Epilogue

Vinri took a week off before returning to her lab. She was dead tired after running around naked all night, so she mostly just lay in bed or lazed around her apartment.

Ezza had come over one night to pick up her prototype and had stayed to hear about Vinri's embarrassing adventure. Quite a lot of booze had been consumed that night, so Vinri wasn't exactly sure whether she'd told Ezza about her new fetish. The night had ended with Ezza trying to explain the intricacies of chronarchy, but Vinri had once again been too drunk to understand. At least Ezza was happy that her prototype worked.

The only work Vinri had done during her vacation was to submit a request to have her lab repaired. She had expected to hear nothing back for at least a month. But, to her surprise, she received a message saying that the repairs had been completed after just a week.

So here she was again, at the same Izzet generatorium. She still refused to wear a hard hat, but made sure to wear her shock-resistant coveralls this time.

It was busier than the last time she'd been in the generatorium. Multiple engineers and guildmages were buzzing about, including Bilkix and Head Engineer Vexwell.

When Vexwell spotted Vinri, the human interrupted her conversation with Bilkix and walked towards her. Bilkix shot Vinri a disgruntled glare from behind Vexwell, but he didn't dare complain.

"There you are, Vinri." Vexwell extended a hand towards her. "Let me be the first to congratulate you on your success."

Vinri blinked at Vexwell before remembering herself and shaking her hand.

"Um... thank you?"

"We're all very curious about how you did it, and why you chose that particular shape."

Vinri was officially lost. None of her recent experiments could be called a success, especially her last one. Letting Vexwell know she had no idea what she was talking about was a bad idea, though. Impressing her could lead to better resources for Vinri's experiments.

"Yes, of course. I'll answer your questions... but first, I..."

Vinri fell silent. She couldn't come up with a good excuse. Fortunately, Vexwell did it for her.

"Of course. All engineers are the same. You want to see your refurbished lab. Don't let me keep you."

Vexwell turned away from Vinri, allowing her to hurry to her lab. A few other engineers tried to ask her questions, but she pretended not to hear them.

Five gelectrodes turned their heads towards Vinri as she opened the door. Her lab looked exactly as it had before the explosion. Only the five weirdos inside their glass enclosure looked different. A typical gelectrode had a bulbous shape that could barely pass for humanoid. These five, however, were distinctly man-shaped.

Though perhaps woman-shaped would be more accurate. Their waists tapered inward before widening into rounded hips, and the bulbs on their chests could only be described as breasts. All five had exactly the same shape, and Vinri had the feeling that they had copied hers.

She had spent many moments standing naked in front of a mirror over the last week, and she was increasingly sure that the weirds had taken on her exact shape. The only time they could have copied her was a week ago, which meant that these gelectrodes had retained their form. The charge capacity needed for that was immense. No wonder Vexwell was impressed.

Vinri was beginning to form a hypothesis about what had happened, but she needed to test it. She locked the door of the lab, making sure no one could interrupt her. The weirds had received a high load of voltastic energy last week, but that was nothing new. No, it was their new form that had high charge retention, and they had formed it in response to another stimulus.

Vinri walked to the enclosure and took off her apron. The gelectrodes moved towards her, staring at her. She unbuttoned her coverall, and the gelectrodes' focus intensified. She let the coverall fall down and took off her shirt, baring her breasts. The gelectrodes' sparks doubled in number

Vinri didn't know how she was going to tell Vexwell about the voyeuristic weirds. But that was a problem for later. Now Vinri had naked experiments to perform. She continued her striptease for the weirds with a big smile on her blushing face.