Meta Experiments 6 (Inflation)

The Lab: Day One: Tamato


He waited an hour, twenty minutes after the absol had recovered somewhat. Her thoughts were in his visor, sorely tempting him to remove his helmet simply because of how tormented and depressing the thoughts were. Mostly along the lines of the pointlessness of life, but even harsher, the thoughts of hers that brought up the topic of how precious a living child was, and how her first pregnancy had been underage somewhat and resulted in many bodies that were for all intents and purposes dead.


Enough was enough.


“We are going to begin the last test today.” The man announced as calmly as he could, turning to his computers. “One more. One more and you can rest, Absol.”


A thought flashed by that ‘Absol’ wasn't her name, but he tucked that information away for later. Instead, he picked up the sole remaining item on the table. The Tamato berry.


He walked over and set it gently in front of the eerily still dark type. “...are you going to get this over with, or must I force you?


...I will never willingly touch that.


He nodded and returned to the computer, swiftly forcing the absol to gulp down the spicy fruit. She choked and spat fire, but the deed had been done. Now, all he had to do was wait.


Within a minute, her skin and fur and blades turned a bright red and she started sweating.


In her point of view, it already felt like someone had turned on an oven within her entire body, making everything extremely uncomfortable. She staggered and groaned as she felt the yet small amount of liquid in her belly slosh around ruthlessly. It made her queasy already; She already felt like she was burning up inside, simulating a fever while her uneasy stomach moved and accommodated more liquid extremely slowly.


She felt like throwing up, and then got an idea. She started shifting from side to side, feeling queasier and queasier, clenching her eyes shut as she fought down the need to stop causing that feeling, if she could get it out of her body…


It didn't happen like that. The absol was confused and scared amidst the self-inflicted sickness as to why she hadn't thrown up yet. All of these thoughts had reached the human that watched her.


“I told you, it doesn't work that way.” He said calmly. “Your body is advanced and… Different. It deals with sickness in ways that wouldn't threaten to infect others. That means no vomiting, no coughing or sneezing in a way that can release the illness to the air… While this all helps you stay healthy in other ways, it’s what made you a prime candidate for this strain of tests.”


Her heart sank at these words as she stilled, still feeling the liquid in her belly churn. She breathed out, and some fire did escape like before, although that was the basic side effect of a Tamato berry. The fire wasn't hot enough to cause burn damage, only to hurt. A lot…


She whimpered and shut her mouth, trying to contain the spicy and literal heat filling her senses and feeling disturbing in her continually filling stomach. She fought past the pain and looked down, seeing her belly had bulged somewhat in that same squishy way it had done when she consumed the oran berry.


Beginning to feel very full and still sweating, the absol sat on her haunches and pressed her paws against her squishy tummy. The unwelcome full feeling got worse as her belly tried to expand under her paws, her flesh pushing out between her claws. It was difficult to even mentally articulate her thoughts about going through this once again through all of the panting and small, weak flames and general pain.


The pressure became noticeable as the juices began to somehow extend into areas other than her stomach, just like the oran effect. As she felt the juices start flowing through her body; her bloodstream, her organs, including her lungs and she suspected her heart, and through to the various orifices on her body.


Filled with searing hot red juice as her lungs were, she found her breathing was difficult, but somehow not impossible, likely due to the magic used in it. Every labored breath released painful spicy flames as she felt the thick liquid begin to slowly flow up her throat and through the muscles between her esophagus and her skin.


As the liquid tormented her throat, she became oblivious to how her lean legs had begun fattening under the ever increasing juice pressure, as her body got rounder.


The absol whimpered painfully as she felt the invading liquid start to fill her face, bloating her cheeks and starting to reduce the space her mouth had to open even as her tongue was assaulted by the spicy berry juices and excess juice leaked from her open mouth.


After she spat out juice and fire alike, she suddenly painfully collapsed, her whole body rippling like a water balloon. She looked around to see that in her distraction, her legs had filled with juice until she couldn't hold herself up from the weight of her body and her legs wouldn't bend properly, forcing her to splay out her useless legs as she landed heavily on the floor. Her body still was in the process of rounding out.


Eventually, her head was pushed forward again as her ballooning body started to overtake her legs and neck, her cheeks finally puffing up enough to seal her leaking mouth, so her labored breaths were even more difficult. Now appearing like a huge red berry, the dark type wished she would just pop already.


But that didn't happen just yet. Painful pressure points originated all over her body, eliciting a pained whimper from her. More juice began to fill er, unnaturally extending parts of her body out into soft spikes that completed her image as a giant Tamato berry.


But the juice kept coming, and as blocked and-slash-or burnt as all of her senses were, she knew she maybe had five seconds…


The highest points of pressure were the spikes that were forced to extend from her, so after four seconds, that was where her skin split open and juice sprayed everywhere violently and she started shrinking as her body ejected the fluid and her vision started to blur as everything went into a worse state than it had the other times she had popped, feeling numb and sleepy, although her tongue still burned. She got her hopes up; was this where she would die?


Now, the heal pulse activated, violently expelling the liquid still in her before sewing up her wounds, leaving her exhausted on the floor, drenched on the outside in juice but back to her normal color otherwise.


“That’s all of them today, absol.” the human said. “Let's get you cleaned up, after we introduce you to your new home.”


She panted, not dignifying it with a mental response, and she hadn’t ever directly spoken aloud other than basic growls. Instead she just forced herself to look him in the eye and make it as obvious as possible how aware she was about how unjust her situation was. But she knew that the man would not yield now.


She got up shakily, seeing the man shut down the laptop that had controlled her so many times. He opened up the sealed door once more, entering and waiting for her to follow. The absol felt a need to rebel, but her conscious self told her that this time, it was five times unintelligent to do so. She did need a wash, she didn’t want to invite more tests by staying in the testing chamber, She was promised a home, or at least a room, she was never going to escape by staying in the one room that seemed the most sealed, and out there there may be pokemon in similar situations to hers to… Conspire with.


If she didn’t have her personal reasons for the way she ran her life, that last option might actually have mattered.


She got up, ignoring that her paws were sticking to the floor for the moment and followed the man. He took her a long way from the original room, moving into a corridor with many labels on the doors with various titles, but the absol did not read them. Instead she read the label on the door at the end. Subject 1. The human looked her in the eyes, even crouching to her level. And he then removed his helmet.


The absol thought about pouncing on him, but something held her back. Perhaps it was because she thought he might be about to give her useful information.


“This will be your home.” he said. “It says ‘Subject 1’ on it… But if you have a name, and you tell me, I’ll replace that tag on the door in a heartbeat.


”Why? Why go to all that trouble?” she wondered.


“Inside there’s a few things I’ll show you how to use. I don’t know how often you deal with technology, but…” he trailed off “You get the picture.”


He gestured to the black pad she hadn’t noticed at her eye level at the door. “That thing is already set to your paw pad. Just press it, and the door will open automatically for you. There is one inside as well, in case you would like to walk out. You now have free reign of the facility… On one condition.”


She blinked, watching him carefully and waiting for him to explain.


“The laptop I use to control you for our tests if need be is shut down. But there is another program, based in a human operated computer in the building, double password protected and through several doors you cannot open.” he said. “All it does is make you stay inside the grounds. There are outdoor areas for recreation or other things, but everything has visible borders. Simply put, you are as free as we can make you without losing you for testing.”


She stared at him, absorbing his explanation. She really had no idea what to say to that.


“Please, open it.” the human prompted, patting the door. She looked at her right forepaw, noticing that some very juice lingered on it. Deciding not to attack the human this time, because convincing him was her only option to get out of the facility in the end, she wiped it off as best she could and placed it on the black pad.


It swiftly chimed and the door swung open with a slight squeak. Inside was… Well, the absol couldn’t describe it in a single word. It would do it a disservice to try. She could tell from fifteen meters away that the bed was built for comfort, and would probably sink extremely comfortably when she got in it. Aside from this, the room had various things that would fit a human bedroom with some augments to hopefully let it prove useful to her, and all of them seemed state of the art. Then more doors branched off into rooms.


“The door to our left is the bathroom. Waterproof touchscreen operated, which should make it easy for you. Not sensitive to heat or anything, so your claws should work fine. To the right is an extra room for whichever purpose you would like. It’s empty right now, but if you make some requests I’ll make sure you get what you need.”


Then he stepped up to the bathroom door. “Because most locking mechanisms are for humans, yours is touch activated as well, right next to the pad to open the door. The door won’t open as long as the pad you touch to lock it is glowing red.” he explained, using the regular handle to open the door and lead her inside.


“I know you know I lied about the lack of surveillance in the last overhead shower.” the human stated plainly, opening the door. “Would you believe me this time if I said there was no surveillance in your bathroom or home?”


Even reading the mental response, it still caused him to wince somewhat when he received the telltale deadpan look. There was a pause between himself and the absol drenched in viscous red liquid, before he gestured to the open door. “There is no surveillance.” he promised truthfully, knowing the absol was about as likely to believe him as he was likely to share his condition.


“...Anyways.” he continued “Everything a bathroom needs. You turn on the fan for the shower over there, by the shower itself. It’s deep enough for you to take a bath in, which I think you would appreciate.”


The pokemon looked at the tub, wondering if drowning was worth it.


He probably sensed this using intuition, but didn’t push it for some reason.


“...Otherwise, I think you’re best suited discovering what you have here for yourself.” he decided, stepping out of the bathroom and getting on her level again as best he could. “Just remember. Not a single person in this facility can make you leave this room other than me.” he told her. It was not in the ‘you belong to me’ kind of way… Rather the ‘I hope to provide you with some feeling of security’ way. “Testing days are every other day. That means unless there’s a test that I have to do, nobody is ever going to take you out of here.”


That sounded… Acceptable. She couldn’t believe the word arose to her mind. Despite being a prisoner, she was essentially the most well treated prisoner she could imagine. And it was odd. She knew for absolute certainty that she would prefer to be back out in the world. But her life was officially overly complicated now, and she knew not what to think about the current situation in of itself. Only the torture she would apparently receive every other day was something she was absolutely sure what she thought of. That she had to do everything in her power to keep it from continuing.


The human had given her the option this time, if she could manage to drown herself in the tub, but then she realized that he had gone to extreme measures to keep her alive before. Looking at the tub again, she noticed that unlike the other structures, this one had black lines circling the base of the tub.


The human put his helmet back on. “Those send a signal to the system if the reading it gets on your vitals is dangerously low, and removes the water as swiftly as it can. Your unique and helpful internal structure will do the rest.”


”I should have expected such a safety feature…” she thought to herself.


“I’m going to leave you alone now.” the man said, standing and walking out of the door. “You’re a smart girl. If you need me to get you something, my name is Robert  Maple. Make sure when you send the message that it’s clear that I deal with it. That’s… Basically to make it easier for everyone else. So they don’t have to track me down, which will waste your time, their time, etcetera. And stress us all out.”


She could only nod, thinking about seeing if food could be brought to her. Then she turned away as the human left. On second thought, she twisted herself around and looked out into her main room, seeing the man close her door behind her, officially leaving her alone. She padded up to the door, noting that he had gotten out on his own. That must have meant he had a way through that paw scanning pad.


She didn’t know whether it was comforting or terrifying that she did in fact trust him enough to believe that he and her were the only ones who could access the room.


Instead of dwelling on it, she noted again that she was still dripping berry juice on her new hardwood floor. It would wash off, and she was glad the carpet spanned seven eighths of the room but left a path between her front door and the bathroom. This was almost a nice gesture, she thought, until her expression promptly flattened into a deadpan expression as she realized it would be because she’d probably often come in here having exploded because of something messy.


So cheery… she couldn’t help but think to herself as she stepped into the bathroom, and closed and locked the door as instructed. Then she looked at the bathtub. Quickly plugging the drain for a bath, having only had the shower before, and looked at the water system. One was a simple nozzle to fill the tub, the other was a shower head.


She did like rain, so she set the temperature to be very high and turned on the shower head, memories floating to the surface of her lying in the pond in her territory when it rained.


The water warmed up quickly, just enough for her to turn on the fan with the tip of her claw and hop in, immediately sitting down and noting the size of the tub. The water went up to her chest while she sat, which meant the tub was deep. Hoping she could always avoid incidents in which her paws slipped upon entering the tub, she finally tried to relax under the water.


”I don’t know what I’m going to go through, but I can relax now… Because I have a day off. I can worry about the torment they’ll put me through tomorrow… For now, I just want to take a bath in my pond on a rainy day...”