those blocks where you feel like you're doing something wrong, or not cut out for it. And I can understand why you were so willing to pass those blades off now. If I might ask, since it's helped me get through a few blocks in the past, have you tried hypnosis at all? Not to the degree of the Mind Control magic that Holli willingly subjected herself to last weekend, but a relaxing trance to more willingly accept a transformation.” -FlexibleAnatomy

    I must admit that I’ve yet to try out hypnosis, mostly at the request of my father. He’s read way too many horror stories of innocent girls being forever ruined by some hidden command put in place by a hypnotist. Never mind the fact that in most of those stories it was done by unlicensed hypnotists, but whatever he’s a stubborn man.
    I’m not sure what David has planned to get me past my inability to be cut up, but if there was going to be anyone who I think my Dad would trust to hypnotize me to try and help, it would be David.

    To Ophelia: “Your phoenix is so cool! I wish I could have one, but I'd bet my landlord would complain that it's a "fire hazard" or some nonsense. Maybe you could try and train Phaedra to take on a different hue of flame? A green or magenta flame might be more suitable for a witch.” -FlexibleAnatomy

    According to David, you can actually get a Phoenix to change the color of its flames based upon the diet you feed it. Similarly to how flamingos get their pink color from the shrimp they eat. He gave me a little chart of what to feed her, and currently my plan is to start mixing a bit of potassium salts into her snacks. He warned me that it can sometimes take multiple lifetimes for the shift in color to fully be completed, however I have plenty of time to wait.
    If your building does not allow for Phoenixes, might I recommend picking up a Pamola? It is similar to a Phoenix in that it is an elemental bird, however instead of fire, they have the power of ice, and they also have antlers. Apparently they are able to survive for up to a hundred years, and are quite loyal birds.

    To Saffron: “You’ve taken this family situation... well. I know it's something for you alone to deal with, but the fact that your father doesn't specify his line of work is concerning. There's nothing he's provided that could give any clue as to the general field he works in? I understand the importance of NDAs, but even a ballistics missile engineer can at least claim that they work in aeronautics.” -FlexibleAnatomy

    I really don’t spend much time with my father back home, seeing as how I moved out a couple of years ago. When I was little, he was hardly around. He’d usually leave for work long before I woke up, and would get home long after I went to bed. He’d leave us enough money to order any food we wanted. According to my oldest sister, when she was younger he’d come home only to pick the food up for us, but when she turned ten, he trusted her enough to make sure that dinner got on the table for the rest of us that were born. She also said that he normally would come home in a suit, but only she really remembers that detail.
    He’d usually stay home on Sundays, but he was typically so tired from the rest of the week that he would only want to sit in his chair and watch TV. None of us wanted to bug him, not because we knew what he would do, but rather what we thought he might do. It kind of reminds me of that experiment with the monkeys and the punishment banana, where after several replacements they had a group of monkeys who had never been directly hurt by the banana, but nobody dared touch it. He’d eventually get up and make dinner for us, but it was usually something easy to make like spaghetti or stew. He’d try to make some small talk with us at dinner, ask us how school was going and stuff, but then as soon as he was finished his food he would go to bed early and we would just go back to doing our own stuff.
    Really, my oldest sister was the one who he was closest with, but if she knew anything about what he did, she never shared it with the rest of us. Dad was the sort of person who was more interested in how our days went than how his went. If we’d ever ask personal questions, he would simply move on to the next of us. We eventually just stopped asking. It’s why I moved out as soon as I could, because as much as I love my sisters I couldn’t stand the oppressive nature he gave off.

    To Ophelia: “Did you know that if you eat the Phoenix, not only you might have a chance to live longer but the Phoenix will simply comeback. Kind of read up some news of a hunting club that did it. Only one survived the process.” -quad2

    Why would I want to eat Phaedra? My original plan was to simply set her free. I would never needlessly kill another Spirit of Gaia , even if it were guaranteed that they would return to life.

    To Leela: “Awh, that looks painful, but you got this! Consult your magician on whether a medical painkiller might help? I'm not sure I have much to add or ask really, except that I would heartily second Penny's suggestion of the more gentle side of hypnosis, to relax and to explore alternate methods. It can unlock a state of pliant suggestibility that I have found integrates very successfully with magic, in ways that I barely understand even after experiencing them firsthand. It does depend on one thing; How suggestible are you~? Well-spoken words can cut more gently, deeply and harmlessly than any blade out there, from someone skilled in both magic and charisma.” -MagicJeans

    Don’t worry about me when it comes to pain. I’m a pretty strong girl, and besides David did a fantastic job in making sure there was no residual pain when he reappeared my finger.
    I’ve never really had the chance to do hypnosis (see my answer somewhere above probably as to why), so I don’t exactly know how suggestible I am, however I imagine I’m probably about as suggestible as your average person? If David decides to use hypnosis, I guess we’ll find out.