Unsurprisingly, Freddy’s truck wasn’t there when I arrived. I pulled on my shirt, put on my shoes and studied at my guilt-ridden face in the rear-view mirror. What was I gonna do without Freddy? I needed someone to… satisfy myself. If I fucked a normal person, one who didn’t have a fey part, what would happen to them? Xianta said Rashakas were kin to succubi? They killed their prey, didn’t they? I shuddered; I didn’t want to do that.

  Should I go home? My mistress would tell me what to do, wouldn’t she? What would she ask in return? I started the car and then turned it off. Xianta had me toy with Alice, going running to a chaos demon like an upset child would just rouse her interest. If I wanted to find a way to give Freddy back his humanity, I’d have to py it cool. That meant finishing the shift. I had a day off tomorrow. Maybe I could find a way in the Wild district?

  I activated the humanity , and I flinched when the old me smiled back from the mirror. Feeling the bit of essence Freddy had given me, I determined it would st me a while. At least until Xianta took her due. As I walked in through the doors, I ponder whether to clock Freddy in. Maybe I should text? I took out my phone. Wrote a small novel of expnations and excuses and bming him for getting scared, then deleted it. I sent sorry and left it at that. Hopefully, he'd be able to call in to HR himself, if he bothered. I straightened my shoulders and walked to the floor. I noted Car, sitting alone with her yellow colr at one of the red tables in the food court, glumly eating a hot dog. Unfortunately, she caught me looking and gave me a wane smile. To my surprise, she didn't immediately hop up from her table to engage and stayed there. I reach the electronics department without anyone else looking at me twice and that continued for two hours.

  Nobody commented on my nails or ears, or the size of my ass. I mean, I wasn't even wearing any pants, just letting the conditioned air flow between my legs. I just did my job, and I wasn't even horny.

  By the time it reached mid afternoon I was so goddamn bored that I was pying with the idea of turning the illusion off. Maybe py a little game with it, turning it off in front of a customer, then disappearing around a corner to recast the spell. That sounded fun. I had begun scanning the customers walking through the door, looking for one that might be appreciative of a little spice in their day when I heard my name.

  "Gavin told me it was you in video Floyd! I think its about time you tell me who you really are." Agent Boon's voice made my ears twitch and I turn toward the sound. It came from the employee area but after those sentences I heard nothing but the ambient rumble of the floor. Alice's curse. But maybe my blessing, had brought them to me. I should stay away, Xianta's distraction hex must be doing something to attract the MDA's agent's attention. So long as it wasn't on me and as a plus side, he wouldn't be bugging Car either.

  Still, I was curious and with the humanity powered illusion Agent Boon shouldn't be able to see the chaos magics composed an ever rger portion of my soul. It should be safe. Right? An eagerness seized me and I walked toward the employee section, my short tail shing behind me. I heard a pounding echoing down the hallway as I approach. I wasn't the only employee attracted by the drama, there was a small cluster of my fellows milling about, looking at their phones, pretending not to be listening in.

  "Open this door! Do not make me break it down! You do not want me to call for backup. Do you understand me Floyd?" Agent Boon , and I heard a solid bang, followed by a muttered, "Ow."

  I smiled. If he was trying to break into Floyd's office he'd need a lot more than a strong shoulder. All the offices were reinforced in case of attack by a monster or person. Particurly the store manager's as it held the cash safe. Floyd's office in particur, had a somewhat hidden emergency exit. Not like a secret door or anything but a white door in the rear corner, behind the heavy iron cash safe. Anyone who'd manned the registers would see it if you'd were tasked with depositing your cash, but someone who'd only been in front of Floyd's desk would never see it.

  Floyd wasn't shouting back or anything so maybe he wasn't even there? I backed away from the cluster and exited the building out the employee's entrance. Directly to the left of it was a ft metal door with no handle on this side. That was the emergency exit. I didn't see Floyd but right on the edge of the sidewalk sat a single forlorn bck leather shoe. The overpriced type common to many an overwhelmed middle manager. I scanned the parking lot and quickly located his bee yellow sports car. Didn't see him in it. Why would he leave his shoe?

  The employee entrance sat on the rear of the building; a narrow strip of pavement made a passage way for trucks to reach the loading dock on the opposite corner. Beyond that, a chain-link fence stood guarding a stand of pine trees that served as a wind break before sloping down into a drainage ditch. I spotted a second shoe at the bottom of the fence. Approaching it I heard mumbling and then saw the light blue of a button-down shirt poking around the trunk of a tree. Floyd's shoulder. The fence had no gate along it but fortunately had no barbed wire either. It rang loudly when I scaled it and swung my body over it. The motion had been surprisingly easy. At this angle, I saw Floyd and the reason he'd run.

  Floyd sat with his back against a tree and his legs spread at the point the ground curved down toward the ditch. The afternoon sunlight glinted off a pair of horns that protruded from his forehead and swept back across his head. In the rear they lifted from his skull. His ears had grown long and pointed. A bck hoof had torn through the sock on the foot closest to me and it bunched up around his ankle, completely useless.

  "I'm gonna be a... drrr," his whispered as hands worked frantically between his legs, "Dragon." A spurt of white shot from his crotch and arced down into the ditch as he let his head back, digging the points of his horns into the bark of the tree.

  I stepped closer, a tiny voice inside my skull whispered that what I should do is go get Agent Boon. Let him catch his chaos culprit, the clear demon colborator. But a dragon with hooves? Just what did that spell do? Stepping closer, I saw both his pants and shirt were open, his rather small cock exposed but also on his belly four fat pink nips had poked up from a patch of pink skin. Beads of milk gathered on each. The horns and ears looked draconic, but that was clearly an udder forming on his belly.

  Something snapped beneath my foot and he looked up at me with irises widened to thin blue rims.

  "Gaaavin, looook," He said dreamily, pointing up at his horns, "I'm gonna be a dragon. I've always wanted to be a dragon. Isn't cool? You think corporate will let me sit on a pile of gold? That be so cool."

  "That is real cool Floyd." I agreed, my voice pitched as if I were talking to a toddler. "But I don't think you should be a dragon here. Maybe you should go home first?"

  "Boon." A small bit of crity entered his eyes as his mouth wrinkled with distaste. "He doesn't like dragons. He thinks I magicked my way into this job. Said you said I am an imposter. I work hard tho. So hard. I work harder than anyone. You don't think I'm an imposter? I'm a good boss right?"

  "Course your a good boss." I smiled at him. "But you can't get stay here. Is there somewhere you can go where they won't find you." Gncing nervously back at the building I wondered how long we had before Boon realized he was yelling into an unoccupied office. I offered Floyd my hand.

  "His eyes squeezed closed, and he rubbed at the base of his horns. "I... I got the keys to my cousin's cabin... Maybe there?" He squinted up at me, eyes far less distant as he took my hand.

  "That sounds good," I said, hoping he could drive in his altered state. I pulled him up and he wobbled on his hooves and fell against me with a small moo of distress.

  "You smell good." He sniffed at me through widening nostrils.

  "Floyd!" I took his shoulders and shook him a little. "I need you to focus. Otherwise, Boon will stop you, you won't be a dragon."

  He blinked but still looked to be on the edge of a dream and reality.

  "Do you know the address of the cabin?" Asked him, pulling my phone from the pocket of my apron.

  "Yeah." He reeled it off. I typed it into a ride app and set the pickup at the end of the shipping driveway at the rear of the store. Then took a little of my gathered humanity and spun a human image around him. At least that would get him picked up. A driver was only a few minutes away.

  "Listen Floyd, you need to go the corner over there," I pointed and get into the car that stops for you. Tell him that you're Gavin and get in. He'll take you to your cabin. You can be a dragon there."

  He nodded, "Will he milk me? I think I need to be milked."

  "No. No milking until you get to the cabin Floyd. Thats very important."

  "Could you milk me then? The voice says that dragons are not allowed to milk themselves. You smell safe Gavin." He said, his eyes were a little less dited. "The pressure makes it hard to think."

  I looked at his still vestigial udder. The skin beneath the nipples had barely swollen at all. Each one could hardly offer half a mouthful. Yet those little white droplets had a certain creamy shine to them. The hell with it. I kneeled quickly and pressed my lips around the upper left nip.

  "Ah!" He gave a sharp cry as a small stream of milk leapt onto my tongue. Warm, sweet and a fizzy electric sensation I recognized as a small bit of his humanity. I gulped it down instinctively. Then harvested the others with a series of three quick kisses. Above me Floyd gave a quiet moo as I swallowed down his offerings. Far more humanity than I put into the illusion around him. "Oh thats so much better." He said as I stood up and wiped my lips. "When I gather my hoard you are welcome to a coin or two."

  "Thank you." I chuckled, wondering what precisely he'd be hoarding by nightfall. "You need to go."

  "Right," He smiled, his eyes still dited but they at least focused on my face, showing wide blunt teeth. "See you ter, mistress." Then he turned to jog away but nearly tripped when his pants fell around his ankles. He did have the presence of mind to pause and pull them up so that boded well. Maybe he'd actually get away?

  It wasn't until I went inside to witness Boon badgering staff into pilot a fork lift into the employee area did I realize that Floyd had addressed me as mistress. Oddly, I could feel him moving away from me. As if there was a string spooling out from me, one end of it tied around his waist. More faintly, I felt Freddy too, out in the direction of the Wild District.

  MisterNibs