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[b][u][center]Smoothing Things Out

Part 6

For Harute11 and Libra-11

By Draconicon[/center][/u][/b]

A night of intimacy was something that none of the headmates had much experience with, and Ptolemy was one of those that tended to pull away from it as a general rule. This was no exception, despite the differences that Libra offered that no previous partner, friend, or interested party had. The rabbit kept himself to the back of the head, resting among Toy’s shadowy realm in the back. There was plenty of room there, considering the tulpa had moved forward to join the rest of the headmates through their fun with their new employer and roommate.

He watched it as he did everything else: dispassionately and logically, ensuring that he got all the information. Not just the information about what Libra liked and what he enjoyed doing to them – though that was definitely stored away for future use – but also the little things that were just enough to keep him curious about what was really happening here. The occasional glances to the corner of the room, the now-and-then looks of curiosity rather than passion, the things that did not fit.

The things that he noticed, but even Cancer had been a little too swallowed up in the moment to take in.

By the end of their fun, their body was all but exhausted, and so were the other members of the group. Blake, Aries, and Ryder were the most exhausted, and Cancer was just behind them, considering that the red wolf had been so suspicious and tense that he could not relax despite all the ‘fun’ that was going on. They collapsed mentally almost immediately, and Toy followed shortly after due to the agreement that was passed between them that Toy would not take charge without an utter lack of anyone else able to do so.

And so, it was Ptolemy’s turn to run things. And as a result…he waited.

It was strange to be pressed against someone that was almost like him. Libra had the rabbit features that he imagined for himself in many ways, and there were moments of comparison as they laid together in bed, moments where he imagined what it would be like if he had been gifted with that body rather than sharing Blake’s. There was a feeling almost like envy buried inside of him, and he made note of it for future slaughtering. There would be no bad feelings without justification.

But it was still comforting. Not nice, the way that Blake had offered as an explanation, but comforting, like a blanket pressed around him and tucked against his sides, holding him down and giving him a place to be secure and safe.

[i]But are we?[/i]

There were those little moments that still left Ptolemy ill at ease, particularly with Libra behaving so strangely in those moments that should have been consumed with passion and pleasure. The fact that the rabbit could focus through that put him at a different level than initially assumed, and that meant that they needed to think about how to get around that.

The latex finally slipped off their body, revealing the human shapes once more. Once that was done, Ptolemy slipped to the edge of the bed, moving quietly and slowly, taking his time to make sure that he made no noise, did not disturb the bed.

Libra didn’t stir. Good.

He got to his feet, only feeling Toy noticing in the back of their head. The other headmates were completely out of it from exhaustion, and he doubted that the tulpa had any interest in stopping him. There was a feeling of curiosity from the back of their head, but that was it.

[b]Something is off,[/b] he thought.

Toy’s curiosity increased.

[b]The lab. And this.[/b]

Almost against its will, Toy seemed to nod. There was something that was unexplained, at the very least, and they could do better to know about what was really happening. Toy did not reach out to wake the other headmates, though Ptolemy knew that the tulpa could do that at any moment.

But there was no logical reason to do it now. He had ‘permission’, as much as Toy needed to give him any.

They walked out of the bedroom, making their way back through the house on shaky legs. Ptolemy bit off small complaints as he made his way down to the stairway on the first floor, having to lean against the wall the whole time to avoid toppling this way or that. He never understood the utter need to submit to that degree, considering that it messed with their body as much as it did. Exhaustion, tiredness, and the mess – oh, the mess was an extensive thing. Shaking his head, he clenched their hole, ensuring that it kept from dripping after the things that they had done.

[b]Next time, I insist on condoms…[/b]

Shaking their head, Ptolemy stepped into the stairwell. The trip down to the bottom of the house was thankfully short, something that was all but required with the way that their legs wanted to fold out from under him. He made it work, but he knew that they would need to rest before long.

Resting now would be better, but he didn’t know how long Libra would stay asleep, or how long it would be before they were found. The headmates wouldn’t approve of his casual paranoia, nor of the way that he was sneaking around in their host’s house.

[b]It is our house too,[/b] he would have justified it as, but that wouldn’t hold water. Not this time.

He was panting at the bottom of the stairs, a sound that irritated him considering the weakness that it projected. Resting his hand on the wall, he looked down at the wall console. Libra had been standing in front of it when he scanned his way in, but he remembered the tones that had come out. A simple bit of logical extrapolation allowed him to guess which buttons needed to be pressed, particularly considering that there was an erase button. He tapped each button, hearing the tones, and then replicated the code.

The other scanner waited for a handprint, but that was also easy enough. Instead of pressing his hand to the scanner, he pressed his fingers to the edges of the scanner. The unwiped print from before, combined with the residual body-heat of his fingers, was enough to fool the scanner this time, and the door opened.

Toy felt a bit off about that, but Ptolemy didn’t. They were sneaking in for reasons of self-preservation and investigation.

After all, that feeling of being watched had returned, and not in a good way. They were being observed by something, and if the controls were down here, then they needed to take a look at that. And maybe there was information that Libra wasn’t sharing with them that they needed to take a look at.

And it would give them the chance to see the wall.

Ptolemy had been curious about the dark wall at the far end of the lab ever since they had not been allowed to get close to it. He imagined that there was some good reason for it, but he was the sort that would not, could not take ‘a good reason’ on faith. He would believe it if he heard it and judged it right, but he could not hear ‘a good reason’ as an excuse or rationale in and of itself.

There was something back there. He would see it, and he would judge for himself whether it was something that the rest of the headmates needed to be kept in the dark about.

Ignoring the various testing platforms, he made his way to the dark wall. Just like before, there were a series of tubes along the wall, each one a little bit different from the other, and all led back through a collection of tube imprints to something that jutted out of the wall further up. It was almost like the wall itself was sheathed in rubber or latex, but just thin enough of a layer for there to be a light that glowed through from the other side. He rested their hand on the wall, feeling for some heat, or buzzing energy.

What he found was a warmth that was nearly enough to scald him. He ripped their hand back, blinking.

[b]To be that hot…[/b]

There had to be a massive amount of energy going behind the wall, something that far belied the sort of home-bound operation that Libra had going here. There was no way that he would be able to keep something like a nuclear reactor that well-hidden, but it had to be something on that level to be producing that much heat.

And that feeling of being watched, he realized, had just peaked. There was something there. Logic dictated that the feeling came from a sense of vulnerability, and that sense of vulnerability only came out when there was something to be vulnerable to. The machines had no chance of harming him, or any of the rest of them, so logic said that there was something else in the chamber with him. And if he could not see it, that did not mean that there was nothing. It meant that the something was very, very good at hiding.

Ptolemy turned their body around, slowly. He looked out at the rest of the lab, looking at the lines between shadows and light…

And for a second, for a split-second, he saw something. There, on the boundary between light and dark, in that moment where he invited himself to see what might be hiding, or the evidence of it, there was the image of a speckled shark-shaped thing that was leaning against the wall. It had no eyes, no mouth, no nothing, just a shape and an unmistakable stare in his direction.

Then the moment passed, and it was gone.

[b]…That was not natural…[/b]

Toy gave him the cocked-head of curiosity feeling again, and he realized that he’d seen it, but Toy had not. He opened his memories to the other headmate, allowing the tulpa to see what he had seen.

There was a sense of shock. It was further evidence that the tulpa had seen nothing, and more, that Toy thought that he must have been seeing things.

Ptolemy wasn’t opposed to that particular possibility. He knew that it was certainly a theory: he had only seen the shape for a moment, and it was such a mix of shadow and light that there was a chance that he had only imagined seeing someone, using bias to confirm his own theory that they were being followed and observed. It was something that he might have believed in other moments.

But for him, the fact that it had disappeared felt like greater proof that he had seen someone of some greater power. Libra’s willingness to hide this impossibility behind them behind a wall of latex and a rule to not go near it meant that there were greater things than they knew in the house already; what was one more impossibility?

Shaking their head, he turned back to the wall behind him. If nothing else, he could examine it and take a guess at what was happening there.

[b]Six tubes, for six minds.[/b]

If he was right, and it truly was a logical leap that was almost more of a stab in the dark, then that meant that Libra was continuing his promise to bring six out of one, rather than keeping six in one. But that would be all but impossible…

Were it not for the brain scans that they had done today, he supposed.

He glanced back at the console and the platform where they had gone through those scans. Libra had proven that they all took different neural pathways for their thoughts and suppositions. He imagined that there were maps that could be overlaid on the minds of different brains, if such a thing could be manufactured. But that would require a very different level of technology…

[b]But then…[/b]

The conversation that had occurred between Blake and the rabbit hybrid came to mind. The way of using colors, the shifting appearances of the different suits that were almost like a neural network.

Ptolemy froze in place, his eyes going wider as he realized just what he’d stumbled on. If he was right – and he was starting to feel like there was a good chance that he was – then there was a mystery that was about to be revealed to all of them. If it was the revelation that he imagined, then Libra was not just a brilliant scientist working at the cutting edge. It meant that the rabbit hybrid had access to technology that was beyond anything in any other sector that the public was aware of. Perhaps further along than anything that the government was aware of, either.

The feeling of being watched intensified, and he felt like, if he turned around, he would find himself staring at the creature that he had spotted for a split second before. Despite the urge to prove that he had seen it, he didn’t move. It felt…

It felt like he was being stalked, now, like his growing understanding was making him more visible. It was strange to feel something that was so similar to fear without it actually being fear, but it was there nonetheless.

[b]Careful…careful…[/b]

He stepped back from the wall, and as he did, he took great care to keep thinking stupid things. Things that didn’t apply to the situation. Things that didn’t take the logical leaps that he had been making any further. Fear, for the first time in a long time, overwhelmed caution, and he walked quickly back to the staircase. The further from the wall he went, the better he felt, and soon, he had left the feeling of overwhelming dread and weird behind.

As he ascended the stairs, however, exhaustion all but overcame him. He managed to get up two flights of stairs before being forced to sit down, panting softly. He dragged their body back against the wall rather than the stairs themselves, groaning as he covered his eyes, holding his hand there.

[b]If I can’t see it…then I cannot be bothered by it…[/b]

The feeling of being seen was still there, of course. But being seen was not bad. Yet.

Ptolemy left himself rest, their body slowly recovering after the long walk, the standing, the sex. The others were gradually waking up, though thankfully the first ones to wake were Cancer and Ryder. The latter was more interested in what they were doing than the morality of it, and the former was in support of anything that gave them more information about the situation that they had found themselves in.

[b]Library,[/b] Ptolemy thought.

[i]I think that Libra has a study. Not a library,[/i] Cancer said.

[b]Either way. Information.[/b]

[i]You alright, mate?[/i] Ryder asked.

[b]Unknown.[/b]

Not something that he would normally say, but that was the most accurate way of summing it up he had at the moment. Something was down there, and he couldn’t allow himself to think of it for now. Whether it was merely curious or something more malevolent, it had more power the more that he thought about it, the more aware of it he became.

[b]Study.[/b]

#

They managed to get up there before Aries or Blake could wake up. They were nose-deep in three different books, alternating between them. Ptolemy was keeping track of the information, but Cancer and Ryder were doing the reading, bouncing between them while he took notes. What they found was fascinating, but nothing that entirely related just [i]what[/i] was beyond that rubber wall.

What it was conducting, however, was well-explained.

There were bodies being created out of rubber there, bodies that were going to be put to use as prosthetics for individuals that had gone through too much trauma to be able to actually do anything with their own bodies. It would be a way to keep those that still had brain function (albeit with the bodies of a vegetable) to be able to go back to living decent lives, to have a life at all that was outside of being bound to one’s bed.

But there were other things. Chemical marks, formula that they were not aware of. Even Ptolemy’s eidetic memory from being in the library for so long didn’t recognize them, and the others couldn’t puzzle it out.

However, if they could, they’d unlock what would make this work. As far as they could tell, the bodies were being made of pure latex, customized into different forms that were suitable for the people that they’d be given to. The current six went undescribed, but considering that there were six bodies and there were six of them…

Ptolemy could read between the lines, particularly with some of the journals in the study being labeled with dates after they’d met. Libra had been planning this shortly after they’d met. While the tech had been discovered and theorized before that, the six tubes in the basement had only been installed post-meeting them.

[b]Which means that there is someone else that knows about this. He does not have staff that would have built that and installed it so fast, and there are no drones, no robot servants in the building…[/b]

It was a dichotomy that bothered him, though Ryder was more fascinated with the mystery of it all, and Cancer was biting at the metaphorical leash to go running back to the bedroom and question Libra about everything that was going on. There were too many possibilities and too few answers for them to make a clear decision as to where to go from here.

As they read, however, the rest of their headmates started waking up. Aries was first, rather fascinated that they were in a different room, but feeling hurt almost immediately that they were snooping.

[i]Hey! That’s Libra’s stuff. Private, guys, private![/i]

[b]We are merely making sure that nothing bad is going to happen to us,[/b] Ptolemy said.

[i]That’s what you call it? I call it snooping![/i]

[b]And if we were looking at his private porn stash, would you be saying the same thing?[/b]

[i]That’s different. That’s fun.[/i]

The excitable member of their group was loud enough that he pulled Blake from sleep, as well, and that was when things got interesting.

#

Blake groaned as he stepped forward, half-expecting himself to still be in Libra’s arms, perhaps even going as far as to have something inside him. Instead, he found himself human, naked, and standing up with a book in either hand and a notebook tucked against his thigh. He blinked, looked down at the journals, and recognized Libra’s handwriting. He turned in place, saw that they were in the study, a place that they might have had right to be in, but – checking the clock – not at this hour.

And not without Libra around.

Blake closed the journals with more calm than he felt that he really had, and then put the notebook down. Ptolemy tried to make a grab for it, but Blake was front now, and that meant that he had control of the body. A body that had gone off the rails as far as he was concerned, and he pressed his hands to the sides of his head as he took a few deep breaths to calm down.

“How long have we been out of bed?” he asked.

[b]Approximately three hours.[/b] Ptolemy admitted.

“And…why?”

[b]There are things that were unexplained.[/b]

“You couldn’t have waited?”

[b]No.[/b]

The simple answer was what he expected from the rabbit, though it was no less annoying for that. Sighing, he did his best not to feel embarrassed as he put the journals back where they belonged – the locations supplied by Ryder and Cancer – and he walked to one of the desks. He sat down, pulling the chair close so that his privates were hidden under the desk. He rubbed his forehead, leaning against his hands.

“Okay…fill me in. What were you looking for?”

The data came in a download that he had to sort through, but it was still faster than talking it out. Flickering images that were somehow coherent and cohesive came through, and so did the memories of what Ptolemy had seen.

That thing was enough to stop Blake in his tracks. For all that it looked almost like a hallucination rather than something real, it was still something that they could fit to the different moments of feeling stared at. Something that lingered in the borders between light and dark, something that was not quite there, something that could be in and out of reality and perception.

“How come you saw it and none of the rest of us did?” Blake said.

[b]I don’t know. I invited a possibility. That is the best way that I can describe it.[/b]

Invited. That made almost no sense, and the consensus between the various headmates was that they’d need to take some time to think this through, consider what the hell was happening, and try and figure out a solution.

As they did, they realized that there was no going back to sleep, either. The mystery had been somewhat unveiled, but not completely. And they wouldn’t be able to pretend that they hadn’t done this. The security cameras in the lab would have seen them –

[b]And, perhaps, the creature.[/b]

That made them all sit up. If that was the case, then maybe Libra could help them. Maybe this would be the thing that would allow Libra to actually explain what was going on and show that he was still deserving of trust.

Blake felt that the rabbit hybrid was, but the rest of the headmates were no longer quite so sure. The fact that there had been some things hidden, some little omissions hanging around, meant that there was a shattered moment. Blake was holding it together from the rabbit’s charm, the gentleness, the way that they had felt together in bed just a few hours ago, but the others hadn’t been so…there with him. They didn’t have the same connection anymore.

[i]Libra…[/i]

For all that there were reasons to be suspicious now, he just hoped that they would be able to get through this and still have this connection. It had been so long since they had felt safe around another person, and he wanted them to keep that. It was more needed than the rest of them understood.

Slumping forward, he rested his head on his arms. He told the others to go to sleep, including Ptolemy, and this time, they listened. He meant to just rest there for a moment and then go back to bed, but the tiredness of running around, the additional stress, and everything else meant that there was little recourse for their shared body. The human closed his eyes, and soon, he was drifting off to dreamland.

#

The next morning came with a hand on his shoulder and the burning realization that he was still naked. Blake sat up right in the study chair almost immediately, his cheeks burning as he looked up at the rabbit hybrid.

“Oh god, I’m sorry. I didn’t – oh god, I made a mess, didn’t I?”

“Maybe a small one.”

“Oh, god…”

“Don’t worry about it.”

Shaking his head, he worried nonetheless. Libra helped him up.

“So, any reason that you spent the night with my books instead of me?”

“Well, um…”

“…What?”

“We ended up…snooping a bit.”

“…Oh.”

It would have been easier if Libra had been angry. Instead, he sounded almost…hurt. Blake rubbed his arm, shaking his head.

“Look. I didn’t want to. This one wasn’t me. And I stopped it as soon as I woke up and realized what we were doing. But…but I need to know. We need to know.”

“What’s at the back of the lab?” Libra asked.

“…Yes.”

“…”

“It’s not…It’s not that I don’t trust you. But we have been open with you. Even made to be open with you. We need to know that you’re going to be the same with us.”

“…That’s…fair.” The rabbit hybrid sighed. “I wanted this to be a surprise.”

“I don’t do well with surprises.”

“Heh. Clearly.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean –”

“No, no, that’s fine. That’s fine. Come on.”

Despite having slept for some hours, they were still tired. The others were slowly waking up, pushing at him to ask questions – whether out of genuine curiosity, like Aries, or in more pointed ways, like Cancer – but he kept his mouth shut. Their mouth shut. They had gotten to prod all they wanted last night, and now, it was his turn. They were going to respect what their host was willing to show them.

They went back down the stairs, and as they did, Libra started explaining.

“I don’t just experiment with latex. There are other things that have been blended with it in the last few years that have created entirely new compounds. New wonders and possibilities.”

“…”

“One of those compounds was something that I came up with in the last year or so. It was a previously unknown substance that had implications of artificial intelligence, able to spread and grow along different pathways, imitating neural networks and allowing for different ‘programs’ to spread through the latex. I could create golems with that, even artificial hubs for the mind.”

“Ptolemy…figured out that was a possibility, and confirmed it with your journals,” Blake admitted.

“He figured it out?”

“He logicked it out, yes.”

“…Fascinating. A series of jumps that most people would never think to make, and he just puzzled it out like that?”

“It was a puzzle. I did not have to see all of the pieces to understand what the full picture had to be.”

Ptolemy’s more focused, pointed voice came without summoning or invitation. Blake narrowed his eyes inwards, and the rabbit pulled back from the voicebox, leaving him properly front again. Before he could apologize, though, Libra chuckled.

“Well, that’s true. If you can reason out the end-point, then you can go backwards from there. I’m guessing that it was something about the six tubes?”

“…How’d you guess?”

“It’s where I would have started.”

They were back in the lab at that point, crossing the floor towards the rear of the room. Blake could feel Ptolemy trying to look around, searching for the creature that he had seen the night before, but as far as Blake was concerned, nothing was more important than what Libra was telling them in that moment. He forced them to focus on that, instead, to stare straight ahead and stop trying to find other things to look at.

There were six tubes, he realized, six different containers for six different minds. Libra gestured at them.

“I know that it’s…kind of a waste to take all of you out, but until I can actually come up with a compound that actually transforms the body rather than re-shaping it, it would be the only way for all of you to completely take on new forms.”

“…All of us?”

“All of you.”

There was a general excitement through the headspace, as even Ptolemy couldn’t pretend that he didn’t want that. They had all wanted their own body, their right body, for so long.

But at the same time…

“Why?” Blake asked. “I know we keep asking, but why? This is…this is thousands of dollars.”

“Probably more,” Libra admitted. “And it’s not something that I would offer to just anyone, that’s true.”

“Then why?”

“Because…well, you seem like you could really use it. And…” Libra rubbed the back of his head, glancing at the tubes. “It’s still kind of at the proof-of-concept stage. It’s not completely risk-free, and…well, I’m not forcing it to happen, but I want to make sure that you know it could have some side-effects. And I don’t want to just offer it to someone that is too desperate to turn it down.”

“You don’t?”

“That’s serious manipulation. I wouldn’t offer it to you if I didn’t think that you wanted it, or if I didn’t think that it would work, but what kind of person would I be if I just took this to a hospital, held it out to a paraplegic, and said ‘I can give you a body that works better than your old one did’?” Libra shook his head. “I’d be feeding off someone that had no real choice in the matter, and what if it went wrong?

“No, no. I’m not just going to shove it at someone like that. I’m putting it together, and I’m [i]hoping[/i] that you’ll take the offer and experiment with it with me, but…I don’t want you to feel like you have to.”

That…was a little bit better, Blake had to admit. There was something there that felt right compared to what he had been worrying about, and it settled some of the anxieties that Cancer had been feeling. Ptolemy was…reserving judgment, it felt.

[b]The creature.[/b]

Right. That.

“There’s one more thing,” Blake admitted.

“One more thing besides the new bodies? You must have been busy.”

“Ptolemy…saw something.”

“…What kind of something?”

“Gray and dark gray,” Ptolemy said, stepping forward after being invited this time. “Vaguely shark-shaped, with a hint of shadowy nature. His patterns of different colors changed in the instant I saw him.”

Libra’s eyebrows just about shot off the top of his head. It was a rather funny sort of expression, and might have invited a laugh if the situation hadn’t been as serious as it was. The rabbit hybrid leaned in.

“Did any of the rest of you see this?” he asked, his voice dropping.

“…No,” Blake answered after a moment. “But we were thinking that maybe your security cameras –”

“No.”

They blinked. Libra’s sudden shift from concerned but willing to work with them to sounding so stern and even strict was a massive change. They just blinked as the rabbit squeezed their shoulders.

“I can’t explain it right now, but trust me. We wouldn’t see a thing. But if you saw him…please, just trust me for now. Don’t think too hard about it.”

“Is he…bad?” Blake asked.

“No. I’m not even sure that he’s a he, though he probably is,” the rabbit said, shaking his head. “Look. The point is, the more you think about it, the more complicated that this is going to get. Please, just…give me a few days to sort this out. If I can, then there’s no problem. If I can’t, I promise, I’ll tell you everything.”

“Your word on it?”

“My word on it.”

“…Alright. This time. Alright.” Blake nodded.

[b][u][center]The End[/center][/u][/b]

Summary: Ptolemy wakes up and there’s a bit of investigation that happens.

Tags: M/solo, Investigation, Human, Creature, Paranormal, Multiple Personalities, Rabbit, Series, Relationship, Weird, Nudity,