Volume 9 - Animate Objects, Chapter 62 - Devil in the Details

"Hello, Nakahara residence." Yuisu cradled the phone with her shoulder while stirring a bowl of pancake batter. Cooking for and caring for seven liminals meant she had to be able to multitask or she'd get nothing else done.

"Hey, Yuisu!" It was Agent Will's voice. "Can you do me a tiny favor?"

Yuisu didn't bother trying to hide her sigh. "Depends on what it is."

Agent Will seemed to treat that as a yes. "Great! There's a liminal girl in town for a couple days, and she's got nowhere to stay. Can she stay with you gals?"

Yuisu quirked one eyebrow and asked, "Why can't you just put her up in a hotel room, or have her stay at your place?"

He chuckled nervously. "Uh, the hotels in town both claimed they were full as soon as they heard what she was. They must be really superstitious or something."

"And your place?" Yuisu pressed.

"Uh, there are other reasons that wouldn't work," he said suspiciously.

What's one more mouth to feed for a couple days? And I can treat this like practice for running an inn, Yuisu thought. She said, "Alright, that's fine. Send her over whenever." After a brief pause, she added, "Oh, what species is she? In case I need to buy any special food."

"Lethe is a Devil, though I guess Succubus is more accurate. No food needed! Thanks again, Yuisu! You're a lifesaver!" he said, then immediately hung up.

Lethe didn't arrive at the house until nearly ten at night, and the doorbell rang when Yuisu was getting ready for bed. Wearing her green flannel PJs, she darted to the front door and opened it wide. "Welcome to our home!" she called, trying to be a gracious host.

A very tan, very blonde girl stood on the porch. She wore a short plaid skirt and a white blouse that was too small for her busty chest. She looked like a normal fashionable teenager at first glance, until you saw her purple horns and bat-like wings, and black where the whites of her eyes should be. A bright purple arrow-tipped tail also poked out from under her skirt and flicked through the air behind her.

The girl blinked and stepped back a step, unused to getting such a warm welcome. She smiled slightly and said, "Like, thanks so much. You must be Yuisu. I'm Lethe." She twirled her long blonde ponytail around on one finger as she spoke.

"Yep, that's me. It's nice to meet you, Lethe. Come on inside," Yuisu said as she gestured for Lethe to enter. Yuisu noticed that the girl seemed to only have one small bag of belongings with her. Maybe she left her other stuff with Agent Will?

Once they were inside, Yuisu said, "Sadly, I have work early tomorrow, so I can't give you the full tour. Some of the other girls are up late, so I'll get them to help you."

She lead Lethe into the living room where Chione and Mimi were watching TV. Chione was sprawled out on the couch in short pink PJs, while Mimi was down in front of the TV. She was wearing her standard socks, gloves, and underwear, and she had her legs out over one side of the chest and her head lazily propped on the other.

As Yuisu stepped in the room, she called out, "Mimi, Chione, this is Lethe. She'll be staying here a couple days. Can you show her around and give her some company?"

Chione muted the TV, which was showing some strange game show, and looked up at Yuisu and the new visitor. Mimi turned her head sluggishly, until she saw Lethe and her eyes widened in surprise. Neither girl had ever seen a Devil in person, but their thoughts went in very different directions.

Ooh, I bet she knows how to party, Mimi thought, already planning how to throw an impromptu party.

Chione blushed and thought, Um… she's really pretty… and she's got wings and horns just like me!

Yuisu waved to the three young women and said, "I'm heading to sleep. It'd be great if you could hang out in one of your rooms, so you don't wake anyone else up."

Mimi grinned. "Good idea. Those are the only bedrooms on that side of the house, so we can be as loud as we want!"

Yuisu glared at Mimi until the mimic added, "Kidding, I'm kidding, Yuisu!"

Once Yuisu had left, Chione said, "It's great to meet you, Lethe. Want a little tour of the house?"

As a succubus, Lethe could sense sexual attraction, and she could feel little threads of it connecting Chione to Mimi, and now Chione to Lethe. Mimi was also oozing sexuality, but all of that seemed to be directed elsewhere. Lethe smiled, which naturally looked mischievous, and said, "That would be so wonderful, Chione."

Mimi had finally received the accessibility machine Agent Will had promised: a very low-profile electric dolly that she could leave attached the bottom of her chest pretty much all the time. It was quiet, rolled smoothly, and was controlled by a simple-yet-effective joystick. It couldn't handle stairs, however, so she'd still needed to be carried to get to the hot spring.

When the tour of the inside part of the house finished, Mimi waved Chione and Lethe on. "Go on without me. I'll get my room set up with some pillows and blankets so we can all lounge there."

Chione nodded, but she was a little nervous to be all alone with the sexy succubus.

While Chione explained the hot spring and showed Lethe the cabin, Lethe was paying more attention to the gargoyle. She's definitely a virgin, but she seems to be the romantic type, so I probably shouldn't offer to fix that, Lethe thought. Her attraction to me sure has a nice flavor, though. If she keeps that up, I'll be set on food for my whole stay here.

They returned to the house and found Mimi making full use of her electric dolly, shuttling cushions from the living room to her bedroom one chest-full at a time. The three girls settled down in that room and looked around, wondering what to do next.

Right as Chione was about to suggest playing a board game, Mimi reached into her chest and pulled something out. She held it up in the air over her head triumphantly and said, "Behold! Sake!"

Chione went a little pale, since she knew Mimi must have stolen that from Yuisu's liquor cabinet. She also knew that she and Mimi were underage to drink in Japan, but mentioning that wasn't going to sway Mimi in the slightest. Instead, Chione asked, "Uh, wasn't the cabinet locked?"

Mimi laughed, "Ha! Locks are a joke once you know how they work, and I have one in my body, so I'd say I know 'em pretty well." She ended her boast with a big swig of sake, straight from the bottle, and then she passed the bottle to Chione.

Chione held the bottle with the same care she'd give to a loaded gun. She knew that this was actually a pretty safe setting to be drinking, and she and Mimi had both had alcohol legally back in France, where the legal age was only 18. The bigger issue was that Mimi's mouth had just been on the bottle, and Chione wasn't doing so well in her quest to get over her crush on Mimi.

Lethe observed Chione's inner turmoil with smile. Finally, the devil reached over, grabbed the bottle, and put it to Chione's lips herself. She said, "Like, hurry up, Chione! I want some after you."

Chione, blushing profusely, took the bottle and upended it, taking a couple swallows of the clear liquor. It was strong, but not too painful and she managed to not cough. She passed the bottle to Lethe and tried not to watch as the succubus's pink lip-gloss-coated lips touched the same spot on the bottle.

The bottle kept moving around the circle and conversation started flowing. Mimi and Chione learned about how the hotels turned Lethe away, and each reacted in their own way.

"That's bullshit! I bet we could sue them," Mimi roared.

"Aw, I'm sorry, Lethe. But at least you got to meet us," Chione said with a smile.

"Thanks, girls. They totally do allow other liminals, so I'm not sure how much of a case I'd actually have. Doesn't matter though, 'cause Yuisu let me stay here," Lethe said, then took another drink. "She's like totally crazy though, having so many of you girls living here."

Mimi leaned over conspiratorially and said, "She probably does it because she wants a house full of hot chicks to ogle." Then, in case her message wasn't hammered home hard enough, the tipsy mimic added, "Since she's gay."

Chione bopped Mimi on the head lightly with a stony fist. "Hey, so am I. Don't be mean about it." Her floaty, cheerful mood wasn't affected, however, and she turned to Lethe and said, "Yuisu is really kind, all she does for us. I wish I could repay her somehow."

Lethe's black and purple eyes flicked side to side mischievously and she said, "So, I may have a way to do that. I could do something really cool for all the women in the house, like as thanks for letting me stay here."

"Oh, really?" Mimi and Chione said in unison, their curiosity piqued.

"Yeah, really," Lethe said with a grin. "I can give people totally good dreams, as long as they are already asleep."

Chione smiled a goofy grin, the alcohol clearly affecting her. "Ooh, how about romantic dreams for everyone?"

Lethe nodded and said, "I like your style, Chione," which made Chione blush adorably. Lethe didn't bother to mention that romantic dreams, or more specifically erotic dreams, were all she could do. "I just need the names of everyone to send them to."

Mimi and Chione started talking over each other, listing off names.

"Well, there's Yuisu…" Chione said.

"And Mara," Mimi grumbled, still not happy about how the little arachne had treated her.

"Tsuen of course," Chione said, then giggled, thinking, A horse of course!

Mimi said, "And Quess." After a moment of thought, she added, "Oh, and Iormu."

Chione finished it off with, "And Haru!"

As they spoke, Lethe was trying to commit the list to memory. Yuisu and Mara, Tsuen and Quess, and Iormu and Haru. Got it! Take that, alcohol trying to make me dumb, just 'cause I'm blonde!

"I'll cast my spell a bit later, once we're sure everyone's like totally asleep," Lethe said as she leaned back against the bed, sticking her chest out prominently.

Mimi followed Chione's gaze to Lethe's boobs and got an idea. "Let's play a game, like truth or dare or something."

Chione looked at the nearly empty bottle of sake, then without really meaning to, mumbled, "Or spin the bottle."

Chione immediately clamped her hands over her mouth and turned beet red. She started to wonder if it was possible to die from embarrassment.

Mimi laughed uncontrollably for a couple seconds. "Tell us what's really on your mind, Chione? I bet you want to smooch every girl in the house, ya perv!" she teased.

Lethe took a practical approach. "Spin the bottle's no good with only three people. Might as well just all kiss each other now and skip the game."

Chione somehow managed to blush even more, before she suddenly changed color again, to a sickly green. URK! She gagged and felt very sick. All the sake she'd downed was threatening to come back up, so she jumped to her feet and bolted to the bathroom.

Mimi grabbed the joystick attached to her chest and started to roll to the door. "I guess this is a good stopping point. I'll go help her out."

"Yeah, good idea," Lethe said. "I'll cast my dream spell while you help her."

After Mimi rolled out the door, Lethe sat cross-legged on the floor and started to focus her will to cast her dream magic. Thanks to all Chione's silly staring, Lethe had energy to spare for the spell. She chanted a mix of demonic words and the girls' names, working her way down the list from earlier.

It turned out that casting three different shared dreams was harder than Lethe thought. It took several minutes of intense effort and left her feeling thoroughly drained, but the spell finished successfully. Wisps of pink and purple energy rocketed out of the room and flew to the six sleeping women in the house and cabin.

Lethe was barely awake when Mimi returned, carting along a slightly-less-green Chione. Lethe stuck her thumbs up in victory and said, "Spell's done. I'm like super tired, though. Goodnight." She flopped backwards onto a bed made of couch cushions and fell asleep. Her skirt had flung up in the fall, revealing her panties to the other girls. She wore a black lace g-string, embroidered with a red rose, and it barely covered anything. Even Mimi raised an appreciative eyebrow when she saw it.

Lethe unconsciously absorbed some sexual attraction energy, refilling her drained reserves, at least until Chione darted forward and pulled Lethe's skirt back down, blushing all the while. Then Chione wobbled unsteadily, clearly still a little drunk and a little sick.

"Get in bed, Chione. I'll get you some water," Mimi said in a kind tone.

"Thanks, Mimi. It's nice when you show tha' you care," she mumbled, already crawling onto the bed. She dropped her face into the pillow and her muffled voice said, "I luff you, Mimi."

"I know you do, Chione," Mimi whispered as she rolled back out the door to get that water. I love you too, but just as my best friend. Can that please be enough?