v1 CHAPTER SEVEN: In which two cohabitating souls break their fast together, and learn a thing or two.

Not long after his messy awakening, Father Michael found himself walking through the early morning light to the Waverly Diner, to meet with Yael. He didn't even bother to dress properly. Instead, he walked down the street, dressed in a pair of loose jeans, his boxers, and a white shirt. He took a deep breath, trying to clear his mind. Why, why on earth, was he going to go eat breakfast with a succubus? With the very succubus trying to destroy his life and write him out of existence?

Yet here he was, standing outside the diner door, waiting for Yael to arrive.

After several minutes passed, Yael emerged from the kitchen. The succubus was wearing a 50s waitress uniform, complete with a tight skirt, a red ribbon tie that matched her lipstick, and black patent leather shoes. Her hair was in tight dark ringlets, her cheeks flushed, and her eyes bright. She smiled warmly when she saw Michael, as if she were any other waitress greeting a regular.

"Good morning, Father Michael. What can I getcha? Warm cuppa joe? Stack of pancakes?" She leaned over to wipe the table with a washcloth, her bosom pressing against the confines of her too-small uniform shirt right into Michael's face. She giggled as she caught him staring at her breasts, then turned away to grab a mug from under the counter, filled it with coffee, and brought it to Michael's table.

"Um..." Michael said, suddenly flustered. Yael's breasts were right there in front of him again. Big sisters to his own fledgling pair, which he felt like a sudden ache. "Why... did you want to meet with me? Or are you here to serve me... breakfast?" Yael grinned broadly, her goat-like eyes sparkling merrily.

"Well, I'm not just serving you breakfast, Father Michael. I am going to be having breakfast with you, today and perhaps in the future. So... do you mind if I join you?"

Michael nodded slowly. "Yes. Yes, please do," he said. Yael sat in a seat, and an actual waitress came over to take Michael's order. Unsurprisingly, the waitress didn't react at all to the presence of a goat-horned, long-tailed, red-skinned succubus sitting in her diner, wearing a copy of her uniform; nobody could see or hear Yael but Michael, after all. Michael ordered a lumberjack special, feeling strangely hungry, an actual cup of coffee, and a plate of french fries.

"Of course you're hungry... for food," smirked the succubus. "You've been devouring a gorgeous nut-brown cock and the attached human flesh for the past hour and a half, in your dreams."

Michael blushed furiously, his face turning a deeper shade of red than usual. "Hmm. The body needs nourishment even if the soul is blighted," he muttered. Yael laughed at his discomfort.

Before long, the waitress returned with Michael's orders. "Mmm, french fries!" Yael said. "Thanks, you remembered what I wanted." Michael dug in, feeling strange that he'd ordered Yael choice of food without even thinking about it.

Yael grabbed a fry and bit it. Or appeared to, at least; it must have been some sort of illusion.

"Are you... actually tasting anything?" asked Michael. Yael sighed and shook her head.

"No. I just enjoy the process of eating food. It's relaxing. But I miss french fries terribly. Why do you think I'm trying to attain a physical form again?" she said.

"So... you don't experience hunger?" asked Michael. Yael shrugged. "What about the succubae who make their hosts eat the souls of others? Do they feel hunger the way humans do?"

Yael thought for a moment, before shrugging her shoulders and saying, "Not really. Some of us do it for fun. But our sustenance is energy, of various forms. We're beings of light." Michael frowned slightly. Light was the most common element in the universe. Yet Yael seemed to be implying that the succubae were on the side of light, rather than darkness.

Yael fixed his gaze with her uncanny, dark pupils, like horizontal bars across her yellow sclera. "Darkness only exists as the shadow of light," she said. "There's a reason you people believe we are fallen angels. It's all just..." she spread her hands. "Energy. Light. Power. Magnetism. Force. We arise from it and mold it."

"Magnetism? You mean as in electromagnetic force?" Michael said. Yael's eyes widened, and her lips parted. Michael felt an overwhelming urge to look away but found himself unable to avert his gaze from Yael's eyes. They glowed brighter, and Michael's vision started to go dark around his view of her uncanny face.

"Would you like a demonstration? I can cause all sorts of odd effects in here. I suppose if I were to go into full haunting mode, I could make the windows shake and the lights flicker. But I prefer stuff like this..." Yael looked over at a neighboring table, where a woman in her sixties was sitting and sipping tea, reading a newspaper. The succubus twitched a finger in the woman's direction.

The woman let out a small yelp, her eyes widening. Looking around furtively, she put her hands in her lap, dropping the newspaper over them. Somehow, as if his senses were enhanced for certain scents, Michael caught a tangy whiff of the woman's musk. His cock began to stiffen in his pants. "I could probably get her to drop her panties and flash you right now," whispered Yael. She licked her lips with a snake's tongue.

Michael gulped. "How?"

"By manipulating the electromagnetic fields around her body. I can control the flow of electrons in her brain and nerves, which would allow me to disrupt the electrical signals sent by her hypothalamus to her genitalia, causing arousal, excitement, and pleasure." she smiled seductively. "And then there's the matter of her scent."

She leaned closer to Michael and inhaled deeply, letting her long tongue dart into his nostrils and taste him. Her lips met his, and she kissed him deeply, tasting the priest's salty mouth and smacking her lips against his. The kiss made Michael's dick swell and throb in his pants, and suddenly Yael's taloned hand was there, feeling his hardness through the denim fabric.

She pulled back from the kiss. "Your scent is so sweet, Michael!" Yael purred. She turned her head and sniffed at the air again, smelling Michael's sweat. "I love all your human bodily fluids. I love making them... erupt out of you. Well, pus maybe not so much. Bile, meh. But all the other ones, gimme gimme!" Yael kicked her hooves out of the booth, as if celebrating. "Do you want to fuck her? Make her a real whore for you? I can make her do whatever you want with her body. Whatever your perverted little mind desires. Would you like to watch me fuck her?"

Michael swallowed hard and stared at the succubus with wide, scared eyes. "Stop it. Leave these good people alone. They just happen to be... in your way. I won't allow it." His fists clenched. This was his neighborhood, his community. "You can do what you like with me, but please stop bothering innocents!"

Yael laughed at him. "Oh, Father Belmont! What a joke! Your 'good people?' Ha ha! Have any of them ever even seen the inside of a church before today? No! Do you know what's going on in their hearts and minds? Of course not, you've been too busy studying your books and running your community programs to learn about the world outside of your church walls." She stood up, sweeping her tail in an arc, coming to point it at a businessman in a trench coat, sitting at the counter.

"This guy. You wanna know what he's thinking about right now? He fantasizes about having a young girl for himself, a pretty little thing to play with and enjoy, and to sell on the black market when he's done. I ought to plunge my fist through his heart right now. How about this lady, over here?"

Yael sauntered over to a student wearing a retro neon sweater-dress. "Last week, she was dreaming about her first day of college. Today, she's imagining herself walking down a hallway of naked boys and girls, all her classmates and professors standing around naked, masturbating for her amusement."

Yael pointed her tail at another businesswoman, a middle-aged brunette who had her purse hanging off one shoulder. "This professional-looking dame just fucked her own au pair, taking advantage of the power dynamic, and then got her fired by claiming she was exposing her children to homosexual propaganda. Hypocrite."

Yael walked back towards the booth where Michael sat and gestured at the woman who she'd been toying with earlier. "And how about our friend here? She..." Yael stopped. "Actually, she's pretty wholesome. Fulfilled, though grieving, by visiting her best friend in the terminal cancer ward." Michael just stared at Yael, horrified.

"Okay, okay. Maybe I made a bad pick earlier, there are a few of you who are fine. I think your disgusting Church fathers would agree..." The succubus waved a hand dismissively and walked over to an elderly couple who were sitting across the restaurant from Michael and Yael. "These two have been married for almost sixty years, but they've never touched each other once during their entire marriage. And they're still married because they believe it's God's will for them to be together until death do they part."

Michael stood up. "What is the point of this?" The other patrons in the diner looked at him, confused. "Sorry... sorry..." Michael stammered, sitting down.

Yael returned to the table, giggling. "You did an oopsie, padre!"

Michael lowered his voice. "Look... if you're trying to convince me that the world is full of sin and people who have lost their way, you needn't bother. It has nothing to do with why I want you to leave these people alone. They all have their struggles. Some may even be hurting others. But it's not as if you... preying on them... is going to help anyone." Yael crossed her arms under her breasts. Her horns waved angrily as she rolled her neck in a circle.

Michael continued. "There is no reason for you to change me into something else. All you need is a bit of power, and the ability to speak to me whenever you wish. If you want to corrupt someone, use your powers to corrupt me! Lead me astray, obviously you're already doing fine at that! Corrupt me to your dark desires. That's fine... just leave others out of it."

Yael sighed, and leaned on one hand, biting her lower lip with one elongated canine. "You don't get it, do you Father? Without a host, I'm just a spirit. There's a reason we want bodies. Not just for the carnal stuff, for the fries and fucks, but because... bodies are the palace of the soul, if you know what I'm saying?" She winked and grinned at Michael. He rolled his eyes.

Michael said seriously, "So what would happen if you just stayed like this. Intangible, letting me exist, but... hanging out. What if you never had a body? Would anything happen to you? Is there any downside?"

Yael smiled brightly. "Oh yes. The problem is, I don't really have any interest in staying like this forever. Sure, being a disembodied spirit sounds cool, but what's the point of having power if no one knows you have it? Wouldn't you rather be able to interact with people?"

"Hmm... all right, I'll tell you. Without a body, a disembodied mind has no anchor. You tend to lose your identity over time, become a mindless force with no personality. You must have heard of demons like that... all just one emotion, or completely mindless beasts?" Yael shrugged and started eating a pancake, picking it up with her fingers.

Michael nodded. "I have." Indeed, most stories of demons were about such creatures. Succubae were one of the exceptions, and even more powerful archdemons. He thought about it for a moment, then asked, "How long does it take to go from a demon with a personality to one of those mindless things?"

Yael shook her head. "It's hard to say. Depends on a lot of factors: your personality, how old you are, traumas inflicted, whether you have a body that gave you strong memories..." she looked down at her hands. Michael sensed a strange vulnerability in this demoness, so ancient yet so like a troubled youth, at the same time.

"The way you look..." he asked, "is it associated with one of your past mortal hosts, or...?" Yael's smile was gone, and she looked away, embarrassed. Michael's heart ached for the girl who had been used up to become Yael. "Well," he said gently, "you can talk to me about whatever's bothering you."

She glanced back up and seemed surprised by the kindness in his voice. "What's bothering me? I thought you were the one bothered, priest. Aren't you, like, righteously pissed off that I'm using you as a cocoon to eat before I burst forth like a black butterfly?" She giggled, and looked away again, as if growing bored.

Michael smiled warmly and held out his hand to her. Yael hesitated for a moment, then reached for his hand and allowed him to help her stand up. Yael's legs wobbled for a moment as she regained her balance on her hooves. When she looked up at him, he saw her blush a deeper shade of crimson than even her skin. She waited with an uncharacteristic silence as he paid the bill; then the two of them walked together out of the restaurant, down the street towards Washington Square Park.