Have you tried turning it off and then on again?

“WHAT?!?” you gasp, and grab the phone out of Tammy’s outstretched hand. Your heart is beating a mile a minute – if the Multiplier is gone, then…

… huh.

“No it’s not?” you say. “It’s there?” Hmm. “What if you look on the laptop?”

Molly does. “Nothing. Can’t see the icons either.”

Tammy looks up at the ceiling. “Are you going to have to authenticate us to this thing every time we want to look at it?” she asks, and you sit back down between them.

“It’s back!” Molly gasps.

“… huh. Let me try something.” You place the phone with the open Multiplier in Tammy’s hand. “Don’t look away from it. Try not to even blink,” you say, and then you get up and slowly walk across the room, stopping at the far wall. “Still there?” you ask. “Still there,” Tammy confirms.

“When I say go, look away from it and then look back. Go.”

They do. “Gone,” Tammy confirms. “I guess we didn’t stare at it the whole time you were peeing.”

Again, you sit back down between them. “And here it is again,” Molly says. “Do you have to be actively showing it to us?”

“Hm. It said ‘level 1 access’ – I guess there’s also a level 2?” What exactly happened when they got access, you wonder. “Let me check the updates log.”

“The what?” Tammy says.

As you expected, it looks like you got a ton of points for what you guess was foreplay, but you ignore that for now and fast-scroll all the way to the bottom, where the most interesting part is.

• A Secret Shared: Gave MOLLY CAROL CARTER Level 1 Access to the Affection Multiplier. 0 points awarded. MOLLY CAROL CARTER can: view the Affection Multiplier when it is shown to her by JACOB ROBERTSON CARTER. To increase MOLLY CAROL CARTER’s access to Level 2, have MOLLY CAROL CARTER state the full name of her first sexual partner, and promise to only use her knowledge of the Affection Multiplier in the best interests of JACOB ROBERTSON CARTER.

  ---

Molly looks a little dubious at that.

“It’s okay if you don’t want –” you begin. “Sonia Maghrebi,” Molly says. “It was Sonia Nur Maghrebi. And, I mean, yes, I promise to only use my knowledge of the Affection Multiplier in the best interests of Jacob Robertson Carter –”

There’s a long buzz from your phone, and an update appears.

• Trust is Fundamental: Gave MOLLY CAROL CARTER level 2 access to the Affection Multiplier. 0 points awarded. MOLLY CAROL CARTER cannot: open the Affection Multiplier or the Affection Multiplier Manual; start new profiles by meeting people; purchase attributes; change any settings without having them automatically revert afterward; tell or otherwise inform new people about the Affection Multiplier or the Affection Multiplier Manual.

  ---

“ – but what if we disagree about what your best interests are? Like, what if I think it’d be in your best interest for you to move in with us and live here permanently?”

You grimace. “I assume we’d talk about it?”

“Also,” Tammy says, “is that promise binding?”

You blink. “Like… legally?”

“Like magically. If I make that promise and then use my knowledge to do something that I don’t think is in your best interest, do I… I dunno, catch fire? Turn into a frog? Die of an aneurysm?”

“Uh…”

“Chelsea Swainton, by the way. And I promise to only use my knowledge of the Affection Multiplier in the best interests of Jacob Robertson Carter.”

Your phone remains silent.

Tammy blinks. “…Traci Melville?”

There’s a long buzz from your phone, and an update confirms that TAMARA SALLY CARTER now has level 2 access as well.

Her brow furrows. “That’s weird,” she says. “It claims that I’ve only experimented with two girlfriends?”

You blink. You definitely want to know more about how many other girls Tammy has had sex with, and how, but it’ll bug you if you don’t figure this out.

“Yeah, hold on, let me open your profile, I’ll show you.”

Tammy and Molly snuggle up to you and lean in close. They watch, fascinated, as you show them the information the Multiplier has on Tammy. “Personal, this is straightforward… Affection –”

– you haven’t actually looked at someone’s Affection information field since yesterday, and it only mentioned an Affection score then, not Love or Lust, but just as you expected, all three scores are there now. And they’re all at a hundred. Tammy nods approvingly.

“What’s ‘Attributes’?” she asks.

You grimace. “I’ll get to that,” you say, and you can tell that they noticed your reaction, but they nod.

“And Physical information– eyes, hair, height, weight, measurements, and… sexual experience.”

Molly peers at the phone screen. “Right, ‘nonvirgin but inactive,’ you said. Where’re the details?”

You tap the row with ‘Vagina’, and a window pops up.

Level: Neophyte. Tamara had sex with two boyfriends when she was in high school. Her first boyfriend was her age. They had sex once, and used a condom. She felt bad because she did not achieve orgasm while being penetrated. Her second boyfriend was a 36-year-old construction worker. They had sex eight times, and did not use condoms. As a result of his skill and experience, she achieved orgasm while being penetrated every time.

You glance at Tammy. She’s pinching the bridge of her nose, and her eyes are squeezed shut.

“… Tammy? What’s wrong?”

“I’d completely forgotten that Darren told me the reason he was able to make me cum was that we weren’t using condoms,” she says quietly. You wince, and Molly hisses.

“Gullible fucking idiot, I was,” Tammy says. She opens her eyes and looks at Molly. “I don’t regret that you exist,” she says. “I love you. It’s just –”

“– my sperm donor was a lying sack of shit? Yeah, I figured that out a long time ago.”

You squeeze one of Tammy’s hands and Molly squeezes the other.

Tammy snorts. “God, now I’m wondering if his name was even really ‘Darren’. … Jacob?”

“Uh? Yes?”

“Can this thing, I dunno… backtrace the people who I had sex with?”

“I have no idea what else this thing can do,” you admit. “I’m still figuring it out. Only got it yesterday.” They’re both clearly startled by that detail.

“And, uh,” Tammy says, “where did you get it, actually?”

“I just found it on my phone,” you say. “And believe me, I know how unsatisfying an explanation that is.”

“Anyway,” Molly says, “Let’s see if Level 2 access means…” and she reaches out and touches the OK button. The window closes. “Aha!” she says, and then she touches the row with Oral.

Level: Neophyte / Experimental. Tamara has given fifteen blowjobs. Fourteen of these were when she was in high school: two were to her first boyfriend, who was her age; eleven were to her second boyfriend, who was a 36-year-old construction worker; one was to a friend’s brother, who told her he wanted a blowjob from a visibly pregnant girl, and she agreed because she was afraid that she would never be sexually desirable again. The fifteenth was when she was in her twenties: it was to a coworker at her first retail job, who had been very nice to her. Tamara has experimented with two of her high school girlfriends.

Tammy looks upset, and for a few seconds you’re expecting she’ll say something about that fourteenth blowjob. Instead she sighs, then reaches out and touches the OK button, and the window closes.

“So the reason I mentioned Chelsea,” she says in a very “I’m changing the subject” tone, “is that it says – you said it said – that I’ve only experimented with two girlfriends from high school, so I figured it was limiting ‘sex’ to… me eating pussy. What have I done with my mouth. And I ate Chelsea out at a sleepover. But a month before that, Traci fingered me at a party. She was so damn sure it didn’t count as sex even though she made me cum.”

“I guess… the Multiplier disagrees?”

“Mm. At the next sleepover, it was me and Chelsea, and also Tiffany Kumamoto. Turned out Chelsea’s bed wasn’t big enough for us to do a daisy chain. But, I mean… I got fingered by a lot more girls than just Chelsea and Tiffany and Traci, a few times I was the one doing the fingering, I got eaten out, I gave handjobs… if the authenticator says Traci was my first, then why isn’t any of that other stuff listed?”

You’re a little gobsmacked by these revelations, but at least this question is one you can maybe sort of answer. “Sometimes when there’s a big project with multiple concurrent modules, not everyone communicates with each other as well as they could, ‘left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing’ sort of thing. And I know that’s not as satisfying an answer as ‘there’s something in the settings’, but, uh…”

You shake your head. “Sorry, I’m just a little –”

“Surprised by how slutty I was?” Tammy says, smiling.

“Oh, I wouldn’t say –”

She waves that off. “It’s fine, it’s fine. I sort of was. For about…” and she looks thoughtful – “damn, from when I was at that party with Traci to when I ended up pregnant, that was barely four, four and a half months.” She sighs. “Track team was wild.”

Molly makes a sort of **** noise. “It’s not wild today!” she says. “Or, well, if it is, I’m being left out!” Now she looks thoughtful. “Wait, is that why we had that big talk about birth control when I told you I wanted to try out for track?”

Tammy nods.

“Also, is that why you were nervous when you told me about Molly joining the team when we had lunch four years ago?” you ask.

Tammy looks blank. “I honestly don’t remember that,” she says. “But I’ll say yes.”

“I am learning a lot of things about you two that I never expected to,” you say.

She shrugs. “We love you totally,” she says. “So… ‘open book’, I guess? To be honest, what I expected was that at least one of us would be full of your cum by now, with the other one licking it out of her pussy.”

Your cock throbs at that, and it is only by willpower that you don’t just grab Tammy and start fucking her immediately. Because you are not finished with your explanation yet, dammit.

“Could I see my profile?” Molly asks.

“Sure,” you say, and open it.

Just like Tammy was, Molly is pleased to see the “100 / 100 / 100” in her Affection information field. She’s also intrigued by her Physical information field.

“Huh!” she says. “I’ve lost two pounds since last month.” Then, under Sexual experience, she taps Oral: Nonvirgin. The window you saw yesterday pops up, its contents unchanged.

“This is word for word what you said earlier,” Molly notes.

“Well, it surprised the hell out of me when I saw it – didn’t even mean to touch the screen there. Plus,” and you shrug, “it’s pretty short.”

“Mm,” she says, and then taps Vagina: Virgin.

Level: Virgin. Molly has not had vaginal sex.

She looks at you. “I’m a virgin in terms of, have I had a penis in there,” she emphasizes, “and I’m so glad you’re going to be my first.” Tammy sighs happily at that, and Molly continues. “But Sonia’s fingers, her tongue, her dildo…”

Tammy snaps her fingers. “Also, how many times have you eaten Sonia out? I’m betting it’s less than nine.”

“Oh, because of the –” you start to say, and then the three of you all say “levels” at once, and then you all laugh.

“Clearly what we need to do is, every time you cum in my mouth, we check my profile, and we see how many times it takes for me to go from Experimental to Neophyte!” Molly says cheerfully. Your cock twitches, and she giggles.

“I’m looking forward to finding out what the next level is!” Tammy says, grinning, and squeezes your erection through your boxers.

“Heh. I wonder if that’d be in your updates log!” you say.

“You mentioned that before,” Tammy recalls. “What is it?”

“Oh!” Molly says. “That’s what had the Level 2 instructions at the bottom?”

“Yeah. You both have one, and there’s also a combined one for everyone, and I’m not totally sure yet how to make it show one or the other.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Tammy says. “‘Everyone’ ? I thought this was just us?”

“Uh, no, this is…” – and you take a deep breath – “every woman I interacted with today.”

Their jaws drop.

“Every woman?” Tammy sputters.

“That’s what it looks like, yeah.”

“You had lunch with Penelope!” Molly points out.

“Yeah, she’s on here.”

“And when you rescued the bunny! You had Eleanor and Sigrid with you!”

“They’re on here too.”

“Belinda and Maggie?”

“Yep. Sonia, also.”

Molly’s eyes bulge.

“ WHAT?!?”

“You introduced us, we talked for almost a minute… that was enough.”

“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god,” Molly repeats. “This is… this… this… oh my god! Jacob! Is she going to fall in love with you too?!?”

You can only shrug. “I really don’t know,” you admit. “I’m still figuring this all out, remember?”

Molly is practically hyperventilating now. Tammy squeezes your shoulder.

“How would you feel if she does?” you ask gently. “If Sonia does fall in love with me?”

“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god, that would be INCREDIBLE!” Molly squeals. “I hope she does! I hope you can be her first! I hope I can be there for it! She’s such a good kisser! And she makes this amazing noise when she orgasms, like a little puppy yelping!”

Oh thank god. You were not looking forward to breaking anyone’s heart or… whatever might have happened. Thank god for the no-jealousy attribute.

“I mean, it’s not definite that it will happen,” you point out. “A minute wasn’t much time to have a conversation, so her scores were pretty low.”

“Can we look at her profile?” Molly asks, so you close out of her profile, back out of Family, open Friends, and there’s Sonia Maghrebi next to Eleanor Rodriguez.

You tap her name, and there’s her profile, with a picture of her sitting on her bed and reading. Molly and Tammy lean forward to read the screen.

Name: Sonia Nur Maghrebi

Personal information -

• Age: 18
• Gender: Female
• Marriage status: Single
• Children: 0

Affection information -

• Affection: 11

Physical information -

• Height: 5’11’’
• Weight: 148
• Eyes: Brown
• Hair: Brown
• Bust: 36B
• Waist: 24
• Hips: 34
• Sexual experience:
  -- Oral: Nonvirgin
  -- Vagina: Virgin
  -- Anus: Virgin

  ---

You tap Oral for more details.

Level: Experimental. Sonia has given one incomplete blowjob to a boyfriend she no longer has. She and her best friend have experimented with each other.

“‘Incomplete’ blowjob?” you say.

“Oh, that was when Connor –” Molly begins, and then Tammy cuts her off.

“Molly!” she says sternly. “Are you sure Sonia would be okay with us knowing that?”

Molly looks taken aback. “But – the Multiplier is –”

“If the Multiplier tells us, that’s different,” Tammy says. “But it didn’t.”

Molly sighs. “Okay,” she says. “So how do we get her score up to a hundred where it belongs?”

“I’m still –”

“ – figuring this out, right,” Molly says along with you. “That’s fair. Can we see her updates log?”

“Sure,” you say, and open Sonia’s log (and at this point you finally realize that sometimes you’ve been opening the update log from inside individual profiles, and sometimes from the main screen, which would explain a lot). You scroll all the way to the top so they can see the whole thing.

• Sonia Maghrebi: Feels bad for you about the fire +6 (6)
• Sonia Maghrebi: Thinks you’re cute! +2 Lust (6/0/2)
• Sonia Maghrebi: Likes that you’re tall! 0/0/+3 (6/0/5)
• Sonia Maghrebi: Oh wow, he’s checking me out! 0/0/+4 (6/0/9)
• Sonia Maghrebi: Molly just told her what a good listener you are. +2/0/0 (8/0/9)
• Sonia Maghrebi: Molly just told her you have a big dick. 0/0/+3 (8/0/12)
• Sonia Maghrebi: Molly just told her she thought about sucking your cock, or maybe jacking you off. 0/0/+2 (8/0/14)
• Sonia Maghrebi: Is jealous of you. A little. -1/0/0 (7/0/14)

  ---

Molly is giggling, although you’ve seen this before. There’s more, though…

• Sonia Maghrebi: Likes how happy you made Molly today. +1/+1 Love /0 (8/1/14)
• Sonia Maghrebi: Likes how horny you made Molly today. 0/0/+1 (8/1/15)
• Sonia Maghrebi: Thinks that even when you were openly checking her out, it didn't feel creepy and wrong like when Alphonso did it. +1/+1/0 (9/2/15)
• Sonia Maghrebi: Thinks that someone related to Tammy and Molly must be really smart. +2/0/0 (11/2/15)

  ---

“Okay, so she’s starting to like you more, that’s good,” Molly comments.

“Yeah, but I’d rather… I’d like to get to know her as a person , y’know? From what I can tell – and remember, I’m still figuring this out, I only got it yesterday – people can’t… can’t like me more, unless they’re liking me more, if that makes sense?”

Tammy frowns. “Maybe?” she says.

“So you need to date her?” Molly asks.

“Uh, well, I was never… never very good at dating,” you admit, which is true, and also lets you sidestep awkward questions about why you’d be okay being in love with someone who was eighteen, and also fucking her, but maybe feel weird about dating her.

“So maybe you two just need to hang out together for a while?”

You blink a few times. She’s trying to hook you up with her best friend so they can fuck you together, you remind yourself. And, honestly, Sonia’s pretty, even if it’s not in a way you would have thought of before.

“Okay,” you say. Molly squeals, and kisses you.

“But,” you say after she lets you go.

“‘But’?” she says, raising an eyebrow.

“But I don’t know that this week will be a good time for it. I’ve got a bunch of stuff to do – even if I don’t find a new apartment right away, I still need to empty out my old one and start replacing things, and…” – and you suppose that eventually you’ll be used to the no-jealousy attribute and won’t feel nervous about saying things like this – “also I’m hoping to spend more time with, y’know, Penelope and Eleanor and Sigrid and… well, and have sex with them.”

To your relief, Tammy and Molly both nod in understanding.

“Thank you for choosing us first!” Tammy says, and kisses you.

The kiss lasts almost fifteen seconds. “Can we meet them?” Molly asks once you’ve had a chance to catch your breath.

You grin. “And by ‘meet’ you mean…”

“Dinner, conversation, fucking,” she replies immediately. Tammy laughs.

You shrug. “Sure, why not. You’ve probably all got a lot in common – you’re all really smart, and I’m pretty sure you’re all interested in at least some of the same stuff as me… actually, that’s probably a big part of why you’re Top Prospects.”

“Sorry, why we’re what?” Tammy asks.