Book Chapter - The Visitor - WIP - 11/28/21 (Patreon)

The test was going splendidly, and the specimen was reacting perfectly as expected without even a slight deviation in its form or activity. Andra typed her notes into her tablet, which prove difficult through the rubber gloves of her hazmat suit, especially through the transparent protective face shield, but she didn’t mind much. The room was circular, kind of like a small dome at least 34 ft.² in all directions, connected to a long secure corridor with a metallic sliding door to seal it off in case of emergency. It wasn’t what she was used to but perfect for testing Rie-Unos unique specimen, giving it a controlled environment to avoid any anomalous reactions. With her was a rubber-clad security guard, covered in white rubber with black gloves and stockings with a metallic visor over her eyes, as well as another lab worker who also wore a hazmat suit typing away at the consoles placed around the specimen.

In the very center of the room, floating underneath a circular disc, the specimen appeared as a rippling ball of reflective rubber, pulsing with strange vibrations which almost caused the room to shake, almost like a car stereo put on full blast. Paying no mind, Angela took notes on all of the forms and shapes the rubber ball had taken since the start of their test, hexagons, squares, and even a spiked form, all with perfect symmetry consistent with their hypothesis. However, the unexpected powerful vibrations coming from the orb made her skin crawl, reminding her of the earthquakes she experienced back home. Her tablet was filled with pages and pages of pleasing results, getting ready to close it up as she looked over to the security guard and coworker. “All right, I think we have enough, let’s wrap things up and get ready to...” before she could finish, she suddenly saw the sphere shifting again.

However, instead of changing into something symmetrical, it began stretching out vertically, taking on a rectangular shape. It had never morphed into something so specific. Andra quickly looked down at the console, thinking she may have accidentally typed in a command by she didn’t mean to write, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary. It was like the sphere was acting on its own, sending a cold shiver down the young woman's spine. Even the security guard seemed a bit wary, and though armed, she wasn’t nearly as well equipped as the androids were. Andra’s lab assistant was the last to notice the rubbers anomalous reaction, looking up from her equipment for a split second before tilting her head up with a gasp. Finally, the latex became still, stretching out 9 x 5‘ as if to mimic the shape of a window or door.

Andra checked the console again as she was about to type in a new command to reset the transforming rubber. But instead, realizing that it may cause more harm than good with its unpredictable properties, she exited the command consul end looked at the analytics and internal readings of the object, seeing something that she just couldn’t explain. While the instruments took the rubber’s new form into consideration, the readings on its mass and dimensions were baffling. The rubber sphere read as if it had its own flux of gravity, and its dimensions seem to invert along with its vertical form. Andra stepped around the rubber object, seeing that it still had a two-dimensional shape contrary to the readings which she had read seconds earlier. The scanner read its dimensions is almost 4D, its vertical plane collapsing on itself as it was a broken 3-D model. It was almost like it was reading as a black hole, collapsing in on itself.

Just then, small ripples could be seen on the surface of the rectangular rubber, like a vibration on a small pond. Not long after did another ripple appear, and then another but with two waves this time. It was like a puddle reacting to footsteps that were growing closer and closer. Despite all three women being completely secure in their rubber suits, they all cautiously stepped away from the center of the room as far as they could, unsure what Rei-Unos experiment was up to. The rubber rippled more and more with every passing second, sending out vibrations with every pulse as if it was getting ready for something big. Then all of a sudden, it stopped. The readings on the specimen stayed the same, keeping the suspense high as the room was frozen with silence.

Under normal circumstances, anyone would have fled the room immediately had they the choice. Unfortunately, the blast door could only open from the outside via securities authorization, and with the specimen acting as strange as it was that wasn’t gonna happen anytime soon. As the seconds passed, nothing happened, the specimen seemingly inactive despite keeping its rectangular shape. Looking down from the object, Andra was about to place her tablet next to one of the consoles, right as a humanoid silhouette suddenly bulged out of from rubber surface, reaching towards her with its hand outstretched. Frightened out of her mind, Andra just simply dropped her tablet without so much as it sound as she jumped back. The figure was lunging forward, its mouth stretched out as if trying to scream, it was like a latex ghost had emerged from the experiment.

Suddenly, with a loud snap, the liquid rubber pulled away from the frightening silhouette, splashing back against the specimen as the figure dropped to the floor with a loud thud. Angela couldn’t believe her eyes, laying before her was what looked like a werewolf, one with pastel green and light brown fur, wearing what appeared to be sporty shorts. The wolf gasped and hyperventilated as if in shock, laying mostly still on the cold floor, giving Andra a moment to get a good look at its form. Rather than looking monstrous, the wolf's figure appeared rather lean and fit, like a bipedal swimmer as opposed to a mythological beast. After regaining its bearings, the wolf pushed itself up on his hands and knees looking up to Andra with a winded look on his face. Finally getting over her initial shock, the young woman reached behind her, and grabbed the emergency quarantine button attached to the waist of her suit.

The wolf’s eyes widened as she pulled out the gadget from behind her, quickly swiping it out of her hand before lunging towards her without warning. Time almost seemed to freeze for Andra, watching the wolf’s jaws open wide with its clawed hands reaching out to grab her shoulders. Just when she thought that it was the last thing she would ever see, a black ball suddenly smacked into the wolf’s face, thrown by the security guard with the metallic visor. Taken off guard, the wolf stumbled and fell to his left side, narrowly missing Andra before the ball suddenly unraveled into a large black sheet. Before he even knew what was happening, everything went dark, tight, and constricting as he was squeezed from all sides in what felt like stretchy latex. With the strange intruder finally subdued, writhing on the floor in a tight rubber cocoon, the security guard activated a silent alarm by touching a button on her visor. “We have anomalous activity down here, and unknown my form has emerged from the experiment please and back up!” the security guard said.

Dizzy, head thumping, and feeling as if he was tumbling in a washer, the young wolf let out a weak groan as he reached up to rub his head. “Ugh… what a weird nightmare…” he thought, attempting to sit back up, only to quickly lose his balance as he fell back against something soft and jiggly. The wolf was so dizzy he couldn’t even sit up straight, almost like a hangover without the headache. Slowly, he opened his eyes to see a curved dome-like ceiling with a bright light shining above him. The wolf squinted, shielding his eyes with his left paw as he struggled to get his sight clear. “Ugh… Did I fall asleep on the bench again?” he thought to himself, hearing some muffled voices somewhere nearby. Thinking he had taken a short nap, he shook the dizziness off and attempted to sit back up, only for the surface beneath him to wobble like jelly. Confused, he opened his eyes completely, and noticed that there was a strange reflective shine above him. Then, with a simple scan of his surroundings, he suddenly realized his situation.

Surrounding him were multiple figures wearing orange rubber hazmat suits in a metallic spherical dome-like room, with consoles and what looked like monitoring equipment lining the walls. It was almost completely identical to the room he was in before. But what was most bizarre, was the flexible transparent bubble surrounding him, floating just 3 feet above the floor. Completely at a loss for words, he finally came to the horrifying realization that what had happened earlier wasn’t a dream. The bubble surrounding him was very soft and jiggly, almost like sitting on a trampoline made of Jell-O. Bringing his attention back to his supposed captors, it seemed that they were observing him as if he were some kind of exotic animal. Even more puzzling was their species, he couldn’t recognize what they were, lacking any fur or notable features that he could identify.

“What do you mean? It came out of the specimen?” said a deep feminine voice. The wolf quickly turned his head around to see the woman he had attempted to strike before, talking with a tall dark-skinned lizard woman of some kind. He was almost relieved to see a species he could identify, however, couldn’t put his finger on what breed she was. Even for a lizard, her skin had an almost seamless shine as if slathered in oil, making her nearly impossible to identify. Without a clue what was going on, all he could do was observe whatever conversation she was having with the hazmat suit an individual. “I don’t know how to explain it, the shape of the specimen was completely two-dimensional, but in the instruments, it appeared as if it was warping into itself.” the woman in the orange suit explained, looking up from her tablet and back to the tall lizard. “Rei-Uno, it’s like the rubber specimen morphed into a door, or some kind of gate.

“A door?” the wolf thought to himself, thinking back to how this all transpired… It was the weekend, college midterms were over and he was getting into his swim trunks in the changing room of his school’s swimming pool. Running later than usual, all his friends and teammates were already out and ready to start practice, while he was still getting into his swimwear. With haste, he stuffed all of his clothes into his locker and power walked his way out of the bathroom and into the pool area, where his teammates were already lined up in position, ready to greet the coach. On his team was his best friend Lock, a grey hyena who was slightly shorter than him, and his dorm mate Jewel, a chocolate lab who had a no-nonsense personality despite his family face. There were plenty others among their team, but it seemed one of them was missing, an orange fox whose name he couldn’t quite remember, but stuck out because of his mischievous personality.

Looking back to the changing room, he thought that he might be running late as well, but there was still no sign of him. Curious, he turned to Lock and tapped him with his paw to get his attention. “Hey, do you know where the jokey guy went? ”he whispered. “Sush Jax, here she comes.” he responded, turning his head back forward. Out of the women’s locker room came a tall elegant and serious-looking leopard woman, sporting a dark red lifeguard one-piece swimsuit, looking at her clipboard as she approached the team of lined up male swimmers. The leopard’s figure was very very fit, with a very confident and elegant walk, stepping on foot in front of the other with her hip swing side to side. However, her feminine demeanor barely distracted from her ripped thighs and calves, as well as her arms and upper body clearly indicating just how seriously she took swimming.

As beautiful as she was, she looked like she could hug just as easily as she break someone’s back. Her attitude alone was enough to keep the students and staff‘s respect. Looking up from her clipboard she looked over the team counting them with her eyes before crossing her arms.” Alright boys, we’ve done enough labs over the past week so today we’re going to practice your diving on the high board today.” she commanded. No one dared to complain, but some of the team were visibly disappointed that most of the practice will be spent waiting in line. Unable to get his mind off of their missing teammate, Jax threw his hand up wondering why they were starting when they were a player short. “Yes Jax?” she asked, putting her left hand on her hip.

“I think we’re missing someone… the fox guy I think?” he pointed out. The leopard woman sighed under her breath, taking a couple of moments to think about how to answer his question. “Ah yes, you mean Mr. fiddle. He’s been dismissed from the pool after playing a rather distasteful prank on the female water polo team. Allegedly he poured a couple of dozen bubble bath bottles in the pool before they practiced.” she explained. The boys all looked at each other, before bursting into a fit of giggles, Jax included. “Yeah yeah, go ahead and laugh it up boys. We had to use a crowbar to get that poor swimmer out of one of those bubbles.” she said, unamused as she looked back down at her clipboard.

“Anyway, if we’re done with all that, let’s get started.” she instructed. On her order, the team started in a single file line behind the diving board, with Jax somewhere in the middle. Each swimmer would wait for the instructor’s permission before diving, waiting for her to take notes on her clipboard before calling the next one in line. The painful part was waiting for each swimmer to climb the ladder, though they didn’t even bother to make conversation with one another as not to annoy their strict coach. After what felt like forever, Jaxs finally went up for his dive, looking down at the pool below as he waited for the coach to blow her whistle. The young wolf had done this dozens of times, and at this point waiting in line just to do a simple dive was nothing short of tedious. Finally, the leopard woman blew her whistle, and Jax jumped in with his arms over his head.

But a split second after he jumped, he noticed the water rippling below him, seeing a tiny black dot in the center. Then without warning, and before he could even make sense of it, the water beneath him turned black and glossy, taking on the consistency of rubber or some kind of oil. Panicked, he lost his diving form and began flailing about before falling into the strange substance. Instead of splashing into the pool like liquid, or slamming into it like concrete, the material only stretched underneath him, as if he was sinking into a giant sheet of latex. Jax couldn’t feel any water beneath him, just sinking further and further into the stretchy surface as it began molding to his form and tightening around him like a bodysuit. Frightened, he tried to scream, but his mouth was blocked by the tight rubbery substance, silencing his cries as he stretched his hands out, praying that he could claw his way out of the elastic material.

It was like he had dived into a literal nightmare, descending into it felt like a bottomless abyss of smothering latex, unable to see hear or feel anything, as if falling into limbo. Then, the stretchy substance suddenly disappeared from his body, falling onto a cold metal surface with a loud clang. Left dizzy and disoriented, it took him a few seconds to finally pull himself together before he noticed the strange unfamiliar creature in the orange hazmat suit standing before him. Back to the present, Jax still couldn’t make sense of how he ended up here, pressing his paws on the surface of his bubble, stretching out only slightly like some kind of elastic-plastic. The air felt so sterile, and everything was muffled around him thanks to the taut surface of his prison. “This thing is so firm, but it still stretches, like some kind of rigid jelly.” he thought, thinking back to how the water polo swimmer must’ve felt when she was bubbled.

—-

11/28/21

Turning his attention back to the two in front of him, he saw that the lizard-looking woman was in deep thought, considering what the woman in a hazmat suit had told her. “So my memory jell, the same stuff we used on that bubble ball prototype, warped in on itself and brought this creature here?” she asked, tilting her head toward the bubbled wolf. “That’s what happened.” Andra replied. “But the strange thing is that it wasn’t visible to the human eye.” The android simply tilted her head again, her optics widening slightly as she couldn’t understand what she meant. “To us, it just looked like a flat rectangle, but according to the instruments, there was he distortion in the object that caused it to fold in on itself. Like some kind of wormhole had been created the inside of it.”

Rei-Uno put her hand underneath her chin, breaking eye contact for a couple moments before looking back to Andra. “I don’t know how to explain the wormhole, but it’s possible that you couldn’t see it because humans just can’t visually perceive four-dimensional space the same way machines can. Perhaps that’s why it looked like a flat shape to you.” she explained, thorough sounding a bit unsure, as she still felt skeptical about the whole thing.” But there’s something else, when this werewolf guy came through, we could see his silhouette stretching through the liquefied rubber, resisting him with it surface tension.” she explained. “Hmmm…” Rei-Uno scratch the bottom of her rubbery chin looking back to the wolf was now wide awake and looking straight at them.

“We’ll discuss this further at a later time, give me a full report tomorrow.” she said stepping closer to the bubble. “I’m going to have a chat with our new puppy.” Jax narrowed his eyes at the shiny-skinned lizard, letting out an annoyed huff as Andra left the room on her command. Rei-Uno and Jax just stared at each other in silence. The android ogled his physique, tilting her head to look at him from different angles as she scanned him with her optics, all while Jax just waited to see what she was going to do with him. “So little man, do you speak English?” she asked casually. remaining cautious, Jax chose not to answer, waiting until he could better understand his bizarre situation. “Well, it looks like you can understand me.” Rei-Uno said with a confident look in her eyes. Jaxs eyes widened curiously, wondering if it was that obvious.

“The expressions on your face, the way you react to my questions, plus you were listening to us talk earlier. It’s pretty obvious.” she boasted, crossing her arms. Seeing how well she was able to read him, he tried not to react, but he was anything but a poker face. “Oh, don't worry little one, we don’t want to hurt you, we’ve simply never seen anything like you.” she said with a cooing tone in her voice as she stepped closer. “This bubble is just a safety measure, it’s for your protection as much as it is ours.” Skeptical, the young wolf backed away from the wall of the bubble. “Oh don’t be scared.” she said putting her hand behind her back. “Just so there’s no hard feelings.” With that said she took out a tiny pink ball from behind her back, which was the size of a marble. “We still need time to figure out what kind of subsidence you require to eat, but in the meantime, you can chew some of this if you’d like.” she said, flicking it towards a bubble with her thumb.

Somehow, the ball passed through the membrane and nailed Jax on the forehead, wincing as he instinctively snatched it in his paw. Rei-Uno couldn’t help but giggle, though kept it subtle enough so the wolf would notice. Jax looked closely at the gum, at first it looked more like a pill, but then recognized the W written on the front, just like a similar WAD brand he saw on commercials back at home. “It's gum, I’m assuming you have it where you’re from? It’s sugar-free so it should be perfectly safe. And you’ll have something to do while we try to figure out where you came from.” she said, walking over to one of the nearby terminals as she put her head down into her tablet. Seeing as the gum in his hand was familiar, and the sincerity in the lizard woman’s voice, he loosened up a bit and began to calm down. However, he couldn’t ignore the other hairless creatures who were closely observing him in their rubber hazmat suits.

Jax found himself blushing under his fur, feeling like some kind of museum exhibit, or like a goldfish in a giant bowl. Wanting to take his mind off things, he plucked the gum into his mouth and began to chew, trying not to make eye contact with the surrounding lab workers. Thanks to his sharp teeth, the gum was easily chewable, and tasted quite pleasant with a cherry light flavor. With nothing else to do, he simply sat in a lotus position and looked down at the floor below him, with only his gum to keep him occupied. That’s what he began to notice something strange, the gum was getting chewier, to the point where it almost felt like it was bubbling. I feel like the gun was expanding like a marshmallow sticking to his teeth with every chew. Jax desperately tried to spit it out, but it was quickly filling his maw, and expanding like dough.