Tegan Date 1, Part 3: Correspondence and Corrections?!?!

Tyalangan

“Hey, Sarge, you look like you could use a drink.” Mattie saunters in, looking as delectable as ever. She sits on the edge of Tyalangan’s desk, leaning to show off her cleavage and her wry smile.

Tyalangan doesn’t take her eyes completely off of the monitors, as much as she wants to give her wife her full attention. The contestant whose date is tonight is certainly... volatile. While she hopes she won’t have to jump in like with Craig, she needs to be ready. Still, she gives Mattie a sigh as she notes, “I spent the day monitoring a season and a half while entertaining a demon. She was quite amused by my transformation list. Asked to examine y’all’s work.”

“So, you definitely need a drink?”

Not drinking in front of Mattie. Don’t want her slipping back into old bad habits. “What I could use is for you to read your reply letter.” Tyalangan presents the missive, stamped with Arabella’s seal.

“Of course, Sarge. What kind of Spymaster would I be if I didn’t examine random letters for secret codes?”

Mattie unfurls her letter with a flourish, then slips into Tyalangan’s lap, grinding her ass into the sea elf’s crotch. This does have the advantage of letting Tyalangan rest her head on Mattie’s shoulder and being able to read some of it. The script is Arabella’s handiwork; that is of no doubt:

Matilda,

Your letter arrived on the terrace during a rather good bottle of Santorini white, which I consider an appropriate setting for discussing the destruction of cosmic horrors. Anna and Herman send their regards and have contributed their thoughts below. You will find them characteristically themselves.

The core of what I can offer is this: weapons do not work on things that exist outside the logic that makes weapons meaningful. A sword requires the target to have a body that minds being cut. A gun requires physics to apply. Entities from beyond space and time are, by definition, operating on different premises. What does work — and I say this from direct experience, not theory — is making the horror question itself. An entity that exists beyond logic is not immune to paradox. It is, in fact, uniquely **** to it, because it has never needed to develop defenses against its own uncertainty. The goal is not to wound it. The goal is to make it hesitate. A hesitating horror is a defeatable one. Your Mistress does not need to be stronger than the thing. She needs to be more interesting to it than the alternative, long enough to introduce the doubt that unravels it.

We trapped one here, you know. It is currently making beds and serving breakfast. It has opinions about thread count. That was not an accident — it was a choice, because destruction, while well within reach, felt like a waste of a perfectly good lesson. The punishment of mundanity has proven remarkably effective. Something to consider, if capture becomes an option.

From Anna:

The other thing nobody puts in the arcane literature because it requires admitting something embarrassing is this — these entities feed on the particular flavor of awe that comes from incomprehension. The moment your Mistress understands even a small part of what it is, she has already taken something from it. Knowledge is not just power here, it is actively corrosive to what the horror needs from her. So: study it. Not to defeat it, but to diminish it. Make it ordinary in her mind even before she faces it. By the time she stands in front of it, it should feel, to her, like a problem she has already mostly solved. The horror of it lives in the gap between what she knows and what she doesn't. Close that gap as much as possible before the confrontation.

Also, and I say this from personal experience spanning several thousand years: the entities that seem most invincible are almost always the ones that have never been seriously challenged before. They mistake the absence of opposition for invulnerability. They are frequently surprised. Use that.

From Herman:

Everything Anna said is correct and everything Arabella said is correct and here is the part they are both too elegant to say plainly: your Mistress is going to be terrified, and that is fine, and she should be, and it will not stop her from winning if she has been told in advance that the terror is part of the process and not a signal to retreat. Fear is data. It means the thing is real and she is paying attention. The Mistresses and Masters who fail against these entities are almost never the ones who were afraid. They are the ones who either froze because they hadn't been told fear was allowed, or the ones who weren't afraid enough to stay sharp.

Tell her: feel it, use it, don't let it make decisions for her. That's the whole job.

One more thing. We have found that these entities, for all their incomprehensibility, have a consistent weakness for being named. Not in the sense of knowing their true name — that is a separate matter and a much longer letter. In the sense of being addressed directly, as a specific thing rather than an incomprehensible vastness. It reduces them, somehow. They do not like being made particular. Your Mistress should speak to it, not around it, the moment she can.

Back to Arabella:

I think that covers the essentials. If Tyalangan needs more specific guidance as the season progresses, she is welcome to write directly. I have a vested interest in the multiverse remaining intact.

Regarding the animal sacrifice — we appreciate the thought, but no. A prayer to whichever deity you feel has been most useful in the preparation would be entirely sufficient. Ms. E will know the appropriate form, I imagine.

Good luck, Matilda. Give our best to your peach of a wife.

Arabella

“Sweet! Free information!” Mattie quips, “No need to bug Skye to sprinkle cockatrice blood on some weirdo human god altar somewhere.”

Tyalangan gives her wife a love tap on the head, “Nope. YOU’RE going to say some prayers. Later. For now, Let’s consider the wisdom of the ancients offered.”

“Just for that, I’m not telling you that they gave their best for you, Sarge. So, that hottie Red said we need to make the Big Bad doubt itself. The hottie Blue said we need to know the enemy and take advantage of it thinking itself invincible. And Speedy said we need to give Mona permission to be afraid and give her it’s name. You gonna drop a text about onomancy in her lap, too?”

“Nah, let Felix have fun with that. I have a different terrible idea that will need some fleshing out. We do need a third transformation for Mona’s Round One vote anyways, since she’s going to ask me for two transformations when she sees me next. Let’s see if the audience wants her to try something other than the ‘if it has a stat block, you can kill it’ approach.”

“And what are we supposed to do in the meantime?”

“You, my dear Spymaster, need to set up some monitoring stations on our foe. Mona is going to need the information, so we should collect it for her. The rest of it is things that we’ll keep in mind.”

“And is Boss Lady going to approve of something other than ‘rip and tear until it is done?’”

“I’ll worry about Ms. E if it comes to it. For now, I got a letter and a cast of Dream to prepare for.”

Mattie shifts so she can be nosy, too. Tyalangan smiles and lets her. She reads:

Tyalangan,

Monsters do not write letters like this. They do not ask whether they were too harsh or too lenient. They do not worry about consent. File that away for the next time you doubt yourself.

Seeking consent was not wrong. It was slower, and it cost you something early on, perhaps, and you are managing a Mistress who came to you uncertain rather than compelled. That is a real cost. But a Mistress who chose, even tentatively, has a capacity for growth that a conscripted one may never develop. Watch her carefully over the next two rounds. If she is rising to the choice, you made the right call. If she is retreating from it, intervene before the pattern sets.

Were you too lenient with your troublesome contestants? Probably, in some cases. Too harsh in others. This is the job. You will recalibrate. The Hosts who don't are the ones who decide their first instinct was correct and stop adjusting, like Azure. Keep adjusting.

Your mother-in-law's advice gets it exactly backwards. Placing the harem's happiness entirely on the Mistress does not build resilience. It produces either a breakdown or a tyrant, depending on the Mistress. Your job is to distribute the weight of the season so that no single person carries more than they can hold at any given moment. The best interventions look like coincidence. That is what you are aiming for.

On the dimension — I understand the pressure and I will not tell you to set it aside. But seasons run by Hosts who are primarily afraid of losing do not end well. The fear narrows your judgment. Do the work in front of you rather than the work three rounds ahead. The structure will hold if you let it.

Write to me whenever you need it. We can think through it together.

Arabella

P.S. Your mother-in-law knew her advice was wrong when she gave it. You don't have to carry it forward just because she handed it to you.

“Told you,” Mattie teases.

“Told me what?”

“That you need to share the load better, Sarge.”

“Fair. I also need to focus more on the immediate, not on the endgame. It’ll come when it will come. Might be good advice for Andromeda, too.”

Mattie glances back at Andromeda’s camera monitor, then leans back so her head is not blocking it. Mattie teases, “Andromeda is munching on Gaia’s cowprint carpet right now.”

Tyalangan laughs, “So she is. Is that a hint on what you want tonight?”

“Yeah; tell Red to start covering for you so you can get to your Mistress duties already. Our Red, not Coder’s Red.”

Rolling her eyes, yet letting the smile reach them, Tyalangan scoops up her bratty wife and flings her over her shoulder. “I love you, Cap’n, especially when you make it hard.”

“Love you too, Sarge. You gonna carry me across the castle to our bed like this?”

A spank to Mattie’s Cutie Mark tattoo answers that question. The way Mattie squirms says she approves.

Tegan

Tegan insisted that they both get dressed for bed separately. So, they are laying side by side, not touching, in a giant bed in this mildly disturbing dollhouse of a bedroom. Tegan in her official pajamas, Mona in some casual sleepwear. Tegan laying on her belly, trying her best not to crush her tail. Mona on her side, staring at her.

“Can we talk already, Tegan? You promised.”

The vicious vixen turns her head towards her so-called Mistress. Tegan’s nerves gave out rather quickly once the moment came. She’s scared: scared of rejection, scared of acceptance, scared of what it means to be Mona’s, scared of what it means to be tossed aside once again.

Mona does not accept the silence, “I don’t know what I did wrong or when, but I am sorry for it. I like you, Tegan. I want to be your girlfriend, if that is what you want. I mean, isn’t that what you said you wanted downstairs? So, tell me what I can do to help make that happen.”

Tegan stares back at her pillow, angry. Why am I always so angry? “You don’t even remember what you did?”

Mona’s words get small, “No.”

“You cheated on me with Kevin. Over and over again. And you never apologized.”

Another small response, “Oh.”

“And you took Andromeda to prom instead of me. And, apparently, you have chosen Tessa and Gaia and even Craig over me, your fiancée.”

“I’m sorry for making you feel like that. But, I did think that you hated me. I thought you hated me for so long that I couldn’t remember when it even started. Also, wasn’t that fiancée thing a joke from Tyalangan?”

The rage Tegan feels is nearly overwhelming. She snarls, “The blue freak was NOT joking! I am yours and you are mine! You promised! And I never stopped being loyal to you, no matter how hard you made it!”

Mona looks stunned. Tegan pants, trying to exhale the pain and tears threatening to consume her. It takes several minutes for Mona to finally respond. She rolls over on top of Tegan, pressing Tegan’s back into the plush bed, her big cow-tits pressed into Tegan’s respectable breasts, and murmurs, “I am so, so sorry for making you feel like I was cheating on you. Obviously, that promise was important to you and I broke it. Tell me what I can do to start making it right.”

Tegan starts panting for a different reason. She’s pressing into me. Her giant cow-tits are touching me. I am not getting aroused right now. Nope. I’m perfectly straight, despite all but demanding Mona marry me.

“What do you want, Tegan? Tell me.”

“For you to never cheat on me again,” Tegan manages to squeak out.

Mona sighs, then starts to stroke Tegan’s ear. She squirms underneath Mona’s cow tits. Nope. Still straight. Not a lesbian. Not currently flooding my panties. Not yearning for Mona to kiss me and suck on my nipples and rub my clit.

“Look, Tegan, if you came to me before we got dreamnapped into porn land and honestly told me all of that, I would instantly agree. The whole harem thing makes that difficult. Can you consider me being with the others not cheating? Eliminations suck and I don’t want any of them to go through that.”

Tegan frowns. “Am I really just a spare for you?”

The kiss is electric. Tegan’s mind goes blank. She doesn’t initially realize that Mona shoved her tongue into Tegan’s willing mouth. The vicious vixen sucks on the invading muscle like it is a lifeline. The edges of her vision starts to gray. Tegan whimpers when Mona pulls away.

Tegan: +4 XP (Kiss the Girl, x2 bonus [First Time Contestant Participant])

“You are not a spare. You’re my super sexy fox-waifu. You are irreplaceable. But, I need to be responsible for the others. So, can you consider me being with them to be okay? You can be with them, too.”

Tegan’s heart is pounding so loud she didn’t hear any of that. She kissed me! She finally kissed me! She didn’t kiss me when she proposed. She didn’t kiss me when I confronted her the first time to apologize. She didn’t kiss me when we were reunited. Eeeeeh!

“Tegan? TEGAN?”

“Huh?”

“Are you okay with me being with everyone in the harem and not just you? You can be with them. It’s only fair.”

“You want me to be okay to share you? Really? You trust the blue freak that those eliminations are real and actually bad? Just how naive are you?” Tegan snarls.

A pair of fox tails suddenly appear in front of Tegan’s face. The owner of said tails, a fox, starts to lick Tegan’s face. It tickles a little. Mona looks super serious from the brief glances Tegan can see past this random fox.

“Scry Vix. Find out.”

Tegan presses her thumb on the excited animal’s forehead, not expecting anything. Then, her eyes narrow as she experiences the trickle of information flowing into her. She reads the whole elimination transformation. That... is fucked up.

“And when Tyalangan punished Craig on his date, she showed him an elimination that scared him to the point that he was begging me to protect him from her the next morning. It was something about a semen flower?”

Tegan shudders. Semen flower? The fox is gone just as quickly as it came.

“So, Tegan,” Mona speaks, a hand curling around her nape, the other teasing her ear, “Will you be my girlfriend or fiancée or whatever you want, so long as I can save the others?”

“I get the first wedding. You are mine and I am yours. Understand?”

Mona’s second kiss is quick. More of a peck than anything else. Tegan leans into it, wanting more. Still, the Mistress says, “Okay. Done. Can I play with your ears now, for real?”

“Fine.”

Mona squees as she starts to vigorously rub Tegan’s ears. Tegan’s eyes cross and become unfocused. Her tongue starts to loll out. She barely hears, “Soooo soft!” Then, a little more lucidly, she hears, Mona’s breath in her ear, “You are sooooo cute, Tegan. And mine!” The aroused archer shudders with anticipation.

“And you are mine,” Tegan gasps, almost about to cum from, of all things, having her ears rubbed. “Please, a little more.”

The world goes white just as when Mona nibbles onto one of Tegan’s ears. “YIP!!!!!!”

Tegan: +8 XP (Mistress Brought Contestant to Orgasm [Eargasm], x4 bonus [First Time Both Participants])

Tegan sighs when she returns to reality. She sees Mona back on her side, watching and waiting on the archer to recover, gently stroking her (non-ear) hair. “Was I good, Tegan?”

Tegan nods, already starting to fall asleep. Mona better not toss me aside now. She’s mine and I am hers.