There's a joke here somewhere, and it's on me

While Nick and Gina were enjoying their time together in Dream Alley, before confronting the major emotional reveal Gina just dropped on Nick’s lap, the other women in Nick’s harem were just getting started with their day, as well.

For Kim, that meant waking up clinging to something soft and warm and fluffy. She let out a nice, peaceful sigh and nuzzled the thing gently. But then she found herself getting confused as sense returned to her brain, before she could open her eyes. Why would she be hugging something fluffy? There wasn’t anything fluffy that she should be hugging in her room.

Her eyes fluttered open, and she saw the golden-blonde fur of a fox tail, which she was hugging like it was a pillow.

Somehow, her position had shifted in the night, and she had been hugging her roommate’s tail in her sleep.

Kim sprang back out of bed, aghast. Her eyes bulged out of her skull and she shivered in disbelief. She’d actually just grabbed Rose’s tail like that, like it was nothing! What the fuck was going on!?

Good thing Rose was still asleep, or that would have been pretty embarrassing.

Kim staggered back across the grassy floor of the Garden Suite, and took a breath to calm her nerves. What a way to wake up!

“Good morning!”

And then, things got worse. Kim’s eye twitched in irritation as she turned around to see the face of the last person she wanted to be talking to right now. (Or, well… sort of. She shared a face with someone who she would be overjoyed to talk to… …But that wasn’t the point.)

“Echo,” she spat, narrowing her eyes. For a second, she wondered what the fuck the host was doing here. Then, realizing what Echo was no-doubt after, her heart surged with disdain. “If you’re here to ask me to take another Sick Day, you can forget it!”

Echo blinked her dull green eyes, as if she didn’t have any idea what Kim was talking about. “Oh? Whatever do you mean?” She asked, suppressing her wicked cackle.

Kim just kept glaring. “After what you did yesterday? Forcing me to follow Vivian the entire time? Oh, yeah, you can FORGET about me EVER taking another Sick Day from you, ever!”

Echo had completely violated her word, as far as Kim was concerned, and that meant she would never trust the wicked woman again. In fact, Kim had half a mind to punch Echo’s teeth clean out of her mouth!

But Echo seemed unfazed by Kim’s overt hostility.

“Was it really so bad?” She asked, leaning forward on her cane. She kept her voice at a low whisper so as not to wake up Rose, and also because it made Kim look like the more unreasonable and hysterical one, between the two of them.

Echo batted her eyelashes. “I mean, when you really get down to it… what did you actually go through, Kim?” She asked the tomboy. “You got to spend the whole day relaxing, more or less. Vivian was so determined not to do anything to upset you that you basically had her wrapped around your little finger! In fact, I bet if you’d asked her, she would have written you a blank check for any sum of money you could dream of, and she wouldn’t have even blinked! That’s how desperate she was to not take advantage of your little condition!” She finished with a laugh.

That didn’t make Kim feel better. “If you think I would actually take advantage of something like that, then you don’t know anything about me!” She snapped. Echo’s statement left her feeling mortified. “My whole goal here is to just live my life! I have no intention of… profiting off of that woman and her wealth, understand?!”

Echo scoffed and rolled her eyes. “What I understand is that you don’t recognize an amazing opportunity when you see one,” she replied. “But, fine. So, you didn’t want to take advantage of Vivian’s generosity and desperation and get rich. Fine, fine, fine, that’s your choice. But what about what you actually got out of your day with her, hmm?”

Kim’s lips tightened into an even angrier scowl. “Oh? And what exactly do you mean by that?” She demanded. Kim had no idea what Echo seemed to THINK she got out of her day with Vivian, but she was almost definitely wrong.

And yet, Echo was still smirking, like she was holding the winning hand in a game of poker and Kim just kept raising the bet like an idiot. It left her feeling unsettled.

“Do you remember your whole goal for this?” Echo coaxed the short-haired girl, slinking closer to her. Her gloved hand ghosted across Kim’s cheek before the tomboy jerked away from her, almost shoving her backwards out of reflex.

“Don’t touch me,” Kim demanded. The fact that Echo was doing all this while looking identical to one of her closest friends had her feeling incredibly uncomfortable. “Just get out, and take your fucking Sick Day offer with you before one of us wakes up Rose.”

“Don’t bother.”

With a yawn, Rose sat up in bed and stretched her arms over her head. “Kim, if you think you’re using your indoor voice right now, you’re absolutely not,” she said, sliding her legs off the bed and walking over to her closet. She picked out her outfit for the day and then walked into the bathroom, leaving the two women behind.

Echo and Kim looked at each other for a second, mildly surprised by the sudden interruption to their conversation. But they quickly got back on track.

“…Anyway, I’m not going to take another Sick Day from you, ever again,” Kim said, crossing her arms over her chest. “Because you’ll just use it to mess with me, like you did this time. And I’d rather not go through that a second time, thank you very much.”

Echo wasn’t impressed by Kim’s bluster. She just sighed and rolled her eyes. “You’re really not thinking this through,” she said, shaking her head. “Kim- the reason I gave you that punishment transformation to begin with, is because I wanted to give you an opportunity to do something you were struggling to do on your own. Don’t you see? Without a transformation like that, would you have ever agreed to spend a day in the company of Vivian Carrington? …Well, I suppose you’ve spent plenty of days in the sweatshop of one of her companies, but that isn’t exactly what I meant.”

Kim rolled her eyes and grunted in response to the incredibly lame “joke” that popped out of the twisted host’s mouth. “Very funny.”

Echo blinked. She looked like she was going to lose her temper, which Kim would have welcomed. But much to her surprise, the host managed to keep her composure.

“I’m only trying to help you,” Echo said, and she actually looked like she sincerely meant it, which left Kim a bit surprised. She looked at the sickly green eyes of the woman who once had been her closest friend in another reality, and shivered.

“By spending time with Vivian yesterday, you got to see a different side to her, didn’t you?” Echo said quietly. “You spent time with her. You got to know her. And that’s really something, don’t you think, Kim?”

Kim twitched. She looked uneasily at Echo, understanding where the other woman was coming from but not entirely comfortable with it.

It felt… wrong. That was the best way she could describe her feelings. Going along with Echo like this, it just felt wrong, because the other woman HAD absolutely misrepresented things to her. She HAD exploited Kim’s foolish decision to trust her.

But, at the same time, the reason Kim had trusted her was because she felt like she could take advantage of the Sick Day and use it to get closer to Vivian. And…

…

…

…

She couldn’t deny that she had done so. The conversations that she had with Vivian that day, the way the two had arrived at a mutual understanding of one another, and agreed to try and do better, not quite becoming friends, but letting Kim get to see that other side of the heiress…

To the point that she could even acknowledge that Vivian wasn’t the worst human being in the world, and that she had a good heart…

…

Could that have happened without Echo’s interference?

Maybe it could have. But the desperate way Vivian had tried to accommodate Kim’s situation had opened Kim’s eyes a lot to the way that the heiress tried to interact with others. And as much as it pained Kim to admit it, no, Vivian WASN’T some twisted, hypercapitalist exploitative monster, even if she was a billionaire.

She was a girl only a few years older than her, a girl who was desperate for friends and human connection.

Kim had a choice she could make now.

She could accept that Vivian wasn’t the person she thought she was, and try to be her friend. Maybe, in doing so, she could even influence Vivian for the better, and show her some ways she could use her influence and wealth to support systems that benefitted the less fortunate, like how she had ended up living in her youth.

If she didn’t do that, there was no telling what could happen. In thirty years, Vivian’s desperate loneliness and need for approval could twist her into something dark, and she’d find herself sucking up to the worst people on the internet and paying Diablo IV users under the table to play the game for her so she could exploit their skills for clout in order to fraudulently obtain the adoration that she couldn’t earn through merit.

Of course, in June of 2023, Diablo IV had just been released, so maybe Kim was being a little bit presumptuous. But that absolutely sounded like something that a billionaire would do, especially since less than a year ago, an egotistical billionaire had just bought a massive social media platform to use as their personal bullhorn.

“Kim? What are you doing?” Echo asked, a little irritated by the way Kim seemed to just check out of the conversation like that.

Kim shook herself back to her senses. “Ugh… sorry, just had a headache and felt a little sick to my stomach… …Look, I get what you’re saying, okay? And maybe I even believe you that, in your own roundabout way, you were trying to give me what I wanted. But if you think that magically makes me okay with what you did? Nah. No fucking way.”

She shook her head. “You messed up, Echo. And I’m not going to let you mess me up again. So… yeah, no.”

Echo frowned. Kim saw a flare of anger surge through her eyes, but then she took a breath, exhaled, and calmed down.

“…I think you’re making a mistake,” she warned Kim. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Throwing away the possibility of a Sick Day is going to limit your options, going forward.”

“What’s this, now?” Rose barged out of the bathroom with a curious expression on her face. “Kim’s not going to be taking her Sick Day? Is that right?”

“No, I’m not,” Kim echoed, shaking her head. “I don’t want to end up as a butler again.”

Rose nodded. “Well, that makes sense.”

“I was only explaining to our friend here that if she doesn’t take any more Sick Days over a simple misunderstanding, when I was trying to help her, then she would be doing herself a grave disservice,” Echo warned, leering at Rose. Then, she turned her glare onto Kim next. “I’m only trying to help you, Kim.”

“We’ll see,” Kim said, crossing her arms over her chest. Contrary to her strong assertion, she wasn’t actually as upset at Echo as she was making herself out to be. She wasn’t even unwilling to take another Sick Day in the future, seeing as how Echo really had been trying to help her, in her own roundabout way.

But… if she didn’t stand her ground here, then Echo might try to walk all over her again in the future and exploit her even further, and Kim would rather not have that, if she could help it.

It was better for her if she could show Echo that she wasn’t about to back down, no matter WHAT the host tried to do to her.

So, that’s what Kim did. She stood her ground and looked fiercely at Echo, daring the other woman to keep pushing her.

Kim would take another Sick Day when she was good and ready to. She wasn’t going to bow her head meekly and say “Yes, you were right all along, Echo, thank you so much!”

Echo was self-righteous enough, due to having spawned from Mary. Couple that with her lack of morality and Kim would rather not go to her hat in hand.

“Oh, I know!”

Rose giggled, and then suddenly she flashed brightly. Kim and Echo both immediately turned to her, surprised.

“Rose, what was that just now?” Kim asked suspiciously.

“Hmm? Oh, I just copied your transformation, that’s all,” Rose chirped. “Using my Method Acting transformation.”

Echo’s eyes bulged in surprise. “What!?” She screeched.

Kim’s jaw dropped. “You… you did what?” She stammered, not sure if she’d heard the other girl right or not. Did Rose just say that she…?

“I told you, I copied it,” Rose repeated herself. She rolled her eyes and her fox ears twitched. “Your Model Employee transformation. That means I get to work in your place today, Kim, and you can do whatever you like!”

She turned to Echo and batted her eyelashes. “And don’t even say anything, because we’ve already established that’s how it works. This isn’t the first time! As long as one of us is doing the job, then the other one is free to do as she pleases!”

Echo went back and checked the rulings. Silently fuming, she couldn’t deny Rose’s claim- that was, in fact, the way that the two transformations interacted.

Kim was stunned.

“Rose… what are you doing?” She stammered. “Are you… …Why would you do that TODAY of all days, though?”

Kim had no issue with going to work today. This whole thing with Echo was more about the power struggle than anything, and Rose had blasted right through it like a bowling ball slamming into a bunch of pins.

Rose just smiled at her. “Don’t worry, it’s fine,” she assured the tomboy. Then she turned to Echo. “So, with that, it seems Kim won’t be needing her Sick Day transformation! …Oh, and I’ll be starting my shift in the afternoon, by the way. I’m not a morning person.”

Echo blinked. She scrunched up her face for a moment and stared at Rose through slitted eyes.

Then, she smirked. “…Very well,” she conceded, holding up her hands and taking a step back. Her cane was clutched tightly in her grasp. “You’ve convinced me. And to be honest, I’m not at all unsatisfied with this decision, either.”

“Oh?” Rose looked suspiciously at her. “…How nice…”

Kim bit her lip. She didn’t like the sound of that. Echo was definitely up to something, but what? She glanced at Rose, but kept her thoughts to herself for now. As long as the host was present.

…Then again, Echo could just listen in from anywhere, couldn’t she?

“Enjoy your day off, Kim,” Echo chirped, tapping her cane on the grass and disappearing, leaving the couple of roommates to confront one another.

And Kim had a lot of things to confront Rose about. The second Echo blinked out of existence, she laid into her.

“So, what exactly was that all about?” She demanded, pointing an accusatory finger at Rose. “Why did you really just copy my transformation like that?”

She wanted to trust Rose’s motivations, but, well... ...Rose.

“Because, I want to help you,” Rose said, acting innocently. As if she would never be the sort of woman to have an ulterior motive.

So, of course, Kim didn’t believe her for a second.

“…Maybe I just like the idea of working, for a change,” Rose said. She reached up and touched her hair. It was still shorter and choppier than she preferred. “If I can earn some BP off of a couple of sales, I can grow my hair back out,” she said. “And that’s where you come in, Kim! You’ll help me out, right?” She asked, her eyes twinkling.

“What, you want me to buy clothes?” Kim grimaced. “Come on, don’t joke about that. I can’t even wear anything other than my uniform!”

“But you have friends,” Rose pointed out. “You can convince them to pay!”

Rose may not have had the upgraded version of Kim’s transformation that allowed her to leave the shop during work hours and solicit clothing sales, but if she had Kim going around peddling product for her, that was a different matter.

Kim wasn’t in for that, though.

“How exactly is that a day off for me, then?” She demanded.

Rose shrugged. “Because, now we can work together against Echo, and you won’t have to take any Sick Days if you don’t want to, and it’s all thanks to me!” She crowed.

Kim narrowed her eyes. She could see what Rose was after, now. The other girl was trying to make Kim indebted to her, that’s what this whole thing was about!

…She had to admit, it was a pretty clever ploy. Not that she wanted to give the other girl the benefit of her begrudging respect.

“…I’m not so sure I’m up for that,” she replied, “but I’ll accept it for today, at least. So, that’s really all that this is about? You’re going to take out four hours of your day just on the chance I might get you a sale or two to help your hair grow back out?”

“That, and maybe Nick will stop by the shop,” Rose replied, not knowing that he was currently in the Master’s Suite. “You never know.”

Kim nodded. Rose was making sense, but… she suspected that there was something else motivating her decision, as well.

“Plus,” Rose said, smiling a conspiratorial smile, “how many opportunities am I going to have to screw over Mary? Or her evil twin, anyway.”

Ah. The last piece finally clicked into place. Yes, that made much more sense to Kim.

“Whatever,” she scoffed, rolling her eyes in exasperation. Then her face softened into a smile of genuine warmth. “...And... thank you, Rose. This really means a lot to me. Thanks.”