Simon huddled on a plastic chair opposite the Monster Kingdom hospital's single operating theatre, knees pulled up to his chest. Marceline was alive. At least she was alive. But the way she'd looked when they'd pulled her out of the Lich's well... She'd been... floppy. And melty. It was like she was made of wax and someone had brought her too close to the Fire Kingdom.

Finn Ice poked him, breaking into his thoughts. "So... I still don't get it. That slamacow puppy I kidnapped just now was really... princess Whatsherface?"

"Queen Marceline," Simon growled. They wouldn't have got Marceline here so fast without Finn Ice's help, but if he hadn't been his normal crazy idiot kidnapping butterfingered self, they wouldn't have needed to.

"Well why didn't you tell me?" demanded Finn Ice. "I thought we were bros!"

Simon clenched his fists so hard that his fingernails dug into his flesh. "I did tell you." They were not, and never would be, bros.

Finn Ice blew a raspberry. "Whatever. You should have told me louder! Now she's probably dead and it's all your fault. Nice work, S the H."

Simon jumped up. "My...!" He sat down with an effort, but he couldn't control the volume of his voice. "How is it my fault?!"

"Hey," said Gunter. "Don't go blaming him for something he didn't do." He patted Simon on the shoulder. "Are you okay, Simon?"

"Huh?" said Simon. Of course he was okay. It was Marceline they needed to worry about. "Yeah. He's just being a donk, like always." He might have done some things he wasn't proud of, but being in the same room when Finn Ice did something stupid wasn't one of them. Why would Gunter even think that?

"A donk who's telling the truth," said Finn Ice. He folded his arms and pouted.

Simon sighed heavily. Why was Finn Ice even still hanging around? He obviously didn't care about Marceline's wellbeing. Why didn't he just go play charades with Jake or whatever he normally did with his spare time?

The door opened, and Simon jumped up again. "Marceline!"

It wasn't Marceline. It was just Nurse Diptera, rubbing her front legs together the way she always did when she was on duty. It looked like a nervous habit, but she was actually grooming herself. The gross juice that her legs oozed was not good for patients, even other flies. "You can come in now."

Simon pushed past her into the airy room, yelled "Sorry, Nurse Diptera!" when he realised what he'd done, and rushed to the side of the bed. "Marceline, are you awake?"

"She's..." began Doctor Zombi.

"I'm fine," said Marceline at the same time. "I just need to rest." Her eyes were open, but she sounded weak. She seemed to have regained her shape, though, and her skin was a healthy grey colour.

Gunter climbed onto the bed and ran his flippers through Marceline's hair. Worryingly, she didn't stop him.

"I hope you're right," said Bonnibel. Bonnibel wasn't really a doctor, but she did know a lot about magic and life and how to preserve life in spite of magic. "We don't have any monster blood left."

Gunter slid off the bed and said "I thought vampires only drank blood for the colour."

"Usually, but sometimes it can help with-"

"Oh, she's okay!" said Finn Ice, coming up behind them. "I bet that's a relief, huh Simon? You didn't kill her after all!"

Simon whirled around. "What is wrong with you, you... jerk?!" Only his relief that Marceline was alive kept him from doing something he'd regret.

"Temper, temper," said Finn Ice, waving his finger. "Just for that remark, I'm not gonna tell you about the really, really, vitally important thing I saw!"

"What?" said Bonnibel. "What did you see?"

Finn Ice shot a bolt of ice over his shoulder, smashed a window, and flew backwards out of the room. "I'm... not... telling!"

Simon screamed the only word he could think of. "Darn!"

Marceline mumbled something about wizards.

Simon tried to compose himself. "Sorry, Marcy. He won't bother you anymore." She seemed a bit better, but he was sure she was still in shock from everything that had happened.

But she was alive.

Now they had to make sure she stayed that way.

.

"Marceline, wake up!" said Simon.

Marceline stirred in her bed. She'd been discharged from the hospital a few hours ago, when Doctor Zombi had found nothing wrong with her. Apparently blood was some sort of cure-all for vampires.

"Marceline!" said Gunter. "Look! We're putting on a magic show for you!" They had top hats and wands and everything.

Bed rest was boring. She needed something to spice it up. Gunter had been sentenced to bed rest a couple of times, and he didn't know what he would have done if Simon hadn't been willing to entertain him.

"It's just fake magic!" added Simon.

This was going to be so great. Fake magic was the best kind of magic. With real magic, either you had it or you didn't. Nothing in between. Fake magic at least took some skill.

Marceline just stared at them. She didn't even smile, but that wasn't that unusual for her. She was not a smiley person.

Simon coughed uncomfortably. "We're gonna start off with a card trick. Just take a card, and we'll..."

Marceline abruptly sat up, and Simon fanned out the cards for her, but instead of reaching for them, she flopped forwards and wriggled like she was trying to sniff something out.

Gunter shrunk and hid behind Simon. "Is that supposed to happen?" he whispered.

"I don't know," whispered Simon. "Listen, we gotta be cool. We can't make her feel bad while she's sick."

"Okay..." said Gunter reluctantly. She was probably just having seizures or something. Or... maybe something less dangerous sounding. "Maybe we should try something else. You perfected that rope illusion yet?"

"I think so- Hey! Where'd she go?"

"What?" Gunter looked back to see Marceline missing, and the bathroom door open.

They ran in to find her searching for something under the sink. "Oi! Marcy!" Gunter cloned himself a few times and dragged her back to bed. "You shouldn't be up! Just relax and enjoy the show!"

They lifted her onto her bed, and Gunter went back to the doorway to get the ropes. Even if they couldn't do the rope illusion, there were plenty of escape artist things they could try! It was good practice for adventures, too!

Simon had been carrying the props, so it took a couple of minutes to untangle everything. Simon could tangle something just by looking at it. He could probably tangle a basketball.

He managed to extricate the ropes, and turned back to the bed to see Marceline whispering something to Simon.

Simon said "Of course I will, Marceline," then headed for the door. "Gunter, Marceline wants me to get her some things. I'll be back in a minute."

Gunter held out the ropes. "What about the tricks? I can't do them on my own." He couldn't just clone himself. You didn't use real magic in a fake magic show. That was just stupid. Also he didn't have fingers.

"Just do that keyboard thing," Simon suggested. He ran out the door. "BRB!"

It was a good thing Gunter carried at least four wireless keyboards with him at all times. He got them out one by one and cloned himself five times. "You like music, don't you, Marceline?" Of course she did. That was one of her defining traits, like being moody and having mixed feelings about everyone.

All six of him began to play a piece he'd composed himself. It was hard to focus on playing with so many clones. It was easy to slap bad guys with multiple bodies, but music was complicated. He didn't know how anyone managed to play with eight fingers. Or ten fingers? How many did people have? He could never remember. Nine fingers?

He was so lost in concentration that he barely heard the growling from behind until it became screaming. One of his clones looked around, and he faltered. "Marcy...?"

She was twitching and moving around like some kind of... demon. She was a demon, or a half-demon or something, but it wasn't usually so obvious. Maybe she really was having a seizure!

She seemed to run out of energy, and fell back weakly.

"I'm sorry, Marceline," said Gunter. She was even sicker than he'd thought. Maybe now wasn't the best time for such an experimental piece. "Listen, I'll play you something else to make you feel better!"

This one was only a two person piece. Maybe three in some places. All right. 3/4 time and... "Marceline," he sang. "You fell into the toxic goo, but soon you'll feel brand new, because I'll tell you what we'll do, we'll-"

The was a whoomph and everything went up in flames. Gunter froze, then turned around. Marceline was twitching and writhing all over her bed. Her bed that was also on fire. "Er... I'll... I'll just leave you alone then."

He packed up his keyboards as quickly as he could, reabsorbed his clones, and ran outside. "Oh Gob, what was that?"

Simon came back down the corridor, with a bunch of bottles and containers in his arms.

Gunter ran up to him. "Simon! Simon! Can Marceline normally set things on fire?" Was it some sort of demon thing? Maybe? Was that it?

Simon stopped. "Huh? No, she doesn't have any demon powers. Just vampire powers. I don't think she has demon powers..."

Gunter took a closer look at what Simon was holding. "Why do you have lighter fluid and ammonia?" That was just going to make things worse! And things were already really bad.

Simon glanced down. "She asked me to get it. I guess she needs corrosive liquid to recover? And uh... radioactive stuff. Like she needed all that monster blood."

Gunter grabbed Simon's leg, multiplied, and grabbed his other leg, his head, his stomach, and his shoulders. "No, no, she doesn't need any of that, Simon! I think there's something seriously wrong with-"

Marceline came out the door, brushed away one of the clones' flippers, and took all the bottles. "Thanks."

She'd closed the door by the time Gunter had time to react. "What! Don't take- No..."

Simon was beginning to look annoyed. He shook off Gunter's clones. "Gunter, what is the matter?"

"She set everything on fire!" said Gunter frantically. "She has demon powers now!"

Simon froze. "What?! Is she okay?"

"No!" said Gunter. "That's what I'm trying to tell you!" He threw open the door. "Look!"

The room was still smouldering, but Marceline was gone.

Simon stepped inside gingerly. "Maybe... Maybe it's just part of the healing process. Humans and penguins sneeze, half-demon vampires set everything on fire."

Gunter shook his head, then pointed at the bathroom door. "Look! She's in the bathroom!" He ran for it, but Simon held him back.

"Gunter! What are you doing? You can't spy on girls in the bathroom! I thought you knew that now!" He called through the keyhole. "Marceline? You okay in there?"

"I'm busy!"

Simon pulled back. "See? She's fine."

Gunter looked in the keyhole, and recoiled. "Simon..."

"Gunter, what are you doing?" said Simon. He tried to pull him away, so Gunter grew until his head scraped the ceiling.

"She..." Gunter tried to sort out what he'd seen. "She turned huge and she's got arms like spider legs and she's drinking something green out of the bathtub! It's like bathtub booze, but green! Look!"

Reluctantly, Simon put his eye to the keyhole, and gasped. "Holy glob!" He pushed ineffectually on the door, then got out his lockpicks.

"Hurry!" said Gunter. Maybe he could shrink through the keyhole and... No, Simon was using the keyhole.

Simon rotated the bendy pick thing, and shoved the door open to reveal Marceline holding up the bathtub and pouring the green liquid directly into her mouth. "Marceline!"

They ran at her, and Marceline hit them so hard everything went black.

.

Simon woke up uncomfortable. He was half leaning against a wall, his head ached, and someone was poking him. He opened his eyes to see Finn Ice staring down at him. "You!"

"Hey Simon," said Finn Ice. "I was thinking, if I saved Marceline from being possessed by the Lich, maybe she'll be so grateful she'll turn into a puppy again and live with me forever! I covered my entire castle in newspaper specially!"

"She's never gonna- Did you say she was possessed by the Lich?" said Simon. That would explain a lot, actually. He just wished the information had come from someone less... entirely responsible for her current state. "How can you know that?"

He sat up and looked around. It looked like Marceline had hit them right through the wall and into the next room. Gunter seemed to be awake, but groggy.

Finn Ice pointed at his eyes. "Wizard eyes, duh! I saw something spirit-y from the Lich float right into Princess Puppydog! At least, I think that's what I saw... It's kind of hard to tell sometimes... Most of the time..." He sighed.

Wizard what? How many powers did this guy have? "Why didn't you say something before?" Simon demanded.

Finn Ice scowled. "I was about to, before you flew off the handle!"

"I didn't fly off-" began Simon, but Gunter put a hand on his arm.

"Let's deal with the Lich first," he suggested, pointing outside through a gaping hole in the palace wall.

Marceline was rampaging through the Monster Kingdom, pausing every so often to destroy a building or smack away unwary looters.

"Come on!" said Simon. He pulled out the sweater, and jumped on Gunter's back as Gunter grew huge.

Now that they knew it was the Lich, they knew how to deal with her. It.

When they got close enough, Simon waved the sweater and yelled "Marceline! You're like a big sister to me!"

Marceline glanced around, and smacked him off Gunter's back and all the way into the same wall as last time.

Simon sat up, dazed. "It didn't work this time..." Why didn't it work this time? Did the fact that the Lich was inhabiting Marceline's body cancel out the familial caring? No, that didn't make sense...

Gunter was still out there, but no matter how large he grew, he couldn't stand up to the Lich's blows. He was slowing it down, but only by a little.

Simon didn't want to have do this, but... He turned to Finn Ice, who was watching the carnage with interest, and said "Finn Ice, will you help us stop the Lich?" With his abilities, Finn Ice would be practically unstoppable if he wasn't an idiot. At the least he could at least freeze the Lich for them.

"Huh?" said Finn Ice. "No way! One of these days, Simon, you're gonna have to learn that what you do has consequence, and-"

Something in Simon snapped. "I didn't flipping do anything!" he yelled. "You're the one who kidnapped her, and you're the idiot who... who got the dropsies and nearly killed her, and now you won't even help? Do you want the Lich to destroy the world? Is that it? Do you want to die thinking up new ways to blame me for your mistakes?"

Simon ran out of words and subsided, his fists clenched.

Finn Ice actually looked frightened. He pressed himself against the far wall like he was trying to pass through it.

"Will you help or not?" Simon demanded.

Finn Ice looked at the floor and mumbled "Yeah. Okay. Okay."

He took Simon from the hand and lifted him effortlessly into the air, which was actually sort of fun. Not for the first time, Simon wondered about the source of Finn Ice's powers. He was an ice wizard, yet he needed his crown before he could do anything magical. Was it some kind of symbiosis thing? Or maybe one of those split soul situations?

Finn Ice quickly snapped back to his normal self. "Man Simon, you can get mad when you want to! You were all like-" he imitated Simon's voice poorly - "You pushed me too far. Prepare to be nerded. Flip is a curse word." He giggled.

Simon sighed and said "Listen. I have a plan. Throw me at the Lich, and I'll distract it while you freeze it from the legs up. Do you think you can remember that?"

In reply, Finn Ice heaved Simon at the Lich.

"WaitIwasn'tready!" Simon flew face first into Marceline's back and grabbed hold of her hair. "Gunter! Help me out here!"

Gunter shrunk down to his normal size, made a few copies of himself, and run up the Lich's arms. "Do you have a plan?" called the closest clone.

"Of course!" said Simon. He pointed at Finn Ice, who was just floating there watching them. "We're going with plan Emergency Oscar."

"Which one was that-" The Lich grabbed at them, and Gunter's clones scattered.

Simon grabbed some of Marceline's hair in both hands and swung over to her face. "Take... sorry Marcy... Take that!" he yelled, punching it in the eye.

The Lich roared and slapped at its face, nearly knocking Simon off. He managed to grab onto a finger, pulled himself up, ran to the back of its hand, and looked down. Finn Ice was still just... standing there. Watching. "Finn Ice! What are you waiting for? Do the ice thing!"

"Oh yeah!" said Finn Ice. He threw ice magic at the Lich's feet and yelled "Lions in the taiga! Lions in the taiga!"

Simon braced himself on the Lich's thumb and dug his feet into the soft part leading to its fingers, trying to keep it distracted. The Lich attempted to shake him off, and when Simon saw the ice approach its arms, he let go and flew halfway across the Monster Kingdom.

He land on a giant Gunter's stomach, and climbed onto his back as Gunter ran to see what had happened to the Lich. Gunter had very sensitive stomach feathers.

They found the Lich standing where they'd left it, completely immobilised by a thick layer of ice and surrounded by a crowd of onlookers seemed to have materialised out of thin air.

"You did it!" said Simon, putting a hand on Finn Ice's shoulder. Even though all he'd really done was clean up his own mess, it was still very impressive. Not many people could immobilise the Lich, especially almost single-handed.

"I did?" said Finn Ice. He looked at his hands, then at Simon. "This is some kind of prank, isn't it? There's camera hidden in your hair, isn't there?"

"What? No!" Simon felt his hair, which was getting a bit long. He guessed it would have been too much to ask for Finn Ice to both save everyone and make any sense.

He craned his neck at the frozen Lich. What now? Could they even help Marceline now that- what was that creaking noise? It was Marceline. She was falling over! "Finn Ice, do something!" The ice would shatter if it hit the ground at that speed, and Simon didn't even want to think about what that would do to Marceline. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Gunter grow and race to catch her, but there was no way he could make it in time.

"Like what?" Finn Ice demanded.

"For the love of Grod you control ice!" Simon screamed. Why couldn't he just act normal? For once in his life?

"Oh yeah!" Finn Ice raised his hands, grunted with effort, and stopped her just before she hit the ground. "Ugh... she's really heavy... Do you think she'll be this big next time she turns into a dog? I'm gonna have to expand my castle." Despite his complaints, he pushed her back upright, and added more ice around her feet.

Simon stared at her until he was certain she wasn't going to fall again, then turned to the crowd. "Uh... now what?"

"Does anyone know how to exorcise avatars of destruction?" said Gunter.

They couldn't just leave her like this. It was possible, if they kept her in the Ice Kingdom, but it couldn't be the only solution.

"Perhaps I could be of assistance." Peppermint Butler emerged from the crowd. Simon thought maybe Bonnibel had made him or something? He didn't really know where candy people came from. They kind of creeped him out, to tell the truth.

.

They moved Marceline to an open courtyard while Finn Ice grumbled. He said she was too heavy to push so far, and he seemed to be telling the truth, so he hovered her a few inches off the ground while a few giant Gunters pushed.

They set her down, and Finn Ice made an audible sigh of relief. He was dripping with sweat.

"Stand back, please," said Peppermint Butler, producing a piece of chalk. He drew some kind of demonic symbol, sat down, and began chanting in a harsh language that Simon didn't recognise.

Simon waited until he'd finished, then said "What's that? Is it because she's a demon? Is it like, her native language or something?"

Peppermint Butler started. "Uh... sure." He clapped his hands, and there was a high, crystalline note. "Anyways, the Lich should be gone now. You can release her."

Simon looked at Finn Ice.

Finn Ice put his head on one side. "What are you looking at me for? Is... is it my beard? My beard is awesome!" He shot a bolt of ice at Simon.

Simon stepped out of the way and said "Did you see the Lich leave her body?"

"Uh, I wasn't paying attention," said Finn Ice. "I was thinking about what to have for dinner. It's Jake's turn to cook, and Jake never cooks." He frowned deeply.

Simon sighed again and said "Just get the ice off her." They were just going to have to trust Peppermint Butler's word.

The ice shrank away, and Marceline shrank as well. She collapsed onto her stomach.

Simon and Gunter ran to her, yelling her name.

"Are you okay?" said Simon.

"Are you awake?" Gunter added.

"Say something!" said Simon. If something had gone wrong...

Abruptly, Marceline shrunk even further, then stirred. "Huh?"

"Marceline..." said Simon. Her voice. It was off. She sounded... childish.

Marceline sat up. "That's weird."

"You're a little girl!" said Gunter. He reached out to touch her hair, then seemed to think better of it. "How old are you? One? Two?"

Marceline looked at her hands and said "Yeah, I'm a kid. I guess it was... uh... actually? I have no idea." The way she spoke didn't quite fit her little girl voice.

Simon hugged her and said "I'm just happy you're all right! You are all right, aren't you?" He made a mental note to look up cases of vampires or demons reverting to a younger age when he got the chance.

"Yeah, I think so," said Marceline. She gently touched her neck.

Simon looked at the area she'd touched. Something else seemed off, but for a few seconds, he couldn't figure out what it was. Then he saw. No bites. "You're not a vampire anymore!"

Marceline frowned. "Yeah."

Simon couldn't tell if she was disappointed or glad.

"I'm bored!" Finn Ice announced. "Hurry up and turn into a dog and come live with me!"

"I can't!" Marceline called. "I'm not a vampire anymore!"

Finn Ice's face fell. "You... can't?" Then he shrugged. "Whatevs." He flew away.

Simon watched him go, wondering what had happened to the Lich. Surely if they'd just unleashed it on some other poor creature Peppermint Butler would have said something. It probably couldn't survive long without a host. It was gone. The world was safe.