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It was just a simple average day. Mc was just minding her business, being a hero, signing autographs, and doing whatever else a beautiful overpowered witch enjoys during the day until she got a letter from Sebastian that read, “Feldcroft. Now. Emergency.”
Rolling her eyes, at the letter, she deigned herself to go to Sebastian and Ominis’ shared home in Feldcroft. She knew Sebastian too well to think there was any real emergency. Most likely, he just wanted her to come rub his overly bulky shoulders. Sometimes when he walked into a room, it was all she could see. Shoulders. And then there was the rest of him…somewhere….underneath his shoulders, of course (but who really cared about that?).
With a groan, she said a last goodbye to her adoring fans, climbed on her Night Dancer broom, and swiftly made her way to the small hamlet where she had spent much of her time since first visiting with Sebastian back in fifth year. Now three years later, she’d barely had time to visit her two best friends, her work at the ministry keeping her very busy. This causing Sebastian to become very needy of her attention, always coming up with ridiculous excuses for her aid, even causing some of the problems himself. He was very lucky she didn’t report him for some.
Upon arriving in the small cottage, she immediately knew something was …. off. Sebastian was acting really cocky. Much more than normal that is. He opened the door for her, puffing his chest out. It reminded her of a chicken if she was being honest.
“MC,” he waggled his brows. “Thank you for honoring my humble abode with your beauty.”
She knew Sebastian was often full of shit, but this was really taking it to the next level.
“Have you been drinking?” she asked.
“Only drinking in your gorgeous face,” he flirted.
Against her better judgment, she blushed. She would be lying if she said she didn’t have feelings for Sebastian, but she was never sure what his true feelings were regarding her.
“Sebastian..are you okay? Why in Merlin’s name did you say there was an emergency? You didn’t let chomping cabbages go after the sheep again did you?”
Sebastian shook his head, a stupid smirk on his face. “Not this time, but you can’t say that wasn’t a good time, now can you love?”
Well, that was different… Sebastian usually gave her endearments but they always were more like, “dear, my hero,” or something of that sort. The last time he said something like this it so happened to be at the worst of times. Oh sorry love, I didn’t mean to kill my uncle. But she figured it was because something was already wrong with him. So it made her wonder if something was going on now.
Brushing it off she pushed past him and into the small cottage, looking around. Everything seemed to be in order, likely Ominis’s doing. Heaven knew Sebastian was terrible at self-hygiene. During their school days, Ominis was always complaining about him. So it had nothing to do with the house and the hamlet had seemed quiet when she landed. Huh…
“I’m serious Sebastian. Why did you owl me? What’s going on?”
To her surprise, he wrapped his arm around her shoulders and led her to the couch facing the roaring fire. Stunned speechless, she faced him as he started to get unexpectedly handsy. His hand was suddenly on her thigh. Her skin felt aflame even through her skirt. His gaze was intense as he watched her.
“I think it’s time we finally give in to our attraction to one another,” he leaned his face close to hers. Her brain immediately shut down. Running on instinct only at that moment, she closed her eyes, as she felt Sebastian’s breath on her lips. And then she smelt it, the familiar smell of socks, the main indicator of any potion of Garreth’s.
She pulled back flushing, taking in Sebastian’s flustered state. He looked overwhelmed and a bit confused. He pressed closer, whimpering, “MC why’d you pull away?” His lips pouted cutely.
“Sebastian…was Garreth here?” she asked carefully, gently pushing some of his hair away from his sweaty face, her touch making him shudder.
“....yeah…” he muttered.
“Did he give you a potion?”
Sebastian shook his head as if trying to clear his head as he struggled to answer. “Yes and no.”
She sighed, this couldn’t be good. “What happened?” she prompted. “What did he do?”
“Why are we talking about that menace when we could be snogging by now?” Sebastian nuzzled her.
MC pushed him away, afraid that she would give in when this was not the way she wanted him. She wanted him to want her genuinely and not as the result of a potion.
Sebastian huffed in frustration. “If I tell you, will you finally let me kiss you?”
MC nodded. She had no intention of upholding that promise, but she needed to know the truth behind what was happening.
Sebastian ran his hands through her long hair as he recounted the earlier events.
Apparently, Garreth had stopped by during his daily deliveries of his home-made potions. He was a Potioneer Apprentice for J. Pippins. This technically meant he wasn't supposed to be creating and selling his own potions yet, but when did that ever really stop Garreth? Garreth was bringing a potion meant for Ominis. After handing it over to Ominis, Ominis left the cottage to run some errands. Meanwhile, Sebastian and Garreth chatted for a while. All was perfectly fine and normal until he lost his balance, knocked into Sebastian, and a potion vial shattered onto Sebastian. The potion was immediately and instantly absorbed into his skin.
At that point in the story, Sebastian lost interest in talking about boring old Garreth when he could instead be kissing the neck of the beautiful woman next to him. MC froze up, unsure of what to do when he pressed his lips to her throat, It felt so nice, and she was growing warm as well.
“...Sebastian…stop…it was probably a love potion,” her breath caught in her throat when he placed another kiss on her neck. Summoning every morsel of self-control she pushed his face away, as he moved her hand towards his legs. “Y-you aren’t thinking straight.”
He chuckled and shook his head. “No, I’m not. I know that. But I don’t care, because what I do know is that…” His arm wrapped around her waist, pulling her closer as his lips neared her neck again, breathy and hot against her ear. “I want….”
She weakly pushed at his arm coming toward her, staring at the bit of chest visible from where his shirt was unbuttoned. It was flushed, like his face. But when had it come unbuttoned?
“Not now..” she protested.
BAM! The door to the cottage flew open. MC jumped up, alarmed at being caught in such a questionable position and with her best friend of all people.
Ominis came through the door, head spinning around at a rate that would make any normal person nauseous. Then it stopped, making him wobble a moment.
His head tilted for a moment in consideration of MC. MC meanwhile stared at Ominis wondering if he had also taken an illicit potion. She was going to absolutely murder Garreth.
“Ominis? Are you okay?” Please say yes, she begged internally.
“MC!” he yelled with a frankly concerning amount of uncharacteristic joy.
“Er…yes?” Why why were all her friends acting insane today?!
Ominis sprinted to her as he eyed her up and down, taking care to stare particularly hard at her face.
It took a full minute for her to realize what happened. “Ominis, can you see me?!” she asked in wonder.
Ominis nodded, tears streaming down his face as he looked into her eyes. “You’re so beautiful, MC.”
Touched, MC held back a sniffle. “You’re not so bad-looking yourself,” she teased back, not one to like being emotionally vulnerable.
“And where is our friend, Sebastian?” he asked, staring around the room, eager to see what his long-time companion looked like.
Taken aback, MC turned to the couch, confused as to why Sebastian wouldn't be there.
And he wasn’t. But there was a …. Chicken? And apparently an egg?? When the FUCK did a chicken get in there?
“He was just here Ominis…but now there’s a chicken?”
Ominis and her both cocked their heads and studied the chicken for a moment before Ominis spoke again. “So that’s what a chicken looks like? Huh..I never read about them having hair like combs before.”
Hair?
MC looked closer and sure enough, the chicken did have hair. Where the normal red fleshy comb would be was a swath of curly brown hair. As she tentatively reached out to stroke it, the chicken let out a happy purring sound and cuddled closer, and with a squawk laid an egg.
Ominis continued to look around the cottage and praised Garreth for finally succeeding at something. He would pause and look back towards her, asking what different things were and their colors while MC’s mind was still spinning with everything that had happened, continuing to stroke the chicken, each resulting in an egg.
And then Ominis brought over a mirror, asking if that was really what he looked like. When he set it down next to her, the chicken was seemingly attracted to the shine. When it looked into the glass it froze. It tilted its head from side to side, pecked at it, lifted its wings…and let out a scream exploding from the couch in an explosion of feathers. It flew at her face, squawking frantically, and landed on Ominis’s head, which made the young man grimace with disgust.
“Kindly get this chicken off of me MC! They are riddled with disease.”
She reached for the chicken which let out another scream before fluttering away. She and Ominis chased the chicken around the cabin, yelling back and forth about how to catch it.
Landing on the counter, the chicken pecked open a bag of flour, spilling it all over the floor.
Ominis cursed. “As if Sebastian doesn’t cause enough of a mess already, now there’s a chicken. Tell me, MC, whose brilliant idea was it to bring a chicken into the house?!”
“I don’t know how it got here!” she retorted.
Just as Ominis lunged for the chicken, she shouted for him to stop because it had started doing something very peculiar. It was writing… with its beak. It scratched out an S … E…B... Until in chicken scrawl, Sebastian’s name was etched on the floor. And it hit her like an egg to the face.
“Ominis…I think I turned Sebastian into a chicken…”
“WHAT?” Ominis looked at the chicken in shock before slowly turning to her, a look of disbelief on his face, as if he was going to make some crack about her joking with him.
When he saw she was serious, his eyes widened as the realization settled in. He let out a mournful sigh, pinching his nose between his thumb and forefinger.
“You’ve turned my best friend into a chicken? How in Merlin’s name did this happen?”
MC shook her head, partially in denial. “When you came in the door, you startled me so much that I must have used my ancient magic reflexively. Sebastian was… well he was doing something that made me rather uncomfortable. And so the end result is-” she gestured aimlessly at Sebastian the chicken.
Ominis and MC stared at Seb!chicken in anxious thought.
“Well, it’s your ancient magic! Surely you can just turn him back into a person?” Ominis pressed before pausing. “On second thought, Sebastian might be more tolerable as a chicken. Maybe we should just keep him this way as a pet.”
Seb!chicken let out a deafening squawk of protest, his small little wings flapping to show his displeasure.
MC choked back her giggles, not wanting to make Sebastian even more upset.
Ominis started laughing uncontrollably, fully bent over. MC and Sebastian stared at him, confused on what caused that reaction in Ominis.
“Sebastian is a hen!” Ominis wheezed out. “You turned him into a female chicken!”
Seb!chicken once again started shrieking and running about in a panic, laying eggs each time he screeched. Each egg in turn, led Sebastian to screeching even louder in terror.
Alarmed, MC and Ominis found themselves chasing him throughout the cottage once again.
“Sebastian please please calm down! I can fix this! Or at least I can try to!” MC begged.
Unfortunately for the two, Seb!chicken was running around on chicken brain instinct. And his small chicken brain told him to go outside through the door that Ominis left partially open.
“Oh fuck!” MC shouted. “Come back here you…you SeBAWKtian!”
“What did you just call him?” Ominis asked as he hurried after her, after the hairy headed chicken running around the front yard. “You didn’t make his name into a chicken pun did you?”
MC groaned, struggling to her feet from where she had fallen, lunging after SeBAWKtian. “Yes, I did okay. Comedy relieves stress, at least for me.” She found herself wondering if it was worthy of Sebastian’s praise, the wizard of puns himself.
The he hen was growing more wild by the moment, sometimes pausing to dumbly cock his head before scratching the earth and pecking for bugs until his approaching human friends set him off again. Eventually MC and Ominis grew exhausted and had to sit down, just watching him walk around, thinking hard.
“What…what if he’s stuck like this Ominis?” MC asked quietly, tears starting to well in her eyes. “I’ll have ruined his life.”
Ominis noticed immediately and took her hand in his. “MC look at me,” he urged her, his tone serious. “You can do anything. If you managed to turn him into a chicken you can undo it too.”
Just then a squawk across the hamlet drew Sebastian’s attention. It was his kind! Chickens. He didn’t need to hang with these big clumsy creatures any more. He could roost with friends, find food, and even a mate. Maybe a nice rooster… rooster ? No, a nice hen. Wait what..? It didn’t matter. All that mattered was to find a flock. Lone chickens were never safe.
With all the speed that a hen was capable of, he took off across the Highlands. MC and Ominis jumped up and followed him, this time making sure to stay far enough away that Sebastian wouldn’t see them and react.
SeBAWKtian meanwhile was overjoyed to find so many hens nearby! They clucked in greeting and one came up to preen him. Shaking out his feathers, he plopped himself on the ground, enjoying the nice grooming session he was being treated to. This was just what he needed after laying so many eggs today.
Ominis glanced over his shoulder. “Oh… look at that,” he said in complete awe and admiration. “There are so many colors in the sky. No wonder everyone talks about sunsets. It’s a type of magic of its own.”
MC glanced at the setting sun, much less enthused than Ominis at the sight. “Its getting late… we need to figure something out. If I could just get close enough, I could try to work my ancient magic. But now we have the new challenge of making sure we have the right hen in sight! Being so far away is not doing me any favors. I don't think any chickens want to suddenly find themselves as people!”
Just then a growl pierced the otherwise silent night, making the chickens flee into a small bush, fighting over the top perch. SeBAWKtian, the competitive creature he was, won.
“What was that,” Ominis asked warily, eyeing how MC had whipped out her wand and was anxiously looking around.
“A mongrel.” She answered tightly, her magical aura pulsing blue in the air in anticipation. Her appearance was incredible.
Ominis had heard from Sebastian how when she was preparing for battle she would always almost unnoticeably glow. The aura he had sensed with his wand now had color.
Ominis pulled out his own wand, preparing as well. The charm his aunt had created still pulsed at the tip, blinking red in the growing darkness. Ominis wondered how people didn’t find it annoying. Although he was enjoying his new vision, it was a bit overwhelming. Garreth had told him the potion should take away the pressure and pain on his brain from suddenly trying to process images, however he couldn’t take away the feeling of trying to put pictures to the knowledge he already had.
Yellow eyes and bared white teeth approached and Ominis couldn’t help a shiver from going down his spine. They were more frightening in real life, to see, then read about or hear.
“We have to keep Sebastian safe,” he managed to say but it was unneeded as MC had already leaped into action, wand flying in every direction, colors flashing loudly with the sounds accompanying them. “Depulso!” Purple, “Diffindo!” Red, so much red, “Confringo!” The sight was horrific. Burning so much burning, the look in the dog's eyes.. He closed his eyes tightly and covered his ears as a lightning bolt cracked.
She called his name, but his mind was still spinning, his ears ringing, his eyes leaking.
MC wrapped her arms around Ominis, trying to provide some sense of comfort to him. She was unsure what exactly caused him to shut down. “Omi? What happened?”
“It’s all too much. Too many colors, too much brightness. And too many of these fucking chickens ,” he moaned out. “Of all the days to get my sight, it had to be today.”
MC patted him on the head. “I know. I know. I think we should go back to the cottage to sleep. The chicken flock is heading to their coop and Sebastian is among them. I think they will be okay and we can try again tomorrow.”
Ominis nodded, and the two of them headed to the cottage for a much needed meal and sleep.
****
“Cock a doodle do!” a rooster sang out, waking up MC against her wishes.
“After this is over, I never want to see or hear a chicken again,” she muttered to herself. “Any chicken in front of me better be on my dinner plate.” With a twitching eye, she dressed herself, trying to block out the aggressively singing rooster that seemed far too happy to greet the day.
Ominis, being the morning person that he was, simply sprang out of bed. “Good morning,” he greeted, far more chipper than her.
Internally grimacing, she chugged a cup full of coffee before leading Ominis and herself back to where the chickens were last evening.
“Let’s find Sebastian,” she sighed, mentally over this whole experience.
She and Ominis gazed over each individual hen, but neither of them were spotting his adorable little mop of hair.
“You don’t think another mongrel ate him?” Ominis asked fearfully.
“I- I don’t know..” she could feel the tears coming at the thought and furiously blinked them back. No, she told herself. I’m not losing him now, I still have to kiss that idiot.
“We have to look harder. And, maybe call him,” she said determinedly before starting to wade through the mess of white and black plump bodies, calling his name. “Here Sebastian, here chicky, chicky, chicky. Here you dumb freckled sweetheart. I’ll give you a snack..heck I’ll even kiss you.”
Ominis however had different taste in summoning his feathered best friend. “Sebastian if you don’t show yourself right this instant I swear on my aunt's grave that I will cook every single one of these chickens and if one happens to be you then oh well. It’ll be your clucking fault.” Ominis couldn’t help but give a self pleased grin at his clever pun.
It seemed to have worked because a handsome chestnut brown rooster, with pale speckles on his feathers hurriedly ran over, stopping at Ominis’s feet and pecking his foot hard in retaliation. His comb was curly and soft. It was him.
“He’s a rooster now?” Ominis asked incredulously.
MC sighed. “Seems so,” she said, staring down at the rooster now rubbing against her leg.
Several hens followed behind Sebastian, clearly enamored with the new rooster in their flock. Sebastian dropped one wing and danced in a circle around MC while enthusiastically clucking, ignoring his hen posse. The hens backed away, clucking in disappointment.
MC and Ominis stared nonplussed at Sebastian’s weird behavior. “Uh, I’m hardly the expert on chicken behavior, “ Ominis spoke cautiously, “but I think Sebastian is trying to court you? Erm…rooster style?”
MC snorted a laugh. “Oh, I wish I could take a picture of this. This would be perfect blackmail someday.”
“Well,” Ominis started, amusement coloring his tone, “at least you know Sebastian likes you no matter what form he is in.”
In the meantime, Sebastian was disheartened that the giant creature of his dreams was not reciprocating his attempt to court. But he was nothing if not a determined chicken! He would make this lovely, giant, featherless chicken his mate!
He was so deep in the zone of his little dance that he didn’t see his potential mate wave the weird stick. Suddenly he was completely frozen. His squawk of protest was stuck in his throat. What a cruel way to treat him! All he wanted to do was make lots of nice baby chicks with her!
Now that Sebastian was unable to move (or run away), MC took a deep breath, calling on her ancient magic. The thrumming was building up under her skin. She willed it to listen to her. She pictured Sebastian in her mind, and with purpose, directed the magic to turn his body back into a human.
Ominis watched with awe the silvery ancient magic swirl around Sebastian’s little rooster body. With a sudden poof of glitter, Sebastian became a man once again. He instantly blushed, before turning to MC with an awkward smile. “..Thanks MC..” MC’s face split into a huge grin, relief rushing over her. She pulled him into a hug. “I am so sorry Sebastian, I didn’t mean to-”
He pulled away just enough to look at her. “MC, don’t. It’s not your fault. I—” He rubbed the back of his neck, casting his gaze downward as his face and neck burned bright red. “I was a bit out of line, potion or not. I should be the one apologizing.” He looked back at her, his wide brown eyes sincere. “I’m sorry.”
MC smiled at him. “I forgive you, Sebastian. You weren’t fully in control. Let’s just forget it happened alright?”
He let out a relieved sigh. “Yeah, alright.”
Ominis’s voice snapped them out of the staring spell that had started between them. “You may be able to forget this but I won’t. I think I’d like to be oblivated of this whole ordeal.”
Sebastian turned towards his long-time friend with a fond grin. “Are you sure? I think this event makes for a very… impeckable story.” Though Ominis rolled his eyes, his gaze softened as he took Sebastian in.
“Well, I guess all the girls were right. You are nice to look at…though I am more attractive.”
Sebastian eyebrows shot up in surprise, a laugh escaping him. “Oh really?”
The two continued to banter until Sebastian wrestled him into a giant hug, tackling him onto the ground. When MC tried to intervene, due to Ominis’s pleas for Sebastian to stop, she got pulled down as well. Ominis managed to escape as Sebastian and MC laughed and rolled around. After a few moments, the two stopped laughing, awkwardness taking over, and got up.
The trio headed inside where they discussed the whole ordeal in more depth, Sebastian adding his analytical thoughts. He theorized that he had become a female chicken as a side effect of Garreth’s potion and that as it wore off he became a rooster. He thanked them again for having patience with him and saving his life and headed to Hogsmeade to get them, sweets, before returning. After a dinner of ham and eggs (not Sebastian’s), Ominis retired for the night, leaving MC and Sebastian alone by the fire.
“So, I recall you promising me a kiss while I was a rooster,” Sebastian teased, an indiscernible look in his eyes.
MC bit her lip. “Yes, I…. I guess I did.”
“I know I was acting like a complete prat earlier, but that love potion didn’t make me feel anything that I didn’t already feel towards you. I’ve liked you…in that way… for a long time now,” Sebastian confessed quietly, watching MC’s expression carefully.
MC’s eyes met his. “Really? I was never sure what your true feelings were. I’ve liked you in that way for a long time as well.”
Sebastian smiled softly, and grazed his hand across her cheek. “Can I kiss you?” he whispered in her ear.
MC nodded and their lips met. It was everything that she ever dreamed it would be and more. Warmth spread through her body as sparks danced across her skin where his hands touched.
Breaking apart, they gazed at each other with love in their eyes.
“I can’t say I enjoyed being a chicken, but I would gladly re-do the experience if it meant that I would finally have you like this,” he admitted.
“Guess we should thank Garreth for his potion chaos,” MC giggled as she nuzzled against Sebastian’s shoulder.
And at that exact moment, there was a frantic knock at the door. They broke apart in alarm, quickly jumping up to see who would be coming over so late. Before they even reached the door, Garreth burst in.
“Garreth?” MC shrieked. “What on earth are you doing here? It’s almost midnight!”
Sebastian crossed his arms, glaring intensely at the intruder for ruining his perfect moment with MC.
“Sorry, sorry but I finally finished it!” Garreth lifted up a potion vial full of grey and sludgy liquid. “It’s the antidote for that love potion!”
Sebastian rolled his eyes and scoffed. “You are far too late for that.”
Garreth deflated, staring between the two. “Nothing happened, did it?”
MC smirked. “Oh, something happened alright. But it’s worked out fine.” She took Sebastian’s hand to show off their new relationship status.
Garreth’s brows shot up. “Oh! Well, look at that! About time you two pulled your heads out of your asses and got together!”
MC gasped and Sebastian glowered but they couldn’t really protest. He was right. They had put this off for far too long. They were total chickens for not plucking up the courage to tell each other sooner.
MC thanked Garreth anyway for the potion. Upon his inquiry on the situation, all they told him was, “Be careful Garreth, it may switch gender in chickens but the eggs aren’t edible” Puzzled beyond belief Garreth left them, a barely concealed smirk as they warned him not to try it out.
but when did that ever really stop Garreth?
***
To conclude this tail of misshaped love and potion brewing we must share the following events.
Ominis upon the next morning found he was blind once again. Although he wasn’t too upset about it MC and Sebastian were crushed that their friend could no longer see them and confronted Garreth only to find out it was another flaw. Two years ending up being only two days of vision. They also found him testing love potions on chickens. As punishment, he had to spend a day as a chicken…which resulted in him never brewing illicit potions again.
And Sebastian and MC lived happily ever after..(with their best friend Ominis as well of course).
The end…
Screenshot thanks to ps-cactus