"Su—Er, you don't mean…" Carl crossed his arms over his chest as he grimaced down at her and the doll. Nope, that's not happening.
Mina grimaced back up at him. "Ick. No, of course not," she said, an offended tone creeping into her voice. "How have you even managed to come upon such a thought?"
Carl held his hands up defensively. "Whoa, how am I supposed to know what you're thinking? It's a sex doll, after all!"
Mina pinched the top of her nose and sighed. "Men," she said, sounding disapproving. Then, without even giving him a chance to defend himself at a time when he knew he'd been misunderstood in a serious and potentially long-lasting way that might permanently alter their relationship—just as when Sammy had finally discovered that Santa wasn't real and had not, in fact, gone to college with Carl—she just kept talking, as though she was really gonna just gloss over the whole freaking thing and leave him with the deep worry that she really thought he might possibly have been interested in—
"As we've seen during the auction," Mina said, striding away towards the workbench, "it's capable of being brought to life with any manner of penetration or, as I suspect, piercing." She picked up a tiny nail from a metal can fixed to the backboard of the workbench and held it up. "This will do, I'd think."
"Look," Carl said, pointing down at the doll and making eye contact, "I just want you to know that I wasn't going to have sex with it, so if…"
Mina giggled, then erupted into laughter while he talked, clutching at her stomach.
Carl frowned. "What's so funny?"
"No, no, it's nothing," she said, the laughs tapering off. She wiped at her eyes. "I do believe you, of course."
Feels like we're having another one of those disconnect moments. Like when I was talking to axe-dad about the whole courtship thing, but worse. Maybe. He sighed. Can't really deny it more than once or it'll start to sound suspicious. This game is the worst sometimes.
Mina had already knelt down next to the doll's head while he ruminated about how stupid the game could be and how it seemed to constantly be promoting misunderstandings with people that he really wished he could clear up, but it was way too difficult somehow, even for things that should've been pretty simple, like convincing a girl that he didn't want to have sex with a sex doll and just wanted to play the frea—Well, no, he didn't want to play the game, because he was explicitly not playing games right now and was only logged in so he could gain new perspectives on things in such a way that it would jog his brain into coming up with a solution to a work-related problem that really didn't seem like it should be anywhere near this challenging to solve but was turning out to be a total PITA despite his best efforts.
"Something like this," she muttered, her hands moving to the doll's right earlobe.
After a moment of fiddling, the doll's eyes opened as she once again transformed into a catgirl. The doll looked around with apparent curiosity.
Mina stepped back quickly. "It seems I was correct."
The doll sat up. "Are you Nyakko's nyew master, nya?" it asked, its fluffy-looking tail swishing back and forth while it looked up at Mina.
"No," Mina said, flinching slightly. "Ah…" She looked to Carl, then pointed. "He is."
"What?" Carl gave her an incredulous look. "I don't—"
"It's only for the sake of satisfying my curiosity," Mina added. "Please, Carl?"
Carl looked down at the sex doll, which was now staring up at him. Yeah, I think maybe we shut it down here. This is gonna get weird, I can already tell. Yup, definitely not something I want to get into. "I don't know…"
"Please?" Mina cajoled, giving him an earnest look.
Carl felt at this point that he had to make it absolutely clear to himself that he wasn't a pushover. No, he wasn't going to go along with whatever people asked of him like he was some weak-willed, passive guy who couldn't make decisions for himself.
He was Carl Weathers, Director of IT for Fire Entertainment and a father of two.
Making Decisions was what he did.
When people asked him to do things he was strongly opposed to doing, he didn't hesitate to decline with varying levels of diplomacy depending on the situation. He had lots of experience in saying no, whether it was when Sammy wanted to get her learner's permit while being way too young, or when Bobby wanted to stay up late playing games on the weekend when Annie was on a weekend trip with her best friend to a luxury spa, or when Annie had begun strongly urging him to get himself an automated car to reduce his stress while she herself continued to drive a traditional car.
Yeah, when it came to saying no, Carl Weathers was one of the all-time greats. Sure, there were a number of times when he'd said no that he ended up reconsidering his decision. That was a perfectly normal thing to do when his unbelievably adorable daughters really wanted something or when his loving wife was just trying to help him make obvious improvements to his life while she continued to work towards her own goals, unable to be satisfied by such things unless she felt she'd earned them.
"Alright, fine," Carl said, his resistance crumpling like wet cardboard in the face of the cute blonde girl who he always seemed to end up treating like his own daughter, even though she wasn't, as he continually had to remind himself.
Mina's eyes sparkled as she watched him with expectation.
Carl sighed again, then looked down. "I'm your new master," he said.
The sex doll blinked a couple times.
Okay, maybe I was worrying too much. Everything else from that zone's been so freaking weird and—
The doll sprang upwards, wrapping its legs around his torso and its arms around his neck, and pressed itself against him as it locked its lips to his.
What the—
Carl's thoughts cut off as a wave of ecstasy rolled over him in a way that only happened when he and Annie were both in the perfect mood and the circumstances were just right, as had been the case the previous Friday night, which brought back the memories of her outfit and her desire, and—
"—off him. Carl? Carl!"
Carl opened his eyes, feeling incredibly turned on and a bit woozy. There was a weight on top of him, and he felt a warm breath on his neck. "Wha…" He was also laying on the floor now.
"Are you all right?" Mina asked, looking down at him with concern.
"Uh…" Carl pushed himself to a sitting position, his mind feeling like it had been run through a blender.
"Hi, Carl," came a shy voice.
A voice that he was sure he recognized.
"Annie?" Carl said as he stared down in confusion.
The naked woman on his lap with her arms over his shoulders was definitely Annie. Sort of. She looked like Annie had looked twenty years ago, with the same exact pretty face, but she also…
She had horns that spiraled up over her ears. Not like the medium-sized horns that Annie had worn the week prior, but more delicate horns on the sides of her head.
Her face was the same, yes, but instead of Annie's entrancing, pure blue eyes, hers were flecked with glowing spots of pink like the contacts Annie had worn the week prior.
Her long, blonde hair had streaks of purple in it, the exact shade of Annie's wig.
A fuzzy, heart-shaped tail caressed his face, stroking his beard, and she leaned in with glistening lips to—
Carl pushed her back. "What the hell?" he demanded, staring down at an unmarked body which he was absolutely certain matched Annie's figure as it had been in the early days of their relationship.
Not-Annie ground herself against him slightly while sitting on his lap. "What do we have here?" she asked with a quick gasp, her playful tone and cadence of speech exactly like Annie's had been when she used to sit on his lap on the couch back in their tiny apartment.
Carl felt like his brain was melting at the combination of things he was experiencing. She's even got the same perfume Annie used to wear!
"I believe I've learned what I'd intended," Mina said to the side. "We can return it to your inventory now." One of her hands reached down and began tugging at the nail that was embedded in the doll's ear.
Not-Annie pouted at Carl.
"Hold on," Carl said, feeling his faculties returning despite the doll stroking its thumbs over the back of his neck in the exact way that Annie always had.
Mina paused.
"You, get off me," he said to Not-Annie.
"Where do you want me?" Not-Annie said, her eyelids lowering and a sexy grin spreading across her face. She slid off him and started to turn around. "Are you gonna fuck me on—"
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"No," Carl said, shaking his head. "Sit there." He stood up, awkwardly adjusting his pants.
"You want—"
"No, I just want you to sit there," he interrupted. Then he scratched his beard. Okay, so that's pretty awesome. Not at all something I'm interested in, but now I can totally see why people would go crazy for it.
"Please tell me you aren't—"
"No," Carl said, turning to Mina, "of course not. But you have to admit, it's pretty impressive. She looks exactly like my wife did about twenty years ago, give or take. Uh, minus the horns. And the tail. And the purple hair. Also the eye thing."
"That… I suppose that's an interesting fact," Mina said, stroking her chin. "And w—Ah, yes, I understand."
Carl felt like that was a statement he should've stopped to consider in more detail, but he was way too distracted. She's even got the same… He tried to stop staring, but it wasn't easy. Few things could draw his attention the way Annie did, even if this wasn't quite Annie.
"What do you intend to do with it, then?"
"Well…" Carl chewed on the corner of his lip.
The doll looked up at him, her expression neither lustful nor eager anymore, just expectant.
"Can you talk normally?" Carl asked.
Not-Annie gave him the same eye roll that Annie would've given him at the question. "Carl, of course I can talk normally."
"And you can do normal stuff?" he continued.
"How normal are we talking?" Not-Annie said, her fingers sliding down her pale torso. "If you mean—"
"No, not that," Carl said, managing to engage his focus and maintain eye contact rather than follow the delving fingers. "I mean, can you do stuff besides sex?"
Not-Annie gave him a confused look. "Why would you want me to do that?"
"Can you?" he pressed.
Not-Annie crossed her arms under her breasts, but Carl's focused gaze didn't budge. "I guess I can," she said, sounding skeptical. "There's some rules, but I'll do anything you want me to do."
Carl's beard-rubbing intensified. "Which means…" He started to nod. "Mina, what do you think about having a full-time assistant to help with your car stuff?"
Mina stared at him, her mouth slightly open.
"I mean, I'm not always gonna be around to help out," Carl said slowly, "but she'll always be here. Er, do you have a name or something?"
Not-Annie shook her head. "You can give me a name if you want," she said. Her expression turned devious. "Or maybe you just want to call me Annie?"
"Nope, not really," Carl said, not entirely sure whether it was a factual statement. "If I told you to also treat Mina as your master, would you?"
Not-Annie's tail tapped against her bare shoulder as she seemed to be considering it. "I can," she acknowledged, "but I won't fuck her unless you're there."
"Uhh… Nope, no, none of that," Carl said, fumbling over his words and deliberately not looking at the eighteen year-old girl he had no desire to ever see naked in the same way that he had no interest in seeing either of his daughters without their clothes on. "In fact, let's just not bring that up again. Ever."
"What an absolute paragon of an assistant," Mina muttered, looking away with her arms crossed.
"I mean, I'll help too when I can," Carl said. "It'll be nice to have more help, right? Not like we can afford to hire people, if that's even a thing."
Mina sighed, looking at the ground as she softly kicked one of her boots off the other. "I suppose your idea has some merit."
"I'll get her some clothes tomorrow, too," Carl said.
"If you wanna buy me clothes, get me some skirts for when I'm in a good mood," the doll advised.
"Nope, gonna be the plainest overalls I can find," Carl said, envisioning the attire of a certain rough shoemaker he'd encountered in the game some time ago. Huh, I wonder if she's actually gonna make those boots I ordered. He moved past the idle thought.
"At least make sure you poke a hole in the butt," the doll said. "For my tail, obviously," it said with a lascivious expression that indicated it hadn't been referring to the tail.
Linda, it's a cool idea, but c'mon. What kinda idiot is gonna want some mindless sex doll that just wants to go at it every second like this thing? Next thing you know, there's gonna be people running around with groups of these that they just buy, convinced that it's an actual person who wants to have sex constantly instead of a stupid doll that was just programmed to act like this. Carl activated his Dad's Serious Now skill, feeling like it would probably have some effect. "Doll, listen up. No more sex. No more talking about sex, no more acting like it's an inevitability, and no more of that," he said, gesturing.
The doll slowly moved her glistening fingers upwards and away from herself.
"I don't care why Linda made you, I just want something to help Mina carry stuff around or whatever," Carl finished. He raised his eyebrows, adding on the combo finisher technique, Are We Clear? in order to, at a minimum, let Mina know that he was being entirely serious, which he definitely was now that he'd firmly set his mind on the fact that his wasn't Annie—obviously. "Are we clear?"
"Yes, master," the doll said, suddenly seeming much less playful.
"Well?" Carl turned to Mina, awaiting her verdict.
The girl was stroking her chin once more. "Very well, I suppose this may be workable," she said after some time. "Your name will be Phonia, as you are a phony and not a genuine person."
"I am Phonia," the doll intoned.
Not a bad name. Feels a little weird now that it stopped being as person-like. Probably a corner-case in the programming since it's not really meant to be used like this.
"Good," Mina said. She looked to Carl. "Now, regarding that meal…"
----------------------------------------
"These things are so freaking good," Carl said, having decided to indulge himself and eat another one of the delicious meat hunks. Awesome that food stays hot when you put it in your inventory too.
"Yes," Mina agreed, nibbling on a bone while sitting on a stool she'd pulled out from under the workbench. "Incredible how this inventory manages to keep them heated."
"Thinking the same thing," Carl said. He glanced over at Phonia, who had been ordered to sit facing the corner next to the bathroom where she'd be out of the way. The doll had remained motionless in a way that was somewhat unnerving, but he'd found it difficult to stomach the idea of putting something that looked so much like Annie back into his inventory.
"May I have one of those potatoes?" Mina asked, holding the finished bone and looking around, presumably for somewhere to put it.
"Sure," Carl said. He opened his inventory and grabbed another potato, setting it into Mina's hands once she discarded her bone onto the workbench. Actually, I bet I could use this as fishing bait for some of the bigger fish. He tossed the discarded bone into his inventory.
Mina took a dainty bite, as she always seemed to do. "These are quite good as well," she said once she'd swallowed. "I wonder at the combination of spices used. Salt, yes, but it has a certain…" She took another bite, her brow creased in thought.
"Annie'd probably be able to tell," Carl said, trying futilely to discern the spices. "She's always had a knack for that sort of thing." His gaze lingered on the papers that had already been scattered across the workbench, each with various designs for car parts. Is that a seatbelt? Huh, that's… I guess it makes sense to do more like a safety harness thing with more belts for racing. He picked up the paper to look more closely at it. Huh, she's got neat handwriting. Great detail in the drawings, too.
"The issue I've found with that design," Mina said, "is in the cost. I've no sense of the prices on many types of goods yet, and we lack the funds to afford nearly anything at this time. We'll need to devise some way to earn marks."
"The coins here are called marks?" Carl asked. Better than just "coins" I guess, but still so vague.
"Marks of Victory is their true name," Mina said. "They are pressed into denominations of one, ten, one hundred, and one thousand. The coin that I had was exchanged for a little over eleven hundred marks, but after our expenditures, only fifty or so remain."
He nodded slowly. At least I've got a better idea about the cost of things here. We spent like, fifty marks on meat and potatoes this afternoon. And—
"Would you mind creating water for me?" Mina asked.
"Sure," Carl said. He grabbed his mug out of his inventory and placed it on the workbench. Let's see. I think it was this much…
He removed his hand, and the cup had a thin layer of water at the bottom.
Nope, maybe…
He removed his hand again, and the cup had slightly more water.
Carl glared at the cup. I know how this is gonna go. The next time I try this it's gonna be a freaking fountain, isn't it. "Gimme a sec," he said, picking up the mug. He headed over to the small door and pushed it open, then stood outside with one hand over the mug. "Okay, nice and easy. Just a little—"
A geyser of water erupted, spraying back out of the cup and into the street, because of course he'd been smart enough to point it away from himself.
He was Carl Weathers, and there was no freaking way he was gonna fall for something that stupid.
When the water stopped flooding into the late-evening street, he checked the mug, which was now a little over half full. Good enough. He turned back and spotted Mina standing in the doorway, watching with a small smile on her face. "Here."
She accepted the mug and drank from it, finishing the water rapidly.
Then she held the mug out again with a hopeful expression.
The second time he was asked to fill the mug using magic, Carl had a thought. "Why don't you do this?" he asked. "Aren't you pretty good at magic?"
Mina shrugged, but her expression turned mischievous as she waved her hand over the cup and left it full of water. "You'd seemed as though you wished to improve, so I thought to give you the opportunity," she said, turning to walk back into the workshop while taking a drink.
"Teenagers," Carl grumbled.
----------------------------------------
Carl was getting ready to sleep.
He'd considered his options, and it seemed like whatever was going on with time wasn't about to cause him any immediate problems, so he decided to see whether having himself a nice nap would break free some new thoughts that he hadn't considered in the Gab/network issue.
When he'd announced his decision, further declaring that he'd sleep in a chair on the ground floor, Mina had grown strangely excited. She'd charged into the bathroom almost immediately, leaving Carl wondering what he'd missed.
The door to the bathroom opened, and Mina walked out with a certain pep in her step. She strode over to the chair he was sitting in and leaned down, giving him a tight hug from the side. "Thank you, Carl," she said quietly. "Truly."
Carl's eyes grew misty, and he returned the hug as best he could from his seated position. "Glad I could help, even if it was only a little," he said, forcing his voice to remain steady.
Mina pressed the side of her face to the top of his head, squeezing even tighter for a moment before she released him. "I'm eagerly anticipating our work," she said, smiling brightly. "Good night, Carl."
"Night, Mina," Carl said, smiling back.
The girl turned and walked towards the stairs, seeming to not have a care in the world as she started to work free the neckerchief that had been wrapped around her neck all day.
Carl scowled when he remembered the reason for her accessory. If I ever see that kid again—or the other one from the coffeehouse—they're both dead.
"Inventory," Carl said, needing something to take his mind off his most recent thoughts. Maybe I'll finally take a look through more of these potions Bobby sent me. What's this one? Elixir of Giant's Strength? Greatly increases strength for six hours? Ugh, Design, or Writing, or whoever's doing this, you guys are killing me. How the heck's anyone supposed to know what that even means? What's this… Elixir of Water Breathing. Can't imagine needing that. What about this one. Potion of Greater Concealment? Completely conceals presence for ten minutes. It's like they only added stupid potions to the game. The nightvision one was cool, but what… What's this one… Elixir of Steelskin? Traditional, I'll give you that, but so boring! At least put in something cool, like Elixir of Shooting Lasers From Your Eyes For An Hour.
And so, laying in his favorite recliner and examining potions sent to him by his youngest daughter, Carl gradually slipped into sleep.