This is a record by Nagato Yuki of her experiences examining the basement of the mysterious establishment. I began by making adjustments to my ocular input to permit visualisation along a wider section of the electromagnetic spectrum, and changes to my audio input so that it may double as a short range sonar. This experience provides only minimal discomfort for a humanoid interface, though it would presumably be extremely painful for a regular human.
Then I began to check the actual entrance of the secret base, which was in fact out of phase from normal reality. To make a simplistic explanation. Each dimension is a room and they are connected through hallways. This base had been moved into the hallway between dimensions, just barely connecting to this reality but inaccessible to anyone without the correct abilities.
As one may presume - since it is the societal norm across the universe - I was quite excited about aliens, sliders, espers and time travel in spite of being an alien and interacting with an esper and a time traveller.
In the back of my mind I could hear the rest of the data overmind giggling in a manner akin to a schoolgirl over our chance to finally meet a Slider.
"Yay!" I whispered under my breath, giving a barely perceptible fistpump to myself.
There was nobody in the first room that I entered, which was disappointing within a 3.58% degree of error. I kept my head down. Tactically it was prudent to minimise the chance of being seen before a chance for study could be performed. The room was occupied by rows of animals suspended in some form of fluid. There was a housecat - american shorthair, a rodent genus Rattus norvegicus, a hackney pony, a crow genus Corvus mellori and a salmon genus Salmo salar. The green tinted fluid was immediately analysed: As per prior hypothesis it was a universal anaesthetic/stasis compound. Extremely advanced technology. The creatures were unconscious, but unharmed.
This of course opened up questions as to why these rather mundane creatures had been collected. Was this an attempt to research the local biology? Or were the Sliders collectors of some kind? Mayhaps this was even a racial trait, to randomly grab animals for some later use, perhaps even consumption.
It seemed likely that they were not intending anything malicious based on first appearances. However, a further investigation was absolutely necessary at this point. Not least of which because of our own excitement about what Sliders were really and truly like.
I fist bumped the air again to eject that excitement, and then heard some approaching voices. Thinking quickly, I ducked behind a table and kept myself very quiet. The entirety of the data overmind was paying very close attention to everything that was being said.
"Man, this reality is <i>weird</i>!" said one voice, the data overmind working at high speed to translate as soon as the words were spoken. "What sort of nonsense have you dragged us into this time, Mr. Suzumiya?"
I barely held that in. It became necessary to focus my ocular input and adjust the retina to properly make out the reflections in the tanks in front of me. Applying the image filters in real time provided me with a proper estimation of what was happening out there in the room, and it was so shocking that I had to restrain from fist bumping the underside of the table.
“Don’t blame me Kyonko, even I am kinda weirded out by this place. But we are explorers! Cannot let a bit of ickiness stop us from doing our work!” Answered another voice and I had to resist twitching over what I had just heard. Again I feared that my ocular and audio organs were not functioning correctly. The next voice made things even worse.
"Ehhh, a n-native of this world just tried to j-j-jerk me off through my trousers!" a handsome, muscular and very pretty man said. The Slider identified as Mr. Suzumiya then turned to this man and lovingly caressed his cheek.
"There are times when I feel compelled to do the same," he said. "After all, I've seen you in the gym. It's really quite impressive, even if it pisses me off that you're that much bigger than me."
"Could we please not sexually harass each other?" The woman identified as Kyonko said, holding one hand up to her head like she felt a headache coming.
"Only if you and Koizumi ki~iss like you did at that Christmas party."
"... That only happened because you spiked the punch!"
It turned out that Kyonko was not the only one who could feel a headache coming. In point of fact, the entire data overmind was starting to feel what humans may consider a migraine developing. Perhaps the biggest headache recorded in the history of the universe was unfolding at this very moment.
The fact that neither the overmind nor humanoid interfaces were supposed to be capable of feeling headaches did nothing to help sadly.
Under different circumstances, I would have relished in this discovery and the new information that could be gleaned from it. The fact that apparently punch was a thing known in the multiverse, same with the holiday called christmas. There were so many questions, were the drinks the same there, did the holiday have the same origin and meaning? Now if only that headache would go away, I would be able to analyze all of this much more efficiently.
"It is my estimation that something peculiar is occuring within this dimension," said the last member. He sounded cool and stoic, and also incredibly cute. The reflection came into view: Hypothesis proved true. He was a rather short boy with a neutral expression and a slender physique. This was rather obviously my double from this parallel world. "Societal norms appear to be altering based on observed behaviour. There does not appear to be any visible reason for this, rather it seems to happen instantly. Current theory is a super-hivemind like connection among the local dominant species, homo sapiens. Perhaps someone is tinkering with it?”
"Now we're getting somewhere!" Suzumiya remarked, stalking up to their Yuki equivalent with a face that was beaming like the sun. "Hrn hrn hrn! But Yuki, cute little Yuki! You're talking too generally. What sort of societal norms do you mean?"
"In one moment it seemed as though romantic interaction between couples was fairly subdued, only permitting limited interaction and touch," the alternative Yuki explained. I found this ridiculous of course, for reasons that are not worth transcribing. "The next, it seemed that french kissing, fondling and further things were the norm for dates." Then my male counterpart lifted a finger and added another explanation. “In addition, earlier groping of the female chest appeared to be a unacceptable faux pas, now it seems to be something even strangers are permitted to do at their leisure.”
"Wh-What?!" Kyonko yelled. "That's awful, some truly evil pervert must be respo- Haru! Cut that out!"
"What? You know what they say Kyonko, when in Rome..."
I could not see from this angle what Haru was doing to Kyonko, but it did not take much imagination to determine the likely actions being taken.
"Um! I just noticed!" the Asahina equivalent suddenly said. "W-Where is Miss Koizumi?"
"Oh, she's off dealing with some local jerk's high score on one of their games," Haru said. "Let her have her fun, it'll let her blend in! That way she's bound to notice if some of these mysterious changes happen, right?"
"Th-That kind of thinking is so twisted it could only come from you..." Kyonko complained. "And, please take your hands away from there already!"
"Hrmm... What's wrong? You liked it when I did this last night."
"Sh-shut up! We didn't do anything last night!"
"Hrm... maybe that was in my dreams again? Oh well. They say they get bigger if you rub them."
"We should continue our analysis within the establishment," the Yuki equivalent said. "Current hypothesis: We are not being affected by the change to societal norms as we are not of this universe. Therefore if they occur within our own universe -"
"Ehhhhhhh?!" their Asahina gasped. It occured to me that Kyon would probably not find such a reaction as 'adorable' with that deeper voice. "Th-then if it happens in our own reality we'd be completely helpless! We - we wouldn't even know it was happening!"
"Kukuku... Good thinking, Yuki! Come on, team! Let's show this pervert the power, the teamwork and the perseverance of the SOS Explorers!"
"Sounds good to me, but <i>take your hand off already!</i>"
"Just trying to fit in with the locals..."
They filed out of the basement to continue their own investigation into something that did not make much sense. Alterations to societal norms that only they, as visitors to this reality, were capable of noticing? From that short conversation alone a lot of information had been provided for them to analyse. I had not even properly examined the contents of the basement yet to better understand their technology level or their goals.
That being said, there was one thing that absolutely had to be done.
"Yes!" I said, fistbumping the air so hard that the air pressure left a small dent in the ceiling. "Oh! This is <i>awesome!</i> Yes! Mmm! Feels good! Feels great! How was your day Yuki, oh not much to talk about only got to see some <i>fucking sliders</i> in the flesh!"
At which point a hand fell upon my shoulder that very nearly made me jump out of my skin. I turned to look and saw the smiling face of a man who wore their hair at medium length. All things being considered regarding the situation and the conversation, there was only one likely outcome to answer the question of who this person was.
"I'm pleased to see a Yuki double that isn't a shy bookworm, but still able to show emotions," said the Slider's equivalent of Ryoko Asakura. "However, as the SOS Explorer's appointed guard, I can hardly let you leave unhindered. Now can I?"
- Kyon was busy trying to flee.
- Koizumi meets his Slider double.
- Drunk Haruhi is warping reality around her in her quest to get into Kyon's trousers.
- Yuki escapes from Ryoko and tries to investigate what's going on.
- Something else
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