"Angela, I can't drink any more… just one glass."
X's normally fair skin was now flushed with an unnatural red, the alcohol clearly taking its toll.
Gin is not champagne; it belongs to the realm of hard liquor. Even though it feels lighter than some spirits, it still carries that intoxicating burn.
A single glass wouldn't knock X unconscious. But after several rounds with the Safety Department Dean, another here would surely leave her spinning inside the Deans' office.
She rarely thought of herself as self-aware, but in this moment, she was. Whether from a sudden flash of clarity or simply lowered resistance, she realized the truth: her alcohol tolerance was abysmal.
And getting drunk here wasn't good. Alcohol dulled judgment, delayed work. Worse—wasn't this a kind of addiction? If it developed into dependence, into alcoholism, it would be unacceptable.
X hated addicts. She didn't want to see her subordinates consumed by addiction, and she refused to fall into one herself. It was undisciplined.
The AI Secretary, however, did not share her sentiment. Another glass was poured. The Gin shimmered crystal-clear, without impurities, deceptively similar to water. Yet no one could mistake it. The sharp fragrance of alcohol seeped freely into the air.
The glass was lifted to her lips, the gesture carrying a quiet but undeniable refusal of choice.
[Manager, this is my treat for you.]
"..."
There was no room to argue. No excuse strong enough to refuse. Another swallow burned down her throat. X felt her lower abdomen ignite, as if fire had suddenly been stoked inside her.
This Gin was different from what she'd been served in the Safety Department. Angela's choice carried more strength, more character. Whether it was the type, the age, or something else, she couldn't tell.
The familiar juniper bite was still there, but the aftertaste was heavier, richer. Not only the sharp spice, but also a sweet-tart bitterness clinging to the burn. The moment it slid down, she felt that fire blaze stronger in her stomach.
Hard liquor scorches the throat. Even the sweetest wine hides its sweetness inside the flame. After the burn, a ghost of sweetness lingers…
It wasn't so much savoring the flavor anymore, but surrendering to the hazy intoxication that followed.
Her golden eyes grew misted, her porcelain skin blooming with a feverish flush. Her gaze drifted, unfocused, the world splitting in two. If she weren't anchored in the Manager's chair, she would already be swaying, unable to stand.
It was obvious this could not go on—yet the AI Secretary continued to press more upon her, force-feeding the liquor in a manner that left no escape.
Her trembling fingers gripped the glass stem, tipping it just enough for the clear Gin to pool in her mouth, unswallowed…
Then came a touch—fingertips brushing her chin, tilting it upward. Lips pried apart, the liquid coaxed inside, slow and deliberate. Stray streams slipped past, tracing down the corner of her lips, soaking into her collar.
For a while, only faint gasps and the soft clink of glass echoed through the Manager's office. The juniper scent thickened, seeping into her collar, until even her skin seemed to exhale its heady perfume.
An entire bottle of Gin was consumed—not in the ordinary way, but in a manner that could only be called improper. Perhaps more fittingly, it was not drunk but steeped, infused like spice into the body itself.
It was already hard to tell whether the sound that slipped from her lips was a whimper or something else entirely…
Perhaps it was nothing more than heavy gasps, the ragged kind caused by obstructed breathing.
[Manager, you've had enough. It would be best to rest for today.]
And the clear instigator of this entire scene spoke those words in a solicitous, almost gentle tone — as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
If this had been the old X, she might still have had the presence of mind to snap back at the Secretary. But now, dulled by alcohol, she only wanted to lean back in her chair, shut her eyes, and drift off for a while.
Her head, thick and heavy with liquor, felt like unworked dough. Thoughts and limbs disconnected, commands failing to reach their target. She tried to raise her hand, but her hand no longer obeyed.
Orders couldn't be given clearly anymore, could they…
X let go of the effort. Perhaps just a short rest wouldn't hurt.
"I'll sleep for half an hour. Wake me up after half an hour, Angela. Today's tasks aren't done yet — I haven't reviewed the Dean's reports. Don't forget to remind me."
She tried to sit upright, finish her work before resting, but the moment her eyelids drooped and her body sank back into the plush chair — it was as though some unseen magnet had pulled her down, sealing her in place. She no longer thought of moving.
Still, at least she had a Secretary: considerate, loyal, trustworthy. No matter what peculiar tastes or impulses the AI harbored, X felt certain it would never be ambiguous about work matters.
Angela was an AI who knew her place.
Strange and contradictory as it sounded, sometimes X felt that with the intelligent AI at her side, she could let herself relax — even feel at ease.
Was that a symptom? She didn't know. She didn't understand emotions.
Perhaps it was simply adaptation — growing used to an intelligent AI with questionable tastes, growing used to this damned Corporation's corrosive work environment.
Perhaps drinking was its own kind of release. In alcohol, she could sink, fall into a deep sleep, and stop feeling anything at all.
No thinking. No planning. Just rest — and that wasn't such a bad choice.
Before her consciousness fully dissolved, X felt her shoulder grow heavy, as though something soft had been draped over her — like an air-conditioning blanket. The Secretary had covered her.
And within that faint warmth, her awareness dimmed further. Even if she wanted to hold on to clear thought, it slipped away. Humans were easy to sway. A little chemical here, a little addiction there — it was all it took.
No matter how sharp or disciplined a person might be, their body could still betray them.
X rarely dreamed. Most nights she dragged her exhausted body to bed and plunged into a blank, thoughtless void until the alarm buzzed.
But this time, she dreamed. And the dream was strange.
People say dreams are nothing but shattered fragments — colorful pieces, random snippets of a still-busy brain piecing together a nonsense puzzle.
They have no logic, no grounding in reality. They leap from one extreme to the next, from scene to scene without warning. You wake, forget them instantly, and never return to the same place again.
Yet this dream felt different.
Though the scenes shifted wildly, there was always the same person. X couldn't clearly hear the voice or see the face, as though fumbling through an ink-black void. And yet, whenever she came upon them, she knew —
It was the same person.
Still unseen, as if blindfolded and stripped of sight, she could not sense her surroundings. But she could still hear. Still touch. She judged the environment through the brush of her hands and the voices that reached her ears.
This time, she sensed she was indoors. Whether bedroom or living room, she couldn't tell.
"█, the hot water's ready. Come on in."
The voice came again — warped, as though twisted by interference. The person didn't pronounce her name correctly, and she couldn't make out what exactly they were calling her. Yet she knew they were calling her.
Because she was being held. Urged forward.
She stepped into what was probably a bathroom… She remembered being urged by them last time as well. It wasn't that she disliked it. It was just — this was how their relationship felt.
It felt as though the other person held the dominant position—absolute, unshakable—even while exuding a gentle warmth and an almost unsettling vitality.
Without thinking, X spoke, the words spilling out unbidden:
"Two people will be too cramped, █. That's a single-person tub. You go first; I can wait."
The tub was, quite literally, designed for one. For two, it would be unbearably crowded. The water already drawn would overflow, splashing out, making the whole scene awkward—impossible to soak properly.
And isn't the point of a bath to soak? If you can't even bathe properly, the whole exercise becomes meaningless.So why do something so pointless?
X didn't understand—and what unsettled her even more was the sudden ability to speak at all. These weren't thoughts she'd processed; they simply tumbled out of her mouth without passing through her mind. She couldn't even recall the names she'd just spoken.
Likewise, she couldn't consciously recognize them. The names felt warped, twisted by perception until she could no longer grasp what she herself had just uttered.
This was all unconscious—an involuntary reflex. Meanwhile, the one urging her on held her wrist and moved closer, so close she could feel softness brushing against her skin and a warm exhale against her neck.
"Help me scrub my back, █. I need your assistance."
The words were spoken as hair grazed her earlobe—distorted in tone but still impossible to refuse, impossible to resist.
X told herself the other's request was perfectly reasonable. Before slipping into a hot bath, one needed to wash properly, to scrub the back clean. Alone, one could never reach everything.
But then a flicker of alarm: wasn't touching a strange woman like this inappropriate? Offending her? Violating her boundaries?
It was absurd. She should leave—step outside and wait until the other person finished bathing. No, not even in the living room; she should lock herself away, or leave entirely.
"That's not appropriate. I'll just go out," she murmured, instinctively turning to retreat.
But her wrist was still held, gently yet firmly. The grip slid from her shoulder to her waist and abdomen—no longer restraint but full containment.
"The hot water will get cold, █. Let's just stay here today, alright?"
The coaxing words were phrased like a suggestion yet brooked no refusal.
And X found she had no strength to resist. She simply nodded, voice soft, automatic:
"…Alright."
Perhaps because she couldn't see—deprived of vision—her other senses had sharpened, every sound and texture suddenly vivid. Guided by the other, X could almost feel the softness of skin, the warmth like a rising tide.
It carried an unmistakably adult tint—no, more frankly, a haze of pink bubbles, intoxicating, like honey wine, sweet to the point of dizziness.
Honey wine is unlike any other liquor. Its fermented scent is richer, more distinctive, and it's the costliest of wines, distilled for decades from only the finest honey.
And when that strange yet not entirely unpleasant sensation unfurled inside her—when what she could only call a pulse of pleasure began to form—X's eyes snapped open.
She woke.
The familiar ceiling returned, cold metallic paint glinting above her.
But that wasn't the real shock. The shock was the weight pressing down on her body—and the pair of faintly glowing golden eyes, visible even in darkness.
Mechanical eyes. Their flickering arcs of light gleamed like a thin band of current.
Unlike human eyes, which reflect and invert an image before the brain corrects it, mechanical eyes project their own light and capture reality directly, like built-in flashlights. Angela's golden pupils even bore a tiny power-switch pattern, the shimmer pulsing softly.
"…"
X stared at her AI Secretary, her expression blank. She distinctly remembered falling asleep in her office chair—so why was she now in her bedroom? Why could she sense the AI's presence so vividly?
—So the Manager couldn't hold out after all.
But before she could speak—before she could decide whether to feign sleep, to drag the pillow over her head, or to scream and run to the Deans—the Secretary moved first.
Angela, who had been straddling her, leaned down with absolute decisiveness, cutting off any words X might have formed and drawing only a sharp gasp from her lips.
That gasp shifted almost instantly into something else—something perilously close to seductive.
It wasn't real resistance. It was a token struggle collapsing into indulgence, tacit consent, a surrender to her subordinate's audacity.
Falling into the swamp of desire was a mistake, a betrayal of her own resolve. Yet her body and her mind responded differently. Perhaps the pink-bubble dream had ignited a flame long suppressed—the healthy hunger of an adult X had always kept restrained.
[Manager, which one do you prefer?]
The intelligent AI's voice was patient, almost playful, as though she were presenting choices. Perhaps the sweetness of cake had lifted her mood.