“I’m just trying to make the world hornier.”

[AUTHOR'S NOTE: I had originally asked for opinions in this Author's Note, but after reviewing the immediate feedback I'm going to go ahead and continue this branch. The other branch will be labeled [Stub] and not be continued unless I come back to it or if someone else wants to continue it. Thank you to everyone who left comments!]

It sounded less corny in my mind. I try again as she looks up at me no less fearful an expression. “I’m… well, mostly I’m helping myself get laid, but I’m also helping everyone get hornier. That’s why everything’s different now: you’re not in an alternate dimension, or… whatever, you’re just here now… under my influence.”

Slack-jawed, she lets her eyes drift to the living room where Sophia and Alice somehow remained asleep through all the ruckus just now. “Then… this is all your fault.”

I'm not loving how she puts it, but she’s not wrong. I nod in response.

Her words quiver as she continues, “Then… you really did hurt my family.”

Again, it feels like she jumps along, like I’m missing a step… but am I? Did I really not hurt them? I did shrink one of them… but no, she’s not talking about that. No, she's just assuming they're as conflicted as she is, right? “I-I haven’t hurt anyone, not really! They're not... aware, like you. But they are… going to be more dedicated to me, along with, you know, the rest. Hornier, for sure. But they'll enjoy it, trust me-”

“How are you doing this?”

“If I tell you, you’ll try to stop me.” It wasn’t a question; her hostility remains in every word, even as fear tries to quiet her. I don’t want punishments making things worse for her, so I add, “And you need to stop trying to hurt me or get me into trouble because you’ll end getting punished… not by me! But yeah, trust me.” I look back to the window. “Hell, Ivette sure knows...”

“Ivette…?”

“The albino doctor last night, white hair?”

“That was… a doctor?”

I smirk at that. “She was off-duty last night.” Patricia looks at me, still trembling… until her eyes widen. She holds her head suddenly, freeing her breast as she grunts in pain. Her face screws and twists as if a migraine had just struck her, and I inch closer as worry grows. “Hey, what’s wrong-?”

But my words drift off as Patricia’s pose changes… and a bright, toothy smile slides onto her face. “Phew! That was… weird!”

You’ve got to be kidding me. Now?! “Jane, is that-?”

“You already know it,” Patricia declared in Jane’s too-familiar voice.

No one possessed by a succubus ever expressed pain like that, either. Patricia's uniqueness continues to worry me, but I have to push it aside for now. I mean who knows how long I get Jane this time? “You… okay, okay, so you're here now, but she hasn't done anything else to get a punishment, right?” Realizing I can answer my own question, I fumble to pull the Vita out of my pocket.

“Nope! And don’t worry about my connection time, I should be able to stick around for… as long as I need to!” Oddly limited. “I'm here to report that we finally debugged this Custom Girl!”

I pause, Vita in one hand, as I slowly turn to regard Patricia-Jane. “De... bug?”

“Yeah! We know she's been causing you some distress, not to mention get you thrown in jail, and that's in part because we had some trouble tuning her awareness. It… hmm, to describe it in a way you’d understand, the app was... barely reaching her conscious mind and landing nowhere near her **** mind.” Seems simple enough… which immediately makes me doubt it. “But luckily we zeroed in on the problem and have tuned the suppression to be just right! Don't worry,” she winks, “she'll still be every bit the Patricia you know, so you can stop worrying about us changing her mind… at least until you start paying gems to do so!”

Jane’s charisma shines through awkwardly on Patricia’s face. It dawns on me that I haven’t seen Patricia particularly “happy” yet. It’s… a pretty smile.

One I think I’d welcome back.

“Well that’s a relief!” I continue to laugh nervously. Something scratches at the back of my head, but… but no, this is for the best. Without awareness, all the rest of my customizations for her can finally take hold… and depending on how that “obsession” manifests, maybe I can make her smile that honestly again.

“Soooo yeah, we'll be patching it in once I'm out of here.” A pause. She forces the smile a bit more. “Did you… have any feedback about recent developments?”

I raise an eyebrow. The question seems to come out of nowhere, but I shake my head. “Last night was… incredible. I just hope Sophia’s new videos are doing good work out there.”

“Check your bank account and you’ll find out how good,” Patricia-Jane happily replies.

Another question forms… an uncomfortable one, but one Patricia forces me to ask with her accusation. “I do have… one. Do you guys get energy from... ****?”

“It depends!”

I hang on her every syllable for long enough that it takes me a few seconds to realize she's not going to be definite. “... on?”

“Well, the motivation for ****, the feelings the victim and **** feel, the remaining humanity in either, and just overall how sexy it might be!”

Hearing her so nonchalantly describe it... well, I feel silly ever thinking Jane was the "normal" succubus. Unless they all think that way, right? More, her words... I mean, the implication echoes back to all the thousands of orgasms I’ve caused with Sophia’s video, to all the initial **** of some of my Girls, to… to all the congratulations I’ve gotten, more or less, for a job well-done via the Custom Girls app. “So... you like ****, too...”

“No!” I jump at the sudden exclamation from Jane, who frowns for the first time since she got here. “No no no, you just asked about the energy! You have to… look, you have to be specific, I can’t give you much explanation unless you ask for it in particular or unless I’ve got a reason to.” She gives me a small, almost condescending smile and nod. “Does that make sense?”

“S-Sure.” A succubus having rules is… kind of funny, given everything they’ve done up to now. But it makes sense, right? Until now it’s always sounded like Ginger was Jane’s superior, but who is Ginger’s superior? What rules govern User interaction? Who governs them?

Hopefully not Satan, as Teller's Bible Club would no doubt conclude. Satisfied, she offers a curt, “Good.”

“Alright, so… why don’t you like ****?”

“Oh come on, that’s easy! Consensual sex is way stronger stuff! I mean everyone involved gets into it and enjoying it and... well sometimes too self-conscious to really enjoy it, but still way better than ****! That's part of why we love how you focus so much on making them horny and not just... compliant. Everyone's happy and horny and... well, you know, energetic! We care about pleasure and sexual energy exchanges, not just… pieces going into parts, after all.” Patricia-Jane winks again in an expression I’d never expect from the host. “I told you at the start: we’re not evil demons here to eat souls or whatever you humans think nowadays. You said it best: we just want to make the world hornier... for the better!”

The words barely leave me, my wide eyes never leaving hers, “What about… the sex I’ve been having? Is… is it ****?”

Patricia-Jane's smile falters, but only for a moment. “You've been putting out good energy. Sometimes it's less than we'd like... but you've also put a lot of effort into making them enjoy it. At this point, almost all of them are totally into it and the energy has been great!”

“Almost all of them?”

“Well, some are more stubborn than others, more in denial… and the one called Maria isn’t even aware yet that you’re having sex, though she really does enjoy it unconsciously.” My eyebrows perk up at that. “But if you keep at it… well, I think you’ll be happy with how willing they’ll all become. Even Patricia! Especially with the fix in.”

“So… at least now, Patricia could become willing…” Alright… even if there were some bumps on the road, then… I can make it right. Hell, making it right is doing what I’ve been doing, maybe even harder! A stupid smile crosses my face as I imagine this ridiculous orgy being just the beginning.

Patricia-Jane grins wide. “See? This is why you’re one of my favorite Daves.”

She earns a nervous chuckle out of me. “I guess at this point my video’s reached lots of Dave’s, huh? Glad I’m still the favorite.” Jane smiles coyly, and I can’t shake the feeling I didn’t quite get her meaning…

“So… is there any way that debug can be… a toggle?”

Jane stretches as she continues to inhabit Patricia. Despite that initial resistance, the demon apparently has no trouble holding on this time… or maybe I’m making them stronger… “You like her being aware, huh?”

“She’s… honest in a way that I kind of dig, yeah. But I also don’t want her to keep calling the police, or worse…”

“Well, we can’t make it a toggle, but tell you what,” she whispers with a wink, “I’ll pass it to Ginger and see if we can’t add something… special to her shop.”

I give her a nod and, with a start, I glance over to Alice and Sophia. Despite all the noise and our ongoing conversation, they’re still asleep. I know I exhausted them, but holy Hell…

“They’re going to be more likely to wake up once I’m gone, just an FYI,” Jane answers without my asking. “So, anything else before I head out?”

I shake my head and brace for her leaving. Sure enough, Patricia almost falls over once she returns to consciousness, and I barely manage to catch her by her armpits as her legs wobble.