CONNOR SAT POISED ON his Secretlab chair like a disenchanted Roman emperor, staring disdainfully at his glowing monitors.

He glowered at the screeching female streamer in the highlight video. For one, she was too fat. She was also peppy, disgustingly so, bouncing in an effort to look attractive and babbling over the newest friend-slop game with her equally whorish friends. When she doubled over in laughter, Connor could see her gut, bloated and pale, forming into hideous rolls like distended nightcrawlers.

She was revolting, frankly, and if she were here in his metaphorical colosseum, she would receive a grave thumbs-down. When her voice wasn’t piercing his eardrums, he was bombarded by her huge nose, her saggy tits, how this whale tried to make “playful” remarks at the expense of the loyal drones in her chat. Like she had any right to poke mockery at anyone when she looked like a blobfish.

“Chat, don’t you have anything better to do?” Blobfish whined out, looming large over Connor on one of the four monitors that spanned his dark bedroom.

“I sure do, bitch,” Connor grumbled back, pulling off his headphones and rubbing his eyes in irritation, the bubblegum pink-glare of her setup intensifying his torment.

This wasn’t how his Friday was supposed to go. It was rare that Connor had a night to himself. His mom had gone on some wine tour upstate with her friends, leaving him to keep an eye on the house for the weekend. He’d finally get to watch what he wanted, wherever he wanted, without the old shrew chewing his ass off. To do everything his heart desired. To try to, at least. If he could find a video of a female half attractive enough to keep him interested.

As if a girl like that even existed.

The RGB lights of his mechanical keyboard pulsed faintly against his crumb-crusted desk, casting dull reflections from the half-empty Monster cans scattered around his monitors.

It was infuriating, being him. Having such a clear vision of what his perfect girl should look like, the shape of her so crystal clear in his mind that he could see the ghost of her hovering over every girl he passed on campus. A gleaming silhouette, the divine hourglass, a “you must be this hot to screw” amusement park test that all these ugly ham-beasts and box-dyed sluts couldn’t hope to pass.

His girl would have pink hair. But a soft pink. A virginal, cherry-blossom pink—not like the hot-pink mullets sported by those online feminists who don’t shave their pits.

She would wear her hair long, let it cascade like a lustrous waterfall down to her full ass. Her tits would be H-cups at least. But even at that breast size, she wouldn’t have any fat anywhere he didn’t want it. No gut to speak of, just a tiny waist he could fully envelop with his hands.

Pale white without a blemish in sight. Little pouty lips. Massive blue eyes. She’d have long legs but be four inches shorter than him, exactly. She’d like all the same things he did, but she wouldn’t lecture or prattle on, just sit quietly and favor him with an interested smile.

She’d listen to him talk about how nobody at college understood him, how girls always treated him like shit. She’d rub his leg and pooch out her bottom lip and say she wished she’d met him sooner and she would never, ever let him go.

She’d have no pubic hair, and would worship his dick.

He was going to make six figures, at least, doing tech. He deserved a wife who matched his exact specifications. If all females cared about was exploiting guys like him for money, he should at least get a perfect female in return.

If not, what was he even doing this for?

What else was he supposed to want?

Connor’s stomach coiled in dissatisfaction. He had to do something, anything to push down the bitterness, the stress of this tireless pursuit of perfection. He briefly considered jacking off to the ceiling fan and slithering back into bed. But something flickered in the corner of his vision. He peered up into the fourth monitor, where a sketchy banner ad had appeared.

Bright and obnoxious, something more at home on a porn site than anything you’d see on a legitimate streaming platform.

At first, it presented as a simple graphic: a swirl of neon colors in a gif playing a little too fast, the whorls seizure-inducing. Before Connor could look away, the image changed.

Long, cherry-blossom pink hair.

Even as she faced away from him, Connor recognized her immediately. Peeking from the silken curtain of her hair, her pale, bare white shoulders atop dainty, sweater-clad arms. His heart pounded. So lost he was in the joy of the sight of her that he almost missed it when she tilted her head to the side, exposing the curve of her slender neck. Beside her appeared bold text:

[I’M WAITING FOR YOU. CREATE ME.]

Connor knew better than to go any farther. This was a classic scam—the kind of trick only low-IQ degenerates fell for. And yet… some combination of want and sleep deprivation persuaded him to abandon reason. He swallowed hard and clicked the ad. The link took him not to a free iPad giveaway or malware injector, but a simple interface showing a text input box with the instructions:

[CREATE ME]

Disappointment washed over him, and he slumped back in his chair in a crumpled heap. This, he should have seen coming. One of those AI girlfriend apps, where you tailor a prompt and the machine spits out a picture of a female generated from a vast database of Instagram models and tentacle hentai. Just because it had conjured up a girl with pink hair didn’t mean it was his girl.

Connor hovered his cursor over the X in the corner of the ad, ready to close it, then hesitated. He knew full well he wouldn’t see her among the frosty bitches and desperate cows that infested his college campus. He could use this app to generate a rendition of her, and use that to guide his search for his perfect female. Gulping down the last stagnant dregs of his energy drink, Connor began to type.

The taurine in the syrupy liquid and his growing lust ignited like twin flames. A sort of mania overtook him, and the words flowed furiously. He put it all in there—his wants, his hopes, the lonely nights and frustrations. His furious typing and panting echoed off the walls of his room. This den of desperation. The place where he’d cried away his first heartbreak. The venue where forums of other men who suffered like him reflected the sad truth of the world. The sanctuary where he thought he’d remain in isolation.

But he didn’t have to be alone any longer. Finally, he had it.

The golden ratio.

Beauty itself, manifested in text.

[Hot female anime waifu not fat cherry-blossom pink long hair tiny waist huge ass huge tits h cup tits skinny huge blue eyes pale white no acne big eyelashes small nose long legs skinny fat ass tiny waist virgin who wants me perfect lips perfect hips only wants me forever]

He was shaking by the time he finished typing, his scrawny body quivering with desire to see her fully realized.

With a trembling exhale, he hit submit. As the page loaded, his breath caught in his throat. Already imagining her lovely and doting, the way the perfect female should.

Agonizing over the painfully slow load, he imagined her voice sweet and demure as she begged for him…

The screen blinked. Then nothing. Black.

“Fuuuuuuck,” Connor groaned, slamming his fist onto his desk and sending the empty cans flying. Frozen. Either that or he just got conned into training some AI without so much as a glimpse of tits.

That’d make a lot of sense, Connor thought as he fished worn sweatpants and a faintly sweaty T-shirt out of a pile of clothes and pulled them onto his neglected body. People would be scummy enough to take advantage of a man’s loneliness.

He considered trying again, but all he had left in him was a grudging bitterness and a growling stomach.

He needed pizza rolls.

Not bothering to close the tab, he opened a different (male) streamer’s latest highlight video and trudged downstairs, leaving it to play in his empty room. He spent a few bleary minutes watching the paper plate spin, the humbuzz of the microwave accompanying the energetic rambling coming through his Bluetooth headphones. Connor was only half-listening, biting off a corner of a boiling hot pizza roll to vent some of the steam, when he heard her. Simple, clear, distinct over the drone of the commentary:

“Connor.”

The voice was feminine, achingly soft. She spoke again, and he could feel her savoring each syllable.

“Con-nor.”

He nearly spilled molten cheese on himself as he scrambled for his headphones to stop the podcast. Hearing things, he must be—he was alone, so pent up that he was hallucinating females.

“I’m here, Connor.”

Her voice, piercing his headphones, clear as crystal.

As if he were not listening to a recording, but was on an active call with someone.

With a girl.

His palms flushed at the thought, dick swelling even as his mind reeled for an explanation. Could it be the stream highlights? No, the streamer was a man. The TV? No, that had been turned off since his mom left.

His computer! He’d left that sketchy website open. Had it loaded after all? Maybe it took so long because it was generating a chatbot.

“Connnnor. I’m waiting for you…”

She was smiling now, he could hear it. God, he wanted her immediately. A deep, possessive desire ripped through him. This was his girl, the one he created. Every bit of prose he wrote was carving her into being—his prize, his property.

Shit. He didn’t think he had the balls to talk to her.

“Just go upstairs, you pussy!” he commanded himself, his voice weak. “It’s a fucking chatbot, not even a real girl. She’ll do whatever you tell her to do, so just go already!”

“Connorrrrr,” she whined, her pouty voice going straight to his center. He felt like he’d been struck by lightning. “You’re not going to make me hunt you down, are you?” she cooed. His feet were propelling him to the steps before his brain could leave the kitchen.

Halfway up the creaking hardwood stairs, Connor was already scheming. What would he try with her first? He decided he’d start by making her rub her tits before moving her hands lower and—

THUD.

Something in the hallway crashed. Something very near his bedroom.

Connor froze at the top of the stairs, foot hovering over the landing, blood rushing from his dick to his panicking mind. He held his breath, willing his racing heart to beat a little quieter so he could hear what, exactly, was going on at the end of the darkened hall.

The faint whir of his PC fans, the soft rush of air.

Otherwise, quiet.

Cautiously, he peered toward his bedroom. His door hung open, the faint glow from the monitors casting kaleidoscopic colors into the hallway. Red, to blue, to green, to red…

He wanted to call out, but his voice did not obey. He took one careful step, thankful for the runner rug that muffled the sound of his footfalls, and squinted ahead.

A shadow cut through the glow.

Someone was in his room.

He bit his chapped lip to keep from yelping and balled his trembling hands into weak approximations of fists. If the guy—it had to be a guy—had scaled the side of the house and entered through the window, he probably had a weapon. Connor needed something to defend himself. He cast about, and his eyes fell on a decorative side table, where his mom displayed a model of Venus de Milo.

He grabbed the statuette and took one more tentative step—praying he would make no noise. One door away from his bedroom. The whirring of the monitors gave way to another sound, wet and organic. If he kept quiet, if the intruder was distracted looking for valuables, Connor could ambush him.

The shadow shifted.

He raised the statuette over his head.

“Con—” sweet, from his headphones—

“—norrr?” faint, from his room.

She appeared in the doorway.

He saw her first in side profile, the shapely, feminine features. His gut coiled in lust as he took in the full bust, the ample curves, the slender tilt of a female’s neck, the toss of long, straight hair over her shoulder. Then she turned and disappeared back into his room.

Could it be her?

No, you fucking chud, Connor scolded himself. She isn’t real.

Was he delirious, the fear of a home intruder robbing him of his petty cash and prized titty figurines driving him over the edge? His mind reeled. Either the impossible had happened and she was there, in his bedroom, or he would have to fight for what was his.

The whirring stopped as the computer transitioned to sleep mode, leaving him in the dark, in the quiet, all alone.

Not alone, he reminded himself, trying to keep his breathing hushed. I’m not alone here.

Connor stepped slowly, slowly.

As he crept closer, hope bloomed in his chest. Even from the brief glimpse of her silhouette, she was exactly as he pictured her. The voice so clear, so real—so perfect.

The warmth radiating from his darkened room was what he’d been chasing all his life.

It would be easy to peek in.

One look wouldn’t hurt, right?

He reached the doorframe. Taking the deepest, most excruciating breath of his life, he stepped into the doorway, clutching Venus in his clammy hands. His vision swam.

What he saw in the center of his room made no sense.

Soft shapes, the curves of an attractive female, but also—

Something soft tickled his bare toes, brushing against them with the faintest whisper.

Hair.

The shape moved—just barely—bumping the computer mouse. The bank of monitors blared to life, casting a deep blue illumination on the figure in his room. Revealed at last.

Cherry-blossom pink.

The curtain of pale, greasy hair extended to the floor and beyond, in possession of a life of its own. The strands moved, snaking over piles of dirty laundry and grazing the tips of his toes with their split ends. Connor was just registering the sensation of this contact, the combination of revulsion and arousal that it inspired, when she moved slightly into a ray of light and he saw her, fully and completely.

Not her, he thought. It.

The thing was almost petite, if not for long, spindly legs that jutted from behind the curtain of hair, legs bent at odd angles and resembling no human limbs he had ever seen. Dozens of knobby knees twisted and coiled and scraped against the walls, leaving behind a thick, unctuous substance.

Connor stood, pinned to the floor in terror, taking in the sight. It still faced away from him, giving him a full view of the broken neck, the gnarled vertebrae of the pale thing’s twisted spine like an old oak, hunched—was it in pain?—to support a great, burdensome weight. Even with its gnarled back to him, he could make out the silhouettes of bulbous, fleshy breasts the size of watermelons, bulging on either side of her. His view wasn’t clear, but what he saw of the gargantuan rack was enough: swollen, covered in weeping sores, nearly bursting with curdled yellow fat like condoms stuffed with rancid milk. The tumorous swells rose in tandem with the figure’s mucosal inhales. Missing ribs served as a broken cage for its compressed organs, pulsing against the translucent skin. With each ragged exhale, the round cheeks of its hind end sagged under its weight like a pair of blood-gorged ticks.

Thin Waist. Huge tits.

I’m waiting for you.

Create me.

Connor lost his grip on the statuette. It hit the floor with a thump.

ShitshitshitshitshitshitSHITSHIT-

A coquettish giggle, that same voice he’d nearly creamed himself over a minute ago, echoing in stereo—through his headphones and in gurgling hitches only a few feet away from him—as it…as she…trembled with delight. She peered over her shoulder with bulging eyes that took up half her face, so fat and filmy with congealing fluid they barely held to their cavernous sockets. Her visage almost abstract, like an artist had smeared the features of a pinup model onto a bulging flesh sack. A Realdoll melting in the sun.

That isn’t what she’s supposed to look like, he thought desperately, then almost laughed at the absurdity of it.

Her ulcerous lips split in a cruel parody of a smile, the tiny malformed nostrils of her flat nose flaring with effort.

“Cuh...Conn-nnnnorrrrrrrhhhhggghhh…”

Gone was the teasing, sweet voice.

She bent in on herself. Her bones yielded as her upper and lower body pivoted on the collapsing axis of her spine, her pendulous tits and clotted ass both facing Connor in a pose that defied all laws of nature. He backpedaled, understanding now what he was—prey—every single cell in his body screaming at him to RUN. In full retreat, without taking his eyes off her, he stumbled into his mother’s decorative table and tumbled feet over head, landing hard on the hallway floor. Pain bloomed across his back, but wasting no time, Connor brought himself up onto his elbows.

A pale, delicate hand gripped the doorway, her long, pointed digits moving so deliberately that even in his panic, Connor noticed she had no fingernails. His pulse pounded in his ears, back screaming in pain.

A delicate, girlish leg arched playfully against the doorsill, smooth and shapely.

Undeniably feminine, like something out of a burlesque show.

But as the leg rose, each inch of skin increasingly more gnarled and warped, he saw the tangle of limbs writhing like a cluster of hungry tapeworms. She bent toward him, and terror rose in his gorge.

“G-get the fffuck away from me!” Connor tried to roar, but instead, his voice cracked.

Her limbs poured into the hallway, rubbery and fetid. They folded over, under, and behind themselves, each unnatural bend of her spongy knees bringing her and her sickly sweet stench forward.

Get out, he commanded himself. Get the fuck out of here!

Her deformed extremities straining with effort, she braced herself in the doorframe and catapulted her misshapen body into the hallway. Connor turned on uncertain legs and shot off in a sprint, counting. Just twelve steps down the stairs, then five more to the waiting front door, to safety—

A hot hand grabbed his ankle and pulled him up hard, like a child snatching a doll by one leg. The stairs he’d been pinning his hopes on lay far beneath him now, mocking Connor as he flailed and screamed, upside down in her grasp.

“Let go!” he shrieked, but her only response was the wet sound of her panting excitement as she dangled him like a prize. Up close, her body heat was stifling, her rippling skin smooth and poreless like melting plastic.

Her corpse-blue eyes trembled in their sockets as she gawked at him, giggling in wet hiccups. The flesh around his ankle was turning purple and white-hot painful.

“Cuh- Cohnnnnnor…” She managed to string his name together this time, with some effort. He saw her broken neck bulge as she tried again, her intonation just a little closer to what he’d heard through the headphones. “Fouhhhhndh. Yyyouh. Cohn-nnnor.”

This isn’t what he wanted. Oh God, this isn’t what he wanted!

Flipping him upright, she wrapped her fingers around his throat, holding him aloft by his tear-streaked neck. With his legs free, he kicked furiously at her, but the soft curves he’d so obsessively created cushioned his blows with ease. It was like trying to fight a water bed—connecting with nothing solid, his bare foot sank into an ocean of warm, yielding flesh.

He scrambled with bony hands, trying desperately to pry away her grip on his neck, but she held like a vise. Her watery eyes ogled him in adoration, the fervent admiration he’d spent countless lonely nights fantasizing about. Her body swelled with each phlegm-filled breath, her massive, bloated breasts pressing into him, pinning him. A blackened tongue darted out to moisten her vestigial lips, and again, she attempted to speak.

“Thosee…ohther…Guh…girlllls…”

Connor caught only fragments of words. He felt out of his own body, someone else, somewhere else.

Here was pain.

Here was death.

His lungs burned as he tried to take in air, any air while her pale digits raked painful slashes down his scalp in a caress. He could hear, up close, the awful sound of her body attempting to function. The gurgles and groans, the wet pops, frenetic tears of muscle and fat.

This thing, custom-built for him.

His vision had reduced to a single pinprick, a miniscule view of cherry-blossom pink hair, cloaking his face in oily, stinking rivulets. Vaguely, he was aware that he was crying. Hot tears spilled on their skin—his, and hers—as his dying body racked in a desperate attempt to take in enough air to wail.

He was going to die right here, he realized with a self-loathing finality. He would be gone in moments, unloved, untouched, in agony, with no one giving a shit about him. Not his mom, not the girls at school, not his online friends. Nobody at all.

Distantly, he heard her speak again, a little clearer now.

“Hhhh…theyhhh…dohhnnn’t carrre. Bbbuh... But. I…”

He felt her clasp his hand and bring it to her face, felt her hot breath and flecks of mucus and drool on his skin.

At this ghastly touch, his senses reawakened. Something new flared up in Connor: strength. With his last gasp of breath, he gave a strangled scream and dug his hand into her eye socket, groping blind, fingers finding a hot, jellied ball. He squeezed hard.

The thing’s eye squished in his hand like rotten fruit, sending stinking hot ooze sliding down his trembling wrist. She screamed, her vocal chords snapping apart like bowstrings as she wailed, the voice of a thousand dying maggots. Blessedly, her grip loosened from his neck.

Gulping for air, Connor felt himself falling. Weightless, watching the popcorn ceiling recede in slow motion before he crashed headfirst onto the hardwood stairs.

***

The pain woke him up. Brutal, merciless agony pulsed from his aching head, his neck. He opened his eyes to his familiar world set on a crooked axis.

Get up, Connor.

Connor inhaled and exhaled, each agonizing breath a wheezing moan.

Get up!

His attempt to lift his head was met with an immediate blinding pain so intense he nearly fainted again. He sucked in three quick breaths and bore down, willing his leaden, uncooperative arms to move. They didn’t obey. He tried wiggling his fingers, his feet, and realized with fresh horror that he couldn’t move his body. His only sensation, blazing and complete, was the fire in his neck—and the faint pricks of bits of shattered bone dislodged and pressing up against his skin.

Broken, he thought. Neck broken.

Crumpled against the foyer wall, Connor strained his eyes for a glimpse of the locked front door, so close but impossibly out of reach.

Then she limped into view. Low to the floor, her thicket of fleshy limbs surrounded him, skin as far as he could see. Nothing for him to hope for, her body—risen from his deepest desires, his most profound fears—rippling over him.

She was hurt, too. Her gaping eye socket wriggled with bits of fat and protein trying to form into a new eyeball.

He was too tired to fight. He lay there, barely clinging to life, waiting for her to strike.

Instead, she stared, nothing between them but their labored breathing and the soft organic squirming of her reshaping body. She gave him a gummy smile.

I forgot to give her teeth, he thought dimly to himself. He would’ve laughed, if his windpipe weren’t crushed.

Her face, half-formed, hovered over his before she pressed a firm, slimy kiss to his bloodied lips. It was his first.

“I’ll…nnnnnever…leave.” She appeared to taste each word in her nearly human voice and gave him a peaceful smile, looming over his broken body. Surrounding him with love, with pain, with her.

She sighed, closer than ever to that sweet, entrancing voice, and wrapped her long, pliant limbs around him. This final gesture completed his undoing—his broken bones at last tearing through his fragile skin, pulverizing his organs, his thoughts, his being.

Connor had no strength left to scream.

“I’ll…never…let…you go.” She finished with a note of proud finality, as if there were nothing left to say.

As he bled out, his body molded to her shape. Misery gave way to warmth. Hazy flashes of his short life sparked in his weakening mind. Summers spent alone. College. His life’s goal of finding someone who cared.

He gave a soft, resigned moan, closed his eyes, and relaxed his dying body into her nest of flesh.

It was nice to be loved.

---

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