Chapter Text
The Toktik livestream had already passed 50,000 viewers when you brought the newest one into frame.
It squelched softly in your palm, pulsing with a faint hue, its texture was gelatinous, with five symmetrical limbs that flexed ever so slightly in the cool light of your desk lamp.
You held it up, fingers splayed carefully to show the weird little thing to the camera, rotating your wrist like you were showing off a luxury watch. The starfish-shaped creature blinked once, all five of its stalked eyes turning in unison toward the screen.
“This one doesn’t have a name yet,” you said, grinning into the chat as it flooded with emojis. “But it’s really cool, huh? He can sense heat and vibrations. Kinda shy though.”
The creature chirped once and curled up slightly.
“No because how does she make silicone move like that??”
“WAIT he blinked??? WTF”
“bro she’s gotta be like, a Hollywood practical effects artist right?”
You swiveled your chair toward the small perch next to your monitor.
A wrinkly little.. thing sat there on a small box, dressed in a handmade velvet cape and a thrifted baby vest, complete with one sparkly doll shoe on his left foot. His enormous eyes stared blankly at the camera, unmoving.
“Dr. C,” you said, nodding to him, “what do you think?”
Cornelius blinked one eye slowly, then his other eye and finally raised one lumpy hand and gave a painfully slow, shaky thumbs up.
The comments exploded.
“OH MY GOD IT MOVES”
“not the mf HOMUNCULUS giving a THUMBS UP 💀💀💀”
“that is disgusting and i want 50 of them.”
Cornelius coughed once and the new starfish creature perked up slightly at the noise, then relaxed again. Your fingers instinctively brushed Cornelius’s head. He didn’t lean into the touch, but his eye twitched like he thought about it.
You flashed a peace sign at the camera and chirped, “Okay! I’ll be back after feeding time- this one eats crushed grapes so I need to go to the store, Byeee~!”
The stream ended and You set the creature down gently onto a heat pad beside your keyboard, then cracked your neck and yawned. “Another successful livestream, Corny.” You sighed as you stood up, making your way over towards Cornelius and picked him up effortlessly. “A few more and we can get outta here.” You muttered as you looked at the delipidated walls of your 'room'. (which in reality, was just something smaller than a walk-in closet.)
Meanwhile, elsewhere, William was sprawled across his bed, one hand propping up his head, the other holding a melting ice cream sandwich. Mark sat next to him, half-draped in a throw blanket as they both stared at Williams phone screen that was leaning against a book precariously.
“She has to be working in special effects,” William muttered, squinting at the paused stream still frozen on the starfish thing. “Like Hollywood-level practical FX. You don’t just make something like that in your room.”
“She’s probably not even the one making them,” Mark said, taking a bite of his ice-cream bar. “Her dad’s probably like… some prop guy for Galaxy full of Guardians 7 or something.”
William pointed at the screen. “That one in her hand just blinked five different directions.”
“It’s animatronic.”
“She talks to them.”
Mark shrugged. “It’s a bit.”
William clicked play again. The clip looped- the ugly creature-baby lifting his knobbly thumb with excruciating slowness.
Mark leaned forward to stare at the screen. “Okay, that one… that’s weird.”
“She sews them clothes, dude.”
“Still just a bit. Like, she’s probably building her brand or whatever.” Mark said as he shrugged again.
William rolled his eyes. “If this girl doesn’t end up in either prison or an Oscar acceptance speech, I’ll eat my socks.”
Mark smirked. “Well I hope she ends up being totally normal then, I wanna see that.”
William rolled his eyes, clicked pause again and zoomed in on the back of the starfish creature in her hand. “Is that a zipper?” he asked.
Mark leaned closer. “Totally. Look- you can see it, like, across the back.”
“You're right.” William sighed as he squinted. “Totally just some weird silicon thing.”
Cecil Stedman exhaled slowly through his nose and set down his tablet as he stared at the many blinking monitors in front of him.
At the center screen: your Toktik broadcast, paused mid-frame on Cornelius’s twitchy thumbs up.
He stared at the screen for a long moment before rubbing his temples. “She’s getting better,” he muttered to himself.
He reached over and clicked the intercom button on his desk and heard the soft 'ding' which meant someone picked up. “Log the new growth pattern. Starfish variant. High eye coordination, temperature-reactive skin, potential vibration sensitivity. Homunculus One: Cornelius is… still evolving. Add a flag to track behavior anomalies.”
His eyes narrowed slightly. “Her abilities continue to stabilize. Adaptive control is improving. No signs of regression, no psychotic episodes. Still no inclination toward criminal activity.” He glanced at the camera again. Cornelius stared back through the frozen image, big eyes unblinking.
Cecil’s lip twitched.
“She hasn’t accepted our invitation to the GDA. But that’s not a priority for now. So far… she’s staying on the right side of the line.”
He reached for his coffee and muttered under his breath.
“Unlike her parents.”