“Let’s start at the bottom.  How many feet should my new body have?”

“How many feet?” asked Sidney, puzzled.  “How is that even a question?”

“Well, zero is an option, but my main body will have that,” Duncan replied with a grin, wriggling her long snaky body.  “If you wanted six or eight, I’d be game to accommodate.”

“Why would I want so many feet?”

Duncan shrugged her shoulders.  “Foot fetish?”

“I don’t have a foot fetish.”

“Why do you always keep poking them at me, then?”

Sidney rolled her eyes.  “Mostly for the warmth.”

“So you’d like a pair of magic slippers that always keep your feet toasty warm?”

“I can’t wear slippers in bed.”

Duncan sighed and turned back to the design.  “Two feet.  Two legs.”  As she spoke and gestured, the appropriate parts appeared.  “Anything special about the legs?”

“They seem distinctly lacking in hair.  Are you building a man or a woman, here?” asked Sidney, archly.

“Was figuring on somewhat androgynous.  Something I can be comfortable in either way.”

Sidney narrowed her eyes at her husband.  “You’ve got something up your sleeve.  Spill.”

The hips appeared, with a flat plane for a groin.  “I’m still trying to figure out the bits.  I’d like something a little less ‘last chicken in the shop’ as you tend to put it.”

“You have to have something there,” protested Sidney.  “Or else you really won’t be male at all.”

Duncan licked her lips.  “That was kind of the idea.  I’m used to a certain body shape, so the outline will be the same.  But the finer details will be more feminine.  Best of both worlds, or so I’m hoping.”

“For you, maybe.  For me, this is not...”  Sidney gestured at the legs standing before them.  “Look, I can cope with no body hair, and I’d certainly not complain about smooth cheeks.  But this is too far.”

“Would retractable be okay?”

Sidney sighed.  “Show me.”

The glittery thing that rose from the figure’s groin made Sidney giggle.  “Really?”

“It was intended as a joke, but I see you eying it...  So done.  Next up, the chest and arms.”

Sidney rolled her eyes as the figure acquired a soft chest with shallow, broad breasts of the type one could easily conceal under a shirt.  But the arms were muscular enough for her tastes, and the face was familiar enough to make up for the rest.

“Not going to go with prettier hair, just the usual mop?” asked Sidney.

“It’s what I’m used to, though you’d not know it from Donna’s preferences.”

“How different are you two, really?”

Duncan shrugged all four arms.  “We both like this shape.  Donna’s better at dancing, though neither of can work a crowd worth beans.  I’m better at engineering.  I’d say she’s more nurturing, whereas I’d be the one who’d tear apart anyone who threatened my family...  But to be honest, we’ve both shown that off in spades.”

“When you nearly nuked Toronto.”

“Yeah.  Not our finest moment.”

“And that wasn’t even a threat to us directly,” mused Sidney.  “That time the RCMP barged their way in here, you turned them into puppies.”

“I was feeling a little more merciful that day, I guess.  One of them came by the club last month, and asked about joining the K-9 corps for a few years.”

“No, really?”

Duncan nodded.  “When I told her I couldn’t guarantee she’d change back in a couple years, that someone would have to bring her to me, she got cold feet... but did ask to get turned into a dog for the week even so.”

“I guess being a puppy could be fun for a while,” mused Sidney.  Then she shot Duncan a sharp look.  “That was not a request.”

Duncan giggled.  “Aww, but you’d look cute as a puppy.  I’ll make a robot dog with a headband, instead.”

“Oh, the kids would love that.”

Duncan offered her a headband with fuzzy brown ears on it, and Sidney put it on.  Courtney was already stirring from her nap, and her squeals of glee at seeing the puppy woke Victor, too.  They played with the puppy until dinnertime, and Courtney was sad to see it “go to sleep” so that Sidney could cook.

Thus, when dinner was ready, Victor was playing with the puppy-bot once more, and Courtney was napping on the couch... wearing the headband.  Sidney glared at Duncan, who shrugged.  “Like I was going to say no to her.”

Sidney conceded the point, and as the week progressed Courtney acquired a small collection of headband-enabled toys, some new, some modifications of existing toys.  Victor’s favourite was a race car that had a speech chip, Duncan set it up so that Courtney could override the chip with her own phrases, but it came out in the character’s voice.  She got a kick out of saying silly things to Victor, though the time she used the car to sneak around at night and accidentally triggered some of the messages while outside her parent’s door got it taken away for a few days.

When the nascent full Moon rose that Friday, Duncan was waiting out on the deck once more.  He sighed happily as he felt its power embrace him, and reunite him with Donna and Dia.  Glowing with suffused power, he returned to the kitchen to give his wife a hug.  “Lots to do tonight, don’t wait up for us.”

Sidney smiled a little ruefully at the pronoun.  “Going to leave this body here to keep me company?”

“Both, I think.  I know the snake isn’t your favourite, except as a blanket.”

Sidney’s smile widened.  “Yeah, but she is a really nice blanket.  Can you make it so she can turn all the way into a blanket?”

“Done,” chimed Dia, who giggled at the look Duncan gave them.  “Trust me, it’ll be fine.”

Duncan hugged Sidney warmly, then three sparks of magic flew out of the room and danced their way toward the hospital.  They easily located Dr. O’Brien, having become familiar enough with him to sense him from well outside.  Dia made a soft chime emerge from his phone, and he glanced down at it to see Donna’s smiling face.

“That time already, hm?  Excellent.  Time for the ICU round.  Are you going to instantiate as a human, or just flit about me like invisible angels?”

Donna grinned from the phone and a halo appeared above her head.

“Grand, let’s be on about it.”

O’Brien did his usual walk about the ICU, dictating notes about this patient and that, and Donna touched them all with power, ensuring they’d heal soon, but not so soon as to raise too many suspicions.  There were even more in the ICU than last time, and the tour overflowed into a nearby ward with patients transferred in from other facilities.  When Doctor O’Brien returned to his office, Donna flitted out to talk to him.  She kept her shape trim, instead of her usual curves at the club.  Dia added a faintly glowing tiara, which made Donna roll her eyes.

“There’s a little more, if you have time,” started O’Brien.  “We have a few people in from Windsor, similar cases to Ruby.”

Donna nodded, recalling the girl she’d saved from a peculiar form of soul-rot.  “I’ll have a look.  I’m not sure how much I can do, whatever affected her didn’t seem to respond to normal magic.”

O’Brien nodded, and led Donna back out of his office and on to a secluded ward.  Six people were lying in beds, hooked up to monitoring gear and IV lines.  “They’re not the worst cases of Windsor Syndrome, but other than Ruby nobody has ever improved.  We picked some that we hoped weren’t past saving.”

Duncan studied them carefully.  “The signs are there, alright.  Their souls are badly frayed.  Being further away from whatever happened in Detroit probably helps... but they’re still losing ground.”  Dia summoned power enough to suffuse the room with light, and the bodies of all six looked much healthier when they were done, but the souls remained dark.

“Anything?” asked the doctor hopefully.

Donna shook her head.  “Lunar magic doesn’t touch this.  So it’s not death magic.”  She paced up to the worst case, and held her hand above the chest.  “Something foul, even so.  The only thing that can save them is the power of faith.”

“Sorry?  Ye want I should pray over them?”

Donna nodded.  “It would help.”

O’Brien turned to the first patient, made the sign of the cross, then bowed his head and recited a brief prayer to St. Jude, asking blessing for a hopeless cause.  Dia watched the patient, and it did indeed help, slowing the damage, but not stopping it.

“Not enough,” murmured Donna.

“I’m a healer first, and a man of faith second, I’m afraid.  Should I get Peter up here?  He would be happy to see you again.”

Donna nodded slowly.  The last time she’d seen the man who ran the chapel at the hospital had been at the end of the most harrowing night of her life.  “I should like to talk to him again.  Let him know his words helped.”

“That too.”

O’Brien made a call, and before long the silver-haired master of the chapel into the ward, a puzzled look on his face.  “A crisis of faith, is it?  I’d buy that from most others but not you, Colin.”  He spotted the other person standing in the ward and smiled.  “Ah.  O’Brien’s angel.  Donna, was it?”

Donna bowed her head.  “Yes.  Thank you again for the kind words that night.  My friend was transmuted by the experience, but returned.  I’m not sure I could have endured the wait without your faith, and others’.”

Paul nodded at the mention of others.  “It is good you have those you can share your burdens with.  What burden is it you wish to share now?”

Donna looked to the patients lying still in their beds.  “These people’s souls are frayed, as Ruby’s was.  Normal magic can’t fix it.”

“Normal magic?”

Duncan took over then, and explained the forms of magic he was familiar with.  Lunar magic was potent and most available on the night of the full Moon.  Solar magic, its opposite, had faded from the world to be replaced by Lunar magic, and there was reason to believe this was an ongoing cycle measured in centuries if not millenia.  Death magic was always available, but corrupted those who used it.  “And the fourth magic, most potent and most difficult of them all, has to do with faith.  I do not understand the rules of it very well, it does not like to be measured and considered and studied as my engineer mind has done with Lunar magic.”

Paul chuckled at that, and nodded.  “Faith is about belief, not evidence.”

“Yes, exactly!  It does not come at my beck and call, and I cannot ask for it.  But when those who believe in me express their faith, I can do extraordinary things.”

Paul’s eyebrow lifted at that.  “You heal the mortally ill.  The miracles you have already done seem quite extraordinary to me.”

“And yet...”  Duncan gestured to the patients around them.  “These I cannot heal.  And that affronts me in a way I cannot easily express.  Save to say that in my heart of hearts, I see myself as one who fixes things.”

“Wisdom lies in understanding there are things you cannot change.”

“There is very little I cannot change,” replied Duncan.  “And for Ruby, I was able to.  Colin’s prayer had some positive effect, I had hoped...”

Paul shook his head.  “I shall pray for them.  But not for you to study.”

Donna smiled at him prettily.  “I shall ask no more of you.  Thank you.”

“Oh, you may ask plenty of me yet, but... not that.  Faith is personal, private, and as you earlier noted, given but not to be asked for.”

“I apologize for putting you on the spot,” sighed Donna, bowing her head.

Paul touched her forehead.  “You are forgiven.  Study your own faith, your own heart, and you will learn more than I could ever show.”

With that blessing, he withdrew.

“There may be other ways,” mused O’Brien.  “Silver has an effect on lunar magic, yes?”

Donna nodded.  “Have you tried it on these unfortunate souls?”

“Aye.  Doesn’t help.  But... if this whatever-it-is isn’t kin to your magic, perhaps there’s something else that will.  Maybe start with other elemental metals, and see...  Better than watching them waste away, eh?”

“Indeed.  Is there anything else I can help you with?”

O’Brien shook his head, but Donna studied him speculatively.  “I’m not just here for your patients.  Something for yourself?”

“It’s no grand thing.  The wife frets about what’s going on, the rumours that something strange happens certain nights at the hospital, and that I’m seen with a lovely woman some of those nights.  I can’t explain it to her, and it’d be a kindness if...”

“I’m not sure she’d appreciate seeing said lovely woman on your doorstep.”

“P’raps not at that.  I should still like to give her answers.”

Donna thought for a moment.  “You could have dinner with her at the Crimson Kitten tonight.  I’ll make sure she gets to see some real magic.  Ask for the Donna special.”

Colin chuckled softly.  “That’s the restaurant beside the Blue Vixen.  I hope it’s child-friendly.”

“Oh very much so, before midnight.  Most children seem delighted to see waitresses with fuzzy ears.”

“I’ll take you up on that.  Tonight.  But if I’m to do so, I should get going.”

“As should I.”  Donna waved, then her body sparkled away to a speck of light, that darted away through the wall.

They arrived at the Blue Vixen in a twinkling, and formed themselves a much curvier female body before emerging from the Changing Room to cheers from the other dancers.  Gwen bounced up to them and hugged them tight.  “Ready to dance?”

Donna nodded eagerly.  However, as they made their way to the stage, Rowan intercepted them.  “There’s a gentleman here to see ‘Mrs. Faulkner’.  Said it was urgent, so I put him up in room 1 and said you’d be along.  He’s been cooling his heels there for half an hour, can you see what he wants?”

Donna smiled an apology to Gwen.  “I’ll dance with you in a bit.”

“No worries, I know you’re good for it,” Gwen replied easily.  She tagged along behind Donna on the way to the smallest of the private rooms, then compressed down to a diamond to adorn Donna’s throat as she entered.

Donna studied the man waiting within.  He was wearing a well-tailored suit that had hardly rumpled at all from sitting.  He was carrying a slim document case, that Donna noticed with some alarm was manacled to his wrist... and the manacles were silver plated.

“Well, aren’t you a puzzle.  What do you want?”

“My Master would have words with you.”

Donna frowned.  “Master?  Oh, what have they done to you.”  A flicker of air turned into a thin layer of plastic, and slid under the cuff to separate him from the silver.  Donna repeated her stunt with his rings and the slim silver torc hiding under his collar.  Only then could she brush him with the Moon’s power, removing the bonds about his mind.

He stared at her, screamed, and ran from the room.