"Alright, chat, I have a special treat for you today. Joining us once again is my lovely girlfriend, but also joining us, for the first time, is my older sister!"

"Hi, my name is Annie, my favorite scent is cherry, I like long walks on the beach, and I'm also blonde and have huge tits."

Annie hadn't needed to pop in to visit us, but after recent events, we'd all decided we wanted her to. Besides, it was hardly like anyone in the world was going to question why she was visiting her sister.

"Fantastic, you fit right in," I remarked, looking at the slender, flat-chested vtuber model Nicky had made for her- it bore such a strong family resemblance to the GreaseKitty model that Nicky honestly might've used it as a starting point. The biggest differences were some slight differences in coloration- darker eyes, lighter hair- along with the cat ears having been replaced with floppy rabbit ears, which were actually visible under the hard hat. Not that this stopped Nicky from adding a bunny ear headband to the model, taped to the outside of the hard hat.

"Now, when are we bringing in the twelve or more suitors to compete for the chance to go on a date with me?" Annie asked.

"This is a Factorio streaming channel, not a reality show," Nicky explained.

"It is also, because she has two guests who don't actually like playing Factorio, a talk show," I said.

"Oh, okay, I can do that," Annie said. "I actually had a podcast going back when I was in college, so I'm used to filling dead air and entertaining listeners."

"Excuse you," Nicky said, "but they are already being entertained by Factorio."

"Yeah but what if they also want to listen to someone talk about Don Quixote, and how being able to read it in the original Spanish doesn't actually change all that much about its presentation?"

"You speak Spanish?" Annie asked.

"Fluently, yeah. Originally it was just a vocational skill, but I got carried away learning it, and..."

----------------------------------------

"I am going to throw myself into the sea," Akane said, lying flat on her back, surrounded by paperwork.

"You're not in Houston anymore," I pointed out. "Austin is about two hundred miles from the sea."

"I will walk," she threatened.

"Why is there so much paperwork involved in this, anyhow?" I asked. "Please tell me you don't actually have to register this organization with one government agency, let alone multiple."

"Oh, it's worse than you think," Akane said. "See, I want this to be a global organization, and as you might've noticed, the world has more than one government in it. And because legally, anyone with supernatural abilities is classified as a 'superhero'- in the legal sense that also includes supervillains, because politicians are allergic to being correct about things- that means that if I want to run an organization for providing support and education to demiurges, it is legally considered a superhero team, and in most jurisdictions, those are actually regulated pretty heavily!"

"I take it that you've already dismissed the option of 'do it anyways and tell the government to sit and spin'?"

"You and I might be personally powerful enough to give governments pause. The demiurges I'm trying to help are not. We do want the government on-side for this."

"Mmn." I sighed. "That's fair, if... admittedly, a little alien to the way I still think of myself, and of the supernatural in general."

"Right, right," Akane said, finally sitting up a little, then patting her stomach, as though I were a dog she was trying to coax into her lap. "On A-510, supernatural people generally considered themselves as being divorced from mainstream humanity, right?"

"Basically," I said, deciding to humor her, as well as take the offered opportunity to cuddle. It was unwise to pass those up, you know; it only happened about thirty seven times a day. Per girlfriend. "The demiurgic consensus on our relationship to humanity was that we could no longer safely and sanely interact with them as peers; that our power was too baked into our psychology and personality, too much a part of how we perceived and interacted with the world to circumvent. That the safest thing for humanity at large, as well as ourselves, was to find community amongst fellow demiurges, and to interact with humanity at large more as neighbors than family and friends. A baseline of normality to bear in mind, and be reminded of from time to time, but not something to interact with too much."

"Sounds pretty anti-social," Akane said.

"Well, here's the thing," I said. "Do you remember that Russian war back in 2019? Where an asshole with supernatural power used it to take charge of his community, and then promptly led it down the highway of self-destruction? A big part of the reason demiurges forbid themselves and each other from engaging with baseline humanity to any meaningful extent is specifically to prevent shit like that. Demiurges are well-equipped to seize social power from mundane humans, and very poorly equipped to use it in a way that will not immediately go tits up in the rhubarb."

"Ahhh," Akane said. "Right, A-510 has that sort of dichotomy, where someone is basically either Doctor Skinner or you- no human friends at all, or actively trying to take over the world."

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

"Mhm."

"You think I'll be able to change that?" Akane asked. "I know I'm not always, or even usually, wrong with my optimism, but... well, you have been around demiurges as a community for years, and I haven't. Maybe your cynicism is well-founded."

"I think," I said, "that, in this regard, demiurges are... really, not that different from supers. The fundamental problem is power, not some unique quirk of psychology. And so, if the problem has been solved for supers, then it's been solved for demiurges. But, all the same..."

"...it kind of hasn't," Akane murmured. "...It'll be something to think about. Thanks, Roxy."

"Any time, angel."

----------------------------------------

"Hey Lisa," I said, during the seventh of our cuddles-and-pets sessions today. "I gotta ask, what do you actually do all day?"

"What do you?" Lisa asked.

"A lot of background brainstorming for mad science stuff," I said. "Up until recently, working on trying to find Skinner, but, uh... well, I did kill her a few days ago, so I've kinda been at loose ends."

"Fair enough," Lisa said. "Well..." She chewed on her lower lip a little. "...Promise you won't laugh?"

"I promise," I said, rubbing her ears assuringly.

"I've been learning how to program so that I can make video games," Lisa said.

"Oh, okay," I said, nodding. "Honestly, probably a good idea, considering one of our girlfriends is already a 3D artist and could be tapped to provide art for your games."

"Maybe," Lisa hedged. "See, I'm mostly interested in working in a genre where being entirely text-based is kind of expected, so like... 3D graphics would seriously change the tenor of things."

"Ahhh," I said, nodding. "So you're not merely a trans foxgirl gamedev, you're a trans foxgirl roguelike dev. I understand now, and also, I love you so dearly."

She grumbled grumpily under the ear skritches.

"So, tell me more," I continued.

"...Like?"

"Like, what're you working on at the moment?" I asked. "I should probably make this explicit, Lisa: I am your girlfriend. I genuinely love you, and desire not only your happiness, but for us to be significant parts of each other's lives. I like making things, and I like talking to people about making things. So if your hobby is making things, I want to hear as much about it as you're willing to share."

"...Okay," she said. "But... don't laugh."

"I won't," I promised. "I only laugh at someone's project when it's clear they want me to."

"I've been working on... a sort of roguelike-ish life sim?" Lisa said. "Like... um..."

"So it's not a dungeon crawler, and in fact may not play anything like the typical roguelike," I said. "But, all the same, it involves a primarily text-based interface, procedurally-generated content, and a few interlocking game mechanics that can produce emergent gameplay through their interactions, which are traits that are most strongly associated with roguelikes."

"Exactly," Lisa said, nodding. "Exactly. Thanks."

"I've done a bit of hobby game dev myself, although not in a while," I admitted. "I might be able to help you wrap your head around some programming stuff, but I don't think I'll know any more than you do as far as game dev concerns. Anyway. Procedurally-generated life sim. Please elaborate on that?"

"It's about being a werewolf," Lisa said. "Not in the druid way that I am, more of a like... Y'know, you're meeting people, sizing them up, and, if you like 'em, turning them into werewolves to add to your pack. And at some point I'm gonna add in external pressures for why you'd want a pack, but right now I'm working more on like, interactions with pack members, and making sure that's solid and fun before I start working on other stuff. Right now it's a little bare-bones? It's only alphas and omegas right now, and you're the only alpha, so like, it's only your pack, and you're the only one who can manage omegas and tell them stuff like, okay, go do this training activity this week, or maybe like, spend some time with this other packmate and get along better... One of the mechanics I do have in the game is basic interpersonal relationships, and people fucking."

"Naturally," I said, stroking her hair and nodding. "What mechanic are you trying to add now?"

"So betas are basically, like, werewolves who can lead other werewolves, but still answer to you," Lisa said. "And they're complicated because it involves a more complicated AI than I'm used to, and I'm kinda stumped, and I think I might actually really appreciate some programming help from my girlfriend who's really super good at making AIs."

"Well..."

----------------------------------------

"I thought you didn't like it here," Nicky said.

"It's grown on me," I said, setting the portal gun back in the box. It laid dormant, now, without someone to power it with their volition. I knew how to power it back up, of course, but... well, I just didn't want to. "It's where my girlfriends live, after all."

"I mean, for now," Nicky said. "Remember back before we started dating, shortly after we fell asleep in each other's arms after that one fight? I said I had to marry you after... I think it was some puff piece about me you got published. And you said you planned to leave. And do you remember what I said?"

"You said 'then take me with you,'" I said. "Which was searingly homosexual, I must confess. But anyway. Just because you declared that, wherever I go, you will follow, does not actually oblige me to go anywhere in the first place. Now, if you want to go, then we can talk about how feasible it is for the rest of us to follow, but..."

"But, that can be a long-term plan," Nicky admitted. "So, okay, what about the mind control thing you're supposedly a master of now? What are you going to do with that?"

"Very little," I said.

"Really? It's not opening new doors for you, compelling you to action?"

"Nope," I said. "I have the skill, but the skill does not have me. Remember what I told Doctor Skinner- I'm the one in control."

"Mmm, fair," Nicky said. "...So, what now?"

"Same thing we always did, just with less looming dread."

"Fair enough."

There was a pause, and not an uncomfortable one.

"Wanna make out?"