Heartthrob

Next stop - room fifty.

The hallways of the 'business' side of things in this den of degenerate delight were tiled with great black slabs, all real stone (or close enough to stone to be the real thing); the wallpapers were light cotton candy pink trimmed with a darker, fruit-punch sort of pink, with nearly white brocade designs painting floral imagery everywhere one looked. It wasn't quite the 'sex and drugs' pit of sin that Esper James had been expecting... but, again, maybe only the fifth floor was like this. Maybe the other floors were more like what she was expecting.

No overhead lights guided their paths; instead, small faux-gilt sconces in the shape of gas lamps curved up from the wall, one taking its place on the wall every five rooms. The ceiling, however, was where Esper James couldn't help but catch her eyes the whole walk: the entirety of it was a digital screen, custom made and extravagant. It displayed the starry night sky in its center, and at the edges near the outer wall of the building proper, it showed mountains... or clouds, or the moon. It was dazzlingly high quality, so much so that a client with one drink too many could be reckoned to believe they were actually out of Vitus. That would have been the true bliss of coming up here.

The piped-in sounds of the sea completed the elaborate, bewildering display. Obviously fake because there was no fucking ocean in Vitus, the warmth of the building, the digitized night sky above, and the sounds of coastal life and warmth (mingled, as they were, with sparse exclamations from what few rooms here seemed in-use) all still evoked a world Esper James had never had the chance to truly know.

She couldn't help but wonder what the point of it was, though. Sure, EJ thought - it would have been reasonable to just say that Khetnep wanted to provide an 'exotic' experience. Pretend you aren't in Vitus, fuck a beautiful man or woman until your hips couldn't move anymore, and then get mind-shatteringly drunk... maybe even outside of that order... It was something that the ghoulette could easily see plenty of the Tsang executives she had the displeasure of knowing by name wasting their funds on.

Suddenly, EJ slammed right into something warm and soft, something that smelled of skin and oil but also detergent, perfume, and a saccharine undertone. Purity giggled softly as the little ghoul bashed face-first into her back and rear, throwing her right arm around to wrap EJ up and pull her in even further. The two were sandwiched; EJ couldn't help but make a loud sound of mock-protest, even as she folded and allowed herself to be drawn in body-to-body.

"We're here, babe. What'cha thinkin' about? Or are you just so excited to get to it that you couldn't keep yourself off of me~?" Purity giggled again, a little louder this time - Est joined her, even, going to slip behind the blonde butcher and make a sandwich of the three of them. Her hands went to ghoulish hips, making sure that EJ couldn't squirm out of her place between the two taller women - even if she could conceivably had wanted to, which, you know. "Yeah, EJ... twerp, heheh, you getting caught up in all this? Hu-uh, little lamb~?" Esthrielle snickered inches away from EJ's ear, mouth opening only just enough to nibble on EJ's lobe.

Esper James was so taken aback by all this, so caught unawares and off-guard... She would come to hate this later, hate herself just a little bit for this, but feeling those sharpened steel tips pressing into her soft, unpierced cartilage? EJ felt her knees nearly drop out from under her, her head beginning to swim, her vision going hazy. She fell back into Est with her torso; her hips, however, pressed forth into Purity's body as best they could, given the height difference.

She warbled like a baby bird, mewled like a kitten, whined like a puppy... Whatever the X was to her Y, she wasn't even of the right mind to think of stopping it. It was only after she heard a soft pneumatic hiss from a party that wasn't herself, nor her lovers, that she was ripped out of subspace with all the force of dragging a sailor from the riptide.

Even with Esthrielle continuing to nibble and pinch on EJ's earlobe, the secretary's wide eyes and quick-rushing blood were enough to help her power through and spark protest. "H-Hey...! Not... not in front of-!" EJ sucked in air sharp as a dagger when Est bit down in earnest, sending a thrill and shock of pain coursing through the gentle Nova Scotian. EJ regained her strength soon after, though - and redoubled her efforts, voice quavering in spite of her supposed conviction.

"Not in f-f-front of Zofi and Lulu! Come on, they d-don't...! They don't wanna see this, I-I'm-!" She turned her head to face the other Waywards, looking for backup just as much as she was attempting to gauge their reaction to this display. What she found was not what she was hoping to see, if only for her own dignity... but in retrospect, it was better than the alternative.

Lucretia, with her headpiece now removed and being used to playfully, mockingly wipe 'sweat' from her forehead, was smiling with a sinister sort of delight. It seemed, to EJ, like a less sadistic sort of expression than the ones Judas made... the revelry in seeing another debased for your own amusement, but without the unconscionable cruelty that Judas would have mingled with it. Esper James couldn't help but feel a flicker and twitch, a small spark of life, beneath her sweatpants - and that only brought further mounds of shame piled high on her heart.

Zofia's expression was harder to read at a glance - head angled downwards at a slight degree, in an attempt to hide her face but still keep watching... Her lips were screwed up in a completely indecipherable wobble, somewhere between a frown and a smile in a way so far removed from a lack of expression. Her eyes were snapped wide and doeish, a deer in headlights which weren't even aimed at her, and yet, she stood stock-still and dumbly waited for whatever came next.

No car crash came. Not this time, at least. Seeing that Esper James was looking at her, she turned her face away even as her cheeks began to turn nearly as pink-red as the trim on the wallpaper. Silence hung over the women for a few seconds as EJ looked for support, support was far from what she found, and the pair sandwiching EJ couldn't help themselves but squeeze her even harder.

Purity's laughter broke the silence, light and twinkling but breathy enough to be lost in even still. "Alright, alright... You're right. We shouldn't be doing this in front of two former nuns, for God's sakes. We'll have to find a way to get Lulu and Zofi out of the room some time, maybe get them in street clothes down to get some drinks... but, once Est and I can get our fucking hands on you, baby girl..."

The unspoken implications were clear. Lulu and Zofi said nothing, making no protest - in spite of their amenable responses to the show, EJ was glad that they all had the restraint to not push any boundaries. Was it something in the air? Something in that perfume that Purity seemed to naturally sweat out? Was it their backgrounds as party girls and free spirits before their conscription to-

Wait, hold on. Hold the fuck on. That was right - Purity's fucking sweat. Esper James had nearly forgotten that she had to confront the pinkette about whatever the hell was going on with her! That was the revelation she really needed to pierce through the haze of sudden lust and fawn-response that had been forced upon her, the chisel now hammered into that smooth mental marble to carve a definite direction of thought. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Fuck.

Esthrielle slipped her hands free of EJ's hips and backed away, standing to full height; Purity, too, took a step forward and aside to let Esper James be untouched and unobstructed once more. Emerald eyes looked down the hallway, past Purity - or whatever was left of the hallway, only a few more steps before they came to the last door on the floor. Just as lovingly chocolatey-brown as the rest of the wooden doors, with the same sort of baroque, artistic numbering etched into the upper half, eye-level for someone Purity's height. Fifty.

Purity gestured to the door with her right hand, adding a comic bit of flourish as if she was a gameshow host displaying a prize. "Well? After you, little ghoul... Step into my parlor, said the spider to the fly...~" A wink that dripped lasciviousness was laid upon the carnivore, garnished with a mischievous giggle that bordered on an outright cackle. Esper James hadn't even wondered why Purity had stopped walking, not at first - but knowing that this whole exchange had taken place mere steps away from the sanctity of privacy? EJ felt a little bit of wry amusement. She had been caught, it seemed.

All the blonde could do was roll her eyes and huff, feigning annoyance and frustration in a vain attempt to save some face - though from the way even Lulu snickered to join Est and Purity, it was completely unsuccessful. The door was taken by its handle and swung out and into the hallway, revealing plush pink carpet in the rectangle of luminance which was allowed for from the open portal. The rest of the room was dark, that love nest which ostensibly lay in wait within now shrouded in lightlessness... for now.

EJ could see just enough to know most of what lay within, but going from illumination to the void of shade always made one's eyes need a few moments to adjust. She fumbled around the inner wall with an outstretched hand, searching for a lightswitch... and eventually found one, or something close enough to one: a dimmer switch. Snide, reluctant bemusement welled in the petite predator's chest as she thought that, of course it would be a dimmer switch in a brothel. Why would there be normal lighting?

The switch was turned, and as it turned, the room was revealed. Fairy lights hung all around the ceiling of the rectangular room, pastel pinks and lavenders and indigos showering the room with gentle radiance - displaying the furnishings with such tenderness that one would have expected this to be a honeymoon suite, not a prison cell for one's untamed lust.

A bed lay against the left wall, headboard against said wall and a silken canopy hanging from the ceiling to envelop it. It was circular, and massive - easily big enough for all five ladies to sleep in it at once, and with enough space between them that there would be no untoward touching. The sheets and comforter and pillowcases and curtains were, of course, the same sort of colours as the fairy lights - this would extend to all fabric in the room, it seemed, though the walls were a soft creme white.

A sawhorse sat off to the side in a partially-opened closet, along with (ostensibly) other toys and apparatuses... There were hooks in the ceiling, likely for harnesses or swings or what-have-you... A dresser lay near the door and opposite the dimmer switch, and beside that, a steamer trunk was nestled up. Both pieces were made of the same dark wood as everything other wooden object here... and on their flat tops, various amenities were strewn: coils of thin silken rope, bottles of myriad different substances, a pair of black leather cuffs and a matching collar... Esper James didn't let her gaze linger too long on any other toys, trying to avoid undue reactions.

The rest of the room contained a fairly lavish table with a pair of matching chairs, their lacquered bodies bearing red leather-clad padding; there was a statue of ivory as the table's centerpiece, displaying a nude woman pulling a sheet about herself, and a similar oil-painting was hung upon the wall. To be quite frank, Esper James was taken aback by it all.

Two thoughts forced their way into the blonde's brainpan almost immediately after setting sight upon the room they would be staying in. First and foremost? It was so significantly classier and more refined than she had been expecting. She had been so inundated with media depictions of brothels and soaplands and massage parlours and love hotels, all with their neon lights and pinks and blacks and modern, lust-provoking designs, that the gentle light and wooden furnishings nearly floored her. It was far more akin to a rather lavish hotel room, she thought... And, honestly, she was glad for it.

The second thought, the one she was notably less glad for but could not deny, was that it reminded her of the manse. Immediately, it felt like a room Judas would design - it felt like her bedroom, with the sawhorse and the oil painting and the erotic sculpture. It was as if she was stepping into Khetnep or Purity's version of that, the same style of sinful asylum, but without the same kind of cruelty Judas would have inflicted. And, even of that, Esper James couldn't yet be fully sure.

She swallowed hard, rolling her suddenly-dry tongue around in her mouth to wet it anew before attempting speech. Ginger touch came from hands about her hips, urging her forwards; Purity's voice accompanied it, trying to help break the ex secretary from her stupor. "Hey, babe... It's nice, right? Come on, though, let's get in there. We don't want anyone to see Lulu or Zofi or they'll get weird about nun sex. Only we get nun sex, right~?"

Another giggle, then... and with the way that EJ couldn't fully shake herself free of that miasmatic taint that this building gave off, she was conflicted on who Purity was even referring to. There would be time to think of that later, though - the bubblegum bitch was right. They should hoard the nun sex to themselves - the people of Vitus didn't deserve it.

Wow, huh? That was... a weird thought to have, right?

No reprieve was given from Purity's urging hands, and so Esper James wasn't given any time to consider the strangeness of her current mentality. She took a few wobbly steps into the room, stumbling over to the bed and allowing herself to flop face-first onto the circular mattress. The silks were, of course, soft on her exposed skin - and should Zofi and Lulu not been there, EJ was fairly certain that her hoodie would have been torn free to get as much skin-on-silk contact as she could.

The rest of the women shuffled into the room, Lulu taking up the back - and shutting the door as she stepped through, isolating their quintet from the rest of the building. A sigh of relief came from Zofia, then, as she practically ripped her own headdress off and threw it into an unoccupied corner of the room.

"Augh, f-fuuuck, finally! Finally! I... It's been almost three years since I've been out of that stupid f-f-fucking convent! It...! It feels so, so, so good to... To be free. Even if Vitus is shit, even if we need to hide... living free but with our eyes peeled is gonna be so much better than that gilded fucking cage." She had started to tremble, face alight with joy and relief - and a bit shaky from all the adrenaline which now pumped through her, simply from the ecstasy of release. Lulu cackled, putting an arm around Zofia's waist.

"Mmm, feel good to swear, too? Hahaha! You sound like a sailor, Zofi... I mean, don't let me stop you, it's kinda cute." Lucretia's face was three shades away from malicious as she looked over the former field researcher, waiting for Zofi to turn and look at her - and once the frazzled woman did as Lulu expected? Black-painted lips found bare ones for less than a second, smooshing together in a smooch that took a blink's worth of time, but felt to Zofia like an eternity.

When Lulu broke the kiss and pushed Zofia away, cackling to herself like she had just pulled an excellent prank, Zofia stumbled to the ground without a word - though not for lack of effort, given her sudden fusillade of stammering. Black lipstick was smeared just slightly off-set from her own lips, and her eyes were so very wide that it seemed their lids may recede into her skull. Colour had adorned her cheeks like she'd been slapped, and soon that reddish hue took a new home across her full visage.

Esper James, having rolled over to face her roommates while Zofi was exclaiming her joy, was speechless. So, it seemed, was Purity... and so was Esthrielle. Lulu was left in a semi-silence of her own design, snickering away with all the pride and none of the shame of a world-renowned mischief-maker.

It took nearly two whole minutes for her to wind to a close - in that time, Zofia had gotten just enough control of herself to stop babbling like an idiot, and EJ's lovers had taken seats beside her on the bed. They each looked between Zofi and Lulu, back and forth, gauging whatever sort of attention or affection or emotion was supposed to exist between the two - one sided or not. Perhaps something more? Perhaps something less? Given Zofia's reaction, this was the first time such a thing had been expressed...

Lulu put on a combination pout-and-smirk, narrowing her eyes and furrowing her brows and screwing up her mouth into a wry, close-lipped smile. She offered Zofia a hand to help her up - the hand was quickly taken, and as Lulu pulled her up, she drew the ghoul enthusiast into a ballroom dancing spin. Zofi's eyes snapped back to their earlier enormity as she allowed herself to be spun, and when Lulu dipped her down with one hand and flourished with the other, Zofia's eyelids drooped suddenly as if she was fit to faint.

Drawing her back to a stand, Lucretia pushed Zofi to the trio on the bed - they caught her and helped her find a seat, then looked back towards Lulu for some sort of explanation or address, or anything, really. Lulu, in turn, put balled fists on either side of her waist. She cocked her hips and her head to the side, shooting a playfully quizzical look at her allies-turned-audience.

"What? We're not nuns anymore. Can't a girl have a little fun~?"