ashleysburrow

[ashleysburrow]

The Best You

Ruby believed Penny to be perfect, but Penny isn't convinced. Ruby wants her to be the happiest she can be and obliges when she wants an upgrade.

This is a NSFW commission.

Consider all characters featured to be over 18 years of age.

Ruby believed Penny to be beautiful.

Not perfect. No one could be perfect. But Penny was perfect to her.

An easy feat, considering Ruby designed every inch of her from head to toe. What started off as a curiosity bloomed into something so much more.

Penny sat on the edge of a metal table, her legs dangling over the edge. She swung them back and forth while quietly humming to herself. The quiet parts of her voice buzzed as she reached the limits of her synthesiser, the ranges of the human voice it couldn't quite replicate. Most people wouldn't notice, but Ruby did.

It didn't make Penny any less perfect. She just thought of it as Penny's version of a vocal fry, that crispy, croaky noise girls could make when they dropped their voices especially low. For Penny it came up when she spoke just above a whisper and always, always when she hummed.

It helped make the quiet, messy workshop feel a little more homely. Ruby had parts and tools tossed all over the place, and the computer she'd set up to one side dominated the space. Cold, mechanical in an obvious way.

Penny's movements were uncannily precise. Her swinging legs stopped at precise angles in front and beneath her, never erring, never altering. Her upper body hardly moved, only shifting a little to the left and right as bodily mechanics demanded.

And yet she looked as natural as ever. Not a device on a metal slab but a person restlessly waiting atop a table.

Ruby tapped a few things one her tablet, and a large device from above started to descend down. Myriad cables dangled from it, powered tools on armatures. Half of everything Ruby needed to get started on whatever project she had in mind.

It caught Penny's attention, and her humming came to an abrupt halt with a questioning, "Hrm?" She angled her head straight up, stretching her neck. Vibrant red hair cascaded down her back while she blinked up at the carousel.

Ruby giggled and set the tablet aside. "Gosh you're so adorable."

The corners of Penny's lips curled up into a wide smile. "And so are you." Without hesitation. That was always Penny. Quick and earnest. Her tone, like the rest of her, seemed just a little off, a lack of emphasis and monotone in just the wrong way, but she had the right cadence. "I take it we are starting momentarily?"

"Yeah." Nodding, Ruby walked over to the table. A dark burn mark covered one corner, a remnant of an accident. She recalled Penny's half-bald head afterward and her nonchalance toward the whole ordeal.

She grasped Penny's hands. Cool to the touch, cooler than a human's, but not cold. Penny was never cold. Thumbs rubbed knuckles while she curled her fingers about Penny's. "Are you sure you still want to go through with this?"

The question had a finality about it, but there was nothing certain in the words. Not really. Just some changes, nothing permanent, nothing Ruby couldn't undo or adjust later.

But it felt wrong not to ask, even if it was Penny's idea.

Penny nodded and squeezed Ruby's hands in return. "I am ready."

Ruby looked down at Penny's body. She wore a spring green dress, with floral patterns crawling up from the hem. Ending at the knee and baring her collar and upper shoulders. She wore it almost all the time, barely getting dirty save for the few accidents Ruby happened to cause.

The exposed skin displayed the seams around her arms, at the elbows and and knees. The places Ruby hadn't quite figured out how to convincingly cover in material robust and flexible enough that it could deal with Penny's full range of motion.

It looked good, though. It reminded everyone of Penny's origins, and yet the little black lines looked wholly in place on her.

"Well, you're almost ready." The burn spread over Ruby's cheeks, a tingle at the bokes beneath her eyes.

Penny tilted her head, then followed Ruby's gaze. "Oh! Yes, of course."

She released Ruby, then crossed her arms at her front, pulling up the hem of her skirt. Lifting it revealed more of her thighs, her tummy, her chest. More seams, more lines.

The dress' removal also gave Ruby access to two important panels across Penny's body. The first a square over her stomach, which Ruby ran her fingers over from corner to corner. She'd need only push it in at the corners then pry it open on magnetic hinges, exposing part of Penny's power core.

Her heart, so to speak. The energy that let her tick. It needed periodic charging but there was a better way to do that than to go through her stomach. The age old idiom didn't quite prove itself true in that instance.

It hadn't come out by mistake, at least. Moving parts proved vulnerable, easy to break or open up without meaning to. They'd both learned that the hard way, and though each mistake proved to be a lesson that Ruby learned from she couldn't help but check, to be certain that nothing had gone wrong in the meantime.

With her hands on Penny's waist, Ruby turned her to the side. Penny lifted one leg onto the table to oblige while she folded up the garment in front of her before setting it down on her lap.

Ruby's fingers found the other panel hidden at Penny's back. This one acted as more of a terminal, something that only came to life when pressed in the right way. A sequence of touches across Penny's shoulder blades could either open the panel up, giving Ruby access to Penny's spinal stack and the chassis beneath for some deep maintenance, or it could be used for so much more.

Commands that needn't be spoken. How to turn Penny off, if necessary.

It seemed necessary, so Ruby started inputting the right sequence to begin a controlled shut down.

"How long will it take?" Penny asked.

"A few hours." Penny's bra got in the way. A small design flaw but one that didn't prove disastrous. She just unfastened it, the straps lurching forward as the tension went slack. Penny's hands raced to her chest and caught it before it slipped too far.

"Are you going to deactivate me?"

"I was about to." The answer didn't seem like enough. Penny struggled to articulate herself some days, to ask the right questions to get at what she wanted or needed. "Do you want me to?"

"No." Quick and earnest. No hesitation. "I want to stay awake for it."

That would complicate things a little, but it wasn't impossible. Penny could distract her, slowing her down or leading to small mistakes here and there. She might also react strangely to the procedure, but Ruby could always dumb things down or just deactivate parts of Penny's chassis.

"Are you sure?" Ruby asked. "It might be easier if you sleep."

"I am sure." Penny nodded, then pulled her bar off completely and set it atop her dress. "I want to see you work. I want to see what you do to me."

Chuckling, Ruby shifted her fingers, tapping out a different sequence. Cancelling the shutdown, allowing access via the at the back of Penny's head. Her hair covered it, hiding it well, but Ruby parted it to expose the wide, circular baseplate beneath. A polished chrome finish that glistened through her locks. "Are you saying you don't trust me?"

"What?" Penny's head jerked around, but Ruby curled her hand around to cup the back of it. "I always trust you, Ruby. I did not mean to imply—"

Ruby's other hand tugged on Penny's jaw, and she kissed the corner of her mouth. "That was a joke, Penny. I know you trust me."

"Oh." Penny blinked, eyes as green as spring grass staring into Ruby's. If Ruby didn't know any better she'd swear Penny was blushing right at that moment. Impossible, given the skin across her face had none of the functionality to allow it.

And yet Ruby saw it anyway.

After patting Penny's jaw, Ruby adjusted Penny's posture, pulling her fully onto the table. With a little hop she grasped one of the cables above and pulled it down, a ratcheting sound echoing off the walls. The cable ended in something that looked like a claw that ended in five distinct needles, a fat one in the centre.

Penny jerked when Ruby inserted it into the back of her head. A twitch, freckled shoulders rising to her ears, an arch to her back. She relaxed again after a few moments.

"Lay back for me," Ruby said, her hands holding onto Penny's shoulders. She helped pull her along until her head found a small cradle at the edge of the table with room for the claw and cable.

She stared down at Penny, and Penny stared up. All quiet except for Ruby's breathing and the faint hum of powerful electronics.

Naked, laid back, Penny was beautiful.

~~~~

Wind blew through the trees, stirring branches carrying early blossoms. In a few weeks they'd bloom, opening up to the world before the bright pink and peach petals fell and fluttered off with the breeze.

Penny and Ruby walked side by side, hand in hand. The green dress fluttered with Penny's every step, while Ruby slipped her free hand into a pair of denim shorts.

After months of cold and weeks of rain, the first sunny and arguably warm day of the year had come. Others took advantage of the March weather, dressed similarly to the two of them. Chatting, laughing.

Ruby only had eyes for Penny while Penny had eyes for everything else.

She didn't take it personally.

Always curious, Penny wanted to examine everything, question everything. Some might call it nosy but Ruby called it wonder. An endearing quality of someone that wanted to know all that life had to offer.

A flock of ducks quacked and swam across the surface of a lake to their left. Some lurked around the reeds at the far side while overs dared to linger closer to the nearer edge, eyeing the people sat at the water's edge with bread and feed. The largest formed quite the congregation around a couple stood side by side, another two girls.

"Should we go feed the ducks?" Ruby asked.

"Hm?" Penny's head twitched, and she half-turned to Ruby. "Feed the ducks?" she echoed.

On cue, several mallards started quacking and fluttering, drawing Penny's attention back to the lake. She made an excited, surprised sound, her cold fingers tightening around Ruby's. "Oh! Yes, I suppose we can." She laughed, albeit without raising her hand to her lips as she often did. It sounded forced, muted, uncertain.

Altogether not quite like Penny should do.

"Maybe we can find some feed for them. I think the kiosk up ahead sells bags." Ruby tried to pick up her pace, pull Penny along. She resisted as expected, but for longer than anticipated. The two of them stumbled at different speeds, both squeaking a little in surprise.

Ruby caught herself by reaching for Penny's other hand with her spare.

"Sorry, Ruby." Penny laughed the little fake laugh again.

Something bugged her.

"Penny for your thoughts?" Ruby asked. A silly pun, groan worthy under other situations. Between them, though, it meant a little more. 'Talk to me. I'm here for you.'

Penny thinned her lips, her eyes refusing to look into Ruby's. She looked over to the lake again.

The ducks didn't bother her. Perhaps an attempt at distract herself, though that would be atypical for Penny.

"Am I enough?" Penny asked.

The question took Ruby by surprise. She tilted her head in response. "What?"

"Am I enough for you, Ruby?" Penny repeated.

"Of course you are." Ruby squeezed Penny's hands tight, pulling them up to her chest. "You're more than enough for me. Where is this coming from?"

Penny pointed with her chin. A gesture made out of convenience, not derision as some might think. Another glance over, and Ruby figured out where Penny's gaze really fell.

The couple standing side by side. Their foreheads pressed together, noses squished in. One of them had a vibrant shock of red hair that fell all the way down her back, brave enough to wear a tank top and a miniskirt. Her sun-kissed skin had no blemishes, not even freckles on her arms and especially no seams or joins.

There had to be more about the couple that Ruby didn't notice. The girl had a figure more like Yang's, a little wider, taller, bustier.

That seemed far too shallow for Penny.

"I cannot help it when I look at others. I compare myself to them." Penny's arms went slack in Ruby's hands. Not withdrawn, but limp, dejected. "They seem to offer so much more than I can."

"Like emotionally? Physically?" Ruby giggled and brushed her nose over Penny's. "You have more than enough to give in both areas."

Penny shrugged. "Maybe. But I still worry, Ruby."

Biting her cheek, Ruby remained quiet as she thought.

"I could always try and change a few things," Ruby suggested. "I put you together. I can change things to make you feel happier, more comfortable." Her hands pressed Penny's together, all twenty entangled with a little pressure. "Would you like that?"

"Would you not?"

Ruby giggled. "I love you either way. You don't have to change yourself for me, but if it is what you want…" She let the rest of the statement linger, unspoken, so she could smile

~~~~

Penny lay on her back, her eyes closed.

She never slept. She never needed to, after all. The closest she ever came were the times she shut down or when she relaxed so fully, so completely, that she appeared dead to the world.

Not needing to breathe made her look close to a corpse, but she still had the colour of someone living, and all Ruby needed to do to reassure herself that everything was okay would be to call out to her darling girlfriend.

Ruby's hands remained around Penny's cheeks for a few moments more, thumbs brushing over them. A sculpture given life, Penny had changed in lots of little ways already. Nothing big, nothing grand, but she was unrecognisable to the old her that first awoke on the table years ago.

Ruby circled around Penny. Her hands trailed over her shoulder, to her bare arm. A finger nail jumped over the seams, stark black lines between vibrant pink. She followed one of the longer seams down past the elbow, down past the forearm and wrist and over the back of Penny's palm.

She had the replacement parts for almost every inch of Penny's body. Not just the bits Penny had picked out to upgrade but every arm and leg, entire facial features.

Ruby didn't like looking through them. Backups, redundancies in case Penny was damaged or broken. No one wanted to root through a box of their lovers' eyes.

She glanced over to the computer on the far side of the room. Data lines and points filled the screens, a few of the more important values blown up to be readable from where Ruby stood. Heat. Processing power. A stress signal, an amalgamated value calculated from a variety of subroutines that made up Penny's personality.

That one lay as a flat line higher than Ruby liked, but not alarmingly so. It'd be worthless on its own, anyway. It served as a reminder, telling Ruby to talk to Penny, keep her calm and collected as best she could.

Ruby reached up to the carousel and pulled on a few of the dangling contraptions and tools. A welding and cutting rig, a strop with loops meant for holding screwdrivers. She even pulled down a welding mask from up high, even if it was a bit over the top. Better to be safe and avoid the eye damage and burns from errant specks.

Once done, she squeezed the back of Penny's palm, then took the dress from her lap. She carried it over to a far edge of the room, laying it down on another table. The source of parts she needed whenever she fond a worn down joint or nut or a sticky hinge. The source of spare hands and tongues.

All custom made, modified from mannequins and measurements Ruby found online then tweaked to suit her desires and needs. They were made of different materials, of course, a variety dependent on the different parts they represented.

Hands and fingers were hard ceramic, built to resist shock and heat. Its why they tended to be cold, they sapped it away, radiated it out elsewhere. Penny's coolness meant she was healthy, operating as she should.

Legs, upper arms, and little pieces of torsos. They were made of something softer. Layers of silicone and gel built for similar purposes, but with some added flexibility and give. Things that were meant to bend with Penny as she leaned over or twisted, or naturally squished in under Ruby's touch.

A trolley had been prepared for the past few days. Covered with a tarp, it looked a little macabre to Ruby, especially given what lay beneath. She pulled it toward the table, toward Penny, the wheels rattling across the floor. She'd taken it from another workshop that would have rather thrown it out, deeming it as not fit for purpose.

Ruby found purpose in it, though.

It did what it needed to. It carried things, held them for Ruby, let her roll them around where she needed them most in her workshop.

She giggled, something short and bright.

Imperfect, but perfect for her. No need to improve it if it didn't ask for it, though she'd repair it when she needed.

Penny opened an eye, her head turned slightly. "Ruby?"

"It's nothing," Ruby responded. "Just finding life a little amusing."

"How so?"

Pulling the trolley up, Ruby let it bump the table and roll away a few inches. That made Penny jolt, and for the briefest moment a spike manifest on the stress monitor. Just a little blip, a little surprise.

"It keeps reminding me how perfect you are."

~~~~

Ruby wasn't exactly one to go clothes shopping, at least most of the time. She tended to wear the same things over and over and over. The same black and red hoodies she alternated between whenever they got stained, the same band t-shirts, a few different skirts, jeans, and jean-shorts. Hell, she'd worn the same sneakers for a few years now and could start feeling the texture of the ground through the soles.

That changed a lot once she had Penny around, though. Without an idea of where she got it from, Penny's little obsession with bright clothes and wanting to try on every darn outfit she laid eyes on had a tendency to exhaust Ruby. She never knew when it would end, when her wallet would find itself lighter. A constant war of attrition on Ruby's senses that kept her on her toes.

She did, however, absolutely adore Penny's enthusiasm.

She had a pretty good eye for fashion. Maybe she'd just subsumed colour theory and the science of good clothing better than Ruby could ever hope or care to do.

This time, though, they weren't shopping for new dresses or outfits, or at least that wasn't the primary purpose of their expedition.

They were body shopping. Superfluous upgrades, maybe, but its where Penny wanted to start and so Ruby agreed to it.

Penny considered the mannequin in the window. She'd pushed her brows together and down, her lips scrunched up to the side in a cute little ball. She only lacked the scrunched up, doppled chin, a feature Ruby skipped out on once she learned the mechanics of how that worked. She didn't need to be reminded of that whenever Penny got confused or lost in thought.

As far as Ruby could tell, most mannequins were built off the proportions of super models. That usually meant they were quite skinny and tall, though some stores had a little more variation. This store was one of them, its faux-people carrying a little more paunch to their bodies, a little more tummy and thigh and hip than most.

A little more mature in general, really, and squeezed into a pair of jeans that accentuated the figure. Mid-waist, they stopped a few inches shy of gracing the sharpest part of the abdominal dip, flared out at the wide hips.

"This is sort of what I had in mind," Penny said. Standing and talking was much better than silently sauntering off without an explanation. It meant they were making progress, though Ruby wasn't sure what kind just yet.

"Could you elaborate?" Ruby had a few guesses, but didn't want to voice them. For one, she worried she might put words into Penny's mouth, but moreover she might imply what she wanted Penny to do, taking away her agency, her perfection.

"I am not entirely sure," Penny said. "But it is closer. What models did you base me off?"

Blinking, Ruby rubbed the back of her head. "A few. I kind of just grabbed what I could." She chuckled and shrugged. "I had less money at the time so I didn't have a lot to work with after I sorted out parts and materials."

Penny hummed, then pinched her skirt and looked herself over. She erred on the side of skinny, closer to that super-model look though without as much of the height. Ruby had needed to adjust some of her proportions so she hadn't turned out too leggy or long in the arm, but it worked out well in the end.

"I think I like the butt and hips." She smoothed out her skirt, pinned it close to her own hips.

Ruby imagined Penny's hips widening out, matching the mannequins. How that might hike up her skirt a little, how it'd flutter behind her as she walked.

The urge to cough built up at the back of Ruby's throat, but she fought it hard when a hand dropped in front of her, patting down the front of her jeans. "It could look good on you," Ruby said diplomatically.

Penny nodded. "We can tick that box, then." She lifted her arms, crossing them under her chest.

"Hang on." Ruby stepped into Penny's field of view. "Let's not finalise anything just yet. Are you sure this is what you want?"

Penny's head tilted to one side like a confused puppy. Ruby realised how she sounded, and she didn't like the implied disapproval either.

"I--I mean, do we really want to settle on the first thing you think you like?" Ruby tittered, nervousness tingling at the tips of her fingers. "There's other places we can look, you know. We have an entire shopping mall we can go through."

Glimmering green eyes considered Ruby for a few moments, flickering between them. The pupils never changed, perfect dark pools in large, kind eyes.

"Is there something wrong with this choice?"

Ruby shook her head. "No. And nothing you choose is wrong, I just…" Ruby shook her hands out, trying to dislodge the anxiety as if it were just dirt under her nails. "I just want you to be sure. I want you to be happy with whatever choice you make. I know I'll be happy with whatever choice you make."

A few more moments of staring, of considered thought in a mind Ruby designed yet struggled to comprehend at times. "I think I understand," she said, breaking the silence. "If that is the case, then maybe I should look at a few more of these, and the clothes they are wearing."

"That sounds like a good idea," Ruby said. She realised she sighed it as much as spoke it. "It might be a good idea to buy some new clothes if you settle on this, anyway. I don't think you'll be able to fit the old stuff without, y'know…" Her eyes fell down to Penny's butt. "Showing off."

Penny's head tilted the other way. "You like looking at my butt, though." She let her hands drop to her sides, pinching her skirt and dragging it up a little.

Ruby whined, her cheeks tingling at the bone. "Not in public!" she sapped, her hands pushing Penny's back down, smoothing her skirt out again. "N-not normally, anyway."

Giggling, Penny turned her hands over and grasped Ruby by the wrist. "I think you like the sound of that," she said, dropping her voice low. She actually winked at Ruby, which drew a small whine from the mechanic's throat.

"L-let's go inside and look, dork."

With another giggle Penny dragged Ruby into the store.

The assortment of clothing within had been organised into different sections for different purposes, like all stores were. A section for jeans, a section for tops. Bikinis took up the front-right, slapped into the more traditional skinny super-model types.

Penny gravitated toward the dresses. Something about their comfort and ease of wear appealed to her, making them easy to slip on and remove. Not to mention they had fewer complexities to get pinched by her seams and joints.

That's where she started, though. Eyeing a few of the green, floral options, though she pointed out something cute, black and short that Ruby considered buying.

Were she braver about those sorts of dresses, perhaps. She had her own reasons to prefer skirts that at least reached her knees, or shorts that had good tightness and compression.

Eventually they wandered closer to the back, where things like underwear and accessories and the checkouts lived.

Penny pulled them toward the former. She had less reason to care for things like bras and panties, neither needing the support or some of the coverage. She wore them anyway, at Ruby's insistence, and partly because there were cute ensembles she herself loved wearing.

That's where It stood.

Another mannequin stood out from the rest. Not just because of its brazen choice of clothes, lacy lingerie that might not hide much if it weren't for the lack of colour on its body. Not just because it's body was a glossy black instead of the cream of every other model.

Penny stopped in front of it, stared up at it. The display pedestal made it taller than it seemed, though without it Ruby estimated it was about Penny's height. The featureless face looked over toward the entrance, confident in what it was, what it had to show.

It had the wider hips of those in the window, but also a much bigger rack. It reminded Ruby of her sister, of genes she'd dodged.

In the corner of Ruby's eye, Penny pat down her chest with one hand. She followed the diminutive curve of her own breasts, gently squeezing them in.

Penny wasn't, was she? She didn't need to look like that to appeal to Ruby. She had her heart already, and more besides.

And yet Ruby said nothing as Penny pointed to the glossy, curvaceous model. "That's what I want."

~~~~

Ruby never liked puzzles much as a kid. They felt a little aimless to her, just something to put together and make a pretty picture when one didn't have anything better to do.

Always so unexciting, uninteresting. Who wanted to just fit little shaped pieces together, really? And it always took up so much space. An entire table or the whole floor for the particularly big ones, and the small ones just weren't worth it to put together.

She understood the joy when it came to Penny.

She'd mostly disassembled her, arms and legs removed and attached to specialised claws and hooks that held them up and out of the way. Their removal had raised Penny's stress levels, though to her credit she still remained calm. No spikes, just a higher base line. Ruby could work with that just fine.

The old torso plates had been slapped onto the trolley. Grease marred the soft, gel-like skin where Ruby had pried them apart with her fingers alone.

That left Penny as mostly a skeleton from the shoulder down. Bare chassis, her core exposed. It didn't beat like Ruby's heart, as it had no blood to pump. Layers of wheels slowly whirled around the device in the centre, a gyroscope that conveyed a little extra power while also adding a little to Penny's balance.

Touching it could be dangerous. It spun fast enough that it could bruise at the best of times, the air hissing as it sliced through it like a cloud of knives.

With two hooks holding the latest torso plate up from the top, Ruby had her hands buried in Penny's chest mere inches from the power core. A small slip would cause injury to both of them.

Penny didn't mind, but Ruby felt certain if her vitals were on the screens she'd be maxing out the stress readout.

She had to carefully set up the joins that would allow the plate to slip into place. It had the flexibility at the front to allow Penny to curl her arms inward, a little bend near the bottom for her to bend down.

Ruby had pondered what to do with the added volume at the front. She could have made it useful. The good mark of an engineer and mechanic was that they were wizards when it came to economy of space.

The problem is the extra volume wasn't rigid. She couldn't put tools in there, plus there was the issue of how to access them.

She'd settled for just adding more gel in the end. It had the right firmness, the right weight. That's all that mattered for now. If she wanted to change something, she could later.

For now, she had to make sure the hinges were in place.

A spark from the soldering in launched up, and Ruby froze for a moment as surprise and fear overtook her for just a second.

Penny hummed. "What was that, Ruby?"

"Nothing to worry about." A tremor developed in Ruby's hands. She'd been tense for too long, bent over Penny at an awkward angle. She had to take a breather, relax.

She let the iron power down, raised its armature up so it was out of the way, and then she flipped her welding mask out of the way.

Ruby had grown far too accustomed to wearing it. She felt at home with it over her face, the coveralls protecting her from the random hot flecks she made when she worked on Penny's inners or whatever other project she'd taken up. She barely noticed the sweat beading down her forehead until the air rapidly cooled it, evaporated it.

A drop fell from her nose and onto Penny's cheek.

Penny slightly tilted her head. It was the only motor control she had remaining, at least for the moment. A small bend at the neck that slightly shifted a shoulder up.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

The absurdity of the question coming from Penny made Ruby laugh. She reached up to rub the side of her face but paused before coming into contact, before she smeared grease over her temple and cheek.

"I'm fine, Penny. Really." She used the same hand to wave forward, at the mess of pieces that made up her girlfriend. "It's just a lot of work, and it's taking a little longer than expected. I just need a little break."

Penny nodded. Or at least she tucked her chin down a little in something related to a nod. "How is it looking? Has everything gone well so far?"

"Nothing wrong so far." Ruby found herself bending over more and more, leaning ever closer to Penny's face. She didn't want to stare at the girl's skeleton, a masterpiece though it was. It just pushed the uncanny vibe at the back of Ruby's head to the forefront a little too much with Penny awake. "How are you feeling?"

"Tingly." Penny giggled. Normally one would need a diaphragm for that. "Is that normal?"

"It's not not-normal." Ruby laughed back. "I think that's kind of to be expected. I had some new firmware installed, and there's some new connections I'm in the middle of making. Everything will be tingly for a little bit until you get used to it."

Scrunching up her face, Penny moved her lips from one side of her jaw to the other. "I kind of like it," she said after a moment. "I think I can feel them."

Ruby blinked, her heart fluttering a moment. "Oh? Can you tell me a little more?"

Penny kept her face screwed up. Ruby wondered if Penny would have pinched her chin if she had arms, or experimentally reached for her bosom to try and get a little more information, a little more data.

"They feel heavy."

Ruby snorted. "That's because they are heavy, dork."

That got Penny to stick out her tongue. "The tingles feel more… Well, more the more I focus on them. I think I can feel my nipples, too. What do they feel like to you?"

"Wha…?" Unsure how to answer the question, Ruby gawked at Penny. It wasn't like she actively thought about the smaller parts of her body when they couldn't move.

"I don't really know how to answer that." Ruby snickered. "I guess there's a way we can be sure about it, though."

"How?"

Ruby straightened up and shuffled around the table, facing the torso plate from the other side. Her eyes focused on Penny's face, her flickering fields as they tried to anticipate what was about to come.

One small hand palmed a heavy breast, and Penny gasped.

"Is this where you're feeling everything?" Ruby asked. She A thumb and forefinger squeezed, denting the fake-skin in from either side. She ignored her own tingling in her cheeks and groin, doing her best to ignore the problem of her coveralls growing uncomfortable.

Another gasp, and Penny managed a nod.

There were meant to be tests. A whole checklist of things to go over, special tools to test the conductivity of the nerve-facsimiles under the upper gel layers.

But groping Penny was just so much more fun.

Putting pressure on Penny's tit squished it to the back of the plate, the more rigid section making the mound bulge out around Ruby's palm. A little more force and the plate folded forward until it lay flat over Penny's skeleton and clicked into place beneath her collar.

More emotional depth. Penny had plenty, but this added a little more.

Surprisingly, she managed to keep eye contact with Ruby, even as she kept squeezing and kneading her breast.

"How does that feel?" Ruby pitched her voice down, adding a little natural fry to it.

"G-good," Penny stammered out. "So good."

Chuckling, Ruby leaned down and kissed Penny, tasting another of her groans.

~~~~

Penny sat on the edge of the table once again, her legs mechanically swinging off the edge. She'd insisted on putting on the same dress she wore before the procedure, spring green contrasting beautifully with her vibrant red hair.

It was longer. Ruby took the opportunity to swap out the dermal layer over Penny's scalp so her hair reached down to her butt. That was purely Ruby's own indulgence, though she'd change it back in an instant if Penny asked.

Some of the longer locks framing her face fell over her shoulders and down the front of her chest. Where before the dress showed off her collar, the decolletage as Ruby'd seen it called before, her breasts threatened to spill over the top now.

They weren't even that big, to be quite honest, though Ruby was comparing them to certain others in her life that could put even the bustiest of models to shame.

Still, it made the usually innocent and demure Penny appear a little more lewd.

Ruby swore Penny knew what she was doing, with the way she pressed her biceps together to squish her tits forward.

It also no longer reached her knees. All that extra oomph around the bustline hiked it up a little, but the added wide around her waist also stretched the fabric out a little more.

She still passed for modest, even with all of that. Hot as hell, but cute and innocent all at the same time. Hotter still, in fact, with the dress on than when she was naked on the table.

Ruby sighed heavily from the computer desk. She used the surface to lean back, her hands bracing herself against it while she pressed one foot to the floor. She'd spent a while staring at Penny, admiring her beauty. Both unchanged and entirely different.

It was the grin, mostly. Probably. She couldn't recall seeing Penny so ecstatic.

"So," Ruby started. "Are you happy with how you've turned out?"

Penny nodded, then bit her lip as she looked down at her boobs again. Ruby did the same, a pang of jealousy tugging at her heart.

Mostly she was just curious what it was like to see a mile of one's own cleavage. She was fine being as small as she was.

"Good," Ruby said. "Most people need to win the genetic lottery or pay more than I did to look the way you do right now."

"That sounds inconvenient." Snickering, Penny slipped off the table, extended toes bracing her impact with the floor. She still bounced plenty, and something flexed in Ruby's gut.

While Penny had got dressed, Ruby had slipped into the little black dress they'd found the other day. It snugly fit her, conforming to her slim frame.

She'd sorely underestimated how short its skirt was. It left her thighs totally exposed, and if she wasn't careful then Penny would get an eyeful of Ruby's excitement.

And so Ruby didn't care to be careful. Let Penny look. She deserved to know what she was doing to her poor, organic girlfriend.

With her hands clasped behind her back, Penny sauntered closer to Ruby. Slow, steady steps, one bare foot directly in front of the other. The hard ceramic clicked off the floor.

"And you?" Penny asked. "Are you happy with it?"

"Yes." The answer came easy. She loved Penny anyway, with her upgrades or without. The only difference, the only one that was important, was that Penny felt happier, more comfortable in her own body.

And if it helped assure her everything between them was okay, Ruby would say it over and over and over again.

"You are perfect. You were before, and you are now." Ruby pushed herself off the table. She still wore her boots. An errant nail or screw would turn into a nightmare for her, and just a mild inconvenience for Penny.

The two came together. Ruby lay one hand on Penny's shoulder while the other curled around her hip, laying on the upper curve of her butt.

Penny, in an uncharacteristic moment of pure cheek, slipped a hand between Ruby's thighs and cupped her groin.

Ruby rose on her toes in response, a gasp on her lips and a blush across her cheeks. Her excitement lay in Penny's hands, her heart thundering through it. She wondered if Penny could feel that little detail, know what her touch did to Ruby as it ever so slightly twitched and shifted against the most sensitive parts of her body.

"You like this, though." Penny beamed, then squeezed Ruby a little tighter.

Ruby groaned, her own fingers digging into Penny's butt. With some small tugs she bunched up the fabric until her fingertips grasped the bare cleft before the thigh. "You okay with me taking you for a little, ah… test drive?"

Penny nodded, and the two giggled in unison as they closed together in one more perfect kiss.

[ashleysburrow]

Digital Pet (WhiteRose)

Weiss, a computer science major, needs help from her roommate. Ruby helps, but she accidentally triggers the special project Weiss was working on and gets trapped in her computer! This won't end badly, right?

Features: Digitisation, puppification, and a little shakeup of overall lewdness the further you get in~

This was a commissioned piece. Consider all characters included to be over 18 years of age.

With a grunt, Ruby hauled another table to the corner of the room. It collided with its compatriots, the various boxes and containers on top them rattling and shaking. An assorted collection of components with silly names, all anacronyms that meant nothing to her.

Weiss would know. She'd be able to name each and every silly doohicky and wotsit in the room, even the smaller things that had escaped and littered the floor before being kicked aside, skittering under the tables and desks. Add in a bed and a kitchenette and the place wouldn't look so different from their shared apartment.

It'd frustrate someone else, but Ruby had gotten used to it. Sleeping on the couch meant she had to deal with Weiss' particular brand of chaos.

Putting her hands on the small of her back, Ruby pushed her hips forward and stretched. Something clicked in her spine halfway up her back, then again further up a moment after that. "I thought working with computers was easier than this."

Weiss half-sat on the table they'd just moved together. One of half a dozen, cleared of workstations and monitors. She'd dressed rather plainly, but still managed to make the white button-up and powder blue skirt look pretty. Her pale skin and silver-white hair made her look like a washed out portrait.

She smiled at Ruby as she dusted off her hands, fingers clapping on her palms. "Normally it is," she said. "This is why I asked you to help."

The room looked weirdly bare. Most classrooms did when all the things that made them classrooms had been removed or misplaced. All the computers were piled up near the door, the dark towers carefully stacked on their sides. Ruby had the pleasure of putting their various cables into a box next to them, a nest of black rubber spilling over the top.

Only one computer remained plugged in, its screen showing the logo of the Beacon Institute of Technology. A circular wreath wrapped around the letters BIT.

They'd done all that to make room for the other things. A large TV linked to the workstation, and some large complicated device that sat in the centre of the room.

It reminded Ruby of one of those stereotypical contraptions people made to kill of spies in movies. A circular platform with a stool welded to it, and what appeared to be two ray guns on a pair of mechanical arms rising out from the ten- and two-o'clock positions.

Ruby flopped forward, her arms hanging in front of her thighs. She'd picked the wrong day to wear a hoodie. She thought she'd be lifting a computer or two, not re-arranging an entire room. Sweat dripped into her eyebrows, and her undershirt stuck uncomfortably to her.

Weiss at least had the decency to look a little exhausted. Not as sweaty as Ruby, but her chest rose and fell a little quicker and heavier.

"I wish I'd worn less," Ruby said. "Remind me why I helped you again?"

"Because I'm pretty and deserving of a helping hand." Weiss chuckled, and Ruby cracked a smile too. The statement wasn't exactly not-true. It had mostly come down to owing Weiss a favour, though. A helping hand for a helping hand. "And yes, you should have. What, are you wearing nothing under your sweatshirt?"

"Of course I am! I'm not Yang!" Ruby gave an exaggerated shiver, her arms crossing over her chest to grab their opposing biceps. "God, she'd do all this in a sports bra, wouldn't she?"

"That seems like her," Weiss said with another laugh. "Though she'd have the right idea here. I reckon you'd look better if you were in one." A beat, and a blush creeped over Weiss' cheeks. "Y-you'd look less sweaty and exhausted, I mean."

Hiding her smile with a turn of her head, Ruby shrugged at Weiss. She tried imagining herself working like that in here, or even coming to the computer labs. She'd get a lot of stares, probably. So many dweebs locked up, coding away.

She wouldn't mind Weiss staring, though.

"What even is this thing, anyway?" Ruby asked. She trudged on over to the machine in the centre of the room, lazily sliding her feet across the floor. Lifting her boots right then felt like too much effort.

"Matter-slash-energy conversion array," Weiss answered, as if that explained anything.

Ruby glanced over her shoulder, slowly blinking at Weiss. "Sure. And what does it do?"

Crossing her arms and rolling her eyes, Weiss shoved her butt off her makeshift seat. "I swear I've brought this up before. This is what I've based my entire thesis around." She then blinked herself. "I have brought it up, haven't I?"

Ruby shrugged again, slipping her hands into her pockets. "Maybe. I don't remember."

Weiss groaned and Ruby giggled.

"I do remember you mentioning like… 3D modelling stuff?" Ruby nudged Weiss' elbow with her own. "You spent an entire night complaining that Shredder or whatever it was didn't work so you had to get a student license for Mia—"

"Blender and Maya," Weiss corrected snappily. "And that didn't work either, for the record." she stepped around Ruby, then around the machine. Ruby followed a few steps behind. "I had to code a custom made program and simulator almost from scratch. I also had to lean on a few self-adjusting algorithms to make it more adaptive. Thank god those dorks in the deep learning labs were willing to give me a few pointers."

Ruby stared forward. Half the words didn't mean much of anything to her, and the other half just didn't matter. She just nodded along anyway, happy that Weiss at least had something to be passionate about.

"So… What does it do?" she asked again. Weiss punched her in the shoulder. "Ow!"

"Bad girl. That's for being snarky." Weiss crossed her arms and pouted. She played it up nowadays, a far cry from the prissy freshman Ruby bought coffee off a few years ago.

"Come on, you know I don't mean anything by it." Dropping into a half-crouch, Ruby cupped her chin in her palms and curling her fingers up while giving Weiss a kissy face. "I'm just a silly wittle girl who wants to have fun."

"God you're like a puppy sometimes." Weiss planted her hand flat on Ruby's face, squishing her nose and lips.

Ruby licked the hand back. The arm flailed as Weiss shrieked in disgust, and Ruby stumbled backward as she cackled with glee. She wrapped an arm around her tummy and reached out for something to brace herself, meeting a soft, plastic stool. Something clicked under it, but it otherwise took her weight without issue.

Holding her hand before her like a dirty handkerchief, Weiss' face pulled back in a grimace. "Ew! That doesn't give you permission to act like one, you know!"

"I'm pretty well behaved as far as puppies go." Ruby beamed back at Weiss as she shuffled backward, eventually falling to sit on the machine's stool. It moved a little, a small drop and a click, but Ruby hardly reacted to it.

"I feel you could go a few more weeks getting clicker trained," Weiss muttered. "Can you not sit on the sensitive equipment? It's a sample stand, not a seat."

Ruby tilted her head. "Oh, pssh. I'm a light girl. It'll be fine."

"If I tell you, 'down girl', would that work?"

"Guess you'll have to try," Ruby snapped back, then stuck her tongue out.

With a sigh, Weiss lowered her shoulders and wiped her hand on her skirt. "Lets go get coffee. I'll pay."

Ruby gave a little fistpump, then started to rise, standing up tall once again. Another click, and then the arms slowly started to turn around the baseplate. That gave Ruby pause, stopping herself mid-step as they orbited, steadily gaining speed.

"…Uh. What's happening?"

Weiss blinked. "Something that shouldn't."

"Is the something a thing I should be worried about?" Ruby tucked her arms to her sides as the ray gun things angled up, aiming at her head. They didn't have any barrels, no holes or anything, but she sure felt like she'd been trapped between two electric coils.

"No, no. It's probably just booted into a maintenance cycle or something." Weiss started off toward the singular workstation, pulling up the chair in front. "There's still a few bugs in the code I need to iron out. This one is mild, as far as they go."

"I wouldn't call metal spinny things mild." Ruby probably could step out, if she were quick enough. Sure, if she messed up she'd get bruised and battered a little, but she'd probably be fine.

She moved a little. "Stay!" Weiss snapped, and Ruby stopped. "If you take another step you might break something."

"So what do I do?" Ruby turned her head, looking over her shoulder at Weiss. The wheeled in TV had turned on, too, showing numbers and graphs that meant absolutely nothing to her. "Just stand here until it's done?"

"Yes," Weiss answered.

"How long is that going to take?"

"Could be a few minutes. Could be an hour. I'm trying to figure out which and if I can cut it off early. It won't be happy but I can probably fix that more easily than a snapped actuator or burnt motor." Fingers tapped away on the keyboard, though it seemed Weiss had no urgency.

"Cool. Great." Ruby huffed and slouched. "Hey, you never actually said what this is for—"

Another click, followed by an electric hum and whine. The hair on the back of Ruby's neck stood on end, matching the tingle running up and down her spine, radiating out to her arms and legs. The arms' rotation sped up, and the complex ends started to twitch, like two excited, mechanical birds looking her over.

They moved too fast for Ruby to jump between. "Weiss!"

Weiss' fingers flew over the keys, though it appeared she had little luck. More angry red error messages popped up on the screen. "I don't—It's not supposed to do this yet. Goddamnit, one of those idiots must have fiddled with something when I sent the code over." She leaned down sideways, reaching for a thick cable running from the baseplate. "This is going to be expensive," she muttered.

"My coffee's gonna be expensive as an apology!" Ruby whined as the ends of the arms glowed a vibrant blue, the air crackling in their wake. "Just turn it off!"

Weiss followed the cable underneath the desk, her head and shoulders disappearing as she fell to her knees. The whine turned sharp, then vanished as Ruby shut her eyes.

Everything fell silent. No whining motors, no furious typing. Even the heat suddenly seemed to have vanished, the breeze produced by the whirling arms.

Ruby swallowed. "Is it off?"

No answer.

Ruby opened her eyes.

The lab was gone replaced by limitless grey. Endless. No floor or ceiling or walls, no furniture or place to rest.

That didn't seem right. Going blind, as far as Ruby expected, should mean seeing only darkness, or something to that effect.. The pure greyout definitely went against her expectations.

At least, that's what she thought had happened until she looked at her hands. They appeared normal. Slender fingers at the end of skinny arms, wriggling to her commands. She even had shadows, though glancing up revealed nothing like a lamp or the sun.

"Okay…" She had no reason to think she'd gone deaf, but Ruby appreciated that she could still hear her own voice, and the faint hiss of skin brushing over skin. It really struck her how the absence of any other sounds made all the little noises she made stand out. "Weiss?"

Ruby did her best to turn on one spot, not daring to stray an inch from it. For all she knew the whirling were still there and she was hallucinating. Matching her new expectations, Ruby saw neither the TV nor workstation nor Weiss' cute butt poking out from under the desk.

"I still don't know what that thing does, do I?" Grunting to herself, Ruby tried to slide her hands into her hoodie pockets, only for her fingers to brush her bare tummy.

She blinked, and finally looked down a little more. Her cheeks burned hot, and she quickly wrapped one arm over her breasts while the other splayed out over her groin.

If Ruby was hallucinating, she hoped that extended to that, too. Was Weiss checking her out?

Ruby swallowed down a squeak and looked up again, getting her confirmation.

It looked like a window. A big, slightly curved rectangle that bore down on Ruby. She recognised the classroom through it, the tables pushed to the sides, the still whirling machine. Above all, Weiss' blushing face filled most of the image.

"That worked!?" Weiss' voice pitched high, an incredulous whine unique to her, usually reserved for those times she wanted to be indignant or had been genuinely offended. "Of all the times I tested it, it worked on you? I can't believe it!" Slapping her hands on the desk, Weiss leaned forward. "Are you… Are you really in there?"

Ruby's puzzlement crinkled her face, contorting her eyebrows so tightly her forehead ached. "Yes? What's going on? Where am I?"

"Oh god. This wasn't how this was supposed to play out. We haven't even gotten around to testing biological matter." Weiss straightened herself up in the image. "Ruby, I need you to remain calm. Don't start screaming or panicking. Everything is okay."

Scowling and whining, Ruby's voice turned as shrill as Weiss' did moments ago. "No one starts off by telling you not to panic when everything is okay!"

"What did I just—" Weiss growled and disappeared from view, save for the crown of her head, the ponytail slipping down one shoulder. "This is going to be such a pain in the ass."

"What is going on!?" Ruby shouted.

Weiss flinched before slowly lifting up her head. She didn't look at Ruby, not directly. She seemed to look at something in front of her or beneath her. Her boobs, maybe.

That urged Ruby to curl her shoulders in a little and squeeze her arm tighter to herself.

"Listen, this is… It's a machine that turns physical matter into energy and stores the information to be output later. It's got a lot of proposed uses that I could spend hours expounding on right here and now but the important thing is you seem to be okay." Grimacing again, Weiss glanced aside. "For a given definition of okay."

Turning matter into energy? Storing information? What was—

Some TV show Ruby'd been sat down in front of a few weeks prior came to the forefront of Ruby's mind. "L-like that transporter thingy?" she asked.

Weiss' grimace turned into a scowl, but before she bit back she drew in a deep breath. "Sort of. I'm amazed you connected those dots, honestly, but that I think that means you understand."

Slowly spinning around, Ruby again tried to spot anything that could tell her where she'd ended up. Just a hint, some sort of lab or sofa or anything. Her expectations remained met, though, and no random signs or furniture or signage or even a gosh-darn door made itself known.

"So… where am I? Can you come get me and bring me my clothes?"

Something tugged at the corner of Weiss' face yet again. Another thin-lipped grimace, as well as a light pink to her cheeks.

"What does that face mean, Weiss?"

"About finding you. Uh…" Reaching forward, Weiss' hand disappeared at the bottom edge of her projected image, followed by several thuds and a slight shake. Whatever rumbled the picture did nothing to Ruby. "You're in the computer."

Something gripped Ruby's chest, but she bit back the whine. "what?"

"It's okay!" Weiss shouted quickly, hands up either side of her head. "We just need to get you back out! Restore you how you were. I just need to get the machine running again and then…"

Ruby didn't like the way Weiss trailed off. She didn't like the way she looked down, then back at the once-whirling machine. It sat still, the bulbous ends of each arm hanging slack.

"Mmh. That might be trickier than I thought."

Ruby stamped a foot on the floor, though the lack of sound made the entire gesture seem pointless. She meant to go for emphatic, attention grabbing. It just came across as pitiful. "Weiss!"

"So. Uh." Weiss turned back to Ruby with a thin, uncertain smile. "This might take a while to fix, so you're stuck for now."

After a few long, slow blinks, Ruby fell to the floor, her legs splayed out around her. She had to be in a dream, right? She'd got bonked on the head by one of the spinning arms and her unconscious mind conjured up some absurd scenario, preying on Ruby's feelings.

Yeah, there wasn't another explanation for it. Why else would Ruby be naked in Weiss' computer? She probably had dreams like that before, put on display for the girl she liked. She just couldn't remember the last time.

If they were anything like Ruby's current predicament, maybe that would be for the best.

"I'll need to do some work to make sure everything is okay." Weiss's attention dipped down, her fingers loudly click-a-clacking on the keyboard. "I mean, everything is okay, but it pays to be thorough."

Ruby stared up, watching Weiss work. At least she still appeared in her dreams. Weiss might be the cause of half of Ruby's problems, but that didn't mean she had to be at fault. The girl was far too pretty for that.

Something itched Ruby's scalp, and she reached up to scratch it. Just to the front and right of her crown. Oddly intense, though that rather neatly summed up the past few minutes, really.

"Huh," Weiss said. "This really is adaptive. Your file is big. Like, really big."

"I had to be big somewhere." Though she didn't find her own joke funny, she laughed anyway. Weak, meandering, but the attempt was made.

Weiss' lips twitched up in something a little more earnest. Not out of politeness, but genuine humour. That calmed Ruby a little, and the urge to make herself small lessened a little. "You're fine. I li—er, people like short skinny girls."

"Try saying that when you're Yang's younger sister."

More twitching, and Weiss let out a sharp little huff through her nostrils. The tiniest little laugh, like she'd just read a mildly funny meme. "There's a lot of variables here I've never accounted for." Humming, Weiss leaned in closer again. "I wonder if I can…"

Her mouse clicked, and an arm slide from one side to the other. At the same time the anxiety dominating Ruby's chest almost vanished entirely. She sat up a little straighter, the hand between her thighs pushing at the floor to support her weight.

Her scalp itched.

"Okay. How are you feeling, Ruby?" Weiss lay her hands on the desk, one arm over the other. She still leant forward, though now it felt less like being an experiment to pick apart and more akin to a friend showing genuine interest in someone they care about.

Ruby opened her mouth, the words, 'Okay, I guess,' floating on her tongue. That wasn't quite right, though. Things were definitely not okay, and yet the panic from earlier had vanished entirely. She was trapped, sure, but Weiss was there to look after her.

"Okay, I guess." It was the best summary of how she felt. "What did you do?"

"Don't worry about it," Weiss said. "Sit tight for now. I'm going to spend a little while—"

Noise to Weiss' left caught her attention, though Ruby made out little more than snippets of conversation. Weiss quickly turned around, her back pushed up to what Ruby presumed to be the computer's monitor. Though Ruby wanted to know what was happening, she kept her mouth shut.

"Just maintenance," Weiss said. Her voice was short and clipped, higher than normal. That shrill, indignant noise when she was insulted, or caught out.

The indistinct voice sounded displeased.

"I had to pull the plug. It, uh…" Even when nervous, Weiss' giggle sounded like pleasing birdsong. "Sorry. Is it going to be hard to fix?"

…

"All day? That's not good, but hopefully that's all we need. Do you need me to help?"

…

"Oof. Okay, well, just remember that you need me for the software. Let me wrap up quickly, and I will get out of your hair."

Turning back around, Weiss stared directly at Ruby. Her shirt hung down a little, letting Ruby see down her front. Weiss never wore much that came close to revealing, so even inadvertently giving Ruby a glimpse at her breasts and belly summoned Ruby's blush again.

Weiss paused long enough to stare into Ruby's eyes. A hand crossed over her shirt, holding it close to her chest. She bit her lip, fingers scrunching up the polyester until she let go and tugged the front down just a little more. Just a bit more skin illuminated by the monitor, the curve of cleavage disappearing into shadow.

That distracted Ruby enough that she didn't notice Weiss start tapping away. Drowsiness overtook Ruby, her only warning something was happening, and then she went out like a light.

Ruby awoke in the grey again. She still sat where she did before Weiss did whatever she did. It was a sudden resumption of consciousness, eyes still looking up at the projection above her.

It had changed a little. instead of it being wide, this looked narrow. Weiss' face filled most of the image, but Ruby caught glimpsed of red brick and white stone, grass and sky. She looked to be on the move from the glimpses of people and signage around her.

"Ruby?" Weiss asked.

"I'm here. Wherever here is."

"My phone," Weiss answered. "Turns out making the software smartphone friendly paid off." She must have been tapping away at something on the phone, but whatever it was remained mysterious to Ruby. Her arms relaxed, with one resting on her thighs while the other reached up to scratch the top of her head.

"A day?" Ruby asked. "What do they need to do?"

"Mechanical assessment," Weiss said flatly. "Pulling the plug might have broken some of the moving parts, but I think we're fine. I'll just need to sneak in tonight and we can get you back."

That didn't seem too bad. Aside from the bland surroundings, Ruby could see herself comfortably managing for however many hours that would take. She might get hungry or bored, which still sucks, but she'd be fine.

"What's going to happen between now and then?" Ruby curled her fingers up on her thighs. She couldn't feel the ground under her. The only reasons he knew it was there came down to the fact she didn't fall, and she experienced some sort of pressure in her knees and feet. Beyond that her brain convinced itself she could reach under and grab her leg unobstructed. Her hands, meanwhile, remained real, her nails idly scratching her skin.

"I figured I can use this opportunity for some… experimentation." The smile and glint in Weiss' eyes sent a shiver down Ruby's back. "Something went wrong, but I can still get some useful data out of this. First, though…"

Something snapped around Ruby, mostly around her hips and chest. With a squeak she looked down at herself. A sports bra and a sporty panties fit snugly around her, perfect for her size. A sense of relief washed over her, though not as intensely as she'd expected.

"Thank god," she started to mutter, but then her eyes fall down her back. She'd been stuck in a thong, not panties, the fabric leaving her cheeks on show.

Though they were damn good cheeks. Still, she reached around and clasped her hands behind her, obscuring her buttocks as best she could.

"D-does it have to be this?" Ruby asked.

"Uh…" Weiss' lips thinned out. "That's all I have for you. Again, dorks must have messed with my files." She cleared her throat. "Still, it's better than nothing. I felt kind of creepy leaving you totally without."

Unfolding herself, Ruby rose to her feet. Further examination of her new clothes revealed just how small they were, regardless of their comfortable fit. The top had a low cut while the bottoms rode low, and fit overly snug behind her. If she tried to actually exercise in them Ruby was fairly sure they'd slip just enough to flash someone.

Heat radiated from Ruby's face, but she made no effort to cover herself again. For one, it's not like her hands would be any better than the scant elastic, For two, the more she thought about it, the less she seemed to mind Weiss eyeing her up. She had been for the past however long it had been since she'd ended up zapped, anyway.

"Before we go further," Weiss said, keeping her voice low, "I'm going to ask if you're okay with this. I've found variables for mental state, and program on my phone can do a little…" She hummed, hestitating. "Physical editing."

Ruby's cheeks ached. "Uh." The sound came out like a squeak. "I guess? But I want to know what you're going to do."

Weiss seemed to stop moving, then reached into the bag slung over her shoulder. Ruby must have been out for a few minutes, she realised. Still, whole and in one piece. Out came something white, a small little device she slipped into an ear.

"So remember that headband you got as a joke present from Yang a while back? The one with the dog ears?"

Ruby nodded. "Yeah? What does—" She went quiet and blinked slowly. She could guess where Weiss wanted to take that. "Oh! Oh, I guess that's okay! That actually sounds kind of fun and cute."

Chuckling, Weiss rolled her shoulders back. "I'm glad you think so. Now, let's see where we can start…"

Further tapping away at the screen, Weiss leaned back. "Let's start with what we can do physically, then," she said. "I think I have just the thing…"

Patiently, Ruby stood there, staring up. Her hands locked together, and as she rocked on her feet she knocked them forward off her thighs, making them swing before slapping back against her. She appreciated how focused her friend looked, the way her brow crinkled as she worked away. So serious, yet it made her look younger. Ruby expected Weiss to look pissed whenever she had to concentrate, and yet all she could think was how adorable she appeared.

Something brushed Ruby's butt, and with a squeak she swung around on the spot. It stood out, a thing amongst nothing, and it touched her.

There was nothing behind her except the endless grey. Ruby stared ahead, hands at her sides. Did she imagine that? She thought her mind remained fairly sound but she was certain that the thing felt had been real.

It touched her again, and she spun again. This time she caught whatever it was in the corner of her eye, and continued spinning around. It moved too fast for her to make out any details, aside from it being long, dark and fluffy. She held out a hand to try and snatch at it.

"Weiss!" She whined. "There's something in here with me!"

"What?" Weiss's finger tapped the screen hard enough Ruby heard it. "There can't be. You're the only thing in there. You must be—"

One last throw of her hand, Ruby struck out and snatched the thing chasing her and pulled hard. "Got ya—ow!"

Long, thick, fluffy. She held the thing tight, but it snaked down her arm, then her hip, trailing back to somewhere above her butt. Twisting an uncomfortable amount, Ruby stared at the newfound tail jutting from her backside

She growled and looked up at a giggling Weiss. "You could have warned me!"

"I thought I did!" Weiss managed before snorting. "How does it feel?"

Ruby gave her tail another gentle tug, then followed it back, her fingers creeping along it as if she were crawling up a particularly fluffy rope. Long, black fluff that ended in the same faded red as the rest of her hair, it looked like a perfect fit for her.

No, not just looked, it was a perfect fit. "Weird," Ruby answered. "But… Good?"

The appendage twitched, and for a moment Ruby thought it tried to escape. When it twitched again, and again, the figured out what was happening. Glancing at where it jut out above her ass, she could see the first few inches wriggling side to side.

Was she wagging?

"Can you give me more than that?" Weiss prompted. "Do you actually feel it? Can you control it?"

Ruby tried squeezing her tail a little tighter, and a shiver shot up her back. "Ooh… Y-yeah. I can feel it. Not sure about controlling it, though…" Releasing her tail, Ruby tied to concentrate on the twitching, writhing muscles behind her. She could centre on them, knew they were hers from the way they twisted and ached like those in her arms and legs, but her tail started waving away heedless of her instructions.

"That makes sense. I wonder if that might require some practice on your part."

Weiss' finger got to work again. Unseen, but the sound of a finger bumping glass thudded through the phone and into the mic. Ruby's scalp itched again, and she shot up a hand to scratch at it.

Her tail wagged faster, enough to make her butt wiggle, as she fondled something stiff and pointy. Convex on one side, concave on the other, and covered in fluff from the base by her scalp all the way to the tip.

With her other hand, Ruby pat the other side of her head, finding an identical protrusion there. The fluff under her fingers rose up, and a counter-shiver ran from her scalp and down her back. More radiated over her shoulders, around her waist and hips.

She applied pressure to the tips, pushing them down. It felt just like pressing her own ears, with a similar sort of straining resistance before she ran out of stiff cartilage, and the whole thing flicked back into place.

"This feels too quick," Ruby muttered.

Weiss hummed. "What do you mean? Am I doing too much at once?" She sounded louder, crisper. Her usual high pitch sounded a little deeper, too, but not wrong. Just… very noticeable. No other noise mattered when she spoke.

Ruby shook her head. "No, I mean it's just instant. I thought it'd be slower! Like it'd take time to grow or something?"

"You're currently a bunch of data," Weiss said. "I'm just ticking boxes and loading new assets on you."

Whining, Ruby pulled her hands up in front of her. "I guess so, but… I don't know. It doesn't feel so fun."

With a quirk of an eyebrow, Weiss subdued her front. "Are you saying you're not enjoying this? I can stop any time if it's a bother. I wouldn't want to make my good girl unhappy."

Wagwagwag. Ruby's body went stiff, her back going straight and arms falling to her sides. "I-I'm not unhappy! We can keep going!" More details floated in Ruby's mind about the strangeness of it all, how it just… happened. She kept quiet, though. It felt wrong to bring that up in case it sounded like further protest.

Giggling, Weiss nodded. "Atta girl." Weiss looked up for a moment, her head quickly turning to one side then the other. "Okay, I think I have the data I wanted. Let's get back to our place and I can try and get a nap in before tonight."

Weiss cleared her throat, stretching it out enough that it bobbed a little before her. "And for being a good girl, I'll let you have a reward," she added, her voice getting a little quiet and creaky. A fry that Ruby's knees went weak for.

The contrast from feeling nothing to a heat radiating from her core set Ruby to panting. She placed her hands on her belly and sent yet another tingle across her skin. The flesh felt tender but good, and her fingers pressed a little further into the muscle. Soft and pleasant, the pressure chased the heat out, up to her chest and down to her hips, her thighs, her groin.

She swallowed and looked down. Other than the tail waving side to side behind her, she looked no different, at least as far as Ruby could tell. Just a flat tummy, little beads of sweat building up across her light skin.

Wrapping both hands around her gut, Ruby let off a whine and looked back up at the screen. "What did you…?"

She trailed off, the screen dark, save for shimmers of blue-tinted light at the edges. Wind battered the mic, but Weiss didn't respond to her question.

As far as she could tell, Ruby had been left alone with her prize, whatever it was. Her tail slowed, her confusion making her forehead ache, but she endeavoured to explore the new sensations more. Her arms moved up and down like an opening scissor, one reaching to her chest and the other to the front of her hips.

The higher hand pressed her skin a little more, near her collar and throat, then inched down. The thin skin and muscle gave way to soft mounds of fat and flesh. Touching them now sent fireworks off in her brain, not just a little tingle at the back but a full chorus of whizzes and bangs that drove her hand onward, into the cup of the sports bra.

Snug as it was, it gave her hand little space to squeeze in. It forced her breast against her ribcage, her fingers digging into the top layers of her boob.

She wanted more, to find out how it felt without the bra's compression complicating things. Ruby tucked her hand in further around and used it as a lever to push the bra aside and half-way tug her tit out to the air.

She expected a tingle, sweat covered skin to pucker now she'd exposed it to cold air. The skin still went tight, but mostly from the absurdity of what she'd just done.

She told herself that she wasn't like this, a part of her brain gripping onto the idea that Ruby was a good girl who only touched herself in private, in her own room. Yet she hadn't had her own room for quite some time now. Sure, Weiss could come back at any point, see Ruby tugging her bra down her torso, the straps slipping down her biceps, but was that really so bad?

She had just seen her naked, after all. There'd be no shame in just… enjoying herself a little.

Cupping her breasts, Ruby's knees shook under her. Everything felt so much more, for some reason, and her tail shook her ass vigorously behind her. She squeezed the little mounds hard and whimpered, while a shockwave blasted across her front. Her arms tensed, hands curling up across her chest with her fingers scratching the skin lightly.

With a breathy laugh, Ruby reached a hand down her front. If touching her boobs felt that good, then surely, surely touching her clit would feel even better.

Fingers wriggled down the front of her sporty thong. Low cat and narrow, its tightness didn't matter so much. She found the little nubbin at the front and gasped in surprise.

It was as if all control of her body left her, all to focus on the sharp edifice of pleasure focused on her finger and clit. Her strength fled from her knees and she fell with a thud to the floor. She'd expected to hurt, but it merely happened, a faint acknowledgement.

Stiff, she waited in mild fear that even just a small rub would erase the world around her.

Her eyes blinked back into focus. Not on the grey, of course, nor on herself.

They focused on Weiss' big blue eyes as she stared down at Ruby, her usually pale cheeks two bright red patches threatening to merge together over her nose.

Ruby's tail never stopped wagging. "It's not what it looks like?"

"Pretty sure it's exactly what it looks like," Weiss muttered. "But I suppose I did give you a nudge in the right direction." Sucking in her bottom lip, her eyes flicked up and down Ruby's body. "Hands off."

The twitch in Ruby's hands surprised her, but she didn't fight it beyond just a little counter jerk. They pulled away from her breast and crotch, one falling to her thighs and the other reaching to her head, scratching an itch beside one of her new canine ears. That put her on full display to Weiss, and she whined.

With a tilt of her head, Weiss smiled. "I am surprised that worked so well. How did it feel?"

Ruby held a deep breath, then let it out slowly. "It felt good," she answered, slow and airy. "What did you do?"

"Like I said, I gave you a little present. No sense in letting my new puppy get bored, right?" She giggled, then seemed to fall onto something. Ruby recognised the fabric pattern. Their couch in their apartment.

Ruby ached. She hadn't expected to ache even after just that little touch, the heat burning up into a roaring flame in her gut and lower. She tried reaching down again, and while her hands obeyed her most of the way, they kept just above what she wanted to touch, an invisible forcefield without any pressure.

She should have been able to overcome it. The thought in her head, the command from Weiss, overpowered the impulses to her limbs. 'Hands off'.

Ruby gulped. "Can I…?"

"Mmh… Can you?" Weiss chuckled. "Maybe. You have to answer a question first, though."

Weiss brought the camera closer to her face, filling the projection. She licked her lips, making them shine. Ruby wanted to kiss them, or for Weiss to kiss her on the lips or elsewhere.

"Do you know what you are?"

Ruby blinked. "Ruby?" she asked, pointing to herself with one lazy hand.

Weiss rolled her eyes. "Yes, but what else?"

Furrowing her brow, Ruby looked forward into the grey. That was an open ended question with no lead to it. A friend? A girl? A puppy?

"A… girl… friend?" she asked. Maybe she was. Maybe their situation changed with everything else.

"A girl, yes. But what kind of girl?" Weiss' smile showed teeth, her lips turned up enough it almost turned into a snarl. "There's a lot of different kind of girls, after all."

"A… good girl?" The question came out in a squeak, unsure of itself. The tail slowed, though it never came to a stop. The arc simply had less energy, but enough to kick her hip to one side.

She was a good girl, right? She helped Weiss today. Lots of lifting, and then testing. Doing all the things she was told to.

She had to be a good girl.

"Mmh…" Weiss looked aside, pursing her lips. She hummed, dodging the answer. Dodging even looking at Ruby, who started crawling forward as if proximity would encourage the answer. As if she could even get closer.

"Right?" Ruby whined.

Finally that piercing blue gaze fell back onto Ruby. "Yes. You are a good girl."

Like a magic word were spoken, Ruby's tail resumed its frantic waving. She fell back onto her haunches, kneeling on the ground, and she tucked her arms up in front of her chest. Not touching, but hovering. "I am!?"

Weiss giggled and nodded. "Yes you are. You have been a very good girl for me today. So you get your full reward."

Weiss' projection zoomed out fully. She had laid back across the couch, her ponytail separated out like half-formed wings under her shoulders. She also had a hand draped across her chest, over the white dress-shirt.

A shirt that had been unbuttoned down to the navel.

Fingers trailed across Weiss' front, and she tugged the shirt aside, just a little. Enough for her bra to show, and then she tugged that aside a little too, the fabric stretching. Showing herself off to Ruby, Weiss breathed slow, ragged breaths. "Paws on."

Hands clapped onto Ruby's body before she even realised what the words meant. She resumed groping her breast, and she slid two fingers back down the front of her thong, over her clit.

She made a whining half-bark when she penetrated herself, digits slipping into her folds while her thumb took over the joy of teasing her love-button.

"You were waiting for that for a while, huh?" Weiss chuckled, her laugh uncharacteristically low. "How long, I wonder? Just today? The past few months?" She clucked her tongue, then rolled it around in her mouth, in front of her teeth but behind her lips. "I hope this lasts when I restore you. You're going to bring mommy a lot of relief."

Ruby barked again. Her breaths came in sharper and shorter, the increasing ache in her cunt and up her belly growing stronger. It coupled with a fluttering of muscles, squeezing her fingers, dancing under her forearm.

"I'll have to think of a few other things we can do to you." Weiss' hand squeezed her own boob, her middle finger pressing down on her nipple. Enough of the faintly pink areola peeked around the fingertip, at least until the mound dented around it. "God I needed this so bad. This is going to be great."

Compelled to bark again, Ruby only stifled it when she tried to moan halfway through. Her fingers didn't just dance inside, they twisted and delved deeper, while her thumb used its entire length as a violin's bow across her clit. As if pinching herself with each thrust in and pull out, she squeezed her pussy tight with both her hand and her muscles.

"S-so great," Ruby managed to say.

"No more words," Weiss said. "Barks and whines only. Let me hear you sing."

Like a good puppy, Ruby sang proudly.