Synthetic population 663.
The swim meet was certainly fun to watch, the otter boys doing times that a human being couldn't match due to having more buoyancy to work with. Casper figured he'd be changing more swimmers eventually to even things out.
He wondered if he truly had an end goal, or if he'd just go on transforming humans forever. Every novelty wore off eventually. Even the drive to continue to use the ring would become a curse rather than a pleasure eventually. He couldn't let that happen. But big was a viable population that was self sustaining? Arguments ran anywhere from 500 to 40,000! True he had created over 600 anthros in less than a week, but that gigantic number was daunting!
Not to mention he still HAD MORE THAN JUST HIS... hobby? To deal with.
One of the otterboys actually shot out of the water like a cannon, right into the bleaches of rubbery animal people and got up without a scratch and leapt back in without missing a beat. Ashley giggled.
When the meet ended, with everything that happened that day, and with the walking they'd done, Casper realized he and Ashley had skipped lunch. Not that he felt that hungry. He wondered if the ring's power was sustaining him. Locomotion took energy after all.
Maybe it would be better to have both their parents there for the big reveal of he and Ashley being engaged. Ashley and Casper would have flipped a coin, but they didn't have any change on them, so they did paper-rock-scissors, which Ashley won, so they'd have the big reveal at Casper's house.
"You'll be able to transform those families you missed the first time you visited after getting the ring because they weren't home remember?" Ashley said. "You still have those 'stragglers' to clean up!"
"But if we go to your house, they'll be more humans to change." Casper argued. "And we just had a dinner at my house, it would be a lot more polite if my parents visited your house instead."
Ashley cringed, and Casper knew he had her cornered. "Blast you."
"You know you love me," Casper said.
"Heh, yeah, I do."
The last time Casper and Ashley saw their parents, the number of Synthetics had been 80, now the number was 663. Would their attitudes be any different now? They had been relieved to meet a family with a Synthetic Casper's own age before. He wondered if it was such a big deal now.
Casper also realized with a shock... he'd rather die than go back to the reality that existed before the ring... when he and Ashley were strangers rather than childhood friends. The memory of her just being the first random person he saw at the coffee shop after stepping out of the Wizard's store felt so... distant now, it had been three days, but it was more like another life time!
"Ashley... what about your job at the coffee shop?" Casper asked.
Ashley stopped in her tracks. She looked at Casper with a startled on her face. "I... " She looked dizzy. "I think... as a synthetic... I had less costs to worry about... but... I still had my job after... well, after I met you... Maybe... I... only work there... a day or so a week?... Maybe?"
Casper had seen that look before, it was on Mrs. Mac's rubbery otter face when he asked her how humans created Synthetics, pieces of reality that weren't completely filled in yet. Casper suddenly wondered if using the ring more wasn't just an impulse, but HAD TO BE USED enough to make the existence of the Synthetics stable in reality!
Casper realized something else, he still HADN'T gotten Ashley an engagement ring! Casper knew diamonds were actually the most common gem on Earth, them being for engagement was purely marketing. But he also knew it had been hardwired into their culture even as the diamond empire began to be split apart. But maybe he could still get something cheaper but just as heartfelt? Besides, diamonds weren't as indestructible as the commercials claimed anyway.
He took hold of Ashley in both hands, "Ashley! You tell your parents that me and my parents would like to come over, and I'll tell my you want us over."
"Gotcha!" Ashley nodded. It was a logical plan, and gave Casper time to do a little quick shopping! ... Where was the jewelry store in town? He couldn't ask Ashley without giving it away! So the two split up!
Thankfully their city had a handful of payphones that hadn't been retired.
It occurred to Casper that he hadn't really seen any Synthetics out and out CARRYING cell phones, their ID code on their butt check apparently serving as ID, PIN number, debt/credit card, movie club membership card, and everything else.
Casper decided then and there that next chance he got he was going to go down town (when he had time!) and zap the stores one after another to make it all capable with his kinds.
Where did Ashley store her cellphone? In her purse? He didn't really carry one (unlike many Synthetics Casper had seen). Between her breasts or rear? Or did she have pockets built into her skin? Any seemed possible. Lana still had her cell phone with her since they'd called her cell phone number before, then again, they still had to carry their backpacks with their school supplies, books, pencils, papers, calculators, and all the rest.
Still, he realized most Synthetics not really carrying around iphones or cell phones was a bit surprising, he hadn't even really THOUGHT about it. He'd suspect some form of telepathy or being able to connect to things wirelessly, but there had been no sign of that at all.
Still... an explicit part of his request with the power of the ring was that those transformed, even if they didn't all share the same opinions and tastes, would still see each other as part of the same community.
Still, it was getting dark, so it wasn't like there lots of students on campus.
He found one of the payphones with a touch screen and ran down the addresses until he found an address of a jewelry store and its hours. Six Days to the second big game. On Tuesday. Casper COULDN'T forget that. Lana and Tommy certainly would far less forgiving if he and Ashley forgot a second time. Casper didn't care much for football, but he did care for his friends.
Ashley meanwhile, as she raced home to carry out her part of the scheme, wondered if Janet and Casey were feeling jealous with how much she had hung out with Casper and his friends in the last few days. And if Ashley and Casper were going to spend the rest of their lives together, then she had better let Janet and Casey know that Ashley STILL cared about them deeply AS her best friends!
Maybe she DID need to take a break from joining Casper on zapping humans every day and focus back on her friends, even if she didn't want to miss a single zapping.
Casper actually IGNORED the humans he ran past, the rubber ram man going as fast as his body could take him, it was too far away to walk, yet too close to take the bus.
Casper was pretty sure Synthetics didn't actually breath, he didn't think they did at least, but he was giving a good emulation of huffing and puffing by the time he came into the small store.
The place was empty except for a middle aged man in the suit who took one look at Casper and asked calmly. "Anniversary?"
Casper shook his head.
"Engagement?" Casper nodded his head.
"Very good," gestured to a set of diamond rings. "Anything that would suit her fancy sir?"
Casper instead pointed to an emerald ring.
The shop owner's brow furrowed. "... Are you sure? I can't recommend it at all."
Casper just nodded.
"Alright, that'll be-" Realized his lack of cash might be a problem and used the ring.
The middle aged salesman became something that made Casper's eyes widen. He was the perfect rubber imitation of a silver back gorilla, no fancy colors, no odd designs, simply a living pool toy of a silverback gorilla, at first glance, Casper would have mistaken him for one. Gorillas were close to human shape anyway.
He still had the nozzle, but it was the same color as his skin, and facing him directly Casper couldn't see his barcode anyway, and he was behind the counter so Casper couldn't see his bulge instead of what would be there for an gorilla. His nipples never existed of course, but that was a detail Casper was likely to miss anyway.
"I'm sure she'll love it," said the salesman.
After letting his butt barcode be scanned by the gorilla Synthetic, Casper took the emerald ring and the container it was in, and hurried on his way to his parents' house. At least he was getting plenty of exercise. Did exercise even effect synthetics? Or were they in frozen physical perfection? Well, Tommy said he spent a lot of time at the gym, so it was logical.
664.
'Master,' said the ring, 'At this point, if you wish it, you may bring up the visual profile of any Synthetic you have created, even those who were created via secondary changes.'
Unable to resist, Casper brought up the husband of the mouse woman and father of the Pterodactyl girl. The illusionary image that appeared was a mustard yellow cat man with yellowish brown 'socks' 'gloves' and belly. Then he hurried on his way.
He again didn't even bother with those houses that still had humans in them in his parents' neighborhood, not tonight.
"Mom... dad... Ashley says... that, in return for coming over... that her parents... wouldn't mind you ... coming over for dinner tonight..."
The red ram synthetic and the orange ewe synthetic were surprised to see their son practically burst in the door, more so with his sudden announcement.
"Dear... that's nice, but this awfully sudden."
"Mom!... Please?" Casper said, giving her the biggest begging and pleading look he had ever given her. "It's important... for me and Ashley... please."
He didn't know if his parents guessed what he meant by that or not but they agreed, then it was only hoping that Ashley succeeded as well.
Luckily, she had.
Casper saw Ashley was confused when she saw him drive up in his parents' car as the sun had set, and the rest of the neighborhood hadn't been turned into a living rubber zoo. She way she glared at him made it clear she was kinda disappointed.
Thankfully people are people, and neither set of parents was about to bring up anything that might be considered rude or insensitive, like questions of this being on such short notice.
It didn't need to be said by either Ashley or Casper that they'd keep Ashley's pregnancy to themselves! And only announce it right after the wedding! Which they would have as soon as they could arrange it!
Casper didn't think much about Ashley's neighborhood, the memories he had now were of having visited this place several times since childhood, it was all familiar to him. The houses, the streets, he knew them all before he even say them. He even knew the way to Ashley's bedroom (where they had played Bario brothers using Game Wizard cheat device once upon a time).
Dinner was of movie set food, plastic, wax, foam, all mocked up to look like food humans would eat: expensive. Had their parents guessed after all?
During desert, Ashley brought it forward. "Mom, dad," she said the other other two lizard Synthetics. "We have something to say!"
"We were at the Bull's after party yesterday and-" Ashley gave Casper a quick kick, she didn't want shared that Casper had proposed to her as part of a Truth or Dare, her parents did NOT approve of that game.
"We're getting married!" Ashley beat him to it.
Well, Casper could still get a surprise in on her. "Yes, we are." Casper presented her with the emerald ring.
Ashley gasped at the sight of the ring.
The couple realized their parents were all smiling at them.
"Well it's about time," Ashley's mother, Mrs. Simmons said.
"I was starting to think you'd never propose!" Casper's father, Mr Thomas said.
"I thought you'd wait until collage was over," Mr. Simmons said.
"My little kid is growing up!" Casper's mother declared.
A little while later, after the shock had worn off,
"So...is this ring anything like yours?" Ashley whispered.
"I bought it from a completely mundane and normal jewelry store, sorry."
"Oh phooey, Ashley remarked.