Trust Machines - Truth or Venn

“I can’t believe you invited our lab instructor.”

“Oh come on, exams are over, and our marks are posted.  No harm, right?”

The other two girls looked at her with knowing expressions.  “Right, suuure.  Someone has a crush.”

“Do not,” Doreen huffed but her cheeks went slightly pink.

“So how’d you get the key to the mall, anyway?” I asked, to distract them from a question I didn’t really want explored.

“My uncle works here as a guard.”

“So he let you borrow the keys?  Cool.”

Doreen didn’t quite meet my eyes.  “Something like that.  Come on, let’s get inside.”  She opened the door, let us all through, and locked it behind us.

“Wait, what about the guards?”

“There’s only the one, and he patrols the outside once an hour.  The Venn Machine is across from the bookstore, we can’t be seen from outside.”

I chuckled.  “I see. You have this all planned out.”

She gave me an impish grin.  “It’s not the first time I’ve snuck in here for after-hours play with the Venn Machine.”

I grinned back.  “Cool.”

Soon we were sitting in a circle on the floor in front of the machine.  The lazily turning circles of its logo seemed to be watching us as cute, blonde Doreen brought out a tetrahedron with numbers on its tips.

She pointed to my left.  “Anja, you’re 1.”  I’d had them as lab students for a term, and still couldn’t tell Anja from Berta.  They weren’t quite twins, but they both had similar dusky skin and dark brown hair.  Berta got given number 2.  I was 3, and Doreen was 4.

Berta laughed.  “Did you really bring our lab instructor just to fill out the pattern?”

“Maybe.  Maybe not.”  Doreen rolled the die, and a 1 came up.  She grinned at Anja.  “Truth or Dare?”

I chuckled.  “Ah, so that’s the plan.  Given that any dare is going to involve this device we’re sitting in front of, shouldn’t it be Truth or Venn?”

Doreen nodded.  “I think you have the right of it.  So, Anja, Truth or Venn?”

Anja looked uncertain and took a quick peek at the machine before blurting out, “Truth.”

“Do you want to kiss me?”

“No.”

Then it was Anja’s turn to throw the die, and she got a 2.  She asked the same question.  “Do you want to kiss me?”

Berta blushed, then nodded shyly as she said, “Yes.  I’m sorry, but I’ve wondered what kissing you would be like all term.”

Berta rolled a 2, and laughed.  “I guess I can’t Venn myself.  Pity.”  Then she rolled a 1 and asked Anja what she would change about herself.

Anja looked over at Doreen. “I’d change my hair. I’ve always wanted to be blonde.”  

The game continued in that vein for a bit, asking each other softball questions like who in the class was the cutest guy (they all thought Lars was).  I asked them what they’d thought of me as an instructor, and answered in turn that I thought Doreen was the cutest girl in the class, though Veronika was the prettiest.  I also admitted that, yes, I’d like to kiss Doreen.

Doreen asked me why.  “Well...  Mostly because of all the girls you paid the most attention.  You always knew the answers, did the best work in the lab, and so on.  I like the clever ones best.”

“Ooh, so I’m cute and clever?  But not pretty.”

“Hey, I never said that.  I just said Veronika was the prettiest.”

Doreen tried to gin up some resentment against me over that, but the other two agreed with my assessment.

Finally, Anja was brave enough to say “Venn” to Berta.  They disappeared into the Venn Machine and emerged a minute later with Anja’s hair turned blonde, and her skin lightened to match.  Doreen and Berta both cooed over how much nicer she looked blonde.  I said that she’d lost something by going for such a common look.  

The die passed around a few more times before Berta said ‘Venn’ to me.  I blinked.  “Hm.  Well, this should be fun.”  I changed her hair colour, but not to blonde.  Instead I tried a rich, leafy green that suited her skin tone much better, and changed her eyes to match.  Berta was a little surprised by it, but agreed with Anja that it looked really good on her.  Doreen just watched them with a speculative grin on her lips.

After that, Anja and Berta always picked Venn with each other, trying out further changes to their hair, nails, and clothing.  They let me Venn them once or twice - I thought Berta looked cute with a smaller nose, but neither of them agreed.  They did like my colour selections, though.

However, neither Anja or Berta would take Venn with Doreen.  The fearful looks they shot her each time the question came up puzzled me, so I used my next Truth to ask Berta why.

“You were right about her being clever.  Doreen’s the smartest of us by far.  And she has a wicked, wicked imagination.  If half the stories she’s told us about this thing are true, there’s no way we’re stepping into it with her.”

So of course, the next time Doreen got my number, I said “Venn.  Show me what you’ve got.”

I emerged from the machine feeling very peculiar.  Trying to comprehend the input from several extra eyes was hard enough, but maneuvering all my extra limbs took all the focus I could muster.  It was only once Doreen gently counseled me to relax and let my body do its thing that I was able to make it out of the booth at all.  I click-clacked across the floor on sharp talons to the mirrored window of the bookstore across the way.  I was actually touching my reflection before I accepted that the image was me.  A spider, perhaps four feet tall and twice that across, with the pinkest, sparkliest carapace I’d ever seen.  Everything about my body was sleek and streamlined, there was none of the hair that normal spiders have.  The only thing human about me was the tongue behind my pedipalps, and the eyes.  I had two large human eyes in the middle of my head, and several pairs of smaller, equally human ones elsewhere, giving me all the secondary images that so confused me at first.

“What am I?” I asked softly.

“I call it a sparklespider,” said Doreen, standing beside me and examining her handiwork proudly.

“Now you see why we don’t let her Venn us,” said Anja and Berta in unison.

I chuckled softly, and click-clacked back to the circle.  Anja and Berta leaned away from me.  While it looked like they wanted to get up and run away from me, they resisted.  “It’s not so bad,” I said.  “Being able to see in all directions would have let me catch cheaters in exams much more easily.”

“But you’re all... glittery.”

“So?  Doreen seems to think it looks good.”

Doreen grinned, and leaned over to kiss me in the middle of the smooth dome of my head.  “You’re lovely.”

“See?”

Anja shook her head.  “You’re weird.”

I settled in place, letting my body figure out how to fold up my six hindmost legs.  I used my two forelegs to pick up the die and rolled it.  “Doreen.  Truth or Venn?”

“After all that?  Venn.  Let’s see what you’ve got.”

I studied her image in the Venn Machine for a time. “I wonder how hard it would be to...”  I mumbled to myself for a bit, then grinned.  “Oh!  Not so hard at all.  Try this.”

Doreen blinked in momentary confusion, then looked about.  The only change was that she now had two heads, and they regarded each other from close proximity until the doors opened.  “Well.  This is actually new on me,” both heads said together.  “Or should we say, new on us?”

“Are there two of you?” asked Anja worriedly when we emerged.

Doreen shook her heads.  “No.  One me, two heads.”

“And four eyes.  I thought you’d enjoy multi-directional vision.”

Doreen chuckled, tilting her heads in opposite directions while studying me.  “It’s... different,” said her right head.  “I think I could get to like it,” continued her left.

The game continued.  Anja and Berta changed each other in little ways, and answered my and Doreen’s questions with careless candor.  I found I didn’t much care what their favourite music was, even though I’d asked.  Doreen found out that I prefer wine over beer, and whiskey over both.  She liked pizza, and punk rock, but agreed on the whiskey.  We also traded questions about plans for the summer, Doreen had a job at a relative’s vineyard lined up whereas I was at loose ends.  There were no courses I needed to take, so I had the whole summer for ‘independent research’.

Then Anja broke the pattern.  “There’s something you’ve been itching to ask me for a while now, Berta.  Truth.”

Berta flushed, then nodded.  “I... well, would you mind if I kissed you?”  I could hear her mumbling something under her breath, but couldn’t quite make it out.

Anja studied her carefully.  She’d given Berta fuller lips their last time in the Venn Machine, but otherwise a slightly more masculine cast.  Berta looked good with defined muscles.  “No, I wouldn’t mind.”

Berta lunged to her knees and scooped Anja into a kiss.  Watching it, I felt the carapace over my head grow warm, and a quick glance at Doreen told me she was getting flushed from the scorching kiss we were witnessing as well.  We grinned at each other when we caught ourselves sharing that glance, but our gaze kept returning to the entwined couple across from us.  Doreen leaned over and gave me a kiss right between my pedipalps, right on my lips.  My legs clattered a tattoo on the floor while it lasted.

Berta and Anja were still at it when we pulled back from the kiss.  My eyes were wide, all of them.  “You... kissed me, as a spider?  Why?”

Doreen grinned hugely.  “Wait your turn.”

I figured the others weren’t going to be getting back to us any time soon, so I scooped up the die and rolled.  Then I poked it with a talon so it fell to to the 4.  “Truth or Venn.”

Doreen laughed.  “Truth.  Why did I kiss you?  Because spiders and bugs and weirder things turn me on.  I’d take you home like this, and do unspeakable things with you.”

“Really?  Wow... I, uh...  Wow.”  I heard the dice clatter, and before she asked, I said, “Truth.”

“What do you think of that?” she asked with sad eyes.  It struck me then, that she must have revealed this secret before, and it hadn’t ended well.

“I think that sounds like a...”

“Yes?” she asked, worried but eager.

“I’d like to try it.”  Then I frowned, canting my pedipalps as well as my lips.  “But I don’t think I have the right bits for that.”

“Mmmm.  True.  Pity.”

I bumped the die, heedless of how it landed.  My gaze was locked with Doreen’s.  “Truth or Venn?”

“Venn,” she said, without looking away or blinking.  Our gazes remained locked, even inside the Venn Machine.  I knew what I wanted to do to her, so it was quick.

Two Doreens stumbled out of the Venn Machine.  Each one had just the one head, so they looked perfectly normal.  She stared at me, then slowly reached out to touch my carapace with just one hand.  She’d been getting better at speaking with only one of her heads, so I supposed this wasn’t all that big a change.  I tugged that copy of her down into a kiss, and could see with one of my spare sets of eyes that the other was puckering up but otherwise mostly staying still.

“Eww!” we heard from across from us.  “They’re kissing!”

The other Doreen stuck her tongue out at them.  The resulting tongue in the kiss was invigorating, and we carried on while Anja and Berta returned to the game.  I mostly ignored their trips to the Venn Machine until Berta poked me and said, “Truth or Venn.”

I grinned at her as wide as I could, and the sight of my fangs made her squeak with alarm.  “Truth.”

“You like being like that?” she asked, puzzled.

“Doreen likes it.  That’s a huge plus.  I’m getting used to the vision, and all the legs.  I could wish I was a little softer, though.”

“Really?” asked Doreen.  I laughed.

When I got Anja’s number, she licked her lips, glanced at Berta, then said “Venn”.

I got up and scuttled toward the machine, making Anja and Berta both twitch with fear, but Anja followed along gamely after a moment.

“So what do you want?” I asked, once the doors had closed.  She didn’t answer, so I looked over her form.  Despite the blue hair, green eyes and purple nails she was very much Anja-shaped except around the chest.  “I’m bored with minor changes, and I’m going to do something more interesting.”

Anja licked her lips.  “I’d figured as much.  Go for it.”

I wished then that I had eyebrows to raise.  “Interesting.”

When Anja stumbled back out of the Machine, Berta shrieked in surprise.  “What did you do to her?  Where’s her head?”

I laughed as cruelly as I could muster.  “Gone.”

“But I still have lips,” came Anja’s muffled voice from under her collar.  She loosened the top three buttons of her shirt, revealing a nose and a pair of lips perched in the cleavage between her breasts.  Berta had enlarged them a few Venns ago, to everyone’s amusement.

“Can you see?” asked Berta.

“Not really, no.  Just the ceiling.”

“Try extending your eye-stalks,” I suggested.

“My what now?” whimpered Anja.  But the suggestion had set her eyes in motion, lifting out of her empty neck on slender fleshy stalks.  “Ooooh!  I can see!”

She dashed over to the mirrored window of the bookstore, and stared into it, Berta beside her.  “Eee,” exclaimed Anja. “I look like I have snail eyes.  This is so weird.”

Everyone went back to ‘Truth’ for a while.  Anja admitted that while she found having eye-stalks “pretty creepy”, she did like being able to see in every direction.  Berta found Anja’s eyes creepy too, but added that having her lips near her breasts made kissing even more fun.  I told Anja that I thought she looked pretty cool like that, and Doreen agreed with me.

Anja and Berta had started kissing again, so I broke the pattern by giving Doreen another chance to Venn me.  I was very curious to see what else she would come up with.

Suddenly having only two eyes, and no legs to speak of, came as a surprise.  I squirmed around, finding out in the process that my body was long, thin, and flexible.  And bright purple.

Then one Doreen was picking me up, cooing at how cute I was.  She carried me over to the mirrored window and I stared at the... thing coiled around her neck.  I resembled nothing so much as a giant maggot, with little nubbly legs, two beady black eyes... and incongruously, a perfectly human-looking mouth where its maw should be.

“What on earth?” I murmured in shock.

Doreen gestured at my reflection dramatically.  “I dub thee... snugglemaggot!”

“You’re entirely mad.”  At least my voice sounded normal.

Doreen’s face fell, and she turned back toward the Venn Machine, dragging her feet.

I wriggled around to put my mouth near her ear, drawing a slight giggle as one of my feet hit something ticklish.  I whispered into her ear, “I love it.”

She grabbed me in both hands and swung me around, my long body flailing in the air.  “You do?  You really like this shape?”

“That’s not what I meant.  You’re crazy about this and... it’s thrilling.  This is mad, and wild, and... hell yes.”

She cuddled me close, and I wrapped my body around hers.  Then she planted a fierce kiss on my lips, to gagging noises from the other two.

While we were still kissing, Doreen glowered at the other two from her other body.  “He’s a good kisser.  And really soft...”

It took a little coaxing from the Doreens, but she got Anja and Berta to pet my soft, fuzzy skin.  They were amazed at how it felt, Anja said it was like petting a velour snake.  Both of them cooed over my form, amazed that something so icky could end up somehow... cute.

“Your turn,” said Anja when we finally settled down.

I considered the die, and swung my rear end around to it.  The nubs of my legs had rubbery tips, and with a bit of work I was able to grab it.  A flick of my body sent it tumbling.

Berta smiled when she saw the result. “Me too,” she said, looking at headless Anja.  “Venn.”

I was a little surprised that I didn’t change back once inside the Venn Machine.  All it did was lower the interface so I could reach it more easily.  “Hm.  Something that goes with Anja, I think.”  A few moments later I said, casually, “You might want to be lying down for this.”

“Okay,” Berta said nervously, and did so.  “What are you going...  Oh!  What did you...  Where’s my body?”

I tried out my best evil chuckle once more.  “You don’t have one any more.”

Before Berta’s hyperventilation could get out of hand, the doors opened and Anja was staring down at her.  They stared at each other for some time, until Doreen scooped me up.

“Well, what are you waiting for, Anja?  Put her on.”

Anja wordlessly scooped Berta’s head up in her hands.  There was a cylindrical protrusion from the base of Berta’s neck about where her spine should be, matching a slot I’d left in Anja’s altered body.  Anja carefully tucked her eyestalks away, then settled Berta in place.

Berta cooed softly.  “Oh!  That feels... right.  Can you see, Anja?”

“No.  You have to be my eyes.  And I’ll be your arms and legs.”  Anja buttoned up her shirt.  The Doreen that wasn’t holding me helped guide them to the mirror.

“Wow,” said Berta softly.  “We look perfectly normal.  Nobody will know.  C’mon, let’s go home and... play.”

Anja giggled muffledly from under her shirt.  “Lead on, then.”

With Berta murmuring directions, they set off out of the mall.

Doreen handed me from one body to the other, taking turns petting me and wrapping me about herself like a stole or a belt.  Then she got a very serious look.  “I want to ask something.”

“Yes.”

“You don’t even know what I want!”

I grinned up at her from my perch between her breasts.  “Whatever it is, it’s bound to be fun.”

Both Doreens bit their lips nervously, and said in sync, “I want to stay like this for longer.”

“OK.  How much longer?”

“A couple months, at least.  Just think, I could go to my job with one body, and stay home with the other.  I could catch up on sleep, watch my favourite TV shows...”

“You’d want to swap bodies each day, but... yeah, that could work.  Sure.”

So Doreen set the Venn Machine for two months, and set me down in one side.  She entered the other, holding hands with herself so she didn’t get cut off and lose one of her bodies.  “Just hit the green button and we can go.”

I did so.  Then the doors opened a second later.

It took me two heartbeats to realize what that meant.  “Doreen!  What the hell, now I’m stuck for two months too!”

She scooped me up and cuddled me against her breasts.  “One of me will work.  The other will stay with you, and be your arms and legs for your research.  We can be together all day, every day.”

I was stunned by the offer.  And the close proximity with her breasts.  “I...  Wow.  Seriously?”

Doreen nodded eagerly, hope shining bright in both sets of eyes.

“OK.  Let’s go.”

Doreen spun me around dizzyingly.  “Yay!  I’ll be so good to you, you won’t want to change back at the end.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of...  And, truth be told, kind of looking forward to, too.”

Doreen took hold of my rounded rear end, and gave it a wiggle.  “Oooh, I’m going to do such naughty things with you.”

I had no idea what to say to that, so I settled for kissing her.  Life with Doreen was going to be interesting, and if it involved kisses like that, I wouldn’t miss it for the world.