Board Thread:What Would You Do?/@comment-32558333-20180208010933/@comment-33398500-20180626073857

“Well, ain’t that a bitch...?”

This was my current thought as I looked at the election coverage on TV. I’d sat the election out this time around. Not for lack of WANTING to vote, mind you, but because my election registration never showed up in my mailbox...

“Technically, the vote is tied at approximately 49.999999% of the vote for each candidate, we are currently 1 vote short of full participation in a tied election, and thus must invoke the missing voter clause...” the reporter on the TV then started. She was right, though, voter turnout here was a staggering 100% on most elections, and even then, the election was usually swung by one side or the other, so this didn’t need to happen (typically a pro-mamono moderate candidate, though those more liberal on the issue often reached the office).

“For those of you unfamiliar with this rule, as I was a few moments ago...” the succubus reporter continued, now reading off a paper she had been handed earlier “...this rule is invoked under the necessity of ensuring a complete vote. Should the candidates be completely even in an election, the identities of non-voters shall be made known, in order to ensure they cast a deciding vote... in this case, we have only one... A male human named Victor... umm... ah, so just the first name?” she asked off-camera, “Okay then.” Now putting up a picture of me from my government ID on-screen for the whole city to see. “This young man has yet to vote, and is the only one that has not done so... according to our sources, his registration was lost in the mail, but has been recovered and is on its way to him by special courier as we speak, so, please encourage him to get out there and vote!” she then finished encouragingly. “Surprisingly, an Order candidate has tied with the opposite radical ‘demon group’ candidate, so the stakes are somewhat high this election... I hope you make the right choice, cutie~” then winking into the camera, causing me to blush brightly at the idea of the succubus anchor speaking directly to me.

A knock at my door jolted me out of my practical trance looking at the tv, turning my head toward the door. Walking over to the door, I looked out the peephole to see my next-door neighbour, a rather well-developed lamia looking right at the hole. “Come on out, sweetie~ We need to talk...” Taking a moment to quietly open the door, I looked across at her “Are you alone?” I asked, before she pulled me  out of the apartment by the hand, looking at what seemed to be a pair of flash mobs on either side of the building. “Nope~” she commented. “Don’t worry though, my daughter likes you, so I’ll keep you safe from the crowd...” it was at this point I was glad I’d befriended her four-year-old daughter when we met once or twice her mother was coming back from an outing, counting myself lucky her daughter wasn’t older than that right now.

The crowds on either side seemed a moment from going to war with each other, as I realized one side had a fair number of people geared up for combat, a number of others waving rather vitriolic signs about mamono and the radicals specifically, while the other group had several powerful mamono, including more than one dragon and several different types of magically-endowed mamono like demons, witches and what looked like a corrupted sylph. These mamono, and a number of men that were obviously incubi, were returning them tit-for-tat with all manner of filthy suggestions and hateful yelling about the church the order represented.

With my sudden appearance, they all stopped, turning to look up at me and my neighbour pushing me along toward the stairs leading from my apartment down to the ground floor. “We’ve gotta go to the election station, so don’t dilly-dally, or this might get bad...” she told me, the two of us continuing, as I tried to ignore the various yelling from each side: appeals to humanity and to stop the ‘monstrous hordes’ from the order side, and appeals to acceptance and even base instinct from the mamono side, bright red now as I could have sworn one of the mamono had just propositioned me when I walked past.

Making my way over the next few minutes to the nearest election station, where both a holstaur and an earnest-looking young man waited for me to arrive. “Ah, there you are. We’ve been expecting you.” The holstaur started. “Your registration, please?” the young man then asked, holding out a hand to accept it.

Wait... the registration! I never got it! I probably had it in my mailbox by now!

“Wait! Waaaaaiiit!” a voice then called from above, before a harpy flew headlong into me, sending me rolling a few meters, almost into the outer wall of the building they had been waiting outside of. “Ow... s-sorry!” the jittery harpy then apologized, jumping up and bowing slightly, before handing me what almost looked like a single-page flyer. “Your registration, sir!” she then explained “S-sorry about losing it! It took me aaages to find it!”

“That’s okay, miss...” I responded, accepting the letter. “...and thank you.” Now turning and handing it to the young man that had asked for it. “Thank you, sir. Now, if you’ll please, come this way...”

Now, going into the building and drawing a pair of pamphlets I’d been given earlier in the election, I sat down a moment “Just give me a moment, please... I need to remind myself what each party stands for...”

“Really...?” the young man responded, looking rather surprised, my neighbour and the holstaur both looking rather surprised as well. “I thought it was obvious... after all... one’s the order... and the other is the radical faction... neither is exactly shy about what they plan to do...”

“So my vote decides if the place ends up a demon realm that the order would likely go to war with, or a xenophobic order state that would exile or kill all the mamono here, which they would then resist violently? Sounds like it would work out the same...” I commented. “What happens if the election ties? I mean, if I simply refuse to vote?”

Saying this, it looked as if I’d suggested abolishing the election entirely. “It can’t... it can’t end up a tie... there’s no actual system in place for it, so we wouldn’t really have a ruler... and the legitimacy of power would give the side with it a powerful advantage should the other side get violent, so it is rather important... and... judging by the fact this building is now surrounded by the two sides, you’re not getting out without voting...” he then commented, pointing outside, where the two groups had followed us.

Well... twist my arm any more, would you?

As I stepped into the small, redundant booth, I looked at the card which would apparently decide the fate of the city. I was a single, male human, so my vote wasn’t guaranteed to go either way. Sighing to myself, I knew there was only one result of the two bad results I could actually tolerate at this point, now putting my vote on the card.

Walking out of the booth, the holstaur and guy vanishing into the booth and returning with a single ballot, which clearly was marked for the radical party. As I looked down at my feet, I could hear angry jeers coming from the order side, most of them saying some form of ‘Traitor!’ or ‘Skirt chaser!’ as the lilim that had been the radical side’s candidate flew up to the top of the crowd and began giving a victory speech, as the mamono crowd quickly swallowed me up to protect me from the order crowd.

However, this had the side effect of leaving me surrounded by different sorts of mamono, noticing some of them vanished into the crowd, others coming right up to me. It took me a moment to realize that it must be the MARRIED mamono that were sliding back into the crowd, the single girls seeming to bring themselves around me: obviously wanting to celebrate the fact that the mamono had just been handed complete control of the city. “You made the right choice.” The lilim then spoke, finally addressing me, as she floated a few feet from me. “Any particular reason why?” she asked, as I was now trying to hold off several grabby hands coming from the mamono around me attempting to ‘thank me for my efforts’.

“Hey... don’t get the wrong idea...” I started, barely able to contain myself with the urge to pick one of these girls and just go to town, but I was managing it for the moment “...I didn’t wanna make the town completely a demon realm... but I REALLY didn’t want to see the order trying to wipe out the mamono from the city...”

“Quite all right...” she then told me “...but you did it anyway... though... I suggest you pick a mamono to celebrate with... or one of my friends might make the choice for you...” she then giggled, before joining her own husband on the ground, demonic energy already seeming to start welling up from the ground, dozens of mamono currently ignoring the order crowd and engaging in an all-out orgy right there in the street.

However, as the order made ready to attack, several of the magical mamono, including the sylph, began scattering the crowd, not actually bringing harm to any of them, but disorienting many of them. Then again, the other emboldened mamono now descended on the order crowd like a wave, forcibly drawing in as many of the fleeing crowd as possible to join them in the debauchery.

Now, as I attempted to use the distraction of the orgy breaking out to get away from the crowd that had seemed so interested in me, I found myself quickly pushed against a brick wall by a rather lovely demon that I thought I’d seen before in town. “Gotcha~” she cooed into my ear “You made it happen... You’ve gotta celebrate~” she then added, beginning to strip me despite my resistance, before a succubus pushed into my side from another group “You smell like virgin~” she giggled lewdly, helping to strip me. “Don’t worry... I can help you learn~” a dark priest then told me from the other side, the three completely trapping me against the wall.

Is this just how it’s going to be now?!