The next morning Takeo had gotten up early, to get breakfast started. He began making the preparations when he noticed someone sleeping on the sofa. Walking closer, he noticed it was Lunark. Did she and the boss have a fight? He wondered.
Lunark didn't need much sleep, so she simply got up from the couch when she realised there was another person in the room. "Good morning, Takeo." Oh, breakfast! "Here, let me help you with that."
"It's alright, I've got it covered, shouldn't you go and get changed or something?" he asked, wondering whether he should ask why she was sleeping on the sofa.
"Hmm. I do need to, but I'm waiting until Tesamu's awake." Then he wouldn't be in the room, possibly waking.
"Tesamu?" Takeo had noticed the kid had been acting weird around Lunark since Muzaka's visit a couple of days ago.
"He's scared of werewolves. And nobles." Ah, right. Takeo might not know that since that argument happened in Latin.
"Oh, I see. Does that mean he knows about you and Rai?" Takeo asked. "He only seems to act strangely around you."
"He knows about me and Muzaka. Not Rai, thankfully." She smiled awkwardly. "You sure you don't want help? I don't really have anything else to do."
Takeo nodded. "Alright, you can prepare the meat? I'm still working on the vegetables," he replied. "Can I ask? Why were you sleeping on the sofa? Did you and the boss have a fight?"
Lunark chuckled. "No. Tesamu had a nightmare. And wanted to sleep with Frankenstein." It was rather normal for puppies to sleep with their parents, after all.
Takeo let out a sigh of relief, "That's good to hear. The two of you are getting married in just over a week." He was excited as were the other two, they'd never been to a wedding before.
"We are." And she couldn't wait for it. "But a small fight wouldn't hurt our relationship either. You've got nothing to worry about."
Takeo nodded as the two of them, finished making the preparations for breakfast. Soon enough, Frankenstein entered the living room. "Good morning," he said, walking over to Lunark, wrapping his arms around her and giving her a kiss.
She eagerly returned it, wrapping her arms around his shoulder in turn. "Tesamu sleep well?"
"Yes, he did. He didn't have any nightmares for the rest of the night. Did you sleep well?" He asked. He'd missed cuddling with Lunark.
"I've slept in far worse places than a comfortable couch, Franken." She nuzzled her nose against his. She'd missed him.
Frankenstein looked down, at her stomach, smiling, "What about our baby?" he asked, "Can you sense our babies aura?"
She shook her head. "Just Dark Spear, as usual." Which was close enough, according to Raizel.
"Alright." He kissed her again. "Tesamu should be in his room now if you'd like to get ready before breakfast. I'll help Takeo." He smiled, letting her go reluctantly.
"I'll go do that." She went to go get dressed, coming back looking far fresher than she did before. Though, no one tended to look anything but comfortable in sleeping clothes.
Frankenstein walked over to her as she returned and gave her a kiss, "You look beautiful, as always." he smiled.
"As do you." Frankenstein was a very handsome man, after all. "What did you and Takeo make for breakfast?"
"I've made the usual dishes, but instead of using beef in the bulgogi, I used venison instead." he smiled, hoping she'd like that little change.
She blushed, saying nothing. Venison was delicious. Where was he getting all of it though? "Did you hunt your own deer?"
Frankenstein shook his head. "I'm terrible at hunting." He laughed. "I have the local butcher import it especially."
"...I could show you how to hunt sometime?" He could probably learn the werewolf method very easily.
Frankenstein smiled at the invitation, "I'd like that."
She grinned. She was sure her powerful lover could take down a deer no problems. "I'll go call the boys down and get the table set." Tao in particular... he might need coffee if he forgot to sleep again.
Frankenstein nodded. He and Takeo set the table as the rest of the household began coming down. Tao was yawning. Frankenstein looked at him. "Rough night?" He asked, certain he'd stayed up all night on his computer again.
"Mmpfh." Tao sat in his chair and his head flopped forward onto the table.
"That good, huh?" He laughed. With the table set, everyone sat down to eat breakfast together.
Tesamu sat in his seat, eating quietly. He looked between Lunark and Teacher. Had he managed to damage their relationship, even a little by doing this? Though, they looked just as close as ever... hmm. Maybe he needed to try more?
Everyone was involved in the usual conversations at breakfast. Frankenstein noticed Tesamu not joining in the conversations. "Is everything alright Tesamu? You look like you have something on your mind."
"Ah! No! I'm fine!" He busied himself with eating his ramen to prove it.
"If you're upset about last night, you don't have to worry." Frankenstein could tell there was something still troubling Tesamu, and though it might be his guilt over getting Lunark to leave the room last night.
He shook his head. No. He was more upset that it didn't work. He could see how closely they still sat together! And how he still put more meat on her plate for some reason. ...Lunark did the same for Tristan, actually. Was she actually in love with him?
Frankenstein thought he'd leave the boy to it, he obviously didn't want to talk about it. Soon, dinner was over and done with. Frankenstein took the dishes back to the kitchen, as the rest of the household left for work.
Teacher... Teacher should know of her wandering eye. Then Teacher would know that she wasn't the best he could get, and get rid of her. Tesamu followed him to his labs. He was supposed to teach him something today anyway.
Frankenstein had set up an experiment in his lab for Tesamu. He had a bar of Ivory Soap and a microwavable bowl ready and waiting. "We'll be conducting some experiments today, have you got your notepad and pen?"
"Yes." He clicked the pen. He'd never get used to that. He could click it all day if he were honest. "... Soap?" That's what that was, right?
"Yes, it's Ivory soap to be exact. Tell me, do you know what kind of experiment we'll be conducting?" he asked.
"...No?" Soap was soap! It being made out of tusks shouldn't matter!
"We're going to be conducting an experiment in Thermal Expansion, but first I'd like to know what you think will happen, when we heat the soap, in a microwave?"
"... If it's called 'Thermal Expansion', then the soap'll get bigger." Duh. That was common sense!
Frankenstein laughed, "Exactly, but how? What are you expecting to see?"
"... Like the noodles?" They got thicker as they soaked up broth.
"That's a good hypothesis. Write that down, then we'll begin the experiment and see if you're right." He smiled, happy to help his young lab assistant conduct an experiment.
"Okay." He wrote it down on his paper. He needed it, after all.
"Let's take measurements before the experiment, so we'll know if it's gotten bigger."
"Okay!" He took a ruler on the table, measuring the soap carefully so that he got accurate ones.
"That's great, we're all set." Frankenstein cut the Ivory soap into 4 pieces and placed them in a microwaveable bowl. He put the soap in for two minutes, and awaited the results.
It grew and made a weird shape. It wasn't what it was originally at all! How? What had happened!?
Once the microwave had stopped, Frankenstein removed the bowl wearing oven gloves, so they could take a closer look at the soap. "Let's measure it again and see how much it has expanded."
He pressed his ruler to it. "Ah!" the foam went down with the pressure of the ruler! This wasn't the same thing they'd had at all!
"Do you have a hypothesis as to why the soap expanded the way it did?" Frankenstein asked, curious to see if Tesamu had any theories.
He shook his head. This was... beyond him. Why did it do that? Maybe... "Did it boil?" It was kind of like a solid version of when water boiled, he thought.
"Something like that, the soap is filled with tiny air bubbles. When heated the air bubbles expand, causing the soap to foam and grow. If we let it cool completely, it'll harden and can still be used as soap." Frankenstein explained.
"Oh." So it was still usable then?
"We'll be turning this into clay, do you have any ideas on how we're going to do that?" He asked.
"Clay? But it's soap!" Soap was soap and clay was clay!
"Yes, it won't be for long." Frankenstein smiled, he produced a jug of water and a roll of toilet paper. "Let's start by unravelling the roll of toilet paper first."
"What for?" Wouldn't that make a mess?
"It's how we're going to turn the soap into clay." Frankenstein smiled.
"Okay." It was just a roll. It couldn't make that much of one.
Frankenstein began unravelling the roll, before handing it over to Tesamu. "Why don't you give it a try?" he asked.
"Umm." He turned the roll around in his hand, accidentally dropping it in the process, leaving him holding one end of the roll while it bounced and unwound itself. "Ah!"
Frankenstein laughed slightly, "It's alright, we need to unwind it, the process doesn't matter."
"But it'll make a mess!"
"It'll be fine, it's not wet like water, so it's easy to clean up." He smiled.
Even so... he picked up the roll and just wrapped it around his arm to unwrap the rest of it. "Done."
"Good, now let's place it in a bowl and add the soap from earlier to it." Frankenstein smiled, the experiment was going well.
Oh. He'd need to gather all the stuff on the floor then. He did that as well and put it into a bowl that Teacher had brought. And the soap... it had cooled down enough to touch, at least. He grabbed at it. The texture was so... weird. Brittle. He wound up breaking bits of it. "Oh."
"Don't worry, we need to break the soap into small pieces, so let's crumble it into the bowl." Frankenstein helped Tesamu with the soap.
"Okay!" He got to work on crumbling it in earnest. He and Teacher made quick work of it together.
"Right, you'll want to roll up your sleeves for this next bit." Frankenstein waited until Tesamu had done so, "I'm going to pour a glass of water into the soap and paper, once it's in there, you'll need to mix it all together until you get a solid lump of clay. Ready?"
He nodded. He could do that. "Yes."
"Okay," Frankenstein took a cup of water and poured it into the bowl, as Tesamu combined the ingredients until they formed a soft mouldable clay.
It felt... weird. "...So we can make pottery with this then?" He looked at it dubiously.
Frankenstein laughed, "No, it's mouldable like clay, but unlike clay, it won't dry out. You can keep shape it as many times as you like."
"... What's the point of that?" They'd made something essentially useless.
"It's fun to play with and the soft texture of it is great for stress relief." He said smiling.
Tesamu still looked at it dubiously but nodded.
"We have some time before everyone returns. Why don't we try moulding something out of the soap dough?" He said.
"Okay." What would he make? What would Teacher make?
Frankenstein split the dough in half and showed Tesamu how to sculpt it into a dragon. The dough was soft and pliable and kept it's shape better than expected.
"Oh!" Wow. They could make things easy! It was an art tool then?
"Here you go," Frankenstein handed his half of the dough back to Tesamu, "Why don't you try making something? You can be as creative as you like."
He didn't need that much, he didn't think. He just made a dog with a smaller amount. "There."
"That's really good," Frankenstein praised the child, hoping it'd encourage him to play more in the future.
Oh. It was... good? He blushed happily. "Thank you, Teacher."
"You're welcome, that's our experiment concluded. Do you want to write down the results?"
"Um. Yeah." He put the clay down and wrote the results down. It had foamed and turned brittle. That was quite the observation!
"Right, let's get everything cleaned up and get dinner started, everyone will be home in a couple of hours. Why don't you take the soap dough to your room, so you can play with it later?" He said, gathering up the bowls they'd used.
"Okay." But wait. "...Umm. If Lunark liked someone else... what would you do?"
Frankenstein thought for a moment, "I'd be happy for her, if that was what she wanted. Why?"
"I think she likes someone else."
"Really? Who?" Frankenstein asked, he was certain he hadn't noticed anything out of the ordinary and if Lunark did like someone else, he was sure she would have said something.
"I don't wanna say." Teacher seemed to like Tristan just fine, after all.
"Hmm..." Frankenstein thought about what Tesamu was saying and doubted any of it was true, especially since he knew Lunark.
"Um. I'll go put this up now." He walked up to his room to put it away.
"Alright, I'll finish cleaning up then get started on dinner." The others would be tired after a long day, so he thought he'd make everyone's favourite dishes.
Ah. Tesamu was going to his room. That meant she could go see Franken now. She took the elevator down. "How'd the science lesson go?"
"It went rather well, I showed him how to make some soap dough." Frankenstein smiled, walking over to Lunark, pulling her close and giving her a kiss.
She happily accepted it, leaning her head on his chest after. "Soap dough?"
"Yes, you combine toilet paper, soap and water to make a soft, pliable dough, that can be shaped as needed. It's quite relaxing to play with." He smiled. He'd missed her so much. "He did say something strange though."
"Strange? Strange for him or strange in general?"
Frankenstein thought for a moment, "I'd say strange in general. He seems to think you like someone else. I'm not sure where he'd get such an idea from though."
Her brow furrowed, trying to think of anyone she would have been friendly with. "Muzaka maybe? But I'm just polite to him because he's my Lord." She shook her head. "No. I'm not interested in anyone but you." Looking to the side and blushing, she started again. "I'm... not opposed to polyamory. But I want you all to myself right now." So she'd have told him if there was another she was interested in.
Frankenstein held her close, "I know. If that's something you'd want, then I'm happy to go along with it, but right now, I don't want to share you with anyone."
She snuggled closer. "I'll help you get the lab clean. Then we can work on dinner."
"Sounds good to me, then maybe we can..." He whispered something into her ear softly, before leaning back to smile waiting to see her reaction.
She laughed. "Of course." She leaned up to kiss him. He needn't whisper when they were alone, but his breath on her ear...
The two of them set to work cleaning the lab, then headed up to the kitchen, where Takeo was already making preparations for dinner. "Good work Takeo. Lunark and I will give you a hand so it all gets done quicker."
"Thanks, Boss." It still felt weird calling him dad, but he was sure that Frankenstein got the implication behind boss now. "All right, what still needs to be done?" Lunark asked.
"The rice still needs to be cleaned and the ramen hasn't been started yet," Takeo responded.
"I'll take the ramen," Frankenstein volunteered, he was the one responsible for making it after all.
Lunark cleaned the rice easily and got it in the rice cooker. Was that everything then? "I'll go ahead and get the bean sprouts out for you."
"Thank you," Frankenstein replied. A few minutes later everything was cooked and placed on the table as everyone took their seats.
Dinner passed as usual, Lunark putting meat on Tristan's plate, and Tesamu watching intently, a bit angry. Could she at least not do that in front of Teacher if she was going to insist on being unfaithful!?
Frankenstein noticed Tesamu seemed a bit distant, maybe he didn't feel like he could join in. "Tesamu, why don't you tell everyone about the science experiment you conducted today?" He smiled, it'd be best to include the boy in their conversations if he was going to feel like part of the family.
He frowned. Was Teacher truly oblivious to what was happening right in front of him? He'd said he hadn't wanted to say who Lunark liked, for Tristan's sake if nothing else, but still! Didn't this make it obvious? "Okay." He described the experiment. How the soap became fluffy and brittle. The making the clay he left out. That was part of a craft, not an experiment.
"That's awesome, did you have fun?" Takeo asked. He guessed that was the main point of the experiment.
"Teacher and I made clay from it afterwards. I have it in my room."
"That's great, maybe we could play with it later?" Takeo suggested. Tesamu was part of the household now, and he'd always wanted a younger brother to play with.
"Umm. Okay." Takeo was always nice to him. He didn't know why, but that was fine! Having Takeo around was good.
Pretty soon dinner was over. Frankenstein helped Takeo and M-21 take the plates back to the kitchen, so they could clean them. Tesamu approached Lunark, "Um, is it alright if I talk with you for a few minutes?" He asked. This time he'd definitely save Teacher.
She blinked. Tesamu wanted to talk to her. She smiled gently at the boy. "Of course. What do you need?"
Tesamu nodded, "It's about Teacher, I think he likes someone else." It was worth a try. Teacher did seem surprised when he'd told him something similar earlier.
Ah. He was trying to make them dislike each other. "Nice try kiddo. He'd have told me if he was."
Tesamu was taken aback, "He really does though." He might as well go all-in if this was going to work.
"Why haven't I met them then? If we wanted another partner, we agreed to introduce them to each other." She figured he wouldn't understand polyamory at his age. "I can share, you know. And he knows that."
Tesamu was stumped, he wasn't sure what she meant. He'd have to come up with some other plan, this clearly wasn't going to work in his favour. "But what if he wanted to keep it a secret?"
"Why would he? We could both like the person he likes. And then we could all like each other." That was probably the easiest way to explain it to him.
Tesamu was even more confused, "Why would you want to share? Isn't liking someone supposed to be a special thing between two people?" If she was thinking about other people, then that means that she doesn't really like Teacher as much as she says she does.
Lunark nodded. "And that's what's called monogamy. But some couples like other people too. And that's called polyamory. Franken and I are monogamous right now. But we have discussed the possibility of polyamory as well." She quirked an eyebrow. "As well as covered that for now, we'd rather be a monogamous couple. Where are you getting the ideas of me or him having outside interests?"
"I've seen you with Tristan! If you like him, then why are you not telling Teacher!?" Tesamu frowned, wondering if she'd try to deny it.
"... Why does everyone think I'm trying to romance our puppy!?" She shook her head. "No. I see him the way I see you. A kid to take care of. Nothing more."
Tesamu didn't like this. If she was telling the truth then that meant there was no way she'd break up with Teacher. He'd leave things as they were for now, but he wasn't happy about it.
She smiled. "Why don't you go play with Takeo? He's been wanting to see your clay." And she had a date in Frankenstein's study with him.
Tesamu nodded, "Alright," He'd come up with a plan to break her and teacher up later. Tesamu excitedly ran off to find Takeo, so they could play with the clay he'd made.