Head down. Eyes forward. Towering buildings flashing by on all sides, enveloped in midnight. Heartbeat matched to the electronic soundtrack. The determined, rising thrum of the vehicle slicing through the air, the elements trying to hold it back. Grip shifting on the handlebars, speed dropping quickly. Leaning into the turn, a long left, maintaining the angle. Through the apex, back on the power. Straightening up with the momentum, onto the straightaway, the engine growing louder.  Ever more wind rushing by. Trackside markings a blur. Lights. Noise. Speed.
Blasting over a row of weapon beacons, she glanced at the corner of the head-up display around the visor’s periphery. Icons cycled rapidly, settling on Laser Cannon. Lap time still ticking by. A right-hand kink, then a longer straight, nothing less than full throttle. Another rider in the distance. She grabbed for the trigger, and a secondary hum joined the symphony of velocity, rising as the power built, the wait always eternal. A blast of energy rocketed from the front of her bike, dead straight towards the target. The rider ahead disappeared around the next bend, the bolt of energy obliterating itself against the wall behind. A frustrated curse was lost to the roar of the wind. The view after the next corner, though, showed her exactly what she wanted to see.
Becky was catching Kimmie.
Another pair of racers came into view up ahead, following closely behind one another. Kimmie moved to one side of them, easing past as they approached a tight chicane, left, right, left. With clear track ahead of her, Kimmie manouvered her way through easily, but Becky caught the slower duo at exactly the wrong moment, braking suddenly to avoid slamming into the back of the bike ahead of her as they entered the turn.
“Niall, get out of the way!” she yelled, almost barging her way past if not for the spider’s last-minute swerve to avoid contact. A startled apology came her way, along with a quick shout of encouragement as she sped past Vince as well, head down once again.
Never did Becky take her eyes off of her target, determination building each time she spotted the bird glancing over her shoulder. Each turn brought her closer, each long straightaway narrowing the gap more and more. The bunny quickly glanced at the mini-map on her visor, the pair were entering the final sector. She was running out of time.
Everything the bike had to give was wrought from it, mechanical sympathy was out of the question right now. Becky flew through the final bends, she could swear she felt the exhaust from Kimmie’s engine on her face as she came into the home stretch, wind fading as she picked up the slipstream. Closer, closer, closer, she had to wait until the last minute to make the pass on the run to the line. She couldn’t have been more than twenty feet behind now. Fifteen feet. Ten feet. She glanced ahead as the finish approached…
…then Kimmie dropped an electro-mine.
By the time Becky realised what had happened, it was already too late, the mine detonating a miniature EMP and shutting down her bike’s electronics, the engine instantly cutting out. “NO!” came her scream, forced to watch the bird shooting off ahead while her own bike hovered to a stop yards from the end of the race before it could start up again. “No! No, no, no, you total-!”
Kimmie raised her arms with a cheer, coasting across the line to take the victory, while the string of profanity from the bunny gradually faded into the distance. Turning along a street that intersected the track, the force-field barriers having been lowered after the final lap for her, the bird pulled up outside a garage-come-workshop, arriving in the center of a golden ring of light shining up from the ground. She allowed herself a pump of both fists, just in time to for Becky to abruptly come to a stop alongside her in a second ring, this one both smaller and silver. “Wow, that was so awesome at the end, wasn’t it?” Kimmie exclaimed.
“That was bullshit!” Becky retorted, jabbing a button on the side of her headgear to retract the visor. “You don’t use weapons on someone when they’re that close!”
“You do if you’re going fast enough to get out of their range,” Kimmie told her.
Becky swung herself off her vehicle with an angry pout. “How long had you had that fucking mine for?” she asked, arms folded.
“About half a lap, I guess? I knew you were gonna catch me up-” Kimmie’s explanation turned to giggling as the bunny rested against her bike, only for it to start moving away behind her, sending her stumbling back. A swift kick to the power cell was delivered in retaliation. “Becky, don’t get mad…”
“If I’d hit you with that laser, though!” Becky insisted. “Or if you hadn’t dropped that mine, and why the hell were you two going so slow?” she continued, turning her attention to their remaining packmates as they arrived.
Vince hovered in on the opposite side of Kimmie, taking his place in a bronze ring, before pointing a thumb over one shoulder toward Niall, who had stopped closer to the corner of the small forecourt. The fennec leaned in toward the others. “He was not even trying to overtake me.”
Becky rolled her eyes as the spider left his bike and wandered over to the others. “What happened?” he asked them, flicking his visor away, “did Kimmie win?”
“Yep, she dropped a mine right in my face,” Becky explained, the bird alongside raising her arms again with a grin. “But she still can’t beat me in Time Trial, so I don’t care.”
The disembodied sound of someone clearing their throat interrupted the group, the four each briefly looking from one to another in some confusion. “Who was……hang on,” Kimmie said, reaching up to remove her headgear. It came free without any trouble, and Kimmie immediately vanished from the scene.
[SuperBird has left the session]
“Kimmie?”  Becky asked the now empty space Kimmie and her bike had occupied. As she turned to the others after a moment, Vince nodded toward her, removing his own headgear, Niall quickly following suit.
[SoundproofFennec has left the session]
[Captain_Scuttle has left the session]
Becky closed her eyed, lifted off her headgear, and when she opened them, she was back in Kimmie’s bedroom, sat on the edge of the bird’s sprawling bed opposite the television. A number of gaming consoles laid out in the unit underneath the screen, the shelves either side crammed with games, videos and figurines, plus the distinctive charcoal cans of a drink called V4 Plasma Punch. The pink accents suggested grapefruit flavour. A few video game and cartoon posters bedecked the walls, a few stuffed toys lay across the bed behind her, some matching up with the figurines on the shelves opposite.
She was glad to be back in her own clothes, though, rather than the close-fit biking suits they’d all been wearing in the game. Niall was still in his segmented pants and collared waistcoat, Vince was still in that dress of his but minus the heels, whereas Kimmie had swapped her more colourful party getup for a typical halter top and miniskirt pairing.
A fifth figure was stood in the doorway, an older cockatiel woman dressed in a slender nightgown and soft slippers, with tousled hair down to her shoulders, a slightly lighter grey than her plumage. “What happened to being quiet?” she asked the gathered packmates.
“Sorry, Mom,” Kimmie replied with a sheepish smile, clutching her VR headset, “we were getting a bit excited with the game.”
“I think if your dad and I can hear you from the other end of the house, you’re more than just ‘a bit excited’,” she told them, nodding down the hallway. “Besides, you’ve all got school tomorrow, so shouldn’t you be getting to bed?”
A cursory glance at the clock on the wall gave them their answer – there was only half an hour until midnight. “Shit, you’re right,” Becky blurted out.
“You really should watch your language, incidentally,” the older bird added, “the kind of things we woke up to…”
“Yeah, sorry,” came the bunny’s hasty apology.
Vince, meanwhile, picked himself up from the floor and began brushing his dress back into form. “Thanks for letting us stay, though, Erin.”
The grey bird smiled softly at the group. “Anytime. But try and keep it a bit more calm next time, okay?”
The four teens each gave their agreement, and Erin headed back to bed, leaving them to clear up for the night. The headsets returned to their shelf, the console was switched off, and the bed was tidied back up again, Becky keeping an eye on the doorway until Kimmie’s mom was out of earshot. “Fuck, I get enough grief from my dad,” she huffed, “I don’t need your parents on my ass as well.”
“Well…you kinda did get carried away, though,” Kimmie interjected, rearranging the pillows on her bed. “Especially if you managed to wake my parents up, it usually takes quite a lot to do that.”
“Oh come on, you would have been screaming if I’d hit you –“
“But you didn’t! I waited for a chance and then I-“
“Girls?” Vince interrupted the pair before they started up again, grabbing his clutch bag from a side table. “We’re not in the game anymore, let’s wind it down.” The two briefly stared down one another, before Kimmie gave a small giggle.
“I thought it’d just be my mom and dad getting woken up, when I got back,” Niall chipped in, gesturing vaguely in the direction of where his house might be.
“You’re normally really quiet, though, aren’t you?” Becky asked him.
The spider idly scratched at the back of his head. “Yeah, but it seems to happen every time I start wandering around in the middle of the night.”
“Ooh!” came the sound of an idea popping into Kimmie’s head. “Do you wanna stay here for the night, then?”
Niall’s extra limbs flexed outward in surprise as he glanced around the room. “Stay here? D’you-in the……with you?” he stumbled, taken slightly aback.
“Of course, with me!” Kimmie swung herself onto her bed, clambering off the other side. “When have I ever made you sleep on the floor or anything?”
“And you’re…it’s fine if I wake up at some point and go for a…just walk around a bit?” he asked her, again pointing in a nondescript direction.
“Nope,” the bird began as she crouched slightly in front of him, wrapped her arms tightly around the smaller spider and picked him up off the ground, drawing a faint squeak. “’I’m gonna snuggle you so hard.”
Niall’s swallowed nervously, holding onto his packmate’s shoulders while his feet were still dangling in mid-air. His gaze was drawn downward to the deep yellow chasm before him as Kimmie’s chest pressed heavily against his, and he felt his blood start flowing toward his face, and one leg of his pants becoming uncomfortably tight.  He glanced towards the other two, but they were already gone, Vince giving him a quick wink from the doorway before disappearing out of view.
His silence gave way to another round of giggles from the cockatiel as she set him back down on the floor. “C’mon, Scuttlebutt, let’s get ready,” she said, swiftly pulling off her top and tossing it on the floor, allowing her breasts to bounce freely as she skipped out  to the bathroom. 
Niall’s mouth gave the faintest hint of a grin, and he slowly began to remove his waistcoat.
Downstairs, meanwhile, Becky was by the front door along with Vince, the fennec doing up the straps on his high heels as he slipped back into them. “Okay, so…we are just leaving him here with Kimmie, aren’t we?” she asked him.
Vince straightened himself up again, satisfied with the fit of his shoes. “Yep, he’s gonna have a great night,” he told her with a sly smirk. “What about you, did you enjoy it?”
“Yeah, it was pretty good,” Becky replied with a nod and a smile of her own, “It’s normally fun when we’re all here.”
“Oh, bye guys!” came a call from the top of the stairs. Looking up towards it, the pair saw Kimmie cheerily waving them off in only her understickers. “I hope you had a good time, I’ll see you tomorrow!”
“See you, Kimmie, thanks for inviting us over!”
“Later, Kimmie, take care of yourself!”
The trio said their goodbyes, and Kimmie eagerly headed back to her bedroom, a soft thump indicating her door had been shut.
“…and put a fucking top on!” Becky added quietly to herself.
Vince chuckled under his breath as he swung the front door open. “C’mon, it’s late and it’s her own house, I think she’s okay.”
“Yeah, I know…” she muttered, following Vince outside and closing the front door behind them. Reaching into her back pocket, the bunny pulled out her PET, and with a few flicks of her fingers, left a message for her spider companion.
[PatchBunny: Have fun, Nine-Legs!]
“Hey, Becky?” Vince asked, catching the bunny’s attention as they drew alongside one another. “Would it be okay if I stayed over at yours tonight?”
“Sure,” she agreed, slowing her pace to match his, “why wouldn’t it be?”
“Just thought I’d ask,” Vince replied with his usual smile. “It always takes a little while to get home from here, and it does get a little creepy over there at this time of night.”
“I’ll bet,” Becky replied with a half-smirk of her own. “Well, you can crash at my place whenever, you know that.” An ascending trio of notes brought her attention back to the device in her hand, where a response had appeared.
[Captain_Scuttle: Please don’t call me that]
A small snort of laughter escaped the bunny, and the device was slipped back into her pocket.
The two continued on their short walk along one side of the street, enjoying the relative quiet that night-time in the residential sector had to offer them, punctuated only by the clacking of Vince’s stilettos. It was fortunate that three of the four members of their pack lived quite close to one another, with only Vince residing on the other side of the river. On this side, though, the fact that each house they passed looked almost identical to the ones before was the sort of thing that wasn’t initially obvious, but once they had realised it, it was impossible to ignore. Back in the days when Midbourn was still thriving, they’d learned, this part of the sector had all been built in one go, thus it was both easier and quicker to simply build the same thing over and over. They even had the same layout on the inside, although that did mean whenever the packmates visited one another, they’d know instinctively where each room was.
The two of them soon arrived at the rabbit’s house, made their way inside, and sure enough, it followed that same template of the house they’d stepped out of just a few minutes ago. Living room to one side, a small bathroom opposite, kitchen-come-dining area at the back, and a staircase in the middle heading up to the bedrooms. “I’ll not be a minute, Bex,” Vince assured her, stopping just inside to remove his high heels.
Becky gave an okay and strode upstairs, along the landing and into her bedroom. Kicking her shoes off, she set about gathering the few items of clothing on the floor into a pile beside her stereo, in an attempt to make her room look slightly more presentable. The sheets of what was probably homework on her desk got scooped up and tossed into a drawer, the duvet was straightened out, and some empty Carbolate cans were disposed of, with the familiar hiss of disintegration as they passed through the energy field on the trashcan.
Another jingle of notes interrupted the rabbit, as her PET received another message. Retrieving the device, Becky took a look at what had been sent her way, and almost dropped the thing as she burst into stifled laughter.
“What’s going on?”
Glancing up at Vince as he came into her room, Becky just shook her head, unable to remove the grin from her face as she walked up to the fennec, offering her PET to him. “Kimmie’s gotten a hold of it, hasn’t she?” the bunny asked, Vince tilting the device his way to read the message in question.
[Captain_Scuttle: dont worry its gonna be great!~<3]
“Oh, yeah, that’s definitely her!” Vince couldn’t help a grin himself as he handed Becky her PET back. “D’you think Niall’s distracted with something?”
“I think he’s distracted with two things.” Becky suggested.
Vince gave a knowing nod at the comment, reaching into his bag and withdrawing a small rectangle of material that fit almost perfectly into his hand. “Do you wanna use the bathroom first? I never know how much time I’ll need,” he asked, gesturing towards his still made-up face.
“Yeah, I’ll do that.” The rabbit stuffed her PET back into her pants as she left the room, the fennec rubbing his face with the wipe to clear off some of his added cosmetics.
A quick trip to the bathroom later, while she was washing her hands, the pain in her knuckles from earlier in the night had subsided, Becky noticed. Maybe it was being back in her own home, but she certainly didn’t feel as mad as she did earlier either, she just felt…tired. The party, the stay in Ashworth Park, the walk back to Kimmie’s place, the heated video game battles, her eyes couldn’t quite stay open after all that. Cracking a smile to the reflection in the mirror, she stepped away to head back to her bedroom…
…and stopped. Snapping her gaze back to the mirror, Becky stared at her reflection, and her reflection stared right back at her, but…something didn’t seem right. The rabbit in the mirror had the same purple eyes as she did, the same styleless hair, the same half-and-half fur markings. Becky turned her head to one side, the rabbit in the mirror did the same. Becky took a single step backward, the rabbit in the mirror did the same. Becky wiggled her nose, the rabbit in the mirror did the same. She couldn’t put her finger on it, it was definitely her reflection, but it just looked…off.
Wow, she really was tired, she thought to herself, with a few blinks and a shake of her head. Rubbing her eyes as she returned to her bedroom, Becky sat herself on the edge of her bed, letting a long yawn escape her. “Fuck…”
“Tired?” Vince asked plainly, getting a simple nod in return. The fennec flashed that usual smile of his. “Go on, get yourself some sleep,” he encouraged, leaving for the bathroom himself.
Becky managed a weary smile of her own, setting her PET on the desk at the head of the bed. The jeans and tee she had chosen for the evening were pulled off and thrown toward the stereo, falling short of the clothing heap. Lifting the duvet, and inadvertently nudging Vince’s bag with one foot, she flopped onto the mattress, shifting herself over to the far side as it began conforming to her figure.
It was a challenge for her to stay awake even in the brief wait until Vince returned. Lifting her head from the pillow, she watched him walk back through the doorway, slide his thumbs under the straps of his dress and tug gently upwards, the garment sliding free from his hips as he swiftly disrobed. The dress joined Becky’s bomber jacket over the back of a chair, and Vince climbed into the bed alongside her, propped up on an elbow while he removed the clasps from his ears. “We all had fun in the end, didn’t we?”
“We did, yeah…” Becky murmured, reaching up for her PET. Another few flicks of her fingers, and the lights in the room dimmed to darkness, leaving only the trace amounts of light filtering in through the window.
The device was returned to the desk, the two silver ear clasps placed alongside it, and the pair receded under the covers, the fennec nestling in alongside the chubby bunny. “G’night, Becky.”
“Night, Vince,” she mumbled into the pillow, allowing that heavy slumber to wash over her.

----
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Eyelids fluttered open, the sounds of early morning gently lifting Becky from her sleep. She pushed herself up, stretching her arms up overhead. “Mmh…hm?” Having had time to take in her surroundings, she found that she had awoken in a completely different room. The bed was in the wrong corner, the desk was against the opposite wall, there was no stereo, no clothes over the floor...and no Vince.
Maybe he was already awake? The activity outside her door suggested there was someone up and about. Shuffling over to the edge of her bed and dropping down to the floor, Becky stopped to look back at the piece of furniture. Her feet should have met the carpet a lot earlier than they did. Scanning the room, the bunny felt a distant unease creeping up in the back of her mind. Like she shouldn’t be here.
Cautiously peering into the room opposite, Becky caught the attention of her dad, who appeared to be arriving with breakfast. “Morning, kiddo!” He greeted her, bright-eyed, setting a plate of toast alongside two mugs on the table. “Did you get a good night’s sleep?”
Becky blinked, treading further into the room and briefly glancing around. There was no way her dad could have got back from Locksmouth this early. Even so, this definitely wasn’t their house, every room was in a different place. And when had she gotten dressed?
A clink of crockery came through the second doorway to one side, the low sun casting Alan’s shadow all the way into the kitchen. Only, when she looked a second time, it didn’t look like a shadow. It looked more like a darkened figure of some kind, standing and staring off into the distance “Dad, who’s…that?”
The rabbit stumbled over her question when a far higher voice than normal came out. She almost didn’t realise her dad stepping in front of her and peering through the doorway himself. Gazing upward at him, Becky suddenly felt tiny. He was tall, sure, but she should have come up a lot further than his waist. Everything looked taller, come to think of it.
“Becky, there’s no-one there,” Alan stated, reaching down and taking her hand in quite a tight grip. “Now come on, you don’t want to miss the transit.”
“But there’s…” She took another glance behind her at the dark figure which still remained in the kitchen, while the taller rabbit opened the door - which she didn’t recall closing – and led her back out into…a transit station.
Becky definitely didn’t remember living in a transit station.
All manner of people strode by as she followed her dad along the platform, some of whom Becky thought she recognised, but none of whom she could put a finger on. Occasionally they would offer a “Morning, Al,” through the hubbub, but no reply came from him, save for a nod. “Dad, what’s going on-” she asked, when she spotted the same distantly staring figure on the other side of the platform, and gave a tug on Alan’s hand. “Dad! Look, that’s the person from before!”
The taller rabbit came to a halt, tightening his grip a little. Looking off toward the figure in the distance for a moment, he let out an irritated sigh. “That’s Mr. Masterson,” he told Becky, resuming their journey through the station. “Don’t try and startle me like that, okay?”
“Mr…? B-But it was the same person!” she pressed, having to walk at a fairly rapid pace to keep up with her dad’s much longer strides. “They were in the-“
“Becky,” Alan cut her off, crouching down alongside her and taking hold of her shoulders. “I know the last few months must have been hard for you to go through, it’s been hard for me too,” he began, locking eyes with his daughter. “I’m sure we all want to go back to the way things used to be, but…” He stalled, his gaze falling a little.
“…I don’t understand…” Becky noticed his lips stiffening slightly.
Alan pulled his eyes back up toward her, and slowly nodded. “Maybe not now, but you will.” Turning Becky around, he ushered her into the doorway of an awaiting train, the murmuring of commuters outside being replaced with the chattering of children. “Have fun at school, princess,” he said as she boarded the transit. “Just…remember to keep yourself out of trouble.”
The doors slid shut before Becky had a chance to reply, the bunny taking a step back as they swept across in front of her. She felt the carriage start moving, watching as her dad waved her goodbye from the platform outside, receding gradually into the distance.
That left Becky with the rest of the passengers, all on her own in the crowd of kids. Presumably they were headed to school as well, and though she thought she knew some of the faces, much as with the adults outside, she couldn’t say for certain who they were. Most had found themselves seats, a few were still standing in the central aisle, talking excitedly to those seated alongside. Nobody even seemed aware of what Becky had spotted at the far end of the carriage – a battered, blackened body, laying contorted on the floor in a pool of what looked disturbingly as if it could be congealed blood.
How could everybody be missing it? Someone was obviously hurt, badly, and nobody was doing a thing about it. Nobody even seemed upset by it, as if this was normal. Surely there was someone around that could do something about it, right? The front half of the carriage was all kids, from her to the far end where that horrifically beaten victim lay, and she could barely see who was on board towards the back, shuffling her way between the others on their feet as she searched for help.
“Watch it, doofus!” Out of nowhere, a pair of hands were thrust into Becky’s shoulder blades, sending her flying forwards with a yelp and crashing hard into the ground. The conversations in the carriage instantly grew quieter, allowing the bunny to hear the faint whimper in her throat more clearly as she shakily picked herself up. Turning back to see what had happened, she found herself face to face with a white-furred cat girl, no older than herself, glaring through piercing blue eyes that didn’t quite match her pigtails. “Jeez, why is it always you?”
Becky’s brow furrowed slightly. Hadn’t she only been on the transit for a few minutes? And when had Carrie turned up here? Either way it shouldn’t have mattered, she thought, as she looked past the other girl toward the front of the carriage, only to notice the now empty space where the charred body had been laying just a moment ago. The floor and surrounding seats were totally unmarked as well, like it had never been there in the first place. Looking back up toward the rear of the carriage showed no sign of it either, just the same collective of kids quietly chatting amongst themselves.
“Hellooo?” The cat snapped her fingers in Becky’s ear, drawing a slight flinch from the sudden noise. “Are you in there?”
The pair stared at enough other for a moment, Carrie still as stern as always, before the bunny shook it off with a small huff and made her way back past, making sure to give the cat’s shoulder a nudge with her own as she went. “Bitch.”
Dropping into an empty pair of seats, Becky shifted herself up by the window, content to just watch the scenery as they flew up above the city. The clouds were hanging unusually low in the sky, but she could still just about make out where the opposite side of the dome itself curved across the beachfront for some reason and into the ocean, which didn’t seem to have a path inland either.
“Why am I in Locksmouth again?” Scanning the landscape beneath her, the tricolour bunny only saw the rooftop gardens adorning the majority of the buildings, when one of them suddenly erupted into flames as they went past. She let out a shocked gasp, pressing herself up against the glass for a closer look, but as quickly as the blaze started, it stopped, flickering out and revealing……nothing. No burnt walls, no ruined internal structure, not even a blackened patch of ground. The building had just vanished in front of her eyes. “…what the hell.”
“She’ll be back,” came a voice from behind her. Becky spun around to see a sullen, scarlet-eyed badger sitting in the adjacent seat, toned arms folded across a broad chest. “You can’t run forever.”
“Cedric?” She couldn’t help noticing that he was a few years older than Carrie had looked. “Who’s-…what’s-…when did you…” stammered the bunny, snapping her gaze from the badger to the window and back over and over. “What are you talking about?”
Before she could get an answer, a harsh electronic whine echoed throughout the transit as it slammed to an abrupt halt, Becky just able to get her hands up in time to avoid going face-first into the back of the next seat forward. As soon as the carriage became stationary, she turned to the window to see what the issue was, and found no apparent emergency. Rather, the transit had come to a stop directly outside the high school. In Midbourn. “How did…”
Stepping out into the aisle of the now empty carriage, noticing she’d somehow gotten both taller and a little bulkier during the journey, Becky quickly disembarked to try and figure out how a three-and-a-half hour journey could have been completed in just a few seconds. She strode into the school grounds, looked around at her surroundings, trying to find anything that looked glaringly out of place, but nothing leapt out at her. It all seemed… normal. 
At the back of it all, sat at a picnic table on their own, was one kid. The first thing that stood out as Becky approached was their pointed, oversized ears, followed by dark black hair, draped down to the neck and tangled in a few places, the warm orange colour of their fur, and finally the deep blue eyes hiding behind a slightly too long fringe. “…Vince?”
The fennec boy glanced up mid-bite from a sandwich, leaning away slightly from the bunny girl stood opposite him, allowing her a better view of what looked like a large wireless headphone in each ear. “Hi…” he eventually said, staying hushed, “…are you new?”
“Yeah, I just got here.” Becky nodded, took a moment to look back from one end of the ground to the other, then turned toward Vince again. “It’s all been really…weird…”
In just the couple of seconds Becky had turned away for, Vince had become an almost completely different person. His hair had been cut back, the big headphones had been ditched and replaced by smaller square efforts clipped onto his ears, and his clothing was a little more light and artistic than it had been. “I’m sure you’ll get used to it soon,” he calmly reassured her, resting his elbows on the table as he finished his sandwich.
Becky certainly didn’t feel like she was getting used to anything here, turning her attention to a nondescript point in the distance as she grabbed her jacket from the table and walked off around the side of the main school building. Slipping her arms through the sleeves, she hoped to find somewhere quiet where she could figure any of this out, but her mind seemed intent on not giving that to her.
“Is something the matter?” asked Vince, now walking with Becky, though not with as much intent as she was.
The rabbit gave an exasperated groan, and slowly ran a hand down over her face. “Just tell me what’s happening here…” she said, pulling her bandana out of her back pocket and tying it around her head, sweeping back the hair that had begun to encroach on the edges of her vision.
“What’s happening how?” another voice eagerly added from Becky’s opposite side. Despite her untied hair being electric pink, and the angry cartoon panda face on her top fairly proportionate, this was still the same upbeat cockatiel girl that the bunny recognised.
“Kimmie?” Becky hastily looked over toward Vince, whose hair had started growing again, along with his butt, then back to the bird. “When did you get here?!”
“Was it really next week that our Tech homework was for?” a suddenly appearing Niall interjected, still in his work outfit for some reason, complete with black and white baseball cap adorned with the logo of a gaming joystick designed to look like a slice of pizza. “’Cause I’ve already done it, I thought it was tomorrow.”
 “Niall, why are you dressed like that?” Becky cut across the pair of them.
 “I work at Bits & Pizzas.” He told her, adjusting the back of his hat with one hand.
The bunny sharply shook her head. “No, I mean-“
“That’s good, though,” Kimmie chimed in, “You’ve got a whole week of not worrying about it now!” Her hair was now tied up in her familiar blue buns, and her panda top was beginning to stretch out over her chest.
“Yeah, but I don’t know how well I did,” Niall continued with a shrug, “I’ll be worrying about that instead.”
Becky turned her attention downward, feeling her thighs beginning to brush against one another as she grew thicker and more powerful. However, the doughy midsection sticking out over her waistband showed that it wasn’t just muscle she was gaining. She frowned a little, quickly zipping her jacket closed.
“That was an unbelievable two weeks, though,” Vince said with his usual smirk. Eyeliner had made its way onto him, Becky noted, and there was now a little extra sway to his hips.
“Oh my god, it totally was! We’ve gotta go again sometime!” Kimmie exclaimed with a hop and a jiggle. She had to have gone up at least another cup size, the bunny thought.
“D’you guys know how…” Niall stared down at his PET, now wearing loose shorts and a vest top in the green and white colours of Midbourn High School. “You can album-ize pictures, can’t you?”
“Hang on,” Becky raised a hand, “You guys just-“
“I’ll be fine, you know that,” Vince interrupted, lips framed with pink, and wrapped in a rather revealing blue swimsuit that did nothing to conceal the bounce he was putting into his backside.
“What?”
“You can’t stop SCIENCE!” Kimmie suddenly threw a high kick in her attempts to replicate the mannerisms of Polly Atomic, the cartoon superhero character whose costume she was squeezed into.
“I-“
“Onward, to adventure!” Niall proclaimed, donning a top hat with aviator googles to complete the outfit of his Airscape Odyssey avatar. “Welcome aboard the...ship, what’s it called again?”
“Okay, stop, stop, stop, STOP!” Becky yelled, coming to a halt. Her train of thought had now completely derailed as she grasped at her head, eyes firmly shut to block out the rapidly shifting madness in the world beyond. “What the fuck is going on?!”
Opening her eyes, the bunny found herself standing on a spotless tiled floor, reflecting the harshly artificial light coming from above. A row of stalls stood behind her, a complementing row of sinks stood opposite, walls either side left bare. She recognised it as one of the school bathrooms. Each stall was locked shut as she tried to check them, as was the door leading out, and the rest of her pack was nowhere to be found. “Guys?” No response. She was trapped here, and she was on her own. “Guys, where’d you-“ 
And then she saw it. In the mirror, staring back at her. It looked like some kind of mannequin, hairless, earless, mouthless, eyes swimming like pools of molten lava against the jet black sheen of its exterior. It stood, unmoving as Becky paced around the room, keeping her gaze fixed on the figure in the reflection.
It blinked.
She froze momentarily, her heart climbing toward her mouth. She wasn’t alone here, was she? Cautiously, Becky stepped toward the mirror, where the creature remained still, reached out with one hand, and gave a sharp tap on the glass surface.
Instantly, the figure liquefied from the disturbance, falling from view with a splash which echoed around the empty bathroom. The bunny was left staring at an empty mirror, which didn’t even show her own self. There wasn’t anyone on the other side at all. Once again, she was left on her own.
Except she wasn’t. As she felt something tickling against her ankles, she looked down to see herself standing in a shimmering puddle of black goo…and it was climbing her. “…what.”
Becky could only watch in disbelief as the slivers of fluid circled around her calves, finding their liquid grip unnervingly tight. She tried to take a step back, but found her feet rooted to the spot, the goop grounding her as it crawled past her knees, the puddle beneath shrinking as it climbed higher and higher.
“N-No. Stop.” The bunny’s voice started to quiver, her usual gruffness all but gone. Trying to somehow push the ascending mass back down did nothing, as it oozed together quicker than she could displace it. Before she realised it, the stuff was slithering over her hands.
The liquid had reached her waist now, high enough to be seen in the mirror opposite over her invisible reflection. It had gotten past her wrists as well, encircling up to her elbows with terrifying persistence. She couldn’t run. She could hardly speak. Welling up inside Becky, for the first time in a long while, was genuine, undiluted fear.
“Wh….what are you doing?” She was finally able to squeak out, trembling as the blackness wrapped around her chest. The ooze over her arms merged with the rest of it, and one viscous tendril coiled itself around her neck. Becky felt her breath growing erratic, the edges of her vision starting to blur. “What are you?” She cried, as the substance curled its grip over the back of her head. “What do you want?!”
The sound of her ragged breathing vanished as the goo spread over her ears, then her face, the bunny keeping her lips closed as hard as she could. The reflection, though, opened its mouth, revealing the same deep orange and yellow as before, and spoke a single word.
“You.”
A dissonant, unnatural voice reverberated inside Becky’s head, the last thing she was aware of before the liquid encroached toward her eyes. She clenched them shut, feeling the stuff enveloping her completely. Her world became only blackness, and then nothing.
“I   n e e d   y o u .”