I'm tap, tap, tapping on the glass, I'm waving through a window

“You sure you want to go?” Mary asked, giving Morgana a sad look. “I thought we were just starting to really connect…”

Part of Morgana did want to stay and keep cooking with the other girls. But there was one more person she had to see today.

“Dawn did a lot for me this week,” Morgana said. “I really want to check in with her, see how she’s doing. And let her know that… I’m doing my best to make friends, in my own way.”

Mary smiled. “I think that would be really nice. But still, a little bit of practice is never wrong. The more you practice, the better your skills become, right, girls?” She turned to the others, who, unlike Morgana, didn’t have any excuse for getting away.

“Run away, Morgana,” Dani advised.

“As fast as you can,” Gina nodded in agreement.

Mary made a sour expression. Then she turned back to Morgana and her face softened.

“I really hope everything works out for you,” she said, patting Morgana on the arm. Morgana smiled back at her shyly and nodded, quickly excusing herself.

The last thing she heard before closing the kitchen doors was Mary barking orders to the other girls like a drill sergeant.

Morgana sighed in relief. She was glad to be free. What was that saying? “If you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen,” right? Well, that was certainly her experience on the matter. Morgana found cooking more fun than she’d expected, and she genuinely DID enjoy spending time with the girls and getting to know them better.

But there was only so much she could take of that much socialization. According to Nick, Dawn preferred quiet places like cafés, so Morgana might find her there. In fact, he’d given her a specific location to check out before he ditched her.

She felt a little anxious about that. Hadn’t he said he was going to stick with her all day? But then he’d just up and left…

That stung. It really did. But at the same time, she knew that Nick had responsibilities as the master of his harem. She couldn’t really hold it against him that he would prioritize being with as many women as possible.

I suppose that’s just another one of his flaws, she thought. Nick had said he wanted her to see the real him. And she was getting a pretty good look today. …He wasn’t that bad, though. Oh, certainly, he had his flaws, that much was certain. But in terms of her feelings…

They’d changed. She wasn’t sure into what, though. She no longer fell over him in slavering devotion, but at the same time, the idea of being his hadn’t really dimmed. She was still infatuated with the idea of being a girl in his harem, and even with the idea of being a sex ****.

At least now, though, she could recognize the possibility that her feelings were clouded by her naïvete and lack of experience.

Those thoughts continued bouncing around in her head by the time she reached the cat café. Nick said Dawn brought him here on their date, and had come back several times. If there was anywhere she could go to find the cat girl, then it was here.

She could picture it already, Dawn sitting at a table with a cup of tea in one hand, petting a cat on her lap with the other. The picture of serene grace and maturity, in spite of her youthful appearance. Morgana hoped that she could grow up to be just as composed and dignified as the doctor someday.

Morgana opened the door to the café and walked inside.

“Aawww! Who’s a good girl? Yes you are! Yes you are!” Dawn rolled back and forth on the floor, nuzzling one of the kittens to her cheek and making little kissy noises.

Then she glanced up and saw Morgana staring down at her. There was no light reflected in the goth girl’s eyes.

Morgana stepped backwards and slowly closed the door.

“Haah… that… was something, alright…” Dakota panted, fanning herself. Her face was covered in sweat, and her clothes were stained with it as well, and other fluids.

“I’d consider that a pretty big mistake,” Nick winced, digging woodchips out of his knees. Luckily nothing had broken the surface of his skin, but the little divots still felt uncomfortable.

“Well, I’m the one who had to be on my back,” Dakota scoffed, wiping some of the flakes of wood off her back before pulling her shirt back on.

Fucking in a pit of woodchips hadn’t been the best idea either of them had had.

“You didn’t have to take your shirt off, though,” Nick pointed out.

Dakota flashed him a coy smile. “Right, like you didn’t enjoy seeing my boobs bounce like that. Don’t make me laugh.”

Nick’s face heated up. “Well… I just…”

“And while we’re at it, you didn’t have to pull your pants all the way down, either,” Dakota said, lazily wiping some semen off her stomach. “Should have just stuck your dick out through the zipper, wouldn’t have hurt so badly.”

“Uh, yeah, if I did that, my pants would have probably been ruined,” Nick pointed out.

She blinked. “…Yes, fair enough,” she agreed.

They quickly pulled the rest of their clothes back on and got ready to leave. But before they could go, Nick reached out to her.

“Dakota… there actually was something I wanted to talk to you about,” he said quietly, taking her wrist gently.

“Oh, so not just about ‘movies and stuff’?” Dakota raised her eyebrow. The smirk never left her face. He wasn’t sure how seriously she was taking this, but he was taking the situation very seriously. The sex had been great, but he had come here for a reason.

“It’s about what happened last night, with Mary,” he said.

Dakota grinned. “Come on, Nick. You don’t need to give me all the gooey details. I’m just happy that you’re happy. How many times did you guys do it? Did you get to double digits?”

“What? No! That’s… that’s not what this is about,” Nick said, quickly shaking his head. His face burned. “No, about the wedding! When you held me down, and then with Mary… that was…”

“That was something she wanted,” Dakota pointed out, immediately turning defensive. “Are you seriously upset with me for giving her what she wanted?”

“No! No, of course not, it’s just… you didn’t talk to me about it.” Nick hadn’t said anything, because frankly he’d had a pretty great time, and he didn’t have any regrets about what happened.

But that didn’t make what Dakota did okay.

“Dakota… my step-mom was there,” Nick reminded her. “Amelia. She saw Mary and I… she saw me fucking her! Do you know how twisted that is?”

“Yeah,” Dakota admitted. She didn’t seem very torn up about it though. “But you still enjoyed yourself, right? And Mary liked it too. You both had a great wedding, and united in the way that a husband and wife are supposed to. So what’s the big deal?”

He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Did Dakota really not think this was a problem? That just because he’d enjoyed the opportunity to have sex with his wife, that he was fine with her doing what she’d done?

“Dakota… I’m really not upset about what you did,” Nick said. “But I’m upset about the way you did it. Something like that, you’ve gotta tell me first. That way if I don’t want it, I can say something before things go off the rails like they did there.”

“Even if that means you won’t have as much fun?” Dakota asked. Her words sounded accusatory, which made Nick feel like he was the one on defense now.

“…What do you mean?” He asked warily.

Dakota clicked her tongue. “I didn’t tell you because I knew that you wouldn’t go for it. It was supposed to be a surprise. If you knew it was going to happen, you absolutely would have put your foot down, isn’t that right?”

“Of course I would have!” Nick exclaimed. “Something like that-”

“‘Something like that’ was one of the best things that ever happened to you,” Dakota cut him off. “And don’t pretend like it wasn’t. You may not have been brave enough to agree to it at first, but don’t say you didn’t want it to happen deep down inside.”

She wasn’t exactly wrong, Nick couldn’t even deny that. That was the scary thing. As much as he had enjoyed having sex with Mary, he never would have signed off on this. He would have demanded a normal wedding. He wouldn’t have had hot, passionate sex right there in the middle of the chapel with his new bride if he’d gotten what he would have asked for, but at the same time, he wouldn’t have had sex with her in front of his step-mother either.

More importantly, though, the reasoning Dakota was using had started to frighten him. It was like he was looking at the first signs of what Morgana had warned him about.

“Dakota… the stuff you’re saying… it sounds like the logic a **** would use just because their victim orgasmed. ‘Don’t say you didn’t want it, because you sure seemed to enjoy it’ and all that. That’s not right…”

Dakota shook her head sharply. “Absolutely not!” She snapped, narrowing her eyes. “When a **** forces themselves on someone, their victim doesn’t want it. But you did want it. That’s the difference. You were just too hung up on your perception of propriety to accept what you really wanted deep down inside. I saw that hungry look in your eyes when you thrust into her, Nick. You weren’t **** into anything you didn’t want to do.”

Nick wasn’t sure. The difference between those two things seemed as narrow as a sliver of grass. But was there enough distinction between them? He didn’t know.

Dakota’s expression softened. She reached up and caressed his cheek gently, and suddenly his best friend was a lover again.

“I promise, Nick, no matter what happens, I won’t do anything that I know you don’t want. You might have those desires buried inside you because of society, but… we’re not IN society anymore. This island… it’s a paradise. A place we can be free to live the lives we wanted. Together. Who cares what your step-mom says? Who cares what they’d say back on earth? We’re here. Now. If you wanted to walk around naked all day, who would stop you? If you wanted to just throw Gina or Carly down on a table in the Banquet Hall and pound the shit out of them, who would say ‘no, you can’t do that’? Nobody. This is YOUR harem, Nick. I just want to show you that you don’t have to hide from it anymore.”

“…I think Dani might take issue with that,” Nick joked, trying to lighten the mood.

Dakota grinned. “Well, she did get that transformation that makes her ambivalent to a lot,” she reminded him. “Who knows? Maybe she’ll get something else along those lines.”

Nick frowned. There she was again. He could almost hear a threat in her voice, and he didn’t like it. That wasn’t something he wanted to do to Dani.

Before he could say something to distract her from that perspective, Dakota closed the distance between the two of them in a flash.

She took a deep breath, sucking in a sharp gasp of air. It looked like she was about to cum just from imagining it as she ran her fingers over his chest. She leaned in close, her lips practically grazing against his.

“All I want… is for you to have the harem you deserve… the happiness you deserve. And I’m going to do whatever I can to give it to you. I promise.”

She didn’t kiss him. Her lips just ghosted across his, the specter of a kiss. Then she pulled back and looked deeply into his eyes.

“That’s what I want for you, Nick. It’s what I always have.”

Nick still felt uncertain. He could see that Dakota was just trying to do what she thought was best. In her own way, she reminded him of Sylvia, trying to break down his boundaries and get him to do things he never would have considered before.

Maybe… that was for the best?

By listening to Dakota, he’d done something he never would have done on his own. And he’d enjoyed it more than he ever would have thought. The primal rush of claiming Mary in front of everyone set him off in a way he couldn’t have imagined.

Dakota was trying to get him out of his shell. While he didn’t want to take it to such an **** level as she did (going naked was a no-go for sure) maybe he was being a little too defensive. He remembered the advice he’d given to Kim about making the most of her situation and doing the things she wanted to do. Was this the same thing? Maybe it wasn’t so bad to shed some of his previous hang-ups and embrace the freedom that being here offered him. As long as the other girls were okay with it, of course. And that meant really okay with it, not brainwashed into compliance.

He noted the sparkle in Dakota’s eyes and swallowed.

“I don’t like this place,” he admitted. “I don’t like the way everyone is being changed and warped. It would be one thing if we could end the challenges now and just keep going the way we are, but we can’t. I have no idea what Sylvia’s planning next. Hell, the next challenge is tomorrow, damn it! So while I can appreciate your perspective of giving in and embracing the island for what it is, I don’t know if I can do that right now. Not when the people I care about are still in danger of being twisted.”

Dakota didn’t have a response to that. She just stared at him calmly, her expression not giving anything away.

Nick felt uneasy himself. He knew that there wasn’t a very big correlation between him loosening up and shedding his hang-ups, and the transformations the girls were going through, but he felt like he was always teetering on the edge of a cliff. And if he fell, he would lose his morality for good.

Sylvia tried pushing him off the damn cliff all the time, but he hung on. And now Dakota was telling him that he should embrace it, and try to shed off some of his morals without losing the rest.

What she said made sense. But he didn’t know if he was a strong enough man to do it. There was no denying that he’d changed since he came here. He was more willing to step out and pursue what he wanted.

For a lot of people, that would be a good thing.

But someone in Nick’s position?

It scared him.

Because if he could change this much in such a short period of time, what would he be like a month from now? Would he even recognize himself?

“I don’t want to hurt anybody, Dakota,” he said finally. “And I feel like if I fully give into what you’re suggesting, then I might.”

“I understand,” Dakota said, nodding. But she didn’t promise him she was going to stop, either.

Nick’s mouth opened. “So does that mean…”

His voice trailed off as he met her eyes.

He wasn’t sure what she was going to say. And if the answer wasn’t the one he wanted, he wasn’t sure if he wanted to hear it.

Maybe he should have been more forceful and kept pressing until he got Dakota to say one way or the other whether she would stop pushing him into things that she thought he’d like, without his consent.

But he was uncertain himself. And so he hesitated.

“…Let’s head back,” Dakota said, a playful smile returning to her lips. She practically seemed like a different person now. She took his hand in hers and held it tight. “Tonight’s your night with Morgana, right? You don’t want to miss that. A sexy, big-titted goth girl who worships the ground you walk on? Should I be worried?”

Right, Morgana. Nick felt like a total tool. He’d left her with Mary and the others so he could go see Dakota, but that must have been hours ago. They had to have been done cooking by now.

He’d abandoned her, even after he said he would spend the day with her trying to help.

Noticing the guilt on his face, Dakota looked concerned. “Is everything okay?” She asked. “What’s wrong? How can I help?”

“Nothing, it’s nothing,” Nick said, shaking his head and trying to smile. But he didn’t have the years of customer service experience that let Kim smile so naturally, and she saw right through it immediately.

“It doesn’t look like nothing,” she said softly.

Nick winced. “…I guess there’s no point in hiding it from you,” he sighed. “Morgana, she… I’m worried about her.”

Dakota frowned. “Worried? Why?”

“Because she hasn’t had very many opportunities to make friends this week,” Nick explained. “Thanks to the wedding and all that. I’m worried that there won’t be anyone who will want to pick her as their buddy.”

“…Oh, I see… yes, that’s certainly something to be concerned about…” In spite of Dakota’s words, Nick couldn’t hear any genuine worry in her voice. And that was worrying in and of itself. He looked cautiously at her, but she was unreadable.

He wasn’t sure what he was doing, talking about Morgana with Dakota. He hoped that Dakota wouldn’t suspect Morgana had been the one to plant those thoughts into his head, because he didn’t want them to fight.

What he did want was for Morgana and Dakota to get along.

“Things have been awkward between the two of you,” he pointed out. “I just… I was wondering what your thoughts were on making her your buddy.”

It was a risky question to ask. But Dakota wanted to make him happy, right? So she should at least be willing to consider it.

Dakota’s lips curled up in a smile. “Oh… so that’s what you’re doing. I see. You want me to save your hot little goth sex toy, is that it?”

Nick’s cheeks flushed. “I-I wouldn’t put it like that…” He stammered.

“Well… I would,” Dakota said, stretching her arms above her head, making her chest bounce slightly. “But tell me, Nick… if I do as you ask, and I choose her to be my buddy… assuming I win, of course… are you sure you can handle the consequences of that?”