Brianna returned to the hotel on her own. Anthony rose from the couch to greet her. He took one look at her as she stepped into the doorway, saw the expression on her face, and smiled.
“You look like a weight’s been lifted from your shoulder?” he said.
After pausing for a moment, Brianna smiled. It was a genuine smile.
“I do feel much better.”
“I’m glad. Why don’t you sit with me and tell me about it?”
Anthony wrapped an arm around her shoulder to pull her close and led the woman over to the couch, where two people were currently engrossed in a game of Smash Hoes.
“Holy shit! I can’t believe you learned how to use that combo so quickly! Damn, Mary! Why didn’t you tell me you were such a beast at fighting games?”
“I, uh… didn’t know? It’s my first time playing one.”
“So you’re a rookie, eh? Wait! That means I’m getting my ass kicked by a fucking n00b?!”
“What does n00b mean?” asked Trinity. She sat on another chair and looked like she was reading something from a tablet. That was pretty old-school. Tablets were considered antiques by many.
“It means someone who’s never played a game before? A newbie, as it were,” Anthony answered.
“Ah,” Trinity nodded in understanding.
The pair were sitting side-by-side with a set of old-school controllers in their hands. Secilia was a ruckus of activity, shifting from left to the right as she jerked her controller around like it would somehow let her make better combinations. Marianne was sitting prim and proper as always. She held the controller with both hands on her lap and tapped buttons with her delicate fingers so fast that it made Anthony’s head spin.
“Have you gotten weaker since we last played, Secilia? I can’t believe you’re letting a complete newbie beat you,” Anthony said as he sat down with Brianna. The young woman was buried into his shoulder.
“Don’t give me that! Have you seen this vamp play?! Oh, welcome back, Bri.” She greeted Brianna before going right back to her tirade. “This chick is insane! She’s pulling off combos that took me months of practice to learn in just minutes, and her attack patterns are so wild that I can’t read her movements. It feels like I’m facing some hidden monster of a veteran. You remember when I entered that terminate and wound up facing a world champion who had hidden themselves as a normal gamer? This feels like that.”
“Uh huh. You know what I’m hearing? Excuses?” said Anthony.
Secilia snapped at him. “Then why don’t you play her? Then not only will you see how good she is, but you won’t have any room to complain when I make fun of you.”
“Uh… do you really have to make fun of each other?” asked Marianna.
“Yes!” Anthony and Secilia said at the same time.
“Anyway, maybe I’ll play her a little later,” Anthony continued. “Bri was just going to tell me about what happened when she met her family.”
At that prodding, Brianna smiled a little, though she also frowned just a bit. “Well… it wasn’t exactly what I had imagined it would be. Then again, I’m not sure what I was expecting.”
“What happened?” asked Anthony.
“Well, my… er… my mother…? The woman who gave birth to me--her name is Samantha by the way--she wanted me to live with her. She said I shouldn’t have to be part of some dangerous organization or live with you, and that I should live a life of luxury and free of worry,” Brianna began.
“I can’t see that going over well,” Secilia said.
Anthony nodded. “Bri is not the type to just sit around, doing nothing all day.”
“I think I’d go stir-crazy if I didn’t have something to do,” Brianna admitted. “Anyway, she didn’t take my rejection well… and it made me realize that I’ve never considered the people who gave birth to me to be my family.” She hesitated, but at Anthony’s prodding, continued with the slightest of blushes on her face. “I think of you three… as my family…”
“Even me?” asked Secilia before cursing up another storm when she lost again.
“Even you,” Brianna concluded.
“How many times have you beaten her, Mary?” asked Anthony.
“Don’t tell him!” Secilia shouted.
Marianne paused. “Um… seven, I think?”
“It’s six,” Secilia grumbled.
“Damn, you suck,” Anthony teased.
“Fuck you.”
“Maybe later.” He looked back at Brianna. “Anyway, please continue. I’m assuming that’s not everything?”
Brianna shook her head. “It’s not. While I was leaving, Ca--um… my father… stopped me and apologized for his wife’s behavior. I sort of understood where she was coming from, so I wasn’t too upset. I could tell he was sincere about forming a bond with me, so I… gave him my communication line.” She paused to look up at him. “I hope… that was okay…?”
“Of course. Why wouldn’t it be?” asked Anthony.
“Well… I mean… I don’t know. I guess I was just worried,” Brianna confessed.
Anthony leaned over and kissed Brianna on the temple, letting his lips linger for several seconds.
“You don’t have to worry about this,” he said. “I want you to be happy. If this makes you happy, then I am perfectly fine with it.”
“Thank you,” Brianna said.
“So enviable,” Marianne muttered briefly.
“I”m with you. Hey! Stop acting so mushy and come get your ass kicked by the n00b,” Secilia said to him.
“All right. All right.” He turned to Brianna. “Cheer me on?”
Brianna raised an eyebrow. “You want me to cheer you on… over a video game?”
“Video games are serious business,” Anthony and secilia said at the same time.
Trinity giggled. “It’s so cute how you two are so in-synch over matters like this.”
Despite her expression, which all but said ‘You can’t be serious’ in not so many words, she still cheered Anthony on. She looked like a tomato while doing so, but that just made her cute.
Anthony also wound up losing several times to Marianne, which he was sure Secilia would never let him live down.
***
They hadn’t accomplished the goals they set out to accomplish in Britannia, but with Lucius having escaped, they had no choice but to move on. Their next destination was Russia.
Anthony woke up with a very naked Secilia in bed with him. Her body was sprawled across his as though her bones were actually pretzels. The woman had somehow managed to contort herself in such a way that he had to wonder if she wasn’t part snake. Stifling a groan, he quietly slipped out of bed and made his way into the Aetherwing’s main cabin. Secilia barely shifted. He thought he heard her say something, but he could have been mistaken.
Everyone else was already awake. Brianna was going through her forms. Her bare feet slid across the carpet as she moved gracefully from one form to the next. Behind the kitchen counter was Marianne. It looked like she was… picking a fight with the automatic cooker. It was basically just an arm that featured a six-axis rotation so it could reach everything in the kitchen.
Trinity was reading again. The woman sat on the couch with her feet dangling over one side. Her bare feet kicked back and forth as she periodically scrolled through the pages of whatever she was reading. She only wore a light negligee that left nothing to the imagination.
Anthony went over to her.
“What are you reading?” he asked.
“Oh. Anthony. Morning,” Trinity said absently. “I’m reading a fanfiction.”
“Fan… fiction?” Anthony blinked.
“You don’t know what that is?” asked Trinity. “It’s fiction--”
“Of existing IPs that are written by fans. I know what it is.” Anthony waved a hand. “I just didn’t know you were into that.”
“I don’t normally read fanfiction,” Trinity confessed. “However, I recently heard that someone had begun writing fanfiction of you and decided to give it a try. It’s surprisingly good.”
“Er… of me? Really?” Anthony pointed at himself.
Trinity smiled. “Yes. Of you. Is that so surprising?”
“Yes,” Anthony sat down on the couch beside her. “Yes, it is. Why would anyone want to write fanfiction of me?”
“Because you are interesting,” Trinity said. “I don’t think you realize it, but you have shaken the entire world with your presence and the things you have done. Also, you are very easy on the eyes. There are a lot of documentaries being made about you right now. It’s clear that whoever wrote this has watched most if not all of them and compiled them into this story.”
Anthony almost dreaded asking, but he was too curious not to. “And… what kind of fanfiction is this?”
“The R18 kind,” Trinity answered immediately.
He sighed. “So someone is writing about my sex life…”
“I mean, it’s not like any of it is accurate,” she told him. “Like this scene here, where you kidnap the heroine, tie her up, cut open her insides, and use her blood as lube--”
“I don’t need to hear about this,” Anthony interrupted, already queasy. He glanced at her askance. “Don’t tell me you enjoy reading stuff like that?”
Trinity shrugged. “I enjoy reading anything interesting. And this is very interesting even if it's extremely unrealistic.”
Anthony closed his eyes. The idea that someone was writing erotic fanfiction of him already made him a little uncomfortable, but hearing what the writer made him do in the story was even worse. He was tempted to find whoever wrote this and educate them on how incubus physiology and psychology worked.
“So you’ve read that one, too, Trinity?” asked Secilia as she stepped out of the bedroom.
“Of course you’d wake up just as Trinity is talking about something I’d rather you not hear,” Anthony grumbled, then paused. ‘Wait. You’ve read this too?!”
Secilia nodded as she stumbled her way over to the kitchen table and had Marianne pour her a coffee. Marianne had to fight the automatic cooker for the right to even pour drinks.
“It’s called Incubus Captive, and it’s about a young woman who meets the mysterious incubus, Anthony. Intrigued and aroused by the girl, Anthony kidnaps her and fucks her in various and often humiliating ways.” Secilia paused to take her first sip, then sighed in relief. “The writer clearly has some freaky kinks and this is a wish-fulfillment fantasy.”
“Who the fuck would want to have her own blood used as lube?” asked Anthony, incredulous.
Trinity tilted her head. “You used to be a part of Lilith’s harem and you’re asking that?”
“No one in Lilith’s harem was that disgusting!” Anthony snapped. “They were all very vanilla, okay?”
“Maybe they were that way when you were around because you were so innocent,” Secilia said with a shrug. “From everything I’ve seen, Lilith very much favored you. They wouldn’t have shown you anything too corrupting.”
“Lilith and my brothers weren’t like that,” Anthony mumbled again, though he couldn’t deny that they had kept him from visiting the bedroom every so often. Now he wondered why they had done that? Were they really keeping him from seeing their weird, freaky sex?
This was going to bother him for weeks.
“Can you three please not talk about this anymore?” asked Brianna. “It’s distracting.”
“Why don’t you join us?” Trinity suggested. “I know you’ve read this as well.”
“Brianna would never read something like that,” Anthony said with a laugh. When no one laughed with him, he looked over at Brianna. “They are lying, right? You wouldn’t read something like that… right…?”
When Brianna refused to even look him in the eyes, Anthony knew that he had lost another one.
“A-at least Marianne hasn’t…”
He trailed off when Marianne looked away after he turned to her. He groaned. Was he the only one among this group who hadn’t read this incredibly violent and kinky fanfiction about himself?
And he thought he was supposed to be the perverted one.