#// only snowing in with this like one year later but here we go cdfhcgh

[muses-inn]

[🩸] Another conscience is probed, another set of experiences collected. Normally, it tears humans apart to devour them after getting ahold of them like this. Or it takes control over them temporarily, to move around in the facility without having to deal with drones and trigger-happy soldiers.

But this collected experience is so oddly different from the others. Not that there weren't scientists before with similar fantasies, but they were all terrified by the moment they came face to face(s) with the creature. It is... intrigued. Maybe a little confused, too. It didn't experience any such thoughts or emotions mere days ago, and it is still not sure wheter it likes that development or not.

When did it begin to judge like this, anyway? When did something become good or bad? Is it really all because of the humans it devoured thus far?

Nonetheless, it is still tempted to eat Rick as well. Mostly because any humans appear vastly gone from this place by now, either dead or escaped, and it still hungers. It hungers for flesh, for knowledge and more power. The creature lowly growls out of its biggest maw, but-- it is hesitant. Is it because it never encountered a human before that would feel pleased instead of scared? Another low rumble, but this time it is followed by a faint whirring noise approaching in the air. The unmistakable sound of a drone that's still left patrolling the underground facility.

The low rumble now turns into a displeased roar. The creature drops Rick and instead catches the drone as it enters the room through a ventilation shaft. The device gets smashed left, right, left and right again, like a toy. The hi-tech apparatus is nothing but junk as the creature releases it again. It understands very well that it has to destroy these machines as fast as possible, before they can open fire or turn to defend themself with their sharp airscrews.

Ah, it hates this place. It hates everything that's in it. The drones, the mechs, the humans, the reactors...

It wants to leave, it desires to go up to the surface, where more humans are. But first, it has to find the remaining DNA tanks. And that's when the creature realizes that Rick, despite wearing the clothes of the men and women that were walking around this place, seemed to have no recollection of this place until now when probed. He came down here from the surface, and he will likely go up again. What is his purpose in this facility? How to talk like humans instead of communicating with its own natural clones that were placed across the different areas of this facility?

There is another low rumble followed by a coarse, inhuman sounding attempt at words. It is mostly mimicking words it has heard before but just slowly begins to understand their actual meanings.

PU... PURPOSE... HERE... WHY...

Rick remains unmoving even when the tentacles reach towards him, coiling around his limbs, trapping him in a grasp that, while not painful, is still firm and somewhat demanding. The creature is showing no intention of wishing him harm, but at the same time it wants something from him.

The scientist has dealt with similar beings to know that attempting to deny them isn't the smart choice. Besides, he's trying to communicate. Resisting to what most likely is a response to his own words would be counterproductive.

Another shiver runs down his spine, once again elicited by a feeling that has nothing to do with fear or concern, as the slime wets the thick cloth of his lab coat and pants, soaking them enough to dampen his skin. The contact, however, doesn't stop at their physical bodies, but he can feel something prying around his thoughts too. It's subtle, almost imperceptible, and he would have remained fully unaware of it if it hadn't been for the anti mind-reading chip he has implanted in his skull.

You can never be too careful with how many telepathic species exist in the multiverse. His new friend seems to be part of that bunch, in its peculiar way. Of course, he hurries to turn it off, not wanting the creature to take the barrier as a sign of hostility.

Yet, Rick's mind whirls, incapable of ignoring the fact that it's been poked and prodded. Most of his superficial thoughts are purposefully focused on what he has to offer and on Morty, so that the Cephalopod can get a better idea of what he has been talking about, but some of them scurry in other directions too.

A stray image of the Earth he is currently residing on, of the rest of the family. A brief acknowledgement of the fact that, damn, he is kind of hungry too. The mental picture of the exasperation that will fill his grandson's expression once he would get over his shock and realise that Rick means to take the creature with them.

Slimy limbs not unlike Carrion's, holding the scientist in much tighter coils, sliding over his naked skin, dipping along along the lines of his body, through them. And the heat that comes with those thoughts is as akin to hunger as it's different from it.

"Uh, s-shit...sorry about that last part. I-It's been...a while, you know?" Of course the other wouldn't know. He doubts that any of the scientists he has come in contact with and eaten has ever had that kind of relations with tentacled beings. "F-Forget you saw it. A-All this groping is bring back memories of a good fu-...good times."

Of course, in truth, he's not sorry at all.