Blended Epilogue

This basement hasn’t received the same updates as the rest of the building. It’s tight, damp, and the floor is gritty. The already narrow halls are crowded with blue metal shelves full of white boxes covered in orange stickers. Air comes feebly through rusted vents, whispering past outdated notices that cover corkboards. Charitably described as tiny, Flores is often the last person to complain about not having enough space. This basement makes her feel claustrophobic. Following directions closely, something she is usually good at, she arrives at a door with a standard federal nameplate: SPECIAL AGENT ALICE WILDE.

She knocks.

“Sorry. Nobody down here but the FBI’s least wanted,” says a voice from within.

Flores enters a reasonably generous storage room being used as an office. Boxes and file cabinets occupy much of the space. Grainy printouts have been taped up all over the walls and the whiteboard. There are two computers, each with three monitors. A stack of old hard drives. Ancient media: CDs and even floppy disks. VHS tapes.

Flores peers closely at some of the printouts, which show smudged screen grabs from what appear to be the primitive online forums of the late nineties and early 2000s. Strings of numbers and characters.

A skeletal form is hunched at the desk, peering at a news site. She turns, looking curious. Alice Wilde is tall and thin. She wears masculine slacks with a shirt and tie. Her sleeves are rolled up, revealing pale forearms and a Timex wristwatch.

She sizes up Flores and forces a smile. “Got something for me?”

“My name’s Valeria Flores. I’ve been assigned to work with you.”

“I know about you, Flores. It’s nice to be popular,” Wilde says with a snort, shaking hands. “Who’d you piss off to get sent down here?”

“Actually, I’m interested in this assignment. I’ve heard a lot of things, and I’m curious to see if any of it is true.”

“And I thought you were just here to spy on me.”

“Why would you think that?”

BLENDED

The basement smells like concrete and old paper. There are entirely too many old boxes of junk, but mercifully few spiders. The Jameson-Dunham household is very good about getting the property sprayed every quarter.

There’s a meaty ka-chunk as Piper pulls the VHS tape out of the VCR. She hands it to Riley. “What do you think?”

“Must be grandpa’s. Mom says he was always taping old TV shows,” Riley replies, putting the tape into a box and handing Piper another one. “She said that’s how they lost the recording of her baptism.”

“OK, well, I don’t think we can go through all of these. And I promised Mary we’d have these sorted before she came home. So, I think we separate the tapes and keep them for now and get rid of this other stuff.”

“Sounds good, but what about this thing?” Riley pats the old TV that the VCR is hooked up to.

“I think we have to keep the setup if your mom ever wants to look at any of this.”

“OK. But you think the old vinyls can go?”

“They have to. They’re taking up too much space.”

BLENDED

“It’s still standing,” Mary reports cheerfully as the house comes into view.

“Can we go to Sonic?” Patty asks.

“I think you need some real food today, sweetie.”

“There was real food at camp. I want tater tots.”

“Why don’t we have tater tots with some real food?”

“I want Sonic tots,” Patty insists.

“We’ll see what your mom has to say.”

“She’ll take your side. She always takes your side.”

“You never know. She might want tots too,” Mary says, pulling into the driveway.

Patty’s out of the car in seconds and racing up to the porch. Mary climbs out and gets Patty’s bags, wilting in the heat just during the short walk to the door.

Cool air and music greet her as she lets herself in. Rapid footfalls upstairs tell her that Patty is going straight to her room. Piper’s in the kitchen, chopping vegetables in an apron.

“Hi, Mary. Want something to drink?”

Mary dumps Patty’s things and goes in, yanking her hair tie off. “God, yes. How are you?”

“Good.” Piper gets her a soda, then goes back to her cutting board, adding hard-boiled eggs to two Pyrex containers of attractive salad.

Bella hurries into the kitchen. “Aunt Mary! How was it?”

“Everything’s fine. Here?”

“Good.” Bella grabs one of the salads and hugs Piper. “Thanks, Piper.”

“Have fun.”

Mary watches Bella leave. “Where’s she going?”

“Habitat. CCL’s out there today.”

Kayla enters the room, dripping sweat, before Mary can say anything else. “Hey, Mom. Piper, the beds are done. Where’s the stuff for the weed whacker?”

“Stuff,” Piper echoes.

“The string.”

“Oh. In the garage, gray cabinet, top drawer. It’s orange. Do you know how to string it up?”

“I’ll figure it out,” Kayla says, taking a bottle of juice from the fridge. She plants a little kiss on Piper’s cheek on her way out of the kitchen.

Mary doesn’t have words. “Kayla’s doing yard work?”

“It’s a lot without you guys here. We all have to help,” Piper replies.

Riley appears. “Got my lunch?”

“Here you go.” Piper hands it over.

Riley takes the salad and hesitates, looking shyly at Piper. “Thanks,” she says. “Oh, hey, Mom. How’d it go?”

“Fine. Are you OK?” Mary asks.

“Yeah,” Riley says. She leaves with an obvious spring in her step. Mary turns to Piper, who is at the sink, washing her knife.

Her eyes narrow, and her phone starts to buzz. She answers the call. “Hey, babe.”

“Hi. Are you good? You sound weird,” Penny says. “Are you home yet?”

“I’m here.”

“Is it still standing?”

“Yeah. And everyone’s getting along. Kayla’s doing yard work. Bella’s leaving the house. Riley’s smiling.”

“None of that sounds right.”

“And Patty wants Sonic.”

“That sounds right. I guess putting Piper in charge was the right call.”

“I guess,” Mary murmurs uncertainly.

The End!

[ For now. As you see, Fridays have been reclaimed for futa stories for now, HS expected to return at some point. I am assuming that there would be interest in Blended 2: The Mother Load (working title) so I wouldn't be surprised if we see that as an option the next time Patrons pick a daily. Tomorrow, SSS. Sunday, Resident Futa Arousal. Monday, Resident Futa Requiem and A Very Problematic FF1 Special. Tuesday, hopefully, a brand new story will begin--although I'll probably try to post it on Monday because it often takes 24+ hours for new things to get approved here (understandably). Futa dailies should continue uninterrupted. I hope you liked Blended, please keep liking, commenting, feedbacking, and buying all of our playsets and toys. Thanks for reading! In terms of choices made, as always, they aren't divided into good/bad, but you made the "right" choices for Piper to solve everyone's problems (and thus earn a scene) except for Kylie. Staying home and not going to Game Night avoided a bunch of Kylie/CCL/Bella content, but I believe it got a little extra Riley content. There's also going to be a little update to Himbo Hurricane on Patreon today where Flynn Stackwell trims tree limbs in Ellen's yard? So that's exciting. Remember that on commissions, the queue will return at some point in August, so go nuts, do what thou whilst, nothing is forbidden. Have a great weekend, everyone. ]