Work Text:
The green liquid in the syringe slowly drained into the mass on the lab table.
“Stability of subject insured.”
The woman towering over the table mumbled to herself as she experimented on the bright magenta pile of goo. She felt at specific points of the blob and mumbled once again to herself. She refilled her syringe with the same green substance, and started to inject it”
“...”
She watched as the substance drained into the goop.
“...”
“Stability of subject insured.”
She felt around the mass once more, a grin formed on her face as she enthralled herself in the scientific process. She wrote down the reports of her strange experiment on a sheet of paper. The woman hit her utensil to her chin in thought. She suddenly put down her writing and with a separate, clean syringe she aimed for a different substance. This time it was a dark purple. The substance filled the syringe and the woman turned to the mass and began injecting it in a different spot than she had been before. The liquid began to drain.
“...”
“...”
The mass began to bubble for a moment, then stopped abruptly.
“...”
“Sudden change found in subject from substance C.”
Her syringe fully drained into the subject. The mass of goo began to churn and bounce as if it was coming alive. A mass that could only be described as a crude arm began to rise for the goo as it began to grow subtly. The goo seemed to open a mouth that was no more than a gap in its form. It rambunctiously knocked over an empty flask on accident and it shattered on the floor. The mass seemed to turn towards the woman, upon spotting her in her pure white mask, it made a gurgling sound and tried escaping off the side of the table. The woman had a wide grin on her face and caught the creature before it traveled off the table. Her hands kept a firm grip on specific parts of the creature where she seemed to recognize it would be easiest to carry it. One would believe the creature would simply fall from her hands since its form was so liquidus. However, the creature stayed firmly in her arms and merely dripped onto the lab table and the floor.
Suddenly, she heard a firm knocking at the door to her workroom. She stayed silent, waiting for them to reveal themself without her asking. There was silence for a while. “Athena.. It is Hephaistos.” Athena’s grin widened and she said in a firm voice back “Come right in, my love.” Hephaistos slowly opened the door, in came a taller man with dark skin, the same white mask as Athena, and a hood covering the rest of his head. He has a stern air around him, a sharp contrast to the carefree air that wafted around Athena. He grunted, “Athena… must you use such flirtatious speech while we are in a facility of business…” He looked at his partner and realized her hood was down, exposing her light brown hair in the usual braid he had seen many times before… “And raise your cowl.. What if someone else had walked through this door and looked upon you?” Athena placed the creation she was experimenting on on the table and placed her elbows on top of it, then her chin in her hands. Weirdly enough, the creation didn’t seem to mind. She gave her usual smile “Hephaistos my dear, this is my private work quarters. I was trying naught to disrespect our society, though who's here to see the state of me in the midst of my work?” She loved Hephaistos, though she found his obsession with the rules a bore sometimes. Hephaistos conformed ardently to the rules.. And the main reason he had ever broken them was because of the same woman resting atop a slime creature in front of him. “I suppose you have somewhat of a point, but I need not remind you our face coverings must stay on at all times unless you are alone in your living quarters.” Hephaistos lectured, knowing Athena would likely listen little to his words. He approached her lab table, “We have to submit a report to Master Lahabrea today, do you have your assigned quadrants completed?” Athena nodded and pointed to a small stack of papers on a distant table. If one knew nothing of Athena besides her behavior they would instantly assume she was some sort of slacker. However, she was actually one of the most accomplished minds in the Words of Lahabrea, rivaled only by her partner Hephaistos. “I completed my fill of the reports a few moons ago.” Athena began placing the small purple slim blob in a large containment tube where it moved around calmly once inside. She fastened the lid and moved to the front of her desk to be face-to-face with her partner. Their faces were but an outspread hand away from each other. Hephaistos looked at her, while his forehead was not visible you could see his face curl in disbelief. “Already..? The reports are needed at the end of the week to have all of your feats from the time compiled. Why did you complete them so early?” Hephaistos chided her. Athena looked back with slight annoyance on her obscured face, “Darling, I completed more than a week's worth of work halfway through the week… I wrote it all down and continued documenting my feats from the time proceding that.. Yet at this point, I ran out of pages to document them on.. So I’m awaiting the report forms for the coming week to transcribe all my work onto.. Along with next week's work.” Hephaistos looked at his partner in shock, his stern tone continued but morphed into that of concern rather than disapproval. “Truly Athena… have you rested once these past few days?” Hephaistos paused for a moment. “What manner of work has you this devoted to your studies?” he wanted to say more but he realized how talkative the woman had made him in concern for her. Hephaistos felt his cheeks burned and was grateful his mask blocked the darkening of his face in embarrassment. Athena got closer to her husband-to-be and clasped his hands, looking into the holes in his mask that obscured his deep red eyes. “Hephaistos, I know I’ve discussed briefly with you before regarding this… However, I think it’s finally the right moment to try and experiment…
...transcending the human form.”
The blue liquid in the syringe slowly drained into the mass suspended in the air.
“Stability of subject insured.”
The woman looking up to the suspended body mass mumbled to herself as she experimented on the unconscious young boy. She felt at specific points on his face and arms for abnormalities and mumbled once again to herself.
She refilled her syringe with the same blue substance and started to inject it once more.
Soon, her vessel would finally be complete.