I did my best, it wasn't much, I couldn't feel, so I tried to touch

“What’s going on here!?” Dani jumped up from her seat, eyes wide with incredulity. She looked back and forth at the figures seated on the stage, from Mary, the real Mary, to her copy.

“Why are there two of her?” Kim demanded. It took her a second to realize that she was looking at Mary’s copy, because it had been such a long time since Mary had looked like that. But even at this distance it was clear that the redheaded girl was a perfect copy of how Mary used to be… except her expression was twisted with wickedness as she approached the edge of the stage.

Echo looked down at the contestants with a gleeful expression on her face, and tightened her grip on her cane, brandishing it as a symbol of her newly-obtained status as host.

Marley gasped and her eyes went wide. “It can’t be… a mimic jelly?”

Sylvia shook her head. “No, that’s not what this is,” she said firmly. “Take a look! That Mary… she’s the same as she used to be. Before the transformations. And what Mr. S called her just now…”

Her eyes widened in realization. “…She’s an echo!”

“An echo? What do you mean by that?” Dawn asked. She had read the comprehensive rules of the show cover to cover and had never heard about anything called an echo before. …Then again, given the nature of this show and how the producers (and hosts) twisted and messed around with things, that was hardly new for her.

The copy of Mary rolled her eyes in exasperation.

“Please,” Echo scoffed, shaking her head. “Do we REALLY need to go over this AGAIN? Certainly the audience must be bored of hearing the same thing over and over again by now.”

Mary took a deep breath and rose from her seat. Summoning her courage, fueled by her frustration, anger, and a far-too-long stint in a dungeon, as well as compassion for what Dakota had gone through, she walked up to the edge of the stage and faced down her duplicate without flinching.

Then she turned to her friends below.

“…She’s me,” Mary informed them without a single ounce of guilt. She wasn’t responsible for the actions of her other self. “The producer created her as a copy of me. She’s… what I could have been, if I had been given a different transformation at the start.”

“A better transformation,” Echo interjected with a sneer.

“I knew it!” Rose crowed, her ears twitching along with her scowl. “She was a fake the whole time! You see, Nick!? I told you!”

Mary ignored them both. “The ‘me’ who was here after you all returned from the challenge, that wasn’t me. I only just got back. Before this, I was chained up in a dungeon… with Dakota.”

Sylvia gasped. “Mom…?”

“Dakota’s in a dungeon? What the shit?!” Dani exclaimed. While she couldn’t say that she felt bad for their previous host, it wasn’t like she was happy about this turn of events.

“Is she okay!?” Gina asked anxiously.

“There have been a lot of things recently that don’t make any sense here,” Amelia noted, adjusting her glasses. “Is there a reason for this?”

“Who cares if there’s a reason!?” Cinder snapped. “None of this matters!”

Mary had to admit that Cinder had a point. The circumstances behind all this didn’t really matter, at least not right now. But she still needed to answer… didn’t she?

“Mary,” Mr. S said, and she felt a probing sensation in her breast. Like the producer was digging around in her heart. “Remember what you said before?”

That’s right… jerk!

Mary turned and glared at the producer. But she knew she was trapped. If she went too far and revealed everything she knew, there was a chance that this whole show might just come to an end. And what would happen to them in THAT scenario?

It was too risky for her.

“…The producer is holding Dakota until she’s… ready to work again,” Mary spat. It was difficult to earn her contempt, but she felt it for the twisted monster in front of her in spades.

“She wasn’t doing a good enough job as the host,” Mr. S said bluntly. “It’s as simple as that.”

Mary glared at him. She knew it was so much more.

“So… so what now?” Morgana asked timidly, looking at the black-clad Mary with a wary expression on her face. “There’s two of them… our Mary… and the evil one…”

“I think it’s self-explanatory where things go from here,” Kim said, grimacing. “Now we’ve got this Mary… as our new host.”

“That’s exactly correct!” Echo applauded. “And yes, everything your dear friend told you is true. I am Mary. I just happen to be different from the Mary you all know.”

She pinched the hem of her dress and curtsied. “It’s a pleasure to be working with you all,” she said with glee. “I can’t wait to see what kind of show we’ll all turn out together… don’t you agree, Nick? Holly?” She asked, turning to the two of them.

Nick honestly didn’t know how to respond. Because no matter how much he hated the circumstances they were stuck in now, one thing couldn’t be denied.

This was still Mary. No matter how twisted and warped by the producers she was.

“Shut up, you!”

Holly had no such qualms about expressing her feelings.

“As the evil clone, you’re supposed to just be sexy and sexually aggressive!” She exclaimed, pointing an accusatory finger at Echo. “You’re not supposed to actually be evil, what’s sexy about that?!”

Echo stared at the girl who was once her best friend, not sure how to respond to that.

“…Moving along,” she said, deciding that ignoring Holly was the best course of action, “consider this my introduction to you all. I’m looking forward to getting to reconnect with you, my dear, dear friends… oh, yes…”

She licked her lips suggestively, her eyes narrowing into emerald slits.

Vivian frowned. “This Mary… this isn’t how she used to be… is it?” She’d never known Mary back then, so she couldn’t say.

“No, she’s not,” Sylvia asserted, shaking her head. “She’s an echo. So like Mary said… she’s a copy of her, a potential future Mary could have taken. It’s a little more complicated than that, but that’s good enough for now.”

“Oh, is it good enough for now?” Echo mocked her with a jeering voice. “Well… I wouldn’t be so sure about that, Miss Former Host!”

She held up the cane, and dark light began to swirl around it.

Mr. S clapped his hands together. “Well, I think that you’ve got quite a handle on things right now, Echo,” he judged. “I’ll be leaving the island in your capable hands.”

“Wait! But what about Dakota?!” Gina protested.

“Once Dakota proves herself deserving of being a host again, I’ll bring her back, as simple as that,” Mr. S said, his assurance doing nothing to assure the frantic girl. “But if I were you… I would focus on collecting more VP in the upcoming challenges. I don’t think Echo will be as considerate towards you as Dakota was, given that you were the one who took the master’s virginity and all.”

Gina’s cheeks flushed and Nick’s eyes widened. “Wait, no way, there’s no way Mary would ever hold a grudge over something like that!” He protested, turning to his wife for confirmation.

Mary winced. The truth was… even though she knew it was such a stupid thing to feel, she couldn’t help herself. A part of her did sting knowing that the two of them had not been able to give their virginity to one another.

But if it was just a tiny sting for Mary…

“Sit down,” Echo said forcefully, snapping her cane forward. Gina was flung back into her seat and pinned there by the host’s power.

Smiling smugly to herself, Echo reasserted her position as host once Mr. S excused himself from the stage.

“Now then! I have a few changes that I’ll be making, as this show’s new host,” Echo said. “To start… let’s talk about our friend here, Nola.”

She tapped her cane on the stage and Nola appeared immediately, startled and flustered and confused by her sudden teleportation.

“H-huh!? How… why-?” Nola was normally quite talkative, but she had been stunned into silence by the sudden flex of Echo’s powers as host. When she saw who was wielding the cane, she turned as pale as Echo’s predecessor.

“Err… is… is that…?” Nola pointed a shaky finger at the cane, trying to force a smile to stay on her lips, to no avail.

Echo smirked.

“Why yes, it is,” she replied, tromping over to the leprechaun in her boots. “I’m the host now. Didn’t I tell you, Nola? It pays to follow the plan.”

She patted the stiff leprechaun on the cheek.

“Now then, a part of me would like to just send you off somewhere because you’re annoying and you talk too much. But I guess I really am a nice person, because I just can’t do that.” She shook her head and turned back to the other contestants. “With that being said, it’s not fair to force all of the burden onto Nola, helping the host with her duties… so I’ve decided to enlist the help of someone else to come join us as my newest assistant!”

With a wave of her cane, another familiar face appeared onstage beside her, staring out at the crowd in surprise.

“H-huh!?” Lynette looked down at her body, confused. The sea of faces staring back at her left her stunned. “How did I get here?!” She sputtered.

“Lynette?!” Sylvia jumped out of her seat.

“That’s right!” Echo cackled. “Little Lynette! Dakota’s first daughter. The producers restored her old form, to drive the knife in deeper for Dakota. But it looks like that had the opposite of the intended effect. What a shame…”

She sighed and clicked her tongue.

“…So, with that in mind, I decided that her talents would best be used elsewhere, in service of this show. What do you think, Lynette?”

Lynette looked at Echo through her ratty hair and didn’t know what to say. Her mouth hung open slack and she just shook her head in confusion.

“…You’ll get to keep that body if you go along with it,” Echo informed her.

“Right! Whatever you say, boss!” Lynette immediately stood at attention and gave a salute, her face rejuvenated with excitement for once. “Shishishishi! I’ll be happy to follow any directions you give me, Echo!”

“That’s the spirit!” Echo threw back her head and cackled.

“Is that all this is to you?” Mary spat at her copy. “Just a joke? Some sick little game? Listen, if you’re me, you should know better than to mess with that kind of power, other me!”

“Don’t call me that,” Echo snapped at her. “I’m more than just some other you. I’m Echo! And I’m the host of this season now!”

She stormed over to Mary and jabbed her finger into the curvy girl’s chest. “…And you better not forget it.”

Mary bristled. She doubted that her duplicate would do anything to actually hurt her, no matter what the producers had done to her. But she couldn’t deny that seeing such an evil expression on her own face was unnerving.

“So if that’s all?” Echo looked expectantly at the other girls. But, like Mary, they were all too wary to say what they really felt.

Well, almost all of them.

“That does it!” Rose jumped to her feet, her fox tail swishing behind her. “I’m done! I’m quitting this stupid show!”

“What?!” Nick exclaimed. “Rose!”

“TWO Maries?!” Rose whirled around and pointed at him. “You get TWO of them now!? No, no, that’s not fair!” She exclaimed.

Immediately any concern Nick had for Rose’s statement evaporated. She wasn’t trying to take a stand or express any moral outrage about what had happened to Dakota, or Mary, for that matter, she was just being her usual bratty self.

“Listen fox girl, you should know better than to piss off the host!” Echo warned Rose, glaring at her. She lifted up her cane and turned it towards Rose this time. “I would hate to have to inflict you with a punishment transformation!”

Rose wasn’t going to be intimidated by threats like that.

“Go ahead and try it!” She snapped. “See if I care! Better than being stuck on a season with you as the host! As if Mary wasn’t bad enough!”

Echo’s eye twitched and she clenched her jaw. “Fine, then!” She spat, as black light began to glow around her cane. “In that case-”

“Wait, Echo!” Nick cried. “Don’t do it!”

“Huh!?” Echo turned and looked at him, irritated. “Nobody asked you, playboy! Back off! This bitch has had it coming since she got foxified!”

“Nick!” Rose looked at Nick with alarm.

“Echo, I don’t think this is a good idea,” Sylvia said.

“Don’t hurt Rose!” Mary cried.

“Shishishishi, you should listen to them, boss,” Lynette giggled, covering her mouth. “Just sharing my thoughts, anyway.”

“Oh?” Echo glanced at the doll, taking someone’s words seriously for the first time. “And why is that, exactly?”

“Shishishishi! Because you giving her a transformation is exactly what she wants you to do,” Lynette pointed out. “She wanted you to abuse your authority and strike her with a transformation out of anger, even though she didn’t do anything to deserve it, showing your bias as a host and maybe even getting you kicked off!”

“Rose…” Mary couldn’t believe Rose would put herself at risk like that. “Rose, that’s-”

“No, I just can’t stand Mary having any power over me!” Rose blatantly lied. Internally, she grumbled in frustration that her plan had been foiled.

Sylvia was split. On the one hand, she shared in Rose’s frustration that Echo hadn’t ended up getting a demerit this quickly by giving into her temper. On the other hand, she was so proud of her big sister for being so clever!

Echo fumed. She glared at Rose furiously as she put the pieces together, her face heating up.

She whirled around and leered warily at Nick. “…You knew,” she accused him. “You knew what she was doing and you tried to stop me.”

“Yeah, what the hell, Nick?!” Gina exclaimed.

“Nick?” Mary looked at her husband, wondering if his actions could be for some lingering trace of affection for her copy.

It wasn’t like Nick didn’t see Mary in her echo’s expression. “…I didn’t want you to do something like that, because I suspected what Rose was aiming for,” he admitted. “That much is the case.”

Rose scowled, her ears twitching. But it was hard for her to be completely upset with Nick either way, even if he’d fooled her scheme.

“…But even if that plan worked and she did get removed as the host, what then? Someone else just gets appointed to be the host next, right? Maybe Lynette this time, or another copy of one of you… I don’t know if that’s the best idea.”

“Reasonable,” Amelia acknowledged. They were stuck in a difficult situation, but those variables didn’t necessarily make things better.

“Besides,” he continued, turning to Rose, “that would require Echo striking you with a bad punishment transformation first. And I don’t want that!”

She had been through enough today.

Rose held her hand over her chest and turned red. Her tail jerked up behind her in an expression of joy Dawn recognized all too well. “Nick-!” She gushed, beaming up at him.

Echo rolled her eyes and her tongue flopped out. “Yuughck, gag me!” She groaned. “Fucking disgusting, the lot of you, acting all mushy. …But whatever! It doesn’t matter now… because I won’t be putting myself in a situation like that ever again, you hear me!?” She snapped, holding up her cane.

“You all can decide what to do with yourselves. But as for me… I have places to be.”

She narrowed her eyes and smiled gleefully. “And powers to try out.”

With a tap of her cane on the stage, she disappeared.

And Nick disappeared right along with her.

It took everyone a second to realize what happened. When Mary saw her husband had been taken away by her copy, she gasped and turned red.

“No! Nick!” She exclaimed, rushing to the chair where he had just been sitting, but of course he was gone. “That… that stupid whore!”

“Yeesh,” Holly said, stunned that Mary would use language like that.

“I don’t care if she’s me!” Mary snapped. “If she lays one finger on Nick, I’m going to break all ten of them!”

“Was Mary always this violent?” Vivian asked Dani.

Dani shook her head. “No, but I kind of like this side of her.”

“She’s always had a temper, that much is for sure,” Carly said, nodding in approval.

“Okay, but is no one else acknowledging the hypocrisy here?” Rose pointed out. “Why does Mary get to lay claim to who Nick spends time with, but I can’t? You don’t see me threatening to break her fingers or anything!”

“Completely different circumstances, Rose,” Kim said, rolling her eyes.

But she was worried about Nick herself. As were a lot of other girls on the beach.

“There’s nothing we can do but try to get back to the hotel,” Amelia said, rising to her feet, choosing actions over words. “And we shall hope that Nicholas is alright.”

Augmented Synthetic Humanoid Assassin was already running across the beach.

Nick really should have figured that Echo would bring him back to the Master’s Suite. Where else would she take him, the Trophy Garden? The Shopping District?

“Echo, what did you do?” He demanded, looking into a set of green eyes identical to those of his wife’s. “You brought me back here…”

“Because I couldn’t get the chance to spend time with you if the other girls were all hanging around,” Echo purred, slinking towards him. “It’s not like the master gets that many breaks away from his beloved harem…”

Nick shivered when she used the word “beloved”. It made him feel like an animal being preyed upon by a vicious predator.

Not the worst comparison as Echo approached him, her fingers tracing across his cheeks.

“Alone again at last,” she purred into his ear.