Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

information and details before beginning kinda like a short prologue

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Marceline lets Betty stay with her after the events of the episode Betty.

Marceline lets her stay in her living room since see doesn't have more rooms and Betty starts her research on magic from thepublic library of Ooo with Marceline helping by bringing books when finished all her current books she needs more and telling her about how the crown affected Simon.

Marceline tries to help when she can like reminding Betty she needs to get some sleep (occasionally by lightly forcibly putting her in bed or putting sleep medicine in her coffee.

-(Betty is grateful for this even if she wants to keep reading and she allows it because even if she keeps going she will start to have lesslogical thoughts which don't make sense and will proceed to make many errors in her work )-

Also when Betty forgets to eat (Marceline will try to get her some food near her) and when Betty has doubts to assure her and keep her from breaking down crying.

Betty sometime later (weeks) after many dead ends in her research and having readall the magic books in the library. Betty hits a dead end and decides she needs to get information from actual magic users and wizards to make more progress on her research and draw her own conclusions instead of what a book says is a myth about magic, a possibly on how it works or that magic isn't real and it's just science .

Betty will always keep all her promises and always keep trying to keep them if it's even extremely difficult. She promised Simon she would save him and she also promised Marceline she would be back in two weeks when she was leaving.

Marceline knows this and knows to worry if shedoesn't hold her promise to be back by two weeks and maybe a day at most.

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Chapter 1

Marceline heard a thump in the living room then some mildly loud muffled sounds while she was polishing her ax in her room.

She wonders if someone snuck into her home and if so who could sneak into her house without her hearing the squeaky door or windows being opened and who'll be foolish enough to do it during the middle of the night and why they would make noise if they could somehow sneak in without making any.

She slowly floats down the stairs to the dark living room where she saw a curled-up silhouette on the livingroom floor which she quickly recognized because she sometimes found Betty fallen asleep or passed out from exhaustion on the ground and on the table and by the muffled noises she was making it sounded like she was crying.

She also noticed Betty was wearing a hat but she didn't pay it no mind it wasn't important right now.

She slowly floated to the ground and left the lights off because sometimes Betty and her seemed more comfortable talking to other in the dark. As she got closer to Betty she tried to lightly call her name but she didn't seem to hear so she slowly approaches and sat next to Betty on the ground where Betty was laying and stiffened.

-it seemed that Betty was laughing but that couldn't be right she had to be hearing things- she forced herself to calm down and slowly and softly put her hand on Betty's shoulder to try and calm her down and let her know she was there like she used to do.

As she did so she felt Betty freeze and stop but Marceline still felt the light shaking of her frame that felt was like she was holding in sobs, she attempted to gently and carefully help Betty up off the floor but then quickly yanked her hand back in surprise and slight pain when some sort of electrical current seemed to flow through Betty from head to toe and Betty let out a noise that sounded like an electric socket that sparked but it didn't sound pained and she didn't seem to be in pain.

So she slowly put her hands cautiously under Betty's arms and picked her up and carefully put her on the couch,surprisingly the hat didn't fall off thought Marceline. Betty didn't seem flinch to show she felt any pain when she moved her to the couch, but fromwhere that electric current she felt came from she has no clue.

As she looked around for any hints as to what happened the only thing different Marceline saw was the shine in the dark from water on the ground from Betty's tears and Betty's sleeves seemed to look a bit darker so they were probably also wet from her tears.

Betty seemed to have calmed down but looked like she was tightly gripping her green robe or cloak. Marceline tried to see her face but she wasn't facing her and it was too dark to see in the dark room.

Marceline sat there with Betty for a while on the couch to make her feel comfortable and safeand in case leaving her alone would cause Betty to breakdown again, she sat there for what felt an hour and a half before Betty says "thanks" in Shakey voice and excuses herself to the bathroom.

Marceline lighty notices that Betty doesn't turn on the lights when she leaves but maybe she feels more comfortable if I can't see her if she looked like a mess from crying, she thought.

Chapter Text

Betty quickly goes to the bathroom to try to hide her new hat somewhere Marceline might not find it, to prevent Marceline from finding out what happened to her today, she couldn't let her find out not after what Marceline witnessed happened to Simon when she was a child, Marceline shouldn't have to suffer seeing her become possibly affected by Magic Man's magic and neither should she after all she went through, she thought. 

She turned on the bathroom lights and looked around the room. She needs to find something marceline wouldn't use or where she might not go through and look at for a long time she thought.

As she looked around she noticed her reflection in the bathroom mirror and froze as she saw her eyes, her pupils have turned white and her iris now had a electric blue color.

They reminded her of simon's Ice king's eyes and she panicked at the thought, trying to calm down she closed her eyes and turned away from the mirror and took a deep breath and slowly exhaled and slowly opened her eyes.

She tried to remind herself that Magic man's eyes were also like this and simon's Ice king's eyes were different they were pale blue almost white, and it was Magic man's magic that caused this not the crown, her mind wouldn't become like Simon's the Ice king's, and she wouldn't forget her promise to Simon and she will fulfill her promise to save Simon.

Then it hit her that vampires don't have reflections and likely don't get sick so the medicine cabinet behind the mirror would be a excellent spot to hide her hat.

She went to open the cabinet slowly and quietly so Marceline wouldn't hear her but she then remembered she could probably hear her since she likely had enhanced hearing and doing it as slowly and quietly as possible would only draw suspicion, so she opened it normally and grabbed a glass of water and filled it with water then pulled out a pain medicine bottle and took only one pill and took it, it probably wouldn't do any harm because they were likely expired and also she did still had light headache and it would make seem like she had a reason to open the cabinet.

She quickly took off her hat and put it in with the pill bottle at the same time but she put the hat in quietly and the pill bottle in normally then closed the cabinet like she would normally do.

She now how had the issue of how would she hide her now differently colored eyes, she probably couldn't magic them away because then all wizards would have probably have attempted that by now and most wizards still had their white pupils or different colored eyes she thought.

She stared at the bathroom floor trying to think of an idea, she then felt her glasses slip a bit so she pushed them back. Maybe she could use sunglasses she thought jokingly but that wouldn't work they could easily fall off and would be suspicious as to why she would need to wear them all the time. Different Hidden Eyewear might work though she thought. Maybe...Contacts!, she could probably make colored contacts with her magic!

She had to be careful to not get overwhelmed by it, even remembering how madding it was when she was given all of Magic man's magic at once still made her head ache and her feel slightly unstable.

She tried to let the smallest minimum amount of magic, and felt it push to be released like a strong river she has to blockage the magic like water with dam or it would over flood her like the last time at Magic man's house and she doesn't want risk the possibility of going as insane as Magic man was.

With the small spark of magic some colored contacts materialized that were exactly like her previously green eye color but they wouldn't help her vision because she still need to look like she needed glasses.

She put them on and blinked a few times and turned to gaze into the mirror, everything looked how it usually would look except that her hair was slightly tangled and the ends of her hair were slightly lifted like they were trying to float upwards but she quickly brushed it, after she finshed it looked better but her hair's ends remained the same.

But it shouldn't be that suspicious she could just say that she started to curl the ends her hair now if marceline asked.

She checked her reflection again incase she missed anything else. Then went back out.