Don't hate the player...

John could open a portal across the city, fell monstrosities of immense power, and enslave potent allies with relative impunity...

... and that same John felt his body stiffen as he took in the promise of this surprise Friday night rendezvous gone horribly wrong.

Brenda had the unhealthy blush of intoxication, and she swooned lightly as she looked around at all the grim expressions.

Lily, with her socked toes bent inward, exuded neither her usual moisture nor it’s intoxicating aroma, and wore a face that screamed guilt in how it was lowered to hide her eyes behind the thick frames of her glasses. She wore her human disguise, and the school uniform he made for her; neither had his classmates fooled.

Tricia, for once in neither a school uniform nor naked, wore a simply red t-shirt and tight jeans, and her expression was perfectly unreadable as she locked those green-blue eyes with John’s. He finally pulled away from that odd, cold gaze to find Moira’s simmering rage. The golden shield brooch glinted in the latter’s hand; she was ready for trouble, though John had a hard time predicting what might trigger her. His eyes naturally drifted down to her motorcycle jacket, left open over a plain white t-shirt to let her massive chest express itself. Her posture exaggerated that expression; she seemed ready to leap across the living room, and John couldn’t be sure if it would be at him or his secretary.

Tricia barely nodded towards that bashful secretary. “Your mother was just telling us about your new girlfriend.” A flash of emotion in the tension around her eyes, and John feared some kind of anger... but saw there, for a moment, something more like pity.

Why is she-

“An exchange student,” Moira spat, “or so we were told.”

“Ah... so many lovely ladies at your Academy, John!” his mother giggled. “My, my... I should probably get dinner ready. Would you girls like meatloaf? It’s my very best!”

The imaginary seal lifted from John’s mouth. “T-That’s OK, mom they-“

“That sounds agreeable. I accept your invitation.”

“I wouldn’t dream of saying no, Mrs. Newman.”

Their deadpan voices replaced the seal.

“Great!” Brenda cheered, standing, and then stumbling, to head to the kitchen, “It won’t be more than an hour... or two, and I’m sure you have plenty to talk about! Feel free to head to John’s room... to study, heehee!” Drunk mom was wildly lacking in subtlety.

Moira and Tricia rose, one holding her brooch and the other the loop on top of her backpack, and stood still to watch John’s mother’s exit. Their eyes fixed on her back. Lily took a step back. John tensed, readying a spell if necessary. The girls slowly tensed as if to move quickly-

“Oh!” Brenda turned around, and struggled to focus as all four faces turned to her. Blinking past her own addled senses, she didn’t even notice their tension. “Sweet potatoes, or fries?”

“Sweet potatoes,” Tricia confidently declared.

“Fries,” Moira almost spat.

“Fries,” John muttered, returning his gaze to Moira.

“S-Sweet potatoes,” meekly declared the only one who surely wouldn’t eat any of it.

Brenda nodded, and turned around the corner of the kitchen entrance.

Moira used Warden's Cell!

You are being pulled into a trap barrier!

Shit-!

It settled instantly, and blurred the details of his real living room; Moira had pulled all four of them into the trap. The golden shield expanded, and Moira was halfway to pulling her hammer out of its inside when Tricia ripped the zipper down on her backpack, unleashing four familiar drones: two of the crystal-wielding variety that once saved his life, and two of the minigun-bearing turrets that nearly took it back that same day. Tricia’s skin turned black up to her neck, and a familiar slit opened on her forehead.

John tapped Lily's arm while keeping his eyes on his classmates, eager to jump with her to his room-

Jump failed. No such location exists within the illusion barrier.

Alarmed, John turned-

The staircase, the kitchen, and the hall leading to the garage: it had all been sealed off by more of the plain, blue-gray of the living room walls as if they had never existed. He turned back to the girls, and only now realized that, just beyond the living room window, and likely before his front door, a plain wall of red bricks had sprung into existence. All the furniture had become slightly insubstantial in appearance, faded and worn, but the walls, ceiling and floor seemed more real than they did in life; they were the hard edges of this tiny cage, and he was already eager to bust out.

Warden's Cell, Level 1
Creator: Moira Brighton
Population: 4
This barrier can only extend to five thousand cubic feet, but keeps occupants from leaving, and unwanted guests from entering, until the creator wills otherwise. Time in the barrier travels four times faster than time outside.

He switched back to his regular eye and watched Tricia open her own. "Tricia, Moira, please, I can explain-"

Lily ducked behind John, tears streaming from her eyes as she squeaked. "They're going to kill me!"

"You were right, Moira," Tricia whispered. The menacing black eye formed, and its red iris glittered with intent. The drones flew to flank John, and the guns began to whirl as they readied to tear the succubus apart.

"John, that is not your girlfriend!" Moira confidently declared. "Let me cleanse you of her demonic influence-"

John grabbed Lily from behind him as the guns began to whir, and the two jumped to the tight, brick-made confines of the space just outside his house. He looked back into the house through his window, and saw as Tricia and the turrets were the first to realize where he had gone. He looked around: sure enough, the bricks covered the grass of his front lawn and only laid out about five feet of space beyond the wall of his house, and didn't extend above his head higher than the living room. He shoved Lily into the corner of the bricks.

"Get down!"

Lily, realizing how **** she was, balled up in the corner and screwed her eyes closed as she covered her head."Master-!"

The guns swiveled to the revealed devil and opened fire. Tricia's eye flickered. Shattered glass, bullets, and raw destruction came racing to John's side of the barrier... and back into the living room. Bullets shattered onto Tricia's faux skin. The beam from her eye barely missed her, striking the wall mere feet away from her and sending her flying past Moira as she was launched by the ****. The Warden herself was nearly toppled by the explosion, wincing as debris from shattered furniture pelted everything in the room. The wild spray of bullets, where they didn't strike their owner, shattered one of the crystal drones. John looked at the destruction through the tunnel he opened to cover Lily: as with Talon, he covered the entire corner in a portal... and put the other end on the first corner he thought of: the one behind the girls.

His heart seized as he watched Tricia's body get flung across the room. No-!

Alarmed, he stepped through the tunnel and kept it going, trying to rush to Tricia's side until the Warden's shield stepped in his path. She held the warhammer high as if to strike him. "John!"

"What the Hell are you two doing?!"

Tricia slowly stood back up; to John's relief, she wasn't any worse for wear. Her third Eye slowly closed. "John, please understand: you're currently under a demon's control-"

"It explains everything," Moira interrupted, sounding oddly hopeful. "Of course you wouldn't put the entire school in danger without such influence at home! You mustn't even know she's a demon! John, that girl, Lily, is not a student at the Academy!"

John stared at them, switching between them as they continued to baffle him. "You..."

"I had only come to patrol when I sensed a demonic presence almost a mile away," Moira quickly explained. "I rushed to your residence, and sure enough the presence was stronger as I approached... very strong. The so-called exchange student is nothing more than a powerful demon, no doubt who has worked to enthrall you!"

Tricia simply nodded. Certainly, she wasn't going to volunteer her reasons for coming here.

"Heh." Both girls raised their eyebrows at the unexpected reaction from John, but John barely managed to suppress a dry, exasperated chuckle. "So... you two think I don't know... that Lily is a succubus?" Their expressions solidified, and then shattered. They exchanged glances, and then looked back at their so-called victim. "Lily is a summon of mine! That's all."

"She... you..." Moira's words and face both melted into newfound rage. "... you're trafficking with MORE demons?!"

"W-Well, I mean, if you put it that way, I realize that's... look, this had nothing to do with the Academy-"

"Then the demon-!" Both Moira and John turned to the Gorbachev, whose eyes were uncharacteristically wide with shock and horror. "Then the demon... the demon is really your girlfriend?!"

"Tricia, that's hardly-!"

"Did you engage in a marriage ritual with her, too?!" Tricia demanded, stomping towards the Gamer with a fury to match the Warden's.

"What-"

Moira looked back at the tunnel, making sure that the demon was still boxed in, before daring to ask. "What... what do you mean, 'too'?"

In a lightless corner, where the conversation vibrated into the walls from the tunnel edges... "Oh my... m-m-marriage?! No... I... I mean, it would be... but it would be so wrong...!" Lily began to cry happy, terrified tears at the thought.

"Tricia," John began, "I know you're saying-"

"Why would he marry a demon?!" Moira demanded.

"He's already married several Abyssal manifestations," Tricia spat. She reached for the ring-filled hand, but John was quick to back away. "He even married the fire mage from yesterday."

"He..." Moira slowly turned back to John, wide-eyed and newly pissed. "...you MARRIED the smuggler?!"

Quickly, John, quickly, think! THINK! "She's... she's only half-Abyssal?"

A pause.

"I can't believe you... after everything we shared..." Moira bit her tongue, and shook her head angrily...

... except Tricia hadn't missed it. "What... did you share?"

Another pause.

"N-Nothing... of import," Moira stammered. "Warden business, that's all..."

"Warden business," Tricia repeated.

"... The point," Moira emphasized with a motion from her hammer, "here and now, is our Gamer consorting with demons and bringing them into our world, in violation of natural law!"

"..." Tricia was quiet as she tapped on an interface, and the remaining crystal drone swung low and behind Moira. Without warning, it pulsed her with beams of light for a scan.

"W-What are you doing?"

"Oh, nothing... Gorbachev business, that's all..."

"Tricia," Moira repeated, "we're dealing with a demon infestation, and a local mage who-"

A beep that only Tricia could hear.

0.2µg OF DNA OF ONE JOHN NEWMAN FOUND IN ONE MOIRA BRIGHTON. SPREAD IS SPORADIC THROUGHOUT THE TARGET'S RECTUM AND COLON.

".... slut..."

"E-Excuse me?!"

"My apologies. My emotional inhibitors are partially lowered, and I'm prone to irrational outbursts." Tricia's voice gave no impression that the irrational outburst was over. "Please, let us continue."

John remained quiet, staring wide-eyed between his lovers, unsure of what inevitably to fear more. Slowly, he fielded an attempt to get away from the truth. "I... just told my mom that lie as a cover story for Lily."

Moira nodded slowly, though obvious skepticism wrinkled her brow.

"Why would she need to be a girlfriend?" Both turned to Tricia, whose eyes gleamed with suspicion more befitting the paladin. "An exchange student is a good cover story... but what circumstance brought the requirement of an intimate relationship?"

John pressed his lips together. Right... I just added that because Lily keeps ending up in my bed... but...

"Look," Moira interrupted, "this has gone far and away from where-"

"Is there anything you won't sleep with after me?"

Moira and John turned into pillars of salt.

"Ooooooh... scandalous!" Lily had all but forgotten that this entire affair was about killing her.

"... After?" Moira meekly repeated.

"L-Look," John whispered, "I'm working with a demon, yes, but-"

"You slept with a Gorbachev?!"

Tricia tsked. "People with traces of male DNA in their digestive system shouldn't throw stones!"

"W-W-W-W-What?!"

"Look, fine, I slept with you both," John shakily confessed, "so can we-"

Moira's eyes nearly bulged out of her head, but Tricia wasn't letting up.

COMBAT SITUATION AVERSION PROBABILITY: 92%. PROBABILITY OF NEW COMBAT SPARKED BY LACK OF ACTIVE LIMITERS: 62%. RECOMMEND RESTORING LIMITERS TO AVOID- UNDERSTOOD. RECOMMENDATION REJECTED.

"When did you sleep with him?!" Tricia demanded.

"W-When did you?!"

"During my studies on Tuesday while examining him!"

"You gave him your virginity on the day you met?!"

"... I-It was anal sex."

"You... you had anal sex with him the day you met?!"

"It... It was for science!"

"... What does that even mean?!" both replied.

"And who are you to- you wear a chastity belt to the gym and you apparently gave sex with him all of 72 hours of consideration!"

John recoiled at that, and blinked rapidly at the Warden. Moira turned a shade of red as she noticed his reaction. "I-It's good for cardio!"

"Anal?" John asked with too honest an interest.

"... The belt," Moira dryly replied.

"The point being: my intimate relations with John occurred first, and you have a primary objective that requires chastity!"

"A... A Warden's duty comes with a duty of bearing the future Warden!"

"No," John declared, "no no no! No more babies!"

The longest pause yet. Both women turned to John.