The next morning at seven sharp, Rachael was back at the front desk, booting up the laptop. It was raining outside, and for a while she closed her eyes and just listened. The sound soothed her mild headache, and allowed her to collect her thoughts, as slow-moving as they were this early in the morning. Most of them were centered on Onyx. The woman was idealized, impossible, yet she had been there. And she'd played Rachael like an erhu, to get a keycard she couldn't have. There were ways Rachael could avoid getting in trouble for that if it came to it, stories she could weave, but she felt guilty about it. If only her attraction to Onyx had been less blindingly obvious, maybe she could have escaped. But surely she couldn't be the only one who'd react that way to such a goddess.
Her reverie was interrupted by the sounds of delighted laughter and clacking heels. Rachael opened her eyes to see Onyx with her arm around Angel, guiding her into the lobby. The two vixens were wearing matching outfits: latex red-and-green schoolgirl skirts, lacy white gloves and socks, and fire-engine red stilettos with ridiculous heels. They wore their hair in large pigtails tied with ribbons, and had pendants around their necks: Angel's set with what looked like diamond, Onyx's with her namesake stone. Angel must have been wearing some serious support, as she filled out her low-cut white blouse quite well, though not as well as Onyx did. But what really caught Rachael�s attention was that Angel�s tanned arms were also well on the way to catching up with as Onyx�s. That was unexpected, but Angel had been wearing long sleeves the day before. Maybe Onyx gave her some 'roids. Wait, is Angel taller, too? Shit, I need caffeine.
�Hey, Rachael, do you know where we can find some breakfast around here?� Onyx called out.
�Go straight out the door a block and turn left, dining hall�s a block further on the right. Or there�s a bagel place a block after, but it won�t be open yet. Wait, are you two seriously going out dressed like that this early?�
�Why not?� Onyx stuck her chest out, nearly sending her generous cleavage spilling out of the tight top. Angel, tardily, imitated the maneuver. �We're students, aren't we?�
Rachael sighed, kneading her forehead in frustration. What could she even say to that?
�. . . Sure. Well, uh, stay safe, I guess.�
�Oh, we will.� Onyx grinned and led her new lover out the revolving door, their twinly round hips exaggeratedly swaying in tandem. Rachael�s eyes locked onto the sexualized display for a second too long, but she managed to force her gaze away, drag herself out of the chair, and run to the vending machine to get a Diet Coke. She drank it quickly, trying to sort out the morning's new information, and miserably failing.
Onyx smoothly stepped into the buffet line, Angel following closely behind. She grabbed several plates, scooping out a huge mountain of scrambled eggs on one, then building towers of sausage patties, bacon, hash browns, and other greasy fare. Angel looked at her with abject horror, as if she�d just stepped on a cat.
�I should explain. Once you have the Seraph factor in your bloodstream, it helps if you eat a lot, so it can bulk up your muscles and enhance you in other ways. Don�t worry about nutritional content; it�s a lot easier to turn even fatty food into muscle and boobs than it is to, say, eat a table. Actually, if you do that, it�ll probably hurt -- so stick to food. Oh yeah, your tits will get bigger, too.�
Angel giggled, and quickly began shoveling food onto her plates even faster than Onyx.
It was too early for the dining hall to be very crowded, so there were a lot of empty tables, but Onyx didn�t seem interested in them. Instead, she scanned the room, examining the few large groups in attendance. Eventually, she whispered something in Angel�s ear, and half-shoved the blonde forward in one table's direction. Onyx retreated behind a column, out of Angel's sight if still attracting stares from elsewhere.
�My name's Angel Fawn. Mind if I sit here?� She smiled sweetly.
�Wow, ah . . . no ma�am,� volunteered an earnest blond guy with a slight drawl. He was tall and well-built, and seemed to have some sort of leadership role, judging from the way some of his tablemates looked at him. Most, however, had caught sight of the scantily clad blonde, and were staring, some more ashamedly than others. "I'm Jacob." He held out his hand to shake, which Angel took. Though the girl's musculature still looked modest, her handshake was firmer than Jacob's, which visibly shocked him.
�So are you athletes?� Angel asked, a bit flatly, and still standing, although she deposited her food tray on the table.
�Most of us. This is a Fellowship of Christian Athletes prayer breakfast, but it�s open to everyone, of course. I�m on the soccer team myself -- just back from the weight room. How about you, ma'am? You look . . . fit.� The young man was doing a great job conversationally, given that he was now short of breath, sweating, and hard.
Angel hesitated for a moment before delivering her prepared line. "The only thing that's a bigger waste of time than sports is religion."
The boy's face fell. He started to say something, make some defense, but soon Angel's hand was on his shoulder, and the thought left him.
"Don't you agree?" Angel pressed the issue, as she pressed her white blouse against the back of Jacob's seated head. The boy gasped at the feeling of breastflesh. His indecision left him -- he was going to say whatever Angel wanted, to feel like that.
"Yes, of course," he managed, hardly noticing the strange, stabbing pain at his neck. "So would you like to--"
Angel slapped him, shockingly hard. Jacob looked at her, incredulous, the red mark slowly fading.
"You slime!" she shouted. "I guess you'd say anything just to try to get into my pants, huh? Well, the joke's on you. I don't even like boys."
At which point she grabbed her food and stomped away in a pique. and put her arm around Onyx as the taller girl strode to meet her. The couple made their way to an empty table and began to eat alone, smiling. At the other table, Jacob stiffened for a few moments, understandably, then recovered and tried to eat, with a heavy expression on his face. No one looked at him -- most were straining to get a glimpse of the two girls halfway across the room.
Angel looked around, confirming they were out of anyone's easy earshot. "Was I good?" she asked.
"You were perfect. So did you enjoy it?"
"Yes." The blonde paused, and undid a button on her blouse. "I don't know why, though . . ."
"That's easy. It's because I made you enjoy it. You don't have a problem with that, do you?"
Angel was silent.
"You don't, Angel."
The girl flinched slightly. "No."
The two looked at each other for a few seconds. Onyx seemed deep in thought.
"Do you think I believe what I told you to say?"
"I don't know."
Another pause.
Onyx, icily: "If I want you to believe something, I will say so. What I wanted you to do was hurt him. Which you enjoyed, properly, because you enjoy my orders. So it is, my pet."
Angel smiled, and sighed. She felt quite warm . . . was it just her?
Onyx resumed eating, a bit more slowly. She eased a forkful of hashbrowns into her mouth and swallowed -- her muscles seemed to bulge out every time she ate. Angel's weren't doing that. She looked at her arms, a bit confused. Onyx noticed, and grinned.
"Remember what I told you this morning, when I gave you the initial enhancements, about pulling up the Seraph overlay? Do the mantra." She saw Angel mouth tchalli tchalli, and go slightly blank in the eyes. "Well, you kind of gave it away, but at least I can see you're in. Okay, you should be able to lift the blockage to the first enhancement, you can sort of see it around the arms and legs, right?"
Angel's perspective shifted as each point of her body, and the environment around her, seemed to unfold into a labyrinth of properties, permutations and connections with each other. The dizzying array had her largely lost, especially as its only explanation was in the chip's mysterious High Speech script. Whatever its origin, she couldn't transliterate it, much less understand it, save a few brief examples she'd learned from Onyx earlier in the morning. But in a moment she calmed herself, and was able to remember the sequence that Onyx had shown her.
She followed the path rotely, without full understanding. But when the procedure was finished, the feeling was unmistakable -- a rush of relief throughout the body. She disengaged as the heat left her in a rush, and, after another brief moment of lostness, saw normally again. Angel quickly moved to redo the button on her blouse, but upon seeing her breasts slowly bulging out, decided to keep it that way. She turned to look at her arms, which pulsed as if she were flexing every muscle, then pulsed again as if the first flex was their baseline. She inhaled sharply at the sight of her growing power.
"May I ask a question?"
Onyx gestured to go ahead, taking a bite of egg.
"Why did you want to reward Jacob with a Seraph chip?"
The raven-haired amazon snorted, managed to swallow, and let out a huge laugh. "It's not a gift if I don't activate his powers. Which I won't . . . he's a boy."
Angel looked slightly taken aback by Onyx's contempt, but slowly nodded. If she was expecting an explanation, she wouldn't get it from Onyx, who moved on.
"He's a carrier, compelled to distribute the chip, like you did to him. But he's not aware of what he's doing, and his powers aren't activated. He's not special, like you . . ." Onyx trailed off -- her phone was vibrating. Either a wrong number, or . . . Shit!
"I gotta use the restroom. Don't get into too much trouble, okay?"
Angel nodded distractedly.
There was only one girl in the bathroom, but a bit of trivial brainwave manipulation and she quickly decided to use a bathroom somewhere else. Onyx ran into a stall and jabbed her phone to answer. She rolled her eyes at hearing the unmistakable voice of Marshal Surin.
�You took your sweet time answering, Lieutenant Varsah.�
�That is not my name.�
�Your name was divinely ordained. You have no power to change these things, nor do I.�
�I didn�t change jack shit, it was the rest of you who fucked up. Look, Surin, this isn�t negotiable. You know what your options are. You can call me by my chosen High Tongue name, which you know. Or you can call me by my Earth alias, which I�ve left in my file. But you will not call me what you called me today, or I will be done talking to you, and quite possibly done talking to any of your superiors as well, whatever the outcome proves to be.�
�Very well. I will humor you for now . . . Lilya.� The name nearly stuck in his throat. �But I do not know why I am doing so, as we have not yet received a status report.�
�Is your clock busted or something? I was asked to file a status update every 48 Earth hours. I�ve been on the ground for 21. A report will be filed at that time.�
�A report �will be filed,� huh? Will I get to see it?�
�As soon as you�ve been authorized to see planetary takeover status reports. I�m done breaking the law for you. As I told you. And Marshal, please check your encryption. There is a chance that what you�re using now could be broken, should Earth show interest in the transmission�s origin.�
�Well, why would Earth show interest in a routine interstellar call?�
�Earth doesn�t have routine interstellar calls. Sir.�
There was a long pause on the other end of the line.
�Good day, Lieutenant. Lilya.� The line went dead.
Onyx punched a hole straight through the stall. She didn�t bother to fix it before she walked out.
Something seriously weird is going on, thought Rachael. Things have been weird ever since Onyx showed up, yeah, but even that doesn�t explain this. Every girl Rachael had checked in so far this morning had acted . . . strange around her. It had taken her a while to piece together what it was. At first she thought she had hurt herself, or gotten dirty, or something, and people were staring at that. But nothing showed up in the bathroom mirror. Then she noticed the way they were looking at her. The hungry way.
"Here to check in? Name?"
"Jessica Scott."
Yep. Like everyone else, the cute, modestly dressed black girl was blatantly staring at her chest. (Her practically non-existent chest. Rachael risked a downwards glance just to make sure. Yep, still flat.) When the girl, embarrassed, eventually glanced up at Rachael's face, she still gave the same enraptured, slightly faraway look.
it was nighttime and she was jabbing something in Jess's neck and the girl was still and she commanded her to rise and Rachael's huge boobs jiggled and something in her panties was straining to get out and she was so strong and it would soon be time
"Erm . . ."
"Oh yes, your card, right. Here."
Their fingers brushed, and both girls flinched.
Onyx staggered out of the bathroom, nearly stumbling before she braced herself against a post, gathered herself, and carefully started walking again. Angel, her food finished, stood up, her super-long new legs pulsing with energy. She was shocked at the scene -- she'd never known Onyx to lack poise.
"What happened? Onyx, are you all--"
With sudden force, Angel's owner grabbed her and brought her into an embrace. The two kissed, Onyx's tongue searching, less seeking pleasure than mere contact. After a short while she broke it off, looking improved but still distressed.
"I need you to go," the larger girl panted.
"What, why?"
"I have a mission for you. I need you to secure our dorm some privileges. Head to the administration building."
"I don't know what to do . . ."
"You'll feel it when you get there. Now go, quickly!"
Angel obediently hurried out of the dining hall. As soon as the girl was out of sight, Onyx sighed heavily and returned to her food. She nearly inhaled the rest of it, without growing any larger, and ran back in the direction of the dorms, looking a bit flushed.