All I ever do is run, so how do I step in... step into the sun?

“Consequences?” Nick stared at her, shocked. “What consequences?!”

Was Dakota going to demand something in exchange for her taking Morgana on as her buddy? While he wasn’t averse to doing her favors, it really rubbed him the wrong way, taking her up on something like this. Bargaining favors for being a decent person was wrong.

“Think about what you’re asking me, Nick,” Dakota said. Her voice was calm and rational as she tried to talk him through this evenly. “You’re asking me, personally, to choose Morgana, over someone else here, right?”

“W-well… I didn’t exactly mean it like that…” Nick realized what she was talking about now. She was telling him that he had to make a choice.

“If you tell me to choose Morgana if I win, then I will, if that will make you happy,” Dakota assured him. “But that means that the person who gets eliminated will be someone else. It isn’t the same as leaving it up to our own decisions. You will be consciously choosing to put Morgana above everyone else in your harem. Will you be able to deal with the guilt of that decision? It could even be Mary that gets eliminated, you know. Will you be able to look at your blushing bride in the face knowing that the reason she got eliminated was because you asked me to save Morgana?”

Her words landed on him like a stack of bricks. He couldn’t think of anything to say. “I… I… I’m sorry, you’re right,” he admitted, hanging his head. “I wasn’t thinking.”

Nick wasn’t able to make that decision. He knew if he asked Dakota to save someone she would, but that would be a conscious choice on his part.

He wouldn’t be able to hold this game, and Sylvia, fully responsible if he began making decisions like that. He just couldn’t.

“I… I don’t want anyone eliminated,” he admitted. “Even if it turns out like Holly and Marley, where they’re happy… I’m afraid of other people being transformed.”

Nick looked anxiously at Dakota. She looked completely ambivalent. He didn’t know what he wanted her to say. Did he want her to console him?

She sighed. “I agree with you,” she acknowledged. “A decision like that, eliminating people… warping them completely… it’s wrong.”

Then she smirked. It was rather out of place, given the content of their discussion.

“It would be much better if you just got a new girl added to your harem every week, and nobody got eliminated!”

…Well, Nick wasn’t sure how he felt about THAT. She was right, that would feel like a lot less pressure, but the thought of trying to satisfy that many women made his head hurt.

“…Let’s just drop it, please,” Nick sighed. “I just don’t know what to do. I want to make everyone happy, but…”

“You are making them happy,” Dakota said, reaching up and caressing his face. “Just by doing the things they want, you’ll be making them happy. And in doing so, they’ll make you happy in return. Isn’t that how a harem should be?”

It just didn’t seem to be getting through to her. He sighed and shook his head. “I just hope this next challenge goes okay,” he replied.

“…Well, if it makes you feel better, I’m not averse to choosing Morgana for my buddy,” she told him. “After all, I quite like her… and that diary of hers… there are all sorts of fun things that can be had with that. Yes, it’s much too early for her to be eliminated…”

Nick felt a shiver run down his spine. Again, he was seeing that side of her that scared him.

“I’m just teasing,” she joked. “Anyway, Morgana should be fine… I think.”

Nick wished he could be as sure.

As for Morgana herself, she was currently occupied with something else entirely.

She sat across the table from Dawn. The short woman had a flushed face, and kept looking away from the goth.

“Um… yeah… sorry about all that,” she apologized, clearing her throat. “Showing you stuff like that, I mean.”

Morgana blushed and glanced away. “Well… I mean… it wasn’t quite what I expected, that’s for sure.” She was being tactful. Dawn had completely blindsided her with her love of kitties. Not that there was anything bad with the way Dawn had acted, of course, Morgana could sympathize with wanting to cuddle cute cats- one of them was sitting on her lap right now, in fact!

But it threw her off to see.

“So… I would appreciate if you don’t mention this to the others.” Dawn said politely. Her ears twitched, with Morgana found just adorable.

“Um… I guess?” Morgana thought that if the others saw Dawn lounging around with the kittens and slacking off, they’d like her even more. But she didn’t say anything since it wasn’t her place. “Don’t worry, your secret’s safe with me.”

Dawn nodded, her tense expression relaxing slightly. “Thank you. Now then, did you want something from me? Or were you just looking to come play with the kitties?”

Morgana noted that her tail was wagging back and forth. She took that as a positive sign that Dawn was actually interested. Although outwardly she looked calm and detached, her tail and ears revealed what she was really feeling.

That’s interesting. I absolutely suck at reading social cues and getting the mood right, but with Dawn’s cat parts, it becomes so easy, Morgana realized. That realization brought a smile to her face very quickly and she looked forward to sharing her good news.

“Actually, I wanted to see you because I’ve been having a really good day today,” she confessed, which caused Dawn to perk up in surprise.

“Really?” She asked. “Even after seeing your results in the popularity poll?”

Dawn had avoided the subject, since she expected it to be a triggering point for the goth. But Morgana had mentioned it herself. That was certainly strange.

Morgana nodded. “I… I really thought for a while all week, about the advice you gave me before. Remember, on our night together? You told me that I had to think about my reputation… and you were right.”

“Oh… yeah, that,” Dawn nodded. “I thought you’d forgotten, what, with all the focus on the wedding and everything. It seems like you’ve been making improvements, though, and that’s good. The bachelorette party was fun?”

Dawn had slept through most of it, but from what she’d heard, it went well. No one would tell her exactly what happened, though.

“Yeah, I really felt like I was starting to get closer to the others,” Morgana nodded. A small smile turned up the sides of her lips. “But see, the thing is… it wasn’t just about that.”

“Oh?” Dawn raised her eyebrow curiously.

“See, you’re right, after I saw my points on the board, I kind of had a freak out,” Morgana admitted, hanging her head shamefully.

“…I know. I was there.”

Oh. Right. Another reason for Morgana to feel like a complete fool; she’d totally forgotten that Dawn had actually been there.

“So, uh… yeah. It didn’t exactly go how I wanted to,” she mumbled.

“Nick went after you, right?” Dawn asked gently. “I thought about going after you myself, but… I thought it would be better to talk with him.”

She studied Morgana carefully. The girl definitely seemed to be glowing. Not necessarily a sex glow, though.

Well, I should think not, Dawn thought, glancing at the goth’s pale hand. Her point total had only gone up by two points since this morning. So she and Nick had clearly done something, but it wasn’t as far as actual intercourse. So what is that shine about?

“Nick basically smacked some sense into me,” Morgana explained. “…N-not literally!” She clarified when she saw the shadow cross over Dawn’s face. “No, what I mean is that he basically told me that if I didn’t get started on making real friends, not just superficial friendships, then there was very little chance I would make it to the next round without getting eliminated.”

“Oh… yeah, I think I understand,” Dawn said, nodding solemnly. “Rose had the exact same problem, actually. …Although, she brought it on herself.”

Not only had Rose made a grand total of zero friends when she was the auditionee, she had actually made enemies by sabotaging the other girls and scheming against them. It was only by the grace of Holly throwing herself on the sword that Rose hadn’t been eliminated immediately.

“So what’s your plan, then?” Dawn asked, adjusting her glasses and leaning forward. She glanced out the window, and saw that the sun was getting pretty low on the horizon. It was late in the afternoon already. “You gotta work fast.”

“Oh, I have been!” Morgana lit up with glee. She hugged the black cat in her lap tightly to her chest, nearly suffocating the poor thing with her breasts. “I’ve been working all day to get to know the other girls better!”

Dawn’s eyes widened and her tail jumped up. “Really? Morgana, that’s great! I’m so proud of you!” Dawn had been very worried about Morgana all week, though she’d done an excellent job of not letting it show. There was something about the poor girl that just triggered her protective instincts.

“So I wanted to come see you, too,” Morgana explained. “So I could get to know you better, and we could become real friends.”

She winced. “Oh, but I don’t mean that in a way like I’m trying to manipulate you into being my friend so you’ll pick me and I won’t be eliminated or anything like that… although I guess that’s part of it… I mean, it’s not like… well it is…”

Dawn cut her off there before the goth began to spiral downwards into a web of confusing self-flagellation.

“Look, it’s fine. I don’t care, really. Mary or Dani would definitely get pissed if you just tried to befriend them for their vote, but I’m more rational than that.”

Morgana sighed in relief. “Oh, thank goodness…” She sighed, slumping over. “I was really concerned… I didn’t want… well… you get the idea.”

Dawn nodded. She understood perfectly what the other girl’s concerns were.

“Now then, Morgana, if you want to discuss me choosing you as my buddy in the next round, then I suppose we can-”

“Wait, no, this is just too weird!” Morgana held up her hands and waved them around like crazy. She looked panicked.

“…Isn’t that what you want, though? To not get eliminated?” Dawn asked, her brow furrowing with confusion. “…Wait, is this another Holly thing? Where you actually want to be Nick’s sex ****, so you want to be eliminated? Well-”

“No!” Morgana blurted out. “…Well, wait. Okay, so, it’s not like I don’t want to be his sex ****, but we both talked, and we agreed that it’s too early in our relationship to make any big- wait, why am I telling you this?!”

Morgana’s brain worked a mile a minute, and that just naturally leached into her words when she spoke with others. She really needed to get a handle on not blurting stuff out.

“It’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine,” Dawn said, chuckling a little. “I think that it’s cute that you’re so devoted to him, honestly.”

Morgana perked up hearing that. “Really? You think I’m cute?”

Cute wasn’t a word that Morgana found associated with her very often. She puffed out her cheeks in frustration. “I’m not cute! I’m sexy and cool, a dark witch goth sex queen vibe! There’s nothing cute about being sexy!”

Dawn just shook her head. “No… definitely cute.”

“Stop teasing me!” Morgana cried. She wanted to be cool and sexy!

“So that’s it then?” Dawn changed the subject, taking a sip from her tea. “You don’t want to be his sex ****… or at least, you’re not sure if you want to be his sex ****, am I getting that right?”

Morgana nodded. “The idea… it’s really hot, don’t get me wrong. But I’ve been seeing Nick in such an idealized light, I guess… I never really got to know the real him, you know?”

Dawn stared blankly at her. “…And you just figured this out today?”

“Yes!” Morgana’s eye twitched in irritation. She liked Dawn, and really wanted to get on her good side, but the cat girl just had a way of stabbing her where she was weakest.

“Well… so what, you want to be my friend… but you don’t want me to save you? What am I missing here?” Dawn asked, confused.

“It’s not that I don’t want you to save me,” Morgana said, shaking her head. “Of course I do! I’d love to be in master’s- err, that is, Nick’s official harem!”

Dawn calmly sat back in her seat and stroked the kitten on her lap as she waited for the “but” to come from the other girl’s lips.

“But…”

Right on time.

“…I don’t want you to feel obligated to do it because of our friendship,” Morgana finished, sighing in disappointment. Her good mood had somewhat deflated since she started talking to Dawn, which was the opposite of what she thought would happen!

Dawn took a sip of tea. “…Obligated, huh?”

Morgana nodded. “I mean… I want us to be friends… real friends. You know, joking around the way everybody else is. And I feel like if we couch that in talk about me being eliminated, well… that might mess it up.”

Morgana had been pulled in a lot of different directions today. She’d had to take a step back and analyze her situation from multiple angles.

And from a lot of perspectives, it was clear that her current actions were unbelievably stupid. After all, she really didn’t want to be eliminated from the harem. The smart decision would have been to throw herself on Dawn’s mercy and beg to be spared. Or even done the same to Dakota. She could have offered up her diary to the other woman for safety, even, that might ensure she made it through the rest of the game.

But that wasn’t what she wanted. It had taken a while, but she’d finally peeled back all the walls she’d put up around herself, and found what she really wanted.

Friends.

Cooking with Mary and Dani and Gina and Holly and even Rose, it had been the most fun time she could remember. She had never had something like that back home.

“It’s strange…” Morgana murmured, her eyes glassing over. “When I first came here, I thought that this place was the answer to all my prayers. That I would finally get to live a special life, become the goth sex dream I always wanted to be, become a witch in the true sense… there was a lot about my life I expected to completely alter.”

“Well… some things have definitely changed, about all of us,” Dawn responded, wiggling her ears to prove her point while she glanced pointedly at Morgana’s huge rack.

“Well… yeah, that’s true,” Morgana said, giggling a little. “But that’s not what I meant. I thought that I’d change my life to be filled with a bunch of hot sex orgies with a man who understands me, that I’d rule over his harem as queen… and I wanted that, too, or at least, I thought I did.”

She sighed wistfully and glanced out the window. A week ago, she would have shirked away from the sun, but now… it seemed so warm and bright.

“Things have changed?” Dawn prompted, leaning in closer. She studied Morgana’s expression curiously.

Morgana nodded, her cheeks flushing slightly.

“I think I’ve finally realized… that is, today, being with everybody, being with Nick… it made me realize that I don’t want that,” she admitted. “…Okay, well, I do, that’s not quite right. It’s not like I DON’T want amazing sex or to be a hot witch, or to rule over Nick’s harem, or…”

“Morgana, Morgana, please, breathe,” Dawn said, holding up her hand again to slow the other girl down. “Drink your tea.”

Morgana took a sip, and sighed. Dawn had made the choice for her (she wasn’t a tea drinker, even though she desperately wanted to fulfill the image of a classy tea-drinking witch) and her selections were always good. Soon enough, she’d relaxed again, and could get out her thoughts.

“…I do want all that stuff,” she clarified. “My fantasies are still in here, you know, I still… hah…” She started drooling and her eyes glassed over again as she imagined all the fun stuff she’d get up to in the future, if she stayed in Nick’s harem.

Dawn rolled her eyes and snapped her fingers again.

“…Right, sorry. But that’s not what I want most,” Morgana explained. “I guess, deep down, what I always wanted… it was friendship.”

She smiled shyly. “That’s so dorky, right? Saying that I really just want friendship?”

“A little bit,” Dawn admitted. Though she could sympathize completely. “But honestly? You’re a teenager, Morgana. It’s natural to want something like that.”

“Yeah…” Morgana nodded contemplatively. “I guess you’re right,” she agreed. “It is natural.”

Dawn cracked a grin. “So… friendship. That’s your goal now?”

Morgana nodded. “Exactly!” She confirmed. “And I think I’m off to a really good start. I think I’ve made friends with Carly, Marley, Kim, Dani, Gina… Mary, maybe Rose… I think even Holly, too… not Dakota though.”

Dawn’s smile became just a smidgeon more ****. Her ears drooped slightly. “Oh… I see. So I was the last one on your list, huh?”

Morgana’s eyes widened and her face went even paler. “Wait, no! That’s not… okay, I mean, technically yes, but it didn’t turn out that way! It was just a coincidence!” She wailed. “I mean…”

“It’s okay,” Dawn laughed. “I’m not upset. I’m just teasing you.” But her ears told a different story. She was a little bothered by it. After all, she was hardly ever chosen first as someone’s friend.

“Oh…” Morgana relaxed a little, and her face flushed with shame. Like with Kim and Gina, she wasn’t used to being teased like this. And Dawn was the last person she expected it from.

“So how are you feeling?” Dawn asked. Her eyes scanned over Morgana’s body. The pale girl had split ends, crust in the corners of her eyes, and her clothes seemed like they could use a good ironing, save her tight leather pants. “You still need to work on stuff like personal grooming, and maybe deal with your slouching problem, but other than that…”

“I’m not trying to be perfect like you yet,” Morgana said, blushing slightly. “I’m just trying to do my best, that’s all.”

Dawn grinned. “Well, it seems that you’ve definitely improved on how you comport yourself, at least.”

Morgana snickered. There it was, that funny word again.

“Hopefully, your hard work to improve your reputation will have the results you want it to,” Dawn said, extending her hand out to Morgana. “I’m really proud of you.”

Morgana looked straight into her eyes with an innocent smile on her face, continuing to pet the cat in her lap.

Dawn cleared her throat. “Ahem… err… you’re supposed… to shake it,” she said, feeling humiliated that she had to explain that very basic detail.

Morgana’s eyes bulged out. “OH! I-I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking… sorry…”

She nodded and quickly accepted Dawn’s hand, shaking it vigorously. Then she stood up, glancing over at the window again. It was pretty close to sunset.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t stay for too long,” Morgana apologized. “But it really means a lot to me that you listened. And that you’re my friend.”

Dawn stood up, wearing a smile of her own. “I was glad to help,” she replied. “Like I said, I just hope it’s worth it.”

The two girls left the café. Morgana felt the sun wash over her as she did. She’d been hiding in the dark for so long, it actually felt nice, going out to spend time with a friend like this.

She hoped that she’d have more options of this sort in the future.