Risa considers the artifact carefully - it really doesn't seem to make any sense.

Why would you use an electrical probe on your foot? Sure, she's heard of medical devices that do neuro-tests through electricity -- but why would her parents send her one of those?

Still she's willing to go along with this for a little bit longer at least in the hope that she'll get some answers.

She lifts the device off her desk, and puts it down onto the floor beside her, before turning in her chair so she can remove her left boot and stocking without knocking the device. Once done, she'll take the probe in hand, extending the cord, and will run the probe along the sole of her bare foot.

Once the probe is brought in contact with Risa's foot, several things happen: First a tingle surges through her foot; second, one of the crystal castors lights up; third, the foot icon on the screen stops blinking, becoming a solid presence like the two hands before it. And fourth, another foot icon begins blinking nearby.

The meaning of the new icon seems rather apparent -- she needs to use the probe on her other foot as well.

The most perplexing thing to Risa is the reaction of the crystal caster. Surely that has some kind of meaning.

As she removes her other boot and stocking, she also considers the fact that she'll basically have operated the device with all four of her extremities at that point -- both hands and both feet. Perhaps that's only coincidence, or perhaps that is part of the secret of the device.

Of course there is only one way to find out -- so Risa also applies the probe now to her right foot as well.

Again, the probe produces a tingle as it is touched to the sole of Risa's foot. Again the blinking icon becomes solid and another of the castors lights up. And again, another icon blinks to life on the screen . . . but what this one represents is less obvious. It resembles a softly curved hook shape that swishes back and forth as it blinks.

Risa sighs as she look at the newest icon. "Ok.. this is getting really strange.. and annoying." she tells the contraption as she looks at the icon, trying to interpret it.

Body part.. moving.. waving... a finger... no... her uvula? That seems a little odd, and doesn't feel right.. either, not with the way the icon moves back and forth..

Movement.. wave.. swish... flicker... a TAIL!

But she doesn't have a tail!

But then again, it's probably a better iconography than putting a picture of an ass on the screen. Still... this is starting to get a little.. personal, isn't it?

Risa decides to give it a chance though, and she stands up so that she can bring the probe up against the small of her back to where her tailbone is, putting the tip under her skirt, and above the edge of her panties, before sliding the tip down over the cloth trying to get a reaction from the machine.

As Risa slides the probe down over the cloth of her panties the tail icon goes solid. But a moment later, the device gives a non-committal beep and the icon resumes blinking. All other aspects of the apparatus remain unchanged while it continues to await input.

Risa frowns as the machine seems to recognize the probe, but not fully accept the input.

"Really??? REALLY??" she sort of growls at the machine. "What kind of pervert created you?" she asks the contraption, not really expecting an answer.

Now she is getting a bit annoyed, but her curiosity is, if anything, only heightened. And her pride isn't going to let her back down this easily.

With a sigh, she carefully slips the probe UNDER her panties and down her buttock, and very slowly moves it over her ass and eventually, if need be, between her cheeks. Risa tries to find the point where the machine will register.. and not put the probe any more intimately against her than is necessary to accomplish that feat.

Luckily for Risa, the machine registers the input rather quickly. As soon as the probe is passed over the entire length of her tailbone while in direct contact with bare skin (tingling the whole way), the tail icon stops blinking and the third castor lights up. A second later, a circle appears around the tail icon and a slash runs through it. Simultaneously the third castor turns red (as opposed to the yellowish green it and the others had been glowing since their respective activations).

The five solid icons rearrage themselves on the screen, hands and feet moving to positions nearly equidistant from one another along the circumference of an invisible circle while the 'no tail' icon moves to a position near the center. Lines appear from these five points, heading inward and converging into a rough stick figure before forming branches along their lengths and filling out into a three-dimensional map of a human body's nervous system, except for the head.

Suddenly, the screen flashes brightly and a warm tingle bathes Risa's face. The head of the figure is quickly filled in, then just as quickly, the whole model is overlaid with a remarkably accurate image of Risa, nude, with legs spread wide and arms stretched out slightly above shoulder level.

A moment passes, during which strange symbols flash in various patterns around the image. Then the device begins to whir and clatter again as though something is being reconfigured inside.

Risa watches with a mix of curiosity and amazement as the icons re-arrange themselves and then render into a stick figure, and eventually a full nervous system map. It must be some kind of medical scanner she decides, although that seems a pretty weird gift from her parents.

Then the scanner renders her face, and her NUDE body - which draws a gasp of shock and embarrassment from Risa. "Stop that you... you perverted contraption... stop it!" she yells at it as she pushes the red button again to try and turn it off.

Of course this has no effect, so she jams the button again.. and again. Obviously this was not the gift she thought, instead it must be some kind of hazing prank on the new girl. "Turn off damn you!" she yells as she frantically starts pushing every button, flipping every switch and turning every knob and gear on the box to try and shut it off.

In the flurry of her activity, there is of course no way that she could know what order she activated things in, or have any hope of reproducing or reversing her activity.

In the Beyond, Spectre chuckled to itself as Risa completely lost her composure at the sight of a nude rendering of herself. Such a strong reaction to such a relatively minor violation did not bode well for her likelihood to survive the true horrors of the island; something she would likely soon be getting a taste of.

In truth, had the young woman not over-reacted, she would have been able to turn off the device. The first button press would have done so, had she merely held it for a few seconds. The second and subsequent pushes caused the screen to flash red in warning - a warning niether noticed nor heeded by the frantic student.

Beeps, blats and buzzers sounded in response to Risa's veritable attack on the machine, and quite quickly it overloaded. Already gearing up for some sort of action, it went into overdrive, the whirring rising in pitch to a whine and the clattering rapidly gaining tempo. The box shook and shimmied on it's castors and eventually jumped from Risa's grasp as it began to spin. Gouts of pinkish, sweet smellling steam shot into the room as the strange cube whirled faster and faster, starting to glow from the inside.

[OOC: Sorry for the absence, just as I try to return, my boss leaves the company, and everyone has been scrambling trying to figure out who now needs to handle everything he did. Wheeeeeee...]

Risa keeps pushing buttons and turning knobs and gears trying to figure out how to shut it off until the machine goes crazy and sounds like it is going to explode.

She quickly backs away from the box, into the corner of her room as it shakes and spins and starts spouting steam all around the room.

"Please don't blow up.. please don't blow up.. please don't blow up.." she chants softly as she cowers behind her bed, trying to get any cover from the explosion that seems imminent now.

Faster and faster the box whizzed, glowing and filling the room with the strange steam. The whining and clattering it produced built to a frenzied crescendo. But just as it seemed the box was about to explode, everything stopped. The box collapsed, it's castors spread out beneath it. It lay there, inert for a moment as though it had finally shut off.

Then, suddenly, strange clockwork appendages shot out of the device's sides. Two of the mechanical 'tentacles' had strange three-fingered hands while the other two had obviously phallic shaped endings. The castor-tipped spindly legs extended further and maneuvered to right the device while the screen popped up and rose on a flexible 'neck.' On the screen was a replica of Risa's face grinning devilishly (and not a little lecherously).

The pinkish steam filling the room was a mild aphrodisiac, slowly working on Risa's body as she breathed it in. It also clung to her form, soaking through her clothes and working directly into her skin.

The mechanical thing looked around the room a moment before orienting on Risa. It's appendages shot toward her, seeking to entangle her in their clockwork embrace.


((No problem, I figured you were busy IRL; I'm glad you could drop in for a reply ))

[OOC: I swear my company is full if idiots. So my boss leaves the company, and what do they do? They decide to re-organize HIS boss out of the company, so anyone who knew anything about what we were working on is going to be gone by End of Year. WTF are they thinking???!! Again - apologies for absence]

Risa sighs and relaxes as the box just sort of 'collapses' in the room, thinking it has run out of energy, or broken down completely.

She stands up and just starts to move out from behind her bed when the mechanical tentacles appear. She squeals and jumps in shock as the box rises up until it looks kind of like a stick-figure drawing, with her own face on it. She just stares at the thing as it starts to look around the room.

The aphrodisiac in the air has definitely been affecting Risa, even if she is unaware of it. Her breasts have firmed up, and the crowns of her nipples have stiffened up against her top.. her breath is short and heavy, although that could also be attributed to shock maybe. While she hasn't realized it, the drug has certainly increased the sensitivity of her nerves, especially to pleasurable sensations.

All of that is causing Risa to be a bit distracted, and to react slower than she normally would. Or perhaps it's because she once again finds herself fascinated by the incredible complexity of the construct in front of her, or because she is confused about the expression on the screen, or what those weird 'pointed' tentacle shapes could be used for. Whatever the reason, Risa is caught just standing there, out in the open, when the appendages grab her.

Of course she starts to struggle once they've entrapped her -- but by then, it is certainly too late. "Let me GO!!" she screams as she struggles and pulls and kicks, trying to free herself from the mechanical embrace.