You pick up the pace and manage to leap behind the booth mere seconds after Briana does. She lets out an "ack!" and quickly moves aside to avoid you colliding with her. She lets out an annoyed huff, her cat ears pointed behind her as she stares at you with a furrowed brow, but she shakes off her annoyance and dives under the booth.
"Oh thank God it's still here!" she says.
"So are the Goodfeathers." you say pointing at the two toughs in suits that had been holding Brianna. The taller man isn't with them. Brianna pokes up head up from beneath the table and swears. She pulls some electrical tape off the thick old tome, leaving you to believe that she'd taped it to the bottom of the table. She furiously begins flipping through the pages.
"Stall them." she says.
"How?!" you ask incredulously, causing Brianna to issue a dismissive frustrated grunt. You glance around quickly. The carnival is beginning to close up for the evening. Most of the booths you can see are going though the routine of closing up for the night, gathering prizes, counting cash boxes, etc. Only a few stray carnival-goers are still here this late. You're much smaller then the two men approaching and you don't have the mallet from earlier so direct confrontation is out. So how on Earth are you supposed to slow them down?
"Beer!" comes the cry of a nearby wandering vendor. It's the same man from earlier with the same box strapped around his neck containing beer in the same plastic cups. You smile and grab a handful of bills from the cash box. You ignore the angry outburst from Brianna as you run over to the man with the beer.
"Here, all this for the entire box!" you say desperately. Confused, but no fool, the man hands you the box of beer and unstraps it from himself. You look at the two men, who hesitate, anticipating that you might be getting ready to throw it at them.
"Free beer for carnies! Free beer for carnies!" you cry out. The response you get is immediate. What once was a few booths with a small collection of workers is not one kissing booth with dozens of carnival workers, and a few dishonest carnival stragglers hoping for free beer. The plan, such as it is, seems to work. You place the box on the table of the kissing booth and the two men now have to fight past thirsty carnival workers, some of whom shove back angrily. You climb back behind the booth and look at the other cat girl who currently is chanting a passage from the book. She closes her eyes as she repeats the chant. Slowly she roles out from beneath the table, standing and chanting. By now most of the beer is gone and the two tough guys are shoving past a trio of carnival workers who are still angry about their trying to shove past. The other carnies have returned to their booths.
When Briana's eyes open they're glowing an orange glow. She shouts some strange arcane-sounding word and the glow shoots from her outstretched arms, down past her fingers and travel in a bolt towards the two fedora-wearing men. A pained yowl issues from them and a hat flies off of the man on the right, revealing a pair of cat ears.
Their noses shrink, becoming wider and flatter as orange fur begins pushing out of their skin. A few hairs of the hat-less thug grow, turning into whiskers. The hatted man's face cheeks are also sprouting the long, thin whiskers from his own face. The process seems quite painful because their progress has slowed to a crawl, literally so with the thug on the left, who doubles over and disappears from view. The thug on the right's hands brace against the table and you watch as his fingers curl up into the stubby tows of a cat. Claws begin poking out of these new tows as they are quickly covered in fur. The man suddenly begins to shrink and he barely managed to leap on the table before disappearing beneath the cloth of his suit. What emerges from the neck of the white dress shirt is a heavyset orange cat, hissing and spitting with his ears flat against the back of his head. Brianna closes the book and shoos the new cat away.
"So..." you say to the three dumbfounded carnies who've just witnessed the entire transformation "...I hear someone's been putting 'special' mushrooms on the pizza at one of the booths." you say to them. They three of them nod slowly and seem to decided that's what must have happened.
"I didn't even have pizza today." one of them says on the way back to his booth.
"Shut up, Donny." his companion says as they retreat beyond earshot.
You turn to stare at Brianna, who is breathing heavily.
"Break's over." you say angrily "Change me back."
"I can't..." she says.