Melty Mercury From Outer Space: Chapter 14

Summary: Nikki is taken over by an extraterrestrial symbiote that changes her into a metal slime girl. While this comes with great power, she's unsure if she can control herself, or handle the extra baggage that comes with it.

[Story Listing]

[First Chapter]

[Previous Chapter]

Melty Mercury From Outer Space 

CHAPTER 14 

Nikki assured herself that she'd be fine heading home on foot. It'd be nice. Scenic. Get a brisk night walk done, work the cardio. It didn't much matter to her if she wasn't really alive in the biological sense anymore, it was for the experience at this point. She hoped it would take her minds off of things.

But she couldn't shake this nebulous anxious feeling in the back of her head. She couldn't pin it down. It didn't appear that the men in black were after her for now. Nobody was following her. But the longer she wandered out in public, alone, the more exposed she felt. Even appearing fully clothed, she felt naked, vulnerable. The anxiety gnawed at her. She wasn't sure if she was hungry yet... but she didn't want to get those pangs in public.

And wandering the streets like this was a bad idea. Especially while lost in her own thoughts. The cars driving up and down the roads, the street signage and light fixtures that could be found in every direction, the fences, the grates... the city was a veritable buffet for her. 

She gave other pedestrians a wide berth. She didn't want to bump into anyone. But she couldn't cause an incident. It would be so easy to cause an incident. Just start reaching out to grab anything... everything in sight, and just bring it all into her. To grow, and expand, and become bigger, so she could grow, and expand, and-

She clutched her head, swaying into the size of a brick building. She whimpered, shaking her head. The urges were getting more intrusive...

"Are you okay, miss?" A man in a business suit hailed her as he was passing by. He lowered his smartphone to get her attention.

"I'm fine..." Nikki smiled. "Just a little, ah... vertigo. Don't mind me. I'm, I'm feeling better already."

Nikki's forced smile wasn't terribly convincing, and the concern on the businessman's face was palpable... but he simply nodded and moved on, letting Nikki catch her breath. She straightened herself out with a grimace, glancing up to the streetlights above. Were people figuring her out? Did she forget how skin works? Did she have an unseemly gleam to her body? The stream of worries went on and on.

She needed to talk to someone. She needed a distraction, she needed to get out of her own head for a bit. 

She ducked into an alleyway, looking around to make sure absolutely no one saw her. She didn't see anyone, didn't hear anyone. She hid her hand behind her back; a smartphone materialized in her hand, her hand temporarily swirling with silvery pigment. She was quick about it.

She raised it to her head; the number was already punched in.

"...Brad? It's Nikki. ...Well, my night class got cancelled. Are you busy? ...Wanna go for a walk? ...T-There's nothing wrong, I just... wanted to see you."

One of Nikki's twintails reflexively rose up on its own, meeting Nikki's free hand as she twisted it in her palm absentmindedly. She bit her lip. 

"Wanna meet in the park? It's halfway between... okay. I'll meet you in the middle. Love you."

Nikki smiled weakly to herself, lowering her hand. She pressed her smartphone against her thigh; it quietly melted in without a trace. 

"...!"

Her arm tensed and she batted her twintail aside. It flopped to the side, no longer seemingly lifelike. She groaned, looking up to the city lights that streamed in from beyond the alleyway. 

She had to get going if she was gonna see Brad.

---

Byfield Park was a small park tucked away a couple blocks from the prime downtown real estate. While the municipal government was trying to give it a facelift to improve family life in the area, for years the land had a somewhat unsavory reputation, mostly for minor hooliganry and some minor drug dealing. 

Nowadays, they installed more light fixtures around the area to offer better visibility, and it made for a decent spot for couples to meet. By the time Nikki hoofed it over, Brad was already there. He wore a blazer jacket, leaning against a streetlight; his eyes followed the passing cars casually.

"...oh, Nikki." He spotted Nikki in the corner of his eye, straightening out and turning to face her. "...You still got your school stuff with you?"

Nikki glanced to her overburdened knapsack—remembering that it was an entirely pile of alien biomass in disguise—and forced a laugh.

"W-Well, I didn't go home yet, to... drop it off." Nikki explained. "So I guess I'm just gonna carry it with me."

"...I mean... are you sure you..." Brad grimaced, scratching his head. "...a-alright. It's a free country." He admitted with a beleaguered sigh. 

"It's like a little buddy! I'm... a little attached to it. Emotionally. Very sentimental." Nikki chuckled. She wasn't lying, perse. 

"Yeah, I'm seein' you everywhere with it lately. I guess it makes sense. You always liked having everything within reach." Brad folded his arms.

"Exactly! I'm ahead of the curve. Soon you're gonna see everyone rocking these big hiking knapsacks!" She cheered, returning to her usual good cheer. Brad couldn't help but laugh with her. The levity was short lived, though. 

"You wanna just... get a drink somewhere? You seemed really out of it over the phone." Brad tilted his head. Concern was written all over his face. 

"M-me?" Nikki blinked. She had to have been really obvious if Brad was picking up on her discomfort today. She rubbed her shoulder.

"...Mm... maybe a drink would do me some good." She smiled weakly. "I've just... I've been dealing with a lot lately."

"Yeah... I kinda got that vibe." Brad approached Nikki, gesturing towards the sidewalk. "Let's walk and talk. See if we can't find a nice bar along the way."

"Heh..." Nikki sighed. She wasn't sure how much that would help in her current condition. But she went along with the idea. "Sounds great."

It would make Brad more suspicious if she turned him down now. There was no way she could let Brad know about her condition. She'd have to come up with a convincing white lie about where she was mentally. Or perhaps only share part of the truth. 

"I dunno, it's just... just a lot of stuff going on all at once." Nikki admitted. "Mom keeps checking up on me to see if I'm settling in fine, the principal is breathing down my neck about my class plans for the high schoolers... and the parent-teacher open house is coming up in a hurry, and, woof some of the parents are just crazy." Nikki vented, trying to let off a breathy little laugh. 

"Eh? What's the deal with them? You already did a year at the high school, right? You got an in." Brad's eyebrow perked up.

"Parents are leery about single teachers, I dunno. They end up gravitating towards the older farts that look and talk like their grandpappies, but they see a younger teacher like me and they think I'm a damn teenager." She pouted. "I'm twenty four! I'm getting a Masters Degree! I don't need to prove anything to them."

"...Huh. I wonder..." Brad rubbed his chin. "You think you need a plus one?"

"...A-actually, the thought did cross my mind." Nikki chuckled. "I figured they'd confuse you for the P.E. teacher though."

"Heh, that'd be flattering." Brad shrugged. "I think it'd be fun, I... I do wanna be a bigger part of your life. Schmoozing with some gawky parents doesn't seem all that bad, in the grand scheme of things." 

"...Aw... I didn't know you felt that way." Nikki tilted her head with a warm smile.

"Well, like, it's just an idea. The other guys in the gym talk about their lovelives, and everything they do with their sig others. Pascal is always going on about stuff like, weaving palm fronds on the beach with his boyfriend. I wonder if we could go 'n' make stories like that..."

"Hmm... like a road trip?" Nikki raised her head.

"Heh, yeah. You can take the wheel to the hummer for a bit even... I'll be cross if you ding the paint." Brad wagged his finger chidingly. 

"Again with the hummer! You really coddle that thing! Like a baby sister..." Nikki smiled wryly. 

"Heyyy, all my siblings were guys. Something in the family needs a feminine touch." Brad laughed, folding his arms.

"Hummer? Feminine charm!? You serious, bud??"

Nikki blurted out in laughter. She loved being around Brad; he really had that effect of grounding her, distracting her from her existential dread. For a moment, it seemed like nothing had changed at all.

"Ah... still have no clue where we're going. Let's see..." Brad fished for his phone; it chimed in his hand. "Hey Siri, where's a good bar?"

In that moment, Nikki tensed up. Something gripped her throat, her vocal chords. An unfamiliar sensation welled up from within as her eyes widened. Her mouth jerked open. 

"Hey Brad! Here's what I found!"

Nikki blurted out in a voice that was familiar, but not her own. The UI in her smartglasses lit up with various search results. Nikki's startled eyes scanned them with equal measures panic and curiosity. Reflected in the corner of the glasses was a look of utter befuddlement from Brad.

"...uh, Nikki? The hell was that?" He scoffed. "You taking drama classes over at McDaniels? That was a hell of an impression."

"...R, right! Impression. Of course. S'called, uh, ventriloquism." She chuckled nervously, desperately reaching for a segue out of this interaction; she hardly wanted to confront the reality that Nikki was part smartphone, and she forgot to turn off Siri. She held a hand to her glasses.

"Joke, it was a joke, haaaaaaarmless joke, awawawa... I-I heard good things about Jupiter!" She stammered breathlessly. 

"...Are you okay?" Brad's good-natured chuckle turned to genuine concern; Nikki was going about like she had robbed a bank. 

"HEYYY let's go clubbing! I think it's thiiiiis way!" Nikki strung Brad along with an awkward grimace.

"Whoa there, Nikki, that's some grip!" He winced, stumbling after her as she scampered along down the sidewalk.

---

As Brad and Nikki drew closer to the busier parts of downtown Bismarck, something seemed off about their familiar surroundings. Sure, there were the usual crowds of carefree college kids, dating couples, the odd game of pick-up b-ball playing out in the alleyways...

But a man in a black suit seemed to be stationed every few blocks, walking up and down the side walks. They were wearing the same getups that Nikki had seen before, at the university, and in the hills before then. 

Nikki didn't know if she should be scared. But she had a horrible feeling well up from withing; she instinctively huddled closer to Brad. 

"Lot of people in business suits." Brad muttered, looking around. "Are people working later nowadays?"

"I dunno..." Nikki glanced left and right with a skeptical look in her eye. "They're all wearing sunglasses. How do you see at night wearing sunglasses?"

"God, you're so right." Brad scoffed, turning to Nikki. "You think it's just them puffing out their chests to look like hot shit?"

"I'm not sure about that. I saw a bunch of them packing heat." She grimaced, glancing to one raising a hand to his ear. 

"...Ah... they keep looking at me funny too." She grimaced. 

"...They're checking you out?" Brad's eyebrow perked up. 

"Brad, this is serious. I think they're secret service, or... or something." Nikki whispered.

"What? Did you do something wrong? You didn't download a car, right?" Brad blinked.

"No I did not download a-" She sighed, rubbing her forehead. "Okay, look, I didn't mention this, but the reason we're here now? My class got cancelled. My professor got snatched up by the secret service."

"...You're gonna have to run that one by me again, what?" Brad blinked. 

"Well, ah... a bunch of men in black suits all showed up tonight. They all wanted to go talk to Professor Riviera. They said they were Homeland Security, but... they didn't dress the part." Nikki looked to the road ahead pensively.

"Suits, huh? You think they get funding from Armani or something?" Brad scratched his head.

"...what." Nikki's mouth flattened. "I don't feel like the U.S. Government is stripped for cash, Brad."

"I dunno. Could be some big new way to... to advertise business suits or something." His eyes drifted to the side, quickly losing confidence in his idea. "...okay, ignore that, it's dumb."

Nikki folded her arms, looking ahead with a concerned expression. 

"It bugs me, like... Professor Riviera is a distinguished professor. There's no way he'd have visa issues, why Homeland Security? They said they were planning on releasing him from questioning tonight, but... something's really fishy about this."

Nikki looked over to another guard on the corner. It was hard to tell because of the shades, but she had a feeling he was looking straight at her. 

Her hand tensed up, leaning closer to Brad. She didn't seem away how one of her twintails wrapped possessively around the far side of Brad's body. 

"Can we go someplace private? They... I think they're staring at us." Nikki whispered. Brad could tell by the tone in her voice that this was serious. 

"...Y-yeah, sure. Let's go." Brad placed his hand on Nikki's hip, coaxing her away from that corner. Nikki might've been a mite paranoid, but... she could've sworn she saw the man's head follow them as they slipped elsewhere. 

Their detour took them farther and farther away from their destination... but also further away from the downtown core. There were fewer men in black suits milling about too. The couple seemed to finally be afforded some privacy. 

"Okay... I think we're okay." Nikki sighed. "Sorry Brad, I... it's been a hard day." 

"It's okay Nikki. We'll take the lumps as we go. We can just walk until we get tired." Brad looked around. "Or run. We haven't ran together in a while."

"We... we haven't, haven't we?" Nikki lowered her head. Of course, she hadn't been terribly incentivized to exercise at all since the changes that came over her. 

"...I just feel bad for dragging you out like this." Nikki squeezed Brad's arm. "Thanks for being there for me, and... and..."

Nikki trailed off. She went quiet, her eyes raised. She heard something. The strumming of a guitar. Of course, she realized buskers would be out at this hour, appealing to passersby for spare change and to get some good practice in. 

It was a jubilant, upbeat tune on a Spanish guitar. Energetic, emphatic. It moved something within Nikki. Inspired her. She reached for Brad's hand, pulling it closer as her body moved on its own. She didn't question it, she didn't understand... for all she knew, she was simply following the rhythm.

"N-Nikki??" Brad bluttered, his body jerked forward as Nikki pulled him into her strange, spur-of-the-moment performance. He laughed as Nikki led an improvised salsa dance, twirling Brad in her arms.

"I-I dunno, I..." She tried to collect her thoughts. Her body felt light as a feather, moving without her prompting as she pulled Brad closer in a passionate salsa. A powerful, primal feeling stirred within her with every note that the street performer played. It compelled her to move. It compelled her to live. 

Part of Nikki was offput, perhaps terrified of this sensation. But at the forefront of her mind, the feeling of power, of liberation, of smarmy satisfaction seeing Brad's casually befuddled expression as he stumbled along to her steps... the sense of authority she wielded playing the lead. It was all so thrilling, so fun. She loved it. She wanted this to happen. Everything felt right. 

"...Let's just tango together. The mood struck me~" Nikki whispered into Brad's ear. Every part of her body wanted to break out into dance. Her hips swayed back and forth, her legs kicked, her arms wrapped around Brad's broad shoulders. 

Her twintails flailed as they spun together along the sidewalk, their bodies pressed against one another. With what little control Nikki could exercise, she guided the two of them along the sidewalk, away from passing traffic. Nikki gripped Brad's shoulders, her breath heavy and hot.

"Y'know this isn't a tango, right?" Brad laughed heartily. "W-whoa, some grip."

"C'mooooon... when was the last time we got to dance like this?" Nikki smiled. All of her earlier anxieties simply melted away. No one was watching them. In her perfect little world, it was just her and Brad...

"Ah, hey-"

The music stopped abruptly on a discordant tone. And the lightheaded feeling that gripped Nikki's body ebbed away in an instant. For a second, the couple simply held each other, looking into their eyes. It would've made for a picture-perfect moment, if the both of them weren't so confused. 

"...Is the moment over?" Brad wondered aloud, somewhat dully. 

"Well... we could seal it with a kiss." Nikki suggested with a coquetish look. 

"Hehe, no objections here." They leaned closer together...

"AH, HEEEELP! SOMEBODYYY!" A voice of a young man hollered out, breaking up the serenity of the moment. Both Brad and Nikki perked their heads up, eyes darting in the sound of the commotion. 

"Someone's in trouble." Brad pushed Nikki aside so he could run ahead. "I'm gonna go help."

"What!?" Nikki blinked, chasing after him for a spell. "What are you planning on-"

"Just wait here for me, okay? Find a police officer, there's gotta be someone on patrol!" Brad commanded, breaking into a sprint. 

In a matter of moments, Nikki was left along in the streets. Worry gripped her. She looked around in all directions. There wasn't a police officer in sight. This was a decidedly quiet part of town; there wouldn't be a police officer just standing around. 

Nikki swallowed, opting to quietly trail Brad. He had disappeared into an alleyway. She followed the sound of shouting voices. She tried to make out what they were saying... 

"...guy, this was gonna be straight and easy, why you gotta be a hero..." An unfamiliar gruff voice muttered with disdain.

"I-I'm telling you, I don't got any money!" Another panicked voice cried out.

"Just leave him alone, and go home. It doesn't have to end this way." That was Brad's voice, standing his ground. 

Nikki peered around the corner, watching the confrontation go down. There were three men gathered around a guitar case. Brad and the gruff-sounding man were standing off, staring each other down. Nikki had a bad feeling about this...

"...Alright bud. I see how it is..."

The gruff man paced around, away from the guitarist and past Brad... towards her hiding position. Nikki leaned her head back, worried if she had been found out; but she quickly realized, his eyes were locked onto Brad. 

"Y'know what I think?"

Nikki gasped silently, following the man reach for something in his back pocket. 

"...I think my buddy here? He needs a reminder of what's important."

It was a switchblade. There was intent in this man's eyes. He was gonna stab Brad. He was going to stab Brad. 

She had to do SOMETHING.

"Here's what I do to '''heroes'''-"

"STOOOOOP!"

Nikki sprinted from out of cover. She didn't have a plan. She just needed to save Brad. The only thing crossing her mind was an unyielding desire to stop this evil, evil man. She shouted to draw his attention, with no regard for her own life...

She immediately got the goon's attention and, brandishing the blade, he tried to defend himself. 

It all happened in a blur; Nikki wasn't processing exactly what happened. She winced, feeling something slash at her shoulder. She raised her arm over her head...

CLUNK!

...And brought it down on his head. He crumpled to the asphalt like a ragdoll. Nikki stopped in her tracks, stunned at the power she exercised in that single swing. 

"...He's breathing, right? I think he's still breathing!" Nikki sputtered. "You guys okay? I think he nicked me, but I'm sorry, I heard shouting, and-"

"Holy crap, lady, your arm!"

Nikki's panicked train of thought was cut off in an instant. Her breath caught in her through, her eyes raising to the man's panicked expression. And then over to Brad; his expression mirrored that of the strangers. She looked to her right. 

The first thing she noticed was a nasty gash in her shoulder. The goon caught her in the shoulder with his knife, but it didn't draw blood. Where the skin parted, that familiar mercurial substance persisted. 

But that was minor compared to her raised arm. From the forearm up, the pink pigment of her skin transitioned to the same silvery substance. Her hand took the form of an enormous pipewrench.

A pained sound crept out from her throat, her face going pale. She tried to hide the arm behind her back, tried to cover the wound she sustained with her free hand. It sealed up on its own as she pressed down on it. 

"Nikki? W-what the hell is...?" Brad whispered. 

"Brad, I... I..." Nikki was at a loss for words. She never wanted Brad to find out, not like this. She gasped, her mouth working to find the words...

She was interrupted by the sound of clattering, scrapping; her eyes darted downwards, gasping sharpling as a writhing mercurial tendril emerged from the sole of her shoe, wrapping around the unconscious goon's switch blade, dragging it before her. Sticking it into her foot. She could feel her body begin to assimilate it... and she could feel the eyes of the men boring into her. 

"No! NO!" She cried out, breaking out into a mad dash into the streets. She had to get away. She had to hide.

"NIKKI!" Brad shouted out, trying to chase after her, tripping over the goon on the ground in the process. This was enough for Nikki to put some distance between herself and Brad. 

She needed to get off the streets. She needed to hide. But there wasn't a taxi in sight, no phonebooth. No good places to hide. 

...No, that wasn't right. There was one out she had. Across the road, there was a gap. A small hole for rainwater to drain through. The image of an alien murder clown peering out from the darkness gave her pause; the reality of the situation made her shudder, but she had no other options.

She ran, her body falling forward as it slumped and deformed into an oozing mass. It lurched towards the sewer drain, shlorping into the darkness and out of sight. Nikki retreated into the sewers, leaving Brad to wonder where the hell she went back on the surface.

"Nikki!? NIKKI!"

He cupped his hands, looking around. He had no idea what had happened... what had become of Nikki.

He needed answers. 

[Next Chapter]