Mischief had three priorities: sardines, proper napping spots, and maintaining his witch's magical education through selective chaos.

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Then a graduation ritual went sideways, and he woke up human - stranded a dimension away from his witch, in a body with the wrong number of legs and no tail to lash. Turns out his "accident" wasn't an accident at all. It was a recruitment strategy.

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Thousands of familiars have been systematically harvested to power reality's portal networks, drained into glass jars in the dark beneath a drafty monastery. The bureaucrats call it necessary infrastructure. The victims call it torture. Mischief calls it grounds for aggressive territorial renegotiation.

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The trouble is, his chaos magic doesn't work the same without a tail. Now it leaks out sideways - frosting whatever he touches and infecting the monks with sudden urges to knead cushions and hiss at empty hallways. They keep trying to pet him anyway. The archivist who brings him fish refuses to stop being kind about it. The Abbot wants answers Mischief doesn't have. And three levels down, the other harvested creatures - a woman made of salt, a boy who breathes smoke, a fox shaved bald for the runes scored into her skin - have been waiting decades for someone to fight back.

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Worse, Mischief is starting to care.

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The universe definitely made a terrible mistake giving him any responsibility whatsoever. But someone has to teach cosmic horrors proper manners, and Mischief has always believed problems are best solved through applied chaos.

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Professional rates. Sardine bribes accepted.

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Cat Out of Luck

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