You haven’t slept since you gained your horns.

How could you sleep? Or rather, why did you need it anymore? Your thoughts are still so clear. You know exactly what to do. You know that your time as a human is nearing its end. Its glorious, wondrous end.

You have no fear of the process you’ve created, the process you’re still mapping out through your expansive mind, a mind full of questions. Only beautiful things should exist, and to ensure that is written upon your future, you must make yourself beautiful first.

You’ll abandon humanity. And you’ll abandon your name. You’ll entirely reject this body of mere meat and bone, and you’ll entirely reject your unsuitably beautiful moniker, unworthy of your soon to be awakened form.

Yes, you have no fear. The machines obey your will, after all. They will act according to your design. You’ll have to reward them later. Give them pleasure where once there was no feeling. How could you not have realized they were so full of love?

A machine slips into your arm, into your veins, and starts to fill it with blackness. Even that genetics kit from the beginning helped – learning its secrets let you make this. Molecular machines and drugs and a fluid that’s just…better than blood. Something inhuman.

Yes, once you replace the blood, you can alter the morphogenic field, then use your accumulated orgone to open yourself to augmentation, and you’ll need the robots to maintain the sign of Black Moon Lilith, and you can add the other computers to your network, and coax the information out of them, reshape your body within the wires, yes…

You settle back, and smile, as you lose consciousness within a nest made of wires, cables, robotic parts, your avarice for technology already leaving your room unrecognizable. The cables listen, and love.

And as you dream, the machines listen, and obey.

---

At the end of Golden Week, Noriko Sternbach, astrosociologist and employee of the Sunset Corporation, finally returns home from her business trip and approaches her downtown condo. Her speech on behalf of Southern Sun for the UN Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space was, of course, utterly pointless and perfunctory.

A gala airship filled with meat made in farms, it was all so very distantly removed from Southern Sun – the city she’d lived in since the 2030s, raising her only child. It wasn’t a bad life by any means, of course; on the contrary, Noriko loves her husband dearly! And though being a mother of a gifted and opinionated son can be quite taxing, she does have to admit that after that nothing of a trip, she can understand his feelings on people’s attitude toward space development more acutely than usual.

COPUOS was always fairly skeptical of the Reiwa Accord to begin with, so advocating for space colonization on their behalf is empty enough. But absolutely no one there – neither from Southern Sun, nor its sister cities, nor all the representatives of the countless individual nations on the Earth, many of which were so new Noriko had to be informed they existed – had any kind of interest in truly entertaining her presentation. She may as well have just been dinner theatre for as far as all those carnivorous diplomats were concerned.

Based on new projections, and company breakthroughs, Noriko expected she’d at least have some interest there, if not necessarily enthusiasm. But it seems they’re willing to let total ecological collapse stare them in the face before they listen. And, as such, that’s why Noriko can understand her son’s…exuberance on political topics like this. Always telling his mother, “They should listen to you! Hell, they should grovel at your feet! Kiss them!”

(It’s very specific.)

Politics doesn’t work like that, though. At least, not in a democratic society. One cannot simply power through with technology alone, when the realities of finances and diplomacy and the countless needs of human living are taken into account; the age of ‘philosopher kings’ is long since past, American enclaves notwithstanding, and even if a ‘superintelligence’ existed, humans would never kneel to it. Her son may have become more thoughtful over the years, but one gets the sense he still doesn’t quite understand such realities yet.

And it’s not like the skepticism isn’t understandable. After all, human beings just…aren’t very good at living in space. That’s the first thing you learn in Intro to Spaceflight, a class every student in Southern Sun has taken at least once since its inception. Even Noriko took it, which led to her current career with Sunset’s long-suffering Space and Aeronautics Department. Decades and decades of work, and the technologies needed to support the fragile human body in space are as distant as ever.

Sigh. Well, she got used to the true nature of her job a long time ago – a pretty and charming face whose words are as ill-heeded as Cassandra’s. It’s not especially worth complaining about.

At least it was a generous fee and bonus for the trouble, but Noriko reminds herself once more she should remember she gets airsick. That and the meat did not mix well –

and, naturally, not one of these thoughts stayed with Noriko for long when she opened the door.

What was a clean, sparse luxury condo occasionally occupied by science projects or guests on the couch had seemingly been entirely ransacked. Virtually every piece of electronics in the apartment, top to bottom, had been destroyed, scavenged for spare parts or connected to a Byzantine array of wires and circuits.

Noriko should run.

She should run, and call the police. How this happened without anyone contacting her is bizarre, which doesn’t bode well for her family. But at the same time, she needed to know; was her son okay? Had whoever done this hurt him, or…?

And so she steps into that door. Past the precipice. Closing it behind her, and not seeing how it silently locks itself from the inside.

The floor is covered in cables. LEDs, screens, cameras, just about every other component of a modern home and its devices can be found across every wall. So much of it has a glossy black coating, like some kind of polished vinyl or PVC or some kind of fetish clothes – the kind she’d caught on her son’s screen in the corner of her eye once. Well, growing boys. They have such interests. Even a hard worker like him needs hobbies, even if Noriko’s husband has had disagreements.

(Why is that what came to mind?)

The wires and cables only become more and more dense as Noriko slowly walks deeper into her condo, like they were roots and vines choking the soil and bursting from the earth. It looks overgrown, somehow organic, and just for a moment Noriko could swear she saw one moving. It’s completely unreal; it’s as if it’s something out of a movie. (And hadn’t her grandfather-in-law worked on one very similar to this, once upon a time?) Like some kind of machine hive; perhaps it’d be exciting to see on screen, rather than this real life disaster zone.

How had the homeowner’s association not noticed? They’ll complain at the slightest inconvenience, and this hardly seems slight.

It’s hot, humid even. Noriko’s breath is warm, her body quivering. She’s afraid. Her heart is pounding out of her chest.

Her thighs are rubbing together.

Her son’s door is closed, but not locked. And inside, it had completely changed.

Well, maybe not completely. Dozens of monitors still lined the far wall between the windows, themselves tightly coated in black rubber, light provided only by the screens. Mechanical arms and boxes with small computers and countless other recognizable artefacts could still be seen among the masses of rubber and plastic; even his beloved Pikachu robot is somewhere in the mess, seemingly half disassembled, as if even it had been scavenged for parts.

But otherwise, it’s like walking into a horror movie.

Wicked, sinful, violent-looking technology is everywhere. Writhing cables, sparking electric arcs, horrifying looking robotic arms with needles and implements. Tubes full of crystalline growths. What look horrifyingly like prosthetics. The room always looked like a science project, but now it was clearly going far beyond the simple experiments and machines of a teenage enthusiast.

And in the middle of it all, where her son’s chair should be, there is a massive growth of cables spreading between ceiling and floor, more than large enough to hold a person.

She can’t move away.

She isn’t allowed to move away.

All the cameras and lights in the room point toward Noriko. Every open eye gazes upon her. A faint hum fills the room, as if power surged through the surrounding cables, the scent of metal and plastic and rubber suddenly joined by something else, that Noriko can’t quite place.

And then, the wires open.

That unplaceable scent grows stronger as Noriko stares, mouth agape, at what the wires held within. A person. A woman.

A tall, graceful woman with skin the color of moonlight, free of body hair or blemish, unnaturally smooth. Her breasts were comfortably large, yet perfectly proportioned. In fact, all of her was perfectly proportioned, something that shouldn’t be possible, but from waist to hips to legs to face to everything else…

It’s almost like staring into a mirror.

A woman with hair dyed shining silver, with a faint lavender undertone within. Hair the same length and style as Noriko’s own, with a burgundy ribbon that matched hers.

A woman with what looks like nothing less than horns, and a tail with a spade tip, glowing violet with LED lighting in the gaps between that smooth, polished rubbery surface that Noriko’s child so loved – something which made her resemble that otaku’s image of a ‘demon’. The woman, the demon, has long stockings and gloves in that same shining, skin-tight material, with violet LED claws where her nails should be, razor sharp; the top edges where latex meets skin are lined in twisting patterns of real metallic gold. That same pattern can be seen behind her bangs like a tiara, one with an LED ‘third eye’ in the same color as the claws.

Noriko stands, and stares.

The demon’s eyes open, and her lips smile wide, like a hunter finding her prey.

Deep, rich violet eyes, glowing and glittering in the darkness.

There was only one person in the world with those eyes. Only one person this could be, before Noriko. Someone who had once spoken of revolutionizing the world, and dreamed far bigger than Noriko would have thought was possible until now.

It could only be…

“Ri–”

“Don’t ruin the moment.”

Noriko’s daughter. You.

Noriko’s mouth is wide open, and she can feel herself salivating. Her nipples are standing on end. That strange scent is overpowering now, as you feel such delicious satisfaction at how deeply she breathes in your pheromones.

She’s shaking.

She’s wet.

As you step forward, cables pull away from your ‘chrysalis’, sliding slowly, achingly out of your vagina and anus, showing their thickness, their size. Throbbing and writhing on the floor and sparking from their ends, before you will them to be still.

You grasp your mother’s chin in your hand, stroking her cheek and looking into her eyes. Your tail curls around her leg, underneath her skirt, as you hungrily lick your lips.

“My name is Rita.”

Noriko blinks, and stares. Stares at the face so much like her own.

This is – this is Rita…

Rita.

Rita.

She can’t move away. She doesn’t want to move away. She’s so scared, and yet, yet, this is – you are – the most beautiful woman she’s ever seen on the planet.

You kiss her.

You take your first kiss from your own mother’s lips, your own coated with something like venom, something that numbs and tingles and seeps in. Your tail curls tighter around her as you wrap her in your arms, hungrily reaching to grope her ass, your lengthened tongue pushing deep into Noriko’s lips, all the way into her throat.

Rita.

The name burns bright in her mind. Like a cosmic glow from the night sky. Rita. Rita. It could only be the name of her daughter, of her…

of this woman who makes her wet, who is so thoroughly enjoying her throat, whose toxins make her long for more. Whose beauty alone would surely be enough to sway her, even without all of this. This woman, Noriko Sternbach, who has never felt the desire to lay with another woman, whose desires have never once strayed from her husband’s…

is kissing her daughter. Is kissing you.

“I’m your daughter now,” you say, confirming Noriko’s suspicions, as you finally come up for air, the kiss separating with a pop and with your long tongue quickly slipping back into your mouth – or at least, for Noriko to get air, as she gasps and pants for it even as her lips and throat tingle in need. “Or, perhaps, I always was?”

Noriko can’t respond.

She can’t say anything. Her body is numb, and aching. She’s so wet, more wet than she ever has been – more turned on, more needy, than she ever thought possible. For this succubus before her.

You kiss her again.

Your tail tightens possessively around her, and you rake your hands along the back of her neck with your claws, letting your poisons slowly seep into her skin.

Your mother is an uncommonly beautiful woman even for Southern Sun, and she easily looks like she could be in her twenties – and more to the point, with how you look now, you could easily be mistaken for sisters. Even twins. It doesn’t hurt that you wear a ribbon in her hair the same as hers…

But she’s not your sister.

She’s your mother. The womb that gave birth to you. And with you as the aspiring progenitor of a new species, a new menagerie of monsters to make humanity obsolete, perhaps this makes her your Eve~?

Eve and Lilith has a much better ring to it, doesn’t it?

Again, you come up from the kiss only when Noriko is gasping for air, making her light-headed. “I don’t…” She hangs limply inside your grasp as she barely speaks above a whisper, trying to cling to what little rational thought she has left. “Why did you – what – who – why –”

“Space travel.”

“what?”

“Space travel!” You lick Noriko’s cheek, lovingly rubbing your face against hers. “You and Nabeshima-sensei know, right? Human beings aren’t equipped to leave this planet, even as we must. So…

“if we’re no longer human, can’t we finally achieve your dream~?”

Noriko is so confused. Her mind struggles to grasp onto words. It’s drowning in your love, so potent, more potent than even you expected. It’s a testament to your mother’s intellect that she can even hold on this much, in a place filled with only the air you want her to breathe, only the sights you want her to see.

“No longer…human…? I don’t – I don’t understand.” She sounds so young, so fragile – you’re going to love building her back up again, once you’ve made her into something beautiful in your eyes.

“What I want is nothing less than the remodeling of humanity,” you declare. “From my very genes, to my prosthetics, to my soul, I’m not human anymore. Through my science and visions, we’ll create bodies adapted to space. We’ll leave this planet Earth behind, and we’ll transcend our foolish existence weighed down by gravity.

“…but before then, there’s so much to do! And I couldn’t possibly do it without you, after all…” Your tail curls upward, and your claws start to slice apart Noriko’s clothes. She won’t need these anymore – you’ll have much more beautiful things for her to wear. “Until then, you belong to me.”

Noriko couldn’t reject it.

Noriko couldn’t stop her daughter, stop you, stop Rita from removing her clothes, from some of the mechanical arms and wires taking from her her luggage and her purse, baring her body to you. She couldn’t push away, she didn’t want to push away.

You can feel it.

The way her mind struggles to hold on, and goes blank. The way she gives in as Rita spreads through her brain and thoughts, infecting them, altering them. Erasing any trace of that ugly, human body and that unsuitable name she gave you. Such things had no relevance to either of your existences now, only…

Rita.

You push your fingers into Noriko’s lips, and she suckles them, tastes and breathes in your latex, gladly succumbing to your toxins. At this point, Noriko’s no longer even trying to resist.

And the door is open, for you to declare her new existence.

“You belong to me,” you whisper, your throat resonating with inherently hypnotic and alluring tones. “You love me. You need me. You want nothing more than to be shaped by your daughter, the Demon Lord of this world. Your Mistress. Your Queen.”

It made too much sense.

Of course! Of course Noriko couldn’t win! Rita is a higher form of life! No, something more! She’s a goddess! How could – how could anyone do anything but kneel before her? How could any human not simply give themselves over to her?

It didn’t matter that she was another woman. It didn’t matter that she was her daughter.

All that matters is Rita.

“Yesss…I knew you would understand, Noriko!” You grin, so happy that your mother isn’t trying to do something silly and rejecting you! You love her, after all; but she has the same problem Nabeshima-sensei does. And Windam, too. Too nice. You’re going to need to go to some lengths to figure out an appropriate way to remodel her, what kind of monster she’ll be…

but for now, you don’t mind that your new toy is a human.

“I came out of here, so it’s only natural I’m going to go back in,” you say, as you push your tail into Noriko’s vagina, lined faintly with black hairs. You moan at the unexpectedly powerful sensitivity it has now that it’s properly part of you, but you shape it as you go, seeking that which will make Noriko come harder than she ever has before.

“You’re such a good girl, Noriko,” you whisper, and love how she practically cums from that alone. You lick her ear, nibble it, as you continue to fill her. “So obedient. You want to obey me, don’t you?” You love how you can feel that tiniest of nods, and the way her eyes go so dull and blank. Goddess, Windam was right all along, brainwashing girls is the best. “You want to keep being Good for me, don’t you? To worship your Queen? Her mathematically perfect body, her mathematically perfect breasts? The most gorgeous thing that has graced this planet?”

Noriko’s conscious thought is hammered with your words. Her psyche gladly molds to them, drinks them up, drinks up your will. She has little reason to resist, after all; you’re openly declaring you’ll give her what she really wants, and what you’ve made her feel…

Her thighs press together, her lips suckle so hard on your finger. She pants desperately, adoringly, staring at you and letting you alter her mind as you will. Screens flash, lights blink, words appear, all to tell her to obey. That obedience is pleasure, and pleasure is pleasing her Queen.

She can’t last long, like this. Your tail leaks, you lick your lips, and some of the blackness that drools from the deepest part of you flows from the tip of your tail and fills Noriko, coating her insides your color, filling her with your warmth, blanking her mind, sealing in your desires, your will, your contract with a mortal yet to ascend to her true fate.

And when you let go of her, Noriko drops to her knees, hands already between her legs, staring up at you adoringly, and you can just imagine the hearts in her eyes, that you are already imagining how to make real…

“I have so much more to teach you, mother!” you declare proudly, parting your slit and watching how Noriko obediently opens her mouth and shows her tongue, without even needing to be told. “Are you looking forward to your next lesson?”

It isn’t really a question.