LET'S FUCKING GOOOOO

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>>4921745

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Absalom Abrams waits patiently in the sunlit boardroom at Darkbloom Enterprises. Sable Best is seated at the conference table, the only other person there, raptly reading through the sheaf of documents Absalom has brought along. That's just the free sample, of course. It'll leave her fiending for the harder stuff soon.

As the door behind him clicks open and he senses more people filing quietly in, Absalom keeps his gaze fixed on the oil painting at the head of the room, the massive canvas portrait depicting the scowling frown of David Darkbloom -- as well as, on either side of David, his precious daughters. Vivian with a scowl to surpass even her father's, and Whitney with a toothy grin not at all befitting the gothic stateliness of the tableau.

"We're here, Absalom. Now what do you want?"

Absalom turns to find that David has convened his entire board, and most of his important advisers. Nelson Berenstoin, Steven Armstrong, Vivian Darkbloom, Alabaster and Rose and Whitney Soliloquy, Renee Carte. And of course, Sable Best, the first one to a meeting for the first-ever time in history. Anna Soliloquy brings up the rear, mousy and rattled-looking, even moreso than normal. They all look rattled, actually, to one degree or another -- this meeting is about 72 hours on the heels of Cerise Soliloquy's brush with death. In fact:

"You've got red on you," Absalom tells Steven, pointing at Steven's tie.

Steven grabs the tie's tail and turns it up to examine it. "I do," he says, as he tucks it back into his suit jacket. "I'm wearing it to remember that my girl Cerise is one helluva fighter. This is a badge of pride."

Nelson grimaces. "You don't need to wear something so unhygienic to be proud--"

"Shut the fuck up, bitch boy," Steven growls.

"Absalom," David says again, obviously impatient.

"It's been too long since I've been in here. I'm happy to see you're all doing so well. Can we sit? There's a lot to go over." He motions at the table.

The group finds their way to some seats, but Alabaster stays standing behind David's chair at the head of the table. He keeps his hands folded behind his back like a faithful butler. Absalom also stays standing, on the table's opposite side.

"What are you reading?" Rose asks Sable. There's a catch to her voice, of fear in search of something to be fearful of. But Sable's curious eyes just keep scanning.

"You have the floor," David says. "We're all as busy as you, so enough niceties."

"Right. I want to sell you my company."

Dead silence.

Finally, Steven speaks. Not to Absalom, but to Anna: "I'm sorry we dragged you away from Cerise for this bullshit. Why don't you go be with her."

Anna shakes her head. "no... i want to be here" Steven pats her on the shoulder in a reassuring way.

>>4921751
Um. Many questions.

>>4921751
>"Right. I want to sell you my company."
Worry?

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"Do not tell me you've convened a quote-unquote urgent meeting just to mock us for having a smaller market capitalization than yours," Vivian says. "And so soon after we've all suffered a personal tragedy--"

Absalom reaches for a pitcher on the table, raising his eyebrows as if to ask, "may I?" When he receives no resistance, he pours himself a glass and takes a sip. "Our offer is very reasonable. I think it's within your means."

"Where's your board?" Renee demands. "You can't expect us to take a negotiation like this seriously without your other stakeholders here. For all we know, this meeting is unauthorized -- maybe even illegal."

"I dissolved my board this afternoon," Absalom says.

"Bullshit," Renee spits.

"It's true. Whether you buy the business our not, Absalom Industries will cease to exist as an entity in the very near future. Fire sale -- today only. Tomorrow I turn to Broad Dynamics."

"Why," is all David says.

"Because I'm a trillionaire, and I want to enjoy the rest of my life in retirement instead of working until my dying day. Unlike some people." Absalom leans against the table. "The financial assets of AI that remain after buying out my employees, will be liquidated and funneled into my philanthropic ventures, which will keep me busy enough for decades. What I'm selling to you is strictly the fruits of our company's research -- those fruits should be in the hands of inheritors who can take things to the next level. I strongly feel that I and my organization have gone as far with it as we can. I bow to you, David. Your team will be much better equipped for future research on these matters."

"What matters?" Alabaster says.

"I should speak with Alex about this," Sable tells Absalom, glancing up from her reading, cutting in as if there hasn't been an ongoing conversation around her. "Do you have some more experimental data on this universal object classification system?"

"I thought you'd like SCRUM," Absalom says with a knowing smile. Nelson arches an eyebrow. Absalom chuckles. "Not the agile framework for managing workflow across multi-functional teams in software and hardware development. But SCRUM: Superpermutated Categorical Relations in Universal Metadata."

"This is brilliant," Sable says. She begins to read to herself again, eyes darting back and forth. "Scrum," she mutters, voice airy. "It's... all... a big..."

Alabaster sways like he's come down with vertigo, and grips the backrest of David's chair to steady himself. David turns in place and glances back at him, leather squeaking beneath him, concerned and bewildered at the same time.

>>4921745
Not even remotely first for Wesley Hisoutensoku ~ Chase the Enigma of the Gargantuan Gideon

>>4921759
oh god oh fuck

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"What we need is a biomechanical prosthesis," Absalom says, "and a platform powerful enough to harness this system for use by human beings. You can take the work from here."

"We don't want to," Alabaster says, swallowing hard. "We have work of our own to do. Important work. Plenty of it. Go peddle your snake oil somewhere else..." His words are confident but his tone is not as, clammy and palefaced, he circles the table and snatches the papers away from Sable.

"Hey!" She says.

"Get out of here before I throw you out of here," Alabaster tells Absalom.

"I'd like to remind you that my next stop after leaving here is Beijing," Absalom says. Rose rubs her face and shakes her head, dismayed beyond words. Alabaster's lower lip trembles.

"Oh, please," Whitney says. She rolls her eyes and laughs. "We know what you want, Abby. You want to make some kind of freaky-deaky, voodoo... eye... thing... right?" This draws strange looks from certain people -- Steven, Nelson, Vivian, and David himself.

"may i see that Sir" Anna asks, motioning for the papers in Alabaster's hand. He gives them over. Sable pouts. Anna begins to read, and soon, voice deepening, she says: "Oh god."

"You think you know the first thing about my research?" Absalom asks Whitney, not affronted, but curious.

"I can pretty much figure it out. You wanna make an all-seeing eye thingy. Assumably."

"...Assumably?"

"Yeah, assumably."

"I smell subterfuge," Vivian says. "Whatever magic technology he thinks he can sell to the more persuadable among us, surely comes attached to some sort of legal or financial entanglement of which we certainly do not want any part."

"I'm sure you will want to have your lawyers comb through every single nook and cranny of the acquisition agreement," Absalom says, "and that's your right. I invite you to it. But I can assure you that I come in peace and bonhomie. I'm retiring. I won't be in business any longer. I don't want my achievements to die with my company, so I am selling them to you."

"Right," David says, steepling his hands and glaring severely from over them. "We should feel just oh so blessed at the show of goodwill. And for the privilege of picking up your intractable technical problems, as well as whatever other albatrosses that attend, what is your starting bid? How much do you want us to pay for your quagmire? A trillion? Two trillion?"

Absalom takes another sip. "How about one dollar?"

Stunned silence meets him.

"I'll take payment in quarters if that makes it easier for you. I do need to refill the parking meter outside."

OP: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Atvsg_zogxo

>>4921759
Tumbling down will continue until morale improves

>>4921775
... I smell a basilisk. Big fucking worry.

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The moms got sick of having a half-demolished kitchen. Now a girl in a bunny costume, workboots, hardhat and safety goggles is busy installing counters. She works all on her lonesome. For a tart, she seems to be doing a pretty good job.

"Are they paying you..." You mumble, watching from the threshold of the kitchen.

"Yes!" Samantha says. She pulls a yellow tape off her toolbelt and measures a piece of plywood. She marks off dimensions with a carpenter's pencil. She chews her tongue. It's adorable. Although you do wonder what the form of her payment will be. You've got a pretty good idea.

K-Mom comes down the stairs, still affixing her earrings. N-Mom follows. "Blue or black?" N-Mom is asking, holding up two different blouses.

"This isn't a date, Noelle. Just put on something comfortable."

"Oh! I'm so sorry I want to make a good impression on the mother of my daughter's girlfriend. Excuse me for caring!" She walks up to you. "Blue or black?"

"Blue is fine..."

"I think the blue brings out your eyes!" Samantha says, before all possibility of conversation gets drowned out by the whir of her bandsaw and the patter of sawdust flying in a billion vectors. Guy yelps in fright and zips upstairs, a blur of grey. You also vacate the general vicinity of the kitchen, to spare your eyesight and hearing.

"Is that really what you're wearing?" K-Mom asks, nodding at your wrinkled jeans and hoodie.

"It's not a date," you remind her.

"It is for you," K-Mom says. "Do you think Summer is going to appreciate having you come over to her house like you just rolled out of bed?"

"Well I did just roll out of bed. But no. She'll probably call me a lazy piece of shit and then pout at me about it."

"Exactly. Is that what you want?"

You shrug. "Yeah, kinda."

K-Mom rolls her eyes. Then, turning, she sees N-Mom changing into her blouse right out in the living room. "Jesus, Noelle. Put your boobs away."

"I'm working on it!" N-Mom says. "Maybe if you had come home sooner, I wouldn't be rushing to get ready in time."

"What does my schedule have to do with -- put a bra on! This isn't your night to get lucky!"

"It's too hot! You know I get a rash if my tits sweat too much!"

Ugh. It's gonna be one of those nights.

You make note of the fact that although K-Mom insists this isn't a date for either of them, she herself is wearing the same perfume she wears on date nights with N-Mom. It's a thick, woody scent with notes of cinnamon and sage. Like a fancy lumberjack might wear. It has nostalgic connotations. The moms have always been at their nicest after coming home from dates.

Both your mothers look gorgeous, in fact. They both dressed up. N-Mom is also wearing her favorite perfume, and her hair is done in a cute pontytail. K-Mom wears a couture designer coat and, rare sight, a skirt and black stockings. If she isn't looking to get lucky at the Denali household, maybe she's thinking she'll get lucky later on. With N-Mom, or... you suppress a not-unpleasant shiver.

>>4921796
god i wish it were me

>more blue eyes posting
WON'T NEVER FORGIVE

>>4921796
Muh based Smatters

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Liz Denali lives in a ranch style house on the outskirts of Palo. The gates are made of artificially weathered wood and the enormous front lawn has got nothing on the acres of grazeland comprising the back. You spy a few horses on the far distance as you walk with your mothers to the door.

"Remember why we're here," K-Mom tells N-Mom. "If I see you flirting with Summer in front of her mother, I will slap the shit out of you."

N-Mom gives her a pinched, patently false smile as if to say "of course, dear."

K-Mom rings the bell. It takes fully half a minute before Liz answers. She swings the door open, throwing her arms wide. "Guys! Wow! Come on in! Make yourselves at home."

Summer's house is bigger than yours. But god is it tacky. It has all sorts of faux southwest decor: a bronze statue of a cowboy on a rearing mustang, a bullhead trophy, a mounted pair of Colt pistols forming a sort of X shape above an archway, a lamp made of beads, a dreamcatcher, a watercolor painting of an Indian chief staring out at a gloomy starlit vista. There's a terrarium where an iguana lies lazing under a heat lamp. A sign over the den says "Varmints Shot on Sight!" and another in the spacious living room says "Bless This Mess" in lettering made to look like loops of rope.

Liz hugs your mothers each in turn, and pecks them on the cheek. "Thanks for taking the time to come over," she says. "I'm making a Mexican meatloaf!"

The moms share a silent, horrified look.

"You'll love it," Liz says, swatting at the air.

"O-of course," N-Mom says.

"Why don't you ladies wait in the living room while I put the finishing touches on?" Liz says. "It'll only be a few minutes yet. There's some wine out on the coffee table, too, so help yourselves!"

The living room is set lower than the front entryway, so that to get there you have to descend a little step. It's homey. The moms immediately head in and pour each other copious amounts of wine, swigging it. As Liz returns to the kitchen, you stand at the entrance to the living room and listen to their whispered conversation:

"Mexican meatloaf? What the fuck is a Mexican meatloaf?"

"Something that doesn't exist."

"Something that shouldn't exist."

"We can pretend we're vegetarians."

"That's the kind of thing that spirals into a sitcom-style web of elaborate lies that's doomed to collapse in embarrassing yet hilarious fashion. No thank you."

"So you want to eat the Mexican meatloaf?"

"...Let me think..."

>>4921828
So that's exactly what happens, right?

>>4921828
lmao, sitcom shenanigans are a go

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You startle, feeling something hard, cold, and a little slimy against your calf. Looking down, you see a large tortoise. You gaze mutely down at it. It gazes mutely back. Then after a palpable turn, it makes a sound at you approximating "ehhhhhh."

The moms snap their heads around at that. They're as surprised as you are at what they see. "Is that a..." K-Mom says.

"Shemp!"

Summer comes racing in from the kitchen. "That's my girlfriend! Stop bothering her, you big jerk!"

"Ehhhhhh."

Summer tries in vain to tug the thing backwards by pulling on the part of its shell that its head comes out of. Shemp refuses to budge.

Summer has told you before that she has a desert tortoise. But you somehow didn't expect it to be so... tortoisey. Or so huge. On its own, and not because Summer or anyone else has any say over its actions, Shemp oh so slowly turns and trots off towards the den, making a huffy exhalation you swear is intentionally meant to be pissy.

"I guess there are worse things to be than a dog person," N-Mom says.

"Summer," K-Mom asks, "how old is that thing?"

"Oh? Shemp you mean? Like nine or ten."

N-Mom is already a-googling. "80 years," she reports.

"Oh god," K-Mom says. "If they get married..."

Summer blinks. "Married?"

You'd like to get her mind off of that train of thought. Summer's great, but you're not ready to have her thinking about walking down the aisle...

[ ] Hang out with Summer and the moms.
[ ] Ask where Winter is.
[ ] Ask if you can help Liz with dinner.

>>4921843
>[x] Ask where Winter is
then
>[x] Ask if you can help Liz with dinner.

>>4921843
>You'd like to get her mind off of that train of thought. Summer's great, but you're not ready to have her thinking about walking down the aisle...
Coward!

>[x] Ask if you can help Liz with dinner.

>>4921843
>[ ] Ask if you can help Liz with dinner.
Help the moms or help this mom?

>>4921843
>[ ] Ask if you can help Liz with dinner.

>>4921843
>[x] Ask where Winter is.

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>[x] Ask if you can help Liz with dinner.

"Is there anything I can do to help with dinner?" You ask.

Summer eyes you suspiciously.

"What?" You say.

"Why are you so helpful all of a sudden? Huh?" She pokes you in the tit. It hurts. "You come over here looking like you just rolled out of bed and now you want to be all... all... Guy Fieri with my mom? What's up with that?"

You throw your hands up. "I can be helpful if I want!"

"But you can't even dress nice for your girlfriend? Lazy piece of shit!"

"Told you," K-Mom tsks.

This is so unfair. Summer didn't exactly doll herself up either. She's wearing her normal attire of loose blouse, skimpy plaid skirt, and baggy socks. Not much different than your uniform at PAP, only if PAP were a whorehouse. Her fingernails seem freshly painted, at least, and her makeup is clownishly slathered on, but you could do without the baby blue mascara and flamingo pink lipstick anyway. She leans in, whispers: "I was thinking we could have a quickie in my room before dinner."

"Uh. Dinner's supposed to be in like five minutes..."

"Yeah. So. That's why they call it a quickie, Wes."

"Did you say something?" N-Mom asks from the living room, looking from you to Summer and back again.

"Nothing, Noelley-belly!" Summer laughs, smiling bright, waving with her patented finger-waggle. N-Mom smiles warmly back. When N-Mom looks away again, Summer's smile crumples and she's back to sneering at you: "You are impossible. A cute girl throws the puss at you and you're just all: hurr, but dinner."

"But dinner..."

Summer exasperatedly motions at the kitchen. "Knock yourself out. Go cook some loaf. I'll be hanging out with the cuter Keki."

"Oh, fuck you."

"That's what I'm trying to tell you!"

You stomp off for the kitchen.

>>4921897
The occasional completely out-of-character choice really helps to mix things up. :^)

>>4921897
Aww, we should be nicer to our girlfriend after everything that's happened. But really, five minutes? That's ambitious even for an FQ protagonist

>>4921775
>Absalom takes another sip. "How about one dollar?"
I'm incredibly late but wow, good job making this thing seem legit, Abby. Definitely doesn't reek of suspicion at all. Although, I guess unbeknownst to him, there's no way the Soliloquys can possibly turn it down... not that he'd have much reason to suspect they would, anyway.

>>4921897
Big heh. Things getting spicy at Casa de Nali

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The Denali family kitchen is larger than most people's homes. It has a Viking Range oven, multiple island counters of finely polished granite, and more cabinet space than all the sticks in all the forests of California can be shaken at. Liz is at the range-top stirring a pot. It smells strongly of cheese and onion -- in a nice way. Walking over and peering in, you see a bubbling brew of potato soup.

"Wesley," Liz says when she sees you walking up. "...Can I call you Wes?"

"Sure."

"Dinner's coming up soon. The meatloaf is almost done." She pulls the wooden stirring spoon from the pot and offers it to you. "Here. Try."

With her palm under the spoon to keep it from dripping on the floor, she steers it towards you mouth. You take a curious taste: it's good. Very good. She steers the spoon to her own mouth now and tastes it, too, smacking her lips. She's pleased with the result.

Her clothes are little tighter on her than they should be -- maybe she's in denial over the right size to buy. She smells like honey.

"Do you need a hand?" You ask.

"Oh, aren't you just precious," Liz says. "All right. Keep stirring for me while I take the rest of the food out of the oven."

You take the spoon and stand in place of Liz and do as instructed. Liz dons comically oversized pink oven mitts and pulls the other two dishes onto the counter: a tray of bacon-wrapped, broasted broccoli, and the main course, an absurdly delicious looking meatloaf. Look, you're not a meatloaf person. You don't "do" meatloaf. But this thing is like no meatloaf you've ever tried before -- it's not dried all to shit, for one thing, and it smells like tacos, like exactly like tacos, and it's topped with a sort of pico de gallo rather than a slather of ketchup-like tomato sauce.

"Ta-daaaa!" Liz says. She cuts a little piece off one of the ends and, stabbing it with a fork, offers it to you. As before, she keeps her palm held underneath to prevent any crumbs from falling. She's practically holding you under your chin as she feeds you.

"What do you think?" She asks. She's hopeful but a bit anxious sounding.

"Itf gud," you say, chewing.

"I'm so glad you like it! You're such a sweet girl, Wes."

"Uh."

Liz blinks, and only now seems to realize that her hand is still under your chin. She pulls it away, and nods. "If you ever want to come over, don't even ask! My door is always open."

>>4921916
Liz is cute! Cute!

>>4921916
>more cabinet space than all the sticks in all the forests of California can be shaken at
At the rate we're going, there won't be many of those left by the time this story takes place

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From a bay window on one side of the kitchen, you have a view of the rolling pasture that is the Denali backyard. Winter is out there. She's feeding one of the horses. She lets it eat hay straight from her hand, and when it's all gone, she scruffs it behind its mane and lovingly rubs her forehead against its forehead.

"That's Curly," Liz tells you. "Summer introduced them when Winter came to stay. They've been besties ever since."

You nod.

"I worry about her," Liz tells you.

You glance away from the window. "Well. You should."

Liz wipes her hands on a dish rag that's hanging around the oven's door handle. "Do you get along with her? She talks about you a lot."

You do an actual double-take. "She -- talks? About me?"

"She said you convinced her to get that job at the bookstore. And she's always asking Summer about what you're like."

"That's really..." you murmur. "Surprising?"

"Winter can be difficult sometimes, but try to understand. Her life's been uprooted. She doesn't have any friends here in town. And her father..."

You purse your lips.

"Do you like horses?" Liz asks. "I can take you riding after dinner!"

"Uh. No thank you."

Liz seems honestly crestfallen. "Oh... I guess you aren't much for outdoor activities, huh? Say, how about we go downstairs after dinner and watch a movie in my rumpus room?"

You like the sound of that much better.

>>4921916
Cute. Cute!

>>4921922
[nervous laughter]

>>4921909
>One Dollar
Hey, if IBM can bribe GlobalFoundries $1.5b to take over their fabs, and then sue GloFo for $2.5b years later. . .

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>>4921922
>rumpus room
Can't get enough of these mommies and their rumpus rooms. Come to think of it, I don't think Charlotte ever gave us the tour of hers, did she...?

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As you take your seat at the irregularly shaped dining room table, the one made to look like it's fashioned from the stump of a single redwood, complete with bark all around the edges -- a couple people are missing.

"Where's Noelle?" Liz asks, setting the steaming pot of soup down.

"She had to use the bathroom," K-Mom says. "She'll be right out."

"Oh. Where's Summer?"

"Noelle needed help finding the bathroom."

You give K-Mom a look. She motions at you with her hands to communicate, "whatcha gonna do?"

As Liz turns again for the kitchen, K-Mom stays her by saying: "err -- I hate to be a wet blanket, but Noelle and I are vegetarian. I don't mind if you all enjoy the meatloaf, but we really shouldn't partake."

Liz frowns. "That's too bad. This soup is vegetarian, at least... but... oh geez. I wish you'd have told me before I cooked this meal!"

"It's no trouble," K-mom insists. "We should have said something sooner."

Liz sighs dejectedly and goes back into the kitchen. Alone with your mother, you whisper: "really? You're going to cover for her like that?"

"What am I supposed to say? Sorry your daughter's unavailable right now, she's fucking my wife? Honestly. Your N-Mom is a complete animal. She can't keep it in her pants for five seconds. It's disgusting."

"Oh, you're pissed off. You're disgusted. Well what about me? I'm getting cuckolded by my own mom."

K-Mom blows some stray hair from her face. Leaning back, folding her arms, she says: "let's make 'em jealous."

(please wait warmly)

>>4921943
Oh.

Ohhhhh.

>>4921943
Yooooo

YOOOOOOO

>>4921916
Thank you Mama D. No wonder Summer is so delightfully healthy.

>>4921922
>rumpus room
O-Oh?

>>4921943
Ohh man.

>>4921943
God damn it you two. And here I thought we were finally going to go fuck Noelle!

>>4921775
>Lowecase I, capital S in "Sir"
I'm late to the party for this episode, I know, but it's important to me to acknowledge what you're doing here.

>>4921943
Wow. Okay. Oh shit, and also damn.

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"WINTER!!! DINNER!!!"

That would be Liz calling out of the window in the kitchen. A few moments later, she returns to the dining room with the meatloaf and the bacon-wrapped broccoli. K-Mom looks like someone who just lost their shirt at the blackjack table as she gazes at the two entrees she just told Liz she cannot eat.

"Is Noelle okay? It seems like she's taking a long time," Liz says.

K-Mom snaps out of her fugue. "I'm sure she's fine."

"I could go check on her--"

"No!" K-Mom says. "Don't worry. I think Summer was going to show her around a little bit, too. They'll be back soon."

Heavy footsteps come thudding from somewhere near the back of the house. A few moments later, Winter is trudging in.

"You're tracking dirt," Liz says.

Winter waves on her way past the dining room as if to say "yeah, yeah." She kicks her shoes off in the foyer, not bothering to put them in one of the cubbies there designed to hold them. Barefoot, she returns to the dining room. "Happy?"

Liz puts her hands on her hips. "You're supposed to take your shoes off on the patio if you come in from the back. Before you come walking in."

"Geawd," Winter huffs, plopping down in a chair. She sniffs the air. "What's for dinner? ...Meatloaf? Fuh-rick yes. I call the end pieces."

She takes the fork beside her empty plate and uses it to haphazardly saw both ends of the meatloaf off, leaving a wavy edge on both sides.

"Winter! Let me serve! You'll ruin th--"

"It's meatloaf, Liz. Who cares?" She shovels it onto her plate, and picks up some of the broccoli florets with her bare hands. "Ow! Hot! Ooof!" She hisses as she drops a few of them beside her meat.

Liz shakes her head. The quest to teach Winter some table manners will not have a happy ending, at least tonight.

You decide to make some idle conversation with this girl who is, apparently, interested in you. "I didn't know you were into horses."

Winter is already eating before the rest of you have even been served -- before most of you have even shown up. "I didn't know you were so nosy," she replies. She stabs the food with her fork like she's trying to kill it again, and shovels it into her mouth. "I'm not some prissy horse girl, if that's what you're assuming. I do think they're awesome, though. It's a sin to keep them penned."

Summer and N-Mom finally return. They're flushed and sweaty. N-Mom's blouse is rumpled. Summer's makeup is a little runny.

"I'm so hungry I could eat a horse," N-Mom says as she sits beside her wife.

Winter grimaces.

"Wow," N-mom breathes. "The food looks really good."

"Yeah, it does," K-Mom says, putting a hand over N-Mom's to stop her from serving herself. "But we're vegetarians. So we can't eat it."

N-Mom stares at her in a post-quickie haze of confusion. Finally, it clicks. "Riiight. Because we're vegetarians." She looks at Liz. "We're vegetarians, so we can't... partake."

"Partaking is strictly forbidden," K-Mom affirms. Must have been part of their rehearsed script.

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They spend the next few minutes looking forlornly at the meatloaf and bacon-wrapped broccoli as they poke their meager bowls of potato soup. It's good soup. It's just not as good as the rest of it.

"I didn't know you guys were vegetarians," Summer says. "That's like sooo admirable," she adds, and takes a bite of bacon. N-Mom licks her lips.

"I have some tofu in the fridge," Liz says, pointing over her shoulder with a thumb. "I could make you some sandwiches or a salad with it--"

"We're... allergic... to tofu," N-Mom says. "Thanks anyway."

You can't take it anymore. You pull down the developing web of lies before it becomes a problem for everyone. "They're not vegetarians," you say. "They lied because they didn't think Mexican meatloaf sounded like real food. Now they're ass-blasted because it's actually really good and they don't get to have any of it."

Winter snrks.

"We--" N-Mom says.

"It's not--" K-Mom begins.

Liz puts a hand to her mouth and giggles over their stuttering explanations. "You wouldn't be the first people to shy away when they hear the words 'meat' and 'loaf' together. Help yourselves. We'll forget about the fib."

They dig in and eat, and although they're mortified, they obviously enjoy themselves. The three mothers chitchat about their careers; Liz explains the dreary details of buying from wholesalers and K-Mom explains the equally dreary minutiae of search engine optimization for her website. When asked how long they've been together, your mothers describe how they met while K-Mom was working a scoop about corruption in the FBI, which leads to the tale of how N-Mom turned down a major promotion that would have relocated her to DC so she could stay in California and marry K-Mom. This story becomes more overwrought and over-embellished with every retelling, and it makes K-Mom misty-eyed each and every time. It does so again, even at a moment like now when she's mad at N-Mom for being so incorrigibly promiscuous. Liz coos in heartwarmed delight.

>>4922017
WEB
OF
LIES

>She kicks her shoes off in the foyer, not bothering to put them in one of the cubbies there designed to hold them. Barefoot, she returns to the dining room. "Happy?"

Oh boy, I wonder what this could be foreshadowing

>>4922020
>You can't take it anymore. You pull down the developing web of lies before it becomes a problem for everyone. "They're not vegetarians," you say. "They lied because they didn't think Mexican meatloaf sounded like real food. Now they're ass-blasted because it's actually really good and they don't get to have any of it."
Ahahaha, based Wes. She's getting confident pretty quickly.

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Winter kicks you under the table.

"Ow," you hiss. You kick her back.

"Bitch," she whispers.

"What's your problem?" You ask.

Winter speaks loud enough for everyone to hear. "Can we stop with the Hallmark Family Movie crap? You guys are here to ask about dad. So go ahead. Ask about dad."

"Winter," Liz says, caught somewhere between tender and mad.

"Come on," Winter demands. "Do it."

"All right," K-Mom says. "Why did Gideon go on the run? And why did he come back?"

Liz rubs her forehead. "He was struggling to get our business off the ground. We went bankrupt, actually, right around the time Summer was born. He was really lost... he ended up joining this new religion, and that gave him some direction in life. They loaned him the money to get the store back up and running... and he did some work for them in return. I didn't know anything about what he did on the side... until the work came home with him one night. Turns out he was strong-arming people who owed money to the... I hesitate to call them a church... anyway, he was basically a mob enforcer. And one night someone who he was terrorizing decided to strike back, by attacking him in our home."

Summer and Winter are both staring sullenly at their plates.

"Gideon beat that man senseless and shoved him into the back of the car. I asked what was going to happen next -- all he would say was that he'd take care of it. He called his partner Buridan over, they drove off with him... we never saw him again. When Gideon came back home, I told him to pack his things and leave. That it wasn't safe for him to be living with us. He was gone for about a year. Then one day he showed up saying he'd left the church. I took him back... and a few months after that, I found him packing his things at 4 AM, saying he had to run, that people in the church were after him, that he was going back to his hometown in Alaska."

"He took Winter with him?" You ask. Winter chuffs, and glances away towards the wall.

"We had an unusual relationship," Liz says. "Winter's mother lived with us for a while. I know that seems really weird."

"Not at all," N-Mom says. (If only Liz knew the half of it.)

"Well. She had already moved back to Alaska by that time, with Winter in tow. Gideon was actually going there to be with her. But... she died of a heart condition not too long after that."

Liz tries to consolingly rub Winter's back, but Winter shrugs it off.

>>4922036
Oof.

>>4922036
Big oof

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"Why is he back in town now?" K-Mom asks.

"You saw how dangerous Buridan is," Winter says. "Take a wild guess. There's still bad blood there."

"I can't forgive him for what he's done," Liz says, "but in his own way -- he thinks he's trying to protect us."

"From the consequences of his own actions," Summer says, standing, and gathering her plate to take it into the kitchen. Her way of ending a conversation, you guess.

"You don't know what you're talking about," Winter mutters.

"Blah blah. Dad sucks. Get over it."

Winter hasn't got the spirit to argue about it. She stands and hurries from the room. Summer goes around taking the other dirty dishes and disappears into the kitchen with them. Soon you hear running water.

"I know you're looking for him," Liz tells your mothers. "If I see him, and Tyrus Kang's men don't catch him first, I'll let them know where he is. Come what may."

"Do you know the name of the man who came to your home that night?" N-Mom asks. "Or any other of Gideon's... victims? If we can tie him to any crimes--"

"I looked the other way, Mrs. Keki. I didn't want to know. And if this goes any further, I could lose my business. It might just be the fruit of a criminal enterprise."

"Is there anything else we should know about the man? Anything you can tell us?"

Liz stares for a while at the ceiling. Finally she says, "he's no monster. I know you're not going to be very forgiving to a man who broke into your teenage daughter's bedroom, but don't hurt him. He's as lost today as he was when those cultists suckered him in. And for better or worse, he's the father of my child -- my children."

"Who's for ice cream?" Summer asks, poking her head back into the dining room.

You raise your hand. You're the only one. There's an awkward silence.

"Meeee," you say in the listless shadow of enthusiasm. "I'm for. Uh. Ice cream."

She ducks back into the kitchen, and the sound of clinking bowls follows.

"Gideon is back in town because he's trying to kill Buridan," Liz says. "That's my guess, anyway. And maybe to expose Instrumentalism as a violent cult. It might get him killed, but he's trying to keep the blowback off of us."

"He hasn't done a great job of it," N-Mom says. Thanks mom.

Liz nods. Then, trying to put on a smile: "I could use that ice cream now. How about you?"

>>4922045
Continued oofing. This poor family.

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I ended up doing expositions instead of lewds. So I'll call it for tonight, but for Sunday evening, let's take a vote:

[ ] K-Mom and Wes get frisky under the covers in the rumpus room while watching a movie. Summer and N-Mom aren't amused.
[ ] Wes feels bad for Winter, but trying to console her leads to a sticky situation.

>>4922051
Ganbatte, OP.

>[x] K-Mom and Wes get frisky under the covers in the rumpus room while watching a movie. Summer and N-Mom aren't amused.
Let's gooooo

>>4922051
You're gonna make me PICK? aaaaaaa

>[x] K-Mom and Wes get risky under the covers in the rumpus room while watching a movie. Summer and N-Mom *are* amused.

>>4922051
>[X] Wes feels bad for Winter, but trying to console her leads to a sticky situation.
Gotta keep the vote close.

>>4922045
If Gideon's actions are all about personal penance and to keep the Denali's safe, why does he need info on some prophecy? I doubt it'll help with keeping tabs on Instrumentalist movements.

Maybe it's somehow connected to Winter's mother? Does he have an interest in the world to be reset too? Was Winter's mom akin to Whitney in the previous timeline for him?

>>4922051
>[ ] Wes feels bad for Winter, but trying to console her leads to a sticky situation.
Well, since this was after Winter witnessed the activities of the BRB gang, it might lead to something interesting.

>>4922051
Winter pussy winter pussy

>>4922063
If the Instrumentalists believe in the prophecy, it would certainly inform their actions. Having that information would be essential to understanding what they're planning to do. I think you're probably right about the world reset, though -- seems like the kind of guy who could really use one.

>>4922051
>[X] K-Mom and Wes get frisky under the covers in the rumpus room while watching a movie. Summer and N-Mom aren't amused.

>>4922051
> [X] Wes feels bad for Winter, but trying to console her leads to a sticky situation.

>>4922051
[ X] Wes feels bad for Winter, but trying to console her leads to a sticky situation.

>>4922051
>[ ] Wes feels bad for Winter, but trying to console her leads to a sticky situation.

>>4922051
>[ ] Wes feels bad for Winter, but trying to console her leads to a sticky situation.

>>4922051
>[ ] K-Mom and Wes get frisky under the covers in the rumpus room while watching a movie. Summer and N-Mom aren't amused

>>4922051
>[ ] K-Mom and Wes get frisky under the covers in the rumpus room while watching a movie. Summer and N-Mom aren't amused.

>>4922051
>[x] Wes feels bad for Winter, but trying to console her leads to a sticky situation.

>>4922051
>[X] Wes feels bad for Winter, but trying to console her leads to a sticky situation.

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"WINTER!!! DESSERT!!!"

That would be Summer calling up the stairs, as you and the others pass by on the way to towards the rumpus room to watch a movie. She stands holding onto the banister, slightly leaning, craning her neck. She waits for a few moments before trying again:

"ICE CREAM!!! GOTCHA YOUR FAVORITE FLAVOR!!!"

Summer listens intently for any sort of response, and receives none. She sets the bowl of cake batter ice cream at the foot of the stairs, frowning.

"Is she okay?" You ask.

"No. All she does is mope and pout and be a total bitch."

"Kid's got issues," K-Mom agrees.

"She needs some alone time, that's all," Liz says.

You glance at the bowl Summer left on the floor. "It's gonna melt."

Summer shrugs. She's done as much for Winter tonight as she's willing to. She turns and follows your mothers towards the basement.

"Hey, do you mind if I bring the ice cream up for her?" You ask.

Summer rolls her eyes. But Liz likes the idea: "go ahead, Wes. Her room is the third door on the right."

"Do you want us to start the movie without you?" N-Mom asks. You nod. "Don't let the little shit beat you up or anything," she warns, before heading downstairs. (As if that would ever happen. C'mon, Mom.)

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>>4923314
>(As if that would ever happen. C'mon, Mom.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ag1o3koTLWM

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https://www.op-studios.net/fq-lewd-wes15

>>4923359
Would it be possible to use a font colour that has more contrast with the background on the OP Studios site? I'm having to highlight all the text to read it without straining my eyes.

>>4923359
OP really missed the rape fights, huh?

>>4923366
Sorry for that. Try reloading this lewd. Let me know how you like that. It will take a while to change the font color on every page because my webhost suuuuuuuuuucks, but if this is better for folks, I will do it.

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>>4923370
That's great, thanks!

>>4923359
Jeez, that's a lot of bullying.
More

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Between periods, Amber briskly sidles up to you and loops an arm around yours. She forces you to match her pace, whisking you away from Summer.

"Uh, fire somewhere?" Summer says.

Amber glances back. "Sister shit. Uno mochotto."

She takes you all the way to the far side of the hall. In the sunlight streaming in from the enormous double-paned window here, she squints and reaches for your hair. "Is that... what is that? Sugar or candy or something?"

"Will you get on with it? We're gonna be late."

Amber clears her throat. "Look. Look at Ophie."

You look at Ophie. She's trudging along, now all on her own, and headed for the fifth period calculus class she definitely isn't getting any value out of.

"See anything?" Amber prods.

"I see Ophie..." you mumble. Amber slaps you upside the head. You recoil. "OW! Bint!"

"Do you see anything different?"

You watch closely. Ophie disappears into her classroom. When she's out of sight, you turn back towards Amber with a shrug.

Amber's voice is grave and furtive. "She's glowing."

"Oh no. I mean, I knew N-Mom said she'd make a great analyst for the FBI, but I didn't expect her to actually sign up..."

"Shut the fuck up. She's glowing, Wes. She had sex with Noah. She's a sex haver now. She's a person who has sex."

You shake your head. "Did she... tell you that?"

"No! She's glowing! Try to keep up!" Amber puts her hands on her hips. "Anyway, it was only a matter of time. You saw how they were all over each other at homecoming. Two teenagers start sucking face like that? It's only a matter of time before they're schtupping. Knocking boots. Bumping uglies."

"That's great," you say. "I'm happy for h--" you jerk back and swat Amber's hand away from your face.

"What IS that?" She says. "It's like... little strings of marshmallow residue or, or something. Did you fall into a cotton candy machine?"

"Why is this so important to you?" You ask.

"If you're being bullied by clowns, I ought to know."

"Ophie."

"Oh. Well, let's start with the fact that she won't admit it when I ask her. I even busted out the oath we swore when we were six that we would never lie to each other. I said to her, I said: are you suuuure you're not having sex with Noah? Tell me, and you can't lie! So she just said --" Amber puts on her impression of Ophie's pitchless voice. "I'd prefer not to." She shakes her head, grimaces. "It's like... what-the-fuck-ever, Bartelby."

"Bartleby?"

"Do you read anything Snuggy Bear assigns?"

You blink. "How do you know that nickname?"

"Noah is bad news," Amber says. "He's going to break Ophie's heart. So then I'm going to have to murder him and it'll be a whole big pain in my ass. That's why it matters to me."

>>4923396
>Uno mochotto
Oh no, Amber, you're hanging around Rose the Younger too much.

Also wash your damn hair, Wes, holy fuck.

>>4923396
>"Noah is bad news," Amber says. "He's going to break Ophie's heart. So then I'm going to have to murder him and it'll be a whole big pain in my ass. That's why it matters to me."
Fucking lol. Protective Amber is good.

Shame we didn't get to see the outcome of the visit to the Denalis though. I'd be very surprised if Summer didn't notice all those stains that just happened to appear on her bed.

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"You know what I think?" You say. "I think you're bugging out because of that prophecy. You're channeling your anxiety into something meaningless because you actually--"

"No. Nope. Nuh uh."

"--You actually believe that some schizophrenic Russian in the 19th century predicted that the three of us would be... important... in some vague, Nostradamus-ass way that gives us zero clue of what to expect other than something big."

"Wes, you might down for the pump-and-dump routine. Ophie isn't built for that. And Noah? He's a pump-and-dumper. Got it written all over his nerdy fucking face."

"And what do you want me to do about it?" You ask.

Amber glances around. By now the halls are empty. Even Summer, who gave you the privacy Amber so obviously wanted but stood around waiting for you to finish, has finally sulked off to class.

"Now for the real shit. Take a look at what I found," Amber tells you. She unzips her bag and hands you a weathered paperback book.

You read aloud. "Information Transfer Across Conformal Barriers in a Cyclic Cosmology: The Hyper-Leibnizian Paramaterized Multiverse... what."

"Check the author."

"Absalom Abrams." You glance up. "So? He wrote some kind of science... book."

Amber huffs. "Some kind of science book. What a fucking sterling mind you've got, Wesley, truly. And do you know what this book is?"

"Some kind of... science book."

"It's a bible. For the church of Instrumentalism. Well. More like the New Testament. Here's the Torah."

From her bag she hands you a slender, transparent-covered folder, inside of which, bound to the spine, is a research paper that obviously comes from some sort of university library. "Instrumentalizing Conformal Boundaries in CCC... by... David C. Darkbloom."

You meet Amber's eyes. She folds her arms. "Uh huh," she says.

>>4923408
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh man.

More tomorrow. What little adventure would you like to pick up with?

[ ] Lily has a vulnerable side!
[ ] Will's perfect driving class!
[ ] The moms try to teach you self-defense! Maybe a bad idea!

>>4923421
>[x] The moms try to teach you self-defense! Maybe a bad idea!

It's a *great* idea.

>>4923408
Fuuuucks sake.

>>4923421
Oh man, good picks. But I could never pass up
>[x] The moms try to teach you self-defense! Maybe a bad idea!

>>4923421
>[ ] The moms try to teach you self-defense! Maybe a bad idea!
If anything, they should extend that invitation to Lily too.

>>4923421
>[ ] Will's perfect driving class!

>>4923421
>[ ] Will's perfect driving class!

BAKA BAKA

>>4923421
Damn all of these look interesting. I hope we get to all of them.

>[x] Lily has a vulnerable side!

>>4923421
>[ X] Lily has a vulnerable side!
Seen enough of the moms already the past few episodes.

>>4923421
>[X] The moms try to teach you self-defense! Maybe a bad idea!
also man is wesley fucked up

>>4923421
>[ ] The moms try to teach you self-defense! Maybe a bad idea!
Only because I feel like we may actually get some vague usefulness out of it?

>>4923421
>[ ] The moms try to teach you self-defense! Maybe a bad idea!

>>4923421
> [x] The moms try to teach you self-defense! Maybe a bad idea!

>>4923421
>[X] The moms try to teach you self-defense! Maybe a bad idea!

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"All in Eddy?" N-Mom asks.

"What?" You yell.

"A spaghetti?"

You turn, peel the earmuffs off your head. "WHAT?"

"I said are you ready?"

"Oh. Let me put my ear protection back on," you grunt. N-Mom rolls her eyes.

Honestly, you feel overdressed in all this tacticool bullshit. The drab green vest that hooks around your waist and loops over both shoulders, with its ab-like rectangular protrusions and non-Euclidean amounts of pocket space. The matching green ballcap to hold your tied-back hair. The yellow-tinted safety goggles. The camo pants and jackboots. The Mr. Cool Guy grip-enhancing gloves. All to fire at paper cutouts, indoors. It's like putting on a wedding gown to hit up an Olive Garden for $9 endless breadsticks.

Fuck, you could really go for some breadsticks.

Lily is in the lane to your right, Summer in the lane to your left. Amber is on Lily's other side and Winter is on Summer's other side. You hate the prospect of competition in something where you're a rank novice. Even if N-Mom insists this is nothing of the sort. It is.

Well, at least you're not the only one who has to dress like a reject from the Iranian War.

N-Mom paces back and forth, instructing you. She adopts the forceful but stilted cadence of a drill instructor, and relishes it way too much. "Keep your firearm aimed forward and do not put your finger on the trigger until you are ready to shoot! Point your firearm only at things you intend to destroy! Do remember! If you hear the words: CEASE FIRE -- then cease your fucking fire!" Lily bobs her head side to side, rolls her eyes, and mouths "blah, blah, blah." Of course, she's well versed on all of this. "Aim for the center of mass! Load your weapon when I blow my whistle. You will have 90 seconds of target practice from the time the buzzer sounds. Good luck!"

She blows. The lights above you dim, the lights over the shooting gallery clack on. You slide the magazine clip inside the bullet chamber, or whatever. It clicks satisfyingly into place.

"Range is HOT!" N-Mom shouts.

"Let's see if your aim sucks as much irl as it does in ranked," Lily says from the corner of her mouth.

"Go to hell."

Lily smirks at you.

>>4924775
Eyy, the whole squad's here!

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The buzzer sounds. You widen your stance a little, raise your gun, rest your cheek to your shoulder, squint, and peer down the sight. This does fuck all to help your aim. You think you've got a clear bead on the paper cutout's chest. But you hear pops of gunfire from either side of you, and feel like you're wasting time aiming. So you start blasting. You get three rounds off before the recoil has you so fucked up that you're sure you're aiming for the ceiling. You resteady yourself and try again. Bang, bang, bang. Are you usually not meant to see the holes in the paper cutouts? Do they only appear after it's over, or something? You are making holes in your cutout, right?

Oh -- no. Lily is firing at a cutout 10 yards further out and you can clearly see that she's putting holes in hers. So are the others. Fuck.

You can feel your grip loosening with every shot and you can't possibly keep your line of sight down the irons. All the little protips your mom gave you beforehand about using the pad of your finger instead of knuckling it, about keeping the trigger to the wall, about finding your sights again between shots instead of firing blindly... all of it goes out the window, and you just empty the mag-- the cl-- the bullet container. Well, at least you can remember enough to eject the gunfire rectangle when it's empty, reach into your vest of holding, and insert a fresh projectile bottle into the muzzle's chamber.

But then the worst happens. You fire -- nothing. You fire again -- nothing.

You glance over your shoulder. "Mom! MOM! THE GUN JAMMED! MOOOOOM!"

Lily lowers her weapon and laughs to herself in sheer delight, like the cunt she is.

N-Mom calls through cupped hands. "I can't help you, baby! Range is hot!"

Fuck.

You pull the sliding mechanism at the top of the gun, to see where the bullet may be stuck. In doing so you turn the gun around, and don't realize you're pointing it at the bay to your left -- at Summer's head. Lily notices it, though. She stops laughing in an instant, dives across the partition to yank your arms the other way. "JESUS CHRIST, WES!" She hollers as, behind you, N-Mom waves her arms frantically and shouts "CEASE FIRE! CEASE FIRE! CEASE FIRE!"

Summer, who's busy laughing and firing without a care in the world, only now looks over, blinking confusedly. "What the f..."

The buzzer sounds. The lighting equalizes. The targets come sliding towards your bays along the overhead rails.

"Did you just try to shoot me, babe?" Summer asks.

"Not on purpose," you insist.

>>4924789
Jesus fucking CHRIST, Wes

>>4924789
Big oof Wes. Guess she's getting the tazer and let Lil handle firearms.

>>4924789
Not an American, honest question - if it's someone's first time being trained to use a gun, is there a reason you wouldn't want to use blanks over live ammo?

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The results:

Summer hit the target eight times in the chest and stomach, once in the head, and three times in extremities. She wants to get it framed. She thinks Liz will be proud. She peels off her goggles, smiling like she just won gold at the Olympics, pointing excitedly at her dead cutout man. "Guess it runs in the family!" She says. "BANG! Haha."

Amber hit the target. Uhh. Once in the shoulder, twice in the gut, and a few times in the white paper around the target's body.

"Aw fuck," Amber mutters to herself. "Shouldn't have gone for the farthest distance... fuck me sideways."

"You should have better depth perception than that," Lily tells her. "Ain't like you're missing an eye or something."

Amber flips her off.

Lily hit the target eight times in the head and neck, fifteen times in the balls and dick, and, for show, one time in the heart. She has only a few stray holes in the paper around the target. "See that?" She asks you.

You turn your head. "No."

She peels the target off the cardboard it's stapled to, holds it aloft, and circles around to face you. "See that? Do you see that, Wes? Do you see it? Do you see my aim here?" She runs a forefinger around the bullet holes to show you all the places she nailed it.

"Nope," you reply, glancing the other way now.

Lily slumps her shoulders and lets the paper cutout man droop limply down by her legs. "Course you don't see it. You're blind, so."

You are in no way blind. You also hit the target.

N-Mom examines it. She pokes at the only bullet hole in the paper. It's close and yet so far from the cutout's head. "Had that been an attacker," she says reassuringly, "it would have nicked his ear. Definitely would have scared him, at the very least. Ear wounds bleed a lot."

You grumble.

"We need to work on keeping your wrists steady. That's so important, Wes-- and... better discipline with where you aim when there's live ammo loaded."

You set the pistol down on the table in front of you. "I think I'm done."

"How'd you do, Winter?" Summer asks, peeking into her sister's bay.

"Eh," she says, shrugging, already stripping her gear off.

Summer snoops. She walks around and checks her sister's cutout. "Holy," she breathes.

You all take a look. Winter nailed her target 30 times, all in the head. Lily, disbelieving, counts and recounts and rerecounts. You only had 30 bullets to work with.

Winter sits on the bench along the walls and pulls her boots off. She plops her duffel down in front of her and finds her street shoes, starts to lace them.

"Anyone feel like Wendy's?" She asks, not glancing up. When after an awkward silence she finally does, she finds you all gawking at her like a zoo animal. She looks surprised, then bashful, then scornful. "I've got good aim," she sneers. "Oooooh. How amaaaaaazing." She looks down and focuses once again on lacing her shoes. "Losers..."

>>4924806
>"You should have better depth perception than that," Lily tells her. "Ain't like you're missing an eye or something."
SHE CAN'T KEEP DOING THIS!

Also, holy shit Winter.

>>4924789
I forgot that OP was once borderline proud of his ignorance regarding all things /k/. God dammit, Wes.

>>4924806
I could go for some Wendy’s right now…

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On your way out of the shooting gallery, you pass the next group of people coming in. Most are strangers. One you recognize. His presence here surprises you. It absolutely floors Amber. She spins on her heels and follows him back into the gallery.

"The fuck?" She snarls.

Auburn sighs, beleaguered.

"What are you doing here, fucko?" Amber demands, still fast on his heels.

Auburn dons his hearing protection and his goggles and pretends not to hear as he pulls a polished steel glock from his bag.

"I asked you a question, bitch! Say something!"

Auburn checks his clipazine or magaclip or whatever, makes sure he has no rounds chambered. He sets his gun down on the table in front of him. Gives Amber a dismissive look. "I'm practicing my aim," he says, rather obviously.

"So you finally decided to go Columbine on us. Fantastic."

"Opposite. I'm a Protector," he says.

"Bullshit. No fucking way they gave you a license to carry at PAP."

"It's true," Lily confirms, walking up, folding her arms. "He's in the program."

Amber shakes her head. This is like finding out your housecat moonlights as a powerlifter.

The people in the other firing bays are jeering at you, Amber, and Lily. As long as you're standing around in here past the do-not-cross line, they can't load their weapons and begin to shoot.

"Not everyone who's a certified Protector likes to flaunt it," Auburn says, giving Lily a meaningful glance. "Anyway. I'm busy. And you're getting in my way. So..."

He makes a shoo-shoo motion. Amber rolls her eyes, makes a disgruntled sound, and storms away. Lily follows closely after.

"Uh, nice seeing you," you tell Auburn.

"Not so nice seeing you," he replies. "Not here. Just let me know if you're ever carrying. I'll keep well clear."

You begin to go, angry at that snotty comment, but stop yourself short. The impatient shooters groan anew -- you start to worry they'll pin you to one of the cardboard placards and use you for a target if you don't clear out soon. But you want to know.

"Hey. Did Noah tell you?"

"Tell me what?"

"About Ophie."

Auburn looks at you like you're weird and kinda stupid -- okay, par for the course -- but he clearly has no idea what you're on about.

"Nevermind," you tell him, and go.

Amber will be happy. Noah isn't spreading the news around.

You're happy about it, too. Until you remember that now you have to practice physical self-defense with K-Mom. If the firing range wasn't humiliating enough...

>>4924825
>A second protector
What are you foreshadowing, OP? What are you about to put us through?

>Until you remember that now you have to practice physical self-defense with K-Mom. If the firing range wasn't humiliating enough...
WRESTLING WITH MOMMY

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Still writing, but gonna continue wrestling with Mommy tomorrow night.

For now, a lewd vote.

[ ] The lurid aftermath of Winter and Wesley's naughtiness.
[ ] Amber tests her theory that bodywriting makes futanaris and newhalfs like moths to a flame.

>>4924891
I really want the first one, but

[xxxxxxxxxxx] Amber tests her theory that bodywriting makes futanaris and newhalfs like moths to a flame.

>>4924891
>[x] Amber tests her theory that bodywriting makes futanaris and newhalfs like moths to a flame.
God, fuck, etc etc

>>4924891
>[ ] Amber tests her theory that bodywriting makes futanaris and newhalfs like moths to a flame.

>>4924891
>[X ] Amber tests her theory that bodywriting makes futanaris and newhalfs like moths to a flame.

This is a national treasure, irregardless of nation.

We should also score aunt points by reintroducing Vivian to Bosporus Rate Books.

And gift wrap Amelia for Smatters birthday.

>>4924891
>[ ] Amber tests her theory that bodywriting makes futanaris and newhalfs like moths to a flame.

How can I not?

>>4924825
>a polished steel glock
>his clipazine or magaclip

Congrats OP, you managed to make me feel physical pain on a fundamental and personal level.

>>4923396
>She had sex with Noah. She's a sex haver now. She's a person who has sex."
Heheheheheheh

>>4923409
Can't say I'm surprised. Starting a cult that gets out of his control is exactly the kind of thing David would get up to. The title of the first book worries me more. "Hyper-Leibinized Paramaterized multiverse" sounds like meaningless word salad, but the things it implies Absalom knows or suspects are downright terrifying.

>>4925671
To be fair we always suspected David had an odd life. You don't go from Cottonmouth Rd. to enucleation of kids without hitting a few speed bumps along the way.

Unfortunately my faith in OP's ridiculous prep time has not yet been rewarded as a Google scholar search showed nothing under the title, or David darkbloom.

Leibniz was a scientist and philosopher famous for creating calculus and rejecting materialism. Hope that helps.

Also 2019 Pennington et al. solved the black hole information paradox for simple gravity systems. The paper is worth a read. It involves euclidian wormholes connecting replicas inside a black hole and other fun things.

>>4927038
>Leibniz was a scientist and philosopher famous for creating calculus and rejecting materialism. Hope that helps.
His Theological assertions are more pertinent here. Leibniz believed that the Universe we currently live in is the best possible Universe. That God in his infinite wisdom created it to be thus. A problem arises from this thesis; if this is the best of all possible universes why are we, mere creations of this infinite and benevolent entity, able to imagine worlds that we can generally agree to be better. Rousseau is quick to point this out with a recent natural disaster hitting a city he loved. Leibniz has a few explanations, but none of them are particularly satisfactory. Which is pretty typical of the Problem of Evil. In Fuck Quest, OP thinks up a work around that kind of IS satisfactory, and may well apply to the Instrumentalists, Darkbloom and Absalom's agenda. An agenda that is apocalyptically terrifying.

>>4927210
Forget philosophy, a problem arises in blatant fact from the standpoint of in universe characters as a result of the operating parameters continued interference.

Better for some doesn't necessarily mean better for all. We've seen hints of this from Camellia Brantley and the Instrumentalist recruitment center where they held Summer. There are also hints and clues here and there that the world as a whole is becoming less utopian by the day. Covid 24, only one surviving president, school shootings are common enough that a Protector program isn't just considered but actively and aggressively implemented... By students...

And since Alabaster is no longer a protagonist, but just another character it might be time to discuss him as a character, because the world as it is has a lot ,perhaps everything, to do with his (our?) decisions.

I keep thinking back to the previous Sable. She thought people could be sorted, each according to wavelength, into appropriate universes. To me that seems similar to something the instrumentalists would want

Tonight's... the night?

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>>4931175
I'm working on the promised lewd, but my website is currently fucked. You may notice that when you try to load it, pretty much all of the pages are malfunctioning to one degree or another. I also have no access to my administrator suite because of an expired SSL certificate.

Don't worry, DynaMax Vanessa with the creepy avatar is currently on top of it. I think.

I'll be posting the rest of the episode tonight, one way or another.

>>4931508
Waiting warmly~

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In your backyard, K-Mom wears a black tanktop, black yoga pants, and rectangular yellow foam pads around her forearms. The pads are long enough to cover her hands, too. She stands with a wide stance, slightly hunched. She swivels repeatedly at the hips. First her left side towards you, then her right, holding the armpads up for you to punch in an alternating fashion. The soft "pah" of your punches is in perfect tune to her grunts of "Hah,, hah,, hah,, hah,, hah" -- it starts to stultify.

"Keep the focus, baby," K-Mom says. "Watch your stance. Hah,, hah. Follow through with your punches. Hah,, hah,, hah,, hah. Put some muscle into it. Hah,, hah,, hah."

She doesn't need to breathe so annoyingly, is the thing. This is a conscious choice she's making right now. She's choosing to hah at you like she's halfway through running the Boston Marathon.

Summer, who insists her 3rd Kup in Tae Kwon Do is really impressive, offered to be a sparring partner for Lily. She isn't hahing. She's perfectly silent unless and until she offers Lily advice on her form. K-Mom should take note.

(Winter and Amber peaced out. Quiz bowl waits for no woman.)

"You need to follow through! That's how you impart force! Hah,, hah,, hah."

"I am putting force into it," you say.

"Carry your punch all the way through. Feel the motion of your arm, shoulders, and spine. Hah,, hah. Don't be afraid of hurting me. Hah,, hah,, hah."

"Trust me, I'm not afraid of that."

To your right, the sparring between Summer and Lily becomes a bit more energetic. Lily unleashes a rapid barrage of punches to Summer's armpads that forces Summer backwards. Lily attacks indiscriminately, so that Summer has to use her arms as a shield to protect herself, rather than as a helpful target for Lily's fists to track. Lily punches down, by Summer's belly, so Summer holds a forearm low. Lily punches up, by Summer's face, so Summer holds a forearm high. And so on.

Soon, Summer starts pushing back against Lily's punches. She leverages her superior weight to arrest Lily's momentum and force Lily to lose both her initiative and balance. The shift of the power dynamic is subtle but certain. Lily isn't striking Summer's armpads with her fists anymore. Rather, Summer is striking Lily's fists with her armpads.

"Don't lose your balance, now!" Summer chides. She's breathy, but obviously not tired.

Lily laughs. "But you just lost yours."

"I-- fuh!"

Lily squats and sweeps Summer's legs. Clean and quick. Summer falls flat on her back in the dewy grass. It takes a lingering moment before she even realizes that it happened and registers the pain. "Ohhhh -- screw you!" she huffs. Lily cackles.

You decide to try something similar. But reaching out with your foot, you trip over yourself, and K-Mom steps backwards. You fall flat on your face.

"Next time?" K-Mom says. "Don't send your opponent a telegram about what you're going to do before you do it." She reaches down and helps you up.

>>4931728
>She doesn't need to breathe so annoyingly, is the thing. This is a conscious choice she's making right now. She's choosing to hah at you like she's halfway through running the Boston Marathon.
Imagining Wesley sparring with Kay, who keeps telling her "Join the Nintendo Fun Club today, Wes!"

>>4931728
Smooth, Wes

>>4931728
Kick her ass, Summer!

>>4931733
... huh?

>>4931736
Uh?

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Next, K-Mom demonstrates some basic over-the-shoulder throws from Judo. She uses Summer as her assistant: "Summer, come here. Face me. That's it. Okay: this is ippon seoi nage," she says. "For a foe approaching you from the front. You grab their collar--" She takes Summer by her collar, startling her. "Uhh?" Summer begins, but K-Mom presses forward. "You cross them up, grabbing them under their opposite armpit." She reaches beneath Summer's arm and wrenches it up. "Uhhhhh?" Summer says. K-Mom ignores it. "Now split their weight by placing your feet between their legs. Then, with the momentum, you turn and leverage them over your back."

In one fluid motion, K-Mom spins and heaves Summer over her back, dropping her with a thud on a mat she has laid out.

"Is everyone going to knock me over today?" Summer cries, staring at the sky.

K-Mom gazes down at her, laughing. "You can take it. Don't be a wuss." She grabs for Summer's forearm and helps her to her feet. Then she helps the still pouty Summer dust herself off. "Similar to any throws they teach in Tae Kwon Do?"

"Yeah," Summer says. "Basically the same stuff they teach you on day one."

"Good. Help Lily again. I'll pair up with Wes."

She and Lily square up. "If you pull anything, I'll hit you where the sun doesn't shine," Summer warns her. Lily flips her off.

You and K-Mom also square up. "Just like I showed you," she says, shifting her weight from foot to foot, reaching out as if she's an attacker going for the throat. "I won't hold back, so you shouldn't either."

But she has you do a couple practice attempts before actually going for it: drawing her towards you, turning her around, and making as if you're going to flip her onto her back, before resetting your position to that front-facing pose you began in.

Every time you draw K-Mom close, and spin her around with her chest to your back, you can smell so strongly her natural scent that it almost overwhelms you. It's sweet and light, somehow, even if she's sweaty. And underneath it, just barely, you can detect that perfume of hers... the perfume she wears on dates with N-Mom.

"Ready, baby?" K-Mom whispers in your ear.

You nod.

"Then let's do it."

>>4931739
>>4931738
Still applies.

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One last time, she resets your position. You try the move for real.

Somehow you remember all the important elements: splitting the weight, one hand on the collar, crossing her up -- the swift turn, the over-the-shoulder heave. You lift your mother into the air and drop her on the ground like it's nothing, even though she's taller, heavier, and stronger than you. She lands with a plap on the blue mat. You, still stooped over, still holding her, stare down at her, stunned at how easy it was.

"Don't give up your advantage," K-Mom says. She winks.

"Huh?"

She swings her entire lower half up, and latches her legs around your neck. Your vision goes topsy-turvy and then all of a sudden you're lying flat on the ground. K-Mom is on top of you, straddling your chest.

"I said don't give up your advantage."

"M-- Mom..." you stammer. Your field of view, in this position, is almost nothing but her crotch, the inseam of her yoga pants, the little stain of sweat discoloring it. Glancing up, you see her grinning ear to ear. Her hands are folded one over the other, up by your collarbone, pinning you down. Her wedding band glints in the sunlight. She's dripping sweat off her bangs, which lands in droplets across your forehead. You gawp. Again, but more softly, you repeat: "Mom..."

"Fuck you! Fuck you!"

You and K-Mom glance over. Summer and Lily are rolling around in the grass, tussling, pulling at one another's hair. Their demo didn't go so well, obviously. K-Mom leaps to her feet and rushes to separate them. You're left lying on the ground, K-Mom's feminine scent lingering in your nostrils, your mind swimming in unchaste thoughts.

>>4931743
god, etc.

>>4931743
I want to give up my advantage against Kay! I really, really do!

>>4931743
Is Wes just built for punishment or something?

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https://www.op-studios.net/fq-lewd-wes16

>>4931777
Fuuuck you really had to go and post this while I'm in public huh

Gotta hold out for mommy lewds ;_;

>>4931777
Jeeeeeeeesus that's

oof

>>4931787
I'm sorry if you didn't like it! Especially after the long wait.

>>4931792

oh no

I liked it.

That's the oof.

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>>4931794
Glad you liked it, then.

>>4931777
Sheesh OP, this one hits different. Good shit.

>>4931777
Built. For. Bullying.

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Backstage in the auditorium before the game, Lily approaches you. "Where is Monaco?"

"Europe," you say.

"I swear I will punch you in the tit."

"What?" You shout, throwing your arms wide.

"Where in Europe is Monaco?"

You let your hands fall limply to your side. "It's -- uh. It's in the west... part..."

"I thought you were good at trivia."

"Does this look like a quiz bowl match to you? There's a reason I'm on E-sports and not the trivia team. Ask my sister. Or better yet, ask Jeeves."

Your phone reacts to your voice. "Yes madam?" it says in a corny British accent. You quickly reach into your hoodie pocket and press the home button to shut Jeeves up.

"It's in the south of France," Gus tells you. His voice has weird sibilance. Poor kid's parents are still wigged out all these years later, and make him wear a self-contained breathing apparatus most places, which aside from the hissy S, makes him look like a spaceman. "Along the French Riviera. Near the border with Italy."

Lily gives him a cold stare. "Been doing a lot of research? Don't count on going there until you learn that the bigger number should come first in your k:d."

Gus shakes his head. "I don't know why I even thought it was a good idea to talk to you. Bitch..."

He stomps off. You watch him go, then turning back towards Lily, say: "did you practice that burn or what?"

"Been thinking it. Didn't practice it."

You fan yourself with one hand, hating that this rival school's auditorium isn't as well air conditioned as PAP's. "Why did you want to know? Do you really think we'll make it to Monaco this year?"

Lily shrugs. "We could. Real possibility, there. It'd be fun -- right? A class trip, going overseas..." She sounds wistful.

"You're rich," you tell her. "You can go to Monaco whenever you want."

"It's not the same!" Lily insists.

You shake your head. You don't get why people keep telling you this.

>>4933096
>JEEVES WINS
Best timeline

>>4933096
>Jeeves
Now this is a timeline I can get behind.

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Mr. S comes by. "Hey girls. Just wanna let you know that counterpicking is off today."

"WHAT?" Lily shouts, wheeling.

Mr. S winces. "It's... a new rule the Pacific region is experimenting with. We'll be on a random rotation of tourney-legal maps--"

"This is bullshit!" Lily screams. "We had counterpicks for the first three matches this season! What happened?"

"The... new rule--"

"God damn it," Lily says. "Did you know about this?" Mr. S's silence speaks volumes. Lily is beside herself. "Why didn't you tell us? My whole stratagem is counterpicking to de_2gulch if we lose the first match! What are we supposed to do now?"

"Don't lose the first match..." you say.

Lily turns on you. "Oh, that's real nice, Wes. That's real fuckin' nice. Why didn't I think of that?"

"Maybe because you're a dumb bitch?"

"Hey now--" Mr. S says.

Lily slaps you.

"Hey now!" Mr. S repeats, holding his hands out, but unable to bring himself to intervene.

You slap Lily back.

"Guys! Guys!" Mr. S says. The whole team is gathering around in a semicircle to watch -- Gus, Miles, Steve, Joel, Jason, and Zach. Of course a catfight between the team captains would draw eyes. The other team's players are noticing too, and are also gathering.

"50 Satoshi on Lily," Steve calls.

Lily slaps you. You slap her. She grabs your hair. You grab hers. Mr. S is powerless to stop you.

"100 Satoshi on Wes!" Jason says, rocking back and forth and hugging himself, overenthusiastic as always.

>>4933102
Well, at least it's not de_bloodbine

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You and Lily notice it at the same time: one of the refs coming backstage, drawn by the commotion. You're not entirely certain, but it seems like a pretty good guess that physical altercations are a quick ticket to being suspended from the league. There goes Monaco. Lily must have that same worry because, as if you've become telepathically linked, you each release the other's hair and clasp each other around the shoulders instead. You butt your foreheads together -- brows and noses touching -- and rapidly stomp your feet like tapdancers gone insane. The whole backstage seems to rumble. You swat Lily on the left side, just below her waist. She swats you on your right side just below yours. You link arms, twirl in circle together like linedancers, then face each other again in that same nose-touching pose. You each let out an ululating wail and cap it off by slapping each other in the face again -- once, twice, three times. There's real anger in these slaps, on both your parts -- it hurts like hell -- but, masked by the patina of your coordination, it doesn't look like violence so much as performance. Stepping back, you shake hands with Lily so forcefully that your arms become a sine wave. Letting go, you each adopt the mechanical rigidity of Nutcrackers in a Christmas store display, as you both swivel at the hips, your cocked arms held out before you to lightly slap each other a few last times on various parts of your bodies. You don't hold back. These slaps hurt, too. You end the bizarrely synchronized improvisational display by making finger guns at each other.

No one gathered round you makes a sound. You're being stared at by a dozen plus pairs of frightened eyes like you're a couple of escapees from an insane asylum.

"Was that... a fusion dance?" Mr. S says.

Lily rolls her eyes.

"It's our... prematch... hype... ritual," you say. You rub your stinging cheek.

"Ancient Maori warrior dance," Lily says, twisting her shoulder around in its socket. "Like my ancestors used to do." (Lily is Nigerian, you think.)

"Maoris do finger guns...?" Mr. S says.

"Will you shut the fuck up?" Lily says, beyond annoyed that Mr. S might make the ref start asking questions too.

"I just didn't know... that you guys were doing that..." he mutters.

"Well I didn't know that counterpicks were off. So I guess that makes us even, yeah?"

You and Lily cast a worried glance towards the ref, who's as befuddled as anyone. He may or may not buy the story. But he doesn't seem prepared to kick you out. With a shrug, he steps through the curtains and returns to the main stage.

>>4933112
o i am laffin

>>4933112
This is true power

>>4933123
>Crossplayers
oh god dammit

>>4933123
wait hold on

>North High

... you mean PAP?

>>4933128
I can't believe I've done this. Hold on a chotto.

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Your cheeks still sing in pain and glow red as you and Lily and the rest of you get into the match against the Leo Ryan High Lions. You wish you could hit Lily a few more times in retaliation and you're sure your residual, unvented anger is going to cost you the game. But a strange thing takes place. Your synergy is actually much better than normal.

For example: normally Lily throws the blue shell just as soon she gets it, regardless of whether you're in 1st. Today she remembers to wait for you to drop back to 2nd before letting it fly. Later in the match, you let her take some painkillers you find because you realize that she's a bit lower on health and will need it to keep the tower in midlane intact during the next wave. You never used to think about it before hogging pills to yourself.

Does hitting each other viciously and with intent to harm somehow make you better teammates?

Mohan is the chief officiant today. Infamous in the Bay Area Division, he likes to ham it up for the meager audience of mostly family that comes to these games. Always wears a tux with bowtie, announces results like he's overseeing a Madison Square Garden prizefight. It hardly matches with his pushbroom stache and enormous round eyeglasses. Lily calls him The Raj. Usually you two find his antics cringey.

But today, when it's all over -- when you and Lily stand on either side of him, for him to hoist your hands high in the air, you feel oddly elated. You can tell Lily is feeling the same way, because she's grinning with an open mouth, and her lithe chest is heaving. This was no hard-fought victory by any stretch, but it was somehow the most satisfying you've ever had. Mohan shouts in his almost impenetrable accent:

"Today's winner: your P! A! P! Crrrrrrrroooooooossplayeeeeeeeers!!! Leeeeeet's -- givemahand!"

The listless clapping from a couple scattered corners of the auditorium may as well be a thundering standing O. For the first time ever you really feel, inwardly, that you'll soon be on stage at the Monte Carlo... and even if you get knocked out in pools, you want to make it there. Maybe the striving is what makes it different.

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>>4933131
Just keeping you on your toes~

>>4933112
Bahaha. Lily and Wes for the Synchronised Slapfights Olympics team

>>4933112
>>4933134
The Bright Slap strat working its magic.

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You get dragged from angelic dreams of Ankoman doujin yet-to-be by your bitch of an older sister. She wakes you up with a hard rap of her knuckles against your forehead.

"It's almo--"

"Amber. I am going to kill you."

She shuts up, folds her arms. You struggle to a sitting position. Her eyes follow. After a beat, she says, "it's starting."

"What's starting? It's Saturday. I have nothing going on today but a lot of masturbation." You tilt your head towards her. "You're welcome to help."

"Come with me to Shake 'em Up. We'll play like everything is normal. But then we'll lose our security" (she makes air quotes) "--and hurry on over to Evil Incorporated."

"...Google?" You say.

"No."

"Facebook?"

"No."

You furrow your brow.

"Darkbloom Enterprises."

Your heart literally skips a beat. "Amber -- no--"

"Yes." She gets onto the bed with you. Straddles you. Stares viciously down at you. "Let me make myself perfectly clear. I am going. You can stay. But if you try to interfere, I will fuck you up. I'm sick of being kept in the dark about what's going on. There's a reason these cult motherfuckers are congregating at Daddy's company. There's a reason David fucking Darkbloom is connected to them. I'm gonna find out why. This is a recon mission -- nothing more and nothing less. Now I already swiped that mask Gideon left for you -- it was in Daddy's bedroom. We can grab another one when we get there. We'll blend in."

She sounds weirdly excited. She's smiling.

"How are we --" you begin. "What are we gonna -- can you just slow down for a second? Let's think about this!"

"No time."

"Yes time! Yes time!"

"Will said he'd take us," Amber tells you. "He'll be a good getaway driver if it all goes tits-up. Are you coming or not, Wes? Don't make me regret trusting you."

"What about our parents?" You demand.

"They'll be there too. I'm sure of it. Somehow -- some way. They think they're protecting us, but they probably have no fucking clue what they're getting into either. So once again. Are you coming or not?"

You stare at her for a few long silent moments. Finally, she gets off of you and lets you stand. "Get dressed," she tells you.

You walk to your dresser and root through it. What's a good outfit to wear on your last day alive?

END OF EPISODE 7.

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All right. This will be a very freeform vote. You have to figure out what Wes will do next.

Will's Toyota Golf seats five. With you, Amber, and Will himself, that leaves two slots.

But you don't necessarily need to go with Amber. You could even try to stop her.

Figure out what you want to do. If you go with her, you can take a couple of people. If you don't go, you have a few alternative options you can take instead -- but that's for you to decide.

I'll let you all think through it in advance of the next episode, and roll with what seems like group consensus.

>>4933184
Ohhhhhhh man. Gonna take some time to think on this one for sure. Thanks for the run as always, OP-sama!

>>4933184
Good stuff OP. Good, terrifying stuff.

>>4933184
God, fuck, etc. (The bad kind)

Good episode, OP. This is gonna be a tough call, so I'll have to think on it.

>>4933184
I would assume that by now we would have some sort of panic button that we could use; to "Rain" on Ambers "fun" preemptively, especially if we're being watched the response time should be pretty short, and depending on what shows up in response we could potentially walk away with far more than we went in with, if we delay activating it early or not.

Also I'm assuming that no one will be armed, so if we get into trouble there isn't much we can do other than wait for the cavalry.

>>4933184
For sure Lily's gonna be in one of the spots. It's the last one that's gonna need a bit more thought.

Winter's probably my darkhorse vote given how she's got her shit together, but Gideon might catch wind of it and it'll possibly end up in a clusterfuck. Or it won't matter and it'll be a clusterfuck regardless.

Summer, Ophie, Olivia, Amelia, Talia, and Liz are out of the question for me. The Buridan connection for Talia might help, but it's kind of a stretch. So that's still a no.

Auburn maybe? He'll have Amber's back at least, but I'm on the fence about him at this point.

That leaves either of the Moms, unless they're pretty much doing their own thing as Amber implied.

>>4933184
Reminder: The Instrumentalists are crazy, good with guns and willing to set shit building on fire to cover their tracks.

I vote we just go in with Amber; one mask will be easier to snatch up than five (or two), and if we can't find another, we can just have her "take us prisoner" after "catching" us.
Will stays outside, circles the block, we call in at regular intervals to tell him if shit's is currently not pear shaped. If we don't, he needs to run and get help.

>>4933264
That's fair, but there's no harm in bringing someone along for backup, even if they don't come in. Precisely _because_ the Instrumentalists are so dangerous, going it alone is sketchy -- and as much as I love Amber, I don't trust her to not get us cornered. So even if they're just sitting in the car, Lily and Winter(?) would be good to have.

Really, I'd prefer to have the adults as backup too, but getting Mom and Mom and Dad and Tyrus to okay any part of this plan is gonna be a real tall order. I guess we could just go and alert them once we're already in? I dunno, seems rough no matter how you slice it.

>>4933273
>That's fair, but there's no harm in bringing someone along for backup, even if they don't come in. Precisely _because_ the Instrumentalists are so dangerous, going it alone is sketchy
Going it alone puts the fewest number of people in the line of fire. Last time we dragged our harem into a situation like this, we lost almost every haremite except for Rose and K-Mom.
That's not an experience I want to put Wes through.

>>4933297
I understand the Instrumentalists are dangerous, but they're not as dangerous as the combined militaries of multiple global superpowers. At worst this is a Vail-tier situation. Still dangerous as hell, but much less so. If it were really that bad, I would say we should grab Amber and run as far away from this situation as possible... Actually, we should probably do that anyway, but that isn't really how stories work.

If Amber (and/or Wes) go in alone, the odds of someone outright dying have to be close to 100%. Probably more than one person, honestly. I mean, shit, you saw how that training session went! Amber and Wes have the combined combat skill of a piss-stained Rilakkuma doll. The second Amber does something rash, or Wes does something clumsy, we're toast. Surely we should bring at least one person who can use a gun?

>>4933134
>Maybe the striving is what makes it different.

Could be off track, but I am reminded of a flashback moment from season 3, when Sable died. (Slightly edited to remove blue board unsafe content)

>Sable recently told Alex, as he lay entwined in her arms, basking in post-coital ecstasy together: that she did not believe in a soul; that Sand Reckoner was the creation of the soul from the forges of mankind's striving. That without this soul, we are just meat, destined to turn to maggoty rot, and then to dust. But that lying with Alex she thought maybe she actually did have a soul, after all, and hoped quite sincerely she did, because she didn't want to lose that moment to the mire of oblivion.

Sable was right, in the end, sand Reckoner was the forging of an eternal soul that persists beyond the universe. “The striving makes it different.” What I struggle to understand is, how does this Instrumentalist religion fit into the theme.

>>4933250
>>4933264
I vote to take Lily and no one else. Lily has proven to be at least kind of reliable whereas Winter is an actual psycho. Auburn might be good, but let’s face it, Amber would veto it and there’s 10:1 odds he shows up any damn way, invited or not. Between his mother being part of the cult and his predilection for stalking Amber, he will be around.

>>4933367
If/when we get caught, they'll recognize we're the grandkids of the scary fucking bastard who runs Darkbloom Enterprises. In addition, they have an interest in Amber, enough of one that they'll want her alive and relatively cooperative. As it is, the only person I'd worry about is Will. But that shouldn't be a problem because he'll be outside doing Getaway driver SoP.

>>4933184
Honestly, I vote for calling in Alabaster/Noelle/Kay and hog-tying Amber to a damn chair until she gets over her suicidal streak.

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>>4934443

Are you sure this vote isn't just a convenient excuse for me to write a scene about hogtying Amber, anonymous?

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>>4934443
>>4934474
If it is, I would like to second this vote.

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I think we should take Auburn along.

It's been established that he does not approve of his mother's 'religion', so I'm sure that'd be motivation enough for him to want to put a stop to it. He's level headed, and as we learned in this episode, competent with a firearm.

The only problem would be any potential conflict with him and Amber. Though honestly I kinda trust having him on this mission more than Amber, given her reckless tendencies.

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Sorry for being remiss with stats. Here we are. The site is up to date as well.

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Fun and completely random fact: I believe this is the first episode Sable appears in that Alex does not appear in since S2E1.

CURRENT PROMINENCE BY MENTION:
Summer: 1103
Amber: 819
Talia: 672
Amelia: 590
Kay: 435
Noelle: 425
Lily: 410
Olivia: 320
Winter: 241

>>4934600
BrantleyXAmber when?

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>>4934871
Let's not and pretend we did.

>>4934600
Seconding this. He's competent and trustworthy, and besides, the narrative development demands it.

>>4934443
...and honestly this, although it would be fun to have Amber and Auburn along on the suicide mission.

>>4934474
Stick a pin in that and let's focus on infiltrating this cult.

>Please tune in to the 8th episode of Wesley's Bizarre Adventure, "[x] WAKE UP, Girls!" -- Saturday August 7th at 10 PM EST / 7 PM PST!

Oh god, oh fuck, oh geez.

>>4938725
Scared, terrified, etc

>>4934888
>Pretend
As if it didn't already happen

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This is MKUltra

Is it too late to suggest bringing Amelia? We’re going to Shake Em Up before the mission, we could pick her up there. I’m sure she’s willing to help and would be useful.

>>4941105
Enjoy the curse, Anonymous-dono.

>>4941145
We've got another week til the episode and OP hasn't called anything yet. I still need to formulate my plan because I have *no idea* how we should proceed desu.

It took over a year, but FQ has finally been finished. It was a helluva read and I'm devastated in every good way. There's too much to process, now, so much to let soak into my heart. All I can really do is say:

Thank you, OP.

And it appears there's another adventure to hop along on and see where it all ends up, again. Fuckin' awesome.

I'll be with you all soon. It's been a long while, but it's only appropriate that I get caught up and vote along before the end hits again, yeah?

I don't need any pitches or summaries for what this new tale is about. I'll be back soon enough knowing everything.

Anyway, make good choices bros until I can be alongside you. Cheers

>>4944231
Good job, Anonymous-dono. Would love to hear your thoughts when you've finished taking it all in! See you at the finish line!

>>4941145
What would Amelia bring to this shindig? I don't think the plan involves dickslapping anyone into submission, though granted Mel would be perfect if it was.

>>4933184
Bring Lily, leave an empty seat for any potential uh... prisoners. Unless someone can think of a field medic. Do we know anyone who can field medic?

Alternative: is there any way we can observe remotely instead? Surely we have an in with Aunt Anna or Aunt Vivian?

Tonight's the night!

>>4949361