It turned out we didn't need to worry about any sort of timing situation after all. When Harper deactivated his ring there was another fsh of red light, then our regur tall strong hunky blond boyfriend was back.

  "Hey," he smiled as he looked down at himself. "It's me again."

  As if to double-check he patted his hands over his ft muscur chest, then reached down and groped himself before joking "Ah good, it's back!"

  I rolled my eyes but smiled, "I'm gd you're back to normal."

  "I don't know," Ellie teased. "I could get used to you in the other shape."

  Harper was still smiling as he rejoined us in the truck bed, "I said it wasn't bad, but I'm not sure I'm ready to be a girl full-time."

  "So I know that was only a minute or two but how do you feel?" I asked. "Now you're a magical girl, you're an official member of the team."

  That left our boyfriend with a thoughtful look on his face. "I'll be honest, I never in a million years imagined I might end up being a magical girl. Even after it happened to you Bke. Or especially after it happened to you? That's like lightning striking twice or something."

  "On the other hand I know how to be part of a team," he added. "And maybe that makes me kind of happy? I know it isn't going to be anything like being on the high school football team, but a team's a team. And I like being a team pyer."

  That made me smile, but I couldn't quite put it into words why. Maybe it was the way he sounded sort of philosophical about the whole thing. Or maybe just the knowledge that my boyfriend was now officially part of the magical team, rather than being an unofficial and maybe unwanted participant.

  That line of thought came to an end when Ellie suddenly stifled a ugh. She ended up smirking as she commented, "I just remembered when we were talking about names, and Bke pointed out how her name worked for both guys and girls? Then we realized that was true for your name too, Harper."

  The handsome jock rolled his eyes, "Whatever."

  "What about when you're in your magical girl form though?" the tomboy pressed. "All the other girls have a code-name, so you'll probably get one too. And what about your pronouns? Don't you think it'll be weird using he-him for you while you've got boobs and you're wearing a skirt?"

  I was about to tell Ellie to drop it. I knew she knew better too, she was just leaning a little too heavily into the teasing. Except before I could get a word out Harper surprised me with his answer.

  "I think I'll go with 'Ruby' as my magical girl name," he decided. "As for my pronouns, you know what? Next time I'm a magical girl you can go ahead and use she-her for me. I'm willing to give it a try, but I might change my mind."

  "When I'm in my normal form though, the name's still Harper and my pronouns are still he-him," he added firmly.

  "Ok Harper," our girlfriend replied in a serious tone. She sounded sincere as she added, "Sorry for teasing. I realized I crossed a line there, the way Bke was looking at me."

  He nodded, "Yeah you did. But I forgive you."

  "Anyways I think it's your turn now," he grinned. "I've taken the plunge and used my ring, Bke's an old pro at it, so that just leaves you. What do you think? I bet you'll rock the bck skirt and bustier."

  Ellie grimaced, "Ugh! Do I have to? I hate skirts, I never wear girly things like that."

  Harper ughed, "If I can temporarily give up my manhood to be a magical girl, I'm sure you'll survive wearing a skirt for a while. And hey, think about what you'll be getting in return? Super strength, nearly-indestructible body, and some kind of magic weapon? Or maybe you'll get some support magic like me."

  "Bck isn't usually a healing colour," the tomboy pointed out. "I think it's more associated with death. Or depression."

  I pointed out, "Or just general spooky occult stuff."

  That actually put a thoughtful smile on our girlfriend's face, she obviously liked the idea of being some sort of spooky witchy magical girl. In fact she seemed to like that idea enough that she actually pulled her bck gold ring out of the little box, then held it in her hand as if she was trying to figure out which finger it'd look best on.

  Harper and I were both quiet, like neither of us wanted to interrupt or distract Ellie while she was thinking about it.

  After another half minute she finally did it. The bck ring slipped easily onto the middle finger of her right hand, and I couldn't help thinking it looked good on her. Meanwhile Ellie slid herself to the back of the truck bed then hopped out, and moved a couple paces away like Harper did earlier.

  "I guess this is it," she grimaced. "See you on the other side."

  With that she gave her ring a twist, but hers didn't glow. If anything it almost seemed to get darker, like it was sucking light into it. That only sted a second though, as she made a fist and punched upwards at the night sky. That led to more darkness, like a wave of shadows came down and temporarily obscured the cute tomboy. When it faded a moment ter, she was the bck magical girl.

  Like me and Harper and all the others, she now looked like a petite busty girl in a pleated skirt and faux-leather bustier. Her outfit was all bck just like we expected. Her hair was still bck too, although the style was a bit different. It was longer and wavier, and a bit more wild-looking. Once again I couldn't be sure about her eyes since it was so dark out, but I'd swear they were bck now too, instead of her usual green.

  That's when I realized her gsses were gone, and so was the scar. In fact the more I looked at her, the weirder it was. Like I knew she was Ellie, but she just looked so different. Shorter than normal, bustier than normal, and maybe the weirdest thing was seeing her in the sexy girly outfit.

  "So what do you think?" she asked, and even her voice was a little more girly than usual. "I look ridiculous, right?"

  Harper shrugged, "No more ridiculous than me, or Bke, or any other magical girls. By which I mean, no. Not at all."

  Magical-Ellie rolled her eyes, then punched her fist at the stars again as she said "May as well see what weapon I get."

  "Aww," she pouted a moment ter. "I was really hoping for a wicked bck sword."

  Instead of a sword she was holding a sturdy wooden staff that stood just a little taller than her. It looked like it was made out of some kind of bck wood, like ebony perhaps, and reminded me of the sort of fighting staves you'd see monks using in video games or on TV. At the top of the staff the wood disappeared into what looked like a cylinder of polished bck crystal. It was about fifteen centimetres long and a little thicker than the wood, and appeared to be made of something like onyx or obsidian.

  "Cool!" Harper commented. "Does it have any special magic? Oh and what do you want us to call you, what's your magical code name?"

  A thoughtful frown settled on Magical-Ellie's expression as she slowly started twirling the staff around her like she was getting a feel for it. It looked like she could use it as a weapon, although without any bdes or a heavy hammer head it probably wouldn't be as effective as my halberd or Azura's hammer.

  I was about to comment on that when my girlfriend was suddenly engulfed in another fsh of darkness. And when the shadows faded a moment ter, Magical-Ellie was gone. She hadn't reverted to normal, she was completely missing.

  "What?!" I gasped in surprise.

  Harper sounded anxious too as he asked, "Where'd she go?!"

  We gave each other a worried look, but before either of us could do any thing else there was another fsh of shadows and our girlfriend was back. And she had a huge grin on her face.

  She actually burst out ughing, "We were just talking about this! No more paying for pne tickets or screwing around with airports and airline schedules! I can teleport, losers!"

  "No way!" I gasped. "That's what the staff does?"

  Ellie nodded, "Yeah! I literally just jumped home to my room and back!"

  Harper was smiling too, as he slowly shook his head. "Damn that's cool! So we both got support roles then. I'm the healer, you're the transportation. And that totally fills the two most obvious gaps in the roster."

  "I'm not so sure about being support-only," the bck magical girl replied with a shrug. "I can think of ways to use teleportation as a weapon. If nothing else I could use it to mess with baddies. Drop them from great heights, send them into solid rock, stuff like that."

  Her eyes lit up as she added, "Maybe your healing magic has some fighting applications too? Like maybe you can turn it around, suck health out of Outsiders or something."

  The handsome jock frowned, "Maybe? I'm not sure I'd want to do that though. I think I'm ok just focusing on healing people."

  "Anyways have you come up with a magical name yet?" he asked as his smile returned. "Because if not, I have some suggestions."

  Our girlfriend rolled her eyes and gave her staff another twirl, before thumping the base of it down into the ground as she struck a pose. With her shoulders back and her chin up she announced proudly, "I'm Onyx! The edgy bck magical girl!"

  "Ooh!" I excimed happily. "That's a cool name!"

  Harper smirked, "I like it, it's good. Welcome to the gender-neutral name club, Onyx."

  The bck magical girl rolled her eyes again then suggested, "Hey why don't you two ring-up as well? Then me and Ruby can compare ourselves to Rosa. Like in terms of strength and speed and everything?"

  I didn't have a problem with that, and after thinking it over Harper agreed as well. A moment ter the area lit up with red and pink fshes of light, then the two of us moved to stand next to our friend and colleague.

  "Ok now it's feeling a little more weird," Ruby grimaced as she looked back and forth between me and Onyx.

  I couldn't help worrying as I asked, "What's wrong? Are you starting to feel dysphoric?"

  The red magical girl shook her head, "It's not that. It's just, I'm used to towering over you, you know? Now we're eye to eye, and it's weird realizing I'm as short as you."

  "I know, right?" Onyx ughed. "We're used to Bke being our cute little girlfriend, but now we're as tiny as her."

  That made Ruby smirk, "Now I'm wondering if that's going to be the biggest adjustment? Temporarily losing my junk is one thing, but not being able to reach things on high shelves anymore is really going to suck."

  "Heck," she added, "I might not even be able to see over the steering wheel of my pickup while I'm in this form."

  Listening to her make jokes about our height actually made me feel a bit better. Like if Ruby was feeling good enough to make fun of the situation then she probably wasn't feeling dysphoric or anything like that.

  With that in mind I decided to py along, I pouted and pretended to be grumpy about the way they were making it sound like being small was a bad thing. "I thought we were supposed to be evaluating your strength and speed, not making fun of us short girls."

  My acting didn't fool either of them though, they both just giggled. Which was definitely cute, but also kind of odd. At least in Ruby's case. The way she looked and sounded, even how she acted with the pouts and giggles and everything, it was almost hard to picture her as my tall strong handsome boyfriend while she was in her magical girl shape.

  Onyx obviously noticed that too, but she couldn't help making it weird. She moved right up close to Ruby then pulled the red magical girl into a tight hug and teased, "It's honestly hard to picture you as a guy right now, Ruby. We both know Rosa admitted to some experimenting with her new form back in June. So if you want to try experimenting too, I'd be happy to help out."

  "Thanks Onyx I'll keep that in mind," Ruby replied sarcastically. Then she pulled herself free of the bck magical girl's arms and stated in a serious tone, "I'm not ruling anything out, but let's not make things too uncomfortable right now, ok?"

  Our girlfriend sighed as her shoulders slumped, "Shit. I'm sorry Harper. I mean, Ruby. I keep trying to be silly and keep screwing up."

  The red magical girl shook her head, "It's fine. I asked you to stop and you stopped, that's what matters."

  "I know the situation is strange," she added with a shrug. "I'm not surprised you're more attracted to me like this than in my usual shape. And honestly, that's not what's bothering me right now. The thing is, something else just occurred to me? And it's got me kind of worried."

  I frowned, "What's that? What's worrying you?"

  Ruby grimaced as she replied, "So I'm assuming Onyx and I got our rings from Cel the seer, right? I can't help asking myself, what have they seen? What made them decide the world needed two more magical girls right now?"

  "Crap," Onyx made a face. "She's right. We've been distracted by the fun cool stuff, but Ruby makes a damn good point. And it's not hard to guess what might be going on. Either bck magic out in Saskatoon, or Outsiders lurking in the oceans."

  I sighed, "Whatever it is, Cel must think it's bad enough that the world needed a magical girl healer, and a magical girl who could teleport. So the team can get wherever we're needed without dey."

  All three of us shared an uneasy silence as that thought sank in.

  PurpleCatGirl