By engaging in the sacred trust of IT

You don’t want to be responsible for your friend installing a virus, so you decide to run a few cursory tests. Thankfully, you have a directory in your phone specifically to quarantine suspicious software. You download the file from Poison’s message to that directory, perform the “computer magic” of changing the file extension from .bin to .apk, and then run it.

It installs quicker than you usually expect when you don’t let an app phone home, but maybe it’s just small. An icon appears on your home screen, featuring pixelated white letters that spell “KDK” on a black background. When you click on it, the logo expands to fullscreen and the white pixels start filling in with pink. Was Poison embarrassed because they downloaded something girly?

Before you can speculate further, the app sheds some light on itself.

Hi! Welcome to the Kink Development Kit (or the KDK for short). I don't know how you managed to come across a copy of this…

Ah, so that was the hold-up. It surprises you that someone with their vibe and a name like Poison would be cagey about having a kinky sex life. Whatever their kink is, it can’t be worse than the fucked up porn you’re into.

You skim through the onboarding instructions, which make it sound like just a specialized dating app. Nothing you need to find on some third-page search result. Checking your firewall confirms that the app hasn’t tried to use the internet yet, but its first push notification catches you off-guard.

Scan complete. Welcome ‘Violet Starshine’ Age 20. Within KDK guidelines. Tap here to proceed.

Just as the immediate security concerns dawn on you, you feel yourself being pulled by inertia as the bus driver hits the brakes. With a glance out the window, you realize this is your stop, so you rush to the exit door before it closes again.

You decide to wait to further investigate the once again very suspicious software until you have the privacy of your bedroom. You pocket your phone and briskly walk the rest of the way home.