The raid had gone perfectly. The ’guard’ had been asleep though they only found that out after they had sneaked through the grassy field surrounding the town and slipped over the fence. In fact they were in more danger of alerting the villagers by going over the shoddy fence than if they had gone right by the guard. Once they made it over the rackety old fence they snooped through the little town and quickly found that someone had gotten lazy and left their laundry out.

Mary-Ann found a homespun simple dress that fit, or at least it did after she cut some rope to use as a belt. They also had a long shawl that she felt would make a good head wrap for Al. Outside of another house they found a pair of muddy boots that would work for Al though they had to gather some cloth to stuff into the toes.

Though they couldn’t find anything else they needed in town they did, ironically, find a set of old worn out work gloves on the refuse pile just out of town. They slipped out the front gate past the sleeping guard and slipped out into the night.

Mary-Ann had them run on for several hours before finally allowing them to make a cold camp. Given how the villagers had reacted to Al, she guessed that they would be upset but they wouldn’t try to hunt them down, not for the couple things they stole. The poor guard will probably be in the doghouse but who told him he could sleep on the job?

She thought of all this as she awoke bathed by the midmorning sunlight. She stretched, or at least tried to. Instead of lightly pulling her muscles she just felt a kind of osculation run through her as she recoiled in horror.

She was a slime again.

She screamed in pure frustration causing Al to jump up and fling an equally startled looking Floppy off his lap. She wondered if it had all been a dream; a pleasant dream that turned her waking world into her own personal hell.

“Mary-Ann?” Al asked as he spun around looking for her. He stopped when he spotted her wobbling back and forth. “You turn back?”

“What?” Al’s question cut through her building hysteria. “It was real? I really turned back into human? I… you… how?? WHY!?”

“Not know?” Al tried to answer her but he really didn’t understand what she was talking about.

Mary-Ann took several figurative breaths and calmed her raging emotions down. She had been human again, she thought to herself and tried to find relief in that.

“Perhaps the transformation is weakening?” The prince speculated causing Mary-Ann to spin around and pointed a pseudopod at him as she considered the possibility.

“Ha!” she laughed and smiled as she thought that it could be that the transformation was slowly coming undone. “I hope you’re right.” She stopped pointing, tapping herself thoughtfully as she sighed. Then she thought about trying to forcefully change back but when she tried she just felt a painful ripple bounce back and forth though her slime spiking when it crossed her core. After several fruitless minutes she gave up and the slight pink hue she had unknowingly picked up faded away. Grunting in frustration she tossed a rock randomly and heard a grunt as she hit Al.

“What I do?” he asked.

“Sorry sorry.” She said. “I didn’t throw that at you. I was just frustrated and had to throw something.” Al mumbled as he rubbed his side but decided not to respond. She took a figurative breath to center herself and considered what to do now. As she thought on it she came to the conclusion that nothing much had changed.

With a little more discussion they decided to continue on but stopped Al before he could stuff her dress in his bag.

“We need to wrap that up in something so it doesn’t get dirty.” Looking around she spotted a plant with long broad leaves and pointed at it with a tentacle. “Those will do, go get me a few.”

“But…” Al began but she cut him off.

“Just get them!” she yelled letting her frustration at turning back into a slime creep into her voice.

Al cringed but didn’t argue as he moved cautiously toward the plant stopping about six feet before it. “Mary-Ann this…”

“Just get it.” Her frustration spiked.

Al took another step but had to leap back as vines exploded from the ground shooting in his direction. He nearly made it but one of the vines managed to grab his ankle and began to drag him back.

“Help!” Al screeched. “Is gunna eat me!”

“What?” Mary-Ann jumped as she realized she had sent Al toward a Tangled Man-Eater, a plant well known for its voracious appetite. “Crap! I’m sorry… How do I?” She watched in horror as the plant slowly drew Al closer. She felt guilty and feared that it would kill Al but when she looked at the plant itself she didn’t feel fear, she felt hunger. It took her several long seconds to realize that she really wanted to eat that animated plant. “Don’t worry!” She yelled out as she started rolling and then bouncing in the plants direction. “I’m coming!”

She raced past Al and jumped on the vine pulling him toward the center the plant. It only took her a moment to rip the vine apart which snapped back out of her grip as it parted. She had instinctively tried to grab onto the vine but it had slipped out before she could get a grip. The taste of the highly magical plant nearly drove her crazy with hunger as she shot toward it. The plant itself recoiled in horror as it realized it had run into something that could and, quite gladly, would eat it. Even as the plant tried to pull its grasping vines back behind the protection of its leaves, Mary-Ann grappled one started slurping it down like a noodle, making contented little noises as she ate.

The poor plant wasn’t smart enough to cut off its own vine and unintentionally pulled the ravenous beast that had come out of nowhere just as it was about to eat a tasty goblin into the soft depths of its acidic core. The acid proved useless against the invading beast as, in an ironic twist of fate, it was slowly dissolved without the comfort of the narcotic venom it itself produced to keep its prey from escaping.

Watching as Mary-Ann ate the hungry plant, Al bravely ran in and cut away two of the giant leaves before running back to camp. He laid the leaves over a log near where Mary-Ann had put her dress before she went to sleep before turning back to watch in fascination as she eat the man-eating plant. It was almost comical watching the slime that just a bit over a foot around eat a plant that was several feet across and stood about four feet high. What was worse was the speed at which it was vanishing without any noticeable change in her size.

In just a few short minutes she had eaten every visible part of the plant and had somehow managed to dig her way down into the roots vanishing below ground. Shortly thereafter she poped back up out of the ground and sighed in contentment.

“I really needed that.” She stated as she started rolling back to camp. Seeing the two leaves that Al had salvaged she felt a bit of hunger but it wasn’t the all-consuming famishment she felt upon tasting the Tangled Man-Eater. Then she saw floppy slowly hopping toward the leaves with his nose twitching. “No Floppy, we need those.” Looking around she spotted a vine she missed and called floppy over using a tentacle to point at it. Once he found the vine Floppy pulled it in between his paws and flopped onto his back gnawing at it happily.

Not long after that they had gathered up all their possession and broke camp with floppy still chewing on the vine in Al’s pocket.