In front of Calvin, there was a clear glass figurine of Ella. Her muscular body exquisitely sculpted in full detail, without any clothes to conceal her perfection.

The glass was completely transparent and smooth, and in the very center of her chest, he could see a tiny whorl of glowing pale mist, reminding him of the haze that he’d witnessed in the abyss, hovering directly above the Siphon. There was a strange hunger, a compulsion to get closer to that whirling substance inside.

Curious, Calvin reached his hand out and touched the glass figurine. Remarkably, the nude statue of Ella moved in response to his touch, the smooth glass strangely soft and yielding before him.

A crack appeared in the figurine as it shifted its stance, cocking her head and sending a concerned look out into the empty void Calvin existed in.

The hairline crack in the class figurine went from her shoulder partway through her chest.

A tiny amount of the white haze escaped through the hairline fracture. The scent filled Calvin’s awareness, adding an extra level to the scene he was experiencing, as if someone had suddenly overwritten his smell with an entirely new set of senses.

Pleasure coursed through his body as he inhaled the tiny taste of the mist inside her. I have to have more…

I wonder…

Calvin touched the figurine again, gently running his thumb over her shoulders.

Tiny cracks spread through the figurine, following the trail his fingers took, but none of them were quite as deep as the first. None of them reached what he needed at the center of the doll.

More.

Calvin’s grip tightened around the clear glass, and began twisting, forcibly altering the glass figurine’s posture.

It was a surreal sensation, like no glass Calvin had ever experienced. It was malleable, morphable, and posable. As he moved the figurine’s limbs, cracks spread through its body.

Calvin folded the figurine’s legs, cracks spreading up into the body from its hips as he made it kneel. As he did so, he caught another sensation of rightness, seeping warmth through his entire body.

More!

Calvin pushed harder, putting the glass doll through pose after pose, each more explicit than the last, practically drooling as he watched the larger cracks went deeper and deeper through the glass, cleaving their way toward the center, where the swirling nourishment was waiting for him.

He pushed the figurine down, to the stone floor, heart hammering in his chest as he studied the pattern of cracks. He spread the glass legs, pushed the figurine’s smooth glass cheeks into the ground, twisting its neck, watching the cracks grow.

It seemed like the more sexual, the more intense the pose, the deeper the cracks, the closer he was to releasing that needful substance inside her. Calvin reached down and forced the figurine’s spine backwards, feeling the glass forehead pressing against his palm, the glass legs spread apart by his fingers.

The figurine shuddered as cracks spread through its body.

MORE.

Calvin kept at it, all thought and logic long since divorced from this strange dream, his only goal was to worry and gnaw at the figurine like a svex with a bone. Desperate to get to the marrow.

Finally, after what felt like hours obsessing over a glass doll, something gave inside the figurine. A crack cleaved all the way into the center, and suddenly the pale mist was shooting out of the cracks like steam from a kettle.

Calvin’s heart leapt as he ate the mist, somehow tugging it into his stomach with some kind of ephemeral tongue that seemed to wind the mist around it like a spindle before pulling it in.

I must be dreaming, Calvin thought as he felt his neck bulge before swallowing the mist, the expression on his face pure bliss. He could feel his lips stretching tight across a mouth that seemed to be widening.

What was the last thing I was doing? Calvin thought, mentally crossing his arms as his sense of self slowly returned to him.

Try as he might, he couldn’t quite remember what he had been doing or if it was important.

Well, if I can’t remember, it probably wasn’t super-duper important, Calvin thought, a moment before a glint of light in the darkness caught his eye.

Where did that come from? Calvin thought, raising a brow as he noticed another glass figurine in his personal abyss.

This particular one was of Kala…Calvin’s hand reached out and grabbed the figurine before he even took a second look, his belly rumbling as it had already learned how to feed itself.

Wait a moment, Calvin thought as he studied the figurine, tiny cracks forming across the surface. It looked like Kala, the face was nearly a perfect match, except for fantastically full lips and slightly heightened cheekbones.

The body was the main difference. Kala was slender and athletic. She had a runner’s body and modest breasts.

This figurine showed a girl that was rather more…idealized, sporting a body with curves that seemed almost inhuman, designed to attract awe and envy. No one could possibly have a body like that.

If this weren’t a dream, Calvin thought as cracks began to spread along the figurine’s shoulders. I would bet this body was unnatural…

Wait, I know someone who looks like this. This is Learner.

Learner.

She went with me to Boles. Ella did too.

Calvin’s eyes widened as the memory of his trip to Boles snapped back into place.

The last thing I remember, Tzen and co. were running away, and I decided to slow down One. Calvin’s heart began to pound in his chest.

Then why am I dreaming about Ella and Learner?

Calvin’s consciousness grew a little stronger as the nourishing mist suffused his body, temporarily shoving back the animalistic hunger.

If there was one thing Calvin had learned through his career, it was that surreal dreams chock full of symbolism were never just surreal dreams chock full of symbolism.

It’s not a dream.

Calvin pushed against the inside of his mind, looking for the exit hatch. He mentally threw out a wave of force into the blackness, and suddenly he felt it.

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He was compressed. He was stuffed into a tiny corner of his own mind, packed in tight like a tarak in its egg.

He needed to hatch.

Calvin pushed outward, expanding inside himself. The clear glass figurine in Calvin’s hands grew larger and more opaque, becoming Learner’s shade of rich brown skin.

The red light of dusk began to pour in from the east, and trees emerged from the flat stone void, creating a forest around him. The earth grew soft and loamy beneath Calvin’s bare toes.

Learner’s heartbeat trembled like a frightened bird under the fingers wrapped around her throat. His other hand was partway through tearing off her shirt.

“Calvin?” She asked, her wide eyes boring into him with a potent mixture of fear, apprehension and desire. Her pupils were dilated, eyes black.

The situation reared up and smacked Calvin in the face.

I’m in the middle of the forest, about to rape Learner

Calvin released her neck like she was on fire, guilt beginning to eat its way through his stomach. Learner let out a little squeak as she dropped onto her butt. The human hybrid covered her chest with the shredded cloth of her shirt, barely able to contain herself.

“Are you back?” Learner asked.

“I…” Calvin didn’t know what to say. A tepid ‘sorry’ wasn’t even close to the shame he was feeling. Still, gotta start somewhere. “Sorry. I didn’t know what I was doing.”

“You didn’t do much to me.” Learner said.

Calvin cocked his head, frowning as his senses expanded in strange new ways.

Superimposed on Learner was her glass figurine, still swirling with Warp. He could feel her thoughts in greater detail than he ever had before, as they seemed to flash across the surface of her glass doll, flickering through his own mind.

That was terrifying…a tiny part of me wishes he hadn’t stopped, though. I wonder if it hurts. I want to try, but it’s so scary! if he was nicer about it…

Calvin felt a foreign heat spreading through his lower body as he watched Learner, nearly overcome by the urge to gnaw on that glass figurine until the Warp came out of it.

All I have to do is be a little nicer, huh? Calvin thought, a predatory urge swelling inside him. He scowled and shook that thought out of his head. If Calvin didn’t have the omniscient grafting, it might be hard for him to keep track of who was thinking what.

You didn’t do much to me.

A chill went down Calvin’s spine.

Ella.

Calvin’ neck snapped around, scanning the forest behind him.

There, about fifteen feet away and laying in a lifeless puddle, was Ella. The Genosian was strewn face-down naked over a fallen log, her purple-tinted skin dotted with bruises and scratches. Shreds of her clothes littered the forest around her body.

“Shit!” Calvin’s legs bunched under him and he leapt the fifteen feet in a single bound, landing beside his genosian wife and flipping her over to check for a pulse.

That turned out to be unnecessary.

Ella groaned pitifully as he rolled her over, her entire body limp. A piece of bark fell off of her cheek, stuck there by the girl’s drool.

“Uugh,” Ella stared straight up into the sky, her yellow irises nearly disappearing behind the dilated pupils that made her eyes black.

“Ella, are you okay? Did I hurt you?” Calvin felt like he had to drag the words out of his soul kicking, screaming, and scratching everything inside him on the way out.

Those were not words he had ever wanted to ask in earnest.

Ella’s breathing was shallow, arms and legs limp, and for a moment, Calvin thought she might be paralyzed. His heart leapt into his throat as he remembered the sensation of twisting the neck of Ella’s glass figurine as he tried to crack it open.

Ella’s eyes fluttered and with effort, looked at him. Calvin could see her glass form under her skin, filled with cracks that ran the course of her body. It was a mess.

“’M goo,” she said, her lips twitching into a slight smile.

Ella’s arm trembled for a moment, drawing her shaking hand up to her chest.

She slowly closed her fist and extended her thumb, giving him an exhausted thumbs-up.

“Oh, thank the gods,” Calvin said, leaning back with a grateful sigh. Not paralyzed. He could see the cracks inside Ella slowly disappearing, blending back together seamlessly as if they’d never existed. The deepest ones had already retreated from her core.

“Don’ thin I ca’ walk,” Ella moaned.

“I’m sorry,” Calvin said, bowing his head.

“You…kiddin?” Ella asked, taking a deep breath between words as she regained more control over her body. “Tha’ was awesome.”

“But it wasn’t me.” Calvin said.

Ella opened her mouth for a moment, eyebrows furrowed as she processed that. Calvin could barely parse the complex web of thoughts and feelings that flickered between them.

It was him. Even if he denies it, some part of him was present. I know it, and that was a good thing. He could have seriously hurt me several times throughout, but he didn’t. How do I tell him all that while I’m as limp as a stuffed Garbok?

I am gonna be so damned sore tomorrow. Eh, whatever, I’ll tell him about it tomorrow.

“Meh,” Ella croaked, waving her limp hand dismissively before she dropped it back to the ground.

Calvin’s shoulders relaxed. Everyone was alive. Ella wasn’t seriously hurt, she didn’t feel betrayed or used.

Everything was okay. Except not at all.

Calvin absolutely hated the idea that the Maculat in him had been steering his body like a guar with blinders, even for a little while.

Calvin took a deep breath.

I can’t afford to let this get to my head right now. If I recall correctly, we can’t be more than a few hours away from One’s front line. I don’t have time to wallow.

+1 Mind

37/60 Warp remaining.

The System blinked into Calvin’s eyes, bringing a little more of recent events to the forefront of his mind.

That’s right, I tried to get a Break. He frowned as he inspected the numbers.

If raising my Mind by one costs three Warp, where did the other twenty go? Calvin thought. He glanced over at Ella, watching her thoughts flicker across the cracked glass body superimposed on her normal body.

He could see both, plain as day, unobscured by each other, one representing her mental state, the other her normal body.

The other twenty went to the Maculat part of me, Calvin thought, clenching his teeth as fear wormed its way into his stomach. I need to figure out if anything else changed. I-

A soft hand brushed against his shoulder, and Calvin glanced up.

Learner was clutching two ragged halves of her shirt together in front of her chest and peering at him curiously.

“We were only a few hours ahead of One when you…” She blushed and Calvin saw vivid thoughts flash across her mental self, accompanied by a few tiny hairline fractures. “Woke up. We need to go.”

“Right, I was getting sucked into my thoughts again,” Calvin muttered, putting his arm under Ella and picking her up.

“We’ll make better time like this,” Calvin said.

Multi-Shaping

Atom Ant

Calvinian Summoning

Atom Ant

Chimera

12/54 Bent remaining

Calvin conjured a palanquin and hoisted Ella’s dead weight up and onto the bench, creating a blanket and some pillows for her out of the various materials in his Grimoire.

The Genosian warrior sighed and snuggled into the soft silk, snoring almost immediately as Calvin and Learner took their seats. Calvin didn’t want to fly because he didn’t want to be in the air and get hit by one of One’s beams.

If the spell got cancelled in midair, the three of them would easily be separated form each other and picked off, possibly injured by the fall.

Plus the trees provided cover. If they flew through the air, One might find them immediately.

Nope. Safer to follow the ground and hide in the forest as they ran.

Long-legged Kurawe variants hoisted the palanquin and began running through the forest at incredible speeds. Inside, they experienced no more than a gentle sway as the palanquin steered around trees.

Calvin found himself sitting quietly across from Learner, still holding her shirt together. The shredded fabric was barely adequate to contain her dusky skin that threatened to unravel the last threads with every breath she took.

Despite the tense situation, and the fresh heaping of guilt, he was getting distracted.

“Can I fix that for you?” Calvin asked, ashamed of the damage he’d done.

Learner giggled. “I’m wearing more than you are,” she said, her eyes dancing with mirth.

Calvin glanced down at himself and raised a brow before sloughing off the useless remains of his sleeves and draping them over his nudity.

“So I see.”

“But yeah, you can fix it,” Learner said, covering herself with her arm as she shrugged out of the tattered blouse and held it out to him.

Calvin reached out to take it, and a bolt of pure adrenaline struck him as their skin touched. Her skin was softer than the silk he’d used to make blankets, and every nerve strained to feel more.

Calvin shrugged off the momentary paralysis, pulling his arm back, only for Learner to catch it, giving his skin a fascinated look.

“Remarkable,” She murmured, sliding her palm across his forearm in a way that kicked his heart in the ass and sent tingles all the way up into his scalp.

Calvin froze as Learner slid forward, taking her other hand and running it over Calvin’s shoulder, no longer bothering to cover herself.

“Calvin?” she asked, moving closer as the skin of her leg slid against his. Her nipples began to brush against his skin as she was only inches away from his lips.

“Yeah?” Calvin asked, barely able to breathe.

“In response to recent events, my parasympathetic nervous system appears to have triggered a state of arousal that inhibits rational thinking and demands sexual catharsis.”

Calvin would have laughed if her lips hadn’t smothered his.